Gardein classic meatless balls

Cancelled plans, but good things, too. (October Favorites!)

That Asian-Looking Chick Leave a comment

In October news, nothing much happened. October was the month of cancelled plans.

We wanted to catch UFC 216 (Demetrius Johnson defending his title again!) at our usual sports bar, but it didn’t work out. We’d planned to go to a Halloween party – I even had a Harry Potter costume! – but we had to cancel. That’s right. We did nothing for Halloween. The closest I came to celebrating Halloween was going to BodyPump looking a little goth. That was it.

At the same time that nothing happened, a lot did happen. We had houseguests in October, you see, for 10 days in the middle of the month… and that was what happened. In the aftermath of their visit, we were wiped out on every level. We were compelled to hibernate.

Enough said.

Let’s get on to the little things I enjoyed in October. OH, here I must insert an apology in advance: these are not great pics. I didn’t have the wherewithal to work on getting super-good shots of anything this time. So it goes.

Starting with entertainment, as usual!

 

1). A Ghost Story

 

 

You may remember the non-review movie review I wrote about A Ghost Story. If so, you know how I feel about it. We were just as happy to watch it a second time.

 

2). Mindhunter (T.V. series)

 

The excellent Mindhunter is not your average T.V. series. It’s unusual. Words that come to mind: Vintage. Stylish. Noir. Not scary. Not glamorous. This series about the beginnings of criminal profiling in the FBI’s fledgling Behavioral Science unit first struck us as a bit awkward in its delivery, but you soon realize that this is deliberate. It works. This is a period piece, after all, and this was how T.V. looked back then.

I’ve heard people say that they had to watch two or three episodes of Mindhunter before they got into it. Our experience was that we were hooked by the end of the first episode.

 

3). Stranger Things 2 (Season 2) (T.V. series)

 

 

Is it even necessary for me to say that we loved Stranger Things 2 and it was fantastic and maybe even better than Season 1 and in our humble opinion everyone should watch it? I think not. If you’re not watching Stranger Things, then I don’t know how to help you.

 

Products!

4). Physician’s Formula Super BB cream SPF 30 (in “Light”).

 

Physician’s Formula Super BB Cream

 

Did you catch the complete name of this product? The operative words are SPF 30. I wear a broad-spectrum SPF 30 cream every day, so I always have it on under my make-up, but I love a make-up product that also has sun protection. Physician’s Formula BB cream’s sun protection includes zinc oxide, which I look for in a sunscreen above other active ingredients.

It so happens that this cruelty-free product not only works as an extra layer of sunscreen, but it also wears nicely as a foundation. It works for me, at least. The color match is perfect, with the right undertone and everything, and the product is long-wearing, as well. Physician’s Formula is one of the more pricey drugstore make-up brands, but it’s still drugstore… easily accessible and not outrageously expensive. I highly recommend this product if you’re looking for a new foundation.

 

5). The Body Shop Frosted Plum shower gel.

 

The Body Shop Frosted Plum shower gel

 

The Body Shop’s 2017 holiday (limited edition) line is Frosted Plum, and – surprise, surprise! – I love it. I wasn’t expecting its pronounced pine scent; I adore pine fragrance, so this was a pleasant discovery. The vaguely sweet plum scent is detectable beneath the pine. I find this fragrance to be less sweet than the other fruity fragrances I’ve tried from The Body Shop. Callaghan loves this scent, as well. (On me, that is. He doesn’t use it.)

 

Food!

6). Wholesome! Organic Coconut Palm Sugar.

 

Wholesome organic coconut palm sugar

 

I started sweetening my coffee with this coconut palm sugar… it’s an enjoyable change from the stevia-based product I’d been using. Coconut palm sugar is less sweet and more healthy. This was a great discovery!

 

7). Organic Honeycrisp apples.

 

Organic honeycrisp apples

 

Apple season! Honeycrisp apples are my favorites at the moment. They’re ubiquitous around here (we get them from Fry’s, but we’ve seen them everywhere), and they’re so tasty and satisfying. My fruit addiction hasn’t suffered a bit with the end of summer fruits.

 

8). Simple Truth walnut halves and pieces.

 

Simple Truth walnut halves and pieces

 

I’ve been eating walnuts the way they should be eaten, in my opinion: unsalted. My preference is always to crack whole walnuts, but time is of essence, so any brand of shelled walnut meat will do. It so happens that I picked up Simple Truth brand in October.

 

9). Gardein Meatless Meatballs.

 

Gardein Classic Meatless Meatballs

 

Gardein does it again with their meatless meats! We love these “meatballs” of theirs. They’re high in protein, high in flavor, and super fast and easy to prepare.

