back 2 skool, yayz!

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School has officially started!  There was something very satisfying about being a student today and not a teacher like the last two years.  Of course I’m sad that I can only take one course this semester, but I’m very happy to start chipping away at my long list of prerequisite requirements; I’m on my way!

I woke up around 7:30 today when Adam left for school and got to work creating my half marathon training schedule.  Then I had to actually implement it – I did 2miles on the treadmilll.  With warm up/cool down it was ultimately 2.3miles in 24minutes.  Afterwards I did abs (100reps) and stretching, bringing my total to 34minutes, 330calories.

I got a little behind schedule, so after a shower I had to rush to my hospital volunteering shift.  I’ll be doing 10-2 every Monday.  I walked to the bank on my way home, and at 2:40 I had yet to eat anything for the day.  I knew my first meal had to be something special.

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I hated the flavor, but liked the texture of this PB Gnu Bar, so I knew it was the perfect way to add fiber to this bowl.

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  • Oikos Fat Free Plain Greek Yogurt
  • 1.5t Crofter’s Organic Superfruit Asia Spread
  • 1.5t TJ’s Sunbutter
  • Peanut Butter Gnu Bar

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The only problem now is that I want to eat this for every meal for the rest of my life!  The mix of sunbutter and greek yogurt truly might be the best thing on earth!

While I drooled over my bowl I got myself ready for the new school year – I printed out all the online materials, organized them and my Chemistry for Dummiesnotes into a binder, and made a google calendar of important assignment dates.  I finished up my work with a small plate of crackers and the last of the homemade french onion dip.

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Adam was a sweetheart and drove me to my first class.  Mondays and Wednesdays class will be from 6:30-7:50, and on Thursday it’s 5:00-8:50.  The class seems ok so far, but I know it will be challenging for me.  The professor said that in order to achieve success most students study at least 7-10hours a week.

When we got home we took a walk to the post office and stopped at the gas station because my hormones have made me very angry that there’s been no candy in the house.  I stalked up and Adam bought an ice-cream Snickers.

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He must be the nicest bear in the world, because he gave me a big bite!

For dinner I did leftovers and a quick salad.

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I prefer noodles cold so I ate my portion straight from the container.  Note: I also ate 4big bites before I could manage to take a picture.

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My salad was organic spring mix lettuce, Newman’s Own Asian Sesame Salad Spritzer, Newman’s Own Organic Dried Apples, and chunks of leftover party cheese.

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To drink I had my plain Ooba sample.

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We watched Bones while I ate and for dessert I tucked into my new candy stash – Sprees.

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I realize this isn’t exactly a health food, but I do love that a whole package has less than 200calories.

Now it is a late late bedtime, clearly I have to skip tv time on class nights!  See you in the am.

Did you ever take chemistry?  How did you do?  I was a 4.0 student in high school until I took chemistry, so I am understandably a little freaked out!

Half Marathon Training Schedule

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This is my training schedule for the Disney Princess Half Marathon I am running in March, 2010.  I have 27weeks to prepare.

Please note the following things about this schedule –

  • the small numbers are miles run, the large numbers are cross-training minutes
  • I am only scheduling 4 days a week, but hope to add 1-2 cross-training sessions a week
  • I will also be doing strength work and stretching
  1. 8.31-9.6 – 2/2/2/20
  2. 9.7-9.13 – 2/2/2/20
  3. 9.14-9.20 – 2/2/3/25
  4. 9.21-9.27 – 2/3/3/25
  5. 9.28-10.4 – 2/3/3/30
  6. 10.5-10.11 – 2/3/4/30
  7. 10.12-10.18 – 2/3/4/35
  8. 10.19-10.25 – 2/3/4/35
  9. 10.26-11.1 – 3/5/40/40
  10. 11.2-11.8 – 3/3/3/40
  11. 11.9-11.15 – 3/3/5/45
  12. 11.16-11.22 – 2/3/6/45
  13. 11.23-11.29 – 3/7/50/50
  14. 11.30-12.6 – 3/3/5/50
  15. 12.7-12.13 – 2/3/7/55
  16. 12.14-12.20 – 3/3/3/60
  17. 12.21-12.27 – 2/9/45/60
  18. 12.28-1.3 – 3/3/5/60
  19. 1.4-1.10 – 2/3/7/60
  20. 1.11-1.17 – 3/9/45/65
  21. 1.18-1.24 – 3/3/3/65
  22. 1.25-1.31 – 2/11/30/70
  23. 2.1-2.7 – 3/3/3/70
  24. 2.8-2.14 – 3/3/5/75
  25. 2.15-2.21 – 2/13/30/75
  26. 2.22-2.28 – 3/3/5/90
  27. 3.1-3.7 – 3/3/2/Half Marathon

 Current Stats

  • Height: 5feet4inches
  • Weight: 130lb (a new and yikes!-worthy discovery)
  • Stamina: 2miles in 20minutes leaves me wanting to die
  • Overall: I feel sluggish and stiff and ready for something in my life to change

I cobbled this training plan together using Google, fitness magazines, and advice from some of the greats (Meghann, Sarah, Caitlin).  If you see any room for correction, please let me know!

