Sistah Pat

Good Morning, Amigos!  Hope everything is well this morning.  Excuse me just a moment while I take care of a little problem here.
Mr. Scale, I don’t know who you think you’re fooling.  I do NOT weigh 180 pounds this morning.  I DID NOT gain four pounds since Saturday.  I have not exceeded my allowed calories even once in the last week or two.  I exercise like crazy whether I want to or not.  You think you can play these little mind games with me and get away with it.  I put up with it yesterday when you tried to tell me I’d gained weight but I will not tolerate it anymore.  You CAN be replaced, you miserable piece of crap, and if you think you’re going on vacation with the way you’re acting, you have another think coming.  I’m not playing around, Mister!  I’m going upstairs and work out on the treadmill and I don’t even want to see your face.  You can crawl back into your little hole between the toilet and the toilet brush which is where you belong and just LEAVE ME ALONE!

Sorry, Chicklets.  I’m sorry you had to witness that but it just couldn’t be ignored anymore.

11:45 - Finished the 3 more miles workout.  Nice to have it behind me and get on with the rest of the day.  Pam sent me an email.  She’s home from the hospital.  They don’t know what’s going on with her and referred her to a gastro specialist.  Hope everything turns out okay.

S’cuse me…

I just finished the dreaded 3 more miles workout, buddy!  Whadda ya think of that???  Just so you know, I didn’t even break a sweat till I’d been at it for 45 minutes and my heart rate never got above 125 the entire time.  Took Britney Spears upstairs with me and had no trouble keeping up with her.  That’s who you’re messing with, Pal!   That’s who I am!  Just so you know…You’re not fooling with some skinny-ass little teenage girl whining because she has to lie on the bed to zip her size 3 jeans.  You’re dealing with a seriously overweight, menopausal woman and I don’t mess around.  As long as you live under my roof, I own the very air you breath, Mister, so you better straighten up and fly right.  In fact, maybe I should send you to live with Britney.  How’d you like that, you miserable piece of crap?  Don’t even look at me, you sorry ass, no-good liar!  You can just hide back there behind the toilet the rest of the day.  You’re so grounded it ain’t even funny!

Sorry…

Breakfast
1/2 cup Kashi Go Lean Crunch (100)
1/2 cup Silk Light Soy Milk (40)

Lunch
Marie Callender’s frozen turkey dinner (350)  Sorry, I’m busy packing!

Dinner
Whole Wheat Light Bun (70)
Veggie Burger (160)
Fudgesicle x 2 (90)

Snack
Rice Cakes (100)

Snack
1 cup Schwan’s Fat Free, Sugar Free vanilla frozen yogurt with 6 blueberries (150)

Total 1,060

I love the outdoors.  Nature is always so full of beauty and unexpected delights.  I ran up to the store to pick up some milk and eggs and was rushing around unloading stuff from the car when a firefly landed right on my hand and everything stood still.  It’s the first one I’ve seen this summer.  I looked around and they’re everywhere.  How could I have missed seeing them?  The little guy took me back to my childhood and gave me some magical memories so I wrote a little poem for him.  Let’s just call it my little Ode to a Firefly.

Long ago and yesterday,
I clutched magic in my hand.
Firefly,
Golden luminescense glowing.

Mystical creatures,
delicate fairies,
dwelling in the dark.
Webs of silver tapestries woven in the night.

Love, foretold in the petals of a flower.

Now, Adulthood and Responsibility
Dictate my thoughts and behavior,
Hard facts and cold logic.
Imagination shattered in the blazing glare of a sun too bright
at noon
to disguise the magician’s slight of hand.

No leprechaun, nor elf
dare hide in my garden.
Magic lives only in children’s books forgotten on the shelf.

Until tonight
Unbidden, unexpected,
a Gift.
Golden firefly lights upon my hand
making me pause,
set down my bags,
and clutch magic once again.

PAR 6/15/08

Happy Father’s Day to all your men, Chicklets! 

Meeting Sistah Pam at the gym this morning.  That means an easy workout in the pool as opposed to a killer treadmill session.  Somehow, I always feel like a pool workout is cheating and I certainly don’t want to cheat today because Mr. Scale is laughing and having a good old time and showing me 178.5 again.  What a load of crap!  I know, I know…it doesn’t mean anything but it’s still disappointing to find that it jumps around like this when I’m working hard and doing everything I’m supposed to do.  Take a deep breath and don’t let him see that it bothers me...

Went to bed with the airbed inflated in the living room so I could check it this morning and see if it lost any air and got up to find that the boys deflated it and rolled it up.

