Friday, February 28, 2014

seasonally affected.

yea, i get it.. we live in canada, we have this thing called 'winter', and it's cold for half the year. but damn, what is it about this winter..? the fact the we finally got one? that it's been steady cold for months on end with maybe a day or two above freezing? i don't know maybe all of it.. i just... can't wait for it to be over.

literally.. it's getting at me. maybe i'm just getting old.. but i've been wanting ever so badly to move to a warmer climate. the fact that i'd be able to grow more too.. mmm food. haha. i swear it's been getting colder every day this week, and it's supposed to be colder yet on the weekend?! dah! i don't even want to drag my clothes to the laundromat.. it's a good thing i lost the capacity to sweat weeks ago. for real, i've been working out just to get warmed up. i have to nearly kill myself to break that sweat.. that might be the very one and only thing i'd miss about the colder weather. then again, sweating it off is far too horrible a challenge, and then there's always hypothermia... i'm really not trying to sound like i'm complaining, but.. i am. ha.


 maybe it's not just me. according to 'news media', meteorologists are even saying, dayumn it's cold! coldest winter we've had in decades apparently. i've been here almost three decades, and yeah in that span of time i remember some crazy winters, big storms and long stretches of ridiculous cold. most notably, the years that i spent living outside in late high school and early adulthood. there were nights and even entire weeks i'd have to find much warmer places to hide, but nothing like this. i can't even imagine being in that position this year. weeks on end with minus double digits, it's so draining. to all my still homeless/vagabond homies, my heart goes out to you. oh and those of you further north, out west, and pretty much everyone else in this ice encapsulated country.. stay safe and warm tonight.

my skin is dry, my lips and fingers are split, the outermost curves of my thighs and butt cheeks are thoroughly chapped with frostbite from weeks of walking to work in the bitter wind [despite the layers], and my apartment is a bloody ice box. it's even freakin freezing at work. i wish it was more snow and less bitter, mind numbing frost burning wind. scrap that, i just wish it'd be over soon. not too quick though, the thaw will be sure to wreak havoc on my subterranean dwelling [as it already has]. bring it on spring.

Wednesday, February 19, 2014

get fit or die!

oh hey. i promise this time it's not blogger neglect.. i've just been spending most of my time on my other blog, the one dedicated to getting my ass back in shape. yea, it's been a goal of mine for a while. something i've had to dig deep into research for as i have 'underlying conditions' that make things like weight loss and regular sleep a hassle for me. well, i'm not giving up.. i'm on a mission.


so if you don't see me posting here for a while i promise it's not because i've fallen off the planet, but rather that i've been 'in the zone'. feel free to follow me as i post publicly about my struggles and triumphs over at The Sage Thrive Challenge. it isn't much yet, but i hope one day it will be my biggest success story.

Saturday, February 8, 2014

bring it spring.. cabin fever

i'm starting to become anxious for the warmer weather. it's not unlike me to feel cabin fever about this time of year, but it's really starting to weigh on my spirit. i found myself snapping at matt about something silly, caught myself immediately and apologized.. i don't know what came over me. more irritated than usual, and it's not even pms! about this time of year i start to feel like a caged animal all backed into a corner. my anxiety isn't as overcoming as it has been in previous years, but it's certainly making itself known.

checking back i noticed that i wrote a similar blog post about this time last year, only it was a few weeks later than now. i wrote about how we had actually gotten a 'real' winter.. i think this one has last year's beat. it's cold. bitter cold. and i hate to complain because i know it could be worse, and so could my situation as it has been in the past.. i mean at least we have 'four walls and a roof over our heads' even if we have to bundle up in blankets and wear shoes indoors to keep warm. when it gets really cold our bathroom floor becomes soggy with condensation, another joy of living in a [not properly finished] basement.

we've almost been here a year, and it's our first winter in this apartment. a friend of mine at work is trying to convince us to move.. even though we have to 'deal with' some inconveniences living here, the pros far outweigh the cons. i had almost considered the offer to check out this other apartment but then i remembered... spring is coming.

so what if it's so bloody cold we have to stay bundled. so what if our bathroom is a wet room pretty well all winter. so what if it wasn't sealed properly when it was converted into an 'apartment'.. that's what we invested in dehumidifiers for. we might not have a 'real' kitchen but we have an enormous back yard, a firepit that we can actually use [bylaws in the city prohibit fires] and we're literally five minutes on foot from a grocery, health food store, natural deli, plus a walk-in clinic and pharmacy [if we ever needed it]. and a little further down is the gym that i joined [and finally opens in a week!]. on top of all that, we can walk downtown in twenty minutes, and get to work without transit if we so choose. and the price is right. i know, you get what you pay for, but everything about being here is more than worth it. this is the lowest  rent i've paid on an apartment. ever.

the apartment that i was offered to view was also a basement but properly finished with an actual kitchen. i took a stroll by, and there are no real windows that i could see on that level of the house. the yard is a lot smaller, with neighbours on one side, a pub on the other, and far too much shade for ever growing food. that and it's over the bridge onto the hill [much too far to walk to work] and the rent is a little higher. it seemed like a good idea in the moment that i was shivering in my living room.. but as they say, the grass isn't always greener. maybe that's not the exact saying but you know what i mean..

i could really use some sun... so pasty!

