Saturday, December 31, 2016

December Review

Man, I feel pretty good. December was kind of a mess by my usual standards, but I'm also relooking at those standards. Maybe things don't have to be so structured, you know? I've been so strict since my stroke, before that even, about only being able to do so much, but my therapist and I talk a lot about how energy can be illusory. Especially when you're depressed, everything seems like so much work. My strategy for years really has been to carefully husband my resources, but lately we are looking at maybe I have more resources than I think. Without, of course, pathologically doing All The Things. It's a little hard to explain, it has something to do with being aware of your quality of energy at given moments: closing off the bad energy spigots, and opening up the good spigots.

December picks:

I didn't pick any specifics for December, just roll the dice and see what comes up.

HOME: Make a better place to live in

1. Pick anything.

The two main things I did in this area was my monthly volunteering for the foot clinic, and decorating my house for the holidays:

home for the holidays #winterval

A photo posted by Pauline Pang (@allapoppy) on

In addition to providing a nice mise-en-scene for Winterval, this was good because the top of that bookcase was getting cluttered and crazymaking; when I move things back after the holidays, it will be calmer there whilst still functional.

Also, der schweetums put up my new shelf!

OMG, it's so good. It has taken up a good part of the clutter and turned it into visual interest. More solutions TK!

There was also a pretty consistent amount of writing to my representatives this month, I suppose now that this inauguration is actually happening I will refocus my efforts where they will be best used.

SYSTEMS: Sharpen the saw

2. Pick anything.

LOTS of saw-sharpening this month: therapy, a Forrest Yoga workshop with Box, a Defence Lab taster with Brawla, holiday stuff like gift wrapping and gift delivering, people stuff like coffee with Painbows, breakfast with Sparty and Maggie, tea with Nina, and coffee with Sparty again, oh and King Spa with JJ:

spa date! #yangmeori #jjimjilbang

A photo posted by Pauline Pang (@allapoppy) on

I guess last but not least, I completed a little running challenge this month. Super-pleased with how that went:

PLAY: Study movement and muscles

3. Keep watching Functional Patterns videos?

Just a tiny bit of this, watched a couple videos on the suboccipital and the illiacus.

PASTIME: Write alla Poppy

4. Figure out what this blog is for.

Nnnn, idk. The only thing I really feel like writing these days are these reviews, just for my own edification. I have more of an idea about not really feeling like flash-freezing my thoughts, I've noticed that I just let them sit at room temperature as it were, they ferment and transform. I'm liking that, it seems really productive in addition to being a lot less work. Well, we'll see.

Going out

It's been an uber-social month, besides the stuff that I've already mentioned under self-care: December is my niece's Christmas concert, we went to that and out to dinner with my family after; I ran into Pom and B at the yoga workshop and we went out after for brunch:

yoga franns

A photo posted by Pauline Pang (@allapoppy) on

There was prime rib at the Aloha Palace, and also UFC 207 there. And me and der schweetums went out to see Rogue One, we were supposed to go Xmas Day but that day he said it was supposed to rain and not the next day, and the next day turned out to be this one warm, sunny, blue sky day that was beautiful to be out walking, boy when he's right he's right.

Staying in

I feel like I did a fair amount of staying in, too—except I don't think I did, but anyway. Actually this month I've been doing a thing that I haven't done in forever: making stuff—i.e., knitting hats for the PUSSYHAT PROJECT, or well, I knitted a pussyhat for Riley and then I sort of couldn't stop making pussyhats:

just making a collage for my blog, nothing to see here...

A photo posted by Pauline Pang (@allapoppy) on

Now I'm obsessed with making hats, I'm almost done with a hat for myself, it's head-shaped and everything. TK!

Knitting means you can't do anything else with your hands, which means watching a lot of TV. Meh, I usually list all the TV I've watched, but no me importa. We're watching the second season of Lucifer, which we really like, and also the second season of The Man In The High Castle, and on Xmas Day I watched The OA in its entirety while knitting and vacating my mind. Okay fine, movie-wise we watched Suicide Squad, which was not good; 2 Guns, which I fell dead asleep in the middle of, and The Magnificent Seven, which I liked all right. And a bunch of other junk.

Woosh, what a year. Much work to do ahead. Happy new year, all!




