Veggie Stir-Fry

Bloggity blog blog blog. It really excites me to write on here so often! (Although no one is reading it at this point haha) But I don't think I will ever be one of those people that links to their blog on facebook for all of my friends to read... There's something to be said about the anonymity of the blog (and of course only really sharing this with my closest friends).

So, I wanted to share a picture of a stir-fry I made last night! Giving up potatoes, bread, rice, and PASTA has not been the hardest thing to keep to, but definitely gets difficult at times. In my work cafeteria today (where they have dozens of different food stations, and pretty good food for the most part) they had potato au gratin as one of the sides. CHEESY potatoes, I mean does life get any better than that? Too bad they're off limits for now! (As was the pizza I drunkenly consumed this weekend, ahh!) I bought a massive amount of veggies and fruits from my local Trader Joe's on Sunday, so what better way to use it than a stir fry! Without further ado:
Shredded brussel sprouts, apple chardonnay chicken sausage, an entire zucchini, and cremini sliced mushrooms (with a bit of hoisin sauce, salt, oregano and basil)

It was delicious! I was fairly pleased because I've never made brussel sprouts before and although I know zuchinni to be straighforward, I never buy it or use it! This isn't just an attempt at being more healthy, but also trying to save some $$$. Living in the city has its costs and spending $100 on a meal for a birthday dinner and then spending $20 on lazy weeknight seamlessweb (takeout) is just not a very financially savvy move. I'm trying to save up some money so that if/when I decide to go off to grad school, I'm not dirt poor because I know my parents won't be supporting me any longer. I asked my coworker what he thinks is a good amount that I should strive towards for savings before enrolling in school. He says: 100k would be good. WHAT?! If I want to get to 100k (i'm not even sure it would be possible if I paid no rent and didn't eat!) then I need to make better decisions with my money and weekday meals is definitely a spot where I need improvement.

By the way, I'm also eating the most delicious breaded tilapia with carrots and peas as a side right now. I would make this a double picture post, but I've already massacred it to the point where I'm sure noone wants to see it. ;)

See ya later!

Optimistic

I like to think that I'm an optimist. Like any girl, I like a good rant and a good whining session, but in my general outlook on life and how I perceive people? Definitely a glass half full kind of girl.

Like I mentioned in yesterdays post, I hung out this weekend with a few people that I normally don't stay in touch with that often. One of these people used to also be close with my ex-roommate who I no longer am in touch with. So I don't have to retell the story today, let's just say there hasn't been anyone who has lived with her for more than half a year that still speaks to her. So after a few glasses of wine, as we were in a cab heading to our next destination, he brings her up again fully knowing from earlier that this girl and I no longer speak and told me it was essentially my fault for all that transpired between the two of us. He claimed that I "knew" upon becoming friends with her that she was a selfish b**ch and so I knew what I was getting myself into. I'm sorry, what?! If ever I heard flawed logic, that was it.

Have I had first impressions of people in the past and known I did not want to be friends with some of those people based on that impression? Absolutely. Has my impression been wrong before? Absolutely. I believe in the best of people, even when they haven't shown that to be true. But upon leaving college, who really has the time to maintain these cancerous relationships? They say that the people you keep in touch with after college are the ones that are important to you and I believe that to be true. Life is too short to waste time talking about nonsensical, frivolous things all day. I'm not talking about being silly, but if my relationship with someone is solely based on the other person taking advantage of me, and our conversations consist mainly of shit-talking, gossiping and recaps of drunken escapades, then no thanks. There is so much more to my life than that and I don't need a selfish person taking up my time. The end.

Speaking of optimism, I'm really hoping that I can come out of this march madness in the top half of the bracket pool. I've never done so badly before! The upsets on the east have really KILLED me. Oh well, there's always next year. And my bracket pool was FREE :)

I'm going to have to go find some fun things to put pictures of on here. We all know that no one likes to read these many words without some fun pictures in between.

Random run-ins

Friday was an absolutely gorgeous day here in New York City!! And I had decided to take the morning off (in fear of a hangover from St Patty's?). I haven't really had time off since August and so I basked in the 70 degree sunshine weather we were having and just had some "me-time" (if you can count me-time as watching Jersey Shore and Top Chef episodes). Trashy television is a habit I will never be able to get rid of. Taking the half day was such an amazing decision, I should make it a habit just to take random days off - except then I won't have any vacation days to take actual vacations! :) I hope the weather makes up its mind and allows spring to come to NY! My hair is short, and I'm ready for the warm weather to permanently make its way over!

