Bento #30: Another "Oh no, what's for lunch?" Lunch

Oh, where would the Sneaky Kingdom be without fried rice?  Hungry, that's where.  The Ubiquitous Fried Rice, some strawberries, and the interested l'il Learning Walrus that We made when We were learning to make stuffs out of clay.  Learning Walrus would like some noms?  Then who are We to deny him!

Man, We tell you, this was the first day out of the prelims closet, and it was a struggle to get this lunch made.  If fried rice weren't basically as easy as making a sandwich, We would have been screwed. Our royal brain was so completely toast.

But let it be said--it was all in good pursuits.  After all, We passed with distinction, not an easy honor to get.  Our committee said that Our exam and oral defense of it was one of the best they'd ever seen.  They sounded excited about the bits of Our exam that pointed towards Our dissertation ideas, and seemed ready and excited to jump in on that process, which bodes really well for Us finishing Our dis in a year (all the funding Our university is willing to give Us).  Oh, We are so relieved.  So happy.  So grateful to be someone who has the protected little life to let Her think these complicated and fun thoughts. 

Bento #29: Some Stuff We Found in the Fridge

We were at T-24 for prelims when We packed this lunch.  Yes, this was the day before the written exam, and We had a thousand more pressing things to freak out about than lunch.  So this was definitely a "er, is there food here anywhere?" kind of lunch.  We suspect that Our fridge was also a bit on the empty side at this point, due to nonstop studying. 

This is why this lunch is clearly not enough food for a lunch.  We suspect that, all told, there were about 250 calories here.  Maybe (remember the oil in the bear).  We know that this is not a lunch.  This is a large snack.  We do not suggest that anyone else bring this for lunch unless, as We did, you go home about three hours after eating it and eat another snack.

You can see what it is for yourself: spinach and tomato salad with vinegar and oil in the little bear; an apple, and a greek yogurt.  This yogurt also sucked.  Which is not to say it was bad, necessarily, but just that it tasted like slightly thickened regular yogurt.  We mean, it was probably 20 times better than that terrible nonfat 90 calorie yogurt the Queen (Our Mama! <3) eats for lunch, but We generally eat a tastier yogurt, so this particular yogurt was not so impressive. 

Royal Decree:  All yogurt must have a minimum of 1% fat content.  2% is better.  More fat is at your own discretion.

Notes for figuring out the King's family, as royal lineages are often quite complex: We, Asher, are the King.  Our Mom prefers the title "Queen."  Our Grandma is the Queen Mother.  Our Dad is a knight, the Royal Man-at-Arms, Captain of the Royal Guard, etc. unless the Queen is irritated with him, at which point he is the Royal Concubine, a role he plays well and with humor. 

Bento #28: Cobbled Together

Man, were We busy that day.  It was 5 days before prelims, and We had to somehow sling together a lunch and rush off to school--gah.  No good.  Stress was very, very high.  Evidence: bringing Our lunch in an old miso container.  Yes, We had not done the dishes in quite some time.  Also note the plastic spoon, for the same reasons. 

Enter a no-brainer lunch: fried rice.  Sweet Jesus.  Meanwhile, one of the the other grad students has a sister who had a Chinese-food-themed birthday party, and he brought a huge box of leftover fortune cookies to school.  Of course, these fortunes were custom-printed and were all about how awesome his sister is, but still, fun to get a cookie to go with Our fried rice.

Hm, does this count as a shame lunch?  Let Us sum up: plastic spoon, weird container, fried rice (not in itself shameful, of course, and yet indicative of a certain je ne sais quoi mais j'ai des soupçons), no sides of fruit or more veggies--not even instant miso or something, scavenged cookie--yes, yes, I think this is officially a shame lunch.

*click!*  Yep, We have now added the shame tag to you, little lunch.

In the background is a Nalgene of tea and the graduate student lounge/computer room.  And Our keys--that's right, keys to the castle, right there.  Such power to be contained in so ordinary an object.

Snackbox: Egg and Tea

We packed this snackbox a few days before prelims, so We could go study somewhere without feeling all starving.  So here you see dried pineapple rings, a tiny cheese, and an Easter egg!  It looks like the egg is cracked, but We assure you it is not; the dye just ran in funny patterns on that side of the egg, making it look cracked.  We were amused.  And green tea, because it was mere days after the terrible Incident that made Us feel so bad.

