Banner Credit


Many, many thanks to Spubba for designing and producing my title banner...so frickin' awesome!!! :D

Friday, March 30, 2012

Ah well, so much for that...

Dad did skip his usual bowl of cereal, at least for one day, but when I (gingerly, hopefully) asked him if he had bacon and eggs instead, he chirped, "nope, had a cinnamon english muffin!" *facepalm*

Anyway, Dad's now on vacation in Barbados for 3 weeks and is quite enjoying their rum and Coke (the lucky bastard).  If he brings us back a bottle of ESA Fields rum, you bet I'll be enjoying it with some Coke shortly thereafter!  :)

Here's a few pics of our eats from the past few days (we were home/off work this week)...

One night, hunnybun made dinner while I was working on my school assignment...he simmered some basa fish filets in a coconut milk sauce, made cauliflower mash, and gently cooked up the peppers in EVOO.  It looks kind of boring, but MAN-O-MAN was it tasty!!


The next morning he fried up some plantains in butter and other tasty ingredients (unfortunately, the raisins didn't exactly turn out the way he wanted...they were hard like rocks lol):


Then later I laid thickly-sliced sweet potatoes in the bottom of the roast pan, cut up some onions, put bone-in, skin-on, chicken breasts on top, and roasted it (covered) for about 2 hours before crisping up the skin on broil:


I also made slow-cooker ribs but didn't want to lift the lid to get pics and just plain forgot before we ate them all.  Sorry. :)

Monday, March 19, 2012

Dad: A breakthrough!!!

My dad's been sick with a cold.  Since the end of December.  Okay, maybe it's been two or more colds in succession, but you get the idea.  I hate hearing him sound like shit and he's tired of being sick.  Hell, he's tired of talking about being sick.  It was my chance, so I took it!

I asked if he had a lot of mucous and he said hell yes - when he blows his nose his eye shoots some stuff out.  Okay, that's odd, but anyway, the answer is yes.  I offered a suggestion to try avoiding dairy for a few weeks, to see if it would help with the snot overload.  He thought for a second, then said he didn't really have a lot of dairy...only with his morning cereal (Raisin Bran), but he could go without his cereal for awhile to try it.

BLAMMO!!!!!!!  Two birds with one stone!!

Holy shit, this is the first time he's ever been willing to give up his morning dose of sawdust.  The little crumbs get stuck in his throat all the time and make him cough - he's said this to me before, yet he continues eating the shit to get his fiber.  Oi.  The perils of being married to a (wonderful, lovely, funny) nutritionist.

Anyway, he said he'd try it!!!  YAY!!!!!!!!!!!

Saturday, March 17, 2012

Today was a good day...

...to be working from home, as the weather was absolutely gorgeous.  I was blessed with a quality movement this morning and my weight afterward was 145.0.  Yippee!!!

My work day wasn't as great; a PITA (that's PAIN IN THE ASS, for those who don't know :)) client that I've been dealing with for about a year REALLY got my blood boiling right before lunchtime.

See, I'm an implementation specialist by title, which means, once we've completed implementing the product for you and you "go live", we're supposed to hand your account over to the support team.  Well, this client has been "live" since bloody November and keeps trying to find ways to prevent this hand-over from happening.  It's REALLY getting on my nerves (and they're not pleasant to deal with, either, so that exacerbates MY problem).  In January we put together an "issues log" and told them that we would hang onto them until the listed issues are resolved, and then they're being handed over to support.  They resisted, but my boss absolutely rocks and she told them how it's gonna be!

Today, during a conversation with one of "them", they realized a new "problem" and they wrote an email, cc-ing everybody that's ever been involved in this project, saying that they felt this needed to be added to the motherfucking "issue log".   I.  LOST.  IT.  I asked my manager if she heard my screams all the way at the office, which is about 33 kms away from my house.  This new "problem" is a result of this client NOT LISTENING while I explained things throughout this project, and there were also many times where I would hear them whispering and giggling (on speakerphone) while I was talking.  Now they act like this "problem" is fucking NEWS to them (hence, the LOST IT part).  There's no fucking way they're adding another item to this issue log for ME to work on, and I wrote an email to my manager to say so (in a much nicer way).  After clicking Send I had to take some ME time and get these idiots out of my head. So, I went for a walk.

