I had a wonderful vacation. We were so crazy busy, here’s a list of all our activities: celebrated my birthday, Lindsay’s birthday, our 4 year anniversary, hung out in Auburn, went to some of her classes, had some great hang out nights with her peeps, took pictures around campus, had a wedding shower, went to my sister’s baptism, hung out with the family, played with Mrs. Bailey’s new dog, Nala, took engagement photos, worked out details with Mathews Manor, had Thanksgiving at Lindsay’s gparents, went to the Iron Bowl, and had breakfast with my fam before heading back to Washington. Lindsay and I were discussing, and there was only one day (really half a day) that we did not do anything. The day of our engagment photos we didn’t get ready to go until right before our photo session that late afternoon, so we’d be fresh for the pictures. Except for that, we were crazy busy.

Now I’m back in WA, and experiencing all that WA has to offer. Dude, I woke up this morning, and it was 28* outside! I think the people that predicted the winter would be colder than normal this year were right. Needless to say, the heat has officially been turned on. Speaking of other things that need to be turned on, my Christmas tree. I need to go by Rick’s house today and pick it up. I was holding off because I was going to try and sell my armoir before putting the tree up, because the tree is going to take the armoir’s location in our living room. However, I worked out a better plan. All I have to do is a little rearranging. The lights are already up in the apartment, but a few more strands wouldn’t hurt. Got to get it ready for the Christmas party we’re going to be throwing. More details to come!

Boy, have I been cranking up that Christmas music. My playlist includes: Family Force 5- Christmas Pageant, Crystal Theory- Christmas Chillout, Relient K- Let It Snow Let It Reindeer, Michael Buble’- Let It Snow Let It Snow Let It Snow, Brian Setzer Orchestra- Ultimate Christmas Collection, and a lot of random Christmas favorites on a various artists list.

 I hope you all keep warm today, don’t forget to bundle up! I will see you again tomorrow.

Weight:- 270.8 pounds

Nutrition:-

Breakfast:-

2 Serving Masala Paratha @ 290 Calories Each
1 Serving Tropicana Fruit Punch @ 130 Calories

Lunch:-

1 Serving Large Burger King Fries
1 Serving Burger King Veggie Burger
1 Seving Burger King Large Dier Coke

Dinner:-

1 Serving Lomein

Misc:-

1 bottle of tropicana fruit punch – 240 calories
3 pieces of sweets (Kaju Katli)

Calorie Totals:-

Exercise:-

30 Mins Recumbent Cycle, Heartrate Max:- 156, Heartrate Average:- 142, Calories Burnt: 450

Comments:-

I went to the gym today, I’m currently doing just 30 minutes cardio while I con myself into going to the gym everyday. I used the recumbent cycle, in manual mode at resistance level 10. This is the resistance level that I am currently comfortable with, it gets my heart rate going & gets me sweating. I imagine, i’ll stay at this level for 2 weeks before increasing it to 12. In the near future, I will be bringing my total cardio time upto 1 hr. In the past I’ve used the elliptical trainer, which is great since it has no impact on my feet. I’ve got plantar fasciatis & it gets worse if I use the treadmill. I’ll need to evaluate the resistance on the elliptical trainer from scratch, because when I last used them, my heartrate would stay at about 132~135, which is hardly a workout and frankly probably a waste of my time.

Sandy … if you can’t see all the notes posted in the charts just click on the chart and it will “enlarge” it … you will be able to return to this page using the back button in your browser.  You can leave comments in the reply box below, talk to me in the room or you can call me if you dare.  Thanks.

December is one of, if not my absolute, favorite months. Why? Snow, Christmas, family, vacation–you get the picture. Thankfully yesterday was perfect for kicking things off. My breakfast(pumpkin oatmeal with smart balance peanut butter and maple syrup and a chobani with blueberry jam and double chocolate pillow) filled me up amazingly well. I was not at all hungry after class got out, so I thought I’d seize the opportunity to go to Eastside Market and Whole Foods! Would you believe me if i told you it’s been over 2 weeks since I walked that way? It has! On the way, I came across the best car:

LDYINRED

Would it be awful to paint this car blue as a very involved April Fool’s joke? Probably. First up was Eastside, which looked mostly the same. I noticed they had brown rice sushi now, which might or might not be new, and for less than $5! I grabbed some for lunch and moved through fairly quickly getting just “the essentials”. Then I hopped over to Whole Foods and was psyched to find this.

December Whole Deal

There’s a new Whole Deal! But it has some pretty awful coupons I would majorly suggest stocking up on the old ones before you can’t get them anymore. Again, I tried to be quick and dirty shopping here so as to get back to my dorm. Thankfully, it’s a small Whole Foods and not much changes. I couldn’t even find a single Tofurkey roast Maybe hunting season’s over? I got back at 1:30 so as to only miss half of Days, and unloaded the loot.

Groceries

The Chobani and banana were from the dining hall bought with meal points. Otherwise, it was all from my grocery fund. And while none of it I had a coupon for, I tried to just get sale items and things that were “essential”. Here’s a question: when did I become the type of person who considers fake bacon an essential? The only thing that was really an impulse buy was the Carrot Cashew Ginger soup which, for 75 cents a serving, I was willing to try. I also got this one last thing:

Advent Calender

An advent calender! Frankly, I was a little saddened to find that the 99 cent advent calenders my mom always got us had artificial ingredients I couldn’t eat Thankfully, this one is made with all-natural ingredients and fair trade cocoa to boot! Here’s to a delicious 24 days.

Brown Rice Tuna And Salmon Sushi, Carrot Cashew Ginger Soup

My lunch was simple yet amazing. The sushi wasn’t bad at all for $4.89, although I only ever really eat sushi for the fish. I honestly couldn’t care less for the bit of whole grains and small amount of avocado they give you that hardly adds up to a veggie. The soup was delicious! Albeit a little thin. I think I just like stews and thick bowls of oatmeal, but the flavor was rich.

