Wasting Food

Yesterday turned out to be one of those long days that leave you with a bit of frustration. I didn't have much that I “needed” to do, so I started on my list of “what I want to get accomplished”. Nothing major happened, just a series of little events that left me feeling like I didn't accomplish anything. As a result, I was feeling pretty prickly by evening.

The monthly Harvesters Food Drop was yesterday. Hubby goes down at 11 and gets our numbers so we don't have to wait in line so long. We waited until nearly 2 before we headed down there – 2:15 is the semi-official start time for handing out food. But the truck was late, and there was a lot of produce in cases that had to be repackaged into bags or smaller boxes. It was almost 3 before they started sending people through the line.

By the time we got home, unloaded our goodies, and I got everything put away – it was coming up on 4:30. I was frustrated enough that I didn't try to accomplish anything the rest of the day. On the other hand, our evening meals were pretty good. I heated up and sliced some leftover steak, then added it to a bun from yesterday's haul and added some fresh salsa. That was yummy and woke up my taste buds. I added some sliced zucchini and yellow pepper to my plate and munched on those as well.

Today I cut up a cantaloup, and used some fresh tomatoes to make breaded tomatoes for lunch. Hubby never tasted that before, and he's ready for me to make it again. I'm enjoying more yogurt and individual cartons of milk – and trying to do what I can do with a 20 pound bag of potatoes for just the two of us! I totally forgot this morning that we also got some coffee creamer yesterday.

A gal I've known since I was a little girl was in line near us yesterday. We were watching the pallets of produce coming in and discussing the amount of food brought every month. We discovered that we both feel the same way about wasting stuff that we just simply can't get used up – like that 20 pounds of potatoes. We were raised in the same area, with the same values. We weren't raised to waste food. I have a hard time every time we get home with our share of the food – so much of it is on the verge of going bad, and it's hard to even sort that out and get rid of it. It's even harder with you find something you don't care for. At least here in the apartment building I have the opportunity of sharing with neighbors. Unfortunately, everyone was stocked up on potatoes.

In the meantime, I may end up being like Bubba from the movie “Forrest Gump” when he was telling Forrest how many ways he can fix shrimp – there are baked potatoes, fried potatoes, boiled potatoes, mashed potatoes, potato salad, potato cakes..........and there are still only two of us!

Another friend I haven't seen in awhile is coming into town tomorrow to get her dog groomed. She'll drop off the pooch, come get me, and we're going out to lunch together. Twice in one week made Hubby chuckle and ask if he needs to put me on an “eating out” budget! I know he was just giving me a hard time. I'm very blessed that he's happy I get spend time with my friends.