#spent all my energy here got some mean asks and then bf had bad day so i pivot to help him (which i am glad to do im just sad)

[hornedcraft]

with that. i must sleep. i have an early tiny baby shift tomorrow and i’m so drained and sad with no recharge so i just gotta sleep it all off

[angeltrapz]

howdy 💙 chainshipping ask time: on days when they’re feelin bad, what do they do for the other person? also favorite date night activities? + th first moment post-bathroom where they each realized they’d fallen in love w th other?

hi!! 💜

ooh I think abt this a lot actually. I think th two of them have a tendency 2 bottle things up, so it kind of takes a lil bit fr them to realize tht Hey, Someone Wants To Make Sure I'm Okay and fr them 2 then get to a place where they share how they're rly doing rather than bein like "no everything's fine wdym :)" but once they Do get past tht n r able 2 be honest w each other, it's a lot better fr both of them + honestly its own form of healing.

a lot of th time when Adam's having a bad day, he's either nonverbal or responds w as short of an answer as possible, so th big thing Lawrence does fr him is just let him know he's there when/if he's ready 2 talk + there's no stress 2 tell him what's wrong right away. tht's smth tht's rly important to Adam, n smth he appreciates greatly. often times, along w tht, Adam tends 2 seek out physical contact - so like coming up behind Lawrence while he's cooking breakfast n wrapping his arms around him, holding his hand when they're walking together, sitting close enough so their knees/shoulders/hips brush + just leaning into Lawrence's side altogether, etc. so another thing they do is either cuddle up on th couch or in th bedroom n they watch a few movies together. sometimes Lawrence will read 2 him too. it's rly all abt proximity + lil actions tht in reality r a wordless way 2 say "I'm here, it's okay, we'll get thru this together." Lawrence is patient, doesn't rush him, n stays close by. fr Adam, tht is more than enough + means th world. n it eventually leads 2 him being more comfortable voicing how he feels more often!!

Lawrence's bad days r a lil harder to catch bc even tho he knows Adam's there, he still feels a pretty intense amount of guilt + doesn't often feel tht he has like. a right 2 complain? bc I think, fr a long time, he views himself as th one most responsible fr what happened in th bathroom n how they got there. it takes a while fr him to break out of tht mindset, but th main thing Adam reminds him of is he's still here. bc Lawrence spends a lot of time thinking like, "if I wasn't a bad person, Jigsaw wldn't have chosen me or put my family in danger, therefore it's my fault + I need 2 atone somehow." Adam is aware of this, n they've found tht th best solution is fr him 2 just b very blunt n ask "well was I a bad person? was I so horrible tht Jigsaw chose me based on tht n I deserved what happened next?" n of course Lawrence will immediately be like "no of course not??? nothing u cld've done cld warrant tht?" (kinda like th way u mentioned Adam comforts William) so Adam gets to respond w "tht applies 2 u too, u know. yr not a bad person. nothing you cld've done wld warrant smth like tht, either."

n Lawrence mentally bluescreens th first time he hears Adam say tht bc it's just like. He's Right. if he doesn't think Adam is a bad person + deserved wht happened, why did he? so tht's like th big thing Adam does fr Lawrence. he reassures him tht despite his brain's best efforts 2 convince him otherwise, he is a good person who Adam loves n tht might've made mistakes, but they didn't warrant being chained to a pipe in a fucking bathroom somewhere w his family in danger + being tasked 2 kill his now-bf, christ.

favourite date night activities!! I think they're mostly p lowkey fr th most part just bc of like, th unease of potentially being around A Lot Of Ppl, but every once in a while they'll dress up a lil bit n go somewhere nice fr dinner bc Lawrence is a hopeless romantic + he likes being able 2 do tht fr Adam sometimes. Adam thought it'd be like, wayyyy too stuffy + uncomfortable esp bc it's not smth he's used to, but honestly it's rly fun n they get to spend time together, so in th end it's all fine! plus there's never any pressure 2 like, go all out w dressing up or anything, so tht's nice too. honestly, if Adam wasn't so in love w Lawrence, th way he holds his hand over th table while they skim thru th menu + talk abt what sounds good might make him think he was somehow th main character of a romcom.

a lot of times, too, they frequent this local diner tht Adam used 2 go to fr breakfast all th time when he n Scott were teenagers bc it was relatively cheap, th food was good, + th staff was full of kind ppl. the lighting is lowkey n they usually have some sort of seasonal decorations around th place, n it's just somewhere Adam feels Safe, which of course leads 2 Lawrence feeling tht way abt it too. it's rly nice fr when they still want to go out, but don't rly want to put too much effort into it (tht's not to say th diner is low-quality tho!). they're there so often some of th servers know them by name + are friendly w them, so there's tht too!

their favourite, tho, is nights in where they order takeout or delivery so tht neither of them have 2 cook (Adam is getting better w it, tho Lawrence still cooks fr th majority of th time) n they can just relax. sometimes they lay a bunch of blankets on th floor n camp out there, sometimes they make a pillow fort bc why not, n sometimes they just grab their favourite blanket n curl up on th couch while watching random TV fr background noise or movies. Adam’s head always ends up on Lawrence’s shoulder at some point. Lawrence will have an arm around his shoulder. sometimes Adam will rest his legs across Lawrence’s lap. it’s just being close + enjoying some downtime tht they both rly appreciate.

as fr th first time they realized they were in love each other... in all honesty, fr Lawrence, it was pretty much th moment Adam finally woke up in th hospital n looked at him n said “you came back fr me.” (like yr text game Still Life is Exactly how I see it happening!!) however, th first time Lawrence rly became CONSCIOUS of tht feeling n was able 2 put a name to it was honestly so simple and yet so meaningful. it was Adam standing in his kitchen th morning after he’d spent th night bc he cldn’t get to sleep on his own, too worked up n on edge n afraid 2 be alone.

it’s Adam in only a faded n too-big t-shirt n boxers trying 2 figure out how to use Lawrence’s keurig. it’s th sunlight streaming in frm th window above th sink n framing Adam’s face n turning his eyes this bright honey-green when Lawrence catches them. he’s in th middle of washing the dishes bc he’d been meaning to since th night b4, watching as Adam moves around n learns th placement of everything, his presence so natural-feeling tht it’s hard fr Lawrence to even imagine tht he hasn’t always been there. and then Adam turns 2 look at him bc he can feel him staring, his hands curled around a mug of hot coffee, eyes still half-lidded w remnants of sleep n hair a wild unruly mess, and he smiles - tht is when Lawrence truly realizes tht he loves him. he cldn’t imagine his life w/ out Adam in it. he can hardly remember how it felt to live w/ out him. tht’s when he knows.

I think fr Adam, th moment he became truly aware of how much he loved Lawrence was actually during one of his bad days where he was stuck in th mental bathroom, unable get out of his own head fr much longer than a few minutes at a time. he had gone mostly nonverbal n found the energy needed 2 keep up a conversation was just not smth he had, but instead of Lawrence being irritated by tht fact, he was going out of his way 2 be like, “I know yr not doing well, n tht’s okay, if u want 2 talk to me I’m here but if u don’t I’ll still b here anyways.” n tht’s like smth tht’s so foreign to Adam, ppl being willing 2 understand his struggles w things like speech n eye contact if he’s distressed + who don’t try 2 force him to power thru it, so tht first time he’s just sitting there on th couch, leaning against Lawrence’s side w/ his legs tucked up underneath him n w his weighted blanket covering them both, watching Lawrence fill out th crossword in th daily newspaper n just kinda coasting tht line between being present n checking out, he’s just like. Huh. This Is Nice.

bc no one’s ever rly offered tht kind of accommodation 2 him? esp not his parents, which is part of wht I mentioned earlier abt his tendency to bottle things up. neither of them have 2 say anything; it’s just comfy, reassuring, sitting so close + sharing a space while maintaining a comfortable silence bc Adam doesn’t think he can explain yet. n he looks up at Lawrence’s face, tracing th heavy line of his furrowed brows as he concentrates hard abt whatever word it is he’s trying 2 figure out, th tip of his tongue peeking out btwn his lips as he squints, occasionally mouthing a word or two, n tht’s kind of when it hits him. it’s just kind of like an internal ah, I see. Lawrence doesn’t mind tht he’s like this. he doesn’t badger him fr answers or expect him 2 be th perfect image of good mental health n is perfectly content 2 just sit w/ him as he rides it out. tht’s when Adam really gets tht this is love.

tysm fr this ask I had so much fun w it <3

[aoibaratraveler]

UK Road Trip Week 4

Ok, so I was actually semi productive with this, this week and finished typing it out on Tuesday morning but then my tumblr app stopped working on my phone and then when I tried to use the browser on my phone it uploaded all weird. So I am finally able to upload this from a Starbucks on the bf’s laptop.

Day 22:

I woke up feeling lucky to have done Snowdon a day before because torrential rain came down all night and seemed to persist well into the morning and afternoon and looking at the forecast for the next month...well, its bleak. I did, however, feel much better after a good night's sleep and even though I am a bit sore, I think that I am more than ready to do another hike or scramble like Snowdon because I just enjoyed it so much. If the rain does let up then I would love to do Scafell Pike in England and Ben Nevis in Scotland, the tallest mountains in each. Soon after we woke up, we decided to head to Llandudno for a walk along the coast and to get some coffee but after charging up for a bit and grabbing some pasties from the local bakery, the bf had the grave misfortune of having half his pasty stolen by an aggressive seagull. In fact, most of the seagulls in this town were rather aggressive, one of them swooped down at my head while I was eating my pasty. After this unfortunate event though, the bf's mood took a dip so we decided to leave and head to Betws y Coed where we would be meeting up with T, the bf's friend later on. It was certainly a cute little village but because of the torrential downpour, we couldn't explore much and so we retreated to a hotel for some Welsh cream tea and to have a safe shelter to watch the rain. After a couple of hours T showed up and we attempted to go on a walk to a nearby lake since it seemed to have stopped raining but not even 10 minutes into our walk and it came down hard again and we were properly soaked. Luckily, it was warm rain so I didn't mind it too much. We retreated to T's car where T and the bf reminisced on their uni days. The rain seemed to let up a bit so we took a chance and explored the other side of Betws y Coed where there were a cute train station and a rhino made of metal that encased bottle caps to promote recycling. Near the station there was a lovely little suspension bridge with a backdrop of a field scattered with sheep and a forest. We played poo sticks there for a couple of minutes and then decided to head to a restaurant called Olif for Welsh Tapas and we were very happy that we did because not even a minute later the torrential rain came back which didn't seem to let up for the rest of the night. It was great timing for us. The Welsh Tapas was delicious, we thoroughly enjoyed the croquetas which was a breaded ball of melted cheddar cheese, potato, and leek, yum. We ate, drank, and were merry for a couple of more hours before heading to a nearby nature reserve to pitch up for the night; the rain still coming down with a fury.