My afternoon felt like a whirlwind. I hadn’t answered emails or read blogs since 9pm Monday night right before my lock-out experience. Rachael Ray, Ellen, Oprah–I think I was there for them all but I wasn’t really “present”. Before I knew it it was 4:30 and I had a rather odd snack craving.

Acorn Squash With Maple Syrup, Cinnamon, And Sea Salt

For some people(here’s looking at you, Heather), acorn squash might not be so weird a snack. For oatmeal and peanut butter boy here, it was. Nonetheless, I complied, cut up my squash, and steamed it in the microwave, adding a little seasoning at the end. It was perfectly spot-hitting. A little later on the munchies came again and I wanted some protein.

Greek Yogurt With Pumpkin Butter And Peanut Butter Chips

18 grams to be exact. For this I just mixed a plain Chobani with Trader Joe’s pumpkin butter and clear liquid stevia and then added on Sunspire chips–yum! It was such a sweet treat. I love the pumpkin butter with peanut butter for a fall flavoring. As for protein, I don’t generally keep close track of all that stuff; I just aim to have at least 3 high-protein sources through out the day, which often end up being greek yogurt or tofu.

For dinner, the online menu for the dining hall was not promising. Really, there was nothing since even one of the main vegetables was beets which I’ve sworn off for 2 weeks. I still wanted to catch up with my friend, Adam, however, since it’d been nearly 2 weeks since we last had dinner with Thanksgiving being last week. Thankfully, he was fine with bringing takeout to my room, where I whipped up this dish:

Tofurkey Loaf Slice, Broccoli, Carrot Cashew Ginger Soup, Orange Zevia

So I like the soup, wanna fight about it This was a delicious way to serve up leftovers. I was thinking of adding some flax to the soup to thicken it up but I hate playing around with things and so let it be in the end. We caught up on each other’s Thanksgiving and groaned about how ridiculous these next few weeks of work will be and then said our goodbyes to “write papers”(which in my case meant blog). I’m not a terribly political person so I was happy to skip the Presidential address for some serious snackage.

Chocolate Vitatop With Shortcut Cream Cheese Frosting

Oh my God. What have I released? This was sooooo good. Seriously, has anyone else tried this frosting? If anyone made it vegan with Tofutti I would be mondo impressed/intrigued to hear how it worked out. The Biggest Loser was inspiring, as always. I couldn’t wait to see them do a marathon! That’s really going to make me feel lazy and like I need to get a move on that, haha. The Biggest Loser must make me hungry because at 10 I made a large(r) snack.

Whole Wheat Vegan Cinnamon Roll With Cream Cheese Frosting, Yogurt With Cherry Butter, Dried Cherris, And Advent Chocolate

Advent Chocolate In Smart Balance

If I weren’t addicted to running and a health eater I’m sure I’d be driving my doctor nuts. The roll tasted just like a cinnabon; Afterwards I had a better idea for the chocolate. I love how the advent candy was in the shape of a heart. I hope they’re all fun like that. I pretty much gave up work after this(note how there’s a notebook under that food) and just focused on getting a good night’s sleep. I was also inspired to ask myself after watching the Biggest Loser contestants run a marathon why I hadn’t tried to run farther recently? Unfortunately my answer sucked: time. I’ve just always been focused on getting back to my dorm and making oatmeal too much to go the extra mile. And so this morning that’s exactly what I’m going to do(literally). I’m going to challenge myself to go 16 miles. If I have to walk or slow down I’ll let myself and I’ll give myself all the time I need. But that’s why I’m up posting at 6:30–to take a bit of time pressure off as I head out right now. Wish me luck!

So so many giveaways…

Popchip giveaway! Snap, crackle, POP!

Some very sweet nut butters to enjoy.

And an awesome regions best giveaway!

Me: Your breath smells like eggs.

The Boy: Awh that’s mean.

Me: Oh …well I love eggs, you know that. So it’s a compliment really!

The Boy: Kiss me.

Me: Uhhhmmm ….I have to go ….somewhere …..

———————————————————————-

Me: Hey, I need to do a dark wash cos I’ve been wearing the same pair of jeans for three weeks now. Do you have any darks so I can put on a full load?

The Boy: Yeah, I’ve got lots of boxers to put in.

Me: No, no boxers.

The Boy: But they need to be washed.

Me: Tough. I’m not mixing your boxers with my clothes.

The Boy: But why!?

Me: Cos they’re gross! And the water will be filled with your crotch juices!!!!

The Boy: But it’s clean water! It gets rinsed away!

Me: Yeah but before it gets rinsed away, it gets sloshed through my jeans and before you know it, my jeans are filled with crotch water. You can never clean away something like that!

The Boy: *silence*

Me: I’ll just wear these jeans for another two weeks….

My day is over and I am pleased with myself but think I could have been a little better.  The scale will show the truth. 

I exercised today so I am happy about that. I am getting stronger. Currently using the Bowflex system. Will write more about that later.

I have found that sleep really helps my appetite. Note to self: sleep more.

Goal for today: Try to connect with other people online that want to lose weight for camaraderie and motivation.

MACD

Today the MACD gave another danger sign.

Current Trade

I was stopped out of my position at the open.  My 25% stop was set at $0.55 but the gap at the open resulted in a fill at $0.49.  This was a 34% loss.

The Plan

I am in cash and will wait for clarity before getting back in.

The Score

My virtual account is worth $10,605.49 and I am all in cash.

