How do I love thee?

Here's the poem of the week. And I am blessed to truly feel this way. I love how she says I love thee to the depth and breadth and height my soul can reach. Trying to love someone faithfully and kindly has expanded my soul in ways I didn't expect or imagine, but I am so grateful for.

SONNET #43, FROM THE PORTUGUESE

By Elizabeth Barrett Browning

How do I love thee? Let me count the ways.
I love thee to the depth and breadth and height
My soul can reach, when feeling out of sight
For the ends of Being and ideal Grace.
I love thee to the level of everyday's
Most quiet need, by sun and candle-light.
I love thee freely, as men strive for Right;
I love thee purely, as they turn from Praise.
I love thee with the passion put to use
In my old griefs, and with my childhood's faith.
I love thee with a love I seemed to lose
With my lost saints!---I love thee with the breath,
Smiles, tears, of all my life!---and, if God choose,
I shall but love thee better after death.

Veritable Vegetable Paradise

This Saturday is Charlottesville's 11th annual Vegetarian Festival! Last year both Aaron (an omnivore who has sworn never to fall to my vegetarian machinations) and I (an avowed vegetarian) enjoyed ourselves thoroughly. Part of the fun is you get to overhear the most amusing conversation. We heard the following exchange between a middle aged lady manning a vegan booth and a nine year old boy who had wandered up:

Boy: You don't eat meat?!? (In almost disbelief)
Woman: No, but I get to eat lots of wonderful and delicious fruits and vegetables. Don't you like fruits and vegetables?
Boy: Well...yeah...BUT not as much as MEAT!
Then he marched off, his mind made up.

There are also lots of tastey treats, food booths from local restaurants, good recipes, raffles, crazy people that are fun to watch, and fun for the kiddies. You can check out their web page here. If you have some free time Saturday it's worth checking out. It starts at 11 and goes to 4 and is located downtown next to the library.

Step Greed

I have a pedometer which I absolutely LOVE. As soon as I dress in the morning I strap it to my pocket and begin to eagerly anticipate its little numbers ticking higher and higher. To accomplish that goal I start to imagine and map circuitous routes through the apartment and office: through the hallway to feed the cat, go back to the bedroom for your socks, then back down the hallway and around the table for the cereal, then back up the hallway for you shoes etc etc. It gives my daily life purpose and meaning: to get a high score! Just like a video game.

Sadly, and despite my meandering, my little pedometer tends to confirm how sedentary my daily life really is. At my office, I have days when I come in to work, eat lunch, and leave without topping 300 steps. That means in an 8 hour period I traverse a distance of only about two football fields. That's like a minute of walking, for the WHOLE day. The recommendation for a healthy, able bodied adult is 10 to 12,000 steps a day. So I often leave work in need of at least 9.000 steps.

This leads to a life of all out step GREED. I am constantly trying to come up with excuses to gain some steps. I walk to the kitchen for water. I hand deliver proofs to editors instead of using their mailbox. I stock the printer paper. And if I'm feeling really desperate I will take ten or fifteen minute break to stroll through the graveyard next to the office. When I get home, doctor permitting, I'll run or go for a walk. If my numbers are still low I've learned that the grocery store is an excellent source for steps. Today I did all those things and my final number: a paltry 7,629. Sigh...

But the Pedometer is still a lot of fun. I really love being able to collect "data" on my daily activities. It's fun to spot the trends of my activity. Oddly enough Wednesdays tend to be my least active days after Sunday. Sunday scores are almost always abysmal since my normal schedule is church, nap, dinner, goodnight. It's also handy in tracking the distance of runs and provides an estimate of aerobic steps as well as calories burned. I have a "Brunton" and it has served me well and survived numerous near fatal drops.

2+2=5

What tastes better than black eyed peas? Anything! With one exception, this spicy black eyed pea salad. It doesn't taste like black eyed peas at all, that is to say, it tastes delicious! It's not spicy, it has a very crisp fresh taste. And it's got veggies and protien and is SUPER easy to make.

2 14 oz cans black eyed peas washed and drained
I medium green bell pepper diced
1/2 cup red onion diced
1 jalepeno pepper seeded and minced
I clove garlic minced
1 avacado cubed (1 cup)

MIX

Sauce:
2 Tbs. Lemon juice
1/4 cup olive oil
3 Tbs red wine vinegar
1 Tbs. Szechuan Sauce
2 tsp sugar

Pour in and Mix again

Optional:
Lightly sautee fresh spinach until it just barely begins to wilt. Then top spinach with pea mix.
Also good in wraps, on toast, plain, snacked on out of the fridge etc etc

Addict

The doctor told me I had to wait a week before I work out and I am NOT going to make it. When friends came by and asked if I wanted to run, I was good and told them I had to wait until Friday. I'm now thinking Wednesday is close enough. My sanity isn't going to make it to Friday. Why? Because I am a TOTAL endorphin junkie.

Without it I alternate between wanting to attack anything in my vicinity that moves and contentedly staring at the wall. It's BAD. I can't eat. I can't sleep. I've got so much nervous energy, I'm twitching. My life is in shambles and it's only the fourth day. I NEED those happy chemicals.

Does anyone have any remedies for endorphin withdrawl? At this point I'm ready to try anything.

The Moral: If you do not currently exercise, or do not exercise on a regular basis, don't start. Once you start, you can't go back. Your life will NEVER be the same!

The Prodigal Cat

Last night our prodigal cat returned mewling at our screen door. (Aaron, who is annoyingly editing over my shoulder didn't believe me that mewling is a word. He is SO wrong. Mewl - To cry weakly; whimper.) Anyway, Battle's coat was matted and full of stickers. Some of his flab had melted off leaving his nobby bones poking through his skin. As soon as we opened the screen door, he ran to his food bowl and after finishing the kitty kibble, ran to our toliet and drank from it for about five minutes (EW) Best of all, as this picture shows, he then plunked himself down between us and began scratching incessantly. Aaron and I figure he staid out just long enough to contract a wealth of parasites and disease to lovingly share back at home. But I am glad to have him back, even if he is ungrateful and dirty.

The most interesting part of his return is seconds before he showed up at our door we heard a large rumbling vehicle drive up by our apartment, idle for a moment then zoom off into the night. We didn't see it because we had the blinds closed over our screen door. This has lead to all kinds of speculation of what Battle could have been doing while gone. What was that vehicle? Battle's newly joined motorcylce gang? The Night Bus? The Cat bus? One of the three Nephites? Battle refuses to tell.

Costochondritis

Good news. My chest pain is just costochondritis, which is a fancy way of saying that the cartilage between my ribs and sternum is inflamed. It happens after a blow to the chest fails to heal. And while it can be as painful as a heart attack it is completely benign. Hurray! So I'll be on Motrin for the next week and doing my best to avoid Aaron's bear hugs. And the heart murmur? Nothing to worry about.

Now all we need is Battle to come home. Battle Pleeaase!