Day 721–Last Post of 2012

You may be saying to yourself, “But…its only the 30th!  Can’t this joker read a calendar?” (No…no I can’t. But that’s not the point.)

For tomorrow night, I’ll be out in the “wilderness” of Brazos Bend State Park with my compadres, celebrating the end of 2012 without my phone, computer, or the obnoxiousness of NYE shows.  I’ll miss you as I’m freezing my fingers off in the rain for the next three days.

It’s been a good year from a culinary standpoint, and a not-so-good year from a weight-loss standpoint.  I started out strong because of Bonnie Ruth’s and not eating during work, but that was a pipe dream.  I got to try some amazing food in Israel, started a quasi-business for baking, was able to do some great cooking with friends…I liked it.  I think I’ll try to make it even better next year.

Breakfast–A little over half a serving of Chocolate Mini Wheats before church.  Part of losing weight is eating breakfast, even if lunch comes soon after.  Just needs to be regulated.

Lunch–We tried Guru Burgers and Crepes in Sugar Land.  The burgers were awesome…the crepes sucked. I had a salmon burger (slider actually) and a buffalo burger (slider); the buffalo one had BBQ sauce made with Mexican Coca Cola and bacon.  Pretty amazing.  The dessert crepe was supposed to be smores-flavored, but it was really just crappy marshmallow filling in a burnt crepe and flavorless chocolate sauce.  Not impressed…they need to hire me.

Dinner–Peanut butter, peach jelly, and banana sandwiches.  Cleaning out our food supply before we leave!

Party time tomorrow…don’t get too crazy now.

Have a good one. (Day and New Year!)

Day 720–Desirable Area Code Edition

If you don’t get it, don’t worry. I’ll explain it when you’re older.

Today was one of the crazier days I’ve had in a long time…doesn’t take much to spice up my life over the break.  We started packing/organizing for our New Years’ Camping Extravaganza, which should be an epic debacle thanks to the weather (yay for camping in the cold and rain!) but fun thanks to the excellent company.  I discovered that while I still had my camping stove (packed away exactly where I would have put it after my last Trek over five years ago…) I didn’t have any of the fuel for it. This prompted a trip to Bass Pro Shop…WHY DO PEOPLE GO TO BASS PRO SHOP?! For hunting and fishing I guess I can understand the allure, but for camping purposes go to REI people.  If there was an REI close to us I would pick it ten times out of ten.  Alas, there is not, and I needed some MSR IsoPro. I felt like I had been to Camping Disney afterwards. Blech.

Before that little journey, we had dinner with Leah and her mom.  It was very nice to meet Leah’s mom and assure her (I hope) that her daughter is in good hands down here in H-town.  If we managed to make it worse…sorry.  Either way, welcome to Houston Ms. Bouteller…good luck with your little hellions in a week.

Before THAT, I went to lunch with some former students for a two hour journey through the Looking Glass where somehow we had exactly one intelligent conversation.  It was fun though, and ended with some pictures we can’t put on Facebook because Richard likes sharp things. True story.

Before that, Man U won.  And the day ended with Texas winning.  So…good bookends to the day.

As I promised a few days ago, I have some numbers for you.  I clocked in at 232 this morning, which for those of you keeping track means I’m still 15 down from my fluffiest but I’ve gained twenty pounds since April.  Not okay.  Some of that is due to moving and changing jobs repeatedly, but most of it is due to being lazy and not holding myself accountable.  I’m also not going to lose twenty pounds in the next two days, so that goal is shot.

But it can and will be better in 2013; I’m just starting a little behind.

Breakfast–Chocolate Frosted Mini Wheats (yes…there is such a thing, and yes, they’re delicious) with a sliced banana while watching my boys stomp on West Brom. Good call, and Glory Glory Man United.

Lunch–Freebirds!  I had a cayenne freebird with white meat chicken, black beans, cilantro-lime rice, lettuce, lime juice, salsa, cilantro, and corn salsa.  No chips.  Go me!

Snack–Some peanut butter with chocolate chips melted together, and another banana.

Dinner–Johnny Carino’s.  We were going to go to Lupe, but the wait was ridiculous.  I had a wedge salad with the house vinaigrette instead of ranch and a mini calamari.  Yes I like calamari. Get over it.

