I guess I run now

We finally managed to pull ourselves away from work and make our way to the UP. There’s still work to do up here…I go up for tenure in the fall, so there will be little actual vaca in this vaca…but that work seems much more pleasant from Michigan’s considerably cooler UP. And it stays light until about 11:30, so you can still have long days working and end up at the beach around 8 for some R & R.

Took a 5-mile walk with hubby and the dog along the portage yesterday. Our longest walk yet this summer, and a walk I did quite a bit as a walk-run two summers ago. Our pace was really slow (5 miles in 2 hours!), but we had to stop to let the dog cool off in the water 5 times along the way, so that accounts for some of the slower pace. I wondered about heading off on my own to see if I could walk-run it a bit faster.

Packed only the case for the pilates dvd, so I did yoga yesterday & I’ll be doing yoga again today. I head back south next Friday to attend a workshop, so I’ll get it then. I’m worried about the workshop, though: the price includes meals, which I’ll have no control over & I’m sure it’ll end up being muffin and warm cookie heaven. Still, I’ve made really good, but slow, progress, and I want to hold onto that progress and see even more progress on the scale when I get back, not slide backwards.

Happy 4th of July chicks!

Unfortunately, it’ll probably be years before I get to Brooklyn again, so…

No sleep.

Stupid, stupid, stupid, stupid, stupid, stupid, stupid, stupid, stupid, stupid, stupid, stupid work stress. (actually, writing stupid over and over again was kinda Zen & almost made me feel better, try it!)

Yeah, the insomnia is killing me. Or work is killing me and its weapon is stress and insomnia. Bleck.

On the up-side, lots of exercise! Yesterday we moved a new colleague’s furniture from a giant truck into our garage, where it will stay until she can find a place to live; then gardening; then a 4.5 mile walk with hubby and the dog. Our walks have really increased, although today I couldn’t do more than 1 mile because I’m so damned wiped.

Hubby’s got atkins-friendly custards working in the oven. Yum.

Apparently this is a random-thoughts blog post, so I should probably end here.

Anyway…happy hump day!

But then, who doesn’t?!

Down 5.1 today, after only 5 days on Atkins! Of course, it’s all water weight, but I don’t care one bit because after the water weight comes the fat weight.

Meanwhile, it’s hot and muggy and I’m tired from a 3hour meeting, and I really don’t feel like walking right now. I’m sure I’ll change my mind when it cools off and hubby puts his shoes on to go, but right now I just want to stretch out with a good book and a nice cold glass of water.

Last night made sugar free jello for a treat, and hubby’s making his shrimp dip tonight since we’re both sick of eating eggs for snacks. That’s the thing that drives me crazy about this diet, all the food prep.

This could be the start of something wonderful! And I’m excited he wants to start exercising beyond our daily walks, but we already know he’ll be at his goal weight long before I can ever hope to be…what if he gets into amazingly athletic shape before me as well?

It’s a silly thing to worry about, but that’s what I guess I’ve decided to worry about today. The plus side is that after finally catching up on what everyone here’s been up to since I went (inexplicably) away there, I’m inspired to do some yoga. Not just inspired. I’m going to do some yoga.

& here we go!

UPDATE: did it, 30 mins of yoga, 60 min walk with hubby and dog (with a shorter walk to follow as soon as it cools off).

AND my excuse for not doing pilates for the last year+ is that my favorite pilates workout was on VHS and hubby got rid of the VCR. So obviously there’s no possible way for me to fix this impossible situation and actually get back to doing pilates again. I think we can all see the logic at work here.

Okay, so after yoga I ordered it in DVD form from amazon & tomorrow I’ll pick up a copy at the library to hold me over til it gets here. That’s right, it’s been sitting on a shelf in my public library all this time. So…lamest excuse evah has been eliminated.

My WW weigh in day is tomorrow. I had a 1.2 lb loss last week, but I hope to see more than that now that we’re doing atkins. Fingers crossed everyone!

& it’s atkins, induction friendly.

So I discovered these chai tea bags last night and they are amazing. It’s the Stash chai tea in the purple box*.