...and spring is coming! i wish it was a little more quickly, but at least i know i'm ready when it arrives. as soon as our bags of topsoil thaw, we'll be expanding the garden bed closest to the house so that we can include more perennials. i can't wait to dig in the dirt.. hell i can't wait to spend a decent amount of time outside without my skin feeling freezer burned all the time. i will be in my bliss the first day i can relax out back with a lawn chair, a good book and a glass of iced tea.

for now i'm keeping myself amused with half a dozen books about gardening, sustainability and business.. plus a bunch of free courses and lectures available at a website called Coursera. in fact, if it wasn't for that amazing resource for free learning, i probably would have lost my noggin long ago. i couldn't be more grateful to the person who shared with me the link, and i hope others will make use of it too. learning about what plants know, the basics of nutrition and how to change the world has certainly kept me positive while waiting out the winter blues. speaking of, i have some chili to make and some lectures to get caught up on, so i'll stop 'complaining' about the cold... for now.

Saturday, February 1, 2014

creative juices

turns out i've actually been having some fun with this juicing thing. i mean my goal is to improve my overall health, but it's had some other side effects. i feel like my mind is more clear than usual since i've been focusing more on what goes into my body.. a super concentration of goodness and nutrients straight into me. i'm in love with my juicer...

..and suddenly feeling a lot more creative. i've been in a slump for a long, long time.. having a really hard time expressing myself with words, or with colours.. i've been looking at this small pile of blank canvasses for months and was finally inspired today to blow off the dust and make use of them. we've been slowly turning our little basement apartment into our own little hideaway, some paint here and there, some art and a random collection of decor. the kitchen is where i spend the majority of my time when i'm home, so i spent a little extra time making it look extra fresh. red green and gold is the theme of the room, so i decided to carry the theme to the blank canvasses.


i sketched loosely onto each blank slate a rough drawing of an abstract-ish mushroom, trying hard not to think too much about it, just let the graphite do it's thing. i ended up with a whimsical trio of oblong mushrooms that will be a series i will use to hide a hole in the wall beside the cellar door. we've decided since the apartment has been so long in disrepair that we would do repairs of our own to a point, and use our creativity to somply dress it up to make it feel more like home.

the weather finally eased up a little today, instead of minus a million below zero it's now above freezing and raining on top of the snow. yum.. well on the plus side i finally had the nerve to make a couple trips to the grocer to stock up on produce for the rest of the weekend. selection usually isn't so great on sundays, and there are things i simply cannot juice without. speaking of.. juicing in itself has become an activity in which i get to express a little more creativity. i seem to be building a skill in blending juices, learning little tricks to keep it fresh and flavours that work well together. i never in a million years would have seen myself willingly comsuming raw cabbage or an entire grapefruit, let alone having them together in a glass. with a few other fruits in there you can't even taste the greenery. i'm a juicer ninja... and i have some more painting to do. toodles!

Tuesday, January 28, 2014

this year's big journey.

i've been having a hard time writing for a while. i have ideas that i don't know how to get across and goals i'm not sure how to reach completely, but i'm learning and that's a start. the whole point in blogging [to me] is to share my experiences with hopes that someday someone will find some inspiration or comfort in my writings. it's a good feeling when you find someone you can relate to, even if they're on the other side of the world. oh, glorious interwebs. anyhoo i also like to have a way to record my trials and triumphs so that i have something to look back on occasionally to reflect, i've never had the best memory. this year's big journey is more of an inward one, a journey that is crucial so that i can continue this adventure we call life without falling to pieces.


i started a blog about a year ago called the Sage Thrive Challenge, with the idea that if i make my 'journey' public it would be a better motivator to regain my health and live a better lifestyle. it's not quite a success story yet, but it has a solid foundation of small triumphs and lots of challenges in motion. it has an outward appearance of a 'weightloss blog' but really, it's not something that i ever intend to finish. to thrive is perpetual and continual.. not just a 'diet' or following the trend, but deep self-reflection and healing through an overall lifestyle change. a true lifestyle change is 'forever' if one hopes to see lasting affects... and though i had the right idea in my head, i got caught up with other goals and achievements and lots of travel. i sort of lost track of myself. spent too much time outside of my body so-to-speak, and treating it more like a vessel to carry my mind around than a part of a whole living being that is 'me'. i've never given [me] the sort of attention i need to not only survive but thrive, to acknowledge the damage done over the years and to truly care enough to make the necessary adjustments to living a healthier and potentially longer life.

