A Metromoment

Dear Loyal Bleaders,

I have been too absent for too long. There is no one good excuse for this absence. Sure, graduate school has been more demanding with midterms, research papers, conferences etc. But really, I haven’t been writing because I haven’t had anything interesting to write about. Since Eli and I got engaged, since we moved into a house and since I returned to school, our lives have taken on the rhythm of an enjoyable, if slightly boring, metronome.

Still, you deserve an update, so since I have no interesting stories, I will share a recent conversation overheard in the Laird-Bilek household:

Emily: Do you love me more than Blue loves Yellow?
Eli: I don’t know what that means.
Emily: You’re just supposed to say yes.
Eli: I’m a lawyer. I don’t say yes to things I don’t understand.
Emily: I’m a psychologist. I make you say things you don’t understand, and then interpret them however I want.

And to make up for (or add to?) that lameness, I will conclude with photojournalism:

City View

Ice Skating in NYC

My new baby cousin, Micah

Happy Thanksgiving everyone!

The Best Policy

I always knew there was a reason I was such a goody-goody two shoes. A beloved English teacher of yore honored me with the Honest Scrap award yesterday on her blog.

Apparently honesty comes with awards and recognition in addition to being good for the soul and all that crap.

I’m not 100% sure that I know what an Honest Scrap is, but I’m happy to be one. Eli on the other hand might be slightly annoyed that I have been honored for my honesty on this blog, as he fights it every step of the way. However, a spirited pronouncement of “the truth will set you free“  usually encourages him to roll his eyes and leave me alone.

As far as the award goes, it seems to be the chain letter of blogs because the instructions require me to: “Present this award to 7 others whose blogs I find brilliant in content and/or design, or those who have encouraged me” or be spurned in love for the next 10 years.

hmm… apparently winning the award doesn’t have to do with honesty after all. But I’m happy to be in the brilliant/encouraging category instead.

ANYWAY. The point is, I’m going to bestow this award on 7 of my brilliant colleagues in order to avoid love’s eternal spurnation. (Plus, I’ve got blogger’s block, and this is as honorable a topic as any. Ok, that’s debatable.  But, frankly, I don’t feel like posting about the Balloon Boy scandal, so take what you can get).

BUT, if I mention you and you are too cool for school, I won’t be offended if you don’t follow up with an Honest Scrap post of your own. It’s your love life.

I however, am planning a wedding here. So we can’t be taking that chance can we?

But, before we get to listing the new awardees, I must address the other award requirements (“with great power...”)

A) Say thanks and give a link to the presenter of the award.

Thank you, Stella! From my understanding of anaphora, to my inspiration for engagement rings, you’ve had a distinct influence on my life. I wish you didn’t live so far away (yes, I know I live in Miami now, but why hasn’t everyone moved here yet?). To her credit, Stella writes a more-than-weekly blog (which is also more-than I can say for myself) and still inspires me from across the country. That’s way more than you ask of your average 11th grade English teacher, but she was (IS) no average teacher. So thank you, Stella, for this award and much more.

B) Share “10 Honest Things” about myself.

1) I am a graduate student. Now, I’m not sure what definition of this term you use, but the definition I am currently referring to is, graduate student: (noun) a person who procrastinates. Case in point? As I type this, I should be writing a paper, making a poster, reading the DSM-IV, buying groceries for dinner, saving small children from anxiety and depression. Instead, I am not. Oh well, there is always tomorrow.

2) I didn’t drink any alcohol until after I was 21. Honestly. I had my reasons at the time, though I now have difficulty recalling the more compelling of those reasons. Apparently this truth is under speculation as I got an odd email from my mother yesterday that read “When you were in high school, did you ever go out drinking and not tell us?” I think she wishes I had a more interesting adolescence than I did.

3) I love face paint. Like LOVE IT.

age 3

age 23

4. I also love costumes. But Eli does not. This generally results in minimal tumult in our relationship. However, last night we went to a friend’s house for a Tibetan dinner party, and I really wanted to go dressed in “traditional Tibetan clothing.” Eli informed me that I couldn’t wear a sheet out of the house. I told him I’d change if he’d take a picture, and he obliged. But I don’t think taking a really blurry picture like this one fully holds up his end of the bargain, do you? I think it means I’m allowed at least one sheet-out-in-public experience. Good thing it is almost Halloween.

