Happy Hag

So there I was, ellipticalling away at the gym when a segment comes on Good Morning America about the “Dr. Siegal’s Cookie Diet” and how so-and-so went from a size 22 to a size 6 in six months. I watched with growing hope: “Maybe THIS is the one”, I thought. The cookies are to be eaten with a big glass of water and they will give you a full feeling. The plan is, you have a cookie/cookies for breakfast, a cookie/cookies for lunch, then a 500 calorie dinner, heavy on the protein. I believe you can partake of up to six cookies a day.

Have any of you Chickies tried this diet? I know I should just save my money (it’s about $8.00 for a day’s worth of cookies). There’s always that little voice in the back of my head urging me to try this or that new product. I would be embarrassed of yet another possible failure in front of my DH who may feel he needed to add his two cents on Why Diets Don’t Work.

Hey Dr. Siegal! If you want to throw some samples my way,
I’d be happy to try them and report my amazing weight loss story!

Just want to let you know, the “Susan’s Cake Diet” does not work. I tried a new recipe for a Pumpkin Spice Bundt Cake yesterday. It was very good. I ended up employing a trick from my youth. With a bundt or any tube cake pan, you can nudge the two cut ends of the cake closer together so the rest of the family won’t have to know what a hog they live with.

Yeah, I’m that pathetic.

It took me almost an hour on the elliptical to atone for that bit of naughtiness. Plus I owe another 1/2 hour for the ice cream sandwiches I also ate.

I know!!! Can you believe it???!!

At the grocery store, I thought I would have mastery over myself. DH loves ice cream sandwiches so. I know I should leave that crap in the store.

I can imagine myself eating a whole week’s worth of “Cookie Diet” cookies in one sitting…

Filed under: General on October 16th, 2009 | 3 Comments »

DS wheedled a ride to school from me today because we all stayed up late to watch the Philly’s win their ball game. (can I get a YAY here?) I said yes, with the stipulation that he had to give our one remaining pair of ear buds to me for my workout. His last pair went through the wash and were agitated to an early death.

“Okay, Mom.”

Time to leave for school and he can’t find them anywhere. I specifically put them in his hands not 10 hours earlier. He suggested that maybe I could work on my lip-reading skills. I glanced over sharply to inspect his face for any sign of mockery.

So there I was, facing a bank of silent TV’s on the elliptical. I promised myself that I could stop after 20 minutes, but watching the different numbers flashing up on the elliptical screen ~ miles, calories and time ~ I was inspired to stay on it for 30 whole soundless boring minutes.

I reckon there’s no such thing as a “bad workout” ~ after all, I could have stayed home and read the paper while swilling joe and smoking cig’s.

I’ll just call it an “un-sound workout”.

Filed under: General on October 13th, 2009 | 3 Comments »

Made it to the gym again this morning. Honestly, it feels so darned good once I get a half hour under my belt, I feel I can stay for hours. …..Well, maybe not hours.

One of my favorite authors ~ Diane Gabaldon ~ finally has a new book out. I have devoured all her previous ones & stalked her a little on her web site to try and figure out if another book in the Outlander Series was soon forthcoming. DS and I were in a bookstore last night and, ever-hopeful, I cruised the “G” aisle. YAY! There it was ~ a big fat new book! Part of me wants to ration the book out, the other part of me wants to lock myself in a room and read the whole thing in one sitting. Um, that would be the part of me that is responsible for my extra 20-30 pounds, by the way.

Been hearing on the local news that some genius figured out that the local corner grocery store may be making urban kids fat. DUH!

I grew up in a rural area that just happened to have a sandwich shop within walking distance. Every coin that I could glean from under sofa seat cushions, my brother’s coin-filled ashtray (this was done with careful rearranging of coins) or any other coin-likely places went directly into the coffers of that corner store. This was back in the day where a candy bar was five cents. Certainly that contributed to my pudgy girlhood. And cavities. Later, that corner store supplied my first pack of cigarettes ~ forty cents a pack ~ from the cig machine in their foyer. Together, my best friend and I pillaged her brothers coin collection. The creepy guy who owned the store must have had quite a nice selection of collectible coins from our patronage through the years.

