Valentine's Day - America's Worst Holiday

Once upon a time, there was a little girl who adored all holidays, in particular, Valentine's Day. Saint Valentine was the creator of a fabulous holiday where your crush or boyfriend has an excuse to tell you how much he cares about you. In elementary school, I always got to decorate fun bags or cardboard mailboxes where every classmate would put a little card with a candy heart taped to it, or if you were lucky, good candy like the pink Valentine's M&M's or miniature Snickers. Those were the days... Then in middle school, the days when you pay a dollar to deliver a carnation to your crush, or better yet, receive one from your secret admirer. Every time the deliverer from StuCo came in the classroom, I would pipe up in my desk hoping that Chris, the start of my 5 year crush, would send one to me. So I bet you ask, did you get a carnation from Chris, Sarah? HA!! I am confident he knew I was alive, but I am pretty sure that he was sending carnations elsewhere. Every year, all the way to the 10th grade, I never received any fun Valentine present from a cute boy. Could it of been my unibrow, my pale skin, or the fact that my birthing hips were disproportionate to my stick figure legs and gangly arms? Probably.

Finally in the 11th grade, I got a boyfriend!! Oh, yes, A.C. Jensen. I would sneak in his window at night and make-out or he would sneak out into the night with me. A.C. and I didn't always get along. When Valentines Day rolled around, he claimed that when he walked out of Wal-Mart with my roses, he accidentally left them laying on the top of his car in the parking lot, and then drove off. Turns out, my best friend said that he thought I was a bitch, and wouldn't get me shit. It should of been a precursor to our future relationship. We were about to rekindle our relationship until he quit coming to school. Let's just say selling weed on campus is not the smartest thing to do. He wasn't around for Valentine's Day due to him getting expelled from Grapevine High School. His opportunity to finish school at Vista, our alternative school was shot to hell when he decided to steal a car on his last day of class. Needless to say, by the summer, he had come back to town, and he was finally mine! In our oh so wonderful two years together, we had our share of ups and downs, but surely, he would redeem himself on Valentines Day for sure! He did get me one dozen roses. They were very pretty. After he gave them to me, he said that he had to leave. Come to find out, he decided to go finish "a deal" out in Arlington. The following year wasn't much different, except I think he had to "seal the deal" with another woman. We finally broke up. I was single for 4 years... no Valentines Day there!

Finally I met Jared. He is so sweet and would for sure make Valentine's Day special. We started going out on February 2nd, so we were both working on the 14th, but he still didn't get me anything. I thought, "oh, he will make up for it this weekend". Turns out, he doesn't believe in Valentine's Day. Shocker. Next Valentines Day... nothing. "Everyday is Valentines Day, babe!" Uh huh. This year, I am hoping things are different. Since our relationship is not at it's best right now, I am expecting him to do something different this Valentines Day, like participate. But I won't hold my breath. Although I have made it perfectly clear that we should do SOMETHING, I doubt my dreams will come true. We will soon see...

The DIE-ET

Jared and I went on a "clensing" diet (his idea), consisting of fruits, vegetables, beans and rice....What the hell? No meat? No dairy? These are both part of the government approved food pyramid (mypyramid.gov/). Anyway, we decided to try it. How hard could 2 weeks of pure starvation be? Here is my story...

