Day one and green smoothie.

How does this look appetizing?

First day of my seven days vegetarian diet challenge. I woke up feeling pretty good, and not particularly hungry. A family member brought home some pies, and instead of whatever breakfast I had planned, ate half a mushroom pie. That filled me up pretty well, so I only made myself my first ever green smoothie an hour or so later. I've heard so much about this green smoothie hype, but whenever I looked at the ingredients list I almost always felt that nagging doubt and then quickly abandoned the idea. I mean spinach? broccoli? all blended into some unappetizing bright green color? I can't imagine how that could taste good. But I do have some pea shoots sitting in my fridge waiting to be used up. I was going to use them in salad, but after chewing on a couple of them decided that I probably wouldn't like it. So into the blender they went. My mother got me a high-power blender about a month ago. It is not the vitamix, which seems to be the blender of choice for most people (that or blendtec). It was, however, similar enough in design and spec that I just use the recipe from vitamix users and everything so far had turned out just fine. Back to my first green smoothie. I decided not to push too far, so I used one cup of pea shoots, half a grapefruit, and about half and half of green and red apples, blended them all down with some water and ice. My first thought after I popped the lid and got a whiff of the juice was that I might regret this. After a very hesitant gulp, I decided that it wasn't too bad. Half a glass later, it could have been a whole lot worse. Another hour later I was feeling hungry again, so I just ate some cherries, and that tided me over til lunch.

For lunch I had half a steamed potato with a big spoonful of greek yogurt and blackpepper, along with a salad of mushroom, zucchini, and tofu. I had often made the mistake when I tried to have salad as a meal by not having enough protein or carbohydrate in it. It usually made me hungry within a couple hours afterward and then I would eat whatever happened to be there, and that was usually something sugary and unhealthy. After looking up a lot of salad recipes later, I tried adding more protein/carbohydrate in the salad. I tried quinoa, pasta, chicken, fish, etc, and found that it kept me feeling full a lot longer. Since this is a vegetarian challenge I skipped the chicken and fish and went for cube of tofu instead. It was very tasty, which was not surprising, since I've always been a fan of tofu. The whole meal over all was very delicious and filling enough that I didn't feel hungry a few hours later. 

The idea of replacing my daily cup of coffee with a healthier green smoothie was no doubt a good one in theory, but in practice it was not so successful. I felt a general lack of energy earlier during the day, and a dull headache coming on slowly as the day went on. A couple hours after lunch and I was really craving that cup of coffee. So I went online and read up on why coffee is bad for me. At the end of a lot of looking around, I came to the conclusion that one cup a day really isn't going to kill me, but four or six just might. Since I tend to limit myself to two at the very most, I decided what the heck and made myself a cup. Now I feel better. 

Oh, by the way, I work very odd and awkward hours, so I don't always eat three meals a day. It also really depends on whether I've been good or not, and whether I've been paying attention at what I'm putting into my body. Sometimes I eat two to three healthy meals, at my worst (which was recently) I eat four to five unhealthy meals. I indulged and had a small piece of stroopwafel with my coffee, and I might not eat much for dinner before I go to bed. I am feeling pretty good so far, tomorrow, I might stick to strictly home-cooked meals and skip that stroopwafel. But then again, it's stroopwafel, and it's so good.

EDIT:
Went to bed later than I thought I would. Had a toaster tart from Health Valley and small lettuce salad for dinner. As I was eating the toaster tart I thought I really should avoid the refined sugar and processed food. Well, try harder tomorrow!

Photo credits: http://www.52kitchenadventures.com

Vegetarian Diet Challenge

Starting tomorrow I'll be on a vegetarian diet for seven days as a challenge. The reason I'm doing this is because my diet has been particularly horrendous as of late and I really think it's time for a change and set my diet back toward a more healthy direction. I've also been eyeing the 3-days juice cleanse for a while now and never had enough gut to actually do it, and this might be a good middle ground.
To prepare for it I've cut up some green and red apple, roasted some zucchini, cooked up some bow-tie pastas, and marinated some mushrooms in my fridge. Also in my fridge are some cherries, organic greek yogurt (I am going ovo-lacto, not vegan), grapefruits, kiwis, a head of lettuce, cucumbers, and a block of tofu. I'll be limiting my caffeine intake of one cup of coffee and a cup of green tea a day. In the following seven days, I'll be posting a daily journal of my progress and my thoughts on the challenge. I'm having a cup of sleepy time herbal tea at the moment and will be heading to bed soon. See you tomorrow.

An update on nails.

First off, this is a picture of my nail after ten days of wear, with five days of work.

Notice the gap between my nail bed and the actual polish? That was one of the reasons of me taking off the GelColor. The other reason being boredom. I was ready to see my real nails again after a week and a half. One thing I've never really realized was just how slow my nails grow. There was this the one time when I was on a trip for a whole month and had hardly needed to cut them whereas my friend who was with me had to cut hers twice in that same time period. I just chalked it up to hers growing abnormally fast, now that I've looked it up and with evidence right in front of me, the abnormal one seems to be me and not her. In my opinion, the GelColor wore like steel. As promised there was no chipping whatsoever. I was quite surprised. The shine, as well, lasted through the whole time.
Now, onto the taking off process. Because of how well it stayed on, it was a bit difficult to take off. All in all, it took me about an hour and a half of soaking and scraping to get them all off. There are supposedly easier ways to do it. For examples, go to a salon and have them take it off for you. But I opted for the home version, and here is what I did.
Step 1 - Soaked cotton balls with acetone based nail remover (100% acetone works better and faster, but I didn't have them on hand).
Step 2 - wrapped my cotton balled nails with tin foil.
Step 3 - wait 15-20 minutes.
Step 4 - Removed the foil and the cotton ball, use a blunt cuticle pusher to push the polish off.

