Sunday Without Yoga

Sunday yoga is a thing of wow. The day start a little before 8 am, because at 8 am my lovely boyfriend and I meet over the Skype, then yoga, then back home to wash my hair and shower down and then goes on the rest of the day with whatever that has been planned. Well, not today, since personal nature got in the way of my plans. Man, where's my menopausia, my grey hair and my retirement staying? I want them all now! Yes, I was born old.

So, instead of stretching and twisting and flowing through asanas, I fell back in bed after talking with my boyfriend, with an aching waist, and went on watching TV and knitting until my avocado-mix colored yarn run out - which happened quite fast. Now I'm doing laundry - also part of my Sunday program - and  waiting for lunch to be ready, when I'll FINALLY have acorn with margarine. Gara love the cooked acorn coated richly with slowly melting margarine that threatens to run down your elbows. Ah, that's the Indian (Native ... Native-what are our indians?) Spirit in me.

My friend Al and I held circle yesterday to celebrate the Autumn Equinox, and this time around it came out rather well, though it was strange to hold this ceéebration while the rest of her family - save her daughter - where coming and going. There are a couple of rought patches going on there, maybe in all the wrong places, who knows, but it got me thinking time and again about the meaning of this celebration for her, and how the rest of her family were taking this circling thing. The languages to talk to God can also become the languages in which men choose to talk to their peers or themselves. I can only hope that a path of acceptance, personal choice, and respect for nature brings home the message these hearts need to be soothed and healed.

It's Sunday and many stores are closed, but I keep thinking about walking to the downtown (though rain looms dangerously close to Earth) to fetch myself more avocado-mix yarn, maybe getting a few new movies from the blockbuster for later. Well, who knows? Maybe I'll get myself The Hunger Games again. :-)

Lean Spicy Chicken

Recipe for Lean Spicy Chicken

Nutritional facts per 100 grs
Calories: 125 kcal
Carbohydrates: 1,8 grs
Protein: 22,1 grs
Fat: 3,4 grs
Fibre: 0,6 grs



Ingredients:

• 2 chicken breasts, boneless and with all the fat removed (this can be around 500 gramms to 800 grams depending on the size of the chicken, and yields two servings at least, but can easily yield four.)
• 4 tbsp curry powder
• 1/2 tsp chopped thyme
• 1/2 tbsp finely chopped parsley
• 2 cloves of garlic (each clove of garlic contains 4 kcals, so if you add more cloves and are counting your calories, add up to the calorie content 4 kcals for each additional clove)
• Salt and pepper
• water (around 2 cups)

Preparation:

1. Chop the garlic cloves as finely as you can (and want), as well as the thyme, and parsley. If you have a mortar, you can much the herbs and the garlic in it. Chop the garlic first into three-four pieces, to make the mashing easier.
2. Wash well the chicken breasts, and remove all the fatty parts you can find. You can cut the breasts in two along the joint of the left and right side, to make easier portions. If the pieces are large, you can quarter it as well. If you like, flatten the pieces a bit with a maller. The point of this would be to allow the breasts to cook through faster, so you don't have to wait too much for them to be ready. (If you don't have a maller (which is a meat hammer or meat tenderizer), you can use a rolling pin or a skillet. All you have to do is put the meat between two foils of clinging wrap or parchment paper and smack it evenly a couple of times.)
3. Put in a resealable bag the chopped herbs, the garlic, the curry and the dill. Put in the breasts and add salt and pepper as you like. Close the bag and roll well the breasts in the seasoning, massaging it into the meat. Then open the bag and add a little bit of water, a table spoon or two depending of the amount of chicken breasts. The amount should be just enough to allow the seasoning to be around the meat, but not so much that it would swim in it. You should be able to close the bag and wrap it around the meat.
4. Toss it into the fridge for one hour, or for whenever you are going to cook it.
5. When you want to cook the breasts, take a non-stick pan, and heat it without any oil on high. On a gas stove it should take you a couple of seconds. Really, no oil, no nothing, just heat the pan. When you put your hand over the pan and you can feel it's hot, place in the breasts in it and turn them a couple of times duting the first minutes (one-two minutes), then pour half a cup of water into the pan with the liquid and seasoning left in the bag.
6. The water you poured into the pan would evaporate quickly, so cover the pan with a lid, but check on the breasts frequently and turn them  a couple of times. Believe it or not, it will take a nice toasted color. Don't pour too much water at once, or you'll drown the meat. The point is to keep the pan from ruining and the chicken from burning onto the pan, while the moist heat allows the inside of the chicken to cook as well. Also check often, so whwn you see that there's no more water, you add a quarter of a cup at the time.
7. Depending on the thickness of the breasts, cook them for 15 minutes to 30 minutes to make sure they are well cooked, turning them several times and making sure that there's always enough water.
8. They are done when they get a nice, toasted brown color and they are cooked through.

Enjoy!

Yes, as you can guess, I lost weight again. Not much, just 100 gramms. However, unlike predicted, I decided to finish the diet. Yes, I was two days away from finishing it, and I was doing so well, and I kept losing weight. However, today as I woke up, I felt dizzy and very drained. The day was sunny and perfect, but I couldn't bring myself to go out and jog. My legs felt like made of jelly, and there was a lingering feeling of fainting. I got out of bed, got to the scale, measured myself, and then dragged my body back to the bed. I though "I can't move today, what the hell will I do?". The very thought horrified me. I debated a few minutes, and then decided to still put on my tracking clothes and go out to walk. No running, no jogging, just walk. However, to do so and avoid collapsing on the street, I went to the pantry and popped a piece of chocolate covered, chocolate filled wafer (it's like the Yippy, in Costa Rica) and a piece of Schoco Bananen (banana shaped sweet banana foam covered with chocolate). With that in I felt a bit more alive, and so I went to take a walk along my regular jogging path.

I had a little bit more energy, but I felt terribly, terribly hungry. Not that hunger of "wanting to eat", but rather the type where your stomach actually hurts and feels really hard and about to digest itself. Add to it, after the walk I was again completely drained of energy, so as I got home I fell back in bed and could hardly pull myself up.

