A Spudnut Moment

Know what I haven’t done in a grip and a half?

Posted a whole day’s worth of food.

So, here’s a day in the life.

I woke up exhausted and I downed two cups of unpictured coffee.

I’m an idiot and that was way too much liquid in my tummy, so I wasn’t digging  breakfast.  But I was off to teach and I knew if I didn’t eat something by calendar I’d be ready to eat the class pet.  So I ended up sticking one of these suckers

(Fact:  these are better if you call them La vache qui rit.)

On some Dave’s Killer bread

I adore hummus and toast in the AM (totally normal, right?), but I ate all the hummus last week and need to cook more chickpeas.  So this worked.

I grabbed my lunch

Weird mishmash of stuff.

Two kiwis, an apple, peanut butter (for the apple),  a hunk of Sin Dawg, crack oranges, and beef jerky.  I’ve been eating yogurt for lunches (and breakfasts) like it’s going out of style.  It’s kinda hit the point where it did go out of style.  Whoops.

(I ended up not eating the oranges, but I always aim to overpack-24 children + low blood sugar = hell)

And guess who I found in my class!  My friend from last year!  He switched schools!  Thankfully he’s less of a “friend” this year.

I got home from work and munched on some of these

These are crack.  I would possibly birth your children for a lifetime supply of these.

While I munched I threw together dinner.

1 can diced tomatoes + back beans I cooked the other day + chicken + brown rice + corn + spices = soup

More chips on there.  Way more.  But I hate soggy chips with a fiery passion so I add them as I go.

And for bed dinner

Popcorn

Which was disappointing.  Not because I don’t love popcorn or anything, but because I watched my girl Sarah give a shoutout to my hometown (first min and a half is all you gotta watch)

And since watching that?  It’s all one big Spudnut moment.

And by “Spudnut moment” I mean I would kill for a spudnut right around now.

What’s a food you want and can’t get?  I want spudnuts.  And more of that PB ish from Trader Joe’s.

Basics

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I looked through my pictures today, and wasn’t sure what to write about…. Yesterday was just so…. basic.

The most exciting thing I’ve been doing lately is watching the cat play with her pepper box

(that’s a box. With peppers in it.  She loves it.  She drags those stupid peppers everywhere.  I found seven in the kitchen today.  And one in the guest room.  She’s advanced for her age)

But really?  Are basics so bad?

Yesterday I made us both oats for breakfast

(yup I followed up a salad with the most normal breakfast evahhh.  I am large, I contain multitudes.)

My husband has oats for breakfast a lot.  I lovingly make them.  In the microwave, with water.

Since I was having some too they were made on the stove, with part milk, and were also half oat bran, rather than just normal oats.

He loved them.

I feel a little guilty now.

(So guilty in fact that I made him French Toast today.  Seriously.)

I put some pumpkin and pumpkin cream cheese on mine

Is cream cheese a weird choice?  I don’t know.  But I have some in the fridge, and I’m perpetually convinced food is about to go bad.  So I have to use it before my brain is convinced it’s coated in microscopic mold.

Breakfast also calls for some coffee

Carbs and caffiene.  The basics to get your day going.

(Know what’s not basic?  Water.  I didn’t drink any till after work yesterday.  Whoops.)

Lunch was, again, basic

Yogurt (that’s a half full container, with peanut flour and enough cinnamon to kill a puppy), banana, carrots.

And I had a day of teaching kindergarten that was basically a blast.

Dinner was something I don’t make nearly enough

Chicken veggie soup.

I always get all these ideas of soups to make and ignore the basic chicken soup.  And that’s silly of me because it’s so darn good!  And easy.

With bread

I could feed my husband basically anything with bread on the side and he’d be happy.

Not going to lie, I like me some basics.

What’s a super basic meal you love?

I like toast.  A lot.  Like a weird weird lot.   But only if it’s made in the oven.

Comfort Food 102H*

*I was going to call this comfort food 101, but I realized it’s not really a 101 course.  In undergrad I was in the honors program.  Rather than philosophy 101** honors kids took philosophy 102 H.

Cold weather makes me ready for comfort food.  Yesterday, with a rainy morning outside I realized my life needed some real comfort food.

I looked in the cupboards and found these

Plus I realized I had this sitting on top of the microwave

(yes, my yeast is expired.  no, I didn’t pay 54 cents for it.  I had a coupon.  I paid 12 cents. For a 4 pack. I love me some coupons.)

I realized that there’s few better things on a dreary day than soup and fresh baked bread.  So I got to work.

(I’m fairly sure normal people don’t bake bread when they’re in the mood for comfort food.  Hence the 102H.  I’m ok with not being normal.  It means I have bread.  Win.)

We all know comfort food needs butter

and comfort food means I even busted out

WHITE FLOUR.

We don’t use a lot of it in our house.  It’s exciting when it happens.

