Ok, I know. It’s semi-odd to be roasting winter squash in June, right? But I had a butternut and delicata squash hanging around the kitchen and figured I better seize the day.
So I hacked my way into them, lubed the skin down with coconut oil, and popped ‘em in the oven at 375.
I made sure to salvage the seeds to roast too. They are loaded with iron and (quite frankly) delicious. Those didn’t get coconut oil though. They were sprayed with PAM and sprinkled in salt. Nada mas, nada less.
I took the seeds out after 20 minutes, but the squash roasted for a full 45.
Sweetness.
The last 48 hours have been a whirlwind of insanity. I wasn’t going to bother commenting on work, but it’s impossible to separate myself into different parts like that. I guess I’m not one of those people who can keep work at work and home at home. Well, that’s not exactly true, I tend to stay pretty mum regarding my personal life with coworkers (oddly, I’m pretty open when patients ask things about me). But that’s neither here nor there.
The last two shifts were kinda train wrecks for me. These days happen, but having two in a row is pretty crappy. Now that they’re over I’m much more “whatever” about the whole thing. I mean, I was lucky enough to have amazing patients earlier this week (and last week), so I felt like I was due for a crazy one.
I was prepared as per usual…
I woke up at 4:30 am for some one-on-one time with Jillian. Home girl made me sweat, but for some reason my appetite was still snoozing.
I brought a big tupperware of fruit (an entire mango, apricot & apple) with me to eat in the car before work even though I wasn’t hungry yet. Boy am I glad I did because I had ZERO time for breakfast over the rest of the morning.
I had made a(nother) batch of chai chia oat pudding for my work breakfast, but I never got around to eating it. Sad face. It was an exhausting whirlwind of a morning. I barely had time to breathe and next thing I knew it was noon. Which happened to be my lunch break time.
Salad: fresh greens, broccoli slaw, gala apple, delicata squash, raisins.
My hospital has break relief nurses who come from 1100 to 1700 and cover staff nurses two at a time. It’s a highly organized system. We sign up for a time slot at the beginning of the day and when your lunch time arrives you hand off your (work) phone and report to the break relief RN. And voila! An hour of lunch freedom without worrying about your patients.
My ideal lunch break time is 1300. Unfortunately I arrived after all the 1300 and 1400 slots were taken, so it was either lunch at 12 or 4 pm. Soooo, noon it was! The reason I like 1 o’clock is because then I can get my noon meds, vital signs, and meal time insulin all over with before I go, leaving minimal work for the break relief nurse. I hate putting stuff on other people. Asking for help is one of my biggest problems actually. These past two days, though, I would have drowned without my fellow coworkers.
When 12 arrived, I was still racing around trying to draw blood and hang other IVs, so I didn’t get to eat until 1230…
My salad was sublime. And the beautiful ciabatta roll and hummus rounded out the meal, so I felt full and happy as I headed back to the hospital. Game on.
The afternoon went better than the morning, and I even managed to chow down on the rest of the food I packed (apple, nuts, candied ginger).
As a treat to myself, I went nail polish crazy. My trip to Rite Aid started innocently enough (I only needed face lotion!), but I somehow wound up with 5 new polishes.
Dinner was the same old same old. Quinoa, veggies, seitan. I had completely forgotten about broccoli slaw because it’s not sold at WFs, but last week I was at Vons for who knows why and I randomly grabbed it. It’s not organic and I could just as easily make it myself, but oh well.
I had two ciabatta rolls and a lot of almond butter as well. And tea. And candied ginger.
The next morning I woke up determined to have a better day at work. I did random abs and arms sets while watching the news. [I’m currently quite sore, so it was obviously a good sesh]
I again opted for fruit as my first breakfast. My second breakfast was also a repeat meal…of chai chia oat pudding. This time, however, I used ground salba.
I have only mentioned Salba on the blog before once, in this recipe. I first discovered their products at Expo, and plan to do a more detailed feature post on the stuff because it’s awesome. I have both the ground and whole seed organic Salba, which are the perfect substitutes for eggs in vegan baking. They are very similar to chia seeds in texture and function (they gel up and act as a binding agent), but they are more like ground flax in their nutty flavor. Unlike flax, though, you don’t have to grind them for the gel action to begin.
And wouldn’t you know it, it was just as good as the chia seeds. Mmmmmm. Those raisins plump up so much overnight!
