Food Journal & Pumpkin

Wednesday, September 16
Snack while walking to work: Cabot 50% reduced fat snack pack.

Breakfast: scrambled eggs with 2 eggs, 2 egg whites and 1/2 oz cheddar; smoothie of 1 C. milk, 1/2 scoop whey protein, ice and vanilla.

Lunch: skinless crock pot chicken - 1/4 breast, 1 leg, 1/2 thigh; salad of spinach, bacon and feta with 1 T. lite Italian dressing.

Snack: 2 T. natural peanut butter.

Dinner: salad with lettuce, tabbouleh, hummus, falafel, gyro meat, tahini and tzatziki.

Thursday, September 17
Breakfast: scrambled eggs with 2 eggs, 2 egg whites and 1/2 oz feta; flax muffin.

Lunch: skinless crock pot chicken - 1/2 thigh and 1/2 breast; salad of spinach, bacon and feta with 1 T. lite Italian dressing.

Snack: 2 T. natural peanut butter.

Dinner: TBA. We're going to a potluck so we'll see what's there.

So last night I made pumpkin muffins for the 12-17 year old girls I work with at church. First of all, none of them had ever had pumpkin muffins before! Or pumpkin bread or anything else made with pumpkin other than pie. We were planning our activities for the rest of the year and the week before Thanksgiving we're going to cook. One girl wanted to cook a turkey and I told her that might be a little involved for the hour to hour and a half we have. I suggested pumpkin pie and one of the girls piped in with, "Can we make these pumpkin muffins?" Absolutely! I told them it was my great-grandma's recipe and they were suitably impressed.

Anyway, I didn't eat any. I made muffins out of half the batter, and then put the other half in the freezer, with the hope that when my birthday rolls around in October, I can make myself some muffins (OK, technically, we'll be in California on my birthday, but maybe I can make some muffins to bring with us). I did lick the beaters because I figured I could have a little treat, but the girls ate all the muffins except for a couple that I left for Jason - which he ate.

And now that I've been talking about the pumpkin muffins, I should probably post the recipe over at Bee's Knees. I'll do that later and let you all know when I do.

Food Journal

Tuesday, September 15

Breakfast: scrambled eggs with 2 eggs, 2 egg whites and 1/2 oz feta; flax muffin (Note: eggs + flax muffin definitely helped me stay more full today. Flax muffin recipe below.)

Lunch: 2 skinless baked drumsticks; 1 stuffed summer squash (I substituted 2 T. flax seed meal for the bread crumbs. Because I'm brilliant.)

Snack: 2 T. natural peanut butter; Madagascar Vanilla Red tea with a splash of 1% milk.

Dinner: I have a work meeting at 7 and I'm pretty sure they're going to have pizza. I brought a chicken breast in no sugar added tomato sauce with some parmesan sprinkled on top, which I will try to eat before I leave work. I may have some edamame when I get home. Mmm, fiber...

Evening Snack: If I'm still hungry after all of that, I might make another smoothie with unflavored whey protein, 1 C. milk, Stevia and vanilla. That turned out GOOD last night. Like a vanilla shake.

Individual Flax Muffin
(for the life of me, I can't remember where I got this recipe last summer, so my apologies to whoever invented it)

2 egg whites
1/2 packet Stevia or Splenda
1.5 t. cinnamon
3 t. plain yogurt
.5 t. baking powder
3 T. flax seed meal

(when not so hot and bothered about carbs, I use 1 t. agave nectar as the sweetener, cut the yogurt to 2 t. and sometimes throw in some raisins or Craisins just for kicks)

Spray a microwave-safe ramekin or small bowl with cooking spray (or use a muffin liner). Mix the egg and sweetener until well combined. Add yogurt and blend well. Mix in the ground flax seed, cinnamon and baking powder until well combined. Pour in ramekin and microwave on high for 1 minute, 30 seconds (note the ramekin should be no more than half full since these do rise a lot, if it is too small they will overflow).

Obsessed!

Jason informs me that I appear to be unhealthily obsessed with food.

In other news, the sky is blue.

Actually, I took affront to his comments initially, but I realize he's probably right to a degree. Granted, if you just read this blog (which is what he was doing at the time), I come off as thinking and talking and living for food and exercise only. I do have another blog. I do have other things I do. For instance, the other night while Jason worked on a paper, I listened to ghost stories on my ipod and crocheted a couple squares for a baby blanket I'm making.

Really, what I'm trying to do here is figure out what works for my body. What makes me feel the best I can. Thus far, I have discovered that eating a lot of sugar/white flour on a regular basis makes me feel like crap. I have discovered that a higher protein diet gives me more energy and keeps me more full (I mean "diet" in the what I eat every day sense, not the restricting calories for weight loss sense).

This blog has been useful recently to vent my frustrations about not losing weight. But also to celebrate my victories - particularly with regard to what I can accomplish physically. OK, not so much since I got bronchitis, but before that I was having a lot of fun doing new things with my work outs.

The thing is, I come by my food issues naturally. Both of my parents have been obese for as long as I can remember. Their weights have been up and down for years. My grandpa was obese. My grandma was obsessed with her weight and always made sure to comment on whether it looked like I had lost weight or not. In addition to food issues, there are also alcohol and drug issues and other signs that maybe my family hasn't quite figured out how to cope with things yet. For me, my issue is food, and I know that. Maybe it would be alcohol, but I don't drink. I find that when I give myself license to just eat whatever, I do exactly that. Having a sugar restriction helps me keep that under control. I try to limit the sugar in our home. I mean, if I was an alcoholic would I buy big bottles of vodka on a regular basis, just to have around, just in case?

Frankly, judging by the rapid disappearance of a giant bag of Red Vines, I don't think Jason is such a paragon of self control. So I think it's best we just don't bring it into the house.

I'm trying to get to a place where I can eat healthy without thinking about it and not be tempted beyond what I can bear by a tray of mini desserts (like, ahem, on Friday night). I think generally I do pretty well with that, but sometimes I go off the wagon in a big way. So for now, maybe this blog will reflect a bit of an obsession. I'm working on it.

OMG

I don't want to jinx anything here, but this morning I weighed in at 186.8. That's the first time I've been below 188 in about 4 or 5 months.

OK, acting calm...

Food Journal

I am not very good with the consistency over the weekends. Oh well. We'll call this the weekday food journal.

Monday, September 14
Pre-Workout Snack: Cabot reduced fat cheddar snack pack.
Breakfast: 2 eggs and 2 egg whites scrambled with feta; 1 C. 1% milk.
Morning Snack: 2 T. natural peanut butter (because the eggs - not enough to hold me until lunch. Need to reassess breakfast); Madagascar Vanilla Red tea with a splash of 1% milk (I forgot how much I LOVE this tea).
Lunch: 2 baked skinless chicken thighs; salad of mesclun mix with mozzarella and a little prosciutto with balsamic vinaigrette.
Snack: Chopped cucumber with a bit of feta, drizzle of olive oil and a splash of balsamic vinegar.
Dinner: Crock pot rotisserie chicken; stuffed summer squash; roasted broccoli.
Evening Snack: smoothie of whey protein, milk, ice, splash of vanilla (honestly, this will probably be my "fixing dinner snack" since Jason probably won't be home until 8 and it's 6 and I'm already hungry).

If you can't tell, I am really working on minimizing the carbs right now. Need more vegetables. And eggs.

When Do I Buy New Clothes?

I am tired of most of my clothes and, frankly, a lot of them are starting to look kind of raggedy. As an attorney, I need to look polished and pulled together, so I've become hyper-aware of how my clothes are faring over time. I have been putting off buying new clothes because the plan was to lose weight. I didn't want to buy new things, only to turn around and bestow them on friends who can use them, sell them on Ebay for way less than I paid or just ship them off to Salvation Army. In the past when I've been losing, that has happened many times and I have bid farewell to super cute items that I only got to wear once or twice. We're in money-saving mode right now so I want the dollars I spend to go as far as possible.

But, of course, this year I'm not losing weight. I've been holding off on having a shopping trip through Spring and Summer. Now we're entering Autumn and I'm pulling out the same raggedy sweaters that I've had for 3, 4, 5 or more years. I call my style "classic" so it's not like I'm concerned about being out of step with trends, but the items are starting to show wear.

I'm hoping that I will actually start losing weight again at some point. I don't want to spend $98 (!!!!) on a pair of nice slacks at Banana Republic, only to have them not fit in a month or two.

(Also, I probably won't be spending $98 on a pair of slacks. Hello, Banana Republic outlet! But it's the principle of buying something that I won't get the full use of.)

