Day 31: A tribute to the last day

I will not be that desperate.
I will not stay up until midnight, April 1st, just to have a warm, gooey, delicious chocolate chip cookie.
I will not.

See?
It's already after midnight and I've brushed my teeth and I'm heading to bed.

Somehow, I'm not sure that I want to get off of this "lifestyle change" diet now. I'm quite addicted.
I do however, desperately want a warm, gooey brownie or chocolate chip cookie tomorrow (I mean, today). And I will down a glass of chilled milk after eating it.

Then, I think that will be all.
I think I will stick to whole wheat pasta and sauteed veggies.
I think I will.

This is not an April fools joke.
I think I will.

Day 27: The life of me

Well, as you all have found out by now, I am just not that dependable, blog every day type of person.
Life gets in the way.

I've been working, cooking, running, painting, sleeping, breathing and moving. It's just a lot to do. However, you will be pleased to know that I've been faithful to the diet and it's DAY 27! YAYA!!

I've just scarfed down some eggs and sharp cheddar cheese. Nothing fancy today, I have far too much to accomplish.



As you can see, I'm in a new location marked by the wooden floors and my newest house pet roommate- Potsy (look closely).
Potsy is a dog. She's a bit of a skitsofrantic mess, skitsy in my vocab. But she's um...loyal.

The last 2 weeks have been full and busy. I've just moved locations again, for the third time in a year. So pardon my lack of culinary updates.
I can't even think of what I've made recently. Nothing too spectacular. I did make a beautiful fruit platter a week ago. And for the first time ever, I tried an Asian pear. Oh what delight!

It truly is one of my favorite vegatables.
I mean...oh crap. Fruit. One of my favorite fruits.
Really Lael? It's the middle of the day on Saturday and I had good sleep. Puck up.

I'm already planning my birthday dessert. Mom's home made strawberry shortcake with fresh strawberries and home made whipped topping. *drools*



In addition to that, I'm dreaming of anything chocolate.



Namely, mom's home made chocolate cheesecake or chocolate cake with coffee icing: a deep, rich, chocolately heaven on earth.
Oh mom. I miss you.
And not just for your food.

I'm off to seize the Saturday!
Happy eating all.

Day 18: Success

I still need sleep. I'm going to bed early.

BUT FIRST!

THURSDAY SUCCESS!! (Recipe #3 this week!)

*Woah. I would just like to note that I nodded off after typing that title.*

Kate (a.k.a. Cats) and I decided that we were hungry tonight and wanted to make food. Cats, being a more expert cook, took control of the chicken with some seasoning, minced garlic and a bit of lemon juice before baking.

I took the butternut squash. Oh yum. It's been awhile since I've had butternut squash and boy was it delicious!
I have to say that last night's meal was okay. Just okay. The eggplant didn't turn out like I wanted and I also added too much red pepper. Regardless, I had it for lunch and it was quite tasty. I just feel that the eggplant cooked too tough (probably due to it being almost bad). I'll cook it fresh next time.

Anyhow, I hollowed out the part of the squash holding seeds and then added some sliced some onions, diced celery, butter and a little salt and pepper.



Even cats liked it! I would say this is my best success so far. Because it not only came out looking delicious but it actually tasted delicious!
I regret that I don't have finished pictures of these dishes...after baking. Most of the time I just don't care too much once it's ready to eat. I stuff my face, cook and stuff my face again. In that order.

Anyway, I'm looking at my computer cross-eyed so I must go.
Happy Friday to you all.

Listening to: "The Chain" -Ingrid Michaelson

Day 17: Time Traveling

Day 17: Sorry about the delayed updates but I've been time traveling and decided to come back later than expected.
I didn't miss Monday-Wednesday. Trust me.

I have 4% battery left on my laptop and I'm waiting for food to come out of the oven, so this will be quick.

