House Hunters round 2

Saw some beauties today. All had garages, but evidently people in Minneapolis don't always use their garages. 2 had roofs so ragged and so many siding problems that we were afraid to even touch the door to open them.

2 houses had beautiful back decks and screened in porches, with fully fenced yards.

I guess my favorite one was a 2 car garage, huge screened porch, huge back deck with built-in fire pit, giant kitchen, finished basement, 3 tiers of front  porch flower beds, all brick and a second floor kitchen suite. IT also had an outdoor bar. It was my favorite, by far, but the downside is that it is only close to the light rail and very few of the other urban amenities that we crave. The good news is that there are SO MANY HOUSES for sale in Minneapolis that we could look forever and ever.  The second house we saw had tons of beautiful built-in bars, hutches, cabinets and original woodwork, with leaded glass windows.

Should post some links to the houses. Here's the one that I really liked:

Door to nowhere

Also, the door to nowhere is now gone. Sided over. Boarded up. Gone. Finito.
Ironic that we just removed a vestige of the rental property  it used to be now that it's officially rental property again.

oh well. I can't wait to see the completed deal!

Did I mention this new doggie?

We've been talking for awhile about adding a new dog to our house now that Skye has passed away. I really can't talk about my White Dragon very much because I miss her and we all cry about it when we talk about her death and leaving us. I loved our White Beast and I'd get another white German Shepherd in a heart beat if I could handle it.

But we live in an apartment and we probably shouldn't get another big dog right now. Somehow, we found the next best thing: a Corgi.

There have been many candidates for dog 2 in our lives, dachshunds,  dobermans and for awhile we had two dogs, a BEAGLE being one of them, until Chris came along to rescue her. But the corgi won out, in the end. As luck would have it, a former coworker has bread some corgis and one that looks just like a mini-Nitro will soon be coming our way. We just have to drive down to KC to pick it up.  The corgi's sire is named Harry Potter, and he's some super duper awesome champion award winning corgi.

Our corgi is not a champion elite wonderbreed, he's just  a regular dog that has a "fluff' coat, which makes him ineligible for breeding of any kind. I just hope that it all works out.  Will post photos once I know for a100% fact that he's ours (though I am pretty sure right now he is ours)

House Hunters

"How do you keep finding these ghetto places?" My friend queried, after I mentioned that the water was turned off in our apartment (again) because there's only one primary water shut-off in the building.

Something in that comment shook me. Kansas City house definitely tarnished our reputation, but we realized we liked it. It kept us humble, it kept life real. We knew what the really important things in life were, and stopped bitching about the small stuff that other people seem to think Ruin Their Lives. But certainly, I don't want the reputation of being ghetto.

So we called a realtor, a friend of a friend up here and we started looking at houses in the Supreme Apple Valley suburb. Dan and I had convulsions. We promised we'd keep an open mind, but it went something like this. "Beige....big yards for mowing....uniform grass.....giant swing set...head explode!" Our Realtor wanted to show us what we could get for  the cost in the suburbs and we wanted to be sure that we knew that we saw "everything" there is to offer in all parts of the metro. She took us to a little enclave in the suburbs that I liked, though. Brand new construction, which we thought we'd never imagine ourselves in, but it's a little community built on smaller lots, like the city, and it has a lovely 4 acre lake with a big set of trails all around it. It has an association, and the houses inside of it actually had some character. And the kitchen was huge. It was pretty affordable, which in Minnesota terms means that it was under 300K.

But next weekend we're going to look at houses in the real city, near the good side of Nokomis and Calhoun and other random parts of the city that we don't know about yet.

House requirements:
Tons of cabinet space in the kitchen
1 car garage or better
3 bedrooms
2 bathrooms
minimal repairs needed???
Well-insulated
Near light rail/bus
close to interstate 35/w or 35/E

Easter in Review

Today I'm making banana bread with chocolate chips, couscous with chicken and tomatoes and curry, bananas dipped in chocolate and the bestest creamed potatoes.
Today I'm basically wishing that I was in Cedar Rapids, with my family. In 2009, we had a huge Easter gathering and all of us played baseball, including my 80 year old grandfather. He still has a full head of dark black hair as he raced around the bases. We even tried to  run the bases  Babe Ruth style for him, but he wouldn't let us. We took a long hike to the river and played iwth the dogs, it was a beautiful and warm day.

Today I'm also wishing that I was in Kansas City for the big Easter Egg hunt this year. If I hadn't left, I would have been the Easter Bunny. For real. Thousands (literally) of kids would have sat on my lap while I smiled and talked about being the Easter Bunny.