I debated about the diet, and my byofriend said that I had gone so far with it (5 days out of 7), so it would be the best to finish it, but no, I wouldn't have it. Honestly, losing weight shouldn't be before your own health, and no diet that makes you feel drained and weak worths the effort. So, with 72% of the diet done, I walkd out of it, ate like a regular, real human being and felt much better. Yes, probably I'll gain weight again, but I decided that I won't do another diet again. Not like that. So, I'll be looking for a nutritionist to get on the right path, and make sure not that I lose weight to become a supermodel, but that I keep my healthy, normal weight.

In five days I dropped around 1,6 kg (around 3,5 pounds), which isn't really normal, nor healthy (the healthy ratio when losing weight is 1 kg per week), though this is still very low a ratio compared with the 7 kg (15,5 pounds) someone I know lost, and the average 5 kg (11 pounds) you are supposed to lose with the regime.

At first I was still filling sick, as my body was getting used to normal food again, and normal tastes, but as the day went by and I had some pizza, and a piece of Black Forest cake (also bought some Eszterházy cake and Lemon cake), my energy came back to me.

This got me thinking about a lesson I learned a long time ago, and which my friends Trish and Dragonfly know better than me: don't fall for the "there's a thin person trapped inside you who wants to go out" crap. Be happy with your body, but when you feel need a change for health-related reasons, then go with the professionals - meaning nutritionists, not your local gym trainer! - and get a plan that adjusts to your personal needs and conditions. Remember that losing weight should be a slow process, so that your body can adjust normally, and finally, if you feel ill, drained, tired or sick in any way, STOP and go back to the nutritionist, because the process should make you feel better, get healthier, not to push you an inch away from inanition.

I'm still not serious enough to post decently

No, no, come back. I won't be writing about puking! ^_^ But yet this is another babbling post about the little things that make life. First of all, diet. I lost some more weight today, so I'm happy and well stablished in the healthy range. Weeeheeee! I still have two days to go, and can't wait for this thing to be over. Allegedly, when you finish your diet you gain back some of the weight (and hopefully not all of it or more, as it's known to have happened, but not because you start to eat like crazy, but because your body says "this was one hell of a week! I better hoard up some calories and fat just in case some other time of horror like this strikes again". As you can see, the body has it's own agenda, and that doesn't fit in diets and weight plans). In the light of this, I had planned on sabotaging the diet by having some nachos with cheese sauce at the movies (I went to see Prometheus. The end is crappy, but Michael Fassbender is aaaaaawesommmmme!), but then I didn't. Not that I didn't sabotage the diet on purpose, though, as I have been taking some "creative liberties", like it said for today that I had to have 200 grs of chicken and I did... in a spicy version. It was healthy, no fat in the process, and I simply marinated the chicken breast (half of it actually) in a mix of parsley, thyme (these fresh from our own pots), garlic, dill, curry, salt, pepper and a little water. I tossed it in a resealable bag and into the fridge for two hours, and then cooked it in a pan with no oil, but by heating first the pan (non-stick) and then tossing the chicken with some of the marinade and a little water. I cooked it for some 30 minutes adding water whenever it looked like it was out of it, keeping the chicken covered with a lid, turning it occasionally (the chicken) for color. It was delicious! Naturally this wasn't what the diet expected, but it didn't say anywhere specifically that it had to be "tasteless, boring, boiled chicken".

If tomorrow I gain weight, then I'll happily ditch the diet (though maybe a little voice in my head will say: "you stuck to it since Monday, now let's do this last two days as it should", but I'll try to ignore that voice, and go back to chocolates, coke, cakes, snacks and all those amazing goodies), because no diet should be sensitive to spices - they are what makes life so wonderful! But if I lose weight (or remain on the same weight), that will show that my recipe of spicy chicken is healthy and diet-fit, not only delicious, and I'll share the recipe as well as I can. ^_^ Then, tomorrow's meal would be beef, which I would prepare in my superfamous dill-style.

20 Minutes to Blog, -100 Minutes to Sleep

WARNING!!! THIS POST CONTAINS ICKY AND DISGUSTING SEGMENTS! (I ate something and had to puke :-P)

Argh! Again a summarizing post of nothing fundamental and philosophical, or merely philo-bitch-sophical, just daily bits and pieces. It's 23:41 and I just came back from a church gathering. No, I didn't know it would take me so long. Would I known, I would have pressed myself to post before leaving. Then again I tried to do so, but only murky, sad thoughts came to mind. And here I've a reason to be chirp: I lost 900 gramms! So I'm still on this diet.

Today was the toughest, if you ask me, because aside of the three servings of cabbage soup one must take everyday, I had three bananas and a glass of milk. The problem isn't that it's too much or it's too little, the problem is that I HATE bananas. (Which is quite odd because one of my favorite candies is this banana marshmallow-like foam covered with chocolate, or banana marshmallow-meets-gummybear covered with sugar.) The taste, but above all the consistency of bananas get me sick. I ate the first one and half way of it wanted to puke. I hurried the glass of milk to swallow (milk and I are best friends, BTW), but for the last two there was no milk (according to the rules of the diet), so I cut the bananas into slides, froze them to get the icky gooey consistency off, and some of the taste, and then ate them. I kinda managed 3/4 of the slices, pushing back the reflect to puke with water, but at the end it was impossible, and so some of it came back. :-P It was really bad.

The rest of the day went kinda flying, as I had lunch, then spent sometime on the net, attended a webinar on a really interesting subject... for those who like telecommunications, like I do, and wrote some postcards I still haven't posted.

Then went to this church gathering, where I met some really, really cool people, and realized that our shepherd is quite a number himself. He's much younger than I thought, and far more open than I would imagine. They were talking today about this book, The Shack, by William P. Young, which isn't a novel per se, and which divided the group in lovers and haters. The book is basically about a crime and how that crime wrecks the faith in god of a man, and how that faith is recovered. However the vision of God in that book is quite different from the standard, Bible approved, Church observed vision, so it seems that the book has raised eyebrows and controversy in the church, and as some see it as a Christian book, others see it as the work of the Devil. (Wonder if there are Smurfs in it, to be considered demonic...) Be it as it may, I kept my tongue but wished so very much that my friend Carrie would be there with me, so we could exchange meaningful looks at this. Oh, they think that's a polemic book about God? That's because they haven't even heard about Vampire's Vow! (And that book was written by a former priest!)

