30 minute post – The Rox Life

August 21, 2013August 30, 2013

blah blah Beer…and the UFO Club

I don’t know that it’s even possible…but I’m going to try to write this 30 min post all about beer. I don’t know if I can fill 30 min with beer thoughts…but I’ll give it a shot. Why?! Well, because I’m currently at the The Flying Saucer (Addison) drinking beer 151 (of 200) in my UFO Club membership. When I have drank my 200th unique brew…I get my own plate. I’m wondering WHERE I get my plate…because I started this membership in Austin. I guess my plate will be in Austin. Who knows….we’ll cross that bridge in 49 more beers. They let you count up to 3 beers per visit. So, I’m looking at AT LEAST 17 more visits…maybe I can get this done before 2014. We shall see…

My membership started in 2008, and (ACTUALLY) it was Ronald’s idea. So, I wouldn’t say that I really got serious about trying to finish this until this year. Looking back at my stats…it appears that I drank most of my beers in 2008 and 2013. I have to say – I’ve learned a lot about beer. I wouldn’t claim to be any kind of expert, but I do know more about what I like & don’t. For instance, my early brews included: Pyramid Haywire Hefeweizen, Blue Moon, New Belgium Sunshine Wheat…lots of other wheats & obvious choices. Now, I’m more drinking the local/craft brewers and seasonal selections. That may not be due entirely to my taste/preference, but perhaps it’s due to striving for unique beers to add to my list. Also, it seems my list is comprised predominantly of draught beers…only 10 bottled choices. I guess I don’t see the point of drinking bottles at a “draught emporium”. So, I should have developed some favorites along this tasting adventure…right?!

I’d have to say I still like the Hefe-Weizen & Oktoberfest beers. They’re just so quaffable. I also like Dunkel Weizen – no big leap there. Sounds like I like German beer, huh? More recently, (2011) Ronald & I were in London and draught beer took on a new meaning. Fuller’s is popular there and I’d have to say one of my current favorites is Fuller’s ESB (English Pale Ale or Bitter – right?). Speaking of that style – my other reigning current favorite is probably Dallas based Peticolas Royal Scandal. While in London, I also got to have some Fuller’s Organic Honey Dew. My my…I sure wish I could find this beer locally. If it’s anywhere draught or bottled…I haven’t seen it.

I’ve also identified some of my less favored beers. For example, I had a bad run in with Oskar Blues Ten Fidy (Russian Imperial Stout) a few years ago. Funny thing, I obviously was interested in Imperial Stouts…or I never would’ve been drinking it in the first place. While the Russian Imperial Stout itself is really not to blame…nor that specific incarnation by Oskar Blues…other circumstances and the hang over from Hades that followed…lead to an eventual beer recovery…but with the exclusion of Oskar Blues brews, all Russian Imperial Stouts, and many of the very perfume-y hoppy brews (like some IPAs). Maybe some day I’ll make it back toward those…but something about perfumey hops really turns my stomach even YEARS later.

Stouts & Porters are still enjoyable, but it’s a little hit or miss. I’d have to say that my ALL TIME/OVER ALL favorite brew is Anchor’s Our Special Ale (brewed annually for sale November-January also called Christmas Ale). Maybe it’s the fall/holiday time, its seasonality, and/or the fact that it was born in 1975 (like me) that make it such a favorite for me. Just writing about it – I can hardly wait for Thanksgiving to get here!! It’s also bears mentioning – Ronald & I visited Anchor Brewery in San Francisco on our honeymoon (the week after Thanksgiving). It was already a favorite, but that may have helped to seal the deal.

Well, look at that my time is up. I did write about beer for 30 min…and it looks like I could keep going. Who knew?!?!

August 10, 2013August 10, 2013

Vacations in progress and recaps…

Well, I guess I missed the last 3 days of writing for 30 minutes…or maybe it’s just that I’ll do it 3 times a week instead of 6.

