Oh, Beans!

Saturday = Market = Breakfast Burrito!! That's some math that I'm comfortable with!

After the Market, it was time for lunch. Here comes some more math that makes sense to me:

Lunch = Brotein Bar!!

In addition, we had some leftover cookies, so I practiced my addition skills:

This was less than a quarter of a Peanut Butter Stuffed Chocolate Chip Cookie, but just look at that gloriousness!!

For dinner, I decided to go shopping once more in the deep freeze. Today was actually surprisingly fruitful. I found some black bean burger patties, so I cooked up a couple, melted some Velveeta on top of each patty, toasted a bun, and got to eating!

With all that cheese, who needs anemones?!

Plus, the fiber content is just an added bonus. The one drawback is the amount of sodium, but as my good bro Andrew would tell me, "Just eat some potassium to cancel it out!"

I still needed more calories and more brotein, though, so I cooked up some chicken thighs that I also found in the deep freeze!

It turned out to be a very good shopping trip, with a lot of delicious food being found at rock bottom prices!!!

A little while later, I sampled what will be my Breakfast: Part I tomorrow... stay tuned for the full story as well as Breakfast: Part II.

Actual Literal Hamburgers

The last time I was in this computer lab I was experiencing feelings of immense anxiety and bouts of nervous hilarity. Today, I was calm. I didn't have a presentation to give, so I was feeling like a million deer. I sat back and relaxed and enjoyed my brotein bar in peace.

Later, after I had returned home, I enjoyed my second brotein bar, although this time it was while working on Western Civ.

Sometimes it's hard to decipher these translations of ancient writing. Oh well, I do my best.

For dinner, I went shopping in the deep freeze. I found some ground pork that was about 8 months old. This was made into burgers.

I then had the epic realization that these were actual hamburgers. Get it???

They were quickly joined by some 2 month old chicken.

I slathered some Velveeta-esque cheese over the top of everything.

This was by far my best decision of the day, let me tell you. Even with the cheese, 11 ounces of 91% lean ground pork that was cooked way to long (read: DRY) and 14 ounces of plain chicken breast still get a little tough to finish. I enjoyed the brotein overdose, but sheesh this stuff just doesn't taste good after eating so much of it.

What I really wanted I couldn't have, both for dietary reasons and because if I did I could potentially not live to see tomorrow.

I'm not just talking about Sidney's blueberry muffins, either. There were also her caramel pretzel brownies...

...and her double chocolate banana muffins.

I wanted it all IN MY BELLY!!! But unfortunately it's destined for the Market, where I'll be forced to watch other people enjoying these wonderful things, not to mention the nearly 80 cookies as well. Oh well, better for other people to eat them than me. I'm trying to get lean, after all!

Beef + Broccoli

This morning, Sidney and I got up early to head over to our new house to do a little cleaning. In all reality, we do not own the house and it was built in 1928, so I use the terms "ours" and "new" rather loosely. 

Anyway, when we got over to the house, I found a nice little surprise waiting for me in one of the bookshelves. 

Apparently, this house cares deeply about my daily brotein needs! I think I can get used to this. After a little while of cleaning, sweeping, and sweating, Sidney and I headed back to her parents' house to bake cookies for the Market.

A very short while into baking, and the inevitable has happened once more. There was an odd number of oatmeal cookies for the Whoopie Pies, so Sidney slapped some frosting on the odd one out and split it with me.

We made it through the rest of the cookies without too many more macro-busting incidents. But after mixing up the Breakfast Cookies, I grabbed a small handful of raisins and ate them.

This has become somewhat of a tradition for me.

Speaking of burgeoning traditions, we did in fact have another Frankencookie this week. This is about the 5th or so week in a row that this has happened. What a shame...

I also had to deal with these sitting right in front of me...

Unfortunately, if I eat all the cookies, we can't sell them. Luckily, we had this to satisfy my cookie craving.

Sidney and I split it down the middle, and it was still warm.

There really is nothing quite like a Sidney cookie fresh out of the oven. The wonderful thing about Frankencookies is that you get to experience more than one (sometimes up to 4!) different kinds of cookies without eating that many individual cookies. Actually, why don't we just make Frankencookies on purpose? I might be on to something here!

But brilliant ideas aside, it was now lunch time. I planned on heating up a leftover chicken thigh from the other night, but seeing as I could not locate the leftover chicken (probably due to the fact that it was traversing someone's alimentary canal), I opted for the second best option.

No, I don't mean the crock pot (that's for later!). I am referring to the brotein bar chilling on the lid.

But soon enough, here I am talking about the crock pot. Actually, it's more so about what's inside of the crock pot.

Sidney's mom decided to make the delicious Chinese staple that is Beef and Broccoli. It simmered for a good part of the day, menacingly teasing me with the aromas of fresh garlic. But now it was my time.

First, I needed a little bit of rice to provide a comfy bed for the beef and broccoli to rest on, and to soak up any extra sauce.

Then it was time for the main event. Behold the gloriousness that fills this bowl:

This was good. Really good. Super really good. Like so good that I, gee I don't know, had to get more!

Of course I got a little more rice...

But I really focused on the beef and broccoli. Mmmm, mmm, mmm it was so good!

This was a perfect way to end the day. The flavor of this was so good that I wasn't even craving any dessert afterward. I was perfectly happy with this being the last food I tasted today. And hopefully I judged portion sizes well enough that I didn't go over on calories. Anyway, it was a good day.

The Perfect Burrito Bowl for Cutting!

Today was a very nerve-wracking day. I woke up with the knowledge that in just a few short hours I'd be giving a 30-minute presentation about foot and ankle structure. I hate public speaking. There's just something about it that doesn't mesh with my personality. I was pretty nervous, but I was able to down a brotein bar before driving in to campus to practice.