I was lying in bed this morning and trying to figure out how I’d be able to exercise on vacation.  A few of the campgrounds that we’re staying in have pools and a couple even have exercise rooms but most don’t.  There are also several days where we’ll be boondocking while we’re on the road.  For those who don’t know, boondocking means pulling your RV over in a Walmart parking lot, or a rest area,  or someplace where you can’t hook up to water or electricity and you run it from the batteries.  That’s not a problem in terms of the RV.  Everything works just fine whether you’re hooked up or not but it means there’s no place to swim or hike.  Most days I should be able to get a hike in or jog in a pool.  Don’t think there’s room for my treadmill (smile).  Oh well, there may be days when I just can’t exercise.  Deal with it.

9:00 - Pam called from the hospital.  She’s in there again because of non stop vomiting, dehydration, and elevated blood pressure and sugar levels.  That’s twice in about six weeks.  This is worrisome.  I hope they find out what’s going on because it’s too much of a coincidence that she’d have stomach flu twice in such a short amount of time.

10:50 - Manny gets a bath!
Since I didn’t go to the gym, I helped DH give Manny a bath.  Not a very good one but then, washing a 37 foot RV is not an easy job.  Anyway, we did a quick wash with a scrub brush and squeegie on a long pole.  I guess I’ll work on getting the inside ready since I’m not working out.  Funny…I get up every morning knowing that I need to workout on the treadmill and it’s something I feel like I need to get out of the way before I move on to other things.  With the mindset that I wasn’t going to use it today, I have no interest in working out.  Maybe I’ll jog in the pool this afternoon.  We’ll see.

12:15 - Need to vent.  DH has the strangest system of putting stuff away that I’ve ever seen!  It’s Father’s Day so I don’t want to be mean to him.  Better to vent here.  He picks stuff up and puts it “out of the way”.  That doesn’t mean he puts it where it goes.  It just means he puts it out of sight.  I set my “Super Bloom Fertilizer” out on the patio yesterday morning to spray the flower beds but it was raining.  I went out to spray and he says he put it “somewhere”.  Now, you have to understand.  For DH, that could mean he put it in the trunk, put it in the hall closet, put it under the sink, put it in the shed (No, that couldn’t be it.  That’s where it belongs!)… I looked and looked and can’t find it.  I’ve been looking for 30 minutes!  I spend half my life cleaning out the bowl in the center of the kitchen table.  He puts everything in there!  Screws, nuts, bolts, spools of thread, scissors, mail, combs, glasses, keys, batteries.  You name it, it’s in there!  Except, of course, the plant fertilizer!

Okay…venting topic number two… Oldest DS really needs to watch his diet.  He’s very overweight and has diabetes.  So he’s going with us on vacation and he’s starting to talk about all the places he wants to eat.  Hello!  I’m on a DIET!  He’s talking about eating dinner at someplace around Memphis where they have “the biggest, baddest buffet of them all!  You can eat till you can’t move and everything is fantastic!”  Considering that we’ll be pulling out of here around 4:00 on Friday evening, I figured I’d have a dinner in the fridge and we could eat while we’re on the road.  We have 8 1/2 hours of driving to do Friday evening and we won’t be able to pull over until around 1:00.  I told him we’re not going to stop at a buffet four hours down the road.  He said, “Oh no, I ALWAYS stop there.  Everytime I go that way.  If we don’t do anything else on vacation, we have to eat there.  You’ll just have to put your diet aside on Friday.”  Sob!  I have a feeling it’s going to be like this the entire time.

1:05- Found the fertilizer.  It was in the laundry room.  Ohhh!  I get it…It’s in a box and so is detergent and fabric softener sheets.  Makes perfect sense!

9:00 - Okay, let’s wrap it up.  My conscience got the best of me and I went out and jogged in the pool for an hour.

Stress point number two.  Not a problem.  I will eat healthy on vacation.  That’s not to say I won’t splurge a couple of times.  I’ll probably want to stop at an authentic Mexican restaurant and enjoy a feast, including sopapillas if I get the chance.  Also…I wouldn’t dream of going to Vegas and not getting an authentic New York Style Pizza or deli sandwich from New York, New York and having dinner at the Stratosphere buffet.  Oh, I almost forgot those yard long dacquiris.  Gotta have one (two?) of those while I’m there.  Okay…I can live with that.  If DS want’s to stop at every greasy spoon and buffet in the west, I’ll deal with it.  I don’t have to eat anything I don’t want to.  No one’s going to hold me down and shove it down my throat.

Daddy’s Day is done.  I fixed hubby a grilled steak, baked potato, and salad and made him dessert.  Made Hoppin John soup for myself and a healthy sandwich.  See??? I don’t have to eat what they eat.  Treated him to a pedicure which he loves to get but doesn’t like to go for (it’s not a MAN thing).

Bought a twin size airbed for Manny.  We’ll take the big one but now I have a twin in case we need it.

I’m done!  G’night, chickies!

