Great Day Off

Today ended up being a great day off... which I was not expecting since I spent all day yesterday in bed asleep fighting a head cold. I've been stressing recently that I forgot to renew my tabs on time, but today Joe found them in a stack of unsorted papers, so that saved me a trip to the DMV! Yay!! I went to BodyFlow this evening, part yoga, tai-chi and pilates. And I realized I can touch my toes without having to stretch for 15 minutes, which means this whole going to the gym thing is working. (Seeing as I used to have trouble touching my knees in the morning). Also had an impromptu visit with some friends which cheered me up. Made a quick stop at  Huckleberry's and picked up so goat yogurt which I'm really excited to try, some half and half in the cutest little milk bottle and some yummy juices! This evening, I made a new recipe in an effort to save some produce from the compost pile, and in a desperate attempt to avoid eating VA cafeteria food for lunch  tomorrow.

Lentil and Couscous Salad (adapted from a Country Living Recipe)
Whisk together
- 6 Tablespoons of apple cider vinegar
- 4 Tablespoons of whole grain mustard
- 1/4 cup olive oil
- 1/4 tsp black pepper
Then cook, drain and add french lentils (1 cup uncooked), and couscous (1 cup uncooked).
Chop up a bunch of green onions and some cherry tomatoes. Mix together and you're done.
(P.s. the original recipe calls for 3/4 cup chopped mint but it tastes great w/o it)

Overall, it seems fairly healthy, it has lentils, that has to up the good-for-you factor right? and if I can whip it up the night before work that proves its not to difficult or time intensive either.

Inspired

I found an interesting blog today while looking for tips to reduce food waste - I know, sounds boring but I'm sick of throwing away wilted, slimy bags of produce and those "science experiments" from the back of the fridge. So I'm starting a more concerted effort to use things up before they go bad. One interesting tip she had was to start a "waste list", write down everything that you throw away over the course of a month or so. Then you can edit your shopping or think of creative uses for those things before they go bad. So I'll see how that goes. The other thing I was inspired to do was "Toss 50 Things", it's based off some book. So in addition to the huge yard sale pile mountain I have in my basement, I'm going to try and find another 50 things to donate, sell, give away, etc. Maybe a few truly un-reusable things I'll actually trash. Apparently, you're only allowed to count repeat items once, i.e. 5 dead batteries only count as 1 thing. ....we'll see how it goes!

Early V Day

Not much is better than some hot lemur tea and a Belgium waffle in the morning for breakfast. The mug was an early Valentines day present. We're not really big into that holiday around here, but a little present is always nice. I guess Joe is using up his presents with new bike parts though, so that makes shopping easy. Tonight we went out to Vin Rouge here in Spokane and used our first "Groupon". Seems like the company is doing fairly well, well enough to pay for a Super Bowl commercial anyways. Nice to save a few bucks and try out a local place. The food was pretty good, would go back again for a special occasion. I had the crab cakes which were actually quite delicious, best I've had so far since moving back to the "east side". This evening we watched the 1962 version of Hans Brinker or the Silver Skates. The acting was pretty terrible but I kind of got a kick out of watching one of my favorite childhood books on the silver screen. It's never quite the same, the book is always better. Joe suffered through the entire thing only to find the money hidden under a loose board at the end (not buried in the backyard next to a tree that was no longer there). Sorry to be the spoiler, but I doubt anyone else will be watching that any time soon.