today= yay!

well, I just have to say, I'm having a lovely day.

here are some superb things about today:

1.) I got my (fixed) visa from the Indian Embassy, thereby granting me the privilege to go back to India for another year. I just keep carrying it around and looking at my beeyootiful visa. oh visa. so shiny. so colorful. so correct.

2.) In exactly two weeks from today I will be stepping down on Delhi soil to begin said year-long adventure. Oh I cannot wait. I need to get on my packing. I bought a very large suitcase. I am not taking the tags off yet. We will see if I will use that or if its even too big.

3.) I suddenly remembered (ok ok, I must confess, amazon.com reminded me by recommending me said title) that I was once upon a time considering buying a Bollywood dance workout video. Today I was thinking, what a grand idea, a workout, some smooth dance moves, and fun all in one. So I bought:
This DVD dance workout is bhangra style (think Punjabi's bouncing around with their hands in air) and henceforth is very fun. It's not very complicated in the dance move department, but gives you basic fun moves and, boy, it does make you sweat. After finishing the workout for the first time today, I was thinking "aww, I wanna do it again" which I think is a good sign. I refrained from doing it again though, I don't want to overdo it and then not want to do the video again. Instead I will look forward to doing it tomorrow, and hopefully I will become so sweet on the dance floor. no one can stop me.

i MADE something!

ok, so I am at my parents house for a month during my wait. And my mom has this sewing machine that I think maybe I tried once or twice when I was a kid, but mainly it was her domain. I never actually used it to make anything. whole.

So, here I am, stuck in Maine-land. And I realized the awesome wallet one of my great friend wendy's mom made for me a couple years ago at Christmas is getting sad and holey. So I was thinking, maybe I should try to make a new wallet? My old wallet is basically a large lined pouch that folds in half and Velcro's shut. On the inside there is a pocket for cards that also Velcro's shut.

So I was thinking, over all I love my wallet but there were a few issues.

Issue 1: Whenever I had to get my money I would have to pull everything out of the pouch, announcing to the world how much (or little) money I was carrying with me.

Issue 2: Same issue with the cards, I would have to take them all out and shuffle through them. Not to mention I have too many. And they are never organized in any order.

So regardless of who's fault this issues are (mine, definitely mine) I decided I would try and take the basic folding pouch ideal (an ideal change/random stuff pouch) and add a little pocket that is bill sized. After that I thought, why not go all the way and make some little pockets for cards too?

So today I cut up some fabric, made the various parts, and this is what I came up with:


Now, I am already thinkings as I write this that I may need to add little flaps over the card/stuff pockets so the cards don't slide out. hmmm. Also I still need to add a button/snap/or velcro closure so I can fold it in half and keep it in my pocket. But here it is, trial wallet number 1.

(oh, and by the way, it cost nothing, all recycled fabric from a trunk in the basement)

1 Month Exactly...

Until I get on a plane to Delhi.

I am so excited. I decided this month of waiting will be devoted to becoming more healthy. Meaning eating healthy balanced food and trying to get some kind of exercise everyday. So today is day one and so far doing ok. I did 50 crunches (whoo!) and also some yoga to wake up, and plan on going for a bike ride later. Right now I am eating a healthy breakfast, and hopefully I can continue the streak for the rest of the day.

Hopefully, I will be nice and healthy and in control of what I eat (no eating things I am allergic to or have sensitivities to) so when I get to India I can stay healthy and happy and not get sick like last summer (I was sick for about 1.5 months with major stomach issues). This year, my goal is to maintain healthy eating there, while being firm ("No, I REALLY can't eat dairy, even if you insist it will make my stomach ache go away") about my food issues.

If I am all set with this, then I can enjoy my 10 months (atleast!) in India that much more.

Blogging Madness!

two blogs in one day? madness!

The past several months, I have been rather hermatose (hermit + comatose).

So, I guess I will finally spill the beans.

I am back on my way to India for at least 10 months!
I am doing a year long Hindi Program. I did the three month version of the program last summer, and this year I hope to achieve fluency. I am really excited and I got a fellowship for the program.
So, Next month I'll be on my way. Stay tuned for updates from India.

Egg Dreams

So I have been a vegetarian since I was 12, when my good friend Anne (no longer a vegetarian, but still a follow of eating healthy and locally) introduced me to the concept. I had never liked meat (amongst a gazillion other things I wouldn't eat, I was the mom's nightmare style picky eater), and I had always loved animals. So one day she told me she became a vegetarian and it was like "whoa! you mean people do that? and I can too?" I was pretty excited. My mom was not so thrilled. "I'm not cooking separate meals for you!"

After all of these years I was pretty used to be being a vegetarian. But I still have lots of stomach issues. I won't bore you with the details. I went to a vareity of Doctors. Mr. By-the-Book doctor proclaimed (after doing fancy tests) that nothing was wrong with me, and it was all in my head. (Gee, thanks). Ms. Happie-Hippie Doctor perscribed me on a no sugar diet to get rid of candidas albicans (or something), also she found lots of food I have sensitivities too (which all have panned out).

Still I didn't exactly follow her advice and my stomach didn't get better. Then about three or four months ago, I began to embrace the truth. Everytime I ate dairy, I felt very ill afterwards, and no lactaid didn't help. It took some forcing (by myself) but I stopped eating dairy, and damn, do I feel better.

So now I am a non-diary imbibing vegetarian.

But back to the title. Egg Dreams.

So I have always had a slight grossed-out reaction to eggs, but always ate them anyways. A few months ago, I purchased what I thought were local cage-free vegetarian fed hen eggs. Then I was making some breakfast and I noticed some hunkachunka pinkie stuff in my egg. Ew. I threw out the pinkie thing, trying not to look. The I went about my business, cracking the two more eggs for the recipe. All of them seemed, well, odd. I looked on the egg carton again. FERTILIZED EGGS it said in large (how did I miss this?) letters acrosssed the top. My stomach dropped and churned about. My intellectual side was reduced to "EWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWW". I mean, eggs are already goo squeezed from between a very unintelligent bird's legs. They are gross enough unfertilized. But, fertilized? And why, oh why, would you sell such a thing? Do people eat them, ON PURPOSE? Are they for hatching?

Since then, I have not stopped eating eggs, but every time I crack one, I feel a reluctance. And last night, was the culmination of this. Egg Dreams.

I have a dream that I was making some food and cracked an egg. A little fetus was in it, which had a spikey backbone, all curled up. I tried to throw it away without thinking and cracked another one. It had a bigger, more disgusting spiney-back boned fetus inside. In my dream, I ran into the bathroom to be sick.

In the real world, I woke up totally disgusted. eggs. shudder. fetus. shudder. fertilized. shudder.

Am I destined to be a vegan? Well I did just make brownies with EGGS in it, so I guess we will see.