What's on your Wednesday Menu?

Yep, it's 10 pounds! I have a regular kitchen bag sized can and a little one lined with a Walmart bag in the bathroom. Unfortunately, I was just behind on cleaning up, so I filled a couple of bags just halfway to offset the weight. Hoping to be cleared next week. Helps that surgery was already almost a week ago since I spent so much time at the hospital.

From what I remember after RNY surgery, I think the lifting restriction was about 10 lbs. anything under that was not a big deal. Hopefully you don't have that much trash. I also remember both the Dr and the NUT saying get moving, walk walk walk. Don't stay immobile. The NUT specifically was adamant that I incorporate exercising at the gym, and not just walking, as soon as possible (around 3 weeks after surgery). Hopefully you can get back to a normal life asap.

Sadly, I've had more than a bit of food waste the past few weeks, both from being out for five days and for prepping food I couldn't eat as things progressed. So...more than I'd like right now. All taken care of, though!

I love the stay active advice. While I've been on leave, and today, I'll go to the Walmart to walk around. Serves a couple of purposes. I can get what I need and I'm in a public place just in case something happens. I'm slow. I'm weak. I stopped for five breaks on the benches and chairs around the store...but I'm moving and doing it on my own. Got to get stamina and endurance going, even a little.

I can definitely understand the slow food progression as you don't want to experience the pain again. I hope it goes well and continue to take good care of yourself.

Thank you! I get the same cramps but I know there could be contributing factors. I'm doing so much soft food. Protein puddings and soups. I've done so much reading on bezoars and how to stave them off in the future.

Humpty Hump!

Sunday was our big adventure.

As far as I can tell, I have been assigned the role of posting the drink pictures. But I have also been instructed not to post the cute pictures. Those are being saved for Photo Friday. So what if cuteness inadvertantly slips into the drink pictures? i would say to either avert your eyes, or practice your affirmations: close your eyes, place your fingers lightly at your temples and chant "mmmm, Jim is not actually that cute and is somewhat overrated." The one exception is that if the drinks or the glassware that contains them are the source of the cuteness, then cute away, Friday or no.

There is one Michelin three star restaurant in Chicago, its called Alinea, and the chef, Grant Achatz appears on shows like Top Chef from time to time. I went in November of 2019 and posted pictures. At the time, Emily said " I don't know if that is the best restaurant that I have ever seen, or the most bougie, but Wow!" In an act of great diplomacy, Sheila noted that "those are really small courses, you probably didn't do that much damage", calorically. Chef Achatz also owns a ****tail bar called The Aviary, which practices similar feats of molecular gastronomy within the realm of drinks.

We had a 5:15 Sunday reservation. Lisa and Roger took the train with us from our home in the Western Suburbs. Lisa looked beautiful with her styled hair and matching black suit and wrap. Me and Roger looked comfortable. We walked down town, caught the train and were off. We creeped into Chicago, walked about a half a mile to the restaurant. And were about 45 minutes early. So we made a short detour to a coffee shop, ate a completely unnecessary pastry, and I showed Lisa Little Goat, where me and Trish had lunch in June of 2019. QJB actually knows Stephanie Izzard, but I can't remember why.

The 45 minutes were up and we were off.

The first course is a punch. It comes with an infusion of thyme, cranberry and orange and actually changes flavor as it sits on the table.

The punch came with a scallop and caviar dish. Despite telling the restaurant 4 times that I have no food allergies, I am allergic to scallops so I gave mine to Marilyn. No glasses were stolen.

The next drink was called a Zombie Panda. The red ice in the Zombie Pandas is actually frozen balls of Cherry Brandy, as they melt the drink gets stronger. This was my favorite and it was served with two scallion fritters. Lisa is a really good WLS patient and sells her carbs dearly (I'm talking about you greasy bun from the Cubs that went straight to the trash). But the fritters were special.

At this point Lisa had to visit the ladies room. We know that because she leaned forward on the table, wrapped her arms around her fritters, lunch and Zombie and said "Nobody take any of my stuff while I am gone." Marilyn thought that she meant that she was worried somebody would try to take Roger, but was quickly disabused of that notion.

Things got a little crazy for the third course, called Peas and Carrots. We had a green pea and crab soup and a carrot based drink that contained a popsicle made from hay bales. Timely for Derby weekend.

The fourth course was called A Moment of Silence. I don't have a picture, but do have a video which I can send people if they want to see it. The moment silence was the burning of something or other with a blowtorch to caramelize something else. A bit hazy on the science. That was served with a salad of duck, butternut squash and mushrooms.

I actually drank Lisa's Moment of Silence in the interest of normalizing weight to ****tail ratios.

The last drink was an ode to the Wendy's Frostee. Complete with truffled chips for dipping.

We tried to no avail to gain admittance to the Aviary's secret bar called The Office. Maybe next time. Then it was time to go home.

Given that it was still relatively early and we were for the most part cogent, we decided to do an impromptu movie night. After a lovely ride home with a really nice Uber Driver (who like me operates a branch of Bank of Dad), we opened two more bottles of Spring Mountain and settled in to watch Bottleshock.

One of the bottles was older and had a very crumbly cork. I must have sighed audibly when it did not open with the traditional cork puller. Its always a toss-up anytime I am required to operate that Ah So cork remover, and I did not want to serve our guests wine with crumbled cork in it. But i pulled this one off without a hitch. We watched the movie in content silence until the aforementioned fritter plea.

I will share Friday and Monday evenings tomorrow and then On Friday I need to complain about our return to office policy.

QOTD: Literature and then history.

Breakfast: Egg sandwich

Lunch: Steak

Dinner: Chicken and vegtables

Have a great day, all!

How fun! Such a wonderful time!!

Marilyn thought Lisa was worried someone would take Roger

I loved reading through your story, sounds like an awesome time.

You sure do paint a picture! Sounds like a lovely visit. Can't wait to see more!

Not sure when but I am definitely coming for a visit.