Church, packing, and the inevitable Cowboy heartbreak to finish the year the way it started…with the Cowboys making me wonder why I like sports.

Have a good one.

Day 716–Tis the Season

We returned from our Christmas travels today, narrowly outrunning a White Christmas in Dallas (much to my chagrin) and arriving back in Houston to 70 degree weather.  That was about the only atypical part of this holiday, as the family time was great, the food was great, the presents were great, and I (of course) feel like I’ve gained a dozen pounds.  I’m sure the actual damage isn’t that bad–or at least I pray it isn’t–but nevertheless, I once again used the holidays as an excuse to eat on weird schedules, eat complete junk, and eschew any exercise in exchange for family time.

I’ll be able to report in tomorrow with the numbers (Terrifying. Absolutely TERRIFYING.) but for now, I hope you all have had a very Merry Christmas filled with love, laughter, and great memories.  And may we all have some peace and joy in this world.

Have a good one.

Day 714–Callahan the Pirate

Huzzah for blog titles that make no sense to anyone!  You’re just going to have to deal with the ambiguity.

We arrived in Canton for the Christmas Extravaganza 2012 today, looking forward to a few days of relaxation and time with family.  The good news is that Katy will be here for the duration, so we get to spend more time with her.  Bad news is no Pa. Unfortunately, being the starving newlyweds that we are (sort of…) we take whatever time off we can get and that’s that.  Soothing the hurt a little bit, we had A) NO traffic on the way up here, which was amazing, and B) three hours at the Dairy Palace hanging out with and talking to Abby’s friend Lauren.  She’s pretty awesome, although one day she will be a famous newslady and forget us lowly normal people.  Until then its fun talking to her…we should try to do it more than once a year.

Breakfast–Two pieces of bacon and a Fiber One bar.  I’ll admit, I was scrounging a bit. Going out of town means a severe lack of groceries.

Lunch–Two peanut butter and strawberry-rhubarb sandwiches.  I didn’t know when we were going to leave, when we were going to eat, or what we were going to eat at the time of this decision.  Using my 20/20 hindsight…whoops.

Snack–I made cookies.  They sucked.  Measure your ingredients people…baking is a science.

Dinner–Deli meat sandwiches made on Hawaiian sweet rolls while driving down 90 on our way to Madisonville.  Lots of bread today…lots of sandwich goodness.  Kind of over it now.  I had one with turkey and one with turkey and ham.  Both good.

Dessert–Sour Patch Kids, again in the car.  And a giant Dr Pepper at Dairy Palace.  Honestly today just sucked, health-wise.  But it sure was fun.

Church tomorrow (somewhere…) and hopefully a game or three of 42.  Some holiday traditions can’t be broken.

Have a good one.

Day 711–Welcome Home Pi

Jason (not me, other Jason) and Casey have a new addition to their family–Pi(sces) the dog.  Casey found her on the side of the road a few days ago, and after doing the due diligence at the local shelter, she got to come live with them!  She’s had a rough last week or so, what with being abandoned/lost, taken home, taken to the shelter, then back home again, and then to the St. Germains tonight with lots of new people and Rue, the neurotic “puppy” who can’t figure out when people want her to go away.  After we locked Rue up in the library, Pi was able to calm down and finally fell asleep next to me on the sofa.  I think she’s going to like it here…I know we’ll definitely like having her around.

The best part is that wasn’t even my first animal “win” of the day.  That honor goes to London, who decided that she liked me again today and proceeded to snuggle up next to me and fall asleep with her head resting in my hand and laid in the crook of my arm.  It was just about the cutest thing she’s ever done, which isn’t saying a ton since she usually hides under things, eats, and poops to fill her daily task list.  Still felt nice to be loved by the animal kingdom today…although I’d say it was highly apocalyptic if I believed in that junk.

In non-animal news, I got an A in my grad class.  Booyah. Also slightly apocalyptic.

I also ate a lot today.  Whoops. Not apocalyptic, just dumb.

Breakfast–Honey Nut Cheerios.  Good start to a less-than-nutritious day.

