I have taken this show on the road. . . . by on the road I mean across the country to San Francisco.

The West Coast is very different than the East Coast.

Here are a few things that I have noticed . . . . .

1    One out of every 3 people is eccentric or downright crazy. No joke. The most normal person I have met is the girl with Down Syndrome who bags groceries at the Safeway. She is pleasant, fast, efficient and can carry a conversation about organic frozen foods. My head doesn’t spin after talking to her and I don’t think I have hallucinated our conversations. A bagger at Whole Foods in Sebastopol (the hippie capital of the world) took it upon himself to tell me about his night terrors.

2    Wine is cheap. Like seriously fucking cheap. Like bring a tear to your eye cheap. Like I go to the super market at pay $5 for a bottle of wine I used to pay $13 for. Needless to say my cost of living has dropped significantly

3      Everyone drives a high-end luxury car (BMW, Mercedes, Lexus and Porche). There are so many Porches. There are more Porches than Hondas. No joke.

      Shit closes early and people get up early. Most people (including myself) get up in the middle of the night (or what I consider the middle of the night) but they also go to bed early. i.e. Liquid lunches are a biweekly occurrence and drinks actually happen at 5pm. None of this show up at 7pm or later shit

5    Everyone does yoga, including me. Yes, I am better for it. Don’t judge

6    You have to go out of your way to buy food with preservatives here. Everything is organic and if you don’t know it is organic by the branding or the giant organic sticker there is lady outside asking you to sign a petition to make it more obvious that your food is organic

7   In the midst of all the health freakiness there is a parade called the “Butter and Eggs parade” in which my yoga instructor ask that we march in. Ironic?

A New 50 Days!!

Ok, ok, ok. So here we are the Tuesday after my sister’s birthday and I have not committed to my 50 days. Fifty days of sobriety will not be back; my readers and friends blatantly shot down that idea. Apparently my recollection of sobriety was much different than y’alls. The sobriety idea went to shit once I decided to have wine at lunch and beer at dinner that day.

I think I’m leaning toward 50 days of running or 50 days of the gym. I would have started it already however I contracted a nasty stomach virus, which left me in the fetal position for 3 days. I emerged from my illness today only to find that I have herniated diaphragm muscles from the intense vomiting. Sexy, right? No.

So in the past year and a half I have gained 29lbs. How and why? I’m a stress eater. I also think I have a compulsive eating disorder. Of course I couldn’t get anorexia or bulimia. My cousin told me I’m just not white enough to get either of those eating disorders. Aside: I notice that I never get the good stereotyped traits from either of my ethnicities. I have gigantic thighs accompanied by a big but, no anorexia or bulimia, and I sunburn. WTF?

Why: We covered that in the last post.

I don’t want people to think I’m hopping on the health bandwagon because I got fat. I mean that is part of it but the ultimate goal is to get back on track with challenging myself. As some of you might remember, there were some rumblings last year of 50 days drunk with my co-conspirator Capps Corleone. The 50 days drunk was supposed to kick off at our first annual $1000 Tab at Café 210 but it never happened. This year we are going to repeat our $1000 Tab at Café 210 in June which will kick-off 50 days drunk. No ifs, and or butts. In order to be properly drunk and assure your body is metabolizing alcohol at the most optimized levels your body has to be a lean-mean-drinking machine.

So, tomorrow I will initiate 50days of working out.

The rules: 30mins of cardio every day for 50days (until April 14^th).

Exceptions: If I become ill, are stranded in an airport or some other weird occurrence that might hold me back from my 30min work out I will need to make up the workout session on another day. If I do make up the session it cannot be tacked on to that day’s work out meaning that I will need to go to the gym twice in one day. The workouts have to be separated by at least 2 hours from finish to start.

My alarm is set for 6:20am to assure I get my ass to the gym for a solid work out.

Ok . . . here goes.

It’s about that time again . . .to begin another bout of sobriety and see where it lands me. The last time I ventured out into the world with out the helping hand of alcohol I ascended to one of the best times in my life. Instead of drinking and ending up in a pool of my own vomit or in some debaucherous situation I threw myself into playing soccer and spending more quality time with people that I care about. I also lost about 20lbs as a side effect.

Sobriety wasn’t easy. I mean I really like alcohol . . . like a lot . . . definitely more than you . . . but it led to a great many revelations. Allow me to take you back to the beginning . . .. http://50dayssober.blogspot.com/2009/03/why-i-am-better-than-jesus.html

So I have gone from a great ascent to the zenith of my life to now -- rock bottom. My descent was marked by my relationship with a narcissistic leech that sucked me dry financially and emotionally . . . but don’t your worry his well-gelled hair is perfectly coifed. That bad decision Sundae was topped with the cherry of my older brother being diagnosed with lymphoma and losing his life a mere six months later.

Rock bottom --what does that look like? Well, like any normal half-Irish American I am treating these failures with a steady dose of bourbon, wine, beer, high calorie foods, carbs and sex. Of course once I get on the scale this morning to confirm my suspicions of a 40lb weight gain I’m sure the sex-crutch will come to a grinding halt. My new boyfriend is going to be pissed! I’m sure you have gathered that rock bottom is not pretty . . . at all.

50 days sober began in March of 2009, the Sunday after my sister Terry’s 40^th birthday. After waking up with a pricker in my foot and no recollection of where my dress or car keys were . . . a change needed to be made. Terry’s birthday is this Thursday . . . . I might start early . . . or just start now and go the 50 days. I sure the fuck am not doing more than 50 days sober. I’m a mess not crazy.

So here goes. . . . . I’m plunging face-first into the ice water. . . .

