3 Years ago today

Thanks to a little app called timehop, your past social media posts are only a finger tap away. Funny that this one popped into my feed today.

Exactly three years ago an overly optimistic October Heather, signed April Heather up for a race two races. A 5k Friday night race and an exhausting 10k race Saturday morning bright and early.

You can read about how that went with the posts titled: Dear October Heather and one gem titled 9.2 Miles in 48 hours.

I say funny this popped up today because, well the thought had crossed my mind to do something similar, only instead of April the race would be in January! I do have the fact that weather will be much more on my side here in Arizona over the winter than it would have been back in Illinois over the winter (which was my lazy excuse last time) I've been throwing the idea around of starting to run, I'm not 100% feeling the snug clothes and I'm past the point of being able to say oh I just moved it was stressful, that's why I eat like crap and never go to the gym.

At the very least I will sign up for the 5k race, stay tuned. I might do something stupid like sign up for the 2nd day race too. You just never can tell here at North of 10th can you?! Also I need some way to kick my dad's butt on the Fitbit steps, that man is a beast! Anyone else fitbit? Oh and that #195 days.. it's 100 days less to prepare as of today #95days #DoubleEek

Book Talk: Elizabeth Gilbert ~ Big Magic

This is actually a really hard post to even articulate into words, but I will try.

Elizabeth Gilbert first came into my life all the way back in 2010. A little book club in Central Illinois called the Page Turner's picked a book called 'Eat, Pray, Love' to read for their August meeting. I LOVED the book. That book means so much more to me than words on pages, after I read that book I feel like it changed the way I look at myself as participant in the universe.

Fast forward five years. I now live in Arizona, and part of living in a sprawling metropolis is authors make stops here to talk about their new books, and I'm literally 10 minutes away! 

Today the author in town was Elizabeth Gilbert, talking about her new book 'Big Magic: Creative Living Beyond Fear'. I think what I like about Elizabeth is her humor and I love a girl who will drop an F-bomb in front of a room full of strangers. She writes like I would think to myself, a flowing stream of consciousness narrative with sarcasm sprinkled in among a few choice words, totally right up my alley.

She started her talk by reading an excerpt from the book. It talks about living your creative life, whatever that creativity means to you.

"and while the paths and outcomes of creative living will vary wildly from person to person, I can guarantee you this: A creative life is an amplified life. It's a bigger life, a happier life, an expanded life, and a hell of a lot more interesting life. Living in this manner--continually and stubbornly bringing forth the jewels that are hidden within you--is a fine art, in and of itself. Because creativing living is where Big Magic will always abide"

Whoa. It's big stuff. I wish I could have recorded her talking because her responses to the Q&A session were like whoa, change the way you see yourself kind of responses. She goes on to talk about fear. Fear and creativity go hand and hand. Wherever there is a creative thought there is fear right behind. You become afraid of so many things that it steals the ability for you to find the jewels hidden within you. Fear of not being good enough, fear that others have already done it better, afraid your dreams are embarrassing or afraid of so many things. 

She ended by telling us that she was sorry. Sorry because she would not be doing a signing line and personalizing books. She did however go to the publishing company's warehouse and sign over 20,000 books ahead of time. She said this was the hard part of creativity, you sometimes have to say no to things you love in order to keep yourself healthy. She is doing her biggest book tour ever and knew that in order to do that she would have to say no to meeting us individually. 

She ended the session by reading a poem by Louise Erdrich which also makes you think...