Day 23:

Today was a bit disappointing only because we really just couldn't do anything for there was torrential rain for most of the day. We set off from the spot we were parked and drove through the gorgeous valleys that gave off an almost ominously beautiful atmosphere to it because of the rain. We made a stop near Tryfan, a cool mountain that is mostly a scramble that the bf had wanted to take me on but because of the rain he couldn't. We tried to wait out the rain for a bit but to no avail so we retreated to a Starbucks for a few hours and read. When we got hungry we decided to leave and we grabbed some Chinese takeaway before heading to T's place to stay for the night. I got to play with her gorgeous border collie so not a bad end to the day.

Day 24:

Today we initially had plans to meet up with another friend of T's but he bailed on us so T decided to be our tour guide around Snowdonia. We had a delicious full breakfast in her town and then set off to a town called "BeddGelert". It was a lovely little town that had a beautiful nature walk and river and where the legend of Gelert is said to have taken place.

"According to the oft-told legend, Llywelyn, Prince of Gwynedd and the most powerful man in the whole of Wales, had a hound called Gelert. In some versions of the tale, the dog had been given to Llywelyn by none other than King John of England. One day Llywelyn went hunting, leaving Gelert behind to look after his infant son. When Llywelyn returned he found his tents in disarray. There was no sign of his son and Gelert, when he jumped up to greet his master, had jaws stained red with blood. Instantly assuming the hound had killed the baby, the Prince drew his sword and ran the dog through. Only then did Llywelyn discover the unharmed baby lying beneath its upturned cot and the body of a wolf that had tried to kill the child, in the corner of the tent. The faithful Gelert had defended his charge and killed the wolf. The hound was buried with great ceremony and, legend says, prince Llywelyn never smiled from that day onwards." (https://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/wales/entries/e6f11332-ae6f-3364-96a4-1af14401369b)

We had a long stroll around the river and then had coffee and cake at a cafe. We decided to get three cakes and split them; chocolate fudge, coffee-walnut, and carrot. They were scrumptious but personally I liked coffee-walnut the best. Afterward we drove to a place called Black Rock Sands--in English, the Welsh name is supremely hard to pronounce. It was a vast, sandy beach with an outstanding view of the mountains. There were a few really cool caves that we were able to explore because the tide was low. I imagined how cool it would be to swim in these caves and I hoped that maybe someday I'll get the opportunity. We then climbed on top of a cliff edge to get a better view. It was awesome. I wanted to walk across the cliff but T said that if it was closed off then we may risk being able to get down while the tide is low so we made our way back down and walked some more along the beach. After our walk T remembered one more cool place that she wanted to show us which was an ancient Celtic forest within Snowdonia National Park and was surrounding a lake. This forest had so many traits to it that made it feel like you were walking inside a forest straight out of a fairytale, from the most covered slate walls to the ancient trees to the lush green nature enveloping a fallen over tree to the misplaced plant life like bamboo trees. It was such a whimsical walk that felt almost therapeutic. It was nearing 17:30 so we decided to grab a bite at the pub outside the forest but were quite disappointed with the portion sizes they gave us of the chips we ordered so we set back to T's town of Blaenau Ffestiniog and purchased some more (which ended up being too much) chips and a couple of spring rolls that were the size of paninis from a local Chinese takeaway. We ate our takeaway next to a lake for a bit...before being attacked by midges so then we ran to T's car to finish it off. We felt properly full of grease after this so we went for a short walk around the lake (by now you can guess that Snowdon National Park is just full of picturesque lakes, mountains, and forests and is very much the scenery that I've been craving to see all year). We then headed back to T's place, said our goodbyes to her and her lovely parents and dog and then set off towards Conwy to pitch up for the night.

Day 25:

I'm so pleased that I've been able to see so many castles on this trip. Last time I lived in England, I hardly saw any although I saw a few castles in mainland Europe during my 2 month backpacking trip before starting my university exchange in Preston. This past year as well I don't think we saw any castles. We started the morning by driving back through Conwy and having a look at the medieval castle there. I unfortunately didn't get a photo though. We then began our drive out of Wales. We did, however, stop in a place called Prestatyn before fully leaving to nip into a Tesco's and use their facilities and get some caffeine. Here, I had the most ridiculous experience. I've dealt with some, let's say not so knowledgeable customer service people before in supermarkets in the UK but this took the cake. I decided to buy some Redbull and in the UK red bull is age restricted to people aged 16 and over (any energy drink is). But then there is also the think 25 policy here where customer service employees ask to check ID for anything age-restricted if they think you look under 25. This is completely fine because even though I am 25, I'm well aware that I could pass as 18 or younger so I always have my ID on me when I buy energy drinks. The thing is when I pulled out my Canadian driver's license that has my photo and age and everything that a normal ID has and which has been accepted literally everywhere else I've gone to (which is what I told her), the checkouts girl (who looked to be my age or younger) rejected it and refused to sell me the Redbull. I couldn't believe it! At first she looked at it and then immediately showed it to her associate who then said she would go and ask the manager about it. She gave me the absurd reason that because she had never seen this kind of ID before or don't get them often in the store (what do you mean "them"? Foreign ID?) that she needed to check that it was legit...I couldn't believe what I was hearing...so essentially because my ID was foreign and she'd never seen it before, she questioned whether it was real. Well, I've spent some time working at another supermarket here called Sainsbury's and we were taught that as long as the ID has their photo and age and looks like ID then it's acceptable. I said that to her (although didn't mention that I had worked at Sainsbury's) and she just kept giving me the most condescending look and said "you'd be surprised what people could fake! And I can't sell you this item if you are underage" ...well she showed it to her manager and she said that even the manager said they couldn't accept it! I tried to remain calm and reiterate that, that just can't be right but she stuck to her guns and said she couldn't sell me it. I went to tell the bf what had happened and he was equally shocked and angry on my behalf and said I should try and argue it so I decided to go back in, directly to customer service and ask to speak to the store manager myself. The customer service woman herself agreed that my ID should have been accepted but said I should be flattered that they thought I look younger than my age...that isn't the point though? I know I look younger than my age and I'm always happy to show my ID (I don't look younger than 16 though) but the point is that checkouts people (1 of which was apparently the checkouts manager!?) refused to accept my official, government-issued Canadian driver's license because it was foreign to them which is really just due to them being ignorant and clueless more than anything, but that's unfortunately how a large portion of the UK is now...when the manager came, he agreed that my ID should have been accepted. Vindication. So, feeling a bit petty, I went back to the same checkouts girl, asked her which manager exactly she spoke to because I had just spoken to the store manager and he said that my ID was completely fine. She gave me another stupid excuse but I just thanked her as a way of saying "fuck off" in my own way without actually saying it. She never apologized. I then used the self-scan machine right next to her but the coward that she is stormed off and got her friend to authorize my red bull instead while she grabbed a basket and aggressively threw it right next to me to pretend she was putting it away. I gave her a smile on the way out and felt victorious but still in complete disbelief at how unprofessional that whole interaction was. We then drove to the top of a hill that had a gorgeous viewpoint of the entire city that wiped away the frustration of that whole event. We drove to Preston from there and had German doner for dinner and then to the Forest of Bowland AONB to chill for the rest of the evening (my favourite AONB so far).

Day 26:

Waking up in the Forests of Bowland was spectacular with the mountains on one side and the sun on the other, it was beautiful. We drove through such gorgeous valleys and fields, it didn't feel like the England that I'd been living in for the past 11 months. I was overjoyed to have the opportunity to see it but a bit sad that I was missing out on sights like this all year. Once we'd driven through the forest, we filled up on petrol at ASDA and freshened up in their washrooms. We then headed into the city of Lancaster where we first had dessert for breakfast at a place called Kaspa's (oh my I'm going to be working off a lot when we get back home). From there we ventured off and walked around the city and up to the Lancaster castle which served as a prison for some time but now houses the Crown Court and is open to the public in some parts. I was pretty tired owing to having a restless sleep the night before with the storm being easily audible from inside the car. At about 5 we decided to set off towards the lake district and Scafell Pike. This drive was probably just a bit more amazing then the one we had this morning. It was absolutely stunning, the bf had to pull over so I could take more photos but my camera most likely doesn't do it any justice. Just absolutely breathtaking and just what you want to end the night on before going to bed.