Lunch
Whole Grain Light Bun (70)
2 slices plumrose ham (50)
Fat free cheese (40)
Fudgesicle (45)

Dinner
Hoppin John Soup (400)
Whole Wheat Lite Bun (70)
Fat Free Cheese (25)
Plumrose Ham (50)

Snack
Fudgesicle (45)

Total 805

DS woke me up at 6:30 to say that the electric flickered and all the clocks went out.  He didn’t know if DH or I had to get up early for anything and didn’t want us to oversleep.  There’s nothing on the agenda that requires an alarm this morning but I couldn’t get back to sleep.  Anyway, it’s nice and quiet and that doesn’t happen often around here so I’m just going to sit here and drink my coffee and enjoy the solitude.

We had a lot of rain last night but the front page of the paper shows that we were lucky.  It looks like Iowa’s about to float away.  I hope all you little chicklets are on high ground this morning.  We would have been driving through Iowa and spending the night in Des Moine in six days if I hadn’t reversed the vacation route.

My dear friend, Mr. Scale, is showing me 176 this morning.  Whooo Hoooo!  Of course, I know how fickle he is.  He’ll probably throw me a curve tomorrow but it feels good this morning.  That’s only one pound from my goal of 175 by June 15 and I can live with that.  At some point, I’m going to have to reassess my goals.  I thought 5 pounds every two weeks was pretty reasonable but I can’t do anymore than what I’m doing and I’m not getting there.  Actually, I have gotten there every two weeks except the one on June 1st.  I missed it by a little bit and that’s what’s thrown me off on June 15.  Of course, today is only the 14th but it’s not likely to change by tomorrow.  Maybe I don’t need to reassess the goals.  I’ve lost 19 pounds since April 15th and that’s only one pound off the goal.

I didn’t eat enough calories yesterday.  At the end of the day, I’d only eaten 515 calories or something like that.  Didn’t do it on purpose and I’m not going to worry about it.  It’s actually kind of nice to be at a point where I forgot to eat.  Haven’t had that problem for a long time.

10:30 - Treadmill is done!  It feels so good to have that behind me and know that I don’t have to worry about it for the rest of the day.  Did the “3 more miles” workout although I guess I should really call it the “5 more minutes” workout because I never look beyond the next 5 minutes.  The first 30 minutes is pretty much a warm-up to get the ankle to loosen up, the next 35 minutes are killers, and the last 30 minutes are cooling down.  It’s nice to start out the day 610 calories ahead!

1:00 - I’m going crazy trying to find the leak in the airbed!  After I set it up the other day I realized, a couple of hours later, that it was going down.  I’m not happy about it because it was “borrowed” without permission by DIL and she loaned it to someone else.  Now I’ve got it back and it has a leak somewhere.  I’ve gone over and over it and can’t find it!  DH went to pick up the car dolly so we can tow the car behind the RV on vacation.  I’m going to get him to help me when he gets back.  Maybe if one of us lies on it and the other goes over it looking for the leak, we’ll find it.

8:30 - I’m bingeing.  STOP IT NOW!  I ate a package of peanut butter rice cakes.  Then I ate dinner.  Then I ate another package of rice cakes and had some Crystal Light.  I just realized I just ate another package of rice cakes.  I’m bored…Snacking is not going to help.  Ughhh…Let me add up the calories and see what the damages are…

1,185 calories.  Okay, I’m safe but nothing else to eat tonight.  I think I started eating because I’m frustrated.  Sprayed soapy water on the air bed and found a leak.  Patched it and noticed it was still not holding air.  Found another leak.  Patched it and it’s still leaking.  Now I have to keep looking for yet another hole somewhere.

I was looking through some diet recipes for dinner and came across several using chicken.  I tried one that used chicken breast, mushrooms, cheddar cheese (I used fat-free) skim milk and dried stuffing mix on top.  As it was baking, I looked over the recipe and saw that it has 500 calories per serving.  Gasp!  I don’t know how I missed that except that I looked at a lot of recipes before deciding to try this one and somehow missed checking the calorie count.  Can’t believe I did that.  Anyway, it turned out pretty soupy and blah and I don’t like wasting 500 calories on blah, soupy chicken.  Guess I’ll call it a day and go look for some more leaks in the airbed before I give up. 

Later, Chicklets!