So, yeah, DUH ~ it doesn’t take a genius to figure out that corner stores contribute to the early forming of bad habits.

I hope there is nary a DUH in your day today

Later in da day… Sure hope you enjoy these kitteh pixtures as much as I do. I gotta tell you, I feel relieved when I see other people also have a warped sense of humor.

And this one may be a little more relevant to this site:

Problem is, I usually always want both..

Filed under: General on October 12th, 2009 | 2 Comments »

DH has left for his annual golfing weekend. This means no cooking.

When DH used to go away in the past, “dining out” for DS was McDonalds and the like. This year, DS says he wants to go to a nice restaurant, even though I told him he would have to dress up. “Mom, I like getting dressed up.” Since he has an adventurous palate, finer dining is not wasted on him. He loves clams, calamari, snails, all kinds of veggies and the like. He does have a few friends who are still at the chicken nugget stage of eating ~ the ones who I make sure to have plenty of rolls or bread on the table when they eat over.

Poor DS is in bed with a sinus headache ~ of all the things he could have inherited from me and it had to be my sinuses. His school has an “Attendance Line”, where parents can call in and leave a message that their kiddo will be late or absent. Way easier than managing to get the written excuse from my kitchen table to the attendance office. I used to find my notes in the wash, in the end of year backpack cleaning and just about everywhere but where they were supposed to end up.

Since I’m not taking son to school today, I am missing my gym time but vow to go tomorrow. (Just sayin’- the only vow I’ve kept with any regularity has been my marriage vow.) I think I am noticing slightly looser fits in the gut area of my jeans, but it could be my fervent imagination coupled with wearing jeans two days before washing them.

The other day we had 45-50 mph winds here. I had to drive in it and one stretch of road was lined with walnut trees. Every leaf was gone, leaving only the tennis ball-sized nuts whipping around in the crown of each tree, just waiting for a car to try to run the gauntlet. All I could think about was the “Whomping Willow” tree in the Harry Potter movie as I gunned it down that stretch. Emerged unscathed ~ whew! Before I became a homeowner, I used to enjoy the extremes of weather. Now I nervously peer out windows, trying to judge the wind-hardiness of our gutters and trees.

Hope you all enjoy the loveliness of Fall this weekend!

Filed under: General on October 9th, 2009 | 1 Comment »

So there I was, completing my purchases at Walmart when the cashier says, “um… I’ll ring up that case of water too, please…” Jeeze, I had forgotten all about that case of water I had put on the rack under my cart. Why did I feel like a would-be crook? I know my face was red as I apologized and dug the water out. I wonder if the cashiers believe it when you honestly forget about those pesky bulky items hiding under your cart?

So far, “Operation Miss The Bus On Purpose” is working. DS is a big fan because he gets to sleep a precious 20 minutes longer on the days I take him to school then go directly to the gym. Once there, I usually do a half hour on the elliptical (longer if those elusive endorphins kick in), about 15-20 minutes using free weights with my arms, then hop on the treadmill for another 15-20 minutes. I estimate I burn about 500 calories on cardio. Yay, as fat is my favorite food group.

Filed under: General on October 5th, 2009 | No Comments »

Well, my style anyway: I drive the cart and drink wine in a plastic cup through a straw and admire my DH’s shapely rear end as he whacks the ball.

About 20 years ago, I “took up golf” along with my DH. He bought me a set of clubs and we spent many afternoons practicing with a five iron in my Mom’s back yard until DH deemed me ready to take to an actual course.

My golfing demise began at the crack of dawn.

Immediately upon stepping onto the course, all the gnats in a miles radius discovered me and the early morning summer sun got hotter and hotter. DH was so concerned we would slow other golfers that he hied me along like I used to hurry my little son past the candy display at the grocery store. Swatting at the gnats that were determined to become my next food source, wiping at the sweat that was tickling my face and dripping down my back, I couldn’t figure out the magic I once saw in golf. Hot, cranky and feeling like a five year old is no way to discover the joys of the links.

My clubs have circulated through at least two other wives/girlfriends who wanted to “take up golf”. For all I know, they are still being passed around from woman to woman in a strange type of “Sisterhood of the Traveling Golf Bag”.

