Back in the Saddle

A few weeks into the new year, and I am finally getting back on track. I completely went off the deep end in terms of being totally unhealthy. I wasn't exercising. I was eating everything I shouldn't have been eating. And I've got the tighter pants and the enhanced chest area to prove it.

Hubs and I finally got our act together and went grocery shopping to get back to making our weekly meals. I do have to admit that this week's menu is not as Paleo as it could be, but I found these recipes on Oprah.com, and had to try them. I definitely tweaked to make them as Paleo as possible, but there were some things that I wasn't confident trying off-recipe to make them truly Paleo.

For breakfast:

Lemon-Pear Breakfast Bread
These were the substitutions that I made:
- 1/2 cup canola oil (I subbed olive oil for this)
- 1/2 cup honey (I subbed raw agave nectar for this)
- 1 cup purchased pear puree (I subbed pear baby food for this)

Results: It looked a little like meatloaf. Not golden like the picture, but my concoctions never end up like the picture. But the taste was not bad. A little dense, but definitely a filler in the morning.

For lunch, my usual sweet potato chicken corn chowder, except without the corn and the onion. I was such a space case at the store that I completely forgot the frozen corn and onion. It was so crowded, I just wanted to get the heck out of dodge.

For dinner:

Chicken, mushroom, spinach lasagna
My substitutions:
- 1 1/2 lbs mushroom, brushed clean and sliced (I cheated and just got the pre-sliced, pre-washed mushroom carton)
- 2 medium heads radicchio (I changed this out for spinach. Not a big fan of radicchio. Always get more spinach that you think you need, it always wilts down into almost nothing).
- 1 Tbsp chopped fresh sage leaves (I left this out. Sage is always so overpowering to me).\
- 1/3 cup all purpose flour (I subbed the whole-wheat flour for this).
- 4 cups 2% milk (I subbed 3 cups of chicken stock and 1 cup of whole milk for this)
- 1 container part-skim ricotta cheese (I subbed cottage cheese).

Results: I am going to have to play around with the sauce. But not bad for the first time out with so many changes.

So, if you're trying to also get your act together and be healthier, at least until February, what are some of your go-to recipes?

Let's Daaaance! A Footloose Review.

I will admit that when I first heard that my beloved Footloose was being remade, I just about had a conniption fit. What was wrong with Hollywood? Surely, with all the wannabe writers, producers, directors, etc. there couldn’t be a shortage of new, fresh ideas. It seemed that everything coming out was some sort of remake, and not very good remakes at that.

Right then and there I made a vow. As God was my witness, I was not going to see that movie, no matter how many degrees of Kevin Bacon gave their blessing. Well, that vow lasted all of about a week after the movie opened. But it wasn’t my fault! My movie-going partner was dying to see it, and since it was the only movie out worth a damn at the time, I begrudgingly gave in.

There is no harsher critic than a movie-goer that is deeply loyal to the original. This movie was in for the fight of its life.

To its credit, Footloose 2.0 stays pretty true to the original storyline, characterizations, and themes of the original. Big city boy comes to small town, ruffles a few feathers, falls for the girl he’s not supposed to fall for, invokes a revolution, and alls well that ends well.

One element that I did enjoy that wasn’t present in the original was the relationship between Ren and his uncle. It was good to see that Ren had someone in his corner with a level head despite the small town mentality, provided a nice foil for Dennis Quaid’s character, even though not a major character.

Speaking of Dennis Quaid, I thought his character was too easily sympathized with. The character of Reverend Shaw was supposed to be the enemy. He was the authority figure responsible for the town’s ban on dancing. Lithgow’s Reverend Shaw was full of hell, fire, and brimstone and easily vilified. Quaid’s Shaw was not. It could very well be because it’s just Dennis Quaid, and how could anyone hate Dennis Quaid? Or because the audience was given the ability to sympathize with the character and understand that the actions of the character were based out of personal tragedy.

The dance scenes were alright. If memory serves, it seems that they cut Willard’s learning to dance scene short, and also the final prom scene. They both just seemed so much shorter than the original, and those were my two favorite parts.

