"I Have Writer's Block."

I have writer's block, I think. I have all these stems of ideas, but every time a blog starts to take form, I get too in my head to finish them and publish them. Or, I get too into the heads of my millions of readers (please note the sarcasm) and stop writing. So, to break the writer's block, I'll just start writing out some of those stems. Don't expected any real connection between the next few items.

1. Today, after work, I came home, ate some dinner, watched "Heartburn," (the Nora Ephron film starring Meryl Streep and Jack Nicholson) and then tidied up around my home. And, it was incredibly satisfying. I'm fed, my romantic comedy hunger has been fed, and my apartment is clean and smells of candles and Glade Plug-Ins.

2.Similarly, me weekend was fulfilling and and thoroughly enjoyable. I had the kind of weekend where you actually emerge rested and ready for the week. I mean, as ready as you can be about an impending 40-hour work week.

First, we lucked into a wine tour. The wine? Eh. The experience? Fabulous.

And, we watched 5 1/2 movies:

• Single White Female -- I had never seen it, it's a piece of work. In a good way. 
• Crazy Stupid Love -- I've seen it probably 5 times. Ray and I both own it. We both love it. It's the movie that made me fall in love with Ryan Gosling and Emma Stone at the same time. 
• The Vow -- Channing Tatum. I can't get enough of him. I've loved him since Coach Carter. I don't care at all that his actor is mediocre at best. 
• Being Elmo -- A recommendation from a friend. Such a cool documentary about the guy who operates Elmo. 
• Life as We Know It -- One of my new favorite rom-coms. 
• 1/2 of I Love You, Man -- Hey, it was late and I had made my way through two-thirds of a bottle of wine. 

Oh, and we saw a double rainbow.

Which made me think about this video, which made me laugh. 

3. I have a theory about 20-somethings and jobs. I don't know if we'll ever been truly happy. I think we spend so much time thinking, dwelling, and working toward our future careers that when we luck into something that is a good career-esque job we start to question things. Is this what I was working toward? Is this the lane that I should be in? Aren't I supposed to love waking up and going to work every single day?

Maybe, maybe not.

What I'm hoping is, you don't have to love your job, but you have to have passion in your life. You have to have something that excites you, exhilarates you, and makes you feel alive. And wherever it is that you happen to find that, live there. Marinate there. Exist there. And use your job as a tool that helps you do the things that really tickle your tooter.

4. Two Saturdays ago, Ray and I drank. A lot. Then, in an effort to continue my training, I said, "We need to go run a 5K." It was after noon. In July. In humid Texas heat. It was miserable. I walked. I whimpered. I was all-around pathetic. And slow. But, THIS morning, Sarah and I ran a 5K. And, this is what happened:

I didn't stop. And, I didn't whimper. I didn't take a century to finish. And, it felt awesome. It was the first time I thought to myself, "This half-marathon thing. Maybe I can rock this shiz out."

5. And now, I think I will congratulate myself with some bad summer programming (Big Brother to be exact), some wine, and some of this by my side:

I know, I can't handle it either.

"Man, I Really Want Some Cheesecake."

The other day I had this conversation with myself, in my head (hopefully not out loud, I was at work after all):

Man, I really want some cheesecake. 
I wonder if I can make cheesecake on my own. 
Cheesecake can’t be thaaat hard, right? 
Isn’t it just like, cream cheese and a couple other things, right? 
You can totally do it. Make a cheesecake. 
Oh, marathon training, eating clean, working out, psh, overrated! 
Make yourself a cheesecake. It’ll be delicious and totally worth it. 
Maybe put in sweet potatoes! 
Why? 
Well, they are delicious for one. 
And healthy. I know, I know, their healthfulness kinda goes out the window once you add butter and sugar and all, but whatever, do it anyway. 

So, after all that, I went to Pinterest and Google and stumbled across this recipe for Sweet Potato Cheesecake Bites.

I know, right? Sounds amazing.