5. I eat the exact same thing for lunch every day (Hey, the award instructions only said that the 10 things had to be honest, not that they had to be interesting). I make a turkey wrap with goat cheese and eggplant caponata. I actually get a little disappointed when people want to go out for lunch or something, because I spend my mornings looking forward to the wrap (with applesauce or yogurt, yum yum).

6. I’ve killed every plant I’ve ever owned (not to mention an ex-roommates fish). And yet I keep on buying more.

7. I still think, despite all evidence to the contrary, that I would make an excellent puppy mother.

8. I watch more reality wedding shows than you do.

9. I pretend I am holier than other grad students who live in the “good old college days” past. But once in a while, I get intense pangs for Wash. U. In those moments there is nothing I want more  than to eat Easy Mac and have interpretive dance parties. I don’t think my “good old college days” were the same as yours (refer to number 2). Unless you’re one of my good old college friends. MISS YOU GUYS!

10. When grad school doesn’t work out, I plan to open a wedding cake store. Too bad my artistic talent does not extend past my face-painting abilities, and that talent peaked at age 3. As my mother would (will) say: Keep your day job.

ON TO NOMINATIONS!

If you’ve read this far in this post, then you are deserving of the Enduring Scrap award, but I don’t have that award to bestow. So now I will: Present this award to 7 others whose blogs I find brilliant in content and/or design, or those who have encouraged me.

1) Sarah McLovely at Bearing Eating Being. Sarah is everything good about blogging. She is inspirational, funny, heartwarming and sarcastic. She also has an adorable puppy that I plan to pupnap if I ever meet him. Sarah is also applying for a job I don’t completely understand, but it is called the Good Mood Gig. As Sarah is the essence of good mood, please vote for her here.

2) Angela Crumpet at Insanity and English Literature. Angela holds the key to great writing and she unlocks it on her blog. I’ve also had the privilege of reading her wonderful writing in all the classes we took together in college (she was an English major. I just took creative writing classes to spend more time with her and her genius). The bad news is she lives in London. The good news is that she’s in an MFA program and someday soon she’ll be famous and then I’ll have a famous friend.

3) Jessica Fressica at I’m not sure what the title of her blog is but the content always makes me laugh. She IS my sister, but this isn’t nepotism. If anything it is some healthy pressure to get her to update her blog more frequently. I guess she is a co-term undergrad and grad student at Stanford and fairly preoccupied. But give me a break, that is no excuse to lapse your blog. The people need to laugh!

4) Jeni Crockpot at The Hilton Head Chihuahua Adventure. Jeni doesn’t blog about her bakescapades because, in addition to being a phenomenal cook and baker, she is also humble. Instead, she blogs about living on Hilton Head and all the glorious things that happen there. So she manages to make me jealous all the same. I visit her blog for the wit, and stay for the stunning photos.

5) Shannon Vogue at The Daily Balance. This girl has got it all. First, she’s super organized: she has a different theme to everyday’s post (yes, you read that correctly, she posts EVERYDAY). Second, she’s so gorgeous and in-style that it makes you want to hate her for also being so balanced. But Third, she’s sooo sweet and considerate, and is always doing everything for a good cause that you end up just hating yourself (Not really, but you know, a little bit). and Fourth, she’s head over heels in love with her fabulous husband, and since my mother just sent me an article about how 45% of marriages end in divorce, I need all the happy ending anecdotes I can find.

6) Abby Stylish over at  Style Me Pretty: The Ultimate Wedding Blog. This is a megablog and there’s no way she’ll ever hear about “winning” this award, but her posts keep me going through long days at work. She posts pictures of different stylish, chic, vintage, always gorgeous weddings multiple times per day. This is her business, which means Emily is sad on weekends because she has no wedding blogeye-candy. Thank goodness for reality T.V.

