Saturday morning breakfast?  A bagel.  Dry, plain, cinnamon raisin.  Don’t ask me why….  just felt like it.

It was quick and easy, which was what I needed since I woke up at noon.  Oops.

I had some good highlights yesterday.  First?  A good ole’ trip to Whole Foods.  It’s really close to where I live, but I still don’t go all that often because it’s so flippin expensive!  Most things I can get at Trader Joes or Safeway.  When I walked in, I saw these:

Have you ever had kumquats?  I grew up eating them.  My grandma (and when I was younger, before he died, my grandpa) live in Florida where they own several acres of citrus tree groves.  On those groves, they have several kumquat trees.  I used to love going down there and just walking around, picking kumquats off the trees and popping them in my mouth.  I have never seen them for sale in a store, neither in Pittsburgh or here in California, so I had to get some. 

These bad boys were SOUR!!!  I still like them, but I think it is more because of the mental aspect.  Because the taste makes your face pucker up!  S had one and said, “No more!”  That’s ok, more for me

I also picked these up at Whole Foods.  I have seen lots of people eating them and saying they are delicious, but have never tried them.

Food Should Taste Good chips!  I got the Sweet Potato ones, and they are delicious!  I ate 3oz (half the bag) and was impressed with my ability to not eat all of them. 

Finally, for my third interesting outing for the weekend, S and I went to an Asian market.  Once again, we picked up lots of goodies that will be seen in later posts.  The main reason that we went there was to buy the ingredients for us to make sushi at home!  In December, S brought home some nice sushi plates that he won in a white elephant game at work.  Ever since then, we have been meaning to make sushi.  We have decided tomorrow will be the day!  We picked up the necessary items at the Asian market.  So we’ll see how it goes.  This should be interesting

I love, love, LOVE going to asian markets.  Besides the little drawback that I can’t read any of the signs so I’m not entirely sure about what 99% of the items actually are…  They have such interesting things and usually have great prices.  I mean, just for the veggies I picked up… I got some broccoli crowns for $.79/lb, some zucchini for $.69/lb, and an avocado for $.50.  I got some chestnuts:

And some dried anchovies (love those bad boys, even though they make everybody else gag…)

Look, you can even see the eyes

And I got lots of sashimi!  A big block of salmon for my sushi tomorrow, and a mixed package which I ate tonight.

Just drizzled with some soy sauce.  Yes, I eat raw fish off a plate by itself.  That’s how I roll.

This was about half, I had the other half later on.

Here’s my salmon I’m saving for my sushi:

There was also more grape consumption:

Outside of my foodie activities today…. I went to the library!  I love going to the library.  I went to Campbell library today, which is a lot closer to me than the Saratoga library, but is not nearly as nice.  And it was totally PACKED today.  I ended up getting two books that I have been wanting to read:

1. Little Bee by Chris Cleave
2. That Old Cape Magic by Richard Russo

I will read Little Bee first, because it is only a one-week library checkout.  I can’t wait, I love getting new books!

Now I’m off to enjoy some of these:

Along with some fudge and some ice cream sammies for dessert.  Yay for Saturday nights!

Thank goodness it is Friday. 

Breakfast:

Nutella sammy, raw peanuts and three medjool dates.

Lunch was leftover tuna casserole.  Once again, the day after tasted better to me.  I love that!

Mid-afternoon I had some Weetabix cereal for a snack.  Eaten directly out of the box, sans picture

Good mid-afternoon gym trip, where I did 40 min on the elliptical and read the latest Shape magazine.  Katharine McPhee is on the cover… anybody else read that one?  Anyhow, she has gone blonde.  I think that she looks great.  I have been considering going blonde for a while now (I even had a few failed attempts in the last year…)

I think another attempt might be in order?  One thing that I have always been concerned about is the fact that I have pretty dark eyebrows.  So I didn’t know if it would look funny if I had blonde hair…  I think that sometimes it can look trashy if you have dark eyebrows and blonde hair.  But it looks fine on Katharine, and it gave me hope that maybe it would look ok on me…

After visiting Jim, I made a trip to Tar-jay, where I got a fair number of goodies including these:

The ingredients list is pretty good…. with the exception of that damn yogurt drizzle coating.  Why do they go and put that hydrogenated corn syrup crap on there and ruin a good thing?