 

10). Helpful friends at the gym.

I don’t have a pic. I just wanted to note that thanks to friends like Rawn, I’ve been able to do the leg track in BodyPump with my usual weights as I rest my tennis-elbow-compromised forearm. (I’m not doing upright rows right now, or any variation thereof. I’m finding ways to modify in the back and shoulder tracks.) I wouldn’t be able to do legs without assistance in getting the heavy barbell onto my back, and I appreciate having a buddy who’s willing to take time from our quick track-change to offer this.

 

Well, that wraps it up for October. November’s list is already filling up!

What I ate on a gym day. (Full day of eating!)

That Asian-Looking Chick Leave a comment

Let’s talk about food! Because in my last “What I ate” post, I said I’d do a gym-day version if anyone was interested, and several of you expressed interest. (Thank you for that!)

Yesterday was a typical weight-training (BodyPump) day. I ate seven times.

Without further ado…

 

Thursday, November 2, 2017

First: (Just like last time, as it’s the same every day) Alarm. Get up. Take thyroid medication (for Hashimoto’s/autoimmune hypothyroidism) with a full glass of room-temperature water.

(Wait 30 minutes because of the thyroid med.)

 

Breakfast (pre-workout): A peanut butter sandwich: 2 slices of Dave’s Killer organic thin-sliced 21 whole grains and seeds bread with creamy natural peanut butter. Lots of peanut butter! This pic only shows one slice, since I actually took it on Wednesday before BodyCombat. I always have a full peanut butter sandwich before BodyPump, and just one slice before BodyCombat (cardio).

 

Peanut butter sandwich (the second slice of bread is invisible)

 

Post-workout: (I think of this as a second breakfast) I always have a protein shake after weight-training, and my protein powder of choice is the vanilla Vega Clean Protein. I throw a scoop into a shaker bottle, add cold water, and shake it up. Nothing fancier than that. This is my favorite protein powder… it’s not gritty in the slightest… and I enjoy it plain.

 

Protein shake

 

(By the way, I drink Xtend BCAAs during my weight-training workouts. I forgot to put that in!)

 

Lunch: Apologies for the redundancy… like last time, I had pasta for lunch. (More often than not, I have a sandwich.) Yesterday it was whole wheat thin spaghetti with almost the same sauce of olive oil, fresh sauteed garlic, sea salt, dry oregano, and a lot of nutritional yeast (nooch).

Instead of broccoli on the side, I had these plant-protein meatless balls… Gardein classic meatless balls. (3 meatless balls have 15g protein. I had 5.) These are delicious. You’ll see them again in my upcoming October Favorites post.

 

Pasta with meatless balls

 

I sopped up the remaining olive oil with a slice of this sourdough bread (the only white bread I’ll eat, since sourdough doesn’t wreak havoc on the metabolism the way regular white flour does)… not to mention, I love sourdough bread.

 

Sourdough bread

 

…followed by a small bowl of fresh raspberries and blueberries.

 

Fresh berries

 

 

After lunch: My usual tablespoon of apple cider vinegar stirred into a tall glass of cold water.

 

Apple cider vinegar

 

 

Mini-meal 1: A banana. Just one!

 

Bananas

 

 

Mini-meal 2: One organic Honeycrisp apple… another thing you’ll see in my October Favorites post.

 

Honeycrisp apples

 

(I took this pic of the apples a day or two earlier because of said October Favorites post!)

 

Mini-meal 3: A small bowl of walnuts and sunflower seeds.

 

Walnuts and sunflower seeds

 

Nuts and seeds every day, gym or no gym.

 

Dinner: A huge spinach salad with tomato, mushrooms, red onion, Kalamata olives, olive oil, red wine vinegar, sea salt, cracked black pepper, and dry oregano.

I love a big spinach salad for dinner, especially on weight-training days. Did Popeye ever motivate you to eat spinach when you were a kid? Spinach is Popeye’s trademark get-strong-to-kick-ass superfood, after all. A plant! Bluto had no chance against it. I love fresh spinach, regardless.

 

Spinach salad

 

I went on a little Popeye spree on YouTube last night and entertained myself for about 20 minutes. Here’s a quick clip:

 

 

 

Dessert: Seedless red grapes.

 

Seedless red grapes

 

 

After dinner: Another glass of apple cider vinegar water.

 

apple cidar vinegar

 

I can see lip balm smudge-marks on the rim of the glass! These pics are not the best I’ve ever taken… but they do the job.

That’s it for a typical gym-day. Oh, and as always, I drank water all day long. I can never drink enough water! I’m grateful to have it.