By now, I have pretty well established a morning routine, that I only deviate from slightly, here and there. So this is pretty well how each day begins:
- Alarm goes off at 4:30 AM. Lie in bed for a few seconds, rubbing the crud out of my eyes, yawning and scratching my head.
- Get up. Drag on my puttering-around-the-hotel-room outfit: shorts & a T-Shirt.
- Use the bathroom.
- Mix up my Ionix.
- 3 squirts of Isamune.
- Unplug my phone charger from the wall in the bedroom (phone's the alarm clock) and take it into the living room, where I plug it into the wall there. Phone's fully charged, but it won't be for long (you'll see why shortly).
- Power up all my devices and go through the process of connecting back to the Hotel's Internet (wired on the laptop, wireless on the tablet and phone). Pretty simple, just gotta go through their gateway once and hit "Connect to the Internet." No password needed; it's complimentary. That should really be standard in all hotels, but I digress.
- Log into Facebook and message my sweet patootie that I am up (she usually beats me to it and there's a message waiting for me, or it pops up just as I'm about to type "I adore you" into the chat window).
- Check my work email.
- Check my personal email.
- Check Feedly.
- Check for Words With Friends moves.
- By this time, Kelly and I have been chatting back and forth on FB for a while and we switch to Google Hangout, so we can see and hear each other. And while a talking head in a box isn't quite as good as the real thing, it's a damn sight better than voice alone, or just text, or (like in the old days) nothing at all. And of course, video eats battery, and I'm using my phone, so it's good that it's fully charged.
- Have my cleanse and minerals.
- Have my shake and pills.
- Continue chatting with my sweetie until it's time for her to get to work. Hang up and plug my phone back in to charge.
- VPN into my work machine and take care of any issues needing my attention that mere email couldn't do.
- Write my blog from the previous day (this is where I am now).
- Lay out my clothes for the day.
- Shower.
- Shave.
- Polish the fangs.
- Get dressed.
- At this point it's usually 8 am CDT by now, so I head down to the registration desk for the conference and get the thumb drive with today's materials on it.
- Go down to the front desk and redeem my "Green Housekeeping" slip for some Starwood Prefered Guest points (I could also get a $5 voucher to use at the restaurant, but I just take the points instead).
- Sit down in the hotel lobby and crack open the laptop again.
- Check any work email or news feeds that have come up until around 8:45.
- Classrooms have opened, so I go up and get a seat.
So, that's the way that Day 4 more or less played out. Class today was The Human Mind and Usability. Very interesting to learn that a good chunk of web design is basically just mind games. But very fascinating.
Anyway, enough dry talk, now we come to the food for the day. So...breakfast was the usual. First snack was...ooo, yogurt, fruit and granola parfait! Very nice! And the tea all day was the organic vanilla rooibos. They brought it back, and I could not get enough of it. OmNomNomNom.
And then...well, let's just say that I made up for not eating any sesame sticks the previous day by having a shit-ton of them today. Maybe if I eat enough of them this week I won't want them for a long, long time. So, yeah, there's the gluten for today. Well, it's the start of the gluten, anyway. Read on.
Lunch is usually when I have my bar and a piece of fruit. Well, I had grabbed the fruit and run it back up to my room with a bottle of water at break time (and to grab a sweater, because it was actually cold in the classroom today! Glad I brought a sweater with me).
But when I got back to my table in the classroom, waiting for me was the menu for today's lunch, which was, incidentally, paid for by NN/g. Burrito buffet. Beef and chicken, with rice, beans, queso fresco and salad. OK, well, guess we'll be having the bar for dinner, because that is just too good to pass up. And it was pretty yummy. I think I could have asked for corn tortillas to remain gluten free, but I just went with the flour, because I didn't want to hold up the line. I did, however, avoid the carrot cake. So lunch was, with the exception of the tortillas, gluten free (there might have been gluten in the spice in the rice, but there was no orzo, so I'll call it good).
Afternoon snack rolls around. Let's see, what did they put out for us...HUMMUS! EEEEEE! HUMMUS IS YUMMUS!!!!! And it looked hand made, too. Oh, baby. Of course, it was served with crackers and flatbread and stuff. Gluten abounds! OK, so this is going to be one of my "off" days. Grabbed some of those, enjoyed them thoroughly, and then had more sesame sticks for good measure. If I am going to do a thing, I am going to do a thing, if you know what I mean.
I did managed to behave for the rest of the day. Had my bar, and that was it. Oh, yes, and my pills. Still had an apple from before, but didn't eat it. Had a touch of heartburn and it was a Granny Smith apple (acidic - not appetizing). I'll have that with lunch today.
But one nice thing about having lunch as my knife-and-fork meal instead of dinner was that I was able to go right back to the room after class was over. With Kelly being an hour later, this gives us more time to chat (first via FB, later via Google Hangouts) before she crawls into bed. And with me trying to stay on the same schedule as her, it means I get more time to unwind before going to bed as well.
I don't imagine I will do that today, however. I still want to check out that Indian restaurant. Or get out and see a little more of Dallas, even if it just means walking over to the Galleria again and trying a different place. I've heard a lot of good things about Five Guys, except that they're pricy. Which I don't have a problem with, as long as the food is good, but still, I can get a decent burger anywhere, so I don't know. Won't really make up my mind until this evening anyway.
But I'm getting ahead of myself. Gluten factor for Day 4:
- Sesame sticks
- 2 large flour tortillas
- Several pieces of grilled flatbread
- Miscellaneous crackers
- 1 chocolate brownie (I forgot about that until just now. How I forgot is beyond me; it was fantastically fudgy with chocolate chunks in, quite possibly one of the best brownies I've eaten, ever)
- More sesame sticks (for good measure).
Not exactly a shining example of gluten free goodness, is it? Well, Kelly and I talked last night and we decided that the 80/20 rule for gluten isn't really working for us, because any gluten at all can lead to cravings, and cravings suck.
So, when I get back, starting Monday (possibly Sunday although I doubt it), we're going cold turkey for at least a month. May 17th is Kelly's birthday, and we will probably hit a nice German restaurant we love over in Grand Falls, NB, and that means spaetzle, but that will be the exception, not the rule. Other than that, no gluten. Zip. Zilch. Nada. Cravings be gone!
But in the meantime, I still plan to have a little fun. I will still endeavor to make largely gluten-free choices, but won't freak out if it pops up here and there. Saturday will be airport day, and all bets are off, but today and tomorrow I can exercise moderation.
And that's Day 4 and extras in a nutshell. Over and out!
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