What do you think? Should I bite the bullet and go spend a couple hundred dollars so I look nice, knowing that there's a chance I might be doing it all over again before the clothes have worn out?

Food Journal

Wednesday, September 9 (last 1/2)
Dinner: salmon, roasted broccoli with parmesan and a leftover scallion pancake from the Chinese take out we got after driving home from Vermont.
Snack: 4 cinnamon graham crackers and 1 C. milk.

Thursday, September 10
Breakfast: plain Chobani Greek yogurt with 1 T. honey, 1 C. Fiber One with 2/3 C. milk.
Lunch: whole wheat crepe with mushrooms, chicken, spinach and bechamel sauce.
Snack: Apple Pie Larabar.
Dinner: ground beef soft tacos (leftovers from camping).

I JUST discovered that Fiber One has aspartame in it. I glanced through the ingredients to make sure that there was no HFCS without even noticing. I'm bummed because I like Fiber One a lot and wow, does it have a lot of fiber, but I don't really want the extra aspartame.

Friday, September 11
Breakfast: Dunkin Donuts turkey sausage egg white flatbread (apparently, it's the official sandwich of the New England Patriots).
Lunch: leftover salmon. I figure I should have something else - but I'm not sure what. I'm not really feeling food so much today. You know those days where you're just not really interested in eating?
Snack: Chobani Greek strawberry yogurt.
Dinner: unknown. We're going to a work function tonight. Last year at this event they had pasta bars, which would have been ok except for they mixed up all the ingredients in about a cup of oil. This is after I told the chef to go easy on the oil. I tipped my plate sideways to let the oil drain to one side, while I ate the pasta off the other side.

How Do You Eat Healthy For Cheap?

Yesterday, Jason sent me a link to a blog post with the subject line: "this is amazing". The blog is one of his favorite economic bloggers and he happened to be talking about a woman who spends less than $10 a week to feed her family of 6. The section about the "Queen of Coupons" includes some of the receipts and a picture of all of the food she bought.

Only, here's the thing. It's all crap. Well, except for the milk. I don't think she had a coupon for the milk, though.

Here's what I wrote back to Jason:

"What would really impress me is someone who feeds her family for super-cheap without having to buy only processed food. There are never coupons for fresh produce or meat, and very rarely for beans. If you look at those receipts they include fruit juices (which are less healthy than fresh fruit because you get all the sugar with none of the fiber), sugary cereals, sugary jelly, salad dressing, noodles, peanut butter that includes sugar and preservatives, Aunt Jemima ready-made pancakes, etc.

This is why it's hard to eat healthy when you don't have any money."

I had the same reaction when I went to a local store that several people I know had praised to the skies for their cheap prices. I will grant that they have a fair produce section (no organics, of course) and great cheese and meat choices if you want to cook Latin American or Portuguese cuisine. However, most everything else was the boxed processed stuff you find in the middle aisles of your average grocery store. They did have one Kashi cereal and some plain shredded wheat, but all the other stuff was the opposite of healthy. But it was SOOOO cheap. So there were all these moms with their kids hanging off the carts, piling the carts full of processed, sugary crap because that's what they could afford to feed their families.

I'm sure they like the processed food. Heck, I like processed food. However, overall I like it less now that I know how bad it is for me. I have these discussions with my friend Rachel about where the problem lies in all of this. Farm subsidies. Lack of education. Powerful, powerful food lobbies. There are so many pieces at play, but it all adds up to, it's hard to eat healthy on a budget.

Tomorrow

Tomorrow I am going to the gym. Now that I'm feeling well enough (not well enough to climb a mountain apparently, but well enough), I'm starting to feel antsy with the not working out. I think my body is done fighting the illness and now it needs something else to do. I feel sluggish and blah.

Also, there are a couple really unflattering pictures of me from this weekend in Vermont. One in which my jeans are pulled TIGHTLY across my upper thighs.

Also, I saw another picture of me taken in July at a church function that just depressed me. Another one in which I thought I looked pretty cute in my jeans, but I kind of didn't. They look too small.

I think I have a reverse body image problem in which I think I look thinner than I actually do. Those pictures are a harsh dose of reality. I blame the mirror in the guest room. I think it elongates me when I stand in front of it.

When I'm working out, even if I'm not losing weight, at least I feel better overall. I know I've said this before, but I'm having a really hard time believing that I'll ever lose weight again. So I'll just eat healthy and exercise and I know I will feel better, if frustrated by the lack of movement on the scale.

It doesn't help that I was confronted this past weekend with the comments of someone who clearly doesn't understand that you can eat well and work out and still be overweight. His comments were general and not directed at me in any way, but I'm sure he looks at me and thinks, as so many probably do, that I just lack the self-control to lose those 30 pounds. He's a cretin and he's offensive and he's just kind of ignorant about these things (and about reading social cues), but sometimes it's hard to know that those sentiments are out there.

Wow, I do need to get back to the gym to pull myself out of this funk.

Oh, Right...

So I got a bit off-kilter with the food journaling since I was in Vermont for the better part of 4 days. It's a good thing I do the SparkPeople food journal too because I honestly don't remember what I ate yesterday.

Tuesday, September 8
Breakfast: Starbuck's Greek yogurt with honey and some granola-ish stuff. Yummy, but cost way too much considering I have stacks of Greek yogurt in my fridge. Day after vacation = lazy.
Lunch: Au Bon Pain low-fat Southern Black-Eyed Pea Soup (for the record, not as good as my black-eyed peas); little packet of 5 crackers, a bit of cheddar and some grapes.
Snack: Cherry Pie Luna Bar.
Dinner: Sushi (mainly California Rolls) and some seaweed salad.

Wednesday, September 9
Breakfast: Chobani fat-free Greek yogurt with 1 T. honey; 1 C. Fiber one with about 2/3 C. milk.
Lunch: Turkey and Havarti on wheat with cucumbers, spinach and dijon mustard.
Snack: 2 graham crackers with peanut butter (leftover S'mores ingredient that is going to go stale)
Dinner: TBA. I really need to start planning our dinners again. I have to be somewhere at 7:30 so Jason is on his own. I'll probably fix myself some salmon and maybe roast some broccoli.

Vermont

I posted some pictures of our trip.

Hiking - Not So Good, Actually

Well, I made it up one mountain. Kind of.

Saturday morning we hiked up Camel's Hump. Right after we started ascending, I realized breathing was going to be a major problem for me. When I started wheezing, my friend Rachel gave me a puff off of her inhaler. It helped a bit, I think, but it just went downhill from there. Not literally, unfortunately.

The lack of oxygen led to my muscles getting increasingly more and more tired. I'm sure for avid hikers the hike wasn't that technically difficult, but I don't think I've ever had to climb up and over quite so many rocks before. Or maybe it just seemed that way since I was already feeling pretty horrible. Everyone was very kind to me and would wait for me to catch up and encourage me. I kind of wanted them to just go on ahead and let me continue at my own pace by myself. I knew I couldn't turn around at that point, and I felt really bad holding everyone up.

Also, I got a blister. Next time I will apply the moleskin BEFORE starting the hike.

By the time I dragged myself to the top, I just wanted to curl up on a rock and stay. The idea of hiking 3 more miles to the bottom of the mountain seemed insurmountable to me. I ate a sandwich, drank some water, looked at the view, tried not to pass out, then started down the mountain with everyone else.

The sad thing is, the view was really amazing. Sitting on top of that mountain with the wind whipping around us was pretty outstanding. The air was clear and we could see Mount Washington almost 70 miles away. But all I could think was how much I just wanted this hike to be over.

The next day everyone else climbed Mount Mansfield, the tallest peak in Vermont. Listening to them talk about the difficulties of the trail afterward, I'm really glad I didn't go. And I'm sure they were really glad I didn't go. Instead I drove up to the visitor's center, with the intention of meeting them and hiking one more mile to the summit. I made it about halfway but that day it was my blister holding me back more than the lack of oxygen, since the ascent wasn't as bad to just get from the parking lot to the summit.

I did have fun camping and hanging out with everyone and sitting by the fire. I was just really frustrated by my lack of lung capacity. Once it became clear to me that the hike up Camel's Hump was going to be extremely difficult and that Mt. Mansfield was out of the question, I cried a little to Jason during one of the times when he was waiting with me to catch my breath. I had been looking forward to this trip and to accomplishing these hikes. Instead, I got bronchitis four weeks ago and here we are. Also, since I haven't been able to work out at all for much of August and then I did a 5 1/2 mile hike, my thighs are really yelling at me today.

Next time will be better.

