Hawaiian Pineapples

I have always liked pineapples, even the canned Dole pineapple pieces. Pineapples are that perfect combination of sweet and tangy fruit that I love.


If I thought I loved pineapples before, I never realized just how good they could be until we went to Maui. On our second trip there, we stopped by the farmers market in Honokowai and picked up some pineapple pieces. Best pineapple we ever had! It was so perfectly sweet. Loved it.

When my parents were in Maui for the wedding, they went on an excursion to the pineapple plantation. That's one of the best things about Maui - the fruits and vegetables grown there are so fresh and just better, because of the volcanic soil. On the pineapple excursions, you get to take souvenirs home, so my parents brought home a giant pineapple. When we went to visit one weekend after returning to NYC, we broke open and split the pineapple, a wonderful memory of Maui.

Up At Night

I don't know what my problem is. I'm stuck in this unending cycle of sleep late - wake up late - tired all day, and don't know how to get out of it!

I can barely pull myself out of bed in the morning. I know part of it is going to sleep late, but it doesn't seem to matter how much sleep I get. I always feel like crap. There have been some "brighter" pockets of days lately when I manage to wake up with some amount of energy, but mostly I don't. Is it because of the weather, cold and cloudy? Is it because the "sun lamp" alarm (whether it's really a sun lamp, I don't know) hasn't been going on lately? Is it a side effect of bad seasonal allergies? Is it burn out because I didn't get to take a sabbatical?

By late afternoon, I'm usually crashing. Food coma? Maybe. But for weeks, I thought I was narcoleptic as I could barely keep my head upright and my eyes open through the entire afternoon. So many of the symptoms lined up. I'm still not convinced that I'm not.

And despite feeling like it was time for bed at 4:30 pm, I manage to get a second (third? fourth?) wind by the time it's actually time to fall asleep and don't manage to sleep until at least 3 am. It's not that I'm exercising too late all the time since I don't even make it to the gym when I feel like I'm going to pass out from standing.

Last night I planned to sleep early as I was a physical wreck through the entire day. What time did I actually manage to get to bed? 3 am, as usual.

And my back is sore all the time with horrible knots all over my shoulderblades. Nothing seems to help. It's like I need 4 hour daily massages for a week and to get a real ergonomic (they claim the current one is but that's hard to believe) office chair (neither is an option).

Any ideas? It's so hard to force myself to go to bed when I know I'm just going to get frustrated at tossing and turning if I'm no longer tired. What do I do?

Grand Place

Brussels, September 2010.


There was some festival going on at the Grand Place. An orchestra playing songs. A marching band performing in the middle of the plaza. People on stilts. Large crowds. To this day, we're not really sure what was going on. But it was fun to watch.

We went to the Grand Place/Grote Markt, one of the most popular locations in Brussels, to sightsee. If you've ever seen the Flower Carpet, this is the place, but it wasn't on display while we were there. It had been a disappointing day. Our suitcase wheel broke on the walk from the crappy metro station to our hotel, a walk which went straight uphill. We waited forever in our hotel lobby to check in while one family monopolized guest services. We tried to see Mini Europe and failed because it was already closed. Then we tried to see the Atomium but didn't want to pay the expensive fees for an inadequate amount of time in the exhibit. We were not really liking Brussels and then we got to the Grand Place, hoping things would get better. But it was crowded, people were pushing and shoving, it really felt like we were back in NYC, and then we decided to have dinner, thinking that would be the turning point to the day. Sitting outside in the middle of the square was absolutely wonderful but the service (spilled beer, neglect, forgotten fries) made us feel like second class citizens. Brussels was not our favorite place when I took this picture.

But, damn, that is one photogenic city.

Looking at our photos from Brussels, the city looks gorgeous. The streets that frustrated us or that looked not-so-nice when we were there turned out really good-looking on camera. The buildings of the Grand Place, which we thought were amazing in person, were absolutely incredible in photographic form.