Sunday, November 27, 2016

November Review

Hoooookay, mooovin' on up. Though sort of in the context of everything else going down the crapper? By which I don't mean to be coy, the horrendous prospect of Donald Trump as the president of the United States and, worse to me, the parlous state of discourse in this house divided. Perhaps this itself has been galvanizing to me, I surely do appreciate that the country flushed itself just to cheer up little old me. But mostly I think the Lexapro is working, I emailed my doctor a couple weeks ago that I thought it was working but was I supposed to *know* that it was working? But I'm not having any side effects so it's no skin off my nose to keep taking it, so then I was out on a little walk mit der schweetums and was chirping about how much I loved my shoes and totally flashed back to the time that I got baked on vicodin, haha. It's kind of just like that, without the dry heaves and lockjaw.

Well, we shall see! I'm working on some other interesting stuff with my therapist, too.

November picks:

My neat schedule was scattered for most of the month, I decided to up my therapist to every week from every other week and that more than anything threw me off, though I've also been trying to pick up where I left off with figuring out who my representatives are and that had to be fit into my life, too.

Luckily I had really low expectations for this month.

HOME: Make a better place

1. Pick anything.

I started the month picking up little piddly tasks—making chicken broth, sorting laundry, setting the thermostat for winter— and finished out the month with a couple good projects:

I seasoned the two cast iron pans that Box and Brawla gave me, I used these instructions from Serious Eats, though for the oil I used Crisco, I read that someplace else. They turned out amazing!

woww #castiron what should i make in them

A photo posted by Pauline Pang (@allapoppy) on

I want to cover our little odd-shaped couch, but I have almost no ability to visualize how anything works in 3D. I had to physically work it out with a scrap of fabric. I'm looking forward to finishing this because the times before when I've done something nice for my surroundings have been really uplifting.

really ridiculous how painful this was to puzzle out, i'm trying to make a couch cover

A photo posted by Pauline Pang (@allapoppy) on


Asking what I can do for my country also falls under HOME: I've made phone calls to Paul Ryan, Mitch McConnell, my senators, and my representative opposing Bannon and supporting Obamacare, sent emails to my alderman asking him to support measures to protect Muslims, Latinos, and blacks in this city, and to Obama asking him to demilitarize the police at Standing Rock, and mailed a postcard, again, opposing Bannon:

#postcardavalanche #stopbannon

A photo posted by Pauline Pang (@allapoppy) on

Though honestly demanding action from my representatives is not really satisfying to me, I won't abdicate my responsibility to do my part with that but I prefer my own agency at the end of the day. I was poking around Volunteer Match for something I could do, it was interesting what appealed to me and what didn't. I didn't want to write. I didn't want to raise awareness. I wanted to work. In a minute this thing about a footwashing clinic popped up, so I sent them an a email. I wasn't really expecting to hear back very soon, I figured it likely that a volunteer organization would have their hands full enough to not be able to attend immediately to my need to feel like I was making a difference. But, Barbara from the foot clinic emailed back in a day asking if I could come in that weekend. So, I did. It was pretty much just what I thought it would be, and just what I wanted. The clinic is the third Saturday of the month, it's simple physical work and I feel like I especially understand the problem as a trainer. Though it's the opposite of what I work with as a trainer—undoing what almost always sitting does to the body. Homeless people are almost always standing, that's going to do something else to a body not to mention their feet. Not that I'm there as a trainer at all, just fill the buckets from the sink and fill the foot baths from the buckets, then empty the foot baths into the big bucket and empty the big bucket into the sink. I suppose what I bring to the party is, lifting that big bucket ain't no thang when you can squat proper.

SYSTEMS: Sharpen the saw

2. Pick anything.

Well, I'm sharpening my brain-saw with my therapist once a week. And, I have a new crown. In my mouth, not on my head. And guess what, I finally ordered those damn glasses. Lol, I get bifocals now.

I'm also putting together a new chart for my life, which is the interesting thing that I'm working on with my therapist. See, this is how I do, circumspicere. I dig myself out of depression by writing myself a routine (in chart form) and then I'm good for a while. Then the routine starts to feel routine and I get depressed and I trash the routine and then I'm good for a while. Then I get anxious. Haha. So I write a new routine. Around and around and around. And you know that's worked all my life, I have been seen as very functional and not even as depressed until after my stroke; that in itself has been quite isolating. My therapist is sort of pro-routine, which is sort of surprising to me. I think the self-help that I've been soaking in has been mostly of the busting out of routine nature. Anyway my therapist wants me to put together a routine and see what happens, and if it starts to feel routine and I want to trash it, then we are going to talk about that.