Today I am also trying really hard to be OK. My friend who has been quarreling with her dad received a call from him today, and they apologized and were very sweet to her. Their argument was less severe, and I'm glad for her. But I can't stop thinking about our last Easter together as a family, when we knew things were surely going to hell in a handbasket as fast as they could, but we were going to pretend anyway.

Today,  I'm wishing you the very best, because that's all that anyone can ask for. Jesus Christ, Superstar.

Half Asleep in Frog Pajamas

When the stock market crashes on the Thursday before Easter, you—an ambitious, although ineffectual and not entirely ethical young broker—are convinced that you’re facing the Weekend from Hell. Before the market reopens on Monday, you’re going to have to scramble and scheme to cover your butt, but there’s no way you can anticipate the baffling disappearance of a 300-pound psychic, the fall from grace of a born-again monkey, or the intrusion in your life of a tattooed stranger intent on blowing your mind and most of your fuses. Over these fateful three days, you will be forced to confront everything from mysterious African rituals to legendary amphibians, from tarot-card bombshells to street violence, from your own sexuality to outer space. This is, after all, a Tom Robbins novel—and the author has never been in finer form.(

The Boxer

In the clearing stands a boxer
And a fighter by his trade
And he carries the reminders
Of ev'ry glove that layed him down
Or cut him till he cried out
In his anger and his shame
"I am leaving, I am leaving"
But the fighter still remains

More lyrics: http://www.lyricsfreak.com/s/simon+and+garfunkel/#share

We could be so very lucky

AL: Ready?
ZOE: Always.
MAL: We're not gonna die. We can't die, Bendis. You know why? Because we are so very pretty. We are just too pretty for God to let us die. Huh? Look at that chiseled jaw.

Best lines in a battle sequence. And I felt a little like that today.  And it's worked so far. I guess it's because Amy and I just won an awesome 2 games of "Last Night on Earth!"

The last time I uttered Firefly to myself, I was just hoping that my bus home after a long day at work wouldn't come while I went inside for a quick second to warm up. I was wrong, of course, the bus came right at that second that I went inside and couldn't see it.  But this time it's different.

PS. Today it snowed 2 inches and accumulated. I still walked Nitro outside in flipflops.

You should see my scars!

I have long loved this song, but today after my appointment, I was again  so relieved to be able to discuss the private recesses of my problems that have so long plagued me.
"You Should See My Scars!"

It's so lovely.

Question of the hour?

Question of the hour? Will the value of our house go down if the siding over the door to nowhere doesn't match the rest of the  house? Isn't it better to have sided over the door to nowhere vs leaving it alone? I  am hoping for the latter.
Oh, KC house.

I had a pretty good week, all things considered. Tax season, of course, sucks, but I think people are calmer this year than in 09. For one, more people bought in 2010 than sold, so their tax formers are easier. People realized that they can file an extension for their excess removals, too. And they did far fewer stupid things in 2010 than 2009.

We had our annual happy hour, which was lovely. I still have to remember that drinking in downtown MN is NOT CHEAP. I keep forgetting this and then get stuck after 3 drinks without any more money to use and eventually everyone is buying everyone else a drink and you get so confused about whose tab you're on that everyone just gives up and moves to the next bar so we can start over. My coworkers are awesome.

Went to a show with some more ladies at work after our shifts on Saturday. It was improv comedy called "For Ladies Only" and has been held over. It's already been my second show at that venue, if I can believe it.  I got to go inside of some nice downtown apartments, but the cost has scared me away. $1150 for a one bedroom downtown! Amenities are lovely there, though, and you really are close to so many great things that it seems worth it.  Maybe I'll win the lottery....

The Paul Bunyan Log Ride

As you know, I've been wanting to ride this for awhile. It's pretty expensive to ride on weekends at MOA and the line is always very, very long. I've ridden some other rides, like the Avatar Air Bender but finally, finally, finally got to ride on Paul Bunyan again. First time I've done it since I was a kid. 
I also was able to see Shannon and Dan in action with the twins and Anna. The twins have grown into two quiet 6 month olds that will stare at anything for hours. If only I'd had my camera....

It was hard to realize that we were out and about with a 3 year old and two 6 month old babies with a giant stroller at Mall of America.  Shannon seems to be the most capable mother ever. There was no bickering between the two of them as they got their kids ready and into the baby slings, no extreme fussing from the babies, and eating dinner in the mall food court was a piece of cake. I guess she makes parenthood seem like  a piece of cake. Of course it will be harder and crazier once the twins are 3 and Anna is 6, but for now, I'm really glad we got together. Somehow, I still remember seeing Shannon at the pool in 7th grade, swimming laps determinedly. If only I was as smart and down to earth as she....

food

At the game, I had one walking taco and shared some pretty nasty tortilla corn chips with all of the bad fixings: cheese, ground beef and tomatoes.  I had two summer shandy beers. At work, I ate some stackable chips. That's it for yesterday, but lots of fat calories.