A few other things:
• Is it me or could Julienne Hough pass for a Jennifer Anniston mini-me?
• And that the actor that was cast for Willard could pass for Chris Penn as well?
• Loved that the director kept the yellow bug, with its nonfunctioning passenger door.
• There were, at times, that the movie felt “hoochified” to give it the sex appeal that seems to sell so well these days
• Was not a fan of Blake Shelton’s version of Footloose, but loved the Jane Dear Girls version that Fandango gave me free from iTunes.

Final verdict? It was as well done as a remake could be done. And I freely admit that I was wrong for thinking that it would be horrible. Does it measure up to the original? Of course not. C’mon it’s Kevin Bacon. KEVIN BACON. But it definitely holds its own, and it will probably be an addition to the DVD collection.

If you saw it, what did you think?

A Mile High and a Mile Long

**Apologies in advanced for my long-windedness**

A couple of weeks ago, Hubs and I got to visit Denver. He was going for a conference, and I just happened to tag along since I had never been. I was really looking forward to this trip. A few days off work, an airplane ride, and a hotel stay. Good times ahead.

When I arrived to my gate, I was surprised to see that Hartsfield had installed little walls of outlets, 2 on each side, between every other row of seats at each gate, which is nice, but very hard to come by unless you get to the gate really early, which I did. I was all settled in with my electronics plugged in, happy in my little social media stalking world, when hunger struck. D'oh. The drawback to traveling alone. If you get up, you give up your seat. In the end, the stomach always wins, and I went off in search of sustenance and caffeine. Luckily there was Dunkin' Donuts near the gate that could provide both. Getting food at the airport is always an adventure. For example:

Me: My biscuit was supposed to have cheese (I know, not very Paleo, but I was on vacation dammit).
Server: (Blank stare)- Okay.
Me: I don’t think it’s on there.
Server: You ordered cheese? (Sheesh, I thought I was speaking English, maybe I should have been speaking “text”.)
Me: Um, yes.

Fortunately, I was able to watch her add the cheese and only the cheese.

The actual flight itself was fine; I slept through most of it. Take-off was interesting with all the swaying back and forth in the wind and rain. And I think this was my first flight ever that had a female captain. Girl Power!

I made it to the hotel and got my key from the front desk and had really bad “der” moment. Although, not entirely my fault. I guess I don’t stay in fancy hotels enough, and by fancy I mean the Sheraton. My ass is usually relegated to a Holiday Inn Express. Apparently, nowadays at these fancy hotels, you have to swipe your room key to get to any floor, instead of just the fancy penthouse suites. Ms. Front-Desk-I’m-Only-Working-Here-Until-The-Wedding-With-My-Rock-Of-Gibraltar-Sized-Ring forgot to inform me of this teeny, but oh so important fact. When I got into the elevator, I pressed the button, and off I went. But then I stopped on a floor that was not my own. It wouldn’t have been such a huge deal except for the fact that the doors did not open. Not so good. Leave it to me to get the defective elevator. Talk about an extinction burst. If that 17 button wasn’t broken before, it was now. Luckily, I kept my wits about me and pressed the open door button. I stepped out into the hallway and pressed the up arrow hoping to get a different elevator. No luck, same elevator. Okay, let’s try this again. 17. Doors close. Up, up, up, wait you missed my floor. Again. 19. This time, I finally saw the little room key swiper. Let me give it whirl. I am such a genius.

I was able to meet one of my sorority sisters for dinner at a brewery called Wynkoop where I got to taste my first bison burger ever. It was fantabulous. After dinner, before dropping me off back at the hotel, she drove me around a little bit pointing out different things that I might like to see. She specifically pointed out the capitol building. Remember this. This is the impetus that would lead me on a walking tour of downtown Denver that I am pretty sure that I didn’t want to have.

With Hubs busy most of the day with the conference meetings, I was on my own for entertainment. On this particular day, Hubs had a meeting that was in a different hotel, so I decided that I would walk him to the hotel and then go exploring.

