Excuses, Excuses

Wow, it's been almost a week since I last posted.  Sorry guys.. the last few days have totally gotten away from me.  I had a migraine for a week straight and it took a LOT out of me.  I'm in a crunch time at work and therefore have ended up spending the work hours super stressed.  I came home from work and all I wanted to do was collapse and not think about anything.  This weekend has been spent cleaning cause Danielle is coming to stay with me, yay!!  But as I've explained in the past, I'm not the neatest person on earth.  Bathroom, bedroom, kitchen, check.  (Minus a load or so of dishes.)  Tomorrow I have to tackle the living room and the carpets and then everything will be ready to go.  I'm excited since this is my first blogger meetup!  (And praying that for once I can actually take a perfectly clean house and maybe, I don't know, KEEP IT THAT WAY.  We will see..) 

I also don't have any food pics for you.  But I haven't eaten anything you haven't already seen before.  Today I had mac and cheese for breakfast, apple jacks for lunch, and a yogurt mess for dinner.  I'm aware that none of that really makes any sense but it's what I wanted at those times.  I forget how strenuous cleaning is so right now my back and legs are super sore.  I took Molly for a walk this evening to stretch my legs, I think we went for a mile or so and it was nice and relaxing.  Right now as I'm typing this I'm realizing I'm starving... it's 11 at night, oh what to do.  Anyway, this has turned into rambling and was never very interesting to begin with so I will end this now.  I hope you are all enjoying your long weekend, I will see you soon :)

Chocolate Cake!!

The big secret from yesterday was that I was making a cake for a friend at work for her birthday.  Sunshine, (real name, fact,) had her birthday this month and even though I was late (bad friend, fact,) I decided to make her a cake.  It was bad enough that it rained on Sunshine's birthday :)

I got a couple of recipes off the internet, if I can find them later or tomorrow I will link to them.  The first was for chocolate buttercream frosting.

Seriously, I could have eaten this with a spoon right from the bowl.

After the frosting came the cake:

All was going well until...

Fail

I tried to take it out of the pan too soon and it all fell apart.  Deep breaths.  I needed two so I just sucked it up and started over.  All came out well in the end.

Isn't it pretty?

The best part is that Sunshine liked it.  For someone who is the pickiest eater on the planet, this was a huge success.  The rest of my team like it as well.  All I brought home was an empty plate.  I'm really sorry for the lack of links to recipes but I will find them and link them tomorrow.  I was cleaning tonight and it's late and I'm too tired to look for them at the moment.

I'm not having the best day either.  I have personal stuff going on right now that I don't want to get into, but it's taking a huge toll on my mood.  Not to mention getting an infuriating facebook message from someone I barely know attacking my religious and political beliefs.  Those are not things that I tend to mention on this blog and I still won't, but there is nothing worse than arguing over those two things.  It never gets anywhere and at this point in history, there is no such thing as "let's agree to disagree."  Although I did try that and it didn't work.  UGH.  Hopefully I get a good night's sleep and wake up for a head-clearing run.  I think I will watch a little RHONJ reunion to put me to sleep.  Nothing like Danielle's craziness to put a smile on my face :)

Homemade Pizza and a Beer, The Dinner of Champions

Phew.. this has been a long hot day.  I've been slaving away all day in the kitchen, sweating and cursing and breaking things and making new ones.  I have to hold off telling you part of it till tomorrow cause shhhh, it's a secret.  But I can fill you in on dinner!

Dinner was homemade pizza, made with the same crust I used to make this.  The recipe for the crust is here.  I made two, one for J and one for me.  I started mixing the dough in the kitchenaide.

Then I formed a ball, rubbed it with olive oil, and let it rise for an hour.  I ended up with this:

While it was rising, I got the toppings together:

Pepperoni, pepper, onion for J.  Mushroom, pineapple, pepper for me.

I split the dough and made two pizzas.

J's

Mine

Cook em up!!!

Sorry about that.  I got a little carried away and forgot I was a food blogger before I cut into mine.  It was very, very good.  Especially when washed down with a Labatt Blue Light Lime :)  Bud Light Lime used to be my favorite beer, but since Labatt started making a lime beer, it has trumped all others.  Labatt is my favorite brand since I'm almost Canadian you know.  I come from a town that waves both flags after all.

I hope everyone had a great weekend!  Mine was pretty boring and uneventful so this is all the fun stuff I have for y'all today.  See you tomorrow when I can share the rest of my day!

Working Overtime For No Extra Money Blows

Seriously.  Y'all don't even know.

Sorry for the lack of a post yesterday.  I found myself with not a whole lot to say and I figured better to skip it rather than bore everyone.  This hasn't been the best week.  I don't really know why, other than I started my period the other day.  (Sorry to any men reading this right now.)  I will be at work and counting the minutes till I can go home and that's not really like me.  I'm really tired which I'm sure is related to this time of the month.  It's just ugh.  The first couple of days this week I was SO BORED at work.  My job is like this, it goes from boring to slammed to boring to slammed, all in a cycle.  So guess what happened... today I got slammed.  It started yesterday but today it all really hit the fan.  I woke up with a migraine so I didn't go running.  I couldn't get rid of it all day so I was sort of drugged on meds and just trying to get through the day.  At 4:00, I had a meeting where I found out that there is work to be done that needs to be done by tomorrow morning at 10am.  Seriously??  I came home and relaxed for a while and finally got rid of the headache, and then sucked it up and logged into work and spent two tedious hours inputting data from a spreadsheet.  I just finished and I don't even have the energy to shower.  I washed my hair in the kitchen sink and am going to call it a night in a few minutes.

