Another successful book sale!!!

Hello, everyone! I hope you all are having a great weekend! I've had a pretty good one so far. It's been cooler out than usual, and I'm still getting over a cold, and I'm a bit concerned because my "service engine soon" light has been on since yesterday morning (keep in mind I just had my damn car in for inspection two weeks ago and they said everything looked great.... hopefully it's just a fluke!), but other than that, I'm good! :-)

I went to one of my favorite library book sales ever with my friend Rick, and we both found lots of great books! I spent a little more than I wanted to- $32, and that was after putting lots of books back. If I hadn't put any back, I would have spent $50! Even I can admit that's a little excessive, LOL. So after some careful weeding and eliminating, I whittled my pile down to $32 worth of goodies. Wanna know what I got? Of course you do!!!

So I got fourteen books, $2 each:

*You Must Remember This, by Joyce Carol Oates. I've been wanting to read more of this author, and this sounded like a particularly good one... it's about a "typical suburban family" in 1950s upstate New York that is anything but the stereotypical "All-American family" they portray themselves to be.

*Life's Work: Confessions of an Unbalanced Mom, by Lisa Belkin. Lisa Belkin is a columnist for The New York Times, and this is a book she wrote about trying to juggle a professional career, a marriage, raising two young boys, and challenging the whole "Supermom" myth. I love women's studies and sociology books, so I figured I'd like this.

*Death by Suburb, by David L. Goetz. A humorous book about how not to let living in the suburbs "kill your soul" and how not to turn into a Stepford Wife or Soccer Dad. I thought it sounded funny!

*When Women Stop Hating Their Bodies: Freeing Yourself From Food and Weight Obsession, by Jane R. Hirschmann and Carol H. Munter. Like I said, I love these kinds of books. And I've struggled with food issues in the past, and thought this sounded really interesting.

*Second Chance, by Jane Green. LOVE Jane Green! She's one of my favorite chick-lit authors. I hadn't even heard of this book- it's one of her newer ones. And it's in really nice condition too!

*More Tales of the City, by Armistead Maupin. This is a book in part of a series called "Tales of the City", following the lives of a group of individuals who live in the same apartment complex, I believe in San Francisco. I bought the first one at a book sale a few years ago at Rick's urging, because he said it was such a great book. I haven't gotten around to reading it yet, but I figured it would be nice to have the second one for when I finally do get to it! :-)

*Best of Friends, by Cathy Kelly. LOVE Cathy Kelly. She's one of my favorite chick-lit writers too. I hadn't heard of this book either, so I was pretty excited!

*The Second Stage, by Betty Friedan. This is the follow-up book to her groundbreaking feminist movement book "The Feminine Mystique", which I actually just bought at the paperback book sale two weeks ago. So it was cool to find this.

*Odd Girl Out: The Hidden Culture of Aggression in Girls, by Rachel Simmons. This. Was. A. Fantastic. Book. Absolutely amazing. Every girl needs to read this, whether you're in high school or you graduated ten years ago! It was awesome. So I was happy to find it. And it's in really nice condition too.

*Conversations with the Fat Girl, by Liza Palmer. This is a fiction novel about two friends who befriended each other in childhood because they were both overweight and lonely. Now as grown-ups, one is still overweight, while the other had gastric-bypass surgery and is now marrying a surgeon, concealing the fact that she had surgery, and she asks her best friend to be in the wedding. It sounded like a Jennifer Weiner novel, or something along those lines. It sounded like a fun read.

*The Worst Years of Their Lives, by Barbara Ehrenreich. Barbara Ehrenreich writes a lot about economic sociology. Every book of hers I've read, I've liked. This particular book is about the 1980s and how it was dubbed "The Decade of Greed". Which means there's going to be all sorts of 80s references. Awesome. :-)

*An American Childhood, by Annie Dillard. This is an autobiography about the author growing up in 1950s Pittsburgh. I like autobiographies/memoirs, so figured I'd give this a shot.

*Holy Hunger: A Woman's Journey From Food Addiction to Spiritual Fulfillment, by Margaret Bullitt-Jonas. This is a memoir about a woman who comes from a dysfunctional family- her father was an alcoholic and her mother was depressed and emotionally distant- and how it drove her to compulsive eating, and how she overcame that. It sounded like a really interesting book. I have never struggled with this addiction, because I have such an interest in the psychology of eating disorders, I thought I would like it.

*The Glass Castle, by Jeannette Walls. I've heard amazing things about this book. My sister actually lent it to me and told me that I had to read it, that she just could not put it down. I saw a few copies at the sale and figured I'd pick up my own copy. It's a woman's memoir of growing up in a very dysfunctional family.

In addition to the books, I picked up four videos for $1 each:

*A weight-lifting workout tape: Kathy Smith's Time-Saver: Lift Weights to Lose Weight. I like Kathy Smith. I'm not ashamed to admit it. I have a few of her workout tapes and DVDs and like them a lot. I have her Strength Training DVD, but thought this might be a nice change.