PLAY: Study movement and muscles

3. Keep watching Functional Patterns videos.

Erk, idk, I only have one day left to do this if I'm going to do this at all...

[ETA 11/29/16: Done!]

PASTIME: Write alla Poppy

4. Keep editing and publishing recipes.

Not done, I didn't even do November Eats this month. I wasn't even going to do this review, but I started feeling cheerful about my shoes and in any case these reviews are actually useful to me. Eats, not so much. I know what I eat, I don't have to look back on what I've eaten. This is the state of the blog at the moment, I have to figure out what it's for.

Going out

Kind of a light going out month, early in the month I went to the South Side Pie Challenge with Problem and Karma:

sweet and salty pumpkin pie, savory sweet potato pie, buttermilk pie

A photo posted by Pauline Pang (@allapoppy) on

The next weekend me and der schweetums rode bikes to Minerva's to watch UFC 205, and a couple weeks after that Box and Brawla hosted an early thanksgiving at the Aloha Palace, and last weekend I went to see Fantastic Beasts with Biggie.

Staying in

It turns out that MJ really likes Harold's Fried Chicken, he normally hates talking on the phone but he's happy to call Harold's and place our order and then go pick it up. He texts me at work on Fridays to ask when I'm coming home so he knows when to call, haha. Though work is winding down and I don't work late so much. So Friday nights we have fried chicken and watch TV, this month we watched this SyFy series The Expanse that's based on a famous series of books, which I got into reading for a couple weeks. Then we fell into a nest of action movie duds: Mechanic: Resurrection, Ghosts of Mars, Oblivion, and the remake of Point Break. I thought I had pretty low standards for action movies, but it turns out I need a story and characters to resonate with. Huh. We did also watch The Man Who Knew Infinity, which I liked. I like movies about math. That's like I love space but have less than zero interest in going into space myself.

Yeah, nope. Nope nope nope.

December picks:

Let's keep it simple, shall we?

HOME: Make a better place to live in

1. Pick anything.

SYSTEMS: Sharpen the saw

2. Pick anything.

PLAY: Study movement and muscles

3. Keep watching Functional Patterns videos?

PASTIME: Write alla Poppy

4. Figure out what this blog is for.


Sunday, November 13, 2016

Please Stand By

Uncle, for now. I'm figuring stuff out, BRB.

Monday, October 31, 2016

October Review

October on paper doesn't look like much, but it hasn't felt bad. For one thing, I self-cared the shit out of myself: doctor appointment, therapist appointments, dentist appointment even. Need another crown, oh joy. Also I am now officially on antidepressants. Not that I was on them unofficially before, just being cute about my various anti-drugs that have at least gotten me this far. I'm on Lexapro, it's supposed to take 4–6 weeks to work. It's only been two and you know what: my globus is down to almost nothing. Which dang, I'll take it.

October picks:

HOME: Make a better place

1. Let's keep working on the house, it's so rewarding: pick a thing, anything.

Well, the only thing I got done this month was to deep clean the bathroom; that was deeply satisfying, I really should do that more often. But not so often that it loses contrast, ha. I did the whole salon coil trick and everything. I guess also I potted the spider plant cutting that I got from Brawla:

#spiderplant spiderplant livin in an old tin can

A photo posted by Pauline Pang (@allapoppy) on

Otherwise I did a little feeble tidying, Problem's annual taco ride, Box's little backbends yoga workshop, both awesome, and per usual one cleaning block is reserved for paying bills.

SYSTEMS: Sharpen the saw

2. Ughhh nevermind new glasses, let's try this pick anything strategy.

Like I said this was self care month, I pretty much did everything but get new glasses. Did I mention that I bought a new laptop last month? I did. I've finally more or less migrated to that. I also finally switched over to my allapoppy gmail account, what a project that was; google does get its tentacles into everywhere.

PLAY: Study movement and muscles

3. Keep watching Functional Patterns videos.

But, something had to give: not a lot of videos got watched this month. I did do some client-driven stuff, that's always something.

PASTIME: Write alla Poppy

4. Keep editing and publishing recipes.

I have a plan for this, but you know how the best laid plans go and this plan isn't all that well laid. Stay tuned.

State of the Blog
Right now I'm just keeping up with the two posts per month, an eats post and a review post. I'm fine with that for now. I want to do more, but I have to figure some stuff out. Maybe I'll write about what I figure out.

Going out

Not much again, the aforementioned taco ride and also Box and Brawla's annual fall chili dinner. I had a surprise night off and got to watch Game 2 of the World Series with my coworkers, I almost never get to do that. And Sparty and I had brunch.