7) Jenna Adventure at Eat Live Run. Another megablogger, this woman should be an inspiration to us all. She has suffered a tough tough year (which I only know about because she bears all on her blog. Talk about Honest Scrap!), and has challenged herself to grow from it. Working at a bakery in Tampa, she dropped everything and moved to Northern California to pursue a job at a winery. Her life is nothing if not interesting. She blogs about food, but read between the lines, she’s giving you the secrets to life.

OK OKAY! And that is ALL! That’s well enough for now. Next post will be short. I promise! Happy almost Halloween!!

Friday, Saturday, Saturday to Sunday

Hey Happy folk!

Just checking in with a weekend update. I should be writing my psychopathology midterm, but E+ I just made delicious chicken-mozzerella-balsamic crepes, and I have heartburn. So to soothe my heart, I am warming up my typing fingers with a blupdate.

So let’s get to this weekend, shall we? Friday our lab had a daylong “training” workshop to introduce our treatment to any grad students that might be interested in being indentured servants in our lab. To bribe them we served caffeine and I made cookies. I also presented a sound bite on our younger child group treatment, hoping to seduce people into being therapists for that. I need all the experience I can get making a fool of myself in front of colleagues before my mentor goes into labor and leaves me with a symposium to lead all by myself.

Afterward, I rushed home to prepare for a little get-together E + I had planned. We love having a house, but we mostly take it for granted and just bounce around in the space by ourselves. It is time to start having people over like adults. So we had a mini bbq, which was lovely and wonderful except we told one of our friends to please bring her humongous dog because “we have a huge yard,” and it ran away (the dog, not the yard, obviously). Apparently the yard wasn’t huge enough for the dog. It was heart-stopping scary for about 15 minutes, until he was found again and our friend put him in the car, said her goodbyes and left (presumably, never to step foot in our house again) before we got to eat her peanut butter cupcakes. Luckily she left those, so we at least had delicious treats to eat while we felt guilty. Note to selves: close gate when dogs are over. This was a particularly unfortunate series of events because I think it sets back my campaign for a dog by at least 6 months… and we were already looking at about a year. Ok ok enough Debbie Downer. The rest of the bbq was fun, and it was lovely to gossip with old friends (See how adult having a house has made us?).

Saturday was deemed workday (this wasn’t a Jewish weekend). I worked on a paper with my mentor all day, (on the exact same topic as the paper I have to write for my midterm. So why am I procrastinating? Because I’m so good at it)  and then E + and I went out for our anniversary in the evening. Some people go out to fancy restaurants or  nostalgic, romantic places on their anniversaries. Eli and I are not some people. We nearly forgot our anniversary (one of us more purposefully than the other), and upon remembering it, decided that the best place to spend it would be at the mall. Not just any mall, Dolphin Mall. Dolphin mall has a banana republic outlet shop (and about 100 other stores worth visiting) and, most importantly, it has a cinebistro. Our dinner/movie didn’t start until 10:30 (I’ve never eaten so late in my life!) so we had lots of shopping time. I bought clothes, and E pretended to enjoy shopping with me. Happy Anniversary to us!

Today, it was like we woke up in a different hemisphere. E + I were just going about our normal morning business with the windows closed and the air conditioning on (to keep out the sauna that is Miami in October) and all of the sudden E yells “we have to open the door!” I was like “is Elijah here?” but no, instead we were waiting on Mary Poppins, because the winds had changed. It was below 70 and breezy! E and I looked at each other and couldn’t believe it. Fall, in Cuba??? Apparently so. Unfortunately the weather channel predicts that by Wednesday, we’ll be back to Summer. C’est la vie, I love Summer.  To celebrate, we decided to take advantage of this strange turn of events (thank you global warming?) by going for a walk around the neighborhood. It is so novel to walk outside and not be dripping with sweat! So, I staged a mini photo shoot:

And then we came home, and I made pumpkin loaf and didn’t work on my midterm. Then we made crepes for dinner and I didn’t work on my midterm, and then it was now and I wrote this blupdate and didn’t work on my midterm. What are the odds that after I post this I’ll watch tv instead of working on my midterm? ZERO!! I AM IN CONTROL OF MY OWN FATE! Ok so that was my motivational peptalk and I’m off to type away. I hope you had a lovely weekend and didn’t lose anyone’s puppy.

