Ready or Not

Yeah, so; didn't take long for me to remember why this daily food blogging thing fell by the wayside. In theory, it doesn't seem like much, I'm snapping pictures on my phone and publishing them on my blog...But honestly, a lot of days even an extra half hour of "to do" seems like too much.

Last night, after I'd already published for the day, Husband and I split this last treat from his Japan Crate:

And just because it entertained me, my view of Isabelle's paws as she was napping on the love seat. My sweater was on the arm of the love seat, so I wouldn't even have known she was there until the paws stretched up.

Food-wise, today was a repeat of yesterday, so I won't bother to repost.


Doctor appointment this morning to finally follow up on that knee X-Ray I had back in...Nov? Early Dec? X-Ray does not show any problems, and given that I am not feeling pain like I was back in the fall, I am clear to start exercising again, but slowly; the doctor actually said "very slowly". I feel like he was just humoring me, but that might be my own bias talking there.

That said, I will take it slow. While it is true that I am no longer experiencing pain like I was in the fall, neither of my knees feel quite right; nor does my ankle; maybe they never will again. But I'd like to keep them in the best shape possible, so "easy does it" will be the plan.

This evening was supposed to be piano lessons, but it's snowing again and the roads were slippery in spots on our way home, so I decided not to go back out. A quiet evening with the Husband and kitties is always nice.

Yesterday

Today

Interesting article of the day:
If You Stop Thinking Of Exercise As A Way To Lose Weight, You May Actually Enjoy It

This is one of those things that I know, yet I need to keep reminding myself.  I know that I feel better when I exercise. It has many health benefits. And I am more likely to do it, and reap those benefits, if I do workouts that are enjoyable to me. And it feels less like a chore if I'm not thinking about it as a way to burn calories. Yet, I still find myself doing just that; did it today, in fact. So good have this reminder.

Also timely:
February 7th is the day we give up.

This showed up on my Facebook feed today and it felt relevant, though maybe not quite in the way it was intended. Honestly, at the beginning of January I was just feeling exhausted and cranky, not at all inspired. Today is when I am starting to feel fired up. I suppose, according to the research, this is due to wear off in 38 days? I'm kinda feeling like I'll just take what I can get for the moment.

Honestly, I had lots on my mind throughout the day to day, and I intended to write more, but I've been trying to type around the cat sleeping on my lap and it is rapidly approaching my bed time, so this is it for now.

And Out Of Fashion

I know it's no longer the thing; daily food blogging is so 2008 and here we are in 2018 already. But reading back over some of my old posts on the weekend was fascinating to me; it's so easy to forget what was I doing then that was the same or different?

I know I won't keep this up. I truly miss the old days  of reading daily posts from other bloggers, but I also remember that it felt like a lot of work sometimes. But revisiting once in a while might be fun, so here we go...

Ten years ago today: Would you like chocolate with that?*  


Well as a matter of fact, I'm having chocolate for lunch today...sort of; read on!

I am forever struggling with what to eat for breakfast. Mostly, I don't like eating first thing in the morning. Late last fall I started bringing a container of cottage cheese to eat for breakfast once I get to work. That's working for me, and lately I've been enjoying some blackberries on the side. With coffee, of course. Last year I also switched to full on 18% coffee cream at home, so when I bring my coffee, that's what is in there. If I get my coffee at work, it's 10%; what they call Cereal Cream around here.

Yesterday, made sweet potato and black bean mole chili. Four ziploc plastic containers went in the freezer, and two ceramic containers in the fridge. There is still one container of Rockin Moroccan Stew in the freezer. Lunches are covered for the next couple of weeks. Oddly enough, 2009 me was also eating Rockin' Moroccan Stew and sweet potato and black bean mole for lunches.

Looks like mud? Tastes like chocolate!

I was looking for a change in routine. I eat a lot of Rockin' Moroccan Stew, and it's good, but it's nice to have something different. I did a Tomato Veg Soup with lima beans and lentils that I also enjoyed. I remembered that I used to to a slow cooker mole, so I went searching for the recipe, thinking to adapt it as a vegetarian lunch and discovered that I already did that, and if I can believe myself, I quite enjoyed it.

I was still not 100% confident, but turns out it's pretty wonderful, if I do say so myself. Apparently I do sometimes know what I'm talking about. A hint of sweetness, warm spice and chocolate. It is rich and comforting.

Almonds were afternoon snack.

