Working at night makes it a bit more challenging to find options for healthy eating outside the home, but it is not impossible to eat food that will truly nourish our bodies even at 3AM.
BYOB |Bring Your Own Baon
Many times this has meant bringing my own baon.
Doing this has made it easier to keep away from white rice and bread – because it’s nearly impossible to find Red or black Rice in a restaurant, much less in an office pantry or a convenience store.
It’s been fairly easy to bring packed lunch, thanks to a husband that cooks. 🙂
This also saved me a lot of lunch money (that I redirect to getting new clothes that would fit better now ?).
I used to skip lunch a lot – because I was too busy to have one – and thought I was saving money then. But it only meant over eating on the next meal which tended to be fast food, and very un-healthy.
For those times though that I don’t get to bring packed lunch, I just do my best to make the better choice.
Convenience Store Find: Gourmet Farms
At our Makati office, where I go 2x to 3x a week, I’ve looked forward to getting my meals at the Lawson convenience store nearby.
I didn’t expect it, but I was so thankful to have found that they offered Gourmet Foods.
Sarap.
I would have to admit, the salads at 99 pesos are NOT cheap. Paired with the chicken or tuna wraps, or a banana, they could be quite filling.
On Tuesday, my lunch of Chicken Mexican Wrap and Sicilian Chicken Salad cost 178 pesos. Mahal if you compare it to pantry food, or a one-piece chicken meal at Jollibee. But it’s fresh, and organically grown. So that’s a price I’m willing to pay occasionally, when I don’t bring my own baon.
And if you think about the long-term benefits, okay na din to spend a little bit more diba?
If only it didn’t mean having to dump all this plastic packaging:
It is possible!
Yes, it is possible to eat better at work. It just takes some planning, and a whole lot of resolve to make informed food choices.
Visiting Ireland is high on my travel goals; reading A Week in Winter gave me a strong reminder NOT to forget. Maeve Binchy once again transports us to a wonderful place in her last novel, published posthumously.
Why do I love reading her books?
Hope. It always seems to be at the core of her stories. Hope that if you put in the work things will get better.
And that it’s never too late to make a change. That it’s always a good idea to take a stand for your dreams, and follow your heart.
It also helps that her stories are set against such a beautiful and idyllic background. Do you also see the movie in your mind’s eye as you read a book? That happens for me a lot, which makes reading Binchy titles such a delight. She has a way of painting beautiful pictures with her words. I guess when you grow up around amazing landscapes, you also learn the words to describe them well.
Have you ever seen that viral video of the turtle with a plastic straw stuck in its nose? Check it out here, if you haven’t. If that doesn’t convince you to SAY NO TO PLASTIC STRAWS, I don’t know what else will.
A few months ago, we finally got our own set of reusable steel straws. I ordered mine from @metalstrawph on Instagram. Although it has been pretty easy for me to transition to using it, I recognize that there are challenges to making this Earth-friendy transition.
Sipping thru steel
Sipping thru a steel straw takes some getting used to, specially to a straw biter like me. I mean, you could very well lose your teeth if you bite thru that. ? But you do get used to it after a couple of sips. It also doesn’t really affect the taste of any drinks, at least none that we’ve noticed.
Remember to take it with you
On a quick trip at the start of summer, I totally forgot to pack our steel straws. I think I had just washed them and then forgot to put them back in my bag. Because I didn’t want that to be an excuse to keep using plastic straws, I convinced everyone riding with me on that trip not to use any with the drinks we ordered from a fast food drive-thru counter. ?Good thing they agreed! But really, it was a bit challenging to drink from the cup in a moving vehicle. But what the hey, my car, MY RULES! ??Since then, I’ve been pretty good at keeping the straws in my bag.
Refuse the plastic straw
Sometimes, establishments still make it hard to refuse the plastics.
When we order food for delivery, we request that no plastic straws and utensils be included in the order. Sadly, they still pack them with the food.
There are also restaurants who automatically serve drinks with plastic straws already in them. Now that is just sad. Whyyyyy?
Don’t accidentally throw it in the trash!
A few weeks ago, we decided to order in for lunch. Our choice: McDonald’s. (We’ve been doing pretty well with eating balanced meals but once a week, we give in to our cravings – ugh, defensive much?)
Before going to bed, I remember seeing two large soda cups on the kitchen sink, with the steel straws still sticking out from the lids. When I woke up, they were gone, along with the day’s trash. I figured the hubby took the garbage out before leaving for work.