Listening to: "Die Alone" -Ingrid Michaelson
(Except I'm not sprinkling butter over my whole grain bread)

Current physical/mental condition:
I hardly have a comment. It's just too much. I need food and I need sleep.
I'm sorry, I've been a grump.

FRIDAY NIGHT MADNESS: (Recipe #1 for last week)
Home made whole wheat and veggie pizza.
Mikaya, you make wonderful pizza dough. Let's let it rise next time.





WEEKEND GOODNESS: (Recipe #2 for last week)




I know, I know…an omelette isn't much of a new recipe. However, I've never sauteed onions, peppers, tomatoes and turkey meat, added cheese and made an omelet. It's new to me. (Yes, I've made eggs. A lot.)

WEEKEND SUPER DELICIOUS GOODNESS:


I KNOW what you're thinking…but I did NOT cheat!
I simply walked up to the counter at the coffee shop and practically begged the girl:
"PLEASE help me! I can't have caffeine. I can't have sugar. I need SOMETHING to drink!"
She gave me a decaf, sugar free vanilla flavored cup of deliciousness. Oh MAN was it good. (I DID check the vanilla flavoring bottle! There were 0grams of sugar. I really don't know what must have been in it instead though.)

I can't count Recipe #3 for last week. I will simply have to live with the failure of not reaching my "3 new recipes" goal for last week.
*living with it*
….
…….
*over it*

Good. Not that we've got that over with, onto this week.
WAIT! I DID try a third recipe. Umm…it was just something I made up but I'll count it for #3.

SUNDAY LUNCH WONDERFULNESS: Recipe #3 for last week.
Whole wheat burrito shell with refried beans, sauteed onions, green peppers and tomatoes plus ricotta cheese to top it off. Wonderful. Once I sauteed and rolled it all into the burrito, I let it cook a bit on the pan to get crispy on the outside.


MONDAY MADNESS: Recipe #1 this week.

Bread.
True. The dough was made last week but I thought it'd be great to finish baking it off this week. I let it rise in a covered bread dish while I was at work and promptly threw it in the oven when I got home.
After all, I was rushing around like a coffee addict with no mug and I simply did not have time to spend in the kitchen.
No, I did not burn the bread. However, I did have some trouble removing it from the pan.
As I took it out of the oven and tapped the top of the loaf I realized that it was done. Maybe way done. It'd only been in for an hour but I forgot one minor detail.
Aren't you supposed to grease the pan and/or add flour to the bottom!!?? WHAT WAS I THINKING!?
I quickly grabbed a spatula to try and dig the loaf off of the pan and realizing that the bread sounded more like a freaking' ROCK I frantically searched for a knife.
I then began stabbing the edges of the loaf all around the pan trying to loosen a part, ANY part of the bread from the pan.
Not working.
I turned the pan upside down, tapped it with the spatula, turned it right side up, panicked a little and thought "dang, if Mikaya were here she'd never let me live it down" (much like the cardboard in the oven that I've yet to hear the end of).
After much banging, scraping and stabbing I think I finally pulled the last of the loaf off of the pan after about 15 minutes. Okay, maybe ten. But it was awhile.

Lesson learned. Grease the freakin' pan.

WEDNESDAY WHATEVER: Recipe #2 this week.




Tonight I was way too hungry. A bit of cheese and a jog took up some time and then I ran to the kitchen where I have been since.
The butternut squash was going to be the delight tonight but I found that my poor eggplant was going bad in the fridge! I'm also running low on cheese so it wasn't quite practical to do an eggplant parmesan dish.
I proceeded to slice up the eggplant and layer what was still good in a casserole with a variety of other vegetables (whatever I could find in the fridge really).
Eggplant
The last of a tomato
The last of an onion
Chopped celery
The last yellow squash
Salt plus some other spice
Red pepper
The last of the mozzarella cheese
A little extra sharp cheddar cheese grated on top

Dang. There's certainly a lot of "last" in this dish. It had better turn out at least partially decent.
It's in the oven now. I took it out after an hour, and I'm just not happy with it yet. So I stuck it back in.
The eggplant just didn't seem done. It was a little chewy still! Oh dear. I'm nervous.

