I’m still busy with all the stuff I mentioned in the last post, except that I’m done with the play (super fun), so I haven’t made it back to gymnastics class yet. I’ve stopped running, too, which is not great. Doing better with the divorce, though. I decided not to see or talk to John for a while, and that’s really helped me focus on other parts of my life.

The weather’s great these days, which Sam is enjoying—he’s been to the dog park twice this week.

My hair’s purple now, or rather it has purple highlights in it. Excited about that. I tried a new stylist this time, since my old one switched salons, but she didn’t cut it the way I like, so I think I’m going to have to track the old one down.

Trying to cut down on the number of times I omit the subject and helper verb “I am” from a sentence. Not doing a great job so far. Maybe I should write sentences that aren’t entirely about myself and what I’m currently doing, so they won’t sound so repetitive in the first place.

Headed out now for some pub trivia with friends. Totally gonna sit outside. Yeah.

Looking back at November, I see not much has changed in the last four months. Job’s still going well, still having a hard time with the divorce, still watching way too many gymnastics videos. I got a part-time staff position with my taiko group, and I’m kind of an understudy musician in a play (long story), so with all that going on I don’t have much time for gym class any more. Pity. I should make time. I miss the exercise and the learning new things.

But like RIGHT right now, I want a hamburger. It’s 9:50 PM, and I already ate dinner, but for some reason I’m starving. What’s that about?

P.S. NOT PREGNANT, but thanks for reminding me that I’m going to die alone and childless, if you were thinking of asking. Time for a quick rant: Nothing personal to anyone I know, but I hate those winky pregnancy questions with a burning passion.

I swear, do not ever ask a woman if she’s pregnant, even if you know she’s married or trying or whatever, unless you’re pretty sure that baby is yours. There could be all kinds of things going on that you don’t know about that could make your comment really hurtful. Like maybe she’s having fertility issues, or she just miscarried, or, I don’t know, her marriage is breaking up and she hasn’t told Facebook yet.

Have I talked about this before? Maybe I’ve alluded to it once or twice. Sorry if this is a repeat.

Okay, must eat now. What’s open at 10:00 and won’t keep me up all night?

Speaking of gymnastics, tonight was the first time I left class without a headache. Okay, with a slight headache, but only every now and then. I used to have pretty bad headaches at the end of each class that would last two or three days, to the point where I was worried that I was giving myself a series of minor concussions.

I couldn’t find much information online about head injuries in gymnastics. You’d think they’d be common, with all the spinning and crashing that gymnasts do. Maybe not. Or maybe they pale in comparison to the broken bones and torn ligaments that abound.

McKayla Maroney had a concussion earlier this year, you know. So we’re totally twinsies, except that she over-rotated a triple-twisting layout and sustained an actual concussion, whereas I, um, “over-rotated” a few handstands and kind of got a headache.

The point is, I’m getting slightly better at not doing permanent damage to myself.

If you’re wondering what most characterized this time in my life, apart from my job going well and me still struggling to come to grips with the divorce, know that this was the time when I watched a lot of gymnastics videos. So many videos.

This was also the time when I took gymnastics classes, but I spend way more time watching videos than I do at the gym.

Last year it was cheer videos, before that college a cappella groups, and before that . . . vlogs? That would have been 2006 or 2007, so maybe there were a few epochs in between. Maybe the ellipses were when I read a lot of blogs.

Anyway, self. This age, this is the one with all the world championships and olympicses and documentaries and tutorials. Oh, and tons of podcasts, too. But not gymnastics podcasts, that makes no sense. Right.

Three more days of NaBlo, y’all.

Because I live alone in a small apartment (with a correspondingly small kitchen), I don’t have much extra food lying around. Almost anything perishable will surely perish before I finish it, and I hate wasting food.

So when I want a few bites of something savory but have no leftovers or snacky things handy, I get creative. Or I walk to the gas station for a bag of chips, but only rarely, because I double-hate making a trip for just one thing.

Tonight I scrounged around in the cupboards and tried falafel on a corn tortilla with mango chutney. It was . . . not terrible. And I filled my belly without spending any money, so I’m calling that a success. Living the dream, y’all.

I didn’t post yesterday, but hey, it was Thanksgiving. Hope all yours were lovely. Or if you don’t celebrate Thanksgiving, I hope you had a nice Thursday.

Today I bought my first pair of skinny jeans. I am under no illusion that I (short, small waist, big thighs) have the ideal body type for skinnies, but, you know, they’re in style these days. And more practically, the boot cuts I’ve clung to for the last decade are all but impossible to wear with, well, boots—the kind that go outside your pants, anyway.

I was looking for a reasonably well-fitting pair in a dark wash, and I found them on sale at the Gap. Score. And then, among the ten pairs I tried on, I fell in love with these green ones to the right, so I bought my second pair of skinny jeans on the spot.

The camera on my phone distorts the colors a little. The green you see in the photo is the green I *wish* they were; in real life they’re more of a bluey-mint. Still fabulous.

