So once again I've been a bad blogger.  It's been a month since I last posted and I feel bad about that.

I found out today that I really should stay away from cheese.  I'm not going to gross you out with any details, just going to say that I have my proof.  And cheese is one of my most favorite things ever so that's hard for me to admit.

I've been craving a lot of kiwi and a lot of shrimp.  I looked them up.  Shrimp has a lot of selenium which helps with thyroid function and that has to do with the metabolism.  The kiwi has a lot of potassium in it which helps the muscles.  So I figure it has something to do with the extra working out that I've been doing.

Though the weather hasn't helped my running much.  I have improved my fastest time from a 10 min 38 sec mile to a 9 min 3 sec mile, but I haven't been getting to do much running.  It's been too cold, even though spring was supposed to have started already.

I think the worst part of all of this, though, is that even though I am actually in a size 12, I look down and I see a size 20 body still.  I'm at my target size more than a year ahead of schedule, but I still feel fat and disgusting.  And I don't know what to do to change that.  Though having a gut that still sticks out further than my boobs doesn't help but I'm not 100% certain how to get rid of that without doing a whole lot of sit ups.

I have a year to figure it out though.  

@Jeffrey_Donovan and Brownies

This isn't just about Jeffrey Donovan, who you might better know as Michael Westen on USA's Burn Notice.  This is also about Archie Kao from CSI.  And it's about the brownies that I made today.


Let's start with the brownies.  I got the recipe from my agave nectar cook book.  It's pretty cool.  They have kind of a dark chocolate taste to them, which I love, and they ended up somewhere between cakey and fudgie which I also love.  It's awesome.

It's a really great recipe, very easy to put together and I highly recommend it.  

And now let's get to the men.  Let's start with Archie.  He's adorable.  He is one of the reasons I like watching CSI.  He's done a lot more than CSI, of course.  He was the Blue Galaxy Power Ranger.  Hey!  I only know that because of his imdb.com page.  But anyway, he's really cute and he's a good actor and I like him.  

And now it's time for Jeffrey Donovan.  My first exposure to him, that I realized, was on Burn Notice.  I've realized since then that I have seen him in a lot of different things and just didn't realize that I had.  He's a talented actor and a good looking man.  Especially when he smiles.  That genuine smile just lights up his whole face.  It's adorable.  

I have to say, in Changeling in 2008, he looked amazing.  He really fits into those 20's era suits, with his hair all slicked down like they used to wear it back then.  Just....yummy.  

He's not everybody's cup of tea, but he's certainly mine.  Just saying.  

Activity is important

So today I had tickets to the Armed Forces Bowl game.  I was unable to use these tickets, but not for lack of trying.  It took us two hours from the time we left the house until the we finally found a parking space.  Only about 30 minutes of that was getting from the house to Ft Worth but that's beside the point.

So we finally got a parking space and we got about 500 feet from said parking space when we had to turn around and go back to the car and then head home.  Why you ask?  Well, it's because we parked about a mile from the stadium and my mother couldn't make the walk.  At barely 500 feet from the car, she was huffing and puffing and needing to stop and take a break.

Now, I'm sure you're sitting there wondering why it is I'm bringing this up and I will tell you.  My mom claims that she is in the condition she's in because she has arthritis and everything hurts and it's hard for her to walk. But the thing is, my dad also has arthritis.  The same kind of arthritis to be exact.  And he can walk miles without having any problems.  You know why that is?  Because he goes to play golf every morning.  He works at the ballpark every summer.  He actually exercises.

Ever since my mom retired several years ago, all she does is sit at home and watch TV or nap all day long.  I have been telling her repeatedly that she needs to get out and exercise.  Even just walking around the block once a day would help.  But no, she insists that sitting on her ass doing nothing all day has NOTHING to do with the fact that she can't even stand up long enough to do the dishes anymore.  It's because everything hurts.

