Things I did today

This evening, I went to a restaurant for dinner with one of my friends. We picked this place because it usually does a ton of lunch business but not dinner business, I'd been there plenty of time before covid, and it's a Greek place with a Subway/Chipotle style of ordering - there aren't any waiters, and the only interaction with the staff is when you order your meal.  True to what I remembered, the place was nearly empty. One patron inside the restaurant, one patron on the outside, at the patio. We grabbed the table at the opposite side of the patio from where the other patron was eating. It was really nice interacting with strangers (the staff) who were also wearing masks and everyone was kind and laid back. It all made me feel comfortable eating there, almost no one there, the people who were there were wearing masks, and I was able to eat outside. I felt safe and was happy my first 'dine-in' experience was so positive! https://thesimplegreek.com/ I was a fan of

 Looking good on my goal for exercise every day in August! I have to post my time at some point between today and September 14th for my virtual 5k. At the very least, I can submit the one I did today, however I expect to run the actual course (the course they do when we're not in a pandemic) some Saturday morning so that my times reflect the same course year after year. I'll keep walking, running or biking every day until mid September, at least. So far I've only walked in the rain one time, and hopefully I'll be able to stay dry! Pretty soon we'll not have rain every day, and it'll be dry... and then cooler. Then cold. I might even buy some winter running gear, although the leggings, tshirt, jacket and visor/ear warmer combo I wore last year for the November 5k when it was 40 degrees wasn't too bad.

  This ended up a terrible photo, but I was too hungry to properly stage it and make sure it was in focus, and now it's been eaten. On the left is the bread I made yesterday. It's dense, but quite good for a bread that I didn't add yeast to, and didn't knead, nor did I let it rise before baking. Is it as good as the Guglhupf bread? HECK NO! I'm looking forward to any excuse to head to Durham in order to pick up a loaf or two of that bread. That was fantastic. However, this being 'clean out the pantry' month, I had the ingredients for this bread, so I made it. And I'll probably make it two more times before I'll be out of ingredients. To gussy up my Roast Chicken Ramen, I thawed and cooked in the Instant Pot two chicken breasts, and cooked them on high pressure for 8 minutes, foregoing the trivet this time, and I think the chicken came out better. I added the usual soy sauce, ginger and garlic chili paste to the Ramen and happily ate it, dunking the b

  Today, I made bread, but before I made bread, I needed to make the milk that the bread recipe called for. So I made another round of oatmilk. Only strained it once. Since I'd done this around 4pm, I didn't try it with coffee, but I don't think it'll be much better. Regardless, I'll have it with one cup tomorrow to see. I used most of the milk I made for the dough. I decided to go for half wheat flour and half white flour, and I followed this recipe: https://www.recipetineats.com/sandwich-bread-without-yeast-quick-easy/ It's a nice bread, though dense. I'll make it again when I can pay attention - I made some errors (added the milk before combining the dry ingredients) because I was also trying to finish my workday. After I get tired of my bean soup and chicken Ramen, I'll make some pasta. I have some canned tomatoes and plenty of butter and a small jar of minced garlic and plenty of spices, and found this recipe: https://spicysouthernkitchen.com/spicy-

 Disappointingly, the oatmilk is entirely too thin to be pleasant in my coffee. I strained the oat milk twice yesterday - I'll make more tomorrow, add a little salt and a bit more maple syrup and only strain it once. I ended up putting in a dash of maple syrup in my coffee this morning to make it less bitter. This could either make me break and go buy a container of oatmilk at the store, or it'll get me down to one cup of coffee instead of two. I did end up drinking a cup of black tea after that, just to help increase my caffeine intake. I don't want a headache cropping up due to lack of caffeine. I mixed up the rest of one of the two  oatmilk containers with some of my chocolate whey protein powder and that wasn't too bad. I think I'll continue that until I use up either the homemade oatmilk or protein powder. I'll drink that instead of eating eggs, which I no longer have in my fridge. I used my Instant Pot to cook two chicken breasts. They had thawed from froz

  I made oat milk tonight, as I've run out of Planet Oat oat milk, and I am attempting to use up everything in my pantry and fridge and freezer before heading back to the grocery store. I'll be eating a lot of rice and beans and chicken in the future. However, I'll be looking for a recipe to make tomato sauce, as I have two cans of tomatoes, some butter, spices, and two boxes of pasta, and Parmesan cheese. Dinner was chicken ramen with chunked chicken breast and seasoned with sesame oil. soy sauce, ginger and chili paste. I started the fifth and "last" book of the series The Chronicles of Prydain. It's about as thick as the last book and the author warns that it's a heavier read than the previous four. I'm looking forward to a successful wrap up of the characters. I put 'last' in quotes above because the author just came out with a prequel for the series, so I'll have to read that after I'm done with book five!

Taran had dropped his quest to find the Mirror in hopes of understanding who his parents are, and decided to find a trade within the Commot Folk. He tried to be a smith and forged his own sword, but it didn't please him to do the work. He found the weaver and worked at the loom to weave his own cloak but it also didn't please him. He found the potter and was happy shaping clay until he started to compare his finished products to the master sculptor. Many people attempted to have him learn patience and he would fair better with each attempt, but he eventually decided that he did want to learn who his parents were by seeking the Mirror. He was successful with his quest, but the mirror didn't show him anything other than what he already knew, and decided to go back home to the farmstead he worked at the beginning of the book. While this was a fun adventure and Taran learned plenty, the end just didn't seem like an end. It almost felt like giving up, instead. He could have