The evening got me thinking, really, about what's God for all of us and how we see God and our life around God. Why God test us, why God let bad things happen to good people... and I was wondering, can't it be that we should be asking ourselves, why we need to test ourselves, and why we, as a society, let bad things happen to good people? God is God and He sees us differently, why do we want him to take a side among us?

A Break from Daily Philosophy, to some Daily Life

Yesterday's post turned out hard to read, right? For posterity I may go back on it and liven it up, because personally I believe that the topic is quite interesting - you know, talking about immigration, and how nobody can actually say that they've always-always belonged to the place they live in, nor can anyone say that they have a millenary culture that hasn't changed a bit since the begining of times. However the reason for it being so dull and hard to read - I presume - is due to the lack of pictures and my trademark colored text, which I use for highlight. If you have ever wondered what's my system for coloring, if colors and bolds or italics mean something, the answer is "not really". I pick the colors when I open the palette, see what colors I've used and which colors I feel like using. Perhaps normally I tend to used green to mark myself or my personal thoughts, fuchsia for religion or divinity, red for importance of shock, often aggression and violence, dark red for gore and supernatural, and blue for the things I don't like much... though I've used blue also for the things I do like, only for a splash of color. But anyway - I just derailed there - the reason why I didn't do that was because I was blogging from a train, on my way home from Mezőkövesd, where I had accidentally left my mouse (and half my power cord too). Have you tried to use your laptop without a mouse? And get online and blog without a mouse? Some parts are tricky, like I forgot how do you shut down a window or open a new page in your browser, but the rest is simple, only tedious.

Yesterday I went to visit Mama and Papa at Mezőkövesd, but I went without my boyfriend, who has been burried in work up to his eyeballs. So, instead of driving there, I took the train. On my way there I had the mouse and the cord, and so took out the laptop, the mouse and the mobile internet and started drafting up the post without any particular embellishing. Ideas and refining would come later. At Mama's place I then took out the laptop, charged it - I had used it on battery on the train - while we had lunch and then partook in a delicious traditional meal made in a caudron, outside over an open fireplace. The expression in Hungarian is "bográcsozás". It was my first one and it was DELICIOUS! It was basically a thick soup made with pork hoofs and venison, and it tasted like Heaven on Earth.

Inspired by Dragonfly's enthusiasm for photography and her beautiful pictures, I decided to experiment around the garden and took a few (okay, plenty) of pictures myself, from which I'll show you here some.

Waterlily

Flower Alone

Careful Close up under light brise

Flower cluster

Flower field

Household farming.

Families sow their yards to produce their own food.

Then, when I packed my things to go home, the mouse and part of my power cord (the one that's easily replaceable, thanks Hyne) decided to stay there without my conscent. I knew of the mouse the moment I decided to inish my blogging on the train, because I was going to get home quite late (I was arriving at the train station at 10 pm). I new about the cord when I've got home and decided to charge up my laptop. Oh well, after the holidays are over I'll go get myself new ones to have while I go back to Mezőkövesd to get the ones I left there.

Today the day was more calm. It's a Sunday-Monday holiday called Pentecost (also Whitsunday). Don't ask me, don't look at me, I don't really know much about this. Due to this even the stores that open on Sundays were closed, and so will be closed tomorrow too, which means that I'll only get to replace the mouse and the cord on Tuesday. However, by then I might also be able to get some photos printed out.

 I've decided that it's time to continue the embellishing of the apartment, and what better to make the place more lively and more of a home than to hang pictures from the walls? Naturally things are never easy, so I'll have to go over my picture archives and start selecting those I want on the walls. Pictures of us, pictures of the family - though this seems more on the line of "pictures of my family" for there aren't many pictures of my boyfriend's family around - so I'll have plenty to do from here to Tuesday. Then again, not like I can complete many of my repeating tasks from my List of 13 during this time. However, I believe it's fair to let you know that I'm getting ahead with the task of making myself June jewelry. I'm not entirely satisfied with the results yet, and basically because so far I was used to get already made chains for the necklaces, and here I have to make the chain link by link. Also, though I have wire sticks with a stopped on the bottom, there were a few only, so I made my own with bead stoppers, but they have given out sometimes.

For this set I used a picture from a book I've got recently as inspiration, but the one I'm making isn't hitting the mark with me. I guess I still have a lot to learn. :-) But that isn't taking away my desire o continue doing it, but rather make me want to see what else can I do and how can I come closer to the concept I'm looking for.

In beading, one of the biggest limitants are the materials: you don't always get to work with the beads and materials you really want, BUT you can work with anything as long as you get around it and know how to make it work. Beading, in the end is an art part knowledge and part experimenting, and that makes it more rich and more magical. Well, we shall see how this goes on in the future!

A Day of Small Adventures

Perhaps today is going to be yet another one of those days - like Tuesday - that I won't be sure I've lived. Damned, I need to get serious with TV shows so that I can set a day tracker in my life. Today I just kept forgetting that it was Friday, and though you may ask why do I need to know which day am I in when I'm not working, well, because others do and businesses keep different hours and Wednesdays, as I recently discovered, the movies can be seen at a reduced rate.

There was no "level 2" and nothing particular to nag at my nerves today, but as my boyfriend prepared to go out to work, I though about yesterday, and how I wanted to go to the movies (after having gone on Wednesday after Level 2), but I didn't go for I was too lazy and otherwise occupied with being lazy, watching some TV, reading some political/financial magazines and busying about the Internet; I though that maybe today would be a good day to make it up for what I left undone. As an after thought, I smiled thinking how on Wednesday - for Level 2 - I acually dressed according with the color of the day suggested by Llewellyn's Witches Datebook, without knowing. I wore brown head to toe and was looking SMASHING in it.

