Snuggly

After doing the laundry in the morning, Edie and I napped and I ended up blowing off all plans for the afternoon. A cold snowy day outside, a warm snuggly baby inside, and enough little things to do around the house to remain sane. Edie fed strongly, and I got a few baby spoons of the good yogurt in. I can't begin to say how fun it is to feed her a food I love, and to watch her weird reaction; a screwed up little face followed by an open mouth looking for me.

BREAKFAST: 9am, apple cider, .5 bowl, hunger 4/5
Stomach still feeling a little weird from yesterday's dinner.

LUNCH: 12:30pm, rigatoni and sauce with meatballs, 1 bowl, hunger 4/5
Around 11:30 got hungry for lunch and started pacing the kitchen looking for something quick, but that feeling was what got me into trouble in yesterday's dinner. I happened to have an onion lying around and all the pantry ingredients for tomato sauce, so I made some. No recipe, just hoofed it, using a little tomato paste in the flavor base to see what would happen. Came out ok, I suspect the tomato paste gave it a stronger fakey tomato taste. Finished up the school meatballs.

I ate half my plate before realizing this was way too much food. I put it into a container and into the fridge -- in the past I would of just shovelled it down...

PM SNACK: 3:30pm, graham crackers and dark chocolate, .5 bowl, hunger 4/5

PM SNACK: 6:30pm, 2 veggie soy sausage patties, .25 bowl, hunger 4/5

DINNER: 8pm, chicken soup with vegetable gyoza, wheat crackers with the good peanut butter, .75 bowl, hunger 4/5
Stomach was feeling acidy but hungry. Roving around the kitchen again, realized I had freshly made never-frozen chicken stock in the fridge, so I cut it with 50% water and boiled up some dumplings in the freezer I picked up in Koreatown. Still nippy, B lead me to some wholegrain crackers which I shmeared with a little peanut butter. A light, very satisfying meal.

Dumb Dinner

Edie & I visited the Brooklyn Museum with our friend L. I thought we'd have some time in the morning to fart around but I was depending on Edie as an alarm clock, and she didn't go off until 9:45, so it was a quick jump out the door.

After the museum, we wandered in Prospect Heights for a late lunch, later than I like, I got too hungry and overate a little. It destroyed my appetite for a normal dinner, and on the way home I connected with B, and we spent some time wandered the aisles of the local drug stores (because that's what married people with babies do for fun, dang nabbit!) I almost got a single cheapo freezer case ice cream cone, but the line was too long, and the next drug store only had a 4 pack. -sigh--

Not a good dinner, not a good dinner at all. Dinner shouldn't give you a throbbing headache then send you to the bathroom when you should be soothing your baby. Lesson learned, I hope.

BREAKFAST: 10am, organic cheerios with organic dead milk, apple cider, 1 bowl, hunger 4/5

LUNCH: 3:30pm, variety of small Indian dishes including shrimp curry, chicken tikka, aloo gobi, rice, nan, rikta, water, 1.5 bowl, hunger 4/5

PM SNACK: 6pm, ice cream cone, .25 bowl, hunger 4/5

"DINNER": 8pm, 3 more ice cream cones, hotdog, 1.25 bowl, hunger 4/5

The Good Yogurt vs The Bad Yogurt

One of the things my wife and I do not see eye to eye on is yogurt. We both love Fage, the thick strained tangy Greek-style yogurt, what I call 'the good yogurt'. However, while I get plain ol' Fage, she get's Fage 0%, as in 0% fat. Fage, a cow's milk yogurt, in it's whole state, is not light: a full 2/3 of it's calories comes from fat, mostly saturated (though no trans). It makes sense, as fat IS flavor. While the 0% stuff looks identical, it's kinda like the difference between eating ice cream and eating paste in the shape of ice cream.

But my wife insists that there isn't a big difference, that she loves her yogurt regardless. A few times we had taste tests with various friends and relatives passing through our kitchen in the morning hours (hello Ido! hello Mariko!) and while they were both polite about it, both agreed that the whole unreduced less processed yogurt tasted better.