Advice to Myself
by Louise Erdrich

Leave the dishes.
Let the celery rot in the bottom drawer of the refrigerator
and an earthen scum harden on the kitchen floor.
Leave the black crumbs in the bottom of the toaster.
Throw the cracked bowl out and don't patch the cup.
Don't patch anything. Don't mend. Buy safety pins.
Don't even sew on a button.
Let the wind have its way, then the earth
that invades as dust and then the dead
foaming up in gray rolls underneath the couch.
Talk to them. Tell them they are welcome.
Don't keep all the pieces of the puzzles
or the doll's tiny shoes in pairs, don't worry
who uses whose toothbrush or if anything
matches, at all.
Except one word to another. Or a thought.
Pursue the authentic-decide first
what is authentic,
then go after it with all your heart.
Your heart, that place
you don't even think of cleaning out.
That closet stuffed with savage mementos.
Don't sort the paper clips from screws from saved baby teeth
or worry if we're all eating cereal for dinner
again. Don't answer the telephone, ever,
or weep over anything at all that breaks.
Pink molds will grow within those sealed cartons
in the refrigerator. Accept new forms of life
and talk to the dead
who drift in though the screened windows, who collect
patiently on the tops of food jars and books.
Recycle the mail, don't read it, don't read anything
except what destroys
the insulation between yourself and your experience
or what pulls down or what strikes at or what shatters
this ruse you call necessity.

Being a Cub Fan in Arizona

In case you didn't know the Cubs have made the postseason! This is the first time that the St. Louis Cardinals and the Chicago Cubs have met in the postseason since.... well, ever! It's been fun meeting up with friends at a local sport's bar to watch the game. A lot of people in Arizona are transplants from the midwest so it's fun to see other people in blue cheering on the cubbies. We had several people walk up to us at the bar tonight telling us good luck, we hate St. Louis so we hope you guys win. Even walking out to your car after the game, people notice your Cubs shirt and will holler 'GO CUBS, WOO!' 

We met up with another friend who had moved out to Arizona several months after we had with our wave of hires and we were talking about how much Arizona feels like home for that same reason. Cubs are here for Spring Training, we've got Portillo's restaurant (a Chicago staple) and no matter where you go if you have an Illinois team's shirt on you'll be sure to run into a fellow Illinois person.

Watching baseball in October is a new thing for me, hopefully it continues! The next couple games will start while I'm still at work (stupid time zones) But you can bet I will be checking the score! 

Go Cubs Go! Woo!

Subject: The Blog

Actual email in my inbox this morning...

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Subject: The Blog

From: [Dad] Fri, Oct 9, 2015 at 8:05 AM
To: [Heather]
Here it is going almost two months since the ”blog” has been update. Your loyal followers are beginning to drop from waiting on an update. So if you can muster up some energy this weekend, please update it.


LOL
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Well... when your own father starts to turn on you, I guess it's time to update the blog.  I do admit I have been terrible at updating this year, and I don't even have a good excuse. I've done tons of fun blog worthy things and have tons of fun/exciting things coming up on the horizon. In my defense though, I did give the blog a bit of a fall-ish makeover, so at least my loyal viewers had something new to enjoy when they visited.

Tonight I watched the cubs game with a friend at Bdubs and decided since they lost and I was nearby I'd check out a good movie to mourn their loss.

I went and saw the Martian. EXCELLENT movie. My brother saw it last weekend and described it as a mixture of 'Interstellar' and 'Gravity'. I haven't seen Gravity so I can't tell you anything about that comparison, other than it heavily relies on Matt Damon as the leading man. If you like Matt Damon and have even the slightest interest in space, definitely check this movie out. 

There dad... I hope that will keep my loyal followers checking back to the "blog"

When the Valley Gets Hot, Go North!

Last weekend Tulip and I had it with the heat here in the valley, so we decided to head North for some new scenery and cooler breezes.

We were going to go to Sedona and see the beautiful red rocks but took at look at their temperatures and decided that wasn't a cool enough escape from the 110+° so we looked farther north to Flagstaff and were much more content with those temps. I haven't seen two digit numbers for a high for a couple months now! It was definitely a nice reprieve from the heat.

Flagstaff Visitor Center:

Chapel of the Holy Dove: 

Red Mountain:

Driving through Coconino National Forest:

Inner Basin Trail: 

The drive up the mountain, rain in the distance

BEARS?!

It was too late in the day to attempt this whole trail, we only hiked in for about 20 minutes, but it was so beautiful and peaceful. Can't wait to go back! 