I'm nervous AND I'm out.
This week has been a trout swimming upstream.


I mean…what!?

Day 11: Bad meal planning

Listening to:
Rekapse
(http://www.myspace.com/rekapse)

Let me just tell you what bad meal planning is.

Wheat cereal with skim milk (not bad)
Plus triscuit crackers with cottage cheese and a slice of tomatoe on top (not bad either)



Only problem is, eating them together. Ideally one would eat the "dinner" first- crackers, cottage cheese and tomatoe.
Then, one would eat the "dessert"- cereal and milk.

However, one might forget that in order to keep the cereal crisp and somewhat appetizing it must be eaten first. This leaves the "dinner" of crackers, cottage cheese and onion flavored tomatoes (due to cutting them in onion juice the night before) to be eaten after dessert.
You just don't do that.

Short post tonight.

Current physical condition:
Sick, congested or just random allergies (I never have allergies!). The last two days at work have been miserable. I have no nasal passages.
I'm surprised they haven't chucked me out the window or stuffed me in a vent for sniffling all day yet.


Status update:
Let's just say FAIL. I'm not even going to try that tonight. In bed late, up late, late to work, accidently stuck chicken in my mouth with the carbs.
HOWEVER, tomorrow is a new day!


I'm off to do one of my favorite things: illustrating.

Day 10.

Listening to:
"White Man's Blues" -Edgar Winter

Song of the day:
"Freedom" -Uhhh…Prince of Egypt soundtrack

Current Physical Condition:
Very, very stuffed up. I can hardly talk sometimes because I'm so stuffed.
Tired.

Status update:
1. Timeliness: Fail.
2. Diet Plan: Check
3. Learning to cook: Check-ish
4. Becoming Disciplined: Fail.

I went to bed uber late last night, this morning was a disaster and tonight isn't looking better. No worries, tomorrow, by the grace of God I will get up.

--------------

Okay. We're going to make something simple but hopefully delicious.
It's a little scary because I'm going to try to use that "bread" again. That nastiness.

One minor issue (Mikaya, PLEASE don't kill me). I had to use olive oil…my onions were sticking to the pan! But I just put a little in the pan for non-stick purposes. I didn't see anything on the "carbs" side that I could use!


I'm infamous for burning toast and overcooking my veggies. Thankfully, neither of those happened tonight. I sauteed some onions and green peppers until they weren't crunchy but not quite slimy. I almost always cook them to slime, so I'm glad I've learned when to turn the heat off. Sheesh.
I experimented with a few different spreads on the "bread" this time:
1. Refried beans
2. Ricotta cheese
3. Hummus

I toasted the bread first and then spread one of the above options on. Then layered a tomato slice, onions and green peppers. I topped it off with either a bit of ricotta cheese or hummus for class. One of them I added some lettuce to the layers.
I have to say that my favorite was ricotta cheese with tomatoes, onions and green peppers.
Funny thing, when I toast the "bread" and layer it with so much…it doesn't taste bad!




I would also just like to say that I am consistently, totally insanitary. I mean…the roomy is gone for the week and no one else is going to be eating out of the ricotta cheese or refried bean containers! Snacking and double dipping is essential to cooking. Especially when you skipped lunch and you're home from work early and famished.

Kate: don't eat out of the ricotta cheese, refried beans, cottage cheese or drink out of the skim milk for that matter. It just doesn't matter when you're single and cooking for one.

I must go. My eyes are red and I still have some illustrating to do.

The culprits trying to steal my precious food tonight:

Day 9.

Listening to:
"Dream Girls" -soundtrack from a movie playing in the background

Current physical condition:
Sad. No energy. Stuffed head. Haven't worked out since Saturday.

