I do my best to avoid taking favors from the Family.

(I cannot remember where I saved this from now, crap. When I find out I will cite.)

Nobody's fault but my own.

Today on FML:
Today, it’s decided, I’m going a diet. For real. But I said that yesterday. And the day before. FML

I can relate, but cannot agree.No, this is not a "FML" worthy scenario. This is my fault, my lack of self control, my lack of commitment.

I believe in eating whole foods and I know that I need to overcome my sweet tooth, my habit of eating out, my resistance to exercise, and my sporadic cooking schedule.

I believe these are reasonable and feasible.

I can change, I can try again. I am doing the best I can, and I know I am not alone.

Todd and I are in a little competition to see who can lose 10 pounds first. I will post our method of tracking, etc once we get officially started. I am not so much motivated by the competition, but by my desire for him to be healthy and follow doctors orders, and he reminds me that he wants the same for me.

This weekend we tried to go to the gym together, but it was closed early. We went home and played SingStar together in duet mode.

Shake it!

We danced and sang, we broke a nice sweat.

We plugged in our neglected Wii controllers for future at home workouts together.

Dear you!

I just had to share this post from Passive-Aggressive (and Just Plain Agressive) Notes, it cracked me up and also was a nice reminder.

In which I shame NPR for luring me with a doughnut to talk about belly bugs!

(I have no clue why the fonts are all messed up, sorry!)

NPR had a little piece today on some early mice based research on fatty food and an increase in MICROBES LIVING IN OUR DIGESTIVE TRACKS!

BAH!

They lured me into the piece online with a delicious picture of a doughnut in coffee. The nerve!

Not the photo. In fact, this is the least alluring doughnut and coffee picture EVER!
I will be working on burning this image into my brain.

I suppose if they put a picture of microbes I would have run away screaming and never read/listened.

Giant Stomach Microbe Plush Toy! Sorta cuter than the doughnut picture. Sorta?

The Gut Response To What We Eat

by Nell Greenfieldboyce

"A high-fat, high-sugar diet can quickly and dramatically change the population of microbes living in the digestive tract, according to a new study of human gut bugs transplanted into mice."

Thank you, brave Mice, for helping humankind!

PS: I am sure Nell Greenfieldboyce is a lovely person, but her promo picture makes her looked possessed! Or as if she is trying to seduce us. Look:

"You will make a donation during the pledge drive this month.
And the pledge drive next month too."

I was dragged to the gym!

My partner is starting to phase out of his highly monitored fitness classes, hooray for Todd!

Last night he made me go to the gym with him.

Well, he was assigned by his instructors to go on his own and earlier in the evening I was totally stoked to join him! I really was, ask him.

Wahoo, let's go to the gym!

But I had started working at home and fallen asleep (deep cat nap) by the time he was ready to go. I tried so hard in my half-awake state to get out of going to the gym. I think I put up a pretty great, really whiny fight.

Todd is the dragn. Missy is the kitteh.

He won. I reluctantly went to the gym.

Todd gloating because he got me to the gym OR me celebrating because I went to the gym?

I went to the gym tonight

and as a reward, the universe had a copy of a recent People Magazine waiting for me to read!

Thanks, Universe!

In the magazine I saw a brief review of this book:



The Big Skinny: How I Changed My Fattitude

"Here’s the skinny: After a lifetime of yo-yo dieting with pills, hypnosis, and ill-informed half-measures, Carol Lay finally shed her excess pounds and kept them off. Now this California cartoonist shares her experiences in a funny, genuine, and eye-popping graphic memoir that tells Carol’s story and shows you how you can do it, too."

Could be a fun read. I enjoy comics and graphic novels. If I ever get aroun to reading this or flipping through it at a store I will let you know.

Pacled love and voodoo diets

Ah. Monday.

I lurched myself awake and then worked and worked, I enjoyed the sun and had a healthy homemade lunch:


Not my actual dish, but you get the gist.

Basmati rice
tomatoes
garlic
jalapenos
green peppers
onions
red pepper flakes
chili powder
shredded chicken
black beans
corn
cilantro

I cooked them all up in my lobster pot and made 12 prepacked meals for my honey and I. Yum.

