What's on your Monday Menu, RNYers?

I work for Carolina :)

oh wow - great school! That's where I really wanted to go - but for some reason my father didn't want me to go there :-( I graduated from high school in Raleigh, so I know....or knew...the area pretty well (I went back c. 20 years ago and I couldn't believe how much the area had grown since we lived there in the 70s - holy cow!!!). I spent a lot of time in Chapel Hill - several of my high school classmates went to school there.

Yes, the whole area is huge now. Chapel Hill, Durham, and Raleigh just bleed into each other. We live on the south side of Chapel Hill in Chatham County.

my brother lives up in the mountains now, so I haven't been back to the Triangle area in eons - like I said, I did go back once about 20 years ago, and before that - wow - it was probably the late 70s. The population of Raleigh at that time was about 110,000, if you can believe it. It's probably quadrupled since then! I didn't even recognize the place when I went back 20 years ago. I can't even IMAGINE it now!

morning everyone. It looks like the US group had a collective nice thanksgiving. Nice to hear. Back to the grind today. The firm's holiday party is on Saturday at the Beverly Wilshire hotel, and from what I hear, the firm goes all out. Then the following week is our secret santa gift exchange and holiday luncheon. Secret santa should be quite an adventure this year, since I really don't know anyone here. There's a soft $25 limit, but I've been told that most people (particularly non-support staff) exceed that amount. I picked our office administrator. If anyone can come up with any fun suggestions (If not I'll likely fall back on an amazon gift card and supplement with little things throughout the week), send them my way!

QOTD: Growing up in So Cal. we had to travel to find snow (only about an hour, but still something that took planning. I like snow and I'm guessing that's because I don't have to live in/with it. I dealt with snow this weekend. A friend of mine wanted pie, so we piled into my car and drove 152 miles . . . one way . . . for pie. This pie is magical, a mountain berry apple pie from Julian California. Anyway, Julian sits at about 4200 feet and we kep****ching the temp and the cloud cover fall until the rain turned to snow. We had to stop a the pie company right outside of Julian proper as they were requiring chains which, needless to say, I didn't have.

My plan:

Still on liquids(ish) for another week (or until Friday since I flat out refuse to go to our holiday party and not eat. I've already put my order in for the sea bass. My other options were filet or rack of lamb.

B: overnight oats with protein powder blended in the food processor until basically oatmeal soup

L: Soup (I brought a can of organic black bean or I may venture out since it's one of the drier/warmer days this week)

D: soup

S: Gingerbread cookie Latte with fairlife milk (I found equal packets with flavoring: Gingerbread cookie and Peppermint mocha. Giving the gingerbread flavor a try; Yogurt before the gym. I also have a quest premade protein shake with me in case I get hungry.

I got the salted caramel, peppermint moch and pumpkin spice. the caramel is my fav

Swear to God, I just tried to hire someone into a new role and they want to wait until January to start because they don't want to miss the secret Santa swap at their old job. Huh? Called the principal to be like--are you sure about this one, lol!? Anyway, I like places like Uncommon Goods or The Grommet for fun little gifts that are interesting and seem more expensive.

Wait the Equal Packets are flavored?? I have seen the flavored Equal creamers, but that is intriguing. I have had gingerbread whey protein powder in my Amazon cart for like a year, BTW, but I know I need another 2lb tub of protein powder like a hole in the head.

Yep, the equal packets are flavored. I'm drinking the gingerbread cookie as I type and it's not bad. I have a nespresso and make two shots of espresso to 6 oz of steamed milk. The box said to use two packets, so I did. It's pretty tasty. I may have to go back for the peppermint mocha today. My favorite drink during the holidays is a vanilla latte with one-half pump of peppermint syrup (neither starbucks nor Coffee bean have the peppermint in sugar free and I have to be really careful because of my blood sugar, but I can't resist) I may experiment with using just one packet of the gingerbread and one regular or one splenda which I prefer.

Ooooh I'll have to look for the flavoured equal packets but sadly I suspect we likely don't have them here in Canada.

Those sound yummy! Where do you find them?