Junk Food Rejection

by rhealitycheck

So lately, I’ve gone on a bit of a health kick. Or maybe not a health kick per se but I have recently discovered many new active pursuits (such as biking and soccer) that in turn keep me healthier.

Now while I haven’t been actively seeking to revolutionize my habits/lifestyle apparently some of these little changes have had a much larger effect. So I made a couple of small changes, one being that I eat a smoothie with a little granola in it for breakfast every week day and it truly has given me more energy during the day/work week, it’s pretty fantastic actually. Another is that I’ve started biking to work a couple times a week (which is approx 6.5 miles and while that may not be much for an avid biker, it is quite a bit for someone that just took up cycling 2ish weeks ago).

Something interesting I’ve noticed since I started biking is that on the days that I play soccer or bike to work my body craves very healthy food that is generally high in protein. It’s just a natural reaction and kindof cool in its own little way. Now the reason for this post is that this weekend I decided that I deserved a break from being uber healthy and I was going to go crazy and get some junk food. I didn’t think it was all that crazy to think that one meal of Burger King would be all that bad, but after about an hour I felt the worst I have in ages. It was like my body was rejecting all the fried and awful food I had just managed to stuff into it.

I have never reacted that badly before and I’m fairly certain it wasn’t food poisoning because it just felt very different from anything else I’ve run across. I suppose I can only be thankful that my body is just naturally smarter than I am. Clearly, no more junk for me, I just can’t handle feeling as lousy as I felt last night and this morning over indulging myself in a little junk food. It’s really not tasty enough to qualify that kind of pain.

An Amazing Olympic Dive

by rhealitycheck

I tell you watching Guo Jingjing and Yuhlia Pakhalina dive is just like watching poetry in motion. I happen to think the dive that Yuhlia Pakhalina did was just visually more interesting but I will admit that no one did a dive quite so perfect as Guo. That was like watching perfection. I mean to see her focus and execute something so brilliantly. It is truly a pleasure to watch the Olympic atheletes, to see the talent and hard work in action is just incredible. I wish I had more words but I’m a little speechless after that. Simply in awe.

Most Efficient Starbucks of Ever

by rhealitycheck

Ok, well the title could be wrong but I’d have to say this Starbucks that I just discovered would be quite difficult to beat. They have a line that is constantly hovering at the door yet all of their customers make it out in 10mins or less including placing orders, paying and picking up their coffee. It is phenomenally busy, it’s right outside of Union Station in Chicago (between Canal & Wacker on Monroe). I am just amazed, not to mention they were friendly and courteous and the coffee is just as good as anywhere else. They even have a few regulars that they know by name and write little notes to on their coffee cups.

(Maybe I should change the purpose of this blog, it initially was supposed to help me keep up with current events but it seems to be turning into Rhea’s Adventures in Chicago.)

Most Fab Haircut of Ever

by rhealitycheck

So this weekend I got my hair professionally cut for the first time in 6 years. I had stopped going to hair stylists the summer before my sophomore year of college because at that time my opinion was that I’d had expensive haircuts of approx $100 (I consider that expensive anyway) down to super cheap ones that cost about $15 and I had never got what I wanted. I found that most stylists didn’t listen to me and didn’t necessarily give me hair that grew out well or were even close to what I wanted. So I decided to start cutting my hair myself because if I do a bad job at least I’m not out of money and it’ll grow out. The first few could have been better, they weren’t horrible or tragic but they weren’t exactly fabulous either.

After about a year they began to have a lot of consistency and for a year and a half while I was still in college they were good enough that I started cutting my friends’ hair as well. After college I went back to only cutting my hair because let’s face it when you have a job you don’t have time to be people’s personal stylist out of the goodness of your heart (or at least I don’t). And quite frankly up until this weekend my opinion was that I’m a better stylist and I know my hair better than any professional I had met thus far. (So much so that my friends who haven’t seen me in a while after I give myself a cut will always compliment my hair and ask who my stylist is. I always got a kick out of smugly saying, “I do my own hair, from cutting down to styling/colouring/product etc”).

