Mr. Frisby

This is my lovely Mr. Frisby. I was at the gym yesterday and saw something that made me appreciate Mr. Frisby even more than I already do. The Maury Povich show was on the big TV at the gym. I don't usually watch it because it's dumb and the sound isn't on anyway and the closed captioning gets cut off because of the format it's in. But, occasionally I will look up from my weights and get an idea of what they're talking about. It almost always has men who are cheating on their wife/girlfriend, men who beat their wife/girlfriend, girls getting into trouble, etc., etc., etc. Like I said, I don't really watch it, I can just tell what's going on. So, yesterday's show had men who beat their wife/girlfriend. When I glanced up at the screen, there was some big, muscular dude yelling at the other dudes about how they shouldn't beat their wives/girlfriends and trying to intimidate them into not doing it. This made me reflect on Mr. Frisby and gave me two more reasons why I love him. Number one, he doesn't beat me and he never would (because he is afraid of my big guns). Number two, if he did beat me, or if we had some other trouble in our marriage, he would not turn to Maury Povich as the solution. He is a smart man. I love you, honey!

Hey USA. . .

I've got an idea. We're in a huge financial mess right now and looking for ways to cut budgets and save money, right? So here's an idea for the good old bureaucrats who run our country. How about you stop making stupid mistakes? Maybe if you would take a few extra seconds to do things right, it would save a whole lot of time, money, and effort to fix your stupid mistakes. For example, if you had taken a couple of seconds to proofread my new passport (and compare it to my old one) before you sent it to me, then you would have seen that you had misspelled my middle name and you could have corrected it before you sent it. You would thereby save the money and effort that is now required for me to fill out a new passport form with all of the same information that I just mailed you a few weeks ago, mail that to you along with the supporting documentation that I also sent a few weeks ago, have it all reprocessed, have my supporting documentation mailed back separately from my passport, and then have my passport priority mailed back to me, hopefully with my name spelled correctly.

Yes, people, that is correct. I recently renewed my passport and in the process, changed my last name to my married name. I sent my old passport, the renewal application, two pictures, and my marriage certificate. All of which had my name spelled correctly. Upon receiving my new passport, I saw that they misspelled my middle name. Which middle name had been spelled correctly in my old passport, required no change on my new passport, and should have been no problem. Does anybody else think that these types of mistakes are unacceptable? My entire life, I have had my name misspelled. On everything. First or last name - didn't matter - one of them was going to be misspelled. And you know what it says to me when you misspell my name? You didn't pay attention to details. And details such as names are fairly important details. So, the United States Government apparently has a problem with paying attention to details. No wonder we have budget problems. No wonder we're in an economic crisis. No wonder we have bad relationships with other countries. Some details, in truth, are not important. But, some are. And if you don't pay attention to those details, you're going to make mistakes. Mistakes that cost time, money, and effort to fix. Proofreading and rechecking your work were concepts I learned in elementary school. Maybe it's time for our government to go back to the basics.

Las Vegas

As I mentioned in my last post, Mr. Frisby and I just got back from a trip to Las Vegas over Valentine's Day/President's Day weekend. It was for business, not pleasure, but since the business consisted of taping a few ankles, we had plenty of off-hours for pleasure. It was my first trip to Vegas, so it was all new to me. The first night we were there, we got dinner, drove around the strip with our friend Aaron (who is also my boss), and we also went to the older part of Vegas on Fremont Street to see the lights there. There were so many pretty lights. It was so glitzy. It was trying so hard to be better than it was. And my first impression of Las Vegas was that it might be kind of cool.

Then, I saw Vegas during the day. It was so desert-y. It was so dirty. It was full of idiots who walk down the street with a drink in a lame novelty cup like they're having the time of their life. The sidewalks are littered with discarded porn. And then I decided that Las Vegas really wasn't very cool.

Mr. Frisby and I had a good time, though. We went to the temple one morning, so that was good. And, really, inside the hotels, away from the casino parts, there was some cool stuff. We saw the lions in the MGM Hotel.


We saw the gondolas inside the Venetian.


Speaking of the Venetian, that was probably the coolest hotel I've ever seen. In fact, one of my favorite things we saw was this little old guy playing the accordian in "St. Mark's Square" inside the Venetian. Awesome.

The next day we even went to a car show that would've made my dad jealous. Mr. Frisby was practically drooling over the Mustangs they had.

And I liked the fountains at the Bellagio.

So, all in all, we had a good time and it was a fun weekend. But, now that I've seen all the pretty lights, I don't need to go back to Las Vegas. Cuz' I live in California!

