Thursday Three

1. This bar is gluten free, vegan, and amaaaazing:

I woke up late on Tuesday and had to rush to get to my workout class (if you miss it, they charge you $15!!!). I had this bar and some OJ and was pretty much good to go.

What I like about the Bonk Breaker is the texture. It's not as gluey as other energy bars, nor is it as sweet as date-based bars.

2. We finally took down our Christmas tree yesterday. I wrapped up all of the ornaments and placed them in our Christmas decorations bin - the one piece of organization in my entire house.

Every year we get a new glass ornament. This year it was a snazzy red VW hippie bus:

I'm sad to see all the pretty lights and baubles go, but I'm glad I made myself do it. Around here, decorations are liable to stay up for months after the actual holiday.

3. What is up with this whole worst-flu-season-in-10-years thing??? 2/3 of my department are sick. Some of them have the flu and some of them have a stomach bug. Last thing I want is a stomach bug. I have a fear of puking. Like, a real fear. And so I try not to do it. My record for not puking is 13 years - between the time I got the stomach flu in middle school and the time I got food poisoning in grad school. I'd like to break that record.

Crisis averted.

I may have overreacted a teensy weensy bit yesterday. Today I went to school and talked everything out with my advisor (calmly and professionally, in contrast to my "I AM NOT HAPPY ABOUT THIS" email from yesterday), and he helped me come up with a solution that, while not ideal in that I'm still going to have a heavier workload and busier schedule than I'd planned for, will be tolerable. I hope. I feel a little silly for getting so upset, but then again, I subscribe to the belief that my level of angst is inversely proportional to the true severity of the thing causing the angst. In other words, if I freak out a lot about the perceived problem, it'll end up being okay, but if I don't freak out enough, I'm screwed. My therapist would probably advise against this line of "reasoning."

At any rate, crisis sort of averted.

Today the weather is the nicest it's been in several weeks. Evening temperatures are in the mid-70s instead of the high-90s/low-100s, the sky is blue, the air feels clean thanks to yesterday's rain, and there's a soft breeze. I'm sitting outside and relaxing with this while dinner's cooking:

(Yes. This is a plastic wine glass. It's for camping. Granted, I rarely camp, but whatever.)

For dinner I'm making shake-and-bake veggies: carrots, zucchini, mushrooms, eggplant, beets, and brussels sprouts, placed in a big plastic container with olive oil and Trader Joe's lemon pepper seasoning, and shaken up until every piece is coated:

(I love Trader Joe's more than any other store, I think.)

Weekend plans:

• Running - hopefully outside
• Making these cookies with my son - we love them!
• Cleaning my house and finally unpacking all my bags

And that's about it so far. Not very exciting, but I'm lazy, so it's fine with me.

What are your weekend plans?