So this early this evening Edie was in a feeding frenzy, first I fed her some oatmeal-pea-formula mush which she ripped through, then I fed her the remaining peas from the jar, and she showed no sign of slowing. So my wife suggested we feed her some yogurt, as Edie already had some at some point. And then, you guessed it, B pulled out the ZERO PERCENT PASTE!! (the horrah, the horrah)

Bottom line, when man discovered that there were bacteria that could be added to dairy that would not only not spoil it, but preserve it, thicken it and have probiotic health benefits, the first thing they probably thought (after, "Hey! It didn't kill me!") was "This is delicious!", not, "How can this help me slim my figure?" Zero % yogurt is "less than", it is more processed, it is "reduced", it is unbalanced. All that milk protein without it's natural fat to help the body absorb it? Babies should never be given any sort of "diet" food.

So Edie tried her first good yogurt, and she screwed up her face in the most adorable of ways, then opened her mouth and went for more. I served her about a tablespoon, and she would of eaten more, but with such a rich food, moderation is probably not a bad thing at this stage in the game.

BREAKFAST: 10:15am, apple cider, .5 bowl, hunger 4/5

LUNCH: 12:30pm, 3 slices white shrimp & bacon pizza, Manhattan Special, 1.25 bowl, hunger 4/5

PM SNACK:5:30pm, large green salad, pickle, 1 bowl, hunger 4/5

DINNER: 7pm, halibut fishsticks, brown rice mushroom pilaf mixed with garlic spinach, graham crackers, water, 1.5 bowl, hunger 4/5
Picked up some battered fishsticks while touring Trader Joe's today. When Is aw them, reminded me of some horrible fishsticks my mom would serve -- processed pressed fish cakes in super thick and greasy coating. These fish sticks were really nice -- the fish seemed to be whole fish, and the batter was relatively thin with a nice touch of tumeric.

No Intervention

After a calm day of a playdate drop in at the community center and some grocery shopping, made myself a quick meal then attended a meeting to establish a food coop on the LES. Had to leave early, as Edie was getting cranky. Spent the evening making chicken stock, and as B slept, Edie woke up a few times crying. I picked her up and soothed her, and 3 minutes later put her back in the crib -- this was the first time I got her back to sleep successfully without the intervention of Betsy. That was pretty satisfying.

BREAKFAST: 8:30am, good yogurt with homemade vanilla extract, cashews and honey, .75 bowl, hunger 4/5

AM SNACK: 11:30am, tortilla chips with a little salsa, .25 bowl, hunger 4/5

LUNCH: 1:15pm, slice of streetza, .75 bowl, hunger 4/5

PM SNACK: 1:45pm, piece of chocolate chip banana bread, hunger 4/5

DINNER: 6pm, bone-in pork chop, sauteed spinach, brown rice mushroom pilaf, apple cider, 1.5 bowl, hunger 4/5
Some left over rice microwaved, put a thick 2" chop in the pan with a little chicken fat for 20 minutes, took a bag of frozen spinach and put it in another pan with chicken fat, garlic, salt, cayenne and a little water and slowly heated it covered. Once I rested the meat for about 5 minutes, I tucked into another meal that I was surprisingly happy with. The spinach was tasty, the chop was a little less pink than I like but juicy and a nice crust. The rice from yesterday was an excellent nutty-tasting side dish, and I would be very happy if I got this plate at a restaurant for $23. Which makes me think, the food cost on this was probably about half that, and in a restaurant setting 1/4 would more appropriate.

EVENING SNACK: 11pm, vegan oatmeal chocochip cookies, sour cream and onion pop-chips, .5 bowl, hunger 4/5
Up late making chicken stock, got hungry.

Corner Baby

Insomnia kept me up until 4, Ediebird got me up at 7:30. Got laundry done, and the plan was to get out of the house after lunch, but felt so run down, had to spend all my strength and concentration on keeping Edie happy and fed and safe. Her backwards crawling has gotten stronger, but when you can only go in reverse, it's inevitable that you're going to back yourself into a corner:



BREAKFAST: 9am, organic cheerios with organic dead milk, .5 bowl, hunger 4/5

LUNCH: 12 noon, large green salad, Stouffers Frenchbread pizzas, 1.5 bowl, hunger 4/5

PM SNACK: 4pm, chocolate covered bacon, .5 bowl, hunger 4/5

DINNER: 7:15pm, curry shrimp over porcini brown rice pilaf, chocolate chip mint ice cream, 1.5 bowl, hunger 4/5
It's nice when a casual meal is successful. Peeled and cleaned some shrimp, let in marinate in curry powder, cayenne and cinnamon. Sauteed onion and garlic in olive oil and butter, through in a pack of chopped dried porcinis, then toasted long grain brown rice. Covered it in a tetrapack of beef stock, brought to a boil and wacked it in the oven for about an hour. No recipe, just following basic method, and it came out really good. The premade stock was really salty, but fortunately the final rice was seasoned in the right spot.