I had gone for the beads, as you know, but haven't bought all I needed to string up a decent set, so I thought that today was just perfect to go over there and hit the glasses and little compartments with beads and make magic. After having taken a look at my book on jewelry, it was easy to go there with a purpose, so I came out of there with a hefty bounty of many, many colored beads of different sizes and shapes, loose, packed in small bags and little tubes. The owner of the tiny place was nice to me and gave me a 10% discount considering me already a "regular". The place was buzzing with ladies so at home around beads and jewelry supplies, talking about the techniques they were most versed in, and referring to bead and supply details I have never heard before. To my amazement, I was quickly included in the conversations and was part of sharing the experiences of how we love to make jewelry, but end up with more pieces than what we can wear in a lifetime. I believe my friend Dragonfly-cr can perfectly relate to that.

From there I rushed to the movies at a close-by commercial center - just like I did in Wednesday. My mission was simple: The Raven followed by The Avengers. I thought I was going to see one good movie followed by one bad movie - but I wanted to see the bad movie to get the jokes on Internet about it. As it happens, I saw a lame movie followed by a comic-comic movie. Thor was handsome, and so was Captain America, and Scarlet Johanson's sidekick, and IronMan was the heart of the movie... though I had to keep myself in check so I wouldn't shout "Go Sherlock!".

These are my third and forth movies of the week, as on Wednesday I saw the terrible "The Woman in Black" followed by "Dark Shadows"... which was just as disappointing. It was like I went to see - and paid! - a really bad episode of Supernatural, with no plot at all, and lacking the two handsome Winchester brothers and their slash, and then went to see a washed down version of "The Monster Family meets Beetlejuice". Oh well, at least today I saw The Avengers and there were handsome guys in it.

Haven't hit the movies so hard in ages, but then again, if I don't do it now that I've the time, when else would I do it? Only, just for insurance, next time I'll hit another movie complex, so that I don't get to be the regular-regular who watches two movies in a row... like I do.

People really don't come to the movies much in Hungary. The Raven was deserted, and the premier was yesterday. Well, The Avengers was full, and the premier of it was weeks ago. Wonder how will it be for the premier of Brave.

In between the movies, I went to have some light, late lunch at one of my favorite restaurants: Leroy. Though this was the one where I can ask for gyozas - and they prepare them superbly - I wanted something new. I asked for a Miso soup - which was particularly horrendous, tasting too much of vinagre - and completed the order with a Tennessee Highball (Jack Daniels, giner ale, lime) and an order of hamachi sashimi. Believe it or not, that was my first order of sashimi of my hole life. I wanted something light, something wholesome, and what could be more wholesome, more healthy, more light than fresh, raw fish slices?

Well, I didn't regret my decision. The order contained three thick slices of hamachi  - which I understand is white tuna - fresh and juicy, served with the mandatory ginger shaves, some wasabi and a siding of cucumber. The pieces were simply exquisite, and each nearly melted in my mouth as I took a bite from them. Perhaps it's not the cheapest thing one can order, but it was amazing and absolutely worth it. Then of course, maybe a Tennessee Highball wasn't the proper drink for it, but it was all amazing and got me out of the fiasco mood after The Raven and ready for the Avengers, even if I had to deal with Ms. Johanson's annoying acting. There goes another actress falling off the wagon, forgeting the requierements of her craft in the name of a fame gained on their physical atributes... Pitiful.

At least the sashimi was good.

So, adding it up, I tried new things and I hit also the old ones, and from all of them I reaped fabulous experiences and a great chance to relax, lay back and enjoy life, because that's what it has been given to us.

A Happy Discovery

After having both of my lower wisdom teeth extracted last week, (one of Wednesday and the other one of Thursday), I've been doing quite well. No major problems, virtually no pain (except for the expected pull here and there from the work done) and everything just swell.  Three days of vacations - which I've taken to have the procedures done and an extra day to link it to the weekend, so I can get a decent amount of rest - have gone flying by so quickly. Still, the looming of Monday and another work day doesn't bother me at all: these are the blissfull days of someone knowing that work is reaching an end (and hopefully a new job will arrive in time ^_^). However, what's pissing me off currently is the baby food. Yes, the baby food.

After having your teeth removed, like with most surgeries that touch any part of the digestive system (and the mouth is part of it, in case you didn't know), you are commanded to eat only soft foods, and soft foods are mainly soups and baby food. Normally I love baby food, and indulge from time to time with a jar or two of peach or prune "2nd Food". From time to time it's fun and delicious, but three days on the row... or more like four now, eating only baby food it's becoming too much. It's ennerving! I've spend days eating less than 1000 calories a day (I know for I keep the count of the calories now with the fitbit), when before that I kept going over the daily recommended amount (2000) and by far (once I've got 6000 ^_^). So, this is when I start dreaming about food and the day I'll be free again to stuff my face with whatever I want.

Yesterday, however, as I met with my dear friend Shimmy Gin, I realized that there was something else I could eat while the wounds in my mouth healed: mashed potatoes. *Insert Celestial Music* As we sat chatting at a coffee place nearby, I nursed dearly a plate with delicious, creamy, warm mashed potatoes enjoying every bit of it. Oh dear, how did we got to that point?

Sometimes you can't help it. I couldn't eat anything else if I wanted, because I undergo a procedure and thus I need to give it time to heal, otherwise I could suffer quite unpleasant consequences. I'm losing weight like crazy now, and though I'm not hungry - I was always one fo those who eat little - I'm constantly yearning for something else. I want nachos with garlic seasoned sour cream, bread with sour cream (I love sour cream), buffalo wings, pizza, chicken risotto, sushi, salad, sesame sticks (with garlic and pepper seasoned sour cream), PB&J sandwich... Shimmy told me that after he had all his wisdom teeth removed - and it was a procedure and healing of 44 days! - he got so starved out, that the first day he could eat like a normal (un)civilized person again, he hogged on an insane amount of Chinese food and he felt soooo good about it!

Hopefully my healing period will be shorter - or so my doc has told me - and it will be over just in time for the trip, so I'll probably hog on plane food (it's Air France, so hogging is understood) and then... in Paris. Can't wait for the Escargot!