Day 27:

Ahh! Scratch what I said about need 2 1/2 to 3 months for the UK and Ireland (well I suppose you can do if you want to take your sweet time), we have covered so much ground and expect to cover a lot more by the 31st, so this trips need at most 2 months and we reckon if we were to do the whole of Ireland then we could probably do it 10 days but we're still saving that for another time. You know those days when you feel like you did a lot but didn't really accomplish anything? This would have been one of those days. I don't know, I guess it was because of the rain as well but the bf and I were also feeling pretty grumpy all day and were short with each other a lot. We had parked just outside Scafell Pike hoping that maybe there was a chance we could wake up and the weather would be great for a hike but it had rained all night and it didn't look like it was going to let up in the morning so unfortunately, we had to give up on the idea of hiking Scafell Pike at least at this part of the trip. The bf told me it always rains in the Lake District and that it's hardly ever sunny but I was really hoping that I would get to see the lakes in all their glory. There was nothing around (except for the lakes and mountains of course) so we decided to drive 15 mins North West out of the lakes to a small seaside town called Seascale. It was very quiet there and we found a small, family-run cafe that served breakfast, cakes, coffee, and tea. We managed to freshen up there and made a new plan for the day which was to drive to Windermere, Grasmere and then watch the Liverpool game somewhere. Well, when we got to Windermere, it was absolutely packed with tourists and still raining which just made us more grumpy. The bf and I don't do well in big touristy crowds. We walked around for a bit and then the bf got more coffee but we quickly gave up on trying to enjoy ourselves since it was just so noisy and busy and the visibility of the lake was horrendous because of the rain and honestly I was just really bummed out about not being able to see the lake properly. So off we went to Grasmere. It was a tiny village but really cute. The reason we went to Grasmere was because of the gingerbread shop that's been there for hundreds of years with an old recipe that claims to make unique gingerbread that is crumbly and gooey. Well, let me tell you that, that claim is not unfounded. There was a big line outside the shop too so you know they're popular. They weren't mind-blowingly delicious or anything but they were yummy. After that, we were at a loss of what to do. The weather was miserable so we couldn't really do anything outdoorsy which is also sad because half the point of this trip was to explore Britsh nature and wilderness and do a lot of hikes but we're in the second half of this trip and that seems unlikely to happen now. Especially since I'm kind of running out of funds for this trip now. We debated whether or not to go to a hotel for afternoon tea but it was getting too late for that. We settled on just cutting our losses and leaving the lakes early. We decided to drive straight up to Glasgow. On the drive up I could really feel how burned out the bf was getting and I started feeling really guilty. I'm used to roughing it up for long periods of time but I don't think he is. I mean we've both been grumpy today but for different reasons. I'm sad this trip isn't going as I hoped it would because of the weather and not being able to save up enough this year and he's just tired and growing more and more irritable as the days go on. I booked us a night's stay in an Airbnb for the day after because we both need to do laundry anyway and he just needs a good night's sleep. Once we got to Glasgow, we watched the game (Liverpool won, yay!) and then we drove up to a country park to pitch up for the night.

Day 28:

When we woke up it was rainy and windy so we decided to head to a nearby shopping mall from the country park to charge up with some coffee. After a couple of hours there we drove into Glasgow for some sightseeing. This proved to be a bit difficult because we soon found out that Glasgow is an outrageously expensive city with exuberant parking charges. It took us a while to find something, but after around 45 mins of driving around we chanced upon a car park that was behind a pub that looked to have absolutely no parking charges or restrictions and seemed to be somewhat of a mostly unknown free car park. After double-checking that it really was free we set off to explore the city. Glasgow is really cool. It has an interesting mix of old school buildings and historical architecture as well as more modern ones with a TON of incredibly artistic graffiti on the side of buildings everywhere . We walked around for a while and tried the famous deep-fried Mars bar which I thought was yummy but it wasn't to the bf's taste. We were still hungry so we grabbed lunch at a place called Bread Meats Bread because I heard that they do great poutine and boy was I right. The poutine was massive and absolutely delicious with tons of gravy and cheese curds, probably the best poutine I've had in the UK. We also got a pastrami sandwich and a fried chicken grilled cheese melt that were both oh so good and served in some pretty spectacular toast. After exploring more of what the city had to offer which included a Tardis propped up in the city square and a statue of a colourful laughing child. At around 4 we decided it was time to head to the Airbnb that we booked for the night but not before stopping in Morrisons to grab some instant noodles for the road. This Airbnb was lovely, clean and just what we needed to have a proper charge up. We took the rest of the night easy, did our laundry, played with the host's dogs and had a shower. The host, herself, was also really friendly and was into all the same fandom as us from Marvel to Doctor Who to Game of Thrones to Harry Potter. The tv in our room was also massive so we watched an episode of Doctor Who before calling it a night.

[pyrogina]

my keto experience

Intro/TL:DR

As a preface I can report that I lost 17lbs in 30 days while strictly adhering to a keto diet.  I'm a 34 year old canadian woman who works from home as an artist and a huge helping factor for me was the freedom to stay home on the bad days and the ability to purchase fresh meats and vegetables on a weekly basis. This is a really tough diet but if you put the right pieces in place, it might work for you too.  Additionally, I am NOT a dietitian/nutritionist in any way, shape, or form.  Everything posted here is from my own experience and a modicum of research on the net.  Please double-check my facts before you begin this diet for yourself.

Is keto for you?

The first and hardest question to ask yourself about a ketosis diet is, Can I Endure this? And you should not feel any guilt if the answer to that question is no, because this is a very invasive and aggressive diet that will cause you physical pain even if just for a brief amount of time. Similar to vegetarianism, or is extreme cousin, veganism, a keto diet involves cutting out large swaths of the food pyramid to facilitate this diet. This does not mean going hungry, the foods that are removed will be replaced with other foods, only without any (or minimal) artificial or natural sugars. Sugar is just a chemical, which doesn't sound like a huge sacrifice, right? Most adults don't bother adding sugar to anything other than tea or coffee, but sugar is much more deeply rooted in our lives than you may realize.

Carbohydrates can be found in virtually every type of ready-to-serve foods: breads, wraps, pastas, fried snacks, hors d'oeuvre (these are examples of things I ate before this diet). All of these delicious and very satisfying foods have a fiber content and sugar content. You're still allowed to consume these, and I encourage you do so, but make sure to monitor the grams of total carbohydrates you consume that day. During this diet you will only be allowed to consume 20 grams (to 50 grams, depending on your body and personal needs) a day. remember this. Those 20 grams of carbs maybe the difference between you having a normal day and one of the worst days of your life.

Before I chose to begin a keto diet, I had been exercising casually (as before I was sedentary, more details on this later) and consuming about half as many carbohydrates as I had normally done in my life before. During the two years I was living this way, I was able to lose approximately 20lbs (from about 230 to 210).  If you're starting your diet or lifestyle change from scratch, maybe try starting here first.  Its significantly slower (10lbs in nearly a year), but it will not cause any pain or significant inconvenience.

What’s the big deal?/What to eat?

Sugar is a chemical, and more than that, its a drug that your body has been dependent on since you were a wee baby in your mama’s belly.  Sugar makes your brain work and when you mess with your brain’s intake of the all-important-life-sauce it goes into panic mode. In the first 2-3 days (up to 6 if your me!) you will literally, physically go into a state of depression.  Many had described it to me as ‘keto flu’ but as a survivor of 2009s Swine flu, I can most assuredly tell you that keto is much, MUCH worse.

First, my appetite became very finicky (and i'm already a very picky eater).  I had no desire to eat the genuinely tasty keto meals that my boyfriend had lovingly prepared.  I didn't want to draw, and I wasn't even in the mood to play easy video games.  All I felt like doing was crying or sleeping (which I did, for 9 hours in the middle of my 3rd day).  This is why, whenever I speak to someone who’s even moderately interested in this diet to BOOK TIME OFF YOUR JOB!!! It’s inconceivable to me to be forced to face other human beings in this state of physical distress.  You need to pamper yourself while in this state in order to endure it and ensure your success.

There was one more bump in the road around the one-week point but i'm fairly certain it came down to a combination of dehydration and moodiness (period) so perhaps that was an outlier.  Either way, water is the key when you start feeling shitty.  Get yourself a nice BPA-free water bottle that you're comfortable carrying around and keeping full of fresh water.  Once your body is in ketosis (you can check using those little paper sticks you pee on from the drug store, wash your hands!) you will get tired and moody the very instant you become hungry at mealtimes.  Sometimes you don't even feel the familiar hunger pangs from your previous diet and mistake it for just a general bad mood. Always have a sip of water, babes; that’s your brain telling you to hydrate.

Alternatively, after eating a keto meal you still may feel hungry or unsatisfied, even sad (longing for your favourite dessert).  This is where those 20g of carbs come in pretty clutch.  Finding your perfect portion of reward may be impossibly difficult, I can only tell you what made me feel better when I got the cravings.  Blueberries are quite sweet, they have a lot of natural sugar, but a handful of them sufficed as an incredibly sweet treat (some keto dieters have proclaimed that ‘regular things taste much sweeter than before’, I didn't experience this). Minigo/iogo yoghurt cups are fatty and sweet and work as a decent replacement to ice cream (count the carbs!).  On extra tough mornings (in addition to bacon and eggs! Totally keto!) we would split a cavendish oven-fried hashbrown (about 15g; 7.5g split between my partner and I).

There are a surprising amount of natural foods that are not keto, but in careful proportions, can be incorporated into a daily keto diet.  Most every fruit (that I checked) is very sugary but can make for a nice dessert.  Certain vegetables like carrots or potato have too many carbs to be anything more than a boost when you feel shitty. Red onions have a very small amount of carbs (sugar and fibre work together to your benefit!) and server to replace pasta as a side to a nice steak dinner.

On that note, you need fibre to make your BMs move.  Cutting carbs from your life means your number 2’s go bunny mode…. Take a sugar-free metamucil on any day where you have more meat during a meal than other types of food, or the toilet will be a nightmare.

Meals:

Cutting away pastas, breads, and other sides seems like an insane task but with some discipline and creativity, it's quite manageable.  Breakfast didn't change much: eggs any way (sunny side for me, cheddar omelette for my BF) with bacon or sausage. Lunch was some combination of chicken breast and various salads (so many salad dressings are low or no carb! Read the back!). On steak night, we replace noodles with sauteed red onions fried and seasoning.  Snacktime was usually pre-sliced cheddar cheese (go NUTS that shit is A-OK!), unsalted peanuts (other nuts have marginally more carbs, almonds and sunflower are moderate, check what works for you), or small amounts of beef jerky.  Accompany those snacks with a big drink of water, or if you've had enough of that, certain drinks are acceptable like tea or coffee (with sweetner and high fat milk, skim milk is too sugary), diet sodas, sugarfree drink mix (migo, nestea).  Just remember water, water, water.