The I ate a crappy stale store bought brownie. Oops.



So not worth it.

Did I ever tell you that I once had an obsession with Little Debbie Brownies? I craved them everyday! They were hard to kick because a box of 10 cost like $1.50 and you could also get them at the corner store by my office for 25 cents.



I was embarrassed by my habit, but I let people know about it too. A friend of mine made a Little Debbie Voodoo doll for me, it really did the trick!

I brought my gym bag to work!

Tonight I will scuttle to the gym straight from work for Body Pump.

Check out this rad gym bag! Only $75! Sigh.

I cannot believe how difficult it is to get myself to bring a gym bag to work...it took like, 3 years! 29 years if you count all the years that I did not have a gym membership!

It is pretty lame because the light rail station is 1 block from my gym and totally easy to get to from work. Then it is just a brisk 8 blocks walk home with my friend who teaches the class and lives right by me.

It will be a super frigid walk tonight (it is -3 right now, up from -21!), but so worth it! I really am so pleased with myself when I get to the gym.

A friend who just joined my gym is part of my motivation, plus my other friend who teaches the class. Also, a doctor I see who was all, "Go to the gym straight from work. Seriously."

PS:
I went to the gym on Sunday even though I was not feeling 100% due to alcohol choices I made the prior evening. Thanks to a friend who called and invited me along to the gym.

I also went to the gym last night! Nice. Thanks to the same friend!

The Shoebox blog again...sorry!

They just hit the nail on the head!

Things not to say outloud at the gym

Things Not to Say Out loud at the Gym:

January 8, 2009 10:23 am

by Renee D from The Shoebox Blog

* “Geez, that door is heavy.”
* “Great! A vending machine!”
* “I only come here for the whirlpool.”
* “Move it, Tons O ‘ Fun.”
* “I can’t wait ’til March so I can quit coming here.”

Always on my mind

A miracle?

Last night, driving home in a growing snowfall, I stopped to buy some impulse ice cream at a wonderful ice cream shop.



I love to eat ice cream when it is cold. I got the Sweet Cream ice cream.

I continued the drive home, Todd put the impulse ice cream in the freezer, he put away the groceries, I went to cat sit, and I totally forgot to eat any ice cream!

I just realized that now.

For some reason I am really proud of myself even though I give most of the credit to my poor memory.

I don't want to be perfect, but this is a nice reminder

Found here.

Did you know I have a "mouth belly". My stomach curves inward in the middle, it always has. Another family member has the same design. I have learned to work with my "mouth belly", but I hope it will be less mouthy someday. Also note that I do not appreciate joking about my mouth belly, only I can joke about it.

Zesty! (?) Santa Fe Style Chicken es así así.

Not the soup in question.

I just ate a can of Progresso (see website for $3 coupon) "Zesty! Santa Fe Style Chicken" soup. It was so-so.

First off, I thought it was filling enough, especially for 2 Weight Watchers points (thanks to the can and commercial partnership for that info!). It has 1 point per serving and 2 servings per can. How could anyone make it through the afternoon on 1 point?!?!? I would be hungry if I did not eat it all.

First.2, I am not certain that this is a low sodium soup, it has 28% of your daily sodium. That is still sort of high, right?

Second, there is not nearly as much stuff in the soup as the picture on the can shows or even the above picture shows. I enjoy Progresso soups and have found them hearty, but apparently hearty takes up too many points. Are black beans a lot of points? Or cooked celery?

This soup was seriously 96% liquid and 4% stuff. OK, maybe 86% liquid and 14% stuff, but either way I have had mojitos with more stuff in them.



Third, I am practically considering a false advertisement or unnecessary punctuation claim on the exaggerated use of the term "Zesty!" on the can. It is in a sassy, red font with an exclamation point, but this Minnesota girl had bored taste buds. There is Spanish on the label and I feel like it should say "Gringo Caliente" instead of "Caliente" to warn people more used to foods with true spice and zest. This soup is as zesty as chicken broth is hearty.


