However this morning a furry beast of an arachnid decided that we would be sharing a workspace. I said nay, nay (albeit from across the room. I don’t mess with big, fat, juicy spiders that may or may not have the ability to JUMP.)

EEP!

While I can deal with tiny spiders, large ones have a high ICK factor. Unacceptable and highly distracting in an office setting.

In the end I manned up. And totally moved my chair a solid foot over from its normal spot. Mutual respect, Mr. Spider. You do your thing, I’ll do mine.

After a while he disappeared, which was almost worse. I blessedly left the office at 1:30 and hurried home for lunch before a shopping date with my mother.

Lunch was a delicious and monstrous salad of greens, tuna salad, chopped apple, and feta cheese. Fitting that I had a huge salad before meeting my mother, as she is a great crafter of ginormously tasty green salads.

(In case you’re interested, I mix my tuna salad up with hummus instead of mayo, cutting down on fat. If you do this but find your tuna salad is a little dry, try adding a drizzle of olive oil. This tuna salad also had some frozen corn and chopped celery.)

So good with lots o’ crunch and a sweet and savory mix from the juicy apple and the salty feta. I was planning on having a yogurt as dessert, but this left me satisfied so I had a malted milk ball and called it quits. I’m full and energized for an afternoon of shopping!

I had a half day of work and I bounded out of the office at 2pm to have lunch with the Boyfriend. The 84 degree temperature called my name and inspired the meal:

Grilled (on a George Foreman, yes) turkey hot dog from Applegate Farms on a piece of toast with spicy cheese! Paired with an orange. And a handful of The Boyfriend’s fries that went unpictured.

The Boyfriend threw some frozen French fries into the oven for lunch and I said didn’t want any because fries aren’t all that healthy. But I am of the mindset that sampling a few fries off of someone’s plate deletes any offending calories. For those of you who watch Scrubs, you may remember the episode where Carla snags fries off Turk’s plate after originally claiming she didn’t want any. “Baby, you know I can’t have fries,” she claims. Carla, I understand. It’s a good thing The Boyfriend understands, too.

I thoroughly enjoyed my sunny mid-day lunch break with The Boyf. Sid wanted in on it, too. Mr. Kitty is not allowed outside but he has serious spring fever and is constantly looking for a means to escape.

“Set me free!”

Luckily his escape through the bathroom window was deterred by my quick-thinking boyfriend.

After lunch The Boyfriend and I hit up the park for an adventure with the pup. While Jack romped at the dog park, I went for a quick jog around the park, which is quite small, so I didn’t cover much distance. It felt nice to run for the first time in a looooong time and I think I’m gonna get my butt up early for a morning run before work tomorrow.

Jack and I are recovering from the heat of the park with a little Charlie Rose. Martha Stewart is on, after all. I think she may be unexpected my role model. She’s unashamed of her success and wealth, which draws criticism from some and admiration from others. But the truth is the woman built an empire for herself and she has every right to be proud of the fact that she’s a household name. She went to jail and bounced back, for heaven’s sake. Lady Stewart’s all right in my book. And if she wants to have me on her show, I’m down with that.

I’m off to rehydrate. I forgot how thirsty warm weather makes me!

And then the Roommate blessedly brought home an avocado and a tomato so it turned into this (the corn clearly had better things to do than participate in my photoshoot):

At least I got some vegetables in with this monster wrap.

I also enjoyed my very first Oats in a Jar:

The jar fit quite handily into my lunchbox for a portable breakfast.

And then, last night I, like Heather, broke down and found myself in the supermarket. I only spent $10 and it was actually pretty necessary.

I get a lot of my daily protein from my morning oats (always made with some type of milk) and yogurt. And we were out of both. I admit I bought the Greek yogurt because it was a dollar and I want to see if Yoplait can hold a candle to Chobani. The cheese is getting paired with frozen dough and leftover sauce for pizza tomorrow night. You know groceries are sparse in my house when we have no cheese.

Speaking of sparse, check out the slim-pickings of my lunch tomorrow:

There’s not much green in there! Short of bringing an onion to munch on for lunch, I have to rely on the veggies in my orzo tuna salad. We have run out of granola as well, so that greek yogurt has to deal with always delicious but less nutritionally sound peanut butter Puffins. Ah, well. Can’t win ‘em all.

Since I went to bed late I planned ahead and made overnight oats to grab out of the fridge and eat at my desk in the morning. Behold:

Again, it’s not too pretty on the eyes. Hopefully if I throw some peanut butter in there it will suffice until lunchtime.

I think it’s safe to say the lunch is always greener in the other lunchbox.

This thing totally fell apart as I was eating it, but that’s what I love about Joseph’s — it’s food, not a cardboard sandwich filling holder.  With my pita I had a yogurt I stole from The Roommate (because that’s what roommates are for) and grapes.  I bought these grapes yesterday and upon opening the container I found that I had forgotten to wash them.  At first I said, “What the heck” and dug in, but Grape #1 left a seriously chalky taste in my mouth.  Ugh! I hate to think about what gets sprayed on these poor grapes.  I didn’t want to waste my fruit, though, so I wiped off each grape before eating it.  Just like Emma does in a scene from Glee.

Now, if only I could share not only her neurotic tendencies, but her cute hair and impeccable wardrobe as well.

Now I’m sitting down for a hasty (but tasty!) lunch before work.