Is it worth it? Pros/Cons

Cons:

-HURTS LIEK DRUG WITHDRAWL (you're literally coming down from the lifelong chemical addiction of sugar.  It hurts like Trainspotting)

-MEAT (you will be consuming a lot of animal product)

-POOP (even when you have your metamucil, the toilet can take some time)

-SWEETS (the cravings for your favourite yumyums will almost never stop, it takes monk-like discipline)

-BORING (you can't go out and enjoy meals/drinks with friends and family without them or the restaurant making odd or even crappy exceptions.  Keto menu options are slowly becoming popular though)

-TIRED (the first week or two will be very tedious and you won’t have any energy, even your favourite hobbies may seen unfulfilling for a time)

-ALCOHOL (basically none, unless you like vodka and sugarfree mix, you'll get drunk a lot quicker and end up feeling shittier without carbs in your body to process the liquor)

Pros:

-INSTANT RESULTS (in my first week i lost nearly 10lbs, and then two for every subsequent week. note that, just like any diet, there will be bounce-back)

-APPETITE LOSS (once you get into the swing of this, after the 2 week mark, you’ll find you no longer are pained when your hungry and the bigger cravings subside)

-BUDGET (this is a bit of an odd one and may not necessarily reflect your cost benefits.  Before engaging in this diet, my BF and I discovered we were spending too much money on restaurants and leaving the food in the fridge to waste.  This was primarily because we were too lazy to cook.  Getting off our asses and cooking 6 days of the week made an immediate impact on this for us.  If you already do that, this won't apply.  Concurrently, we spent more money at the grocery store ensuring we always had fresh meat and vegetables; this did net us positive)

-REWARDING MEALS (having to stop and think about what it takes to make a tasty and satisfying meal has forced us to look at things in a different way.  Making yourself and your partner a healthy, supremely tasty meal gets those endorphins peaking)

-EXERCISE (Unnecessary! Your choice! Just note that building muscle increases your weight as muscle weights more than fat)

My fave meals:

-Coffee (reluctantly replacing 1tsp of sugar with a fairy-dust sprinkling of sweetner cos i HATE sweetner, its 20-30x stronger than sugar so you only need 1/20th as much)

-Eggs and bacon!!! (sausage sometimes too)

-Garlic grilled chicken with spinach salad (onions, sliced almonds, feta, dressing)

-Steak and red onions (meat rare and onions grilled with seasoning)

-Spicy ground pork tacos (replace the taco/burrito with large boston lettuce leaves, shredded cheddar, green onions, diced tomato, dab of ranch sauce)

-Baked chicken breast stuffed with ricotta and spinach, topped with parmesan

-Slow-cooked pulled pork slathered with sharp cheddar (just eat with a fork!)

-Baked shrimp with garlic butter and parmesan

-Jalapenos stuffed with ricotta, cream cheese and cheddar, then wrapped in a strip of bacon (great late-night snack)

-Even changing the texture of a cheese can change the taste of the meal.  Shredded cheddar adds a salty bite to a lettuce wrap, grated parmesan can trick a baked chicken breast into thinking its breaded.  creamy cheeses can replace other baking sauces entirely.

-Diet pops (make sure its 0 sugar!), and tea/coffees with sweetner are fine, they do contain a lot of sodium though, make sure to drink 1-for-1 with water (meaning: every diet coke or tea you have, accompany it with the same amount of plain water so your body can process it and pee it out).

Variations/Control:

Vitamins: It should be noted that I take a daily multivitamin (C3+D) as I generally don't get enough sun or fruits.  I highly recommend you take these just in general. They help keep skin soft and blemish free (I initially began taking these because of acne on upper arms and it cleared within days).

Activity: As briefly mentioned earlier, I began shifting from sedentary (not moving much, sitting for hours a day) to a more active lifestyle about 2-3 years ago. This entailed a personal regimen of making an attempt at physical activity approximately half the days of the month (period week was generally excluded).  Every other day I would attempt one of the following: walking at least 2km, 15-20m of floor exercises (‘lady push-ups’, sit-ups), 15-20m of time on the indoor bike, or an hour of house related chores (lifting, laundry, cleaning, anything that involves getting sweaty).  In addition to these, yoga is peppered into my lifestyle as frequently as possibly, particularly in the morning before breakfast. On days where i'm unable to exercise, I at least attempt the basic yoga poses to stave off my (no-longer chronic) back pain.

[occasionalfics]

In The Meantime (Thor X Reader)

drabble masterlist | series masterlist | taglist (let me know if it’s working pls!)

For Anonymous: “Can I request drabble/fic where say the reader got injured on their last mission and was told to refrain from any sexual activity by their doctor for a few weeks but their bf Thor is visiting and reader is super horny and begs him to at least get off next to them so they can watch and wish they could participate?”

A/N: I was kinda worried about this being weird but...I don’t think it is. Also...knee-highs? Really? Okay. Anyway. I tried to go for a gender neutral reader :D

Warnings: WOW THIS IS NSFW/18+, it’s basically all masturbation. Just being honest.

Words: 2,453

Your last mission went horribly wrong right at the tail end of it all. It wasn’t so bad that you wouldn’t ever be allowed back in action, but it was bad enough that you’d be out of commission for a few weeks. A few of your ribs were broken and you had a bad enough concussion that Dr. Cho wouldn’t allow you out of her medical wing for three days after you returned from the mission. You spent most of that time rolling your eyes and attemping to prove that your ribs wouldn’t magically cause any internal bleeding if you just leaned over the wrong way once.

But they would, and Dr. Cho knew your stubborn personality better than you thought. It wasn’t your first time being placed in her care.

She let you out of the infirmary on the fourth morning after the mission, but demanded you stay on bedrest for at least another three days. A full week in bed with nothing to do. You were restless, mostly because your boyfriend had disappeared after Ultron showed up and you hadn’t seen or heard from him since. You’d thrown yourself into work and missions in the interim to distract yourself, but being forced to stay in bed would only bring on panic as you worried more and more.

FRIDAY kept a close watch on you. She was at least open about sending daily reports to Dr. Cho, but her intense stare via infared camera only made you more nervous. It stunned you into submission, and you hated it.

Toward the end of your prescribed bedrest, there was a knock on the door. It was soft and quick, and when you called for the person to open the door, Thor stepped inside.

Only he was completely different. He had one eye, for starters, and a huge hole where the other used to be. He was covered in dark marks and scars, and his cape hung from only one shoulder. You would’ve flung yourself out of bed if it didn’t mean FRIDAY would immediately alert Dr. Cho about it.

“Baby?” you asked, slowly sitting up with a long, drawn-out groan from the self-induced pain in your ribs. “What the hell happened?” You waved him over, and Thor obliged, walking to you and sitting on the edge of the bed by your knees.

“I could ask the same of you,” he retorted. “Except both Tony and Dr. Cho informed me what happened to you, Wreckless One.” He smiled softly at you, reaching gently for your hand.

You pulled it from his automatically, going straight for his hair despite the surge of pain that ran through you. “You got a haircut,” you said. “And your eye… My ribs will fix themselves, but your eye…” You traced your fingers down his face and gently ran your pads along the darkened skin aournd his empty eye socket.

“You don’t want to know what happened to me,” he said. “It’s not a happy story.”

You pushed yourself closer to him, still groaning as your ribs most likely pushed themselves into places they weren’t meant to be. All of that, just so you could kiss him and remind him that you most certainly wanted to hear what he had to say, no matter what. You loved him, and not a missing eye or a crudely planned haircut would change that. “Tell me anyway,” you whispered as you sat back.

He shook his head, but only followed it with helping you relax against your pillows. You pressed your hand against the empty spot on the bed where he would fit, and so he kicked off his boots and laid down beside you. Then he recouted his whole story - of Surtur and Hela and Sakaar - until there was nothing left to say. The silence that followed was awful, and you couldn’t help but reach out and touch his scarred, beautiful face to try to comfort him. He sighed, but the silence pervaded.

After a bit, Thor leaned over you and crashed his lips against yours. You had just kissed him a few minutes ago, but it didn’t feel like it. There was urgency to this kiss, and to the way his fingers pressed against your sides - in response to which you winced, not moaned, and he noticed the difference. He immediately stopped, pushed himself away, and turned over so he was beside you again. You groaned at him in frustration rather than pain.

“You can’t just leave me like that,” you whispered, trying to reach for him. “You can’t start something and then stop just because my ribs are healing.”

“Actually,” FRIDAY cut in, in a manner you’ve never heard of her before. She would normally wait for prompting, but you thought perhaps someone saw something on the infared camera across the room or something. “Dr. Cho has placed a note in your file stating that you should refrain from any sexual activity until further clearance is given.”

“Fuck Dr. Cho,” you mumbled as Thor chuckled and grabbed your hands in his.

“Dr. Cho is unavailable at this time,” FRIDAY said.

Thor laughed again, but you weren’t in a similar mood. You crossed your arms as gently as you could and made up for it with the most sour face you could conjure. “You can’t get me started like that and then not finish the damn job!” you said, regardless of having said something similiar before FRIDAY had so rudely cut in. “FRIDAY, can you shut the hell up and leave us alone for an hour? Please?” you called, never looking away from Thor.

“One hour timer set, Agent. I’ll check back then.”

“Thank Gods,” you sighed, and then Thor turned over so he rested on his elbows, though still not over you.

“Yes?” he asked, an entirely different person now that you were kind of turned on and slightly embarrassed. He smirked, knowing he’d riled you up.

“You’re really just gonna not touch me because some stupid robot said not to?” you asked him, lightly straching one of his huge muscles on his bicep so you didn’t have to move too much. You thought you might be able to save some stamina if you made little movements, litte touches to entice him, but Thor knew that wasn’t how human bodies worked.

He shrugged. “If Dr. Cho says you should refrain from sexual activity, who am I to question her?”

“A literal fucking God,” you said as you lowered your brows. “A literal God who’s been gone for two fucking years, leaving me with all this stupid pent up energy that my stupid broken ribs are keeping me from expending all over you.” You knew he loved dirty talk, so you tried your best, although it almost made you feel pathetic. He was way better at it, and his sarcastic smirk told you that he knew it, too. You whined and said, “C’mon, Thor! Please! Something - give me something!”

He wiggled his eyebrows at you, then pecked your cheek without touching much else beyond your shoulder. “You’re adorable,” he said, once again grabbing your hand. “And I apologize for being gone so long. I was keeping the leaders of the other realms from advancing on Asgard-”

“Yeah, okay, cool, but I’m still ready to go here and I don’t know when you’re leaving again,” you told him. You’d have time for more stories later, maybe. Or when he came back again. You cursed yourself for having made whatever mistake on the last mission that had left you with broken ribs and the threat of internal bleeding. All you wanted to do was jump his bones before he left again, preferably without dying in the process.