Ice Cream & Peccadilloes

This morning a friend in the neighborhood came over with her 4 year old, and I ran the kid through the steps of making mint ice cream from scratch. He didn't quite have his coordination down (cracking an egg involved slamming it down full-force for a well-messy splatter) but it was fun anyway. I made a batch of mint custard yesterday so we would not have to wait 8 hours for it to chill.

In the evening, I went to Nobu with E to celebrate her latest personal peccadilloes. The restaurant was surprisingly empty, the weak economy in full force.

Tomorrow, B goes back to work and me n' Edie are back to getting our grooves back.

BREAKFAST: 10:30am, toasted pumpernickel bagel with cream cheese and homemade cured salmon, apple cider, 1.25 bowl, hunger 4/5

AM SNACK: 11:30am, "pig candy", just a snap
I was given really decadent chocolate-covered bacon as a gift for the ice cream excursion. Really tasty, but it just tastes so....unhealthy.

PM SNACK: 12:30pm, mint ice cream, .25 bowl, hunger 4/5

LUNCH: 3pm, mac n' cheese, .75 bowl, hunger 4/5

DINNER: 6:30pm, 7 small seafood courses, green tea mouse over sesame cake with redbean paste, half a bottle of sake, 1.5 bowl, hunger 4/5

EVENING SNACK: 10pm, mint chocolate chip ice cream. .25 bowl, hunger 4/5

Winding Down

A day with the family. B left early to get her hair did, and Edie and I joined her. While waiting for her hair to be cooked to well-done, we sat in a Chinese bakery and I ate an almond cookie. They had the very-Chinese stuff (sesame balls with super sweet black-bean paste in the middle) and the very-American (chocolate chip cookies), but I thought the almond cookie was a nice Chinese-American compromise. I forgot how crumbly they are, and about 1/3 of the cookie was caught between me and strapped-on Edie.

We spent the day at my brother-in-law's place, watching his whole-wall television, ordering in food, and watching Edie crawl across with a foot print as large as our whole apartment. A very chill way to wind down the holiday week.

BREAKFAST: 10:30am, almond cookie, .5 bowl, hunger 4/5

AM SNACK: 11:15am, slice of streetza, .75 bowl, hunger 4/5

LUNCH: 12:30pm, vegetarian burrito, 1.25 bowl, hunger 3/5

PM SNACK: 4pm, diet root beer

DINNER: 8pm, half a margerita pizza, Cesar salad, glass of chardonnay, 1.5 bowl, hunger 4/5

EVENING SNACK: 10:30pm, 2 chocolate chip cookies, .5 bowl, hunger 4/5

New Year's Day Brunch

3 old friends from back in the day, 2 spouses and one 2 year old came over for brunch. Made butter and hummus yesterday, set fish for curing then, too. This morning made bagels, using 1oo% bread flour and despite the extra gluten almost blowing out my mixer, they were definitely chewier and crisper for it. I had poppy seeds, sesame seeds and dried onion on hand to top some of them. The fish came out extra mild, almost like salty sashimi, fortunately the fish was extra fatty so it really transmitted the curing flavors it did absorb.

Good friends, good food, a chillaxed atmosphere, and Edie was bopping around and thrilled to be there -- last year she was just a gestational bump riding along B's hip bones.

BREAKFAST: 8am, small piece of babka, apple cider, .5 bowl, hunger 4/5

BRUNCH: 1pm, freshly baked bagel with freshly cured salmon, maitre d'hotel butter and cream cheese, several pieces of babka, seltzer, 1.25 bowl, hunger 4/5

DINNER: 7pm, fresh pasta with school-made meatballs, 1 bowl, hunger 4/5
Dressed with garlic, oil and parm. Pretty good.