We stayed at the Grand Place through dinner, listening to the marching band and taking in the sights and the setting sun, and if we ignored our rude and unhelpful waiter, it was actually pretty nice. After dinner, the sun was gone and the sky turned the most amazing shade of blue for blue hour, and I got some of my favorite photos from our entire trip. The contrast of the old ornate lit buildings with the deep blue sky was striking. We may not have been the hugest fans of Brussels on that day, but the city sure knew how to look good.

Tapas

In December 2004, we were living in Chicago. It was my last year of law school and a few college friends had come to visit. One of the first things we did that weekend was to go out for tapas at our favorite tapas place in Chicago, Cafe Iberico. From the photo it looks like we got patatas bravas (spicy potatoes in tomato sauce), tortilla espanola (Spanish omelette), champinones a la plancha (mushrooms in garlic and olive oil) and something else with potatoes that I can't identify. Yum. We loved the patatas bravas and tortilla espanola (sorry, don't know where the tilde is on here), and I think we got them almost every time.


Iberico isn't the only tapas place in Chicago. There was a place closer to our apartment but on my first visit there (and A's second), we didn't have a great experience. We were with my parents when they came in the summer and attempted to eat at that place. They offered us a table inside or outside, and we chose inside since my parents aren't huge fans of eating outdoors. Promptly upon sitting down, we were told that we could not sit inside because of the sleeveless shirts we were wearing. Well, why didn't you say something about this when we said we wanted to sit inside? The fact that this was never mentioned when we put our name in at the door, and they proceeded to let us wait 15 minutes for an inside table, and then told us we couldn't sit there was ridiculous. If we were not dressed "appropriately" for an inside table, then why let us wait for one? Why not just tell us at the first moment that we could not sit there so we could decide if we wanted to wait or go somewhere else? Why wait until we were sitting down at the table to tell us this wasn't an option? We obviously left but I have no recollection of where we ended up going. Although I had heard good things about the food, I had no desire to ever go there again after that experience with their service.

But on to happier things - the tapas at Iberico are good. Before we left Chicago for NYC, we did a "favorite foods" tour in Chicago to hit up our favorite places one last time and we made a stop there. We don't go for tapas that often here in NYC. There are plenty of places but it can get really pricey and places get crowded. But now I'm craving tortilla espanola and patatas bravas!

(I'm really enjoying this random photo thing. It's allowing me to tell stories about the past and I love it! It's so interesting how something like a photo can jog your memory.)

Flashback - October 2

What did we do on October 2?

One year ago today... we got haircuts, watched the sunset and played around with the self-timer on our SLR in Riverside Park South and then had our own little Oktoberfest - wurst platters and potato pancakes from Hallo Berlin and a Bavarian-inspired concrete (cranberry almond streusel) and beer from Shacktoberfest.

Self-photo shoot - I love this photo
Two years ago today... we went to Plate by Plate, a fundraiser event, which was one of our last NY activities as an engaged couple. Two days later we would be Maui-bound for our wedding prep week! Plate by Plate brings in restaurants from all over NYC for a tasting event and there was a lot of good food. After we got home, we were unpleasantly surprised by an apartment that smelled like garbage because the cover popped off some onions in the fridge. Oops.

Black truffle tuna sandwich from Geisha at Plate by Plate - apparently we got the last one and it was so so good
Three years ago today... work day. Obsessed with the election. A provided me commentary on the VP debate while I finished up the day at work and then we went for dinner somewhere in our neighborhood. (My recordkeeping was not as good back then!)

Four years ago today... also a work day (Tuesday). I was thinking about how songs keep getting repeated on TV shows, making them the "song of the season." There's definitely some songs like that this year like Hello.

Five years ago today... it was a Monday so I assume we went to work. But I have absolutely no idea. No blog posts, no chat logs, no calendar entries, no (uploaded) photos. I suppose I could check my work time entries but I really don't want to do that.

