Watching Seth & Alex's Comedy Show and it is the worst piece of self congratulatory drivel out there! Like watching Seth McFarlane masturbate. THIS IS HORRIBLE! So 3 timeslots on Sunday prime time is not enough that he had to make this piece of crap, too??? *BOGGLE*

I am planning to post about my first time experience & a realistic packing list, but I haven't had time (read as motivation) yet. Until then, here are some of the best pics I have found and a great article that sums up the experience.

I can't wait for next year!

Article - http://www.huffingtonpost.com/jay-michaelson/the-truth-about-burning-m_b_279464.html

Pics - http://theblight.net/09/bm/

Here are the pics that I took. I was really there to enjoy myself this year and not to document it, so my pics are pretty bland. Also, the dust is hell on cameras so I only took pics for a couple hours on one day. Anywhoo:
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=107345&id=766829093&l=643e068fcd

d00d. srsly? wth??? http://www.perkyjerky.com/home.php

Woo! Just when I was starting to feel uber discouraged at work - more and more of the night shift, no feed back about anything, ever...

I got some compliments from the pilots and my managers. I guess I am doing a good job after all. :P

Woot.

Fank goodness for my east coast vacay coming up soon. Sea Isle beach house + ocean that is actually warm enough to swim in = :D

http://sea-isle-city.nj.us/HOME/BeachInformation/tabid/673/Default.aspx

*HUGGLES*

I miss yer brains out, y'all.

Bexy

Harro thare. I has dun a many updatings!

http://www.flickr.com/photos/prexious/

Hope you are grate!

<3 B

Goddammit! I was kind of doing ok on my diet but now I just discovered Sprinkles cupcakes! There is a store in Palo Alto - the other is in Beverly Hills. Fuckers! Those cupcakes are amazing and they cost like $800 each, which I happily pay because they are so good and I am obsessed with cupcakes right now. :P http://sprinkles.com/

http://sleepinginairports.net/

Hella yes!

Yay, I did a good deed. As I was driving home from work this morning, I stopped to help a guy who ran out of gas take his can to the gas station, then drove him back to his car. Yay, karma!

It was raining. He was a tiny old asian dude, so I didn't think anything bad would happen. He was grateful and I was happy to help.

There is nothing like honesty to get things started off right. I am currently 6’ and 240 pounds. My ideal healthy weight is 180 to 190 pounds. I’m setting an intermediate goal of being down to 200 pounds by the end of August, 2009. At 40 pounds in 5 months, that comes to losing 2 pounds per week. That is a pretty aggressive goal, but I am looking forward to the challenge, and the results!

Looking at generic, average numbers, 1 pound of body weight = 3500 calories, so that comes out to 1000 calories per day that I need to reduce, or burn in order to lose 2 pounds per week. On average, if I eat 500 calories less, and work out to burn 500 calories each day, then I will be golden!

My plan is to eat a reasonable diet that I can maintain after I am done losing weight, too - a healthier, less processed, more raw diet; more of a lifestyle shift than a diet. This will be high in protein, and high in fiber, with low fat (especially good fats like avocado – hello, homemade guacamole with cucumber slices instead of corn chips)! I also plan to drink 80 or 90+ ounces of water per day. I am kind of always thirsty these days 

Over the last few years, on and off, I have been tracking my calories with FitDay.com. It is a pretty good free online site, but the Lose It app on the iphone seems to be even more convenient, so I am switching over. I have been counting calories for ever, but eventually, when I stop measuring things and just eyeball it, the portion sizes creep up :P Heh, I find that if I know that I am going to have to write it down, then I am less likely to eat that random cracker or piece of candy or what ever.

Ugh, lately I have been eating probably 2500+ calories per day due to my weird sleeping situation. I tend to nibble on snacks at night to keep myself awake, so I will get that in check. I will plan fruit and veggie based snacks, and miso soup instead of something processed and simple-carby. Cutting out 500 calories per day will put me back down to 2000 which will not be painful at all. I will try to cut out 800 calories on the days I don’t work out, and try to do 700-1000 calorie work outs three or four times per week. I burn about 500 calories on the elliptical in 45 minutes, so if I add in some weight training on top of that I should be set. I plan to start running around the track at the high school by my house to get me back into soccer-shape. I have already signed up on an email list for pick up soccer on Wed nights in Palo Alto, but I am feeling so schlempy and out of soccer-shape that I am gonna get a couple weeks of running the track under my belt before I make it to a game. We also changed the flat tire on my bike and Andrey and I have been riding around town. There are some nice hills to the west of us, so I can get a great quad workout that way. Ft Funston Beach / dog park is a great little hike, with spectacular scenery and the weather has been fabulous lately, so I am sure I will keep hitting that up. Luckily there are lots of great activities around me, and my 24 Fitness is close, too. On warm summer nights I even plan to ride my bike to work once or twice a week. It is 10 miles each way, so that will be great! Exercise is definitely the critical piece that I have been missing since I moved out here. I went from playing soccer 3-4 times per week, to none at all  No soccer + extra calories overnight = bummer.

