I "heart" my bicycle!

Whoa! Three posts in one evening? I should prolly have saved them up. Spaced them out. LOL.

I did end up purchasing the Detours Toocan pannier I talked about here in that funky green color which does look pretty cool with the orange bike. Unfortunately within 24 hours one of the handles started to unravel, so I had to take it in to exchange it. Even worse, I had to go to the Polaris store because Easton was out of the green. I felt like such a schmuck going to Polaris since they just fixed our bike seats and replaced my stained white seat with a fancy (has gel padding) black one. I swear I'm going to end up on some "problem customer" list there. So far the replacement bag has held up well. I've been to the library, Kroger, and another long ride on the Olentangy trail.

The weekend before last I went on the Market to Market ride, which was a lot of fun even though I was on my own for the ride. Even though it was a cold start, it was a pleasant ride and warmed up pretty quickly. I opted for breakfast at The Hills Market, where I had a nice conversation with an older Taiwanese couple over blueberry pancakes. Turns out the guy runs the Ohio Chinese American News, which I think is a local paper. Pretty cool! Got some good recommendations of restaurants to try.

Then this past weekend I met up with another biker at the Lane Ave roll: store . Every Saturday morning they meet to ride up the Olentangy trail to The Hills Market for pancakes. Have I mentioned how AWESOME the blueberry pancakes are? There were a few issues that popped up for the other riders, so it was just me and one other girl who made the trek. Good conversation and good food, which is what I was hoping for. This is part of my quest to branch out, try new things, meet new people. I'm hoping to ride again this Saturday...those pancakes are calling to me!

The latest awesome thing with the bike coincides with working at home. Lunchtime bike rides! Might as well ride as much as possible while the weather is so nice. Gotta work in that extra cardio.

Is is Oct 26th yet?

I can't wait until Fable III comes out! I loved Fable II and this new one can only be better. I hope there's more chicken kicking! In true nerdy fashion, I already have a copy pre-ordered from Gamestop, although I won't be taking any time off from work to spend all day playing it. Not like the last game which was a total FAIL.

After spending HOURS (maybe it was the 9 hours listed on the download timer but I went to sleep so who knows) downloading Final Fantasy XIV updates before I could even play the game (shame on you SE for using P2P file sharing!), I was met with disappointment as I was incapable of controlling my character with the keyboard. This I can't totally blame on the game as I'm not accustomed to using a keyboard for that function. The best MMORPG I've ever played utilized the mouse to move your character around. Why that couldn't have been done, I don't know. I was also struggling with trying to figure out what I was supposed to be doing in the game. Everyone else seemed to have a purpose. Stranger still, no was was talking. Usually there's always people chatting, especially if they want to sell you something.

Anyhow, I went back to Gamestop the next day to inform them I hated the game and needed advice. After some discussion (and cat care tips!), I wandered into Best Buy to buy a wired XBox controller. Supposedly that's the best peripheral for PCs if you're in the market for a PC controller. We used to have these ourselves, but upgraded long ago to wireless for our console, so we got rid of them.

Back at the house, I hooked it up, calibrated it, and signed in to the game...only to truly notice how choppy the gameplay was. I enlisted the husband's help, and after putting all the video settings to their lowest, he proclaimed the game to be "unplayable" due to the lag. I felt better knowing that it wasn't my faulty gaming skills, but I'm still disappointed that I'm not going to be playing it. We knew going into it that the video card was a wild card, and it turned out it just wasn't good enough.

In the meantime, I can hack through hordes of zombies. Mindless bludgeoning should keep me occupied until Fable comes out. As long as I can pry the game away from my husband...

The second worst protein shake ever

Never mix the following ingredients together: vanilla protein powder, unsweetened vanilla almond milk, and 1 packet of Starbucks Via. Grossest thing EVER. I needed a caffeine boost and it was time for the afternoon protein shake, but this was an unfortunate combination. The only concoction worse than this was what I made yesterday: vanilla protein powder, unsweetened almond milk, 1.5 tbsp peanut flour (kinda like PB2), and roughly 2 cups of spinach. Now normally that combo is fine...when half a frozen banana is included in the mix. I left it out only because I'm trying to eat super clean this week and bananas don't factor in to the Cooler 1 plan (although, neither does that peanut flour...).

And while you may be cringing at the thought of adding spinach to a shake/smoothie, you really don't notice it if you have the right amount of the other ingredients. My PB & Banana shake may be green, but it totally tastes like a PB & Banana smoothie.

These past two days have found me working at home, which is a nice change, but then I miss my cool view from my cube. I haven't been able to watch the squirrels or the occasional crow plucking a mouse...yeah, that happened last week and was morbidly entertaining. Other than an actual office with real walls and a door, I think this is the best location in our office. The wall magically stops right at my opening so I get a full view of the outside.

Changes recently at work have greatly increased the probability that I could work exclusively from home, but not only would I miss my awesome cube (be jealous!), my husband also works at the same company so I miss out on carpooling in with him. I've still been a good wife and packed him his lunch both days. Whether or not he eats it, I can't say...he's so picky and prolly ended up at McD's instead of eating his slightly healthier (and free!) lunch.

So while I toiled all day, finishing up an old project, listening to conference calls, and reading up on new things, Ben was doing this ===============>

Other than changing positions, I think he hasn't moved. All day.