1st day of school, a week late

I've decided to do a weekly blog-- a cumulative one, since I spend my free time sleeping when I'm not swimming or working. Here's something I wrote the day before the first day of school, before I decided that writing every day would be too hard. My camera is having problems! I bought that damn expensive battery charger and the camera still won't turn on. I've been using my mom's iPhone, but she's away for the weekend, so I don't know what I'll be doing:

9/07/08

Today was a major reorganizing/ running errands day.

7:00—got up and went running. It was a gorgeous day out—slightly chilling that’s perfect if you’re planning on getting your heart rate up. I ran north and stopped at the orange fences where the bike path is currently under construction… My guess is that it couldn’t have been more than 3.5, 4 miles, but that’s fine for me. I don’t feel the desire to run every day, just every once in a while to get a change of scenery.

Breakfast was a real indulgence today with apple pie oatmeal. I caramelized a chopped up apple with a TINY bit of butter and some brown sugar, and then made my oatmeal with ½ milk and ½ apple cider. To the apple filling I also added cinnamon, cloves and lemon zest. I stirred the filling into the oatmeal, added a DROP of the farmer’s market cream, and topped it with wheat germ, walnuts, and a little bit of Kashi GoLean Crunch… it tasted exactly like an apple crisp with the cereal topping. My hands smelled all delicious and cinnamon-y afterwards.

After breakfast I completely reorganized my room, throwing out a lot of things I felt bad throwing away, selling my used textbooks, on Amazon, etc., without a break until lunch, which consisted of leftovers. My mom had leftover mushrooms from last night, but instead of baking the eggs, she just fried one and ate in on top. I tried a bite and with a bit of liquid they really did taste better. As for me, I topped brown rice with leftover chickpeas, squash, and spinach, then microwaved it and topped it with hummus, yogurt and a little cayenne. It really struck me how I had put way too much sage on the squash, but it still tasted great, and it was one of those extremely healthy meals where you can practically feel the antioxidants working their magic on your body as you chew. We also finished the leftover beet soup.

Then it was errand time… we popped down to Barnes and Noble so I could use the gift card I unearthed while I was cleaning my room (I bought Breaking Dawn… so trashy, but addictive. I can’t wait to read in bed tonight), then to a little glasses store for my mom, where I sat and read happily, then to Best Buy, so my mom could finally get an iPhone and I could get my camera’s battery charger, and finally to Whole Foods, although we didn’t buy much.

When I got home, I finished reorganizing my CLOSET, an impressive feet. Before that, I had a snack, realizing I was starving. In fact, I think I ate too much, since I wasn’t that hungry at dinner—I had graham crackers with peanut butter, PLUS yogurt + cottage cheese with berries and cinnamon, and mint tea. It was satisfying, though, consider dinner certainly wasn’t. We decided to try the salmon burgers at Whole Foods, since we’ve always wanted too, but they were so incredibly dry and tasteless that we basically had to experiment by drowning them in various sauces (ketchup, mustard, yogurt and Indian lime pickle—separately, of course).

The guy working there had recommended the spinach and feta salmon burger, which already seemed strange to me, but feta, already being a relatively dry, low fat cheese, did nothing to the texture. I ate my whole burger, since dipping it in ketchup reminded me of meatloaf, something I miss. We also had some arugula, but I was longing for some more substantial vegetables. Dinner also ended badly, with my mom suggesting that I quit piano. Quit piano? I would never have considered such a thing before, but it’s like now that I’ve gotten so into sports, languages and cooking, I’ve left it behind… it hardly crosses my thoughts now… The thing is, I know it’s something I’m good at (if I practice), and something that lasts longer than sports, but lately I haven’t been enjoying it, or even doing it at all. It’s the first time in my life I really haven’t been practicing—I used to always practice an hour a day, and it was just part of my routine. I don’t know what to do, especially because I also do need extracurriculars. Plus, school starts tomorrow and I am totally unprepared. I didn’t do the summer reading because my mom somehow misplaced it (it was only a little packet on politics, though, and no one cares if you do), and my books won’t be here for a while. Luckily, I GOT INTO AP FRENCH! At least that’s worth looking forward to.

My camera is still charging, so no photos again. Got to go to bed early for SCHOOL! Good night.