Who Plows, Who Doesn?t

It was 6:30AM.  Ted had taken most of the covers. At least he wasn’t snoring. I was awake but so wanting to get another 15 minutes to 1/2 an hour of rest, but it wasn’t going to happen. My mind began going over the day ahead. I surrendered and got up, brushed, washed, got dressed.  It was 11 degrees.  Not as bad as the past few mornings. 

I decided it was going to be a walking day meaning minimal amount of jogging, if any.  So the direction option was up the very steep hill of Sherman Drive (south).  As we approached the top, I thought the plow was coming so we cut to the right, the first available side street (about 1/2 mile up from our home) which would take us down Tilden, the parallel road from Sherman, just as steep,  however we would use that for our descent.  We went around a few of the side streets off to the left and ended up on ….think it’s Pleasant St., the back road toward Valley View, or rather, from the Parkway. 

A fair amount of snow had fallen but the streets were plowed so it wasn’t too taxing on the legs…that’s until we crossed the Parkway at Mohawk St, onto the streets of Utica.  You see when we go up Sherman and to the point of Valley View, that is zoned New Hartford.  New Hartford apparently has the funds to allocate for snow plowing.  Utica, it seems, does not.  I soon found out more snow had fallen than originally thought.  The streets were a mess. At this point, the snow began falling, stinging my eyes.  Some wind picked up.  Ok, so the somewhat pleasant walk with a “chill” in the air now turned into a leg breaking, eye stinging, 10 force wind resistant enhanced plod home.  The end result?  We managed 4 1/2 miles by the end of an hour.  One big PHEW!

Once home did some chores, vacuumed, laundry…Ted hadn’t made an appearance yet.  I began to wonder since it was 8AM. Unusual.  There he is!  Donning gym shorts asking what happened while he was sleeping.  I gave him the synopsis… unexciting.  He was headed to the gym to loosen his back up.  Both of us were suffering from an achy back due to the sitting in one position for that long movie yesterday.  We’re just not used to it. 

Breakfast:  One mega pear.  I mean it was HUGE (Billy Fuccillo )!  My stomach is making some pretty obnoxious noises right now…too MUCH pear?!!!!

Now for the Sunday omelet.  I tried practicing my food photography:

Sunday Omelette

Ok. So…who can recommend a class on Food Photography…or a book?! Anyone? Help?!!!!

I’ll leave you with this little tidbit of calorie cutting news:

As per RealAge, a great way to reduce the fat and calories in some of your favorite foods is to substitute mushrooms for the meat. A great place to start is with pasta dishes, stews, chili’s….  According to the article, you can cut as much as 420 calories by this substitution.  They also recommend a book: Mushroom Magic: 100 Fabulous Fungi Feasts and Marvelous Mushroom Meals.   * I checked on that book and there is limited copies… it might be out of print. But there are probably other great resources for mushroom dishes.