Discussion

I took a pretty big hit today.  I have noticed that every time I take a loss it is when I am trading counter trend.  In this case to the downside.  I may decide that trading this is not worth the risk.

we lornt u boot canta in musyc. jorge

It’s the 1st of December!!!

This means that I can finally be excited about Christmas… My ABSOLUTE FAVOURITE time of year!!!

In my opinion Christmas starts on the 1st of November, But there are just too many cynical Scrooges out there to allow me to begin the celebrations that early!!!

So now bring on the festivities….

Stole the above picture from someones blog, sorry!… It’s so true… I had to have it!

Things I Love About Christmas:

“Hello Buddy the Elf, what’s your favourite colour??”

“Smiling’s My Favourite!”

Neat illustration from r8r's photostream, click on picture to see more

Yaaaay, woke up lighter today – 0.8 kg. I am sure it is all fat… Hehehe, maybe not. But even if it is water I am happy it is gone. I was good yesterday. Ate very light meals and semi-fasted and had 3 cookies (that might sound bad but I would usually eat more cookies and also heavier meals throughout my day). Maybe I’ll explain that in another post.

A side effect of eating light yesterday was lots of energy.

Let’s hope today will also be one of my strong ones. I have to admit that there is a part of me that think it is impossible for me to ever be thin again. Very negative thinking, I know, so I have to prove myself wrong.

XOXO

After asking The Boy if I’d managed to get all the grey hairs out of my fringe (yes, yes, I know I’m only 22, but I also have quick-to-grey black hair) the other night, I had a horrible realisation that I was becoming an asexual slobby creature, like that girl in the McDonald’s ad ….

Maybe these can make me feel a little more girly and irresistible and goddess-like…

So much for getting back into the swing of things! I couldn’t have been more off my game yesterday if I’d crashed my car into a tree and then drew attention to myself by releasing a sketchy statement about it. I completely forgot the first rule of morning time management: The days you want extra time are exactly the days you won’t get it. Regardless, I skipped doing the dishes and ran out the door at 10:45 to grab coffee before class. For the first time, I forgot my camera. What if yesterday was the day I ran into Emma Watson and explained to her about my blog and she offered to pose for a photo with me?… I like to dream big so that whatever happens in the day isn’t a disappointment. Well that wasn’t the case, but I did get my coffee, sit through an rough hour of “welcome back, now work” class, and hustle on back to my dorm to pick up where I left off. After cleaning, emailing, and blog reading, I made another meal of leftovers.

Cheesy Broccoli, Tofurkey Slice, Acorn Squash With Caramel Mustard

I think from now on I’ll just cook everything on the weekend and only eat “leftovers” all week long because they’re always the best. The broccoli was simply steamed and mixed with a slice of cheese from Trader Joe’s. The acorn squash was delicious with the caramel mustard, which I definitely had a heavy hand with(how could I not?). And the Tofurkey roast was still mighty fine, though I made sure not to overdo it again because apparently too much Tofurkey is rough on the stomach! Cost for calorie, these aren’t so bad to buy on sale after the holidays eat throughout the week. Here’s hoping to more in the future!(besides what I still have as leftovers )

I don’t know where my head was because I almost left my room and went to class without any of the books I needed. In history we got back our 3 midterm essays, all of which I did really well on and lifted my spirits. Then we got our final paper topic–yikes! That’ll be 12-15 pages of get-me-out-of-here. After class I “had” to dash back to my dorm to pick up stevia packets for a coffee before epic poetry(going to class without a coffee would be dangerous). Unfortunately, as New Englanders know, the weather was awful in the afternoon and my plans to grab something at Whole Foods were no more. I headed back to my dorm, at which point I was struck with a Jimmy Neutron brain blast.

Pumpkin Oatmeal With Butter Toffee Peanut Butter And Shortcut Cream Cheese Frosting

I loved this recipe so much, I had to post it immediately. That is seriously going to change the way I eat anything carby(probably not for the better but oh well). Oprah had some awesome guests on, including Sugarland, all singing Christmas songs! It was pretty awesome–I wish I’d known to tivo it. Afterwards I had to get out even if it was raining. Naturally I chose the bookstore.

Coffee At The Bookstore

I realized I forgot all my cold-weather clothes at home, as well as an umbrella and q-tips. Again, where was my head? After perusing I couldn’t find any good coats, and the umbrellas were a bit much(and I completely forgot about the q-tips ) so I left empty handed. I was still feeling a bit snackish, though, so I dug up this bar back at the dorm.

Lemon Ginger Gnu Bar

Wowza! I think this bar had the most flavor out of any of their bars, and I really really liked it. The lemon and ginger were both loud and it made a fun study snack. While doing some work before dinner, I realized I hadn’t heard from my friend if we were doing dinner. That’s because I forgot to turn my phone on in the morning and it’d been off all day… wtf. After getting some texts and finding out I was too behind for the rest of the world, I ended up grabbing something and eating in.

Vegan Roasted Vegetables, Sweet Potato, Wildwood Teryaki Tofu

Do you see the sun? It needed to come out at some point. Before I dug into this, I realized, I took my only fork home before break and forgot to bring it back. What’s wrong with me? Chopsticks and my baby spoon it was. Unfortunately, the flavors were not nearly as sunny; this was one of those meals that just felt like a waste after eating it(except the sweet potato, which would take a lot to feel like a waste). I wish this tofu had half the flavors on the ingredient list but in the end it tasted much like their savory flavor and wasn’t teryaki at all. As for the veggies, I tried to ignore the massive amounts of olive oil, but I had to stop 3/4ths the way through and throw out the rest. I don’t mind healthy fats, but I’m not a big fan of olive oil :-/ Nuts, peanut butter, avocado–all good. But this was too much to an absurd amount.

