theinbetweenismine

just a girl living the expat life

Archives for 2020

Currently | October

filed under: currently

DRINKING | Stumptown Coffee again!! Jon got a shipment for his birthday – pssst, it was from me! Totally unselfish gift, of course! Haha, I am glad that he’s always happy to share with me! – and we’ve been enjoying our morning cups of “Hair Bender” over the weekend. It’s so, so good. Oh, and also…

LOVING | the new mug that came with it. Seems like just the right replacement for my beloved “Thinking Cup”-mug that I accidentally broke last week. 

EATING | sourdough Greek yogurt blueberry crumble muffins for Jon’s birthday. I am telling you, it’s worth starting a sourdough starter just to have sourdough discard to use up in baked goods. The texture of these muffins was somewhere between a scone and a muffin, a little chewier, not quite as soft. They were so delicious. 

READING | Olive Kitteridge by Elizabeth Strout. It’s the first fiction book I’ve read in a while, and it’s a nice change of pace.

APPRECIATING | the week of (use or lose) staycation that I was able to take last week. I hadn’t really planned to take any more time off this year (before Christmas), but I am for sure not wasting any earned vacation time if I can help it. I didn’t really “do” much, it’s not like we could really plan anything or go anywhere, but I was able to sleep in a little, get some outdoor runs in, I took my (road) bike for a ride, and also took a few naps here and there. Glorious.  

WATCHING | Hocus Pocus! It’s Halloween time – what else do you expect me to watch?

LOOKING FORWARD TO | the holiday season. Although I know it’ll be sneaking up on me again (as it somehow always does) and I am not sure yet how we’re going to spend the holidays (probably by ourselves, I am guessing), I feel like it’s always a special time of the year. 

ENJOYING | these extra-warm fall days while they last. It’s not normal for Northern California to have temperatures up into the 90’s and no rain at all by the end of October, but since we can’t do much about it, I am embracing the late-summer feeling for a little longer.

(still) WEARING | shorts and t-shirts. 

FEELING | a little anxious regarding the upcoming election. Just me? I want to be hopeful, I am hopeful that things will turn out alright, but man, I was thinking the same thing 4 years ago and you all know what happened.  But I am…

EXCITED | to hear that so many people have already voted early, including us!

BUYING | a new microwave. Ours finally bit the dust. I contemplated for a minute if it was worth trying to repair it, but I honestly think it was about 10 years old and I was not sure I should be meddling with electric appliances (and getting it repaired would probably have cost as much as a new one). I did the right thing, right? 

STOKED | to participate – or should I say keep carrying the torch? – for NaBloPMo again, starting next week. It’ll be my 15th year. Call me committed. Who’s joining me?

What is currently going on with you?

Blogging through the COVID-19 crisis: Update 7

filed under: Corona Life, real life

It’s been 7 months since I’ve been to my office, eaten at a restaurant, or seen any friends. We’ve postponed a visit to my in-laws (in March), canceled a whole three-week road trip with my family (in July), and forwent a whole slew of other outings we would certainly have planned and executed this summer if it hadn’t been for Covid-19. We cut down the frequency of our grocery runs, I haven’t been to a Home Goods or Michaels in forever, and really, really miss just browsing the aisles of Target (I’ve been to Target because we do part of our grocery shopping there, but it’s usually been a quick in-and-out kinda affair. I will admit that I have strayed to the home decor aisle once or twice out of desperation, but didn’t buy anything.)

It was Jon’s birthday last weekend and weeks ago, we had talked about possibly going down to visit his family for his birthday. We were cautiously hopeful that we’d be further along with the Covid-situation and that we might feel ‘safer’ to travel.

Nope. That didn’t happen. We ended up not feeling comfortable enough to travel halfway across the state. 

Then I read this article yesterday, that says small gatherings are causing a surge in COVID-19 cases, and I thought to myself: yup, not worth the risk. “The CDC also warns that gatherings with people traveling from different places are riskier than those with people who live in the same area.”

