Spicy Tomato Soup with Italian Sausage (meat)Balls

I am sure by now everyone in the grips of this cold, subzero weather is not only sick of hearing about it, but also sick of living it!   The heat went out again overnight.  The icicle formed on the outside pipe again sometime in the middle of the night.  We sleep with a small space heater in our bedroom – its toasty posty in there!  Here’s the thing though, I am super cold when I first go to bed.  Like all blankets chin up to my neck cold.  But, somewhere through my sleep like the dead sleep, I start to sweat and by morning I only have maybe the sheet on me.  So imagine my surprise when I turn the space heater off, the humidifier off, and open my bedroom door my face was slapped with a wall of cold air.  Like 43 degree cold air in our house!  It was 6:15 in the morning and there I was, putting on my snow pants, jacket, scarf, boots, etc. to walk through a foot of snow to whack the icicle off the damn pipe.  Oh, and did I tell you the temperatures had warmed up from the day before so it was only –14!

Luckily the roads are not bad by now.  Just an occasional patch of ice – although I have to say that it’s hard to tell a wet road from black ice, so I was very careful.  I got to the hospital by 7:30.  He said he slept pretty good, although they do check his vitals WAY to often for his liking, especially when he finally gets to sleep!

The breakfast he ordered looked really good actually – the seasonal fruit plate with vanilla yogurt and granola!

I could only stay 45 minutes because I had to head to work.  I had my broccoli almond milk quiche with another skinny pork chop.  Um, I guess the hot sauce kind of got away from me!

There was no way I could make a hospital visit in my lunch hour, so I finally hit the gym!  It’s been since December 31!  And while it’s sub-zero outside, I really wanted to swim.

While it was arctic outside, the pool was super warm – I didn’t want to get out!  A quick 40 minutes and I headed back to my office.  One of the attorneys I worked with agreed to do the 21 day sugar detox with me.  Although because of the weather, she hadn’t stocked up on stuff.  I texted her the night before last and said “hey, I have spicy tomato soup with Italian sausage meatballs, would you want some for lunch?”  She replied “does a kid like chocolate?!”

This inspiration for this soup came from Justine at Cooking and Beer (very cool blog by the way – check it out!).  Although hers is a bit more complicated and has pasta and beans.  Oh, and I don’t do ground turkey either – see, I told you it was “inspired!”

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I was happy that the tomato sauce really helped bind the balls together.  And get your mind out of the gutter with that last sentence!  Once the balls were portioned out, I just rolled them into balls.

Such a perfect thing to eat on a super chilly day.  The balls added enough protein to make it super filling and the tomato soup was the perfect amount of spice.  And my friend at work gave it two thumbs up!

After a whirlwind afternoon at work, I headed to the hospital.  Tony requested dental floss, and while I had some in my gym workout bag, um, turns out some moisturizer exploded all over the bag so I had to make a pit stop.  I decided to get a better salad from the salad bar at Jewel – this whole thing, which took me like half an hour to eat, cost $5, including the balsamic dressing.

Tony had a board on his wall in his room – each time a new nurse comes on call, she writes her name in, what the date is, when the expected release date is and what the goals of the day are.  The goals yesterday?  Restore INR levels to 2.5 or high and . . . GO HOME!  The only time I’ve been in the hospital was when I had my daughter and that was 22 years ago, and I was healthy.  I can’t imagine having to spend so much time in a hospital – and he’s had WAY too many days in a hospital to count.  Like I’ve said to people in emails and texts – 2014 can only get better from here!  I just can’t wait to have my hubby home.  It’s way too quiet here by myself.

Alright – off to pack my food for the day then head to the hospital before work – not sure how the day will go, but I will head to the office for at least a half day, maybe take a long lunch to bring him home – who knows.  All I know is that the time they say “we’re getting your paperwork ready for discharge” that usually means they will cut him loose 5 hours later.

Make it a great day!