more sickishness

Blah blah blah I’m always sick. I will NOT miss this aspect of working with children.

It’s always conscientious to leave a helpful label on food you have contaminated.

 

(That is good. Obviously. It comes from Trader Joe’s. It has mango. What’s not to like? Also, I like to believe that the healthy bacteria in yogurt products adds a healthy dose of competition to the nasties in my body)

Also, sometimes when you are sick and your throat is raw you want potato chips for lunch. Did not have potato chips. Had this:

So did this (super thin)

Then this (baked in toaster oven with cooking spray above and below).

First cooked on high (400) but edges crisped before middle, especially on some (damn lack of knife skills). So lowered to 300.

  

Some finished sooner than others. Look at my attractive bowl!

And my attractive chip!

While I waited for the chippers to finish, I created a nice nutritious concoction to round out my potato-chip meal.

It started with this, of which I am very fond.

Pleasantly short and simple ingredient list.

 

Plus some BIG FAT HUGE local cucumber and black beans. This was very tasty and very filling.

  

With still only some of the chips. I got really really really impatient waiting for the chips to finish. I devoted as much time as possible to salting the few chiplets I have…. really high quality salting. Rubbing it in, as it were.

Out came their brethren, perhaps not totally crispy but good enough (actually the ones that were still chewy in the middle were REALLY GOOD!)

  

Another day… went into work, realized that I was supposed to spend 9 hours working, most of them at the zoo in the hot sun, and that my voice wasn’t working (which is a real problem with loud children) and I also sort of felt like I was going to die.

So I said “When you criticized me for mentioned in my performance review that I didn’t manage my hours and worked too much even when I should’ve taken time off, did you mean it?”.

And then I went home and collapsed into bed and guys. I day slept! I never day sleep! It was great, too, because I sort of ate breakfast (some of that mango lassi, which is fabulous, and half a muffin, and a prune… ) and then I sort of dazedly lay in bed reading and then I slept and then when I woke up it was four hours later and then AN APPROPRIATE TIME TO EAT AGAIN! Napping is great. Any time I finish a meal, I immediately want (psychologically) to eat another one. Sleeping away those frustrating ensuing three or four hours before that becomes appropriate is wonderful.

I woke up and there was vegetable stock. It smelled wonnnnnderful.

Because when I collapse into bed with sickness, I precede it by putting veggie trimmings and water in my crockpot. Don’t you?

A bowl of nourishing broth, straight up, seemed a perfect aperitif.

Then I had the breakfast I’d packed that day- sweet potato overnight oats! I KNOW!

1/2 a sweet potato (probably 4 ounces), pre-baked and soft and gooey
1/3 cup oats
1/3 cup milk
3 T or so water
2 T plain yogurt
heaping 1/2 t ground flax
droplets of vanilla stevia

Gosh it was so so so good.

 

‘Specially with pecans on top. Thanksgiving!

 

When I am sick, rather than making myself a cup of tea, I cut to the chase and make a pot. Let’s admire my English grandmother’s hand-knitted tea cozy.

 

So my dear sister, not even knowing I was sick, arrived home from work with a treat for me! She works near Buzz Bakery and bought me a HOMEMADE POP TART! I know!

 

The thick, sweet, heavenly buttery crust crumbled into my mouth to reveal a PEACHES AND CREAM FILLING!

I was planning on not eating it all in one day. I was like, “No way man! That is huge!”

And then I did.

I had NO CHANCE. Thick buttery crumbly crust, heavenly sweet frosting and sprinkles atop, and TENDER SWEET FRESH PEACHES! Actually, I didn’t really care for the cream cheese. So I just dissected it. It was hours and hours of fun.