Second day in Yakima, I had a very relaxed day.  Woke up at eleven, worked out, hung out with my sister, made dinner, played scrabble.  I could use about a dozen more like this one.  I managed to not eat my parents out of house and home, managed, in fact, to stay within my general calorie allotment.  

Breakfast: nein

Lunch: scrambled eggs (2) with leftover hamburger, swiss cheese, spinach

Dinner: 2 tacos with same leftover hamburger, about 2oz of shredded cheese, red and green onions, lettuce, tomatoes, fat free sour cream, salsa, guacamole, sliced tomatoes.  Fruit salad with jicama, radish, cucumber (dressing was lime juice, honey and chili powder), 1\2 cup of black beans with jalapenos and tomatoes

Exercise: 3 miles with the dogs, 30 day shred, 30 minutes stationary bike (8.5 miles)

1000 miles in 2009: 55

Song of the Day: Maybe Your Baby, by Stevie Wonder

Daily awesome: I am currently watching Let the Right One In, which actually is the best movie I saw all year.  It’s out on DVD, rent it, love it, let it rock your socks off.

I drove over to Yakima with my sister and Sandro very early this morning.  I’m nervous about being here- it hasn’t exactly gotten off to a good start and now I haven’t worked out in TWO days.  Tomorrow, I’m remedying the scenario right away.  I’m also planning to sleep in, blissfully.  Right when we arrived, we had to go to this lunch meeting for a board my sister is on (for an organization that provides aid and ESL classes to low-income, Spanish speaking women  and kids in this area).  We ate lunch there (not the best), then came back to my parents house.  I’m too tired to write in extensive detail about the day.  Ellie and I have been beading necklaces for a craft fair we’re doing in a couple of months all night and my hands are sore, so I’ll wrap up for the night.

Breakfast: no

Lunch: Casa Hogar board meeting; 1 hard shell taco with diced chicken, salsa, cheese (less then 1 ounce) lettuce, olives, tomatoes, 1\2 cup spanish rice, caesar salad (which was totally soaked in dressing), about six bites of carrot cake

Snack: 2 servings multi grain chips, 1 ounce cashews

Dinner: salad with tempeh, baby spinach, lettuce, radishes, pine nuts, feta, cabbage, 1 small slice chocolate cake (my mom always has unbelievable things like that lying around the house- it’s so enraging that she and my sister are both skinny minnies)

Exercise: nope.  But, thankfully, my parents have a stationary bike and I brought a couple of exercise videos.  

1000 miles in 2009: 43.5

Daily awesome: bomb magazine has a fiction contest I’m entering; I’m pretty excited about it.  Jonathan Lethem is the judge- he’s not my favorite author, but still intimidating.

Well, everything went fabulously with the screening.  We got about 150 people, it was very well received, spontaneous applause and all that.  What a relief.  I botched the intro a little bit and was blushing up a storm, but I managed to basically appear sane and able to confidently speak on complicated political issues.  It helped that the documentary before ours was very long, slow and depressing (but good.  Kabul Transit, it’s called, see it!), so ours seemed fast paced and fun in comparison.  TCTV wants to show it and they’re planning another fundraiser around it in the next couple of months.  Yay!

I was not as good as I could have been today and I did not exercise (and I mean at all), but eff it, the screening went great!

Breakfast: no

Lunch: can of soup, chicken and dumplings, 360 calories

Dinner: Thai restaurant, half order of pad see ew (with extra broccoli and basil added- it’s how I always get it and it’s fantastic)

Snack: 1 cup yogurt with 1\2 cup granola

Exercise: no

1000 miles in 2009: 43.5

Song of the Day: Pretty Green, by Santogold

Daily awesome: great film screening, starring me!  The cute projectionist flirted with me after the show.  My sister’s in town with Sandro and they didn’t fight all day.  The movie theater is super old and antiquey- the seats are red velvet and very narrow.  The arms of the seats usually press into my thighs on each side, which gets uncomfortable during most movies.  Today, they didn’t because I’m totally getting skinnier!  Awesome day, all around.

