True Beauty exerts and sweats
she’s strong and flexible
she’s persevering and unstoppable
she likes to eat (!)
she’s assertive
outspoken
positive
active
opinionated
creative
resourceful
and
relentlessly, tirelessly, defiantly
independent
Author: chungwipff
Dear Garmin, Throw Me a Bone!
Dear Garmin,
A couple months ago, I received my Garmin Vivofit tracker. Thank you. It has put my OCD mind (a little) at ease because now I can confirm (and double and triple confirm) the number of steps I have taken and need to take, how much sleep I received the night before (including deep and light sleep hours) and, with the chest strap, I can track my heart rate and how many calories I burned.
Great.
But we need to talk. You and I know who purchases your products. People like me: control freaks. Obsessive, compulsive perfectionists. We sync our trackers just to watch our progress several times a day. We lock ourselves in the Starbucks bathroom and do a quick jog until the red line of shame goes away.
So why – oh why – do you torture me when I am stuck in the optometrist’s office for a three hour appointment (the doctor had to check not only my eyes, but the health of my two daughters’ eyes, too)? Why do you state the obvious?
By the way, when I walk more than usual, I don’t receive a “Wow, you’re exceeding your average – way to go!” You don’t send me a message appreciating the fact that it’s 108 degrees out there and that I still managed to surpass my goals. Please, go easy. Take mercy on us tracker users. We’re a damaged breed.
Compulsively Yours,
CCW
Failure
“Jumping from failure to failure with undiminished enthusiasm is the big secret to success.” Savas Dimopoulos
Dr. Dimopoulos is a prize-winning particle physicist at Stanford.
This quote was just what I needed as I’ve failed at many things this past year and felt a sense of discouragement with each defeat.
However, if a friend of mine had called and commiserated her misery, I would enthusiastically tell her to KEEP GOING!
So I will. And so shall you. Keep working hard and doing the right thing.
Here’s to UNDIMINISHED ENTHUSIASM!
Celebrate every effort you make. Let’s disco!
Are You Selfie with Your Tools?
With your smart phone, you can:
browse the Internet,
take pictures,
record video,
make calls,
text someone,
email people,
create music and art,
and bear witness
It’s a tool
What will you do with it today?
Desert Flower
She blooms among the rocks
her roots absorb precious water
she soaks the unforgiving rays
and bursts in all her glory
whether anyone sees her or not
Is Benadryl Harmless?
It started a little over a year ago.
I would wake up at around 1 or 2am every single night. Er, morning. I would be wide awake and it would take about a half hour for me to fall asleep again. Of course, I’d feel less than 100% the next day. I need my sleep, at least 7 if not 8 hours. A friend of mine suggested I take Benadryl. She’s a nurse, so I trusted her.
Taking Benadryl every night helped tremendously. I slept through the night and felt refreshed each day. A creature of habit, I did this every night for over a year.
And then I read this article.
Basically, anticholinergic drugs have been found to cause dementia in people 65 and older who used them for over 3 years.
This was the first study where they looked at over-the-counter drugs. You would think that if you don’t need a prescription, they’re very safe, wouldn’t you? Not so.
The writer recommends you take all the drugs you are taking, put them in a baggie and discuss your use with a doctor. I have mixed feelings about that. Of course, it sounds logical. However, for those of you who know me, I was diagnosed with breast cancer over five years ago and I believe that it was caused by being on birth control pills for so long. When I complained to my OB about my PMS pain, she literally pushed me onto the BC pills and assured it was acceptable to be on them for years.
I’m Asian. I don’t eat much red meat. I exercise regularly and am not overweight. I have never smoked. I have no breast cancer history in my family at all. I am in the lowest quartile for breast cancer risk. And yet it happened.
That’s my hypothesis. Beware of popping pills to solve your problems! You might create bigger ones!
What If….
What if you added this to today’s goals:
“….with presence and care.”
For example, “Today, I will attend present at the sales meeting with presence and care.”
Or,
“I will work with my subcontractors to complete this project with presence and care.”
I believe you will see a difference in how your day goes, for the better.
My daughter Josie (often the illustrator for my blog), created this clay dog tonight with presence and care.
Cool, huh?
GROI
Madonna, at the height of her career, would famously reject promotional photos with “Ew! Groi!” When asked what that meant, she answered, “Get Rid of It.”
To GROI is oddly empowering.
The only things I have ever collected are books. I have many, many books. They overcrowd my large bookcase and two closets in my house.
Yesterday, I decided to start the groi process with my prized collection. I am keeping my Sherman Alexie and Natalie Goldberg books. I’m sentimental about each since they were the writers who gave me the first sparks to write. Listening to Alexie in A Clean, Well-Lighted Place in San Francisco, I thought, Wow, stories about struggle, poverty and education CAN BE interesting! And I used to write for hours in a coffee/doughnut shop on 9th and Irving, taking Natalie’s advice to heart.
As I place books in my “Bookman’s pile,” I console myself with the thought that the public library is just blocks away. I can always check them out again later. Also, Bookman’s will give me store credit for the books they accept and if I choose to do so (and I do), they will donate the rest to a prison for inmates to read.
Already, the increased space on my bookshelf and closets bring a sense of calm, peace and freedom. I also found a gift card to See’s Candies a former student of mine gave me two years ago. I was using it as a bookmark.
Sunday Funnies #4
I
exercise
every single day
in effort to stave aging
Ava’s brownies haunt me here
sore muscles cry out
why bother
now?
Poetry form = “Joseph’s Star“
Korean Hand-Torn Noodle Soup
My daughters love sujebi, a Korean hand-torn noodle soup. My mother makes a fantastic soup and I have not encountered it at a restaurant (yet). Supposedly, sujebi goes back to the Goryeo period (935 – 1392) and was a dish served on special occasions. The inexpensive nature of it (veggies and wheat flour) have made it more of a common comfort food these days.
Mandu is Korean for potsticker. Here is a picture of Maangchi’s sujebi using mandu. I am NOT nearly as industrious and I’m not so sure my daughters would like it anyway, so I made the traditional kind:
I have made sujebi for my daughters before. They just love the soft dumplings in spicy broth. It’s very lame, the way I have made it and this blog post has led to some research which produced much better sujebi on my part. They wanted it tonight and I didn’t have all the ingredients so I substituted a few things. Instead of anchovies (which I didn’t have), I used the seafood packet from this:
I also used some sesame oil in the broth (never did that before) and added a bit of vegetable oil to the wheat flour for the dumplings (another first). I also added diced carrots and squash this time. You might be wondering….what did you used to do? I’m ashamed to tell you. So I won’t. Suffice it to say, it was quite lame.
One thing that bothers me about this dish is the lack of protein. I am going to add shrimp next time – Josie gave three cheers and Ava gave me a frown. You can’t please everyone!
You ought to check out Maangchi’s recipe. It’s fantastic: Maangchi’s sujebi recipe.
The girls LOVED my sujebi tonight! And I felt good serving it. Thank you, readers, for inspiring me to learn and share.
Good night!
Kismet 