Category Archives: grad school

Blissfully Unplugged: Camping in Lopez Lake

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Hello everyone! This weekend, I went camping for my third annual grad school girls camping trip (here are the posts from 2012 and 2013). I met these ladies in grad school, and we quickly bonded over an insatiable need for caffeine, the horrors of mass communication theories, and how many times we cried each week. I jest (kind of. grad school aint for sissies). We drove north from Los Angeles to Lopez Lake near Arroyo Grande, which is about an hour south of San Luis Obispo. Our campsite was “Buck 12” and was on a shady hill looking over the madmade Lopez Lake, surrounded by oak trees. Isn’t this beautiful?

LopezLake_Sunshine_Buck12_Campsite

We set up our tent on Friday night and made a fancy gourmet dinner of fire-roasted hot dogs and chili cheese fritos, in addition to s’mores. In typical Alyssa fashion I enjoyed the indulgence at the time, but later paid for it when I woke up at 1 a.m. in a swirly nauseous junk food haze. I was really excited this camping trip to try out my new Klymit Static V Camping Mattress because for the past two years I’ve relied on a yoga mat or towel to shield my soft body from the unforgiving rocks. This year I splurged a little and got this camping mattress, which comes to you the size of a Nalgene water bottle, you blow it up with 15-20 breaths, and BOOM! Instant mattress. I was really happy and surprised with how durable and comfy this thing is… and it totally doubles as a fashionable skirt. See?

Klymit_SleepingPad_Camping_DoubleChinDiary

We woke up the next morning and headed out on what was supposed to be a 1.1 mile hike, but ended up being about four miles because we got lost several times trying to actually find the trail. It was all good training for the 3-Day, especially because it was in hills, in the middle of the day, in the sun. While we tried to find the trail, we enjoyed seeing the numerous deer at the campground who were totally unafraid of humans.

Deer_LopezLake

We finally made our way to Blackberry Trail and were so excited we had to take a picture with the sign. The hike was beautiful, with lots of fluttery butterflies, shady fern groves, and brambles of berries. Because we’re awesome, we actually got on to another trail after some other hikers had told us they had seen a bear on it (Yes, we wanted to see a bear!). Sadly, we did not run into any California Black Bears, though I did hear one huffing and puffing around our tent later that night (bears have a very distinct huff n’ puff style breathing. See?)

Hiking_BlackberryTrail

Training for the 3-Day has really shown me how important the right shoes are, and I was happy for this hike to be wearing my Ahnu Women’s Sugarpine Air Mesh Hiking Shoe. I actually won these on Facebook (and so did my friend Julie – see? She’s wearing hers, too!), and I have to say I’m loving this shoe for hikes. They have plenty of support around the arch and toe box, and the grip was great as we scaled up loose dirt and tip-toed down shale-covered ravines. Plus they come in cute colors in a size 11, which is actually a big deal because most shoe manufacturers stop making cute things past a size 10 (thanks, Ahnu!).

SugarPine_AirMesh_HikingShoes_DoubleChinDiary

After our hike, we schlepped back down the mountain to the Marine store, treated ourselves to a well deserved cheese burger, and then hiked all over the campground again to go lay on the lake beach for a few hours. Sprawling in the sun felt SO GOOD. Then, it was back to our campsite for dinner for night 2 – ceasar salad and JIFFY POP! Jiffy Pop is kind of the best thing ever when you’re camping, just because it’s so fun to make over a fire. You basically shake it like crazy and then watch the foil on top turn into this huge martian head filled with delicious buttery corn.  It’s worth the $2. Do it!

JiffyPop_DoubleChinDiary

I think I so badly needed this camping trip because early Saturday morning, my phone ran out of battery and I was able to super unplug for the whole weekend. As much as I love tweeting and instagramming, there’s nothing like taking a break from being “on” and spending time really being present, like the amazing colors in this sunset, or the tiny tomato plant growing in the camp water fountain — or, even better, laughing with my friends!

LopezLake_Sunset_DoubleChinDiary

When was the last time you went camping? Are you a fan of camping or is it not for you? I definitely love camping but have learned over the years it’s better to go a little closer to “glamping” and splurge on things like a sleeping pad, bringing a table cloth for the camp, and choosing a campground with showers. Those little things can make a big difference in your comfort level! What did you do this weekend?

