I love roobios tea also! But I call it bush tea. I learned of it from the Alexander McCall Smith books, the Number One Ladies Detective Agency. Mma Ramotse drinks it in her town of Botswana. I became obsessed with it for a while but now I'm on a Good Earth orange spice kick.

iced roobois tea. So delicious. I first discovered it in my local herb shop.

Alinnell, thank you for the kind words. You likely cannot imagine just how much they mean to me.

flower123!

I finally jumped back on the scale today and found myself a mere half pound away from the overweight line. Feels like it, too. Maybe a couple are reflections of a wildly indulgent long weekend that started Thursday night and ended with a "celebratory final nail" of a turtle sundae. Some of it's been the poor-me re the swimming, some of it's been feelings of being overwhelmed at work and home, some is a bad mindset about a vacation at the end of this month that I fear is going to be a nightmare. But (and butt getting bigger) it's time to take it all out on something besides the refrigerator, quit screwing around with 5:2 and go back to the same formula as 2010 - logging and calorie counting. The yo-yo has gone back up quite enough.

Hi Maintainers,

After pixellate's visit and tons of GI problems from too much fruit fiber, a music festival and a bout of hangover, I am down to 115.2 for the second day. I'm HUNGRY and I'm definitely going to have some kind of large sandwich for dinner as I spend all evening cleaning my old apartment to be "out" by tomorrow.

flower123

krampus, have a cup of rooibos. I've just made a pot. There's enough for everyone.

I have to tell you guys my tragic exercise story:

Yesterday I went out for a long run on a ridge trail that I love. I ran about 5 miles then stopped to stretch. I put my water bottle and phone on a stump, bent over to stretch... and a giant swarm of wasps came out from the stump. I ran for my life down the trail! I got two stings on the back of my head and a few on my thighs as I ran away. Then as I stopped to catch my breath, I realized that I had left all my stuff on the stump. And that included my car key (in my water bottle holder).

So I turned around and peeked around the corner. There were several hundred wasps buzzing around the area. I waited a while for them to calm down a bit, then took a long stick and tried dragging my water bottle toward me. This angered the wasps and they chased me away again, down the trail. So I only managed to move the bottle a few inches at a time. This cycle repeated for about 30 minutes until I finally had the water bottle, along with more stings on my face, my hands and my chest. At this point I looked at my iPhone, covered in wasps on the stump, and thought the he** with this, I'm going home.

I got home in a HORRIBLE mood and told my husband. He insisted on going straight back up the mountain to get the phone. I was in no mood to see those wasps again, I kept saying "I'll just buy a new one". But we went back up and he put on gloves, hat, ski mask etc. and just ran in, grabbed the phone and ran away. No stings.

So here I sit at work, one eye swollen partially shut, a finger like a painful sausage, itchy burning stings everywhere - and the thing that makes me the angriest is that I was having a really good run when all of that happened.

Geez, Jay! I think I'd be for leaving the phone up there, too! Very scary.

Am I weird that I like edamame for breakfast?

I am proud to say that I jogged last Saturday! Ok, sure, it was at a ridiculously slow pace but I did a full 5 minutes! I think it's been two years or more since I've jogged. It actually felt good and my knees are not complaining. I intend to repeat tonight.

Welcome Flower! We all struggle......daily.......

Jay- that is the worst story I've heard in a long time! You poor thing!

Hugs to you Becky.

Thank you UCUwishing for the welcome wave. Turtle sundae sounds divine.
Silverbirch, thank you for the lovely and exuberant welcome
Traveling Michele, thank you for the welcome and kind words
JayZeeJay How HORRIBLE this happened to you. I am so sorry. Must hurt a lot.

I think I have to go into carb deprivation to get this food craving monster back to sleep. But my addiction to cocoa powder in the form of low calorie hot chocolate is fierce. I keep the weight down though. Even though I want to lose the two I gained. Having lived a lifetime of yoyo I know all too well what a slipperly slope this all can be. 2 lbs turn all to easily into 3,4,...... Cant go there or do that. yoyo is the past. Not the future. Just have to get this food craving monster back into sleep mode. Where it belongs. Still looking for the hibernate setting, lol.

JayZee, your story gave me goosebumps! I am a total wasp weenie - and so sorry you had to bear the brunt of the wrath of those little flying arse daggers.

krampus, Enjoy that sandwich! It's probably not a bad thing necessarily that the bod will let us know when we've gone too far. A little negative reinforcement here and there can be productive.

Bravo, Allison! Sending good wishes for your knees! And it's just my opinion, but I'd answer yes to your question.

Thanks for the hug, Michele. I'm owning the regain and not going to futz around hoping for an easy solution any longer.

silverbirch and the tea drinkers, I'd like to know what your favorite teas on ice are? I need some cold beverage options besides beer and water.

1605 good calories yesterday. The ticker's updated for yesterday's smack back to reality. I think I'm going to go scale-less for a bit while I get back in the groove, and just go by feel and fit.

Welcome flower! This is definitely the place for you. You are welcome to join us on the maintainer's weekly chat thread too!

JayZee -- how terrible! Hope the stings subside soon. As a random aside, I was reading the other day about the gympie gympie tree, which is apparently a tree in Australia that will give you a terrible sting if you touch it that can last months or even years to go away!

167 today, hopefully this week will end with 166 and I can move my ticker down again (I change it on Fridays). Last week was a wash but I did manage to do my intensive workout 4 times, so this week I'm on phase 2 of core exercises plus another 4x intensive. If I can keep my food under control I think it will be fine.

I've done something bad. Despicable maybe. I've started buying and drinking diet ginger ale. Only have a couple a week but I'd sworn off all sodas long, long ago. Why now? Granted I'm getting the one with the least ingredients (Hansen's) but still... That said, it's better than drinking other stuff (whiskey, wine, etc.).

Had a great day yesterday with food and exercise. Slept well, too. But my BP inched up (I check it each morning a little after I wake). Not sure what to take of that.

Welcome, flower123. Your siggy makes me want to ask you if you've read "Brain Over Binge" by Kathryn Hansen. The "food craving monster" is, I think, just another name for the desire to binge, and some folks at 3FC have found her book very useful.

JayZeeJay, that s*cks. Glad your new DH was able to rescue your phone (isn't that what they're for? To slay spiders on the wall, to take the garbage out in the rain and to massage your feet when you've had an exhausting day?). Wasps are the WORST.

ICU, I'm sure that number on the scale was painful. I also know that after this long as a maintainer, you know what works for you. I do think that weighing at least weekly is important though, because pant fit won't give you the sort of early gratification (or early warning) that the scale can. You used to use some kind of "rolling average" weight program, no? That seemed quite helpful, and not prone to giving you false alarms from a single low or high read.

I've slipped in the last week, eating 100s more than my maintenance calories several times. For me, there's always something negative about getting to goal weight; I can't seem to shake the utterly false mindset that, now that I've hit my goal, I should be able to relax and eat more-or-less what I want. I KNOW BETTER. Despite that, I ate 3 large handfuls of almonds as dessert tonight, after indulging in a graham-cracker-peanut-butter sandwich for breakfast this morning. At least I worked out, hard, this evening.

Sigh Andrea.... I know the feeling all too well....

Jessica... You're doing fantastic! Bet it's great to see the scale moving down again.

How much are you drinking? I've been having one packet some afternoons when I start to get hungry and it helps stave off the munchies for me.