Now, what do EVERY SINGLE arthritis commercial in existence tell you?  That keeping active is important.  Yes, they want you to take their drug to help ease the pain, but ALL of them say that you need to stay active to be able to continue to be active.  If even the drug companies are saying it, you know that it's bound to be at least a little bit true.

My mom has type 2 diabetes.  This could have been prevented with a bit of exercise and some weight loss, but she doesn't care.  She can't even walk from one side of the house to the other without being winded, which could be solved with a little bit of exercise but she doesn't care.  She just keeps sitting on her ass and expecting the problem to go away on its own, but it never will because she refuses to exercise.  And now she's gotten to the point that she can't because of the fact that when she could, she wouldn't.

This is one of the reasons that I am taking Taekwondo.  The only exercise I was getting before I started Taekwondo was at work.  Going up and down stairs, walking from my car to the apartments.  And I swear I  probably walk about 4 miles a day just going back and forth across the store.  But even I know that that isn't enough.  And eventually I might actually get to the point that I am allowed to retire and will need something to keep me active and moving.  I do NOT want to end up like my mom.  I refuse to have similar medical records.  I am going to be healthy as long as I can because I do not have the luxury of going to the doctor.  I have no health insurance and can't afford to be put on umpteen million prescriptions for problems that could be solved with diet and exercise.

So here is my challenge to you.  Stay active.  Even if it means just walking around the block once.  Or even just playing Just Dance on the Wii for half an hour a day.  Or like my dad does, go to play golf every morning.  Find something that you like to do and do it to keep yourself active.  Because if you refuse to be active while you're able, eventually you won't be able anymore.

@officialkat and @2BrokeGirls_CBS

Alright, so I feel the need to stop objectifying all the gorgeous men in Hollywood for just one minute and tell you about one of the amazingly awesome women that Cally and I love and who inspire us as well.  See?  This isn't all about great looking guys, there are some women in the world that we'd really like to be like too.

The first that I am going to mention is the amazing Kat Dennings.  Now, I first fell in love with Kat Dennings when I saw Nick and Nora's Infinite Play List.  I liked her even more when I watched Charlie Bartlett.  I mean, come on, she got to be Robert Downey Jr's daughter.  How awesome is that?!  And then, my love affair with her was complete with her role as Darcy in Thor.  And it has only deepened with her role as Max Black on CBS's 2 Broke Girls.  She says so many things that I wish I could get away with saying in my job as a delivery driver.

Kat Dennings has played a variety of characters ever since she was 12 years old. I truly believe that she's a wonderful actress.  Though she specializes in sarcastic, razor wit characters, she can do anything she wants to do.  She's just that amazing.

And I am secure enough in my sexuality to say that she has an amazing body.  One of the things that I love about her is that she's not this skinny little tooth pick that wears clothes I couldn't even dream about fitting into.  Granted, I'm sure I couldn't fit into the clothes she wears, but I can actually see myself eventually getting there if I tried hard enough.  That's all I'm saying.  And let's not forget that she has a great rack.  But that's very obviously not her best feature.  Though I'm sure most guys think it is.  She has beautiful eyes and an amazing smile and she can actually rock mustard yellow.  Not many people can.

If you haven't watched 2 Broke Girls then you are totally missing out.  If you want to have a great bit of entertainment for a while, go here http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0993507/ pick a movie and watch it.  I trust you, even the cheesy made for TV movies that she did as a kid are worth a watch.

So here's to you, awesome Kat Dennings.  You have at least two women who greatly admire you.

  

@geoffstults and the fact that I've been lazy

I know I haven't made a post lately.  There's really no excuse for it other than when I am not at work, I'm kind of lazy when it comes to posting.  And then there's the fact that I have been watching The Bourne Legacy over and over and over and over and over....you get the point.

I realized today that I haven't made a hot guy post in a while because the guys that I drew from the post aren't men that I consider to be particularly hot.  I put them on the list because my mom suggested them, I looked up their pictures and agreed at that moment.  But when it comes down to it, I really don't think they're that pretty.

