Blog #177: Annual Defense of Valentine's Day

(Written after eating a heart shaped bagel and while listening to cheesy pop love songs)


It's Valentine's Day! Or, as singles of all ages tend to revert to calling it "Singles Awareness Day". However, I have hardly been aware of my own single status this weekend due to having filled my social calendar to the max with opportunities to spend time loving the people I love. It started with a Valentine's Eve date with the coolest big kids and sweetest baby girl ever to be:

There, glad to get those gratuitous proud aunt pictures out of the way. There will be more after tonight because I have a very special dinner date with my bro & sis in law and 2 favorite single digit boys. "Aunt Riss" is my favorite of titles and the one of which I'm the most proud, despite having done nothing really to earn it. Tomorrow, for a post Valentine's Day celebration, I'm having chinese buffet lunch and seeing a movie with my Grandma. Love is all around.

I feel like everyone has a lot to say about Valentine's Day. It's one of those days that is pretty polarizing. (I blog about it nearly annually) People who DO have that special someone feel an inordinate amount of pressure to demonstrate their love one way or the other and people who DON'T have a significant other feel pissy and hyper aware of their lack of romantic love.  I would like to get down on one knee and propose that we see things just a pinch differently.

While there's certainly nothing wrong with wanting and hoping to have a special someone in life, it's ridiculous to think that life is somehow incomplete until that box is checked. The problem here is in the equating of "singleness" with "loneliness". As one who is currently dateless, I feel the need to point out that I am definitely not lacking in the "people I love" department. Celebrating that love, to me, sounds like fun! Celebrating anything, to me, sounds like fun. If it doesn't sound fun to you, that's cool too.  

It's just a day - not a judgement on your life.

And, if you accept that simple fact, it should be easy to just let it pass without making a point of being negative about it, regardless of your relationship status, yes? 

For the record: yes, it is basically a commercial holiday designed to get people to spend money, much like mothers day, fathers day, halloween, etc. This is not worth pointing out because it's not news to anyone, and it's silly to use such a thing as an excuse to be bitter. Who cares? Life is both short and long. It's too short to waste time feeling negatively unnecessarily. It is too long to develop patterns of negativity to continue for its duration. I'm going to live life being ridiculous and silly and prone to enjoying pointless things because it's much better to be remembered for loving than hating.

If you need me, I'm spending my day at work listening to love songs and decorating cards to hand out to the people I'm lucky enough to have in my life. LOVE IS GREAT.

Roses are Red.

Violets are Blue.

This blog post was long.

Coffee.

Blog #176: I'm not a food blogger I just play one on TV.

That's a lie no one lets me on TV. I've got a face for radio. Well, in high school I was on KHS TV quite regularly as an anchor for our school news program but that just aired within the school. I took part in a segment or 2 of the news magazine our school did that was on an actual cable access channel several times - one of which involved me doing a snow day dance in pajama pants in an episode that aired a few times even after I was in college. Yes, I am the most embarrassing person I know. Thank you.

 But that's not the point. I wanted to share with the internet a thing I did. It might not really be all that original. I didn't bother to do a search to see if anyone else already thought of it. In fact, the very thing itself is really derivative of another thing so by definition it's not original. But I still feel good about it. I sort of made my own recipe for Apple Cake.

 It all started with a recipe in a giant Taste of Home cookbook for carrot cake from scratch that I make every year for Easter. It's always such a hit because it also includes homemade cream cheese frosting so I wanted to find a way to make it work for Thanksgiving, too. But carrot cake is such a spring thing that I knew it would be out of place at a Thanksgiving dinner. So, what did I do? I decided to replace shredded carrots with peeled shredded apples. That makes it a super moist ridiculously awesome APPLE CAKE.

 Here's the original carrot cake recipe:

Yes, it's filthy. A good baker makes a good mess.

And seriously it did not take many tweaks. Replace carrots with apples. Throw in a teaspoon of apple pie spice along with the already called for spices (which is really just more of each spice already called for because that's how spice blends work). I also put a teaspoon of cinnamon in the frosting because it sounded like the right thing to do. I wanted to top it off with drizzles of Pioneer Woman's Caramel Sauce recipe because I'm a bad, bad girl but at the last minute I realized I didn't have enough brown sugar. Yeah, the stores were still open but you better believe I'm not going to the store Thanksgiving morning.