I tweaked the recipe a tad, but here’s what you'll need:

Kitchen utensils: 

• Hand mixer
• Parchment paper
• and 8 x 8 pan 

For the base: 

• 8 Tbsp. butter (1 stick)
• 1 1/2 cups sweet potato puree 
• 3/4 cup light brown sugar 
• 1 cup whole wheat flour 
• 1 egg + 1 egg white (reserve yolk for topping) 
• 2 tsp. vanilla extract 
• 1/2 tsp. salt 

For topping: 

• 1 (8 oz.) package reduced-fat cream cheese 
• 1/2 tsp. vanilla extract 
• 1 egg yolk 
• 5 Tbsp. light brown sugar

Start by preheating your oven to 350 degrees. Then, grease the pan. This next part takes a little finesse. Trim two pieces of baker’s parchment so they can sit flat on the bottom the the pan and so they are long enough to hang over the sides by a few inches. Butter the paper. 

At the grocery store, if you're lucky, you'll be able to find pure sweet potato puree. If you're unlucky like me, you can't find any. In that case grab a couple sweet potatoes from the produce section (literally, like two), peel them, cut them into cubes and boil them. 

You can stop boiling them once they are soft and you can easily stab them with a knife. 

Next, whip them as smooth as you can. Then, take your stick of butter, melt it in the microwave and then mix it with your sweet potatoes. 

Then, use a hand mixer (or a whisk if you're in the market for an arm workout) and add the brown sugar to the mixture. 

Next, add the egg, the egg white, and the vanilla. 

Now add the flour and salt to the mixture. 

Finally, add your sweet potato mixture to your buttered pan. 

The next step is the cheesecake part. 

This is simple. You just blend all the topping ingredients, the cream cheese, the vanilla, the egg yolk, and the sugar. 

(I may have forgotten to take pictures of this. My b.) 

At any rate, take this mixture and spoon 6-8 large dollops of it onto your sweet potato mixture. It doesn't have to be pretty. 

Then, swirl it around and make it pretty. 

Then, pop this into your oven for 30-40 minutes, how ever long it takes for the cheesecake to turn golden brown. Poke it with a toothpick. When it comes out clean, it's good to go. 

Ta-da!!

Give it some time to cool before you use the hanging pieces of parchment paper to life it out and cut it. 

I recommend cutting it into bite-sized pieces. (This recipe makes about 30 pieces). 

Now, I have to admit that these are like 80% sweet potato pie filling and 20% cheesecake-ness but they are still 100% delicious. Really creamy and smooth and comforting. And, not too sweet. They’re more naturally sweet tasting instead of out-of-control, in-your- face, man-you-must-have-dumped-a-lot-of-sugar-in-here sweet. 

In case you’re wondering how much damage these will do to your diet, I Googled some more and calculated the nutritional damage.

But forget about that! Imagine this in your belly. 

"Thursday Night Snack: Brownie in a Mug!"

If I had to list out the not-so-fun parts of living alone, one of the things that ranks high on the list is not being able to ever make desserts.

Now, I know, technically, I could make desserts. But here's how it usually goes: 

- Jonna makes a pan of brownies

- Jonna eats a bit of the brownies that night

- Jonna takes slivers from the pan of brownies every day until they are so hard they are inedible

- Jonna throws away 2/3 of a pan of brownies 

Well, thanks to Pinterest, I've found a workaround ... 

Brownie in a Mug! 

It's awesome because it is one-serving of deliciousness. Here's how you make it. 

1. Grab a mug. All my mugs are these tiny 8-oz things. But, lucky for me, when my friend Kale moved out after living with me, she left this massive 16-oz mug. If you have one of those, use it. If not, just watch your mug carefully, so that it doesn't spill over. 

2. Mix the following ingredients in your mug: 

- 1/4c. sugar 

- 1/4c. flour

- 2 tbsp. (unsweetened) cocoa powder

- pinch of salt 

3. Then add: 

- 2 tbsp. of olive oil 

- 3 tbsp. of water

4. Stir, stir, stir until its consistent. 

5. Then cook for 1 minute 40 seconds. 

6. Voila!! 

7. And because I can't leave well enough alone sometimes, I added this: 

It made something that was already good, better. 

I highly recommend this one. I'll bet you have almost all these ingredients on hand in your pantry right now. So, if you get a hankering for something sweet, this is the perfect quick, easy dessert for one. 

"I'm Gonna Sign Up for the (Half) Marathon."

Yeah, I can't believe it either.

See, I'm not a runner. I'm really not good at it. I've been told that I look like a runner before, to which I have to be like, "Oh no, I do not run ... Nope, no runners here!"

A marathon, even if it's "just" a halfie seems insane to me right now.

