A homeless man critiqued the change that I gave him tonight.

And I yelled at him. In public, in front of people.

So I will revert to my former policy of never giving anyone begging any money. I am not evil, I am under 30 and not close to rich and I make efforts to give to charities I deem important all year [Jimmy Fund, ARL, Salvation Army, USO, Helping Hands, various MS and Diabetes orgs], I'm trying to get over my fear of giving blood, I donate bags and bags of my old clothes a couple times a year, and would gladly give my sweatshirt or the 2nd half of my Twix to a stranger as long as he wasn't a kiddie rapist... But I seldom, actually never, for years, give homeless folks money when they ask for it on the street.

Tonight, on my way to meet Darling at the lawyers [we are re-fied at 5.25..woo-hoo!!] after trying to park for 40 minutes and then starting my walk across the Common in the oh, 8 degrees? out, I walked by a guy asking "for money to get him out of the cold". I smiled and said sorry, per usual. Then I felt bad and reconsidered - it is SO COLD OUT - and I was late so I quickly fished out the teeny amount of change I had in my wallet. I didn't even look at it, just handed it over and started to walk away. I got a "Thank You" and then an immediate "Wait...what's this...did you just give me 4 cents??" I shit you not. And this was accompanied by an almost comical look [I'd turned around by now] of disbelief. Now granted, 4 cents isn't going to help this guy and under other circumstances I maybe would've dug up more change - hell if Boston wasn't so annoying in charging 25 cents per FIFTEEN MINUTES, it would have been at least 29 cents. But this was what was immediately available in the change portion of my wallet while I'm hustling and cold. And

a. I had no idea it was only 4 cents

b. I worked for that 4 frigging cents and CHOSE to give it to someone who appeared down on his luck but more likely is a drunk or drug addict. Sorry to any other druggies or drunks, I'm a liberatarian and have no issue with you if you don't drive, harm me or my family/friends or ask me to finance your life cause you're too fucked up to do so yourself.

c. This dude is STANDING there - just generally, here's a hint: if you can't get a job, at least move around the park. Rule # 1 of staying warm, keep the blood flowing.

So needless to say, I flipped out - just briefly, I was running late. And I will be honest, I felt good about it. "Are you criticizing me after I just gave you change?" He starts back peddling and mumbling and looking a little scared. I look meek and pie-eyed, I'm a girl and I smile a lot and I'm barely over legal-midget height. But I will warn you: do not let the 1980's Joseph Lee Elementary School upbringing rear its ugly head because it is in fact very ugly. He switched back to "No, no, THANK YOU, I mean THANKS!". Whatever. I then added on a couple of each of the following "Seriously?" "You've got balls, dude" "What a fucking asshole" "Never again" and "Only in this fucking state, jesus". Apologies to Boston/Massachusetts and Jesus, I love-love-love my state and have no religious background that makes me yay or nay Jesus, but I was all types of fired up.

I kept walking, totally talking to myself like a nut for most of the remainder of my journey. As someone who speaks up for herself enough, but doesn't always, I was glad I fired back at him. Maybe some will consider this a hate crime, or at the least insensitive or that I'm a jackass for giving someone 4 cents. In hindsight, in his shoes, I'd probably think I was a yuppie-douche too, but I would NEVER even conceive of calling the yuppie-douche out on it. Sorry I don't carry change - it's 2009. Did he think his piping up would make me reconsider "Shit, sorry dude, hold on - let me fish out a $20". I am never going against my instincts again. NEVER.

On our walk back we went by him again - still in the same place. I asked Princess to please be quiet while we passed [I had of course screamed to him the entire story via iPhone 5 minutes later, like the yuppie-douche that I am]. He grew up in San Diego and lived in San Francisco for a couple years as a grown up, so if you think that I sound like I hate homeless people, have a beer with My Muffin. Needless to say, the dude started with his standard request and immediately shut himself up when he recognized me. I avoided eye contact and the urge to kick him...

Enough with the ranting, it's just people with bad manners really piss me off. How hard is a please or a thank you? Being gracious should be taught in school. I am so lucky to have been raised by nice, normal, decent humans. Thank you mom and dad and the entire Harris family. I'm going to stop now before I start going off on the kids and the myspace.....goodness. Anyhow, this is a food blog so today I ate:

My bagel, some tea.

Some water, an LC pasta bowl for Lunch [I was in Westford until 4].

Dinner was a McD's cheeseburger Happy Meal with a small order of nuggets on the side. They screwed up my order, thus the nuggets. Worse things could happen, and I ate them anyway. And I sure as hell didn't rip the dude at the drive-thru a new asshole....grrr...

Came home and had more tea and 2 Reeses during The Office. Line of the night was "beet-stained teeth"....from Jim, sigh. Liz Lemon dancing was also impressive. Channel 7 has had Thursdays on lockdown for a while, huh?