“I don’t, either,” he said quietly. When you saw the seriousness in his eye, you knew he was tellign the truth. He didn’t have many other places to go, you remembered. Maybe he was here for good, but that still didn’t help the ease the heat that flushd your body. “We have time, and I can be patient.”

“I can’t,” you mumbled, tracing small circles on the back of his hand. You bit your lip and pulled him to you so you could kiss him again, because if that was the most you were going to recieve until Dr. Cho said otherwise, then you had to take it. But Thor had a certain effect on you; even if he wasn’t trying to turn you on, he was doing it anyway. You were putting yourself in a corner you couldn’t really afford to be in, but you didn’t want to stop yourself.

There was another sharp pain in your side, and you gasped against him before he pulled back.

“I won’t hurt you,” he said softly, a hint of a warning on his tongue. “We’re waiting.”

You moved your hand down to try stroking him over his trousers, but he caught you in the middle of the act and shook his head. “We’re waiting,” he repeated, louder this time. More commanding.

You huffed and laid back against your pillows as you shook your head. You almost crossed your arms and put your sour face on again, but then an idea struck you. If you couldn’t get release, maybe you could convince him to give it to himself. That might help, maybe. It could make things more tense bewteen your legs, but you wanted to give it a chance anyway.

“Fine,” you said, “we’re waiting. But…”

He rolled his eye before you went on. “I hesitate to ask what it is you’re about to ask of me,” he told you.

“What if…” You bit your lip, then reached out and ran your fingers through his short hair. He was sticky, like he’d been sweating before he came to find you and hadn’t even managed to shower. It wouldn’t matter with what you were about to ask him anyway. “What if you...worked yourself...for me?”

He stared at you for too long. You knew you’d have to help him clean his eye and find a patch or something for it, but you doubted losing an apendage could kill him now if it hadn’t already. He could stand to get a good handjob, even if it was from his own hand.

“You won’t let me touch you until Dr. Cho says so,” you said, vitriol lining her name even though she was only looking out for your health, “so why don’t you do the job for me? And when I’m better, I’ll repay you for it.” You wiggled your brows at him, still running your fingers through his hair, hoping that would play some part in convincing him that you needed him to do this.

Either it did, or it had no part in his decision at all. Either way, he sighed, turned himself over so he was on his back, and looked at you again. “You’re sure this is what you want?” he asked.

“No, it’s not,” you said simply. “But it’s close enough.”

You both took a second, then shrugged at the same time. Thor went slowly as he pulled his armor off, handing it to you one piece at a time so you could place it in a nice pile beside the bed. You missed seeing his glorious naked body, and while he wouldn’t let you explore it the way you wanted to, having him so close in such a state was enough to satisfy your craving for him. For now, anyway.

You motioned for him to lean against you, and he compromised by placing his head on your shoulder. You wrapped your arm around him and drew little patterns against his chest, which was just as sticky as his hair and beautifully displayed for your viewing pleasure. You focused on his hands, though, and placed a kiss on his head as he trailed his fingers all over his body. You bit your lip to keep from gasping when he gripped his cock in one hand but dug your nails into his skin when he gently started pumping.

You could hear how desperate for moisture his skin was, and you weren’t sure how he’d react to you forcing his fingers into your mouth, so you went with a safer option. You could just reach a bottle of lotion you kept on your bedside table with the tips of your fingers, so you brought that over to him and pushed a dollop into his free palm.

“Thank you,” he said, always royally polite.

You chuckled and rolled your eyes, even if he couldn’t see it. After putting the lotion away, you focused on him again and enjoyed the show. He worked himself the way you wanted to, and in minutes he was already leaking precum. You continued to gently run your fingers over his chest, trying not to block his vision to what was going on below. You moaned when he did, kissed his head when you especially liked a move or a sound he made. He pumped faster, arched his back, and dug his head into your shoulder, and you gasped behind him, hoping he would turn his head so you could really kiss him. But he didn’t; he just shut his eye and grunted, picking up speed as you watched his toes curl. You knew he was close, so you pushed your nails into his chest and bit your lip.

“Fuck, baby,” you whimpered close to his ear. “This is so hot.”

That was all he needed to push himself over the edge. His his bucked repeatedly as white streams of his cum pumped out of him in bursts, covering the sheets and parts of his thighs. You wished all of that was inside you, but you didn’t say as much. You let him have this, knowing what he’d already been through.

You let him catch his breath before pulling his face towards yours. He obliged, and even let you lean over to kiss him. When you pulled back, you kept your forhead against his, even though your position put strain on your sides. Not much, but enough for you to feel uncomfortable. Still, you told him, “Thank you, baby.”

“I’m the one who came. I should be thanking you,” he whispered.

You smiled and softly touched his cheek, unwilling to argue anymore. He’d done what you’d asked of him. It wasnt enough, but it had to be, for the time being. “The second Dr. Cho gives us the all clear, I’m letting you do whatever it is you want to me. So get creative,” you told him.

His smile was all the assurance you needed to know that was exactly what he needed to hear.

Tags! (link above to add yourself if the doc ever wants to work again!)

Global/Permanent: @infinityblogger @champion-ofthe-sun @hopefulblazetriumph @httpmcrvel @capsheadquaters @samanthasmileys @sunigyrl

Thor: @thewayilookatbacon @athorable-and-deanlicous @baileythepenguin @mysweetcookie99 @girlwhoisfearless @tegan-eva @loveavengersandspn @loverofthor

Drabbles: @athorable-and-deanlicous

[msfoodlover]

April in Pictures

APRIL – “All’s well that ends well” is how I would sum up the month of April. April had me on my toes taking care of life’s business. I had to travel for work, had multiple work projects, car issues and family celebrations.  It was indeed a stressful and busy month but definitely not lacking in fun, travel and love from family and friends. Here are the highlights:

CAR STORY

After the bf got his car fixed, it was my turn to deal with car issues. My car had to go into the shop for a major repair. I have had enough of this stress that I have been dealing with for over 2 months. (I let the bf drive my car while his was in the shop forever!)  I finally bought a new car. I have always wanted a Jeep and 4 wheel drive, so I finally got one. I am very happy cruisin’ in my brand new Jeep while blasting the satellite radio. The bf and I are looking forward to driving it to the snow in the winter. (And I still have not given up on my old gal Toyoto Matrix, she is still in the shop with our turtle of a mechanic trying to save her. I am sentimental like that.)

BABY NEPHEW’S 1ST BIRTHDAY AND BAPTISM

A GRAND CELEBRATION:  That started at 9 in the morning for the baby dedication followed by lunch reception at Tomi’s Sushi and Seafood Buffet in San Jose, CA. Then followed  by a feast at the grandparents’ house that lasted until almost midnight. We stuffed ourselves with yummy Filipino food including lechon (roasted pig). Food was beyond plentiful and everyone took lots of food home. It was a  great time with my whole family and lots of  play time with my baby nephew.

EASTER

HOT CROSS BUNS: Easter means indulging in Hot Cross Buns that are only available during this season. (I make sure that I get my fill because they are only around once a year. Yum!)

EASTER SUNDAY: I spent Easter Sunday with the bf’s family. It stormed really hard all day. We celebrated Easter at Texas Roadhouse. ( I had  burger and fries.)

DATE NIGHTS

PIZZA AND PASTA DATE NIGHT:  A casual date night at this suburban Bay Area restaurant (Pizza Napoli) to escape the nightmarish parking (lack thereof) in SF and surrounding areas. We had creamy artichoke pasta, sausage thin crust pizza and glass of cab. It was not bad at all!

WINGSTOP AND MEXICAN FOOD: After spending about 5 hours at the car dealership and sealing the deal, the bf and I were beyond famished! We celebrated by ordering  chicken wings, fries,  nachos and quesadilla to go and devoured them at home!

TRAVEL AND VACATION

SAN ANTONIO TEXAS:  I was in Texas for work turned vacation. I asked the bf to meet me after my work was done. It was 4 days of delicious Tex-Mex and bbq meals, and  margarita-filled date nights at the famous River Walk, and a visit to the historic Alamo. It turned out to be a really fun vacation after the sleepless nights, jet lag and work stress.

OTHER LOVELY MOMENTS

MORNING CARPOOL WITH THE BF: With the car drama were some nice moments such as commuting with the bf to San Francisco. He had a project in SF and he dropped me off in the Financial District. I do not remember going to work with him ever in the years of being together. It was a beautiful cold morning and I treated myself to a bacon and cheese croissant before going to my office.

COFFEE DATE WITH BFF: She was as busy as I was but we managed to meet up at our new hangout which is SFMoMa for a quick date. As always she spoiled me with tons of treats including salads and rice crackers. Thanks, BFF!

WONTON AND COLD: The bf brought me wonton soup when I had to stay home for a minor cold. This was impressive that I was only sick for a day when everyone in my family and at work were catching the flu left and right!

MORE BIRTHDAY CELEBRATIONS; Loved ones’ birthday celebration at Paxti’s pizza but I was too tired to even take a picture.  (Unheard of!) I managed to take one photo of the cake.

I am thankful for the strength and energy that came with the challenges.  I am thankful for the blessings of my family, the celebration of my little nephew’s 1st birthday, travels and happy moments with my bf, quiet yet happy moments with BFF, the new car, stressful yet rewarding and fulfilling career, and the blessings of delicious meals and good health.

TO MY TUMBLR FRIENDS: So, these were where I had been and what I had been doing during the month of April. Thank you very much for continuing to support and visit my blog despite my inactivity on Tumblr. I miss your blogs and hoping to drop by soon!

[invincible-selfxmade-punk]

Pull Me Under

Warning:  Long Post, no 

I really wanted to talk about what happened to me this week.

 Will I survive the night on my own?

I am a workaholic because my dad was a workaholic and he's the one who raised me I was raised and told that to ask for help is a sign of weakness. To show weakness is a sign of weakness, to tell the truth when someone asks you how you are is a sign of weakness, to slow down on any level is a sign of weakness.