Cheerio and joyeux autumn.

Paradise

Just in case anyone was worried that I was working too hard…

This is where I spent last weekend. Eli and I went to visit his father and stepmother in Hilton Head. My parents came too! It was a nice jaunt to paradise, just long enough to decide we’d be better off staying forever. Of course we came home, though. And we found that our avocado tree had borne fruit. We were gone for 2 days, and 6 avocados had fallen! INCROYABLE.

More incroyable is the size of these avocados. Take a peek:

Needless to say, we’ve been eating about as much avocado as 2 humans can (since only one of us actually LIKES avocado, I’m consuming more than my fair share of ‘good fats’). My fridge is FULL of slowly overripening avocado. Anyone need 3lbs of guacamole? Too bad the superbowl’s so far away (only time in my LIFE I’ve ever said that).

Anyway, in other avocado news, another one fell today and broke a hole STRAIGHT THROUGH the side table attached to our antiquated grill (I use the term “our” loosely. Greg- if you are reading this, your grill is going through some tough times…). See the picture up there ^ ? That is the before picture. Who knew avacodos were so hazardous? Or so huge? Seriously, I can’t get over it.

Ok that’s about all the update I can stand for right now. If there are specific things you want to hear about, feel free to inquire, otherwise I’m liable to go on about the other humongous fruit you can find here in Miami…

Ok, clearly Eli and I need other subjects to take pictures of. Come visit and we’ll photograph you and feed you avocado.

Enticing, no?

Also- please ignore the orchid dying a slow death in the background of these photos. I’m three for three.

Yo! Gupdate (Practice makes….better)

After stealing some wonderful pictures from the internets, I have prepared some compare and contrast for you today!

Consider it your dose of yoga update.

An Expert (with pretty scenery)

Me with all the blood rushing to my head

An expert doing Crow pose

Me attempting Crow pose

Clearly, my crow needs more work. But check it out- the toes are off the ground!!! YAY!!

After taking this picture, Eli proceeded to try Crow himself.

He was phenomenal, but too quick and would NOT recreate for a photo.

His skills live on in lore.

Why I Fast on Yom Kippur

I am not, in ANY sense of the term, a Jewish scholar.  So I’m going to begin this post with a huge disclaimer: I do not know what I am talking about from a religious perspective (I hardly know what I am talking about from a spiritual perspective, and that takes place within me!).

Please, if you know NOTHING about Judaism, do not mistake me for an authority. Don’t go around repeating what I say, as if it were true. You’ll just embarrass yourself. Also, if you DO know something about Judaism, (and therefore know more than I do), please don’t be offended by my inaccurate representation of the faith. Feel free to correct me in comments/private emails/snarky remarks made to friends. But don’t be offended. I know not what I do.

Phew, with that off my chest, allow me to misguide and offend the masses:

Allow me to tell you, in the most drawn out, convoluted way possible, why I fast on Yom Kippur.

Growing up,  I fasted because “that’s what Jews do.” My family doesn’t follow a lot of Jewish law, but we don’t (er…and I didn’t used to) eat pig, and we fast of Yom Kippur because “That’s what Jews do.” As far as I’m concerned, that is a good enough reason to give it a shot. But by 3:00pm on Yom Kippur, that logic starts failing me. Through high-school andcollege, I stuck with it because I had my family’s competition support, and whatever, I can do a day without food (of note: during these years I wasn’t addicted to caffeine, and it wasn’t that hard. I thought it was hard, but now I know better). I’m aware that while this may fall within the letter a liberal spelling of the law, my observance doesn’t remotely reflect the spirit of the holiday.  I just don’t think too much about it.

But last night, I had a phonecall with a close friend. She was going to fast this year, as she does every year, but she confided in me: “I can’t remember why I do this.” Half listening, I told my friend that services would help her remember why she fasts.  She responded (unconvinced) “I hope so.”

So why do Jews fast?

I think most Jews have some sense of why we are supposed to fast on Yom Kippur (and on many other Jewish holidays that I don’t observe). Here is my understanding (keeping the original disclaimer in mind): Yom Kippur is a day of atonement. By abstaining from food and drink, from washing, “marital relations”,  and wearing leather, we are freeing ourselves from the necessities of the flesh. I always thought about it as: if we are able to forget that we are human and have human needs, then for one day we can be completely spiritual- completely engrossed in our attonement.