St. Patty's was nothing monumental. Went to a friend's apartment by me to watch some March Madness and down some Irish Carbombs before heading out to a neighborhoody bar. It always surprises me how often I run into people I know in the biggest city in the world, and mostly on the tiny island of Manhattan! On Thursday, I randomly saw a girl from college, and a girl from my junior league provisional group! Keep in mind, the bar we were at is tiny. Then, on Friday while celebrating the birthday of another girl from my provisional group, I ended up running into a high school friend! And lastly, I randomly saw multiple people from my college on Saturday while celebrating another friend's birthday. It's just such a small world sometimes.

Last night was more fun than I have had in quite a while, but I do find myself saying that pretty often. A few friends that I don't normally hang out with in the city, but did used to go out with quite often freshman year of college all decided to surprise our friend T in New Jersey for a birthday dinner before heading back into the city. We cracked open a few bottles of wine, and were just laughing non-stop the entire dinner and entire train ride back to new york. I can't even recall all the things that were said, but it was basically joke after joke after joke. My abs hurt from laughing so hard! Sometimes you need to hang out with a group of outrageous, witty, crazy people. It's incredibly entertaining! Although this group isn't really what I would call close friends, they reminded me how lucky I am to be surrounded by so many intelligent, funny, awesome people that I can call friends.

I'm sad that it's Sunday night and the weekend is over. The schedule this week is pretty full and looking at all the things I have to go to is already giving me a bit of anxiety. How soon will the weekend come back. Oh and please don't snow!

PS. Drinking does not bode well with not eating bread. The restaurant we were at was turkish/mediterranean so there were endless buckets of pita bread, and some $1 drunken pizza after the bars as well. But I made an epic trip to trader joe's and plan on making brussel sprouts by myself for the first time ever! I'll let you know how that goes haha. But seriously, no bread, rice or pasta is HARD.

Consistency

Today has not been a good day so far, but I am determined to turn it around. It's only half way over!

I need to learn my lesson. No tequila on weeknights -- because they make me have crazy nonsensical dreams where I literally wake up crying! Regardless, I had a great time last night. Two NYJL provisional group members and I went to Southern Hospitality. Justin Timberlake's bar! WHY have I never been here before? Well, actually probably because it's on the Upper East Side and I rarely find myself there. It just so happened to be Trivia Night, but the girls and I just had a great time catching up, marg-(arita)-ing it up and just talking the night away.

Then, this morning I get an email from Orbitz reminding me to confirm my flight to San Antonio. Um, What?! I thought I cancelled it a month ago! I was supposed to get a full refund, but I guess it didn't go through. However, the customer service I called were not only unhelpful, confused, but most importantly, extremely rude. I'm sorry, but if you work in customer service and are a bitter human being, then I think it's time to switch jobs. The entire job description is SERVING the CUSTOMER. I am your client, and unless I am being rude to you I see no reason to be condescending. I used to use Orbitz ALL THE TIME and praise the amazing price assurance packages to my sorority sisters, friends, and family. Well, after this experience, I'm really put off and I just don't think I will be using Orbitz again. Ugh. I just hate unnecessary rude behavior.

Is any one impressed by the fact that I am posting two days in a row? I definitely am. Moving on to the title of this post. I've mentioned before that I have so many great loft goals and fail to carry through. So two things I'm trying to be consistent with in my life right now. Healthy eating and blogging... well, I guess I should throw exercising in there too!

I've stuck to my lent diet of no breads, pasta, rice, or potatoes. But today I cheated and had some croutons with my salad. Not the end of the world right? Haha, not as if eating fried chicken last night was healthy. I found a GREAT new lunch place though--wichcraft. It's a sandwich/salad place chain owned by the great Tom Collicchio (who also owns Panera...WHAT?) I already love this place. You can choose any sandwich filling option they have and throw in on a bed of salad with a yummy, light citrus vinaigrette. Thumbs up. Since SPRINGGG is coming, I will definitely be walking a few blocks further for this awesome lunch, hold the croutons though.

Happy Hump Day all! I hope you're having a better day than me so far!

Crushing

And so, another month has passed and I have been a bad blogger! So, the steelers lost, but I had a good time watching the game anyway ;) More to come on that later. That's alright, but March Madness is upon us! And as I've done the past two years, I invited some of my good girl friends to join in on the fun with some friendly competition via bracket making!

