i think i've gone way beyond just being in a rut.
There's a cafe on campus and i usually buy my lunch there. It's subsidized so it's cheap, and it gives me a chance to get away from my desk for a while, even if it's to discuss things like naked co-ed speed golfing. (Hey, it's not all MySQL tables and PHP optimization techniques.)
Inevitably, i walk in to the cafe, check the specials, and pick up either:
- A Firecracker Chicken Salad (Buffalo chicken chunks on top of various greens)
- An organic Peanut butter and jelly sandwich on apple cinnamon bread with a bag of non-organic chips (tasty and cheap)
- A regular box salad
On VERY rare occasions, i'll get one of the specials or something different, but there are a lot of things i've generally just avoided. i've also kind of gotten out of the habit of bringing lunch mostly because i tend to forget i did that and either leave it in the fridge at home or work.
i wouldn't mind too terribly much, except that i've also realized that i'm doing the same sort of ditch dining when it comes to dinner. Aside from meals at home, there's the mexican place, the chinese place (ok, two. One cheap, one good), the pizza joint, sometimes the Hawaiian plate lunch shop, and… that's about it.
It's not like i'm afraid of trying new things. i love trying new things. It's just that when i get home, i'm tired and cranky and not really into the "try new things" mindset that one must have in order to suffer food one would rather never, ever eat again (Oh shush, you know exactly what i'm talking about), or jump in the car and play eenie-meenie with the joints that we pass.
Granted, for all the good dining in the area, there's a lot missing. There are surprisingly few good greek restaurants around, or seafood that's not wok fried and covered in hoi shin, or even italian that's better than what we can make at home, which kinda narrows down the options more than i'd prefer, but still, i can't shake the feeling that i'm really hovering right above food pellets or bags of Bachelor Chow.
Is it just me, or are you kinda like that too?
Those pb&j sandwiches are kick-ass. Don't spead the word too much because I really enjoy eating one of those as I walk over to Bldg-E for some meeting or another. Sad as it is to say, that is my lunch break for the day on occasion.
My fiancée is a foodie, so even though we're geographically distant, I feel obliged to pick up my game when it comes to cooking at home. But I hardly EVER go to restaurants — it's just not that much fun by yourself.
One way of branching out, since you travel for work, is to adopt my travel axiom: never eat anywhere you could eat at home. That cuts out most chain restaurants and generic burger joints, and forces you to try new things while you're out of town. I find that also inspires me to try new things when I'm IN town, too.
Now that you've brought this up, I think I'm going to start making more of an effort to make dinner dates with friends. My parents are visiting right now, and we're going to try the new fondue restaurant (!!) in town tomorrow night, but I should try to step out every month or so.
sometimes I take all of the stuff in the freezer and blend it into mush and make Everything Pancakes.
…never eat anywhere you could eat at home.
I normally do this, but having traveled to places much smaller than the critical mass for food-services, be forewarned that below the threshold this game plan can really screw you over and make you beg for a Sonic.
…Everything Pancakes.
Mmmm, just like Foster-Mom used to make!
There is good greek around, but you'll pay through the nose for it (Dio Deka, for example). At the low-end, you're better going a little east, culturally, and heading for Falafel Drive-in and it's kin.
The huge gaping crater out here is Barbecue.
Actually, there's a not bad greek joint not that far from the MC campus (which, in spite of the moniker, is not where the rap guys hang out). It's Athena Grill, located in an office park next to a welding shop.
The best greek food in the Bay Area can be found at Mediterranean Wraps on California Ave in PA. Ok, it's not not completely Greek, but they have the best falafel, shwarma, and baba ganoush that I've ever had.
I miss the Indian food from the Y! cafeteria…
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I really enjoy
eatingdining out, but when left to my own devices, instead frequent a series of meals that make yours look like a circus of variety.When I was on a calorie-restricting diet, it worked really well. Now that that's passed, it's just sad and makes me wonder when I will open the closet and discover 7 identical sets of clothes.
Somewhere along the line, it became just not worth it to invest energy in non-social dining. Considering how anti-social I am, this is indeed a problem. But once you have efficient sustenance, the risk in trying new things seems awfully high. Not only are they usually much less efficient, but there's a good chance of unhappiness. This is poor risk management.
Do the meals you have at work, and the restaurants you go to also match some pattern of minimizing effort? At the rather excellent cafeteria at work, my habit became choosing the meal that could be delivered with the least stand-in-line-, human-interaction-, and prep-time.
Recently I started working in an new city and that's messed up my pattern. How long until stability returns? God, it's only about two hours until dinner, and then the pain begins anew.