Yesterday Merideth texted me a picture of Tillie. She said, “She is huge now, as you can see. She has a drinking problem.” Bwah, hah, hah! I think Mer and I share the same deranged brain! Anyway, here is the kid who says, “I’m so chubby.”
She obviously has a ton of hair, too.
Time keeps flying past, and I wonder constantly where God wants me. Today’s sermon was helpful, because Matt spoke about how we need to be open to be used and involved where we are. I struggle with this sometimes because I don’t really want to be where I am, for the most part. For the most part, I want to be anywhere but here in East Central Indiana. I like teaching and I love my students, but I always have this restless spirit that says to me (possibly it’s some sort of Tempter), whisperingly in my ear, “You could be so much more. Why are you settling for only this?” I have to slough that off, though, because I feel for a change that I am doing the best thing I could be doing right now. Since I’ve already posted my rant about the Methodist Church and their stupidly conservative policy about GLBT pastors, I won’t go on about that. However, short of being a pastor, my calling in life is to teach. And I love — there is no sarcasm in that — middle school students! I feel like I am right where I should be with that aspect of my life.
There are other areas where I feel restless. I feel restless in my inability to stay on top of grades, because this makes me want to stop teaching. I feel restless in my relationship with God, because I feel like I can never know enough, read enough, be enough. I feel restless in desire to be an activist for liberation (people, animals, the poor), because I don’t see a future in which we are all free; though I do have hope. I feel restless because of my debt, which traps me, because I feel as if my debt holds me back from doing so many things I am called to do. I feel restless because I own a house. That’s huge to me, owning a house. If you had asked me ten years ago if I thought I would ever be so grounded, I would have answered a resounding, NO! But if you ask me today if I enjoy my life, I would say, YES, but I do suffer from a heapin’ helpin’ of wanderlust. I can’t help it. I simply have a need to roam. At least having the ability to go on road trips is helpful.
If I wasn’t so grounded, so stable, I wouldn’t be able to experience things like these:
Delicious Homemade Vegan Pizza
Cat Boyfriends Pudge and Kermit
Beautiful Woman and Her Annoying Cat
All of these things are the perks of being settled. I suppose it’s okay to be stuck somewhere with all these beautiful and amazing comforts, or blessings, surrounding me.
It’s difficult for me to keep up with this blog since no one can actually see it anymore. I know now how my students feel when they write essays that are simply for my eyes, so I know that my teaching will be entirely different next year from what it is this year. It’s really hard to come here time and again to write, just like it is really hard for them to muster up any level of caring about their writing when they view it as simply an assignment. Next year, I am hoping to help them do assignment that will have a bit more exposure, more influence in their culture. But for now, I will occasionally write for you, my faithful and devoted reader(s), and they will write for me and each other. It’s an exercise in non-profit diligence.
I wish I didn’t teach until 9AM. If so, I could run in the morning without having to get up at 5AM. I am not so much fun when I get up at 5AM. In fact, I am quite grumpy when I get up at 5AM. You wouldn’t want to be around me when I get up at 5AM. Seriously, 5AM is bad. For me. However, what running I can eek out is going well. I am back to pre-injury speed, which in the running world, is more like a slow walk compared to where I should be for my age. I blame it on my girth. I’d like to strap a one-hundred backpack on some of these scrawny little runners and see how fast they go then! They’d then be thrilled they could move their 200-plus-pound frame across flat land at 12:30 a mile. That’s pretty fast for a rounder! 🙂
The diet has changed. I am trying to only eat whole foods. The 1200-1500 calorie thing worked for about two weeks until I felt as if I was starving to death. Along with not liking to wake up at 5AM, I really don’t like to wake up hungry. When my stomach’s growling is more effective than my alarm clock, I realize I am no longer dieting. I am then starving myself. I am trying to transition to eating things like sweet potatoes, broccoli, barley, oats, nuts. You know, whole foods. I feel better, but last night I caved to a craving and ate pizza. Without cheese of course. And tonight I am having some beer and probably some other unhealthy food, like fries or whatnot.
On a very different note, I’d love (still) to go into business with Merideth to open the “Hoot and Whatnot,” the coffeehouse/bar/bookstore/general store conglomeration that we fantasized about so long ago. I can’t wait until Christmastime when she and her sister are going to be here. I only wish the time would be longer, and the days less packed with family events. Everything changes, but everything’s changed. We’re old. We’re married. She pregnant. We can’t just lie around all day eating peanut M&Ms and watching bad movies. We have to behave like adults. Sigh.