In with a roar, out with a babka

BREAKFAST: 7am, organic cheerios with organic dead milk, .75 bowl, hunger 4/5

LUNCH: noon, veggie patty sub on whole wheat, small quantity of chips, diet coke, 1.25 bowl, hunger 4/5
Stopped in at Subway on the way to the supermarket -- didn't want to food shop hungry. I used to eat at Subway a lot when I tried to be vegan -- the veggie patty they have is vegan, but none of their breads are -- all contain a small amount of non-fat dry milk or egg product. Still, I ordered it without cheese. Funny to have a food sensory memory from my early/mid 20s, not my childhood.

PM SNACK: 2-5pm, chocolate babka filling, .25 bowl, hunger 4/5
Oy. Made a large quantity of this in the process of making 5 medium babka loaves. Take 2 1/4 pounds of good quality dark chocolate, chop it into chunks then plop it into a food processor to make mealy pebbles. Add 3/4 cup of sugar, 2 tablespoons of cinnamon and a stick and half of butter and pulse until you have a loose, dry sandy mixture. Intoxicating.

And the dough, oh boy. I never made a sweet yeast dough before. The yeast was activated in warm milk, and sugar and eggs were added to the liquid before meeting the flour. And once met, it was kneaded into 2 sticks of butter! Wowzers! Had to rise for 90 minutes, then get assembled, then another 30 minute rise, than about an hour and 15 of baking. All told, about 4.5 hours of labor. While waiting, I made hummus, maitre d'hotel butter from heavy cream, a big salad and got a slab of salmon curing (salt, brown sugar, dill, kirschwasser) for tomorrow's New Year's Day brunch...

PM SNACK: 6pm, green salad, large slice of hot-out-of-the-oven babka, 1 bowl, hunger 4/5
Had salad in advance of dinner, then when the babka came out of the oven, I just had to cut one in hald, and once I did that, I just had to cut a piece off to taste, and once I did that, I had to cut another piece because the first was so good.

DINNER: 7:15pm, pork dumplings, shrimp lomein, water, 1.5 bowl, hunger 4/5
And there goes 2009....

EVENING SNACK: 11pm, a few spoonfuls of ice cream, .25 bowl, hunger 4/5
Not my idea, but when B spoonfeeds me, I can not say no.

Party with Peas

Got to bed around 11 last night, in a weird state of tired/not tired, but through force of will stayed in bed and got to sleep. This morning B went to the doctor early, so me n' Edie partied on down with some peas and formula, then she passed out in her walker/activity thing and went back to bed. Seems B has a sinus infection and needs some anti-biotics, hence her low energy this week. I wonder if I have the same thing, I hope not. I've never had a sinus infection before, my sinuses feel fine.

BREAKFAST: 8:45am, good yogurt with honey, homemade vanilla extract and raw cashews, .5 bowl, hunger 3/5

LUNCH: 12:30pm, pork and broccoli rabe sandwich, small portion of pork braciolla with fresh pasta, water, bread, 1.25 bowl, hunger 4/5
Freeflowing meeting with L at Frankie's on lower Court Street. As weird as he is sometimes, it's always fun eating out with him.

PM SNACK: 4pm, popcorn, 1 bowl, hunger 4/5
Popped in a pan with olive oil and a little butter.

DINNER: 7pm, gyro with pilaf, potatoes, onion salad, roasted tomato, 1.5 bowl, hunger 4/5
B went to a Turkish restaurant we like while I hung back with the bebe, and she brought me home an entree. Now that's a good wife, friend and pardner!

Low

Couldn't fall asleep until 3 last night, and was woken up by B around 11 to make sure I was ok. We initially had plans for a day trip today, but that went out the window by the end of day yesterday.

Didn't eat dinner last night, and woke up without out appetite. Eventually ordered in, and stayed on the couch most of the day. Fell asleep for 2 hours in the afternoon, dreamt that B & I lived in the house I grew up in on Staten Island, very strange. I remembered little details of the house that I haven't thought of since I lived there, little things like the accordion cover of the shelves that held linens and bathroom supplies, it's specific scent of freshly washed towels and tens of soap bars. How the sun came streaming in on a winter's afternoon, making everything look golden and different. How the old-fashioned pencil sharpener attached to the side of the shelves gave it's own woody scent for days after just one use.

Low energy, enjoying Edie crawl backwards on the floor, trying to think of little as much as possible. Ordered in dinner, and watched TV with B.

I guess this is holiday eating.