I polished one off in the car on the way home, because I was starving, and one more when I got home.

I also picked up some grapes on sale.  They were really crunchy, which is exactly how I like them!  I got a huge container (2.5 pounds) so will be eating grapes a lot for the next day or two (S doesn’t like them that much.)

Dinner was an improvised hodge-podge.  Broccoli, spinach and roasted pork mixed with half a can of condensed cream of mushroom soup.  With baby carrots and flax seed crackers on the side.

Dessert was some chocolate and ice cream sammy.  No pick.

You are the weakest link.  Good bye.

I guess that having too much chocolate is a good problem to have, right?

My day started with a little chocolate, of course.  With toast and nutella, and a pear.

Mid-morning I was totally craving some oatmeal.  So I made it and mixed in a little brown sugar, a pear, and some cinnamon.

See that pear in there?

I love oatmeal.  I keep thinking about how I should eat more of it, especially now that it is cold.  I don’t know why I don’t eat it every day!  As soon as it gets hot outside, I will wish I ate more of it in the cold weather…  So maybe I should fix that problem so I don’t have to live with any regrets

Lunch started out with some spinach and onions sauteed in EVOO.

Then they became one of the many toppings in my hugh jass.

Right after lunch, my doorbell rang.  It was the Fed Ex man, with a special gift!  It was a package of Dove chocolate that I won in Rebecca’s giveaway!!!  Now… my house is already on chocolate overload from the initial batch that S’s family brought us from Switzerland, the huge amount we brought back from Switzerland a few months later, and the Christmas box full of chocolate that his family sent to us last month.  And since S eats chocolate a maximum of once a month…. that leaves it all to me.

That’s a lot of pressure!  Especially for someone who tends to be a binger and who works at home…  but the fact that there is a lot left shows that I’m not doing that bad!

Anyhow, the chocolate I won in the giveaway was a good compliment to what I have because none of the Swiss chocolate I have has peanut butter in it.  Europeans aren’t big on peanut butter in general, it seems.  The dove chocolate was with peanut butter, so it was perfect!

It came in a cute little bag:

And this was the loot (minus one bar, which I ate as soon as I opened the box!)

THANK YOU, REBECCA!!!

In the afternoon, I ventured out to the gym.  I was pleasantly surprised when I walked in… it wasn’t packed!  In fact, it was even a little bit on the empty side!  I got my choice of machines, and I chose the stepper.  Happy Raychee.  After about 10 minutes, though, everybody and their mother showed up.  I guess everybody was just running late today.

Or maybe they were just waiting for me to get there

Either way, I got my stepper.

I came home and made tuna casserole for dinner.  I kind of made up the recipe as I went along, but it included a can of tuna, sour cream, parmesan cheese, peas, onions, celery, condensed cream of mushroom soup, some seasonings, and egg noodles.

Topped with provolone cheese and some breadcrumbs crumbled with a little buttah.

The cheesy, crispy top was the best part!

I am proud to say that I limited myself to two desserts today.  An ice cream sammy,

And one of my new chocolate bars. There are five sections in each bar, but I ate one so fast that it didn’t even get in the picture…  Thanks again, Rebecca!

Thank goodness tomorrow is Friday.  I can’t wait for the weekend!!

I tell you what, I am about iPad-ed out.  And the dang thing has only been revealed for a day!

Breakfast:  Nutella sammy with a hard boiled egg and a greek yogurt.

Profile:

Peekaboo, nutella, I see you!

Mid-morning I snacked on a braeburn.

Lunch was leftover rigatoni with tomato sauce that I made for S’s dinner last night.  And some baby carrots.

And lots of cheeeeeeeeeese.

Mid-afternoon I got on my treadmill to watch Oprah.  No running today, I just walked 3 miles and varied the incline.  I like how I have been making so much good use of my treadmill lately.  For a while I didn’t use it.  I guess that’s because it was summer and SO HOT in my house.

I was very excited to see that Michael Pollan was on Oprah!

I am ashamed to say that I haven’t fully read any of his books.  I have read about them in many places, and have looked through them at Barnes and Noble, but have yet to read one cover-to-cover.  Well, I promise you that is going to change!  I just have too many books to read, and not enough time to read them in!  But his book(s) are next on my list. 