Adults. How do they behave? Badly, usually. I am trying with all of my might to help my workplace not be such a den of negativity. It’s like the beginning to Richard 3, “Now is the winter of our discontent,” only without it “made glorious summer by this son of York.” It’s just a pit of despair.
I am hoping to make it into sunshines and rainbows!
This morning I made vegan sweet potato waffles from an excellent recipe I found here. The only things I changed were substituting apple sauce for the oil and upping the amount of clove and nutmeg, and the waffles turned out very well. Frequently, I change quite a bit from someone else’s recipe. This one really worked as it is, but I always under-cook the first waffle every time. I forget that I am supposed to wait for the little red light to go off before removing the waffle. Once I got the hang of the machinery, I made some very nice waffles, which paired nicely with my favorite Starbucks coffee, Africa Kitamu.
Thinking about coffee brings me to another point: I need to cut back on my extraneous spending again. I was at the point during last school year where I was going to Starbucks several times each week. I wouldn’t mind spending so much money if it was going to an independent coffee shop, but I don’t go them regularly. I should. I need to remember to focus on the mom-and-pop places instead of using big, national chains. I just think it’s good karma to support people who are trying to make a living in a honest, controlled way. I realize that most big companies started with this same ambition, but companies like SBUX have lost site of their original vision and don’t pay as much attention to the little guys as the smaller businesses. For example, my friend Kellie and I went to a local smoothie place and didn’t realize they only took cash, so the woman let us have our smoothies and pay her later. All of this after they were already closed; we didn’t see the sign on the door that said 4PM.
Right now, I am sitting here waiting to go over to the 505 for Izzy’s birthday party. She is 3-years old today, and it doesn’t really seem possible. How does time go so quickly? I always used to think people were crazy when they talked about their kids growing up so fast. Izzy’s not even my kid and I am amazed at quickly three years has gone by! Anyway, Becs and I got here these really cool little books about four famous artists, and we were going to get her some art supplies and stuff to go with them. However, my mom got her art supplies and things like that, so we are just going to put our gifts together, or at least they will seem like they go together. My brother’s gift is the best, though. He got her this fantastic lady bug laboratory that comes with lady bug larvae that she has to feed and watch grow. It is really a fantastic present. I hope she likes it.
I am hoping that once I get back form vacation, I can make some headway on this dissertation. I also need to make some headway on the house painting. I really want to get it finished this summer, but I also need to plan for next school year. Those are the big three things that have to get finished this summer, along with my work for the IEI and training for this marathon. I have to keep telling myself, “You can do it!”
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Food: banana, sweet potato waffle with Earth balance and pure Maple syrup, juice, coffee, baby bagel with faux-peanut butter, ten baby carrots, grape Kool-Aid slush, whatever I eat at Izzy’s party
Exercise: walked the dogs, bike ride to the 505 and back
They have teeth and claws. No matter how many of them you release, they keep breeding and building, breeding an building. Now they have expanded their domicile to include the left sinus as well, and possibly the throat. This diagram neglects to mention their sharp little incisors. 
In fact, this diagram makes them look downright lovable, which I suppose they are when they are not taking residency in your head.
Tonight we had a splendid time at Two Johnny’s, and I recommend it. Though it is not a restaurant you should explore if you are in a hurry. They have one person working the floor and it seemed like the same number in the kitchen. I don’t mind waiting for my food, but this is a friendly warning that our salad and sandwich dinner took almost 2 hours. Of course, we passed the time quickly because we haven’t spent time with the Combers for a while, so that wasn’t an issue. If I went there alone for a quick bite, however, I might be annoyed at the fact that it took so long. Our waiter was friendly, so that made our experience even better. Also, if there is any doubt just order the large salad. The small is probably fine for lunch, but for dinner it was a bit skimpy. And, try the Old Fashioned Cream pie, even though mine is better.
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I am thankful for spending time with my brother today, even though we moved furniture.
Food: banana, juice, apple, almonds, soup in a bread bowl, veggie bagel and cream cheese sandwich, chips, cheese bread, old fashioned cream pie
Exercise: walked the dogs, ran 4 miles
Posted in Family, Food, Running, Vegetarian or Vegan
Reason Breeds Insanity 