LUNCH: 1pm, pizza, Cesar salad, 4 cookies, 1.5 bowl, hunger 4/5

DINNER: 8pm, chirashi sushi, shrimp tempura hand roll, shumai, green salad, 1.5 bowl, hunger 4/5

Hoot n' Holler

Feeling a little run down today. After eating an unusually large lunch, didn't eat anything else all day -- definitely not typical of my eating day.

BREAKFAST: 9:45am, organic cheerios with organic dead milk, .5 bowl, hunger 4/5

AM SNACK: 11am, 3 cookies, .25 bowl, hunger 4/5
B actually hid these from me, and I had to hoot n' holler for 'em.

LUNCH: 3pm, Philly cheese steak with fries, tofu sticks with marinara, chocolate cake, water, 2 bowl, hunger 4/5
B, Edie & I took the ferry over to Ikea, but popped over to the Hope & Anchor for a greezy lunch with a friend. Then we popped next door to Baked, a world-class bakery in Red Hook. I definitely overate, and overate heavy, greasy food. Does deep fried tofu balance beef n' cheese?

Ah, yeah

Woke up around 4am after getting to bed around 10pm. Road my bike over to Greenpoint to look in after E's cat while she's away. Weather wasn't too cold, it was dry, the sun had this spectacular hue of breaking through many day's gloom and it was happy to be able to stretch it's arms. While huffing up the Williamsburg Bridge, I had one of those 'Ah, yeah' moments -- this is why I ride, this is why I must get Edie on a bike as soon as can be negotiated with B. Being able to read what the weather is saying, observing something as pedestrian as the bridge and every rivet looking like a story, the trains whizzing by and the sparse fellow pedestrians on the bridge, it was a feeling of connectedness that is hard to achieve without recreational medication. Its a feeling I had every day on my cross-country bike trek. It's something that is a goal to achieve as often as possible.

BREAKFAST: 6am, good yogurt with homemade vanilla extract, honey and cashews, 1 bowl, hunger 4/5

AM SNACK: 8am, sour cream donut, .5 bowl, hunger 4/5
While in Greenpoint, I stopped in on Peter Pan, an old-style bakery on the business strip there. Not as good as Donut Plant, but it is a top example of the old-school style. My donut was slightly crisp on the outside, tender and rich on the inside, and the flavor of the sour cream shown through. Nice.

LUNCH: 1:15pm, Stouffer's French bread pizzas, 1.25 bowl, hunger 4/5

PM SNACK: 4:30pm, mac n' cheese, 1.25 bowl, hunger 4/5

PM SNACK: 8pm, pint of bad ice cream, 5 cookies, 1.25 bowl, hunger 4/5
In one of those moods.

Intermission

B took me to the Met for an Opera in the afternoon, and just like I used to do with my dad, I slept through most of it. It was nice getting dressed up, having Yomomma come down and look after Edie, and going and coming back. My only issue is that it was a one-act opera -- no intermission. Intermission is when you take a break from your nap, stretch your legs and admire the building some of the finest people watching. On top of that, you can get a flute of champagne AND a brownie! They should sell tickets just for intermission. I remember one opera had like 5 intermissions, that was a mind-blower.

BREAKFAST: 9:30am, toasted pumpernickel bagel with cream cheese and sable, 1 bowl, hunger 4/5

AM SNACK: 11am, tortilla chips, pancake, .5 bowl, hunger 4/5

PM SNACK: 4pm, baby carrots, .5 bowl, hunger 4/5

DINNER: 5pm, catfish burrito with rice, beans, guacamole, salsa, 1.25 bowl, hunger 4/5

Prize Winner's Ice Cream

Woke up at 10:30 feeling horrible, scratchy throat, headache, tight stomach. Laid around for a while, then started off on Grandma Birdie's "Perfect Noodle Pudding". I got the recipe from B's mom, who got it from her sister, who got it from Grandma. It called for a few specific brands, like "Pennsylvania Dutch" wide noodles (I found Maneshevitz) and "Fleichman's" margerine (I replaced with organic butter.) She called for coating the noodles with beaten eggs, before adding each ingredient one at a time, but I basically made a sauce in the mixer, then mixed in al dente noodles after.