The night just went downhill from there. Heroes was OK but nothing to draw my attention, and my stomach just felt off, which I’m going to go ahead and blame on the vegetables. I did some light reading but realized I was tired. Could I go to bed at 9 and be asleep at 10? Was that allowed? Why the hell not, so I shut down my computer early, and figured out what to have right before sleeping.

2% Greek Yogurt With Strawberry Jam And Strawberry White Chocolate

Well the night wasn’t a complete bust; I removed 1oz plain and replaced it with 1oz full fat yogurt to give the base a 2% taste. Then I swirled in strawberry jam(technically ”conserve”) and topped with a shaved Divine bar and some more jam. Just what I need before going to be–sugar. Midway through this I realized I forgot to brush my teeth, and so went to the bathroom to do that. In the 3 minutes I was in there, my roommate must have came home and grabbed something, locking the door and leaving. I was locked out in my pajamas, glasses, barefoot with a toothbrush–glorious. I freaked out for a minute and tried running outside to find him but no luck. Thankfully, one of the RC’s on the other side of the dorm was home and called campus services on my behalf. She also lent me slippers to wear while I waited outside(in 40 degree weather) for the campus security to show up. By the time I got in my room, i completely missed Big Bang Theory and was quite livid. The only thing I could do from wanting to tell someone off was eat this.

Deep Chocolate Vitatop

I’m not sure how well that worked, but heating it a little extra and just holding it in my hands for warmth made me happy. I totally didn’t get to bed early like I had planned, and the entire night felt like a waste. I maybe got 20-30 minutes more of sleep than normal–maybe. When I woke up I just needed to run it out, so I grabbed this and just left:

Amazing Grass Berry Energy Bar

I swear I always run farther than planned when I have an Amazing Grass bar. Stock up while they’re still on sale! I was first thinking 8, then pushed it to 10, then settled at 12. 3 days in a row? I think that’s a new favorite distance. My time was a little slower(1:41:11) but not bad. I was very pleased that my room wasn’t locked when I came back this time, and I was able to get in and make a quickie breakfast.

Pumpkin Oatmeal With Smart Balance And Maple Syrup, Plain Chobani With Blueberry Jam And A Double Chocolate Pillow

Is there anything better than opening up a new jar of PB? I bought this Sart Balance with agave to replace the one I had with molasses–it’s just better! And perfect on some salty oats with maple syrup. And the yogurt–yum! I love the combination of chocolate and blueberry but it’s so hard to find in foods unless I make it myself. The pillow cookie made a perfect, rich cocoa topping.

How about a question of the day, shall we? Tell me either your worst story of being locked out(fortunately this hasn’t happened too me more than 2 or 3 times in my life) or your most annoying roommate story(I realize my roommate could have been a lot worse so now I want to hear about those who were). And here’s to December not being as bad as November ended!

Hello Friends!  Alan here:  It’s been a long while since I’ve posted.  As the folks at the candy bar company say, “sometimes you feel like a nut…sometimes you don’t.”  I’ve had a good off-chemo week.  We had a great Thanksgiving as we changed up our surroundings and trucked to Dillon to enjoy the day with my family.  Happy to say that I’m on par with my standard Thanksgiving Day Turkey and Trimmings Demolition rate.  Having held steady with my weight for the first 12 weeks of treatment, I’ve been adding about a pound here and there (so to speak) over the last 4-5 weeks.  Weight gain is finally embraced!  Go figure…

Sometimes, if original ideas were dynamite I couldn’t blow my nose.  It’s times like these that I’m forced to evoke the truly oldest profession….plagiarism.  My Aunt Kay gave me a book at Thanksgiving.  Title of the book is “IF YOU WANT TO WALK ON WATER, YOU’VE GOT TO GET OUR OF THE BOAT” by John Ortberg.  A quick word on my Aunt Kay…if she were a cereal she would be “Special K”.  Not because she ever rode a short bus, but because she’s just that sweet.  

As noted, I’m going to be very unoriginal today and directly quote Mr. Ortberg’s book:

I believe that God’s general method for growing a deep, adventuresome faith in us is by asking us to get out of the boat.  More than hearing a great talk, or reading a great book, God uses real-world challenges to develop our ability to trust in him.  

We tend to seek a world of comfort.  We try to construct manageable lives with some security and predictability to maintain the illusion that we are in control.

Then God “passes by” (as Jesus did while walking on the water while the disciples’ boat was in peril-AD) and shakes everything up.  The call to get out of the boat involves crisis, opportunity, often failure, generally fear, sometimes suffering, always the calling to a task too big for us.  But there is no other way to grow faith and to partner with God.

Wow.  I don’t know about you, but that sounds a wee bit familiar to me.  It may have occurred to other disciples to ask Jesus to “command me out onto the water” with Him, but only Peter piped up and said it/did it.  Even in a stormy sea, a little fishing boat, creaking, yawing, in danger of sinking is more “comfortable” than being out in the water…particularly when God is calling us to a task. 

Can you imagine that THIS was a (comparative) comfort zone?

So the questions that come to my mind include the following: 

• How do we discern what God wants us to do?  By building a prayer dialogue with Him and asking for the ability to discern His will for us.
• What is my boat?  What is the comfort zone that I don’t want to leave?
• What do I do when I step out of the boat?  I DON’T KNOW!  I keep thinking of storehouses/warehouses and I get a sense that this is a very human construct to which God really wants us to let go.  When the Israelites were delivered from slavery in Egypt, it’s not like they were wanting for divine attention.  God opened the sea for them to walk through and then used it to smash their pursuers.  If God wanted, it would not have been much more of a miracle to equip the Israelites with large trailers full of well-preserved food.  Instead, He wanted them light and nimble…and CLUELESS about tomorrow’s food.  And then it fell from the sky.  I guess they had stepped out of the boat.  And I bet NO ONE in the group knew what they were going to do.  What do you think?