P.S.  It is these huge bowl-cups that did the damage in the Incident.  Two--that's right, not one, but two--of these full of coffee.  And cupcakes after.  Good lord, what were We thinking?  Now you can see the scope of Our madness.

Bento #27: The Easter Reign of Eggs Continues!

At least it's prettier this time!  Here We have an Easter-egg-salad sandwich on Kingdom-made bread, with carrot sticks and four adorable l'il strawberries all nestled in together.  We love cute strawberries!

We like to show you the innards of things.  Is that too much?  TMI?  A little too prurient for all those gentle souls out there?  We have to admit, We do not care.  We are far too interested in seeing.  And We want you to see too.  Rawr!

Bento #26: Egg Salad Sandwich

Now, let the parade of lunches begin!  We have a backlog of lunches from the days before the prelims closet that We did not get posted in Our efforts to cram knowledge in Our head.  So We will move through these dull-ish days in a calm and stately manner and then get back to more interesting (read: more time in the Kingdom) lunch opportunities!

Here is a sandwich.  An egg-salad sandwich, as it turns out, because this lunch was made not so very far after Easter, and while we are pretty much an apatheistic Kingdom, We do love dyeing eggs for Easter.  Thus, egg salad.  On the Kingdom's own bread!  Hooray!  Death to the shame bread! 

With carrots and apples.

Oh, and there's a custard donut in the background.  One of the other TAs brought donuts in for some reason, and when We went to the grad computer lounge, someone had left a box of 'em in there, which is Standard Operating Procedure for getting rid of food you no longer want.  It may have been to bribe students for higher teacher reviews--statistics demonstrate that if you feed students during your teacher evalutations, you get more favorable responses.  We no longer remember the rationale, but We do recall the donut.  It was custardelicious.

Snackbox: Prelims Day 3

The third day snackbox for Our prelims wasn't a snackbox at all, but a snackjar!  (You also get to see the inside of the Royal Fridge this way.) 

We decided that the apple and yogurt option, while delicious, was far too fiddly for prelims.  Too much messing about while trying to also type and think.  No good.  Time for a smoothie!  This one has soymilk, strawberries, orange/pineapple juice concentrate, and vanilla-flavored vegan protein powder.

It was, We think, the smartest of the options.  Not too sweet, but fruity, and it totally ended the midmorning snackish moment (normally We wind up eating lunch around 11:30 or so because of Our teaching schedule).

Hooray end of writing exams!  Now on to the last bit, the oral defense.  Be watching: We plan to pack a big group snackbox for that.  People with snacks are less prone to be stabby, and We will take all the anti-stab We can get.

Snackbox: Prelims Day 2 and a Bonus Bento

The snackbox for Prelims 2: Greek yogurt and apple slices to dip in it, with two charming little strawberries taking up the extra space.

The day 1 snackbox was excellent brain fuel.  But We found out that the dried fruit and the cookie was too sweet.  Meh.  That said, We are also way tired of things in tortillas. We have been eating burrito-y devices for dinner lately, and so two tortilla-based things in one day is too much!  Rather than change dinner (We still have refried beans left!), We will change Our snackbox.  We hope the yogurt is not too sweet.  We also have hopes that the yogurt will soothe Our still troubled tummy, send some backup to the front lines.  Perhaps Our tummy troubles will go away when the stress does.

In related news, We have been going on a yogurt quest lately, eating small quantities of various Greek yogurts before We buy a giant tub.  This has been a wise idea.  Most stores seem to stock mostly fat-free Greek-style yogurt, which We think is a shame and a farce.  We spent half a year in Greece, and let Us assure you, We did not find fat-free yogurt in that kingdom!  We prefer 2%.  Enough to make the yogurt tasty and give it some body; not so much that We feel saturated with fat.  2% Greek yogurt only really comes in tiny tubs.  We can find giant tubs of 0% yogurt, but We have not found a kind of 0% that We like yet.  (Lookin' at you, Chobani.  Bleaugh.  Your 2% was fine, but 2% only comes in pineapple.  How weird!) All of which is to say, We have high hopes for you, Stonyfield Farms.  Otherwise it's plain 2% (The Royal Choice) in lots of tiny, non-recyclable tubs (the Royal Sorrow).