As much as we’d like to travel, I still don’t think it’s a good idea.

So, Jon and I continue to do what we’ve been doing: we’re staying sane by going for runs/walks, getting curbside takeout once a week, and generally counting our blessings. We are pretty lucky that we don’t have to worry about kids/childcare/homeschooling. I understand what a luxury it is right now to just have to worry about ourselves and not have the responsibility for some small humans. 

I was doing pretty okay this summer when I could go for my runs/walks and enjoy our backyard. Things became temporarily a little direr when we were hit with yet another blow when the whole Western United States were on fire (and we’re still in fire season, just to be clear) and we were hermetically locked inside the house as the air outside was unbreathable. Thank God for the spin bike that we had just invested in before we couldn’t leave the house anymore. Nothing a good sweat can’t fix, am I right? However, does anyone else feel like the universe is plotting, what other wrenches can we throw into the works of 2020, or is it just me? 

I wish I could say that I am super-productive, that I have all this extra time that I am using purposefully (something that usually makes me feel better than any “give-yourself-grace” self-care routines). Alas, I am not. I scroll the news a lot, I scroll Instagram a lot (don’t judge me, I know you’re doing it, too), and I continue to be in a reading slump. I get a little upset when I squander away my time like that, but can’t seem to do much about it. Let’s not mention the emotionally draining fuel that this historic upcoming election is putting on the dumpster fire that is 2020.

Do you want to know why we all feel so awful these days? After 7 months, our surge capacity is depleted. Oh, this makes so much sense to me. “Surge capacity is a collection of adaptive systems — mental and physical — that humans draw on for short-term survival in acutely stressful situations.”

Here’s the thing: coping is usually an “after the fact” event when you come to terms with what just happened, assess, make a plan, and move on. But what if the situation is ongoing and you just have to learn to live with it? “How do you adjust to an ever-changing situation where the “new normal” is indefinite uncertainty?”

Time feels like an amorphous blob these days. It feels like we’ve been in this pandemic forever, but what I really want to know is, how in the world is it almost the end of October? 

October Link List

filed under: link love

linklist

Around the Interwebs

How much would Trump’s Coronavirus treatment cost most Americans?

This is a long, but important read! Why ‘cluster-busting’ might be the strategy to beat Covid-19.

Some mental health tips on how to deal with 2020.

‘What are we so afraid of?’ This. This is what we’re afraid of. 

Hard to swallow truths.

Why we all love a Nancy Meyers’ house. (Any of them will do!)

How to curate your iPhone’s home screen. I haven’t updated to iOS 14 yet (because of some known bugs), but that sounds intriguing.

When there is no one left to tell us the truth.

Around the blogosphere

“You watch: Every Trump Supporter you know in real life will one day deny they were ever cheering for Trump.”  Some honest thoughts (and links, too!)  from Gabrielle.

The Pandemic’s Toll on Mental Health and Relationships: What Can We Learn?

How to organize your week with time blocking.

Vote 2020: It’s about Humans & Humanity. I agree with Sara.

Craftiness/DIY

OMG, so cute. Felt Woodland Fall Pocket Pals.

Favorite Fall Home Decor on Etsy.

Easy no-carve pumpkin ideas.

Pretty! Modern hand lettered free printable 2021 calendars.

For my runner friends

I am not ready. Are you going back to the gym? If you are, avoid these 9 things.

The benefits of varying your running route.

Deliciousness

The perfect October treat: Cinnamon Apple Spelt Muffins.

I can’t wait for soup weather: tortellini-vegetable soup.

We made these spicy pork brussels bowls for dinner last week. Yum! 

Share a good link with me in the comments!

Tuesday Topics | What about rest days

filed under: fitness, running, Tuesday Topics

This week, I am linking up with  Kookyrunner and Zenaida  for Tuesday Topics and we’re talking about what we think about rest days.

