Yet another day with no afternoon post. Boo. My job has always been an all or nothing situation when it comes to work load, and right now my cup is overflowing. So much so that B and I have decided to take a half day on Friday and head to Myrtle Beach.

Thank you all for your encouragement on my work situation.  I am so sorry to keep venting to you all and thank you for continuing to read. My work is directly related to my work-life balance, my mood, and stress level and therefore my health so I don’t feel like I can leave it out.

I did get out of bed this morning for a workout. I tried 30 Day Shred and was excited that my performance was slightly improved. It wasn’t much but enough to keep me from being discouraged. Pre-workout I was starving so I grabbed a little Agave Plus granola and a few almonds.

Like the rest of this week I did not have time to eat breakfast before leaving for work, but I busted it out as soon as I got to the office.

I finally got to try a Glo Bar!!! I will be honest that it was not love at first bite. At first I thought it really had a “healthy food” taste. But the more I ate the more I liked it. I think that my initial taste was just because my palette was completely unfamiliar with some of the ingredients in the bars. I definitely am looking forward to trying the other flavor that I ordered.

My morning was psycho. I was hopping from meeting to meeting, each overlapping with the other, plus I had a lunch appointment and was having to make sure I left in plenty of time to get there on time. It was this appointment that had me feeling so torn about my job yesterday. Can you guess what it was?

Anywho, I managed to grab a handful of peanuts in between meetings to keep my stomach from grumbling.

Lunch was eaten on the road. It was  wrap that I made this morning before work with a really old La Tortilla Factory wrap, smear of Miracle Whip, slice roasted turkey, and tomato. I really wasn’t feeling it so I only ate about 1/3 of it.

I also had some pickles but didn’t take a picture because I was driving. This picture is of the leftovers that I ate later in the afternoon. These guys completely satisfied my stress induced salt craving.

My appointment went well and as expected. I was kind of dreading going back to work because I knew the craziness that was waiting for me. When I got back I had a surprise on my desk.

Sal got me some new Triscuits and Laughing  Cow to try. I wasn’t hungry quite yet and saved them for later.

I felt pretty useless the rest of the afternoon. I had a ton of work to do but my mind felt so scattered and I was having a hard time focusing on all of the tasks at hand.

I had a chocolate craving this afternoon and decided to pull out a snack I have been dying to try, chocolate Oikos.

I tried it by itself and was honestly disappointed. Then I added some chocolate chips, granola, and coconut and still wasn’t feeling it. I ended up throwing away close to half of it.

I am not sure if it was my mood or the fact that the yogurt was close to room temperature that it just didn’t hit the spot. I have 3 more in the fridge and I will definitely be giving it another try.

As I am posting I am realizing what a snacky afternoon I had. After my chocolate craving passed a salt craving hit me with a vengeance. I ate my last three pickles and then some almonds. I packed apricots with the almonds because I was going to try a snack that Katie posted, but I just wasn’t feeling ‘em so they are still sitting in my lunch bag.

Then I busted out the Triscuits and Laughing Cow that Sal got me. I went and got him and we had a quick snack time at my desk. These crackers were good, but a little more of an acquired taste. I only think they are okay on first taste, but think I could grow to love them. Thanks Sal! You spoil me.

As soon as I got home I called B and told him I wasn’t cooking dinner and that he had 2 options. He could either cook or pick something up on his way home. As you can see he opted to stop by Subway. Really easy and filling. Thats all we needed.

I promise dinner will be more interesting tomorrow because we are having dinner guests so we can’t cop out on dinner…or as Jillian Michael’s says, we can’t “phone it in”.

And to make the whole day better I ate the last bit of Samoas ice cream out of the tub with a Samoas cookie.

Now that I have a full belly, empty dishwasher, and somewhat empty sink I am off to do some ready, soaking, and then sleeping.

I hope you all had a great day! And goodnight!

Today was B’s parents last day with us and we had everything planned out.

We started out morning with homemade cinnamon rolls and deer sausage.

Plus some milk from Homeland Creamery on the side.

The dough for the rolls did not rise like I wanted so they didn’t quite turn out like I had hoped. They still tasted good but they were not a light and fluffy as I would have like. Maybe I over kneaded it? Yeast doughs are definitely something I need to work on.

We had some clementines on the side too.

After breakfast we went to take Piper for a walk in Jetton Park and boy was it cold. I was really happy when we got back to the car!

We weren’t planning on going to lunch until 1 PM or so and I was already starving. I started out with a snack of Salt and Vinegar PopChips.

