Feel like in Wallydraigle

I love to do things I'm not particularly good at, usually for one of two reasons.

1. They make me feel powerful.
2. They help me imagine I'm really good at it, like a person on a TV show, or in a movie.

I love running. I'm terrible at it, in the sense that I am slow, and my body really just isn't built for running. I'm not terrible at it, in the sense that at a slow enough pace, I can run pretty much indefinitely. Granted, I have only gotten up to 8 miles so far; HOWEVER, that has only been because of time constraints. When you run five to six miles an hour, you can only make it so far before the neighbors call CPS for child neglect.

However, it makes me feel strong. If I run at least three miles, I get a high that does not wear off for several hours, sometimes all day. It's magical.

You know that meme going around Facebook, where there are two different pictures of a specific activity; one is, "what I feel like when I do X," and one is, "what I actually look like when I do X." When I run, my "feel like" is a rock star tiger on a motorcycle with machine guns and a black belt in karate. My "actually look like" is... a really slow person, running. Or maybe a snail. It doesn't matter. While I'm running, I'm a rock star tiger with a black belt riding a motorcycle with machine guns.

Cooking. I'm probably pretty average at cooking, as compared to people who cook regularly. I like to cook new and fun things, even though I'm still hopeless at baking. My family gets a home-cooked meal with at least one vegetable and a protein every evening, and Grace hardly ever gags anymore.

Lately, I've been on a Martha Stewart kick. Through Jeremy's Sky Miles, I got a free subscription to Martha Stewart Living. I like the recipes because they're not insanely complicated, but they have enough variation that I don't feel like each recipe is essentially, "Put quantity of meat in 350 oven with quantity of vegetable and seasoning." I hardly ever have to look up what something weird-sounding is. And! My favorite part: when a recipe says something like, "1 large onion, finely chopped (about 2 cups)," it's actually right. I love it when a recipe calls for one medium onion, and it's only supposed to yield half a cup of onion. I'm either doing something really wrong, or those people are from a place where the onions are ridiculously tiny.

So, when I'm in the kitchen cooking dinner, I imagine I'm on a show and everyone thinks I'm amazing at what I do. I mostly do this when I've raided our fridge for every last thing that will go bad soon and that seems like it might all go together without making everyone at the table die of vomiting to death. I turn on music and "dance" because I like to be spicy like that.

Feel like: Martha Stewart, except younger and more exciting. Am actually: Housewife with way too much imagination for the amount of time on her hands.

So, this is the story of my life. My interests all lie in things that I am not particularly talented at; they just have to be things that make me feel cool or make me think I look cool. I am 31 years old, and I just realized this is why I originally chose engineering as a major over English, which was clearly my strong suit. I didn't want to be another girl who went into English; I wanted to be a cool math chick who likes nerd things.

Weird. I meant to save this as a draft. I must have hit the wrong button by accident. It's not done yet, but... I'm lazy. Hah!