 My dad live by these rules and unfortunately that caused him to die younger than he should have, falling cancer when he was normally pretty healthy.  It is also this mentality that allowed me to survive when I was left to be an orphan at the age of 20 and it is how I have lived my life since.

 However it is something that I feel needs to change now in order for me to live longer, You do not have to live your entire life in this fashion in order to survive or in order to impress people.

 I have always prided myself on not taking sick days on coming to work no matter how bad I felt and finishing my shifts because in the back of my mind I thought that any time I ever told my boss I was too sick to work they thought I was lazy, and I would go on the list of the first person to be fired if the opportunity came up.  It has always been my way to hide how I really feel, how sick I truly am, because in the long run no one cares but me anyway, and if somebody else can see that and use it as against me, somehow they're going to do it.  In the last TEN YEARS I have taken less than ten sick days from work.

 My first year teaching has changed all that because I got sick about every 2 months,  as soon as I was over one thing I was sick with something else. I had ten sick days to play with but I also had to work from 7 a.m. to 4 p.m. 5 days a week which meant I would have to take time off at some point doctor's appointments to keep myself healthy and that would eat up into my sick day time.  I think I ended the year with two days to spare and I was not going to mess with it.  

 I woke up Sunday morning knowing I was sick.  I had slept with the windows open and a cold front came in.  I could feel it growing colder but could do nothing because I was so exhausted I could not wake myself up enough to get out of bed and close them.  I woke up with chills, aches and a sore throat.  I ignored it.  I went to work.  I lasted until noon, went home and went to bed.  I should have called in for Tuesday but I did not I went to work. I had spent all of Monday freezing under 2 blankets with the heater turned up to 80 degrees.  But because I also did get some sleep and because that little bit of asleep I felt OK Tues. morning I made myself go to work.  I work the full day but  by the time it was time to go home,  I could not walk myself to my car.

 I have been fighting anxiety and dizzy spells for about a month-and-a-half so having to have someone walk me to my car really wasn't an alarm ball for me.  When I got home I tried to open some Gatorade and was shocked to find that I was too weak to get it open.  I don't own the thermometer which is something I need to change but I knew I was having a fever.  I started taking Tylenol PM but it did nothing it did not help my fever and it did not help me sleep.

 It would just so happen that I posted my symptoms to Facebook. A friend I barely knew that I had met through the Deuce fandom told me you need to go to the doctor right away you have pneumonia.  And I hate to say it but my first thought was “kid you're half my age what do you know?”.  But it did alarm me b/c he had the exact same symptoms. My sister Toni called and asked if I wanted her friend Cathy to take me to the dr.  Now normally I turn down offers like this.  Toni is now my only living sister, my family period really, and still sees me as being twelve.   And I would rather walk on broken glass than ask for help.  However I found myself agreeing to it ---maybe because of what the kid had said on Facebook--- but I still decided to go….. just not right away. I had not slept at all that night and I told my sister give me a chance to get some sleep.  The clinic I go to is open late, I could go in the afternoon .  However in the back of my own mind I was even thinking “well if you feel better after your nap just tell her you decide not to go and don't go.”

 The problem was, I couldn’t sleep, and I was getting worse. The appointed time came around I decided it was time to get out of bed………... only problem was I couldn't I couldn't make it more than two or three steps without being so overwhelmed so exhausted and dizzy I pretty much had to sit down wherever I was.  This was a problem because it is a long walk from where my house is to the driveway where you park your car as my house is in the middle of a field.  My sister’s bf Cathy is a small firecracker of a woman who could go toe to toe with the devil but is about one fourth my size.  I could not use her as a human crutch to get to the car. Again my first inclination was “go back to bed and sleep it off, go back to the doctor when you feel better” which is so ass-backwards it’s stupid, but I swear that’s how I felt.  I nearly called and told her not to come back but thank god I didn’t.  Cathy, being the resourceful woman that she is, drover her SUV through the field and up to my door.  I got into the car and she took me to the clinic.  At the clinic everyone stared because I needed a wheelchair to be brought in.

 Now let me discuss another component of why I have been reluctant to go to the doctor.  I have been going to a small clinic since I moved home and I really like it.  I recently found out that the guy I had a crush on my entire senior year of high school and freshman year of college is a nurse practitioner there whom I have not seen in 25 years. These stupid narcissistic fifteen-year-old in me would always say “Don’t go!  You look like shit and what if you get him as the one who sees you.”   I knew he worked there from calling in to get lab results from my last bouts with dizziness in April where I was given a clean bill of health.  I called the clinic to get my results only to have a friendly voice call me by my maiden name and ask (already knowing the damn answer) if I remembered him.

 So anyway at 3 pm Cathy wheels me in in the wheelchair and asked me if I want her to stay. I am already feeling guilty because she has offered to go get me some groceries which I desperately need and obviously can't get for myself so I tell her no there's no need for her to waste more time by waiting for me at the clinic just go ahead get the groceries I'll call her when the appointment is over just because I'm pretty sure they're just going to give me a prescription and send me back home.  The nurse takes my information, takes my blood pressure pulse and temperature then wheels me into another room where my worst nightmare comes true.  

 Lo and behold here comes My High School Crush. Only this time there is no witty banter no hey how you doing.  He looks at me and says   “You are very sick you need to be in the hospital.  If you were just dropped off here, I am going to call you an ambulance right now.”  He even gave me back my copay!   I know this is serious.   I called Cathy and told her she had to come back. Normal blood pressure is 120/80 and mine has always run just slightly lower than that.  A resting pulse rate for me is 85-99.   When my vitals were checked at the clinic my bp was 80/40, my pulse was 120 and I had 102 fever.

 I didn’t feel like my pulse was that fast, I wasn’t having no trouble breathing, I was just weak and tired.    BUT THAT’S JUST IT.  I’M A TEACHER, I AM ALWAYS FUCKING TIRED….just not hat bad. I got into the ER just as a trauma is coming in on an Angel Flight.  I know I’m going to be there a whle and tell Cathy to go home because there’s nothing she can do for me anymore anyway and I don’t want her to see me this sick.   My ex would never take me to the ER when I was sick, always made me go alone because he “hates hospitals, and get bored there’ so I was used to being in the ER alone. I wait about 30 min in the waiting room which honestly is not bad.   One they take my vitals they whisk me back to a bed.   They had to stick me 3 times to get an IV going, took blood, tried to catheterize me FIVE TIMES which left me literally screaming in pain (my lady parts are quite small and delicate).  I am given THREE bags of IV fluids before they can start to stabilize me.  But I’m too sick and exhausted to even be scared.

 I mean, I was scared, I knew it was serious and i prayed a lot but I literally did not have the energy to expend on being scared and worried. Those are the times I miss having someone with me.  Not in the waiting room but in the back to hold my hand when I’m getting stuck with needles and poked at and shit.  Just someone to tell me “It’s gonna be okay.”    But I didn’t have it and I haven’t that in so long I have learned to survive without it.    Every orderly, and nurse I saw (didn’t see a doctor for 4 hours) told me:  “You are one sick lady”.   But I was not in any pain, I could breathe fine, I was just so tired.

  A lady comes to go over my information.  I am asked if my sister Terri is still my emergency contact and I have to say the words “No she died two weeks ago” and it is hardest thing to say.  I wanted to follow it up “in this very ER” but I don’t.    As they are wheeling me down the halls to get a CAT scan on my chest I see the inside of the hospital really for the first time and it hits me fully:  THE LAST TIME I WAS IN THIS HOSPITAL WAS WHEN MY MOM DIED WHEN I WAS 12 AND NOTHING HAS CHANGED.   So now not only am I middle aged, helplessly sick and at the mercy of the world, I am also 12 years old, helpless, at the mercy of the world and watching my mom die.  Every door we pass looks like the door to the room she died in.

Now I know why I had nightmares of hospitals all the time when I was in college.  It never made sense then but it does now.  It was this hospital I was dreaming of and now I’m right back there.

 At 8 pm I am told I have pneumonia and am “septic”, which I had to literally google when I got home.  I knew it was not a good thing to be and always thought it meant your blood had been poisoned.    At 9 pm I am told I am being admitted.  At 10 pm I meet some of the nicest nurses I have ever met in my life in the ICU unit. The exact same ICU unit and quite possibly same room my mom spent a good deal of the last days of her life in as well.   On my fifth bag of IV fluid my pulse has only gone down to 108 and my blood pressure has only poked up to 96/56.   I am tied to so many machines I feel like I’m in the Matrix.  I don’t sleep for three days and getting out of bed to walk two steps to the toilet (which I am now having to do every 15 min b/c of the IV fluids) is enough to leave me out of breath and push my pulse rate back up.   This is also hard because of all the tubing and leads attached to me that I must pull, balance and not step on or let get tangled.  The bed is an ergonomic nightmare that is impossible to get up from even though it is just inches off the floor. It takes 10 bags of IV fluids, 3 bags of antibiotics, 3 shots in the stomach for blood thinner (PAINFUL) and three bags of potassium and magnesium before my vitals get to anywhere near the normal range. There are literally pages more I could write but I am still recovering and need some sleep.

