more than you ever wanted to know about my armpits

On Saturday, after my long run (12 miles! eee!), I noticed that I had a weird patch of bumps in my armpit region. Chalking it up to sports bra irritation I ignored it but by Sunday the bumps had gotten worse and were a combination of itchy and burny. Thankfully, I just happened to have a dermatologist appointment this morning so I had him take a look because an itchy and burny armpit does not make for a happy me. Turns out I have infected hair follicles (fucking gross) and am now on medicine to clear it up.

The downside to this? I am not allowed to shave my armpits for at least two weeks, possibly more if the antibiotics don't work. Folks, in two weeks time it's going to look like hamsters have taken up residence in my armpits. People will assume I live in Berkeley. Can deodorant penetrate a layer of hair to reach skin or am I going to be stinky? Is men's deodorant make to soak through a layer of hair? Should I borrow jparks'? The family that deodorizes together stays together, right?

(yeah, seriously that's my blog post for today. I got nothing else. Sorry)

((No offense if you have hairy armpits. It's just not the look for me))

my love for vampire romance books will never wane

On Sunday I started reading Twilight by Stephenie Meyers and could not put it down. Seriously, I plowed through 300+ pages of it and had to force myself to stop so I could go to bed. On Monday, before I went to work, I went to Target to buy the next book in the Twilight series. Yes, before I had finished the first one, because folks, they are THAT GOOD.

What are these books about? Um, vampires. And the girl that loves one of them. Did I mention that the series is shelved in teen fiction? Actually this series isn't just any teen fiction, it is exactly what every teen fiction title should be: a sappy love story with overly dramatic characters and VAMPIRES! It is perfection wrapped in a kinda cryptic cover that only has a slight bit to do with the story.

If this book had existed when I was a teenager, in the middle of my goth-wearing-all-black-loving-anything-about-vampires phase I would have proclaimed it The Best Book Of All Time. I would have written poems about how this book spoke to me. I would have told whatever boy I was dating that he didn't get me the way Edward got Bella. But now that I'm an adult who wears color and doesn't write bad poetry, I'll just declare it The Best Book I've Read This Month. And I'll admit that I have a bit of a crush on Edward the Vampire, because some things from my teenage years I will never outgrow.

The other thing about Twilight is that a film adaptation will be released in December and seriously, read the book now before you see the movie. After reading the book I was pretty excited about the movie but when I found out that the kid playing Edward also played Cedric Diggory in Harry Potter 4 I have to admit I got a bit too excited. The cops will be arriving shortly to pick me up for being a pedophile but I don't care, Cedric Diggory was hot. (so is Harry Potter. don't act surprised, you know you agree) And now Cedric is Edward who is a vampire! Teenage me has officially died and gone to goth girl heaven.

So, after this incredible book review, who wants to borrow my copy of Twilight first?

how's the running going?

I am so glad you asked! Because I have nothing else to talk about. Seriously. I get up, I run, I go to work, I go home, I sleep. Lather, rinse, repeat. Sometimes, if I'm feeling really adventurous, I run after work. I know, I know the excitement is almost too much to bear.

This week I ran 21 miles (actually, as of Sunday I will have run 21 miles) but that number goes up every week. My long runs happen on the weekends and this week's is 10 miles. After this they increase by 2 miles every week. My weekday runs are short ones, typical 3 miles, 5, and 3. But even those will be increasing in the coming weeks to 4,6,4.

Other than all of this running, I'm trying to become more balanced in my training so my time decreases and my endurance increases. This week I started taking a pilates class at my new gym and next week I'm working out with a trainer. Because, really, why should I do anything that doesn't require spandex shorts and a wicking bra? Oh right, so I have something interested to share with ya'll. My bad.

With all of this working out you might think I'm losing weight at an amazing rate. Well, YOU WOULD BE WRONG. My goal in registering for the marathon wasn't weight lose, but it would be a nice side effect. But, in all honesty, I'm not shocked that I'm not losing any as I can't stop eating. Especially salty things. For lunch today I had fried rice, mainly because I could drench it in soy sauce. Then for dinner I had more soy sauce fried rice. And now I'm eyeballing the bottle of soy sauce on the table. I'm pretty sure I could kill it in one or two swigs. And it would taste DELICIOUS.

do you know what sucks?

Have you ever really had to pee? Like "you've had one too many refills on your large diet coke, then were stuck in the car for 45 minutes, finally got to your destination, but had to wait 15 minutes before they opened the doors, then you had to wait for an elevator, wait for the elevator to reach the fourth floor, and then walk down a really long hallway to get to the bathroom" have to pee? Because the worst thing that can happen after this is that you walk into the bathroom and your bladder starts gettting all excited because it's finally in a place where peeing is allowed, but you're wearing a belt for the first time in months and your bladder hasn't planned for that extra two seconds it takes to get the belt off and for those two seconds you're not sure if you're going to pee on yourself or make it to a toilet. Well, that really sucks.

