Wed Apr 19, continued - Dinner was lovely, even if it was with only one friend instead of with two. Jade and I will get together next week for dinner, since she had some family obligations.

But Eric and I had a *wonderful* time over Thai food (yummy rice and veggies!). And we kind of invented a silly game on the spur of the moment. We were just randomly chatting about different credit card benefits and things, and just started opening our wallets and laying out cards on the table. It turned into a silly game of "I'll see your Ralph's card and raise you a Vons card" or "Do you have a Blood Donor card?" "Sorry, Go Fish." I even dug into my folder of coupons where my restaurant gift cards are tucked away, and where I had two trump cards: Two free movie tickets that I haven't used yet. *giggle*

I also accidentally over-paid a credit card this month (don't ask, very silly story), so we headed over to the local Barnes & Noble where I went on a bit of a shopping spree in the idea of getting to a "zero balance" on that card. I know, I know, but it was fun. So there!

I picked up a very full bag of books I'd been putting off purchasing for a while, and I can't wait to show Adrienne the cookbooks I found. [I can't help it. The books leapt off the shelf and grabbed me by the wallet, dragging me up to the counter to pay for them. Really. Honest!]

Now, I simply MUST turn you on to several new things: First, a soundtrack and a DVD of a show called "Blast" which consists of part theatre, part Drum Corps. (If you're not familar with DCI or Drum and Bugle Corps, you simply MUST watch the video on DCI.org... be certain you have a high-speed connection and ten minutes to sit and watch something amazing.) Eric recommended "Blast" and gave me a taste of the music before we went over to B&N. I didn't realize it was drum corps based (Star of Indiana) until I opened the CD at home, but I'm absolutely entraced.

Thu Apr 20 - (Quick aside about Thursday: All I really got done was enjoy a lovely dinner out, shop for groceries, and pick up a little around the house. I've started working with my new portable 40 Gig hard drive, which will simplify my website design work and my digital photo albums.)

Fri Apr 21 - Next, I just have to tell you about two internet tools. There's a site called del.icio.us where you create an account and you save links to websites. Then you categorize your links with "tags." You can browse other people's links and tags, so remember not to put personal links here that you don't want other people to see. But it's an *amazing* research and reference tool, and I've added a link to the top of this journal template where you can browse my del.icio.us links anytime you like.

Second internet tool is a reference I found while browsing del.icio.us today, called the LibraryThing - where you can catalog your personal library at home. I was just talking about online catalog tools with Eric at B&N, and then ran across this one today. The search engine looks on the internet and in particular in Amazon.com to find probable matches for your keywords, so you can automatically select the right book for your library catalog. I was just saying I'd like to catalog my books so that I can easily check "do I already have this?" when I'm shopping my favorite authors.

On my way home from dinner yesterday, I picked up a bunch of groceries so I can get back to cooking again for next week. Even though I hit a new personal best, I've slid all week. Daily weigh-in's can be misleading, but they can also show patterns that need to be adjusted. It wasn't a good week for planning food, so time to fix that again.

Tonight: Dinner with Adrienne, some time to relax and hang out, then finish packing for Collegium this weekend. I'm taking such classes as: Beginning Middle Eastern Music Appreciation, Knitting - Reading Patterns & Charts, Period Hair: 500-1600AD, Caidan Circle of Bards -- Roundtable Discussion, Basic Hats & Headdresses, Heraldic Design & Applique Techniques, and Basic Hand-sewing & Finishing Techniques. A very artsy weekend this time. Five of us have gotten a hotel room for Saturday night, so I'll have plenty to catch you up on later.

Hope you all have a lovely weekend!

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Today's Blessing That I'm Thankful For: Theresa, Lynn, and Saul for having del.icio.us links pages for me to get ideas from and inspiring me to get organized with this tool. Thanks folks!

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Exercise: Tonight is the last day for the walking challenge at work, and I get to fax in my results on Monday. The idea of the 21-day challenge was to do something long enough to build a habit. And it's a pretty good idea, because I think I'm going to stick with using my pedometer to track my normal day-to-day exercise, outside of my need to get into the gym.

Weight Loss This Week:
Thu 4/20 17.0 total lost (up +1.2 from Wed)
Fri 4/21 16.8 total lost (up +0.2 from yesterday) - Sigh. My personal best, and plateau, was 16.8 for 1-2 weeks. Then I hit a new personal best of 21.0, and have slid from it all week. I clearly wasn't cooking. Time to cook again.