Touch and go Thursday

My output of late is depressing. I apologize. The only thing more sorry than this meager epistemoblogical offering is the nutritional value of the crap I ate yesterday. Not to give a way to much of a spoiler but when most of the actual nutrition value of your day comes from a bottle and a half of VitaminWater, you're probably not balancing your pyramid too well.

Starting, naturally enough, with breakfast, I managed to leave my breakfast sitting out on the oven where I set it to cool. It was a Jeno's combination frozen pizza. Much like you, my dear reader, are not surprised by this choice of breakfast, my roommate was not surprised that I left it sitting out as I rushed off to work. At least I turned the oven off. He was kind enough to wrap it in foil and put it in the fridge for me, after our cat, addled by drugs and one of those "don't lick yourself" cones as she recovers from being spayed, jumped off the top of our kitchen cabinet squarely into the middle of the pizza. That probably was not intentional on the part of the cat. Probably.

I did remember my coffee, though: Oren's Roast Sumatran brewed in my French press. It was a black coffee day, although some calories would have been nice. Skipping any real breakfast and drinking coffee, my guts were screaming for something to beat up on besides themselves. I had a little plastic baggie with some peanut butter Cap'n Crunch and a butterscotch pudding cup in my bag that I had intended to be snacks. They didn't do much by way of sustenance, but eating them slowly, I managed to make it through to lunch without noticeable ulcer development.

I thought I might go to a ramen joint in the area of my assignment, but on my way out of the office I caught a whiff of someone's deli sandwich and a pickle and my mind was made up. It was the pickle that did it more than the sandwich, so when I got to the deli, I ordered their cheeseburger deluxe special: one cheeseburger, grilled fresh, about 7" across with lettuce and tomato, french fries and a pickle on the side for $5.50. That's a good food value for buying lunch out in Manhattan. The cheeseburger was so big, I didn't really feel like eating anything the rest of the day.

That may have also been due to nerves. Last night was my first time performing on stage in over 5 years. It was my friend's final writing piece of the semester at Columbia University and she was directing it herself in a writers' showcase. It was about as low-pressure as theater gets, but I still got very nervous beforehand, and as showtime got nearer, my insides got smaller. I had a Charge VitaminWater and half of an Energy VW, trying to stock up on B-vitamins to help with stress response. I only had half of the Energy because, as my castmate pointed out, they contain caffeine, which does not tend to lower stress levels. It wasn't so much that I was afraid of stressing and having a heart attack, as much as the fact that I had to play a drunkard, and I was afraid me hopped up on caffeine and the thrill of an audience after so long without would play more as a crackhead than a drunkard. Even when I acted on a regular basis, speeding through lines was always a problem of mine.

In an attempt to build some sort of nutritional support without inducing pre-show nausea, I had a cup of Whole milk yogurt, some triscuits, and a lot of water. I also had a piece of a castmate's hazelnut banana bread. My wired must have been really crossed, though, because when I first stuffed it in my mouth, it tasted like sashimi. No one else who tried the bread could corroborate my fishy impression, though, so I think I was just going crazy.

The show went off very well. We made a great mess of the stage area, as was our goal. Afterward I could manage to finally put things other than water in my stomach in any considerable volume.
I had a bottle of Odwalla Superfood while watching the rest of the performances in the showcase, then I went home to polish off that pizza that had been waiting patiently, wrapped in foil, perched atop the egg carton and sour cream. It struck me that it was possibly the first time I'd ever had a Jeno's pizza cold before; not tepid from being left to sit on the counter while you took a shower, got dressed, watched some anime on youtube, went to the kitchen to get a glass of water and then realized you'd made a pizza, but cold from being refrigerated all day. Besides being the first time, though, it was pretty unremarkable; not something I plan on doing again any time soon or possibly ever on purpose.

And just to make sure I covered all of my food groups, I knocked back a 22 oz. bottle of Preferred Stock Malt Liquor and some cheese curls as I watched the second disk of Battlestar Galactica, Season 2. At least 70% of that combination comes highly recommended as a great way to spend a Thursday night.