Staying in

Not much here either, what MJ and I watched together was Luke Cage, Vice, and Star Trek Beyond. Otherwise there was a lotta lotta laying on the couch and in bed watching superhero TV. We started watching the fifth season of Longmire because Fran at work started watching it and wants to talk about it.

November picks:

Geez, I don't even know. Heading into the holidays and that's usually the worst time for me. My work project is finally winding down, though. Maybe work will get back to normal, then I can figure some stuff out.

HOME: Make a better place

1. Pick anything.

SYSTEMS: Sharpen the saw

2. Pick anything.

PLAY: Study movement and muscles

3. Keep watching Functional Patterns videos.

PASTIME: Write alla Poppy

4. Keep editing and publishing recipes.


Saturday, October 15, 2016

October Eats

Me figuring out what to eat is like an advanced word problem: I want a different protein at every meal, but for breakfast that can only be yogurt or eggs and for snack that can only be yogurt or nuts, I only want starch for one meal, and I think in my present condition that I can't even cook more than one day per week and on that day I can't even cook more than one recipe. Which means I'm looking at you, ready to eat things—but not too processed ready to eat things, mmkay. And which also means I'm looking at der schweetums. Who comes with his own set of word problems, chief among them that he doesn't really love meat. Which I only just learned, I have apparently entertained some highly gendered notions about protein consumption until pretty recently.

So speaking of ready to eat, I have gingerly retested greek yogurt and it seems okay now. I don't know what that was all about, but I'm glad it's over. I liked goat milk yogurt a lot, but greek yogurt is a lot more available. So I'm back to greek yogurt and fruit for breakfast, erryday:

Then back to egg bites for work day lunch:

Obviously this pic was not taken at the office, but I'm in a jam. Trust me, it looks just the same.

Things ended very abruptly and SO HARD between me and noodle jars, by the way. I don't know what happened, it was going so well and then it wasn't.

Staying with chicken and rice bowl for gym day lunch:

Also rice bowl for work day dinner, here der schweetums has taken it upon himself to learn my ground meat recipes, as he can just about deal with ground meat.

#chinesegroundpork #roastedgreenbeans #rice #dinnerbowl #goodeats

A photo posted by Pauline Pang (@allapoppy) on

I would like him to learn my slow meat recipes too, but I don't think he's going to do well with visible muscle fibers. Maybe when we get to that point, we can pivot and he can learn egg bites. Or maybe this therapy and medication will start working and I will again be able to cook more than one thing, who knows not where a wasp does wear his sting. (Which is to say, who knows.)

Have I told you this already: for "dinner" on gym days, I just sling a bottle of tart cherry water into my gym bag; this has been a gamechanger. I eat my starch meal for lunch and pretty much stay fueled for the rest of the day on that, and don't have to think about timing my dinner before going to the gym—that was always awkward, this is much smoother.

nothing to see here, just the bottle of #tartcherrywater that i take with me to the gym

A photo posted by Pauline Pang (@allapoppy) on

I want to always drink a little tart cherry juice (high in melatonin) before bed to help me sleep (though in truth it's the clonazepam doing the yeoman's work there), so I'll end my work days with a little glass and some cashews (high in magnesium, also for sleeping).

#tartcherryjuice #melatonin #cashews #magnesium #goodsleeps

A photo posted by Pauline Pang (@allapoppy) on

On gym days I just finish what's left of my tart cherry water and then I decided I could kobayashi maru my word problem and snack on an egg bite if I'm hungry.

Do you want to see it in table form? Yes, right? Eee hee hee:

SUN MON TUE WED THU FRI SAT
yogurt yogurt yogurt yogurt yogurt yogurt yogurt
chicken eggs chicken eggs chicken eggs turkey
tc2o turkey tc2o turkey tc2o chicken meat
eggs nuts eggs nuts eggs nuts nuts

Friday, October 14, 2016

Happy Birthday Kevin!!

kevin is two! #domokun #domo

A photo posted by Pauline Pang (@allapoppy) on

Sunday, October 2, 2016

Greek Yogurt with Roasted Apples and Sliced Almonds

greek yogurt with roasted apples and sliced almonds

This is really delish, it just got edged out of my regular rotation by microwaved apples. Which are also delish and don't have to be cooked ahead, and also come with bonus apple sticks. Not that roasting apples is so hard; if you have a little free headspace to pop a couple three apples in the oven, it'll be worth your while.