It doesn’t usually pan out that way for me (and I assume for at least some others). It’s much easier for me to forget my base human needs when my stomach isn’t growling, when I don’t stink and when I am donning leather (kidding, I don’t think this one applies so much in modern day when we have lots of options for footwear). And I think this is troubling: Why do we do this if it only reminds us of our humanity? If it makes us so miserable that we can’t focus? I don’t deprive myself from food to feel angelic and immortal, to feel as if I belong to something outside of this world.  Instead, it makes me feel human to fast.

So, why do I fast on Yom Kippur?

I didn’t go to services today, so I had no inspirational words from a rabbi to keep me going. When I fasted today  I was feeling sorry for myself. I had convinced myself that I wasn’t addicted to caffeine, but the truth snuck up on my this afternoon, and I felt terrible. My headache was so bad, at one point I thought I might puke. I spent the afternoon moping around, looking for sympathy.

Eli told me that if I was bored, I should go lie down and think about my mistakes from the past year, to atone. I brushed him off, but lying in bed- unable to nap because my head was killing me- I was able to recognize my shortcomings. I have been a bad sister, focusing on my own needs and foresaking theirs. I have been a bad daughter (and in-law) ungrateful for the insurmountable love and support my family shows me. I have treated friends poorly and not reached out when I knew people were in need. I have missed the mark.

Contrary to whatever reasons I believe I am supposed to fast, being human necessitates that I focus on my humanly shortcomings when I fast.

I am human, and I have wronged. I am a spoiled twentysomething, in love with a wonderful man, on the path to a good career, whose biggest problem is whether or not I’ll get the band of my dreams at my wedding. For most of the year, I feel immortal, and I ignore my shortcomings.  But for one day a year, I honor my mortality.

I deprive myself of my humanly needs to remind myself of everything I need to do to deserve this life. When I am reminded of my humanity, I am reminded of how I can be a better human.  And then I eat, and instantly feel 100% better. In that moment,  I am  grateful to be human and alive.

I fast because it makes me human, and allows me to recognize and repent for my shortcomings. And then I eat, and I hit my restart button and try again.

But you can bet I’ll wean myself off of caffeine before next year. No one needs to feel THAT human.

Fall

Dear Darlings,

Sorry I’ve been a little absent lately.  I was waiting to get a camera so I could share pictures with you. But now that I bought a new camera, I find I have nothing to take pictures of. So I arranged a little something awesome/embarrassing for you guys (is there a better combination?).

In addition to shirking my blogging responsibilities, I’ve also been a little delinquent about practicing yoga lately. So today, I sucked it up and got up at 6:00 am to go to class (why? because my friend, K is evil).To my extreme joy, the yogi started the class by asking “how many times have you practiced in the last week?” Great, it was only 7am and I was already going to disappoint someone (I lied and said I had practiced once).

ANYWAY, despite all this, I thought I had a great practice today. I did my first headstand EVER all by myself! I was so thrilled (and thought I was the sh**), so I rushed home and had Eli photograph me and my perfect form!

These little gems were what I found when I uploaded my “great yoga photos” onto my computer.

While this is a valiant effort, I clearly have a ways to go (more specifically- my butt has a ways to go. As my yogi would say “tuck in that butt”). So much for my ‘perfect form’. It looked so AWESOME in my head!

Yet, as we (especially I) well know, pride cometh before a fall (sorry about the blur, Eli was working over time to get this action shot):

I’m lucky this didn’t end in tears. I think I better start “practicing” more than once a week. And I don’t think deep breathing when I’m bored in class counts. The good news is, I am well on my way to becoming the next hot star on SYTYCD (So You Think You Can Dance. Duh!) Check out my moves:

(ok yes, this was mid fall, but I think it looks SOO COOL. I just have to harness this amazing untapped talent/spinal hazard)

No other big news to report. Grad school and wedding planning keep me busy. I’m hoping to launch a wedding website soonish (we all know how good I am at simultaneously maintaining more than one blog!). But we don’t even have a venue yet, so it’s hardly the priority. Grad school should be the priority. And with that, I’m off to watch a new tv show Eli and I are trying out. (Dr. E + Mom, if you’re reading this, I’m not watching tv, I’m researching and curing anxiety in children. All in a days work!)