Breakfast
1/2 cup Kashi Go Lean Crunch (100)
1/2 cup Silk Light Soymilk (40)

Snack
1 pkg chocolate drizzle rice cakes (90)

Dinner
Chicken Casserole (500)
Green beans (75)
Rice (100)
Asian Slaw (50)
Watermelon (50)

Snacks
2 Pkg. rice cakes (180)

Total 1,185

Asian Slaw

1/2 head shredded napa cabbage (40)
2 cups shredded Romaine Lettuce (20)
1 red pepper cut into thin julianne strips (30)
1 carrot cut into thin julianne strips (25)
1 large green onion sliced (5)
1 Asian Pear cut into julianne strips (50)

Dressing
6 Tablespoons Rice Wine Vinegar (0)
1 1/2 Tablespoons Lime Juice (0)
1 Tablespoon Sesame Oil (120)
1/2 teaspoon red pepper flakes (0)
1 teaspoon black sesame seed (0)
2 teaspoons Splenda (0)

Prepare dressing and set aside so flavors can mingle.  Combine salad ingredients.  Just before serving, pour dressing over salad and top with cracked peppercorns.

Calories : 290 for the entire thing.  This serves at least 8 generous servings at 36 calories per serving.

I’m at 178 this morning.  That’s another half pound.  That makes 1 1/2 pounds this week.  Sometimes it seems like it goes sooooooo slowwwww but I was just remembering how shocked I was on June 3rd after the colonoscopy when I weighed 177.  I was thinking, “Man, I wish it was true and I really was down to 177.”  So here I am, a few days down the road and I’m almost there and that’s without having another colonoscopy prep! (smile)

Now, the question is, will the weight stay off or will it pop back up tomorrow.  I ate some calories at dinner last night.  Thanks to all who looked over the menu and made suggestions but I decided to do a “sensible” splurge.  I love Hot Browns and haven’t had one for a couple of years so I decided to go with it.  In preparation for dinner last night, I only ate a salad yesterday and I burned more than 600 calories on the treadmill so I decided to go for it.  I looked up “calories in a hot brown” on google this morning and found two examples.  One of them listed it at 1,060 calories and the other said 1,108 so I guess I’m safe to go with 1200.  Here’s how it went…ate a salad yesterday, gave it 200 calories but it was most likely less.  Worked out on the treadmill and burned 600+ calories.  Went out with the girls and skipped the before dinner drinks in favor of club soda and lime.  Passed on the appetizers and sent the plates right on by to the next person.  Ordered the hot brown with a  side of tobacco onions and Asian slaw.  I was surprised to see that the tobacco onions were onion rings.  Didn’t expect that.  I thought they’d be some kind of sauteed onions or something.  Passed my plate around like an appetizer and told everyone to help themselves. With 24 women in the group, what came back to me was a greatly reduced portion of which I ate just a little bit.  The Asian slaw was wonderful.  Wish I had the recipe.  I’ve had that slaw they make with raw ramen noodles that a lot of people call Asian slaw and I don’t like that at all.  This slaw was made with jicama, peapods, and carrots and had a nice vinegar dressing that was a little bit tart and a little bit hot and lots of cracked peppercorns.  I’m going to try to find a similar recipe.  Ate every bite of my hot brown and would have licked the plate but the “girls” wouldn’t let me.  Had club soda with the meal and skipped dessert.  So, I think I did okay.  Yesterday’s calorie count would be the salad (200), the hot brown (say, 1200?), Asian slaw (50), and a couple bites of tobacco onion (100).  Figuring the count and being generous, it comes to about 1,550.  I feel pretty good about it.

Menopause, the Musical, was great!  Joy, you would have loved it!  Four women from different backgrounds meet at Bloomingdale’s and bemoan the agonies of menopause as they drift from floor to floor looking for sales.  I can really identify with that!  It was a riot!  In fact, I felt so silly after I got home around 11:00 last night that I went out and skinny dipped in the pool.  Did 15 minutes of jogging!  Take that, middle age!

Alright, what’s on the agenda for today?  Still working on Manny (the RV).  I got the bed made yesterday and cleaned the bathroom.  Checked all the sheets for the beds and decided to wash them.  They were clean but they’ve been sitting in the closet out there for almost 8 months so they needed some freshening.  Good thing I went out there because I discovered that the air conditioner in the bedroom isn’t working and that’s not a good thing when you’re heading for the desert in June and July.  DH, who is a genius when it comes to anything mechanical, thinks it a capacitor (whatever that is) and is easily replaced.  Started making a list (checking it twice!) about what Manny needs:  dishwashing detergent, laundry detergent, soap, toilet paper, etc.  After I work out today, I’ll go back out there and continue getting ready for vacation.

12:00 - Okay, the workout is done.  95 minutes at 3.0mph.  All the way up the incline and all the way back down in 5 minute increments.  Burned 610 calories and went 4.75 miles.  Strange, a couple of weeks ago, I was so proud to have done this workout and now it seems like it’s the routine.  At that time, I was really reaching to get through it.  Don’t get me wrong, it’s still hard but I know that I can do it and I pretty much expect it of myself.  I think I’ll start referring to this standard routine of 95 minutes, 610 calories, 4.75 miles as the “3 more miles” workout.  That way, I don’t have to keep writing up the mileage, speed, incline, etc.  I know how lucky I am to have this amount of time to devote to myself right now.  Between getting ready, doing the workout and then cooling down, it takes up almost two hours.  I also know how lucky I am to have so many wonderful, encouraging friends on this blog who respond to my rambling and encourage and support me.  Thanks, girls!  Maybe we could make our own musical.  Let’s see…what would we call it?

