Picnic Double Header

Yesterday was a fun day as I had two picnic scheduled.  

The first was a work-related picnic.  I belong to a great organization at the company I work for; all great people to work and party with.  We get together at picnic or other social gatherings several times a year, and this is our annual summer picnic.   We had a good time grilling chicken, ribs, and salmon and after eating all that great food, we headed up to the ball-field and played a fun and competitive game of softball.  

I hadn't played softball since my knee and elbow replacement, but the workout must be helping cause I was able to hit, throw and even run the bases with some degree of confidence and very little, if any,pain in the joints.  Granted, today, the day after, I am a bit sore in places, but overall I was happy with being able to participate in a sport I used to enjoy.  BTW, our team won with a clutch  pitching save by yours truly.   

After the fun of that picnic, I headed to a great park on the western shores of the Puget Sound to meet up with some old friends for a birthday bash picnic.  These are friends I had in Seattle before moving to NYC and it was nice to catch up with them and their lives (and their kids!).  Three of the folks ll have birthdays in close proximity, so we had a big cake for them and celebrated with more good food, great conversation, and a beautiful view of the sun setting behind the Olympic Mountains.  

I was tuckered when I got home, but it was a fun way to spend a beautiful sunny summer day here in Seattle.  Plus I managed to do both picnics without gaining any weight.... YAY!

Home Sweet Home - Part 2

My friend Joy asked in the comment section of my last post what luxuries am I enjoying now that I am home from Japan.

I have four luxuries that I am enjoying now that I am back in the USA.
1) Hibernation from People. I enjoyed Tokyo, but there were just way to many people there. I was so fed up with crowds by the time I got home that I shut the doors and curtains and didn't emerge from my place for three days. Just me & my cats lounging around in PJs (me in PJs, not my cats) for three days was a nice break from the assault of people & noise that never seems to cease in Tokyo.

2) Pizza. They just don't do good pizza in Japan, so I have had pizza that last two nights. Yum!!!

3) TV. Yes, they have TV in Japan, but most channels are local Japanese channels so I didn't watch TV for a month (I did catch a few of the season opener MLB games in Tokyo, but it was all in Japanese). I spent much of this past weekend catching up on my TiVo'd shows.

4) Jeans & tennis shoes. We are expected to dress up for work in Japan so that meant a month of dress slacks, silk blouses, blazers and heels. Ugh! I am so happy to be wearing jeans and comfy shoes to work.


Things from Japan I miss....
1) Heated toilet seats (they are really awesome!)
2) Learning lots of Japanese cause not many folks spoke English.
3) Maid service. The best part of hotel life is they make your bed everyday!
4) Udon & Ramen noodles for lunch at the cafeteria every day. Hey, I lost 10 pounds in Japan so the inexpensive noodle lunches can't be that bad.

There are Way To Many People Here

I used to think New York City was a large city. That was until I came here to Tokyo. This place makes New York City look like a small mid-western town. Tokyo is claustrophobic; 34 million people sharing the space of Hawaii. Guh!

Work picked up at the end of last week. We had visitors galore, so there was lots of escorting, meetings, and business lunches and diners that went along with those visitors. Tuesday night, we went out with our customers and had Shabu Shabu, a Japanese type meal where you cook thinly sliced beef (or pork) & vegetables in a hot pan of water. If your thinking... hey, that sounds like fondue, well you would be right. It is very similar to fondue, just with a Asian slant to it. It is also like fondie in that it is a very fun and social meal. I also discovered plum wine that night and am now looking for a bottle to bring back to the states with me. Yummy!

Thursday was a National Holiday here in Japan. It was the spring equinox and in celebration, everyone has the day off. And how was the weather on the first day of spring? Horrid. Cold, rainy, & windy! Welcome to spring everyone.... head indoors to your nearest mall. And man, they all did. I worked from the hotel that day and took lunch to walk through the mall connected to the hotel. Holy overcrowded batman! I couldn't even get near the Pokeman store. :-)

The weather got better for the weekend, but that is another post and hopefully it will come with more photos. The cherry blossoms are getting close to blooming.... one more week!!!!

Janet is.....

Enjoying: The fun that was Superbowl Sunday. I didn't really care who won the game, but I was thrilled it was close and exciting. Bravo to the Giants for a great game and bravo to Eli Manning for stepping out of his big bro's shadow.

I hosted a party for the game and we had a great time grilling out on the deck, socializing, and cheering on the game. And I actually had guests who helped me clean up before they left. How nice is that?!!


Replacing: My trusty old Foodsaver Vacuum Sealer finally bit it and went to the 'ol kitchen appliance heaven in the sky. Poor thing just couldn't hold its seal anymore. But since I LOVE my vacuum sealer and save so much money in keeping food unspoiled (especially cheese), I went out and bought a new Foodsaver unit.