GradSchoolGirls

*I was not compensated in any way to write about the sleeping pad or Ahnu shoes, just wanted to share two things that made my trip less campy and more glampy. There are affiliate links in here which will earn me a few pennies if you end up deciding to check either item out 🙂

Girls’ Weekend – Camping in Ojai and Santa Barbara Day Trip

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Hi Everyone! I hope you had an awesome weekend and the first day of the work week is treating you ok. I had an amazing weekend, because it was my 2nd annual Grad School Girls Camping Trip! Remember last year we went to Big Bear? Well, this year, we headed up the coast to Ojai, a sleepy little town known for its citrus and hilly retreats. We camped at Wheeler Gorge, a beautiful campground with a chapparal type feeling, covered with big river rocks and low grassy scrub.

Here’s our campsite before we set up our tent.

Wheeler_gorge_CampgroundWe arrived at the camp site on Friday around 5 pm, so we had some work to do before we could settle down with some hard ciders and s’mores. With only minimal frustration (aka one hour of “wtf?!” type exclamations), we set up our tent and got the “mess hall” (aka the picnic table) all prepared. Once that was done, it was time to cook dinner, and I’m proud that I was the official “chef”, serving up very gourmet all-beef hot dogs. Don’t mind my stylish camping apparel.

Alyssa gets grillin'

Alyssa gets grillin’

After dinner it was time for S’MORES! I love me some marshmallows, in fact, they’re probably one of my favorite sweet things. I had previously seen Jumbo Marshmallows and was enamored by the size, so we had to get them. Unfortunately, I can say they’re almost too much for a s’more — and at a whopping 90 calories each, I’ll stick with the normal s’mores size. However, they were super yum despite their monstrous size.

Expert Marshmallow Roasters

Expert Marshmallow Roasters

See how huge they are?!?! Massive Mushmellows! After a couple drinks, we hit the hay… only to be awake all night thanks to our rude campsite neighbors, who decided playing their guitar loudly to crappy Bieber music was the best thing to do from midnight through 5 AM. I can definitely tell I’m getting older, because as a teenager, sleeping on the hard ground was never an issue. Now, I feel all creaky and like a 90-year-old as I lament the dirt beneath me instead of my posh pillowtop. The next day, we got up early and headed to the beautiful Santa Barbara Mission.

Santa Barbara Mission

Santa Barbara Mission

If you’re ever in the area, I highly recommend you pay a visit to the town of Santa Barbara. It’s a gorgeous coastal town nestled up into beautiful mountains. The Santa Barbara mission is only $6 to get in and you can take a self guided tour through lush rose gardens, see the Friar’s old living quarters, read about the history of the people who lived (and died) there  in a beautiful cemetery, and check out the chapel.

Missiongirls

This mission is also the site of the famous I Madonnari Italian Street Painting festival, so you could see the remnants of highly detailed chalk paintings around the missions grounds. I also caught a glimpse of this Monarch butterfly in the gardens, isn’t he pretty?

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One very important thing I realized about this weekend is how nice it is to be out and about and STAY HYDRATED! I took my hubby’s CamelBak and was able to suck down water anywhere we went. With long days in the hot sun, it felt really good to not feel parched and chapped.

Stayin' Hydrated!

Stayin’ Hydrated!

 

In terms of camping while on the Double Chin Diet, this weekend was way better than last year’s trip in that I really didn’t go overboard on anything. I ate until I was full, enjoyed s’mores, salt water taffy and pasta when we went out to dinner, but I ate without remorse and just tried to remember the trip wasn’t going to be “good or bad” based on the food I ate, but what memories I made. It’s nice to have a healthy attitude towards food!

Santa Barbara Beach

Santa Barbara Beach

 

We ended our trip with a beautiful evening at the beach. I basked in the sun and read magazines, and then later, we all walked down the Santa Barbara pier and had a sunset dinner at a seafood restaurant. This weekend made me so grateful for the amazing state I live in (Thanks for dragging us here 19 years ago, Dad!), my awesome friends, and also, the ability to disconnect for awhile. I had decided the day before I left that my phone would be OFF all weekend, and other than a quick phone call to the husband, I didn’t check Facebook, Twitter or instagram once. Especially because my career depends on constant connectivity and monitoring of social sites, brand pages, accounts, e-mails, etc, I wanted a break. As a freelancer, you’re essentially on call 24/7 — meaning if something breaks online, you’re the person to handle fixing it. It was really nice to enjoy the sights and sounds of Ojai without hearing the “ding ding” of an incoming text. It may sound scary, but if you’re going away for a quick weekend and can get away with being unplugged, do it! You just might find out how nice it actually is.

So that was my weekend, in a nutshell! What did you do this weekend????

 

 

 

Mastering a Goal

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Good morning and Happy Monday! I’ve been a little more quiet on the blog lately, because I’ve been putting the finishing touches on a very long-term goal… my THESIS!

