Back in the Routine

It took me a week but I'm finally back in the swing of things. Last night I was feeling very domestic and I made a delicious dinner of mango and coconut marinated salmon with rice and green beans. The whole meal was super easy to make - I bought the salmon pre-marinated from Whole Foods and it came frozen so I just defrosted it, put it on aluminum foil and baked. It stuck to the foil a bit hence why it's in pieces in the photo. The green beans were leftover, but they came in a bag that you just to microwave, and the rice was easy to make. After dinner I decided to make Chocolate Peanut Butter Cookies that were amazingly delicious and quite decadent.

Marinate salmon with rice and green beans

Cookies cooling off. Click here for the recipe.

I finally cleaned all my dirty laundry from the trip, got all of it put away, and feel settled. Just in time to leave next week again for Thanksgiving.

The Big Reveal

 So yesterday was the big day - the day of my haircut! It was such an amazing experience at the salon. My stylist had lots of good pointers for me such as when you shampoo you should rub and massage the scalp to release all the oils, and when you condition you should take your hair in sections and rub the conditioner into each section until it feels like seaweed in order to get it deep into your hair, and finally to lift the portions of hair by my roots when its drying with clips pointed straight down in order to not have the top of my hair flat by my part.

When I first sat down in the chair, I what my typical hair routine was (which is not much) and then showed him this picture for the look I was going for:

Without wetting my hair or combing it, he started cutting it. He based the length off the natural flow of my curls in order for it to look the best. At the end, he had me stand up to do the finishing touches. After the cut, he took me to the wash room where he washed my hair. This part usually hurts my neck, but this washing chair thing was super fancy and comfortable and even had a nice foot rest.

After he washed and conditioned my hair, he placed towels on the floor and had me flip my hair over onto them in order to scrunch it up and put in product. Then he used special towels to blot the hair while scrunching in order to maximum the curls. Then I sat under the heater for a bit to let my hair dry, something I had never done before.

Lastly, he used this special diffuser shaped like a hand to get it completely dry (it was already almost dry). Then he sprayed on some spray stuff to set it and I was all done! Here is the final outcome:

On the metro on my way home

Side view

The back

The best part of it all is that when I did my hair by myself this morning (without the special shampoo, conditioner, diffuser and towel) my hair still looks great. Nothing is worse than when your hair cut only looks good when you are a professional stylist (something I definitely am not). I'm so happy with it!

After the haircut I came home and made myself a delicious meal of Pasta Carbonara and green beans. I used Bethenny's Skinny Girl Recipe, but then un-skinnified it by not using soy milk, turkey bacon, or whole wheat pasta. It was super easy and super tasty.

A Shit-Show

Last night, I was at home making dinner with my roommate Emily, when she goes to the front window and says "come look, there's a shit-show happening outside our house". I run to the front window and see 4 firetrucks outside our front door, one of which is the Arlington County Hazmat Unit:

Firetrucks

Hazardous Response Unit

We weren't sure what was going on, but something had happened at our next door neighbors house. We thought it was some sort of fire, seeing as there was no ambulance or police, only firetrucks. We watched outside from our front porch, trying to figure out what had happened, and when we saw the crew putting on hazmat suits, we got concerned. Then another roommate came home.  We sent her out to chat up the firefighters, and she said they had said that there was an oil spill next door in their basement. 

Worst picture ever, but if you look really closely you can see a guy in an all white Hazmat suit

Then our final roommate and her boyfriend came home, and they went outside to talk to our next door neighbors. Apparently they had a 100 gallon oil drum in their basement from when the heat used to be oil. When the heat was converted over, the oil drum was never drained, and it started leaking last night. Since the oil is a hazardous material, the hazmat crew had to come clean it up.

Running wires through our yard to the neighbors basement to try and get the oil out

The trucks finally left around midnight, I'm not sure if they got it all cleaned up, but I haven't seen them back since, so I assume so. The neighbors also said that the county would pay for them to be put up in a hotel if they wanted (it smelled strongly of oil), so that's good to know if you ever have a hazardous material spill in your house.

Speaking of dinner, it was supposed to be the highlight of my post, but then the shit-show took over outside. I made steak and Emily made me pan-roasted potatoes and an avocado salad. It was delicious, healthy, and thanks again Emily for cooking for me!

Rain, Rain, Go Away

So I have been slacking and haven't posted anything all week! I have some updates - the roofers came out to look at the roof and determined that it needs to be replaced because it is so damaged. This is great except that they can't come back out for about 3 weeks. Did I mention it's raining out right now. Sigh.

I've been enjoying my break from soccer - it's between the Winter and Spring leagues right now, but my Sunday Spring league starts back up on Sunday. In the meantime I've been busy with kick-boxing and yoga. I've also started a diet - not an actual diet like no carbs or anything like that. Just a general, trying to eat healthier, diet. I'm also trying to stick to Bethenny's advice of "you can eat everything, just not at once", meaning if I want a Girl Scout Cookies, I will eat 1, instead of 4.

Not much else to report on, except work has been surprisingly busy this week, which has been nice. Not too busy where I'm stressed that I can't get everything done, but just busy enough where my days are full. This has been a nice change and I'm hoping it stays this way.

Besides that I just can't wait for the Spring weather to get here. So over this rain and cold weather. Hopefully I'll have something more exciting to talk about next time!

Cooking Recap and This Just In

The cooking adventure last night went fairly well. I made the mac and cheese with chicken and the coconut chicken strips. The mac and cheese was delicious, and I decided to take my friends advice and bread the chicken with rosemary, and pan fry it. Then i cut it up and put it in the mac and cheese, but there was way more mac and cheese than chicken. The coconut chicken strips were tasty, and super duper easy. I made a dipping sauce to go with it, which was key.

I was supposed to also make the soup, but forgot to get the potatoes for it, which is the key ingredient. Oops. Postponed to later this week.

Lunch was also a success, with a ham/salami/pepperoni sandwich, gigantic grapes, and individual-sized Smartfood White Cheddar popcorn. Yum.

Tomorrow is our company's Thanksgiving Potluck which I helped plan (I'm on the Social Committee), so that should be fun and filling. And tonight is my second official non-work related outing with work friends.

In random celebrity news, Eva Longoria and Tony Parker are getting divorced. Not sure if I should be sad about this, but I never really saw them as a good fit in the first place.

Healthy (Somewhat) Cooking

In my quest to eat healthier, and thanks to my sister letting me borrow the car, I'm off to the grocery store tonight! I don't know what it is but I'm bad at grocery shopping. I either come home and feel like I have nothing to eat, or I buy all this food and then throw away half of it before I have a chance to eat it. So I spent the past hour at work trying to come up with food to make this week and a grocery list. Here is what is on my dinner list for the week:

- Macaroni and Cheese with Chicken (healthy edition)
- Coconut Chicken Strips (trying a new recipe)
- Steak and Baked Potato with Asparagus (my classic go-to)
- Baked Potato Soup (also a new recipe)
- Chicken and Cheese Enchilada (haven't made this in years)

For lunches I plan on having either leftovers from dinner, salami and ham sandwiches, or going out to eat. Hope this goes well, updates to follow.

Diet Fail

I've been trying to eat healthier, but my work is making it very difficult. Yesterday - baby shower (champagne toast and Whole Foods cake), tomorrow - happy hour for co-worker leaving, Friday - potluck to welcome new employees. And of course I can't forget about the candy bowl which is always stocked and looming there in my direct eye-line.