my destination is in each step

anyways, it's not about the weight loss. i mean, that will hopefully be a part of the outcome of a happier and healthier lifestyle, but it's not my only goal or my main one. my main goal is to provide my body with what it needs to heal itself; nourishment, a happy and healthy environment, a positive headspace, and plenty of proper exercise and rest. this past year of the journey has been learning about how to achieve this, and what i need to do to prepare. i'm currently 67 hours into a 72 hour juice fast and i'm more than confident that i can see it through. this confidence took time to build, and self-education had a lot to do with it.

with recharging my overall physical health, i hope to also recover my creativity and dissolve the fuzzy mental blockages i've been lazing behind for a while. i have a hard time writing and thinking and starting on a blank canvass these days, i even get frustrated in the kitchen trying to figure out what to make. this fast has forced me to be more thoughtful about what i put into my body and how it will affect me, and if nothing else comes from making it though i hope that mindset sticks with me. i'll repeat this process as many times as need be until it does.

something else that i hope to achieve in all of this is the ability to truly 'let go of my past'.. all of this weight that i'm holding on to was put there when i was in a point in my life that caused me a great amount of stress. i always gain weight when i'm stressed, it's just how i work. i know this, yet i had a seriously difficult time eliminating [unnecessary] stresses from my life. i think it was part environment and part attitude, i took things very personally before. and though my circumstances are way better than they were, i'm still dealing with things that others in a different mindset would find unmanageable. 

another part of my past that i'm ready to let go of is the 'addiction' to foods that i know aren't good for me, like breads and processed things, things in packages that contain far more ingredients than one. my overall diet could be seen as generally healthy in comparison to the average, but there's still all those hidden 'things' in my food that i don't know what they do to me. it started in my childhood for sure, my mother fed us not much else besides peanut butter sandwiches and Kraft dinner. anything that was fast and cheap, with the occasional meat and potatoes. if she fed us at all.. so it was no wonder when we set out on our own my brother and i always had a taste for refined foods.

let me get back to the mindset.. my state of mind in all of this is huge, i've tried juice fasts before and with no success. my wantings and cravings for foods that i was restricting myself from were powerful, even nauseating. i could never successfully cleanse or fast for longer than a day and i felt terrible. this time was much different, educated, motivated.. a jumpstart into a whole new way of life. i'm not broke anymore [well, in comparison to before] and i'm not homeless so i have no excuses like eating to survive. now i have the opportunity to eat to thrive, and hopefully heal the damages done over the decades.

today i get to ease back into the eating world only with this whole new mindset.. i'm actually excited to challenge myself to eat nothing but Real Food. novel idea, no? how many of us actually do eat nothing but real food.. look at our grocery stores!! they provide for demand, and the demand is processed junk. you think you're making a 'healthy choice' by grabbing a can of tomato sauce and a bag of pasta instead of say, McDonalds.. and as it turns out there's probably about as much refined sugar and wheat in the plate of spaghetti as there is in the cheeseburger and coke.

my kitchen is already pretty stocked with delicious fresh produce, so i suppose instead of [correction, alongside] juicing it i'll just eat a small bowl of cut fruits and vegetables to break the fast. thoughtfully.. which brings me to another point! ...that i'll save for a new post because this one is getting pretty long already. making up for lost time... and i'm finally doing something [for myself!] worth writing about. go me! this year's journey is one that i'll take internally [and then share, because why not?] ...thanks for reading. i'll be back..


Tuesday, January 14, 2014

so fresh..

ahh yes, good ol' blog neglect. it appears as though i forgot to hit this one for a couple weeks.. didn't miss too much, mostly hibernating.. and planning for the fresh new year ahead. a week ago the weather was absolutely wretched, being minus forty degrees outside with powerful arctic wind for a good few days, there were an awful lot of Day After Tomorrow memes floating around. it finally started to thaw the past couple days, it's nice to be able to breathe the air outside again.


at least i've been keeping busy in the kitchen, trying new things like juicing greens and making different dishes from scratch that i'd never tried making before, and made a good few mean batches of chili. it's about time i'd better commit to improving my health before i fall apart any further, so i'm starting with my diet by doing my best to eliminate processed foods, which is mostly grain products filled with that delicious evil gluten. and i'm hooked on my juicer. there is absolutely nothing more satisfying to quench me than a nice fresh pressed glass of everything juice. mmmmmm everything....


...so i'm pretty excited for the garden this year. it was 6 degrees yesterday which is the warmest it's been for weeks, so i took a good long walkabout around the garden to start daydreaming about the new layout this spring. last year we hadn't moved here till pretty late in the planting season so we just kind of threw it all together, this year we have plenty of time to come up with a better design. apparently all i can think about right now is food. sprouting it, growing it, preparing it and eating it. ohsnap! i'm human! haha. now imma have a bit of that there chili over rice and a nice glass of lemon lime apple carrot ginger beet juice! ta...