I used the new Reeboks on the workout.  My ankle that hasn’t had surgery yet gave me a lot of trouble in the beginning.  I thought I’d have to run downstairs and grab the old Reeboks but I decided to give it 30 minutes and see if it eased off.  It got better after the first half hour so there’s hope that I might be able to throw out the ratty old tennies one of these days.  I would love to make my goal of 175 by the 15th but I realize that’s just about impossible.  Still, if I can, I’m going to try to jog in the pool this afternoon.

8:3o - Put on a bathing suit and went out to jog in the pool.  As soon as I went out back, it started pouring rain.  I know it shouldn’t matter.  I mean, I’m jogging in the pool.  Still, it kind of puts a damper on things. (Hee, Hee!)  So, I gave up and sat in the spa.  I don’t like to be in the pool in the rain but I do enjoy being in the spa when it’s raining.  If felt good to sit there in hot water up to my chest and let the cool rain come down on my head and shoulders.  I thought about jogging in the spa but it would be difficult (Hee, Hee, again!)

Fixed a good dinner.  Boneless, skinless chicken breasts in Cream of Mushroom soup and white wine.  I know the soup has a lot of calories but DH and the boys love it and I figured I could just scrape it off my chicken.  I fixed brown and wild rice with toasted almonds and sauteed onions for the guys.  They always miss their carbs so I have to give it to them occasionally.  Also had blanched green beans and Asian slaw which I got to eat.  The Asian slaw wasn’t as good as what I had last night but I experimented until I came up with a pretty close approximation.  I’m going to write down the recipe so I won’t forget and then I can play with it next time.  I like it because it’s a sweet and sour dressing and I can eat all of it that I want.  It has like no calories to speak of and that’s always a dish after my heart.

I didn’t eat all day.  Don’t know why…I just got busy.  Funny, this is how I used to be before I had weight problems.  I know it’s not good for me but sometimes I just don’t get hungry.  I seldom eat breakfast and I just got busy and then realized I was getting hungry around 6:00 this evening.  Not a good habit.

Dinner
Chicken breast (150)
blanched green beans (75)
Asian slaw (50)
1/2 cup brown and wild rice with onion and toasted almonds (150)

Snack
Mini rice cakes (90)

Total 515

Today’s goals are pretty simple.  Continue to do some laundry and get the RV clean.  I really enjoy cleaning the RV.  It’s so simple.  Itty bitty house.  There’s nothing in the bedroom but the bed and some empty dresser drawers and closets.  Make the bed and the room’s clean!  The bathroom hasn’t been used since we took the RV to Florida over Thanksgiving so it’s already been cleaned.  There’s nothing to do in the kitchen either.  In fact, I like cleaning the RV because it can go from being a mess when everyone wakes up in the mornings to being totally clean in just a matter of minutes.  You get up, make the beds, do the breakfast dishes, run the vacuum and the entire place is sparkling!  

I finally lost a pound this morning.  Weighed in at 178.5.  I’m trying to remember what my goal was supposed to be.  I think I wanted to be at 175 by June 15 which isn’t likely.  Boy, this is slow going!  I was thinking I might try to boost the exercise up to twice today but I don’t know if I’ll have time.  I’m meeting a bunch of girlie friends for dinner and a play at 5:30.  I forgot which restaurant we’re going to but I hope they have something light.  Guess I’d better save as many calories as possible for dinner.  Think I’ll take a break here and look through my email to see if I can find out where we’re going and see if they have a menu on line.

8:50 - My back hurts.  My ankle hurts.  I guess it’s because of all the digging I did planting the rest of the flowers yesterday.  I keep sitting here hoping it will ease off but it doesn’t look like it’s going to happen.  I really DON’T want to do the treadmill this morning but I’ve been procrastinating for about an hour and it isn’t going to go away.  Guess I’d better get it done.

11:15 - Done!  In deference to my ankle, I kept the speed down to 2.9.  In deference to my back, I didn’t take the incline any higher than 7%.  In deference to my stubborn nature, I went for 2 hours.  Went 5.7 miles but only burned 612 calories because I didn’t use the steeper inclines.

Found out we’re going to Bistro 301 for dinner.  I looked at the menu and it looks delicious but it doesn’t look very low cal.  The dinner menu is at http://www.bistro301.com/  Anyone got any suggestions?  I love Hot Browns and French Dip sandwiches but, obviously, those are out of the ballpark calorie wise.  They have several salads but they all seem to have croutons, or bacon, or ranch type dressings.  Hmmm…decisions, decisions.