Has anyone read them?  Do you have a suggestion of which one I should start with first? 

I don’t think that I could ever be a vegan or a vegetarian.  I do eat a lot of veggies, but I am a girl who loves her meat.  The thing I like about Michael Pollan, however, is that he’s not anti-meat, but rather he is pro-REAL FOOD and not what he calls “edible foodlike substances”. 

Overall, I think that I eat pretty healthily.  However, I do eat too much processed food and too much sugar.  Even things that I think are real foods, like the chicken breasts I eat regularly, I can improve on by buying grass-fed rather than just the regular corn-fed option.  I have to admit, I have a tough time forking up the extra money to pay for grass-fed or other sustainable food options sometimes when I see the cheaper versions that look almost exactly the same right next to them.  But the more I hear about it, the more I realize that we have to change what we are putting into our bodies.  I’m going to try to do it a little bit at a time.  Baby steps.

Dinner was good to put in my body.  I had a Hugh Jass with romaine, broccoli, carrots, onions, chicken breast, ham, mozzarella cheese, egg whites and flax seed crackers.  With olive oil and vinegar, of course.

Oooh, and check out what I got today!  A Camelbak Better Bottle!

BPA free, and pink of course.  I have been wanting one of these for a long time and am very excited about it!

After dinner, I had some Swiss white chocolate with white chocolate mousse filling.

So good.  I also had a handful (or two) of jelly beans, followed by an ice cream sandwich.

I have literally been having three desserts every night.  This has GOT to stop. 

Now I am finishing up some work and headed to bed.  I barely watched any TV today, besides Oprah and that doesn’t count, because I was on the treadmill

I am feeling a little better today than I was yesterday.  I think that Jack Bauer has something to do with that, as does the Biggest Loser which I am writing as I type this (and snack on jelly beans, of course.  Gotta eat while watching the Biggest Loser… it’s practically a law.)

I think Chef Ramsey and Hell’s Kitchen had something to do with it too, as S and I are catching up by watching Season 4.  Love that show.  Why is it that TV seems to be one of the things making me the happiest these days?  Besides food, my cats, and S?  That can’t be a good sign.

Breakfast was a peanut butter and honey sandwich on french bread (of which I ended up eating each half separately… wasn’t feeling the whole sammy deal this morning) with some dried fruit and some flax seed crackers.

I made these crackers salty – using garlic salt and some italian spices.  Next time I make them, I am going to try a little bit of sweetness by adding some maple syrup!

Right after I finished breakfast, the doorbell rang.  I was pretty surprised (who comes over at 7:45am??) and answered it… to find S standing there.  Turns out he missed the train to work, so drove back home from the train station and decided to work from home for the day.  I must admit, that helped my mood a little bit too

Mid-morning I had a granny smith apple.

For lunch, I had the leftovers from the chicken pot pie I made last night.

I wasn’t sure how well it was going to reheat, since I kind of squished it all together in a tupperware container.  However, it was delicious!  I think that the flavors blended a little bit more in the fridge overnight.  It tasted even better than last night.

Mid-afternoon, I went to the gym.  Alone… even though S was working from home.  He is still sore from when we went on Sunday… he did the pushup game only with ab crunches.  And since he hadn’t done ab crunches in a really long time before that… he is majorly sore.  I told him not to do so many, but when was the last time he listened to me?  So I went by myself.  I did 30 min on the stepmill and then did a quick Target run for some staples I was running out of (cottage cheese, lettuce, etc.)

At Target, I picked up some whole wheat dinner rolls.  I am always on the lookout for bread like my beloved Subway rolls.  So far, I have not yet found anything that can compare.  But these rolls looked promising.

I was starving when I got home, so had a quick snack of a (VERY) large fuji apple with some almond buttah.

I made myself two turkey and provolone sammies with lettuce, pickles and onions.

I didn’t have any tomatoes or black olives, which are always staples on my Subway sammies.

I will have to pick them up next time I head out.  But my sammies were delicious nonetheless.

Not quite as good as the Subway bread, but I think it is the closest that any bread has come yet!

Dessert was… cottage cheese cheesecake pudding with a crumbled cookie from Switzerland on top.

As I mentioned, I am now snacking on jelly beans.  Let’s examine the jelly bean timeline quickly, shall we?