I'll probably will gain back all the weight I lost with the forced diet, but who cares? Yes, I set myself a goal and it would be nice to work to get it... but food after such starvation is a welcomed blessing, no matter what comes behind. :-)

Petty Issues

January is usually a month of frugality for many. After receiving (in Costa Rica) an extra month's salary, and spending a lot on presents, office parties, family parties and what nots, many people actually end up either on a quite tight budget, or carrying more debt on their shoulders. Be it as it may, the end result is seen at the office during lunch, when the dinner is filled to capacity and the lines at the microwave ovens are endless. Indeed the number of lunchboxes have grown exponentially, compared with other months, as people now carry their food from home rather than buying anything.

Today I went to have lunch at 13:00 h, which is a bit early compared with my favored 14:00 h when normally the place is deserted. After having spent a great deal of my morning chatting with one of my coworkers about Scrouge and his issues (Scrouge was talking laudly on the phone all day about moving to a smaller house, because he doesn't mind living in a hut as long as he has the basics, then about lending people money at a 4% rate, and assuring that someone to whom he lended money was now talking to him through his assistent - assistent of the other person, Scrouge has no assistent - but that "he's going to pay, I don't worry" and then all that about his wife and yadda-yadda), and how he's so petty and lame he actually gets offended when you don't stop your life to serve his, here I was, with my Japanese lunch box filled with delicious Hungarian food, waiting for the microwave, when the woman before - who crammed three containers for five minutes in the microwave, was actually going to give space to a friend of her who was waiting on another line. Rude, considering there's a freaking lot of people waiting in line, and she was already at the microwave. However, passed the 5 minutes, she touches the containers and deem them to be "cold". Fucking shit, how cold can it be after 5 minutes?? 2 more seconds and the plastic of the containers would melt into the food!

I was about to tell her to just let me put my lunch one minute on the microwave, then she can go back again at her containers, when - leaving the door of the microwave open and the containers in - she took off without saying a word. I waited a little and was about to pull her containers out of the microwave when she appeared tailing a guy... who was the owner of the containers. He deemed them hot enough, packed them and left. She then moved with her friend to the other line, where her friend was already packing the microwave to capacity, and crammed her own containers in too.

Upset? Look me in the eye and tell me you wouldn't be in my place. It's a matter of consideration, which people seldom exercise and we all hate. What's on your mind when you leave your food in the microwave - AT THE OFFICE - and just wander off, and walk back when you remember you actually were heating your lunch? What the fuck is on your mind when you set the microwave to 5 minutes only to stop it a minute after because that's all you need to heat it? What the fuck is on your mind when you heat fish in spite of the clear sign saying "DO NOT HEAT FISH IN HERE BECAUSE IT STINKS"? What are you thinking when your food spills out of the container and leaves the microwave a mess? I wonder, do you have problems separating HOME from OFFICE or is just that at home you are taught to be a rude pig?

Sadly, like Scrouge, there's one too many people in this planet who walk around with no consideration towards others. They do not think of the uncomfortable situation they put others by imposing, by going to someone they are not really friends with, and ask them to give them some of their food. They don't consider that others also want to use the bathroom/microwave/teller machine/vending machine but rather hog on them like they were at their own house and the rest of the planet were invisible. Thing is that whether we like it or not, we live in a society, and as part of it, we must adapt. This doesn't mean to sell our souls and abjectly abide to every single demand, but it means that there's other people out there and we should behave in a manner that's polite and consider them too, just as we want to be considered. It means that you are not entitled to abuse of the kindness or politeness of others because "if it really bothers them they'll say so" or because "I have the right to do it".

Yes, these are petty issues, but no matter how small, and how no war can actually spun out of it, it's most unpleasant. One thing is that, ok, they don't have any respect for themselves - as someone who disrespects others often don't respect themselves either - but why do the rest of the planet has to suffer their personal issues?

When faced with people like this, suddenly the signs of attention to manners or polite behavior make sense. Yes, give your seat to the elderly, the pregnant or the people with special habilities. Now, can we get one for the office that says: "consider your coworkers and use the microwave to heat your own food. Maximum use: 4 minutes" or "if you are heating your food stay here and remove it once it's heated, otherwise you'll find it in the trash".

A Freshly Baked New Week

Monday Morning. I started AGAIN the 15-Minute-German little program, with all the intention of taking it to the end (instead of drifting away hardly three weeks away from completition (three out of twelve)). Now that I know how the system works, and how much does it have, I know also what kind of stuff I have to investigate in alternative sources. I'm back at the "Guten Tag, Ich heiße Martina Li, freut mich"-thingie, but I don't mind it at all. Repetition is the key to success in language learning (though over repeating is the key to language forgeting, which is why I always suffer with my French conjugations - particularly with the verb faire - ). The morning was cold, clouded, stormy, and so I was happy. Perhaps "happy" is too soft a word to express my feelings. I was exhilarated. Stormy mornings are my favorite kind of morning. The chill, the cold, the promise of a diluvian rain sparkled with loud thunders made me dreamy, hopefull and inspired, and so, starting a learning regime, such as this German program (again) was puuuuurfect!

I also fed the masses - or the proletarian people, if you wish to see it that way - with bread and sour cream. Nah, not some metaphoric bread, such as the bread of hope, the bread of education, the bread of information, but actual, freshly baked flour bread, from the local grocery store.I asked around if anyone knew who was supposed to bring bread today, but nobody seemed to know, so since I had to go to the store to fill the tank, I decided to cooperate with the cause and bring them a baguette and some sour cream. Probably the one with the bread task sorted for today would bring one or two bars of bread and I really didn't want to leave too much leftovers. I mean, bread from various days accumulate in Cyn's old office getting old and ugly in several paper and plastic bags, wrinkling up, hardening and becoming sort of gummy, like the limbs of old people.

Well, no bread was left over today, for nobody actually brought any bread, and so my humble, only loaf of bread was the one that abolished hunger in the office. Go figure. Tomorrow the Ants plan a breakfast-sale, for which I offered a bottle of Salsa Lizano. I guess that, in solidarity, we shall not gather to partake in our communal everybody-brings-something breakfasts, but buy from them what we ourselves have offered. Wonder if it will work.