Lunch
Leftover chicken and snow pea salad with whole wheat linguini (200)

Dinner
Hot Brown (1,200)
Asian slaw (50)
Tobacco onions (100)

Total 1,550

Ahhh!  No committments today.  I’m sitting here at the table relaxing and having my coffee.  I woke up feeling good that I don’t have to work today but then I got to thinking about it.  I need to clean the house.  I still need to clean the RV.  I need to do laundry.  I still have tons of plants to get in the ground.  I need to set up the tent and inflate the air bed to see if it has any leaks. (The boys want to have the option of sleeping in the RV or a tent on vacation).  I need to work on the treadmill.  I need to go to the store.  I need to get all this done before David brings Jake and Scout over for me to babysit.

On the weight issue…179.5.   Need I say STILL 179.5??  I upped the calories some the last few days and I think that was a mistake.  I’ve also eaten some popcorn in the evenings the last couple days and I don’t even like popcorn.  Well, not that much anyway.  Jake and Scout love it and I’ve been exposed to it while I’m watching them so I’ve started eating it.

I got up determined to workout on the treadmill this morning before it gets too hot.  I know I’m jogging in the pool for an hour everyday but it just isn’t as much of a workout.  So, little chicklets, I’m off to the treadmill.

10:00 - Ahhhh…the treadmill is over for today.  95 minutes at 3.0mph, and 607 calories.  I went 4.6 miles in increments of 1%, all the way up the incline and all the way back down.  I’m feeling pretty smug because it wasn’t an easy workout.  I found out that it’s not the batteries in my MP3, it’s the player itself.  It kept shutting down on me but then it would immediately restart.  After fooling with it for an hour and a half and listening to Enrique Iglasias sing “I will Survive” 47 times (well, maybe not that many…) I discovered that it was happening whenever I turned the volume up.  As long as I didn’t adjust the volume, it kept playing.  Weird!  It’s under warranty but I wonder if it could have something to do with the headphones?  Oh well, that’s what DH is for.  I’ll let him deal with it.  I think I’ll go back up to the first paragraph and strike out things as I get them done today.  First to go is the treadmill!

12:45 - The house is clean.  Actually, let me rephrase that…The house is as clean as it’s going to get today.

3:15 - My back is killing me!  The plants have all been tucked in the flower beds and watered down.  The laundry is moving right along.  I won’t get it all done but then, I don’t think it’s been completely done since around March 24, 1987 anyway.

Here’s a kicker…Stacy called me a while ago.  She and David are back together.  Can you believe it?????!!!!!  She said she wanted to apologize for putting me through so much.  She said she realized what she was doing and she doesn’t want to go down that road.  Said she’s back on her medication and loves David and the kids so much she doesn’t want anything to mess up their lives together.  And, like an idiot, I’m sitting here wondering if she truly is going to make it work.  I’m thinking, Well, she didn’t stay gone too long this time.  Only a couple of weeks.  And she’s been okay for two years now.  Maybe she really is going to be okay.  I don’t even want to think about it.  She’s home, everybody’s happy, I’m getting my car back, and I don’t have to worry about Jake and Scout.  Nuff said.  So, I get to mark off watching Jake and Scout.

3:45 - I put up the boys tent and inflated the airbed in it.  Man, it’s really pushing the limits.  Their little two person tent is not that big.  The air bed is really nice.  It’s real comfy and it comes up to a full size bed height so you don’t have to crawl around on the ground.  A full size bed or two twin air matresses would probably be okay but the queen size airbed fits in there like a pillow stuffed in a tight pillowcase.  It wouldn’t surprise me if it busted the seams of their tent.  Maybe I should just get a couple of twin size air matresses.  Anyway, I get to mark off another chore and now I’m heading to the store.  I’m moving the RV prep to tomorrow’s list.  I know, I know, I keep moving it to the next day.  My friends keep nagging me to get ready for vacation because I’m leaving in just 9 days, but hey, that means I still have 9 days, right?

Breakfast
Oatmeal with Soy Milk (180)

Dinner
Chicken and Snow Pea Salad with Whole Wheat Linguini (500)
3 Breadsticks (70)

Breakfast
1/2 cup cherries (40)

Lunch
Drunken Chicken with rice (500)

Dinner
Some kind of pasta, canned chicken salad I made up.  (400)

Snack
Popcorn (300)
fudgesicle (45)

Total (1,285)

Here’s what my virtual model says I look like now and what I’ll look like at 130.  I’ve got news for them…I don’t look like this at 180.