Here is a picture of Step 2

I only managed to snap one picture of the removing process, but let me tell you, the aftermath on my desk was not pretty. It stunk of lavender laced heavier with acetone (my nail remover was lavender scented, why? I couldn't tell you.) With tin foil and cotton balls, along with pieces of soaked and scraped off polish strewn everywhere. I recommended laying down a piece of newspaper or plastic cover before attempting it at home. I certainly would the next time I do this.

I do intend to get the GelColor again in the future. Perhaps in some subtler nude color over the dramatic dark color. I figure the growth would be less obvious, and maybe I won't get bored with it as easily.

Games

I am a gamer, and a bit of a geek. I love games, it's one of my most time consuming hobby. My first memory with the new generation of game consoles was on a gamecube. My then boyfriend introduced me to Super Smash Bros on the Nintendo system. I had watched people played it before but had never played it myself. My then boyfriend(let's call him Sam for simplicity's sake) pitched me against another complete newbie, our friend's girlfriend(now wife). Since I have watched them played before, I cheated and took the easy route of picking Kirby. If you are familiar with the game, then you'd know Kirby was pretty buoyant, and kind to newcomer. My opponent, who had far less insight into the game, picked the pretty princess Zelda. Zelda, or Sheik, would later became my go to character in that game. But she was slower, a bit clumsy, and compared to Kirby, practically laden with lead. Before long, she was falling down the side and getting kicked to oblivion by my big footed pink ball of a character.
I had access to every popular consoles available at the time. From the Nintendo Gamecube, to Sony's Playstation 2, and even the much used but lesser liked Xbox from Microsoft. I played the charming prince in Prince of Persia: the Sands of Time, fought Hayate and Hayabusa(damn that Hayabusa and his special moves, and my friend who kept pulling them off) with Kasumi and Ayane, killed a lot of covenants with my Master Chief on the Xbox. I've since only brought the Nintendo Wii, and the Playstation 3, never coming around to the Xbox 360.
I don't exactly have a wide interest in games. Mainly I play the most popular, the Uncharted series, some Call of Duty here and there, there was the Prince of Persia series and now the trilogy on my PS3, Assassin's Creed (I still prefer Altair to Ezio, for one reason or another), and then there were Bioware's games. I think they are my favorite, Dragon Age was a great RPG, then of course the famed(or infamous, considering how it ended) Mass Effect trilogy.
The original Mass Effect was not released on Playstation, only on Xbox360 and PC. It finally came out on the PS3 around Christmas. I was struck on another playthrough of Dragon Age to play the Mass Effect series from start to finish. Now that I am near the tail end of Dragon Age 2 (in my humble opinion a far inferior game to Origins), I think I am going to pick that up next. Although I still have Assassin's Creed 3 and Call of Duty Black Ops 2 sitting on my shelf staring at me, asking to be played. I do think a Mass Effect complete playthrough is long overdue. I am looking forward to recruiting Garrus, and talking to Wrex about his family armor.
Photo Credit: Dawanda

Shellac Nails

I went to a tiny little nail salon, in an obscure little mall with the most complicated non floor plan yesterday. The place was like a maze, with a jumble of shops both local and chain alike side by side. There were counterfeits and legitimate goods right next to each other. Certainly very different. My sister took me there, and if it wasn't for her I likely would never found my way around. But I digress, the thing I wanted to talk about is nail color. CND shellac, or OPI GelColor, or similar system by different brand in different names. I was told they are essentially the same thing. I am sure people who've paid any amount of attention in nail lacquer trend at all would have known about already. But just in case some of us are like my sister (who didn't even understand the difference between gel nails and simple polish), I am just going to run through it.
Basically, it's a system that utilizes UV lamps to cure (is that the right word?) the special polish. It promises fourteen plus days of wear with no chipping, and super fast drying time. I have been wanting to try it for some time now, since with my line of work it's difficult to keep nail polish on. I have actually accumulated a pretty impressive array of bruises and cuts, all of them relatively minor, ever since I started in my current field  of work. So with this little tiny nail salon I decided to try it. I think mine is actually not CND, but OPI. I am not even really sure about it. I have another three days off work, so I won't really see how it fares at work for a few days yet.
Here is a link to Lisa Eldridge having her nails done with CND Shellac.
Here is a picture of my newly done nails -

Dark nails for the recently cooled down weather.

P.S. Congratulation on Tito Vilanova's so far speedy recovery! He had returned to training with FC Barcelona.

Be Strong, Tito! Anims Tito!

If you haven't heard already. Barça coach Tito Vilanova had a relapse of his salivary gland cancer, or parotid  gland cancer. He had undergone surgery on Thursday, and will have radiotherapy and chemotherapy in the coming weeks. We wish him a speedy recovery!

His surgery went fine. That's good news, and we'll see what happen in the following weeks.
Anims Tito!

I hate to turn this into a football blog, or a FC Barcelona centric blog. I do have to do this. I also apologize for being completely MIA in the past weeks. I have no excuse other than having no inspiration and my own laziness.

Photo credit: FC Barcelona Official Website

El Clásico

We drew. Messi and CRon both scored a brace. We played with no central defense, no el capita, no Piqué. We did show up and play tiki-taka when we were not losing the ball. We drew, and I am quite happy about the result. We are still on top of the table, and we can do better. I am trusting my team that we will do better.  Meanwhile, we'll take that one point against our arch-rival.