Springtime nights

I had the best evening in the universe last night. Lately I’ve been trying my best to eat only vegetables and fresh foods, and I was shocked at how well I did yesterday (oatmeal, apple, peas and corn, and some dried cranberries), so for dinner my friend Chris and I decided it was a good day to make homemade potato chips and a really good salad, and cupcakes for dessert.

So, I picked him up from school and we swung by my apartment to get some supplies, then we walked to his place and then to the grocery story to buy some cheese for the salad and potatoes. It was beautiful last night - 75 degrees, sunny, just perfect. Texas often sucks when it comes to weather, but sometimes it’s really, really good. And those are the days that you spend outside.

And also, making food with friends is amazing and excellent. We invited J and My Roommate to come along, and so we had a feast outside - homemade potato chips and fries, salad with blue cheese and sunflower seeds, springtime cupcakes, and white wine. It’s something you can only do when the weather gets warm.

I don’t mean to rub it in to everyone who doesn’t live in a) Texas b) California c) Florida, or d) Southern Hemisphere, but as soon as the weather gets warm, get your friends and go have a picnic outside. I mean it. It’s amazing.

March 19, 2009 @ 10:22 am . Comments (4)

Health — Tags: bliss, relaxing, well-being

Health myths

The other day I learned that we don’t actually need 8 glasses of water a day. Now, I had never really believed that, and honestly I found it rather silly so I’ve never been a water drinker (mostly juice, coffee, and tea - I don’t like the taste of water in general), but I started noticing how everyone had a water bottle. It was weird to me, and honestly I don’t like drinking too much because I hate having to run to the bathroom, but I went with it. People have done stranger things.

Anyway, then I read something recently that made me research this further. We don’t need eight glasses of water a day. It’s a “gross estimate,” “flat wrong,” and you only need a liter of liquid a day, most of which you get through food. In fact, it can be dangerous in some instances to drink eight glasses of water every day. And you can get your water intake through caffeinated or sugary beverages. For someone who isn’t used to caffeine, 1 cup of coffee == 2/3 cup of water. And if you are used to drinking caffeine, a cup of coffee is just like having a cup of water. Tea, juice, milk and caffeinated sodas all give you the same benefits of water. These all do not dehydrate you.

And yet despite all these studies everyone still spends thirty bucks and a chunk out of the environment buying bottled water every week. This is stupid. During my research I saw that people were struggling to drink eight glasses of water, and I saw people feeling guilty and bad about themselves for not hitting the mark. I couldn’t believe it - do people seriously guilt-trip themselves because they’re not drinking eight glasses of water a day? I couldn’t do that! I’d be going to the bathroom every thirty seconds.

They’ve shown that drinking isn’t even the most effective way to get water. It just passes right through your system. Eating vegetables and fruit is more effective because your body has time to absorb the water while it’s digesting. You are NOT walking around dehydrated. When you’re thirty, you still have plenty of time to drink before becoming dehydrated.

I just can’t believe this has turned into a nationwide phenomenon. It feels like that one time when everyone was doing the Atkin’s Diet. In fact, while we’re on depressed thoughts about our health, consider this article. It states that you have to exercise more than you think you do, eating more of something doesn’t help you lose weight, and your body and our culture are working against you. The only one I don’t agree with is number 8, simply because I know for a fact that losing weight can help with blood pressure and diabetes - the less you weigh, the less likely you are to have high blood pressure or Type II Diabetes, and furthermore, I feel like a lot of people use stuff like this as an excuse to not get healthy. They read it and say, “Oh, my lifestyle is justified,” when in reality they’re horribly unhealthy. It’s not about the weight, it’s about how likely you are to die.

I’m concerned, I really am. I’m worried about the health of the world and the health of the next generation. When I hear about things like childhood obesity and kids developing heart problems and diabetes and high blood pressure, I get so angry and upset. There’s so many myths we take for granted, and we don’t bother to research what’s actually going on. And the worst of it is we feel that if everyone is doing something, it’s more okay for us to do it too.

I want to see everyone get healthy and lose weight, for the sake of their future. I hope that this most recent wave of healthier foods on the shelves will help this.

January 27, 2009 @ 10:34 am . Comments (3)

Health — Tags: Future, Health, well-being

Relaxing Friday

It’s been a really long semester so far, and I’ve been starting to get really drained because I don’t have time for warmth, relaxation, and happiness. It took yesterday, getting to the point where I just broke down, for me to finally force myself to take it easy for awhile.