For the record, I made it in to the toilet, but I didn't have time to latch the stall door behind me. Thank god the bathroom was empty.

boys, it's not that descriptive, I promise

This morning I had a gynecologist appointment and it was my first one with a new doctor since my old, most-favorite-gynecologist-ever bailed on the Bay Area and "moved somewhere quieter to have kids" (When my hair stylist changes salons I get a phone call, but when my lady parts doctor wants to leave the Bay Area and take her family somewhere quieter I find out from the receptionist. And somewhere quieter? Like where, rural Kansas? Maybe the tundra region of Alaska? How dare she leave when I still have my birthing years ahead of me!)

So this new doctor walks in and is immediately, eh, nervous? Not nervous nervous, just not right. She wasn't dropping speculas and other tools or anything, she just didn't seem at ease. And I don't know about other girls, but I want the doctor that's going down there to be cool and calm. I want them to seem like they have their shit together and this poor doctor's shit seemed to be flung far and wide. Possibly even as far as a quieter place, especially since I read online that shit really loves backwoods Tennessee.

The best moment to describe how flustered this doctor is: when she went to turn on the lamp that lady doctors use to stare into your abyss, it wouldn't turn on. She tried to jiggle the cord, no light. She tried unplugging and replugging it, no light. She tried jiggling the cord again, no light. She then started frantically looking around the room trying to figure out what to do. I offered to move to another room but she wouldn't have that. "No, no, stay put. I can figure something out."

After some more searching she pulled out what I assume was an earthquake kit and found a flashlight in it. I have no idea how she held the flashlight and performed the exam, stupid paper sheet blocking my view, but I like to think she held it in her mouth.

After she finished the exam she hastily tried to bolt from the room, only to have to reenter to give me some paperwork. When she came back she knocked, but didn't pause for an answer and kinda shocked herself when I was standing there mostly naked. Not that it bothered me seeing as how she knows what I look like inside and out, but she seemed pretty embarrassed. Without making eye contact she handed me the paperwork explaining that one was about reproductive organ cancer ("You're too young for this, but take a paper anyway.") and one page declaring that I'm obese ("It has, um, exercise suggestions on the back.")

Part of me wants to try another doctor in the office, but part of me is afraid that if I don't see this doctor at my next appointment then she might feel like a failure and quit medicine. Maybe it was just first time jitters. Although it's not like I was her first patient, she's been with the practice for seven months. Everyone deserves a second chance right? For God's sake, she held a flashlight with her teeth! That's got to count for something!

a boring recap for a boring weekend

This weekend was jam packed with fun activities. Activities like sleeping! And then sleeping some more! Followed by another round of sleeping! Yay for sleeping!

Friday night jparks and I had plans to go out to dinner with some friends but ended up skipping it when my stomach started to feel not so happy. That's the thing about my stomach, it's very temperamental and will ruin my plans with no warning. It has no concern for what I want to do or eat, it only cares about itself. My stomach is quite the bitch. So, after bailing on our friends, jparks and I went home where we sat on the couch, sucked down smoothies, and waited for Battlestar Galactica to start. Exciting, yes?

Saturday morning I woke up and, still not feeling 100%, decided to bail on trampoline class. While jparks was off bouncing his heart out, I took a nap. Then when he got home we took a nap. After being awake for a couple of hours, the clock struck 8pm and I decided to go to bed as all that napping had really worn me out. I woke up Sunday morning feeling sort of refreshed, but still a bit tired. What's up with that?

On Sunday we went to a BBQ hosted by jparks' D&D friends. I know, and it was everything you would expect from a D&D run BBQ. We played video games, watched a truly horrible movie, and cracked a lot of "your mom" and "that's what she said" jokes. But before jparks gets all worked up to full T.Rex mode (when he gets mad he becomes a T.Rex. I really have to show you what I mean because explaining it doesn't do it justice) let me say that I did have fun.

And that was my weekend. Very low key, very boring, very sleep filled. But considering I haven't had a full weekend off in quite awhile, I must admit, boring was just about perfect. And now, please excuse me, I'm currently sitting in my underwear due to the heat (FUCK YOU HEAT! DO NOT WANT!) and am thinking I should probably cover up before I leave the house to forge for dinner. Unless I go through a drive thru, then pants might just be optional. Win-win!

now with video goodness

My Flip video camera arrived this week (a day before the newer model was released. Of course, because that's just my damn luck) and I must say I'm both smitten and repulsed by it.