3–4 Honeycrisp or your favorite baking apples
honey
salt
cinnamon
greek yogurt
sliced almonds

Heat oven to 500 degrees.

Halve and core the apples, and arrange the halves cut side up in a 13 x 9 baking pan.

Thin about a tablespoon of honey with about a tablespoon of hot water in a small bowl. The hot water will melt the honey a bit, then whisk them together with a basting brush. Brush the thinned honey over the cut apple sides, using it all up. Sprinkle with a bit of salt and cinnamon.

Roast apples for twenty five minutes, turning the pan around in the oven halfway through if you think of it.

Let cool a bit, then plate two still warm halves right away with some greek yogurt and sliced almonds. The rest you can put away in the fridge to eat cold.

Saturday, October 1, 2016

Greek Yogurt with Microwaved Apples and Sliced Almonds

greek yogurt with microwaved apples and sliced almonds

Ahhh so good, thanks to Betty White Lightning with the assist on these!

an apple
Greek yogurt
sliced almonds

Quarter and core the apple, then halve and peel the quarters. Save the peels for apple sticks! Chop the eighths crosswise into small chunks.

Microwave the apple chunks in a covered bowl, how long depends on your microwave. I put mine in for two minutes, stir them up a bit, and put them in for another two minutes.

Spoon a few spoonfuls of yogurt into a bowl, then top with apples and sliced almonds.

Friday, September 30, 2016

September Review

September has been survival mode, or give myself a break mode, or basically trying to put into practice what I said last month: get better at 1) counting things that are being added to my plate, 2) taking other things off my plate to keep my plate total at a manageable level, 3) putting the plate down, 4) giving my brain a little extra quiet time to process it all.
E.g., You know what I thought would be fun, an axe-throwing party for MJ's birthday in October. So I floated a balloon to my usual suspects about that. It's eight minimum; if you have less than eight, you still get charged for eight. I got six bites. I mean, probably I could get two more and should just put down the deposit. And then I thought: with the 7,000 things that you have on your plate for work, I know it just seems like two little things about an axe-throwing party that you could nudge in on the edge of the plate. But, this is what you do! This is how you end up not being able to get out of bed because you can't face picking up that heavy-ass plate. Or dropping the plate and der schweetums finds you sobbing and terrified surrounded by shards of plate, and has to be like sigh I'll get the broom. So, I put the kibosh on the axe-throwing party, some other time. Good job, Munt.
And besides that, frankly just excusing myself from doing much of anything besides watching a looot of Netflix. Well also, work and stuff.

September picks:
HOME: Make a better place
1. The house needs me again: pick a thing, anything.
I did a major thing for this, actually. First of all as previously reported in September Eats, we finally got a new (to us) refrigerator. Secondly I suddenly went hog wild and took the front room to the next level, like threw out things and moved things that I actually use to places where I can actually reach them:

A video posted by Pauline Pang (@allapoppy) on

Similarly if I'm doing plank rows and rotations on my mat in the OPEN SPACE in the front room and I think, I could do with a 3# weight for these, I can get right up and get that 3# weight right out of its cubby.
Out of four blocks for HOME this month: one for the refrigerator, one for the front room, one to actually go into work on a Saturday and catch up on my work project, and one to pay bills (which is normal, one Saturday morning per month to pay bills, because I need to be brighteyed and bushytailed for that.)

SYSTEMS: Sharpen the saw
2. Order new glasses!
I still have not ordered new glasses, SIGH. I did order new contacts, though. And, I pretty much used 4 of 5 blocks for sharpening the saw—i.e., self care—on self-care: one to order contacts, see Dr Reyes, and fill a prescription for clonazepam, one to start a new notebook:
A photo posted by Pauline Pang (@allapoppy) on