I’ll leave you with some classic posts . . . to bring you up to speed . .

http://50dayssober.blogspot.com/2009/03/day-9.html

http://50dayssober.blogspot.com/2009/03/days-16-and-17.html

http://50dayssober.blogspot.com/2009/06/two-coke-cans-and-muffin-quality-time.html

Sex vs. Pizza

Ahh, I can breath. Yes, there has been a hiatus in my blogging. Long story –short; I ended up in a relationship with the wrong guy. I felt suffocated and nothing at all like myself therefore unable to write. Now I’m back . . . raring to go.

So after being blissfully single for almost 6 months, I strongly felt that I was well over due for sex. Especially since my co-work did a drunken walk of shame through my office on Friday morning to pick up his sun glasses (In comparison to him I’m failing at life). After some thought, I had no idea where to start in my quest to find an acceptable sexual partner.

Anyone who I had a chance with before I dove into my ill-advised relationship is most likely in a relationship, seeing someone else, I’m not interested in or they are not interested in me. Of course it doesn’t help that I am a stress eater and let’s just say that for the last 5 months of my relationship I was really stressed. So with an extra 20lbs on my frame (I swear 10 of it went right to my boobs) my prospects are limited.

So after pondering my asexual fate; I decided that the only way to get back on the proverbial horse is to continue to hit the gym hard core. Today after work I took a nice hour-long jog. Being that I spent most of Sunday on the couch nursing a two-day wine hangover, the run took a lot of out me.

All day I’ve been feeling like a bottomless pit. To fight the starving feeling, I came home and ordered a pizza. I haven’t eaten pizza in over a month and I felt that it would be the perfect antidote for my hollow feeling. I cracked over a bottle wine (don’t judge. haters) and waited for my 12” person plain pizza to arrive.

I eagerly housed 3 slices and felt like a new women. That urge to have sex quickly faded.

Moral of the story: who needs sex when there is . . . Pizza.

Happy Cinco De Mayo

Circa 2003:

Capps: I never liked you!

Circa 2005

Capps drops me off at my apartment in Morristown after a night of drinking:

Me: I can’t wait to go home and eat chips

Circa 2000, 2001, 2006, Revived in 2010

Me: Hi, I’m V.A.. Have we met? (I reach my hand out to shake).

Victim: Nice to meet you

Me: Great to meet you too! However, you are not drinking fast enough”

Circa 2010

Me: Elvis, I wish you would put as much effort into rubbing my feet as you do in professing your love for me. Love, love, love, blah, blah, blah.

Elvis: That’s a conflict of interest

Me: Jimmy Kimmel has narcolepsy

Elvis: No he doesn’t

Me: Do you know what narcolepsy is?

Elvis: Do you want me to smack you?

Me: Elvis, rub my face!

Elvis: You are taking advantage of me

Me: Don’t make me pimp slap you

Elvis: Do you know what Tiger Woods used for pick up lines?

Me: No. What did he use?

Elvis: Well, nothing really good but . . .

Me: Tequila makes me do bad thinks. Happy Cinco De Mayo

Laziness Gone For Lent! WTF is Lent?

What fucking happened to me? I got all wifey-ed up. I’m in a relationship with a very nice, great guy who doesn’t get my sick sense of humor. Nor does he really appreciate me sharing my thoughts about our life together.

So after 5 months of suffering in a job that wasn’t quite for me I have made some changes. Got a new job that is way better. However I managed to gain about 25lbs in 5 months. In my quest to figure out what I want to be when I grow up I used bacon to patch the holes in my soul that my job at the time created.

So now I’ve committed to 50 days of no laziness. What does this mean?

Sticking to my weight watchers regimen

Hitting the gym everyday

Today was Day 1:

7:15am: Alarm sounds. . . . . . Bullshit! Ok. 7:15 isn’t really that early however I can get up at 8:15 and be at work before 9:30. You see the struggle?

7:30 am: I get out of bed and head down to the gym

7:45 to 8:15 am: Cardio while holding 10lb weights

8:30am: Having a very difficult time blow-drying my hair because my arms are so tired

9am: Walking to catch the bus . . . . . is that bacon I smell.

7:30am: Plopped down on the couch with a huge mixing bowl of arugula with olive oil and vinegar. I’m kind of obsessed.

9:00pm: Polished off a bottle of Indaba. Tracking my points on WW online.

9:30pm: Tipsy stroll on the treadmill

Living Single No More

It has been quite some time since I have “blogged”. In that two plus months life has happened all at once. One of the most drastic life changes I have made was moving in with my boyfriend.

After five months of dating I moved in with the adorable Yugoslavian man who stopped me on the street months earlier.

Living with a man is an adjustment, well a man that is not technically a roommate. Male roommates understand boundaries, and with roommates there is no expectation of sharing or the “what is mine is yours” assumption. When you first move in with the person you plan to share your life with there are a few things that may come as a surprise:

Men don’t diet; they just eat less of something and lose 10lbs or take a walk and lose 5lbs (bastards)

When you move in with your significant other don’t expect the good leftovers to be there when you go back for them

It’s always best to be sick when you have someone to take care of you (even if they are trying to cure your kidney infection with “remedies from Montenegro”

Men should not be allowed to use bleach, unless pink is becomes the new white . . . . literally

Men take longer to get ready than women

Men like cheesy reality shows . . . a lot

Putting a dish inside an empty dishwasher is apparently not common sense

Snoring . . . . .VERY LOUD snoring

Nocturnal flatulent

Men are always better drivers than women even if they suck at driving worse than anyone ever alive

Men do not replace the toilet paper roll . . . ever

My boyfriend is awesome really though. He cooks and cleans and rubs my back :-)