Don't be jealous of my chic baking wear.

Peeling is my least favorite part

Shredded apples!

yeah, I licked the spoon clean. AFTER I was done using it.

The frosting will make it all better

I licked this spoon when I was done too.

One good thing to do is to make the cake while wearing your pajamas and then while it is cooking and cooling you spend time getting into the Thanksgiving uniform of stretchy pants and a loose fitting forgiving sweater.

 Voila!!

Cake got RAVE reviews. So did my hair.

You, too, can be domestic genius. I made this cake while watching the Thanksgiving day parade and dancing in my kitchen to every musical performance. You don't HAVE to do it that way but I don't know why you wouldn't. (Still the most embarrassing person I know. Thank you.)

Blog #175: EVERYONE RELAX

Here's the thing. Nobody cares how "busy" you are. Your stressful lifestyle is not a badge of honor. Having a terrible work life balance is not synonymous with being a "hard worker".

Everyone is busy. I'm pretty sure that's just called life but we're also pretty much just as busy as we choose to be. And some of us like a full calendar and thrive like that while others of us feel maxed out if our whole week is spoken for. I like to be busy but I prefer my busy to involve much more relationally based activities than work activities - at least on nights and weekends.

 True, some jobs have higher demands than others and many of us have passions that put us regularly in high stress situations. True many individuals unfortunately must over extend themselves to feed their families - though they are rarely the ones I've ever heard voicing how busy they are. I'm not against a busy lifestyle per se, but I do take umbrage with the tendency to equivocate being busy with being important. One does not necessitate the other.

This happens a SURPRISING amount in the caregiving and mental health field, where we preach and preach self care but fall into the trap of martyrdom because we think that we must suffer for the cause in order to be legitimate. We tell one another "Take a break! Take time off" while thinking to ourselves quietly "but I don't need to because I'm stronger/smarter/more disciplined"

We should really stop that. You are not important because you are busy. You are important because you are you. Yes, we do important work but we won't continue to be effective in said work if we keep these thin and/or nonexistent boundaries between what we do and who we are. No one is stronger or better for not taking breaks. No one is a harder worker because they answer their work emails from home and take calls in their off time.

 Today I overheard a conversation about someone who was out sick. "What happened before they had back up?" Someone asked. "They never called in sick" was the reply. Followed immediately by "So and so is a hard worker." That doesn't sound like a hard worker to me. Maybe this person is a hard worker but to me it sounds like either someone who was incredibly lucky and healthy or someone who had very poor work/life boundaries.

 I would wager that the vast majority of people who broadcast their stress and busy lifestyles are fully capable of making a choice to simplify and be less busy whether that means engaging in one less sport with their kids or finding an area to delegate. It is not always obvious but it is there, and to ignore the choice is actually an insult to those who really are trapped in a cycle of stress just to survive.

I'm not advocating for laziness or just doing the bare minimum and never going above and beyond at work. Sometimes a job might require a weekend day here and there but there should always be a way to balance it out whether through pay or flex scheduling. And maybe every now and then it doesn't quite balance - because life isn't fair and all that. But can't we all agree to make a concentrated effort to aim for a semblance of balance most of the time?

 There's something wrong when our family life, health, self esteem, and relationships become the collateral damage so that we can provide support to others in their family life, health, self esteem, and relationships. /soapbox

Let's just take a dance break to this song and call it good:

Blog #174: THE FINAL COUNTDOWN

Well, likely not my final countdown ever but I really like lists and I really like counting so...And here is a recent photo of me:

GET IT????

Whatever. That wasn't dumb. You're dumb.

Here are some countdowns!

0: The number of days until my next fun meet up event. I joined a couple weeks ago because while I am certainly not afraid to do things alone, I'm still an extrovert and this way I can be entertained without commanding my friends to bow their schedules to my every exploring Kansas City whim. And I've met really interesting people and enjoyed KC more than ever. So it's a good deal.

5: The number of days until I get to move out of my crappy apartment and into one with actual air conditioning with a very great and like minded roommate. I wish instead of packing I could just burn this building down. *

* this is a joke. In the unlikely and tragic event that the building does burn down I'm going to need someone to help me prove to the authorities how I'm so afraid of fire I won't even hold a sparkler or lit match.

