YAY More Uses of Zucchini

Date: September 26, 2017

Author: astottler

I have to say, I had much more ambitious study goals for today. However, after 5 hours of intense lectures, and then spending the rest of the afternoon/evening studying/doing reading, my brain is DONE. So, I figured I might as well pop in here to share some updates on how you can use your zucchini.

Also, why is it that now, whenever I want to celebrate something, I by mass quantities of zucchini?

Today I was happy about something and my first thought was, “I should go get zucchini.”

…but yeah, still working through that massive bag. I’m certainly making progress though! Going through 5 pounds of zucchini in a week is honestly not hard.

Monday night, I made a teriyaki zucchini stir fry. I sautéed up chopped zucchini and stir fry vegetables in a little GF soy sauce, then topped them with GF teriyaki sauce. I served my stir fry over rice.

I made double veggies, and separated out half of them before adding teriyaki. Those turned into today’s lunch: I added more soy sauce, a little powdered ginger, and chicken.

And of course zucchini bread is still being eaten.

The highlight was probably making spaghetti squash pad thai.

I used the sauce recipe here, but used sunbutter. My measuring spoons were dirty, so I just eye balled it, and I didn’t have fresh ginger so I threw in some powdered ginger. I would say with this lack of effort, the sauce wasn’t as good as it normally is, but it was still delicious! I stir-fried zucchini noodles and stir fry vegetables, and then tossed the sauce in. Lastly, I scrambled an egg on top. YUM. I was SO hungry for dinner today, and this hit the spot!

I made extra zoodles for tomorrow’s lunch salad: zucchini noodle and corn. I tossed it in olive oil, lemon juice, rice vinegar, garlic, and salt and pepper. I think it was a little much lemon juice though! I also threw in some chicken, and topped it with goat cheese.

In terms of other life things, I signed up for a 5k this weekend. I’ve been regularly running 3 miles, but nothing fast lately so this might be interesting. I have no clue what pace I should even go out at!

I also want to start going to yoga classes. I’m not sure where I should try to go, but I need to figure it out! I went to a tai chi class at the vet school at lunch today, so that was cool! The only thing is that my plantar fasciitis is flaring right now, so being on my feet for 45 minutes was less relaxing and more painful. So I might hold off on that until this cools off. The plantar fasciitis is kind of weird. I think it’s because I haven’t been rolling out enough, plus general inflammation. It gets super painful, but 10 minutes of icing makes it 1000x better. I guess that really shows it is inflammation. Speaking of which, I think I know more about inflammation now than ever before in my life. I feel like for years I would always see studies/articles talking about how XYZ causes inflammation, without ever explaining it. Now I get it. Learning, my friends.

Ever since Chloe left, I’ve been missing her a ton. She has such a big presence, and it feels so lonely and empty with her gone! She also was a surprisingly good and motivating study buddy. Plus, walks were a great way to break up the day! I don’t have class at all this Thursday, and I keep thinking about how it would have been great to have her here!

I think that’s all I have for now. 9pm bedtime….?

Pup Comes to Vet School

Date: September 23, 2017

Author: astottler

Categories: Uncategorized

Hello!

Be ready for pup overload today, because I’m recapping the adventures of Chloe coming to visit me here at school!

My mom brought her up last Thursday when I had a break in my schedule, and we went out to lunch.

Once I was done with class for the day, I hurried home to take Chloe for the first of what would be MANY walks around the neighborhood.

My mom brought me some of my favorite soup, plus a giant bag of Pirate’s Booty. Because the pup was so labor intensive, this was about how every meal looked:

I also learned that Chloe LOVES Pirate’s Booty. It has been sad to eat it alone since she left!

Chloe actually got along super well with Rina. Rina stands her ground, so Chloe mostly left her alone minus some sniffs here and there.

Unfortunately, her relationship with my roommate’s sweet golden was a little rockier. Chloe recently started getting a little territorial with other dogs in very specific situations, and having another dog at home was a little rough. Most of the time they were fine, but occasionally Chloe would get super barky.

Friday morning, we were up with the sun to walk before class.

And then Friday night, I took her to one of the breweries with a bunch of vet students. She can be barky in social situations with other dogs, but we’re working on it, and she was really good!

She made a doggy friend. Another vet student dog. She was super barky when they first arrived, but then calmed down and we all sat together and it was fine. At the end of the night, we let them play it out. When they saw each other the next day, Chloe was totally chill with her!

Chloe is great with other dogs when she meets them on walks, but when she meets them in large groups of dogs and people, she gets pretty overwhelmed and can get riled up and barky.

