March 10th, 2008 by Kateastrophe

Sheesh it’s been depressing around here! I’m about to try to change that but first I need to thank you all for your sweet comments. My friend and his wife are doing SO well in spite of the horrible circumstances. It was a beautiful service on Friday celebrating the short life of their gorgeous little girl. I don’t often speak of my religious beliefs here, but is one of the times I can’t help it. I am so very grateful for the knowledge I have that my friends will be able to be with their baby again someday and that she will be able to watch over and protect their family until they can be together forever. It makes a tragedy like this so much easier to stomach.

OK enough with the depression and the likes. Moving on to a funny story.

I have the world’s coolest Grandparents and I try to spend as much time with them as possible. After the services on Friday I decided to drive the hour to their house and spend the rest of the weekend with them. I arrived in the late evening and we spent the rest of the night chatting. My Grandparents are total night owls and it’s not unusual to be up with them until 2 or 3 in the morning. We talk about all kinds of random things and these talks are some of my favorite things in the world.

At some point, late in the evening, I was wrapped in a blanket on the couch (my Grandparents have apparently, along with their hearing, lost all sense of temperature. It was FREEZING!) my Grandpa looks over towards me and says

“Katie, have you been losing weight?”

“Why yes I have!” And in my head I’m thinking “In fact I’m hardcore dieting and exercising and thank jeebus SOMEONE noticed!”

“Well I wouldn’t have said anything before, but you’ve really let yourself go over the past couple of years, so I’m glad to hear you’re doing something about it now.”

Eh. Er. Wha . . . SCUSE ME?

Now, I’m the first to admit I’m not the nicely toned girl I was in college, but LET MYSELF GO? Uh, not a chance. Sure I’ve gained a few pounds . . . sure I’m trying to get it off BUT I DID NOT LET MYSELF GO. Also, I was COMPLETELY WRAPPED IN A BLANKET. The only part of me that was sticking out? Yeah, my HEAD. My very well taken care of, night creamed, highlighted hair HEAD. Let myself go my butt.

I couldn’t really be offended by what he said. This is the man who can’t says stuff like this ALL the time.

“Katie, you were a real pain in the butt when you were young but you’ve turned out to be a fine young lady.”

Or, “You’re not fat sweetie, you’re just hefty.”

OR my personal favorite, “Big girls like you shouldn’t wear high heels. It’s bad for your feet and back.”

I don’t know if he’s capable of giving a real compliment. He was trying to tell me I look better than I did a few months ago, and for that I’m grateful but I was DYING laughing after his poor attempt. I had to cover my face with a blanket to stifle the laughter.

He’s lucky I have a sense of humor. When I left for my workout the next morning I left him a note on the counter that said “For fear of letting myself go again, I woke up early this morning to go for a run. Be back in about an hour!”

February 27th, 2008 by Kateastrophe

Back in a previous life (aka college) I spent an average of three hours a day dancing. I was never very good at it, with my over-arched back, thick legs and awkward appendages called arms. I would excel at the warm-ups and bar work and then get out on the floor to do choreography and fail miserably. Despite all of that, I loved it. I loved the workout, the muscle tone, the freedom, the music and the expression. I’ve taken ballet, tap, jazz and modern dance and dabbled a bit in ballroom.

When I graduated I figured I’d find a way to take a class here and there to keep in shape and keep up.

Cut to six years later. Not a single class has been taken and I’ve donned my dancing shoes ONE time for an audition for Oklahoma. (Let me just tell you, attempting to go on point after four years off is not a pleasant experience for the ankles.) I’m out of dancing shape, cellulite has appeared where there used to be muscle tone. My once extraordinarily defined calves have started to droop and dimple . . . I work out often, but it just doesn’t seem to produce the same results as it did during my dancing days.

I’m in another play now and we have a scene where we have to waltz. Last night we worked on choreographing the scene for about three hours. CAN I JUST TELL YOU HOW BADLY MY FEET AND LEGS HURT??? Leaps that used to be easy pulled muscles that I forgot I had. The balls of my feet are screaming in pain. The arches of my feet which used to point without a care are cramped and achy. AND THIS WAS JUST A WALTZ. It wasn’t even the intense dancing that I used to do. I’m a big, fat wuss.

I must be a masochist at heart or something because I’m actually kind of loving the pain and I think I’m signing up for a dance class. I’m going to force this pain on myself more often! I’m looking forward to muscles so sore you can barely walk, blisters on the balls of my feet from turning on hardwood floors and the endless piles of dance tights, leotards and worn, stinky dancing shoes.

Watch out, body. It’s about to be “broughten.”

December 11th, 2007 by Kateastrophe

*Begin verbal vomit transmission*

What day is it? Tuesday? It’s already the 11th of December?

HOLY CRAPOLY WHERE DOES THE TIME GO?

