I was ready for a Thursday morning run today! Last night we had some fierce winds blowing through, and I had totally anticipated going to the gym for a treadmill run this morning as I don’t like running in the cold and wind. Cold is okay, but not both (wuss). It was 38 degrees and I saw the flags still, so I decided to run outside as the sun came up. I had a Balance bar (desperately seeking any natural light here).
New flavor of S’mores and pretty yummy, I have to say. I bundled up and headed out. It was a nice run today. Just through the neighborhood, passing kids waiting for the bus. The sun peeked out over the horizon and I just zoned out with my tunes on. 4 miles later and I was back at home!
I was ready to eat a filling carby breakfast, so I made up some steel cut oats. What I do with these is to put a serving of these in a container and cover with a cup of boiling water. Then I put it in the fridge overnight. The next day, they only take about 8 minutes to cook instead of the 20 it takes if you do them from scratch. I am all about saving time, especially when I am hungry!
Done pumpkin custard style and topped with craisins (10g) and pecans (5 whole). I add some molasses to the cooking water, which gives this a fabulous flavor (and some iron!).
Lots of work to do for job 2 today. Well, pretty much every day with them. It’s nice with them in that I don’t have to work holidays or even weekends unless I choose to, as an independent contractor. Job #1 actually have to work on Thanksgiving since my regular work days include Thursdays as an employee. We do get extra for working holidays and there is not always a lot of work except for the NICU, which never closes. I don’t mind so much, though. I can take my computer down to my sister’s house where dinner will be and check in from there.
Lunch time:
That”s gravy on that chicken! I got some at the store for some unknown reason. I was surprised at how low calorie it really is. It was a nice change to add that instead of hot sauce.
Finally finished up the soap order. Now I am feeling some relief from getting that done, although I am loving how the house smells. Here is a quick chemistry lesson of how it is made. Soap is a combo of oils, water, and an alkali (aka lye). The lye combines with the oils and creates a chemical reaction called saponification – and the result are soap, water, and glycerin molecules. Melting the solid oils (cocoa butter, shea butter, coconut oil)
The lye solution (must be extremely careful with this stuff – very caustic)
Melted solid oils, olive oil, and goat milk in a bucket and the added lye solution:
Scent and color added. Blended up until it gets to be a gravy-like consistency. Then poured into molds:
Then it sits in the mold overnight. During this time, the soap will actually get very hot as it goes through its chemical reaction. Funny how such weird ingredients make some good stuff. Pretty cool!
Snack time included a latte:
Plus a couple mint cups:
Unfortunately, my football picks let me down this week and I owed John dinner. He chose Arthur’s:
Someone didn’t really want his picture taken:
I started off with a salad:
Then we split a cheese calzone with feta inside:
Come to momma! The crust at Arthur’s is more biscuit like – similar to Chicago deep dish style. Good stuff. I went to pay and found out they didn’t take cards and I don’t carry much cash on me most days. That meant John ended up paying. Ooops! That’s one way to cheat out a meal 
There will be a gingerbread donut from Dunkins tonight while we geek out to MST3K, but I don’t have a photo of it. Just to let you all know…
Question: Have you ever had a job where you had to work on holidays?