To try to say something positive about the week, I have two things:  First, I think I mentioned that my car needs some extensive repairs.  I had a quote from my mechanic for about $1200 worth of work, and could be cut down to $630 before taxes if I didn't repair something that was recommended, but not necessary.  Being broke at the moment, I decided on the $630 repairs obviously.  The thing is, I'm not too thrilled with my mechanic lately.  I used to love them and felt like they really did a good job, but the past few times I've gone something bad has happened.  This all came to a head when I got an oil change and my Check Engine light came on right afterwards.  I brought it in, they said they checked all fluids and they didn't know what was going on but they were sure it wasn't related to the oil change.  I got home and had a bad feeling and popped the hood.  Look at that, totally out of coolant.  They checked my fluids?  Really?  I'm pretty sure coolant is a fluid, and a pretty necessary one in the 100 degree NC summer we have been having.  Anyway, I'm rambling... so I was talking to a friend and she asked me to bring the estimate to her mechanic and ask if they could do it cheaper.  So I did, I literally walked in and slapped it on the counter and said, "Can you beat this?"  Mind you, I brought the $630 estimate.  After checking and looking everything over and looking at the car, they brought me their estimate.  It was for $566, AFTER taxes.  But wait... it was for the work that was originally quoted at $1200.  Sold, done, it's getting fixed tomorrow.  Oh yeah, and this place will bring me to and from work as well.  Fabulous, fabulous.  Do you need to ask if I will be switching mechanics?

The second thing is that I ran twice this week.  This may seem like a failure but I don't think so.  Tuesday it was pouring rain, so I missed it.  Today I was dealing with the migraine and was absolutely unable to go.  Tomorrow the car needs to be in at 7am, so there won't be time.  I plan to work out this weekend to make up for it but I am proud that the two days where I woke up and was able to go, I went.  I wasn't lazy, I didn't choose to sleep for another hour, I just did it.  That makes me happy.

I'm about to pass out so I'm going to sign off now.  I apologize for no pics, if it makes you feel better, you have seen all the food before.  I am not being creative this week :)  I hope you all have a great Friday!

An Amazing Salad

You are all about to be treated to almost a full day of meals from me.  Crazy, I know, I don't think I've ever photo'd every meal of the day.  You're welcome :)

I woke up this morning all set to go running.  My breakfast/lunch was packed and ready to be picked up from the fridge, I drank a bunch of water last night, went to bed early, etc.  I was awake enough to get up before 6 so imagine my frustration when it was pouring rain at that time.  I'm just not hardcore enough to run in the rain.  Back to bed I went.  I will try again tomorrow but I promise as long as it isn't raining I will go!  I just got off the phone with my best friend, we promised each other that by the time we see each other at Christmas, we each will have lost 20 pounds.  Not to mention that I will also have Brittany to answer to :)

I was starving when I finally got up an hour later so I made my new favorite thing:

Toast with peanut butter, half a smashed banana, drizzled with honey.  It was easy, quick and filling.  I also ate a yogurt mess later in the morning, but I figure you can only see so many pictures of those :)  Lunch was the salad I promised you all yesterday.  I sat down and got it together, only to realize I had left my camera at my desk.  I went back to get it and Jenny said, "You better take a picture since you promised on the blog that you would!"  The perils of having IRL people reading the blog... ;)

Spinach, iceberg lettuce, dried cranberries, sunflower seeds, 1/2 avocado, 1/2 mango, feta cheese, topped with organic orange-cranberry vinaigrette.  It's really good, and actually very filling.  I never cease to be surprised when a salad fills me up without any bread or anything else.  I think it must be the fats in the avocado, mango and seeds.  Either way it's a good thing!

After a painfully long boring day at work, I came home and made dinner.  I realized that I'm in a serious pasta slump lately with all the shrimp pasta and mac n cheese.  It seems like every night I have some variety of pasta.  Tonight I decided (grudgingly) to break pattern.

