Treat of a Day

Creamy and robust!  Sounds like a good way to take your coffee don’t you think?!  I didn’t want to crack into a whole pound of fresh coffee, knowing I’m leaving town in less than two weeks (!!!) so I picked this little packet of Italian goodness up to get me through.

Knowing I had a coffee meeting this morning I opted to consider eating yogurt directly from the container to be breakfast. 

Obviously I was saving room for my REAL breakfast.  What?  There is absolutely nothing wrong with chocolate for breakfast.  Especially when it’s said with a French accent…pain au chocolat s’il vous plait.  I’m practicing for my European vacation.

Totally tortured Canadian French is perfectly acceptable in Greece, non?

Hey look.  Vegetables!  Vegetables totally erase chocolate breakfast pastries.  And full fat cafe au lait.  Totally.

ART update:  I actually have bruises on my lower back/glute where she “massaged” me on Tuesday.  Today she worked on my neck/shoulders/upper back and all I could think was “oh crap, I’m going to have bruises on my neck…not awesome”.  She says I should be OK, but someone please back me up when Michael asks where those bruises came from, OK?!

She sent me home with two awesome exercises to help open my hips, back and shoulders.  Out of all of the stretches the various physiotherapists, chiropractors, and massage therapists have given me over the past couple of years I can actually tell why these ones might help.  The hard part?  I’m supposed to do these every 15 (!!!) minutes. 

Yikes.

After work I headed to mall in search of a few more items for my vacation.  Note to self:  don’t wait until September to look for cute Summer dresses.  After trying on too many pairs of ill fitting shorts I picked up Opa! for dinner.

Greek salad and chicken souvlaki just seemed appropriate given the reason I was shopping.  :)

And since any day that starts with chocolate should also end with chocolate…and since I clearly have no concern for my bank account today…I deemed a trip to Cold Stone Creamery totally necessary.

I mean really…a girl that works all day, gets “beaten” by her chiropractor, and tries on half price bikinis in a change room with bad lighting obviously deserves a treat.

And obviously deserves to forget all about that treat she already had today.  Right?  Right.   I knew you would understand.

Easy Way Out

Getting up two hours earlier than usual definitely required a bigass coffee yesterday.  Sadly this may have been the worst coffee misto ever.  But the lemon loaf was extra fresh so that’s good. 

Second breakfast after getting some work done.

Easiest lunch ever.  Pasta leftovers.  I didn’t even bother trying to reheat this. 

Pre-gym snackypoo.  Yup, that’s two days of cardio.  My hips hate me.

By the time I finished buying dog food and toilet paper and getting my workout in I was famished.  I knew if I came home for dinner I’d have to take time to make a salad and wasn’t entirely sure I had anything on hand to serve as a protein so I took the easy way out and stopped at Subway.

Six inch turkey & ham on 9 Grain Honey Oat bread…with lettuce, double tomato, double cucumber, pickles, Sweet Onion Vinaigrette, and s&p.

Later after a doggie walk and a glorious shower I settled in for some Big Brother.  Stupid double elimination took out my favourite player ever.  Buggers.

I consoled myself with chocolate and peanut butter before heading to bed early.  Sometimes it’s nice to just abandon brain power and call it a night.

Caffeine High

Coffee coffee coffee coffeeeeeee!  Thanks gawd the antibiotics have cleared my system and once again coffee is happy in my tummy.  Yesterday marked day two of my return to caffeinated joy.

You will get sick of seeing Squirrelly toast with PB and banana.  But I won’t get sick of eating it.  :)

I was so excited for fresh BC apricots.  Too bad these ones tasted like nothing.  Boooo.

Lunch was a refreshing treat.  I picked up a couple of new-to-me apples at Root Cellar this week…Transparent Apples from the Okanagan…and decided the best place to put one would be into a bigass salad with blueberries, honey and goat cheese.

Oh and pecans!  Nom.

Tasty but not quite filling enough.  Hence the appearance of this box of [unidentifiable] Outback Animal Cookies from Laura.

Dinner was beef & broccoli leftovers with the addition of like three quarts of extra soy sauce to flavour things up.  Minor fail but my belly was full.

After dinner Michael picked me up and we took the dogs for a walk to Dallas Road.  Chibi has finally come out of her shell and will actually let Burl chase her around in the grass…it’s incredibly funny and heart warming.  She’s so small compared to him that it looks like he is going to eat her, but she’s so much faster and quick to make a turn or a corner that she all but flips right over him.

And me without my camera!

We stopped for tea and dessert afterwards.  Oh wait…I didn’t have my camera so obviously there was no dessert.  I mean if there isn’t a photo it must not have happened.  :)

Mama Likes a Good Deal

What’s better than a Wednesday morning walk with the pupper to get coffee?  Well, getting that coffee for free of course.  I’d been totally carrying that freebie coupon around in my wallet for months…why?  Who knows.  So I cashed it in.  Sadly I forgot to order my Venti Non-Fat Cinnamon Dolce Latte half sweet, but it was still freeeeee and delish.

Squirrelly Bread is back in the house.  Why do I ever buy anything else?  Oh ya, sales.  I’m frugal like that.

Hard to believe a statement like that when the next photo is a $4 bowl of cherries, but a girl picks her battles you know.  Cherries always win.