But then again, the thought of completing a 60 Bikram Yoga Challenge once seemed ludicrous and I did it.

And then, the thought of doing this once seemed like crazy talk and I did it.

This is me, at 5:30 AM, deadlifting my own body weight. Freaking heavy.   

So, I think this is something  I can do. And I think it will feel amazing when I do it.

Have you ever been at the finish line of a long race like that? The people there are soo happy. They go through the finish line with the biggest smiles on their faces. They are simultaneously so exhausted but so fulfilled. It warms my heart and makes my eyeballs hot.

I know my training regimen will be tough. I didn't want to give up my CrossFit to train so I talked to one of the CrossFit coaches about how to do both.

He told me that, contrary to popular belief, it isn't necessary to train up to the 13.1 miles to complete the half marathon. Instead you can train at a higher intensity most of the time and then slow that intensity down and the actual race will be cake. So to speak. He let me know that you may be more successful at training if you can get it out of your head that you muuuuuuust be able to run 13.1 miles prior to the race. It's more about be in great shape, pushing yourself, and not letting giving up an option.

So, that's what I'm going with.

I developed a training schedule that had CrossFit in mind. Right now, it looks like this:

Mondays: CrossFit
Tuesdays: Interval Run
Wednesdays: CrossFit
Thursdays: CrossFit AND Interval Run
Fridays: CrossFit
Saturdays: OFF (thank goodness)
Sundays: Long Run

 Fun stuff.

Do you have any tips for first-time half marathoners? Give me all you got.

"I Have an Irrational Love for Train."

My name is Jonna, and I love Train.

I do, I can't help it. At the risk of making all my friends and the readers of this blog think I'm ultra lame, I'll say it. I'm a proud, Train-loving, 26-year-old.

My friend Eddie and I once went to a Train concert. Actually, we sat through an entire rodeo, complete with bull-riding and calf-roping (or whatever it's called) and then watched Train. And, it was freakin' incredible.

You know how bright and lively and energetic Train sounds through your car speakers? You know how "Hey, Soul Sister" makes you want to sing and smile and be happy? That's how they sound live. The lead singer runs around the entire stage and takes pictures and he belts it out to the crowd, which is mostly full of women straddling the 40-year-old line of life.

So, why am I professing my undying love for Train? Because I am head-over-heels for their new album. This album is totally worth the $10.99 that iTunes sold it to me for. And, because I'm hoping that I can get a group of friends to buy tickets and go up to Dallas in September and watch them with me.

But, because I don't want to bore you too much, I'll just share with you my three favorite songs from the new album, in no particular order.

1. "50 Ways to Say Goodbye" 

It's a really upbeat song, which is semi-challenging since it's starts off talking about an "it's not you, it's me" situation. This should be pretty unsurprising from the title but the vocalist rattles off a series of hilarious, and inventive, excuses he'll give his friends who ask, "where's your girl." For instance, he maintains that maybe his ex isn't around because she got "run over by a crappy purple Scion. This is something I find particularly entertaining, mostly because I have a friend that has a Scion. But his isn't crappy. Or purple.

2. "You Can Finally Meet My Mom" 

This little nugget is really about taking advantage of any time you have with loved ones. Not a new, crazy innovative song theme. But still good. Now, while this song is insanely peppered with pop culture references (I think Bieber, Whitney Houston, Steve Jobs, AND pop rocks all weasel their way into this one), it's actually pretty awesome. I find this lyrics especially memorable: 

... There's so much that we miss
Trying to be rich, and famous
Pretty and thin, to win 
It's a shame that youth is wasted on the young ... 

That lyrics is just screaming to be a status update, if you ask me.

3. "This'll Be My Year" 

I think I have a thing for songs with pop culture references. These lyrics highlight different pivotal events from the world and the songwriter's life. And, for any other 26-27 year olds who are reading, this song starts recounting events in 1985 and makes it all the way up to 2012. Gotta love it.


And, if you didn't believe me when I said Train was awesome live, listen to this one. Proof.

The Best Stuff on the Internet: Lip-Dubbing, JCPenney's, "Heroes," and Doritos

Some people have jobs where they are always up and about. Always moving, never sitting still, and definitely never sitting at a computer screen for hours.

I envy those people. More often than not, you can find me sitting at a computer screen pretending to work. I know, I know, I ought to be working. They pay me to do a job and I should be doing it. But, I like to work under pressure. It's the college student in me. Don't give me something with a completion date two weeks from now because I will wait until two days before you need it to start.

