Long one.

Today was a long day. A really long day.

I am currently in my last semester of college, and I have reached the point where it is near impossible to motivate to do any work. So being stuck at school for 12 hours straight having nothing to do but homework is strikingly similar to how I envision hell.

Luckily Jeffrey brought me lunch today!


Leftover chilli with a hunk of wheat bread! I ate all of the bread and about 3/4 of the chilli. Jeff brought a lot. What a guy!

It is simply impossible to make chilli look appealing... As I was waiting for the chilli to heat up in the microwave, I did a little bit of stretching. I find that stretching throughout the course of the day and then right before I go to sleep makes a huge difference the following morning.

I snacked a bit in the afternoon. Unfortunately, I was running around campus so much I had to sneak the snacks in transit, so no photos. I had an apple, chickpea blondie, and a couple of Mary's crackers, all of which held me over until dinner.

More leftovers!


I had another navy bean burger with lettuce, tomato, onion, and a little bit of jalapeno goat cheese (so good!) all on sprouted wheat buns. This enormous burger was paired with some mashed sweet potato on the side. I also chopped up a yellow pepper for me and my man friend to split. I was a little light on the veggies today, and I was trying to bulk up where I could. I will be better tomorrow!

Dessert was two coconut date rolls (unpictured). If you have not tried coconut date rolls, do so now. You can find them at Whole Foods, Trader Joe's, and probably any local food coop.

Gretta is ready to go to sleep. As am I.

Playing with pictures!

In the past 24 hours, I have begun playing around with the brightness, contrast, cropping, etc. of my pictures. Thanks, Jeff! It is a slow process, but I think I am actually beginning to learn how to use my camera.

I have a long list of eats today. First off, lunch!

On really good days, I get free lunch from work. By free, I mean expired, of course. We sell pre-made wraps, and sometimes I am lucky enough to be around when the expired wraps get pulled. Today was one of those glorious days. I saw the avocado aioli wrap sitting on the "expired foods table," I inspected it for mold, and off I went. You will learn I am a complete scavenger of free food...


I paired my wrap with some Mary's Gone Crackers.

Later in the day, I got really hungry and did some snacking sans camera. I also met up with my boyfriend and a couple of his friends for a beer (and possible a chicken wing), which somehow escaped the camera's eye also. Whoopsies.

By the time we got home, I was more than ready for dinner. Luckily, my lovely boyfriend had prepared everything in advance, and all we had to do was heat it up. Dinner was a navy bean burger (made from expired navy beans...again, complete scavenger), with portabella mushrooms, tomato, onions, and lettuce. The burger was huge! Jeff also made the most delicious mashed sweet potatoes I have ever had! So much butter.


And then I spied a furry friend lurking in the corner...

She wanted a burger too. We refused. Then, I stepped away from the table, and when I came back, I found the little beast in a very compromised position.


Maybe that's why she is getting plumpy...

No dessert for me last night. I decided to pick my poison yesterday, and I chose beer.

This morning, I managed to get outside for a two mile run and ab work! I am trying to incorporate ab stuff into my daily exercise routine. What can I say, Angela is an inspiration. The run was okay. I was a little disappointed by how difficult it was. Last time I did this same loop it felt so good! The ab work hurt a lot too. Oh well, these things take time.

When I came home, oats and coffee!

1/2 c oats
1 small banana
1 (heaping) T of PB
1 T chia seeds
Sprinkle of cinnamon, nutmeg, and agave
1 t hemp protein powder

I got a sample of hemp protein powder a few days ago. I was a little nervous about how it would taste, but in the end, I didn't taste it at all, and it had a whopping 13 grams of protein! And it looks like chocolate chips, doesn't it? This is giving me ideas....


Sooo much peanut butter. Sooo good.

Now it is time to go to school (for 12 hours!!).

Meet Gretta.

This is Gretta. I have neglected my furry friend for too long on this blog. I got Gretta last year (it is almost our anniversary!) very impulsively.

I was always a dog person. My mom has cats; Sweetness and Bobo. Sweetness is an ill-tempered, 25 pound ass, who is named after the pimp in He Got Game. Bobo is autistic, and I often forget he exists.

I work with cat people. They would come into work in the morning regaling stories about their cat falling asleep in a box or tripping on cat nip. Sweetness would pop into my mind. "I don't like cats; I'm a dog person."

Then, I met Jeffrey, and in turn, Fandals. Fandals is Jeffrey's cat. She is equally as fat as Sweetness and almost as ill-tempered, but for some reason, I warmed up to her. She lays in puddles, on her back, with her paws crossed. Awesome. Soon, my co-workers stories about cats became precious, and the idea of having a cat of my own was slowly forming in the back of my mind.

One day, I was sitting in the office at work, and I decided I wanted to go to the animal shelter "just to look around." I didn't necessarily want to adopt a cat, but I wanted to look. Lo and behold, I was met by Gretta's enormous, sad eyes, and I was filling out paper work.

It was one of the best decisions I have ever made.

Gretta is an integral part of my life; thus, Gretta is an integral part of this blog.

Man , I take bad pictures.

I am mad at myself for two reasons this morning. One, when I woke up for my morning run, I looked out the window, saw it had snowed, and climbed right back in bed. Two, I could not seem to keep my hands steady long enough to take an okay picture.