Food

We wound up running around last night grocery shopping and getting last-minute camping supplies. So I ate a chicken leg and thigh and that was it for dinner. I actually made some kale chips - or tried to. They turned out pretty horrible. I made them before and they worked so I'm not exactly sure what I did wrong.

Around midnight as I was packing I realized I was hungry again and then I realized I only ate about 1100 calories all day. Whoops. But by that time I had brushed my teeth and knew I would be in bed soon so I let it go.

Here's today:

Friday, September 4, 2009
Breakfast: 1/4 vegetable frittata, strawberry Chobani Greek yogurt.
Lunch: Footlong ham and turkey from Subway. I entered it into SparkPeople and holy cow, that's a lot of sodium. I was craving Subway for some unknown reason. Should have just gotten a salt lick.
Dinner: Unknown. Guessing probably PB&J on whole wheat since that's what we bought tot ake to Vermont.

And we're off!

Food Report

I don't have anything that interesting to say today other than I'm feeling increasingly better and hopeful that I WILL be able to hike Saturday and Sunday.

I am liking this idea of being accountable for my food by reporting it on the blog. Makes me think more about what I'm putting in my mouth and whether I REALLY want to disclose it.

The food:

Wednesday, September 2
Dinner: 2 skinless baked chicken thighs (I'm a dark meat girl. I've never been able to make a chicken breast that wasn't too dry for me. I'm sure I'm doing something wrong, but until someone tells me how to do it right, I'm perfectly happy with the dark meat. It works out well since Jason likes white meat); 1 cup edamame; 1/2 cup Fiber One with 1/2 cup milk.

Thursday, September 3
Breakfast: 1 cup Fiber One with 1/2 cup milk.

Breakfast 2: So I had to be at a meeting at 7 AM this morning, which meant I ate the Fiber One at 6 AM, which meant by the time I got into work at 9ish, I was starving again. (Jason is always annoyed by how I eat a little something and then I'm hungry again a few hours later. It's just the way my stomach works. I can't help it.) So I stopped by Dunkin Donuts and got a Turkey Sausage and Egg Flatbread. Not ideal, but we have very few breakfast options around my office. At least the flatbread has some semblance of grains and the whole shebang is relatively low fat.

Lunch: Mexican salad with black beans, chicken, cheddar, sour cream, lettuce and salsa.

Snack: Strawberry Chobani Greek yogurt.

Dinner: TBA. Again. We're supposed to do some shopping for the camping trip tonight so it may be a forage in the fridge kind of dinner. I pick up the Farm Share after work and I still have some stuff left over from last week so, if nothing else, we'll have vegetables.

Back in the Game

It's September and I'm feeling much better. I got my new hiking boots from LL Bean yesterday (20% off and they have wide widths) and I'm going to give hiking a try this weekend. I may not make it all the way up either mountain, but I can give it a shot. I'll be sure to bring a book in case I reach a point and have to wait for everyone else to go up and back.

The weather has been gorgeous this week and I confess that I'm so out of the looking for any opportunity to exercise mentality that it didn't even occur to me that I should be walking to work until a woman at work yesterday asked me if I had been walking. No, but I should be. I've been known to walk home from work in February when it's unbelievably cold and there are piles of snow in my way. I should really take advantage of this perfect weather.

In an effort to not gain 15 pounds this winter, I'm concentrating on keeping up with my healthy eating. I've gained 15 pounds the last 2 winters, but in fairness, I lost 15 pounds the last 2 summers. This summer, as I have written about obsessively, there has been no weight loss, so I really need to watch my indulgences this year.

Monday marked the beginning of another sugar purge and I was fighting migraines both Monday and Tuesday. At first, I thought it was just because my shoulder is sore from my unergonomic office set up. However, the office has not changed, my shoulder is still sore, but today I have no headache. My body really takes hold of sugar and runs with it. It's like crack for me.

On the camping trip we'll be eating S'mores because that's what you do on camping trips (I'm partial to dark chocolate with cinnamon graham crackers). So that will be my September splurge. (I wish there was some way to cart ice cream up to the mountains of Vermont...). Then in October we have my birthday, November is Thanksgiving, December is Christmas and then voila! we're back in January with limited temptations. I won't lie, I may have a treat now and then, particularly since we have friends who have been known to bestow delicious cookies on us around Christmas time. But my goal is to eat healthy every day of the month except one.

Maybe I should start reporting on my eating here. I log it on SparkPeople, but it's not like anyone's reviewing that on a regular basis. OK, so for the month of September, I'll write my food at the bottom of my posts. If you're not interested, just ignore it.

Tuesday, September 1
Breakfast: 1/4 vegetable frittata, strawberry fat-free Chobani yogurt.
Lunch: Turkey and Havarti on whole wheat with cucumbers, spinach and dijon mustard, 4 squash fritters.
Dinner: Baked skinless chicken (3 thighs, 1 drumstick), roasted broccoli and cauliflower, 1 cup Fiber One cereal with 2/3 cup milk.
(Usually I have a snack somewhere in there, but I got busy yesterday. Thus, my dinner was huge)

Wednesday, September 2
Breakfast: 1/4 vegetable frittata, strawberry fat-free Chobani yogurt.
Lunch: Small Au Bon Pain Southwest Vegetable Soup (low-fat, reduced sodium), ABP multigrain baguette.
Snack: Banana
Dinner: TBA - I have to be somewhere at 7:30 and am not sure when I'll be leaving work. I may just grab some leftover chicken and hope for the best.

Getting Back in the Game

I think my lungs are getting better. I'm coughing less overall at least. This week I want to get back into strength training. I still don't think I can do any real cardio, but I should be able to lift some weights, right?

Only now I've gotten used to staying up an hour later, making it really, really hard to get up and work out before work.

Another thing I'm trying to do this week is wean myself off of the sugar. This past weekend was a sugar extravaganza. No real reason, I just wanted candy. Oh and a blondie brownie yesterday. Lame. Today I finished lunch and immediately craved something sweet. I don't have any fruit here at work, so my body will just have to suck it up.

Yesterday I weighed myself for the first time in a few weeks and bronchitis + no exercising + eating pretty much the same generally healthy way = no change whatsoever. Shocker.

Hill

Last night I had to walk up the hill to Brown to pick up Jason's car. I walked halfway up the hill. Then I stopped and caught my breath for a good 2 minutes.

Then I walked the rest of the way up the hill and gasped my way through the 3 or 4 flat blocks to the car.

It has been a very long time since that hill has winded me like that. Actually, I don't think it ever has. Even in my worst shape, I could make it all the way up without stopping. I feel pitiful.

I've been thinking about Plan B's for myself if I can't hike over Labor Day weekend.

Plan B #1: I have a friend from a long time ago who lives in Vermont and I just emailed her to see if she wants to try to get together if I can't hike.

Plan B #2: Saturday's mountain has a road up to the top so I can at least drive to the top and meet everyone up there with water and snacks and congratulations.

Plan B #3: If it's sunny, find a nearby lake and soak up some sun.

So those plans aren't too bad. I have some good books to bring along as well. Though my fingers are crossed that I will be magically healed in between now and then and will be able to hike up those mountains.

Sabotage

I'm now well into my third week of coughing and I'm sucking on a cough drop as I type this because the cough is still bad enough for that. Lately I'm fine during the day (except for today), but when I get home from work at night, I have several coughing attacks. I think this is probably because at work I'm just sitting on my bum, but when I get home I want to DO stuff. Crazy stuff. Like laundry! And dishes! And cleaning the bathroom!

Last night I changed the sheets on our bed and midway through I was doubled over coughing, with my arms wrapped around my torso lest I crack another rib.

So anyway, I'm feeling kind of frustrated. As I mentioned before, we're going camping and hiking over Labor Day weekend. The plan is to climb 2 (Vermont) mountains. However, I'm having problems just bringing laundry up from the basement to our 2nd floor apartment. I hope that in the week and a half until the trip, my lungs get their act together and start letting me breathe like a normal person again.

I was going to use August to get ready for the hike by climbing the hills in Providence and the hills on the elliptical. Alas... I feel like I'll be lucky to get in a couple of workouts before the trip.

We're Gonna Be Famous!

My friend Rachel and I are kind of mulling over doing a podcast on health, nutrition and wellness issues. In my search for podcasts to listen to while working out and walking to work, I've happened upon several complete duds. A microphone does not make you an entertainer.

That said, I don't know how entertaining Rachel and I will be, though we sure have a good time discussing these issues amongst ourselves. And maybe Jason will pop in now and again to offer his voice of contrariness (He likes to be a devil's advocate. Also, he can be a bit cynical).