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I started graduate school in 2010, twoweeks after I got married, and two months after I had scored a big promotion. I remember nervously sitting around a table of unfamiliar faces, still glowing from my honeymoon, starting to freak out a little bit as my eyes scanned the lengthy syllabus of research methods. At work, I went from a copywriter to a content manager, managing a team of three people, writing Facebook updates and blogs for nine different brands. I worked at least 45 hours a week and went to class at night, exhausted, bleary-eyed and hungry, but I made it through with my laptop, diet coke and the support of my husband and family.

I had intended for grad school to take two years, but as the reality of school set in, I knew it would take longer. I ended up staying for three years, and in those three years, I met wonderful friends, some of whom read this blog. (Hi Julie, Emily, Lauren, Virginia and Luis!) I also worked my way through stress-eating (Something I’m still fighting), cried when my 36 page literature review came back for the 10th time needing more revisions (I’m not exaggerating. That %&$#! lit review came back ten times!), traveled to Thailand, lost my sweet kitty Leo, and did a million other things. Life always went on, but it went on with a giant weight on my shoulders – my thesis. I turned down fun party invitations, missed family vacations and spent hours glued to my computer. I wrote and re-wrote huge chunks of the same text, over and over again. I made a lot of sacrifices for the past three years to work on this thesis, but I was always grateful I had the opportunity to be learning and to be in grad school. It was hard. But I did it.

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The first photo of me as Alyssa Curran, MA. Taken minutes after my thesis was approved – with happy tears still shiny in my eyes!

Last Thursday, at 2 pm, I paced the hallways of the Mike Curb College of Arts, Media and Communication while my thesis committee deliberated my final project. I had come prepared with 106 pages of my own work, two PDFs of the social media handbook you can read at SocialSyllabi.com, and a cheat sheet of notes. I defended my project in front of two women I greatly respect, both who are doctorates, one in education, one in journalism, women who have worked at the Los Angeles Times and have been embedded in war zones. At the end of an hour and a half of changes, they signed a paper and shook my hand – I had just earned my master’s degree!

When they signed the paper, I wanted to leap across the table and hug them. Tears flooded my eyes and I had to do that embarrassing fan-your-face thing to prevent myself from bursting into happy, joyous tears. I have worked SO HARD for this degree, and I am so proud of myself. I’m not usually a braggart (ok, fine, sometimes I can be), but I’ve been basking in my accomplishment the past week. I have a MASTER’S DEGREE before I’m even 28 years old. THAT is awesome. THAT is accomplishment. THAT is hard work, and opportunity, and commitment – and THAT reminds me that this whole weight loss thing? It might be the hardest thing I’ve ever worked on in my life, but I can do this, too. My Master’s Degree taught me a lot. Not just about dedication and time, but about perseverance. About not throwing in the towel when all you want to do is quit. About keeping going, when your eyes are heavy and your heart is tired. About not comparing yourself to others, about realizing this journey is your own – no one elses, and if your heart is in it, you will get there, regardless of your pace. I need to remember these thoughts, these feelings, when the number on the scale is up, when my jeans feel snug, when I compare myself to a thin girl and think that I am not enough. I can do this. I will do this.

My sweet friend Ruby and I in 2008. We are still friends to this day!

My sweet friend Ruby and I in 2008. We are still friends to this day!

My master’s degree is so much more to me than just a paper saying I’m well educated in the field of mass communication and media. It’s a reminder for me that when I work hard, I can do anything. I just need to remember to take it one step at a time, believe in myself, and try my best. On May 21 I’ll once again walk across the Oviatt Library steps, exactly five years after I earned my BA in Journalism in the same spot. In a lot of ways, I’m a different person than who I was in 2008, but one thing remains the same – my ambition to make my life worth living to the fullest, every minute of every day. I am proud of the person I am, and you should be proud of who you are, too.

So tell me – what is one thing in your life, big or small, that makes you proud of the person you are today?

 

Busy busy bee

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Have you guys heard Rimsky Korsakov’s “Flight of the Bumble Bee?” Take a listen from these fine fellows of Canadian Brass:

I feel like this piece is the musical accompaniment to my life the past three weeks. As you know, I’m in the final stages of finishing my master’s degree, a three-year long process that’s caused me a lot of grief. When you write a thesis, you go through millions of revisions, up to the point that you “defend”, which means you basically defend your completed work in front of a small group people and respond back to the comments and constructive criticism your graduate committee might have. At this point they can either sign a piece of paper granting you approval, and you graduate, or they can say they need more changes before they sign it and hopefully you’ll graduate, or they can say “You’re SOL”. I’ve been making changes left and right, and I’m really hoping on Thursday when I defend that I’ll have minimal changes to make before I get the all-clear to graduate. It’s been crazy… and I’m ready to get my life back to the still very busy but totally doable routine of work, blog, fitness, relationships, friends and maybe, just maybe, house-hunting. (PS big shout out to April for being so awesome and picking up my blogging slack! You go, girl!)