Last Day of Summer

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Tomorrow I start class (and half marathon training) so this is technically the last day of summer.  It was a good end, very relaxing.

This afternoon Adam made a big bowl of Purely Decadent Nondairy Frozen Dessert Peanut Butter Zig Zag and I ate his melties.

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So tasty.  I love the melted part on ice-cream, especially Frostys, which I happened to also have!

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We did a test-drive out to my campus this afternoon so I could feel comfortable tomorrow.  We found my parking lot, and even walked into my classroom.  On the way home I was so hungry I could barely see straight so we pulled into Wendy’s for a last summer hurrah.  We might have also watched Bones while we ate 🙂

During tv time (technically online time as we don’t have cable and only watch shows on the internet) I also ate a few pieces of my new candy.

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We saw this “milk” candy at the store and we’re too intrigued not to buy it.  It was chewy but creamy, and quite good.

For dinner I went a little more grown-up.

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That’s Shallota Flavor Spaghetti, a recipe from Rachael Ray’s Big Orange Book.

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A bug-free salad.

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The salad had organic spring mix lettuce, Newman’s Own Asian Sesame Natural Salad Mist, walnuts, caraway seed cheese, and Chili Oloves.  My mom sent me the olives from San Francisco and they added a nice kick.

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It’s 10pm now and I’m hoping to do a little reading in bed so I’ve got to get going.  I’m excited but nervous about LIFE starting tomorrow.  Sweet dreams.

Do you like Rachael Ray?  I adore watching her on tv, I think she’s so cute, but I don’t cook her recipes that often.  They take longer than 30minutes (minus), but are very creative and tasty (plus).  Plus they are easy to healthify – use less/lower fat cheese, sub in ww pasta, cut the olive oil/butter…..

Party Pooped

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Good morningafternoon!  The get together was a success, but now the husband and I are all pooped out 🙂  I didn’t get to take pictures but we had wine and cheese, and I made baked Brie and spinach and artichoke dip (recipes below).  Everyone brought a wine or cheese and everyone had a good time.  I got pretty drunk (don’t worry mom, I was still a good hostess) but I managed to be calm with the cheese.

People stayed from 7-12ish and then we cleaned up and went to bed.  We ended up with leftover wine,

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and cheese.

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Once I quit drinking I chugged an orange Ooba, which was the perfect way to end the evening. 

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Today we slept in for-ev-er, and then woke up to eat lunch and watch “My So-Called Life.”  I made a tasty looking salad, but then there was an incident with a bug, so brunch ended up being this –

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Dr. Kracker Pumpkin Seed Cheddar Flat Crisp with homemade sour cream and onion dip.

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Quite good.

School starts tomorrow, so there’s lots to do still.  See you for dinner.

Baked Brie

Top a round of brie with chopped walnuts, dried cranberries, and a dash of salt.  Bake in a 350* oven for 15minutes.

The dip recipe is here.

Errands to Ecstasy

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 I found time for a mid-day post!  We’ve been busy, but having fun.  I ❤ errand Saturday with my husband.  We got up around 8:20 and got straight to work; there’s been a lot of movement today.  After loading up the car with stuff for Goodwill (including a heavy mattress that gave me an arm work out) we headed out to our car inspection.  The car took about an hour so Adam and I walked to the post office and back while we waited.  Afterwards we dropped off our donations.  During the drive I ate this Balance Bar I found at Target yesterday for 78cents.

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Gah, too good!  I ate the cookie dough flavor and it was literally like cookie dough.  I try not to eat them that often because they have much more saturated fat (3-4g) than I prefer, but they are a really great occasional treat.  I gave Adam a bite and he fell in love too.

Next we took our coupons to Wegmans.

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I’m sure you’re all shocked that Adam insisted on salad bar again 🙂

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I knew I would eat some snacky food tonight at the party so I skipped my usual buffet philosophy (90/10 healthy food to splurges) and went all healthy.  I had Bourbon grilled chicken, Asian baked tofu, and steamed veggies (that is a small container).

We got a ton at the grocery store (I got another arm workout carrying purchases up the stairs) and then came home to do some cleaning.  I stopped to paint my toenails and figured drying time was a good time for dessert.  I don’t know if you guys remember my super sample sundae?  Forget that.  This is the new hottness –

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Purely Decadent Dairy Free Coconut and Crofter’s Asia Superfruit Spread.  Ridiculous.

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This is hands-down my favorite ice-creamand the jam addition was out of this world.  I was in ecstasy.

We have a few more to-do’s this afternoon, and then tonight people are coming over for wine/cheese.  I’ll do a recap but I’m not sure how many pictures I’ll take.  See you later for some drogging!