I got to the computer lab about an hour and a half before my presentation time, which gave me just about enough time to run through it a couple times. I sat down at the computer, started my presentation, started my stopwatch, and talked through it. By the time I finished this practice run, my stopwatch read about 27 minutes.

This was good.

I then reset my stopwatch, went back to the start of my presentation, and did it again. This time I took about 25 minutes.

Okay, a little short, but still good. By now there were only about 20 minutes or so until my presentation time, so I had to walk to the classroom. As I started walking out of the computer lab, I got this interesting feeling as though I was willingly walking to my own demise. It was weird. I got a similar feeling in 7th grade Speech class where while writing a speech I felt as though I was writing my own suicide note.

But I kept on walking. I walked into Malott like I had done so many times before. I passed through the tunnel bridge connecting Malott to Haworth like I had done so many times before. Then before I knew it I was entering the classroom where my presentation would take place. I grabbed the doorknob, turned it clockwise, pushed the heavier-than-it-should-be door open, and flipped on the lights. I then mindlessly drifted toward the podium, where I took my laptop out of my backpack, plugged it in to the wall, then plugged the projector into the 15-pin VGA port on the left side of my laptop.

I then opened up my presentation and pressed F5 to enter presentation mode. It was almost time. Except I was still the only person in the room. A minute or so later, my professor walked in. We talked a little about the paper while I tried to act like I wasn't nervous. Then another student walked in, and then another.

It was now time for my presentation, but there were only two students in attendance so far, so we decided to wait a little while longer for anyone else to show up. About 5 minutes later, we made the decision that I should just go ahead and start. I felt my leg and back muscles tighten as a leaned forward slightly, slowly rising to my feet. I then numbly walked over to the podium, laser pointer in hand, and pressed start on my stopwatch and then the right arrow key to begin my presentation.

Everything went fine from here on out, and I managed to bumble along through my slides and figures without making too much of a fool out of myself. When I got done presenting, I looked down at my stopwatch and quietly laughed to myself; it read only 20 minutes! So, somewhere between practicing and presenting, I lost nearly 10 minutes. I guess this means that I blazed through my presentation in a tongue-twisting slurry of words and incomprehensible noises. But I made it. I got through it. The feeling of relief afterward was so intense that I couldn't stop laughing for quite some time.

Feeling as though I was on top of the world, I went and got a haircut and then went home, where I treated myself to a delicious brotein bar lunch.

It tasted so much better for lunch than it had for breakfast. In fact, everything looked more cheery in general after my presentation!

In celebration of my presentation being done, Sidney and I went on a date to Chipotle. Not wanting to accidentally have a cheat day, I calculated out ahead of time all the nutrition info for what I would order. I'll run through it really quick:

I would order a Burrito Bowl with the following:

• Chicken
• Steak
• Double black beans 
• Fajita vegetables
• Green tomatillo salsa
• Double cheese
• Lettuce

Notice: no rice and no sour cream. This is what that looked like:

I added up all the nutrition facts and entered them into MyFitnessPal, and this is what that looked like:

Not bad for eating out.

When Sidney and I got home, we treated ourselves to the remaining 2/3 of that poppyseed "bread" that we had gotten at the Market last weekend.

We split it down the middle.

But seriously, this thing is really not bread at all. This is literally a poppyseed muffin in the shape of tiny bread. I mean, check out the sugar coating:

And with a hint of almond extract, this is the best poppyseed bread/muffin that I've ever had. I knew it would take a lot to dethrone the lemon poppyseed muffins from Mrs. E's, but this has unanimously accomplished that. It was just so amazingly good.

Peanut Butter Brotein Time!

I had a slight pang of creativity this morning, so instead of simply eating my brotein bar and being happy, I concocted a little something extra. 

I whipped up some Jif reconstituted peanut butter, but what was I to do with it??

Spread it on top of a chocolate peanut caramel brotein bar, of course!

This was all I really ate for most of the day, but I ended up splitting my dinner into two separate meals. I got a bowl of green bean, potato, and kiolbasa for round one...

...and about an hour or so later I got round two!

Sidney then decided to get some ice cream, and I was very close to being tempted into getting a bowl myself. But I didn't give in; I simply settled on taking a spoonful from her bowl!

I savored the flavor and it was all I needed! This was definitely a get lean day!

Happy Pie Day (Wait, it's not March 14th...)

This morning, I found my brotein bar hanging out with some fairies.

Then I spotted this:

Okay, more like I opened the fridge, rummaged around, found the container (knowing full well what was inside), opened it up, beamed upon the glory, contemplated my serving size for a second, then got to work cutting out a piece.

This was a cherry pie made from the cherries I picked and painstakingly pitted. Alright, I have no evidence that these were the exact cherries that I picked and pitted, but they could be! At the very least, they came from the same tree!

Thanks to Sidney's mom for turning these tart cherries into a deliciously sweet pie!

Sidney then left a cookie and glass of milk sitting on the counter.

I took a very small bite of the cookie and a very small sip of the milk.

Later, for lunch, I had a brotein fiber bar.

I then headed in to campus to do some homework (interesting, I know). I was on my way back down from the computer lab when I stopped to admire the scenery.

The pictures don't do it much justice.

Then I approached my home away from home, Haworth Hall, towering toward the blue.

It is this building that the Biology Department calls home, so it is likewise this building that a majority of my classes have been in for the past couple years of so.

I also made a stop by KU's own installment of the Dharma Initiative...

And after finally returning home, I found a lovely dinner prepared by Sidney's mom.

This is one of my favorite ways to cook chicken. It's easy and absolutely delicious.

After dinner, there was still some cherry pie left, so we were quite literally forced to eat it. Sidney and I shared a decent-sized slice.

But there isn't a much better way to start and the day!