Primal Journal **Greensprout** page 160

[Greensprout]

Up fairly late, slept in (9 1/2 hours), woke up hungry. So a big brunch was in order.

A pretty uneventful day, I took advantage of the cool sunny day and went for an hour and a bit walk, and hubby decided to join me. First walk together in a long time, aside from the vacation. It was nice, we chatted more about what might be in store for the next 5 years for us career wise, potential moves, what that may mean for the boys, retirement, and so on.

I made my best version to date of the squash soup. Browned chopped bacon, into the drippings went shallot, fresh ginger, celery, cubed butternut squash. Added homemade turkey broth, salt & pepper, nutmeg & cinnamon, pureed when soft, added a tin of coconut milk. Served with minced cilantro, squeeze of fresh lime and the chopped crispy bacon bits. I did forget the scallions, but excellent otherwise.

Much laundry had been done. I think the washer has been running almost nonstop since it was fixed yesterday.

Eats:
black coffee
steak, mushrooms & 3 eggs cooked in ghee
a black plum
butternut squash soup
hot wings
a cider, rum & zevia.

The scale is inching downwards. This is a good thing. I should take some measurements this week. And hit the gym for some lifting, which didn't quite happen last week.

[Greensprout]

Made it to a short lifting session at lunch, about half an hour. Good golly, you'd think it had been years, not months, since I've done much of that, based on how my arms felt afterwards. Almost had difficulty removing my tshirt and sports bra to shower, my arms & shoulders felt that heavy.

Nothing spectacular as far as weight, either, in fact, I went lighter than I would like just because it's been a little while. Assisted pullups/chinups, bench press, medicine ball squats/leg extension/hamstring curls (squat rack was busy and I didn't want to squat with dumbbells), overhead presses, planks.

Arms not feeling quite so heavy now, but no doubt both upper and lower body will be protesting tomorrow. Need to pull out that "suck it up, Princess" attitude and readjust to doing this regularly. I think I'd like to add kettlebells as an option, but would like some coaching on proper form, especially for swings, as I'd hate to screw up my back, given the previous couple of low back strain episodes in the past. I've been rather leery of deadlifts as a result. Going to look into it with the trainers at the main base gym.

Badonka donk I may not possess, but I'm pretty sure I can put some curve on back there. Booty work in progress, or something like that.

[Pedidoc]

Typical white eastern European decent chick, no booty.

And son #2 had a girl over this evening. This too is new. Has happened before, but with a buddy and a couple of girls, this time was just the two of them, and he made a point to introduce us when I came home from work. We gave her a ride home later on in the evening. Very pretty young gal. Son #1 said he was proud of his brother, heeheehee.

So I had to laugh at the booty description - my sons are glad they got their dads and not mine!

Teen sons - let me tell you about the time I came home unexpectedly and heard two voices in the shower.
Me- who's with you?
DS2 - I'm talking to myself
Me- not unless you are a girl
DS2- I'm talking to C. She's just in the room.
Me - do you think I'm stupid?

They were showering together and got caught. Have to give C points - no shame, she stayed another 2 hours talking with the family.

For another time - when the 2 youngest hid under DS2's bed to scare him and heard more than they expected!

[Greensprout]

OMG!! I have to say, THAT sort of thing we've not yet encountered, though in the summer son #1 did a few times have a girl (or 2 and a buddy) in the hot tub until well into the wee hours...the deck with the hot tub is just below our bedroom window. They're 16 & 17.

Boys always give you something to scratch your head about, regardless.

[winencandy]

Your walk and you soup both sound lovely!

Teen sons - let me tell you about the time I came home unexpectedly and heard two voices in the shower.
Me- who's with you?
DS2 - I'm talking to myself
Me- not unless you are a girl
DS2- I'm talking to C. She's just in the room.
Me - do you think I'm stupid?

They were showering together and got caught. Have to give C points - no shame, she stayed another 2 hours talking with the family.

For another time - when the 2 youngest hid under DS2's bed to scare him and heard more than they expected!

Hehehe

I've been "lucky", but my sister walked into a room, catching one of her sons "in action", she's also found a tube of "hot cinnamon body lotion" in the couch cushions

[Pedidoc]

she's also found a tube of "hot cinnamon body lotion" in the couch cushions

Hope she had the couch cleaned...........

[Greensprout]

It was a foggy morning, which evolved into a beautiful fall day. 17C, no doubt the last day this warm for a very long time. Like 6 months or more. So I took advantage of getting out for a superb walk to the park for an hour midday. Feeling somewhat stiff from the LHT yesterday, but manageable.

My evening was full of kid related stuff. A parent meeting at the school about convocation, grad and "safe grad" aka the party the kids have that is handled by parent volunteers. Here, the legal age is 18, so half the graduates will be of legal drinking age by grad at the end of June. I seem to have volunteered for the medical committee, which will have people on hand at the safe grad in case of need. Always a few doctors and nurses among the parents. Figured I'd better let hubby decide for himself if he wants to be involved, and then thought we should check with son #1 if he minds if we are involved in being there, which he doesn't. In fact, he thinks it's quite fine.

After the meeting, off to pick up son #2 (was at a friend's near the high school), home, then delivered him elsewhere. Somewhere in there, I got some laundry done.