And work is kind of killing my spirit.  I spend all day around pizza and wings and pasta and it makes me want to eat some of it.  The pasta isn't that bad.  I usually make it up with some chicken and mushrooms and a little bit of cheese and it's really good.  But every day I smell the bacon cooking on the pizzas.  Or the chocolate dunkers coming through the oven.  Or the cinnamon sticks.  I see the traditional wings cooking in the fryer and I just keep thinking WANT IT ALL NOW!   It's really hard to work around all this food that I used to eat all the time and resist it.  It's REALLY hard.  But so far I have managed to do exactly that.

I have been making a lot of cookies lately, using whole wheat flour and agave nectar so they are actually healthy.  I also got an agave nectar cook book, but I haven't tried any of them yet.  One of the recipes is a Margarita pie that uses actual tequila and doesn't spend enough time in the oven to cook off the alcohol, so that's pretty awesome.  Kind of want to try that.  We'll see.

So I drew two new names from the Jar of Hotness and got two guys that I think really are pretty hot.  The first guy is Geoff Stults.  Now, he's not really hot in the most traditional of ways, but I think I found him most hot as Walter Sherman on The Finder.  While I really wish that show had gotten a second season, with the death of Michael Clarke Duncan I'm glad it didn't because they would have had to do something about Leo being gone and the show wouldn't have been as good.

This is one of the times that I found him hot.  He doesn't have a six pack but he's got a nice body and Walter had this goofy, I'm crazy but in a good way kind of charm that made me want to just hug him.  

The other guy's name that I drew was Cary Grant.  Who honestly doesn't think that Cary Grant is sexy?  I think my favorite of his roles was in The Philadelphia Story.  That was a really funny movie.  The whole cast was awesome and Grant was amazing.  That's really the only one of his movies that I've seen all the way through, to be honest.  

I showed this picture to my 13 year old daughter and her response was "Oooooh wow.  Wouldn't mind seeing him shirtless."  Which amused me greatly.  

So that's my post for the week.  Two hot guys, one of which is dead, the other is on a new TV show that I don't watch.  A lot of baking and a lot of dealing with my ridiculous parents and a whole hell of a lot of hating my job.  

On the plus side, my jean jacket fits me again and I am currently wearing a juniors medium t-shirt that fits me the way an extra large used to and makes my books look HUGE!  

COOKIES!!!!!!!

And today I made the oatmeal chocolate chip cookies.  Now the recipe calls for raisins, not chocolate chips, but my dad is the only one in the house that likes raisins in cookies so we substituted.  I also used whole wheat flour instead of regular all purpose flour.  They turned out AMAZING!  I love these cookies so much!

Since it's not my personal recipe.  

I didn't get a before picture of the first batch of cookies.  The recipe makes 4 dozen cookies and I stretched it to 5.  Because I am that awesome.  Although usually in my house cookie recipes yield fewer cookies because we spend more time eating the dough than putting the cookies on the tray to bake.  lol

You will note that two of the cookies are missing. lol.  HAD TO TRY THEM!  

So yeah, make these cookies and make them your own.  They're really good.  Like, really good.  

CAKE!!!!!

So yesterday, November 22nd, I made a cake.  It's a basic cake recipe using agave nectar instead of sugar as a sweetener.  This cake was so freaking moist, when I stuck the knife in it to test if it was done, I thought for sure that it was going to come out covered in batter.  And it turned out tasting SOOOO good.  Here's the recipe.  Now, I don't have Madhava organic amber agave nectar.  I have the stuff I picked up at Costco, but it works just as well.  And I used oat flour instead of wheat flour, regular all purpose flour instead of the unbleached organic white flour.  I also added 1/2 teaspoon of orange extract to the cake and it made it AMAZING!  Just saying.  

Look at this batter, isn't it pretty? 

Ready to go in the oven.

This is the final product.  

This cake is amazing and I recommend you make it.  It's very moist and very good.  I plan on making it again for sure.  Tomorrow, however, are organic oatmeal chocolate chip cookies.  Can't wait!