We are the champions

Even though I basically never keep my New Year's resolutions, this year I did manage to keep one of them, which was to run an 8K race before the end of the year. A few weeks ago, my friend Rocio and I went out to the West Potomac Park at 7am on a Sunday morning to participate in a race called "Run Geek Run." It was a surprisingly mild November morning, with just a slight breeze, which actually made the run quite pleasant. Of course, at about the 4th mile I started wondering why I was doing that race at all, but once I crossed the finish line, I felt great and had a sense of a profound accomplishment. To add to the excitement of the day,I also jumped my first fence in about 20 years---it was about 4 feet high, and I managed to climb it up with encouraging prompts from Rocio (and also watching a family of 4 with young children and a stroller jump the same fence). Both Rocio and I did better than expected at the race, with even better timing than our last 5K. More races to come next year!

Finding joy in simple things

After a looong week of endless mind-numbing mathematical proofs, the Sox getting pummeled by the Yankees last night, 19-8 (yes, I know it was a throw-away game, but it still hurts for many reasons), and dreary, muggy, rainy weekend, two great things happened this morning on my way back from the gym that brought a smile to my face:

1) I figured out the origin of the word "brunch"!!! I was thinking about what to have for lunch and decided to have an English muffin. I remembered the episode of Scrubs where they talked about brinner ("breakfast for dinner") and thought that it would be a good thing to have a name for "breakfast for lunch"---that's when it dawned on me that it already exists: BRUNCH! (And to think that for all the years since I have been in the US, I always wondered where "brunch" came from).

2) I had to stop by Staples to get some more of my beloved Papermate twisty-bottom pencils and got sooo excited to be there: I forgot how much I love the smell of school supplies, so I spent about 15 minutes wondering around the aisles, playing with fun paper clips, looking at different types of pens, and being completely amazed at the scientific achievements that led to the creation of clicky-top Sharpie markers.

(Yes, I do realize this post makes for a major nerd-alert, but oh well...that's me!)

Helen vs the Flying Beast

Imagine my horror last night: I was watching a great movie after a relaxing (3 hour nap) and productive (nice workout) day when I saw a huge roach crawling on top of my TV. Having an uttermost fear of giant roaches (and this one was the size of my pinkie), my brain immediately kicked into gear trying to devise a plan to overcome my fears and kill the intruder. Since I didn't have any bug spray (will own a can of the deadliest stuff by tonight for sure), I grabbed the only of the two sprays I had, the Green Cleaner, and a running shoe, and embarked on operation Kill the Roach. To my surprise and utter horror, this wasn't your regular slow-crawling bug---this was a flying and a very speedy one that managed to crawl/fly under the fridge after about 10 minutes of me spraying and chasing it around the apartment. I had to resort to doing other things until it re-emerged from hiding, at which point I knew that I wouldn't be able to sleep or stay in the apartment with the bug in it, so I HAD to kill it. Not knowing what to do and still being utterly terrified of getting too close to it (the thing could fly!!!), I called the one person that has practical ideas for all situations: Meg. Her basic advice was to smash the thing, which, of course, was what I couldn't bring myself to do. Her roommate then got on the phone and devised a great plan which involved switching the organic cleaner spray to Windex (the only other thing I had in a spray version), careful positioning of all the tools in my hands, and strategically stunning the bug with Windex so that I could smack it with a magazine. He concluded the strategy session with an encouraging "just smash the @#%$! out of it." I must say that the pep talk really helped, and after another 15 minutes of waiting to see what the bug does and working through my fears, I DID IT!!!
So, the final score is: Helen-1, nasty flying creeper-crawler-0. In fact, he has been washed down the toilet, so I'd say that his score is somewhere around -10.

Happy 4th of July

A public service announcement about fireworks safety brought to you by Big Papi:
"Just sit back, relax, crack open a beer and let someone else light the fuse. So long as it's not Manny. Oh, and watch the eyebrows."

***For the uninitiated: Big Papi, aka David Ortiz, is a Red Sox designated hitter from the Dominican Republic who recently became a US citizen. Manny, aka Manny Ramirez, is another Red Sox slugger who is famous for his scatter-brained but hilarious ways. This is probably funnier if you know these characters, but I thought that everyone could benefit from the fireworks safety tips.

Helen versus Clogged Sink: Round 2

A few months ago I was having a friend over for dinner on a Saturday night (I cooked something...gasp!), and my kitchen sink decided to get clogged about the time my friend was getting there. The next day I, armed with the most potent de-clogging stuff Target had and a plunger, attacked the clog, and after several hours, I won the battle! The sense of empowerment and personal satisfaction can only be compared to the time when I used an electric drill to hang up a towel rack in my bathroom.

This past Saturday night the sink decided that it was time to get clogged again. This time, the countless attempts to attack it with a combination of the potent Liquid Plumr and energetic pumping with the plunger did not yield the desired results. I tried for about two days, after which I had to gather up my pride and call the apartment building maintenance crew (who, of course, fixed it with some magical tools---not sure how, I was at work).

So, if anyone is keeping score...Round 1: Helen-1, Clog-0; Round 2: Helen-0, Clog-1. I wonder if there is anything more potent than Liquid Plumr Foaming Pipe Snake on the market so that I can prepared for the next round (which hopefully won't come for a while). Of course, I could just call my resident friendly maintenance crew, but I refuse to go down without a fight.

One exciting accomplishment

A few minutes ago, my boss and I submitted a book manuscript to our institute's Publications Review Committee. Wow...this has been a long road, including multiple hours of brainstorming and writing, collaborating with people from 10 different countries, a major conference in Uganda, a productive week in Boston, sending a gazillion different emails, and copyediting about 120,000 words of a manuscript. To many people, this would not really be all that exciting, but to a major nerd like myself, this is a great day. Of course, the book now has to go through several rounds of revisions, more back and forth with the authors, and more nagging emails (Im getting quite good at this). So, I will probably have more gray hairs by the time it comes out (probably at least a year from now), but at least today I can celebrate!

I Love Red Sox Nation

How great is it to be a part of this great community of fans! You can strike a conversation about your beloved team anywhere and with anyone who proclaims to be part of the great Red Sox Nation. About a month ago, I was on my way to the elevator when I ran into a colleague from a different division who is always very busy (hence, spends very little time socializing) and who I knew was a Red Sox fan. We said the usual quick "hellos" when he suddenly said, "How about Dice-K last night?" (For the uninitiated, Daisuke Matsuzaka, or as everyone lovingly calls him, Dice-K, is a Red Sox starting pitcher who left the game early the night before this conversation with pain in his shoulder leaving the Nation terrified of the potential injury and stint on the disabled list). Of course, I couldn't pass up the opportunity to express my concern about our beloved Japanese import, and we spent about 5 minutes talking about it. It was a unexpectedly great break during a monotonous day at a research institute, and Im grateful that I have a compatriote in the same building in case something else exciting or terrible happens with our beloved team.