Lunch–Oriental Ramen.  I was making dinner while making/eating lunch, so it needed to be fast and non-labor intensive. I sauteed some mushrooms to go in with the ramen, and then of course my soy sauce/sriracha additions.  Not bad, especially since it was “cold” here today.

Dinner–Red velvet pancakes with cream cheese “icing,” maple bacon, fried eggs, and smoked ham.  I’m completely stuffed…ate too much, loved every bite.

Dessert–Are you kidding me? RED VELVET PANCAKES.  No need for dessert. At least I did that right.

I’d like to go on a walk tomorrow and look at some more Christmas lights, but we’ll see what ends up happening.

Have a good one.

 

Day 710–Christmas Break

Sorry for the absence here folks.  I don’t like writing after a loss, and the last one was kind of a doozy.  Some dirty play, some jerk coaching by the other team, a bit of running up the score…wasn’t pretty.  So my apologies for getting into a funk.

The other rough news is that my weight continues to go up.  I’m just not motivated like I used to be, and my goals aren’t even helping.  It’s kind of a mess, compounded by the holidays and baking and blah blah blah…I need to be better.  The good news is that the last couple of days I’ve tried to be extra involved in practice and do some work outside of that, whether it be the Navy SEALS workout that I’ve got or taking a nice long walk to see Christmas lights with the wife.  More of that, less sugar, and I’ll be back on my way.

Breakfast–A bowl of Kashi Cinnamon Harvest–one serving–and then I put some dried fruit and nuts on top for a little extra oomph.  Pretty solid breakfast, especially before practice.

Lunch–With finals and whatnot, practice is at 1, and it takes me almost an hour to get there, so I didn’t really eat lunch.  I had a Chocolate Chip Cherry Torte Larabar (not as decadent as it sounds…incredibly delicious though) when I got home to ease some hunger pangs before dinner.

Dinner–We decided to try a place less than a mile from our apartment that “locals” have raved about…Taco Grill.  It’s like 100% Taquito, only not as good.  Pretty good, but not quite there yet.  If 100% is a 10, I’ll give this an 8, so not too shabby.  I had four street tacos with corn tortillas, steak, and sauteed onions/peppers/bacon.  Yes, BACON.  Hence the 8.  Pretty freaking awesome.

Dessert–A cameo apple with some chocolate/peanut butter to dip it in.  Not bad.

Hang out with the Thugs tomorrow, complete with awesome dinner.  I’m excited.

Have a good one.

Day 696–Empanada House!

One of the fun things about Denver was the ability to treat it like an extended vacation, because that’s what it was.  We took weekend trips, checked out restaurants, walked neighborhoods…we did everything we’d normally do if we were on a week long vacay, except it was four months.  It was also an absolute blast…exploring a city and getting to know it is a wonderful thing to do.  I longed to do that to Dallas after I moved to Abilene, and was kind of afraid I’d lost the chance to do it completely to Houston.  Now that we’re back…I’m taking the opportunity.  Starting with Katy.

Therefore we went to Marini’s Original Empanada House tonight. It wasn’t, in fact, the original but one of a couple I believe.  But it was a lot of fun…very unique, not something I’d do all the time, but still pretty cool.  I’ll recommend it.

Breakfast–Two of the listed servings of Honey Nut Cheerios.  Good cereal…helped increase my fiber intake for the day.

Lunch–Two sandwiches like yesterday, only I used rolls instead of bread to cut down the calorie intake. Which was stupid because two rolls had more calories than four pieces of bread. Whoops.  But the buffalo chicken was great, and I did barbecue seasoning on the okra instead of the cayenne.  It was good stuff.

Dinner–The aforementioned empanadas.  One spicy pulled pork, one spicy beef.  Both delicious.

Dessert–Two cups of chocolate peanut butter ice cream.  Wonderful.

Game tomorrow against Awty, which will test us a lot.  I believe in my team though…going to battle with them is an honor.

Have a good one, and go Wildcats.

Day 695–Kaboom

Well, the team is 0-3. On the bright side, we played by far our best game of the season last night; on the not so bright side, we still continue to have horrific luck. One of these days things will line up for us and the hard work will pay off in a victory.