Eats:
black coffee, bone broth
chai mate tea
L: tiny bit of pork chop and 1/4 of a lamb/beef burger, squash soup.
D: slow cooker grass fed beef short ribs on spinach with horseradish
berries with cocoa coconut milk & toasted coconut, glass of wine.

The beef turned out a bit chewy. My current slow cooker heats a bit lower than my previous one, maybe I should have used High rather than Medium setting. Or perhaps more liquid in the pot might have helped. Very tasty, regardless. I reduced the juices which was fantastic.

Not doing so well for sleep this week. 6 hours, 6 hours, and 6 1/2 hours. Well, maybe closer to 7 but only because I kept hitting the snooze, which doesn't add to quality sleep, so I shouldn't even bother, but I do it without even realizing sometimes. Which says, of course, GET MORE SLEEP. I did much better while on my W30. I do find that I end up staying up later when I have wine in the evening. Says she as she sips on a glass of red. Yeah.

[Greensprout]

I remembered today that I have a big container of pastured pork cracklings that I got with my last meat order. A bunch of crispy bits frozen into a container in the lard they came from. I'd fed the boys leftovers earlier, as they were hungry and I wasn't. Too impatient to wait for the frozen mass to thaw, I hacked at it with my trusty chefs knife (probably a bad idea, but my fingers remain intact). Melted it all up in a pan and crisped up a bit, removed them and scrambled a few eggs in the lard. Most awesome meal. Mixed all the crispy bits into the eggs, and ommmed and awwwed and groaned over the lot. I don't think I'm going to share these cracklings. Nobody else here (well, maybe son #1 in the right mood) would get or appreciate it.

I've been quite low on vegetables this week. Just going with the flow. Eating what feels right. Well, that seems to have included several spoonsful of nutella, which I blatantly realized today does not make me feel good afterwards. Duh. Funny, as I have good chocolate stashed away, but am not particularly interested. I've nibbled maybe 2 or 3 small squares of it since the W30 last month, and it's been rather "meh". Berries with coconut milk or cream is nicer at the moment.

I ate my lunch before 11am, which was fine as it was the day for the work group to head to the mess and the sandwich bar. Normally I bring my own meal there, today I didn't have to, and was quite fine with sipping a club soda while the others snarfed their sandwiches/wraps and soup. A funny vegetable soup that looked just like the Weight Watchers veg/cabbage soup I remember from a dozen years ago. Heehee. I remember going through huge volumes of that stuff, all veg/broth and totally fat free...no wonder I was always hungry.

Rainy day, was planning to do some walking in the gym at the end of the day, but the mood passed, so came home and did some chores around the house instead. I'm still feeling Monday's LHT light workout. Legs and pecs in particular.

Eats:
black coffee
L: small bowl of squash soup, beef shortribs in extra broth over a few leftover sweet potato cubes. Yum.
after work: 4 walnut halves dipped in nutella, a loaded tsp of nutella straight up.
D: 3 scrambled eggs with pastured pork cracklings
glass of wine.

Hubby's home tonight very late, I'll see him tomorrow sometime as he won't go in to work early. He's off again on Mon for 4 days, so perhaps Mon (or even Sunday) might be the time to start a tater experiment. I'm still skeptical, but I suppose it can't hurt for a few days or a week or whatever. Actually kind of looking forward to eating potatoes, as they have been a rare addition indeed in the past couple of years. Some seem to have had issues after a couple of days, we'll have to see.

[winencandy]

I remembered today that I have a big container of pastured pork cracklings that I got with my last meat order. A bunch of crispy bits frozen into a container in the lard they came from. I'd fed the boys leftovers earlier, as they were hungry and I wasn't. Too impatient to wait for the frozen mass to thaw, I hacked at it with my trusty chefs knife (probably a bad idea, but my fingers remain intact). Melted it all up in a pan and crisped up a bit, removed them and scrambled a few eggs in the lard. Most awesome meal. Mixed all the crispy bits into the eggs, and ommmed and awwwed and groaned over the lot. I don't think I'm going to share these cracklings. Nobody else here (well, maybe son #1 in the right mood) would get or appreciate it.

Sounds AWESOME!

A funny vegetable soup that looked just like the Weight Watchers veg/cabbage soup I remember from a dozen years ago. Heehee. I remember going through huge volumes of that stuff, all veg/broth and totally fat free...no wonder I was always hungry.

reminds me of the soup I made for lunch today

a loaded tsp of nutella straight up.

I saw that!

perhaps Mon (or even Sunday) might be the time to start a tater experiment. I'm still skeptical, but I suppose it can't hurt for a few days or a week or whatever. Actually kind of looking forward to eating potatoes, as they have been a rare addition indeed in the past couple of years. Some seem to have had issues after a couple of days, we'll have to see.

I'm still skeptical, but I guess I started today. Kinda. With soup.

[Suse]

Not doing so well for sleep this week. 6 hours, 6 hours, and 6 1/2 hours. Well, maybe closer to 7 but only because I kept hitting the snooze, which doesn't add to quality sleep, so I shouldn't even bother, but I do it without even realizing sometimes. Which says, of course, GET MORE SLEEP. I did much better while on my W30. I do find that I end up staying up later when I have wine in the evening. Says she as she sips on a glass of red. Yeah.

some things just never change.... not that I can talk. pot, kettle, black stuff.