My Saturday was spent like most of the week, alternating between studying and walking, and then studying WHILE walking. Chloe was pretty wild/jumpy/barky/energetic the first couple oft days especially. Because she is a high energy breed, she needs a ton of exercise. I would walk her, then study while she slept, and when she woke up and starting getting wild and bratty, I would walk her again. And repeat and repeat. Despite the somewhat constant interruptions when she was wild (her favorite thing was to drop my roommate’s dog’s numerous tennis balls under the couch where she couldn’t get them, and then bark until I got them for her…), she was pretty helpful for my studying. When she was sleepy, I felt a lot of pressure to get some good, focused studying in. I also started relistening to some of the lectures I was confused about while walking her, which was really helpful. I’m definitely more of a visual learner than an auditory learner, so listening to things forced me to conceptualize the information myself.

Here are my babes:

Study buddies <3

That afternoon, I took Chloe to a big vet school event with all the first and second years at a nearby park. We were only a mile away, so we walked there to get some extra energy out. Chloe met a ton of people and dogs, and saw her friend again. Overall, she was a good girl! I could tell by the end though that she was totally over it.

Later that evening, I brought her to another brewery with friends, and she was AMAZING. She has been getting better (the behavioral issues are fairly recent, only several months), and I discovered her favorite treats in the whole world that she’ll do anything for. It takes the right motivation, and vigilance on my part! She got barked at aggressively and even growled at, but she stayed quiet as we walked through.

When I got home I had to study some more, which was productive thanks to the most beautiful sight: everyone PASSED OUT.

Sunday I volunteered at a clinic, and had to leave her alone for 5 hours. We did a short walk before, and then a lengthier walk after while I listened to a lecture.

That evening, we took the dogs to the park so they would have some time to get to know each other better. They’re TOTALLY fine outside of the house, at least! Chloe also had her first off leash experience. The golden played fetch, and ran like crazy 100 yards out for the ball….and Chloe watched from about 10 feet away from us. She doesn’t like fetch, and didn’t quite know what to do off leash.

Progress!

Monday night, I brought Chloe to school with me! The buildings are obviously very dog-friendly. We went around 7:30 to study, and so I could show her around where I spend most of my time!

We stayed in a study room together, and she was the best study buddy! I don’t know if I would have liked being alone in a windowless room at night, but having a dog to snuggle with every so often to break up some dense study time makes it so much better.

Tuesday, we ended up walking 2 hours! Our morning walk+an evening walk with a friend along the campus trails.

And then we were back at school to study that night. This girl <3

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Wednesday morning, we went for one final long walk just as the sun was rising. Before coming to vet school, our walks with a podcast became one of my favorite parts of the week. It was even more so here. There’s nothing better than watching the sun rise with an adorable pup, and being up and out while the world is still quiet. It was honestly so nice having her right before a test. I let her off leash one final time…and she just sat there, a little ways away. The previous day I let her off leash at the park when she was wild and she ran around like crazy, but she’s still learning about the world of off-leash!

We had one last study session together before my mom picked her up.

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My mom and I went for our pumpkin spiced drinks of choice to recap the week, and future training goals for Chloe.

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PSLs are not quite my thing; I don’t love sweet coffee. I got a decaf cappuccino with a single pump of pumpkin spice, and it was perfect! Not too sweet, but still the hint of fall!

Chloe and I had such a great week together. I want her to come back soon, but I have to wait until I have another week where I’m not in class for such long blocks of time! I miss my girl, that’s for sure!

Full Day of Eating on a Study Day

Date: September 9, 2017

Author: astottler

Categories: Uncategorized

Guess what? I have my first test of vet school on Monday. As a result, this has been a very study-heavy weekend. I felt fairly caught up on the material, so it was a leisurely study day. I actually like studying, especially when it’s not stress-studying. I tried to keep things fresh for myself today, and take some much needed study breaks. Let’s dive in!

Breakfast:

I started my morning before 8am at my favorite coffeeshop, and had a decaf cappuccino and GF blueberry muffin while reviewing my notes. After almost 2 hours, I switched it up and headed over to Starbucks where I sipped on mint tea and continued working.

I took a break around noon and headed to the gym. I’m restarting my squat program. My goal is strength maintenance. We don’t do back squat strength much at Crossfit here, so it’s good to sneak in a day of my own lifting. I finished my strength work with a little conditioning, sit ups and double unders. Guys. My doubles were AWFUL today. I don’t think they’ve been this bad in years. I could string like 2 together….last week I strung like 40 together. Um, excuse me? My left forearm got whipped to death, and I think I even managed to bruise my elbow. So frustrating.

For lunch, I made my usual weird salad with turkey, cheese, guacamole, and ketchup, and had some crackers.

After lunch, I got back to studying on the couch. Rina decided to join me, and as the day wore on, it became forced studying because I couldn’t disturb her nap and the only thing within arm’s reach was my study materials.