*Shaking head, squinting eyes, trying to focus*

Yeah I have no idea what’s going on with the time. I have NOTHING done for Christmas, no presents - not even a tree! Every time we plan time to go get one, it freaking rains on us. We live in Arizona, it’s not SUPPOSED to rain. Sunshine all the time, especially in the winter, isn’t that what the people who LURVE Arizona tout?(does that sentence even make sense???) Just FYI, those that tout beautiful, sunny winters appear to be liars. Because it’s rained the majority of the last two weeks and I have an impromptu river and a three inch depression in my front yard to prove it. Oh, and my car has been dirted. Stupid rain.

Matt and I still haven’t taken holiday photos and I’m waiting for the cards I ordered (WON! Yay!) to arrive, so, don’t be mad if you get a holiday card from the Murphy’s in June. That’s how I seem to roll lately, assuming that’s about the time I’ll get my Christmas tree too. It will be Christmas in June, super-hot-120-degree style. Sweet.

Life continues to give me swats on the butt to keep me lively. I can’t talk to much about details, but things at work are kind of crazy and up in the air. It’s all pretty good stuff, just sort of unnerving and against my “change is bad” mentality.

Also, EVERYONE I KNOW is either pregnant or just had/is currently right at this moment having a baby. (OK that might be a bit of an over-exaggeration, but hi, my name is Kate. I over-exaggerate. Shoot me.)(Also, it’s sad that exaggerate and Kate rhyme. Sad but typical.) Despite the peer pressure, and my co-worker Pete’s insistence that I won’t be allowed in the “Ha ha we have a baby and you don’t” clique, I’m not having a baby because I just had a new car.

**Sidenote: HOW MUCH WOULD IT HURT TO BIRTH A NEW CAR?!?!?! End Sidenote**

Operation “Skinny Kate” has taken a hit this week, due to sugar cookies from WalMart. Yes, you heard me, I went to WalMart. Mostly because Matt needed stamps, but I found the cookie and rejoiced greatly. They are those super soft ones with the thick frosting — do you know what I’m talking about? Ahghghghghg they are so tasty. However, the hit to my thighs is being handled because I’m still running and biking every other day, despite loud protestations from my butt bones and my hip. I biked ten miles on Saturday. It SUCKED and I sweat a lot (have I mentioned I hate sweating? Well, I do.) but I must admit it felt great to waddle off the bike and announce to Matt “HA! Ten miles conquered! *pause to hold on to his shoulder before gravity overtook my shaky body* Carry me to the car?”

*Apologize sincerely to readers. Verbal vomit ended*

December 6th, 2007 by Kateastrophe

Today is a great day!

Let me count the ways:

I am getting a fun new toy today, and don’t you worry, tomorrow I will show it to you. I’m GIDDY with excitement at my new toy and I can barely stand waiting until my lunch break to go get it. I love new toys.

Today I start physical therapy. Not QUITE as exciting as the new toy, however, I’m running a good, solid mile every time I go to the gym and having my hip NOT hurt when I’m done sounds very, very pleasant.

I cleaned my entire kitchen last night . . . not that it was that dirty, but I did the whole “granite cleaner” and “stainless steel polisher” thing and it’s all sparkly and beautiful like it was when we moved in and that makes me happy. I love coming home to a sparkling, clean kitchen. Then I mess it up cooking and have to start all over again, but at least I started with sparkly and clean!

I’m having a good hair day, which hasn’t happened much lately. My straight, flat hair even has body, and it NEVER has body unless I tease and hairspray it in!

I found my favorite, previously lost earrings, and I’m feeling all decked out and festive.

My jeans are fitting better thanks to my running, biking thing. Shrink, thighs! Shrink!

My husband is amazing. He said the sweetest thing to me yesterday that just made my heart melt and I think I fell in love with him all over again.

I talked to one of my best friends, Jewels, for 45 minutes last night about singing and I’m still sighing in happiness about it. She’s going to kick butt at her audition, I just know it.

This morning I talked to another best friend, Hannah, on the way to work. The subject wasn’t exactly pleasant, due to people being retarded, but the conversation once again proved to me that Hannah is awesome and strong and an amazing friend, not only to myself but others as well.

I am hosting Soap Opera Sunday this week and I’m so excited to do it! I have the sequel to my last post all planned and I can’t wait to read everything you guys have to say!!

I’m a few short weeks from going home to Utah for Christmas. I get very homesick this time of year and I’m counting down the days until I’m there, but today it doesn’t seem very far away!!

I am a lucky girl. I have an amazing husband and family, incredible friends, a great job, a beautiful home . . . I am blessed beyond words and more grateful than I could ever express.

I hope all of you have great days too!

December 3rd, 2007 by Kateastrophe

My baby brother’s comment in my last post kindly (?) reminded me that I forgot to mention the second best part of the weekend.

