The Importance of Being Lauren

Let me share a ChatGPT haiku about dating: Flickering screens glow, Echoes of hearts left unmet, Lonely swipes in vain. Dating is exhausting and I ready to accept my spinster fate. The woes of dating have been slowly crushing my soul. I make connections with people who seem super cool and then they turn out to be the scum of the earth. It's emotionally draining to talk to 30+ people over the apps and hope that they ask you out.  This month I was done with the chat roulette and I decided that I wanted to be proactive about going out on dates. I put in my Bumble bio: "I hate chatting forever, let's just go on a date". To my surprise I got a compliment from a guy and he said he agreed with me. I immediately swiped to match, and we made plans to meet up a few weeks later. We matched when I was on a NYC trip so we scheduled a coffee date for two weekends after.  I meet him at the coffee shop and I was shocked when he reached for a hug upon meeting. I am not a particularly

I have not been great about updating y'all on my recovery! So much has happened in the last 12 weeks, and I am better than ever. I only have a tiny bit of soreness in my left knee when I get up in the morning, which is AMAZING. The knee pain first thing in the morning was super annoying.  The only issue that I can complain about right now is my knee's new occupation. My left knee is a straight up meteorologist now. A cold front with rain came through last week, and I had sharp pains all day. I asked the other girl in my office if she experiences the same thing post-surgery, and she said 12-years post-surgery she still gets weather related pain.  Week 12 The flexion in my knee in week 12 was at 125 degrees. I was assigned new exercises to build my hamstring strength. My PT had me do 220 lbs on the single leg press movement, and exclaimed, "Damnnn Cordova, I wouldn't want to take you in a fight." I was finally able to do a 50 lbs single leg curl without pain. My PT

Before the pandemic I was a very social person. I had a PACKED social calendar, and constantly sought to be around people. I would host weekly game nights, friend dinners, and group outings. During and post-pandemic I was left with a lot of social anxiety and depression, and that really impacted my ability to socialize with others. I was convinced that one of the lasting symptoms of COVID was introversion.  When I first started working in my current office, I was still recovering from teacher burnout. I felt drained after any social interaction, and felt overwhelmed in highly populated areas (i.e. the grocery store). Anyway, when I started working in the office, I told my parents daily about how chatty people in the office were. I frequently said, "Wow, everyone in the office is so chatty. They just stop by my desk to talk to me all the time. Sometimes I get behind in my work because people stop so often.*" *I feel the need to clarify that I am constantly weeks ahead of sched

Oooh child, I just KNOW my guardian angel is on the verge of quitting. The past few weeks have been full of close calls, and they have been working overtime keeping me alive.  Experience 1: Almost Died While Blogging In August I was still recovering from ACL/Meniscus surgery. I spent a lot of time work outside on the porch. I really enjoyed writing on my Blog after work hours so I would post up on the bench for hours writing about my recovery. I also spent a bit of time reading outside because I couldn't do much on my bum knee. It was a lovely evening, the leaves were just starting to change on the trees, the birds were chirping, the crickets were munchin' on the bush leaves, and the porch cat was being a general nuisance. I was typing away on my laptop when I heard 2 loud noises that sounded like a scooter backfiring. I saw a red scooter driving past my parent's yard super fast. I was confused by the noise it emitted but went back to writing. The next day my mom discovered

My physical therapist cleared me to run the Friday before Labor Day. I used to run all the time in college, but I got out of the habit in NYC. I was so excited to get cleared to run because that means my recovery is advancing. I ran at 3.9-4.0 for a few minutes with my PT watching. I stopped running before the belt had slowed down at the end and stumbled a bit. He freaked out and tried to catch me and put his hand on my very sweaty back. I didn't fall or anything and we just laughed about it.  I started working on endurance on Saturday and Sunday, and planned to run for more than 5 minutes on Monday. Labor Day was super busy, but I decided to go to the gym anyway. I ran for 4 minutes and started feeling pretty tired. I wanted to push myself to run for 6+ minutes at speeds between 3.8-4.0 mph. I decided to take a quick break, but I didn't think about how much faster 3.8 mph is compared to 2.8-3.4 mph. I missed the step and felt my body lurch forward.  I desperately tried to grab

Ooops. I can't believe I haven't updated the Blog with my knee recovery progress in 6 weeks! Things have been so busy at work and in my personal life. I totally fell behind on writing. My knee has made tremendous progress the last few weeks, and I almost have full flexion (touching my foot to my butt)! PT has forced me into being super consistent at the gym, and I am actually enjoying it. Please enjoy the July-September memory recap below: My mom and I went to see "Thick as Thieves" at Pickleville Playhouse. It was fun, but having my knee bent for 2 hours was not the most comfortable. We also saw an older lady trip on a step and crash into a trash can. I was terrifying. The play was very cute.     The biggest potato came to town for a grocery store grand opening. I completely forgot about it, but it was in the hotel parking lot when we walked out of the movie theater. I was so excited! We took tons of pictures.  Snackin' on pickles and popcorn at Pickelville.  Vis

When I first started working at the university I worked out in the staff gym. There was a super cute guy who was always there after work. I thought he was super attractive and insanely strong. However, I do not talk to random strangers at the gym. Okay, let's be honest, I am not one to approach any strangers ever. I am totally fine chatting with people if they approach me first, but I am apprehensive to start conversations in public.  Anyway, once winter hit I stopped working out altogether. Then in February the knee injury occurred, so it's been many months since I last saw the hot guy. I saw him at graduation back in May when all the offices came out to clap for the graduates. Seeing him with his coworkers made me think that he worked in the Business School. I did some university page digging and quickly found him. Y'all, if this higher education thing does work out for me, I might have a future in investigating.  Anyway, my light stalking   research revealed that we have

I saw a different Physical Therapist this morning and he was amazing! I left the session feeling strong and competent. He was so engaging and we chatted throughout the session. It was nice to be able to chat without feeling like I am overstepping by asking about my PT's personal life. My regular PT is not really a chatty person, so usually I am left to talk to other patients or insert myself if conversations going on around me. Today my exercises included biking with a high resistance, squat walks with the resistance band, steps ups with a 10 pound kettlebell, calf press one-legged at 115 pounds, bulgarian split squats, then lying down hamstring workout with the exercise ball, and finally backward and lateral walking on the treadmill. This other PT was awesome about praising my progress and told me multiple times throughout the session that I was doing very well. I have never been a verbal words of affirmation girlie, but I think I may be become one. As we chatted we realized that

I think I am mentally exhausted from having to do physical therapy three times a day. It has been so hard to force myself complete the last two sets in the evening, and I have been skipping more often. I always do the 27 minute work out in the morning, but I'm starting to get a little burnt out. I begged my PT on Friday to add different exercises to my app, because I am getting bored. He said he would, but spoiler alert, he forgot again . Today I did the bike on a high resistance level, then box steps (lateral and forward), squats, leg curls, Bulgarian squats, walking squats with a resistance band above my knees, balance ball squats (I was terrified to get on the ball), and finally resistance band lunges. Let me tell you something, I was almost in tears when he told me to get on the balance ball. I was like "please, please, please don't make me do this. I don't feel ready. What if I fall over and break something again." He rolled his eyes and said, "First of