Stop for groceries on the way home, then home where the first order of business was to take Isabelle outside. Most of the snow is gone again, and it was warm - relatively speaking anyway, 2C - and Isabelle was a happy kitty.

Then inside to make dinner - another recognizable favorite:

Mapo Tofu over Jasmine rice. Dinner entertainment was Star Trek: Discovery which I am loving, though it has already broken my heart a couple of times.



And, um... 9 Unexpected Things That Happen When You Abandon Your Workout Routine

Time to get back to it.

* Technically, the date is off by one, but I chose to use the nearest Monday, which was Feb 4, 2008. Carry on.

Old School

Friday morning we woke up to above 0C temperatures and rain. By midday, the temperature had dropped back down below freezing and it was snowing. As you can imagine, that made for a bit of a mess. Buses were pulled from the roads, businesses were closing for the day; I was already working at home, but Husband actually came home early.

Back in November, a friend sent me a link to Japan Crate which is one of those monthly subscription box services. They were offering a special Holiday box, so I ordered it for Husband. The shipping was estimated to be 4-6 weeks, and it shipped Dec 4, so I was figuring it would show up some time in January.

Finally arrived on Friday. Yep, February 2. Almost a full 2 months.

But on the up side, it was a nice surprise for Husband, arriving home on a stormy afternoon.

And Isabelle enjoyed the box.

Trixie just really enjoys our wool rug.

Anyway, yesterday was -18C, with a wind chill of -30, so we decided not to go out, and put off shopping until today...Which has turned out to be a messy, rainy, snowy day and we have plenty of food to eat so who wants to leave the house anyway?

Last night we had one of our weekly Indian delivery dinners (a local entrepreneur delivers to workers at an office building in our neighborhood where two of our friends work, we got in on it and now he delivers to our house on Friday morning).

 Butter Paneer (Butter Chicken for Husband) and Rainbow Rice.

Slept in until around 8 am this morning, then stumbled out for coffee.

Was not the slightest bit hungry, so just served myself some blackberries to munch on while I relaxed for the morning.

Around 10:30 I decided it was time to get up and get some things done. I threw together a sweet potato and black bean mole (based on this recipe) and then it was noon and I was finally hungry. By this time, we had decided we could get by without going out for groceries today, since the weather is still not great, so I threw together some pasta for myself.

After lunch, some puttering around doing laundry and trying to de-clutter at bit (one of my biggest challenges).

And then I pretty much goofed off for the rest of the day, and I don't feel bad about it. I've been in the computer-gaming mood lately, so I indulged. It will wear off, and then I go back to other things.

Since we didn't end up going out for groceries, we ended up with sausage, eggs and hash browns for dinner. It was not really all that picturesque, so I didn't bother with a photo. It did the job. Now winding down and kind of looking forward to sleepy time (if not to the Monday morning that will follow...).

Can We Start Over? Part 2.

Nothing particularly exciting about yesterday; it was Friday and I was glad.

- JavaChick, Nov 21 2009

I went searching for an old recipe from my blog, and wound up whiling away a bunch of time reading posts from November 2009. Wow. I miss Blogger JavaChick, circa 2009.  I often feel like I have so much less energy than I used to; I've been telling myself I'm probably imagining that, but Nov 2009 JavaChick was getting things done. 

I've said this before, but one of the things I appreciate about blogging is the ability to go back and read old entries. I wish that I kept up with it better; recipes I had forgotten about, pictures of my Fabulous Felines - oh, how I miss them! - and remembering that I actually used to enjoy doing intervals on my treadmill. Honestly, I've never been a person who has a huge amount of energy, but compared to now, that girl seems like a go-getter.

The walk down memory lane was entertaining. The aftermath was a little bit of me thinking: "What's wrong with you? Why can't you be like that again?" 

But that is pointless. What was that New Year's Resolution again? Do the best I can, and don't beat up on myself (paraphrasing). I am feeling better than I was a month ago; I've rested up, the days are getting longer, I've started taking some vitamins and they're kicking in? Either way, things are looking better. So, looking forward...

Immediately after publishing my last post, I thought: "Okay, you've done your venting. So, what are you going to do about it?"

The very next day, I decided it was time to make friends with my treadmill again. and marched downstairs after work...To be confronted with the mess that my workout area has become. 