I am thinking of joining a support group of some kind to help with the dieting part, too. Either Weight Watchers or a Craigslist group. At least I am already going to a weekly sewing/crafting/making meet up, which has been AWESOME! I am a social creature and I thrive on livin it up with friends. These cats are cool and inspiring, too! They are up to lots of rad projects. Chillin with these peeps does wonders for my mood and happiness 

I am combining all the methods that have worked for me in the past to lose some pounds and get back to my healthy self. I am setting mini goals, too - 4 pounds every two weeks – 10% increments of my August 31st goal. In my head it is much easier to lose 4 pounds at a time, than think about the whole 40 pounds. Woot!

I am off to a good start today: Two mugs of chai with fat free milk and Splenda as I woke up and got ready for work, strawberries and fat free yogurt, brown rice with tomato/eggplant compote + turkey meatballs. I also have edamame and a little handful of dark chocolate chips to kill any cravings that come up.

I have done raw diets for 3 day stretches and there are lots of yummy foods to include that I sometimes pass by. Pecans, raw oats and a tablespoon of honey make a really yummy, sweet, satisfying mini meal. Raw diets are awesome, but I need hot food to keep me sane. I totally dig teas and soups. If I can do 50% raw / 50% other healthy stuff I will be happy. I am also planning in little, moderate, reasonable desserts so I don’t feel deprived and go off the deep end. The little 150 calorie Betty Crocker mini microwave cakes and brownies are awesome!

Ok, all that being said – if you see me shoving pie in my face or eating something stupid and fucked up say “Hey Rebecca! Knock that off! Think of your goal!” :D

Thanks for reading my commitment! Updates to follow 

I bought my ticket today! Hooray! It has been about 5 years in coming...

I am looking for a crew to team up with, too. Mebbe some SF people, or Boulder people, or San Diego people? I am planning on driving one of my Subie station wagons so I'll have some room to share. I am cool chipping in for a shade shelter and a solar shower! Heh, I am at the very beginning of my research and planning so more posts to follow. All suggestions welcome! :)

Ok, so while doing all these gummy projects I ended up with a lot of gummy things. We found out there is a definite window of time that makes for good alcohol infused gummies. About 4-6 days is the ideal amount of time to let the gummies soak up the alcohol. Shorter than that and the gummies are still a little hard and haven't soaked up all the liquid, longer than that and the gummies soak up too much liquid and all glop together into one gigantic messy blob.

The vanilla vodka infused gummy raspberries and cherries turned out wonderfully! Very delicious and the perfect gummy consistency. They were pretty strong, too. Definitely got me a little bit tipsy, but I would not want to eat enough of them to get drunk. That much sugar is overkill! I might experiment next with sugarfree jello...

From our first attempt, I ended up with two gigantic messy blobs of alcoholic gummy goo (oversoaked gummies - soaked for about 14 days), so I melted them down and recast them into the little molds again. I am pretty sure that by heating up the goo, a lot of the alcohol evaporated. This mixture was a lot runnier this time, and the gummies did not set up as nicely. I read somewhere that they should cure in the molds for 24 hours, and I found that to be true, too. I did a batch of green ones that I let cure for 24 hours and they held their shape better than the red batch that I only cured for 12 hours.

I did try adding more stuff to the gummies this time, too. I did white chocolate again and tried to swirl it in with a toothpick, but since this gummy mixture was thin, it didn't offer enough resistance to really make the swirl work. I did kinda scramble it instead and it did make some pretty patterns once set.

I added dark chocolate, white chocolate and dried cranberries to some of the red gummy batch and they turned out with maximum deliciousness! :) I need some smaller gummy molds tho - as yummy as gummies are, a 1 inch-ish cube is too big and too sweet!

On a side note, we put a bunch of clear, yellow, and green gummies in a dish to soak up the absinthe. After sitting for too long, it congealed into a big gummy block, but since it was three colors to begin with it ended up with a cool marble effect. I cut that block into smaller bits for serving to preserve the cool coloring, and since it didn't get re-melted it also maintained some of the alcohol content :)

This guy is sick! Mad skills!

http://amazingstufftome.blogspot.com/2009/03/amazing-japanese-tetris-player.html

http://djdebo.com/tracks/pjelly.wav

By my friend Scott - AKA DJ Debo

100% Awesome.