Okay, so I will preface this by saying that when my friend was driving me around, I had no clue where I was in relation to my hotel. So, when I decided to go exploring it was very last minute and very spontaneous, as in, I did not consult Google. I figured, hey it’s a capitol building, I’m pretty sure that I can pick it out of the skyline and head towards it. Well, that might have worked had I actually picked out the right landmark. So to save myself the humiliation of actually typing out what happened, I will let Google Maps illustrate.

So, this is the route that I could have taken had I wanted to be there in, oh, five minutes:

This is the route that I actually took because I was walking towards the wrong building and too stubborn to look at the visitor guide maps:

On the bright side, I got to peruse the 16th street mall and since it was such a great day weather wise, I didn’t mind being outside, and I got some exercise. At the end of the day, I got the picture of the mile marker. Of course, that didn’t stop Hubs from the obligatory pat on the head when I relayed yet another story of my lack of directional intuition.

On an even brighter note, I discovered a great little place to eat that is not here in Georgia. I had actually planned to go down to the hotel coffee shop for lunch and pick up something there, but as I found out, it is a coffee shop in the true sense in that once the muffins run out, they’re out. Now I was in a pickle. And then I happened to look outside and see that right across the street was the 16th street food court and the first thing closest to me? Noodles and Company. What the hell? Definitely can’t go wrong with a name like that. So, I hopped on over, and it was like stepping into heaven. A place dedicated to serving all things noodles. The best part? Their signature dish is macaroni and cheese. Oh. My. Gravy. It’s almost a good thing that there isn’t one here in Ga. I would be HUGE and poor from eating there every day. Which is what I did. Mac and cheese the first day and beef stroganoff (pictured) the second day.

After the conference was over, we stayed our final night with friends who live in a nearby town. I cooked a big family meal, as a thank you for letting us crash and carting us around. And let me tell you, there is nothing more out of your comfort zone than cooking in someone else’s kitchen. Our last morning there, they took us to a place that is known for their awesome brunch and also featured on one of my favorite tv shows, Man vs. Food.

We made it out of there just in time, a foot of snow was dumped on the city the day after we left. All in all, a great city. I thoroughly enjoyed my first time out there and hope to get back there soon. Although, my skin wasn’t so thrilled with the extreme dry air. I am still trying to recuperate from the snake skin that I developed out there.

He Is...

Happy Anniversary to my Hubs. Today is our wedding anniversary and our together anniversary as well. After being together for the better part of a decade, we didn't think that introducing a new anniversary date would work out too well. Lucky number 13 would pull through again for us(me) and allow our wedding day to fall on our anniversary. In honor of this special occasion, I dedicate this post to him and why I am lucky to call him my Hubs.

He is the calm to my storm. He may be the ginger in this relationship, but I am definitely the one with the fiery temper. One statement taken the wrong way can usually lead to cacophony of slammed cupboard doors as I stomp around the kitchen cleaning, and a pout that can last for the better part of an afternoon/evening. It's become a running joke, that whenever he wants me to clean, all he has to do is piss me off, and the house will be spotless. Side note, I can't clean anything now without being asked what I'm mad about and is it his fault. Fortunately, 11 years has provided him with some insight as to how to deal with my rages. He can deal with me calmly and effectively without aggravating the beast even more. I'm sure he is ready to put a fence around me with a Beware of Irate Wife sign and go hunker down in the underground bunker.

He is the eldest to my youngest. If any of you have read anything about child psychology and birth order, then you would know that eldests and youngests is one of the better matched pairs. Partners who are the eldest naturally tend to take the lead and like to be the "boss" while youngests are used to having things done for them and are willing to follow. I think you can see why these types of people would make good matches. We are a textbook example, especially when we travel. Hubs is on the ball researching EVERYTHING. If I tell him what I want to do and when I want to do it, he's on the internet for hours with how we're going to get there, how long it's going to take to get there, etc etc. You get the idea. Hell, he even figured out the subway system in Prague. And while I am perfectly capable of doing this myself, if he's willing to do it, why would I deny him? But to be clear, he's not some chest-banging caveman that drags me by my hair expecting me to follow blindly. He's very perfectly willing to let me be in the driver's seat when I want or to consider any alternatives that I point out. But he's so good at what he does; I think I'll just continue to let him drive.