Among the things that fill me this new week is the novel "Emma", by Jane Austen. As I wrote (somewhere), yesterday I saw (again) this movie "The Jane Austen Book Club", where plays one of my currently favorite actresses, Emily Blunt, and I was taken away  - again - by the wish to read Jane Austen's books. Well, as far as I know, we don't have Jane Austen's books at home, though I could have asked my mother, since I believe she's the only one who actually might have an idea about what volumes to we keep in our so called library. (We had Kurt Vonnegut, to my surprise, and also the book about Genghis Khan... all of them in Hungarian, of course.) Anyway, I was browsing the Amazon, when I came across this comment of a man who gave a 1 star grade to a compiling book I was cheking out, and so I found out that the novels could be read FOR FREE online. Go figure that. So I sought and found and saved the link. Read the first chapter yesterday, from Emma, the first novel in the list (and the first read in the movie) and found it strange. Yeah, strange. Getting used to the type of English used in the book, such as calling a woman "handsome" (my devious slashy eye made me wonder if Emma Woodhouse wasn't actually some Emmerson Woodhouse), or the reversing of numbers, saying ages such as four and thirty instead of thirty four; but the strange way in which the whole thing is dumped on you, with a basically selfish Emma, who feels herself superior to everybody else, surrounded by repression, passive-agressive blows and who herself deals out a great deal of them, well, that's not at all expected. There's so much crammed into that first chapter and it is so strange to read, you feel like you need a readjusting at some point. Oh well, I've clicked on the next chapter so I'll continue my discovery of Emma, and hope this book will be NOTHING like Dorian Gray.

Workwise, my alotted work has been slashed in two for today. Ro will tackle one batch and I'll tackle the other. And here I expected both to be dumped on me today. Oh well, we shall see, we shall see. This is, after all, just the first day of the rest of the week.

Three Days Down at 2009's Surf Championship's Headquarters

So Kari wanted, WANTED to go somewhere, anywhere, but out of my folks' house and close to the sea, or the ocean, to a hotel, for at least two nights. He wouldn't have it any other way. due to the pressure it would put on my finances I wasn't very interested about the idea, and hoped I could just go by and entertain him here. Besides, as we all know, I was in probation-vacations this week. But Kari wasn't happy, he needed his fix-of-beach, and having read my entry in the Hungarian blog about the matter, offered to pay the hotel, or, well, transfer me the money. Well, shame to me, but I accepted. Still that was just an idea up in the air, nothing sure, something we kind of planned for yesterday and today (Kari also wanted to stay until tomorrow), since I had a meeting booked for Wednesday. Yep, a meeting in the middle of my vacations. Since Monday I had been waking up before 7 am to log into the office mail service, working on a project that has been blocked more times by a superior than the Universal Health Program by the American Senate.

Wednesday morning my boss called me and told me that the meeting had been cancelled, so sooner said than done, Kari and I made quick reservations to Terrazas del Pacífico, a hotel at Playa Hermosa, which last year was the headquarters of the World Surf Championship. The decision was between the Best Western in Jacó, where we had already been, but we knew that wasn't an all inclusive hotel anymore (which makes it far more sucky because it's no longer that good, and often the food they serve is beyond bad, but then again that's my opinion and I'm, known for being hard to please with food, though then again eating only tortillas - corn flat bread - at lunch because that's the only thing I could eat from the whole menu is a little above my wildest cases of no-like-anything), and this new hotel, all inclusive, in Playa Hermosa where we had never been before. The add sent to my e-mail offered an all inclusive experince for $88 per night, per adult. We made our numbers, and though the total cost of the Best Western was somewhat lower ($32 less), we went for the all inclusive promise.

In the most improvised fashion ever, we packed into a sportsbag some clothes, sunblocking creams and lotions, toiletteries and such. Then we grabbed our things and left, taking the first available buses everywhere. And so, after leaving the house at 11 am, we arrived at the hotel at half past four. We had no idea where the hotel was, what would it look like, but I certainly expected more than what I saw. The bus (we had to take a bus going to Quepos, but get off it before the final destination), stopped before a desolated red brick road that went steeply down, covered in dust, bordered with dry looking plants and weeds. There was nobody there, and it looked like the place you go to make Hostel 3. Rooms looked less that pretty, and the lobby was quite simple. The guy at the reception was nice though, and very, very helpful, friendly and all, confessing that there were actually only five rooms in use, and that after the Holy Week it had been quite low. It was so low that they took the chance to fumigate the entire place. Oh goodie. As a matter of fact, he also told me that I was the only one who was Costa Rican in the place. Awesome.

The room we've got was the 202. No, I have no pictures of it, so you can imagine it wasn't as pretty as it could be. The again, exposed beams, even if well finished, have never delighted me. A pentagonal room with two double beds (not even queen), a frigde with no mini bar, one wood chair, no extra pillows, no extra towels, no notepad, no pencil, one glass... dude, ONE GLASS! Two double beds and only one glass? Dude, really, check your maths. No coffee machine, no coffee... I don't know where was the all inclusive, but it wasn't included in the room.

There was a TV and an extremely noisy air conditioner, that at least worked well. Oh, did I mention that there was a terrace, but there wasn't a single chair out there to enjoy the view? Yep, the chairs weren't included in the all inclusive.

Close to six, but not six yet (half past five, actually) we went down to the bar, to exercise our all inclusive rights, only to realize that after five we couldn't get any snacks, and had to wait until six to get food. Hey, but we could get booze, so we did. Well, only cocktails and some hard licor, and beer from a barrel, not from a bottle. Hn. The arrangement of cocktails was also quite limited, so we made it on Tequila Sunrise and Piña Colada. At least those were good. It was unsettling though, that despise us being there with the all inclusive plan, the bartender and then the waiters kept writing up everthing we consumed. That kind of killed the whole implied all inclusive mood the place should have. It wasn't also very nice to see a set almost carbon copying the arrangement of the best Western, only slightly more run down, so to say.

