<p>MomWC, sendin ya the unflappable mojo for your procedure today!</p>
<p>I have done something very bizarre to the muscle of my upper left arm between shoulder and elbow and suspect its from a minor mishap tripping up the trail when slipping on the stupid pile of leaves. I remembered hanging onto my ski stick as I went down. I seriously must have torn something because it hurts like a bugger.</p>
<p>I must say between the leaves, and then the fallen tree, and now the idiot arm pain I am feeling a little “blocked” on the movement front this week! Good grief!</p>
<p>Ouch kmcmom, I hope that heals quickly for you. MoWC, good luck with all your testing today.</p>
<p>I was playing around with the Mio and the Mio Go app to set the hr zones. It uses your age to set your default zones and then you can change them, except it won’t let you change the max hr. I had to lie about my age to get my true max in there :)</p>
<p>Good luck with your testing MOWC! I have to keep my eyes closed when I get stuck with a needle.</p>
<p>PlantMom…so envious of your weather! We have had snow, sleet and rain this week. Today is another cold rainy day.
sabaray…you know how excited I was for your race! Congrats again! I also eat a lot of the same things every day. Egg whites, veggie sausage, berries, salad, chicken breast. I do try to come up with some different side dishes. I am loving Parmesan spinach quinoa lately. It reminds me of risotto. </p>
<p>Have kept the quick 8 water weight pounds off and lost another. Hoping to get a magic 10 soon. Friends have really noticed the puffiness in my face is greatly reduced. I am, however, missing my nightly glass of red wine that was supposed to help increase my HDL. I read that switching to grape seed oil should help in that area so I will try that. Started my Vitamin D yesterday so hopefully that will also help improve my well being. One more step to feeling younger next year! :)</p>
<p>1 cup quinoa, rinsed
1 1/2 cups water
1/2 teaspoon salt
3 tablespoons olive oil
1/2 cup pine nuts or 1/4 cup sunflower nuts (I have also used slivered almonds)
1 clove garlic, minced (optional or as tolerated)
2 cups fresh baby spinach, chopped
1 tablespoon lemon juice
1 cup shredded Parmesan cheese</p>
<p>Directions</p>
<ol>
<li> In a large saucepan, bring water, salt and quinoa to boil. Reduce heat to medium-low, cover and cook until quinoa is tender and water has been absorbed, about 15 minutes, set aside.</li>
<li> Heat the olive oil in a large skillet over medium heat, stir in the pine nuts or sunflower nuts and cook until lightly toasted (2 min). Stir in the garlic, cook until the garlic softens (2 min). Stir in the quinoa and spinach; cook and stir until the spinach has wilted. Stir in the lemon juice and all but a pinch of the cheese. Stir until the cheese has melted. Serve sprinkled with the remaining cheese.</li>
</ol>
<p>Ouch, MoWC, kmcmom,and BB. Hope the needles, arm, and grill death are overcome in a hurry. </p>
<p>Hello again, NMinn! Don’t be too envious of this southern weather. We skipped spring, somewhere along the way, and are into sticky 90’s with rain every day. Blah. Parmesan spinach quinoa sounds great! We haven’t been eating so much of that grain, ever since my husband brought home 5 pounds of red quinoa that turned out to be gritty as all getout. I’m sticking to Whole Foods ordinary white variety out of the bins, from now on. I did discover their short grain brown rice which seems to cook nicely–kind of like risotto rices. </p>
<p>Yesterday morning I did a short bike ride, and a 2 mile evening walk. I’m cooking little eggplant “crust” pizzas for lunch. Then a planned gym day with a run and weights.</p>
<p>I’m really not happy. Mr B wants to fix the grill instead of buyng a new one. Arrrgh. This means I will have to freeze the beautiful steaks that I planned on grilling yesterday, because that thing is so badly rusted that it is going to fall apart one beautiful evening. And, to add insult to injury, it is 85 degrees today! A perfect day for grilling. I know, first world problems. :)</p>
<p>We just got a new grill. The gas guy hasn’t come out to hook up the gas yet, so we are still using the old one. Everyone’s deck needs two grills…
I hope Mr. B gets it fixed quickly!</p>
<p>Tell Mr. B that it’s a fools errand. I replaced all the rusted parts when I refurbished a Weber Performer grill 12 years ago. By the time I had ordered all the parts, piece by piece, I had spent enough to buy a new grill! </p>
<p>This time, when the cart rusted, I did just buy a new one.</p>
<p>On the other hand, if its JUST gas burners, then it might make sense to repair it!</p>
<p>Alas, the back side of the grill is rusted through, as well as the burners. I’m going to stage a May Day protest on the deck and demand a new grill - better working conditions for the proletariat! :D</p>
<p>Speaking of the May Day, my commute home is going to be hell. Every news channel has their truck parked in front of the Westlake Center. I might as well run home! Today, it would probably be only 2x slower than taking the bus. :)</p>
<p>We replaced parts on our grill for years and years. I finally put down my foot and we went out and bought a nice Webber grill. Best decision ever, cooks so much better than that old one, I couldn’t figure out why I kept repairing the old one. </p>
<p>But we don’t need to convince BB. Doesn’t Mr. B know not to disagree ;)</p>
<p>I figured why Mr wanted to repair the old one! He wanted to have fun with tools. I think I convinced him that assembly of the new grill could be just as much fun. I think 10 years is a good lifespan for a metal box that sits outdoors and gets heated to 700 degrees once in a while. Time to RIP! </p>
<p>Now I need to start a new thread on LP grills. </p>
<p>Fingers crossed for MOfWC. Hope she passes the test with flying colors and NO more needles. </p>
<p>kmc, hang in there! Sending some positive cyber energy your way for speedy healing. Dang leaves! I almost had a wipeout during my Boston run - those wet paper cups on the ground were slippery!</p>
<p>No IV for the echo stress test! Yay. It was HARD. Modified Bruce format so starts at 10% grade and I made it a minute into 16% grade. Increases every 3 minutes. 10 minutes for me. He had told me not to get competitive with it. HR only got to 165 before I quit, so well short of my max. The incline got me. I was thirsty, too. Waiting for results now.</p>
<p>Today’s exercise: Almost an hour of brush clearing. We’re having a split rail fence replaced, so the stupid invasive bushes needed to go. And no, I am not splitting the rails myself! :D</p>
I read that switching to grape seed oil should help in that area so I will try that. Started my Vitamin D yesterday so hopefully that will also help improve my well being. One more step to feeling younger next year! :)</p>