Well, not actually sabotage, but my baser instincts are doing their best to bring down my diet right now.  I had this problem last night too, and succumbed, horribly to my fatty-pants urges (damn you’s, crackers and cheese, damn you’s all to hell).  Not tonight, no, I decided a rambling blog entry (and, I swear to god, a gallon of water) would be a better way to go.  I know what’s going on is that I’m nervous about tomorrow.  The screening started out low-key, but now is being sponsored by local businesses and covered by the local press and Noah’s not going to be there with me, so I have to introduce the damn thing myself.  Also, what happens when you make a documentary about a sensitive political incident in a small town is that generally, you’re showing your work to a stacked-deck audience.  We’ve had screenings in the past; one at a local, liberal-arts high school and two now at the college and those times, we were met with unanimous praise, mostly because two thirds of the audience participated in the demonstration the documentary is about.  But tomorrow, I’m extra nervous about, because it’s at a real movie theater, it’s listed in the paper and we’ve now been interviewed by two reporters (I must say, I acquitted myself admirably both times, no nervous laughing or chatterboxing- two things I thought might happen, both of which would have been horribly inappropriate while trying to speak with authority on the subject of ongoing litigation with the city and police brutality) and it’s a much larger scale event.  I need to get used to it now, because we have film festivals coming up in Seattle and Tacoma and those events will be five times the size of Olympia’s, but I’ve always had stage fright and I have an often-debilitating need to be liked.  Every time we’ve screened the thing, I feel like it’s going to be this huge disappointment and embarrassment.  We’ve gotten nothing but positive feedback and we’ve been accepted into film festivals that I know only show ‘real’ movies so I know that it must be fine, but I just can’t wrap my head around the idea that we might have made a film that other people (besides, like, our parents) would find interesting.  We’ll see if they do tomorrow.  Not to be gross, but I’ve totally had diarrhea the past three days just thinking about the 10 minute opening talk I’m supposed to give (again, no Noah, arrggh!) and I’m not even letting myself consider the sweaty-faced horror that is sure to be the panel after the film.  Anyhow, I’m incredibly anxious about it and I feel better just saying that, now.  Before this, I just felt CRAZY HUNGRY.  I need to just go to sleep. . . the house is clean, I’m all exercised and face washed and teeth brushed, but I can’t relax.  It’s late enough that I can watch the newest episode of Lost on abc.com (how good has this season been, you guys, right?), then read my book (Stalin biography, weirdly engrossing) and eventually fall asleep.  I want to start seeing dramatic results with the exercise and diet; I feel like slow changes are being made.  I certainly feel different, and I think I’m starting to look different, but I’m not a very patient person, I just want to be at the end of the process, dropping all my fat pants off at goodwill and trashing my 40DD bras with nary a thought.  But that’s not how it works, we all know that. . . instead, I am trying to celebrate small victories.  I never, EVER thought I would be celebrating the day a size 20 pair of jeans fit me comfortably and it makes me sad that this is my reality, but it is and at least progress is being made.  Also, this guy in town who I’ve always thought was a stone fox just came on the market again, so I hope he turns up tomorrow night at the screening, I need to flirt with someone, meet a cute boy, something.  It’s spring, I’m exercising constantly, so I’m suddenly (after, I must say, a pretty long dry spell for me) feeling quite frisky again.  I’m not in any kind of relationship mode right now, but I think it might be time for me to start putting myself out there again.  I don’t know- every time I do that lately, I end up freaking out (again with the nervous laughing and chatterboxing) at the moment I should be having sex with someone (sorry David) so who knows if I am ready for that kind of thing?  I think pretty soon my physical urges are going to MAKE me be ready.  When I lived in Seattle, I never had trouble meeting interesting guys, but this is a smaller college town and most of these boys are marijuana-addled, white-dreadlocked, guitar-strumming hippies, or they’re gay and wonderful (Noah, my bestie and partner in crime- well, actually in business and the movie), or they work for the state and are totally square or are already taken.  Smaller pond, for sure.  Eh, sometimes I feel confident that it’ll happen when it happens, like it always does, and sometimes, I have that horrible, strangling, I’m-going-to-be-alone-for-the-rest-of-my-life-because-I’m-gigantic monologue pinging off the inside of my skull.  Today, it’s a dash of both.  Okay, well, this blog has served it’s purpose tonight- I’m now fatigued, feeling much better, and am not full of any unhealthy food.  Still nervous, but I think I just needed to talk myself down for a minute.  

Well, I feel a little more on track now, I did my workout and ate a large but healthy dinner.  The dogs have settled down and now I can get down to the business of cleaning the hell out of my house.  It always shocks me, how easily messy and disorganized it becomes, especially my bedroom.  Oh well, I have to give everything at least a once over before Ellie and Sandro arrive.