The dinner offered three options for entries, two salads and one ceviche (raw fish with lemon, coriander, onion and other stuff), and there were five options for mean courses: chicken in with sauce with mushrooms, meat with strogonoff sauce, fish with garlic, rice with shrimp and pasta with red sauce. Three plain desserts completed menue, one of them was a cheese custard, another was a tiramisu, but none of them was really available. The same menu was repeated for each and every meal, except breakfast. Salads weren't like the menu described them, and none of the meals were exactly as described either. Chicken and meat weren't properly cooked, so we had to request them to be really, really, really well done. Whomever, truth to be told, the garnishings were delicious, the pasta was exquisite, and once the chicken and the meat were VERY WELL done, they were awesome. Fish was great too. It was kind of displeasing to be faced with the same menu three times. Why couldn't they, at least offer two different menus, or at least many more options? Breakfasts had more options, but I always went with the Continental Breakast, and Kari went for the Traditional Breakfast.

The pool was nice, and the view was beautiful, and though the beach wasn't good for swimming (currents are too strong there), the shore gave a nice place to take a long walk, enjoy the sunset, collect interesting colored pebbles and shells, and run away from the waves that stretch giddily across the shore with foamy lace fingers. Yeah, sounds romantic... even for me. (We did all that, if you ask me, and I felt a bit dumb, but I enjoyed it inmensely, because I was with Kari :-) )

Then came the nightly experience. No, I'm not detailing our sexual life, I'm detailing the hotel. All night long we heard the loud noise of trucks, trailers, buses and whatever engine running down the road, as if it was running right next to our ears. I've been in traffic jams more quiet than that hotel. Hell, I've been in bars more quiet that that hotel! The pillows were hard and the matress was so stiff, so hard you couldn't sleep on your side or your legs and hips would start hurting like hell. Now, okay, I'm one of those that need to sleep, love to sleep in very soft beds, but this bed was horridly hard. I woke up constantly with numb limbs and pained hips.

Finally, but not less important, though there was wireless internet available, for free (with a password), the connection was SO bad, I, evidently couldn't access it to blog, or even tweet. No mobile phone coverage, and finally, the bathroom was disasterous, to say the least. The toilet wasn't working as it was supposed to. Can you imagine to ACTUALLY have to open the tank and fill itt MANUALLY with water so that you can flush it? Yep. Like that. All fo the personal was nice, though I really resented the way they were friendly with me completely disregarding the fact that Kari was with me, and Kari resented the constant lack of manners as waiters kept serving him first than me.

The hotel wouldn't be so bad, really, but unless you are Spring Breaking and minding not for the looks of the place, go ahead, but for me, it doesn't worth the $88/person/night we paid. But then again, that's just me. You may like it, but I don't recommend it.

The "System"

The other day I had lunch with this acquintance of mine (who looked so very different from what I remembered), and he told me about this methond or system or something he was following, that had helped him lose Hyne knows howmany pounds of his weight. The system is called "Superthon System" and he explained it to me through the notes he did from the book, which he sent me through e-mail.

First of all, I didn't remember him ever being a human rocking ball or anything like that, so it was strange for me why would he follow a diet to lose weight. And well, lose weight he did, now he looks rather dried out. Well maybe is only me, who likes people with "substance" on their bones. Like any dieting system, it had rules about how and what to eat. One of the things was that food was divided in four categories: proteins, carbs, vegetables and fruit. You can mix them all, but you can't mix carbs and proteins. Every other mix is allowed... except that you have to eat fruit on an empty stomach. Then, like every other diet in the world, it said that you can drink as much water as you like. Water is free, free, free. You must also eat every three hours, but you must make sure that you are not making two carb meals consecutive. You can eat proteins twice one after the other, but you must spaciate carb meals with protein meals or anything but carbs again.

Now, proteins are all animal and animal-derivated foods, and carbs are "non-animal, but neither vegetal or fruits", such as grains, fluor, sugars, yeast and so.

Suddenly, even though the system tells you you can eat all you want, you can't. You can't, for instance, eat a lasagna, because there's meat, cheese (proteins) and pasta (carbs). Same goes to hamburgers, hotdogs, and yeah, sandwiches, bread with butter, bread with ham, or liver cream, jambalaja, rice&beans (Caribbean style), any kind of spaghetti, pizza, calzone, risotto... fish and chips even (fried in vegetal oil...), and lets not start on potato skins! So, it got me thinking. Shouldn't it be the point that people eat healthy? Our lifestyle is not the best for heathly eating, but depriving us from good stuff, stuff that has been around for centuries ain't the solution, it's just another way to make people unhappy. I think people should eat whatever they want to eat and be happy about it. Don't eat until you are about to explode, but eat until you are not hungry, then take every chance you have to move a little. Walk to the grocery store if you can, take the stairs, at least for a few floors, and maybe you take the electrical stairs, but you can still climb them! Walk as much as you can, and drink as much as you can. Water, juice, beer, whatever makes you tick. And as often as you can, prefer fresh and natural over stored and artificial.

And if you are a bit round, a little bit puffy here and there, what's the big deal? Ain't like you've gara make a living as a toothpick, right? Just be happy the way you are, with whom you are, change what you want to change, if that truly makes you happy, but don't force yourself. Live for yourself, because nobody else will live for you. Remember, we have only one life, so shouldn't we take advantage of it and enjoy as much as we can?

Pistachios

Take the bag, open it, eat one and I dare you to stop... stop anytime before the bag is empty. Yes, I know, you can't. Neither can I, and I tell you, I'm not much of a nut person. So yeah, I'm nuts, but I'm not nuts about nuts. Peanust are fine, and peanut butter only if inside a Reese's pieces. I hate almonds in all their forms and varieties, pecans are not one to take my breath away, nor hazelnuts even though I like to eat them from time to time because they look like brains; and I like chestnuts only as mashed cream. But pistachios...

Let's start with the fact that they sport my favotire color: green.

Early in the morning, I come to the office talking on the phone with my boyfriend the last 100 mts, since the system manager decided AGAIN to close all verbal communication forms thought the Internet, and yet I want to hear his voice everyday. Yes, you gara be in love to do that.