Everyone seems to love the noodle pudding, but I thought it was kind of gross -- noodles n' paste. But this was Grandma Birdie's recipe, and it's hard to compete with sense memory and nostalgia. The recipe was thus:

8 oz wide egg noodles
4 eggs, beaten
3 oz cream cheese
8 oz sour cream
8 oz farmer's cheese
1 tp salt
Bread crumbs to top

Cook noodles al dente. Blend all other ingredients except crumbs. Combine noodles and sauce in baking pan, top with crumbs, bake at 350˚ for 30 minutes or until top is browned.

No sugar, nothing to really give variety to the texture, no flavors other than the rather mild cheeses.

There was an Emmy winner, a New York Times columnist, a New Yorker contributor, a best selling author and a recent Pulitzer Prize winner at the Xmas party we attended, and they all were very complimentary on my ice cream. He he.

BREAKFAST: 11am, 2 pancakes, 2 tylenol, .25 bowl, hunger 4/5

AM SNACK: 11:45am, tortilla chips with salsa fresca, .25 bowl, hunger 4/5
I know tomatoes are out of season, but this is ridiculous. Never had such flavorless salsa as this batch of Wholefoods salsa. Gotta make some myself, there are ways of jazzing up bland tomatoes.

PM SNACKING: 2pm-6pm,several pigs in blankets, bite of noodle pudding, a couple of small latkes, a slice of ham, a slice of turkey, half a bagel with salmon, some ice cream, a few chocolates, a little slice of chocolate cake, glass of fizzy water, 1 bowl, hunger 4/5

DINNER: 9pm, vegetable dumplings, .5 bowl, hunger 3/5

Eating comfort.

We were supposed to go out to the movies, then get some Chinese or Asian food or whatever, but B felt ill and spent most of the day sleeping it off. I got to bed around 6am, and was woken up with some arm twisting, and spent the morning making a large mac n' cheese. I was intending this for tomorrow's get together of B's family, but it was changed at the last minute for B's Grandma's recipe for noodle pudding, so this needed to be cooked off or eventually the milk and cheeses would go bad.

Never ate hot mac n' cheese right of the oven, I usually let it set for an hour or two, but this was pretty damn good. I let the roux get to the brown stage, I tripled the Worcestershire sauce, and used whole wheat panko and grated Parmesan to form the crust. I also cut back the noodles by 1/4 to make a saucier product. Probably the best mac n' cheese yet. I think powdered mustard in a larger quantity than the small sprinkle of cayenne will give a bigger flavor, too.

As B slept, took a walk in the 'hood with Edie. Stopped by the local supermarket to pick up some butter for tomorrow's noodle pudding. Very busy, but enough staff were around to handle it. Overheard a conversation with a register person -- they're actually open on Xmas, but a lot of people assume (like I did) that they will be closed. Picked up a walker-thingy for Edie from the office which accepts packages. Set it up, it's basically a basket with leg holes, suspended so Edie's feet touch the ground, and she's surrounded by noise-making buttons (with an off-switch, thank goodness) It's also on wheels so she can move around but is protected by it's bulk. We put her in that thing, and the joyous confusion on her face was a sight to behold.

As B started feeling better, I started feeling worse and felt kinda out of it by 10...

BREAKFAST: 10:30am, toasted bagel with creamcheese and sable, 1 bowl, hunger 4/5

LUNCH: 2pm, mac n' cheese, 1 bowl, hunger 4/5

DINNER: 8pm, General Tso's Chicken with pork fried rice, egg roll, wonton soup, 1.5 bowl, hunger 4/5
B wasn't hungry, and I wasn't particularly hungry either, but I'm Jewish, it's Xmas eve, and most of my life that meant hanging out with my parents and catching a movie, then getting Chinese food, and nothing will stop me from this food tradition. I actually don't like General Tso's chicken, but I haven't tried it in years. I remember smelling it from across the table, as my mom would get it often. And I thought, well, if I don't like it, I won't eat it and I certainly don't need to eat a brick. I also ordered a wonton soup -- my dad would always order a wonton soup, especially when it came "free" as part of a combination, and would always save it for the next day for lunch. The food itself was pretty whatever, but communing with my parents was comforting. I was eating comfort all day.

Squigglebeast

Upon reflection, perhaps the massive quantities of caffeine I consumed all through the day was perhaps not the cleverest idea. While delicious, and was fun staying up until 1am with my wife watching bad/good TV, I didn't really need to shave my head, do the laundry and make ice cream between 2 and 5am.

