Well, no, I’m not really the Loch Ness monster…I just play one on TV.  Well, no, I don’t do that. either. I just FEEL like “Nessie” these days.

I’m still around – alive and kicking. Still walking every day – although it’s down to just a mile every morning before work. Leslie Sansone is starting to grate on my nerves just a tad, but the walk is a good one, takes just about 20 minutes, and I can fit that in after my first cup of coffee and before my shower. Gets busier later in the day, and when I get home from work, I am frankly just too wiped out to walk again. Still eating pretty healthy, although I went a bit crazy in the four days I had off for Thanksgiving. To be perfectly honest, I’ve been eating too much for a couple of months, now. Not unhealthy stuff – just too danged much of it. I’m a little too fond of my own cooking, I’m afraid. I had lost 30 pounds back last year after I found 3FC and started blogging here. I wasn’t any size 0 by any means – a good, solid, loosely-fitting 12 is more like it – but my body was fitting nicely enough on my bones, and I felt that I could comfortably settle into staying at that weight forever. Then, the same sad story that so many of us can tell here…I stopped watching what I ate; or in my case, stopped watching how much I was eating…and have now managed to gain back ten pounds!!! I weighed myself yesterday, knowing that I was going to have to do some cutting back between now and Christmas. I know…I know. This is the oldest story in the book. Trying to lose those pounds is a grueling uphill-all-the-way battle, while gaining them back is just one smooth slide down a well-greased slope. And, it’s a never-ending battle, besides. I thought that when I was MY age, I wouldn’t be concerned about how much I weighed anymore. Hah! Looks like that’s another one of those myths that we desperately cling to when we’re in our thirties and dieting…if we can just get our weight where we want it in our thirties, we’ll be able to relax and not even care by the time we hit sixty (if we hit it at all, that is). Well, now I’ve hit it, and sixty isn’t anything like it was when my mother was sixty! Now I’m expected to stay in shape so that I can walk and exercise; rock-climb (only on very gentle slopes) with my son & his girlfriend, hike in the woods with DH, paddle a danged canoe, and just generally MOVE around like elders never did when I was young and THEY were old, for pity sake!

Well, now that I’ve kvetched and moaned a bit, I have to say that I’m planning a rather drastic cutback over the next 22 days in the hope that I can lose at least half - and possibly a pound or two more - of what I’ve managed to gain back. This see-sawing is ridiculous at my age, you know?

Other than the overabundance of food, Thanksgiving was nice - quiet, with only one daughter and her DH & DS for dinner, but we had all the rest (except for DS, who is still living out in L.A. and will be home for Christmas) on Friday for a huge feast of leftovers.

There are so many things to talk about - our new president-elect, the sad state of the economy, family stuff, work stuff, stuff-stuff - but this is far too long already, so it will have to wait for another day.

Here’s hoping that all my blog-pals here are happy, healthy…has anyone seen or heard from Ini?? Bad stuff happening in India!….and doing well, looking forward to the holidays.

Warm hugs all around,

Z