OK.  I’m going to go comb my hair and talk to it about staying put.  After last week’s treatment I had a loss of ten hairs and I thought that was the beginning of the end for my pompadour.  Once I became less toxic that minor hair loss stopped.  Now that you’re all up to speed on the level of my vanity, I’m off to Round #8.  

It feels very good to be writing to you again.  I’ll check in again soon!  Thanks for all your prayers.  Greetings to all my friends in Chicago for the week…good luck and be careful!  Love,

Alan

Nutrition:-

Breakfast:-

1 Serving Diet Coke
1 subway foot long egg & cheese sandwich with mayo

Lunch:-

Half Serving, Olive Garden Egg Plant Parmigian (Leftovers)

Dinner:-

100gm Basmati Rice
1/2 Serving Thai Pa-nang Curry (Left Overs)
1/2 Serving Paneer Tikka Masala

Misc:-

2 Pieces of Kaju Katli (Indian Cashew Sweet)

Calorie Totals:-

Exercise:-

None

Comments:-

Not such a great start up day. Ate mostly unhealthy foods in an effort to get rid of leftovers & the fact that I was hungry. I did not exercise, since I wanted to come home, get some of the many pending chores done & sleep off the very hectic weekend with dad.

MACD

Today the MACD continued to indicate a downtrend.

Current Trade

I established a new position buying 210 contracts of the QQQMO which is the $41 Jan Put.  I paid $0.69 per share.  Today’s high was $0.75 the low was $0.62 and the close was $0.63.  My 25% stop is at $0.55.

The Plan

I will continue to hold this position until  I see a danger  sign in the MACD or until I get a significant daily drop.

The Score

My virtual account is at $13,860.76 with an open position.

Discussion

I got back in today to the downside based on the MACD ’s continued downtrend.  However, it looks like we are getting close to the end of this downtrend.  I will probably get out with any decent ROI over the next few days.

So…I’ve lived in this bloody country for some time now… When it comes to Academic Writing, my skills aren’t worth shit… Eighty fuckin’ percent… Well, 80% my ass… I am a failure…

bats are not brds.  jorge

Good morning! In case you were travelling over the weekend, there was a new recipe dreamed up on Black Friday, a review of Clif bars, a day that had me blushing beet red, and a 2nd, meatless Thanksgiving.

After that awesome lunch, I needed time to digest on the couch with Montana, and then got to work on my next project.

Christmas Tree

The Christmas tree. After chopping it down yesterday and leaving it in the cold overnight, we finally brought it in. Traditionally, I do the lights and the cranberries while my mom does the ornaments afterwards; since I was moving back to my dorm I needed to do this snappily. I was happy at the end I love the lights on a Christmas tree. I think the ornaments are always nice and personal but it’s just not a tree to me if it doesn’t light up.

Afterwards we got to packing up. I dreaded this. It always feels like I have more going back than coming home, and this time I knew I did because of all the leftovers and extra clothes. Ugh. Thankfully with enough helping hands in the house this wasn’t too bad and shaped up pretty quick.

Packed Bags

I think it was a backpack, 3 bags of food, 2 of laundry, 2 of random machinery, and a stevia plant. Because, really, how could I live without all of that? We swung by my grandmother’s apartment to pick her up because she likes to come “just for the ride”. Wouldn’t it be nice to have time to go for a ride just because you have nothing else to do? 60 more years and I’ll be there.

Double Chocolate Pillow

Of course before hitting the highway we wento McDonald’s for some decaf and I broke out one of these cookies. I think it’s always the case that things grow on me after a few days, because 4 days later and I’m now becoming obsessed with them. Seriously, just smelling the cocoa–bliss. On the way down we stopped at Target looking for a movie. Alas, no luck But underwear was on sale and that’s close enough to grab, right?

Moving back in was actually quite quick and painless with enough helping hands(again). The rug looks awesome since my mom brought down her vacuum to clean it up(thanks!). I definitely lost track of time in all of this and realized I was hungry. A little cookie is not a substantial afternoon snack, but you know what is?

Laloo's Strawberry Darling Goat's Milk Ice Cream

Ice cream. I’m surprised this has survived the common freezer for so long, but yesterday I decided it was time to polish it off(only about 1 serving left anyway). I love the tang of the balsamic vinegar in this. Something tells me adding balsamic vinegar, even an organic one, to strawberry chobani wouldn’t work the same. When all the groceries were away I enjoyed staring at a full fridge.

Full Fridge

Really? Is there anything more blissful? I’m surprised I managed to cram it all in there; it looked like it might not make it and I’m glad I left some tofu at home for another weekend. I also found this which I snuck into my bag:

The Killer Angels

I don’t really “pleasure read”, and if I had time to, I’d probably choose a book I haven’t read, so I’m not sure why I brought this. But I do love and recommend this book for anyone wanting to read a psuedo-historic novel. I did a huge paper on it and the battle of Gettysburg in 11th grade. As you might know, I’m a Classics major, but besides that American history 1640-1865 is my other area of interest. There’s a movie, Gettysburg, based on this book I have yet to see but I can’t wait to find it some day.

Dinner started off a little disgusting; I went to get one of my sweet potatoes and found it covered in mold–yuck! That’s actually never happened with the food I keep under my bed but I guess there’s a first for everything. Instead, I had to improvise.

Broccoli, Turkey Breast, Cinnamon Raisin English Muffin With Lightlife Breakfast Sausages And Maple Syrup

You know how sometimes your eyes are bigger than your stomach? Yeah, story of my life day. First there was being stuffed from a stuffed tofurkey and acorn squash, and then there was this. The turkey wasn’t anything special, I just wanted to eat it up before it got moldy like a sweet potato. The english muffin with sausage was the real money maker here. Does anybody else remember McGriddles from McDonalds? That’s EXACTLY What this was like, except with infinitesimally less trans fat. Oh my God, so good. Rest assured it will be made again. Unfortunately, there was one casualty during dinner.

