back in the (knitting) saddle

My trip to DC was a quick one and it totally re-started my knitting. I was on a bit of a hiatus, I guess, from knitting in general (basically, I suck at knitting socks and it totally broke my knitting stride). What was nice about this trip was that the knitting made it go by really fast and calmed my nerves for the meeting that we were about to attend.

I grabbed this great olive/gold yarn from my stash. It was a chunky adrienne vittadini skein that I got from WEBS when we visited Sage and Brian over the summer. I got two hanks (there is something cooler about the word hank than skein) for two bucks each -- quite the deal! I adapted a pattern for a luxe neck warmer from Knit-2-Together, and I think it came out pretty nice. 54 stitches on size 10 needles -- the pattern was an alternation of feather and fan which looks so pretty and is relatively easy for even the most basic of knitters. The entire thing was done on the ride down from Newark Airport to Silver Spring, Maryland! The pic doesn't do it justice, especially the color; I will have to get a pic of me wearing it. It will serve as a proto-type for my christmas presents this year. I already started on one in Noro Silk Garden this morning when I sat next to a fellow knitter on the train -- gotta love a stitch-n-bitch commute.

Road trip: DC with my boss in the snow!

We're off to meet with the FDA tomorrow. I can't believe that it's
snowing or that we are actually listening to the Village People
singing along.

Luckily I brought my knitting and a book. Maybe I should have brought
some music. We are actually listening I why whole album. Yikes!!

Up the Mountain

There's nothing like a fall day, an outside party up the mountain
and a bonfire. Jared and I are just hanging out trying to stay warm and live it up mountain-style. We're up at Jamie's parents house celebrating she and Steve's engagement. There are lots of activities besides wine drinking and eating. Earlier, we ran down to the lake (UGL!) and hung out on the docks throwing rocks to our hearts content! Then there was the whole bonfire and knife throwing (yes, I am serious. I threw the knife over the fence -- oops).

Congrats to Jamie and Steve on your engagement!

be the change.

i totally freaking love this ad and not just because it's obama. i actually used it as a theme in my yoga classes this week. what i love is that it's a pic of him at the most awkward age, yet it's steeped with optimism.

i believe the be the change mantra comes from gandhi's famous line, “Be the change you want to see in the world.” -- pretty profound, if you ask me.

you may ask, how does something like this apply to yoga philosophy?? well, it's not that you have to change and become something totally different. change can come in the form of totally being you no matter how awkward you think you are. i mean, think about what you were like as a seven year old. probably missing front teeth, sort of annoying, ansty, goofy, nerdy -- but you were still you. there were mannerisms and nuances that carried through to your adult life, they are the things that are so endearing and specific to you.

at my dad's house we have this wall of pics that chronicle years of our lives. you can see this arc of awkwardness that makes way for beauty (i was a pretty nerdy kid/ adolescent). the physical appearance definitely changed, but it was also a change in the way i viewed myself and got more comfortable being me. that's where the yoga comes in. nothing is going to come and wipe out your identity to make you something/someone new. the change comes as you get better at being who you already are. that is change i can believe in.

get the cool shoe shine

I have a horrible cold and got sent home early. Unfortunately my next
train to Montclair doesn't leave for thirty minutes. Stuck in Penn I
decided to get my boots shined up. This is the first time I'm doing
this while they are on my feet -- just like the boys do. They really
needed a shining!! They had the remnants of last winters snow and salt.