Howard the Travel Troll

This is Howard. Howard is a Travel Troll. You may not have heard of traveling trolls, but they exist! Howard is quite the little travel troll. He's been to Germany, Disneyland and everywhere in between. Howard usually resides here in Arizona with me but sometimes he likes to go on trips with other friends.

Howard is currently visiting Paris, France this week and will head to London in a couple days, quite the life he lives! Howard is on Instagram if you'd like to follow his adventures you can find him with the username: HowardsTravels to follow along with his trips! 

Do you have a travel troll at your house? Howard loves to hear about other traveling troll adventures, send your pictures and stories to him at howardstravels@gmail.com and maybe you'll be featured on his instagram! 

Yeah... Sure.. We'll go with that

Energy Saving Mode (ESM) has been in full effect here at North of 10th. The hot weather is a perfect time to go into ESM. This weekend I have been so incredibly hot that it's just gross. It's a constant battle between do I want to be hot and sweaty or spend money on my summer electric bill and just make my humble abode an ice castle. I usually land somewhere in the middle.

My brother ever so eloquently pointed out that I have neglected my blog for at least a whole month. Yeah yeah.... I could say to him, that he hasn't send me any exciting NiBo Hawaiian adventures for me to share with you either, so ha! 

Have any of you just been so incredibly bored that you start thinking of ridiculous things to do? My current ridiculous thought is going back to school, for a for-me-degree. I graduated six years ago with my Bachelor's Degree in Business Administration. It was one of those, this is what I should do decisions. It makes sense, Bachelor's in Science is nice. Then when you are 2.5 years in and doing imaginary number math up to your eyeballs you have that thought that maybe this isn't what you want to be doing. I've always said I wanted to be a teacher and with my current job at the insurance company as a trainer, I can start to actually see that I'm kind of good at it. On top of that I love learning things, I'm good at researching the crap out of things on even just life purchases like a car, add to that a little bit of fun, like say history and I'm hooked. I casually browsed Arizona State University's online programs, and it just so happens they have both Bachelor's and Master's online degrees for History. Hmmm. My ideal job in life would be a historian, ideally working at some grand Museum sharing the stories of the past with others.

Some of the pros: 
- It's all online so I wouldn't have to quit my job 
- I'd be in no hurry to finish, so I could take one class here and there as my wallet allows

Cons: 
- Is a for-me-degree really worth it in the longrun? 
- what if I never do anything with it, was it a waste? 

What will come of this? Who knows, I have a tendency to work myself up about these things, then just slowly back away. Just ask anyone in my family. I don't know though, we shall see. Would be cool to eventually get more degrees and be Dr. 'North of 10th' and maybe I could add some archeology in there too just like Dr. Jones and go all Raiders of the Lost Ark on life... could be cool right? 

Still not technically Summer

Contrary to the rising mercury, it's still not officially summer for a few more days...  someone forgot to tell the weather that.

I live in the desert, it gets hot. I get it. I have air conditioning at home and at work, and there is a pool nearby calling my name. I'm not complaining... too much anyway. This too shall pass, and I just remember, you don't have to shovel sunshine in the winter! 

I still enjoy the funny things I see on the internet about summer here in the desert...

The struggle is real my friends. It's 10pm, I had to take the garbage out.. it's 103°, I had to shower and change my sweaty clothes. Happy almost officially summer! 

It's Not Technically Summer...

The first official day of Summer is June 21st, which isn't too far away... but Arizona doesn't know that. In the valley of the sun, it's either summer or almost summer. Though it's been fairly mild compared to last year at this time, it's still been hanging out in the 100°-108°F which doesn't exactly scream let's all go outside and play. 

On top of all of that, this wave of training I have a part-time training class and work 12:30p-8:15p which has totally messed up my whole sleeping schedule! I do enjoy sleeping in, but it's still got my all jarbled up on when I should be sleeping and when I should be awake, hats off to those third shift workers of the world, I don't know how you do it! 

More on top of that even, I have been should have been studying for an insurance exam I signed up for as part of my continuing education for my job. Me and school... I'm what you would call procrastinator. I crammed for it last minute and had my test yesterday and by some miracle I passed! I'm very glad too, it's an expensive test if you have to retake it. 