Breakfast: nope

Lunch: footlong Subway sammy with chicken, tomatoes, dijon, honey mustard, olives, pickles, cucumbers, lettuce, vinegar

Dinner: salad with mixed greens, tempeh, feta, radishes, olives, red cabbage, garbanzo beans, balsamic vinaigrette

Exercise: 30 day shred, 20 minutes stationary bike (5.5 miles), 4 miles with the dogs

1000 miles in 2009: 43.5

Song of The Day: Se Acabo, by the Beatnuts

Daily awesome: The digital gallery of the New York Public Library is about the most incredible thing EVER, check it out.  Oh, also, I got a package from The Gap today and in it were some denim bermuda shorts which I thought would not fit me for another month or so (size 20’s) and they totally do fit with room to spare- although they look hideous and are getting returned.  Exciting.  They would not have fit me a month ago- huzzah!

Having a day where the dogs are driving me absolutely CRAZY, needy and hassling all the time, not satisfied with their long walk AND their trip to the dog park, anxiously pacing the house, barking at every passing car.  Noah and I are trying to work today even though we are both overwhelmed- his boyfriend Chance got home yesterday from a 3 month trip to Venezuela and the screening is tomorrow.  During the screening, he’ll be out of town with Chance (romantic oceanside cabin- I’m totally jealous), then Friday I leave town for five days, during which time he will return from his Chance-vacation and the fly to California to visit his mother.  So we won’t even see each other for ten days, but will have to work remotely on various projects we’re in the middle of.  

I had such a good day yesterday, and then I blew it all right before I went to bed.  I ended up eating at least 800 calories worth of cheese and crackers.  I was so upset I nearly cried.  I’m really trying to get this thing on track and all the mantras I repeat to myself, all the inspiring episodes of the biggest loser, every drop of sweat dripping from my brow during workouts. . . all that doesn’t really mean shit if I can’t keep my food intake under control.  I’m really frustrated with myself. The worst part about having a mini-binge like that right before I go to sleep is that the next morning, I wake up HUNGRY, for godsake, because my stomach is all stretched out.  But this morning I was feeling too guilty and unsure if I could eat a normal breakfast, so I ate nothing and it threw my eating off for the rest of the day.  I haven’t eaten dinner yet.  I’m planning on a salad, but what I want is a big fat bowl of pasta.  RESIST, DAMMIT!  

Not looking forward to my sister and Sandro’s visit.  As I discussed in my post from yesterday, they are an unpleasant couple to be around; one of them is either sulking or openly angry most of the time, or they have that exhausted, drawn look that people get after they’ve been fighting over complete bullshit for 18 straight hours.  I hope it’s going to be fun.  Sandro is a pleasant person to pass time with, he’s nice and thoughtful, but I’m really feeling like the sooner my sister realizes he is not husband material, the better.  I really empathize with how draining it is to be with someone who makes you miserable, but whom you are desperately attached to.  I hope we’ll all have a fun time, but I’m not counting on it.  I’ll write later with my final food and workout breakdown.  

Today, I was officially back on track.  Yesterday, I did eat well, but I skipped my full workout, again.  I made up for it today.  Spent some time with Nancy and Josh and baby Max, who was circumcised today.  Nance said it was so insanely traumatic for her that she nearly fainted.  My sister and her completely useless, manipulative, controlling, monopolizing fiance are coming to town Thursday.  It’s so frustrating- she tells me all these things about how badly he treats her, how much she wants and needs to leave him (which she definitely, definitely does) and I agree and advise accordingly.  But they’re so codependent that I know a few days later, I’ll end up looking like the bad guy.  I’m sad for my sister; because she’s pregnant, I don’t see her gathering the strength to leave this enormously unpleasant relationship anytime soon.  She’s given him chance after chance after chance, before she was pregnant, and was constantly on the verge of breaking things off, but then decided to re-commit once she found out she was knocked up.  But now, it’s almost four months in, and he’s still his same bullshit self: useless and selfish and a complete drain on her energy.  It makes me so fucking sad, what a huge waste.  I spend literally hours each week listening to her talk about how miserable she is, but it’s such a huge codependent nightmare that I know she can’t recognize the relationship for what it is: a bad egg.  Anyhow, a good day today.

Breakfast: whole wheat toast with sliced chicken, mustard and baby spinach

Lunch: no

Dinner: salad with tempeh, baby spinach, feta, radishes, red cabbage, sprouts, garbanzo beans, olives, balsamic vinaigrette

Snack: rice crackers (2 servings, 120 calories)

Exercise: 3 miles with dogs, 30 day shred, 40 minutes on the stationary bike (11.5 miles)

1000 miles in 2009: 34

Song of the Day: Shuffle Your Feet, by Black Rebel Motorcycle Club

Daily awesome:  I’m too tired to think or be awesome today and when that happens, this site is a perfect place to go to look at\find something interesting to talk about.  