Status update:
1. Timeliness: Check. Wow? Yeah.
2. Diet Plan: Check
3. Learning to cook: Pretty much.
4. Becoming Disciplined: I never know till tomorrow. Bed time is essential.

Ok, quick post tonight.
I've got stuff to do.

Same thing as Saturday. Eggs, green peppers, onions, tomatoes and a mix of mozzarella and sharp cheddar cheese. Oh, sour cream.






Working on some illustrations with a friend so I don't have time for a new recipe tonight. He's also a great photographer.


However, Friday is home made wheat pizza dough night with my sissy! I'm so freaking excited. I've NEVER been so excited to make and eat bread before. I'm SO excited.
I will have to try two new recipes on Saturday to catch up I guess.


Excuse me…I'm going for a second helping.

Day 7/8.

"Say 8! Say 8!" -Brian Regan

Just sayin'...Brian Regan lovers...this diet is an 8. I just hope nobody with a broken femur comes after me now.

Listening to:

"Dish and the Spoon" -Jon Troast

(Mmmm…reminds me of toast…and delicious raspberry jam.)

Current Physical Condition:

Tired. Very tired. I also haven't had much energy for the past two days at least.

Current Mental Condition:

Whatever.

You know, I should really do a better job at tracking results. However, with my inability to even keep up with posting lately, I don't think I should add another task.

Day 7/8 STAUS UPDATE:

1. Timeliness: Fail.

2. Diet Plan: Check. (Besides I have slight guilt, I ate this raspberry vinaigrette dressing on my salad today, but as I was pouring it on I realized I didn't know what was in it. There could've been sugar and I wouldn't know it. Ignorance is bliss.)

3. Learning to cook: Fail. I'm sorry to disappoint, but I simply didn't have time to make whole wheat bread with my family in town this weekend. And it's not happening tonight. I haven't gotten the recipe from Mom because she forgot it, and my sis will be busy until Thursday at least- so I won't be making bread until then. Excuse? NO! Me!? Of course not!

4. Becoming disciplined: I'm going to give myself a check. 8 days of this is definitely discipline.

I'm realizing that I can put up with a lot. If I'm not being challenged to improve on what I'm eating, then I just keep eating the same thing.

For example, tonight I came home and rushed back out to meet someone. In about 45 minutes I packed a bag of clothes, made lunch for the next day and stuffed my face with the quickest thing to eat- Triscuits and cottage cheese.

A sufficient dinner? Hardly.

It was easy and I'd done it before. For lunch tomorrow, I fried up two small burrito wraps with refried beans and threw them in my lunch bag along with a few pieces of lettuce. I'll heat the burritos up and then peel them apart a bit to stick the lettuce in. Darn, I forgot tomatoes too. Oh well.

I also threw in an apple, a small orange thing (you know, one of those oranges that you peel and it ends up being about a bite and a half altogether- woot), and some fresh blueberries for breakfast.

NEW GOAL:

I want to cook 3 new dishes/meals a week.

My supervisor always inspires me with her love for cooking and easy, new dishes and she didn't fail me today. We got to talking about this Susan Somers 31 day diet that I'm on, and I decided that I just couldn't go any longer without trying a few recipes.

So, I will. Three a week I think.

And now, I've got to get some sleep before I croak.

Last night, I had a headache so bad that I got nauseous as I drove around an exit ramp and promptly crashed when I got home (9:45 by the way). Maybe that will make up for me not being disciplined tonight.

Toodles peeps. Here's to spring.

Day 5/6.

Day 5...was okay. Not horrible but close to it.  