...one to research therapists (recommended by Dr Reyes), research Quicken, and then to throw caution to the wind and buy a new laptop, one to see my new therapist, Dr Wolowitz. And the fifth one to go into work on Thursday, which Dr Wolowitz says is sort of self care, because at the moment it's this work project that's causing me the most anxiety. So taking care of the work project is taking care of my anxiety, which is self-care. That sounds kind of like a sucker's proposition, but this work project is supposedly finished on October 14th and after that I get to take care of my actual self? We shall see, and in any case I have Dr Wolowitz to talk about it to.
So yeah, so far September is seeming pretty all right, pretty productive even...
PLAY: Study movement and muscles
3. Keep watching Functional Patterns videos.
I only used 1 of 4 blocks for PLAY, for that I watched a video about taping for knee fat pad impingment and read an article about pain, and also produced a little collateral for a mobility session that I'm donating to WCR's Legends Ball for their raffle. That's my tiny gesture toward getting more clients, or I should say another client since I'm pretty committed to only ever onboarding one new client at a time. Getting more clients is something I would think or do something about if I wasn't so tired and sad all the time. Which is something I will talk about with Dr Wolowitz.
The three other blocks, one I think I ignited on the front room (so, totally worth it), one I caught up the week's cooking that I didn't do on Sunday because I couldn't get out of bed, and one I'm using to catch up writing this review that I didn't do on Monday because I went over to the Aloha Palace to eat grilled meats for Box's birthday (also worth it, plus I got two cast-iron pans and a spider plant cutting!)
Have I mentioned my plants? I have plants living at home now:


PASTIME: Write alla Poppy
4. Keep editing and publishing recipes.
No editing and publishing recipes was done this month, well, I did write up my instructions for noodle jars, but I'm talking about that friggin goodeats collection that I so dearly want to put to bed and be done with. The noodle jars I wrote up on a Sunday afternoon, though. The four Monday blocks that I had this month for blogging, one of them MJ and I went on a walk to scout out The Squared Circle, which was part of an initiative to do more fun things together:

A photo posted by Pauline Pang (@allapoppy) on

There lies the axe party.
One of them I drew some charts:

A photo posted by Pauline Pang (@allapoppy) on

One of them I was laying on my face on the couch watching Law & Order SVU, and one of them I was eating the aforementioned grilled meats.
State of the Blog
I. DON'T. KNOW.
Going out
Not much here, we did end up going to The Squared Circle to watch UFC 203; that was fun. Actually the day after, the supper club went out to Duck Duck Goat. It was good, said the world's most limited restaurant reviewer. And Sarge and Loren got married this month, and Box's birthday was this month.
Staying in
So not gonna lie, there was a lot of junk Netflix watched this month for resting, working, and sleeping: the aforementioned SVU, Hawaii Five-0, Bones, and Person of Interest all have had new episodes on Netflix. This is me putting the plate down, if not giving my brain quiet time. Apart from this, der schweetums and I tried to watch Hail Caesar but lost interest. We loooved Jean-Claude Van Johnson, though. And we also watched and liked Your Inner Fish, Your Inner Reptile, and Your Inner Monkey. And Luke Cage just started, we like that.
October picks:
I mean, mainly I want to be on the other side of this work project...

HOME: Make a better place
1. Let's keep working on the house, it's so rewarding: pick a thing, anything.
SYSTEMS: Sharpen the saw
2. Ughhh nevermind new glasses, let's try this pick anything strategy.
PLAY: Study movement and muscles
3. Keep watching Functional Patterns videos.
PASTIME: Write alla Poppy
4. Keep editing and publishing recipes.

Thursday, September 29, 2016

List #27: List The Things That Make You Feel Healthy: Mind, Body, and Soul

Truth be told I'm backdating this list to get it into third quarter. It's been a rough quarter, but these things help:

  1. Cooking weekly and cleaning at least biweekly.
  2. Scheduling appointments weekly.
  3. Recording bills weekly, paying bills monthly, reviewing budget quarterly, and prepping taxes annually.
  4. Sleeping 8–9 undelayed, uninterrupted hours nightly.
  5. Brushing teeth, washing face, and bideting twice daily, showering every other day, shampooing twice weekly, and bathing weekly.
  6. Drinking 16 oz water upon waking and with breakfast, lunch, and dinner.
  7. Drinking butter coffee with collagen upon waking four times weekly.
  8. Drinking black coffee with breakfast.
  9. Drinking green tea daily.
  10. Drinking tart cherry juice nightly.
  11. Eating eggs and fruit for breakfast, chicken, veg, and starch for lunch, yogurt for afternoon treat, meat and veg for dinner, and nuts for evening snack.
  12. Walking three times daily.
  13. Standing at least fifteen minutes morning and afternoon.
  14. Doing yoga four times weekly.
  15. Running three times weekly.
  16. Stretching nightly.
  17. Meditating daily.
  18. Going to therapy twice monthly.
  19. Staying in by myself weekly.
  20. Staying in with der schweetums weekly.
  21. Going out with friends at least twice monthly.