I’m not gonna lie, I’ve been stressed. My desire to stress-eat has been intense. After one particularly rough day last week when I got the first set of revisions and 10 e-mails stared me down with lists of things I had to immediately change, my first instinct was to make popcorn and crunch away my anxiety. But I didn’t – I took a quick walk around the block, came back, had a mango, and settled down to get to it.

Yes, I still ate out of stress, but it was a small mango – much less damaging than a bowl of calorie-laden salty crunchy popcorn. (PS – My latest passionate fruit love affair is definitely Mango. I just took our relationship to the next level by buying the giant jumbo pack from Costco!) I’m still making time to fit in exercise, and tonight, I met with a friend (Hi Suz!) for a long leisurely walk. I’m trying to view exercise as less of an item on my to-do list and more of as a natural stress relief. I know those endorphins will mellow me out, because my body’s been in a particularly flighty panic mode as I imagine not graduating and being sentenced to what feels like the rest of my life in grad school. But that’s just anxiety – anxiety I can work through by getting good nights of sleep, eating well, and fitting in exercise when I can. It’s weeks like this that remind me even if the scale isn’t showing what I want, I’ve made huge changes in my life when it comes to food and fitness.The old Alyssa would have no problem eating popcorn when stressed, nor would she hesitate to blow off all forms of fitness just because it was one more thing to do. But Alyssa 2.0 knows that living a healthy life means not just losing weight, but managing stress, too.

Have you been stressed out this week? How are you managing it?

Yo ho ho ho, a grad student’s life for me

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Hi everybody, don’t have much to say tonight because I’m on page three of yet another paper for school – but I wanted to share this image I found on Pinterest. The past week has been pretty crazy stressful for me – I’m close to finishing my proposal for my thesis, I’ve got a few major things going on at work, and in general, life is pretty busy! I know I wasn’t supposed to get on the scale until the 16th but I snuck on it today, and things are lookin’ good. 😉 I hope you have a good Monday, I’ll be back with more to say tomorrow!

 

Weekly Weigh In #10

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Well, there was no weekly weigh in #10. I was in a meeting that ran long, (we have Weight Watchers meetings at work at lunch -they start at 12, my meeting ended at 12:15.) I didn’t have any lunch, and I desparately needed to work on my literature review. So I didn’t go. There was some internal hemming and hawing about me deliberately deciding to skip a meeting, but the stars just didn’t align. I have the slightest suspicion that I might have lost more weight this week – although my eating choices have been less than stellar, I’ve been clocking in 15 hour work days between work, homework and freelance projects – leaving me little time for grazing.

Copyediting at my desk at work... on lunch.

While I may not have succeeded in a weight loss accomplishment this week (and I don’t know if I did – I’ll try to weigh in tomorrow or this weekend), I did have a major academic accomplishment. In grad school, part of your thesis is analyzing at least 30 different pieces of research and summarizing why they might be important to what you’re studying, called a “lit review”. Here’s the beginning of it all: The 38 page baby I just birthed, as in uploaded to Google docs for my whole thesis cohort and committee advisor to read and edit. As you can see, this picture was taken at work – and this was on my lunch break, as I skipped lunch (that’s bad, I know) and used my little red pen to mark my way to awesomeness.

Here’s what my wild and crazy Wednesday night was like:

Wine + Thesis = BFF

So there you have it. I may not have invested enough time in my physical self this week, but I rocked it on the academic front. It’s one of those days where other than the slightly nagging pain in the ball of my foot (plantar fascia – heel pain from being fat and wearing crappy, supportless ballet flats), weight loss is far from my mind. I’m in an academic zone – focused, ambitious and determined to get this done. I’m eight months away from graduating with my master’s degree, and that makes me damn PROUD of myself.

However, I’m not going to let pride get in the way of working towards the happiest, healthiest lifestyle I can have, and that means getting back to the gym, cutting out the late night wine and peeps (yeah – it happened),and not skipping meals. Now that this initial deadline has passed, I’m giving myself a few days off of homework for spring break and focusing on getting back into the exercise routine, since I didn’t manage to make it once this week. I’m also going to spend time with my dear husband, whom I call the “grad school widow” when school’s in session.

So that’s where I’m at! Focused mentally and academically, but distant and sort of floating on the weight loss side of things. We can’t have it all.. but I can try 😉

How’s your week going? Anything exciting happening? Make sure to check in on Monday for your chance to win an EatSmart Food Scale!