9: days until I have "games with grandma" day in Topeka. Basically starting a new tradition. Polishing my Yahtzee skills.

Between 0-30: number of days before I GET TO MEET MY NIECE OMG IM GETTING A NIECE IM FREAKING OUT

(Will be buying variations of this outfit in every size)

41: number of days before I get to travel to Billings, MT for training and certification in the Grief Recovery Method for my job and stay there for 5 nights.

AND number of days before first regular season NFL game AND Bearcat season. (And 45 until the first regular season chiefs game)

66: number of days before my brother and I get to attend MONDAY NIGHT FOOTBALL AT ARROWHEAD against the fighting Tom Bradies.

68: Number of days until I turn 30 - and I'm not dreading it! I'm excited! Embrace life man. 

83: Number of days until I travel to Portland, OR to visit my BFF to celebrate said 30th birthday. #BFFGNOOMGPDX 

129: number of days before the bro and I attend SUNDAY NIGHT FOOTBALL AT ARROWHEAD against Manning and The Pips.

153: days until Christmas, which means probably 160 ish days until I attempt to make another Austin trek for NYE. Cheers!

Littered in among those countdowns are just a number of other fun things to file under "life" because I've decided that it's just always fun to have something to look forward to and I'm the only one responsible for making that happen for myself.

Thanks for humoring me. Happy Counting!

Blog #173: this magic moment

It's occurred to me that I am in a really special life stage. There are definitely some deficits (I can think of 2 big areas of my life where there's nowhere to go but up) and struggles but they don't feel overwhelming or insurmountable. I have this feeling right now that I'm on the uptick. I feel proud of the work I do, confident in my capacity to do it well, secure in my ability to navigate my social life, happy with my appearance (most of the time), and just feel fairly content overall. 

I'm documenting this now because it's such a nice moment and maybe tomorrow I'll have messed something up and need to remind myself that these moments exist.

In other news, this is technically a playlist but my intention is that it operates as a mix CD. 

Blog #172: on doing what you want

I had the BEST date Friday night. My date knew exactly what I liked and wanted me to enjoy the night as much as possible. My date took me to a concert by one of my favorite bands, bought me some delicious beer, and introduced me to some really cool new people. It was such a wonderful date that it might even be love.

So, who was this date, you ask?

Me. Myself. I.

So I went to a concert by myself. Look, I have friends. Plenty! And I had done some lobbying throughout the week for said friends to join me in my concert attendance. However, they all had other plans or weren't interested in spending the money or any number of reasons not about me (or maybe they didn't feel like hanging out with me that night - who cares!?) Rather than take all of this personally and spend the evening sulking about how I wanted to go to the show but couldn't because I didn't have a partner... I just went to the show. I'm a grown woman who wanted to see a concert and had the means to do so, so I went. 

And it was wonderful. First of all, The Avett Brothers' fan base is a group of pretty cool individuals, so there wasn't a shortage of people to talk to about the music. I met people before the show, during, and after - all friendly and happy to share the moment with me. Second of all, my ability to enjoy something is not dependent on whether I have someone to go with or not. 

It's kind of silly, but I'm pretty proud of myself for going alone. I know that Marissa even 2-3 years ago would never have considered it. And that's too bad because she would have missed out on a really great show. The Avett Brothers simply do not do bad shows. They are top 3 in my faves for live performances and among an elite group for me in bands I've seen live more than once (and plan to see again live whenever I can). So, wouldn't it have been a shame if I had let something as small as being the only one in my social circle who felt like going get in the way of seeing a band I love sing songs I love? 

This post is not about getting you to see me as some bad ass lone wolf (I still much prefer the company of others) or elicit any kind of sympathy for "having to go alone" (I told you, I have friends! I just made a fairly last minute decision to attend a time consuming and fairly expensive event). I'm secure in my social life and my choices as of late. The point of this post is that it is totally okay to do things by yourself sometimes. And not just things like going shopping or grabbing lunch while using your smart phone as a buffer. It's okay to do big, intimidating things by yourself. It's okay to go to a concert solo, drink a shock top or 2 in the parking lot before you go in and start conversations with strangers over the shared interest that brought you all there. To plant yourself in a great GA seat and welcome the people who sit near you. To enjoy the things you enjoy because YOU enjoy them and not just because you found someone to go with. All of that is okay. Awesome even. I had a really wonderful night. Avett opened with my favorite song, and made sure all my other faves (to be fair- most of their songs are my faves in one way or another). And I just kept thinking about how much I would have missed out on if I had just given up on going when I couldn't get a gang together for it. 

