Lunchtime!

Yes, that is two types of Annie's Organic Bunnies. I'm such a fat kid.
Today's sandwich is peanut butter on sourdough. This was the first loaf made with The White Rabbit; the starter that my girlfriend and I began a little more than a month ago. Possibly the best loaf I've made (we let it sit overnight).

It's Lunchtime!

Hold up! Is that two different types of Annie's Organic Bunnies? Zach, you gluttonous child, you.
Today's lunch consisted of a peanut butter sandwich on Wegmans brand 12 million grain bread. (I'm still picking seeds out of my teeth eight hours later). And two (count 'em!) different types of Annie's Organic Bunnies: sour cream and onion, and cinnamon. I think the trick is to gobble down the cinnamon ones first, since you can't taste anything but sour cream and onion for twenty minutes after eating those bunnies.
Notice something missing? I forgot to buy fruit this week. So there's no banana.
And I tried to keep today's meal a little bit lighter, since yesterday was what could generously be called a "feast day". Yesterday was the last day for one of the women who works for me. There was food in which I indulged: three doughnuts from Easton Baking Company (best doughnuts outside of Moody's Diner in Waldoboro, ME) and a piece of cake. I think I was making up for Fat Tuesday when I really didn't have anything.
And that was today's lunch!

It's Lunchtime

A running blog in which I detail what I had for lunch.
Today's lunch consisted of a peanut butter sandwich on sourdough bread, a banana, some trail mix that I made up myself (unsalted dry-roasted peanuts, unsalted almonds, salted cashews, and dark chocolate covered raisins), and Annie's sour cream and onion organic bunnies.
The sourdough bread was made lovingly with my girlfriend. I was teaching her how to make bread, so rather than start easy, the first loaf we made was sourdough.
The banana is at the perfect stage for me. Just starting to brown, when I think it tastes the sweetest. When they're "riper" than this, I think they have no taste, and the skin is tough to peel. I should probably throw out the other bananas I have. By now they're past their peak.
I can say a lot about Annie's bunnies, but the sour cream and onion ones are so addictive. I WILL eat a whole box in one sitting if I don't portion it out. I have absolutely no will power when it comes to that green box.
And that was today's lunch!
P.S. My collection of tiny boxes that I pack my lunch in is actually grey. I don't know why it looks so blue here.

Blood Work and Bruises

I had blood drawn the other day; the second time within a month. Because my company was providing it free-of-charge and I enjoy needles. If memory serves me, they usually do it much later in the year, which is why I went to my doctor a few weeks back and asked him for a workup. And because you can never be too careful.
I've always felt like I'm a "healthy" person. Yes, there are times when I inject burgers directly into my bloodstream, but that''s rather infrequent. (Read that last sentence as: Yes, there are times when I enjoy the Jucy Lucy that is the staple of Matt's Bar in the wonderful city of Minneapolis.) Plus I have a hard time seeing healthy as a relative term:
I can't see myself as completely healthy when I compare myself to my brother. The one who bikes to and from the train each day, plays frisbee on the weekends, and usually sprinkles in a run 4 times a week. Oh, and he's basically vegetarian. And it's harder to see myself as healthy when I realize that the heavier I get, the more belly button lint I have.
But then I compare myself to a lot of people I know and think, actually, I'm probably the fittest person here. Which is not a good thing. I told a friend I needed to lose some weight, and she replied, "Compare yourself to the people you work with." Which is sort of like saying, "Zach, everyone you work with is a serious philanderer. But since you only philander a bit, you're off the hook. After all, those people all philander a lot more than you." (I don't think all my co-workers are this way, I just wanted to see how many times I could work the word philander in to a sentence. Philander.)
So I'm trying to get back into shape. Or relative shape. You'll never see me lift my shirt to show off the Situation. First, that's just dumb. And second, it'll be entirely underwhelming. I'm too lazy that get in that sort of shape. And I don't want to shave my stomach.
I'm sitting in the chair, nervously, while the woman draws my blood. I get nervous, because I think it's like an algebra test. I didn't do enough to prepare and I'm going to fail. I imagine I'll get my blood work back and find my cholesterol is through the roof and my triglycerides are spiking. Yet the guy next to me is eating a extra-large Coney, despite the fact that we were told to fast for 8 hours before, and he'll be as healthy as an ox. And I can't even put it out of my mind, because I still have a bruise where she apparently didn't do the best of jobs at sticking me. Three weeks. That's when I should know. And if you see me back at Matt's, ordering up a basket full of Jucy Lucy's, you'll know that despite my best efforts, I failed my blood work, and it's time to give in.

Unknown Knowns

My brother and his wife recently had a baby. I know this, because I’ve held her, and heard her cry. And had her cry while I held her; I’m not great with babies. She’s super cute, and I’m thrilled for Ben and his wife.

However, leading up to the birth was like playing a game of Clue. My brother kept us all guessing. He would send cryptic text messages that were vague enough that you never fully understood what he was talking about. Not purposefully cryptic, he just usually doesn’t send complete thoughts. And perhaps outside of the context of “hey, by the way, any day now we’re going to have a baby”, I wouldn’t have jumped to the conclusions I did with each new text. But I think, without knowing it, my brother became the Dan Brown of 12 word messages. I parsed everything looking for hidden context.

I was walking through Target when I got a text message that read, “PAPI!”. And the first thing I thought was that the baby was born (at this point we knew the sex of the baby but not the name). And I nearly ran out of the store before I stopped and thought. First, when did my brother all of a sudden become Spanish? And more importantly, wouldn’t he give a few more details than that?

I racked my brain, finally realizing that the Red Sox were playing that night, and clearly David Ortiz (aka Big Papi) did something. Which is actually what had happened. But then later that night I get another message. This one, a picture of a dresser/changing table with the message, “And so it begins.” After which I received a call from my oldest brother asking me if the baby had been born. I assured him that no, there was no baby yet. I didn’t know that for sure, but I felt like I was getting better at deciphering Ben’s statements.

I was expecting to receive texts for the next week like, “This delivery is taking forever”, by which I would know he meant the pizza he ordered. My brother was like the boy who inexplicably cried wolf. As if he didn’t realize that putting together those sounds (wuh-oo-ll-fuh) he would have the townspeople running up the hill in no time. I don’t think he did it on purpose. And while I’d like to blame it on the stress of that week and the week that followed, I don’t think I can. I think he was just unaware.

It all works out in the end. They have a beautiful daughter, and the next time I get a message that states “She’s a pooping machine!” I think it’ll be safe to assume whom he’s referring to.

It’s All in How You Sell It

A word of advice. If you have a million dollar website idea, don’t mention it to your friends and family. Not because they’ll steal it; more likely they’ll just laugh at you. I found this out when I brought up my new website idea: “My Belly Button Lint Looks Like a Spider.” It’s exactly what it sounds like. I envision it as a website of user generated content, because someone else MUST have reached in to their belly button one time, pulled out a ball of lint and hair and thought, “That really does look like a spider.” It can’t just be me. Can it?
Really, I should have explained it this way: It’s a community site, in which people can post photos, ask questions, and converse with other like-minded folks about the questions that really interest them. Questions about their bodies; how does what happens happen; am I the only one?
That's how you get people interested. You provide vague details, question existence itself, and let people imagine it is whatever they want it to be.
But in advertising you learn about the elevator pitch. Imagine you’re in an elevator and you have the length of the ride to explain your strategy. So when it comes to ideas, that’s how I think. And in this case, what came out was My Belly Button Lint Looks Like a Spider. Dot com. About sums it up, doesn’t it?