So since I started grad school in June I really haven’t had time to spend on my hair and definitely not enough to give myself a decent cut. Let me back up a bit, early in June when I had just started work and a few weeks after I had moved to Chicago, there was this poor kid selling salon gift cards outside my office and was getting turned down right and left. So I decided to be nice and just pick one up and figured I’d probably give it away as a gift to one of my good friends.

After having this card for a couple of months and not having time to cut my hair except for minimal trims that weren’t even close to acceptable, I decided maybe I’ll just bite the bullet and let someone else cut my hair, I mean what’s the worst that can happen? I’ll hate it and it’ll grow out, that’s not the end of the world. So I made an appointment and went in not expecting much. By the time I left, I was amazed.

I have officially decided that I have met the stylist of my life. Her name is Gabi, she works at Colin of London just north of downtown Chicago. I have never been happier with my hair. I gave her minimal direction and she has done a wonderful job. Not to mention everyone that walked in the salon knew her and everyone else that went to her *loved* what she did too (I got to see a couple of cuts because she talked me into highlights, which I surprisingly like. I’m not sure I’d do them again, they look great – barely noticeable, which is what I like – but they’re a little pricey without the gift-card and I don’t think I’m invested enough to put in the maintenance that highlights require).

So this is my shameless plug for my wonderful new stylist, Gabi, if you live in Chicago, she’s worth going to see. My hair looks fabulous styled or just air-dried. I never thought I’d see the day when I met someone who could do better things to my hair than I can but I’m eating my words quite happily.

The Influence Of Oprah

by rhealitycheck

Ok so I remember back when Tina Fey did her little sketch on SNL supporting Hillary how everyone just flew at her about her snarky comment about how “Women today feel perfectly free to vote for whoever Oprah tells them to”. (If you want to know where that came from just google Tina Fey Bitch is the New Black). Well, folks here it is from the New York Times, there are economists who have done a study that approximate Obama received a million or so votes because of Oprah’s influence. Check out the Times article if you’re interested. I just think it’s interesting to finally have Oprah’s influence quantified, she is truly remarkable to have that much influence on the country. And while people may argue about how these economists got their evidence, I don’t question the validity of it. Perhaps it is only anecdotal reference but I have far too many friends/acquaintances/colleagues/family members who do take her opinion very seriously to underestimate it’s significance. While I do not read her magazine or watch her show I am well aware that she does hold a significant amount of power to sway public opinion. Far more than any politician I would imagine.

Uncomfortable Conversations with Co-Workers

by rhealitycheck

So today one of my coworkers asked me if I had met anyone recently? And not in that have you met new people, I know you’re new in town kindof way but in that wink, wink, nudge, nudge have you *met* someone kindof way. Quite frankly, I’m fine with you sharing as much of your personal life as you want to with me, I don’t particularly care. But asking me questions about my personal life at work strikes me as a little odd and hugely inappropriate. It’s like crossing all sorts of boundaries. I don’t mind answering if I just sent a notification to the team that I’m going on vacation, I mean you’ve kinda opened yourself up to questions when you tell people you’re out of the office. But just random questions coming from nowhere does strike me as just being intrusive and bordering on offensive. Ok, maybe not offensive but definitely creates an awkward feel. Oy. Sometimes I just don’t know what to do, I will probably just end up trying to pretend like that conversation never happened. But it’s not like this is the first time we’ve had an awkward interaction. *sigh* The joys of managing work interaction.

Internal Jukebox

by rhealitycheck

This is a bit random but it’s something I noticed yesterday. I had always been a bit jealous of people that seem to just have this little internal jukebox. For some reason, I’ve always had a good number of friends that are always bopping along to some song or other without the help of any headphones or anything. And just yesterday I noticed myself bopping along at work and on the train, somehow (and perhaps it’s due to the fact that I take so much public transportation that I’m always bopping along to my ipod) I no longer need real music. There’s continually some sort of song just playing in my head and sometimes I can’t recognize it but most of the time it’s like I have my own little database of music. It’s royally bizarre but in a good way. Going back to bopping along to my internal jukebox at work.