179.5 is still hanging around.  I guess I’m going to have to get more intense and give him a kick in the butt.  I’ve relaxed and had some popcorn and stuff lately and I don’t seem to be losing very much.  I’m still keeping the calories pretty low but not as low as I did when I was losing well.  As it stands now, I really haven’t shown a loss of more than a pound or so in the last week.  Time to get back to the treadmill.

Another day of Ementors looms.  Get it done and then start packing the RV!  I have places to go and people to see.

5:30 - Home again.  I planted about 20 or 25 more plants and watered everything pretty good.  The boys finally got their room halfway straight so DH put their air conditioner in the window.  I don’t know how much that’s going to help me on the treadmill across the hall from their room but it should make it bearable.  I didn’t realize until today that DH loaned the other window unit to DS because his central air is not that efficient.

Okay, so I’m finished with Ementors and I don’t have anything looming except dinner and a play, Menopause the Musical, with a group of girlfriends Thursday night.  I need to get ready for vacation.  I know I keep saying that but there’s really not that much to do.  The RV is always stocked and ready to go.  We call it Manny.  Manny has his own coffeemaker, mixer, blender, dishes, pots and pans, vacuum, tablewear, towels, sheets, etc.  All I really need to do is get some food in there and toiletries.  I still haven’t made the beds and vacuumed but it shouldn’t take long to get it ready to go.  As for the house and lawn, DS will be staying here so I really don’t have to do anything about that except make sure the freezer is stocked. ;-)  All I really need to do is have everyone pack their clothes and move them out to the closets and drawers in the RV.  I have the plans pretty much finished but I need to do a double check on them.

Tomorrow, I want to get up early and workout on the treadmill.  It’s too hot to do it right now so I guess I’ll hit the pool for an hour.

I’ll be working with the eMentors today.  We’re a group of teachers who have been involved with new technology for several years.  Our job is to spread the word and assist teachers in learning to using technology in the classroom.  Most of the time it’s volunteer kind of stuff but we have four workdays this summer when we’re getting paid a stipend to do some work with the Jefferson County Public Schools websites.  JCPS uses a program called Angel to host our on-line services.  This includes the ability for teachers to post lessons on-line, create classes on-line, etc.  I wrote an on-line geometry course complete with interactive lessons, quizzes and tests and became an eMentor way back when.  We kind of pick areas we’d like to work on when we get together and I’m not sure what I want to do today.  Actually, I’d like to work on the blogs and wikis.  They don’t work as well as we’d like within the Angel Program.  Imagine how much teachers could do with those tools if we could figure out the best way to use them.  Kids could work together on on-line projects, they could post written items on blogs and other kids could review and edit them, etc.  Sistahs Jana  and Pam are also eMentors so it should be a pleasant working environment.  In fact, Pam wants me to go over to her house at lunch and give her some ideas on landscaping.  I’m not an expert but I do know a little bit about the subject and she swears she has a brown thumb.

I didn’t get everything done yesterday and I probably won’t get a lot done today on the RV or the yard.  I’ll be working from 8:30 to 3:30 with the mentors.  That “way down the road” vacation trip is looming.  It just dawned on me yesterday that it’s only a week and a half until we head out.  I have so much to do before then.  I’m going to ask David to stay here at the house while we’re gone.  It’s a lot closer to work for him and he and the kids can enjoy the pool and spa.  Stacy’s visit with the kids went okay on Saturday.  She always fills the kids heads with a bunch of crap but I think Jake is finally getting old enough to understand a few things.  She was really mean and nasty with David but that’s par for the course when she’s in this frame of mind.  He didn’t rise to the bait and just let her rant and rave and get some of her clothes and stuff while she was there.

DH started his summer schedule last week.  He’s on four day work weeks all summer.  That means he’ll be here at the house to take care of things while I’m working today.  He promised to plant some moonflower seeds that I have soaking in water.  I know it’s really late but I didn’t get them out earlier and they grow so fast I’ll still get a lot of enjoyment out of them.  I usually plant a lot of them on the fence next to the spa.  It’s fun to sit out there in the evening and watch the flowers open up and they’re so fragrant!

DS, Darryl, doesn’t have a passport and he’s off today so I hope he’ll get that taken care of.  It’s way to late to get a passport but he can go over the border into Mexico with just a drivers license and birth certificate.  It’s an hour and a half drive to the state capitol where he can pick up a copy of his birth certificate.

Weight is sitting at 179.5 again this morning.  Ementors starts in an hour.  Later!

3:20 - I’m done.  I know we have ten more minutes but I’m at a good stopping place so I quit.  I wrote tutorials today and matching quizzes on how to use an HTML editor.  Subheadings were for using the hyperlink tools, inserting graphics, movies, and tables.  Pretty basic stuff but it seems like it takes forever to write the lessons and quizzes.