Virgin America

Mr. Frisby and I just got back from a weekend in Las Vegas. I will blog all about Vegas with pictures and everything later. But, for now, I'm going to focus on our transportation to and from. We flew on Virgin America Airlines. We had never flown with Virgin America airlines before, but let me tell you - it is one of my new favorite things! Virgin America is how the airline industry should be. The Virgin America folk are all very nice, helpful, and friendly. The planes are all new and awesome-looking, complete with purple interior lights. They were very forthcoming with information regarding our weather delays (which we had both leaving and returning to San Francisco). They had the best pre-flight safety information video I've ever seen (so good that I would watch it again outside of an airplane just for the sake of watching it). They also have a power source at every seat, individual screens at every seat with an on-board computer that allows you to listen to music, watch TV, watch movies, play games, and chat with people in other seats. Their flight attendants all had cool-looking uniforms. None of this ugly striped scarves/vests/jackets business. When we got on board, it felt like we were on the cool plane and that we should look out and wave goodbye to all the suckers on all the other lame airlines. And the best part about Virgin America is that they're cheap! Cheaper than most of the other airlines, in fact. The problem with Virgin America is that they only fly to a handful of cities. So, if you're not going to the right destination, they're not even an option. But, based on our Virgin America flying experiences, I would not hesitate to recommend them to anyone. And if I get the chance again, I'm taking the cool plane!

HMB

On Saturday, Mr. Frisby's brother and his wife and daughter came to visit us. We decided to go to Half Moon Bay for the day even though it was supposed to be cold and overcast. The weather surprised us, though, and it turned out to be a beautiful day! We got lunch at a deli on Main Street and then headed north a little bit along Highway 1 to see the ocean. After a failed attempt at going out to Mavericks (too many people had the same idea since it was so gorgeous), we pulled off at a small state beach which is usually not too crowded. It was Shelby's first trip to the beach and we had a great time. Thanks for visiting us, guys!


Mr. Frisby and I

Jordan, Shelby, and Bernie

It was a little rough at first, but by the end, Shelby was liking the beach

Isn't he cute?

In my defense. . .

I've taken a little heat for my last post. Of course, I won't name names *cough*Sharon*cough*, but I do now feel the need to defend myself. It appears that my comments were misunderstood. When I said that I had lost weight without trying, what I meant was that losing weight was not my goal. I did not mean to say that I just stand around and lose weight. Let me reiterate that I do cardio workouts 5-6 times per week and I lift weights 3 times per week. Although it was not my goal, losing weight was a very unsurprising result. And these are not pansy workouts that I do. I played collegiate soccer and I know what tough workouts are. I'm not going to pretend for a minute that I work out as hard as I did during my soccer days, but I work hard. And, predictably, my hard work is showing results. Such as losing a few pounds. And putting on some muscle (want proof? Next time you see me, just ask to see my guns. Jared was a little surprised when I showed him). The point of my last post was to share some weight loss tips with everyone who cares because I know that losing weight is not easy. So, before you get all mad because I've lost a few lbs, remember that hours of hard work and sweat were the reason.

Weight Loss

This is me (with Mr. Frisby, of course) at the end of September, just after getting on a regular weekly workout schedule. I do not look at myself and think, "I should probably lose some weight." It's not something I try to do. I do not do diets, I do not work out to lose weight, I do not think about my weight on a regular basis. It's never been an issue for me. However, over the last 4.5 months, I have lost a good 5 or 6 pounds. Without trying. Do not think for a moment, though, that I haven't been working hard. In September, I decided that since I had plenty of time, I needed to be working out regularly. I like to work out because it makes me healthier. I'm also trying to put off the ill effects of old age for as long as possible (And I'm not all concerned about old age because I'll soon hit 30. I just know that by the time you start to have ill effects from old age, it will be difficult to do anything about them. So, I'm trying to prevent them from happening at all. I know I can't really stop getting old from happening. I'm just trying to make it as pleasant and classy as possible. Don't rain on my parade, okay?). So, I started working out regularly to improve my overall health. For the past 4.5 months, I have been working out 5-6 times per week and lifting weights 3 times per week. And taking into account the muscle that I've gained (bear in mind that muscle tissue is heavier than fat tissue and, therefore, most people actually gain weight when they lift weights because, even though you're losing fat, you're gaining muscle which weighs more), I'm about 5 or 6 pounds under my normal weight. And I haven't been consciously doing activities/working out with the goal of losing weight.

Now, onto my point. As I said, I don't really care about losing weight. It's a beneficial consequence of the work I've been doing for my general health. It's great that I've lost a little weight, but it doesn't get me all excited. So, why am I blogging about it? Because I know there are people out there who do care about losing weight and have a hard time doing it. So, for anyone who cares, I will now give you two little tips for losing weight that will hopefully help you in your weight loss efforts.

1. Lift weights. Fat is burned within muscle tissue, so the more muscle you have, the more space your body has to burn fat.

2. Do interval training. Forget the old notion that steady-state aerobic exercise is the best way to lose fat. Losing weight is a simple matter of math. The calories you consume must be less than the calories you burn if you want to lose weight. So, you should do exercise that burns more calories. Well, don't you burn more calories if you work out at a steady pace for 30 minutes instead of doing one or two minute intervals with a 2,3, or even 4 minute rest in between? The answer is yes, if you only look at the calories burned in those 30 minutes of the workout. However, to put it in simple terms, interval training increases your metabolism for a much longer period of time after the workout. So, if you look at an entire 24 hour period, you actually burn more calories total with interval workouts because you continue burning a lot of calories even after your workout is done. With steady-state aerobic exercise, your metabolism will return to normal much faster and then you're just burning your normal amount of calories. Make sense? I think so.

So, if you want to lose weight, try it out. It worked for me and I wasn't even trying.