I'll be done in time to catch my train and sleep the rest of my day.
And holy cow are these thing shiney now!! Shinier than when I bought
them.

the 'how-to change a tire' experiment

so we called AAA and as per their protocol it would be 45 minutes before they showed up or at least thought about it. luckily, neal and matty-big-hair showed up for moral support. as we stood around at the gas station and watched the goings-on of the evening we decided that we could probably just change the tire on our own -- which we ended up doing.it was interesting to me that as independent as i am, i had no freaking idea or desire to know how to change a tire up until this point. but stranded at the exxon station, my interest was peaked. out of the three of us, only matt had changed a tire and that was once.

so here's how/what i learned are the most important steps to changing a tire:

1. first check to see if you have a: jack, spare and tire iron. this should be in your trunk. in my car, they were hidden in the trunk underneath the trunk space. that is, i had to pull up the floor of the trunk to find the tire changing goods.
2. loosen the lug nuts on the tire. we did this wrong. you are really supposed to loosen them before you jack the car up. luckily we didn't push the car off the jack by trying to loosen them while the car was mid-air. also, you are going to need to use force. we found that using our foot to apply the force on the iron worked well
   
3. use the jack to lift the tire off the ground. no real explanation needed here -- there was a diagram on the jack to show where it was supposed to go.
4. take the lug nuts completely off and pull off the tire. you may want to make sure all the lugs are in one place, those suckers roll around.
   
5. place spare where you just took the old tire off. you may have a 'donut' as i did, don't be alarmed that it looks like a tire from the short bus. just note, as almost everyone that i told about the donut retorted to me -- don't drive over 50mph with that thing!!
   
6. attach the lug nuts loosely. just enough to keep the tire on, make sure tire is on straight.
7. lower jack. make sure there is nothing/no one under the car before you do this.
8. tighten lug nuts. use force for this, you don't want to be driving around and have those bad boys fall off.
9. revel in the fact that you just changed your own tire. woo hoo!!
   

all-in-all this was not how i wanted to spend my friday night. AAA didn't make it in time for us to change the tire so we canceled them all together. it did feel pretty damn good to change it and it was good to learn. while i was waiting for the guys to show up, i witnessed a mini-van back up with the pump still in it's tank and pull the pump right off! that was funny.

Flat-busted on a Friday night

I got out of work early enough to catch class at South Mountain Yoga with Joe and then caught a ride back to my car near the train. Got in the car drive about two blocks and realized I had flat. So now I'm over at the gas station waiting for AAA with my savior/ former prom date Neal. He's the one with the AAA card. I'll just say that the Exxon is totally happening tonight.

Gluten-Free (for you and me) Review: Glutino Frozen Spinach and Feta Pizza

as you may or may not know. i have a gluten intolerance. it seems that they can't tell if it's celiac or not but regardless when i eat wheat i feel tired, cranky, sometimes sick to my stomach and sometimes itchy. the itchiness usually manifests itself on my hands or elbows. i'll save you from the grotesque imagery and just say my elbows get itchy.

anyway, since i have not been eating wheat for just over a year, i've started to seek out all the gluten-free goodness i can get. there are a few really great websites about gluten-free cooking and whatnot and so i figured, why not review some gluten free items for other glu-tards (i was introduced to this word while at the Anusara Gathering last month by yet another gluten-free 'glu-tard' -- not sure if i like that word just yet). i can't believe that there is actually a real definition for this one!!

"Hey, do you want some pasta for dinner?"
"No, sorry, I'm a glutard."
"...what does that mean?"
"It means... I'm glutarded."
"Oh. Okay."
-thank you Urban Dictionary for the context.

now that you are up to speed on what i am talking about, here's my plan in this blog....besides posting a bunch of funny things that i see or obsess about, i thought it would be a great place to review somethings that i pick up at the grocery store under the gluten-free (gf) category. basically, i am limited so whenever i see something that claims to be gluten-free, i usually buy it. in fact, i have had coworkers and friends bring things to me that they've found in the supermarket.

the thing that i miss most is pizza. i don't usually eat cheese either, but i make an exception for things like feta or goat/sheep cheese. so i have been experimenting with the gf pizza options. whole foods has a selection of gluten-free stuff. usually it takes a lot of time to prepare, but i found this frozen pizza on night after work and figured i'd give it a try.