So we are talking, mainly me bitching about the thesis and our ever-so-adorable-and-understanding tutor, Hyne bless his soul, and eventually things turn to: "Let's meet online". Well, when you have to deal with monthly calls from Hungary to Costa Rica and vice versa, you do want to ensure the "financially healthier" choice. Well, my boyfriend was about to fix himself some lunch (yes! he can ... well, maybe not Iron Chef Hungary in the kitchen, but he does know his beginer's way around the stove!), and so we agree to meet around here when he's finished. Phone placed on the receiver, and I'm left to my devices and find my own food. Sure, I could pick up the phone again, dial and have Bagelmen's deliever me a bagel with butter, toasted and two regular cokes, or maybe go to the seven-eleven and pick some bread, some yoghurt, some coke (I actually have to replenish my coke reserve. It's depleted, truth to be told.), some Raisins Kellogg's Komplete and Hyne knows what else can I dump in the cart before hitting the exit. Never, never send a compulsive buyer alone to the seven-eleven. We can spend an average medium-low family's monthly food budget on one breakfast.

However, due to the world crisis and the food crisis that stroke down months ago, and will strike again soon, plus all the banking crisis, the bailouts and the growing unemployment, I decided to have breakfast from what I have in the office, assuming I have something. I found a bag of pistachios on my desk, and first I thought "what a drag. This will be a poor breakfast". I opened the bag and that was the end of it. I did found in my food drawer all I need for a wholesome oatmeal (the one with pear pieces. Haven't been able to find the one with apple and cinnamon, my favorite, or the one with peach), which I did started to prepare, you mind, but I just couldn't lay off the pistachios.

The rhythm with which you eat them borders maniac behavior. You compulsively reach for more and more, peeling the hard shells off, risking to get your tips nipped by the clamping shells, and fiddlesticks, getting them nipped! (Fiddlestick: for those whose English is poor, it's the name of that long, straight arch like thing that people use along with the violin to play the violin. In this case, fiddlestick replaces an "f" word I don't want to use. Yes, I've been watching The Skeleton Key again.) There's hardly pause and therefore there's no way you can multitask while eating pistachios. When you are with the pistachios, you are only with the pistachios! You may really like to do something else, but both your hands are engaged in a fierce battle to free the green, salty, tender nutty trapped in the armor of two clamping pale shells.

It is a battle for the pistachio, for the taste and for the joy.

At the end, well, I had a very nice breakfast put together: oatmeal, tea, Everess beverage, Reese's Pieces... you can't ask for more... and yet I had to finish my pistachios. ^_^

What drives YOU nuts?

Győr

News upset me, so I won't talk about the news. All the papers are filled with stuff about the Israelies and Gaza and ... give me a break. You know, I start to think that people should stop paying attention to them. Maybe they will stop if no one listens, because no matter how much people disapprove them, they keep going at it on and on and on. What's the story with this people? I don't care and I don't want to care either. They have a fight and go killing each other. Flash news, Sweetheart! People do that everywhere. Sure, it's bad that people kill themselves, and war is always a very bad thing, BUT when they are on and on for years rolling over the same topic, you either do something effective or just let them... kill themselves. Look, you can't do anything to help them if they are not willing to get help, so why would you waste time worrying?

So no news in this segment. Not today, thank you.

Nor will I refer to this problematic fag I know who has more issues with his mind and his emotional life than the global economy. Funnily, he ACTUALLY expects the world to bail him out of his troubles! Anyway, I hope he has finally realized he has no business with me and decides to permanently retrieve his toxic presence (because he has no personality) from my sight.

You may wonder about the picture I put, where I pose AGAIN before a set of bars. Well, today my aunt, my uncle and Anikó, our friend, and I went to Győr, a beautiful small city close to the border with Slovaquia and Austria.

Győr is incredibly small, and what makes it even more amazing is that even though its reduced size, it has such opulent and luxurious buildings as if it where another capital city. Notoriously I took only a few pictures, yet all the more were consagrated to taking pictures of a group of ducks smilling in the Rába river. Why would I take pictures of some ducks in a river? Am I planning to order them for dinner or something? Well, no, only I have never really seen such "picture like" ducks in my life. Our ducks in Costa Rica are plain gray or brown. Just some bird with flat feet and rounded beak. These ducks were something else. Like the ones you see in cartoons. So I devoted a healthy amount of shots to these lovely swimming dinners. Hey, I like to see them, I like to eat them. Live with it. I love these green headed beauties. Would never keep them at home, but I sure like to look at them... and eat them.

Then again, my diet lately has been generously dosed with stag meat. I love to eat stag! I guess I'll have to gear up with a bow and arrows when I get back to Costa Rica, and head to some wood area in order to go hunt my favored meal. Or may I be able to request stag at a restaurant? I think the bigger the animal, the stronger, the more I like it. Shit. I like my meat like my men: big, strong and ready to fight... and handsome, stylish, fast, and then so slender it's slightly femenine, yet with a few curves in the right places. Hn. I think I would love to eat horse too. Evidently I already like them horny, it's time to find out if I like them hung like a horse too. ^_^

Due to the time, there wasn't much to say, much to visit, and it was freezing like a son-of-a-bitch. We had a good conversation, though, Anikó and I, and a glass of warm wine. I burned my tongue, though... :-P Anikó took some pictures of me, for which I posed in such a fashion that I'll look slender than what I really am. After all, who can remain slender with all the awesome food you have around here??? I believe the next time a guy asks me what kind of food I like, I'll confidently say: "Hungarian". There's no better food in the world than Hungarian food.

Tomorrow I promised to visit my Grandpa, and at some time I'm supposed to go to Gödöllő and then be back before 19:30, because THEN I'll go to Gitta's and from there to the New Year's party at this pub near the Deák Tér... which is so cool! Party until 4 am! There will be 6 kg of bread and 3 kg of sausage cream and chilli&fish cream. Yes, I'll take pictures to record this feast of booze and food... and the people downing it all. Wonder if I should cooperate with something, like 2 Kg of pork lard and 4 Kg of bread.

This year seems so exciting!