So I’m going to spend this weekend resting, drinking tea, and relaxing my mind. I’ll also be getting my creativity back, taking my time on projects and assignments, and taking lots of breaks for coffee and sweets. I’m also staying away from my phone, and also my computer - maybe possibly I’ll check my email but mostly I’m going to be gone.

Have a great weekend everyone!

October 24, 2008 @ 6:25 pm . Comments (4)

General — Tags: living, real life, relaxing, well-being

Been awhile …

A lot has been going on lately. I don’t really know where to start. I’m not even sure if people care what’s been going on. It’s been very hectic.

Instead of making a post about everything that’s been going on, I’m going to make a list of things I’ve learned in the past week:

• Just because you can doesn’t mean you should. This has been my motto as of late. It applies to so much stuff it’s not even funny. It’s all about knowing what you need to do, not what you can do just because it’s there.
• Taking time for yourself is more important than making near-perfect scores. Jeez, do I need this as a constant reminder. I’m way happier when I have some time to myself, and I feel way better too. This in turn makes me less grumpy in general and more able to tackle the tough stuff. Which is more important than making a high A vs. making a low A or high B.
• Wheat tortillas taste really good with spaghetti sauce. Yes, I’m weird. Then again, I eat pickles with peanut butter on top.

Also, I just remembered I forgot to read the Declaration of Independence for class today.

September 25, 2008 @ 12:27 pm . Comments (4)

General — Tags: Health, lessons, well-being

Creativity

Stephanie recently made a post about how she’s going to challenge herself creatively, which is also a contest at this knitting website. I don’t really care about the contest (but you might), but what I do care about is thinking about how I’m going to challenge myself in the next year.

This year is a lot of upcoming craziness for me, with the whole “finding a job” thing. The number one thing I am going to do to is going to happen in the next few weeks, let alone the next year! I’m going to convert my main domain lunsh.net into my design portfolio - a collection of my web designs, patterns, art, etcetera. My blog will sit on a separate subdomain (probably tasty.lunsh.net. :D).

The second thing I’m going to do is create business cards and distribute them to potential employers. That’ll put my contact info and my portfolio at the center of their attention. Ideally, I’ll be hired at a web design firm, or at a Small, Pretty Software Company where I can make usability and design the focus of my work. Ideally. We’ll see.

Another challenge is decorating my apartment and TAKING MORE PICTURES. My lack of pictures has been twofold - I don’t really have a camera. I borrow J’s for all my camera needs but obviously I can’t just steal his camera all the time. Secondly, I don’t like Flickr because of their upload limit (and do not want to pay for a better account), but I still would like a place to put my pictures. In all honesty, I’m probably going to have to end up with a server-side gallery on my domain. Either way, though, I’d like to take more pictures of random stuff, to make it seem more like I’m a real person and not a robot. Plus I love blogs with pictures - they’re just more interactive and fun to read.

These are the main ways I’m going to be challenging myself and I think they’re good ways. Creativity is so fleeting that we can’t force ourselves to be creative - we can only search for that moment of inspiration and then go with it. Ideas are a dime a dozen, but good ideas are few and far between. What can we do but try to find them?

You cannot wake up and suddenly BE creative. I also don’t believe that by doing things you’ll come up with ideas more frequently. I fully believe that you already have the creativity, you already have the ideas. Ideas come frequently and subconsciously - maybe you see something and get an idea for something you want to create, but you don’t even realize you’re thinking about it, not consciously anyway. Or you think of something but forget it. The key is tapping that well, and forcing yourself to become conscious of the thought when you have it. You will lose some, but you will win some too if you force yourself to write it down. Creativity is like a dream, easy to get, easier to forget.

I also believe a lot of people simply put creativity off, and instead do other things first. They often talk about how they want or need to do certain things (people who talk about the book that they’re writing, that they’ve been writing for the past ten years, or people who tell you about their latest cross-stitching, which has been half-done since they were fifteen). Creativity doesn’t work like that. Once you let it go, more often than not it’s gone.

Here is the secret: when an idea comes to you, do it.

Do it right that minute. If you can’t do it, start planning it. At the very least, write it down. But get to it as soon as you possibly can. Creativity WILL NOT wait for you.

And don’t be afraid of it, either. The act of creating is joyful, even if in the end you do not like the finished piece. It is the process that matters more than the result.

September 3, 2008 @ 5:51 pm . Comments (4)

Art — Tags: creativity, well-being