Happy, um, not Monday?

The reason why I need to get to the farmers markets!
Source: Single Minded Women

Hi hi! Sorry my Monday slice of love and gratitude is very late. I had every good intention of writing this post when I got home from uni and a staff meeting Monday, then got ridiculously sidetracked by my first piece of loving this week…

FoodBuzz has just started the most amazing contest. 2000 bloggers (well 1,889), whittled away over 10 rounds until finally there is one winner. Loving to read other people's adventures with food, I started browsing through the contestants, and 4 hours later it was 1am, I was loath to stop reading, and my 'followed' blog list had at least tripled in size!, It has seriously reinforced my love of blogs by young, active guys, a rarity in this area of interest, and I've found some amazing new reading material, Here are some of my favourite finds:

• Food Makes Fun Fuel & The Kitchen of a Runner – Both of these guys have reinforced my love of young guys blogging! This is a seriously female dominated area, and it is great to read the kitchen exploits of two active, health conscious young men with awesome appetites. Not to mention they've given me some great ideas for taming the hungry animals over at Safari.
  
• The Flexitarian Foodie – I had no idea what a flexitarian was until having a read of this blog. Must say, she's going to become one of my regular reads, as I love her writing style, and some of the yummy looking posts.
  
• Gluten Free Betsy – Everything I saw on her blog looks seriously yummy! Mumma Dryad is gluten intolerant. Well, that, or allergic to wheat, we're not really 100% sure. Either way, we've been doing a LOT of gluten-free discovery since she figured this out. I'm going home next week, so we may have to give a few recipes a whirl, and see how we go!
  
• Poor Girl Eats Well – Awesome advice for uni students, or anyone else on a seriously tight budget. This woman is amazing, and makes living off a small amount of money look very appetising!
  

I'm loving the way Geelong is currently gearing up for the UCI Cycling Championships, starting this next week. Lacking the "Cats in the Grand Final" buildup of the last few years, it's nice to still finish off September with a bang. The town has got a general tidyup, people have been painting the power boxes, and this time next week, the place will be crowded with 200,000 sporty/athletic types and their entourages. I'm not going to be here for the first half, which disappoints me greatly, but hopefully I should still get to see plenty of action, since my house is literally 25m from the main straight of the course. I have heard some people being quite negative about the whole thing, but having witnessed the annual tourist influx in Alice Springs, and the life it brings to the town, I'm seriously looking forward to the event!

Warning, shameless work plug! Mr Hyde is starting breakfast! I'm actually seriously excited about this, because even before I started working at Hyde, I loved the food. Seriously, pancakes topped with gooey berry goodness, and a heavenly cark hot chocolate to start the morning? Yes please! In case you didn't know, we also do $3 coffees for students all day, every day. That's cheaper than uni caf, not to mention better quality, direct-trade coffee. So who's coming with me to the breakfast launch on Saturday morning?

My favourite thing about this time of year is the insane amount of fresh produce starting to pop up all over town, and cheap. Seriously, last week I spent $13 in Fruit Shack on enough veges to last me 2 weeks! Course, they're not organic, and not all local, but it WAS all Australian produce, and with my return to studenthood, I'm trying to save money, so I'm not complaining too much.

This has been a rather food orientated Happy Monday, but then it's been a very food orientated week for me! What's getting you fired up this week?

Love, Neysa xo