Rachel has a background in nutrition and dietetics and is currently working on a Masters in Public Health. Her lofty goals include reforming food policy (starting with farm subsidies) and teaching everyone in the world how to be healthy in their food choices.

I have no official qualifications to speak of. I'm just interested in the subject matter and constantly in pursuit of finding the right balance of healthy living for myself.

We have a couple of ideas, but are there any topics that you would want to listen to us discuss?

So, I Guess I Really Am Sick

I don't really like going to the doctor and figure it's generally an exercise in futility unless, say, a bone is broken. Usually I get a cold and then it goes away and I'm fine all by myself.

Well, I've now been coughing for 2 weeks. Last night I had a really hard time getting to and staying asleep. I also discovered that the only way to not cough all night was to sleep on my left side. If I lay on my back or on my right side, the coughing started up like crazy.

So I called the doctor this morning. I went in and found out I had a temperature. Only 99.2, but considering my normal temperature is around 96.5, that's fairly substantial. The funny thing is, I didn't have a temperature a week ago, so it's like this thing has actually gotten worse. She diagnosed an upper respiratory infection/bronchitis and prescribed an antibiotic and some cough medicine with a narcotic that's supposed to help me sleep tonight. And any other night in the future with whatever's left over, I wager.

On the upside, my blood pressure is 110 over 74. Pleased about that.

Hopefully this cough will finally go away soon now that I'm actually treating it.

I also took the opportunity to discuss the whole no weight loss despite 4-5 months of eating well and working out thing with her and I'm going to get blood drawn for thyroid and other tests on Friday morning. It's a fasting blood draw so I can pretty much guarantee I will be passing out. Getting blood drawn doesn't make me squeamish, but I always nearly pass out. Last time I had blood drawn, I had eaten a hearty oatmeal and fruit breakfast and still, bam! Tunnel vision and clammy skin. Here's hoping I manage not to completely lose it on Friday.

New York Weekend

So I'm still coughing and just really tired of that whole mess. I haven't worked out for over a week now. However, I spent the majority of my weekend in un-air-conditioned parts of a sweltering New York City, walking a lot, so I figure that counts for something, right?

Tonight, in addition to doing 3 or 4 loads of laundry (which means trucking it all up and down 2 flights of stairs), I'm going to do some strength exercises. I may not be able to do any cardio without collapsing into a coughing fit, but I should be able to do some crunches and some bicep curls.

I'm going to post a New York report with pictures on my other blog, so stay tuned.

Cough

How come when I come to work I'm so much more exhausted at the end of the day than if I stayed home? I mean, I'm just sitting on my bum either way.

This cough is getting annoying. It was a little over a week ago that I got a tickle in my throat and started coughing a little. This morning, not being able to breathe for a second while I was asleep resulted in my hacking myself awake. I definitely think I need to sleep on the couch tonight and leave Jason in peace.

In addition to feeling really frustrated about not being able to work out, I'm annoyed about the cough throwing off our upcoming plans. For instance, we're going to New York this weekend and I don't want to cough my way through the trip, and through Jason's choir performances.

We're going hiking and camping in Vermont over Labor Day weekend. I realize that's still a few weeks away, but my goal was to spend August getting stronger so that I don't totally die on the hike. We'll be climbing 2 mountains and while I realize they're Vermont mountains, they still involve climbing. We're going with some people who are crazy fit and it doesn't feel great to be at the back of the pack, wheezing my way up the mountain.

Also, I'm craving carbs like mad. What's that about?

So here's hoping this cough clears itself up by next week. I'm sure you all are sick of hearing about it, and, frankly, I'm sick of experiencing it, so it would be a win-win.

And I'm Still Sick

It's Wednesday and I still feel like poo. Coughing is really exhausting. I stayed home from work yesterday and felt well enough to head up to Boston to have dinner with a friend, as planned. Only when I got home I was pooped and spent some time having some amazing coughing fits while drifting off to sleep.

The second I woke up this morning, I launched right into some coughs. Maybe I should sleep on the couch tonight so I don't bug Jason so much. He hasn't said anything, but I feel bad when I cough and then he rolls around and I know I've woken him up.

I'm at work today, because I feel guilty and extravagant taking sick days and I don't feel THAT bad. I had the flu in February and I felt bad enough to take 2 days off then. But this is just annoying and tiring rather than debilitating.

I'm kind of getting a headache now.

Amy posted her Wednesday Workout today and I read it and thought, "whatever". My body is so not up to exercising right now.

OK, going to take some pills for my head now.

Sick For Real

So I had grand ideas of what I was going to accomplish workout-wise over the last few days. Friday - swim. Saturday - run. This morning - elliptical and weights. Instead I'm coughing like crazy and just dragging myself around the apartment.

I don't know what is up with this cough. It's a deep cough, from my lungs, but there's no accompanying stuffy head and it's not really a productive cough, as the doctor would say. But I woke up yesterday feeling like utter poo and didn't make it to church. Last night I was feeling a bit better, though today I'm still coughing as much as ever. At least I have the day off work. Rhode Island celebrates V-J Day. It's great to have a random day off in August and I was looking forward to Jason and I getting out and maybe going for a hike or to the beach. Oh well.

Yesterday I crocheted and knitted and watched period pieces. Then Jason came home from church and we burned through an entire DVD of season 2 of Star Trek: The Next Generation. Because we're cool like that. We like to Netflix TV shows and run through all the seasons. Neither of us watched Alias when in was actually on, but we watched the entire series last year.*

Today I still feel kind of yucky and the idea of doing much more than taking a shower (which I already did) sounds kind of exhausting. Stupid cough. Stupid cough with no point to it. My main goal is preventing another cracked rib, because, seriously, that was a major drag.

* And marveled at how incredibly crazy it became over the years. I mean, it was always pretty crazy, but it got REALLY crazy.

Just A Little Sick

I thought about going swimming this morning, but instead I slept in. Even though I've only been to the actual for-real gym twice this week, my muscles are very sore and needed a day off. I walked to and from work twice this week, and walked one way yesterday. Then I packed on the strength training in the evenings and my muscles need a break.

Also, I'm getting sick. I've had this annoying tickle in my throat for about 4 days and have had periodic coughing jags. It's kind of annoying because I'm not REALLY sick, but I do feel a bit under the weather and just wish the illness would either take hold and give me an excuse to whine and curl up on the couch, or go away altogether. So far it hasn't affected my working out, although yesterday I noticed I was breathing a lot harder when I walked up the steep hill on my way home from work than on the 2 other days this week that I scaled the same hill.

In case you're wondering, I'm still not losing weight. I made it down to 190.0 a couple of days ago and thought, maybe tomorrow I'll finally be back in the 180's. Alas, the next day I was 191.6. I drink a lot of water and watch my sodium, so I find gains like that kind of inexplicable. Oh well. I've kind of come to the conclusion that I'm not going to lose weight anymore. All I can do is keep eating healthy and exercising so that I can feel the best I can in my body, even if it's 30 pounds heavier than I would like it to be.

Could Exercise Be Making Us Fat?

That's an inflammatory headline right there. But this article is interesting: Why Exercise Won't Make You Thin.

"Could pushing people to exercise more actually be contributing to our obesity problem? In some respects, yes. Because exercise depletes not just the body's muscles but the brain's self-control "muscle" as well, many of us will feel greater entitlement to eat a bag of chips during that lazy time after we get back from the gym. This explains why exercise could make you heavier - or at least why even my wretched four hours of exercise a week aren't eliminating all my fat. It's likely that I am more sedentary during my nonexercise hours than I would be if I didn't exercise with such Puritan fury. If I exercised less, I might feel like walking more instead of hopping into a cab; I might have enough energy to shop for food, cook and then clean instead of ordering a satisfyingly greasy burrito."

Yeah, ok, I can see that. Except for me, personally, when I'm in a regular exercise routine, I want to eat healthy stuff afterward. I feel pumped up and energized from the exercise and I don't want to lose that by eating a bunch of crap. My typical post-workout breakfast is scrambled eggs and a fruit and protein smoothie. The idea of inhaling a Starbucks muffin after a good workout (as the author's wife's friends do) is kind of revolting.

How do you feel after you work out? Do you want a bunch of sugary/salty/greasy food, or do you feel like being healthy?

Thanks to Rachel of The F-Word for the link via her Twitter feed. FYI, she links to some really fascinating stuff @thefwordblog.

Sugar Beast

Not to overshare, but it's amazing how TOM rolls around and like clockwork I want SUGAR!

NOW!!!!

All day I've been thinking about Jordan Almonds and Cheesecake. Maybe Cake Wrecks isn't the best site to be perusing today...