I'm on my final cup of tea now and just had one of those mini-bags of popcorn? Nice concept but poor execution. Maybe it's my microwave but I either can't pop enough of the kernels or burn the bag entirely. The latter was tonight. God is probably punishing me for my treatment of the less-fortunate by making my entire house reek of burnt corn. Yumm-o.

Off to bed, I'm digging the Artie book but fearing he's heading toward a really bad melt-down soon. He is hysterical but there is this huge sadness and need in him that I don't think anyone can help with the way he is right now. He needs to take care of his shit, I hope he will. Adding to this, Celebrity Rehab Sober House made me sad... Enough with the feelings, good night!

Holiday Season es Fine

Trying to sound exotic but those 7 years of French clearly didn't stick with me. Just returned from Craige and Aaron's lovely holiday gathering. Ed bailed due to illness and I felt a little like ass but my cough let up and nobody gave me weird bubonic plague looks. Their house is soooo nice, if the burbs didn't make me break out in hives, it's a wonder the bang you get for your buck outside of the city.

Awesome food: chips, crackers, bean dip, macaroni ball things, veggies and dips, ham cream cheese asparagus wrap things, shrimp cocktail, peppermint bark, gingerbread, asparagus wrapped in cheese and wonder bread (bomb!), and an eggnog and gingerbread trifle. I sampled all of that and had 2 glasses of wine and a diet coke. I also made out like a bandit with the Yankee swap. I was ghetto and just brought beer with a bow on it but other people brought nice things. Hanging out with grown ups is rough on the self-esteem when you're poor. Anyhoo, I got the second to last pick and wound up with a mirrored/light up Jesus and Mary wall adornment that says god bless this house. Hello, perfect! It's been in their Yankee swap for 10 years but sorry fellas, not getting it back next year. I LOVE it. Plus I got a Buddha bank and homemade BBQ sauce and rub - yum-o. A very successful evening.

Before that, I painted trim and did 13 miles on the bike to the lackluster season 2 finale of Brotherhood. I think I'm kind of over it, I need a new series. The Wire totally spoiled me. I also had a yogurt. Tomorrow, I will make French Toast, go to Home Depot, exchange some Xmas items and take a crack at the Wii Fit. For now, I'm blogging from bed so good-night!!

Ps. Special shout-out to my wonderful boss' big brother Tim. He had an aneurysm a week ago and had successful surgery immediately after. He's making great progress but still needs to wake up so he can do even more. So Tim, I don't know you but I adore your sister and family is everything to her, so please please please wake up asap. There are a million people who love you waiting for your eyes to open. That's all for now.

Success!

So we ran our 5k today. Erin and I together placed #786 and 787 and ran THE WHOLE TIME. I felt like death and still feel kind of wacky but I am so proud of us! Josh took pictures, I will post when I get them. Woke up at 6:40, had a yogurt, had some juicy water, had an e muffin with butter. Did I already write this? It's been a long day. We were super nervous, headed down around 8, got registered, paid $20 to homeless people. There were a LOT of people - 900 I've since discovered. I was #860. This was definitely one of those times in Somerville that I 100% felt like the vapid yuppie that I keep pretending I'm not...one day I need to accept that I'm not quitting my job and dyeing my hair pink again any time soon. Days like this smack me in the face of the truism of this notion.

I kept making nervous and stupid jokes Erin has heard repeatedly over the past 17[!] years - given a "Which 'Friend' are you?" Quiz, I'm Chandler. But yeah, I felt SUPER SAT-jittery, but I would've rather been preparing for a school test. Physical challenges [I Heart Double Dare] are not my forte, by any stretch. Debate me, ask me some trivia, have me write an essay, make me crank out a math problem, even sit me in Dunkin Donuts and at gunpoint demand I identify the song that is playing and sing along - THESE are things I can do. Running, moving, not sitting - these are a brave new world and I was terrified of puking, of passing out, of scraping my knee, of sucking in general.

Walked around until 9 to warm up, it was cold! Went to the post office, dropped some stuff at Erin's car [we elected to drive in, smart decision] and puttered. People were stretching and jogging in place like it was a 10 mile run, so weird. I think I'm in Camp Bob Gaudet in that we can stretch and stuff pre-game, but don't HAVE to, everyone is different. Erin stated the simple but I hadn't thought of it goal of running the whole thing, no walking. I stated as long as I broke 45 or 50 minutes, I'd feel good. Keep in mind, in our "training" we've never run more than like a mile? Maybe that one time at Fresh Pond but I have no idea and based on running today, that as def less than or equal to a mile.