Day before: One oozy, gooey cake (ramekin sized), one glass of milk with  a shot of Baileys.  Leann Chin plate of chinese food. VERY reasonable portions. A lot of stackable chips. Probably at least 3 servings.

I made a present to myself

After 12 hour work day
After 1 terrible escalated call about people that wouldn't give out their last names (seriously??)
After my Dad said I was dead to him when I called out the new wife for being the terrible person she is....
After I gave up early on my 12 mile run
After 4 consecutive days of terrible nightmares about my dad and TNW chasing me around and attacking me

I decided I needed a special present. Or several special presents....

4 oozy gooey chocolate cakes made from scratch with the leftover milk chocolate instead of dark chocolate
1 corgi puppy, 10 weeks old, coming sooooooon!
2 episodes of Amazing Race
2 tickets to tomorrow's TWINS vs Royals game

What I ateeeeeeee

god, I am sick of writing about what I ate. But Runners World says I have to.

Today:
1 can spaghetti Os.
6 oz chicken with orange sauce
3 handfuls whole grain tortilla chips (yeah, like the whole grain matters :P)
giant bowl of life cereal that probably comprised 3 servings of 1/2 cups.

Yesterday:
a whole bunch of chips
Rotisserie chicken (maybe 1 breast worth?)
Tabolluouliioiiiii
1.5 glasses of Crispin Apple Cider

hot chocolate without whipped cream

Swimming suits and scales

These are every woman's favorite things, right? I mean, who doesn't love standing on the scale to see a 10 lb weight gain?After the scale said Dan gained 10 lbs, we decided it was time to retire that scale. The new scale from Target gives a  more accurate number, to our great relief.

On a side note, in our building, if you don't want something, you just place it in the space near the elevator and it finds a new home. I found a shoe rack this way and gave away our scale and a gray sweatshirt that I never wore. People even put food out there. The other weird thing about our building is that Dan and I have twice this week lumped into an elevator with several other people on their way to a potluck with their food uncovered. The food smells good, but I keep wondering why everyone is out of tinfoil or lids.  It is almost the same as living in 263 in Ames, where the place constantly smelled like curry and everyone was speaking hindi. Except here it's lots of beef ribs and everyone speaks Spanish.



Anyway, I mentioned before that my swimming suits were stolen, including the $70 suit that I bought in the northland after forgetting mine on our anniversary weekend. This completely sucks, but I do have to go out and get a new swimming suit soon. It's land of the 10,000 lakes, and heaven help me if I'm not in the water at least 20 times this summer. I'll put that out there as my goal and hope that it happens.

Another side note: I am debating whether or not to fork over the money to fly my friend out to MSP for a week or two. One one hand, it's a lot of money to spend on a trip that I'm not taking. On the other hand, she really needs to get out of her current situation and point-blank said she doesnt have the strength to do it. Should I help?

Rabbit Saddle

On Thursday, we saw an article in the paper for a really great restaurant, called Heidi's. (I think they named it after one of my BFFs.)

It looked like a place we'd love, so we decided to check it out. Of course after any restaurant receives rave reviews in the daily, people flock there. Reservations were full for the entire night, but we got in by just enjoying the full-bar menu.

First course:

Roe wrapped in bacon with a brown sauce, dried mini-peaches and a bean salad garnish

Second course

Rabbit sausage and rabbit saddle with sweet potatoe and something else. It was divine. I've never had Thumper before, but it was close to chicken, except with a darker and more subtle flavor.
Dan's second course was Pheasant, which also tasted like a cross between chicken and turkey, with a side salad.

Dessert:
dried peanut butter powder that they concocted themselves, with chocolate and vanilla mousse and all of that other fancy stuff that you get for 4star dining at a 3 star price.

Our drinks were subtle and amazing, mine had pistachio nuts and it took a few minutes for it to absorb into my stomach, bringing a pretty nice feeling to a really shitty night in our personal life.

I have to say that so far, this is the best place I've gone to in Minneapolis, with amazing service. I did get to figure out what Minnesota Ice is, based on the chilling snobbery of the hostess, but that's what you get with a nice place, they're paid to be a bit snooty. By the end, the staff realized we were newcomers based on their good press and they really warmed up and chatted with us a bit.

I will say that even though we've gone out to several places here, Kansas City's restaurants  have a head  above the restaurants here. KC just has more fine dining choices, but that could just be because we were living so near Westport/Plaza. Of course the service here is better and the Minnesota snobbery is nothing compared to the Overland Park snootiness, but who cares!