Workout Wednesday & Weekly Challenge

This week I actually did Workout Wednesday on Wednesday. So what do you get when you combine a walk home in pouring rain (I had my umbrella, but was still pretty soaked when I got home), followed by what amounts to a circuit training routine in an apartment that is 81 degrees and 70% humidity? A very sweaty me:
I have to say, I felt very accomplished after that. Also, I did 15 push-ups in a row! Real push-ups! I am definitely getting stronger.
Usually I work out in the morning anyway, so I thought the Weekly Challenge of working out in the morning would be no biggie. Only it's been tough to wake up this week. So far I've worked out once at night and walked to and from work for 2 days. This morning, after hitting snooze a few times, I finally dragged myself out of bed at 6:20.

Then it took me 2 minutes to find the camera and take a picture for posterity.
This morning I did 20 minutes of weights (lower body only since my upper body is still sore from the beating I gave it Tuesday and Wednesday) and 35 minutes on the elliptical.

Excellent news! The TVs are back up at the Y. I ellipticaled to Clean Sweep on TLC, which used to be one of my favorites back when I had cable. I am SO tempted to take some video of our living room and office/guest room and ask for them to come to our house. I'm sure our landlady would be ok with people painting the walls for the sake of a TV show...

I know that I am guilty of some of the clutter, but Jason has so many "treasures" or "just in case" items crammed into those two rooms that it drives me nuts. He's been promising me since we got married almost 2 years ago that he would clean stuff out. The goal has always been for him to clear out enough stuff for me to transfer my desk contents to his desk, and then get rid of my desk. Then to put a small bookshelf where my desk was to hold the books that my desk hutch currently holds. Only none of that has happened and the small bookshelf is just sitting in the living room. And since it had 3 whole empty shelves, Jason usurped it and has been putting stuff randomly on those shelves for months. The bookshelf is not a staging area!

The other night he was chiding me because I have a bunch of clothes on the guest room bed. Seriously? The room is so overtaken with his crap that you can't even open the door all the way and he's begrudging me some clothes on the bed? I do have to give him credit, though. He has stopped acquiring so many things. Which is good since otherwise I think we would be wading through the stuff.

Jillian Lost...And Found

Remember how sad I was about Jillian Michaels's radio show ending? Well, thanks to a long comment stream on Diet Girl's blog, I found out that her radio shows back to 2006 are all at mediafly.com. If you search her name, you have to scroll through a lot of other people's stuff from the same radio station, but I can deal with that. Also, if you have a Mac and realize, as I soon did, that Mediafly's proprietary software doesn't work on Macs, I recommend using the RSS connection with itunes. It works great.

I listened to one of her 2006 shows on my walk to work this morning. It's not the same as having new shows and hoping she'll spill some interesting tidbit about the upcoming season of The Biggest Loser, but since so much of her advice is timeless, I still enjoy it.

And I Really Wanted to Watch Friends Last Night Too

Well now the new TVs on the new cardio equipment have no reception, period. In fact, they've put signs on all the equipment that basically says don't even bother with the TVs and yes, we know they're broken. Those signs make me think they don't anticipate them getting fixed anytime soon. Stay classy, YMCA!

Even without the TV distraction, I did manage to kick my own butt on the elliptical yesterday by listening to some great music with a good beat and trying my best to keep time with the beat. I was sweating like crazy. I also did 20 minutes of the weight machines before ellipticaling. My thighs were still screaming after Saturdays exercises, so I only did upper body weights.

I was supposed to swim this morning, but some family drama* last night had me tossing and turning a bit, then waking up at 4:15 AM and finally getting back to sleep around 5:30, just as my alarm went off. I have noticed on the days I don't get up to go to the gym, I have a really hard time waking up when I need to just to get to work on time and I wind up being late. Today was no exception. I could have caught the bus in, but I was determined that since I didn't swim, I was going to walk to work. Which I did. And walked into the office to pick up a ringing phone from the Boston office making sure I didn't get hit by a bus. (I'm the only one in the Providence office today). Whoops.

Food has been pretty stellar, if I do say so myself. This week, I'm feeling in tune with my body and able to give it what it wants. I made some homemade pudding on Sunday night in wee ramekins and it was a perfect portion of dark chocolate goodness. Since I upped my calories to 2100, I have to really work at eating throughout the day and I never reach the point where I'm starving so much that I gorge at my next meal without really thinking about it. I haven't lost any weight, but I'm holding steady at around 190 and haven't popped up to 193 in about a week.

*Nothing to do with Jason. Though when I'm in a quandary he is an excellent sounding board for these things.

Sunday Night Dinner

As I bragged about yesterday, I was going to make some quinoa as a side dish for our grilling tonight. Well, I got a little overambitious in the kitchen. I wanted to make some bread for the week so I started that going as soon as we got home from church at 1 PM. Then in preparation for having guests for dinner I did the dishes and cleaned the bathroom. And hung new shower curtains because ours were gross*.

Then Jason started grilling the steak tips while I finished up the bread, made stuffed zucchini to throw on the grill and made chocolate pudding. I actually forgot about the quinoa until the last minute.

I thought I had failed Amy's weekly challenge until it occurred to me that the whole wheat flour I made the bread with is also a whole grain. Oh right. I thought I needed to be more creative than that, and usually I would be, but I think this week I'm going to let my whole wheat bread count.

Ta-dah!

PS Amy's inner thigh exercises totally kicked my inner thighs' butt. I didn't really feel it so much while I was doing them, but wow am I feeling it today!

* Antimicrobial shower curtains are no match for Rhode Island humidity. I bought the cheapo vinyl ones this time because what's the point of paying $10 more if it's not going to prevent the mold, but only make you mad because it was SUPPOSED to prevent the mold.

15 Week Challenge: Week 5

This morning I woke up and did Amy's inner thigh exercises. I did 2 sets of the Figure 8's because I wasn't really feeling it in the first set. Since I didn't have a bar to press here at home, for the sumo squats I held a 5-pound dumbbell in each hand and held them up, with my arms bent at 90-degree angles, my elbows level with my shoulders. I could feel it in my arms as well as my legs by the end. I think my favorite exercise was the sumo squat pulses. Ow!

Then Jason and I went for a run together. We're at different level of the Couch to 5K (I'm still at the beginning and he's doing 3 and 5 minute runs now), but we did our 5-minute warm-up walk together and went to the Brown track to do the bulk of the run.

I kind of felt like I was going to die. I think we waited too long to go. I wanted to go around 9 AM, but we finally got down there closer to 10 and the sun was already high in the sky and beating down on us. It took about an hour after the run for my face to not look like a big purple grape anymore. But at least my shins didn't hurt the whole time. They were a bit sore so I think I'm going to run once a week until my body gets accustomed to it. The other days I'll elliptical and strength train or swim.

Today was an amazingly beautiful day and we were planning on grilling. Then a series of events including going to Costco up by Boston and realizing we were starving by the time we got up there* so we went out for dunch/linner instead made us put off grilling till tomorrow. Jason is going to make steak tips. I'm going to make quinoa as a side, to fulfill the Weekly Challenge to cook using whole grains. There seems to be some debate as to whether quinoa is a whole grain or just a seed, but I think enough people designate it as a whole grain that it counts for the challenge. I'm also going to make some version of grilled zucchini boats, and I'll post the recipe at the Bee's Knees Recipes blog.

* Seriously, we have 3 shopping center meccas near us in Attleboro, MA, Seekonk, MA, and Warwick, RI, but no Costco. BJ's and Sam's Club seem to have cornered the market down here. So it's always a big production to get to Costco now. But that's where our membership is and we're Costco loyalists.

Farm Share Week...Um...9

I missed a few weeks there. We've been very busy the past few weekends and since I pick up my farm share on Thursday nights, sometimes it gets lost in the shuffle.

Last week I got zucchini, beets, cucumbers, carrots and pattypan squash. I've been indulging in my new favorite zucchini (and baby bok choy) recipe (you don't have to have bok choy. Apparently the baby bok choy was only a one week thing at the farm share. It was tasty while it lasted!)

I've been collecting beets for the past few weeks and storing them in preparation for making borscht, a Russian beet soup. My brother-in-law lived in Russia for 2 years and has a genuine recipe. I thought my attempt tasted great. Jason told me it was the wrong color. Despite the color issue, he managed to choke down a few bowls. Apparently the tomato paste I put in overwhelmed the bright red beet color. (If you've never worked with beets before, beware the staining red juice.)

A friend told me she just roasts beets in the oven like potatoes, which I'm going to try with this week's batch.

