I had a late start this morning as I had a doctor appointment at 8 a.m. All is well...I had lost more weight (yay!!) and all my "numbers" are improving. Good to know I'm going in the right direction. To celebrate, I stopped at Starbucks (just for coffee - no treats!!) on my way into the office. The morning was frantic/busy, but now I have a little lull before going home.
Continuing with the medical theme, I will rant just a tiny bit about medical insurance. I am fortunate that I work and can get benefits through work, but geeze Louise, the costs keep escalating like no tomorrow. It's open enrollment time at my company and yesterday I enrolled. Oy!
Like most folks (I think), we have a choice between "gold," "silver," or "bronze" plans. I had always gone with gold until last year when my payroll deduction would have sky rocketed. I switched to silver and (of course) our out of pocket charges have gone up a lot (co-pays and the like). I was hoping that the difference would have narrowed a bit this year, but nope - if I had chosen gold this year, my payroll deductions would have been an additional $80 each pay (every two weeks) over what I pay for the silver plan. Crazy! I do have a flex spending account so our out-of-pocket charges are paid with pre-tax dollars and fortunately Fletch and I are basically very healthy. It just makes me nuts that I am spending around $375 - $400 every two weeks for insurance (this does include dental and vision as well).
OK, enough of the rant. At least I have a job and insurance. But still....
On to nicer things. Last night I used some of the veggies I got at the Farmers' Market on Saturday. First I sliced some garlic, chopped up two potatoes and added the leeks (which were the cleanest leeks I have ever seen - no grit or sand or dirt!!). I tossed them with olive oil and sprinkled a ton of Trader Joe's "Everything But The Bagel" seasoning over it all and roasted at around 400 for 40 minutes or so. Yum!
The "Everything" seasoning is marvelous.
Next I sautéed the wild mushrooms with some onions, added white wine and a little cream. Put that aside and sautéed a couple of pork chops in the pan and then added the mushrooms back in.
I can't remember what kind of mushrooms these were, but they were so tasty - very sweet and flavorful.
I also cooked the greens (I think it was chard of some kind) that I got. Frank (Colin's friend who runs the CSA) added a bit of protein to the greens in the form of worms. Yuck. Fortunately I saw them and fortunately I did not take pictures of them. The greens were delicious.
On the knitting front (since this is Unraveled Wednesday), I managed a couple of rows on my Close To You shawl yesterday at lunch. Here it is spread out on a conference table.
It's getting there. I'm hoping to finish it by this weekend, but sometimes my hopes are greater than reality - lol.
Book-wise I finished "Mr. Penumbra's 24 Hour Bookstore" which I liked. I have started "Lisette's List" but am only a few pages in - couldn't keep my eyes open last night.
Looking forward to a gentle (hopefully) wind-down to the work week. How about you? What are you up to this mid-November?
