Week 1 - Day 5

Arm Day Here We Go!

Our final day of Week 1 is upon us and I am so excited. Not sure if I mentioned this in any of my last posts, but I’m only going to be doing this routine for the 5 week days. Weekends are mine and mine alone.

Today’s exercises are upper body and core and I love doing these kinds of things. Lifting dumbbells is one of my favorite gym activities. I like the burn in the arms and forearms. Why? Who knows. I also really like working my abs. I still have a lot of belly flab from where I lost all my weight when I was younger that I never got rid of. I have dreams of being able to see abs poking through there one day (and not being able to pinch it out).

My sets consisted of push-ups, dumbbell rows, plank shoulder taps, and Russian twists. The only thing that mentioned adding weights to it was the dumbbell rows. Specifically it said use household items like water bottles if needed. This is where I realized another mistake I made with my initial prompt.

I really hadn’t thought of it before now, but all of the exercises it gave me were using body weight and simple movements. Now, don’t get me wrong, that is perfectly acceptable and you can get pretty far, but I like lifting actual weights. I have an entire workout room and I want to be able to use all my equipment. This had me going back to my AI Life Coach and giving it an update.

AI Prompt -> I need to update your memory. Going forward, no more recipes with avocado (or make it optional). Also, when suggesting workouts, assume I have access to a full gym

I don’t think the avocado portion needs clarification if you’ve been following me so far. However, I’ll explain down in the meals portion of this post.

With the memory update, I’m curious if any of next week’s exercises will change or be different. There might be another experiment to be had about leaving that memory update out versus adding it in, but that’s for a different day.

Another good thing happened today. I remember all my stretches! My little stock cards worked out great. I knocked them down as I completed my stretches and workouts. All-in-all, I’d call it a success. We’ll see if that holds true next week.

Gotta Use All My Spinach Up

Breakfast

I know someone somewhere will complain about my constant use of frozen vegetables. The problem is, in my experience, vegetables go bad too fast. I can only make it to the store once a week so I’ve got to stock up when I can. Sometimes, a vegetable isn’t going to last a full week. Hence, frozen vegetables. I don’t have to worry about them going bad before I can use them and I can keep them in a convenient place and off my countertops.

Which is why, I’m pretty mad that my spinach is going bad.

It’s such a small thing too, but I’m still upset. I’ve used over half the container, but the leftover leaves are starting to wilt with some of them already starting to become slimy. I fry most of them anyways so the sliminess doesn’t bother me, but it’s pretty annoying.

That’s why, for breakfast, I made my egg and spinach sandwich again. Or at least I tried. It turned more into scrambled eggs because I also added my frozen peppers and onions to it. Luckily for me, this was actually another recipe that I was given on Sunday. It was actually titled “Scrambled eggs with mushrooms, bell peppers, and a side of whole-grain toast”, but I don’t like mushrooms and my spinach needed using.

Remember my AI prompt from earlier that said no more avocado? Can you guess what I was supposed to add to this recipe? Yea, that’s why I added that little tidbit to the memory update. I don’t mind if avocados are optional, but I don’t want them to be a main feature.

Morning Snack

I know everyone is probably tired of me singing these rice cakes’ praise, but I can’t help it. Not only do I keep them at my desk for easy access, but I can also eat them one-handed while I still work. It’s literally a win-win. So, we’re going to keep eating them and enjoying them and talking about them. (This is probably a good time to say I’m also not being paid, endorsed by, or am a part of Big Rice Cake).

Lunch

For the third time this week, I tried to perfect this turkey wrap. It also used up some of my dying spinach so it was a good thing to do. This time, I left off the fried peppers and onions and I used about half the spinach I normally do. And it rolled! It rolled like a wrap was supposed to. I was so happy to see this beautiful rolled wrap that I forgot to take a picture of it.

Unfortunately, it didn’t taste as good. The extra spinach provided a nice crunchy layer that I missed. The fried peppers and onions provided a warmth that wasn’t there anymore. It was disappointing.

I guess what I’m saying is, sometimes the best things come from our first tries, even if they aren’t perfect.

Evening Snack

I watched 3:00 pm come and go and didn’t think anything of it. Not a thought in my head as I really didn’t even register it’s passing. Only now, as I type this up, do I realize I was supposed to do something.

I really need to set an alarm.

Dinner

Dinner was another experiment and one I was 50/50 on. Growing up, there was, not a fear but a disgust, to the idea of ground turkey. We never had it in the household, we didn’t talk about turkey sausage. Turkey was meant to come from the actual bird or as deli meat.

So, turkey burgers? Sure, let’s try it.

This recipe was fun to make, up to the point that I sliced the very tip of my thumb off (so about 30 seconds in). Luckily, I didn’t need stitches and I got no blood on the food. Hurts like the devil, but I’ll live.

Once again, I had to deviate from the recipe because of a lack of Dijon mustard. Going to pause here. What’s the deal with this mustard? I don’t think I’ve ever had it, but it’s been in like 3 of my recipes so far. Is it supposed to be a magical mustard like Greek yogurt? What’s funny too is that most of the time, Dijon mustard is getting paired with Greek yogurt in sauces. Oh well, un-pause. Instead of Dijon mustard, we went with our tried and true California Reaper honey mustard.

Frying that burger with my bum-thumb made for a trying time, but man am I glad I did. That was one of the best tasting burgers I’ve had. Most cow burgers have an over-powering “beef” flavor, which isn’t really a bad thing. However, with turkey burgers, all of the other spices were able to shine so I tasted it all. To me, it was a better “one bite” than most other burgers I’ve had.

Would definitely recommend that experience.

The side dish, on the other hand, I literally couldn’t finish. The side was a quinoa bowl with Brussel sprouts. Now, granted, I think they were supposed to be two different sides, but both are so bland that I just combined them on my plate.

To say that it was one of the most disgusting things I ever ate would be an understatement. I would rather eat that Greek yogurt bowl again than eat that.

Now, I’ll also add this. A lot of these issues of my probably came from human error. I used the leftover quinoa that I had made too much of yesterday, rather than cook fresh. The recipe did say to boil it in beef broth, while I had cooked it in water. I also had never cooked Brussel sprouts before, so I probably messed something up there as well.

Hard to say, but that’s a no from me.