Besides you can easily see my el cheapo tendencies in my lunch o’ leftovers.  I’d already eaten all of the veggies out of the turkey mixture from the other night so I reheated what was left of the meat and piled it atop a fresh salad.

Red leaf lettuce, zucchini, tomatoes, carrots, EVOO, s&p, and a sprinkle of old white cheddar just for fun.

I figured out how to stomach straight up cranberry juice.  1 part juice to like 5 parts water with a squirt of lemon or lime.  Palatable now.

After work I met up with the other Jamie for a coffee and a few quick errands.  The highlight of my free morning coffee was this ‘treat receipt’ coupon for a reduced priced iced coffee. 

Back at home I whipped up a quickie Beef & Broccoli stir-fry. My attempt at creating my own marinade turned out a little bland…weird considering I used hoisin, soy, fresh garlic, fresh ginger and a few other fun things…but such is life.

A chocolate after dinner treat took the edge of my boring dinner.  :)

Here’s hoping that leftover stir-fry is more exciting on day two!

Java Rescue

This morning required a Venti Mocha Misto.  Conference call day.

What do you get when you find a basically empty almond butter jar and a final serving of steel cut oats in your pantry?

OIAJ of course!  With banana, UVAB and chia seeds.  Topped with jam.

Light lunchy.  Who knew hummus and goat cheese go together?

Especially when schmeared upon brown rice crackers sent from Oz. :)

Chibi says hi!!  She’s rocking her doggie hoodie cuz she’s so cool.

We did take an after work walk at the dog park with a new bachelor friend (bet you’d thought I’d given up!).  It was freaking freezing out there today though so the dogs got to cozy up in the cars while we enjoyed hot tea instead.

Ended up being perfect that I had leftover tuna casserole on such a chilly day. 

Dessert during American Idol…crack mango.  I keep thinking I should put these in a recipe, but instead just eat em up!

*cue singing angels here*

Squeeeeeeeeeal!  Look what Tiffaney gifted to me!!  For some unGodly reason she’s had this baby in her cupboard for three years…unused!  The horror. ;)  So she said I might as well put it to good use.

We all know I can handle that!

Just in time.  I have a *gasp* 8am Skype meeting tomorrow morning.  Without a pre-set brew, people might die.

I will kinda miss my morning walks to Starbucks with Chibi though.  My mocha caffeine reward sure was good motivation for a longer walk.  Slacker alert!!

Coffee Talk

Not being able to face another day of weak instant coffee (even if it is VIA it’s just not real coffee to me) I trekked on over to the mall for a cup of bold to start the day yesterday.

Sitting through my weekly teleconference without coffee would have been torture!  (See below for how you can help me avoid this happening again.)

Breakfast was quickly prepared while my headset was on mute. :)

Liberte Svelt vanilla yogurt with 1/2 banana, 6 almonds, hemp hearts and chia seeds.  Light but totally delicious.

Last week I bought some chicken to boil for Chibi’s upset tummy.  Turns out it didn’t matter what she ate so I had leftover chicken to use up.  I grilled it up the other night and turned it into chicken salad for lunch yesterday.

Nom nom nom.  All stirred up with green onions, dried cranberries, sunflower seeds, olive oil mayo, Dijon, and dill.  Rolled up with lettuce and light Laughing Cow.

Afternoon snackeroo was cooooookies…which apparently went straight into my piehole before getting photographed.

The evening was dedicated to catching up on a few more episodes of The Walking Dead now that my friend Ray is back from his vacation.  Always the great dinner guest he arrived with crusty rolls and flowers. :)

And took on my role as food paparazzi while I cooked.

“Fancy” hot dogs for dinner.  Those yummy, fresh Sooke pork sausages from The EdGe…grilled up and served on the crusty rolls with old white cheddar and condiments of choice.

I like ketchup, mustard and a smidge of mayo.

Salad and baked fries (potato & yam) on the side.

We made it through episodes 4 & 5 before calling it a night.  Only one episode left!!  Hopefully there’s a Season Two peeking around the corner soon.

After he left I was feeling snacky and grabbed an Altaulfo mango from the fruit bowl.  I don’t even generally care much for mangos, but after learning about this Philippino variety I am a little bit addicted. So deeelish!

And now…a very important question for my coffee loving friends…

As you know my coffee maker bit the dust the other day.  As you also know this is a TRAGEDY around here.  It owed me nothing so instead of trying to repair the old gal I’m shopping for a new caffeine maker.

Via Airmiles (ie: FREE coffee maker!) my choices are as follows:

• Krups Thermal Precision Coffee Maker – 1300 points
• Cuisinart Coffee Maker with Hot Water System – 1100 points
• Cuisinart Fully Automatic Burr Grind & Brew – 1900 points
• Delonghi Exclusivo Coffee Maker – 1050 points
• KitchenAid Architect Thermal Coffee Maker – 1450 points

Do any of you have one of these? 

OR… I can just cough up some of my hard earned money and buy something at the store (and use those Airmiles for something else…food processor?  espresso machine?).

OR… Tiffaney has a very nice coffee maker she has generously offered to lend me because she never uses it (how is that possible?!) but with the amount of coffee I make I just think I should have my own.

What the heck should I do?  Opinions please! :)