Well, a shitty night tonight.  I really ate a lot today- too much, after I had planned on having a nice, restful, non-stress, no-workout day, I’ve now ended up in an anxious frenzy, because I totally overate today.  I’m just going to go to sleep and work out hard tomorrow morning.  Moving on.  We finished the movie today and the press release came out- it’s a crazy thing, really, but I’m getting super excited for Thursday.  

Breakfast: no

Lunch: mexican food (this was the beginning of my slide into gluttony). . . many chips with salsa, 1\3 fajita quesadilla with 1\2 of provided beans and rice (I did take home a ton of leftovers, but gave them to Noah, thank god)

Dinner: 2 cups pasta with 3 slices flank steak, 3 tablespoons pesto, parmesean, 1 tomato, 2 servings rice chips, handful of cashews

What a fatty, ridiculous dinner to have if you’re dieting.  Gahh, I’ve just got to fall asleep and forget this day ever happened.  Also, Delita, thanks for the advice and support.

Exercise: 2 miles with dogs

Song of the Day: Street Hassle by Lou Reed

Daily awesome: a tiny burst of hilarious light, in a world of darkness.

1000 miles in 2009: 19.5

So, new plan: I’ve got to buy a food scale.  I’m always estimating how much in oz. I eat- I measure out with cups of stuff like yogurt or milk or whatever, but I’m noticing from reviewing my old blog posts that I often blow it for the day by eating more calories than I want to.  I haven’t had more than a couple major blowouts, but I routinely eat more regular\healthy food than I want to.  SO! I think I need to start weighing out my food portions carefully and diligently, to keep stricter track of how much I eat.  I would really like, for instance, to be able to measure out exactly one ounce of nuts or exactly 6 oz of chicken.  I think I’m going to hassle my mother about this; it strikes me as the type of gift she would like to give me.  

Does anyone out there have one of these bad boys?  Has it helped anyone with maintaining stricter control over your portions and snacking?  Any idea of what the best kind to get is?

Also, I’m in the middle of a day without exercise (except a dog walk this morning); I decided a couple days ago that this would be my off day, but now I’m feeling like I’m dying to work out. . . not because my body isn’t tired and doesn’t need a rest, but because I’m filled with weight-loss anxiety.  Arrrggghh.  I’ve been feeling good lately, ramping up my workouts and all that, I’ve got a lot of energy, but the internal monologue is still completely haywire (’am I losing weight? how much? how fast? how can i lose more?’) and I’m doing that trying-on-15-items-of-too-small-clothing, just to check how it’s fitting (minor changes detectable) thing.  This would be fine, if I wasn’t doing it EVERY DAY.  This is one thing that I really hate about dieting, how it takes up so much space in your mind.   I guess, if I’m being honest, it certainly doesn’t take up as much space as the other internal monologue, the harsher, you-fat-piece-of-shit one, so it’s a happy trade.  It’s like they tell you in AA and rehab programs: if you could find time to drink, you can find time for meetings.  If I could find the time to agonize over being fat and miserable, I can certainly devote some time to having hopeful, if slightly obsessive, thoughts about my body.  Eh, it’s just the process, I guess: the idea is that all the fretting and sweating and anxiety ultimately transforms your body and mind into the person you want to be.  I’m hoping and praying that will be the case for me this time.  I’ll write later with a final food\exercise\daily awesome breakdown but now must get back to work.

Noah and I have been editing almost all day today.  We went over to some friends for a game night (where I was forced to kick everyone’s ass in Scrabble, nobigdeal) and ended up staying about three hours later than we intended to.  We’re on a roll, though, so are pushing on through into the wee hours.  We usually work very well and fast in the evening and tonight is no exception.  Decent day today.

Breakfast: 3 slices dried mango, 4 slices pineapple, 30 edamame pods

Lunch: footlong sub sammy with chicken breast, lettuce, tomato, olives, pickles, cucumber, spinach, dijon, honey mustard, sweet onion sauce, american cheese (or whatever passes for it at Subway)

Dinner: not really, but about 20 edamame pods, 3 fig newtons, 1 large handful corn chips with salsa

Exercise: 20 minutes stationary bike (5.5 miles), 30 day shred, 1 mile with dogs

Song of the Day: The Promise, by When In Rome

Daily awesome: Noah and I are getting interviewed by the local paper for the screening- I’m kind of nervous and also very excited; happy to be recognized and hoping I don’t make a complete ass of myself.  

1000 miles in 2009: 17.5