Not too much has changed in the past month. Work has been work. Stressful and long hours (although not as bad as bankers have it). However, the most irritating part of work, isn't the actual work, surprisingly. Rather, its my dumb coworker. Was that too blunt? I suppose being dumb is not something I should hold against a person. But rather I am constantly irritated by his lack of effort, motivation, and constant pushing of "bitch" work to me although he's not that busy. Keep in mind, he's not my boss. Additionally, it's as if his iPhone is actually a brick. He has SO MANY personal phone calls coming into the office every day. Aside from friends, his unemployed girlfriend calls ALL DAY LONG. This is unprofessional in my workplace, although I know each workplace environment is different. And cackling loudly while gossiping about your friends? Completely unacceptable and distracting.

Moving on from complaints, I am crushing. Hard. On some random boy I met twice. And I honestly canNOT stop thinking about him! This makes me feel like a complete schoolgirl, because I really have no reason to be thinking about him this much. In fact it's been over a month since I have seen him last, and we met at mutual friend gatherings. But yet, because it's been so long since I have clicked that well with someone, he stays on my mind. Or maybe we didn't click as well as I thought, who knows. But finally, someone adorable and intelligent, that I can exchange witty banter with. I'm trying to get those mutual friends to set something up, just to see if maybe there is a spark there. But until then! Daydreams at work :) and lowered productivity.

Oh and for lent, I've decided to give up carb-type items! At first, it was bagels (which is tough for me, I LOVE BAGELS). But as of last night, I've decided to try my best to give up bread, pasta, rice, potatoes and anything similar to those items. It will be hard though, I do love myself some sourdough bread and fried rice or penne alla vodka. And especially tough when eating out with my friends...but I'll allow a little slip-up here and there for special occasions. Does that still count as giving it up for Lent?

Til Next Time,
Panda with a Key

Home for the weekend

I feel like I have been going out so much this past few weeks that my body is exhausted and rebelling. On weeknights, I seem to be an insomniac and can't get to bed until the late hours only to have to wake up around 6:30 for work. On weekends, I don't get home til 4 and then sleep until noon - also not healthy sleeping habits.

So in lieu of "saying yes" to the various opportunities for going out this weekend, I decided to go home to my parent's house (only around an hour plus travel time from my apartment, thankfully) and sleep the weekend away, hang out with my pups, eat great food, and catch up with my siblings. All in all, zero regrets. I have little things to get done anyway.

One of those things is my NYJL one page bio. I don't know what to write! It's like high school english class all over again. One page is by no means long, especially compared with the papers I've had to write all throughout college. But when this entire page is supposed to filled with what should be compelling information all about me? This is a challenge. What can I put on this page that will be witty and funny but not cheesy and really show the other NYJL provisionals and members who I am? Ahhhh, I better get working.

Productive weekend: Worked out, ate good food, watched a romantic comedy, caught up with an old friend, blogged (woo), slept, and am doing my "homework!"

STEELERS v JETS tomorrow.

blackandyellow

blackandyellow

blackandyellow

blackandyellow

blackandyellow

blackandyellow

2011 - Starting anew?

So much for consistently starting a blog. I'm not even sure what the "theme" of this blog is but with only three posts, I'm sure it's still open to interpretation. Whenever I have time, I like to follow SO many blogs: fashion blogs, mba blogs, law blogs, healthy eating blogs, etc. And originally, when starting this blog I wanted to have a culmination of all of those, but who am I kidding? That is just typical of me, over ambitious with grand ideas and impractical. I work 11 hours per day recently and when I am home, I definitely don't have time to catch up on others' blogs, grab inspiration from around the web and formulate my own opinions in a unique and interesting way for others.

So instead, I'm just going to write about ...whatever is on my mind.

Seeing as this is the first post of 2011, it's probably appropriate to elaborate on my expectations for this year and possibly resolutions?

Every year, I makes all of these do-able yet not so do-able resolutions and this year's is simple.

Say "yes" more often.

I don't want to be held back by myself any more. I've already made steps towards reaching this goal but I think that making a conscientious effort to actually get out there and do things will be good.

What I expect for 2011? Nothing too crazy and life changing, but maybe more finding myself and deciding what I want for my future: career wise. Little steps in life, right? Little steps that build into bigger ones?

I'm not usually so self reflective and emo-sounding (is this emo? haha) but after I found out that a once really close friend got engaged in the past week, I feel like everyone else is making huge moves with their lives and I'm sitting here twiddling my thumbs analyzing numbers all day. Yesterday, I didn't feel rushed or pressured at all about where I was/am/am going with my life in all aspects. But now, I'm realizing as more and more people are building... FAMILIES? along with their careers, I suddenly feel so ...not well rounded.

So anyway, here's to 2011, taking baby steps, and saying yes to all many opportunities that are around me (except for smoking with that weird emo/artsy guy that I met at a bar and is moving into the neighborhood) haha

-Panda with a key