I did my normal lunchtime route around the block, stopped back at home to drop my sweater off, and went for another lap.  Except this time I incorporated some primal jogging into it - getting my feet/legs used to landing on my toes.  I tell ya, it felt pretty good!  By the time I was almost home I sped things up a bit too, almost running full throttle.  Anyway, this helped me get my brain calmed down and the stupid went away.  Yay!

When I got back to my laptop I read the response from my manager to the client's email.  She supported me by telling the client that, as previously discussed, no further issues would be added to the current issue log, and this new issue will need to be addressed by support.  YESSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSS!!!  I love her to bits. :)

Enough about work...  Mom came by after work to go for a walk with me in the warm sunshine - I put my froggy feet on for this outing - and we did two laps at a pretty slow stride.  Now my feet hurt in different ways than before!  Ah well, I'm sure it'll get better.  No running for me tomorrow...on Thursday my sweetie took the wheels off my Honda 599 and brought them to the shop, along with my new tires, to get the rubber swapped.  Well, today he put the wheels back on the bike and I'm betting the bike and I will get reacquainted nicely tomorrow!

FTW, we're goin' RIDING!!!  Here's my OTHER sweetheart:

Wednesday, March 14, 2012

Tonight's very interesting dinner

Due to lack of planning/shopping, we didn't really have anything ready to cook for dinner tonight...soooo, we decided that we'd have an egg dinner.  Yeah!  Mmm, eggs.

However, also due to the above, when it came time to cook these delicious eggs, I realized we only had three of them.  Woops.  Good thing we also had a lunch-sized portion of leftover hunnybun meatbeals and spinach to divvy up between us!  I also wanted to try frying the eggs in the rendered beef fat I made a few days ago (oh yeah, I forgot to load those pics!).

So, I put about a teaspoon of the fat in the pan and cooked the eggs.  EGG-citing story so far, eh???!  Well, seeing as I'd never cooked eggs in beef fat before (usually butter or bacon fat), I wasn't entirely sure how this would go.  Anyway, they turned out slippery (yay - no sticking to the pan like usual!) and were really tasty.  I'm sold!

Eggs (sunny side up) with meatballs and a small pile of previously-frozen spinach.  It was really yummy!  (Apologies for the lack of photo...)

Here's the pile of beef fat in the slow cooker...


After a few hours on low, the golden oil started to accumulate.  I scooped it out in two separate attempts...


And the crispies that resulted (some of which kind of tasted like fat from a steak, but others, not so much!)...


Lesson learned for next time:
- Spread the bits more across the bottom of the crock
- The bits should be cut into smaller bits - some pieces remained puffy and held the oil within
- I need to think ahead and get a glass jar to store this stuff in

Sunday, March 11, 2012

Stupid toes...

The worst problem I've ever had with my feet have been the odd mild in-grown toenail, which was never painful enough to require surgical intervention.  In the past several months I've suddenly had 1) a really bad, deep callous, which made it very painful to walk normally, and 2) yesterday I was startled when I noticed that the toenail on my left big toe is suddenly starting to lift off!  WTF?!  This is freaking me out a little - what happens if it falls off??

A few weeks ago I did notice that the older half of the nail was a bit yellowed, so I applied a drop of grape seed oil a few times (also in hopes of softening the nail to ease the in-grown problem that has resurfaced as well).  Now that it's lifting off I'm applying a drop of tea tree oil in hopes of killing this fungus.

The best part is that my doctor's office never bothered to phone me back when I left a message, asking them to arrange a podiatrist appointment.  A-holes.

Saturday, March 10, 2012

Sheeeeeeeewes!!!

So the shoes I proxy-ordered through my ex, who happens now to live in OK, have finally arrived!  He had mistakenly taken a box of my stuff with him when he moved, so as part of the return shipment of that box, he stuffed these in there too.  It's really nice when you can remain friends with your ex-things, yanno?? :)

I *lof* my new black suedey 'roo Vibrams.  The ex refers to them as "froggy feet". lol

Friday, March 9, 2012

Well I'll be damned...