Jared and I were sitting at our normal seats (3 & 4) at Fireside Pies after inhaling massive ammounts of delectable crimini, ricotta, and pepperoni pizza. We were beyond miserably full. Jared begins, "I think we should go on a detox diet." I turned and looked at him as if maybe the pepperonis were laced with drugs. Being as full as I was, I began to think that it wasn't a bad idea. I mean, even before the holidays began, Jared and I were eating like fat kids.
"That's a really good idea, babe", I replied encouragingly. "Now is a good time to do this, so we can avoid gaining excess weight over the holidays." I really was convincing myself that this was what we both really needed to do. After conversing about the details, we decided that Monday was the big day...we were going to detox for 2 weeks.We went shopping on Sunday night. It was a very short trip since we were limited to only 2 isles. Monday morning I woke up and got ready. I had a fat, juicy, honeycrisp apple. I thought, "not to bad, I can do this." The day went on...LUNCH TIME! I was STARVING!!! Everybody at work was excited about chicken-fried steak day at the Chuck Wagon. Mmmmm....chicken-fried Steak, mashed potatoes, 2 rolls with excessive amounts of butter. As I entered the Chuck Wagon, my coworkers made their way to that greasy pile of goodness. I made my way to the crappy salad bar where I filled my plate with lettuce, cauliflower, and brocolli...and thats it...
Everyone was wondering what the hell I was doing. I explained my situation and they all agreed it was a stupid idea, well, all except for the vegan at the end of the table. My stomach was aching and growling. I wanted those mashed potatoes so bad. Finally lunch ended. I emailed Jared I AM HUNGRY via email, and he replied that he was as well. The rest of the day went by and my hunger eventually deterred. By dinner time, I was dizzy and irritated. When I got home, Jared said, "I want Fireside". As we ate steamed veggies and brown rice, I convinced him that we could do this. Every night after, he announced that he wanted pizza and I continued to encourage better choices and that it was only the beginning and we could make it through. It would all be over soon.
Day 2 and 3 were not so bad. I precooked some beans for lunch and baked sweet potatoes for dinner. Jared was bitching every second he got. "Maybe we should just do 10 days instead", I suggested on Day 2.
"I'm thinking about trying to just get through a week", he replied.
Day 4 was kind of a blur (it was yesterday by the way). I remember being frustrated about having the same meal 4 days in a row. In all honesty, I didn't want to be ther 'first quitter'. If he wanted to stop, he would have to say so and I would just follow. I surprisingly felt o.k. My hunger wasn't satiated, but I was o.k. That night he finally said, "I quit". I thought he was joking, but apparently he was dead serious. He was irritable, cranky, and his eyes were glazed over in hunger.
That night, we made our way to Fireside Pies where we enjoyed the same pizza we left off on, delicious crimini, ricotta, and pepperoni. It tasted better than I remembered. We spent our evening watching the Mav's game. We also got to decorate and hang a stocking next to all of the employee stockings because of our constant dedication to the restaurant.
Do I regret it? No, I don't. I know that I could of done it, and been better off than my significant other, but truth be told, I love food too much to deprive myself of all the things I love for that long. We told ourselves that we do need to start eating healthier which I feel is an attainable goal. We decided to start Monday. ROUND 2!

What is it with jealous women?

I don't really understand why some women are so jealous. I wanted to explain the piece of work I encountered the other day at the Grapevine Mills Mall (the classiest mall in Texas). Jared had gone solo to another store to purchase the new "War Hammer" game while I shopped for a dress for an upcoming wedding I was attending. I exited the store and ready to move to the next. As I was calmly walking down the crowded, claustrophobic isles, I saw a guy that I could of sworn I went to high school with from a distance. So after doing a double take, I had to squint to see if it was this man just in case I needed to say hello. Keep in mind that this was not an attractive guy... but the similarities between him and my previous schoolmate were unreal. The blonde girl escorting him looked fresh out of the trailer park, in her early 20's, and fairly unattractive. They were hooked arm-in-arm. How adorable. Turns out it wasn't him so I had forgotten and my mind was already elsewhere. As I was debating on what store was next..."Charlotte Russe, or Windsor?", I passed the couple and the girl stuck out her elbow and jacked my arm as I passed. I know this was no accident, due to a lack of apology. She must of thought I was checking out her boyfriend. I guess the double take and the squinting could of given her a bad vibe, but she should of kept her social graces. When deep in my heart I wanted to beat her with my purse, I decided to take the higher road in order to be classy, and just let it go. I had to tell myself that I was the better person out of the situation and I know that I didn't want to put on a public Jerry Springer Show in the Grapevine Mills Mall.

Not A Blogger

Welcome to Sarah's Adventures! To start off, I will tell you about my recent decision to join the blogging world. I guess I have never understood the art of "blogging", or why anybody on earth would want to read about somebody elses life. It is like a diary without the juicy stuff. How fun could that be? But then again, it took me 3 years after MySpace was cool to join that, so I figured, "why not?". I will get the pictures up soon, as well as more interesting reading, but for right now...it's all about baby steps.