Two Bodies One Mind

I weighed myself tonight and it turns out that I've lost 14 pounds since I graduated. Holy moly! I guess there are benefits to not having money afterall.  I don't eat out as much and exercise is usually free.

I been really into running lately because a) i've been unsure about paying for another month of membership at my gym and b) because running in this weather is one of the best feelings ever.

I played some Paramore to get me pumpin' tonight and it reminded me of when I used to go running with Brittany at the UF track. She was such a good Weight Watchers buddy last year. Oh how I miss ye, Brrrritneh. I still don't use that Irish/Scottish accent with anyone but you. That's weird.  But then again, we are weird people (See below)

Song of the Day + Washington DC...Dang Cold?

I've been wanting to visit my friends in DC for a loooong time.  When my friends suggested that we meet there for New Years Eve, I was all for it.  Well I'm glad we made it happen because not only did I miss those friends a lot, but I also got to visit our nation's capital!  Now...I knew it would be cold, colder than Florida that is.  Being born and raised in this state, I haven't experienced the cold much...ok maybe I've NEVER really experienced cold weather.  This is why I've dedicated this post to my experience in DC's freezing climate.

 First day out and we come to find that Natalie's car is lined with little tiny icicles.

 Since I had never seen snow, I was naturally fascinated with the large piles of ice that sat on the sides of the streets.

 Wait...so you mean ice skating rinks are actually really supposed to be on frozen bodies of water and not in indoor hockey arenas?

The Reflecting Pool in front of the Washington Monument was completely frozen over.  I'd like to see Jenny try to get to Forrest over that!

And this is me for about 90% of our late night walk through the National Mall...and about 50% of the entire DC trip.

And now for a song...Take it away Selma and Rainn!

A Very Patel Christmas

So many things have happened in the few weeks that I've been away.  I guess the first thing to start with is Christmas.

This Christmas we were lucky enough to have my Binamasi and my three little cousins come to visit us.  The nice thing about having a 5 year old, a 4 year old, and a 2 year old around for Christmas is that everything about this holiday becomes exciting again.  There is such a thing as Santa.  We know that because...well...why else would we have put those cookies out?

It was the first time we had carolers around in years!

It was really cute seeing them open their presents, realizing that Santa had gotten them of few of the things they had circled in the toy book.

 

 

Along with all of this excitement, our usual Patel shenanigans took place.

Drunken Pictionary.  Note how happy my cousin Samir is, how my mom is complaining of the pinch her sister just gave her, and how my brother is just sick of all the yelling. Ah, family.

Lunch was make-your-own subs...

My mom was very proud of her arrangements.

 

And then there was the usual portraits.  We only get to see our family every once in a while.  Wish Ninamasi and Sonal could have been there too!

 

Merry Belated Christmas everyone!  I leave you with our stolen Picture People photo. 

Song of the Day + Not- so- romantic Romantic Comedies

The other night I saw Paper Heart. For some reason, I really liked this movie. It was a documentary about Charlyne Yi and her quest to find out what love is. It pretty much had all the elements I could want in a movie: love, awkwardness, and puppet shows. While travelling around America interviewing people, she meets Micheal Cera...who I love. The movie has a lot of cameos in it. I pretty much wanna be friends with all of Charlyne's friends: Demetri Martin, David Krumholtz, Seth Rogen.
I have to say that one of my favorite parts in the movie is when Charlyne interviews some kids at a playground in Atlanta. She holds up the mic to this little black girl and asks "How will you know when you're in love?" and the little girl says "Well, he'll make me happy. Sometimes take me to Applebee's and get me some HOT WINGS!" I immediately thought of Kalen. All in all a good movie, though. I'd recommend it.

 

Speaking of unconventional romantic comedies, 500 Days of Summer comes out today. LOOOOOVED LOVED that movie! So for our song, the Hall and Oates song Joseph Gordon-Levitt dances to in the movie. A treat for both the eyes and the ears!

Song of the Day + Traffic Reports

I was on my way to work yesterday listening to the local radio station in my car. And I realized something. Isn't it weird how car accidents are reported as inconveniences? The reason that they're reported on the radio is so that people know how much of a delay there will be on that road. Why don't they ever give a brief description of how serious the accident was or if the people in the accident are okay? It doesn't seem like it'll take up much more air time. "There's an accident on 41 and Vanderbilt. Just a slight fender bender, no one was hurt.Another accident on..." Right? But then again, maybe people don't wanna take a break in the middle of their music listening to hear about people who got seriously injured.