*P. M. Yoga: Conditioning for Weight Loss. I'm too cheap to pay for yoga classes, my gym doesn't offer them, and I thought it would be a nice addition to my workout-at-home tapes. I only have one yoga tape and I figured it couldn't hurt to have another to mix it up a little.

*Pilates Intermediate Mat Workout. I love Pilates. I've been doing it for years! Had to get this!

And last but not least...

*Walt Disney's Sleeping Beauty, Fully Restored Limited Edition. Sleeping Beauty was my absolute favorite Walt Disney movie when I was a little girl. I loved this movie so much. I would prance around the apartment in my princess costume and my tiara and pretend to be Princess Aurora, or sometimes I would get out the accessory wand and pretend to be the fairies when they're having the fight over what color to make the cake icing ("Pink! Blue! Pink! Blue!"). I saw this movie and immediately felt warm and cozy and nostalgic. I had to buy it. LOL.

So it was a good sale! Rick and I rejoiced with tea at an adorable little coffeehouse near the library, then we walked to the local Trader Joe's to pick up some fun treats. I bought sodium-free whole wheat bread, pumpkin butter, organic brown rice marshmallow treats (healthy Rice Krispy treats... there is a God!!!), frozen mango chunks (these are a must-have in my freezer at all times, especially now that fresh fruit is getting a little on the expensive side), and chocolate chip fruit and nut bars (my new favorite pre-cardio workout energy bar).

So it was a very successful outing! And now today is a typical Sunday... picked up a few groceries to get me through the week (I successfully managed to not spend a lot of money- $24- trust me, for me, that's good! Normally I spend quite a bit more than that! I didn't need much though, and what I needed was cheap). I picked up a new sandwich roll that I've been wanting to try, those Arnold's Whole Wheat Sandwich Thins. They'll be perfect for veggie burgers. So that was exciting. This afternoon I'll probably hit the gym and then chill out for the rest of the day and get all my stuff ready for another fun-filled work week.

Oh! I started a new book! I can't believe I almost forgot!

Silent Witness: The Untold Story of Terri Schiavo's Death, by Mark Fuhrman. In case you don't remember the Terri Schiavo case, she's the woman who collapsed in her bathroom in 1990 for reasons still unknown (she was only 26 years old!), and went into a vegetative state, needing a feeding tube to live, and her husband and family spent the next fifteen years fighting each other over whether to have the tube removed or not (her husband wanted it removed because he said she wouldn't want to live that way, but her family wanted to keep it and keep her alive. She hadn't left any instructions either way). It's a very interesting read, and I'm liking it. Personally, I don't know what I would want in that situation. She did eventually have the tube removed, and died in 2005. Anyway, I'm about halfway through already (it's a fast read), and it's extremely interesting. Her husband sounds like a very manipulative, controlling ass! He was even engaged to another woman for years while still married to Terri, but refused to divorce her, because then he would lose control of her medical affairs, as well as her estate and life insurance. Makes you wonder what his best interests at heart really were.

I tried a new concoction side dish for dinner last night...cheesy vegetable rice!

Nothing extremely fancy here... 1/2 cup instant brown rice, frozen broccoli, and frozen pepper and onion mix all mixed together with a Laughing Cow Light Swiss Wedge melted in. It was so freakin' good!!! It kind of tasted like a healthy version of those casseroles people make, with the chicken and rice and creamy Campbell's soups? Very delicious!!!!! I also made some grilled chicken. I <3 my George Foreman grill. We're very good friends.

And last but not least, I wanted to show my readers just HOW much I am a sucker for "limited edition" products:

I bought an 18-pack case of Clif Z Kids Bars in the Spooky Smores flavor, LOL! I have always been a sucker for any food product with the marketing gimmick "limited edition" stamped across it. I always buy it, figuring, I have to... it's limited edition, it will be gone soon! I am their total target audience, LOL. Anyway, I looked for this flavor all over the place, and finally found one, and tried one, and LOVED it... they reminded me of a healthier version of those Quaker S'mores flavored granola bars that I used to LOVE as a kid...I bought a few more and loved them so much, that when I went food shopping last week, I asked if I could buy them by the case! The guy seemed a little taken aback (I didn't blame him, haha), but said it was fine! So I got this case for $12.99. I didn't think that was bad at all, since they sell for .89 cents apiece! Plus, I had to... they're limited edition! LOL. And by the time they're gone, I'll be sick of them until they come back next October anyway, haha. Anyway, I thought that my healthy food aficionados would get a kick out of that. :-D

And on that note, I'm going to take some more daytime cold medicine and make some lunch (have I mentioned how much I'm digging hickory-smoked tofurky lately? Love it!). New Cold Case and Mad Men on tonight- can't wait! :-)

Hope you all had a nice weekend! :-)