It’s a lovely Saturday morning, and Ronald & I are out at Canyon Lake. My brother, Bryan, and his girlfriend Eryn are here. Mom & Dad are on the way (with breakfast tacos from Casa Alde YES!) Other brother, Beau, and his girlfriend Amber will be here later. Not sure I know of a time when we all made a point to get together and just hang out (unless it revolved around a deer lease/hunting trip). We should definitely make a point to do it more often. Ronald and I made our way out early to do our week 1 day 3 Couch to 5k workout. The view along Canyon Lake while we ran was quite nice. Seems like scenery helps make running a litter easier. I tried out mapmyrun.com to plan our route/distance. It seems pretty handy…only problem being we ran into and area that apparently required DOD ID for entrance… I’ll have to look into some better resources for planning/mapping routes if perhaps you’re not too familiar with the area.

We’ve made some coffee and are just enjoying the views on a lazy morning. Not sure what else we have planned for the day, but I’m sure it will be fun. Our dogs are staying with a good friend in our absence, and I miss them. We’ll have to find a pet friendly lake house to bring them to one day soon. I think they’d like a little trip like this. I know they’re having a blast where they are! I just hope my friend doesn’t want to pull her hair out by the end of their visit.

Yesterday, after our drive into Austin- Ronald & I made sort of a quick tour of the major points in our relationship. We had a quick beer at The Draught House (where we were on an outing that turned into our first “date”). Then, we drove out toward Driftwood where we visited Chapel Dulcinea (site of our own nuptials almost four years ago) and then had an early dinner at Salt Lick BBQ (site of our wedding reception). We brought along a growler filled with Live Oak HefeWeizen. I’m quite fond of the “Come and Fill It” logo on the growler (acquired at The Growler Room.)

So, I’ve been thinking I needed to write a post (or a few actually) talking about our time spent on vacation in San Francisco. I found a cool feature on google where you can create your own maps with various points of interest. So, I started making one with all the locations we’ve visited (spanning 3 trips to SF since 2009). (Here’s a link to my San Francisco spots map still in progress.) I really REALLY enjoy San Francisco. I knew it was time for us to visit again because I had started having dreams about going and having Blue Bottle Coffee. We stayed 4 nights. It doesn’t sound like a long time, but we did a lot. We literally got off the plane and took a cab to Blue Bottle in Mint Plaza. It was walking distance from our hotel – so, we headed to the hotel to get settled in post caffeine fix. Once rid of our bags, we walked all the way down Howard toward the Bay Bridge/Pier 14. It was a GORGEOUS day! We wandered into the Ferry building. Apparently, we were just a little too late for the usual Saturday farmers’ market. We decided we’d do an early dinner at Tadich Grill. The Cioppino was pretty epic…and the seafood sauté wasn’t too shabby either. In order to maximize our post dinner calorie burn, we walked ALL the way over to Alamo Square Park and snapped some pictures of “The Painted Ladies”. There was a random couch in the middle of the park…which I think made for an even better photo opportunity than the old Victorian homes… We decided to take a bus back, and we pretty much turned in for the day.

August 6, 2013August 6, 2013

Elvis Pupsicles

Hey, it’s only 102º! WOOHOO!!

Hendrix had quite the eventful morning. She got to visit the vet for the first time in about a year. I can’t complain – she’s pretty healthy. Sadly, a lot of the vet techs she had made friends with had left our clinic and moved on. Thankfully, the wonderful Dr. Hunter at LazyPaw Animal Hospital took her time making Hendrix comfortable & accommodating her finicky with new people behavior. I understand she was quite the angel in the back (blow me over with a feather). After that, we were off to agility class. I was trying to keep her energy up & a bit “frenzied” by tugging and she seemed very willing to play today and with some speed. The other half of her team (aka ME) was a little off kilter though…as I had a little bit of an upset stomach this morning. She got to chase and be chased by our coach’s BC…I think she has a crush on him (he’s quite the blue chip agility prospect). She was pooped! I came home to drop her off and pick up Cooper (he was going to visit his pal TuggerTails for a bit). I peeked in on her a few minutes after leaving (yes, we have a dogcam), and she had installed herself to sleep in her open kennel. I totally endorse that choice when she was left “free” to roam downstairs. She remained there sleeping until we got back home a few hours later.

Looks like this 30 minute post is going to consist of mostly doggie info! (Imagine that!!) I thought I’d share my “recipe” for what I’ve decided to call Elvis Pupsicles. These are great make at home treats for days like today (that is – HOT).