I had an afternoon off coming to me, so that Friday I took the afternoon and did some cleaning up down in the basement. I find I am always more motivated to go down there when things are at least somewhat tidy. Sadly, I ended up packing away the paintings I've had sitting up on the ledge down there. I put them up last fall I think? They were just leaning against the wall, but I have all these paintings, so I figured I might as well have some where I could see them. 

Then every once in a while I'd go down and find one had been knocked down (climbing felines, you know). Anyway, Isabelle knocked one down while I was down there cleaning up and actually knocked the wood framing a bit out of whack, so the painting is no longer flat. So I put them away, and now it looks bare down there; didn't realize how much of a difference it made until I took them down. I will have to see about putting up some picture hanging hooks.

Any-who, first step accomplished: I can actually access the treadmill. 

Of course, I then proceeded to avoid it until Thursday. I let myself have the rest of January, but now I'm giving myself a kick in the butt. 

We've been having a weird winter. It snows; it turns really freaking cold; it warms up and rains; all the snow disappears...and repeat.  Isabelle thinks she still wants to go outside, but on the cold, snowy days she usually doesn't make it far, or last very long outside.

But for now, the routine is still to come home and at least attempt to take Isabelle outside. Now that I have dug out my treadmill, I will attempt to add in some short walks...Partially to start getting in the habit again, and also because I want to see how my knee holds up. 

I've been doing well with bringing lunches to work, and allowing myself one day a week to buy lunch. I've been getting in my piano practice. We've been keeping the freezer well stocked with things we can come home and defrost for dinner.

Can We Start Over?

Dec 31, 2017
 
I still like my 2017 Resolution:

Keep doing what I know I can do, but do it better, and be kind to myself.

In all honesty, I feel like 2017 kicked my butt. Not that it was necessarily a bad year, but it was extremely busy and left me feeling overwhelmed.

I used most of my vacation time for going places. I feel like I should not complain about this because I know I get a good amount of vacation time - more than many people have available to them - and I really am thankful for that. And we did a lot of fun stuff; they were good trips. But this home-body-introvert likes to save a chunk of vacation time for spending quietly at home, doing her own thing, and she did not get it this year. Work seems to get busier and more stressful all the time. I didn't get to start my December vacation as early as I wanted because of the way project deadlines worked out. I was so desperately looking forward to vacation starting, and then it ended up being busy busy...Things that had to get done, but they weren't my things, not the things that I had been counting on doing....

So I had 3 days of rushing around, wishing I was doing different things, then we went home to visit family and I was probably not in the best frame of mind because I was tired and frustrated. We got delayed coming home because of weather. I was almost in tears on the way home, feeling tired and frustrated still/again. Husband said "Sleep in, tomorrow you will feel better."

I thought: "No I won't. That won't solve anything. I slept plenty while we were home."

Ha. He was right. Ssshhh. Don't tell him I said that....

The bed we were sleeping on while visiting home makes my back hurt. Amazing how much better you can feel after a night sleeping comfortably in your own bed.

I still haven't done the things I wanted to do, and at this point I can't even figure out where to start. I have spent the last two days doing not much. Recovering my equilibrium, I guess. Today I am finally feeling like I want to do things...sort of? It's our anniversary. Hey! Happy 16 years! We are going out to dinner. Early this year, so we will be home in our jammies well before midnight, I am sure. Sounds good to me.

I find myself feeling reflective, and thinking about what I want for the coming year.

There was lots of good stuff. There was lots of stress which is not so good. Things have been changing at work over the years, since our happy little company was acquired by a larger entity. We still have jobs; we have better perks now...But the day to day gets harder and harder. I feel like I need to get a better handle on dealing with stress.

Health-wise; I wish I could turn into an energetic, not tired person...But I don't think that is my physical makeup. That said, there have been some extra challenges with my knee being uncooperative, and I also feel like I need to get a better handle on my eating; I am not eating in the way that makes me feel my best and I need to make some changes there...even if it means I drag Husband along, kicking and screaming all the way.


Jan 21, 2018
...So I started writing this post on Dec 31, walked away to gather my thoughts a bit and here it is, weeks later...I'm not sure my thoughts are gathered yet.

Went back to work on Jan 2nd and jumped right back into craziness and my 'almost feeling like myself again' went back to exhausted.

I feel like I have not accomplished much.

• Still have not made a follow up doctor's appointment about my knee (I did go for x-rays, but need to go back and find out if they showed anything and if there are any next steps).
• I wanted to at least try to start doing some easy yoga, and get back to some short walking breaks at work, since it does seem like my knee is cooperating at the moment.
• I still have bunch of things to tackle at home. It's still hard to know where to start
•  I need to book vacation time and buy a plane ticket for a planned sister vacation this spring.