  1. Do you use coupons when you food shop?  I don’t comparison shop or anything like that, but I do clip coupons.  I keep them in a mini file folder, organized by category and expiration date.
  2. Do you bring your own bags to the grocery store?  I sometimes slip, but 90% of the time we bring cloth bags from home.  It’s good for the environment, and I find it way easier to carry heavy bags over my shoulder.
  3. What was your most exciting grocery purchase this week?  We got some organic, dairy free chocolate syrup with a bear on the front that I am pretty eager to open up!

Balls, of Meat

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Extra to-do’s are done, dinner was made from scratch, it’s been a good day!  This morning was not much of a success.  I wanted to do chemistry review – one last ditch effort before class starts on Monday – so I rode to school with Adam to study at the South Campus library.  We got to school before it opened so I hung around the med school lobby and ate my snack.

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My baggie was about 2servings and very tasty.

Once the library did open at 8 I put in a valiant two hours of day-dreaming before I accepted that I was too cold and hungry to focus.  I trekked in search of a cafeteria, success.

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My egg/cheese bagel and coffee were just what I needed.  I studied in the cafeteria until I was halfway through with my coffee.  I should mention, the coffee machine was one of those push button thingies, and I ended up with English Toffee Cappuccino.  It was very syrupy and halfway through I basically had diabetes.

I trekked again, bought a diet soda to clear my head (don’t judge me!) and went back to the libary for some actual  studyingcompletely worthless blog reading. 

It wasn’t until 12:30 that I finally had some success!  I went for coffee with a blog reader/R.D student at UB (hi, Katie!).  I got to ask questions about the program and catch up on blog gossip, it was great.  We ended up sitting at Starbucks for hours!  While we were there I had a more successful snack.

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Unsweetened iced coffee with skim milk and a KIND bar.

I didn’t get home until after 5, and then Adam and I headed out on errands.  We spent forever at Target.  Among other things, I replaced my devious Sigg,

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and we bought a new blender, woo!

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Before we could head home we had to hit up a wine store too.

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We are having a small get-together tomorrow, the theme of which is wine and cheese.

Somehow at 9pm I managed to force myself to cook dinner.  While I worked I ate two farmers’ market plums for energy.

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We made Giada De Laurentiis’ meatballs, from her Everyday Italian cookbook.  I only had a small serving,

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but it was frickin delicious!  Hands-down the best turkey meatballs I’ve ever had, I’m sorry I can’t post the recipe.

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Dinner was great, and “My So-Called Life” was even better 🙂  We will be very busy tomorrow (in addition to our get-together set up we have to get our car registered) so I probably won’t be posting again until the evening.  See you then!

What is your favorite ground meat, for balls form?  My favorite is extra-lean turkey.

Jordan Catalano

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It’s been a long day and I am watching Jordan Catalano and Angela Chase decide whether or not to have sex so this will be a quickie (ha) post!

For breakfast I ate a Cliff Mojo Bar on the walk to volunteering.

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Today was my last 6hour shift, next week I do 4hours each Monday.  There was employee appreciation bbq in the cafeteria which meant not a lot of choices for me.

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I ate half of the macaroni and ate the chicken out of the bun with a fork.

When I got home it’s possible I got in a screaming match with my husband.  Just a poss ability though, it’s not like my husband is a first year med student under tons of pressure or I don’t know what to do with my life and am freaking out.  And if we did fight, we might have made up with Arby’s five-for-five and “My So-Called Life,” which is how I ended up with this –

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Jamocha shake and Diet Dr. Pepper.

Fueled by my awesome shake, I tackled tons of to-dos.  Laundry,

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meal planning/coupon organizing/list making,

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recycling our paper,

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While we were being green I drank so chocolate Amazing Grass with So Delicious Unsweetened Coconut Milk,

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and around 9 we finally broke for dinner.

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I know it looks like swamp, but Moo Shu Stoup left-overs rocked my socks.

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I stopped 80% of the way through though, so I could have a threesome (is anyone else as amused as I am by the punny sex references as I am?) with a couple whose child could rule the world.

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Purely Decadent Dairy Free Peanut Butter Zig Zag and South America Crofter’s Superfruit Spread. oh.my.god.

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The ice-cream had chunks of chocolate and peanut butter and the spread had maqui and passionfruit.  They were both samples, and they will both be purchased when I run out!

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Gah!

We are finishing up our 90’s TV marathon, sweet dreams folk.

Did you watch My So-Called Life growing up?  I really liked it as a kid but now I am obsessed!

(Belly)Flop

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Bad decisions all around! “District 9” suck, suck, sucked. Save your money, do not go. Also, my mom told me to charge my movie snacks to her and I might have gone a bit crazy –

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Adam and I split popcorn and a diet soda and I ate 85% of that (huge) box of candy.

It is, unequivocally, time for bed.

What do you eat at the movies?  The movies seems to be my Achilles’ Heel of healthy eating this year.  Popcorn is my favorite thing ever, but I don’t even like movie-made popcorn, so I’m not sure why I keep eating it.  What I really, really like, is to bring apple slices to the movies (or jr mints).