Olympics!

by rhealitycheck

I just love the olympics. The athletes are just so incredible. I wish I had even half as much talent as they do.

Unfortunately the American women’s gymnasts have been having a horrible day. It’s been rather sad to watch, there was this one mishap (at this point I forget which one was the initial one) that just lead to almost every member of the team making some serious mistakes. I believe there were about 3 members that stepped out of bounds on floor and at least 2 that fell from the uneven bars. What I found was most tragic was this stunning performance on the uneven bars that was marred by a slip just as the girl was switching bars. And it had been so capturing up until that point, it’s always so hard to watch.

On a slightly different note there is this amazing woman, Oksana Chusovitina, who is 33!! and competing for Germany. They were doing a piece on her because she used to live in Uzbekistan and her son had leukemia, so she had reached out to a friend in Germany who managed to get her moved out there so her son could get treatment. And this woman is competing in her FIFTH olympics. Maybe I’m out of the loop but I’m pretty certain that that is unheard of for gymnasts, especially women. The sheer amount of skill and fitness it takes to compete against all those little 16-year olds, I just can’t believe it. She is seriously amazing, definitely a great role model/icon.

Band-aids Are the New Fashion Statement

by rhealitycheck

Imagine my surprise when I open up my favorite section of the Thursday paper to discover that band-aids are the new hot accessories and mascara has started vibrating. What will they think of next. I mean I can sort of understand the desire to get the sympathy vote via the bandaids but to make up an injury just to accessorize does seem a bit much for me. Not to mention the idea of vibrating mascara baffles me. Perhaps I’m not looking at the benefits closely enough but I’d imagine you’d have to be a good deal more careful with your daily make-up routine in order to use something like that. And I have to wonder who has the time in this modern fast paced world to spend extra time in the morning before work. But perhaps this is catering to a different sort of clientele.

Cylcing to Work or Reading the Newspaper?

by rhealitycheck

This is my dilemma. I really don’t have time enough in the day for both activities but I took my first bike ride down to work today and I was a little slower than public transportation but I also didn’t have to wait for a bus or train, which was awesome. I’m a little precocious on my bike since I haven’t ridden in ages and well let’s face it driving around in downtown feels like someone’s going to run you over all the time. Thankfully that is only approx 5-10mins (depending on lights and cars trying to take me out) out of my 40ish-min trip down. Actually it may be faster than public transportation come to think of it… I think it’s just the taking out the bike, locking it up that takes up all the rest of the time to make it relatively equal.

Ok I got a little side-tracked there. But here is the real dilemma. I subscribe to “The Times” as the good little informed person that I’m supposed to be (at least so says my uncle who is ridiculously biased and been a subscriber of the Times since the 60’s). Now I haven’t always been a fan of the newspaper. In fact, I don’t particularly care for any other newspapers but after subscribing for a little over a year when I was living in CT I got quite attached to reading the Times every week day and at least a good bit on the weekends. Now that I’ve moved to Chicago I have found some problems with this. For one, I don’t have time to read on the weekends because I’m in grad school and my weekends are devoted to a little soccer and a lot of studying and maybe a couple of hours to see some friends if I’m lucky. Just last weekend I decided I wanted to make a healthy change in my life. With my crazy schedule it’s difficult for me to find the time to work out during the week. But then I thought to myself if I get a bike and just bike around town (and luckily Chicago is a hugely bike-friendly city, yay!) then I’ll get my exercise and cut out the irritating waiting for public transportation deal and it’ll be perfect! While I was thinking about this I totally forgot that I will also be cutting out my down-time of reading the paper while on the bus/train. So now I don’t know what to do. I know that I definitely don’t have time to read the paper during the week should I bike to work. But I’m hesitant to give up my subscription altogether.

I suppose I may try suspending my subscription for a little while and see how I feel about that. Oh how I wish there were more hours in the day. Maybe if I just leave early for work and get to work early I can take half an hour to unwind with the paper afte