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Posted on February 29, 2012 - by Ashley Jackson

Thank you girl, for making the morning brighter…

I was looking forward to writing an epic post today since I haven’t blogged since Saturday, but now all I want to do is sit around listening to songs by The Monkees (and also that one Davy Jones song from The Brady Bunch Movie). I grew up listening to The Monkees–no joke, want me to serenade you?–and I am sad that Davy Jones is no longer with us. My Facebook tells me I’m not the only 20-something whose day got a little dimmer upon hearing the news.

—

Saturday morning I nibbled on the remains of a bag of salt and vinegar kettle chips.

Then I had some grapes and played with the new setting I discovered on the camera I’ve had for two and a half years.

Super macro!

I got distracted while straightening up my apartment and forgot to eat lunch. Ha ha. My fiance came over and we did some shopping for our Oscar party and then went to Arby’s for dinner. There would be a picture here, but I forgot my camera. But I got the “max” size roast beef sandwich and it was awesome. Arby’s is so stingy with their meat these days! Remember the five-for-five deals they had back in the day? Those were good times…

Saturday night I made two chocolate chess pies for the party, and used the leftover filling to make a small crustless pie for sampling purposes. It was great, and I’m really, really glad I put in 2 1/4 cups of sugar instead of the 3 cups the doubled recipe would’ve called for.

Sunday morning I broke out some plum and fig Liberte.

I hereby approve of Liberte plum and fig yogurt, and declare it better than the old plum and walnut variety!

I had a meeting at church that lasted so long that I didn’t even have to break out the book I had stuck in my purse between the time it ended and the time mass started. Immediately after I left church I called my fiance to tell him we were never going to let our kids act the way that the parents sitting on the same pew as I was let their kid act. Seriously, kids like this kid make my ovaries cringe.

But then I went to the library to pick up a book and while I waited for it to open (along without about 20 other people–awesome!), I saw a cute little boy who was really excited about going to the library and very well-behaved.

After I picked up my book from the holds shelf and self-checked it out, I went to Char-Grill for a bunless burger.

Skipped the fries since I had no one to share them with and didn’t want to get a drink.

Then I checked out my pies. I was worried they hadn’t set all the way, but they were fine.

I checked my ballot for the Oscar pool one more time before my fiance arrived…

And then we started going into serious party-prep mode. I used painter’s tape to make some horribly awesome entrance decorations.

We broke to go to the store for some not-quite-last-minute things, and also to get some Dunkin Donuts munchkins for a snack.

Then we got our decorating on, hard-core.

And…I’m going to save the rest of the post for later, ’cause I have a dinner date!

Posted on February 25, 2012 - by Ashley Jackson

Fishy Weather Friday

You know how they say that if you don’t like the weather in place X, wait a day? We’ve had a snowy, mid-30s day and a thunderstormy, 70-degree day in the same week here in Raleigh! While I don’t really like North Carolina’s wild weather swings, I do love the mild winters and the spring-like weather in February. I just hope the unseasonably warm weather doesn’t lead to a repeat of last year’s spring tornadoes.

I had my first bad night of sleep in a long time Friday morning. I woke up at 2:30am and had that old familiar feeling that I wasn’t going back to sleep soon. I got up and read some news and blogs for a couple of hours, then managed to back to sleep for a few hours before I headed off to work a little late. In my haste to get out the door I left my camera sitting on the desk, but at least I remembered to pack some food to eat at work!

I started the day off with a mango Chobani, then went ahead and broke out my lunch early.

Tuna salad, using the mayonnaise I made Thursday night. The mayonnaise tasted and smelled strongly of olive oil when it was on its own, so I was worried it was going to be a bust, but mixed into the tuna I couldn’t taste it at all. Which is how I like my tuna salad. It also had pickles and shredded cheddar cheese in it. I had it on some new gluten-free seed crackers that I bought on a whim at the store the other night. These actually taste like crackers. Unfortunately I left the bag at work so I’m not sure what brand they are.

Afternoon snackage included a banana + pistachios and a peach Chobani late in the afternoon. My boss came around at 4pm and told everyone we could leave if we wanted to because of the tornadoes, but I decided I was safer at work than in my apartment.

The bad weather was over pretty quickly and once it was gone all the tornado watches went away, so I headed to my fiance’s place for a trip to Target and dinner. I wanted to grab a couple Chobani Greek yogurts at Target to hold me over for a few days until I could get to Whole Foods to buy some more Liberte yogurt. I stopped buying them last year even though I love them (seriously, BEST YOGURT EVER) because they’re around $1.25 each and I was trying to save money. Money’s not as tight now and I’m paying pretty much the same price for Chobani as I would be for Liberte, so why not get the kind I like more?

We grabbed a couple of Chobani yogurts from the sale case, and for some reason I felt compelled to go check out the actual yogurt section at Target. Lo and behold, they had my beloved Liberte yogurts! My fiance put my other yogurts back while I loaded up on a couple of weeks’ worth of THE BEST YOGURT EVER (and also a couple of Fage yogurts, because they had recently been price-dropped into the same price range).

My tiny Target does not have these wonders; it barely has a grocery section. Hmph.

