It’s been awhile

It's been awhile since I've written here – sorry about that.  With the craziness in Feb of the Kirov and the new position in March this just kind of gotten away from me. 

 Anyway, I'm back at it and things here are going well.  I have a meeting tomorrow with Michael to discuss how I can assist with one of his pet projects.  I'm excited about that opportunity and it'll be nice to see what this job can evolve into. 

All the guys are doing well.  Eric just sent out an invitation for his annual Easter Brunch which should be a lot of fun.  Plus I'll get to see the Patty Griffin concert that night so Easter is looking like it's going to turn into a really nice day. 

Other than that there isn't a whole lot of news.  It sounds like Kevin is going to take the new position as the Archives weren't able to match the offer of the new place.  He sounds really excited about that. 

Hope things are going well for you guys!  I'll talk to you soon I'm sure!

 Love,

Jon 

Good excuse to drink coffee

I just saw this article on www.salon.com and thought you may find it interesting. 

Coffee may reduce some women’s risk of breast cancer

Just when we were resolving to drink less coffee this year, here comes a study from the University of Toronto saying coffee consumption can drastically reduce women’s risk of breast cancer.

The finding isn’t quite cause for rejoicing yet — it still has to be confirmed by larger studies. And it only applies to women with BRCA genetic mutations which put them at greatly increased risk for the disease. But since that’s pretty much like saying that this discovery will only affect those who need it most, we’re going to go ahead and get a little bit excited.

Researchers surveyed 1,690 women who had either the BRCA-1 or BRCA-2 mutation, half of whom had cancer and half who didn’t. After adjusting for factors like age, oral contraceptive use, number of births, and smoking, the researchers found that participants’ cancer risk decreased in proportion to the amount of coffee they drank. Participants who drank one to three cups a day were 10 percent less likely to get breast cancer, and those who drank four to five cups saw a 25 percent reduction of risk.

Drinking six or more cups cut participants’ risk by an average of 69 percent.

As to why this might be: Caffeine helps the body break down estrogen, and may thereby preventing the hormone from stimulating the disease. Plus, coffee is a source of phytoestrogen, which is thought to have a protective effect against cancer.

Doctors won’t start recommending increased coffee consumption to BCRA patients just yet. Still, it seems safe to predicts that Starbucks will gear up for a big breast-cancer awareness push this year.

Gym in Jan & the Roomba…

Not all that much new to report this week. Yet another short week in the office yet somehow the week seems to drag on. It’s mid-afternoon on Friday and my work brain is fried so I figured I’d move on over to the conversational side and post something up here.

One thing I was reminded of this week is just how crazy the gym gets in January. Everyone gets on their new year’s resolution kicks for a month or two and the gym turns into a madhouse. Certainly has made for a longer wait at the gym to get in a full workout as you revise and adjust your time in the gym to what equipment is available and not being used. Plus all the long lockers get taken first….same thing with the showers – instead of getting the great ones with wonderful hot water pressure the only ones left are the ones that barely sputter out water that is lukewarm at best. Not that I’m encouraging people to have bad health habits, but I’ll be glad when some of these people give up their resolutions….

Oh, and I used the amazon gift certificate you gave me to get one of these:

It’s a roomba – a vacuum that cleans the apartment on it’s own. Seeing that both my roommate and I have a natural aversion to cleaning the apartment this is something that’ll help keep the place a little bit more tidy. I ordered it today so I’ll be sure to let you know how well it works once it arrives.

Age old question

I now find myself in a predicament that everyone has been in before, yet I’m not sure anyone has found the perfect solution.

What to do with the bad gift…

One of the bartenders at Remingtons found a wine rack they thought would go just perfect in my apartment – so he bought it for me for Christmas. This is a guy who gives me a ride home from work every weekend, occassionally will come on over to the apartment to hang out and overall a geniunely good guy.

And I know with presents it is the thought that counts, but what thoughts were going on in his mind that made him think I would like this:

It really has no place at all in my apartment, and when Jared gets back in town I’m sure he’ll agree. Problem is that Jeremy will be coming over from time to time and I don’t want to hurt his feelings by him not seeing it in use. He’s a great guy and I would never want to feel bad about it… So I feel like I need to keep it around – although we don’t really have an abundance of extra closet space to hold it in either – it is quite the hefty item. For now it remains in the living room scarying off evil spirits or something – who knows they way it looks it may be conjuring evil spirits.

Yikes…

Merry Christmas

You said not to go spend a lot of money for you guys for Christmas so I tried to think of ideas of things that would be meanful, yet not involve financials.

I decided to create a blog that I could periodically write in to let you know some of the day-to-day details going on in my life. I can’t guarantee it’ll be all that exciting by any means, but maybe it’ll help make the distance between DC and Iowa a little smaller.

For example, I can show you pictures of the guys and I from Thanksgiving:

or some pictures of Eric’s Birthday party:

Here’s the setup we had:

and this is me with Kelly and Raina – the two girls who helped me plan the party:

And me with Kevin, Eric and our new friend Bob:

you may notice the stickers on people’s shirts….we had done up some fake pictures of Eric’s favorite things (cookbooks, movies, music, etc) and put his face on them…here are two examples of the cookbooks:

Anyway, I’ll do my best to try and update this on a semi-regular basis. You can always leave comments on here if you’d like!!

I hope you both know how much I love you. Hope you have a wonderful Christmas and great New Year. I’ll be talking to you soon.
Much Love,

Jon