Oh, and here's a bonus bento We made for a Friend of the Kingdom who has a night class:

We have officially decided that it is impossible to take a photograph in Our apartment in the afternoon.  The natural light throws off the artificial and makes it all funny-colored, and yet if We go with natural light only, it's all pseudo-dramatic and not-very-visible. 

Anyway.  Two Tofurkey, cheese, spinach, and carrot wraps on whole wheat tortillas with Vegenaise and mustard; apple slices, dried low-sugar pineapple rings, strawberries, and an oatmeal-nutmeg cookie.  Vegan 'til the cookie. We have hopes that it made our friend's class easier to handle.

Snackbox: Prelims Day 1

We interrupt your regular programming of bento lunches to bring you a very important series: The Prelims Exam Snackboxes!  Check out day 1:

Here you can see Our snackbox for Our first day of prelims.  We are not packing a proper lunch because We will be done by 12:30, so We will just come home and eat lunch (and decompress, and maybe weep a little, We'll see how it goes).  So We are just packing a snack to quickly be shoved in the Royal face.

That said, We are trying to maintain Optimum Nutrition! for Our exam.  So instead of some terrible power bar of some kind or some terrible Kwik-e-mart thing, We figured that a balanced mini-lunch style snack would give us the best energy.  Also, Our tummy has been distressed ever since the Explosive Incident, and We are finding out that it reacts well to not-so-processed, mostly-vegan foods.

So here is a mini-wrap made of Tofurkey, spinach, carrot, avocado, Vegenaise, and just a bit of mustard; some dried pineapple rings cut up into little snacky bites, some dried apricots, and a relatively-low-sugar oatmeal cookie.  Cookies are good because they are fast food in Our face, but We still can't stomach a lot of sugarbomb after the Incident.  So it's kind of a bready cookie (not that it doesn't have a bunch of fat in it, though); mostly tastes like nutmeg.  The cookie makes this whole thing not-vegan, b/c the cookie has butter in it. 

We have hopes that this will fuel Our stab towards victory!  As the "intention for the week" that We chose in Our yin yoga class this evening says, "I trust myself to do my best this week."  (Remember, We go pronounally incognito when out and about.)

Bento #25: Shocking Mystery Lunch

Aw, a cute l'il lunch, all wrapped up!  What could it possibly be?

That's right.  It's fried rice.  And an apple in the bottom tier.  We don't know if you can see this, but the fried rice is made w/ leftover Easter eggs--so the egg is kind of blue.  Also pictured: Strong Bad.

Bento #24: TMT and Pudding

Continuing to wade through the lunch backlog, here you see a closeup of a very similar lunch to the one We ate in the science library.  It is not the same exact lunch in material existence, We assure you, because We at this one in Our office, but it's the same lunch concept.  Although, come to thnk of it, there was an apple in that lunch and the pudding was a snack for later.  Either way: TMT on Shame Bread with spinach, carrot bits, and chocolate pudding.  And coffee, because We had not yet had Our catastrophic moment.

More gratuitous pudding shots!  (Ew, We have just grossed Ourself out.)  But We think this one is cool, because if you look closely, you can see a blurry, upside-down image of the King in the bowl of the spoon!  Yes, We Snuck into this picture!  Hooray!  We are so clever.

Back to studying.  We are making a quick "cheat sheet" of poetics.  Anyone care to know anything about Coleridge's Biographia Literaria (a complete mess of a text) or how it prefigures Frost's and eventually people like Olson and Ginsberg's poetics and finally all the way through to LANGUAGE poets by suggesting that the poem, rather than the poet, provides direction for the work, thus establishing (or at least reifying) a tradition where the poet is not the guide/sage/ultimate knower, but rather just a conduit for the forces of language to act upon/through?  No?  No one's interested?  Okay then, We will save it for Our committee. 