I've been hanging out with my family late while they're in town (hence my lack of Day 5 update). Of course, whenever people gather the American thing to do is eat. Food everywhere. Pizza and cookies and delicious things. Of course. No further comment, other than what I ate instead:

Day 5 dinner instead of warm, cheesy, delicious pizza:
I found a three grain bread with hardly any other ingredients aside from whole grains from the health section. I can't even say it tasted like plastic, I just don't know how to describe it. You really wouldn't think it'd be that bad at first.
So, dinner was:
Toasted nastiness (3 grain bread)
Classic Hummus spread on top
Sliced tomatoes with a little pepper (Jon, what is UP with you not having any SALT in your house!!??)
THE END…of dinner.

Hello out there:
I'd like to give a shout out to all my readers. Ghostly and visible alike.
Thank you to my one follower, a faithful man and dear brother.
Thank you to my one, recent commenter. A dear, asian companion. (Yes, you should be my asian sidekick for the upcoming sky-diving adventure. Because it will happen. I'm not encouraging you to continue procrastinating, but thanks for reading.)

On another note, I can't remember how to edit this html to make my sentences indent. It's very annoying. And what is up with the varying font!? As a designer, this ruins my post.
C'est la vie. No time for this today.

My goals this weekend:
I'm going to make home made wheat bread. Hold me to it (or at least by Monday night?). Along with finishing some illustrations that must be done by Wednesday and hanging out with my family who came for a visit. Accomplishable you think?
Do the cats love to claw at my butt while I'm sitting at the table for breakfast?


I think yes.

------

Saturday morning goodness:
Oh. my. gosh.
I've just made the best eggs ever.

Ingredients this morning:
Season all, seasoned salt
butter
salt
pepper
diced onions
diced green peppers
cherry tomatoes cut in half
turkey breast deli meat (>1 gram of sugar)
sharp cheddar cheese
sour cream
ice cold water
cats

So it's actually better to sauté the peppers, onions and tomatoes first in a little butter and spices. I threw the turkey in last for a few minutes and then just dumped the beaten eggs into the pan. I've found out that it's best to put the cheese in right before the eggs are finished scrambling. *giggles* I just find that to be an interesting image. Eggs scrambling. Tee hee...
Next time I think that I would get a better result, both in taste and appearance if I scrambled the eggs in a separate pan and then threw the other sautéed ingredients in at the last minute with the cheese. Otherwise, it starts turning into too much of a mushed together dish.

I don't even know why I got sour cream. I mean…it's been sitting in my fridge for 5 days now and I have absolutely no idea what to do with it!
So…I've tried it with eggs. It was quite good. Just a little dollop of sour cream beside the eggs to mix in or dip or whatever you'd like. Quite tasty, and since for some insane reason sour cream is on the "pro-fats" side of this diet (while skim milk and cottage cheese is with the carbs!?), I can mix with eggs and cheese.



Sounds from the kitchen:
"You touch ma' food you dead cat!"



No, Mom. I'm not encouraging the cat to eat off of my plate- she's doing it on her own, free will.



It's such a pretty day outside. I only hope the temperature is as appealing. I'd like to go for a jog.

Cheers to Saturday!

Day 4.

Update...not happening.

Not at 3:01 AM. Plus, that should give you an idea of my success level with discipline today.

Err...yesterday.

Here's to 3 hrs of sleep and a shot of skim milk.

Quote of the night...

"Your gender is regrettable"

-Brandon Lay

Day 3.

Well it's day 3 and I'm wondering more and more why they don't call diets "torture exercises". It's just not right.

Listening to:
"Stronger" - Hillsong Live

Current Physical Condition:
Tired, full and unexercised.
Tired due to my extremely late night and feeling quite nasty due to lack of exercise.

Current Mental Condition:
Dazed again. Did I tell you about day 1 yet? Oh let me….