I wish I could say the work day went better. I don’t have the energy to go into it. It’s a mystery to me why I got a fourth very heavy patient on top of my already overwhelming three patients, but it’s done now so what’s the point in analyzing it. The thing that was so difficult wasn’t even the nursing side of my job! I have a knack for developing a good rapport with patients so when we have “difficult” people, they seem to come my way. I felt like I was putting out fires all day, smoothing things over between the families and other staff. It was impossible! I wanted to pull my hair out because I hardly had enough time to do my real job, so I definitely didn’t need that added pressure. When they say jump, I jump. That either makes me a caring person or an idiot. I hope it’s the first one.
At least I had time for my work breakfast this time. The rest of the food I packed was relatively similar.
Salad: greens, delicata squash, broccoli squash, carrots, tomato, & Follow Your Heart’s Citrus Poppy Seed dressing
To answer some questions I have gotten:
Yes, I often do eat the skins of squash when it’s been roasted. When I first started roasting squash (pre-blog days) I had no clue what I was doing and never thought to look it up, so I just guessed. I ate the skin and never thought twice about it. So yeah. That’s that. I don’t always eat it though. Thicker squash shells I will cut off.
Yes, I pre-dress my salads the night before. I am a freak and like my lettuce like I like my cereal – soggy. I LOVE leftover salads that you bring home from restaurants for this very reason. Kyle, on the other hand, brings his salads and dressings separately using a tiny tupperware like the one I showed above.
Here’s my pre-dressed salad with a ciabatta roll a la mode. This salad is so-so. Sadly, you can taste the oil-free-ness of it. Follow Your Heart’s vegan Caesar is SO much better.
On my way home from work I called Kyle and he was at The Veggie Grill, so he offered to pick up dinner for me. Love.
I got the same thing. Again. I love this salad.
I had seitan on the side, and then ate an entire tub of WF peanut butter covered pretzels.
The tub said six servings. I beg to differ.
Do you separate your work life from personal life? How much do you talk about/think about work at home?
Sorry to hear you had quite a rush at work those days! Hopefully there are some marvellous days coming! 🙂 You meals look great as usual, so I hope they keep you happy and full of energy 🙂
sorry you had a rough couple of days, and glad you got through it! your salads look amazing. and peanut butter covered pretzels?? WOW. I am speechless.
I hate when really good days are followed with a few really bad days—but I love when crappy days are canceled out by kick-ass days!
Your packed lunches looks amazing as always—thanks for the inspiration. Haha your blog has saved me from boring PB & banana sandwiches and baby carrots.
I sometimes eat the skin on my squash too, especially acorn and butternut! 🙂
I’m sorry to hear about those tough days at work. My mom is a teacher and some years she gets awful classes and some years she gets stellar classes. She is great at her job and I think when they do the grouping they put the challenging students in places where they know the teacher can handle any issues. I’m not sure how it works with nursing but maybe it’s similar!
Anyway, you seem to be wonderful at what you do and I wish you better luck with your next patients! 🙂
Sorry to hear about your rough work days! I’m in grad school, so unfortunately I can’t separate anything haha.
Dang, sorry about all the work woes. I got exhausted just reading through that! And even though you like soggy salad and cereal, I still love you. I can’t separate my work and home–my boss is ALWAYS calling me. It sucks!
Ugh, hang in there girlie with the work stuff. I’ve been there. And also currently dealing with workplace changes and stuff. I can empathize with craptastic stuff.
And pre-dressing/soggy-ish things…I like my lettuce and kale for sure on the soggy side. 🙂
Eek! Glad you got through those last two days alive! I try to keep my work and home life pretty separate but sometimes it is tough when you are there for half of the hours in three days. I also tend to have my sleep interrupted with dreams about work!
Elise, I’m so sorry you’ve had such a stressful few days at work, I can only imagine how challenging it must be to wear so many hats, but you are amazing that you take such good care of yourself with amazing eats and nutrition throughout the craziness! I hope your next shift (and beyond) are much better 🙂 I made a chia oat pudding this morning (well, I ate it this morning) inspired by your chia one, and it was absolutely amazing! Thank you for the inspiration! Wishing you a much more restful and peaceful weekend! 🙂 xyx
I am sorry work has been so rough lately 🙁 I hope things get better soon. I know what it is like to be unhappy at work, and it is so not fun.
I’m SO jealous that you are roasting squash/veg in June! You clearly have AC, Eh ? 😉 I would roast veggies year round if I did!