Ohio State got into the National Championship game! Granted, it was at the cost of a lot of other great teams losing (thank you LSU, Missouri, West Virginia and pretty much any other team that was ranked #1 or #2 after Ohio State’s embarrassing loss a few weeks ago) but we’re #1 and we’ll take it!

Even MORE fun is that we’re playing LSU and I don’t know if I’ve mentioned it, but my sister just moved to New Orleans and her husband is not only FROM there, but also attends LSU.

This is gonna be great!

November 30th, 2007 by Kateastrophe

Miles run: 1

Miles biked: 6

Hip: Ow

Butt bones: OH MY GOSH WHAT DID YOU DO TO ME OWOWOWOWOWOWWWWW

November 27th, 2007 by Kateastrophe

Have your eyeballs ever felt as though they were fried in oil? Yesterday and today, mine do. I have no idea why I’m so tired or why my eyes feel like this but OW, ‘scuse me OW.

So in other boring news, I have an appointment with the Orthopedic Surgeon today and I’m scared (hold me!). About a year and a half ago when I started running again, er, scratch that, for the first time, my right hip started hurting. I just thought it was due to non-use. As I’ve been trying to run more and more (I’m attempting to train for a triathalon in April) it has hurt worse and worse, and it pops pretty much every time I try to stretch it. Soooo, I was told to go see a doctor. I’ve been so excited about getting into shape again, and now I’m afraid the doctor is going to tell me I can’t run or even worse, that something is “broken” and needs surgery. So like I said, I’m a bit scared. I’ve never had any body issues other than a few sprained ankles (ok like ten sprained ankles) so this is the first time I’ve ever gone to the doctor not knowing the outcome. YIKES!

Anyway, just a quick little updated on both my chicken fried eyes and my loudly crunching hip. I’m a huge mess.

Hopefully, this week I’ll get the Christmas Tree up and I can show you pictures of my house ala Christmas! That’s much more fun than any of the other boring, depressing crap I’ve been writing about lately! Yay for Christmas!!

October 16th, 2007 by Kateastrophe

I only have a few minutes but I wanted to update you all on the boring goings on in my life. Because I know you care sooooooo deeply. Or something.

So, in no particular order, I give you:

- I would LOVE to post pictures of the new house for all of you, but somehow in the move, I have misplaced the camera cord. Well, by I, what I actually mean is Matt misplaced it. And by misplaced I mean packed in a box and forgot which one. So um . . . yeah. Sorry about that, but not really because all the pictures are of a HUGE MESS. Our bed is in the family room due to technical difficulties with the frame (which should be fixed tonight. Who knew a 200 lb man doing a superman-esque leap onto the bed after running down the hall at full speed might actually do damage to a bed frame? Oh wait. I did. And I warned him.) and there are boxes and wrappings and blue tape (from finding little things that need to be fixed by the builder) EVERYWHERE. So it’s really in no condition to show you.

- We are almost completely moved out of the old house. Now all we have to do is a bit of cleaning. I’m proud to say the house was not that messy. We got the wood floors pretty dirty moving everything around but all in all, I pat myself on the back for being able to keep the house relatively clean over the past six months. It’s been helpful in many, many ways. And has sucked and been stressful in many, many ways.

It’s bittersweet to be moving out of that house. After spending one night in the new house it seems small, cramped and old, but I still love it. Our blood, sweat and tears went into turning it from a pink carpeted, outdated disaster to something we were proud of. Tomorrow as we do the final cleaning and shut the door for the last time, I will be sad because a very, very happy chapter of Matt’s and my life together is ending. We were in love when we got married for sure, but I truly fell madly in love with my husband in that home. I will miss it and be sad. But only on the drive to the new house. Then I will see the new house and I will be happy again because I really LOVE our new house.

- The Great Internet Debacle of 2007 is raging a war at our new house. We had one of the satellite companies come and install our new TV system and they forgot to mention that they were tapping into the cable box in the study . . . which means that the TV in the study works but the cable Internet doesn’t. That’s a big problem because as nice as a TV is in the study, Internet would be nicer considering it’s where the desktop computer lives. The satellite company promised us a phone call in 24-48 hours to arrange a time to fix it and it’s now been 48 and no call from them. For now we’re thinking wireless on the desktop, but that uses valuable USB cords and heaven knows we need those for multiple iPods, the laser mouse, wireless keyboard . . . you know other junk. So wireless it is for now.

BUT then we tried to use the wireless router. Somehow, on the drive from the old house to the new house, the router broke. It wasn’t dropped, damaged . . . who knows what happened. Maybe it’s against new construction. However, JUST the wireless part broke, the router part still worked. So we had Internet when we were connected to it through a cable but didn’t have wireless. *scratching head here.* So after an hour of trying to figure it out on our own, we decided to do the really dumb thing and call tech support. IN INDIA. (Please note I have nothing against India in general, I just find it very, very difficult to understand and be understood by anyone in another country trying to do TECH SUPPORT.) It was a giant disaster.