He is the comedy to my drama. He makes me laugh. Plain and simple. He makes me laugh when I don't want to laugh and that's usually when I need to the most. When I am particularly feeling low, a well timed, off-colored joke from him is all it takes to clear the gray and get me smiling again.

He is the love to my hate. Hate is a strong word, but I'm working with a theme here. Hubs and I are not perfect by any stretch of the imagination. We do have our disagreements. Sometimes those disagreements are loud. Sometimes those disagreements can be silent....for a few days. But what he has never failed to do was say I love you to me, and then make me say it back. This has got to be, hands down, one of the most important and hardest things that I have learned from him. You always say it back because you never know what can happen. Oh, how I resisted though. The last thing I wanted to do was tell him, "I love you", when what I really wanted to do was hurl the nearest frying pan at his head (see that temper?), so usually he had to settle for a grunted, "you too", in response. It's still a work in progress, but I've managed to go from grunting to saying the whole damn phrase with as much civility as possible, AND, without gritting my teeth. Progress, people, progress. That's what's important.

I could go on and on, but for the sake of brevity, I will cut myself off here. All in all, my hubs is a rockstar. He is a supergenius, gentle souled, not hard-to-look at rockstar. Does he have his faults, sure. Who doesn't? Do I wish that he wouldn't turn every room of the house into his personal hamper? Of course. Do I wish that he would learn to put dirty dishes into the sink and not on the counter catty corner to the sink? You betcha. But at the end of the day, they are faults that I am willing to live with, because to live without them, would be to live without him, and I just don't believe that I would want to or could do that. Hopefully, he feels the same way about me and mine. Or else he's in for a long 50+ years.

Okay, the cliches are done. Promise.

So, here's to my Hubs.
Happy Anniversary!
I love you so very much!

Onward Paleo!

I have to admit. Eating paleo for a majority of the time isn't that bad. You just have to plan. I think I have stumbled onto a few things that I will keep in the rotation.

Breakfast:

A sweet potato frittata with veggies. This is so versatile. You just change up the veggies, or even add meat, when you feel like a change. I started with asparagus/onions/garlic/mushrooms. This week, peas and mushrooms. I had this in my previous post about paleo eating, but it's served me well for the last couple of weeks.

Snack:

Fruit and nuts. Again, versatile enough to where you can switch up the fruit and nuts when you get bored. Before I leave for work, I pour in coconut milk. A sweet little treat mid-morning. Would probably work well as a dessert too. To give credit where it's due, I totally stole the idea from the website LeanMachineNYC.

Lunch:

Sweet potato chowder with chicken, corn, and mushrooms. Boil the sweet potatoes, throw into a crockpot with two cans of coconut milk and blend until smooth. Throw in the chicken, mushrooms, onion, garlic, corn, and any spices you want, and let her rip on low for 6-8 hours. It was sooo good! It had a taste of coconut soup that you can get from Thai restaurants, but so much heartier with everything else thrown in. A great fall soup. And can I just say that the new immersion hand blender that I just got is now one of my favorite kitchen tools.

All in all, for about a week and half worth of food, took me about 2 hours total from prep to closing the lid on the crockpot. Not bad.

I haven't been as great about preparing dinner as sometimes, I honestly just don't have an appetite for dinner so I will munch on some nuts or veggies. My attempt at zucchini spaghetti last week was a disaster because I'm not talented enough to "julienne" with just a knife. I have now bought myself a julienne peeler and will be attempting again to make the zucchinis my bitches later this week.

Apologies for the crappy photo quality. The lighting in my kitchen isn't great.

Stay tuned to see what I come up with next week! I think I like doing these posts better than the weekend in review collages. Let's face it, I'm a boring old suburbanite that has no weekend life outside of sitting on my behind catching up on the dvr, and food is just much more fun.