Six years ago today... we went to the Pickle Festival on the Lower East Side and had dinner at Republic in Union Square. It was warm so we also had a nice time just walking around.

Testing out the pickles
I can't go back any further than that unfortunately, but it was a nice walk down memory lane!

Cranberry Sauce

Today's numerically chosen photo of the day is...


Cranberry sauce from a can.

This photo is from Thanksgiving 2009. We had dinner at my parents' house and unlike most years, we didn't drive out the night before. We stayed in the city and went to the Thanksgiving Day Parade which was being held in Times Square that year. It wasn't that cold out but I didn't remember the parade being so boring! (I had gone once before as a kid.) We didn't know who all the balloons were (we were Yo Gabba Gabba-dumb until the kids in front of us started talking about it) and after awhile, we (and others near us) just wanted Santa to come already so we could leave! We had invested all that time; we had to at least stay for Santa. Somehow, collectively we took almost 350 photos of the boring parade.

Dinner was delicious as usual. In addition to the turkey (which is my least favorite part of a Thanksgiving day meal - I love sides), there was stuffing, mashed potatoes, carrots, pumpkin pie and our contribution - brussels sprouts with chestnuts. Love brussels sprouts. So healthy and hearty. There was also cranberry sauce that came out of a can. That's how cranberry sauce is usually served at our holiday dinners, but it makes A sad. One year he made his recipe for cranberry sauce which included lots of actual cranberries and fruit. It was really good, but I guess a lot of people in my family are so used to the canned cranberry sauce that that has become a tradition of sorts. I liked A's cranberry sauce for dessert but I don't usually use the canned stuff because I'm not a big fan of putting fruit into my regular food.

Thanksgiving is one of my favorite holidays of the year. I would say that I can't wait for it but that would send time speeding along even faster, and I don't want to do that. But I am looking forward to Thanksgiving!

(Side programming note: It may seem like we are posting more, and we are definitely trying to post more. I miss blogging and feel like I don't really write anymore, not anything "real." So I am trying to get that back. Also, I like looking back to see what I was doing a year ago, 2 years ago, etc. and I can't do that if I don't blog. So, consider blogging more to be like a new years resolution. That was conveniently made on Rosh Hashanah.)

Boots

While I love the cooler weather that fall brings, I hate saying goodbye to sandals and other summer shoes. I know a lot of people like fall because it means boots season, but I don't feel that way. Boots are not really my friends. I wore boots tonight for hours and was on my feet walking and dancing, and now I feel like I need to soak my feet in ice buckets. The cold bathroom floor feels so good.

Two main problems with boots for me - (1) my leg shape isn't long and lean so a lot of them don't fit and (2) they feel like I'm walking on blocks of wood/stone and it's so painful. I don't know how people do it and don't have problems with their feet!

Any recommendations for comfortable boots? I haven't found one yet which has a nice cushion and doesn't make my feet angry at me. All suggestions welcome!

Sun Rising

Writing on a regular basis is hard when all you do is go to work and eat (and the food is covered by the food blog). To try to write more on my old blog, I would randomly choose a photo and then write about it. I think we'll do that here too (and tag them "Photo Diary"). Before, on my laptop, I used either the Windows photo viewer that sat on the desktop or my screensaver, and wrote about whatever came up. This time I picked a numerical combination and applied it to my web albums and came up with this:


Ah, Greece is such a beautiful country. We still haven't finished recapping our honeymoon (regular recaps or food recaps) but this photo was from the end of it. We were heading to the Athens airport for our flight to Munich. We were very sad because our honeymoon was over but excited to fly to Germany for a few hours.

It was early in the morning. We were catching either the first or second metro run of the morning and we were expecting it to be empty. It was anything but empty. By the time we switched trains at Syntagma (a very central stop), the platforms were packed with people, many of them returning home from a late Saturday night out. I had completely forgotten that, since the trains don't run late at night, people would have just stayed out until they could catch the first train home. There were lots of people sleeping on the metro, but also a lot of people who were very awake for 5:30 in the morning!