To make these wholesome, cool treats you’ll need:

plain non-fat yogurt or Greek yogurt
honey
peanut butter (get one with no sugar…preferably just peanuts)
bananas
ice cube trays
blender or food processor

I can honestly say I didn’t measure a thing for this recipe. I just eyeballed it. I put about half of the 35.3 oz container of yogurt in the blender, added 1 very ripe and 1 not as ripe banana (though I think ripeness is irrelevant it’s just what I had), and maybe around 1/4 cup each of honey & peanut butter. I blended it all up till smooth and then poured out into ice cube trays. The consistency was pretty thick but I went with it. You could certainly add a little water or the dogs would probably like chicken stock – if you wanted to thin it out a bit. Trays went into the freezer for at least several hours, and then I removed from trays and stored in a Ziploc freezer bag.

We like stuffing the cubes that will fit inside of the pups’ Kongs. Here’s a picture of Hendrix enjoying her Elvis Pupsicle Kong…at this point she’s actually just continuing to lick the empty inside…I confess we give our dogs lots of treats. However, we try to choose healthy ones and we balance treat intake with food portioning and lots of activity. Our vet seems to approve of their weight & condition.

August 5, 2013August 5, 2013

beer coma, carb coma, and other pressing weekend issues

Since I didn’t complete a 30 minute post yesterday, I suppose that means this new resolution of mine isn’t a daily thing…or maybe Sunday will just be an off day.

I’ll start this session off with two things –

I need to amend my Saturday “to do” list with: make my own beer
If you need a timer application for Mac here’s a decent free one – Alinof Timer – https://itun.es/us/tD5IE.m I’m using it right now 😀

Moving on – Ronald and I had a pretty eventful uneventful weekend. See what I did there…I love paradox…har har. Anyway, we’ve been exercising/playing with the dogs early to avoid the near 100º heat throughout the day. I think this week is going to be the consistently hottest so far this summer. We’ve actually been fairly lucky this July with rain and unusually less than 100º temps. We try to get them their activity time early so they don’t mind being indoors for a LOOOOOONG time the rest of the day. Seems to be working so far. Saturday we tried a new place for brunch and ventured out to the Flying Saucer by the lake to add some beers to my list. I don’t remember much after the beer coma. We didn’t get active again until later in the evening. I walked both dogs (give or take a mile each). While walking Cooper, I decided to jog a little and got the hair-brained idea to actually workout on my own when we finished. I invited Ronald along with me and we did the pretty easy walk/jog 30 minute combo that is the couch to 5k week 1 day 1 workout. I’m thinking either tonight or tomorrow night – I’ll tackle day 2. I’m not even going to say I’ll get all the way through the program, but for now – at least it’s something. Sunday morning – we awoke to discover that our downstairs A/C unit didn’t seem to be working. BOO ON THAT. Fortunately, we were able to get someone out same day & they were able to make the necessary replacement to get us up and running again. It did get a little warm – but not too bad. We also had working A/C upstairs and that kept things from getting out of control. So, we spent most of the day working that issue out and then headed South (as is starting to be our Sunday afternoon custom) to fill our growlers at Craft & Growler. We also had a Sunday repeat from last week – visiting the Lakewood location of Cane Rosso for pizza. If Saturday was beer coma, Sunday was carb coma. I had to nap off my Neapolitan crust when we got home. Then we watched some more episodes of Game of Thrones. We finally bought into all the hype & started watching this show. We really liked season 1, and we’re now almost finished with season 2. I can’t say this 2nd season has really impressed me much…we’ll see if it picks up again in season 3. I’m pretty sure the books are WAY better, but I don’t know if they’re my kind of reads…especially now that I know a lot of the story line. My understanding is the tv show is fairly faithful to the books’ storyline.

It’s been my experience that spa business sometimes slows down in the summer. I haven’t really experienced the slow down yet – but I’m not so busy this week. We’ve got agility classes this week and Cooper has a private lesson (think we’re going to work on his jumping competition height now). Looks like I have a work conflict with Cooper’s obedience class this week, but maybe we’ll find another time to make up for it. Other than that, it seems this weekend we might have a little family get together at Canyon Lake (us, my parents, my brothers & their girlfriends). Should be a fun time. I asked my brother to bring some shrimp for us to cook (I’m thinking scampi style seasoning)…and we’ll have to come up with some other grill worthy choices.