Did he remember to keep the straws? I messaged him to find out. Here’s our conversation:
So I left home without confirming with my own eyes that the straws were just there somewhere. After a long day at work, I came home and couldn’t help but take a peek at the trash bin outside the house – yesterday’s trash was there, and it looked like someone had gone thru them.
As soon as I stepped thru the door, I asked – “Nakita mo?” (Did you find them?). He owned up to it right away, he had to retrieve them from the bin! We still laugh about that – a LOT!
But over Mother’s Day weekend we spent time with his friends and their families at an amusement park before heading to a resort. Before leaving, he needed another drink and got us a large cold Milo. Knowing na paubos na yung Milo, and as we walked out of the park, I kept telling him – “Babe, yung straw ha,” as a reminder NOT to throw it away.
We stopped for the obligatory group photo by the theme park entrance and then left.
While in the car, he remembers too late, that he had thrown the straw away. I’ve been giving him a hard time about that, haha.
Then yesterday, it was my turn. We ordered fruit shakes with our meals – because it’s soooooooo hot you just HAD to have one. I used my straw, while he chose to drink without one. To cut the story short, I left it at the restaurant! But no worries, I called it in, and went back for it this morning.
So, don’t leave home without it AND remember to take it home too!
These challenges are all so easy to overcome, and the reusable straw options are affordable too – specially since you’ll be using them many times, and for a very long time.
There really should be no reason NOT to switch to reusable straws. As in anything else, when you do, you just have to COMMIT TO IT AND BUILD THE HABIT.
When it comes to helping save the planet, no act is too small. What are you waiting for? Reduce single-use plastic waste, and SAY NO TO PLASTIC STRAWS!
It’s Day 34 of the global 100 day Project. In this period, I have managed 14 blog posts.
On one hand, I feel like it’s a signal telling me to give up on writing. That I really am not meant to write. Not meant to be blogging.
On the other hand though, I also feel like things are going along just fine.
That’s 14 posts in a month! The last time there was that many posts in a single month on this blog, was in September of 2012. And when else have I tried to write from the Heart, much less end up publishing the result?
Though I haven’t produced a daily blog post, this is really the most time in forever that I have spent on writing, and all the tasks related to it. When there’s a lull in my day, I think of what I should write about next, examine thoughts and feelings around specific subjects, and (try to) articulate them. Sometimes I talk to myself, mostly while driving, so I can hear the words. I write drafts, edit, rewrite.
Now, I still wonder about this platform and where we’ll go at the end of the hundred days. Do I keep the blog up, or give it up?
After all, there’s always Facebook and Instagram. I suppose I can write there too, like many others do. I’ve always craved engagement from readers, and social media is excellent for that. People really interact with the content shared on FB and IG, and there’s almost always no SPAM! Comments are preferred, but those likes (and other reactions) are good enough. And these are from people I (mostly) know in real life.
But then, that’s the thing isn’t it? Sharing anything deeply personal on social media feels a lot like leaving myself exposed and vulnerable to people I actually know. I didn’t really think of it that way before, but the truth is, I can post anything on my blogs and not worry about judgment – readers, when there are any, are mostly strangers. While anything I share on FB or IG will likely be seen by my Mom, my husband, and just about every one else I know. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not afraid that the people in my life will be too judging!
I don’t post anything I could not say to another person directly. I am almost never hateful, and I don’t care for social media posts that tend to be negative or bullying, so hindi ako natatakot that people will read something I write and be so surprised that way. Arghhh. I don’t know, it’s just, why do I all of a sudden feel so exposed?
Seems like the husband and I, we have some of our more interesting, and funny, conversations on the road.
Like today, while running errands. We had just seen a few episodes of Shark Tank on Netflix so the husband was on a business/product development frame of mind. Here are a couple problem areas he thought about addressing:
A solution to the long queues that customers have to suffer through at the bank for whatever business they have to do there. It’s such a waste of time. Today, we actually went to another bank because the first one we went to had such long lines.
Modernizing the Sorbetero so he wouldn’t have to suffer under the intense heat of the sun pushing his ice cream cart.
I can’t go into detail on any of his pitches, but here’s what I had to say: Not scalable. And for that reason, I’m out! 🙂
I like these moments. And really, any opportunity to have a real discussion.
Sometimes we also talk about the latest News (or gossip), or interesting posts on our Facebook feeds.
We also talk about work a lot. Mostly, he vents out about his work, and I either just hear him out and give advise, or I call him out on his attitude towards the issue.
I really enjoy our conversations. From the most trivial, to the more serious topics. And today I am reminded of how just talking got us falling in love with each other.