These guys did not even put a dent in my appetite! So I moved onto the last of my Rosemary and Olive Oil Triscuits and hot capocolla from last night. This snack really satisfied my appetite.

The morning flew by and it was already to head to lunch. Late last week B and I had already decided that we wanted to take his parents to Boudreaux’s Louisiana Kitchen in NoDa.

Everybody but me started of with bloody Mary’s from the make your own bloody Mary bar. Since I had such a huge snack B and I decided to split an entree.

  B started with she crab soup. We both thought it was really buttery. I definitely could not have eaten the whole cup so I was glad I had ordered something else.

I started with a side salad. This salad was great except that I put way too much dressing on it. We ordered Shrimp and Crawfish Etouffe for our entree. I thought the chunks of celery were way to big but otherwise thought the dish was delicious!

Then everyone else finished off their meals with some beignets.

I may have a had a bite or 2. We weren’t impressed with the sauce on top. We would have preferred them with powdered sugar only.

I did not order beignets because I had another plan in mind. Tasty Yo is Charlotte’s only tart frozen yogurt place, and one of their 2 locations is in the NoDa area. So guess where I was planning on grabbing dessert?

I got the Valentine’s Day special with M&M’s, coconut, strawberries, and strawberry sauce.

I can’t wait to go back!

After lunch we parted ways with B’s parents. They needed to hit the road to head back to Florida.

My afternoon involved a bit of shopping but nothing too exciting. I am really having a hard time finding stuff that I like. I guess I will just have to keep looking.

Dinner was easy breezy and mostly prepared by Brian. We steamed some white rice and warmed up some of TJ’s BBQ Teriyaki chicken, one of our favorites! We also have a ton of lettuce to use up so we decided to make lettuce wraps.

Lettuce wraps always make such a refreshing meal. I had plans for dessert but I am thinking I may be too full from my 3 wraps.

The weekend has now flown by and it is time to get ready for work again. Friday through Sunday always fly by so fast while Monday – Friday drag on and on. Such is life…for now.

Happy Valentines Day!!

This cold weather has got to go! The cold weather is making my leg hurt and the pain relievers I am taking for my leg are making my stomach hurt. This morning was particularly bad because I felt like I had been punched in the stomach.

Of course I snoozed through my workout time but I did get up and got ready as usual.

I wanted to keep things simple for breakfast so I ate a PB&J on a bagel thin for breakfast. Usual eating a little something eases the stomach irritation but I had no such luck this morning.

Once I got to work i was still hungry so I ate a couple of clementines and an apple. The hunger went away but my stomach still felt icky.

With my in-laws in town this weekend I wanted to try to feel a little bit better so I decided to email my boss. He gave me permission to work from home so I could feel better.

Even though I have a desk set up at home similar to my set up at the office, this is where I have spent my afternoon working.

I sat here so I could extend my leg out in front of me and elevate it when I needed to. And my office phone was only a couple steps away. Fortunately most of my work comes to me via email so I was not having to get up and down all day.

After I got home I had a couple of snack. Pickles.

Popcorn.

Then it was lunch before I knew it. I indulged myself with some pasta since I could keep working while it was on to boil. Underneath all that pasta sauce are the leftover mushrooms and onions from last night as well as some wilted baby spinach.

For dessert I broke into some of the valentine’s day candies I got yesterday. The flavors were. I am usually really picky about which flavors of chocolates I will eat but I liked all of these. Caramel is usually my favorite but this time I like the coconut the best. I have had a few techinical problems this afternoon and the time has seemed to drag on. It has been really nice to be a little more comfortable (pain-wise) while I worked. I am really hoping this incredibly cold weather (by Carolinian standards) will pass soon. I don’t know how much longer I can take it!

This afternoon I started craving oats as my snack but I did not feel like dirtying up a pot. Instead I ate Triscuits and Laughing Cow. I am excited for the weekend to begin and to start hanging out with B’s parents.  We will be sure to have a good time whether the weather is good or bad.

Did you like my extra post today? I would really like to start doing some freelance writing so I was trying to branch out from my norm (for practice) as well as give you a little more insight on Me. I have a particular magazine that I would like to submit an essay to and I need some inspiration. I was hoping doing something non meal related would help get the creative juices flowing. We shall see.

Breakfast was a big ole bowl of oats.

I was amazed at the difference in using 1/2 c oats to my usual 1/3 c. I felt like there was so much oatmeal. I definitely could not finish it all.

I topped with some Costco PB and strawberry perseveres.