On that really random note...today's Song of the Day is The News by Jack Johnson.

OCD

I couldn't stand how that hulu clip was blocking the column on the right hand side of my blog. Sooooo... here's a random picture of my three little cousins (WHO WILL BE HERE IN JUST A FEW DAYS!!!). They came to wake me up. I, of course, look like poop but I thought it was a cute picture otherwise.

And when I'm not playing with them, I will be drinking wine and/or other beverages with my masi.

:)

Glee and Cake Love

Every Wednesday night Holly, Erika, Victoria, and I get together to watch Glee.  If you haven't seen Glee before...you should.  It's very entertaining.  Here's a clip of one of the songs performed on the show:



It became a tradition to bring a low-fat dessert to each Glee night. Usually someone would bring Skinny Cow ice cream sandwiches or Weight Watchers ice cream bars. However, last week was the season finale...and store bought, low calorie desserts just would not suffice. So Erika came up with a brilliant plan. She and I would bake a cake from scratch. Holly and Victoria couldn't participate because they had to work during the day. We decided to go with a chocolate cake with chocolate ganache and meringue icing. Yummmay.

I went over to Erika's house that Wednesday.  Being the expert baker that she is, she had already laid out all the materials and tools needed to bake the perfect cake.

 

Look at all the butter! Yikes.

 

 

Erika baked, I assisted, and Peanut helped us clean whatever had fallen on the floor.

We made the three layer so gigantic that the third layer started sliding off!  So we decided to take the top layer off.  Coincidentally, the spatula Erika used left her with a monogram.

In the end, it turned out to be a very tasty cake!

Priya and Ojas Go To Miami

For those that don't know I was born in Miami.  I lived there till I was 11 when we moved to Naples.  Even though it's only 2 hours away (not even) I don't go there except to visit family occasionally.  Ojas was down for a week long visit and we thought it would be a good idea to go to my hometown for a couple of days.  In two days, we packed in a lot of activity. 

We went to Hollywood to have lunch with my brother at the Hard Rock Resort.  Then we went to Hollywood Beach.  This place was kind of dead on account of the "cold" weather.  But we had a nice walk anyways :)

You can't go to Miami without going to South Beach.  I was a little excited about this part.  Even though I've been to South Beach as a youngun', I've never taken part in the grown up aspects of it (i.e. going out...getting a drink or two).  Unfortunately, South Beach was a little dead too.  I guess Miamians are in no mood to go out if the temperature is less than 80 degrees (maybe it's because they can't wear skimpy clothes? I don't know). 

 South Beach is where we encountered a diner with the most MAMBO menu we have ever seen.

We had also gone out one night in Coconut Grove, where Ojas got me some pretty roses.

On Saturday night, we went to Bayside to eat dinner and take a mini- hour long cruise.  This was Ojas's first cruise of any kind.  He was pretty stoked.

We got really nice views of downtown Miami.  Towards the end of the cruise we saw this giant Christmas tree.  Ojas wanted to walk to it before we left Bayside.  I told him that there was probably no point to walk all the way to it seeing as how we could look at it pretty well from the boat.  But he "works on Christmas Eve and won't have a tree, so he REALLY wanted to walk to it." Allllrighty.  Weirdo.  So we walk to the tree.

 

We're standing 20 feet from the tree.  "Alright...here it is...wanna head out?"..."Let's go closer" he says.  So we go closer.  We find a seat nearby and as soon as I plop down, Ojas takes a box out of his pocket and says "Well since it's Christmas and all....Will you?"  After I saw the ring and said a few "OH MY GOD...'s", I said yes! :)  We then found a latin gay guy (who was admiring the tree and was "just thinking how wonderful it would be if someone proposed by it!") to take our pictures.  I wish I had realized at the time that the pictures were a little blurry but I was in an ecstatic haze.

 

 

I may be an unemployed girl...but I'm a very HAPPY unemployed girl :)

I'm ENGAGED!!!

More about this later today!  But for now...song of the day.  Just cause it's a really cute song :)

My Kansas Boy...

...can't hack the the Florida sun...even though we were only out for two hours.

We got back from the beach and I told him I was gonna change so that we could pick up a few things from the grocery store.  A few minutes later, I came back to the family room only to see this:

Looks like I'm going grocery shopping on my own. Heh.