Today I combined my cooled tea with two scoops of vanilla protein shake mix (a kind made with splenda/sucralose), cream, and ice. And it is so much heaven! Last night I realized the tea alone could get me through induction, but today is even sunnier since I’ll replace eggs with this 25g protein, 4 gram carb shake once in a while as well (2 from the shake mix and 2 from the heavy cream).

*I am not a paid endorser of this product.

I’ve been doing admin work & trying to get ready for my tenure review next year, so that’s the excuse I’ll use for not writing yet this summer. Not a great excuse for a writing prof to offer, but there it is.

In good news: hubby and I were on our evening walk on Sunday night and out of the blue he said, “maybe we should go on Atkins.” Boom! Hubby’s never been on a diet, but he says he’d like to lose 20 pounds. I have much more than that to lose & he’ll lose his 20 in record time, but I can’t even tell you how happy I am about this!

We started on Wednesday, so it’s very early days yet, but if he’s on the diet, I think I’ll have a much easier time of sticking to it myself. Of course, 3 days earlier I’d purchased 3 months of WW online…so I’m logging food, exercise, and weight there, but not really following the points program…at least not worrying about points as long as we’re cutting carbs.

Now I just have to add something to our walks for daily exercise, and I know that something will be yoga to start…I just need to just do it!

Okay, thanks for passing part of one insomniatic hour with me. Happy Friday Chicks!

Okay, part of it is I’ve been making myself record every bit of food on this iphone app. Nice one too: it lets you set your goal weight and the amount of time you want to take getting to that weight, and then it tells you how many calories you can have every day (adjusting as you go along).

Otherwise, though, my mom’s visiting for the first time since I moved here 5 years ago & my nephew’s back for a second visit (he’s 15 and apparently thinks Michigan is some culinary capital of the world because he remembered every restaurant we took him to last year and wanted to go back). Anywho, food’s been bad, but I’ve been aware of how bad and recording it, so that has maybe put a halt to my tendency to use any excuse (like a visit with family) to overindulge.

The scale hasn’t moved in either direction, which is good news under the circumstances. I’m looking forward to getting back to normal, healthy food, though.

I’ve been recording all of my food on my iphone and taking nice long walks with hubby now that the weather is nice and the sun doesn’t set at 5 any more.

It’s the end of the semester, so I plan to kick it into high gear as soon as the grading is done.

Lost a pound…not bad, not great: I’ll take anything I can get anyway.

I’ll take it!

Doing a combination of mostly vegetarian with a 2-day semi-fast. The mostly vegetarian is working out this week: we’re eating only humanely raised, grass-fed meats. I’m buying a pound of meat every two weeks from the local CFA: last time was a pound of ground beef for yummy burgers; this time we’re getting a pound of bacon. I really like this CFA: they’re making eating local a lot easier and since they plan to hoop farm all next winter, we’ll have lovely hearty greens even in February.

If you’re thinking about eating local, try a google search for Community Farmers Associations in your area. We’re getting eggs, meat, cheese, fruit, veggies, four and cake mixes, popcorn, etc.

It’s nice to see the scale moving in the right direction for a change. I’d celebrate the full 10 pound loss, but I’ve been back and forth over this number on the scale so many times over the last year that it seems hardly appropriate to celebrate a number. Instead, I’m going to celebrate having control over my eating again and being able to wear my jeans without feeling like they’re going to cut me in half.

We have a spring seminar with the entire department at the end of April, and my mom’s visiting around that time as well, so I’d like to be down enough to fit into some of the fun spring clothes in my closet.

Happy losing Chicks!

Seriously.

Hubby and I tried a new place for breakfast, just opened, and I guess they’re trying to drum up business by serving the world’s largest portions. Giant plate, about a 6-egg omelet with tons of spinach, about 12 oz of home fries, 2 pieces of toast. I couldn’t even think what to do with all that food, so I took my toast plate, cut 1/3 of the omelet and took 1/3 of the home fries and ate that off the small plate with one slice of toast. Was more than enough. What a waste of food. I mean, it’s not like you’re going to take an omelet home and reheat it.

Anyway, with that giant plate I’d have had no idea how much I’d really eaten, so the smaller plate was a good idea.

Tonight’s perogies and kraut with salad.

Happy Sunday!