Too lazy to really cook

Cooking takes time. I don't really have the patience for that. That's why I've accumulated a stash of ramen in the pantry and turn to it maybe three-four times a week. Ramen is definitely a guilty pleasure. I feel terrible eating it as much as I do, but it's just so damn delicious.

I've recently discovered this "Neoguri" Korean ramen stuff and it's the best ramen I've had--my current favorite.

It's summer time. My face knows it.

I've had freckles for as long as I remember. They're on my face all year long, but I feel like they get darker and more prominent in the summertime.

On a bit of a tangent, my skin hasn't been doing so great lately. I've been breaking out more and I feel like my pores are getting bigger. This is my excuse to spend exorbitant amounts on facial creams and stuff on sephora.com. I just queried "pore" on sephora.com. Let's see what products I convince myself I need and end up buying...

i need a life.

I'm taking summer classes, but I'm only going to school two days a week. This leaves me a lot of free time. Sure, I could be doing homework and studying, but I don't do that.

In my five days a week of down time, I've been watching the Hills. I got a Netflix subscription just so I could watch the Hills in higher quality. (I'm a total loser, I know.) I've just finished season 5 and started season 6 so I'm pretty caught up and up to date on the drama.

I should go find a job or volunteer opportunity.

it's a lifestyle change

It may be difficult to acknowledge, but denial won't do this issue any good. Here it is: I've gained ten pounds and some pudge around my tummy since I've started college. I know I'm not really fat or overweight in any sense, but just seeing that I've put on some extra baggage bothers me. Although it may be simple and easy to blame this wholly on the dorm food in the dining halls, the rational part of me recognizes that other factors and newly acquired habits have contributed to my weight gain. I have never really been a huge snacker up until the start of college. Bored? I snack. Stress out? I snack like a fiend. I've also been eating out a lot more than I had back home.

So what to do, what to do? Diets do not do it for me, at least all the ones I've tried have failed for me. They've left me hungry, grumpy and lethargic--a total no go for a college student. What to do, what to do? I've concluded that as much work and change as it may involve, the only reasonable and healthy approach toward weight loss is to adopt a healthy lifestyle. This would entail me changing my old lifestyle of overeating, eating and snacking on unhealthy foods at that, and living a sedentary lifestyle. I've been slowly cutting out as many processed junk foods as possible, limiting my sugar intake, eating more fresh fruits and vegetables, and cooking and preparing my own food instead of eating out all the time. Okay, I didn't say I cut out ALL junk food. That's really unrealistic at this point. I still crave chips every now and then (: Chips in moderation though.

That's only one half of the lifestyle change I'll need to adapt to though. The other half? Get off my butt and exercise. I absolutely hate exercise...I guess because I'm so out of shape. Exercising is really difficult too when the gym is so far away and we don't really have access to equipment and such. Karina's a big fan of workout dvds, especially the Jillian Michaels ones. I've recently started doing the dvds with her. Jillian is really motivating! She actually makes me want to work out. The routines and circuits are pretty difficult--cardio, abs and strength. The strength parts of the workout kill me every time. I haven't an ounce of muscle in my body so lifting weights is super difficult. We've been doing the dvds for a couple weeks now and I definitely feel my endurance improving. Comparing myself now to my pathetic self on day one of our workout, I've come quite a long way.

Karina goes jogging and I guess I'd like to pick that up too. I've been jogging with her a few times, but I'm usually too lazy to go every day. The track is pretty far and with school work and other commitments, this doesn't really leave too much time for working out. Oh, I forgot to mention.: we usually do our dvd workouts at 11:00 pm at night. Yeah...

Results? It may be a little too soon to notice any drastic results. If anything, I do feel more healthy, energized, and physically fit. Weight loss and stuff doesn't come quickly or easily, so I know I still have a ways to go to lose weight and tone up. Let's hope that I can keep this up. Maybe one day I'll be able to cut chips out of my diet--or not.

attempting to eat and drink a little healthier

Not having mom make or cook all my meals makes it a little hard to get my recommended daily servings of fruits and veggies. I'm constantly reaching for ramen noodles and cereal--just two of my go-to staple foods.

In an attempt to eat healthier, I've decided to try my best to cut out the unnecessary junk foods and limit my consumption of ramen noodles and cereal for meals. It is a bit difficult though when ramen and cereal are just so convenient and yummy. We made a recent trip to Safeway and to the Oakland Chinatown to stock up on some much needed fruits and veggies. Strawberries, apricots, grapes, cherries, celery, carrot juice, and even chives now fill out fridge!

Now that there's actually fruits and veggies in our fridge, maybe I'll start reaching for this stuff instead of my ramen (:

feels more like a home.

I haven't posted in a while, and I totally have finals to blame. Finals put me in to a total funk and I'm just glad they're done and over with. Grades are out and I guess I'm pretty satisfied. I did better than I expected. This past semester has definitely been my toughest yet and that's why I'm pretty surprised that I actually raised my GPA. I was in "deep struggle," but I did work really hard and I guess it paid off (:

On another note, there have been a bunch of changes to and in our apartment. We had a roommate decide to move out and we've had to deal with the repercussions for the past two months. We eventually settled everything and she went on her way. I moved into a new room after finals!

We finally decided to get a couch for our living room to make it feel more like a living room, and for our apartment to feel more homey. Transporting the couch back to the apartment was a total mission. We were being cheap college students and decided that we didn't want to pay $79 for Ikea to ship it, so we took it upon ourselves to load it to the top of our car to drive home ourselves. The couch looked unstable and to be honest, I was getting a bit afraid that we wouldn't be able to secure it safely enough to drive it home. Karina and I even offered to pay for the shipping at one point. We bought a bunch of straps and took advantage of Ikea's free twine and strung and strapped and wrapped that sucker on top of the car. It took oh...only about an hour or so to secure the couch. Wendy was a bit afraid to drive on the freeway with the sofa up top the car, so we took street roads and drove at about a cautious 5 mph.

We made it and it's here. Oh, and that couch cover was the cheapest one we could find at Ikea. Yeah, it may look a little unsightly at first glance, but we've grown to like it. It's like what Tyra calls "ugly pretty".

Good food surrounds me

I live in such an amazing neighborhood surrounded by a good number of restaurants and bakeries. Macarons, cupcakes, or even bread is just a block away! I LOVE bread, or anything filled with carbs for that matter.

I'm not really a fan of Cheeseboard pizza, but their bread and baked goodies are seriously the bomb. Fresh muffins and even scones make a great breakfast treat. My favorite is definitely the brioche knot. So good I wanna go get one right now.