“But Natalie,” I hear you say, “No store ever makes pants in the right length for moderately short women!” And you’re right, of course. Most stores seem to assume that the average American woman is about 5’10″ and cut their pants accordingly. Gap does make petite sizes, but they only sell them online, and hell if I’m going to buy pants without trying them on. The pants I bought are “ankle length,” which means they just about reach the floor on my (one inch below average height!) frame.

By comparison, check out this third pair. These are SKINNY jeans, IN MY SIZE, but they look like sweatpants because the extra three inches on the “regular” length bunches up around my calves. Even if I stand on my tiptoes, they still flood at the bottom. Ridiculous. I guess Gap errs on the long side and assumes most people will hem them. Nope, I’ll leave them in the fitting room instead.

I managed to get out of the store without buying anything else, which I’m pretty proud of. Okay, except a belt, which I TOTALLY NEEDED, you guys. My other brown belt doesn’t go with these pants, all right?

But seriously, except for a couple things in LA, I haven’t bought new clothes in about eighteen months. I only have a teensy bit of spending money left over in each paycheck, and right now I’m choosing to spend it mostly on tapioca tea. My Christmas list is like ninety percent clothes this year. Clothes and a new laptop. Also CLOTHES.

Sorry, feminism. I like science and actually I’m fairly good at it and also I know some things about computers! There, now we’re even.

As we often do—but haven’t done in a few years—my family is going to run in the Turkey Trot tomorrow. It’s nice to do things together, and to have traditions, but ugh, the crowds, and double ugh, the leaving at 6:30 IN THE MORNING.

This is the first time I’ve run a 5k when I’ve been running semi-regularly beforehand. That’s pretty neat. Maybe it means I can finally regain the fitness level I had at age twelve.

I haven’t been running as much since the end of Daylight Savings Time because now when I get home from work it’s dark or nearly so. I feel like running in the dark ups my chances of (1) getting raped, (2) getting hit by a car, or (3) tripping over a crack in the sidewalk and breaking my clumsy self. Mostly the third thing.

Do you know when my second-least-favorite time to run is? Butt-early in the morning. Speaking of which, I’m off to bed.

Some dogs have common people names, like Max or Sophie. Some dogs have uncommon or old-fashioned people names, like Elmer or Beulah. And some dogs have decidedly pet-specific names. You’d be hard-pressed to find a human named Pickles, Radar, or Starbutt*.

My own dog’s name is a bit of a hybrid. “Sam” is relatively common, but it’s usually short for Samuel. There aren’t many baby Samsons these days, though of course it’s a brilliant name for a dog, especially a tiny dog with long, unruly hair. (If I shave him, does that make me Delilah? I’m only trying to make him more handsome!)

But if you’re going to give your dog a human name, you can’t just throw a dart at a baby name book. Can you imagine a dog named Matthew? Stephanie? Eric? Many great dog names are human nicknames (Emmy, Chuck), but even “Matt” and “Steph” would sound out of place at the dog park.

I’ve looked through the fifty most popular names for human babies in 2011 (fifty names each for boys and girls, actually) and picked out what I think are the most and least suitable candidates for dog names. Why? Because it’s NaBloPoMo and I had to write something.

So, in my two minutes of consideration, with no rational basis for the decision, I’ve judged the most suitable to be . . . Mason and Zoe. I have to admit that I’m a little biased on the boys’ side: my brother’s dog is named Mason. But I still think it’s a perfectly good dog name, even if it did fly up to SECOND in the national rankings last year thanks to that one Kardashian who keeps reproducing. Runners-up: Luke, Jack, Riley, and Layla.

The popular human names least suitable for dogs? Christian and Evelyn. This one was tough. It turns out most common human names sound weird on dogs, so it was hard picking the absolute worst. I had to think about which had dog-friendly nicknames to break the tie. Elizabeth could be Lizzy, Benjamin could be Ben or Benny. Even Christopher and Victoria could be Topher and Torey, if you squint a little. But the only nicknames I could think of for Christian and Evelyn were Chris and Lyn, which aren’t much more doggish than the originals. Runners-up: John, Ethan, Charlotte, Natalie.

My takeaway? Human girl names sound way better on dogs than boy names do. Is that because boy dogs are more likely to get goofy names like Buster or Taco? I don’t know. What I do know is that I finished writing this post before midnight. Shazam!

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* Actual name of a dog my dad knew growing up.

Sam threw up his breakfast again this morning, so I worked from home for a bit as he snuggled in my lap. This dog doesn’t usually even sit next to me unless I have food, so he must have been feeling pretty crummy.

Tonight he was able to keep down some rice and chicken broth, so I think he’s starting to feel better.

Speaking of Sam, the poor pup has some kind of stomach upset this evening. He’s barfed three times already, leaving me bewildered as to how much barf can fit into such a small dog.

“Don’t worry, Mama,” he says, “I’ll help you clean that up.” Thanks but no thanks, buddy.