Two over easy eggs and cinnamon raisin Ezekiel toast with Earth Balance.  It was filling but not super satisfying.  I am a carb freak and as such, I tend to wayy overeat pasta and breads.  When I realize that it's out of control and I start to cut back, I have cravings and get a little miserable.  Don't misunderstand, I am definitely not advocating low carb.  I clearly had 3 pieces of bread, granola, and a bunch of fruit today.  But for me it's not about what I eat, it's about portion size.  I let myself eat as much fruits and veggies as I want but portioning pasta is hard for me.  I can easily put back half a box in one sitting when a serving size is actually 1/7 of the box.  At 200 calories a serving, that means without paying attention I can eat up to 700 calories worth of pasta and that doesn't count the sauce, cheese, olive oil, etc that I top it with.  I also don't count calories and don't believe they are all created equal, but I DO know that packing away 1000 calories without even realizing it isn't a good thing.  So I need to cut back to "regular" sizes even if it means being a little miserable for a couple of days.  I will adjust :)

I'm out now peeps.  I gotta prepare to run tomorrow and hope it doesn't rain.  Have a fabulous night :)

Advice Needed

Do you see this sweaty mess??  I woke up early this morning and finally went running.  (By the way, running is a total exaggeration.  I went "wogging," as Brittany would say :)  Aka, walk/jogging.)  I went to sleep early last night and woke up this morning, in the dark, and forced myself out of bed.  Molly was super excited.  I stumbled out the door, hated myself for the first half, woke up for the second half, and felt great by the time I got home.  It was a terrible time, 2.6 miles in 45 minutes, but I took practically the entire summer off and now I'm back at square one.  We had gotten as good as 25 minutes.  We will again, I'm not too worried about it.

Getting ready for work was kind of rough though.  Even after a cold shower, I couldn't stop sweating!  I am not one of those people who doesn't sweat.  I sweat a TON.  It takes a while for me to cool down so after the shower it was pretty difficult to straighten sweat-wet hair and put on makeup.  The makeup went on ok.. the hair ended up in a bun.  There was no saving it.  Plus, I had to get food ready so I didn't have time to just sit down, chill, and cool off.  So tonight, I got everything ready for food so that if I go tomorrow I will be able to take a few minutes to sit down after running.  I'm hoping to go tomorrow, but there are no promises.

This afternoon I got a migraine.  I learned a long time ago that strenuous exercise causes me to get migraines.  I first discovered it with spinning, which was later at night and I would wake up with the migraine.  Now, even though my time may make it look as though my run isn't a huge deal, I find it difficult and therefore strenuous.  I get really really hot and that is the main cause I think.  Also, even though I do my best to relax I always have tight shoulders and neck afterwards as well.  This also causes headaches.  I googled "exercise induced migraines" this afternoon and I was shocked to find out that up to 35% of people suffer from this!  And it's for the reasons I thought, overheating and tensing up and also the spike in blood pressure that comes with exercising.  I like working out, and I need to work out, but I don't always want to be suffering a migraine every day that I do work out.  Does anyone else have this problem?  Are there any suggestions?   I'm taking Excedrin migraine for them but I'm sure it's not healthy to take them every day.  I drink a ton of water, I warm up and cool down, everything that was suggested.  But if any of you have a tried and true idea I'm all ears.

Sorry for the lack of food pics today.  I made a great new salad for lunch today but didn't have my camera.  I will try to take a pic tomorrow, it's SO good I will have to share it.  Breakfast and dinner were standard and don't really need mentioning :)  I'm off to stretch my tight muscles and watch one more episode of Without a Trace.  Bed early so that I'm more likely to wake up in the morning, goodnight blog friends :)

A Strange Saturday Evening

Hello everyone!  How is your weekend going?  Mine is ok, I have been sort of laying around all day.  I planned to exercise today but I've been so behind on sleep that I let myself just sleep all morning.  This afternoon I cleaned my kitchen.  It took forever, I hadn't cleaned since I got home and J let it get to be a mess and it's kind of built and built till it was a little ridiculous.  Everything is good now though :)  After the kitchen was clean I spent the rest of the afternoon watching TV.  J went to see family so it was definitely a perfect chance to veg out.

Dinner was my shrimp pasta minus the shrimp.  I took the tomatoes and cream and put on top of pasta.  It was really good and quick.  After dinner I really wanted something sweet, but there isn't anything like that in the apartment at the moment.  Until I remembered the heavy cream I used for dinner... and had a fabulous thought...

Do you see where this is going?

Yummy :)

Homemade whipped cream and blackberries.  I can be very creative when I want something!

I'm watching something odd at the moment on TV and I feel compelled to share.. you know how you are channel surfing and you end up watching something you would never plan to watch?  Well, that's what happened tonight when I came across this show on polyamory.  (No clue if that's spelled right.)  Basically, the show is following a woman who has two boyfriends, and they all live together.  Her and one of the men have a baby together, and the father of the baby also dates other women.  The other guy seems happy to just be with her and help with the baby.  It's definitely interesting.  They all appear to be completely happy with this arrangement and everyone is the best of friends, and I don't really know what to think.  On the one hand, I think it's totally bizarre and absolutely not for me.  I see her come in from a walk with one man and give the other man a kiss, and then he turns around and introduces her to his date.  I'm not really a jealous person, but I would definitely NOT be ok with my man introducing me to his date.  Not even if I had just come in from a walk with my OTHER man.  On the other hand, if they are all truly ok with this relationship and are happy like this, then to each their own.  It's none of my business.  If nothing else it makes for some really interesting TV watching.  On a purely feminist note, (another thing I definitely usually am not,) I am thoroughly enjoying that this is a woman who has multiple men.  Whenever you hear of this kind of thing it's usually a man with multiple women.  It's nice to see the tables be turned!