Day 30

Calories burned in the gym today: 574


I jogged for a full half hour today!! Woo-hoo! This has been a mini-goal of mine since I first started going to the gym. Now I need to think of a new one. An unforseen consequence of this accomplishment, however, became apparent soon afterward when I had a pain in my foot and took off my shoe to discover (brace yourself, o ye weak of heart)...

this monster!!!

All together now, "EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEWWW!!!"
The blister was big enough that my camera automatically focused on it.

At which point I did the obligatory hissing intake of breath, followed by, "Oooooooouuuch". *wimper*
I then said to myself, "Self, you need a new pair of running shoes. These ones sucketh." So, I am now on the hunt for reasonably priced, high quality, running shoes.

Sister from another mister

This morning was also funny because of the lady at the gym who was shocked, shocked I tell you, to discover that Shelayna and I are not related by any known blood lines back to Noah. We decided that we're just simply meant to be friends. A little bit about mine and Shelayna's history. We met back in 2007/2008ish while I was employed at the front desk of Anniversary Inn under the management of a women by the name of Gay. No joke. Just try to keep your composure when the first thing the person interviewing you for a job does is stick out her hand and say, "Hi, I'm Gay." I'd worked at IHOP before and was thus used to working with the un-closeted, but I was nevertheless startled by how forward she was about this. Then I noticed her name tag.

Ooooh...

This woman was a nightmare to work under. She ranged from passive-aggressive to outright aggressive on everything from my desire to refer the truly crazy people to my manager, to my hair length.

Anywho, back to the short history lesson. I was working there under the crazy lady when a sweet girl came in to apply for a position. Gay said some inexcusable things to her and sent her on her way. Within the week, Gay was fired. So the new management called back Shelayna and talked her into taking a job there. That is when Shelayna and I bonded over insanely awkward moments that are inherent when working at the Ann Inn. We've kept in touch loosely ever since we went our different ways after the Inn, but always missed each other and talked about how we needed to hang out sometime. I'm psyched to see her every morning now. I just don't get sick of her. She is so funny and a great person to talk stuff out with. In short, I just love her to friggin' pieces.

Now, if you'll excuse me for a moment, I need to go
change my pants after seeing this.

In other news, I've recently developed the awful habit of waking up in the middle of the night, freaked out of my mind from vivid dreams about being attacked by lions. Yes. You read that right. Lions. This is coming from a girl who did a midnight hike through the thick of grizzly country. But lions are what my worst nightmares are made of. The thing is, they used to be somewhat plausible dreams. They started out on safaris. But then, slowly, my subconscious decided to screw with me. The situations became more and more unlikely, and yet the fear was just as paralyzing. This last one was ridiculous. I woke up from it at about 3am. It took me until about 10am to logically take a step back and point out to myself that when I came across the large pride of lions it was in a cafeteria like setting. And the lions were sitting at the table like people. I distinctly remember that one of them was wearing glasses and idly flipping through a newspaper. And they were speaking English. I'm fairly certain a few of them were discussing whether or not Romney was a viable candidate for president in 2012. And most of them carried on with their business when I came in, just like humans would. But I stopped, horrified. There was just one of them who started roaring at me. So I began to back away, and he gave chase. At some point I noticed a mouse running in front of me and then the lion started asking for my help in catching it. So I picked the mouse up and chucked it a good 20 feet away from me to work as a decoy. The lion gave me a strange look before pursuing its real prey, which was the mouse, not me. I wasn't breathing from fear as I leaped behind the nearest door and slammed it. Then I woke up. Not breathing in real life, and shaking in panic. The only girl in Utah whose biggest fear is lions. Because my subconscious is a jerk.

So, I have a new co-worker named Spencer. I was thinking that he's a nice enough guy when today he did something that moved him up the social ladder in my noggin. He pulled me aside at work and told me that he'd read my blog yesterday. Then, after looking around to make sure no one else was within earshot, he outed himself as a fellow Buffy fan. And he also blogs. This Spencer dude is one cool chico. You should really check out his blog, too. He writes a whole lot about BYU sports, but if all of you xx chromosomes can get past that, there is some dang funny stuff in there. Here are a couple of examples:

The Day I Was A Sister Missionary

The Wax Museum 

Hey Spencer, I promised you that I'd go through your blog and see if it was worthy of linking to from mine. (This makes me sound like more of a blog-snob than I thought at the time. My apologies.) Good news, I gladly give it the Steph Stamp O' Approval, the highest award you could ever hope to achieve in blogdom. If I ever figure out how to make buttons for blogs, I'll make you a very dignified one.