Friday, January 18, 2008

Food: It's Not Just a Four-Letter Word

This week was endless. Twelve-hour days, no breaks. And yes, this is a naked cry for sympathy.

What happens when I feel put-upon, when I feel like I have no time for myself, when life consists of nothing but working out, working working working, getting home late, and going straight to bed—oh and let's throw in a few unwarranted criticisms by certain people—what happens is that my nutrition falls apart.

My nutrition was STELLAR this week. S T E L L A R!!! Five fruits and veggies every day! Protein galore!

Until today when I ran out of food.

Let's take a close look, cuz I know you are hanging on every word here:

Breakfast: Well, Friday is my one day of the week to sleep late (7 a.m.!) so I did. I skipped my usual small bowl of plain oatmeal with soy milk that I eat every single day of my life, so that I could make the bus so that I'd be at work with enough time to prep for a 9 a.m. meeting. I thought I'd grab a bagel along the way. No chance, too late.

10:30: I am starving, and thought I had a yogurt stashed in the fridge at work. Nope! But some evil entity kind soul has brought doughnuts. Oh joy. One sugar doughnut later, my hunger is under control. Sort of.

1:30: I remember I have a store-bought vegetarian pasta/soy thing in the fridge. Real food! Yay!

1:36: Um, scarfed that down. Now, what's for lunch?

2:30 I am so mad about nonstop working. And I'm starving again. (BTW, I realize that everytime I say "I'm starving"? I realize that I am nowhere near starving. Nowhere.) Oh look, it's our subsidized vending machines! Where everything is $.25!!! How HELPFUL. And there's a dark chocolate candy bar! I don't even want it. But I think I deserve it. And the voices in my head say dark chocolate=blahblahhealthyblah.

3:00 Start with the cups of tea. This is to forestall more eating.

7:00 p.m. I am finally finished with work. And mad. Because it's Friday, and I've been here for 11 hours. And yes, I am now starving again.

7:20: High-tail it to bus depot, just in time to see my bus pulling out. Which means a 15-minute wait. Sigh.

8:00 p.m. Finally home. I have two small servings of leftovers, neither of which will make a meal in itself: tofu meatloaf (don't bash it 'til you've tried it) and poached salmon. I could nuke a sweet potato to go with, but that? Is too much trouble. Pushing a button is too exhausting. A sorry state of affairs. So I have surf 'n soy—with nothing else. This is not dinner.

8:15 p.m. Glory be, I'm starving again. Let's try cheese and crackers.

8:45 p.m. If you guessed that I was still hungry? You win! Break out the vanilla soy yogurt!

8:46 p.m. Hey, you know what would turn this into dessert?? CHOCOLATE CHIPS! Which I happen to have in the freezer!!! Whee!!!

And that, ladies and germs, was today's exceptionally sorry and sad intake.

I'm sure it really fueled me up for tomorrow's 10 miler.

I shamefacedly share this story because I hope to inspire you: Don't grow up to be like me.

Suddenly? I don't feel so hot.

Morals:
1) Buy enough food to keep at work. 2) Stop working so hard.

13 comments:

a.maria said...

omg i've definitely been there. i HATE when i don't have anything to eat at work.

because that means i usually don't have anything to eat at home either.

so i end up staring into the fridge for what seems like hours on end hoping that magically something delicious will appear.

it never does.

and so it goes....

ItchyBits said...

Well you certainly ate better than I did. GDamn cheese and crackers. I usually blow it between 2:30 and 6:00.

Danielle in Iowa in Ireland said...

Subsidized vending machines? Who thinks this is a good idea!

21stCenturyMom said...

Roger that 'Stop working so hard'. There's no pay-off in that other than people heaping more work on you.

Work less, eat more. An excellent plan.

Thomas said...

Golden Rule of weight management: eat breakfast. No excuses. And who sleeps until 7am anyway??? (must be a female thing. The three girls in our house can sleep until forever. The three boys are usually up at 6:xx)

Rhea said...

Don't be so hard on yourself. If I ate like you ate yesterday, I would have expired from hunger. And yes, grocery-shop for the week. It's hard, but that tactic has saved me several times.

Susan said...

Man oh man! I do have some sympathy for ya, my friend.

Rainmaker said...

I agree with Thomas - it's amazing how eating breakfast keeps things under control. Otherwise I'm just like you - digging through my drawers and cabinents at work looking for random things to eat. Unfortunately I always succedd in finding something... which is kinda bad.

Black Knight said...

Starving and working: is that life?

Rich said...

Do you have Jamba Juice in DC? A giant smoothie fills you up for a long time, and I don't feel guilty.

LBTEPA said...

So six days out of seven you were totally on track - somehow you can only focus on the one slightly-less-than-perfect daY? Mate - so hard on yourself!
I like Black knight's comment.

David said...

I am appalled... figuratively speaking.

Anonymous said...

but see, i've read these posts in reverse chrono order. i know you had the best run ever!

see? it was good. it might have addled the part of your brain that works with directions, but for energy, you were all over it like wild on rice.