Day 1:  One hot day in July, S’s family was here and they bought me that huge container of Jelly Bellys from Costco.

Day much later:  January 5th, I had a little over half of the container left.  Not bad restraint, Rachel!

Day not too much later:  Today.  Down to about a quarter.

I never know how many I eat at any given time, because I refuse to eat them in any way except directly out of the container.  They taste better that way! 

And so the jellybean saga continues… 

I also ate a piece of white chocolate, which jumped into my mouth before the camera could catch it.  Slippery little sucker.

I leave you with a picture of my happy family.  This is why sitting on the couch and watching TV (and blogging) makes me so happy.  Look at the three bundles of love I get to sit with. 

G’night, ya’ll.

I don’t know what has been going on with me recently.  I have been on a total emotional roller coaster… and am not quite sure of the exact reason why.

Last night I had a little bit of a meltdown.  I haven’t had a big binge in a while, but really late last night I went crazy with the ice cream.  There was about 3/4 of a half gallon of sugar cookie ice cream left… and I ate every single bit of it.  Out of the container.  With a spoon.  Which of course made me feel even worse, so I went to bed with a bellyache and a bad attitude.

The good news?  It didn’t lead me into a full-fledged binge as it would have before.  That is partially because of S – he literally came downstairs and took the spoon out of my hand and led me upstairs.  But that’s also because for some reason, I just didn’t want to do it.  I felt sick already and my “eat everything in the house because I already ate a container of ice cream” mentality just didn’t hit me.  As sick as I feel today, I am pretty proud of myself for that.  It makes me realize that I have come a long ways.

I wasn’t hungry when I woke up this morning, but forced myself to eat breakfast.  I didn’t want to not eat it and then be overly hungry later on.  Or feel like I could or should eat more later on because I didn’t eat breakfast.

A pear and french bread nutella sammy.

Lunch was a big salad with some of my flax seed crackers, turkey, cheese and veggies galore.

Mid-afternoon, I had some more ice cream as a snack.

This time, I polished off most of a pint of blueberry pomegranate ice cream.

Now I don’t have any more ice cream left in the house, thank goodness.  And I will NOT be buying more any time soon.

Then it was time for a date with Oprah and my treadmill.  I have been using my treadmill a lot more lately.  I think its for a combination of reasons:  1.  Because the crappy weather makes me not want to leave my house to go to the gym, 2.  Because the gym has been so completely packed, and 3.  Because work has been really busy so it has been hard for me to break away for long enough to go to the gym.

Today Rosie O’Donnell was on Oprah.  I find her really interesting, and enjoyed the show.  One thing that she said really resonated with me.  She was talking about this one time in the dressing room before a taping of “The View” when she absolutely screamed at Barbara Walters.  She let out all this anger and rage, and said some really hurtful things.  But the truth was, she was really hurt.  Barbara hadn’t come to her defense earlier, and it hurt Rosie’s feelings.  Rather than tell Barbara that she had hurt her feelings, though, Rosie just let out all this rage.  On Oprah, she said “If I was brave enough, I would have cried.”

That just hit me.  And it’s so true.  So often I mask my feelings of hurt, fear and insecurity with anger.  I don’t want to show my “weakness” so I lash out.  I tend to do this to S and my family a lot.  Isn’t that what we always do?  Attack those closest to us?  Funny how in that split instant, I perceive sadness or fear as weakness and try to show how strong I am by yelling or saying hurtful things.  But the truth is, that is weakness.  It takes true strength to show and express your feelings.

Anyhow….for dinner, I decided to make an easy chicken pot-pie.  S had never had one before, and I thought he would love it.  First I mixed up the innards.

I improvised a little, and used ham and sausage along with the chicken.  I combined the meat with frozen veggies and a can of cream of mushroom soup (plus 1/4 cup water and some spices.)

Then I put a pre-made refrigerated pie crust in a pie plate.

Spread in the meat and veggie mixture,

And put another pre-made crust on top.  Folded together the edges, cut some slits in the top for air, and pop it in the oven at 400 degrees.

After baking for 40 min, it was ready!

It was absolutely delicious.  And so quick and easy!  I would definitely recommend this recipe for a weekday night when you want something semi-homemade.

Dessert was cottage cheese cheesecake pudding with strawberries and cinnamon toast crunch.