[well-hidden-hot-mess]

i just...

so yesterday was a lazy day because i had literally zero motivation to do literally anything except get up once an hour for most hours so i could close my stand ring on my apple watch. spent most of the morning sitting at the table but then at like 2pm i just got so tired where i couldn't keep my eyes open and legit crawled into bed and took a nap... i don't know whether i should be happy or concerned because i never nap anymore because vyvanse won't let me so the fact that it let me is concerning for 2 reasons - 1. it means it's not as effective anymore and it's not just due to depression that i'm so low energy all the time and don't get the same jolt i used to and 2. it means my depression is much worse than i've let myself believe and getting worse... either way, not a fan. but thankfully i finally motivated myself to get out of bed at like 5pm and drank preworkout and didn't end up working out until 6pm but had a pretty decent band/bodyweight glute focused workout on my "rest day" from the Epic program. i'm glad i did because i was in a better mood after it and i burned enough calories so i could eat dinner because i may have gone a bit overboard earlier in the day.

after the whole weigh in debacle yesterday i was just in such a mood and i actually cried a little bit... i felt feelings and expressed them... i don't know who i am anymore but i'm not mad. so of couse after that rocky start to the day my brain instantly started dropping those random one liners saying "i could binge", "i want to binge", or just general thoughts about bingeing in general and i know now that's one of the warning signs that if i don't change something instantly that doom is on it's way so i distracted myself by allowing myself to lay in bed guilt free and watch true crime youtube videos while giving in a little bit by having a whole bag of popcorn for breakfast so my brain thinks it's a binge but it's not, then had some wasabi roasted edamame, a peach from the peach truck 😍, and some dates with almond butter as my preworkout snack and after all of that i had like 100 calories left and was about to be hangry while my stomach was growling so badly so i was like okay, just do something so you can eat dinner and ended up having a pretty good workout where i listened to haunted by t swift at the end and was doing the alt curtsey lunge to squat x 12/leg with a 15lb dumbbell and then dropping the weight and doing it again followed by RDL to deadlift x 12 with the DB and was struggling and dying and then that came on and i may have forced it a little bit but i cried for a second in between sets because the adrenaline and emotion was so high but my brain was like nope, you have one more set, we don't have time to feel emotions right now because your heart rate is going to drop so let's go haha. and yes i know that sounds bad that i'm saying i had to workout to "earn" eating dinner and while yes that's what i mean, it's not a punishment or anything - i came at it from the viewpoint of i've been doing so well this week and i avoided a binge all day even after that shitty weigh in and the frustration/emotions and i don't want to negate all the positive things i did today by going way over my calories and once again giving up right as i'm about to get out of the 190's for the millionth time recently and i don't want to keep repeating that pattern and letting myself stand in my own way/drag me down so i wanted to stay on track and push through because i knew i'd feel better after working out in general and then it would carry over to today waking up and not feeling that shame and negativity knowing i had let myself down again and knowing that if i pushed through, i would finally reach the 180's today and would feel proud and would be one large step closer to breaking this cycle aka i had good intentions i promise.

so after all of that i'm sure you're expecting the next thing i say is going to be "and i'm so glad i did because i'm finally in the 180's again!!! YAYYYY!" (accidental caps lock but i'm keeping it lol). well jokes on both of us because that's what i thought today too especially because i feel extra morning skinny and "empty" despite filling the second largest mixing bowl i own with a big ass "burger" salad bigger than my head and devouring it very close to bedtime so i'm like oh i must've dropped like a full pound or something. NOPE. stepped on the scale all excited and honestly just wanted to be lower than yesterday which was 190.3lbs and 30.4%bf... what did the scale say this morning you ask? oh just 190.3lbs and 30.4%bf 😑 i put the body fat in there because i figured oh i still have all that food in me so my weight might be skewed but if the body fat % goes down then i'll know i'm still heading in the right direction. NOPE OF COURSE NOT. today i'm not even sad about it, i'm just mad AF. now the logical side of my brain is trying to step in and remind me of a few things - 1. i didn't fall asleep until like 1am and woke up at 3:30am because (this is gross just fyi) sir sprayed his butt juice all over my bed/pillows/etc and the smell woke me up and then i was angry so i couldn't fall back asleep so 2.5 hours is not enough sleep and my body tends to hold onto stuff when i don't sleep enough so that's not helping. 2. i didn't drink enough water yesterday to help flush out all the salt i ate all day and just in general 3. i ate multiple literal pounds of food last night before bed and it hasn't been "processed" yet and is still all in there so i'm sure that's adding to it. 4. these little plateaus are normal and once i get a better night's sleep tonight and murder myself with the final full body DB workout of death in the Epic program and sweat my bodyweight's worth of sweat during it, i'll get that great woosh effect and all that i'm holding onto will see it's way out and i'll drop like 2lbs overnight (and now i've reminded my brain of two of it's favorite partial quotes to play on repeat for months at a time "if i haven't lost 2lbs by tomorrow i'm gunna be pissed" and "i feel like i keep getting heavier" both from the true life: i can't stay thin episode from like 10 years ago and those two quotes have been tormenting me since then. (jk i checked it was 2008 so 13 years ago holy shit i'm old). but anyway, yeah i'm annnoyed. am i still sitting here almost 2 hours later hoping that my body would wake up and do what it needs to do to process last night's meal so i can have a more accurate weigh in and honestly the one i deserve? yes, yes i am. am i debating drinking some of the digestion bitters in hopes that it speeds up the process? yes i am. is this me being a little crazy? definitely. am i going to stop myself or do anything to snap out of it and remind myself that one weigh in isn't that big a deal? no because that's what i've done the last 2 days and almost willingly dove head first into a binge and i don't know if i have that level of inner strength to do it again today if this doesn't go my way as pathetic as that is but honestly i just don't care - i worked hard, i deserve to see the reward/benefit of my actions (second time trying to figure out the right words and that's still not it but whatever moving on) and i'm not letting my stupid body take this away from me today. i need this win mentally and that's just how it is. okay i'm over listening to myself now so i'm gunna get up and start my day.

update: was getting changed into workout clothes so i figured why not just step on the scale since i'm already naked... and it happened 189.8lbs. should i be concerned about how much relief that brings me? a little. it didn't bring nearly the level of release i thought it would which could either be good because then my mental health isn't as tied to it as it normally is or what i think is the more probable answer bad because instead of feeling proud or relief or anything, i didn't really feel much and that means depression is taking emotions away again but for now i'm not going to overanalyze it, i'm just going to move onto other things and start my day and accept the feelings/lack of feelings and just move on.

[cannonisland9-blog]

My Trip to New York City — a NYC Native Traveling with a NYC Virgin!

Aug 28, 2018

My Trip to New York City — a NYC Native Traveling with a NYC Virgin!

New York City — whether you’ve visited the Big Apple before or not, “New York City” always brings something to mind.  Sex and the City, Law & Order SVU, Saturday Night Live, amazing food, tall buildings, crazy taxi drivers, a Starbucks on every block, etc. etc. etc.  This probably sounds super cliché, but New York City truly is a magical place.  There is so much to do, so much to see, so much to eat!  I wish I could say the people are friendly, buuuut nope… lol.  People be cray cray in NYC.  But that’s okay, you just can’t let it get to you.

I lived less than an hour away from NYC for over 10 years, from age 7 to 18.  I traveled to and from the bustling city most weekends, and lived there with my sister for a few months.  Even after moving to Arizona to attend university and moving to Texas post-grad, I’ve been able to visit NYC on quite a few occasions.  Six times to be exact.  My latest trip was with my boyfriend, Jake — a NYC virgin.

A HUGE thanks to TripAdvisor for providing free vouchers for us to use to scout the city together!

My boyfriend and I celebrated our one-year anniversary back in March but didn’t really have time to celebrate until summer.  He’s in college and works on the side, and I blog full-time, also working for other companies as an independent contractor.  We’ve always talked about traveling together but didn’t know where to go first.  He mentioned a while back that he had never been to NYC but wanted to some day.  In the back of my mind, I knew that’s where we’d travel first.

One day I was looking at flights, found some decently priced nonstop roundtrips to JFK, asked him if he was free those dates, aaaand whaddya know, our flights were booked  😉

Next on the list?  A place to stay and stuff to do!

We turned to TripAdvisor to get some ideas on things to do in New York City.

Because I’ve actually lived there and stayed away from touristy things for my entire life (because, duh, why would I want to endure the pain of standing in crowds of lost out of towners?), I didn’t know where to start.  TripAdvisor helped in that arena.  The website was super simple to navigate — we typed in “New York City” under the “Things To Do” tab and BOOM!  A big list of all the the “must sees” in New York for first timers!

TripAdvisor had lists of top things to do — the American Museum of Natural History (from the movie Night At The Museum), Times Square, Madame Tussauds, Central Park, etc. — but it also pointed us towards fun things that we never would have thought to do — like bike the Brooklyn Bridge and take a chocolate truffle-making class!

The selection of truffles you can make at Voilà Chocolat!

I didn’t want to arrive in NYC with a long list of things to do and see without planning it out beforehand.  Trips like that are never organized and you don’t get to cross everything you want off the list because something always gets in the way.  And New York City is huge.  You can’t walk from SoHo to Brooklyn to the Upper East Side all in one day.  Lots of walking and cab rides (don’t forget the traffic) are involved.  You just can’t wing it.

We got tickets to the attractions we wanted to visit via TripAdvisor and planned our days around specific locations so we didn’t kill our feet (or our wallets from all the taxi rides).

We got to do everything on our list and more, even though we were only there for a few days, and we had a blast!  Here’s some of what we did:

Attractions:

Times Square

Central Park

American Museum of Natural History and Hayden Planetarium (recommended by TripAdvisor)

Madame Tussauds (recommended by TripAdvisor)

Museum of Sex

Museum of Modern Art (recommended by TripAdvisor)

Brooklyn Bridge (recommended by TripAdvisor)

Grand Central Station

Eats:

Voilà Chocolat (recommended by TripAdvisor)

Loreley Beer Garden (recommended by TripAdvisor)

Grey Dog

3 different bagel shops (I don’t remember their names but they were all great!)

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French Macarons from Ladurée

Ladurée is tradition.  I get macarons there every time I visit NYC!

Coconut Thai Basil Donut from The Cinnamon Snail (recommended by a reader!)

Mind-blowing beet and burrata dish from Eva Jean’s (recommended by a friend!)

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At the American Museum of Natural History, we got the “Museum Plus All” tickets because we wanted to see the Hayden Planetarium too (my bf is a space nerd).  Here are some of the highlights:

Brain Pathways

Sensory Exhibit

Sensory Exhibit

Had to include this in here because this was actually our very first photo together after more than a year of dating ❤😂

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At Madame Tussauds, we got the “Silver/Standard” tickets.  Here is a goofy shot of us:

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At the Museum of Sex, we got “Anytime Admission” tickets.  Definitely one of the unusual things to do in New York City, but it’s definitely a interesting to say the least  😉

Playboy in Braille at the Museum of Sex

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At the Museum of Modern Art, we got “Skip-the-Line Access” tickets.

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We also got Day Pass Bike Rental tickets to bike across the Brooklyn Bridge.  Such a beautiful view!