Traveling: Next week, I am headed to Miami, FL for a two-week business trip. Miami in February! Rough, I know. I am looking forward to the training class as I think it will be a great learning opportunity, but I am also looking forward to a few of the off-work hours activities. I am taking my camera and hope to spend some time in the Everglades National Park and maybe the Florida Keys.

Hoping: I have always wanted to see a Space Shuttle launch live and in person. To see the shuttle clear the tower and hear and feel the roar of the rockets as they lift the Shuttle into Space would be awesome. Unfortunately, I arrive in Florida 3 days to late, so here's hoping that the Shuttle launch gets delayed until Feb 10th (shuttle is set to launch on Feb 7th @ 2:45pm). Hey NASA, a launch anytime on Sunday the 10th would be best for me, so pleasepleaseplease delay until then. :-) If NASA can't accomodate me, then my co-worker and I still plan on heading up to Kennedy Space Center for a tour of the facility.



Purchasing: I have been using my old trusty iPod during workouts for a while now and have found it to be just so big and bulky. It's way to big to clip onto the workout gear and I certainly don't need the 2,000 plus songs the large iPod holds. So I visited the always fun Apple Store and got myself this cute little iPod Shuffle. It perfectly holds my workout playlist and weighs next to nothing. I also got an armband and some new earphones that actually may stay in my midget sized ears. I also spent a few minutes drooling over the MacBook Air.... *sigh*.

Over the Hump

I've been at this "non-diet" eating healthy, getting fit thing for 25 days now and so far things are going really well. After loosing a quick 6 pounds, I found myself gaining 2 pounds early in the 2nd week. Ugh! But instead of getting upset and going on a binge of eating, I pushed through it, continued working out and eating well. Now that I am over that 2nd week dieting hump, I am now down 11 pounds. YAY!

I definitely feel better and have more energy, but haven't yet seen a reduction in size, although I have a long way to go, so an 11-pound loss may not show up this soon.

I've added swimming to the exercising routine to try and relieve some of the pressure off the joints. There is a pool nearby in my neighborhood and they have lap swims most nights. I've also been adjusting the diet to lower calorie foods. It's amazing what you discover when you start reading the nutrition panel on the back of the food products.

Janet is.....

Reading: Currently working through Then We Came to the End by Joshua Ferris. A subtly funny book about life in the corporate world during a time of layoffs.









Buying: A Tokidoki by LeSportsac purse. I happened by the display in Macys and fell in love with these cute purses with adorable Japanese style designs. Its the most I have ever paid for a purse, but I have gotten so many complements on it. My design is slightly different than the one shown here. My design is called Transporto and has all modes of transportation on it from high speed rail to hot air balloon to skateboard.




Cooking: In my current effort at eating healthier and loosing weight, I discovered this recipe for Oven Fried Chicken. I made it last night for myself and some friends who were over watching the football games. The chicken came out quite well and is fairly good for you.




Pondering: I currently have a Minolta Maxxum 5D Digital SLR, but due to Minolta's exit from the camera world, I am looking to finally make the leap over to Canon equipment. Which means basically starting over.... I really like this little baby pictured here. A Canon 40D Digital SLR. Great rating with lots of features.






Watching: I caught the new show, Terminator: Sarah Conner Chronicles on Fox the other night and to my surprise, it was good. Along with the rest of the world, I had seen the 3 Terminators movies and this TV show nicely fits, plot-wise, into the Terminator world. I also must add that the kid playing 15 year old John Conner in hte TV series has an amazing similarity to the actor, Michael Biehn, who played Kyle Reese, John's father, in the very first Terminator movie. It's good fun for TV and I am enjoying watching.

TGIF

This is one of those days I could easily skip the whole workout thing after work. Its the end of a long week and I am tired. Add to that, I feel a cold coming on (damn!) and I am a bit achy in the joints.

The old me would have gone home, changed into PJs, eaten an entire pizza, and then climbed under the comforters. That was the old me. The new me is determined to get healthy, so I am headed to the workout place for an hour of exercise despite just not feeling motivated to workout today.

I may still have a slice of pizza later tonight after working out, but it will only be a slice and it will be after the workout, not in lieu of the workout.

Off I go......

So Far So Good

The new health program is going well so far. The first week was a tough transition, especially the one coke a day thing. Not that I was grumpy, but I found myself sooo tired during the week and struggling to get out of bed each day. But I got some good rest this weekend and Monday morning wasn't so bad.... only one snooze button.