Anyway, on to Week 9. Behold!
3 large zucchini, 3 short but thick cucumbers and a bunch of beets. It doesn't look like much, but one of those zucchinis will make enough for a large side dish for me and Jason for 2 meals. As for the cucumbers, I like to chop one up, drizzle a little balsamic on top, and eat it with my lunch or for an afternoon snack.

Cable TV!

Tuesday night I went to the gym. I seem to have a chronic inability to pull myself out of bed this week so I ran over after work and before some of my friends showed up for our weekly craft night. I blame the mugginess for not being able to get up. I get tired just being.

Anyway, I believe I mentioned that they just put in new cardio equipment. WELL, now they have TVs attached to that cardio equipment. TV with cable! Jason and I made an executive decision to not pay for cable right after we got married almost 2 years ago (really? 2 years?!). I spied the TVs when I was weight lifting on Saturday, but since I swam afterward, I didn't get to do any viewing. I was really looking forward to a TLC or HGTV fix.

So the volume was broken on the first elliptical's TV. Hmmm. I got on another one, looked at the channel guide while warming up, picked my show, and tried to scroll to the channel. Only for some reason, this TV was not hooked up to the cable. I was already about 7 minutes into my workout and thought I would probably look like some TV-obssessed freak if I changed ellipticals again, so I stayed put. All around me I could see logos for HGTV and TLC and Bravo and the History channel. Next time I will check that there is cable first!

However, I must admit that the workout flies when I watch TV, even if I'm only watching bad Seinfeld* reruns. Plus, since I'm so completely distracted, I wind up working harder because I'm not so attuned to how hard I'm huffing and puffing and sweating. Tuesday night on the elliptical's hill program, I climbed 3100 feet.


* Yeah, I don't really get the whole Seinfeld thing. I suppose the show was new and inventive in that it was about nothing. But Jerry Seinfeld was a horrendous actor, the show wasn't really very funny, and every character was kind of a miserable person. Meh.

Jillian

Apparently Jillian Michaels is no longer doing her radio show, which totally bums me out. I think hers was probably my favorite podcast to listen to while I walked to and from work and when I worked out. Alas, no longer. Sad.

So I make the plea: does anyone have any fitness/health podcasts to recommend? Right now I listen to:

• Dr. Fitness and the Fat Guy
• Livin' La Vida Low Carb (not so much because I am low carb, but because I'm low-ish carb and he has interesting guests)
  
• Fitness Rocks (though it looks like he's done now. Well, there are always the archives)
• Underground Wellness (although lately he's been having on these crazy conspiracy theory guests and is kind of losing his street cred in my mind)

I also regularly listen to Wait, Wait Don't Tell Me, This American Life, NPR On Health and a few other NPR podcasts.

Podcasts can be hit or miss. I found this one fitness podcast online and was so excited when I saw each episode was almost 2 hours long. One problem - it was insanely boring. You really have to have some personality to keep a listener engaged and these people did not. Since there were anywhere from 3-5 people hosting each episode, you would think there would be some interesting conversation at some point. Not so much.

Smart People

I can't tell you how much I love having a friend nearby with a background in dietetics who not only helps me figure out what the heck is going on with my body, but can also explain all the information to Jason using scientific terms so that he actually believes her. Because I've been saying the same things to him for years, only I don't know the jargon so he blows me off. Annoying.

Sunday night the three of us spent hours talking about health care reform, the need for farm subsidy reform, and then Rachel helped us figure out what to do to get healthier. I showed her my SparkPeople nutrition and fitness charts and she said, "Hmmm, I still think your calories are too low." Lately I've been shooting for an average of 1800 calories per day, and when we averaged up last week as a model, it turns out I'm eating more like 1700 calories per day. And that's too low?

We then figured out my BMR, with the added factor of my activity level. Result: 2500 calories. Then we figured out Jason's, with HIS activity level. Result: 2500 calories. So basically, all my working out gives me the BMR of a not-skinny, 6 foot tall man. Awesome.

Rachel thinks I should be averaging about 2100 calories per day to keep me at a healthy deficit and get my body losing again. This week I'm giving that a go.

We're starting with baby steps for Jason. Step one: eat breakfast. He never eats breakfast unless I make smoothies for us. He might have a Fiber One granola bar, but Rachel told him to shoot for about 300 calories and the Fiber One bars are only 140 calories. Also, Fiber One bars are not really the breakfast of champions (neither is Jason's other favorite, Lucky Charms). I had a mini discussion with him yesterday morning about how whole foods are best. Fiber One bars are okay on occasion, but when the ingredient list takes up half the packaging, there's a problem.

Stats

Sometimes logging all my information only serves to point out how frustrated I should be.

I ran a fitness report on SparkPeople on Friday. I have been working out for 17 weeks straight with no visible results in either weight or measurements or clothes fitting or anything*. Week before last I worked out 3 times, but the other 16 weeks, I worked out at least 4 times - usually 5 times per week was my average.

Where is the fairness?

Well, it just goes to show I'm not crazy.

I also looked at my nutrition reports and I've had some days where my eating wasn't stellar. But usually that was one meal when either we were on the road, or we went out special (Like, for instance, the past 2 weeks have been Restaurant Week here in Providence, and we went out a couple times because when else are we going to be able to afford to eat at the really posh places? Every time, though, I came away with leftovers from my entree AND my dessert). I honestly think if I printed off the last 4 months of reports and took them to a doctor, the only thing the doctor could say would be something like, "Well, maybe you shouldn't have had that dessert that one time. Maybe you shouldn't have eaten McDonald's on that road trip." These are valid points, however, even when I ate the dessert or ate the McDonald's, I still stayed within my calorie range. (Saturday being the one exception)

I told Jason all this and his response was, "What a downer." Yes. What a downer, indeed.

*Actually, I lie, I have had one (or two) visible results. Yesterday, I measured my thighs and they are both about a half inch smaller. So that's good news. That's the only measurement decrease though.

True Confessions

In the interest of full disclosure, yesterday was not a good day. It started out great. I woke up early and went to the gym for a half hour of weights and an hour swim. Then I came home and ate some scrambled eggs and a smoothie. Then it all went downhill.

Once again, we were on the road yesterday, headed up to Tanglewood to see a friend of ours sing (and, as we later found out, to enjoy the giant mosquitoes). I meant to cook a loaf of bread on Friday night. Then I meant to have that bread ready to make sandwiches to take with us. Then I got some cherries, which Jason LOVES, for us to snack on.

Well, I was busy doing other stuff Friday night and didn't get to the bread. So no sandwiches. I was also running around yesterday morning and forgot to wash the cherries and we were running late so that didn't happen.

We decided to pick up lunch on the way out of town and stopped at Wendy's, where I proceeded to completely sabotage my day by getting the new Asian Sweet and Spicy Wings. Newsflash: they're fried. I don't know what I was expecting exactly, but not the heavy breading. Also in a combo meal. With a small Frosty.

Ugh. I just entered all of that into SparkPeople and for the first time in a very long time I am over my calorie range. Not to mention sodium, carbs and all that other good stuff. Newsflash #2: those wings have 2500 mg of sodium. Insane!

The thing is, about 5 minutes after I finished eating all of that, I told Jason that next time we're going on a roadtrip, he needs to remind me to make sandwiches. I felt HORRIBLE. And then I was drowsy for the rest of our two-hour drive as I tried to seriously fight off the carb/sugar/crappy food crash. Totally not worth it.

Normally I would get the Mandarin Chicken Salad at Wendy's, but I was driving the first leg while Jason tried to figure out via his phone where exactly we were headed. This is a big lesson to me that it really does pay to be prepared.

Could I Have Shin Splints Already?

I've run a grand total of twice now. This morning I was going to run, but we had a major storm going on outside, so I stayed in my cozy house and shredded and did some ab exercises afterward. On Wednesday when I ran, I noticed pain in my shins, but pushed on through. Today during the 30-Day Shred, I couldn't even complete a 30 second segment of butt-kicks*. It wasn't because I was out of breath, but because my shins hurt every time each foot hit the ground and I finally had to stop.

This sounds an awful lot like the shin splints my running friends used to complain about. What can I do? Will they get better as I run more? Do I keep going with the running, or revert back to the low-impact world of the elliptical and swimming?

I want to finish this C25K thing, but not if it's going to hobble me.

I have bad joints on both sides of the family and bone issues on my mom's side, and I might be a little paranoid about making sure I don't break down my body before its time.

*Jillian has you do 4 different cardio exercises in Workout 1: jumping jacks, jump rope, butt kicks and boxing.