Now it’s time for my weekly dose of Jack Bauer.  Surely he will make me feel better.

I have no idea where my weekends go.  I know that I say that every Sunday but… I really mean it.

Today I spent the whole day watching football.  During the second half of the Indianapolis game, I baked up some baby quiches to snack on.

Good thing S was there to eat the other half of the package, because I polished off this whole plate faster than you could say “I’m in love with Peyton Manning.”  And I don’t know about you, but I can say that very fast.

After a not-so-great first half, the Colts came back for the win.  Yay!  Then on to the second game of the day.

I actually didn’t have a favorite to win, Vikings or Saints.  I don’t really like either of them.  But at least it was an interesting game!  During the game, I polished off a cottage cheese cheesecake pudding with strawberries and angel food cake.

I was tired and grumpy after the game, but made myself (and S) go to the gym.  I like to go on Sunday nights rather than Mondays, because Sunday nights are always pretty empty, but Mondays are packed.  I did 30 min on the stepmill (and felt like I was going to die…)  S did stepmill too

The highlight of the gym trip?  We stopped at Subway on the way home!!!  YAY!  I had my footlong turkey on whole wheat:

With a bag of Cheetos on the side.

Sometimes ya just gotta have those Cheetos.

It’s not easy bein cheesy.

I don’t know what my problem is tonight.  I just feel totally down and not like myself… but I can’t put my finger on why that is.  Hopefully watching some Hell’s Kitchen that we DVR’d will help…

My Sunday morning is consisting of quite possibly two of the best things ever.

French toast, made on French bread.

With Nutella and maple syrup.

And this:

Catch you on the flip side, peeps…

This morning I woke up bright and early, totally excited to have my first German class!

I turned on my hair straightener to heat up in the bathroom, then went to get dressed.  When I came back into the bathroom, here is what I saw:

Yes, that’s Mendy.  With her entire body shoved into a teeny little drawer in the bathroom.  This cat is totally hilarious.  She loves trying to fit herself into the tiniest spaces she can find.

S got up with me, and we went out for a healthy breakfast at McDonalds.

I love the “Wakey Wakey” on the hash brown!  That’s what my daddy always used to say to me when ie came to wake me up in the morning for school.

Wakey wakey!!!!

Ah, the memories.

So anyways, we finish breakfast and drive to my class.  I go into the office and pay all the enrollment and class fees (YES, it was EXPENSIVE) for my Adult Beginner German class, and then S dropped me off at the classroom and left.  I walked in and started introducing myself and talking to the teacher and the other students in my class.  They already all knew each other, which I thought was a bit strange.  It all became clear a few minutes later, when I found out that they had already completed a semester of the class.  It turns out they started in September, and they were already halfway through the book and the German Beginner class!  So, as a total beginner with virtually no German knowledge, I was coming in to the class halfway through the year!  I looked at the work that they were doing and talked to the teacher, and it was clear that there was no way I would be able to catch up and keep up with the class.  I was just too far behind.  I (and the teacher) have NO IDEA why they didn’t tell me that when I signed up for the course.  Especially because I intentionally and clearly stated to them that I had no German experience or knowledge and I was a total beginner.

So I had to go back to the office, get my check back that I had just given them, and explain why I couldn’t take the class.  Then I had to call S and have him come back to pick me up.  I was (and still am) so sad that I can’t take the class.  I was so excited for it!  I tried looking for other classes in the area but was unable to find any.  There were a few at local colleges, but they also start in the fall and won’t allow me to come in and start at the beginning in the spring semester.  So I either need to work on my own or wait until the fall to start a beginners course

I’m thinking about getting Rosetta Stone or some other sort of language learning software.  I definitely need one with audio that I can listen to, because it is too hard to learn it properly just by reading.  I need to understand the different sounds.

Has anybody used Rosetta Stone?  Do you know whether it is good or not?  It is pretty expensive and I am trying to figure out if it would be worth the investment.  Or do you have any other language learning method you are familiar with or would recommend?

After my disappointing morning, we went home for lunch.  I had  a turkey salad with some flax seed crackers crumbled on top.  I made those crackers in my Excalibur dehydrator!