Does anyone else use Costco PB or some other brand of organic PB? I has a jar of EarthFare PB that had a really thick texture, but the Costco PB separated and was really runny. Is that normal?

Once I got to work I also munched on some Cuties.

I love the cute little stickers on them!

They are Valentine’s themed.

I also ate some Laughing Cow and Triscuits as a snack before my Wednesday conference calls. I did not want my stomach to be rumbling.

After my meetings I promptly left for lunch to meet Jennifer at Yoshi’s for 1/2 of sushi. I wasn’t planning on eating out today but I have been craving dumplings all week.

Once I got to Yoshi’s I found out that they were out of steamed Gyoza (pork dumplings). Argh. But they did have Shumai (shrimp dumplings) so I settled.

So my lunch was a tempura roll and shumai. The roll was delicious, but gyoza would have been better than the shumai. There is always next time though.

On the inspiration front, I am looking for words that have “ex” in them. I have thought up a few such as inexplicable, experience, and exercise. Someone else has suggested  sex, mexican, excellent, and MEXellent. I am hoping to write an essay/article themed on this word. Do you have any suggestions?

I can actually say today was a happy Monday for a change. After the terrible week I had last weeks this is really exciting news for me. I expect to go into tomorrow feeling good too because I am finally getting to go to an much anticipated lunch meeting tomorrow.

My afternoon was just as steady as my morning and I was starving once I finally realized I was hungry.

So I munched on one of my favorite new snacks, Triscuits and Laughing Cow. I am completely addicted to these rosemary and garlic Triscuits. I was still kind of hungry but I didn’t want to ruin my appetite for dinner.

Once I got home I waited for Brian so we could take Piper for a walk around the neighborhood. It was so nice to get out and walk, but boy it cooled off. The temperature was so nice at lunch and they seemed to drop really fast.

Dinner was nice and low maintenance. Before work this morning I put a beef roast (not sure exactly what cut of meat), 1/2 onion, green bell pepper, red wine vinaigrette, and water into a slow cooker and set on low. This cooker was packed full. I really could use a bigger one.

After our walk I sautéed some collard greens in sesame oil with some garlic, soy sauce, Worcestershire sauce, and chicken broth. This recipe was inspired by a recipe I found in a cookbook my brother and sister-in-law gave me for Christmas.

Greens are a veggie that I am still working on trying to like. I have struggled with like vegetable all of my life  and greens are really low on my list. These were okay. Tolerable. I ended up eating them mixed with bites of meat and BBQ sauce. B said that he really liked them. They were very different from the collards he grew up eating.

Since I ate all of my veggies I definitely deserved dessert. I really wanted to go to Cold Stone and get some chocolate ice cream with Heath Bar and caramel sauce but did not want to leave the house. If only they had delivery.

Instead I had some Edy’s Somoas Girl Scout cookie ice cream with mini semisweet chocolate chips and toffee chips. This was definitely the next best thing to what I wanted. I may be over exaggerating this in my head but I feel like tomorrow is a big day so I have to go get ready. I need all the beauty rest I can get.

Today feels like it has been one of the longest days in the history of the world, and I have had the worst overwhelmed, unsettled feeling all day. I am ready to get off of work and hide under the covers.

This morning even started out off. After my alarm went off I laid there trying to talk myself into getting out of bed and I just couldn’t do it. Plus Piper is being more high maintenance than usual because she was to go outside to run and play but it is just too darn muddy! I see doggie daycare in her future tomorrow.

For breakfast I got to try the long awaited PB&J Larabar thanks to Katie.

I loved it! It is amazing how similarly this tastes to a real PB&J sandwich with such a short list of ingredients.

I may even have to hide these from my husband.

It was so nice to have something do convenient on hand because this morning was one of those mornings that I just couldn’t get myself together.

It is amazing how long this bar held me over. I did, however, get hungry for a morning snack.

Rosemary and Garlic Triscuits and a wedge of Laughing Cow. I am not usually a fan of Triscuits but these guys taste amazing. You can tell I was so excited about the that I dug right in without taking a picture.

I probably had 7 or 8 of these.

Because of my snack I was not terribly hungry for lunch so I decided on soup, which does not usually do a very good job of holding me over. I added some extra brown rice that I had in the fridge plus some shredded cheddar and a dollop of Oikos plain Greek yogurt.

I may have also crumbled in a few tortilla chips post-picture.

I finished things off with about a tbsp of mini dark chocolate chips.

Now it time to bide my time until 5 PM. I think a wine tasting at Corkscrew this evening may be just what I need to make this day all better.