In terms of the running, I actually think I have made some progress. When I blew off my run this morning, I felt really guilty. That has never really happened to me before. Oh well, I will make it up on Friday (my original rest day).

As I was laying in bed, feeling guilty, my stomach started growling like I have never heard it growl before. I honestly did not know if I was going to make it until my oats were done. Luckily I did, and now I feel just fine.

This morning, I went with

(Still so blurry!!)

1/3 c Bob's Red Mill High Fiber Cereal (I got it for free, and now I love it!)
3/4 c water
1/2 banana
1 T PB
1 T chia seeds
Sprinkle of cinnamon, nutmeg, agave, and unsweetened coconut

Now I am off to work then class. Wednesdays are long.

Thank goodness I'm home.

For some reason, I thought it would be a good idea to set up my schedule so I have class from 6pm-9pm Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday. This was a terrible idea. I get so unbelievably hungry when I'm at school. Some might say it's boredom, but it feels like real hunger to me. I had packed three emergency snacks, planning on returning home with at least one, I ended up eating all of them. Again, school makes me really hungry. I had a makeshift PB and J on wheat bread. The bread is from a local bakery, and I could honestly eat it at every meal. I love it. For anyone living in Connecticut, try to find "Now That's Good Bread." Holy cow.

Accompanying my sandie was a slightly bruised apple.

During my night class, hunger struck once again, and I knew I would not be able to make it to my late night dinner, so I ate my remaining emergency snack...chickpea blondie! Again, unpictured, for two reasons. 1. They are ugly. 2. I was in class, and I didn't want to take a picture.

When I got home, I threw together the quickest possible dinner a la Meghann. I had left over chili and a lot of veggies about to spoil. I was so hungry that I forgot to take the picture at first. So this is my dinner minus a few bites...

Sorry for the fuzzy picture. I am still getting used to the camera. To clarify, this bowl of randoms included

Chili
Yellow Pepper
Tomato
Brocoli
Romaine

And dessert...


Fuzzy. Sorry. These are coconut date rolls...delicious.

Well, now my eyes are heavy, I still need to fold laundry, and I am going to wake up and run in the morning.

Goodnight!

Pictures!

I have made my decision. I will be posting pictures of what I eat on my blog. I realized that I don't enjoy reading blogs without a visual component, so why would anyone else?

This morning was another surprisingly nice morning of running. I wanted to try to push myself a little bit further today seeing yesterday went so smoothly, so I decided to try for two miles. To my delight, it wasn't that hard! I stopped to walk for about 30 seconds, but then I was right back to running, and my recovery time was little to nothing. This running business is actually getting easier!

When I got back, I was more than ready for a very warm bowl of oatmeal. I wanted to switch it up this morning, so I decided to make PB and J oats. I got this at the Food Coop yesterday, and I was very eager to try it.



In addition to that, I added
1/2 ripe frozen banana
1 T PB
1 T flax
Very light sprinkle of agave.

Perfect.

Later in the morning, my boyfriend and I walked down to a little coffee shop that just opened up in our town. I got a sencha green tea and ate a pear I brought along in case hunger struck (which it did).



It did not tide me over for too long though, so we decided to go home and warm up with chili, wheat bread, veggies and hummus! The veggies and hummus were communal, but he got a phone call in the middle of lunch, so I ended up eating most of them...whoopsies.


I also had half of a chickpea blondie (not pictured). I made them last night, and they turned out great! Recipe thanks to http://havecakewilltravel.com/!

I realize I have mentioned my boyfriend a couple times now, and just so I do not have to keep writing "my boyfriend," I will clarify. I have a lovely boyfriend named Jeffrey, whom I live with, and thus, eat with frequently. He also just started running! Woohoo!

Now, I am off to class. Lots of class.

Freezing.

I knew getting out of bed this morning was going to be difficult. It shouldn't have been seeing I climbed into bed at 9:45 last night, but as expected, I was tired this morning. I planned ahead though. I put my cell phone (alarm clock) across the room so I had to get out of bed to turn it off, and I laid out my running clothes last night so I would have no excuse. The alarm went off and off I went.
This morning's run was not that painful!! For the first time, I could actually feel the progress I have made over the past two weeks. Granted, I only ran 1.5 miles, but as my boyfriend's mother told me this weekend "The first mile is the hardest." I decided from the get go that I was going to take it slow in terms of training. Whenever I've tried to "start running" in the past, I push it way too hard the first few times out, and I never do it again. So, I will go slow and hopefully stick with it.
Throughout my whole run I was thinking about the delicious bowl of oatmeal I was going to eat as soon as I got home. This is another thing about me. I love oatmeal. I really love oatmeal. Prior to my obsession with food blogs, I made extremely boring oatmeal that was made up of solely cinnamon, oats, and water. Then Kath opened my eyes. This morning, my combo looked a little something like this:

1/2 c oats
1 c water
1/2 very brown frozen banana
1 T peanut butter
1 T chia seeds
1 T flax seeds
1 T agave
Sprinkle of cinnamon
Sprinkle of nutmeg

Heavenly.

I am trying to decide if I want to photo everything I eat. That may be starting soon. Who knows. Off to work!