Somewhere in there, I had a NuGo bar as well.

Around 5:00, I took a break to go to a vet school fundraiser at a local brewery. Such a great study break. Delicious hefeweizen!

There’s nothing better than sitting outside with a beer in the summer. I needed the break and the human interaction. I feel like today I was sort of in a mood because coffeeshop hopping made me REALLY miss St. Louis and the amazing time I had there last fall.

For dinner, I microwaved a veggie bowl with beans, kale, tofu, and rice, and topped it with cheese.

Then I got to work on my evening activity! I’ve been on the verge of going pumpkin crazy for a while. (It started with an embryology lecture…apparently association is very strong because I took a developmental biology class during the fall a few years ago.) It was time.

I decided to make my healthy pumpkin bread, which is technically pumpkin banana bread, so it’s sort of easing myself into pumpkin season. Wow though, this recipe is amazing. Better than I remembered!

I ate a piece of dark chocolate while whipping everything up.

I swirled in a mixture of whipped cream cheese, maple syrup, and a shake of cinnamon.

Somehow I didn’t eat the entire loaf, and that’s an accomplishment!

Well, it’s back to studying for me!

Who’s ready for all the pumpkin??

How I Study

Date: September 7, 2017

Author: astottler

Categories: Uncategorized

Hello, hello! I’m taking a study break to share some of my food as of late!

Also…my body hurts. I don’t know what it was, but Crossfit hit me hard this week! I’m not sure what it is, maybe the programming, but I’ve spent a lot of time very, very sore. Someone had a shirt on yesterday that said “Everything hurts and I’m dying.” That’s sort of how I feel right about now.

I have been wimping out on my deadlifts lately (as in….the last year. whoops.) and did them with a partner the other day…so I was pushed to go a little heavier for sets of 5. I didn’t realize how sore I was until the next day, I reached down to pick up a horse’s foot and OW. And then it just keeps building. Yesterday was a spicy little couplet of 65# snatches and thrusters. I was expecting the thrusters to be trivial (for some reason…). Nope. The snatches felt much better. Oh, and here’s a new one: I bruised my hand doing pull ups (over 50 of them, to be fair). So that’s cool. But other than everything hurts and I’m dying, vet school life around here is going well! I’m actually fairly caught up on studying everything, which is a great feeling, and one that I’m not entirely familiar with. I completely changed my study habits when I got here, and honestly it takes away a ton of stress. This apparently is how I study:

On the lap

2. On the iPad.

3. On the chair.

And then this was last night. Apparently Rina knows I’m a grandma and meowed at me to come to bed at 9pm, so I brought my studying to bed.

And while we’re on the topic of pets, guess who’s coming in just over a week??

I believe I promised you some food (and not just animals, but let’s be real here), so let’s dive in!

Breakfasts

Watermelon, a GF pumpkin spice waffle, and plain greek yogurt with honey and cocoa powder.

Smoothie as I ran out the door after Crossfit: frozen banana, 1/2 school of chocolate Quest protein, milk, and cocoa powder. The classic.

Yogurt bowl with raspberry jam and sunbutter. This was supposed to be with passionfruit, but the very expensive passionfruit I got was pretty awful (and basically empty.)

Yogurt bowl with cinnamon granola and sunbutter, plus a farmer’s market plum.

Lunches

Basically all packed salads. The treat was picking up a rotisserie chicken breast this week!

Salad with grapes, shaved parmesan, and rotisserie chicken. Tossed in light balsamic, served with rice cakes.

Fig, goat cheese, and chicken salad with balsamic vinaigrette.

Dinners

Beet, carrot, apple juice at the farmer’s market.

Zucchini and corn tamale from the farmer’s market, plus a kale salad with nutritional yeast.

More zucchini soup with grilled cheese.

When I picked up the rotisserie chicken, it was perfectly warm. Dinner was chicken with ketchup and a side salad with ginger dressing.

This meal was a Quick and Easy FTW. I wasn’t sure what to make this week, so before going to the store I scrolled through to see what looked good and decided on this salad. Balsamic kale with roasted butternut squash, dried cranberries, and parmesan. Chicken on the side.

Another farmer’s market tamale. Can you tell I’m a little obsessed? This was chicken and vegetable. Ginger salad on the side.

That’s all I have—it’s dinner time!

New Uses of Zucchini+Stepping Outside My Comfort Zone

Date: August 28, 2017

Author: astottler

Categories: Uncategorized

Hello! Random Monday night blog post because I am TIRED. I was going to get ahead on some work, but my brain isn’t quite where it needs to be in terms of functioning. Since it’s not too late, I figured I’d pop in here and share some adventures.