Edie is beautiful. She's getting more and more interactive with the world, becoming a bit of squigglebeast when it comes to things like staying on the changing table, laying on the couch by my side, or being put down on any surface. She can crawl backwards awkwardly, and when in the crib, she is on all fours, pumping her little booty up in the air, like an engine revving for a quick start.

I had to get rid of my hair -- I have been growing it since Edie was born, but like with Rufus's fur, it's become one of the things she loves to tug on with all her might when she gets close to it. It's easy to put on a shirt to get her away from my chest hair, but head hair is something less manageable. Until now.

BREAKFAST: 9am, toasted pumpernickel bagel with creamcheese and sable, 1 bowl, hunger 4/5
Hadn't had sable in a while, damn it's good. Should be on a pizza.

LUNCH: 12:30pm, 2 small slices of pizza, Manhattan Special, 1 bowl, hunger 4/5

PM SNACK: 2:30pm, hot chocolate, .5 bowl, hunger 4.5
From Jaques Torres, incredibly rich and on target. Got the "small", which was probably 10oz, or a 1950s extra large.

DINNER: 5:45pm, large green salad, potato chips, chocolate cornflake cluster thingies, 1.25 bowl, hunger 4/5

EVENING SNACK: 2am, 2 pancakes, .5 bowl, hunger 4/5

Urge

Not a great eating day for me, pretty good for Edie. She finished up the pear & raspberry puree in the morning, finished up a jar of peas in the afternoon, lots of formula in between. Me, I spent the morning at Wholefoods, munched on potato chips, went to the playdate drop-in and munched on extra fatty chocolate chip cookies, and munched on a mess of cookies in the evening after feeling a strong urge to consume sugar. Perhaps the baked potatoes set it off?

BREAKFAST: 6:30am, toasted egg bagel with cream cheese, 1 bowl, hunger 4/5
B bought the last batch of bagels, and now at the bottom all that are left are whole wheat, a cinnamon raisin (!) and this chewy monstrosity. Why can't I have a wife who can choose bagels properly? Waaaaa!

PM SNACK: 12:30pm, potato chips, .5 bowl, hunger 4/5
Snack of champions.

PM SNACK: 2pm, "chocolate chip brittle", .25 bowl, hunger 4/5
The leader baked these for the playdate drop in. Really just a chocolate chip cookie with extra fat, pushed into a big pan and cut into triangles. Addictive, though.

DINNER: 7pm, large green salad, sauteed curry shrimp with 2 baked potatoes, 1.25 bowl, hunger 4/5

EVENING SNACK: 9pm, newmano cookies, .5 bowl, hunger 4/5

Trudge

Laundry in the morning, a trudge to the post office in the afternoon, asleep by 7pm. Maybe I'm fighting a bug?

BREAKFAST: 10am, good yogurt with homemade vanilla extract, agave, raw cashews, .5 bowl, hunger 4/5

LUNCH: 12:30pm, beef lomein, wonton soup, shrimp toast, 1.5 bowl, hunger 4/5
Ordered in Chinese. After doing laundry, a bunch of chores and living the life with Edie, just felt like treating myself to something comforting and easy.

DINNER: 6pm, slice of Earth Mother pizza, slice of Mel Cooley pizza, 1.25 bowl, hunger 4/5
B brought in some 2boots.

Tundra

Woke up to a snowy world, and after being indoors for more than 36 hours straight, had to enter it. Rode the mountain bike through the tundra to Brooklyn, to look after E's cat, then across the wasteland to C's house, where she has a 8 month and 3 week old border residing in her tummy. Then fought the snow beasts a few blocks and had dinner with Y, at a rather lame Italian restaurant. Why does the lasagne taste like nutmeg? Does the octopus have to be this chewy? The temp dropped, the roads froze, and took a train home to the warm welcoming light of B & a sleeping Edles.

BREAKFAST: 9am, 2 frozen mini pizzas, .75 bowl, hunger 4/5

PM SNACK: 1:30pm, 1 slice streetza, .75 bowl, hunger 4/5

PM SNACK: 3pm, diet coke

PM SNACK: 6pm, apple turnover, .5 bowl, hunger 4/5

DINNER: 7:15pm, grilled octopus, meat lasagne, tiramisu, bread, water, 1.75 bowl, hunger 4/5