glutino (pronouced by me and my glu-tard friend, emma, as glu-tee-NO!) is one of the more prevalent gluten-free brands that i have seen. at first glance the pizza looked sort of gross. the crust is a rice flour blend and it had feta and spinach on top. judging from the appearance after pulling it out of the freezer i was not impressed (see pic to the left). so i decided to doctor it up. i do this all the time. it's not that i eat pre-made stuff a lot, but when i do, it has to have something that makes it tastier and/or healthier. so i opted to add some cherry tomatoes that i had in the fridge.

the result was pretty tastey. definitely add some tomotoes or olives. i used my trusty pizza pan that allowed for the bottom to get a little crispy. with a rice crust (i've made these from scratch) you need to be careful that they get fully cooked or they are all chewy/rubbery and basically gross. so it's best to spray some olive oil to make sure it gets golden. this brand cooked up pretty evenly. my only complaint is that for the price it was a really small pizza. you can see by the size of the pan compared to the actual pizza. it's definitely not for sharing. that's the unfortunate thing when it comes to being gluten-free. if there's a wheat substitute of any kind, you can bet it will be way more expensive than its glutinous counterpart.

overall, i give this a thumbs up for what it's worth...it taste like a gourmet sort of pizza and cooked up pretty quick! crispy, flavorful and it definitely sated my desire for some pizza.

happy 'jew' year!

so with the jewish holiday there is no one here in my office. but the internet definitely isn't jewish or at least doesn't celebrate the high holidays....

i got a few goodies in my inbox that totally made me laugh. first, i got a link to the literal video for aha's take on me song. it basically sings what is happening in the video to the tune of the actual song. if you have had any sort of exposure to the 80's (that is unless you've lived in a black whole for the last 30 years) you know this ridiculous video where an 80's chick is reading a comic and the comic guy comes alive and pulls her into the comic with him. there's also a wrench fight at the end!!



then the other goodie that i got to pass the slow day is this other 80's redux but with a slightly more political slant:

courtesy of Bust Magazine

i'm wondering if the drill/snowmobile is likened to mc cain. does anyone else see it? it seems to have that goofy/slighly evil mr. smithers grimace that he keep flashing.

A new meaning to 'green'

We just stopped by the Whole Foods to get some food to cook up. I saw these awesome heirloom tomatoes and got two. As we were walked back to the apartment, I glanced down at the bag and saw something green moving. Ewwwwwwww - It was a worm/ caterpillar crawling out of the tomato!!! Needless to say we had to let the 'pillar and tomato go.

Btw, Nick and Nora's Infinite Playlist was freaking amazing! I didn't know it was a movie about Jersey kids! That just made it better. Plus they had some of my old haunts in it (Veselka and Union Pool). I definitely felt affinity to the story of some music-loving bridge and
tunnel kids. It's a must see, Jersey!!

Chicago!

Here's a pic of my adorable man hailing us a cab to to and catch Nick
and Norah's Infinite Playlist.

Check it out:

And yes, I actually made it here in time. It's starting to get chilly
and fall-like. Not quite 'Siberia' as my father refers to it as...but it's getting there.

On the plane with 25 minutes to spare.

Look at how nice the plane looks before people mess it up with their
stuff. Since when do every row get a pillow?

I was worried that I would be late. I left the office at 5 and took
the N to Penn and then NJ Transit to EWR. Though it took 35 minutes
from Penn to the airport, I breezed thru security -- thank you
Continental Elite Status. Total cost a whooping $7.50 ($2 for NYC
Subway, $5.50 for Airtran, I used my monthly pass to get there).

Now I'm just hoping that they come back and wisk me up to first class
I am wayyy in the back. I also wish I grabbed some eats before I got on.

On time?!?!!

I'm not sure his is actually possible, but so far my flight from
Newark to O'hare (the most ridiculously late airports) is on time!!
The picture poorly illustrates it but that green scribble in the
middle says 'on time'.

I'm also number 5 on the first class stanby list. Ooooh they ate
boarding us at the time it says on our tickets!!!