I have been checking in on a friend's house while they are on vacation, I'm trying not to kill their plants, and taking care of their cats. Bonus is they have a pool! Which in this heat I have been taking full advantage of! I've decided my house MUST have a pool, what a great treat after a long day of not studying! 

A.Drama is coming to visit in a few weeks and we have lots of fun things planned, plenty of blog worthiness coming your way soon! Hope you all are keeping cool and enjoying the almost summertime! 

Blue Apron

Have you heard about this whole Blue Apron thingy? I had seen several promoted posts on Facebook about it and it looked cool. Basically it's a food delivery service and then send you pre-portioned meals for the week with a serving size for 2 people. The price comes out to be about $9.99 per serving, which considering it's really that bad. PLUS I don't have to go grocery shopping. 

Now I am no Chef Boyardee but I have a few kitchen tricks that I know, so I decided to give it a try. The only thing they assume you have (besides the needed utensils) is salt, pepper and olive oil, everything else comes in the box! 

Having completed my first week of meals, I thought I would give you a sneak peek at what I had cooking up in the kitchen and the opening of my first box! 

The meats in the box come sandwiched between two big ice packs and everything is in a freezer bag to keep the ingredients cool during shipping. I opted for the Saturday delivery so most likely I'd be home when it arrived, you know living in the desert and all. You do have the option to pick your day of delivery, I think it's Wednesday-Sunday to pick from. 

Here's all the ingredients measured out and labeled for each meal. Inside the box (not shown) are cardstock pages with the recipes and how to prepare them. I didn't take many during pictures but here are my first week of finished products! 

Dukkah-Spiced Salmon with Spring Vegetables & Oyster Mushroom Ragout

First off this meal was my first attempt at cooking salmon and I think I did ok. This recipe took the longest to prepare because there was a lot of googling of how to prepare these random 'spring vegetables'! Celery Root and Fennel bulb with fronds were not previously part of my vocabulary but they are now and I just might be able to remember how to prepare them.

Sirloin Tip Steaks with new potato, asparagus and radish hash

This meal was much easier to prepare as far as cutting the vegetables, and I had heard of all of them which helps. The only skill yet to master here is the art of the medium well done steak. Following the directions and checking with the meat thermometer when I went to cut them they were still quite pink and a little bloody yet, so I decided to err on the side of caution and threw them back on the skillet for a bit more done finish.

 

Laotian Larb Gai with sticky rice, peanuts and mint

This was by far the easiest as far as cutting all the vegetables and it was quite tasty and might even be my favorite of the three. I did have a bit of a learning curve here with cooking the rice. When preparing two different things on the stove top it's important to know which dish is on which heat setting, it can be quite confusing....

the vegetables are looking good on that medium high heat

uh oh, the rice was accidently sent on high instead of low to simmer :(

RIP sticky rice

Overall I was able to get one serving of rice saved from the heat, the rest was stuck to the bottom of my pot. Always something to learn in the kitchen right?! 

My opinion of Blue Apron so far is great! The meals do take a bit of prep time if you aren't familiar with fennel and how to cut it lol. I like that everything is pre-measured so there is not waste. The price is very reasonable considering everything you get. It would be better suited for someone who can use both servings at once. I was under the assumption that I would fix the two servings and save one for lunch or dinner the next day, but that's just not happening. The food is much better fresh and sometimes you just don't want the same thing back to back, especially when they are quite exotic to your palate that is used to pizza. 

The complexity of the meals hasn't scared me off, and I like that you have the option to skip a week if you are on vacation or just don't like what they have scheduled. My work schedule has changed for the next 5 weeks so I won't be getting home until 8:30 which really isn't ideal for preparing a 'fancy' meal. 

For me it was a good thing to try, but I don't think it has the long term likeability. I wish there was an option for just a single serving and I'd be totally in! If you decide to give it a try they do have family serving options as well. Let me know if you give it a try and how it went! 

bon appétit!