Becoming a grown up

I've been living in my house for about two and a half weeks. It's been a great experience so far. My sister has been subletting from one of my roommates for the summer. She and I have been shopping and cooking together. (My other roommate has mostly been eating at her fiance's apartment.) I've made a price book (result: food is CHEAP here!) and a coupon folder and have signed up for rewards cards. So far, I've been enjoying this taste of adult life. We'll see whether I still like it a year from now!

My biggest hassle has been transportation. I don't have a car, so I've been riding my bicycle everywhere. I got a trailer so that I could carry a lot of stuff, so I've even been grocery shopping with my bike. This is fine, in theory, but there are two big problems: The first is that it's fairly warm here, and so I wind up covered in sweat. That's not great at work and it's no fun to get home and just need to collapse and dry off. The second, bigger problem is that I don't live in a very convenient place to do all my shopping and travel by bike. There are not a lot of sidewalks in places you'd want them to be (hello, the mall?). I need to investigate the bus a bit and see if that can make up for some of the missing sidewalks. There is still the problem that a lot of local drivers don't seem to realize that bikes can be part of traffic. I try to stick to sidewalks so I don't die. (Yes, I realize I'm enabling their bad driving. No, I don't care; when cars nearly run over a BABY TRAILER, I'm not sacrificing myself on the altar of a principle.)

My plans for the next few days are to finish unpacking/organizing my room and to get some supplies to make jam. We don't have the right size pots, but I am going to try it anyway before I buy more because pots are expensive. I might be able to just make smaller batches. I'll keep you updated!

Seven Quick Takes: Mostly Cooking and Cleaning

~~ 1 ~~

I take back what I said about next semester being easy. I just put it all into an actual weekly calendar with colored in blocks (the only way schedules make sense to me) and there's a LOT of color and not very much white space. (Well, right now there's a lot of white space, but I know most of that is going to be colored in once I finish scheduling lab and work hours.) I guess I'll buy a crock pot and learn how to make crock pot meals that last for a week! Just kidding.

~~ 2 ~~

Actually, speaking of cooking, I'm going to try going gluten free this summer and see what happens. My sister has just gone gluten free and it's made a big difference to her overall health. That kind of stuff tends to run in families, we are (suspected identical) twins, and I have a lot of the same symptoms. For the record, I hope the experiment totally fails because I LOVE NOODLES and I don't want to stop eating them.

~~ 3 ~~

I'm also on the lookout for recipes that are easy to make ahead of time and then pack. I'm lactose intolerant, so combined with the gluten experiment, my old strategy of cheese sandwich is going to need to be rethought, as will my "noodles and cheese" strategy. Suggestions welcome. Easy and cheap suggestions very welcome.

~~ 4 ~~

I'm in the middle of tidying for move-out. For some reason that I don't quite get, our rooms are supposed to be ready for inspection (i.e., reasonably tidy and posters down) by Sunday night. Inspections are on Thursday. Are they just trying to make sure we get things done in time? I don't know. Whatever! Saves me some of the last minute rush to turn my disaster of a room into neatly stacked boxes. (Of course, I'll create a different last minute rush. That's just how I roll.)

~~ 5 ~~

Speaking of mess, packing, and rushing, what's the best organization book you've ever read? I have trouble staying organized and I finally figured out one big reason why: I like to have things where I can see them. If I can't see something, I won't remember it. So things that I need to remember to use on a regular basis, such as medication and toothbrushes, need to be visible. Something can only stay hidden if I only need it when I know I need it (e.g., Tylenol, spoons). But if I just set things around on top of tables and shelves, I start putting everything I have on there until my horizontal surfaces are piles of mess. Is anyone else like this? What do you do about it?

~~ 6 ~~

Did you see that the Boy Scouts now allow gay boys to be scouts? They still require leaders to be heterosexual. I will write a more in-depth post about this later, but I think this was a wise move pastorally.

~~ 7 ~~

Lastly, in orphan news (you thought I would have a SQT without orphans, didn't you? Ha, not likely): Recent negotiations with Russia have not yielded any results, and Russia will not reopen to American adoption in the foreseeable future. (Of course, with international adoption, the future is always uncertain.) Because of this, Reece's Rainbow decided to give the grants of waiting Russian children to children in other countries. Because she was my Christmas child, I got to decide which child would receive Aisha's grant. I was asked to give her grant to a child with DS who was in greater need, and I chose Mark in Latin America. He already had a significant grant, so his adoption is now nearly half paid for. He needs a family quickly--he is an older boy, and he has leukemia as well as Down syndrome. I have absolutely no idea what conditions are like in his country; I hope he is getting treatment for his cancer. But he still needs a family.

For more Quick Takes, visit Conversion Diary!