When working isn't a problem

Things have taken off, and my schedule has stabilized. This may be, in part, due to roommates waking up insanely early even on the weekend to go showshoeing and mountain climbing and other alien pursuits. Also this cold hasn't helped, I've been waking up before my alarm from the sound of my tongue cracking (since my nostrils don't work).

The thing I am still having trouble with is getting things done around the house, and sticking to an exercise schedule. My new thought is that if I have fun new video games to play, it will get me down in the exercise area and function as a non-food reward (those are hard to find). Of course I can't afford to buy new games so instead I made a small investment so I can do a little h4x0ring. Stay tuned.

The other day, when the pantry was a bit bare, I decided to try cooking up some of this grain mix that's been sitting around forever. It's a combination of Trader Joe's harvest grains mix, some buckwheat groats, and assorted unknown dried beans, legumes and grains. Possibly rice? Who knows. Here's what it looks like:

 

So I cooked it up with some Italian spice blend (no salt when cooking lentils) and it came out tasting like mashed ass. After that initial disappointment, I decided it was a perfect time to make some burgers to freeze for quick protein. Lately my joints have been extra achy and my brain malfunctioning what with the cold, so I decided I might be low on Omega fatty acids. Hence this recipe:

Omega Burgers
Makes 10+ burgers depending on how big you make them. 

1 cup walnuts
4 cloves garlic
6 green onions, white parts only
3 cups mixed, cooked grains
1/4 cup ground flax seed
2 TBSP soybean oil (aka vegetable oil)
2 TBSP soy sauce
1/4 can beer
1/2 C chickpea flour (or other flour)
1/2 C cornflake crumbs (or breadcrumbs or panko)
olive or vegetable oil
season salt
black pepper

Combine walnuts and garlic in a food processor and run until fairly well chopped. Add green onions and puree. Scrape the sides and add grains, flax, oil, and soy sauce. Process until it starts to freak out or a large clump starts circling, then slowly pour in beer until it has a paste-like texture. Scrape into a bowl and mix in chickpea flour and cornflake crumbs, adding more beer if it becomes too thick to work, or more flour & crumbs if it's too wet. You're aiming for something that you can shape into a patty in your hand that sticks together, but doesn't stick too badly to your hand. 

It'll look about like this (note I used Busch Lite because it's not like I'm going to be drinking it or anything):

You can either panfry these or bake them. Panfried are squishy in the middle, but have a nicer color and a crisp crunch.

To bake, preheat oven to 400 (or maybe 425, I had them at 375 and it was too low). Brush a baking sheet in olive oil. Shape burgers by about a 1/3 to 1/2 cupful in your hand. You can squash them flatter on the baking sheet. Brush the tops with olive oil and shake on a dash of season salt and grind some fresh pepper on the tops. Mine looked like this:

Bake for at least 20 minutes and keep checking until they're firm, starting to brown on the bottom and hopefully will release easily from the sheet. It might take longer so adjust times/temps accordingly.

For panfrying, cover a plate with paper towels or torn pieces of a paper bag. Heat a skillet on medium heat and add enough vegetable oil to cover the bottom of the pan. Drop in a burger (I did mine one at a time but you can be daring and try more), and cook a few minutes until you can see the bottom edge starting to brown. Flip and cook the other side for a minute or two and cook until it's as brown as you like. Here's about the color after the first flip:

Put the cooked burgers on the paper-covered plate to absorb the extra grease. Use the leftover oil to caramelize onions, if you like.

I had mine with caramelized onions, salsa and avocado, or the next day with some ketchup and mustard on a cracked wheat sourdough roll. Both are good.


If you have a dog that does well with onions and garlic (they can be toxic), or you leave those out, get the dog to clean your hands for you:

Thanks Lulu!

Stress!

Freelance tip #1: Just because your paycheck arrived super-quickly the last time, do NOT budget for that to happen again.

My last mailed paycheck arrived on the same day that I thought it would be mailed, so I assumed it would be that quick again. Not so! Now my rent check was mailed Saturday and is probably in the hands of my landlady already. Will my check arrive tomorrow? Not until Friday? I have no idea. And I have $12 to my name. Bad scene!

Also, I'm making sure we have everything set for our big long meeting next week, and remembered that way back in October before I took time off to finish my thesis, the GIS guru and I had discussed installing HAZUS on one of the computers in the office so that I could run some scenarios and do some analysis. For the most part, I don't need this until next month, but I suddenly realized that actually, having a couple of maps would be useful right now, and I'm kicking myself for not taking care of that earlier.

There's also this bit of imbalance where I'm not sure if I should take the initiative in contacting people or if I'm overstepping my bounds as a contractor. It makes me question my actions in a way I didn't anticipate.

On a more positive note, here are some tips that are helping me get some work done from home, many of which were gathered from Lifehacker:

• Make a schedule that works with your natural schedule
• I found myself only able to get down to work around noon, but then I was able to crank away until dinner time. So I set that as my work schedule, rather than trying to force myself to wake up every morning at 8 or 9 and get right to work. Before I start work that gives me some time to wake up, take care of house chores, cook, work out, etc.
• An aside to this: if I bring my computer up to my room when I go to bed, this schedule will fail. I'll stay up late doing stupid stuff, sleep in through my alarm, then spend hours the next morning in bed doing stupid stuff on the computer. My Precious stays downstairs at night now and I can check e-mail on my blackberry so I don't have to worry about missing a time-sensitive e-mail.
• Set up a work space
• It's not a private room where I can close the door and remove distractions, but our cafe setup is made for working, and not as comfortable for relaxing. It helps to have others working at the same time. I can leave my Wacom tablet and hard drive in the same place, and the printer is there, too.
• The pomodoro method (set a timer for 25 minutes, work until it's done, take a 5 minute break)
• I just started this and today had so much to do that getting myself to focus wasn't an issue, so the jury's still out on this one. I can see how it would work well, though.
•  Task list
• At the beginning of the week, I make a task list with several items, grouped by deadline or project. Throughout the week I cross them off as I go, and if I hit a wall on one item, I check my list and switch to something else. Whatever is left at the end of the week goes on the next week's task list. I e-mail a copy to my client so she knows what I'm working on, and can add items if she thinks of something that would be useful.

I'll add to this list as I discover more or tweak these things. Hopefully I'll also figure out some stress management ideas. I was on the Wii Fit for an hour this morning but I don't feel like that helped.