4:00 - Home again.  DH baked a ham with a splenda, pineapple juice and mustard glaze, made cornbread, green beans with potatoes, and potato salad.  Crap!  I have two choices here–hit the pool for an hour of jogging (boring) or hit the treadmill for an hour and a half of heat stroke.  Guess it’ll be heatstroke.

4:45 - Sometimes, it’s just karma.  or whatever…I’m not working out today.  I went upstairs and it was like an oven.  Got a fan, got my water, hopped on the treadmill for 2 minutes and the battery went dead on my MP3.  Ran downstairs and grabbed another battery out of the charger and went back up.  Two minutes later, the battery goes dead.  Ran downstairs and grabbed another one.  Back upstairs, the battery goes dead.  I don’t know who keeps tossing batteries into the charger without connecting them.  It’s full of dead batteries!  The window unit AC is not installed upstairs because DH told the boys Saturday morning that he’s not putting it in until they get their room clean and it’s still not done.  I went on the warpath, told them not to come downstairs until it’s done.  I don’t care if it takes all night.  Then I came down here and discovered Scout crapped all over himself.  I supervised him cleaning up and told DH I was going to jog in the pool but he told me he just shocked it a couple of hours ago and the chlorine is through the roof so I can’t do that either.   I’m NOT in a good mood.

6:45 - Oh Ye of Little Faith…

Things are better now.  I really don’t like it when things interfere with my exercise or diet.  I went out to the pool and jogged for an hour.  If I were blond, my hair would be green but I’m not, so I’ll survive.  I have tons of honeysuckle growing on the back fence and it was really fragrant.  Add the cool water, beautiful blue sky, and soothing breeze and I’m much better now.

Did pretty good with dinner.  Ate a good sized chunk of ham (the sodium will probably have me retaining water for a week), skipped the cornbread and potato salad, ate green beans and one small potato.

Breakfast
1/2 cup cherries (40)

Lunch
McDonalds Asian Chicken Salad (390)

Snack
2 fudgesicles (90)

Dinner
ham (250)
green beans (100)

Snacks
popcorn (150)
beer (150)

Total 1170

Good Morning little chicklets!  Weighing in at 179.5 this morning (but that’s with nail polish so it might be lower). 

On the “to do” list for today:

1. Meet Pam at the gym at 10:00 for water aerobics.
2. Get some more plants in the ground.
3. Straighten up the RV (air it out, make the beds, check the linens, vacuum, etc.)
4. Finish up the revised vacation plans.
5. Nag DH and DS to get the window unit air conditioner set up upstairs.

Gotta take a break now and see what bargains I can find in the Sunday circulars.

12:45 - Home from the gym.  DH has been WORKING while I was gone!  Dug up and threw out tons of stuff in the front flower bed (much of it perennials, but I don’t care).  It gives me a big area to start planting!

7:30 - OMG, I got so HOT!  Working in the garden was murder!  I used to have these wonderful big flower beds that I worked peatmoss and top soil into every couple of years and the soil was perfect.  I haven’t done that for at least 7 or 8 years to the flower bed out front and it was like concrete!  I really need to get a rotor tiller and work the entire bed up and recondition it but that’s not going to happen with us leaving on vacation in about a week and a half.  The best I could do was chip away at the concrete with a shovel and try to get a hole big enough to throw a little peat moss into before threw in an innocent, unsuspecting little plant.  These big old maple trees are murder on the soil.  They send out all these shallow surface roots and drain every drop of moisture from the soil unless I keep a sprinkler on it pretty often.  Poor DH.  He was hoping I would work tomorrow and Tuesday for some extra income and I told him he had two choices…work his butt off today and help me get these plants in or I could work on it myself for the next three days.  He worked like a dog digging and planting today.  I was drenched in sweat and he was working harder than I was.  We barely made a dent in all the plants that needed to go in but, a deal is a deal, and I’m going to go ahead and work the next two days.

Most people think teachers are off all summer but it rarely works out that way.  We don’t get paid but we do a lot of work during those two months.  Last week, I attended a seminar for 20 hours and didn’t get paid.  I have an opportunity to work Monday and Tuesday of this week but will only get paid less than half my usual pay.  Even so, it’s play money that we can use on vacation so I’ll go ahead and work.  Teachers are in demand quite a bit in the summer.  I used to grab everything I could get but I’ve learned that the summer is going to fly by so I like to enjoy as much time off as I can get.

I haven’t eaten nearly enough today.  Only around 500 calories.  I need to try to eat something else but I’m really not hungry. 

Breakfast
Clafoutis (150)

Lunch
Veggie Burger (170)
Bun (100)
Salad (75)

Snack
Fudgesicle (45)

Dinner
fat free cheese (25)
deli beef (80)
bun (100)
tomato (25)

Snack
Popcorn (300)

Total (1,070)