Bento #23: King Off the Radar, now with Extra Sneaky

Dearest readers, devoted fans of the Sneaky Kingdom (all two of you--hi guys!), We apologize.  We know that there has been a dearth of lunches demonstrated here lately!  We assure you that no one has been going hungry in the Sneaky Kingdom. We have just gone a little--well, Sneaky--lately, because as We believe We have either mentioned or intimated, We are currently in a PhD program. Next week--TWTr--We will sit our preliminary exams. As a result, We are going quietly and determinedly batshit crazy in the Sneaky Kingdom, and thus almost everything We do on a regular basis that isn't sleep, eat, and read has been taken off the table. 

Allow Us to demonstrate with a lunch vignette:

The lunch itself is hard to see.  However, We assure you that it is nothing you haven't seen before, and you'll definitely see that action again: a TMT on Shame Bread, carrot sticks, and an apple. 

Over on the side there you'll see a tumbler w/ coffee, which is alarming: We are normally a low-caffeine Kingdom over here.  We used to drink crazy tons of coffee.  We used to be the kind of person who gets up in the morning and drinks a Diet Coke while We waited for the pot to perk.  We had a problem.  We did a beverage fast at one point, to get out of it: nothing but water, milk, green tea, and beer--very basic, very little processed drinks.  It was awesome.  We loved it!  We felt so much better.  And that's basically what We still drink--today, for example, We have had three cups of tea (one is herbal decaf and is at Our elbow right now) and water.  Oh, one of the cups of tea had soymilk in it. 

But studying for prelims has meant that, at times, We must be awake with full brainpower ready to go Right Now.  And sometimes that is hard, because We have not been sleeping so well--worry, worry.  Fret.  So We have started drinking coffee.  And abruptly stopped, because Tuesday, We drank too much.  We thought Our heart was going to come rocketing out of Our chest, all Aliens style.  Our resting heart rate is usually about 60 or so, maybe 65.  Tuesday it was 117.  We tried to run the energy off, which has worked in the past with sugar, but may have been a mistake here: We sweated and barfed (!) and generally got very dehydrated and had massive tummy troubles for about two days.  We are done with caffeine!  Whoo.

So here you can see where the cubicle is located: The Library.  Not just any library, but the science library.  We love the science library for its "Shut the hell up" culture.  It is not cool--Not Cool!--to make noise in this library.  Because people are working!  How unlike the main library, which is basically a meat market for undergrads looking for dates, and thus is sort of loud even on the "quiet" floors.  If people want to talk here, even if it's very quiet and just for study buddy purposes, they check out one of those closed, soundproofed rooms. 

While We were there that day, a girl sitting at a table answered her cellphone, which, to her credit, rang on vibrate, and started to talk on it.  After about two or three minutes, a really strung-out looking dude wearing medical scrubs walked over to her.  He leaned down and said something very quietly that We couldn't hear, and then walked away.  When he walked away the girl frowned, gave his back the finger, and hung up his phone.  He glanced over in Our direction and We gave him a thumbs-up.  He nodded grimly and went back to his study cube.  We love it there!

At least there was pudding for a snack. We love pudding but 1) pudding cups are expensive and often taste like plastic, and 2) that goes double for soy-based puddings.  Sometimes milk-based puddings are not cooked puddings but magically-insta-whatever thickened, and they trigger Our gentle milk-straight-up-causes-some-inner-workings-problems issues.  So We make Our own pudding snacks sometimes.  It is easy and delicious!

We have told you this mighty saga in order that you might understand why We have not been posting lately.  Also so that you might understand why We keep eating the same ridiculous lunches over and over.  It is because We are panicky about Our exam.  In fact, We are going off to study right now! 

Bento #22: Lentilloaf Sandwich

Awww, look!  The l'il Smoking Bunny is hungry!  He wants Our carrots!  Poor l'il guy.  Our heart melts.  <3

We apologize for the blurry photo.  It is hard to hold a sandwich in one hand and a camera on macro (don't shake, don't shake!) in the other when the sandwich itself is threatening to slide apart.  A small price to pay, though for a delicious sandwich.  Here is Lentil loaf, spinach, We think some cheese (it was sort of a long time ago and We kind of misremember), mayo, and ketchup on, embarrassingly, store-bought bread.

And carrots.  We have poor enough vision as it is without forgetting to eat Our carrots.

Fun fact: this lunch features a device within a device!  Rare, even in this device-filled kingdom.