Sunday, September 25, 2016

Noodle Jars

noodle jars

The thing I didn't get about these Pinterest noodle jars was the just add hot water part. Just hot water?? Surely not. Why not miso, obviously. Of course miso comes with its own handling instructions, I don't think you can just add water to the jar and stir: the miso will clump, and is that going to be hot enough to heat up the noodles and stuff out of the fridge? And you don't want to heat miso in the microwave, all the good little probiotics will be killed :(

miso
a package of saifun noodles, mine come with three noodle bundles per package
a 4 oz box of shiitake mushrooms
one recipe Korean ground beef
a 5 oz bag of baby spinach

Put two tablespoons of miso each in the bottom of three mason jars.

Soak the saifun noodles in hot water for twenty minutes or so. While you're waiting, stem and slice the shiitakes. And make the Korean ground beef. Or you know, whatever. Rotisserie chicken also works. Drain the noodles and put one bundle into each jar.

Top the noodles with a generous scoop of Korean ground beef, a third of the sliced shiitakes, and a third of the baby spinach. I mean, that is really stuffing the jar with spinach. As you know, I just don't like having half a bag of baby spinach hanging out in the refrigerator. Causing trouble. Being a bad example to the other vegetables. Do what you want.

To prepare a noodle bowl: dump the noodles and stuff into a bowl and reheat them for a couple minutes in the microwave.

The miso stays in the bottom of the jar (or if it doesn't, I put it back.) We have a hot water dispenser at work, I whisk a little hot water into the miso like you do with miso and really the jar is ideal for this as it doesn't splash. Then I add more hot water and the jar is also ideal for this, as it has measurements marked on the side. I add enough hot water to make about two cups of broth. Then I pour the broth over the noodles and stuff and let it sit for a minute until the spinach is wilted.

So like, I'm not eating my noodles out of the jar. The jar does have its uses, but I'm fine with eating out of a bowl.

Thursday, September 15, 2016

September Eats

FIRST OF ALL, we got a new refrigerator. Which I named William. Which I had to explain to der schweetums. We're very happy to have him.

yayy i bought william a lil bling to welcome him to the team 😊

A photo posted by Pauline Pang (@allapoppy) on

Are those bins perfect or what? They fit so perfectly! They are my F&V bins for, from left to right, breakfast, lunch, dinner, and snack. So that's a fruit or vegetable for every meal.

I'm still feeling overwhelmed so keeping September eats very easy. Breakfast is still hard-boiled eggs with fruit, but you can really fancy up fruit with a little dusting of spices. I just read a restaurant review where melon was dabbed with, wait for it, FISH SAUCE. I have fish sauce. I will try and tell you how it is.

[ETA: Meh.]

For lunches I got a big helping hand from my friend rotisserie chicken, not even heated. This is my lunch bowl for gym days, cold chicken, rice, kimchee, and avocado, couldn't be easier:

Somehow starch got moved from lunch to dinner, which is fine. For work days I've been playing around with those mason jar noodles. I couldn't see how just adding hot water to noodles and vegetables would be at all good, I added miso immediately. The jar is literally two tablespoons of miso, bundle of soaked and drained saifun noodles, some shredded rotisserie chicken, some leftover cooked kale that I needed to use up, and some sliced shiitake mushrooms.

I'm not a huge fan of eating out of a mason jar, I did try it and it was fine for home but for work I don't want to be slurping out of a jar. I do think where the mason jar will shine is as a mixing and measuring jar for the miso broth. But, not if the jar is cracked.

Der schweetums has been shoring up dinners, which would normally be red meat, but did you know, he doesn't like to eat (or cook) meat. So he makes me tofu, I get this like twice a week, on gym days I just bring a bottle of tart cherry coconut water with me, and then the other days we eat tacos or other fun stuff.

On gym days after training, I get chocolate chia pudding with strawberries as a treat. The pudding alone is a little bitter; but in combination with the berries and a bit of goatskal or cream, it is uh-mazing.

Wednesday, August 31, 2016

August Review

So, what, I get two good months and then I get a bad month. Fine. I was doing pretty heroically for a couple weeks with the refrigerator fading in and out, that actually started the last week of July. Then I pretty much lost the plot for a couple weeks, like the coke and chex mix level of losing the plot. Eight hours of prolonged sitting losing the plot. Yuck. Then get back on track, then get kicked off track. Going to see the doctor tomorrow for a little help sleeping. I can help myself if I can sleep!