I used hot sauce and pepper olive oil as dressing. I also sprinkled some Parmesan on top, too. It might seem random but I find there are few situations where Parmesan is the wrong choice. The end product looked more like this:

Super filling with a spicy little kick!

*********************

Do you have a dog? Mental_floss has an article today claiming people get more exercise from owning a dog than having a gym membership. I agree! Jack is a great motivator to get up and moving.

Off to work and then I’ve got super rockin’ evening of laundry at my mother’s!

The other night we pulled out frozen lasagna from the freezer (care of the Boyfriend’s thoughtful mother) and roasted some chopped carrots with rosemary olive oil my own mother gave me for Christmas. (Dinner was a family affair — thanks, moms!) It was a simple dinner that called for a lot of oven time. To occupy myself I made a quinoa salad that I’ve had on the brain for a while.

• 1 c. quinoa, cooked
• 1/2 pepper, diced
• 1/2 c. cheese, diced (Cheddar is okay; Feta is betta)
• Olives (any variety), sliced
• a drizzle of olive oil
• Salt and pepper

Bring 2 cups of water to a boil and add the quinoa. Turn down to a simmer and cook quinoa for 12-15 minutes. The quinoa will completely absorb the water when it is done cooking.

Add the quinoa and the other ingredients in a bowl and mix thoroughly.

I think capers or pigeon peas would have been such a good addition to this! The salad was tasty but there could have been more flavor. Next time I make this I think I’m going to go all out and buy feta and roast some red peppers, too! Yum!

The most important thing about this salad was the hearty and healthy quinoa. Quinoa is very fast to make, which is a huge plus in my opinion. And I love having a large grainy salad to portion out for lunch throughout the week. Zesty Cook seems to agree: check out his tasty-looking pasta salad from today’s post.

Scratch just looks so cute from the outside that I’ve been wanting to eat there for ages.  It’s a really low-key bakery and sandwich shop with some surprising menu items. The sandwich fare is basic, but delicious.  I got a turkey sandwich with tomato, lettuce, avocado, Swiss cheese, and pesto mayonnaise.

The pesto definitely made the sandwich.  And can we just take a moment to appreciate the glorious things avocados do for any sandwich? Mmm! It came on soft wheat foccacia with a pickle and carrot sticks, which upped the cute factor for me.  The Boyfriend got a turkey panini with sundried tomatoes and Provolone cheese which left him, to quote, “full.”  (This is a big deal in The Boyfriend’s book.)

I was all about the sandwiches, but I did notice a small selection of notable lunch options: Chobani and granola to go, sundried tomato macaroni and cheese, and quinoa and cranberry salad.  They do some regular off-site catering gigs, too, which probably helps business.  There were only two other people in the cafe when The Boyf and I walked in and a few passers-by popped in for coffee.  The place seems like a great little neighborhood haunt.

I was already sold on Scratch’s sandwiches, but I stopped to admire the small selection of homemade baked goods.  They have the typical pastry and cake as well as some vegan and gluten-free options. The Boyfriend caught me drooling over the Pumpkin Cake with Cream Cheese Frosting and bought slices for The Roommate and myself.  There’s just something about the combo of pumpkin and cream cheese that really does it for me I guess.  I ate my slice for dinner (pumpkin is a vegetable!) while folding our laundry.

The cake was divine and presumably the same thing could be said about the other baked goods at Scratch Bakery.  I’m willing to be the guinea pig and test them out. Just a team player like that.

If you’re in the Albany area, definitely check out Scratch Bakery and Cafe for a laid-back lunch.  Take your own boyfriend or a friend you haven’t seen in a while.  Scratch has a quiet, casual atmosphere that is perfect for catching up.  They also have a nice selection of beverages including tea and coffee, and some items from the cooler.  I’ll leave you with my Honest T bottle cap quote:

I really enjoy this quote. And I’m glad I snapped a photo because I totally threw the bottle cap away even though I was going to save it as a reminder to my scatterbrained self…

**Chobani Giveaway

Don’t forget there is still time to enter the Chobani Giveaway! Enter via comment or tweet!

I came home in the late afternoon and threw a sandwich together while I made applesauce (which you will see later in the week!).  With yesterday’s chutney looking particularly appetizing, I came up with this:

Sliced turkey and pepperjack cheese with apple-cranberry chutney on whole wheat.  I threw that bad boy under the George Foreman for a little melty crispification.

Hello, sandwich! While I ate I perused some old postcards my mom found for me at an estate sale.  They’re from the Garden of the Gods in Colorado Springs.

I love stuff like this! These cards have so much character! And it’s even cooler because I was there not so long ago! Check out my post on Colorado from my trip this summer!

I was here!

This was a nice trip down memory lane.  Thanks for the sweet gift, mom!

To celebrate, The Boyfriend and I planned a picnic sans dogs, friends, cell phones, or work.  It was glorious.

The weather was warm, but the leaves had already begun to change with the cold weather of last week.

My dad, who lives in England, always asks about the leaves here this time of year.  I suppose I take them for granted — I’ve seen it every fall for my entire life — but they certainly are stunning.

We spread out a blanket, munched on sandwiches from Uncommon Grounds plus a thermos of coffee, and enjoyed each other’s company.

Uncommon Grounds always has such fresh, bright veggies.

There was a playground at the park, which we completely avoided, of course.

We are adults, after all.