Workout Wednesday

So I did Amy's bum exercises last night and they were pretty good. A couple of them felt completely ridiculous, but I really liked the ones where I had to focus on balance as well as actually doing the exercise. I liked the Tree Arabesque
and the Glute Swoop
for the balancing aspects.

I planned to run again this morning, but my legs are pretty sore from all the work I've been giving them (weights and elliptical Tuesday, running yesterday) so I thought they deserved a day off. This means I won't make my workout 5 times per week goal this week, but next week will be another story.

Running Again

I ran again today. Then I posed the question to Facebook of when exactly does running become fun? It did not make me feel better when my former Marine, totally in shape cousin responded that the runner's high for him is really more of a "runner's relief" felt only after the run is finished.

I like the idea of running. It's like the walks I like to take through the neighborhood, only faster. But right now I feel kind of scared of next week, when I'll be running for longer than 60 second intervals. I'm totally in awe of anyone who can run for, say, 5 whole minutes.

Tonight when I get home from work I'll do Amy's Workout Wednesday that she just posted. It's all about bum exercises, and heaven knows, I can always use those.

Goals

This week, Amy challenged us to ponder and write about our goals, both short-term and long-term.

Long-term Goals

1. Lose 30 pounds (aka, the one I've been whining about the most). I honestly don't know right now if that will ever happen. Right now I would be pretty darn pleased to lose half that and keep it off. Regardless, this is still a goal. I suppose my reward for achieving this would be getting a new wardrobe. I would probably do that after losing 15 pounds though, because most of what I now own wouldn't fit that well.
   
2. Run a 5K, for reals. Sunday night we had dinner with some friends, one of whom is a big-time runner. When he found out that not only is Jason jogging, but now I have joined in the Couch to 5K effort, he challenged us to actually do a 5K race at some point. My reward after completing this would be a new pair of nice running shoes.
   

Short-term Goals
I'm thinking of the short-term goals as a means to an end with regard to the long-term goals.
STGs related to LTG 1:

1. Work out for one hour, at least 4 times a week, with a good mix of cardio and strength training. If I keep this up for one month, I get a massage (Yay!). After that I'll make it a month and a half, two months, and so on before I get my reward.
2. Eliminate white sugar and white flour from my diet as much as possible. Part of this goal is recognizing that sometimes I can have treats and sometimes I will be places where healthy food is not available, but overall I want the majority of my days (say 6 out of 7 per week) to look like my clean eating day last week. If 6 out of 7 days do not include the "white foods" for a month, my reward will be a new book that I have been wanting (believe me, I have a long list of books I want).

STGs related to LTG 2:

1. Keep up with the Couch to 5K program, running 3 days per week. After one month of consistency, my reward will be an actual workout outfit. Right now my workout clothes consist of a ratty T-shirt and ancient workout pants. Sexy!
   
2. I suppose in order to actually do the 5K, I'll need to research local 5Ks. I don't need a reward for that, but I'll list it here so I'll remember.

I'm going to print this list and put it next to my mirror to remind myself of my goals every morning and to help me make good choices. I should also probably hang it dangling from a rope over my pillow so when I'm tempted to not get up to work out, I'll be reminded of how I really, really want those nice shiny rewards. Oh yes, and health and fitness too. Of course.

Farm Share Week 5

I didn't post about week 4 because after I picked up the farm share on Thursday evening, I rushed home and started prepping for our friends' going-away party. This included slicing up one of the zucchini from the farm share for a veggie tray (paired with parsley hummus made with the out of control parsley from the AeroGrow). Then we left the next day for DC. Week 4 consisted of beets, onions, sugar snap peas, broccoli and zucchini. Since we were leaving for 4 days I focused on getting veggies that would wait until we got home for me to prep them.

Here is the score from last Thursday:

I got sugar snap peas, beets, garlic, pattypan squash, zucchini and baby bok choy. I was only supposed to get a pound of zucchini, but since they were all mammoth sized, he said we could grab whichever one we wanted, even if it was more than 1 pound. The one I got was almost 2 pounds. Nice! The broccoli is gone from the selection, which makes me sad. Having fresh, local broccoli to roast was awesome. However, other things are coming into season and it's getting more and more interesting to choose.

Running

I ran. FYI, running with good shoes is a whole different experience. Yes, it was difficult, and yes I sweated a lot (assisted by 70% humidity), but I didn't feel like my legs were going to fall off at the end of it.

I did the first step of the Couch to 5K program, which is a 5 minute warm-up walk, then 8 sets of 60 seconds running, 90 seconds walking. It's kind of like very, very slow intervals. I warmed up by walking down the hill to the Brown stadium, then ran around the track, then walked back up the hill home. I timed myself via my iPod, which was difficult as I was jostling around so much.*

One thing I noticed that was nice is that by interval 6 or so, my breathing was calming down more rapidly and I was raring to go again by the beginning of the 60 seconds. Also, I would glance at my iPod and notice that I had, say, 5 seconds left, but I would decide to go to a certain mark in the track instead and make the interval last a bit longer. I only did this when I was running, not with the easy walking, so the moral of the story is I was pushing myself rather than cheating. Always a good distinction. I guess my internal competing with myself thing is still there even when I'm not swimming. Good to know.

Here's my pretty picture:

After taking this I did a bunch of crunches and planks and did 10 whole push-ups! In a row! I know! I was shocked too.

Here are my new GIGANTIC shoes that don't cripple me so I love them:
(The fact that they're brand new and GLOWING white really accentuates the hugeness)

*I was talking with Jason yesterday about how I really want a heart rate monitor to time myself and to keep track of calories burned and all those little numbers I love so much. I just got a bonus at work and while the bulk of it is going straight into savings, I'm going to set aside a little to buy myself something. I've wanted a heart rate monitor for, oh, about 2 years, so it's probably time.

Eating Clean

This week on the 15 Week Challenge, Amy challenged us all to eat "clean" for one day, and that day for me was Wednesday. I'm pleased to report that this didn't require any huge deviations on my part. I'm usually pretty good about eating whole foods, but I realized there are still a couple of "processed" things in my regular menu - namely Klondike Slim-A-Bears, Healthy Choice Fudge Bars and Larabars.

On Wednesday, the only one of those I ate was a Larabar. My friend Rachel introduced me to these bars a month or so ago when we went on a Costco excursion and she came skipping back to the cart with a bulk box of them, thrilled because they were so cheap compared to buying them individually. Here's the thing, though. They're not really all that processed. I ate an Apple Pie one as part of my snack on Wednesday.
Ingredients: dates, walnuts, unsweetened apples, almonds, raisins, and cinnamon. That's it. Even better is the Cherry Pie bar. Ingredients: dates, cherries and almonds. Also, it tastes exactly like cherry pie, which blows my mind.

It occurred to me about midway through the day - when I was at work with no camera - that I should really be taking pictures of my clean eating. But I didn't. However, I did take a picture of a lovely dinner I made last week, just because the colors were so pretty. Of course, vivid colors never really translate in my point and shoot, but here you go:
The dinner above is similar to what I ate Wednesday, just with asparagus rather than zucchini.

So, my menu for Wednesday:
Pre-Workout Snack:
1/3 Cashew Cookie Larabar (FYI, not enough to power me up for my hour-long workout. I got serious hunger pangs after I finished the weights and was 5 minutes into the elliptical. Then I fought off a headache for the rest of the day and finally took a migraine pill at about 7 PM. My body does NOT like exercising on low blood sugar)

Breakfast:
Smoothie with unsweetened Almond Breeze, strawberries, blueberries, plain Greek yogurt, whey protein.
3 scrambled eggs with feta cheese

Lunch:
2 pieces of baked chicken
Salad with romaine, parmesan and homemade balsamic vinaigrette

Snack:
Apple Pie Larabar
1 T. all natural peanut butter
1 oz cheddar

Dinner:
Salmon
Roasted zucchini and summer squash
Roasted broccoli

Evening Snack:
Popcorn popped on the stove in my Whirley-Pop

The popcorn may not be strictly "clean" either, although I think it should be okay, since I popped the kernels myself without any mysterious chemicals like you find in microwave popcorn. The popcorn is straight from the Whole Foods bulk bins.

I Was Running

I got some new running shoes this past weekend when we were in DC. My sister-in-law's dad owns a running store in Maryland and he fitted me for proper shoes and gave me a discount. So nice! Apparently I have some of the flattest feet he's ever seen.* The shoes I got are built to give me the stabilization that I don't have naturally. They feel great when I walk, which will hopefully translate into comfort when I run. He also showed me how to lace my shoes so that my narrow heel doesn't slide up and down and get blisters, which is a problem I've had before.