Ah ha! I easily popped the gummies out of their molds this time. The key is definitely treating the silicone with something before pouring the hot gummy goo in. The molds I treated with non-stick cooking spray (canola oil) let the gummies pop out with hardly any effort at all. The gummies kept a nice shine and the mold was a snap to clean up afterwards. The molds I treated with powdered sugar let the gummies pop out nicely, but left the gummies a little bit matte - not as shiny as gummies usually are. But, on the pro side - there was no weird flavor associated with the non-stick cooking spray. Perhaps there is a milder, better, different cooking spray that would not leave a flavor. Even so, the canola flavor went away within about 1 second of eating the gummy - since they are SO SWEET :)

The hearts with white chocolate chips were very tasty. It was a little awkward to have hard bits in a gummy, so maybe the white chips would be best swirled into the hot gummy goo a bit with a toothpick before the gummies set.

All in all - a success!

Here, are the gummies I made in this batch. The four hearts on bottom right were from molds treated with cooking oil, and the four on the bottom left were from the powdered sugar mold. (The shiny vs not shiny is very subtle.) I left one from each batch right side up for contrast. You can see the white chips... The stars are from a mold treated with cooking spray, and have green gummy bears that I added after I poured as an accent. That part didn't actually work very well. I think I let the stars get too cool before adding the green gummy bears.

See earlier post for more info and video :)

Here are a couple of possible color schemes for my new tattoo. I am leaning towards the bottom one. It is a little less gay :P Darn you homos for claiming the rainbow! ;) I will have a similar one with hearts on my other arm. Spongebob wristbands are NOT punk rock!

It was a lot of fun to play with gummy things last week at SCOW! I decided to test some other options out on my own. The biggest problem last time was getting the gummy things out of their molds once they had set. This time, I made some gummies in a silicone mold dusted with powdered sugar, and some in a mold sprayed with non-stick cooking spray. I also added some white chocolate chips to the heart molded gummies for interest, and to see how the 2 kinds of candy would interact. Since the gummy goo is hot when poured into the molds, it melted the white chocolate chips, so I bet it would be easy to make some sweet swirls or patterns with a toothpick before it cools.





I'm also infusing some cherry and raspberry gummies with mid grade vanilla vodka.

The gummies in molds are now cooling and setting up under waxed paper. I'll bring some to SCOW, but the vodka gummies won't be ready for another week. I dig this DIY candy!



My next step will be gummy shot glasses (or ice shot glasses) with this mold:
http://www.amazon.com/Fred-Cool-Shooters-Shot-Glass/dp/B000I1UTNE

but I still think they are cool. and clean! neat...

There once was a man of Fort Orange
Who longed to make rhymes using orange.
He quit in despair,
Hung himself in mid-air,
Where he swings to and fro like a door 'inge.
by John Field

Flappity, floppity, flip,
The mouse on the Moebius strip.
The strip revolved,
The mouse dissolved
In a chronodimensional skip.
by John Field

There once was a man from Peru
Whose limericks stopped at line two.
by John Field

There was an old lady from Hoakum,
who'd steal your cigars and then soak 'um,
in sugar and rum
and smear 'em with gum
so it wasn't a pleasure to smoke 'um.
by Kathleen Schulte

A young man whose fad was pajamas,
Wore a suit made of wool from the llamas;
The unmanly effect
Made people suspect
That the outfit was really his mama's.
by Kathy Ewing, Oman

Yay! I found a group of friends to sew, paint, knit, and make gummy things with once a week :) Rachel and Matt have a sweet loft on Mission and Cesar Chavez where they do all kinds of art and sewing things. Tonight was gummy craft night! We melted gummies down to make our own gummy creations, including a gummy bear smoothie (you know with fruit, milk, sorbet, ice, vodka and gummy bears), vodka infused gummy bears (they won't be ready for a week), and new gummy shapes - we did hearts and stars. The gummy smoothie was not as gross as it sounds, but I prolly won't make another one. It was a tad hard on the blender, too. The key is to blend all the stuff together, then pour in melted gummy goo while the blender is going. Very sweet - like eating candy and fruit and ice cream.

Then I got to knitting! I am working on a gigantic scarf - 12' x 2' plus the tasselly ends. I currently have about 18" x 2' :/ I got about 4 more inches done on it tonight.

It was a farkin sweet ass time, and some of these arty people overlapped with the Noisebridge people I hung out with last night. Hooray! I am starting to feel like I have the circle of peeps that I always wanted (and used to have back in CO). I'm excited to hang with these d00ds and burners and create more fun stuff!

Here is a video of some of the night's tomfoolery (or Bexfoolery) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qm0g3X3-kSA