In my attempt to participate in the Amateur Gourmet's Bring Your Gourmet to Work Day. I have failed rather miserably. Since yesterday I happened to be at Trader Joe's right after reading his Pasta Pesto Peas entry I decided to grab a bottle of pesto and a bag of whole wheat penne and sort of go at it. And by "go at it" I mean I boiled the pasta and then dumped the pesto in there. I don't really like peas so I didn't put them in. It turned out pretty boring but I am eating it at work and I'm glad to have brought my lunch since I'm on a restricted budget due to buying a couch with a chaise and a half (1.5 chaises) stuck on the end. I've been living pretty happily on alternating cheese veggie sandwiches and peanut butter banana sandwiches, but this was a nice change of pace. So maybe the failure wasn't miserable, just not exactly "gourmet." Or maybe kind of gourmet, but heavy on the "amateur." Anyway, it keeps reminding me of this salad I used to buy at the CoOp downtown that was basically pesto penne but it also had little bites of chicken and chopped up sundried tomato in it. But with all these fancy ingredients we're sort of getting away from the whole point of eating less expensively. Here's hoping your gourmet experiment is more stunning than mine!

p.s. Last night I unearthed a seriously fuzzy and thick spider (like a baby tarantula with a giant body and stubby little legs) about the size of a ping pong ball hiding halfway down in my pile of steer manure bags. It was something I never would've imagined living in North America and I really wish I hadn't seen it.