These crackers are amazing! I got the recipe on Choosing Raw.  I just soaked flax seeds in water with some garlic salt and a few other italian seasonings sprinkled in.  I soaked them for an hour and a half.  Then I just spread the mixture on my Excalibur sheets lined with parchment paper.  Dried 3 1/2 hours at 115 degrees, flipped them over, and dried another 3 hours.  Then, I had:

So incredibly easy.  And so good, even S liked them!

Mid-afternoon S went to the DMV to practice for his motorbike license test.  I stayed home and did a little cleaning.  I had a snack of a yogurt.

I also snacked on these:

I know, rice cakes are so completely empty and void of any nutritional value.  But when I saw this new Vanilla Creme Brulee flavor at the grocery store, on sale(!!!!) I had to try them.  I’m a sucker for anything creme brulee flavored.  And they are tasty.

Between this snack and my dinner/dessert, I ate the whole bag today!

Here’s how I finished off the crumbs:

On top of cottage cheese cheesecake pudding!  NOM NOM NOM.

The rest of my random dinner included celery with peanut butter, pita and baby carrots with hummus, and an apple.  Apparently my camera was as hungry as I was because it somehow ate my pictures.

Now I’m going to read in bed and nosh on candy.

I’m going old school with Nerds to start with.

Then we’ll see where my sweet tooth takes me… I have a feeling it will be in the direction of the swiss chocolate…

It.is.still.raining.

How is that possible?  Apparently someone still didn’t get the memo that this is in fact sunny California.

My coworkers that I work with on a daily basis are located all across the country (and internationally.)  They keep asking me about the tornadoes we are having.  I keep reminding them that I live in northern California, which is very far away from southern California where the tornadoes are occurring.  That’s how I was too, though, before I moved here.  I assumed that it was really quick to get from LA to San Francisco.  After all, they are both in California, right??  And everybody must know one another as well.

Not like it’s a big state or anything.

Hearing the rain during the night was nice and soothing.  Hearing my alarm clock go off at 5:55am for my first meeting was not.

During my meeting I was hungry, but was sharing my computer screen to show and annotate some files so I couldn’t get up and make anything.  Plus, I think I was to tired to make anything anyway.  So I went for a quick and easy Clif bar.

Still hungry after my meeting, I went for a protein-packed greek yogurt.

I’m glad this week is just about over.  I have just about had it with work and rain.  Not that it might not rain this weekend… but at least I won’t have work! Plus, I can’t wait for football on Sunday.  I am going to be so sad when football season is over

Also, I start German language class on Saturday!  I am very excited to start learning.

I am going to pack breakfast and lunch for school!  Just like in the old days.  So I decided to practice with a lunch box lunch today.  A ham and turkey sammy with swiss cheese, and an apple.

Even though this is “natural” swiss cheese, you can tell by looking at it that they actually make fake holes in it to make it officially swiss cheese.  I didn’t even think about that, but S was laughing at it.  So now every time I eat it, I think about it.  Isn’t that amazing?  They actually punch holes in the cheese to make it look authentic.

Snack was quick and convenient – a Kashi bar.

Then a string cheese…

It was still pouring rain outside so I didn’t feel like venturing out to the gym.  So it was a treadmill kind of day.  Just me, the treadmill, and Oprah.  Today’s show was about addictions.  There was a man who was addicted to food and reached 540 pounds, woman who was an alcoholic, and a guy who was addicted to drugs.  Stories about addiction always hit home with me.  The good thing was that the people on the show were all in recovery so it put a little bit of a positive light on it.  But it was still sad how they lost so much and hurt so many people with their addictions and subsequent behaviors.

I ran 6 miles with Oprah.

My afternoon snack:

S stayed late in San Francisco, so I was alone for dinner and the night.  I was feeling really lazy, so continued my convenience food kick with this:

Yep, since I couldn’t eat dinner with S, I ate with Amy.  And it was goooooooooood.

And that so good was followed by this so good:

Just me, the carton, and a spoon.  Which resulted in this:

Bye bye, sugar cookie ice cream.  Luckily, I have one more half gallon in the freezer.  Once that’s gone, I’m done until next Christmas when the flavor comes out again

By 10, S still wasn’t home.  I finished up the episode of Rescue Me I was watching (love, love, LOVE that show!) and nibbled on this:

Now I’m off to read and head to bed.  Tomorrow morning is my last 6am meeting of the week, YAY!