I don't know....I just feel like I should be doing things but the work week knocks me out and on the weekends I don't want to go anywhere or do much of anything. I suppose this is partly just winter.

So this is kind of a whiny, going nowhere post I guess? Somehow I need to get on the ball, pull up my socks, get my butt in gear and all that jazz.

I started taking B12 a little less that 2 weeks ago. My sister was talking about it, and I looked up the symptoms of B12 deficiency and felt like I was reading about myself. I don't tend to eat much meat, so it is probably something I should to doing. I do think I am feeling a bit better, so we shall see how it goes. When I bought the B12, I happened to see a natural remedy that's supposed to help with stress, so I'm giving that a try. I figure it can't hurt, right?

Thursday night/Friday morning I dreamed about Frank. It's been a while. In my dream, I was not at home, but I had Frank with me. So I was mostly carrying him around and holding him, because I didn't want him to get lost. Frank was always such a satisfying armful of cat. In my dream, I realized that I hadn't seen Frank in a while. I was all confused, trying to figure out why that would be so. Eventually, there was this little voice in my head reminding me: you don't have him anymore. Then I woke up and went and cried in the shower. While it's not weighing down on me the way it was for the first year or so, I do still feel sad when I think of Frank and Zappa, and I have felt it a little more so over the past couple of days.

But it helps to have this snuggly one.

On weekend mornings when I don't have to get up, she likes to come and sleep the extra hour or so with me. I love sleeping in while cuddling a cat.

We had some extremely cold weather for the first part of January. We had some snow. Last weekend it warmed up enough that all the snow was gone and it felt like spring. Isabelle and I enjoyed the interlude.

It snowed again around the middle of last week, it warmed up yesterday and the snow started to melt away a bit. Then colder again today and supposed to snow more starting tomorrow. Mother Nature can't make up her mind.

All about my knees...

This is making me cranky.

• Still afraid to exercise. Walking is even iffy, since I never know when my knee is going to go funny.
• Made a doctor's appointment.
• Have adjusted my chair and keyboard tray at work so that they are in the lowest position and I am trying to sit with my feet flat on the floor (Am very short. Hate sitting down that low. Feel like a child sitting at the grown-up table).
• I am a person with a large shoe collection. Surprisingly, I have very few flat, supportive type shoes that are not casual/athletic looking. Went shoe shopping on the weekend, even though I am the last person one would describe as "in need of new shoes." Bought 2 new pairs of Naots that should be okay with dress trousers (as opposed to jeans). Looked around a lot, and tried on a bunch, but Naots have never let me down in the past. I may also have tried on a pair of Fly London heels because I fell in love with them; they did not have the right size in the store; I then hunted them down online and ordered...Stubbornly optimistic about knee recovery.
• If not exercising, should probably start paying more attention to what I am eating... :(
•  Am now sleeping with a pillow under my knees because it is the only way I can get comfortable. Already had three pillows on my side of the bed (so I can sit comfortably to read before I sleep) which makes Husband shake his head; this brings the total of JavaChick required pillows to four.

 I am to young for this. Right?

One Year

Yesterday was one year since we lost Zappa. One year without my Fabulous Felines. Still sad, in all honesty, but at least I am back to myself (or mostly anyway). Trying not to dwell on it, but it has been popping up in my mind whether I want it to or not. I've been missing Zappa hugs lately; he was really good at that.

My knee, which I thought was getting better, is worse again. Probably my own fault for wearing heels the past two days at work, but I am getting bored wearing the same two pairs of shoes...So still afraid to actually work out. I keep meaning to google 'exercises to strengthen muscles around knee.' Suppose I'm getting to the point where I should maybe see a doctor or something. I just hate going and trying to explain what's wrong.

Definitely starting to feel like fall. Starting to cool off, and I've been noticing it smells like fall; when I take Isabelle out in the yard, I can smell the leaves on the ground, and whiffs of evergreen.

Still, there is my brave little rose bush...

And interesting things to see, now that the leaves have fallen from the trees...

And that's about it for the moment. Short one tonight, it's late and I need to take myself off to bed, but somehow I just needed to post this.

This is why I don't blog much these days...By the time I actually manage to sit down at the computer, it's late and I'm tired, and while I have a vague notion of why I wanted to write a post, I can't seem to put it all together.