Due to the late night predicated by the game, Abby and I were very excited about sleeping in this morning.  Unfortunately, we needed to get up early to take our cars in for service.  We dropped mine off, drove to the VW dealership, dropped Abby’s car off…and waited.  And waited. And then they told us it’d be another 2 hours.  Thankfully they were kind enough to take us to get my car–which took all of 30 minutes–so we could go home.  Then we put up Christmas decorations (finally…its been so warm I haven’t been in the mood.  And Abby’s the Grinch.) and cleaned up the apartment. Then, and only then, did they call us to come get her car. Three hours and fifteen minutes for an oil change and some brake pads.  Ridiculous.

While we were waiting at the dealership, Sealy called and requested that Abby went in for the afternoon.  This was fine, because I had soccer practice anyways, so Abby went straight from the dealership to work.  I grabbed some petrol for my car, some groceries for my lunch, went home, made said lunch, and got ready for practice…and then the skies broke apart.  Dark clouds, thunder, lightning, rain…it was pretty cool.  I ended up canceling practice (I have no idea what the weather was like in Westbury, but if it was anything like Katy I made the right call) and fell asleep on the couch for all of six minutes before a thunderclap hit so close to the apartment that it shook our couch and woke me up.  It was kind of ridiculous…kind of cool.  I really like storms…they show off a lot of power and majesty of our Creator, and they usually cool things off a bit.  Let’s hope that holds true to form.

Breakfast–We went to Steak N’ Shake for breakfast because I’ve heard its a legendary college place to go.  Not bad, very cheap.  I had a sausage and egg biscuit with hashbrowns and a peppermint chocolate chip shake (yeah…milkshake for breakfast.  It was early, I was groggy…and I’m fat.) and they were both more than passable.  Although Chick Fila’s shakes are better.

Lunch–A buffalo chicken deli sandwich with lettuce and bread and butter jalapenos, and some cayenne okra.  Solid meal.

Dinner–Pei Wei.  I wasn’t overly hungry with my caloric gluttony so far today, so I tried a salad.  Don’t go to Pei Wei for salads.  It was okay, but huge, covered in dressing, and didn’t taste good enough to merit a repeat order.

Dessert–Some homemade toffee.  I love that stuff.

Practice tomorrow should get us ready for Thursday’s game…we’re playing the best team in the district.  It’ll be a challenge.

Have a good one.

 

Day 692–Level Up

In the last 60 hours, I’ve seen a high school soccer game, an MLS Cup, and some Premier League games.  I have to tell you…there’s a HUGE difference between the three.  They may all be playing the same sport, but that’s about where the similarities end.  High schools are fast-paced, almost frenetic.  Every kid wants to push the ball forward as quickly as possible, which leads to turnovers, counterattacks, and enough head-swivelling to rival a tennis match.  The MLS is more chaotic.  It’s got the pace and control of the Premier League without the talent, so you still have turnovers and counterattacks.  Houston just didn’t have enough of the latter and too many of the former to pull out a win today.  And in the Premier League, you have some really, REALLY good football.  Man U and Reading played to a 4-3 HALF this morning, and at no time did I think one team was horribly outplaying the other. Reading came out firing, Man U responded, and they entertained.  A good day full of sport.

It’s been much the same with the progress of our WCS team.  Our first couple of practices were rough…unorganized, raw skill, lots of freneticism but lots of fun.  In our first game it was chaos. Straight chaos.  No real direction, but small bursts recognizable as soccer.  And then Thursday, in the second half, it all came together.  Yes, we lost, but it looked like football.  I’m proud of my boys and the growth they’ve made, even this short into the season.  They make me look good.

Breakfast–Muffin! They’re. So. Dense. I don’t know if I need more oil for moisture or to cut out some flour, but I might be able to kill someone if I threw one at them.  Delicious, but deadly.

Lunch–A spoonful of cookie dough. Because…

Dinner–At 3 Jason, Evan, and I went to BWW to watch the MLS Cup and I had the wing combo (6 boneless, 6 traditional, and buffalo chips) to eat.  MyFitnessPal tells me I have 1820 calories a day to play with.  That meal, not counting my Dr Pepper, was 1700.  Yikes.

Church tomorrow…it’s going to be good to be back.  It’s been two weeks since I’ve been there for a Sunday, and it feels like forever.  Although we are talking about hell in class…so it isn’t all roses and kittens.

Have a good one.