(Day 1 recap)
Horrible headache coming home from work, my stomach felt funny for the second half of the day. "It can NOT be the lack of sugar from my diet!" I told Sarah as I sat on the kitchen counter eating my sugarless dinner. "And it can't be lack of caffeine, I go days without drinking coffee and I'm fine!" (As I proceeded to slump to the floor and lie flat on my back due to an oncoming light headed spell.)
But you see, what I didn't realize was that those bagels in the morning, bread on sandwiches, juice, white pasta, etc. ALL had enormous amounts of sugar and if it didn't, my body was breaking it down as sugar.
Sarah pointed this out to me as I jumped up in surprise. "Seriously!?" I said. "Oh my gosh! It CAN'T be!! *gasp* I think I'm having a sugar withdrawal!" I said as I fell to the floor with another flash of a headache and dizzy spell.

Oh dear.

---------------------

Day 3 STATUS UPDATE:
1. Timeliness: Fail. Due to the slush outside this morning.
2. Sticking with the diet plan: Check.
3. Learning to cook: Temporarily on hold (ate the same thing I had for lunch)
4. Becoming disciplined: I suppose. We'll see about bed time.

No entertaining images tonight. Just me drinking skim milk. Enjoy.



Some needed clarification for certain parties:
Let me just clarify that I'm not on a "diet" because I think I'm fat or because I want to do something extreme. I will be doing something "extreme" in the summer, so if that's what you're looking for, please check back in a few months for my skydiving adventure update. It will happen.
As for the present month, I merely seek to encourage someone dear to me and become a little more disciplined in the process.

A brief overview of this "diet":
A whole lot about cutting sugar out of your diet.
This includes white bread, white flour, beached wheat flour, concentrated natural sugars such as juice, and anything that is more 1 gram of sugar. Sigh.
A whole lot about pairing foods.
Since your body breaks down the combination of foods differently and even takes vegetables like potatoes and turns them into sugar, the pairing of foods is quite important.

I can eat meat, cottage cheese, whole wheat bread (with NO sugar), eggs and cheese, veggies, fruit, etc. Trust me, I'll be fine.
And I'll spare you the rest.

The reason for my "torture exercise" called a "diet" this month.
1. To support my dear sister
2. To learn to cook (or force myself to cook)
3. To become more disciplined
-Living without out coffee forces one to go to bed earlier
-Going to bed earlier encourages waking up early
-Waking up early helps being on time for work


So really people, it's not that bad. I'm just ignoring my desire for that wonderful cereal stash in the pantry.
I'm going to discipline other areas of my life now.

Day 2.

Listening to:
"Don't Panic" - Coldplay

Current Physical Condition:
Just fine. A bit tired…then again…it's late. 11:02 pm.

Current Mental Condition:
Apathetic. But not in as much of a daze as yesterday.


Pardon the disorganized mess of a blog update below. It's quite late and I'm quite tired.

Status Update:

1. Timeliness: Check. On time to work for the second day in a row.
2. Sticking with the diet plan: Check-ish.
I accidentally took a swig of milk with my breakfast of eggs and sharp cheddar cheese this morning. BAD. You can't mix the pro-fats (eggs and cheese) with the carbs (milk).
I also accidentally fried the yellow squash with butter (totally fine) BUT I mixed this in with the whole wheat pasta for lunch tomorrow (mixing pro-fat butter with whole wheat carbs). It's not going to kill me…but I'm just trying to stick with the strict menu.
3. Learning to cook: Check-ish.
Tonight I made a mad dash to Food Lion. Starving. Desiring something other than meat and veggies. WHAT? What do I want? CRACKERS! Crackers and tuna! But nooooo….I can't mix carbs and pro-fats.
I took my sister's advice and decided on the cottage cheese.



Discovery: Triscuits and cottage cheese do in fact taste good together. I found this out as I stuffed my face with this delicious new snack while making lunch for tomorrow:
Lunch for tomorrow: Whole wheat pasta, fried zucchini and sliced cherry tomatoes. PEPPER AND SALT!