I thought this weekend was gonna be difficult being at home with a tempting fridge full of food, but I did ok. I was able to cut the food calorie intake by roughly 500-1000 calories over the weekend. I did some grocery shopping and picked up a whole bunch of healthy foods with a lot of fruits and broccoli. There were a lot of tempting stuff I put back on the shelf after reading the nutrition panel on the item. Yikes, there are lots of calories out there in food. Even in so called "healthy" food, I found some very high calories. Like the Lean Cuisine pizza that had more calories than the Red Baron "regular" pizza. I was able to enjoy a Panera lunch and still stay relatively healthy with a 1/2 of Assagio Roastbeef sandwhich and some fat-free chicken noodle soup. Yum....

I overdid the Friday evening workout a bit (hips!), so I took it easy these past two days and will start back at the exercise today. I also haven't tried to pool thing out yet. I got the goggles and swim cap, but I need a new swim suit. I have swim gear, but they are the fancy, cute kind of suite that aren't really designed for swimming laps. Unfortunately, it is a little early in the season for the stores to stock the swim gear. I need to look around a bit more though.

I am also still looking for a good 30 minute aerobic workout that works your abs, back, and arms. Most of the machines are so geared towards you legs. I'll have to ask the fitness center staff about that.

But overall, things are going well. I am starting to feel better overall and even the pants had a bit of ease to them this morning.

Resolutions

To many, New Year Resolutions are dread. What am I gonna have to live without for the upcoming year... or month... or week for most folks.

I'm sure diets are the most popular resolution, and for me, this is my only resolution for 2008. Yes, I am headed for diet-land. After a lot of "I'm approaching my 40th birthday and I fell like crap everyday" soul-searching in December, I decided that this was gonna be the year I get into shape. I am not necessarily focused on "diet", but on just getting healthier and feeling better.

For me, this is a three-pronged approach.

1) Reducing the intake of Coke. Gasp! I know! I love coke and will readily admit I am addicted to the stuff. But there is no way that crap can be good for you. I don't think I can quite cold-turkey and I still need my morning does of caffeine (and I hate coffee), so I am limiting myself to 1 coke a day. Plus, I am not allowing myself to buy that case of coke for the home fridge.... just too tempting. I can get my one coke a day at the cafeteria at my work place.

2) Eating Healthier. Not necessarily a diet as in the traditional sense, but trying to cut the fatty, processed, & carbs food down. I started a food journal and now count calories. It is amazing to discover how many calories are in something as simple as 1 tablespoon of ranch dressing. By counting the calories of what I am eating, it certainly makes you re-think your food choices.

I am not putting myself on any kind of calorie limit per day, cause I just think that leads to a quick failure. Instead, I looked at my normal daily calorie intake back in December and am trying to work to cutting that down by 500 calories a day, especially in the fatty processed food department. My normal caloric intake was in the 2500-3500 range, so I think I can easily drop 500 calories a day without feeling deprived. It takes 3500 calories to equal one pound, so by cutting 500 calories per day, I could drop a pound a week.

3) The final step is to get in shape. I joined my companies activity center prior to the holidays and have also checked out the local indoor pool. I'm gonna start the exercising slow due to my arthritis, but I want to work up to working out 4-5 times a week for 1-1/2 to 2 hours. I started on Wednesday with about an hour of exercise; 30 minutes of treadmill and a 30 minute step class. I did pretty good and wasn't too sore the next day, so I will stick to an hour of exercise for a week or two before adding more.

I also found this website, which is a great resource for calorie-counting and calorie-burning. They have a nice large database on the calories in most foods and the calories you burn in exercising. I have found this site very helpful for my food journal.

So, three days into this, I am doing ok. First day was great, 2nd day was a struggle (due more to a bit of PMS than anything), and I am back on track today. I'll keep you posted as I progress.

Homeward Bound

I am sitting at the Hartford, CT airport awaiting my flight home. It was a great weekend spent with Joy cheering on the Red Sox and touring around Cape Cod. We had a very good time, took some photos, shopped, and ate some good (and bad) food. I tried bush tea for the first time at the Dunbar Tea Room. Very good.

It's a long flight home (through Chicago) and they are calling our flight to board so talk to y'all later....

In the Kitchen with Janet

I'm off second shift and back to first.... which means "real" first shift of 6:00 am and not the cushy engineering first shift of 7:30-8:00am. So I went form late nights to early mornings.

The one good thing about 1st shift is that you get home in the middle of the afternoon and I have used that time to do some cooking.

First up, lollipops!