I’m feeling pretty accomplished already this morning. I got 1 mile in with Cooper (Ronald took Hendrix on her morning mile) and I’ve already put in my 30 min! I have no illusions that my life is tough… Monday is my usual day off – the only other things set on the agenda are my nail appointment and movie night. I’m gonna see 2 Guns. I probably need to go to the grocery store, too.

Stream of conscious random add on – I watched an episode of something like Hoarders – Buried Alive yesterday. That seriously scares me…the piled up tchotchkes everywhere…it makes me shudder. I don’t claim to be a neat freak…but just wow. CRAZY.

August 4, 2013

Commence the 30 minute posts!

Ok. I’m always telling myself I need to write more or blog more. (Honestly, I’m always telling myself I need to do a lot of things more. Workout more, read more…eat better more…etc.) I digress. So, THIS is my new (*cough* we’ll see how long it lasts *cough*) attempt at writing/blogging more. Setting aside 30 minutes and just putting something out here. I set a timer and everything. At this point, can’t say I’m even sure if this is a plan to do 30 min daily, 4x week, weekly…or what. I guess I’ll figure that out as I go.

Today, I’ve got lots of things swirling around in my head about what I want/need to do. I feel like there are so many things swimming around and I never capture them (write down/remember). So, I’ll just rattle on a list –

make youtube channel/commercials for my business (improve SEO & attract more new customers)
eventually redesign my web site
speaking of above – a whole host of skills I want to take some classes regarding are: photography, Photoshop (actually the whole Adobe Creative Suite)
there’s a continuing education photography class at Collin County Community College starting in October…gonna do my best to get in on that action
make a “Rox Skin Studio, LLC” sign to hang in my window at the studio as well as some menu of service cards
enter a hunt test with Cooper before next summer (probably HRC Started)…I’d also like to run my brother’s dog Tara for either an AKC Junior Hunter or Senior Hunter test
finish out Hendrix’ Open Agility and Open Agility Jumper titles – hopefully by the end of the year…she has one leg in standard and 2 in jumpers and we’re entered in two trials (only one day each trial) so far in September
continue to focus on having at least one short focused play session one on one with Hendrix & Cooper – you know to remember life with the dogs is fun 😀
Couch 2 5k – man, I hate even writing that down…Ronald & I just did the Week 1 Day 1 workout together and it wasn’t too hard. However, this is like the 3rd/4th time I’ve started the program. Haven’t finished it – always stall out somewhere around week 5. Today, I just sort of jumped on it…not so much because I want to do the program but for the structure of what to do for a not too tough 30 minute workout. I definitely need some cardiovascular exercise injected into my life on a more regular basis.
buy some kettle bells
make eclairs – or something with choux pastry (the incongruence of this following the previous two bullet points is not lost on me)
think about taking on some creative writing (like short story or fiction)…remember college?
plan a trip in the next 2 years to Hawaii
get 1-2 IPL photofacials (for redness/rosacea and to lighten that strange sun spot that I can’t really figure out when it officially appeared prominently under the corner of my right eye)
spend more time productively less time on facebook and my iOS devices
I’m on beer 146/200 at the Flying Saucer – gotta knock out those last 54 beers!
read more – make a list of what to read (start with finishing Lanny Bassham’s “With Winning in Mind”)
teach Hendrix more tricks – I think that’s her favorite thing of all…maybe I need a book of tricks because my ideas are kind of dried up
I seriously need to buy myself some more clothes. I hate buying clothes.
I already tackled & finished a recent closet clean out, but I need to organize some more cleaning and actually attempt to “decorate” more of the house.
repaint & put to use (probably in the studio) the curio cabinet sitting empty upstairs
ignoring previously mentioned spend less time on fb – leverage fb better for the business and build up a fb for theroxlife.com

Wow. 30 minutes goes pretty fast. I’ll have to go back and compare, but I’m pretty sure some of these items are repeats of ones I wrote down at the beginning of 2013. I guess putting it out there on the internet where no one is reading it (but could at any moment) might help make me more accountable. Until my next 30 minute post…I’m feeling a little like small steps in the right direction were made today. I want to keep that forward momentum. It’s actually almost midnight, but I think I will read some of that Bassham book before turning it in for the evening.

I’m thinking I should accompany each 30 minute post with a picture from the day…related or not. Here’s a link to some great pics of the pups swimming with their pal Tugger this morning. Picture above is from brunch at R+D Kitchen earlier today.