Then we were off. The first bit was kind of rough, a hilly sort of stretch but to be honest, we hit the 1st mile [at 11:12] rather quickly. Erin remarked that's the hardest, which was encouraging. Josh and Mia cheered and photog'd around 1.75 miles. In hindsight, the 2nd mile [reached at 22:10 I think?] seemed like a half marathon. Then we were ok, the bulk of the last part was the dog path that we run on so I had a good expectation of time, terrain, hills. We decided to sprint from the end of the path to the end of the race, which I think we both thought was like 25 yards. Not so much. Josh was there at the end again to snap photos, he is a good boyfriend [Princess slept till 11, god bless him]. I'll be 100% honest here, I couldn't feel my legs for the sprint part and I def thought the end was right in front of the theater, but it was more down by ABP. By that point, I felt like semi-fainty and exhausted.

However, we persevered, grabbed some waters, walked around on a side street, I think we were both thinking if our bodies decided to give out in strange and unusual ways, we wanted to be in semi-privacy. Not in the middle of these 20-minute finishers who appeared unfazed, glistening in a cute Americana kind of way. We were red, we were sweaty, hot, panting. Couldn't stop moving, I understand why people at the end of the marathon continue to move, it's hard to stop! And you like can't trust your body if you stop, so you just kind of keep auto-pilot moving. So weird. Final time was 33:31, 10:49 minute miles. That part felt good, if my actual body did not.

Hung out in Davis for a bit, had some Rosebud breakfast - water!, 2.5 fried eggs, some home fries, some white toast, some chocolate milk [I JUST RAN 3 MILES - and I haven't had real chocolate milk in like 10 years], a bonus iced tea they double-poured [thank god, I was thirsty], some sausage. Gave Erin my bacon, surprisingly I am not a big fan of the b. Met up with Bill in Davis, grabbed a skim chai at Diesel and sat around in a field at some bleachers, still stretching and sitting and unwinding until like 12:30? I hate getting up early but it constantly amazes me how much longer the day is if you do manage to get up and out before noon. Tomorrow, I'm sleeping until 4 if my body so desires.

I feel ok, semi-out of it, my legs will hurt tomorrow. Took a couple Advils after, probably will take some more. My neck/shoulders/traps are killing me these past couple days. I'm blaming office job and getting cold, I swear I tense up without knowing it and cause knots and pain. Ed rubbed some Biofreeze [magic junk he gets from his masseuse] and it feels a bit better. I am so thankful my body doesn't hurt on a regular basis, I would be a total douchebag.

Hmm...got home around 1, took a nice hot shower, changed into a Mom outfit [crew neck Hanes sweatshirt, jeans, and some Chucks, so comfy] and we went to New Balance. Ed has wide hooves and beats the shit out of his footwear so needed some new kicks and I decided I would get some wide shoes because, while not today, occasionally I feel like my third toe creeps over my 2nd toe while running. Daddy says us Gaudets have long meta-tarsals? Caroline and I have always referred to them as Hobbit Feet, but Daddy went to a dr after the marathon this year wreaked some havoc so now we have medical confirmation. Anyway, I was due, I think my existing running shoes were $25 at Marshalls, they're New Balance but for who knows what sport or specialty. So yeah, got some wide cushiony running specified shoes, I'm excited for them.

We hit up my reward on the way back - THE ARCHES. It was Ed's idea [he must've been in a mood, he is not as in love with the FF as I am], I had my Cheeseburger HM with a DC and extra Cheeseburger, didn't finish all my fries [decent batch, not amazing]. We sat on some bleachers [my second set of the day - weird] and watched dogs as we ate. I am a total dog-peeper, I'll admit it. I wanted to steal a guy's perfectly stout little black french bulldog [it was jacked - excellent blood line - and kept rolling over like a goof in the sun]. Ed didn't let me.

Got home, sat, reclined, talked to my parents. Daddy was shocked and awed that I actually did this, I specifically kept it quiet in case I failed but he was stoked. Even suggested I aim for the James Joyce 10k in April. I think Erin and I are going to try for another 5k in November around T-Giving, we def both want to keep it up. Running is ok. I'm syncing up my super old iPod Mini with podcasts so that I actually go out by myself when our schedules clash. In a year, I may actually be a healthy 30 year old human!

Took a nap from 5:30 to 8, and here I am blogging again on a Saturday night, such a loser. Ed just made some TJ's corn bread, it's good. He put real roasted corn kernels in it which makes it's more savory and I kind of prefer my CB sweet but it's tasty and most importantly covered in butter. Having that right now with some lite iced tea from one of those weird To-Go packets. I think I will go through my correspondence and watch some bad TV, make some tea and eat a few Double Chocolate Milanos that I have hidden from Darling in our bedroom [not a joke - he eats sweets like Prater Wully if given the opportunity, so I hide food in obscure drawers and storage bins] and the go back to bed. All in all, a good day, and I have very little to do tomorrow too so I feel great. Over and out.