Things I did today

Another 'yes, I went to the gym!' day. Did legs and core yesterday, so I did arms and chest today. I've done a full week of gym and I really don't see how I would fail my challenge unless I get very sick or injured. I'm able to make sure my social calendar has enough leeway so that I'll still easily get my work out in. But you're here for today's wine and cheese review, I know. Today's wine is a chilled rose wine. (I just can't be bothered to find the alt code to get the correct e.) The cheese just says Gouda. Feels like a let down after eating the other fancy goudas before it! But before I start snacking on the cheese, let's have a look at today's wine. It smells both sweet and tart and light. The aroma is indeed light, and I really have to stick my nose in the glass to get a good amount of the smell to tell what I'm about to taste. However, it smells very pleasant. The taste is MUCH more tart than the smell lead

Got all the things done that I wanted to get done today. I went to the gym - decided today is leg day. My friend mentioned that since I'm going every day, I could switch up leg day and arm day and cut my routine time in half. So, I was in an out of the gym within 20 minutes. It was nice, but also felt like I wasn't doing enough, even though my legs were very tired. After that, I went to the grocery store and capitalized on some sales. Bought $93 of groceries for $66 and have a well stocked fridge and pantry for the rest of the month. I stopped at my favorite sandwich shop, that is closing forever on December 12th, for a Porky Pita, a pulled pork with Eastern NC sauce, coleslaw, and per my request, some habanero pickled onions. Excellent! I'm going to be so sad when they close up next week. But, onto the wine and cheese of the day! The South African Shiraz was... full of tannins and fermented grapes, and not much else. There weren't any outstanding aromas... and

Went to the gym and ran my routine like usual. Happily increased a few of the weights for some exercises. Came home and ate some Thai leftovers. But now we're to the big event of the evening! Here's day 5's wine: A chilled Chardonnay! To go with: Herbed Gouda! The wine is a middle of the road Chardonnay. Light, bright, with notes of apple and some peach. More like a semi-sweet, and I don't feel like it is an over oaked wine, thought this one was made in Australia, which usually uses oak barrels in their winemaking process. I like it! The herbed gouda smells absolutely wonderful. I feel really dumb for not being able to pick out the herbs used, as my brain keeps thinking onion, and that's not a usual seasoning for cheese. Perhaps tasting it will allow me to pick out specific herbs? I think I see dill and oregano. It is wonderfully tasty, and I'd happily eat a block of it. Clearly I need some sort of spice/culinary class so I can find out exactly

Today's schedule was stacked against me. Instead of sleeping until 6am and then heading to work, I woke up at 4am and stared at the ceiling wishing I could fall asleep until 6am. Instead of rushing off to the gym after work, I had a wonderful dinner with a good friend of mine. After dinner, I ran into another friend and talked to her for a bit. It wasn't till 7:36 that I was actually leaving for the gym. I knew today would be the only day that would be like this, and that I'd be upset that I did not do the challenge all 30 days, and fail so early on! So while my brain tried to convince itself that it just wanted to go home and sit on the couch and not exercise, I let it continue to think thoughts while I drove myself to the gym and went through my routine. Success! I went to the gym on my planned hardest day of the challenge! On to the wine and cheese: It's a Spanish Tempranillo. I've never heard of that before. The description says "Rounded and fruity

Excellent day at the gym. I increased several of the weights on most of the machines I used, then followed up with my PT exercises. I like the idea of having a rest day where I drop to a very light weight and focus on form, and the next day go back to a weight that challenges me. I don't want to exhaust myself by day 5 when this is a 30 day challenge. Not surprisingly, I definitely need to work on my shoulder muscles. I'll just keep doing my best and increasing the weight on weight-not-rest days as I move forward. The wine for day 3 is a Merlot Rose. Another "chill before serving" wine. And the cheese is an Aged Cheddar. The wine is smooth, but that might just be in comparison to day one's Brut and day two's Sauvignon Blanc. This is light, smells more tart than it tastes, and I can taste berry and a bit of apple. It has a nice mouthfeel and is very pleasant to drink. It's sweet, but not cloyingly so. The cheese, an aged cheddar, smells, well, l

Today's Advent Wine and Cheese is Sauvignon Blanc and Gouda Cheese. Here's the wine: The wine smells sweet and of light fruit and honey. It tastes more tart than it smells, but is nice overall. The description is: A delightful Sauvignon Blanc from Chile's Valle Central. Zesty and refreshing with tropical fruit flavors of gooseberry, passion fruit and hints of mouthwatering fresh lime. Well that sounds lovely. On a second taste, sure I can pick up some lime in the aftertaste, but I still get a fair amount of honey smell and taste - it must be due to the grape. Let's look into some of the characteristics of this wine. From Winefolly.com : FRUIT FLAVORS (berries, fruit, citrus) Lime, Green Apple, Asian Pear, Kiwi, Passionfruit, Guava, White Peach, Nectarine OTHER AROMAS (herb, spice, flower, mineral, earth, other) Green Bell Pepper, Gooseberry, Basil, Jalapeño, Grass, Tarragon, Lovage, Celery, Lemongrass, Box of Chalk, Wet Concrete Wait... w

Success! I went to the gym and did all of my exercises. I took a picture of myself this morning to get a baseline and realized that my posture is not terribly great. After having two cups of tea (all my milk has gone bad after two weeks away), I got ready and went to the gym, where I had a great workout and enjoyed being there. Along with my new daily gym habit, today is also the first day of Advent. Here is the wine calendar: And with that is cheese, but I doubt the cheese is actually paired with the wine: Oh look, it does say at the top right that the cheese pairs with the wine! Well, let's get started! Here's the first bottle of wine: And here is the first cheese: So I've got a Spanish Cava Rose Brut paired with a Red Leicester cheese. The wine smells lovely and gentle and lightly of berry. The taste is dry and light and fizzy and, well, I'm not quite liking it. It's a bit too fizzy for me. The description says "A refreshing fizz w