Happy Friday!!!

TGIF!!! Another weekend has arrived! And this is a particularly nice one, because it's payday! And while Fridays are always nice, payday Fridays are always just a smidgen nicer in my book.  :-)  Hopefully everyone has fun and exciting weekend plans! My agenda includes a trip to Trader Joe's, a trip to Wegmans, hitting yard sales to look for patio furniture, watching the Phils hopefully beat the Pirates, writing in my journal, meeting up with friends, a haircut, Pilates, laundry, cleaning the fridge (I have some stuff I need to toss), and reading, of course!!!

Here's a random list of the ten things that made my week pretty awesome:

1. Samantha Brown: Passport to Great Weekends. I just started watching this a few days ago, and I love it! Samantha Brown is like a less-annoying Rachael Ray. Don't get me wrong, I like Rachael Ray, but sometimes, she's a bit too much.

2. Watching Sex and the City on DVD... I borrowed the entire boxed set from my sister- I never had HBO, so I've really only seen the edited episodes on TBS. The unedited eps are much, much better!

3. Trader Joe's Lentil Rice Biryani. Yummy and good for nights you don't feel like doing real cooking- it only takes 90 seconds to make!

4. Meditiation.

5. Self-acceptance.

6. Appreciating and savoring the little things in life.

7. Clementines.

8. My new sparkly hot pink water bottle that I bought at Wal-Mart, on clearance for 75 cents. It's cute AND I'm helping the environment!

9. Alanis Morrisette. I just read an interview with her in this month's issue of Women's Health magazine at the gym today. She is so cool! That's one chick who has self-acceptance down pat!

10. Clif Kid Bars, chocolate-chip flavored. These aren't new to me- I love these things- but they're on my mind because I ate one today on my way to the gym, and, YUM! I've had the Chocolate Brownie and Peanut Butter flavors (I can't find the Honey Graham and Blueberry ones anywhere!), but the Chocolate Chip is by far my favorite. Does anyone else think that they taste just like Entenmann's Soft-Baked Chocolate Chip Cookies??? Plus it gave me energy for a great workout on the epliptical today- 50 minutes of hill interval, while I read this month's Women's Health magazine (which was very good!)

So that's my week in review, LOL. Not too shabby.

I didn't post last night because, well, I didn't really have much to say. Plus I wasn't home. For the past few Thursday nights I've been going to free concerts in a nearby park with some girlfriends, and last night was the last one. The last shebang was a big band orchestra. They actually had to stop for a while because for a few minutes, there was light rain, and a bit of thunder and lightning, which was so weird because the sun was out. Very odd. My friends and I decided to stick it out, and walk around the park until it cleared up, which eventually it did. And the band played on. And fun was had by all.  :-)  

Dinner tonight was simple, and basic: my last Amy's Texas Veggie Burger on an English muffin with half a Laughing Cow swiss wedge, arugula, chopped onion, organic ketchup, and barbecue sauce; the last of my arugula (because I needed to use it up), and some baby carrots w/light balsamic vinaigrette, and some broccoli. Oh, and a few pieces of pineapple:

I've been seeing other people eating veggie burgers on English muffins on their blogs lately, so I decided to give it a whirl. It was much tastier than a regular hamburger roll! Much more doughy and satisfying... I have definitely been missing out all this time. I don't think I'm going to be able to eat veggie burgers on anything other than English muffins from now on! (I used a Trader Joe's Whole Wheat English muffin). I ate dinner while channel-surfing and reading.  I can't decide how I feel about Protect and Defend. I'm about 130 pages into it so far (it's 603 pages- I'm a fast reader, and I'm skimming the boring political stuff). Just when I start getting into the story, it gets boring, and just when I start getting bored with it, it picks up again. Argh! What's a reader to do? If it was a flat-out yawnfest, I'd give up altogether; but it's just interesting enough to at least TRY to get through... you know? Especially when the story focuses on the poor pregnant fifteen-year-old girl and her lawyer... I don't see how she'll even be able to have an abortion once the case goes through the notions of a trial and everything; trials can stretch out for a long time, and she's already more than five months pregnant, if not more, and getting more pregnant by the day... so won't she be nearly full-term once the trial is over? I don't know. I don't know enough about abortion OR the judicial system to speculate on either one. The trial just started, so I'm hoping that the story is going to really pick up from here. I definitely intend to get some reading done over the weekend. I love to wake up on the weekends and read outside on my balcony for a while, especially before the humidity and heat kick in, but there's a lot of stuff I want to get done tomorrow, so that might not happen. Oh well... there's always Sunday!

Okay, time to watch some TV and read. And obviously have ice cream right before bed. I'm still pretty full from dinner, but not too full for dessert! Plus I only have a scoop or two left anyway, so that's a perfect before-bedtime snack.

Enjoy the rest of your evening!   :-)