Well, let’s define rest days first. There seems to be a consensus that everything between no exercise at all to lighter exercises and active recovery days can all be called ‘rest days’. 

I personally am a fan of rest days and I respect my body’s need for rest. For me, a rest day usually doesn’t include any form of planned exercise. I do believe that rest days are important for physical recovery and well being, but also for your mental health. And I also believe that not one rest day has to look like the other.

Most times these days, rest days are “somewhat” active rest days for me. I’ll do some stretching, light yoga, or go for a nice long walk. But it’s usually nothing structured and I just go with what I feel like. Sometimes that’s more, sometimes that’s less. It also really depends on what the rest of my workout schedule looks like.

Every once in a while, I will do a complete rest day, which means barely moving at all (and lying on the couch reading all day, if I want to), because sometimes this is what my body and mind truly need. I know a lot of people who have a hard time with complete rest days and I’ll say that most of the time, I too crave some sort of movement during the day, but if it does happen that my body doesn’t want to move,  I am okay with it (occasionally).

Rest days are all about giving your body (and mind) some love.

How do you feel about rest days? Do you sometimes just take a complete day off from any type of exercise?

Five Things Friday Vol. 14

filed under: Friday Five

Five Things Friday: just five things I’m thinking about or things that made my week, or things that I otherwise feel like sharing.

five things

Jon and I had our 19th meet-a-versary earlier this week. 🖤 It’s mind-boggling to me to think about how long we’ve known each other. I had calculated a while back that on September, 22, Jon knew me exactly half of his life. He looked at me incredulously, when I told him. It definitely doesn’t feel like that long. How long have you known your SO?

*  *  *

This week has been so mentally draining. I don’t know about you, but if you still follow the news regularly, you probably know what I am talking about. Throw social media on top of it and it’s been particularly hard to escape the sh*tshow that’s been going down for the last week with Trump contracting COVID-19, going to the hospital, allegedly taking ALL THE DRUGS, miraculously “recovering” within a few days, boasting the American healthcare system chaos (that so many people can’t access) and asking people to not let COVID-19 dominate their lives. WTH, bro?

And all this, while I haven’t even mentioned the vice presidential debate (although big kudos to Kamala Harris for putting up with it and calling Pence out by saying “I am speaking“. We all felt you, Kamala!), all the other nonsense Trump has said since Monday, and the foiled plot of a militia group to kidnap Michigan governor Gretchen Withmer and attack police officers. What the hell is going on in this country?

*  *  *

All this is why it’s so important that we voted this week. We got the ballots in the mail on Tuesday and they were filled out and ready to be dropped off at our nearest polling place on Wednesday morning. God, I am hoping you’ve made a plan to vote. Here’s a reminder on how to vote in every state. Please don’t let your voice go to waste.

*  *  *

I emailed my supervisor this week to coordinate my taking some “use or lose” leave this month. In all the years that I’ve lived and worked here, I’ve never had “use or lose” annual leave available at the end of the year that forced me to take time off when I was not planning a trip to see family. It’s a weird feeling, to be honest, and I truly wish I would take the time off to travel somewhere, but I don’t see that happening anytime soon. However, I definitely feel that taking a few days off is never a bad idea, but especially this year, so I am thankful for it. 

*  *  *

I haven’t run outdoors because of yet another round of bad air quality for two weeks. I’ve been thankful that I had my spin bike to keep me busy indoors, but I really hope to get out this weekend for a nice long run by the river. What are you up to? Do you get a long weekend (because of Columbus Day, which really shouldn’t be celebrated anymore)?

TGIF!

What I read in September

filed under: books

My reading was all over the place in September. I actually picked up a total of 4 books, but only finished one, so the review for the others has to wait.

Too Much and Never Enough: How My Family Created the World’s Most Dangerous Man by Mary Trump (★★★★☆)

I must admit, when I heard about the book, I was instantly intrigued. Not because I wanted to read one more word about Donald Trump than absolutely necessary, as I am honestly more than fed up with this man, but because I knew that Mary Trumps perspectives would come with her professional qualifications as a clinical psychologist and through a (maybe somewhat) biased lens of her personal experiences. That was to be expected.