“Please plug your modem into the router and then your router into your laptop.”

“Done. I have Internet“

“No, take the laptop cord out of the modem and put it in the router and that should get you connected to the Internet“

“Um, that’s what is already done. And I have Internet on the laptop.”

“I repeat myself kindly please. I need your laptop plugged into the router.”

oh.my.gosh. It went on like this for like two hours and three disconnected calls. We finally talked to someone who seemed to understand what was going on and it appears our router stopped assigning an IP address. So um . . . now that means new router or wait for the company to send us a replacement one.

And the money keeps rolling out.

It’s expensive to move. And I’m tired of sleeping in the family room and eating fast food. And lifting and unpacking boxes. And not exercising and feeling fat. I want so badly to wave a magic wand and make it all done.

*squinting eyes and waving hands*

Not done?

Crap.

June 29th, 2007 by Kateastrophe

So far this week I‘ve worked out with my trainer three times.

And I’m sick of the gym.

I’m sick of being sweaty and gross.

It feels good to exercise, don’t get me wrong

BUT . . .

I have this weird hatred of FULLY showering, fully meaning the part where I have to wash my hair. I guess I have to admit that I hate showering in general, not that I don’t DO it, just that I don’t LIKE it.

I REALLY hate washing my hair.

I hate having to put on lotion post-shower.

Then I hate having to DO my hair.

I hate having to get dressed while covered with lotion and the logistic nightmare it presents.

Then I hate having to do my make-up after ALL of that.

And daily exercising makes me have to do all of this EVERY DAY.

And now for some reason, my whole butt area itches like crazy.

So today, I found myself sitting at my desk, wanting nothing more than to reach DOWN my pants and scratch away at my itchy butt.

I blame it on the exercise.

May 3rd, 2007 by Kateastrophe

I have a bad case of the skin funk.

It’s pissing me off. I apparently have some weird form of eczema that causes me to break out into millions of tiny, leprosy-esque (OK, I’ve never actually SEEN someone with leprosy, but in my HEAD this is what it looks like, all right?) water blisters ALL OVER MY FINGERS. It’s very pretty.

I also have this horrible habit of being a picker/popper of all things that grow on my skin. (Just my skin though. I want to throw up in my mouth a lot at the thought of picking or popping things someone else. Hrppbbb) I find much joy in exploding that rat-bastard pimple that has been taunting me, or pulling out the wretched hang-nail. I play and pick at my split ends. I am overjoyed at pulling off peeling skin. SO, people. Imagine what I do with millions of tiny water blisters.

That’s right. I pop them ferociously.

Watery skin funk + OCD need to pop things that grow = I just grossed out the whole world.

OR

Millions of exploded water blisters, some of which weren’t, of course, ready to be popped and have decided to give me their equivalent of the “finger” and grow back, some with fun colors! (OK not really. Or maybe. Or . . . yeah.)

I have been prescribed medication for these little buggers. But that leads me to the next point:

Said medication is steroids and while I relish in the though of gaining all of that muscle whilst joyfully rubbing steroid cream on my hands, I can’t bring myself to even fill the prescription. Why you ask?

Oh I’ll tell you why.

I AM GROWING CHIN HAIR. Not normal, peach fuzz, white chin hair. Oh no. Thick, dark, disgusting, make me want to scream and wail and pound my fists on the floor, FREAKING CHIN HAIR. Granted, there are only, like, two. BUT THERE IS CHIN HAIR.

I come from a hairy bunch of apes (Hi Mom! Hi Dad! Thanks for all of the features I love on myself but seriously, could we have avoided the DAMN HAIR? And the two of you aren’t apes. I am talking about, er . . . my brothers.) and I guess I should have known this day would come. I was blessed with strawberry blonde hair on my head and white blonde hair on my arms and legs, so I should count my blessings (currently naming them one by one . . . ) and be grateful that I am the only person who can really tell when I haven’t shaved my legs in a month or so. (KIDDING people. Sheesh. Only three weeks. HA!)

I just don’t know if I can handle the chin hair, and the other random dark hairs I have noticed rearing their ugly little heads over the past few years. (I just thought those three black arm hairs were freaks . . . apparently not. And while I’m giving you TMI, I might as well let you know that I think I am also growing a happy trail on my stomach. I noticed a random hair under my belly button too. ACK!)

Let’s see . . . Manly Dark Chin Hair + Skin Funk Steroid Cream = Possible to Likely Growth of Male Parts.

It’s like I have the the Black Haired Oozing Skin Funk of Elderly Death for which the only cure is becoming a man. Super duper.

Now if you’ll excuse me, I have to go pop a water blister with a whisker that I shaved off my face with my husband’s razor.