Snackpacks are for kids

And my friend, Craig, who got sick off of eating snack packs this week. Poor man.

Today I went for Chinese in the skywalk. I probably had at least 2-3 "servings". One Chinese lunch = giant amount of food.  I wasn't hungry at all.

Came home and ate a steamable of vegetables and cheese.

The Chinese was probably 1k calories alone. Weighed myself. I've gained 10 lbs (SERIOUSLY!) since Sunday. I don't know what happened.

More about what I ate today and yesterday

Wow, this is the easiest place to talk about how much I eat. I really don't like using the online calorie counter thing, so I'm sure that  it would be awesome if I could just take a photo of what I've consumed with my phone and it would tell me how many calories it was. I am sure this is possible.

So anyway, yesterday I had 1.25 more bowls of cereal. I also ate a can of Spaghetti 0s, about 400 more calories.

Today I had a cup of tortilla soup and a banana. I had NO CHOCOLATE at work, which is amazing. I had about 4 handfuls of pretzels thanks to my pretzel buddy. Then I came home and had a bowl of noodles and cream of chicken soup and 2.5 serving of cereal and milk.
I guess that's a lot of food, right? The cereal part and the noodles alone made a big amount.  I'm stuffed right now, so I guess that's a good thing.  I wasn't very effective with the protein part of dining today.

In other news, I am trying to get the hookup for a corgi puppy. I'm also trying to hook up two friends with jobs at my company, go for a run, get the insurance inspector to certify our house for rental property and figure out how to stop having pseudo nightmares about my dad and his new wife. They've come up in my dreams twice this week.   I know it's just because I'm nervous about my birthday coming up and having him not call me. Yikes.

Chicago: I think we are going to go there for Memorial Day weekend. I'm stoked b/c we'll be in Hyde Park, Chicago AND because I think I finally get to take that architectural boat tour thing.

3/4 cup of cereal, 1/2 cup of milk

This is my serving size right now, coming in at 160 calories.
I have to write down all of the things I eat because I guess that's what you should do when you wonder why you're not losing weight. For example, I ran 9 miles on Sunday and came home and had gained 2 lbs.
My diet is probably a bit out of control, so I'm hoping that I am just eating too much before I resort to blaming something like sleep apnea or hyperthyroidism for my weight gains.

Today:
Protein shake with Mango. Sugar free, 14 grams of protein. Right around 500 calories.

1 bowl of cereal so far.

Yesterday:
handful of hershey kisses and mini (not fun-sized) snickers
1 salad with spinach leaves and cottage cheese
3 pieces of vegan crusted pizza
1 brownie without the frosting
1 glass of Baileys at the concert
1 salad with feta cheese and banana peppers



So you tell me....am I out of line? 3 pieces of pizza is extreme, indeed. The brownie and the snickers was probably too much. But didn't I just run 9 miles the day before?

Sunday I ate a veggie burger with italian bread as a crust, a belgian waffle that was very sugary and bad, a hot chocolate with whipped cream, 1/2 cup of bulgoki with onions, and a bit of cereal.

Yeah, it's here. Yeah, yeah, yeah

The snow is mostly gone. I can run outside now. And I can bike outside....which means GOODBYE CAR!

Unless it's raining or so windy I will die, I have figured that I can bike to the transit center (only 1.5 miles away) and take the bus to the city and then bike back to the apartment. This was long our goal, to live car free, and it's going to be real. Dan can bike into work now, too. So I'm connecting our tires and checking the pressure and off we'll go.


So anyway, we went to the drunk spelling bee. Dan's mom spelled Citrine and then in round 4 was knocked out by Rocquille or some word similar to it that isn't spelled R-O-Q-U-E-T-T-E.
Dan and Kari got KOed in round 3, though Dan was one letter off and poor Kari got a word that was F-U-H or something so easy that it's deceptively simple.Spelling bee was at the 3-3-1 Lounge, which I decided is my official favorite bar, should I ever manage to get there with my ID and money again.

We also spent a ton of time at Ikea and MOA. I bought some pillows that decreased in price and noticed at least 3 other women buying them, so they'll soon be on their way to a home near you.  We dress shopped like crazy at MOA.  Dan's mom  has a wedding on New Year's Eve 2012 but wanted to shop in a bigger city. We found several that ALMOST fit, she wasn't quite ready to fork out $150 for a dress yet. But her event is months away, so she can wait for awhile. She recently lost a lot of weight, but she's in the in-between sizes now, where she can't quite find something contemporary enough in the regular sizes and doesn't want to wear something old and formidable, either. Quite by surprise, I found a fuchsia dress at Bloomingdales with clever and forgiving cut. I might look like a pink snowball while wearing it, but what the hell....