On the Cusp

Finally, it is October. Do you ever have those months that you can never seem to get out of? For me, getting out of the month of August has always been just tortuous. As a native Georgian, by the time August rolls around, I am so freakin' tired of the triple digit temps and extreme humidity. I am ready for summer to be done and fall to roll in with the pretty colors, the fall festivals, and being able to go outside and not be drenched in sweat two seconds out. Summers are just slow and getting out of August usually marks that whatever I am waiting for to happen will happen so much faster.

This year, life bucked tradition, and August was upstaged by September. As busy as hubs and I were during this month, it is amazing how September seemed to never end! And I know exactly why. Hubs and I are on the cusp of finally being able to figure out the rest of our lives. Okay, well maybe not the rest of our lives, but at least for the foreseeable future. What can I say, I have a flair for the dramatics.

I shall explain.

Hubs is currently in the final stages of his PhD in finance. He has been working towards this for about 5 years. And for those 5 years, we've been forced to dance to the tune of "if this happens, then we'll do this" because we literally had no idea what would happen when it would be time for him to finish. Would it be a bad job market, and he would have to stay for another year? Would we have to move to another continent altogether? Would we be able to stay here with our families and friends close by? The possibilities were endless, and it made planning for ANYTHING impossible.

And because we enjoy having a roof over our heads, and we also really enjoy that pesky habit of eating even more, I've kept myself chained to my alarm clock and cubicle in an endless cycle of Office Space meets Groundhogs' Day. As a result, we've had to put starting a family on hold. His program is so demanding, and that makes his schedule, while flexible, so unstable, that it would have seemed as though I were a single-working mother, and I just plain didn't want to do that. When I have children, I want to be able to devote my full energy and attention on him/her/them with the option of being able to do anything else I want to when I so choose. I won't lie. I don't need to juggle a job and a family to feel fulfilled. I couldn't juggle in gym class at school, not going to attempt it now at the expense of my children. I am probably a disappointment to the women's lib movement, but hey, it's all about choice, right? Fortunately, we will be in a position for us to have this choice that a lot of families don't have. But I digress. Now that we are finally so close to figuring out what our next move is going to be, we can start to plan more concretely for when this baby thing can happen. Thank jeebus, too. With all the pregnancies and newborn babies that I am surrounded with, I was starting to channel Marisa Tomei, in My Cousin Vinny, stomping her foot on the wooden porch trying to explain to Joe Pesci that her biological clock is not just ticking, but pounding.

So hopefully, we should know fo' sho' where we are going by February. If everything works out like we hope it will work out, we might even know by November. For now, we will sit and wait for the phone calls for interviews to come. At least the if-then game has settled down a little bit, and we've had a chance to focus on some specific areas. What was now a chance to move between 50 states and two continents, has now been whittled down to about 20 states and this continent. We will fly out to Denver later this month for the first round of interviews.

Let the games end begin.

Walk Like An Egyptian, Eat Like A Caveman

It is no secret that I love all the foods that are totally bad for me. It is also no secret that I am not the most active of humans. Obviously, these two non-secrets do not provide for a healthy existence. Last week, a blog in my local paper discussed if it was plausible for families with young children to convert to a completely vegan diet. In one of the comments, someone mentioned "Paleo eating" or in other words, eating like the cavemen. Meats, fruits, veggies. No dairy or grains. I was intrigued. And then I was terrified. Could I really give up the two greatest food loves of my life? Luckily, I was able to find a couple of sites that avoided the preachiness that sometimes comes along with advocating certain diets, and they assured me that you don't have to be 100% paleo if you don't want to. The key is really to try and get away from any sort of processed foods and back to basics. I have made a goal to be at least 75% paleo.

My first attempt was a fritatta that would provide me breakfast and maybe a couple of dinners. Ingredients: eggs, shredded sweet potatoes, asparagus, garlic, and red onion.

Sautee all the veggies until tender:

 

Combine eggs with veggies, pop into the oven and ta-da:

 

 

Not only was it super easy, it turned out pretty tasty, too. I still have some food items to get rid of before I can get serious with the paleo meal planning, but next week, I attempt zucchini spaghetti. Stay tuned!