Nice walk by the river followed by a hearty dinner

My roomie Pranav always goes for his daily "river walk" and I never come along (let's admit it, I am pretty lazy when it comes to walking and getting sweaty) but today I made it an exception and decided to come along. Turns out it was quite a scenic walk and a pretty relaxing one. I must say that I've realized quite a few things during this walk, one of which included the fact that I'm not such a great listener and that I tend to zone out when others are talking to me (then later on when they remind me of what they told me I don't remember hearing them speak of that, to their annoyance). It's a bad habit and I've come to strive to improve upon daily.
On top of that, knowing that the brain cannot actually multi-task efficiently, I've come to realize that giving someone or something my undivided attention would be a more efficient use of my time (i.e today afternoon for example, when my mom called me I was trying to listen to her while trying to cook my honey glazed chicken. Funniest thing was when our conversation ended and I hung up the phone, I recalled our conversation very hazily, and I had a hazy idea as to what I did to my chicken while I had this conversation with my mom.) Also, I realize that I tend to worry a lot about things- especially things out of my control. Worrying does not help solve things. Pranav was describing to me it's like a swimmer trying to get across to an island with weights tying him or her down (weight equivalent to worries and burdens of being attached to material possessions). We spoke about attachment to material possessions as well since I raised the topic of this book I am reading by Robin Sharma called "The Monk Who Sold His Ferrari" that points out that attachment to material possessions is one of the causes of unhappiness.
He then described to me the origins of yoga and the importance of controlling your breathing. Apparently once you master your breathing, you can master your mind. (I think this is important because then you can be disciplined enough to focus on one thing only- once again, be more efficient). This is a goal that I also strive to work towards- having discipline of my own mind.

Along the way, we saw a few pretty houses by the river and got to talking about what kinds of houses we see ourselves settling down in in the future- he prefers the more traditional ones (chateau looking ones) while I prefer the modern-looking ones (preferably ones that are 2 storeys) with the glass decks (more minimalistic style I suppose).

The walk itself was pretty long, I'd say it took us around 2 hours in total but it was really relaxing and allowed me time to self-reflect through my conversations with Pranav. When we got back home, we made dinner with our other roomie Christine. Christine made some salad (tomatoes with spinach and feta goat cheese and balsamic vinaigrette) while Pranav made his chicken salad. I made steak pita with caramelized onions and steak with Japanese teriyaki sauce, pineapples, lettuce and tomatoes (I made too much and the fillings would not fit the small pita so I put it all on top of the pita and things were constantly falling out- it got messy though it was delicious!). Then we cleaned up our entire kitchen and then I made us some Cadbury hot chocolate with marshmallow (inspired by my Qantas flight- I was served this exact same concoction and it was delish!) and we sat around and chatted for a bit. Then Pranav went to stick his head into a bowl of steaming water with eucalyptus oil and looked really silly doing it. I took some pictures of it but felt bad since he was hacking up his lungs. It was funny nonetheless. So now I'm exhausted but I do feel content. Even though I did not do much studying (actually none), I feel like I've accomplished quite a bit.