(I really should get a red pepper shaker for my office, this could be a personal problem.)

In conclusion, I have had worse canned soups, I have had better canned soups, and if you want to keep some "Light" soup around for when you forget your lunch this soup is OK. I am left again thinking, "If I got my act together, I could make something similar, with less salt and more stuff."

(I could make this...another recurring theme, I should read my own blog and these books.)

A nice read.

If you feel like a laugh and have a moment, check out this piece from McSweeny's:

NOTED POST-MARXIST SOCIOLOGIST, PHILOSOPHER, AND CULTURAL CRITIC SLAVOJ WELCOMES YOU TO THE GYM.

BY Evan Johnston

Slavoj Žižek

Exerpt:

A deviation: have you ever been doing a repetitive motion over and over and then thought, "My God, what am I doing?" Exercise allows us to engage in these repetitive motions without having to question why. The superego asks the id, "What are you doing? Don't make me look stupid," and then the ego and id respond, "Go to bed, old man. I am working out like Olivia Newton-John!"

Me: Yesterday

From: Natalie Dee

I hope to get my booty to the gym tonight. Maybe to Body Pump...I don't need to do much walking tomorrow anyway.

The magic of the spoken word

On the bus home last night I was exhausted, all I wanted to do was curl up in bed, but I knew I was free to go to the gym- no plans, no illness, just time. I needed to go to the gym, but I did not want to go. I was set to pretend that I forgot all about the gym....

And I would have gotten away with it too, were it not for my bus friend Kevin hoping on the bus.

Kevin is a fitness instructor at my gym and he lives in my neighborhood. My sister recently chaperoned me to a class he teaches called Body Pump. I have been meaning to write about that experience!

We did not have matching outfits in our class.

Kevin sat down and I did what I knew I had to do: I told him that I was plotting to avoid the gym.

Kevin is nice, he knows of my struggle to workout and does not pressure me to get to the gym. He did not pressure me last night.

Even so, I went to the gym because I TOLD Kevin my inner wrestling match and I did not want to look like a lazy and cowardly person by skipping the gym when I had no excuses to stay home. I wanted to do the brave thing, the right thing!

I rode K's bike to the gym and I did my workout, and of course I was so proud of myself.

"Look at me, I go to the gym like it's no big thang!"

Accountability got me to the gym; there was not even peer pressure in this case.

When I got to the gym, I totally forgot to take my blinking bike light off until I was on the elliptical. I probably deserved that, it brought my head back down to Earth!

This is close to how my night went

Here

Actually, I worked late, went to Target and a bike shop to buy accessories for riding K's bike around (like a bike like and bike lock- not a crazy biking outfit!). By the time I got home I was zonked and I watched some Project Runway.

I have been feeling under-motivated this week because I saw some pictures of myself. The image of myself in my head is so much slimmer than the image of me that comes out in photos! The pathetic thing is that instead of motivating me to change that shape, seeing the images makes me feel defeated.

toothpastefordinner

I cooked some veggies and cleaned a little bit to...does that count as exercise?

I hope to ride K's bike tonight, maybe to the gym!

What have you been doing? Is anyone out there?

STATSHOT via Chicagoland!

I hope this is not too hard to read...it is a "Statshot"from The Onion.

J from Chicago sent this to me, it made my day! I am going to have to weigh my cat again because a "Don't-Get-Your-Hopes-Up Total Body Machine" will not fit in our condo.

Hip hop, and ya don't stop!

Guess who accidentally ended up in a Hip Hop Dance class???

C. and I!


We are total hip hoppers now, so step off!

We thought it was going to be hip hop aerobics, but it was straight up dance class. It was pretty hilarious, I felt like such a geek, but I laughed a lot- good for the abs, right?

After hip hop class, we took a Zumba class, that was so fun! There was no pressure to conform, just pressure to shake your moneymaker!
That is MY kind of dancing!

Get this- there was a woman in the class who had a 4 or 5 month old baby in a baby Bjorn shaking her booty. That baby was loving it!

Her little arms and legs were flapping around and she had a HUGE smile on her face, that is...until she fell asleep half way through the class! Too much fun!!