The line that goes to the airport terminates at either the airport or a stop called Doukissis Plakentias. The train we were originally on stopped at the latter, and we had to wait for the train that went to the airport (which I think only came every half an hour). The station was nice - not very exciting but unlike our subway stations, it was clean, there were seats and it wasn't unbearably hot and gross. We rested and shared a bologna and cheese sandwich that we got from our hotel before departing. Eventually the train came, we boarded with our luggage and then got to watch from the windows as the metro left the underground tunnels and journeyed through the suburbs outside Athens. (It rides along the highway reminding me of the blue line in Chicago.) At some point, the sun started to come up and the sunrise was gorgeous. I love early morning light. There's something so renewing and hopeful about it. The optimism of what the new day will bring and feeling like you have an entire full day ahead of you.

This is the only good photo I have of our outdoor ride to the airport. I think we were near an area called Kantza. Pretty soon after that, we had arrived at the airport and it was time for our last honeymoon adventure!

Another DVR Mishap

I feel like all I talk about these days is needing to work out and how much our cable box sucks. The DVR just keeps malfunctioning! Granted, this time, it was a program that recorded way back on August 2 (the next to last episode of Covert Affairs) but it's been giving us grief for months now. Must do our best to get a new box this week!

This time, we were watching Covert Affairs and it was doing fine until about halfway through the program. Then abruptly it started getting glitchy, became pixelated and then just stopped. The trouble with catching up on shows so late is that, if it messes up like this, we might never find out what happened before watching the next episode. Luckily Hulu still has this one up (since it's no longer on demand). Hopefully the finale recorded!

Work Out Like an All Star

When we first moved to Manhattan ~6 years ago, I was really excited when I discovered our new cable package included FitTV. We had never had the station before and it was like having exercise classes available 24 hours a day (ok, to be fair, it probably wasn't 24 hours as there were some infomercials in the early morning/late night hours). Fantastic! I would just exercise to whatever was on when I turned it on, whether it was Gilad or Sharon Mann (both were perfect half hour pre-work workouts) or something else. Didn't matter as long as I was moving.

As the years went on, I saw the programming start to shift from all day workouts to pockets of workout programs and pockets of "lifestyle" programming (e.g., let's watch how other people get in shape or eat which doesn't really help the viewer get in shape). I couldn't just turn the channel on and exercise. Eventually, the workout programs were gone. Now the channel is part of Discovery Health (or something) and workout programs are relegated to ExerciseTV on demand (which sometimes doesn't work because our cable box sucks).

During that half-and-half stage of FitTV, they did have some good programs that I really liked - especially Namaste Yoga (a half hour yoga program with serene backgrounds and good sequences) and All Star Workouts (hour long workouts which varied from Bosu to exercise ball to boot camp to stretch class to kickboxing). I loved All Star Workouts. It was different every day. I recorded a whole bunch of them on our DVR so that I could workout when I had time to do it (instead of only at 9 am and whatever time it was rerun during the day), except I sadly had to keep deleting them as we ran out of space and then lost them altogether when we had to trade in our malfunctioning DVR box (thanks, Time Warner Cable). I thought I would just re-record them later, but when I tried, I realized they were just gone. Nowhere to be found. My favorite workout program, gone.

ExerciseTV on demand isn't bad. There are a lot of programs and it's available whenever you want (provided that the cable box is working and that you're not DVR-ing 2 things at once in that time period - another advantage of previously having them on the DVR). Today I was looking for a half-hour workout and came across a Kendall Hogan boot camp workout. It reminded me of the hour-long All Star Workout that he did and I started missing the program again. It was a great workout and I'm still soaked from it, so at least I know I can do that one. I still miss All Star Workouts though (and from reading online forums, I'm not alone). I think it will always be my favorite.