After Target, we went for a late dinner at Cap’n D’s, which was hoppin’ on the first Friday of Lent. Right after we arrived, they ran out of tartar sauce, ice, and sweet tea. Also, we somehow got our order ahead of the two families that ordered before we did. I got my usual #4–three-piece fish with fries and coleslaw, plus a Diet Coke.

Afterward we split a piece of chocolate espresso cake that we got at Target, because I wanted a reward for going candy-less for three days.

This morning I had a delicious strawberry Liberte Mediterranee yogurt. It was just like a remembered–thick and smooth, like eating strawberries and cream.

Mmm…

I noticed while I was loading up on yogurt at the store that they had switched out the plum and walnut flavor for plum and fig, and added a coconut variety. I also noticed the lack of apple pie yogurt, which was my favorite kind–it had apples, cinnamon, and raisins and tasted like heaven in a #5 plastic cup. Unfortunately, a little Googling tells me that Liberte discontinued the flavor recently, which makes me sad in the face.

I’m going to spend the day straightening up my apartment and getting ready for tomorrow’s Oscar party! I’ve already filled out my ballot…

Posted on February 23, 2012 - by Ashley Jackson

All the Other Kids…

Does anyone else get “Pumped Up Kicks” by Foster the People stuck in their head randomly? It’s alternatively catchy if you just listen to the music and kinda horrible if you listen to the words. And it is constantly stuck in my head.

My plan to front-load my eats into the earlier part of the day worked, to the point that I actually executed it; pretty much the only time all day I was hungry was in the late afternoon when I was on the way home from work and to dinner. I got to work in time to eat a mango Chobani with some walnuts crunched up on top of it before heading off to a four-hour meeting that started at 8am.

(Un?)Fortunately, no one brought any donuts to the meeting. I would’ve shamelessly eaten and enjoyed at least two. Mid-morning I had half of an apple pastry and a miniature cinnamon roll, then chased it with some grapes.

For lunch, I had some salami and provolone on pecan Nut Thins.

I bought a box of the almond Nut Thins when they first came out, but didn’t like them enough to get them again. I decided to get a box the other day so I could have cheese and crackers and was happy to find four or five different varieties on the shelf (including ranch!). I didn’t grab the pecan version for any real reason, but after getting over the initial “these don’t taste like crackers!’ phase, I’m cool with them. Not totally primal, but they’ll do for me.

I took a walk after I finished eating, then got back to work. My mid-afternoon snack was a bunch of grapes and a Diet Dr. Pepper.

I have some irrational need to spend any one dollar bills that I have on the vending machine. Normally I’d buy some peanut M&Ms, but I decided to give up candy for Lent because I have a serious candy problem. The Diet Dr. Pepper was kinda like a fake sugar patch for my candy addiction.

In all seriousness, I really have decided to give up candy for Lent, even though everyone does it and it’s kinda the go-to thing to give up. I eat a LOT of candy at work; I eat it mindlessly if it’s around in large supply; I replace meals with it…I don’t want to stop eating it completely, because I do enjoy it, and because I believe that pretty much any food is fine to eat at least once in a while. But I do want to break the habit of being pretty much gluttonous when it comes to eating it. I was going to try to figure out how much money I would have spent on candy between now and Easter and donate it to the food bank, but since a lot of my fixes come from the office candy bowls, I’m not really sure how I’d figure that out. I’m not good with the math. It’d be easier to just donate whatever’s leftover in my food budget for the month. I’m also going to try to take a 15-minute walking break in the afternoons to just chill out and think when I start hitting the mid-afternoon slump, because that’s about when I start stuffing my face with miniature Reese’s cups every day.

I decided to do all this a couple of days ago, so it has nothing to do with the fact that I weighed myself last night and discovered that I now weigh 171.8 lbs. I knew I’d gained back most of what I lost in late 2010/early 2011 but I thought I was still around 165, so it was a bit of a shock since I’m pretty sure the heaviest I’ve ever been is around 175 lbs. I guess what shocked me most is that I still fit into all of my size 10 pants, and last time I was close to this weight I was a size 16. Do my awesome calves really weigh that much?

Anyway, this is why I’m going to try to get back into the habit of walking during my lunch break at work, and in the evenings after work once it gets lighter a little earlier in the evenings.

I stayed at work a little late, then met up with my fiance and went to Five Guys for dinner.

Lately I’ve been eating my burgers bunless most of the time. I like being able to actually taste the toppings and the meat, and since I don’t really like bread anyway, I’d rather ditch it and eat extra fries. I started ordering burgers without buns at Char-Grill, but a couple of visits ago to Five Guys I asked them if they do it, too. And they do. Tonight they put my cheeseburger on lettuce and topped it with onions, tomatoes, and more lettuce. I paradoxically put mayonnaise on it. It was all good.

Since a regular order of fries at Five Guys gets you a cup full of fries plus at least another cup’s worth thrown into your bag with your order, we just got one order of fries and split it. I’ve decided I like both the burgers and the fries at Five Guys better than at Char-Grill. But I still love Char-Grill, too. And Cook-Out. Can’t I be in love with three burger joints at once?

After dinner I tried to make my own mayonnaise for the first time. I’ll let you know how it turned out tomorrow…