I have a new client! It actually takes a lot to onboard a new client. Obviously a new client is a good thing, but I think I just had too much on my plate—good, bad, ugly—between that and the refrigerator, and dropped my plate. I'd like to get better at 1) counting things that are being added to my plate, 2) taking other things off my plate to keep my plate total at a manageable level, 3) putting the plate down, 4) giving my brain a little extra quiet time to process it all.

I started a bunch of new pothos plants at work, too:

movin on up! aramis, bazin, and madame de chevruse have moved in together #pothos party

A photo posted by Pauline Pang (@allapoppy) on

I moved the Aramis family to a spot in the hallway that I hope nobody minds, gave away two pots to people with offices (i.e., windows, though pothos don't really need much light), and have three new babies on my desk.

Whaaat, Porthos needed a haircut bad. Propagating plants, though, that's a thing. And it's been straight busy at work, I'm in the middle of a huge project that hopefully finishes mid-October.

It has been a lot.

August picks:

HOME: Make a better place

1. Learn more about the Chicago Progressive Caucus.

Right, remember I added this to my plate too. Done, I guess, in the sense that I know more than I did, which was nothing. I read through their whole website and signed up for their mailing list. I haven't solved Black Lives Matter or anything like that. I don't think I'm going to make myself into a social justice warrior (not in the pejorative sense), I think I'm going to make myself into a better informed voter who still has to clean her own house.

Four blocks earmarked for this were used to 1) put away laundry, 2) :'( 3) pay bills, and 4) Fury boat trip.

What an amazing day on the lake for The Fury Boat Party!!! #tffy #tffl #teamfury #windycityrollers #lakemichigan

A photo posted by Lisa Adreani (@vigilannie76) on

SYSTEMS: Sharpen the saw

2. Order new glasses.

Not done, sigh. Now that I'm looking at this, in addition to the new client thing, I had a lot of social things this month. And sometimes a social thing comes with an extra thing, like making food ahead of a potluck. These four blocks were used to 1) make lemonade for Problem's Olympics opening ceremony party, 2) brunch and lipstick date with Biggie:

aloha!

A photo posted by Pauline Pang (@allapoppy) on

This is before the lipstick, obviously.

And then 3a) draft a workout for my new client and 3b) a new workout for an old client, and 4) pay bills to finish.

PLAY: Study movement and muscles

3. Keep watching Functional Patterns videos.

Done, not as much as I wanted.

Five blocks for this were used to 1) draft an About sheet to send to my new client, 2) draft an email to send that About sheet to my new client, 3) catch up on appointments and grocery list that weren't done because of plate dropping the previous weekend, 4) actually watch videoes and 5) breakfast with TS.

PASTIME: Write alla Poppy

4. Keep editing and publishing recipes.

Done, not as much as I wanted.

Five blocks for this were used to 1) draft Boiled Eggs and Goatskal, 2) draft August Eats, 3) :| 4) draft August Review, 5) draft Chocolate Chia Pudding.

State of the Blog

Sigh, idk how this is going to go. I have just about enough time and energy to keep up with two posts per month, a short eats post and a long review post. If I can get through a month without a breakdown, I get two, three more blocks to write other stuff. Am I ever going to get through this goodeats collection? Do I want to write other stuff besides goodeats? Or just the two posts per month.

I don't knowwwww.

Going out

So there was the Olympics opening ceremony party and brunch with Biggie, and also Box's jiu-jitsu meet followed by more lemonade and Olympics:

And the winner is......GUNS AND BUTTER!!!! So proud of you! YAY GWEN! #ibjjf #evilstrength

A photo posted by Corrin Cafferty (@corrinfiltrate) on

Also Sarge's bridal shower:

And Fury boat trip, and breakfast with TS. So busy.

Staying in

I'm in a battle with "sleeping TV," trying to beat it back from bedtime and then getting beat right back, but at least "working TV" is still not a thing. What's still a thing is enforced rest TV, when I have to make myself lie on the couch and rest—and hopefully, nap—before I go to the gym to train clients. I watched Marcella and River for that this month, and now Netflix has a bunch more seasons of The Murdoch Mysteries.

Watching TV

For entertainment this month we watched Limitless (the movie), Ex Machina, and Central Intelligence. Haha! I love the Rock.

September picks:

HOME: Make a better place

1. The house needs me again: pick a thing, anything.

SYSTEMS: Sharpen the saw

2. Order new glasses!

PLAY: Study movement and muscles

3. Keep watching Functional Patterns videos.

PASTIME: Write alla Poppy

4. Keep editing and publishing recipes.