Lots of people get their hair dyed or highlighted all the time, I just didn’t think I’d be one of those people.  In fact, the idea didn’t even occur to me until after I moved to California.  6 months into my first job and I was already starting to feel the grind.  What other way to shake it my look but to dye my hair or to shave it.  Of course I could have just taken up a new hobby or something but hey, gotta try everything at least once right?  I buzzed my head in college and vowed never to do that again so a dye job it would be.

Being the cheapass that I am I bought one of those self hair color kits from Target and proceeded to turn my head orange.  That got a big shock at work the next day. A lot of “What did you do to your hair?!?” to “How’d you get it that color?”  I dyed it again 3 months later then stopped for a couple years.  The whole novelty, or is it amateurish-ness, of it all just wore off.  That and self-dyed hair just looked pretty stupid.

While I was going out with her she had always tried to get me to get highlights because it “would look good on me”.  I brushed it off for a year or two before noticing I was in a haircut rut; having the same haircut for 3 years just got boring.  So I got highlights for the first time in the summer of 04 or 05 and it did look pretty good (at least I think so). My hair grew out and I didn’t highlight it for awhile.  Going to a salon to get it done is a lot more expensive than doing it myself, although it comes out way better at the salon.  I guess you could say that I also lost interest in it.

Nowadays, I do the highlights when I need that “shakeup”.  Close a chapter and start a new one.  Today was one of those days.

Wow it’s Wednesday already, almost the end of the week hehe.  I love short weeks thanks to holidays, and what a holiday it was.  I barely spent anytime at home, going to two bbqs, a happy hour, morning tennis, and wandering around in the nice weather on Saturday.  Pretty tired from the semi-lack of sleep but it was worth it, was fun hanging out with old and new friends.

And the fun continues in the upcoming weeks as I’m headed out of town the next weekends.  More visiting with friends then off to Vegas for a weekend of whoknowswhat.  In fact, looking at my calendar I was shocked to see that I had things planned through the end of the month.  My schedule has never, ever been this full.  I guess this lackluster summer ends with a bang instead of a whimper.

For some reason or another I’ve got this affinity for remembering license plates.  I don’t try to remember the numbers but seeing the same ones over and over again and they end up getting burned into my brain.  One of my coworkers was all shocked when I told him what his license plate was; He couldn’t believe that I knew what it was. It just seems to happen, like remembering useless pop trivia.  A lot of it I guess is based off my own car license plate.  I’m always on the lookout for numbers that are close to mine, because ya know, that would mean that that car was bought pretty much at the same time as mine.  Sibling cars.  It’s stupid yeah but I get a little kick out of seeing ones that are close. Today’s close encounter was only about 400 off mine.

I looked at the calendar today and just realized that August is almost over. It’s almost September! Where has the summer gone? I don’t think I even did much this summer, just working and some other mandatory things like that.  And even though I didn’t do much I’m kinda glad that summer’s over.  It wasn’t a very good one so I’m ready to put it behind me.  Ready for fall.

Managed to spend most of the weekend at home instead of out and about for a change.  I had invited some people over last night to have dinner and hang out so I had to get the house in order: cleaning, organizing, taking out the garbage, the usual.  The house isn’t usually too bad but I’m pretty lazy about keeping it in a clean and orderly fashion.  After all that it was time to hit the grocery store for supplies.  On the menu for dinner was my baked macaroni and cheese, some sausages, a balsamic vinaigrette mixed green salad, and chocolate chip cookies for dessert.  Not that complicated a menu but still quite a few things to make.

This was the first time that I entertained people at home by myself and I think it went alright.  The macaroni came out pretty well considering I hadn’t made it for a year and both the salad and cookies were tasty too.  I did have a little frantic period before people came though trying to get everything perfect and ready.  There was also even a panic moment when I didn’t have enough milk to cook with.  But in the end everything came together and everyone had a good time.  Nothing to worry about.  I should really stop stressing out over small things.

The cooking continued today with my first attempt at banana bread.  I found some highly rated recipe online so hopefully it’ll turn out ok.  Geez it feels like I’ve been in the kitchen all weekend long.

I was watching the Olympics, yet again!, last night and the women’s balance beam final was on.  Thanks to the time difference and the interweb I already knew who won but figured it would still be enjoyable to watch.  So even though I knew Shawn Johnson would end up winning it was still exciting to see how close (or far) second and third place would be.  Would there be a major mistake and she would win by a large margin? Or would the gold medal come down to the very last score?

In the end her score was pretty high and tough to beat so there wasn’t much drama at the end about whether she would win or not (not that it mattered for me anyway).  But what really got me was the point at which she realized she had in fact won and the medal ceremony.  Here’s a girl who won three silver medals up to that point but had yet to step on the podium as a gold medalist.  But when she finally did it was like the dream of the last 10 years had come true.  How did she react? Quite composed I’d say.  It looked like she was trying to hold it in while the anthem was being played but you could totally see the utter joy on her face, the overflowing elation in her eyes. It almost made me tear up watching her like that.  How would I feel at the culmination of a 10 year dream?  I probably wouldn’t be able to process it at all.  Congrats Shawn! Job well done!

People looking at my Flickr feed must think I’m pizza crazy.  Ever since I got that American Pie book I’ve been making a pie at least once a week, sometimes twice a week. There’s just something about making it now that gives me so much satisfaction.  Stretching it out flat, wondering whether this’ll be the one that doesn’t rip or stays whole. Transferring it to the pizza stone cleanly without it falling apart. And finally taking it out and seeing the finished pie.  I think I’ve gotten the super thin napoletana-style crust down pat, now it’s time to move onto the more traditional “neo-american” chewy crust.

I didn’t end up in the hospital, for real. Work has this weekly basketball game and the guys who play ask me if I’m gonna join in. I’ve said no for the last few months out of fear that if I did play I’d have yet another shoulder mishap. In fact I’m still dealing with the last incident, a shoulder separation. But watching the guys play a couple weeks ago made me kinda wanna play. Well, it made me want to participate in some kind of team sport; there’s not much camaraderie in running now is there?
So I said a couple days ago that I’d play with them on Friday.

When the games started I took it pretty easy, not really moving my left arm that much and just trying to get back in the rhythm of playing basketball. At least some of my shots were going in, considering this was the first time I’d been on a court and played since the great dislocation of ‘02. We played for about an hour, subbing in and out 2 on 2 5 point games and by the end of it I was wiped out. The last time I felt this tired was when I did that Page Mill climb and almost died. And the pain continues today as I’m pretty sore. Stupid basketball. Until next week’s game.

I’m still watching Olympics swimming pretty much every night when I get home, with so many events it never gets old.  But with all the watching I’m now getting the urge to hit the pool and start swimming again.  What’s weird is the last time I swam regularly was probably middle school.  Mom signed me up for the local YMCA and I went to swim there a couple times a week.  I can still remember the pool being kinda grody, not dirty per-se but kinda dark with old, dark tile that gave off the appearance of grodiness.  It smelled a little too I think.  Ahh memories.

Swimming would do my body (and more importantly shoulder) some good so perhaps I’ll try and find a pool to do some laps.  But knowing me it’s probably all talk.  Swimming will turn out to be the next pilates or yoga for me, hehe.

Been watching a lot of Olympic swimming with the round the clock Directv coverage and I gotta say, I’m feeling a little inadequate.  All these male swimmers are in super good shape, totally cut and hardly any body fat.  I’m wondering how much time they spend in the pool and the gym to get like that.  I wonder if I could ever have a cut body, for sure nothing like that, but something decent.  I guess it’s time to hit the gym.