Happy Fall!

3rd Time’s the Charm?

I heart (<3) biking. But my enjoyment has been interrupted twice during the past three years by people stealing my bikes. Yes, I have gone through 2 high end bikes in 3 years (I have also lost 2 nice digital cameras during that same time. You may notice that, as a result, this post is woefully devoid of my photographic genius. My next paycheck comes at the end of Sept. I’ll invest then). I am hoping third time is the charm.

Eli recently reminded me that the University bookstore is selling bikes for $85. They do this every year, sell bikes in UM colors (LORD!) for cheap, but last year (before Eli bought me a bike for my birthday!) I waited and went to buy one in the store, and they were sold out! So, this year, I decided to order one online and just pick it up as soon as possible. Which I did today.

(I got it in Green.)

Ok so, I was giving all this backstory about how I bought it online, so that it would be more forgivable when you found out that I bought the bike without knowing that it had 1) no gears, 2) no brakes. But I realize, NOW, that this is obvious in the picture (the picture is from the store’s website). I was just so bike-drunk when I was purchasing it, that I didn’t notice. I didn’t even notice later when I was IN the store ‘trying it on.’ It wasn’t until I was riding out of the store and down a ramp that I realized that squeezing my right hand wasn’t slowing me down. Then I ran into a pole. Luckily this happened at a very low speed (~.5 miles/hour), but my ego was bruised. Also, it is a VERY frightening moment when you realize you are on a moving vehicle that does not have brakes.

Of course, it does have brakes, you just pedal backwards and it stops. I haven’t had a bike like this since I was about 6 years old (maybe younger?). It’s intriguing, and surprisingly dangerous. It takes a long time (for me anyway) to get used to a new system of braking. I’m not too worried about the fact that the bike doesn’t have gears, (mostly because I am already afraid of dying on this contraption so I’m not going very fast) because Miami is sooo flat. The terrain is almost an insult to gears. Or something.

Anyway, I’m back on the bike and despite the adjustment, I’m thrilled about it. I live a little too far away to bike to work, but it is just as well; this beach cruiser would be the icing on the nightmare-cake that is Miami traffic. In case you’re wondering, nightmare-cakes do not need any icing. They’re plenty terrifying as they are. Instead I’ll just be biking around campus and to yoga (hurray for not having to search for parking spaces)! Just wait until I invest in a new camera; there will be abundant pictures of me, undoubtedly grinning like an idiot, and my well-locked bike.

On several unrelated notes:

1) School is progressing as expected: more difficult in the post labor day era. Still enjoyable. I am settling in quite nicely and quickly rediscovering my place as the annoying student in the first row who only stops taking copious notes to raise her hand, AGAIN. My fellow students despise me the appropriate amount.

2) Wedding progress is slow. I’m going home for Rosh Hashanah tomorrow (L’almost Shana Tova!) and will be doing a whirlwind tour of Ann Arbor/Detroit wedding vendors. Still looking for (musical) wedding bands. Preferrably ones who do not completely suck.

3) In addition to biking, (and grad schooling and wedding) I also <3 Taylor Swift. She’s the blond, famous, country-singing little sister I never had. So, even though I usually <3 Kanye, I am staging a mini Kanye boycott (Kan-ye? More like Kan-nay!).  This essentially amounts to: a) changing my phone ringtone (it used to be American Boy) b) changing the station when he comes on the radio, and c) listening to a LOT of Taylor Swift instead. Despite being his #1 fan, I know I probably won’t change his behavior. But I’m just fed up with his antics, and how his bad behavior becomes a promoting publicity stunt. So join my ranks, say Kan-nay! And buy Taylor’s album, Fearless. If anyone should benefit from this assholerie, let it be Ms. Swift.

Taylor’s a sweetheart (plus she actually makes country music palatable which is no small feat),  and Kanye’s a Jackass (And I am not the only one who thinks so).