So, basically the moral of this story? Do what you want. Or, as the Avett brothers put it in my favorite of their songs and their opener - "decide what to be, and go be it." Only you get to decide what you're gonna do and how you're gonna be. I decided that I was going to see a band I loved and enjoy it regardless of anyone else's plans, and that's what I did. Go do what you want to do. 

Seth Avett wants to wear his hair in pigtail braids, so he does. Let's all take a page from that book. (Please don't think I'm making fun of Seth's pigtails. I love everything about Seth Avett and would never consider mocking him.) 

Disclaimer - in saying "do what you want" I'm not advocating selfish decisions that hurt others. I'm simply making the point that a lack of an entourage should not keep you from experiences you want to have. 

Now, go and have fun and get down with your bad self! You might discover that you are pretty good company.

Blog #171: a love letter

"Kansas City is cooler than you think blog post"

I wrote that note idea down in my notes section of my iphone in August of last year after watching some really great live music at Knuckleheads. Now, my life has changed in significant ways since then in the professional and romantic areas but the sentiment is still 100% true.

You guys. Kansas City is awesome and I love it here. It's something that I never fully experienced until I moved downtown but it is true.

This city has everything.

So without further ado, I present to you a list, because I know how to Internet.

Reasons Kansas City is actually way more awesome then you think:
1. Everybody says the BBQ. BUT THE BBQ.
I'm not kidding. No one is kidding. The BBQ. (I know several people who would require I say "except for Arthur Bryant's" here. Just hit OK Joes, BB's, Smokehouse, Gates, and any others a Kansas citian tells you to, ok?)

2. While not a lot of people talk about Kansas City as a premier live music spot, we have some great venues! For me, enjoying live music in KC has always been more about chilling on a patio or in a bar rather than being shoved up against the front of a stage but we've got that too. And we host great concerts at all sorts of venues... Whether that's small shows/crowds at places like Knuckleheads or Riot Room or major acts at arrowhead or the Sprint Center. And you can always grab a fairly reasonably priced beverage while you listen.

3. It's pretty.
If my Instagram hashtag #prettycity tells you anything, it's that Kansas City looks good. Hey everyone, come see how good we look.

4. It's safe.
I just saw on the news yesterday that our murder rate is down, so we have that going for us. And, as someone who lives downtown and utilizes street parking, I can vouch for how well lit and clean our streets are.

(Mark Twain guards our streets)

5. It's cheap. I mentioned the reasonably priced beverages earlier. And I meant it. You can live and experience downtown and still be able to travel and explore because it's the Midwest. I can't vouch for your ability to afford the places you travel to. That's on you, man. I don't know your life.

6. I want to talk about Kansas City sports but I don't want you to laugh at me so I'm going to start with Sporting. US champions 2013 which is wonderful and they continue to do well and be major players in US soccer making Kansas City legitimately a soccer town, Kansas City also hosts all kinds of NCAA championship games and tournaments and Sporting Park is going to be the location of the D2 national football championship this year and I really hope to be able to cheer the bearcats to another title in what would basically be a home game.
And the Chiefs had a playoff game last year that... Forget it, I can't go there. It's still too soon. Royals games are fun though! And there's the T-bones and a speedway if you're into that sort of thing. And other league sports like hockey and indoor soccer that I still need to get out and see.

7. There is so much room for activities!

For real - go on pub crawls, join a kickball league, I know a cool gal that does pickup soccer every week I still need to join. I've been on wine walks, done silly 5k's, gone to farmers markets, enjoyed the artsy First Fridays... There is seriously zero excuse to be bored here.

(In my proud and purple kickball uniform!)

(Scenes from a first Friday!)

8. We're getting things! KC has Trader Joes and Raygun and all kinds of good shopping. We've got an ikea going in which I guess is a big deal. Our local food is delightful (for ideas watch the local access show "Check Please".

So sure - you other cities are great. Really. And we can hang. But if I'm going to write a gushy love letter and buy a ring... It will be for KC.