Broken Amazing Grass Bottle

My Amazing Grass bottle I dropped it on the floor while it was full and water went pretty much everywhere–fun. After cleaning it up I went to the bathroom and tried refilling it, wondering why it kept being empty. Smart one, Evan. I think they carry these at Whole Foods? That’s what I’m hoping at least. After getting ahead(ahead! not catching up!) on work I made a snack and settled in for A Dog Named Christmas.

Peanut Butter Soy Yogurt With Fig Jam And Peanut Butter Chips

I don’t expect much from cheesy, holiday, made-for-TV movies, but this one was even below expectations. I expect them to suck, but to also be cutesy, and the child acting in this was not cutesy. This snack also did not disappoint even though I was iffy on the flavor combo. I think I forgot to sweeten the base but thankfully I bought a Vanilla flavor. I completely forgot I even had fig preserves but they were still just as good. And the pb cheeps were nice and sweet, nothing at all like real peanut butter and yet just as magical

After I’d put up with bad child acting for an hour, it was time for a new Brothers & Sisters. Last weeks episode was not on because Adam Lambert needed to whore it up at the AMA’s, but this week there were supposed to be great plot twists and secret revealings–it did not disappoint. Midway, I snacked on this:

English Muffin With Pumpkin Cream Cheese And Honey Maple Peanut Butter Topped With Me And Goji Granola

2 english muffins in one day? I was on a roll. I liked the crunch from the granola. And the gojis I’m sure were some decent brain food. I also love “rediscovering” peanut butters I forget about. Brothers & Sisters I thought was awesome–can’t wait until the wedding(or will there even be one?) next week.

I was exhausted so I knew I wanted shut eye but for some reason, as tired as I was, I wasn’t getting to sleep. I don’t know how much I slept overall or how many times I woke up/had weird dreams. This was one harsh “welcome back” to the swing of things. When I woke up, though, I was ready to meet my old friend–the gym. I made a quickie snack.

Kashi Strawberry Flax Waffle With Banana Peanut Butter

Normally I like bars that I can take on the treadmill but for some reason this was what appealed to me best. When I got there, it was packed for 6:50am(read: 3 other people). But then it quited down and the regulars started showing up. I didn’t concern myself too much with pace or anything; I was plenty happy to be back and watching the Today Show(does anybody care about Tiger Woods’ car crash at this point? really?). In the end I did 12 miles in 1:38:59. That’s almost exactly like yesterday, which is good because I tend to be slower inside than out. When I got back, I relearned how to make a dormroom breakfast.

Pumpkin Oatmeal With Pepita Butter And Maple Frosting, Eggnog Yogurt

This microwave just ain’t the same as the one back home. For the oats I used Caitlin’s pancake frosting recipe with a little vanilla stevia. I think my cooking skills were on vacation and are just getting back, too, because everything was underseasoned/sweetened. Afterwards, I added more stevia and cinnamon to the yogurt and some vanilla sugar and salt atop the oats and that perked things up.

And so, clearly I’m relearning dorm life after a week of bliss. I suppose with finals and papers coming up I won’t even notice the time between now and Christmas vacation, right? Now if you’ll excuse me, it’s cyber Monday, and as dirty as that sounds I have some deals to catch.

Lol, so I was back in the blogosphere a whole five days …and then I disappeared again!

Basically Judy (baby girl ginger kitten) got sick and I spent all my free time worrying about her, instead of blogging.

So here is my last few days in bulletpoints:

• General Week: Work, Cry, Sleep, Work, Cry, Sleep, etc, etc
• Friday Night was spent watching the Late Late Toy Show, which always signals the beginning of my Christmas season and which was actually good this year, unlike the past ten years that Pat Kenny strangled it.
• Saturday morning, after a thorough investigation of Judy, we decided she seemed much better and we wouldn’t need to drug her and smuggle her passed the caretaker and to the Saturday Morning Vet.
• 8pm,  I arrive back home to find she has now suffered a cut to the inside of her eye, which looks like it could become a gross infection.
• Saturday afternoon was spend finger painting and making things out of lollipop sticks and baking a Tank cake with a six-year-old and two four-year-olds. Note to self: mixing icing with small children is a terrible idea.
• Saturday night was filled with X Factor, jager and cider. ending up in a local nightclub and then wandering the streets alone clutching a bag of chips and asking God (outloud) to please let me get home safe. Gooooood times though!
• Late, late Saturday nights ….being out-smarted by my five-month-old kittens who managed to steal and eat my chips, which were covered in vinegar and salt. Kudos to them for not puking afterwards.
• Sunday was spent chirpy and listening to GaGa while cleaning the apartment.
• Sunday night consisted of Family Fortunes and X Factor, while cuddled up on the couch with The Boy and the kittens.

Had a dream where I was still going out with my ex.  I followed her all over what was suspiciously like a mix of the UIUC campus and the Wisconsin Madison campus as she went to find her classes.  She was always two steps ahead of me.

She was pre-med in this dream and we had made it through the hardest of her starting weed-out classes as  a couple.  Somehow, I knew she was going to dump me.  I don’t know why I was sad: knowing we were going to break up, or knowing that we were actually broken up IRL while I followed her around like a puppy dog.  My mind would point out the slightest incompatibilities between our personalities as we ran around places, despite my dream self’s happy complacency, and say, “See?  That’s why we broke up.  That’s why we’re going to break up.”  But still, all the while, running around was fun.

I’m going to have some breakfast.

No more dreams about this.

