things I am currently obsessing about...

Sometimes I wonder if I have an addictive personality.  According to the lectures that we had in the last few weeks, addictions have a genetic basis (although scientists haven't quite worked out all the details or narrowed down the genes just yet).  Maybe my genes cause me to become addicted to certain things.  Now, my addictions may not be bad (i.e. drugs and alcohol), but I sometimes I think I still can get addicted.  Eventually, I'll get over my addiction, but it can take awhile...maybe a few weeks or a month.  For example, sometimes I can listen to a good song on repeat for hours.  (Last songs I did this with were "Little Lion Man" by Mumford and Sons and the Glee version of "The Only Exception".)  Right now, my addictions are revolving around food.  My friend Mindi introduced me to these wonderful little cucumbers.  OH BOY ARE THEY GOOD!  Technically, they are called persian cucumbers and are smaller than even a pickling cucumber, have little to no seeds, and are super sweet.  While you can buy a cucumber just about anywhere, the persian variety is not the easiest to find.  Mindi buys them at Costco; but since I am not a member there, I've been searching high and low to find some.  I recently discovered them at Trader Joe's and I've seen them twice at the local Sprouts (a wonderful "farmer's market" grocery store, kind of like Whole Foods, but cheaper).  I just bought 2 tubs, which is good, because now Mindi doesn't need to bring extras to share with me in class.  I seriously will eat several in a sitting.

My other new addiction/obsession is with this website I discovered called "Smitten Kitchen".  It is a blog written by a woman in NYC that refuses to cook the same thing twice.  She tries all kinds of recipes and puts them on her blog along with these gorgeous step-by-step photos.  So far, I tried a pasta recipe that was simple yet amazing and I just took a pan of blueberry crumb bars (her recipe) out of the oven and they look and smell heavenly; I can't imagine that they will taste any different.  (Update...I just tried a blueberry bar.  They are AMAZING.  I was going to give most of the pan away.  Not anymore.  I am going to eat it all myself...I don't even care if I gain 10 lbs.)  I've printed off several more of her recipes and I can't wait to try them.  I could spend hours searching that site for new recipes.

In other news, this week has been a "fix-it" week.  My back injury started getting worse, so I ended up going to the MWU medical clinic across the street.  (Background: the medical school at MWU is an osteopathic school that grants DO degrees, which is slightly different from an allopathic medical school that grants MD degrees.  The education in both types of schools is essentially the same, except DOs ahve a slightly different philosophy and learn a certain type of manipulation of the musculoskeletal system.  Check out this link for more information.)  If anyone ever says anything bad about osteopathic medicine, don't believe them.  I went to the clinic on Friday with my back in pretty much constant pain.  The doc over there said that my muscle had spasmed and pulled my L4 vertebra out of alignment with the rest of my spine.  He used some OMM technique (apparently called the "Kirksville crunch" according to my roommate) to pop it back into place and I felt instant relief!  Seriously, I couldn't believe the difference.  All fixed (pretty much...it's still a bit sore, but he also gave me medication for that).  What I want to know is how an MD would have solved that problem.  Would I still be in pain?  Would I have been referred to a chiropractor?  My car also broke this week, which was a fun discovery.  I had quite a few errands to run before I left town for the weekend, so I hopped in my car to leave and it wouldn't start.  (Luckily, all my errands were within a reasonable walking distance and it was 70 degrees and sunny.  I hoofed it all over town to finish them in time before remembering I have a bicycle.  Oops.)  I called my dad and he thought it was a dead battery.  Normally this wouldn't be much of a problem, except for the fact that I had no idea how to use the jumper cables in my trunk or replace a dead battery.  Luckily, my friend Joe offered to help me fix it.  It took us a few hours to get it up and running again, but the car is fixed!  I also learned quite a bit, so I feel like I could confidently say that if my battery goes dead again, I could totally fix it.  I like learning how to fix things; it makes me feel handy, which I like.

The other interesting update is about my trip to California this weekend.  It was a fun weekend with some gorgeous weather.  My friend Jen is a pretty busy girl, so I pretty much just followed her around to her various activities that she had going on.  I did get some time at the beach though, which was my main goal for the weekend.  It was obviously too cold to swim, but sitting in the sand soaking up the sunshine was just fine too.  I walked around the Venice Beach boardwalk for a bit.  It is an interesting place filled with some strange people and some very interesting smells (some of them that are not so pleasant).  Apparently it is also quite easy to get a medical marijuana license there too.  There was lots of advertisement for that.  LA is quite an interesting place.  This time I stayed on the west-side where Jen lives and we went to the areas super close to her...Santa Monica, Marina del Rey, and Venice.  Eventually, I would love to go back and see more stuff there, maybe some of the touristy Hollywood stuff or go to Disneyland or head back to Orange County.  There is just so much to do and never enough time.  Here are a few of my favorite photos from the few I took this weekend.