I have been getting some cookbook/recipe books from the library recently and I saw this recipe for lollipops and wanted to try it out. I picked up some basic round lollipop molds and some sticks from a local cake decorating store and went to town. The result........
They turned out pretty good. Just some sugar, corn syrup, water and a dash of strawberry & banana extract in a pot heated up to 300 degrees and poured into a mold. I had some difficulty getting the suckers (heh...pun) out of the molds so the lollipop were a bit rough around the edges. I read later that you can brush oil into the molds to help extract them easier. I will have to try that next time.

Next up was something a little more healthy. Butternut Squash Risotto. I am still on my risotto kick, but wanted to mix it up a little bit. While purusing the clearance shelves at Barnes&Noble recently, I ran across a very inexpensive cookbook on just risottos. I will be trying a few of the recipes in the book over this cold, wet rainy winter we appear to be headed into.

After making a complete mess in the kitchen, the risotto turned out pretty good. Still working on perfecting my techinique, but this one was the best yet.
That's some feta cheese and sage in there with the squash and rice. Yummy!

Risotto - Part 2

So, I cooked Risotto (a rice!) again last night and did much better this time out. Instead of the boxed up version I had treid before, I just had a bag of plain arborio rice and some ingredients. At the end of the simmering process, I folded in the parmesean cheese, and holy cow, that was good! I also cooked some sous-vide chicken with thyme which came out very juicy and delicious.

Maybe I will become a decent cook after all. :-)

And one day I will remember to take a photo of the finished product for y'all to see.

Risotto

How have I lived my life up until now without ever having tried Risotto? I've seen chefs cook it on all sorts of Top Chef/Hell's Kitchen/Food Network shows, but I have never actually tried the stuff myself. I though it was a rice pudding-ish kind of dish (Yuck!), but discovered it is pasta... and who doesn't love pasta.

So, last night I went out with some old friends who were in town. We went to a great Italian restraunt and I decided to stretch the palette a bit. I had chicken saltimbucco in a sage sauce and parmasean risotto.

De. Liscious!

Now I am looking for other good risotto receipes to try out.

Laborious Labor Day

On this long weekend of celebrating working, I worked my big butt off and got a lot done. New tires and a tune up for the car, painted the master bathroom (with the help of my friend Lori), installed the new bathroom hardware including a new toilet seat, and cleaned up and cleaned out my closet. Whew! It's always nice to feel like you actually got things accomplished on a long weekend.

Now I am over at my friend Lori's house for a dinner BBQ. Yummy!

My Birthday at the Market

It was a relatively nice, somewhat non-rainy day here in Seattle on my birthday. So mom and I decided to head downtown to Seattle's famous Pikes Place Market to do a little eating and shopping. There isn't much else to do at the Market other than eat or shop, but wow, this is some of the best eatin' there is.

We walked past the various fruit and vegtable stands and flower row, although this wasn't quite the season for fresh flowers so some had only dried flowers instead. There were various stands selling honey and chocolate covered candies and of course, there were the famous fish stands. The most famous of them all, the Pikes Place Fish is at the main corner in the market and always draws a crowd.

We joined the crowd and watched the obligatory fish throwing and other sights to be seen. The had a Monk Fish lying on one of the ice displays and all the kids would walk up to it and look at it with disgust. Of course, Pike Place Fish had the Monk Fish rigged and it would jump every once in a while right when some unsuspecting kid would be close enough to the fish to get the crap scared right out of them. Hee. Let's just say, it was fun to watch the little kiddies be tormented. I know, I am bad.

Next, mom and I found a delicious little doughnut stand. For around $2, you get a bagful of little doughnuts coated in cinnamon or powdered sugar. A great trat to nosh your way through the market.

Then I discovered DeLaurenti, a wine and cheese store. And I loved their cheese selection. Does it match Murray's in New York's Greenwich? No, not even close. But they did have a rather nice selection, so I bought some Gruyere and Emmenthaler for a future cheese fondue. Yum!

We continued on through the market passing news stands, trinket stores, butchers, and other various food stores.

I lived in Seattle for 11 years prior to this, and never really realized how large the Pike Place Market actually is. You could wander for hours through the small stores and never even come close to seeing all of them.

We ended the tour getting some bread at the 3 Girls Bakery, eating some DELICIOUS mac and cheese at Beechers Cheese Shop and then buying some jewelry among the many booths in the Market.

We then dropped all of our goodies off at the car and headed down to the waterfront to one of my all time favorite places to eat... The Crab Pot. Yummy! Nothing is better than fresh Alaskan King Crab, Snow Crab, and Dungeness Crab steamed to perfection and dumped from a bowl right onto your table. To me, this place is Seattle. Forget the poshy places to eat here in this town and come down to the waterfront and get your hands dirty crackin' crabs. Thank goodness for plastic bibs or else the clothes would have been ruined with all the mess we made.

Overall, it was a great and memorable birthday.... the last one of my 30's.