I thought the best way to welcome the Flip into our family would be to make a sex video of jparks and I. Kidding. Seriously. I swear I wouldn't do that to anyone including myself. But what I did attempt to do is make an MTV Cribs style home tour for our family and friends far away. It started outside of our house with a brief introduction from me. It ended not long after that. Actually I did complete a couple of tour videos of the whole house (shoe pile included!) but when I went back and watched them I couldn't hit the delete button fast enough.

It turns out video is much more honest than still pictures. All the tricks you can use for photographs: tilting your chin upwards, standing at an angle, do not work for video and actually make you look like a total idiot. And then there was my voice. Oh my god, it's like fingernails on a chalkboard. I sound like southern hick meets valley girl. WTF?? How do you people that know me in real life listen to me talk? Do you just zone me out and I've never noticed? I really can't blame you if you do.

After trying a couple of different takes on the home tour I gave up. And instead I present you this:


That would be Lily freaking out at Tangi because she was on the coffee table, inching toward my dinner. Exciting I know. But hey, at least it's not jparks and I having the sex.

(Bonus question for the geeks: the quality of this video turned to crap once I put it on youtube. When I watch it from the original file on my computer the quality is much better. Why is this? What can I do to make the quality better?)

again with the books

Whitney over at the Ugly Green Chair tagged me for a meme and since the only time I've spent on my blog this week has been to change almost all of my category titles (exciting!), I am more than happy to take part in the fun.

Total number of books I've owned:
HA! I worked in a bookstore for a number of years, was an English major, have a major issue with walking out of a bookstore empty handed, and haven't had a library card in oh, maybe 10 years. So about 2500 books? I am in no way worried that I'm over-estimating. In fact, I would bet I'm under-estimating.

Last book I bought:
The Complete Stories by Flannery O'Connor
I Was Told There'd Be Cake by Sloane Crosley
I Love You, Beth Cooper by Larry Doyle

I guess technically whatever one of those was scanned last by the Border's employee that checked me is the last book I bought.

Last book I read:
I've got a bad habit where I read 2 or 3 books at the same time. I have an easy read in the bathroom for when I take baths. Usually this is a teen fiction title because I seriously love me some teen lit. I keep a book on my night stand for when jparks won't turn off his laptop at night. And I usually have a third book in the car or in my purse. So the last bathroom book I read was: How I Live Now by Meg Rosoff. Last night stand book was: Bird By Bird by Anne Lamott. And the last car/purse book was: Beautiful Boy by David Sheff.

Five books that mean something to me:
I'm not going to pretend that all of these books are great works of literature. Heck, you might have even read one of them and hated it. But to me they are special for some reason or another.

The Little Prince

Bastard Out of Carolina

Alice's Adventures in Wonderland

Olivia

What We Talk About When We Talk About Love (specifically the title story)

Five people that should answer these questions:
You, You, You, You, and You

I blame the shoes!

Last month two friends of ours eloped and last night was the wedding reception. So there we were at this lovely wedding reception and what do I do? I get totally drunk. Like three sheets to the wind, not sure how I even remained upright, possibly drank more than one bottle of wine by myself drunk. It was not pretty.

I'm not even sure how I got that drunk. I planned on having a few drinks and expected to get a little tipsy, but I seriously didn't plan on passing out in my makeup when we got home. I woke up this morning with black eyeliner smudged under my eyes. It was not pretty, although it did kinda have that sexy look that I can't achieve when I'm doing my own makeup.

Most of the people at the reception are not folks we see on a regular basis and when we do see them I'm not normally drinking. I'm now trying to run through the bits of the night that I can remember and see if I said or did anything asinine. God, I want to die just thinking about it. I'm pretty sure I told various folks that I was hot. And then I might have touched a finger to my bum and made a sizzling noise. Booze + 4.5 inch heels + a little black dress + some makeup = Regan feeling all sexy and mouthing off about it to every person that commented on her shoes. (not to linger on an off topic, but those shoes are bad ass. When the salesgirl asked me if I liked them I told her I wanted to go make out with them. When jparks and I got out of the car at the wedding he said "Baby, you look really slutty tonight!" "Uh, thanks honey." "No it's a compliment, I LOVE SLUTS.")

I am just horrified. Did I mention that I'm horrified? I AM HORRIFIED. Sizzling noise! What person actually does that to themselves? Paris Hilton maybe, but not me.

And folks, if I thought I felt like death after that one beer earlier this week, then you can only imagine how crappy I felt this morning. And I didn't even get to sleep in, I had to get up and go work a Giants game. Thankfully there were fried foods in the suite. Nothing makes a hangover better faster than fried foods. Unless it's fried foods and a fountain diet coke.

No more booze. No more not paying attention to the number of refills I've had. No more skipping a glass of water between drinks. No more making an ass of myself in front of people that might not be expecting that from me. No more touching my own bum and making a sizzling noise. The next time I wear those shoes I can't let their power go to my head.