I felt, for one reason or another, that learning and understanding more about  their family background would somehow make me feel better. (Spoiler alert: It kinda did and it didn’t.)

There are many things she didn’t, and couldn’t, cover that would have been interesting to know, but my guess is that she tried to stick to areas that she could verify and areas that she had the most personal knowledge about. Speculating is what we have all done enough as we’ve become professional arm-chair psychologists over the last few years. 

I can’t say that anything in her book really surprised me, as the behaviors that she describes are what we see from Donald Trump on television every single day, but her disclosures about her family life really put a lot of things into context. 

Mary doesn’t excuse her uncle, but she explains him.

So much of Donald’s erratic and immature public actions make even more sense in the context of his upbringing and dysfunctional family dynamics. He has been the victim of an overpowering, sociopathic father and mostly absent mother. 

When Mary’s father, first-born Fred Jr. couldn’t live up to his father’s expectations, Donald was chosen and groomed to be the successor in the family business. His father enabled him to be antisocial, unaccountable, and superficial by not punishing him for misbehavior and essentially providing him with a bottomless well of cash flow and bailout money.
Eager to please, Donald did everything his father wanted, often by trampling on his own siblings. He’s never heard a “no” in his life. Not from his family, not from his father’s business partners, banks, or the media. It’s kind of mind-boggling that nobody has ever stood up to this – deep down inside – insecure and needy man.

You might think that learning all of this might make you feel empathetic to Donald Trump, but I have a hard time feeling empathy towards someone, who’s so blatantly opportunistic, claims to know everything, can’t care one bit about other people on a fundamental level, and who continues to treat others with so little respect.

I know we all are tired of hearing about and from Trump on the daily, but I still thought this book was worth my time. I feel like I got some answers, albeit unsatisfying ones, to the question how on earth a person can turn out the way he has.

What did you read in September? Anything you’d like to recommend? Leave a comment, and then add me on Goodreads to keep in touch.

Recipe | Quick Almond Butter Oat Cookies

filed under: baking, food, recipe

The other day, when I talked about my quarantine baking, I asked if you were interested in the recipe for these quick almond butter oat cookies, so here it is! 

They require only four ingredients (that I usually have at home at all times) and I’ve used coconut sugar. I hadn’t heard about coconut sugar before, but when I saw it at Trader Joe’s, I was intrigued and bought it. Coconut sugar is no sugar substitute and has the same calories as regular, white sugar (if that matters to you), but it’s supposedly a little lower on the glycemic index and won’t spike your blood sugar as much (although that might be debatable).

One thing to note, coconut sugar is brown, so be aware that it might change the coloring of your baked items. It obviously didn’t matter for these cookies. They’re gorgeous and delicious! I hope you enjoy them.

 

Almond Butter Oat Cookies

Print Recipe Pin Recipe
Prep Time 10 mins
Cook Time 10 mins
Servings 16
Calories 125 kcal

Ingredients
  

  • 1 cup almond butter
  • 1 egg
  • 1/2 cup coconut sugar
  • 3/4 cup oats

Instructions
 

  • Preheat the oven to 350F and line a baking sheet with parchment paper.
  • Mix the almond butter and egg, then add the other two ingredients and mix well.
  • Use a spoon and scoop a spoonful of the cookie dough onto the baking sheet. Press flat with a fork.
  • Bake 10 minutes at 350F.

Currently | September

filed under: currently

LOVING | my new spin bike. I’ve had it for almost three weeks and have been on it almost every day (I only skipped a couple of days when I opted for outdoor runs). This will be great to have during the fall and winter months, I already know it!

LISTENING TO | the Peloton instructors’ playlists. Haha. Have any of you guys tried the German rides yet?