(I also may have ran out of whole wheat bread flour.  Details)

While the bread was rising

I worked on some split pea soup

I love split pea because it’s all stuff I have in my house.  Dried peas, chicken stock, carrots, celery, and onions.  Simple.  And yet magically delicious.

And I got to sit down to a happy, warm lunch

After lunch, the rain stopped so the kitten and I went outside.  She immediately decided to make good choices, and did this

Then realized she couldn’t get down.  Smart kitten.  Smart kitten.  Of course, it started to rain again as this happened.

So I scooped the kitty out of the tree, went inside, and had another bowl of soup.

When it rains, you can never eat too much soup.

What’s your favorite comfort food?  I love soup, and I love that it’s pretty low key to make.  Stew is well loved in our house too, it just takes more planning.

**philosophy 101 was logic.  Really, if there was ever a course a bunch of smart kids need, it’s logic.  Intelligent /= logical.

…that just happened.

When I moved to Portland, I lived in a house with four other people.  One of whom is now my fiance.

Also in the house?  My darlin’ Callie.

(that would be us, two years ago, clearly not drinking margaritas out of princess cups while waiting for the max.)

She and I became friends by watching and judging our neighbor.  (He deserved it-for some unexplainable reason he owned two SUVs.  Why on earth do you need TWO SUVs?)

After the house she and I lived with another roommate (and the fiance lived a whole 5 blocks away).  She lives in Seattle now, but she came to play this weekend.  It was a very low key bachelor party.

Without penis straws.

Whoever thought up penis straws is stupid.

Callie and I always had this magic ability to find weird weird people when we were together.

There was the time while we were buying booze, the man at the liquor store told me my ID looked “like a professional modeling photo”.  And then gave us candy.

Or the time we went to a hockey game, and the mascot kept trying to hit on Callie.

Mind you, the mascot was in a giant bird costume.  Didn’t stop him from trying to grab her butt.  Repeatedly

So, what happened this weekend is, with history in mind, to be expected…

But still.

We went to one of our favorite places

Bartini.  Lame name.  Pretty drinks

Plus, bread

with melty smoked cheddar to dip it in.

Really, what more could you want than a pretty drink, bread, and cheese?

Maybe the fact that it’s also next to Trader Joe’s.  And it used to be a block from our house.  That’s what more you could want.

I had on this shirt

Callie had on the same pink tank top, only hers says “bridesmaid”

We were talking about my wedding.  Wearing matching wedding shirts.  I have an engagement ring on.

Guys at the table next to us decide they’d like to be our friends.

First ask about a restaurant.  Then ask me to take a picture.  Keep asking me all sorts of things.  Would we like to join them for dinner?  Go to more bars?  Go to a play?

Our potential friend even notices that we have the same shirt on, and comments on it.

Finally, when the waitress brings our bill, she tells me “congratulations”

“why’d she say that?” potential new friend asks

“I’m getting married in three weeks”

(seems the matching shirts, ring, and us talking about my wedding weren’t dead giveaways)

…..awkward silence….

then potential friend turns to Callie and goes “So, Callie, tell us more about you”

Walking to the car all we could say was”seriously, that happened.”

and we headed back to my hood, where we were far less likely to make new friends and got…

Margaritas the size of our heads!

Then watched terrible movies.

The best point was the end of the night, when we’d busted through an entire bottle of vodka, and watched Center Stage on fast forward.
We didn’t need any plot getting in the way of dancing.

And, like all stories of me and Callie, the visit ended with ice cream

So, who else has awkward stories of being hit on?  I can’t be the only one.

We’re good with the wheel

So I’m totally on my lunch right now… but at my house cause I had a 2 hour lunch!  Score.

I was going to blog yesterday, but then I found this.

That weird lump?  On the downstairs bathroom ceiling.  FULL OF FRIGGIN WATER.  You have no idea how long I stared at it.  Then I popped it.  The hose that connects the dishwasher to the sink came lose the other day, and the kitchen sink flooded all over.  This is right below that, so I’m crossing my fingers that this was just weird residual stuff from that.

But seriously, WTF?

Being a homeowner is fun.

On a good news front, I made fantastic bread

I have no idea why I keep doing different bread recipes.  This one is one I used way back when I first started making bread, and it’s fantastic.  Sometimes  I need to remind myself that I don’t need to reinvent the wheel.  Wheels are pretty awesome as is. that’s what this bread is-it’s nothing fancy, but it’s good, tasty sandwich bread.

I used it to make an open faced tuna sandwich yesterday

And then I ate it while watching wayyy too much HGTV.  That channel is oddly addictive.

Allergies have been kicking our butts lately, so we got takeout last night (with a BOGO coupon!  Score!).  This is how my curry was packaged

It’s like a goldfish, but tastier!

I had my curry (no clue what it was-the fiance ordered) plus some pad thai

Ok, better get going back to school!  I’m teaching art today!

And guess who’s coming to Portland tonight?

Total giveaway hint:  I’m mapping out the closest Starbucks and Baskin Robbins for him….