Would you like a holiday gift idea for a close friend that costs no money, but will change their life for the better?   Here it is …

Give your friend a holiday card that tells them that for 365 days you will commit yourself to encourage and inspire them, at least weekly, to live any goal, dream, or passion they might have by the end of the year.  We all have goals, dreams, and passions, but what we don’t always have is the support of a good friend.  In doing this you might actually get inspired to accomplish your own goal, dream, or passion.

— The YoliLife Team

I’m glad to hear that I delighted some of you with my embarrassing beet story(and that I’m not the only one!). On my run today, which I’ll get to, I asked myself this: What makes someone a “full-time blogger? Is it the amount of posts they make per day? Surely I or someone else isn’t less of a blogger for posting all at once what someone else posts spread over 3 times. Is it someone who can live off their blog income alone? Ha! If somebody can do this, congrats to them and they can go f— themselves(jk here ). Or is it someone who just loves posting and is inspired by the whole community and blogs when and because they feel like it? I’d argue the last one. What do you think makes a full time blogger?

Oatmeal With An Egg, The Heat Is On Peanut Butter, And A Morningstar Breakfast Patty

Unfortunately, today was one of those mornings when my hunger was there but my appetite wasn’t. I had no clue what to make and went through a number of dishes before settling on this. Most mornings my tongue tells me what dessert(because my breakfasts always taste like a dessert to me ) I want but on the rare occasion that it’s vacationing in Rio I feel up a creek without a paddle. These oats, Green Dog Wine style, were delicious nonetheless. I decided that this morning I would run(2 days off and I feel like a sloth, haha) so after letting breakfast settle for 5 minutes I grabbed some fuel.

Apple And Double Chocolate Pillow

This fuel was fun(oh em gee, the title of this blog!). The apple was adorably small; I think any fruit that’s a little abnormal is adorable(plantains, anyone?). And why didn’t I realize how good these cookies are? When I had it on my oats Friday, I thought it was pretty decent, but needed a milkiness to it. Today, however, it was perfect: like bittersweet chocolate but with a cakey texture. That had me revved up for a strong run. I first went around the neighborhood 6 times for 6.7 miles. After that I set out on the road for my small loop around town of 5.3 miles. Both of these were my “long run” at some point so it felt awesome that I could do them both on one day now. When I got back in the neighborhood I noticed my dad had been sent to drive around and find me so I figured it was time to stop I did a great 12 miler in a little under 1:39. Not a bad “welcome back” to running. When I got back, I was ready to try a new recovery drink.

Vega Acai Berry Sport Drink

Vega was nice enough to send me some of their powders to try out a while ago and I’m just getting around to them. I’ve never experimented much with energy powders but this one seemed simple enough: just mix with 1 cup of water and shake what your momma gave ya’. It says drink before a workout but I think the nutrition still works for post-run recover. I’ve never had an acai berry, but this was rather nice; the flavor was a lot like a diluted blueberry flavor and definitely nothing I minded drinking. I’m not quite convinced yet specialty powders and drinks are necessary for optimal recovery but I guess I’ll see how this makes me feel tomorrow. Once I showered, it was time for our family Sunday lunch, which felt like a second Thanksgiving!

Carving The Tofurkey

Yesterday we picked up a Tofurkey on sale at Whole Foods and I couldn’t wait to give it a try; this is like the epitome of fake meat products, right? We cooked it in the oven according to directions, and it looked beautiful all done. It was both my dad and I’s main protein, and my grandmother even took a slice!(though I’m not convinced she had any clue what the hell she was eating). After I made my plate, I could have sworn it was Thanksgiving all over again.

Tofurkey, Roasted Brussels Sprouts, Acorn Squash Stuffed With Canned Cranberry Sauce

I actually think I ate more here than at Thanksgiving lunch. Oops. Well there wasn’t going to be much leftovers so I thought I’d seize the moment The tofurkey was excellent, but it felt like a little much. I seriously think this is sitting like a brick in my stomach right now. The stuffing was amazing for being whole wheat; I wonder if they sell that seperate? I’ll need to try Tofurkey deli meat to see if it’s the same. The squash + cranberry sauce was equally excellent. I still can’t imagine how cranberry sauce is accepted as a lunch item and not dessert but I’ll take it!

Speaking of dessert, let’s not. I don’t think I have any room :-X Now I’m off to decorate the tree! And then it’ll be time to pack the car and go back to campus Boo. Can’t I just live here again and pretend like work doesn’t exist? I’ll just dream on…

If you want a good laugh at another’s embarrassing story, by all means read on. After sleeping in, not running, and blogging yesterday morning, I got around to breakfast. I wasn’t super hungry from pre-sleep turkey but oats are always appealing.

Pumpkin Oatmeal With Smart Balance Peanut Butter And Banana Pineapple Frosting

See? Always appealing. At first I think I oversweetened the greek yogurt for the frosting(who knew this was possible?) so I added a little more plain to dilute it and it was muy perfecto.

Even though I had declared my rest day and the wind was 20 mph, I decided to gear up for a 6-7 mile slow paced run. And then the morning got a little weird(feel free to skip to lunch if you don’t want to hear tmi). After a pre-run trip to the bathroom, something I was fearing happened again–my “stool” had red color running through from it in the toilet water. This had actually happened several times in the past 2 weeks between that and urine, but I, being a stubborn Pollack, would rather ignore anything that looks negative from a medical perspective. Having happened two days in a row, though, I brought it up to others and suggested we go to the hospital. I think just about everything went through my mind as I showered and went from running clothes to day clothes; all of this thinking about diseases really had me anxious and pushed my limits. And then when I came down ready(though not quite mentally) to face my medical fears, Dr. Dad had an explination: beets.