ASKING | for some good vibes for a dear friend.  

DEALING | with some heartburn issues again. Do you think this could be psychological with everything going on this year? Ha. I am pretty convinced it’s caused by low stomach acid in my case and it’s very annoying. I was good for a while and haven’t really changed my diet, so I have no idea where this is coming from again. So over it.

READING | Too Much and Never Enough: How My Family Created the World’s Most Dangerous Man by Mary Trump. Have you read – or are you planning to read – it?

EATING | pizza with tomatoes and arugula. So good, you should try that.

DRINKING | hot tea for the first time in a while. We had a couple of days of more moderate temperatures and if you know me,  I’ll take any excuse to make hot tea. However, it’s supposed to heat up again over the weekend. It’s not quite fall here yet.

WATCHING | the sunrise.  I was able to get out for a couple of early morning runs to the river again recently because air quality has finally improved. I hope we won’t get any more bad fires, in fact, we could use some rain soon.

FEELING | depressed about the death of RBG and what this means for the court and the country, and

MIND-BOGGLED | by the fact that so many Republicans, first and foremost Mitch McConnell, have no spine or moral compass. Shameful.

WORRIED ABOUT | what will happen in November. We cannot have a repeat of 2016, and I am just so worried that Trump won’t leave the White House if he loses.

AMAZED | that it’s almost been a year since Jon and I flew to Germany to surprise my parents for the big birthday party. I have no idea where this year went and I miss my family. That’s all. 

LOOKING FORWARD TO | fall. Are you?

WEARING | Jon’s Fitbit in addition to my Garmin, because I want to compare step and heart rate output. Because I am weird like that. 

What is currently going on with you?

What else you got, 2020?

filed under: I can't make this shit up, politics


{via @politico}

If you thought things can’t get any worse, you can count on 2020 to throw another wrench into the works. Ruth Bader Ginsburg, the second woman in history to serve on the U.S. Supreme Court, died in Washington, from complications from cancer, at the age 87.

When I heard the news on Friday, a “F*CK” slipped out of my mouth and prompted Jon to look up and over from the couch, alarmed because I don’t usually throw the F-bomb around casually. But this seemed like the only appropriate response.

Losing Ruth Bader Ginsburg just 46 days away from the presidential election is bad news bears and it hit me in the gut. 

I don’t get too emotional when public figures die, after all,  I don’t know them personally, but damn, we needed RBG for just another few months. I know she was hoping and holding on to be around at least until election day. And damn, did she fight for us all, literally up until her very last day. 

The fact that days before her death, she dictated to her granddaughter that her “most fervent wish is that [she] will not be replaced until a new president is installed” tells you all you need to know about her. She knew how precarious the situation at the Supreme Court would become if she didn’t make it, that her death would have profound consequences for the court and the country.

And count on Mitch McConnell to have full hypocrisy on display a mere few hours after learning of RBG’s passing, vowing that he’d fill her empty seat on the Supreme Court ASAP. As you might recall, he was the one who didn’t allow for Antonin Scalia‘s seat to be filled during the remaining 11 months of the Obama administration. God, everything just seems so broken right now.

But to be honest, we were pinning a lot of hope on a single woman, when it’s really been up to us all along. 

Please vote in November! Tomorrow, Tuesday, September 22nd, 2020 is National Voter Registration Day! Make sure you double-check that you’re registered. If not, register! Make a voting plan. Vote early by requesting an absentee ballot. Encourage others to vote early.

Support Senate candidates in swing states by donating to the Get Mitch or Die Trying Fund (which will support the Democrats in the top Senate races in 10+ states) so we can flip the Senate. Vote Save America has raised more than 20 Million in the last 48 hours alone. It’s more important than ever that the Democrats take control back.

Rest in power, RBG, and thanks for everything. 

Also: what else you got, 2020?