I think we left off on Friday.

I had a BBQ after class (black bean burger), and afterwards all I wanted to do was drink lots of water, eat a chocolate chip cookie, and hang out on the couch. And that’s exactly what I did.

I went to Nugget market that evening, which was the local competitor that drove Whole Foods out of business here. It looks identical to Whole Foods inside.

Saturday, I did a high ropes course. So, so not my thing but we all know I’m all about character building. I did some things, and certainly not other. I scaled a tree and jumped off a very high ledge (with a harness) which I did not enjoy at all, but I”m glad I did.

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After the redwoods, this is what I came home to:

Hah. If only I knew what was to come.

For dinner, I had a simple veggie burger, kale and nutritional yeast salad, and microwaved sweet potato with cheese.

After pushing myself and exhausting my adrenaline stores, plus spending all day outside, ice cream was necessary. I’m currently loving the chocolate Halo Top+sunbutter combo.

The fun part about Saturday was we were dog sitting an Aussie. We all know I have a soft spot for Aussies. It’s crazy how similar their mannerisms are!

Sunday morning, my friend from back home visited me with her pup. She came early, because of the projected scorching temperature. He got so big!

We went out to brunch and coffee, and then walked around downtown before it got too hot. For my meal, I had a delicious spinach frittata with swiss cheese and avocado.

After she left, I planted myself inside as the temperature was climbing well over 100. I decided to try out a new use of zucchini. Have you ever made those 2 ingredient cookies, with a mashed banana and oats? Well, I had an idea. I’ve had GF maple brown sugar oatmeal for a while, and I rarely eat oatmeal. I thought I would try that in cookies.

I mixed together one mashed ripe banana, one grated zucchini, and 2 packets of the oatmeal. I formed them into cookies, and baked for 12 minutes at 350.

The final result was delicious, and actually a really good texture! I packed some for a school snack today.

In the early evening, I headed to the gym for a short workout. I want to keep up with my squatting. I took a break from my squat program, but I’ve been doing some other squat-based strength building since. I’m planning on starting it again soon, with the goal of maintaining strength. When I left for the gym, this was the situation:

I warmed up with slow descending back squats, then did 8 minutes of 2 squats every 30 seconds. I used a moderate weight. Enough that the volume made it difficult, but I still got good depth. Then I did a few sets of single leg squats and pistols, and finished with some abs. In and out in 40ish minutes!

I stopped at Trader Joe’s on the way home and picked up a citrus chicken salad for dinner, plus some cheese puffs. I try to limit impulse buys to one item per trip, and I have sure been enjoying these since!

Right as I was finishing dinner, things started to go south.

We lost power, along with the entire neighborhood. It quickly started getting hot and dark, with no end to the outage in sight. When I attempted to go to bed (it was SUPER warm), the projected time the power was supposed to return was the next morning at 10am!

THANKFULLY, it came on just before midnight and the cool air was restored. Also thankfully, I did all my classwork ahead of time before I lost power and therefore wifi!

Monday morning, I went for an early run and then ate a yogurt bowl with blackberries, honey, and sunbutter. I’m trying to eat more fruit (plus hydration), so I had some pineapple on the side.

As hot as yesterday was, today was worse.

You know how when you get into your car when it’s hot out and it feels like an oven? That’s what the air felt like. Just for fun, when I turned my car on at first, this is what it showed:

Obviously the car has been baking, but even so, I’ve never seen a temperature like that! And then this is what it was when it normalized:

Honestly not so much better.

Finally, I want to share my dinner with you guys because it was surprisingly amazing! I made zucchini soup. And yes, I realize I made soup in 111 degree weather.

For the soup, I sautéed 2 chopped zucchinis with garlic and butter. After those softened a bit, I threw in some riced cauliflower, fresh sage, fresh chives, herb blend, salt and pepper, and onion powder. ( I accidentally bought 2 onion powders so I add it to pretty much everything.) I sautéed that up, and then wilted a few handfuls of spinach on top. Then, I pureed all that in a blender with some vegetable stock, and had a delicious, herby, fresh veggie summer soup!

…which I served with cheese puffs. And salad. I accidentally bought an extra bag of lettuce, so I need to eat salad at every meal for a while. I made my healthy thousand island with greek yogurt and ketchup.

I spent the rest of the evening cleaning, doing laundry, and setting up my new iPad! Apple actually owns my life now. I’m currently surrounded my 2 laptops, my iPhone, and iPad. I’m excited to try it out for notes! I’m probably going to do handwritten notes on the iPad for some classes, and typed notes for others. I’ve never done electronic notes in my life, so this is definitely new!

That’s all for now; my sister’s wedding is THIS WEEKEND, so I’ll probably check in after that!