Courtney
Sorry about the stressful days, not fun! Great nails polish binge at Rite Aid, I always end up buying more there too. The squash sounds wonderful, there’s never a wrong time of year to roast it. 🙂
omg, you get an entire hour for lunch????
Up here in Manitoba, it is definitely squash roasting weather… rain almost every day, most of my neighbours’ houses are actually under water, or sandbagged (I’m glad we live on a high spot father away from the river). Need warm eats to keep from getting all the colds going around!
ugh- we all have those days when things seems to pitfall and you don’t see the bottom.
I work as a PSW as a summer job and boy sometimes it’s really hard! I’m only a nursing student finished first year so there are tons I don’t know and that I am learning everyday…. But all that great learning experience comes with a price.. So much stress sometimes!
At first when I started the job I couldn’t stop talking about work or being emotionally drawn by it. It made me depressed. But now that I’ve picked up the gist of things, I can better separate myself! And I think that it’s essential. For your own mental health.
Just as a side note- Elise, do you ever plan to do a video blog??? I’ve been following your blog for a few years now and I’d love to see a vlog!
I never knew you could roast the seeds along with the squash & eat them..I mean obviously I was aware they were edible I just didn’t make the connection. Silly me.
I don’t have any PAM but could I give them a rub down with coconut oil, too?
Gosh, i’m sorry you had such crappy work days. It seems like being a great nurse almost works against you sometimes, as the difficult patients or more patients are added to your workload because of it. I’d still rather be a great nurse when I’m qualified though, and it sounds like you are 🙂
I roast veggies all year long but not squash, It literally turns my stomach. Like you I prefer my salad soggy, (a-hem, I mean pre-dressed) so I always dress it before I take it in. And, I also prefer my salad to be at room temperature and not straight out of the fridge. Is that strange?
I’m pretty good at separating work/home life. But there are some times that i do take work home, if it’s been a particularly difficult day or I’ve met a patient that has affected me in some way. Tom’s good at listening to me go-on (obvs I still maintain patient confidentiality and act ethically). I sometimes access my geeky side and write a reflection on my day/part of my day that’s affected me. They go on about reflection in UK nurses training and using reflective models. Is it the same in the States?
Hope you have a great weekend x
PS Sorry it was such a long comment!!!!
i know. whole foods. do it.
🙂 glad to help!
thank you! and im glad to know i have fellow squash skin eaters
thats NOT cool.
haha…i swear i hear arrhythmia alarms in my sleep!
thank yolie. you are so so sweet to leave me such a kind and uplifting comment 🙂
no ac! just lots of windows and an overhead fan 🙂
i know. it was an amazing thing to me too (very unlike where i worked in NYC)…clearly im working at a world class hospital 🙂
boo. enjoy the squash i guess 🙁
just keep your head up and know that there are always good and bad days. the payoff is SO rewarding and makes even the crappy days worth it.
vlogging, huh? hmmm…ill start mulling it over…
im sure coconut oil would work too. i was just too lazy to massage it in the little seeds and spray seemed faster. haha.
i agree 100%. i could NEVER give less than my entire best effort because thats just not me.
i dont mind whatever temp a salad is. i think chilled is better, but room temp doesnt gross me out or anything.
we dont have any of that reflection stuff (at least in any organized manner). in general i think journalling is so helpful though, so i can see it being a useful tool to get your thoughts and feelings sorted out.
i liked it 🙂
you’re very welcome, elise, i meant every word 🙂 take care! xyx
yo tambien como calabacera en el verano…..creo que es perfectamente normal
Go you! I love overhead fans–I wish my apt would put those in. They really do make a difference! I rely on my oscillating fan, but I am thinking of getting a window fan…
Courtney
And that you get relief nurses is amazing, too! I work in the MSICU and we get 1/2 hour lunch and just another nurse to “listen” or keep an eye out, but we don’t ask them to do anything for us. If the patient is just too unstable, then you might not even get lunch lol
i know!! thats how my old job was. if i got a lunch break at all it was a good day. but nobody would ever do anything for my patients while i was gone, so they had better be stable and content. im really proud to be at the hospital i am at now. the reputation is backed up in every aspect of care.
i have a really hard time separating work from home. i worry about mistakes i made, patients experiences/satisfaction throughout the day, getting sued, mis-diagnosing, mis-treating, staff satisfaction, missing things in the history or exam, etc. this is likely why, when i’m at home, i do my best to remove my brain from anything…reality tv, dramatic tv, celeb gossip, working out, napping. dont know if that anxiety will ever subside…
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