Beets, as described by wikipedia, are a member of the amaranth family. The are a root vegetable with a bright red pigment, and over the past 2 weeks when I’ve been home my mother has been preparing them at a much more common rate than usual since she discovered how easy they are to prepare. And one of the side effects is having red coloration in the toilet. Well, very perplexed, I consulted the blog and looked at all the days I remembered being worried by this and when we ate beets. And it seemed that, always a day or two before an “episode”, I ate beets. Really? I was thrown into all this anxiety, embarrassment, and anger because of beets? Ugh. We nixed the trip to the doctors and now I’ve ressolved not to eat beets for two weeks to make sure they’re the culprit(and then never again because I’m not going to go through this BS). That pretty much wasted my morning and the run, so I moved on to homework and then lunch.

Stuffing Stuffed Pepper

2 Eggs Scrambled With Celery And Shredded Turkey

I made two of the leftover dishes I’ve been wanting to since Thursday. I heated up a pepper in my pan and some stuffing in the microwaved for a delicious stuffed pepper. If it were a little bit more runny of a stuffing, it would have been perfect, but it was still good. I loved the slightly runny eggs with the turkey; it sort of made its own sauce, and was a perfect protein with a little salt. I’m going to miss making proper eggs when I get back to the dorm today. After lunch we decided to pick up our tree. While my dad drove, I walked(it’s not even a mile down the road). They even let me cut it down. Now whose bright idea was it to hand me a saw?

Cutting Down The Tree

It wasn’t a perfect job, but no fingers chopped off. After I walked home and the tree was dropped off, we took a trip to Whole Foods. Don’t you hate missing a sales period or weekender? Well, they didn’t look too too good this week, but I was glad to get a bunch of deals between coupons and sales and then the stuff we needed. We also stopped at Trader Joe’s and Stop & Shop. Has anybody noticed that Trader Joe’s doesn’t sell chocolate covered peanuts, milk or dark? They sell chocolate covered everything. I can sooner get chocolate soy beans than I can peanuts. Ummm, what? Though they do now have chocolate oranges with all natural flavorings which I hope to have one of this season. Oh well, that was pretty much the only thing on the list we couldn’t find.

Groceries

I got a total of $4 off two Green & Black products between coupons and sales–score. Can you tell I like my organic chocolate? The star of the trip was the Tofurkey! It’s for my dad and I for lunch today, and was 3 dollars off at Whole Foods I figured since it’s a frozen product that’s good for 2 more years, it wouldn’t go on sale any more than that so I seized the day. I can’t wait to see what it’s like. I also couldn’t wait on another Whole Foods find:

Pumpkin Oatmeal With Pumpkin Cream Cheese, Peanut Greek Yogurt

A Whole Foods exlusive pumpkin cream cheese was on sale for 4 dollars a tub. It had in it pumpkin, honey, ginger, walnuts, and spices. It probably wasn’t something I couldn’t have made, but it was convenient and sounded good. And it tasted awesome! The spices and walnuts really worked with the creaminess and it was very sweet. And though the oatmeal and yogurt were in two containers, rest assured they were eaten as one Before dinner I caught up on Slapsgiving 2–legen, wait for it… I also tried watching an SNL but it crashed everything and that was the end of that. For dinner I forwent leftovers *gasp*.

Lentils In Trader Joe Curry Simmer Sauce, Broccoli, Roasted Zucchinni, Full Fat Voskos Greek Yogurt

One of the non-sale items we picked up was Trader Joe’s Curry Simmer Sauce; I was looking at getting a prepared Indian meal but the sauce was a better bargain. I cooked some lentils and let them simmer. The flavor was good, but it probably could have used a little more curry. The yogurt I felt was very Indian and a nice touch This meal reminded me, though, why I hardly ever have lentils or beans even though I love ‘em(i.e. buddha belly and discomfort). I suppose it was that or sleepiness from turkey, right?

There was an entire Charlie Brown Movie on ABC Family. I love my specials, but after 90 minutes I was tuckered out and couldn’t finish it. Instead I moved on to fun for the whole family: Knocked Up. What else is better to watch with the fam? I also had a vitalicious snack.

Coffee And A Vitabrownie

On a paper plate because, at 9pm, I’m not aiming to impress anyone I still think these taste best in circular form with evident chocolate chips(i.e. the vitatops), but they didn’t have them where these were on sale for 3.99 so I compromised for a bargain. The rest of the night was filled with about 4 cups of decaf coffee, and then this two-faced inspired snack.

Vegan Whole Wheat Cinnamon Raising Roll With Smart Balance Peanut Butter And Pumpkin Cream Cheese

Um, perfection. Since coming home I have not stopped craving smart balance agave sweetened peanut butter. Have you noticed? That’s why I picked some up at Stop & Shop to take back to my dorm. I don’t know why the flavor is better than molasses sweetened, but it is. This pumpkin cream cheese is also to die for; I loooove that it has crunchy walnuts for texture. And the vegan rolls are just always euphoric I went o bed nice and happy with this in my stomach, until I woke up at 4:45 and couldn’t sleep. I decided maybe I was hungry and that this snack would knock it out:

Cinnamon Raisin Gnu Bar With Pumpkin Cream Cheese

I tried this new gnu bar, heating it up in the microwave and then topping it with the cream cheese. Wow, this was all good. The bar was just like a good slice of cinnamon raisin bread with a nice earthiness, and the cream cheese made it perfect. It definitely filled me up, but that must not have been the problem because I was still awake for quite some time.

I woke up at 8:30 this morning–a tad bit of an improvement from 9, right It’s definitely time for me to get a move on it and make breakfast. And, who knows, a run might even happen today(could you imagine that?). I’m going to need to make plenty of room for my Tofurkey for lunch! Haha.

Sodastream Giveaway! I could make some very bubbly seltzer with this bad boy