I also found out that my feet are HUGE. Here I thought I was an 8, 8 1/2. These new shoes are 9 1/2. Wide.

I am a delicate flower.**

This week for the Wednesday Workout Challenge we're supposed to run/walk for 20 minutes. Now that I have my new shoes, I can start running. I plan to start the Couch to 5K program this week. Stay tuned for a running report.

*Whereas Jason has obscenely high arches. I'm hoping our kids come out a happy medium.
**Well, I have dress shoes in 7 1/2 wide that are perfectly comfortable, so I'm going to say I average about an 8 1/2, depending on the shoe.

No Sugar

I have a friend who is becoming vegetarian not because of any ethical concerns, but because meat makes her feel awful. She tests herself periodically, and most recently eating meat made her feel lethargic and actually triggered some of her anxiety issues. We were talking last night and I mentioned to her how my body is the same way with simple carbohydrates. Whenever I wean myself off of sugar and white flour, I feel awful for the first couple of days, and then I feel amazingly good. After that, eating sugar makes me feel loopy and I always have a heavy crash afterward. Of course, if I eat enough of it my body gets used to it again and I don't notice the bad feeling because it's there at a low level pretty much constantly.

Then I mentioned how I had brownies in the oven for our craft night and we both laughed.

After that discussion, though, I realized I need to get back in that no simple carbs mode. Without really planning at all, today is day 1. I'm not doing South Beach, I'm just cutting out the simple carbs, and focusing as much as possible on protein, fruits and vegetables, which are the foods that make my body feel the best.

I find it interesting that my friend can get sick from eating meat, while I feel my best when I'm eating fish and chicken and limiting carbs. It's just further proof to me that everyone is very different and no one food plan works for everyone.

By the way, I'm feeling better this week. I'm trying to focus as much as possible on how good I feel when I'm eating right and working out, and not so much on the scale. Even though I just want to yell, "Go down, d**n you!!!" when I step on it lately, I'm working on finding that zen place in my head where it's really just a number.

This morning I did 30 minutes of weights and 30 minutes of elliptical. My Y must have gotten a big donation lately because they upgraded all their machines over the weekend. It took me a good 5 minutes to figure out the display screen, which is all computerized and fancy schmancy with animated trainers. I did a hill program where it takes you to different peaks around the world and has you climb, adjusting the resistance based on the trail. Even though I had my towel over the screen, I could tell when the path inclined upward because it got really tough. According to the program, I hiked 2.11 miles and climbed 2300 feet. I realize it's not REALLY like hiking, but since I love numbers I can now keep track of mileage AND feet climbed.

In A Funk

I am really having a hard time busting out of my discouragement mindset. It's hard to convince myself to get up out of my cozy bed when there's a voice in my head saying, "What's the point? You're never going to lose weight again." I know I should throttle that voice, but the motivation to do so just isn't there.

In the meantime, I feel round and puffy and like none of my clothes fit and that my pretty clothes from last summer when my hips were a few inches smaller are never going to see the light of day this summer and that's just depressing. I'm so tired of my clothes that do fit. I had a plan to give myself a little spree when I lost 10 pounds or so to get some newer stuff that doesn't look so raggedy, but I haven't lost any weight. So my clothes are old and raggedy and I'm still 190.

I know I shouldn't focus so much on the weight and I should love myself as I am and all that. Generally, I'm fine with me and I'm comfortable in my skin, but this feeling of wanting to lose weight and not knowing what in the world to do about it, when I feel like I USED to know what to do about it and whether or not I lost weight was MY choice, is discouraging.

I had 5 whole days of exercise planned this week and so far I've done 2. Tonight we're having a going away party for some friends and then I have to get ready for our trip to DC this weekend. We're leaving at about 1 PM tomorrow so I need to have my bag packed and in the car before I leave for work in the morning. So no shredding after work, and probably no swimming tomorrow morning because I'll be too tired and, let's face it, probably still doing laundry and throwing stuff in a bag.

The problem with not working out in the early AM is that I then wind up staying up too late that night because I'm not quite tired at my normal 11 PM bedtime. Last night I got to sleep at 12:30 and just couldn't get up to get to the gym at 6. It's becoming a vicious circle.

Physically, I'm really feeling the lack of exercise. I am dragging and a little cloudy today, and it's not just because the weather is crappy - again. Maybe the weather is playing a part in all of this, but if I'm having a hard time with some gray clouds in the morning, I'm never going to able to get up in January when it's pitch black and below zero.

In Case You Were Wondering

The BMI is crap.

courtesy of The Rotund.

Cross Training

This week I'm making a big effort to cross train and not focus so much on swimming. Yesterday I walked to and from work, then shredded when I got home (76 degrees and about 60% humidity. I was soaked by the end.) This morning I did 20 minutes of weight lifting, then 25 minutes on the elliptical. If all of this doesn't start working, I might flip out a little.

I've been feeling kind of discouraged about swimming because Jason keeps telling me anecdotes from his scientist colleagues that you can't lose weight swimming. It's kind of funny since he's usually all about wanting the scientific proof and yet he and the other science-type guys are speaking strictly from anecdotes. I have heard before that people don't lose weight swimming. However, I lost the initial 35 pounds a few years ago swimming. And the last couple of years I've lost 15 pounds each year primarily through swimming. (Then I slacked off for 4-5 months and gained it all back).

A lady on SparkPeople had an idea that maybe there's something off in my body now that wasn't a problem a year ago. Maybe it's just a slowed down metabolism, or maybe it's something more. Women on both sides of my family have had thyroid issue, but I've always tested normal. I think if I don't start seeing results from the cross training in a month or so I'll get some bloodwork done.

Farm Share Week 4

The bounty is getting more diverse:
2 heads of lettuce, a couple pounds of broccoli, beets, onions and zucchini. I'm going to try to roast the zucchini with a bit of salt, pepper and olive oil, since roasting is my favorite way to do vegetables lately. Also, I'm going to make my brother-in-law's borscht recipe. He went to Russia on his mission and so not only is it tasty, but it's authentic. I don't know if I have enough beets, though, since they're kind of small, but I'll give it a whirl.

Since I had the day off work today, I got a lot of little chores done, including prepping the veggies for the coming week. Have I told you all how much I love to chop? It's soothing to me.

Side Plank Impaired

I did the Wednesday Workout last night and worked my abs hard. They were screaming at me by the end, and were sore last night, but today they're ok. I guess that means they're ready for more abuse.

I have discovered that I have serious problems doing side planks. As soon as I push up on one arm, it starts wobbling like jelly. Oddly, it's easier for me to do a side plank if I go straight into it from a regular plank, rather than starting from the floor. But either way, my arms can't last very long. Ideally, the side plank is supposed to be working your core muscles, but I can't even get to that point when my arm won't hold me up. Does anyone else have that problem?

The weather is killing me and making it really hard to just get up in the morning, period, let alone getting up early and going to the gym. This morning I woke up to hard rain and thunder and lightning and while I usually love a thunderstorm, I just groaned at the prospect of yet another gray day. Almost every single person on my Facebook page who is in New England has made some sort of comment to the effect of, "Et tu, July?"

15 Week Challenge

I've decided to give myself some sort of goal other than losing weight and I'm participating in the 15 Week Challenge at Amy's Quest to Skinny. OK, yes, the ultimate goal is weight loss, but that's not all and I think I need more to focus on right now. Amy is kindly giving us a weekly challenge AND a workout challenge on Wednesdays AND we get points for doing those challenges. I'm all about points (15,552 SparkPoints and counting).

I'm looking forward to doing today's Wednesday Workout when I get home from work (even though my abs are trembling in fear and will hate me tomorrow). This week's weekly challenge is to remake an unhealthy dish into something healthier.

For those of you who read my other blog, or the recipe blog I contribute to, you've probably seen the below recipe before. However, it's one of my favorite unhealthy recipes that I tweaked to be healthier (relatively speaking) and it tastes great.

Sweet Potato Pie

• 3 T. all-purpose flour
• 3/4 C. sugar
  
• 3 C. mashed sweet potatoes
• 2 eggs
• 1/8 C. light corn syrup
  
• 1/2 t. ground nutmeg
• 1 t. cinnamon
• 1 t. vanilla
• Pinch salt
• 1/4 C. butter
  
• 3/4 C. evaporated skim milk
• 1 (9 inch) unbaked pastry shell (I’m a slacker and used a store-bought crust)

In a large mixing bowl, combine the flour and sugar. Add potatoes, eggs, corn syrup, nutmeg, cinnamon, vanilla, salt, butter and evaporated milk; beat well. Pour into pastry shell. Bake at 350 degrees F for 55-60 minutes.