It was quite funny actually, trying to eat dinner, make lunch and get out of the house in 30 minutes. Didn't quite happen.
Scene of the night: Lael throws the pan on the stove along with a pot of water turned on high for a quick boil. Runs around the kitchen pulling random veggies out of the fridge, washing tomatoes, throwing butter on the counter, stuffs wheat crackers and cottage cheese into her mouth.
Starts slicing butter with a less than sufficient knife and as the butter and sliced zucchini gets thrown into the pan she realizes that she has absolutely no idea how to slice veggies quickly. Starts to hear a sizzle…it grows louder…realizes the pot is boiling over for the pasta. In between turning down the water, throwing pasta in and stuffing her face again she realizes that she hasn't stirred the zucchini once and promptly throws herself across the stove to grab a spoon and man both sides of the stove at once, while chewing another cracker.


4. Becoming Disciplined: Check and fail.
Going into the day was fine, I came home and made dinner and lunch for tomorrow. However, it is now 11:53 and I'm still at a friend's house brainstorming for an art project. Brilliant. JUST WHAT is going to happen when I'm falling asleep at work tomorrow and CAN'T HAVE COFFEE!!??

C'est la vie, eh?

Day 1.

Listening to:
"Taxi Cab" - Vampire Weekend

Current physical condition:
My legs are slightly sore from my Saturday jog. My stomach feels funny and I have a headache.

Current mental condition:
I've been in a bit of a daze. But fairly motivated…to get some sleep.


I found myself wondering about my decision today, as I do with most decisions that stem from what my older sister says.

I never read the fine print on her packaging and I'm not sure I ever learned my lesson.
It started as I was rushing to work Friday morning, mumbling "I can't be this late AGAIN" to myself and praying for discipline and timeliness. I work through lunch and stay late but still…late is late.
She asked for support, that's all it was.
"I NEED somebody to hold me to my diet!" she said. A Susan Sommers diet. It can't be that hard. Something about staying off of sugar and not being able to eat certain foods together because it imbalances you, blah blah blah.

"Sure!" I said. I was thrilled to help hold her to something she really wanted to do and grateful that she suggested I do it too! I knew I wasn't dependable enough to remind her of her diet daily so there was no better way to support her.

Conversation over a sub:
Me- "Okay…well I can do this. *thinking of my daily snack venture over to the little Asian Cafe* I can just get tea instead of my usual coffee and animal crackers (don't make fun!). I won't even put sugar in it! Now that's a stretch!"
Sis- "It's gotta be decaf".
Me- "What!? Darn. I don't think they sell decaf. Fine. I'll just get orange juice! I love orange juice!"
Sis- "You can't have juice"
Me- "WHAT!!??? What the heck!? It's JUICE!"

And then proceeds the conversation that leads me to wonder now why I didn't ask about this stuff before agreeing.
C'est la vie. And such is a gullible person.

My purpose in this rant:
1. For the next 31 days I'm going to document my occasional pain and suffering *note my current headache and overall funny feeling*. NO, I'm not trying to be cool like the girl in "Julia & Julia". YES, this is a blog and the subject is food-ish.
2. To occasionally update. No, I will not update every day. Am I THAT dependable? Hmm.
3. To learn to cook (more than a sandwich for dinner and cereal for breakfast).
4. To become disciplined.
a. In eating
b. In getting to bed and waking up at a decent hour
c. In being timely

Tonight's dish:



(Yes, I'm sitting on the counter. What? The cats do it.) Some left over chicken warmed with mozzarella cheese melted on top. Sliced yellow squash fried in a pan with butter, salt and pepper. Water.
Overall dish quality:
Chicken was too dry, I found out mozzarella does NOT stay melted (just sorta melts and turns into a stretchy plastic-like substance), and the squash was amazingly good- but a bit too juicy. I'm surprised at how delicious the squash came out though!

Note:
I found out potatoes are on the "No-No" list. Seriously!?

You should also make note that I've never enjoyed using pepper and salt more in my life. Seeing as how cooking skills could improve my chances at marrying and keeping my love's appetite satisfied, this month may just prove to be a useful experiment.