I like my new version of golf better

Filed under: General on October 4th, 2009 | 3 Comments »

Woke up sneezing at 2am last night. Leaped out of bed and Zicam’ed my nosey, popped a zinc lozenge and put my trust in Grey Area Science. I haven’t had a cold in several years and was inwardly congratulating myself on my healthy constitution refusing to (three hour break here to make dinner, clean up and drive DS to movies) succumb to a cold.

Figured out a way to get to the gym regularly: take DS to school three days a week and go directly from the school drop-off lane to the gym. So far it has worked a whole week and a half. Vinyasa yoga is doing good stuff for my arms ~ I can feel ‘em ache for a day or two afterwards. The Vinyasa style we do involves a lot of push-up style arm work. By the end of the class, I am not gracefully dipping down onto my mat in the chin- chest-tummy sequence via the gradual and controlled levering of my arms: it’s definitely more of a flop.

So, if this exercise trend continues, it will be a good thing. Then to tackle Food. Glorious Food, with the perfect season for baking and cooking all kinds of marvels. Always seems to be a leak in the diet dike somewhere, huh?

Yay Fall! Soon I’ll be tromping around in the woods and subjecting you all to my amateur photos.

After dropping DS off at the movies (watched him meet his two friends who are girls), I drove home, trying to remember where my head was at that age. Things are much changed, with the advent of cell phones. I remember trying to have private conversations on our one kitchen phone with family members coming and going, Dad asking how long could I possibly talk on a phone, and yelling “I’LL GET IT!” every time the phone rang. I was in 9th grade when I had my first kiss in a movie theater. The kid did the old “Airplane Move” to get his arm around me and it seemed like five hours went by before he got up the courage to kiss me. I trust my DS will have a better move, but for all I know, the old Airplane Move is still being used.

DS and I enjoy a lot of the same music and movies, and he and DH play golf together, so I pray that closeness will continue through the teen years to come. DS turns 14 next month ~ time goes so fast!

An naw for a humerus ketteh interlud…

Filed under: General on October 2nd, 2009 | 1 Comment »

We are busy mowing and planting before winter. I ordered a “Gourmet Selection” of garlic bulbs ~ the good thing being if I don’t plant ‘em, I can eat ‘em Vampires would not feel welcome here.

We are also updating our restaurant web site and getting online ordering lined up. Wednesday we will shoot new pictures of our food. Gotta remember to eat lighter in the next day or two, because it’s hard to resist taking a bite of one of our beautiful sandwiches after we are done photographing it.

Yep, my lazy aimless days of Summer are over and it’s time to get back to work and busyness. Summer will be welcome when she rolls around again but for now, I am enjoying having purpose and structure to my days.

LOL Cats had lots of funneh kitteh pictures today ~ here’s one that made me laugh out loud…

And this one is diet-related so…

Hope you all haz a laugh-out-loud day!

Filed under: General on September 21st, 2009 | 3 Comments »

Okay, technically it’s still Summer for a few more days, but a crisp morning today is a reminder for me to plant bulbs for next Spring. I love the happy surprise of bulbs in the Spring. I never seem to plant enough to share with squirrels & voles, and yet leave enough blooms for me to pick for the house.

I’m going to try planting garlic this Fall. I just finished the last precious clove of a garlic bulb I bought in New York City, of all places ~ in a fabulous open air farmer’s market in the middle of the city. The hand-printed cardboard sign advertised it as The Best Garlic In The Universe and it fully lived up to its claim.

Why do I have to settle for the generic, nothin’ special tasting bulbs from the supermarket when I can possibly grow my very own BGITU?

Have a savory weekend, Chickies!

Love the blasé look on the kitty on the right.

Filed under: General on September 19th, 2009 | No Comments »

Not much to say here - just “chicking” in on you all.

I heard on the local news that our area is to have spectacular Fall color because of all the rain this Summer. Yay!

Eating has/has not been good, depending if we’re talking taste or proper dieting. I don’t think I can pull off the “Fat Grandma” look when my son is 13 so I’d better become more mindful.

Filed under: General on September 15th, 2009 | 2 Comments »