I forgot to mention what ELSE I purchased yesterday!  I popped over to Medium Rare at lunchtime to see if I could snag some of their pork lard and yep, they had some.  I bought one container for now, but I later wondered "isn't this pretty much the same pork fat that I have in a mug in the fridge from cooking bacon??"

Anyway, it was $8 so I didn't mind trying it out.  I asked (again) if they had any beef fat available AND THEY DID!!  They had a few scraps to throw in a bag for me, NO CHARGE.  Wheeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!!!!!  Happy me drove back to work and put the stuff in the fridge.

On another note, I've been somewhat upset lately that our grocery store had run out of my plantain chip-crack fix (spicy flavour) and SURPRISE, hunnybun sneakily grabbed three bags that he happened to notice while there yesterday.  The only three bags they had of the spicy.  One bag was already demolished this morning.  He's so sweet.  :)

Thursday, March 8, 2012

Thu-mpday

My friend and I usually get together one night a week after work, and we usually go to the local mall to walk around, grab something to eat, and shoot the breeze.  Tonight we did just that.

She always arrives at the mall earlier than I, and today she was starving so while she was waiting for me she went downstairs to the dollar store to buy a chocolate bar.  *face palm*  See, this is my friend that grew up as an overweight girl, who later had lap band surgery and lost a whack of weight.  She has kept most of it off over the years, partly because she can't eat a lot of things that make it through the screening at the entrance to her stomach (!!), and thus most things come back up/out.  She was starving today because her lunch didn't stay down.  She also goes to the gym almost every morning before work, to work out for 2 HOURS.  Crazy shit.

Anyway, so she ate a "turtle" (you know, "Mmmm, I love Turtles!") and we made our way to the food court.  I hit up Bourbon St. Grill and got mixed veggies (99.6% broccoli) and something they called "coconut shrimp", and my buddy got a small sub from Mr. Sub.  After eating, we walked around the mall, chit-chatting about various crap and browsing in some stores.  At one point she wasn't sure if her dinner was going to stay down (the reek of the Crocs store nauseated both of us, actually), but it stayed put, thankfully.  After some more walking and shopping we headed for Dairy Queen and each got a blizzard (mini for me, and small for her).  Not a wise food day for either of us!

Earlier today I was having a hard time at work and my buddy, Gary, handed me half of his Coffee Crisp chocolate bar to cheer me up.  I told him straight out that it was like crack and he was being a pusher (not taking no for an answer), but I took it anyway.  I tried to ignore it for awhile, but eventually gave in.  Crack, indeed.

So, I renamed Thursday to Thu-mpday because of today's antics.

My bowel movements have been absent for much of this week, and I think it's because of last Saturday's antics; steak with Diane's sugary BBQ sauce, sweet mixed drinks (holy moly were they strong!), and desserts to top it off.  I had my regular bowel movement the next day but since then everything ground to a halt.  Until today, where it was not the usual easy-going event.  Hopefully tomorrow will be better.  I miss my daily deposit!

So there you go.  Until next time...

Friday, March 2, 2012

Stupid neck!!!

It's been an interesting week...the back of my neck is absolutely killing me on a daily basis, and I wonder if it's because of the new height-adjustable desk I have at home.  Perhaps I'm not using it at the right height, or, maybe I need to go to the chiropractor for an interim adjustment since I'm now doing a LOT more standing at work and home.  Not sure, but this is really annoying me.  It hurts like fuck.

Nothing much interesting is going on in the foodiness of my being...I haven't had the desire to cook very much, what with being occupied with Sons of Anarchy (DROOOOOL) and schoolwork.  I don't feel the urge to be creative in the kitchen and thus we've been eating pretty much the same meals each week, cooked exactly the same way.  A little boring, yes, but at least the stuff tastes good!

I've laid off the alcohol and sweet cheats since my last update and didn't even order a slice of to-die-for coconut cream pie as part of our Swiss Chalet delivery last night.  I came close, but I didn't.

My latest rash is starting to clear up, thankfully. Damn that sugar crack.  DAMN IT ALL TO HELL!