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At Voilà Chocolat, we got tickets to the Make Your Own Gourmet Chocolate Truffles class.

I took my boyfriend here because I love, love, LOVE chocolate and kinda miss working with it in a bakery.  I honestly thought he would be bored during it because he doesn’t bake or eat sweets all that much but he said this was definitely the highlight of the trip.  We shared a bottle of champagne, made truffles (while a tad bit tipsy), the instructor was incredible (I wish I remembered his name!! 😔), and the truffles were delicious x 473.  There were so many unique flavor choices to choose from and I liked that we got to choose which ones to make.  We left with 16 decadent truffles each, PLUS chocolate bark using the leftover chocolate.

Truffles at Voilà Chocolat

Top = Mine (left to right: Speculoos, Praline, Creme Brûlée, and Hibiscus)

Bottom = Jake’s (Jack Daniels, Coffee, 72% Dark, and Creme Brûlée)

Us and our truffles!

My favorite truffle:  Praline!

This was one of my favorite romantic things to do in NYC.  I’d definitely take it over a fancy dinner or stroll along the High Line.  I would get a ticket to this class again in a heartbeat!

Our entire trip in NYC was great.  It really was.  UNTIL our flight back to Austin.  We got in an Uber with the estimated time until drop-off at 1 hour.  An insane amount of traffic came out of nowhere and we ended up spending 3 hours in the Uber.  3 HOURS!  We got to the airport 5 minutes before gates closed.  We even had TSA precheck, but if you’ve ever been to JFK, you know that ain’t happening.  The only flight back to Austin was the next morning.  So guess what?  We made do.  And by that I mean we went through security, walked to the nearest bar, drank a bottle of wine, and spent the night in the airport.  It wasn’t too bad, but only because I got to spend the night with the bf.  And maaaaybe also all the energy drinks and snacks we got before the shops closed for the night  😉

The bottle of riesling we drank before spending the night in JFK

No matter what you see on TV, New York City is unlike no other.  No matter how hard I try to describe it, NYC simply can’t be described…  you just gotta GO!  It’s nothing like Calgary (where I was born), it’s nothing like Milwaukee (where Jake was born), it’s nothing like Tucson (where I went to college), and it’s nothing like Austin (where we both live now).

And yes, NYC can be a shitshow at times, I’m not gonna lie.  It’s uber crowded, people are always stressed out, you smell some weird things, you see some weird things (aka a guy slowly walking backwards through an intersection, pants down, ass out wide out in the open, high as a kite)…  they’ve sure got some interesting stuff going on there folks!  But the good will always outweigh the bad.

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If you visit New York City you’ll walk into the most unique boutiques, find some of the cutest coffee shops, and eat some of the best food.  You’ll make more memories than you can count.  There’s never a dull moment in the Big Apple  🙂

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Have you ever been to NYC?  If you have, what was your favorite thing to do?

Let me know so I can add it to my to-do list for my next visit!

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With love and good eats,

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– Jess

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Eat.  Love.  Travel.

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Source: https://dessertswithbenefits.com/new-york-city/

[dustsparrow]

Oh! Your blog is alive! Welcome back! Answer all the odd number questions?

Well hey! I didn’t realize how long it had been since I posted here haha. I’m alive and doing well. Most of my energy toward this site goes to reblogging stuff to my side blog @stufftoshowcrow (I guess this is sort of a plug but by no means do you all have to check it out)

And I’ll get to the questions later today! I’m out with a friend for the day but I didn’t wanna leave you hanging. Thanks for asking!

Time for those answers! (under the read more)

1: 6 of the songs you listen to most? Dancing’s Not a Crime by Panic! at the Disco, Irony of Dying on Your Birthday by Senses Fail, Instant Crush by Daft Punk, Somewhere in the Between by Streetlight Manifesto, Your Love by The Outfield, and Shut Up and Dance by WALK THE MOON (these are just recent ones on my mind)

3: Grab the book nearest to you, turn to page 23, give me line 17. The closest book was my sketchbook and it’s got a drawing of Sonic, Tails, and Knuckles on it that I think I referenced from somewhere. I may post a picture later if there’s any interest.

5: What does your latest text message from someone else say? “Ok I should be home in about an hour” from my dad

7: What’s your strangest talent? I’m pretty good at chugging alcohol but stuff like hard sodas or rum and coke. And that usually only happens when I’m already a little drunk and want to maintain it.

9: Ever had a poem or song written about you? Technically (said by my bf). He said it was never finished so I never heard it

11: Do you have any strange phobias? I’m slightly afraid of escalators and elevators. Elevators is because I hate when they rock and I’m afraid they’ll fall and escalators is because when I was a kid, there was an escalator at the local book store that seemed pretty steep and I felt like I’d fall off when I was young and it sort of continued on into adulthood. It’s not as bad now but it’ll pop up sometimes.

13: What’s your religion? I was raised Catholic, went to a Methodist church from middle school to high school, and now I’d consider myself Agnostic. I was never officially Methodist so yeah, I’m not really religious.

15: Do you prefer to be behind the camera or in front of it? It’s a bit of both. Being an artist, I like to dabble in a lot of different art forms and one of those being photography. I love photography and I’ve even gotten into making my own videos. So I know my way around a camera and I’m used to being behind the camera but I like when I get the chance to be in front of the camera. It may be a little vain but I really like photos of myself and seeing myself at different angles.

17: What was the last lie you told? Oh shit, I can’t really remember. I know the funniest lie I’ve told recently is I convinced a coworker of mine that one of our other coworkers is my brother because we look sort of alike.

19: What does your URL mean? I went with Novakid-Outlaw because I really enjoy the game Starbound and the Novakids are my favorite race. They’re sort of like cowboys so that’s where the outlaw part is from. It used to be “Novakid-Bandit” but I figured Outlaw sounded better.

21: Who is your celebrity crush? Brendon Urie

23: How do you vent your anger? A lot of it is spent yelling at terrible drivers in my car. Some of it is directed at my coworkers who don’t do their job and I’m already done with the day. I try to use some of it on artwork, I know one time I smashed a TV for a friend doing a photography project. That was a lot of fun.

25: Do you prefer talking on the phone or video chatting online? Video chat because I like seeing the other person’s face. But talking on the phone is also nice if I want to talk to that person (so like talking to my BF verses my dad. My dad is weird to talk to sometimes).

27: What’s a sound you hate; sound you love? I hate the sound of nails scratching one of those holographic cards that has that terrible texture. I love the sounds of cats purring (and my boyfriend’s voice).

29: Do you believe in ghosts? How about aliens? Ghosts are iffy but for sure Aliens. Space is too big for us to be the only living organisms.

31: Smell the air. What do you smell? I’m in my room so nothing. I’m too used to the smell.

33: Choose: East Coast or West Coast? East Coast since I live nearby and the most I’ve done on the West Coast was go to Vegas and it was stupid hot.

35: To you, what is the meaning of life? Doing what I love with the ones I love.

37: Do you believe in luck? I guess because I’m the luckiest girl to be dating the best guy in my life. He’d disagree but I do love him a whole lot and he’s made my life a lot better.

39: What time is it? I got this ask around noon and I’m getting around to answering it at 11:12 PM (as I’m typing this answer)

41: What was the last book you read? I guess Scott Pilgrim. I haven’t read a book in a while. It’s sorta sad

43: Do you have any nicknames? Many

45: What’s the worst injury you’ve ever had? In recent years, I burned my arm at work and it hurt like a bitch. I still have a scar. In middle school, I broke both of my wrists (not at the same time but only a month had passed when my first wrist healed and I broke the other).

47: Do you have any obsessions right now? Okami

49: Ever had a rumor spread about you? Not really cause I’m not that interesting that people talk about me.

51: Do you tend to hold grudges against people who have done you wrong? If it’s a big enough wrong. I’m still upset at my ex but that’s justified.

53: Do you save money or spend it? I spend it. I need to work on saving money.

55: Love or lust? Love

57: How many relationships have you had? 3

59: Where were you yesterday? Work and home

61: Are you wearing socks right now? Nope

63: What is your secret weapon to get someone to like you? Jokes and slight teasing

65: Give me your top 5 favourite blogs on Tumblr. Aight, that’s too much work, nope

67: What were you doing last night at 12AM? Playing Okami

69: Be honest. Ever gotten yourself off? Yes

71: You are walking down the street on your way to work. There is a dog drowning in the canal on the side of the street. Your boss has told you if you are late one more time you get fired. What do you do? Save the dog. I can find another job. I’d feel terrible leaving the dog behind.

73: You can only have one of these things; trust or love. (I have both but) Love

75: What are the last four digits in your cell phone number? 7815

77: How can I win your heart? No chance because someone already has my heart

79: What is the single best decision you have made in your life so far? Giving my current boyfriend a third date those 2 years ago.

81: What would you want to be written on your tombstone? She died doing what she loved most. (*boyfriend’s/husband’s name here*)

83: Give me the first thing that comes to mind when you hear the word; heart. Love. How cliche

85: What’s the last song you listened to? Your Love by The Outfield

87: What is your current desktop picture? Bulbasaurs

89: What would be a question you’d be afraid to tell the truth on? If my mom ever asked if I’ve lied to her recently because she made me promise her once that I’d never lie to her again.

91: You accidentally eat some radioactive vegetables. They were good, and what’s even cooler is that they endow you with the super-power of your choice! What is that power? Shape-shifting

93: You can erase any horrible experience from your past. What will it be? My first instinct is to say my last relationship but I know it sort of helped to shape me. So I guess I would say I’d avoid dating the last guy but I wouldn’t avoid him entirely.

95: You just got a free plane ticket to anywhere. You have to depart right now. Where are you gonna go? Germany

97: Have you ever thrown up in the car? Yes. When I was a kid, my mom took me to pick up my brother and his friend and she brought mini cupcakes along. I ate a bunch of the chocolate ones and I threw up on my brother’s friend when they got in the car.

99: If the whole world were listening to you right now, what would you say? Let’s be real, I have no clue.

Finishing this up at 11:39 PM and I’m super grateful to anyone who’s read all of these! I hope these are entertaining to read and I hope everyone has a wonderful day/night!