And, despite my work's best efforts to block most of the Internet, I still manage to stumble upon fantastic-ness online.

So, here are the highlights, in no particular order:

1. Lip-Dub Proposal. Do yourself a favor and watch this. In a time where real-life humans are literally eating the faces off other humans, videos like this find a way to make you smile. Not only is the proposal incredibly well thought-out and thoughtful, you've gotta love seeing a group of family and friends come together just out of the kindness of their hearts. I sat at my desk and cried a stream of happy tears a minute into this. You might just do the same.

2. JCPenney's Gay-Friendly Ads. I have a mother that loves JCPenney's. She loves the place. Shops there all the time. Was abnormally upset when they closed the location nearest her house. As for me, I think the last thing I bought there was my Jessica McClintock senior prom dress. But, JCPenney's may just earn a few more dollars from me. In addition to seeking out Ellen as a spokeswoman, they've come out with these incredibly awesome, incredibly progressive Mother's Day and Father's Day advertisements that feature same-sex couples. 

3. On Calling All Soldiers "Heroes." My place of employment blocks about 99.2% of all websites that provide any ounce of fun. However, Thought Catalog has somehow slipped under the radar of our web filter. (Hope I didn't just jinx myself.) Well Thought Catalog is full of entertaining, but kinda pointless articles. So, when I came across this article, the title was initially off-putting. It seemed to assert that our country's courageous soldiers maybe shouldn't all be called heroes. Um, what? Can you say that? Isn't that like, really bad? But the article's author makes really good points about not cheapening the word "hero" and using it in for individuals and circumstances that really are heroic. It's definitely worth the read. 

4. Doritos have MSG?! So, this may be kind of ignorant / naive, but I thought that food ceased to contain MSG. I thought we were done with all that. So, imagine my surprise when I saw THIS tweet: 

You learn something new everyday! By the way, the day that I read this, I went to Target during lunch, and got a bad of Doritos to accompany (and negate) my Lean Cuisine lunch. 

Well, there you have it. 

It's not an exclusive list of all Internet goodies, but it's stuff I think is pretty cool. 

Have a good week everyone!

"It Was a Paula Deen Day."

If you have a Twitter, you need to be following Chrissy Teigen (@chrissyteigen).

Wondering why?

She's so funny.
She follows pop culture.
She tweets offensive stuff, just to get a rise out of the weirdos on Twitter.

And, she's real pretty. Every once in awhile, she'll tweet a picture of her in a bikini. It makes me hate life.

And it makes me want to give up Mexican food.

I couldn't ever give up Mexican food. I love queso way too much for that business.

At any rate, because of following Chrissy, I came across her blog. She blogs foods that I'm not daring enough to try.

But, lucky for me, Ray is all about trying new, different dishes. So when I came across Chrissy's blog about Paula Deen's Country Potato Salad, I knew it was right in Ray's wheelhouse.

So, we made plans to make it on Memorial Day. No idea what the main course would be, but this potato salad was going to be a part of it. No questions asked.

It was delicious. Chock full of bacon, egg, and mayonnaise. Nothing good for you but totally good. Do yourself a favor and make it.

Ray and I have a recipe book full of recipes we love. Way back in the day, we came across this recipe for Dry Rubbed Baby Back Ribs. This is also a recipe from the Deen fam. We made them. They were good. So good. These ribs are the kind of ribs where you don't even need barbecue sauce. They were fabulous.

Oh, and I tried deviled eggs for the first time ever. I know this makes me a freak, the fact that I've never had a deviled egg. But, lucky for me, Chrissy posted a recipe for them. That included bacon. Bacon + Chrissy = me and Ray buying a dozen eggs and trying them.

I'm not saying deviled eggs are something I'll eat every day, but they were good. They have a lot of the same flavors as the potato salad. I can appreciate what they bring to the table.

So for our Memorial Day, we woke up uncomfortably early (I'm talking before 7AM), cooked these recipes, and watched approximately 5 hours of CNBC. I wish I was kidding. But, it was awesome. Good food and good company. I highly recommend these recipes. You won't be sorry.

We also made a dessert. Mini apple pies. I'll post it soon. Get ready, people. That is a get-off-your-couch-and-make-it-now kind of recipe.