Six months of working from home

filed under: Corona Life, daily life

It’s been six months to the day since we were told to go into full-time telework status. We were given two days to figure out the logistics, grab all our necessary stuff from the office, and make sure that we had a functioning workspace set up at home. Not a small feat for everybody, as I for one didn’t have a spare bedroom to convert into an office.

I was still excited about it. I always liked the idea of working from home, but only had a handful of opportunities to do so, e.g. when we had a short stint of mandatory telework two years ago when the wildfires in California were out of control and the air quality was so bad that we were asked to not leave the house for a week (sounds like it would have been a repeat this year if we hadn’t been already teleworking).

While my employer has a very generous flexible work policy (you might know that I’ve been working a 4-10 work schedule for most of my career) and I knew that teleworking was generally an option for every employee, I never felt like the option was available to me. Asking to work from home felt like asking for something that I wasn’t entitled to, for whatever stupid reason. 

Well, the stupid reason being that I was a contractor for 9 years and was repeatedly told that certain things just didn’t apply to me. Feeling like a second class employee is something I struggled with for a long time in my career (and sometimes still struggle with); even after 14 years working at the same office, I sometimes still don’t feel equal with my co-workers. But that’s a story for another time.

So, here we were in March, all of a sudden being forced to work from home while all other aspects of our normal lives mostly came to a screeching halt simultaneously. 

I was relieved and excited at the same time. Relieved because I felt that our management took the Covid-19 situation seriously and took proper precautions, and excited because part of me was looking forward to working from home. I realize that we were also exceptionally fortunate to be able to move into telework status almost seamlessly. Of course, there were some issues that needed to be worked out, as not all of our work can be easily done remotely (think: field/lab work) but overall, it was a fairly smooth transition.

I was able to take home two (big) monitors and a docking station from my office to create a semi-permanent, efficient workspace in the corner of our living room, and after riding it out on a rigid kitchen chair for a few weeks, I invested into an actual office chair, which has made all the difference. Granted, my space feels a little cramped, but at least I have a dedicated workspace and don’t work from my kitchen table. So there’s that.

Separating work from home life hasn’t really been a problem. I am not allowed to work overtime without supervisor approval and while I am dedicated to my work, there’s no benefit for me in working more hours than approved. I thrive on routine, so I mostly stick to my pre-pandemic work schedule, but I also enjoy having the flexibility to work late if I need to meet a deadline or to attend a meeting on my day off if need be, and shift my work hours around accordingly. 

We had just recently switched to a new mail and online meeting platform (Microsoft Teams) and transitioning to virtual meetings was easy-peasy (for the most part). Group calls, screen sharing, and shared file servers all made it possible. Could you imagine if the pandemic happened 10 or 15 years ago?

I must say though, I’ve never had so many (virtual) meetings and teleconferences IN MY LIFE (like, way more than in-person meetings at the office), or maybe it just feels so intense, because everything is virtual these days.

Still, I’m very grateful for the ability to work remotely (although I wish the circumstances weren’t because of a global pandemic) and for the opportunity to figure out if that is something I’d like to continue once this mandatory order is lifted. I know other people have already inquired about increased telework flexibility in the future.

So, to cut a long story short, I am loving the work from home life (minus all the surrounding circumstances). It has slowed down my days, it has allowed for a no-rush morning routine (including daily exercise!) and it has added extra flexibility into my life.
I feel this is probably also a good time to acknowledge that I am not only aware but lucky that I don’t have the added responsibility of dealing with homeschooling and childcare during these trying times. I don’t envy working parents one bit right now (kudos to all of you who have been on double-duty for months now. It can’t be easy!).

Being able to work from home makes me feel safer during the pandemic, and I very much appreciate that I am not forced to go to the office to mingle with other people unnecessarily. 

While I do miss interacting with my co-workers in person, I think I would be perfectly happy with a part time-telework schedule when things go back to normal (and hopefully would have enough ground to stand on to advocate for it). 

If you’re (still) working work from home, how do you feel about it?
Oh, and show me your workspace!