Evening all. Sitting outside in the cold waiting for my DGS's baseball game to start. It's windy rainy and yucky. So I thought I'd catch up with Tera and Am2. ��Ill end my day at 1457 and no exercise. If I start shivering I'm going to walk up and donn the dirt road.

Tera I do gain now over 1500-1600 cals. It's frustrating but it is what it is. I have to stay vigilent or I gain.

Am2 without a doubt your way works. Truthfully I've never found anything weird about your methods.

Game is starting. Night
Marie

Hi, Tera & Marie! Deleted a few redundant posts this week, but had a good week, a lot of work. Had an exact maintain, very happy with that, plus a NSV of fitting in some capris that have not fit for a year. Have a good day, all.

cals this weekend-do not want to admit, exercise-lifting forks and wineglasses. Ha, ha. It has been a weak weekend! It was fun though. Yesterday was a lovely shower for my future DD in law with my friends plus dinner out with same friends and husbands. Today I have been eating leftovers from Mothers Day again. I am done with all that now though. From now on I will be spot On Plan.

Am2-Good for you on the maintain. How nice to fit back in the capris from a year ago. Great way to save on clothing expense as well. Win, win!

Marie-Did you get your walking in? No good to sit and shiver when you have perfectly good feet to provide the heat. Hope your DGS enjoyed a fun game.

Lol, my cals have NOT been at a good standard for three days. I am working more & eating more & I'd like to cycle down on the calorie front for a few days.

Still, I feel better physically & mentally when I am having enough high days & functioning better exercise wise. Calorie cycling is the only way of eating that produces this result for me, hand in hand with gluten free.

Marie & Tera, thanks for the congrats. It does feel good to fit in clothes.

That is more or less the whole point of the journey some years.

Hi, Marie & Tera also. I'm working this morning but then I think not until middle of first week in June, & possibly not after that, depending on some political flux. This is going to get me back in a stress free eating zone for a while. I want to focus on my maintenance project & feeling better all around & am doing one of my fun challenges from after my weigh in on the 26th to weigh in on June 30. That is 4th of July week & I am dedicating this litte challenge "season" to all the decades of working on the 4th of July & loved it (I was a reporter) & was never during those days at a weight I wanted to be on those happy holiday assignments so I now want to dedicate this year to staying within my happy maintenance range & doing it stress free.

Hi Ladies-Sorry I have not been posting lately. My DD has been using my computer so I didn't have much access this week. I have pretty much maintained this week and exercised a few days. That was about all I could manage with the work schedule. However, I got let go yesterday for incompetence so now I have lots of time again. It does not seem fair to be judged so harshly after only four weeks but I could tell by the bosses mean comments and looks of disgust that things were not going well. Simple things like typing errors, unfamiliarity with the calculator, their phone system, my lack of knowledge on some basic Windows keystrokes (such as printscreen) and not having memorized the phone number were making her very disgusted. That is really just the beginning but very frustrating for me as well. I also suspect a stupid comment I made may have sealed my fate. The job was with a public utility that is presently going through a long overdue reorganization and the employees are very worried about layoffs. I made an offhand remark about them "living in a bubble". True but certainly an unnecessary and unkind comment. I don't know why these stupid things come out of my mouth but it surely stems from my own jealousy of their primo jobs and benefits.I plan to work on my jealousy issues in the hopes I will not make unkind comments in the future. It was a very bad, stressful week. In the end I am much better off without that particular job. To make things more stressful, my DS who is about to be married in two weeks was also let go from his job for a similar reason-not performing up to the expected standard. It was definitely a tough day yesterday but I have been to the school of hard knocks many times so I am pretty good about bouncing back and accepting difficult circumstances. What choice do you have if you want to be a happy person? Thanks for letting me vent.

Oh, Tera, I am so sorry. Hugs to you and DS and just remember that things that don't really seem positive turn out to be the start of something much better. As time passes, we look back and are usually happy with the way things turned out. But that is not a lot of comfort at the time and I wish I could say something more profound that would help, but hugs.

I can't share right at the moment but have also been to the school of hard knocks and you are right about bouncing back.

Right now I'm playing a guessing game with career (as usual). Politics are a funny thing, as well I know. I have let things recently get me really down but have felt a bounce back today. It has been a snacky week lol but we'll see what the scale says.

I've been planning my July Jubilee Maintenance Challenge and crowned myself Queen of the July Jubilee. The challenge is to, er, maintain my range (120-129) from May 26 (tomorrow) to June 30 (July 4th week). It is, well, kind of boring. It is in honor of all the fun 4th of Julys I have had, and my love of family, friends and country and my dedication to wearing little capris pants that fit and how I slaved for two decades to be in this nice maintenance range (I've actually been lower but I think this is the range I will stick at FOREVER 'cause I'm TIRED of buying new clothes).

So, I'll post my weight tomorrow but as far as I'm concerned it's the 4th of July.

Thanks for listening.

Hi, Marie!

Thanks to both of you again for the kind thoughts. I feel much better today and see things with more perspective. I do want to clarify though that although I am a nervous and easily flustered person, I am not incompetent. No doubt the job was a definite mismatch, as I do not thrive in hostile enviroments led by unprofessional egomaniacal bosses. I still acquired significant gains from my brief foray with enterprise accounting and I also was able to apply some unpracticed Excel skills although I somewhat regret having completely rewritten my ungrateful former boss's inferior Excel workbook with page links to replace her inefficient process of reentering the same information twice between worksheets. I also created detailed notes of all her processes which she had me spend an inordinate amount of time on and makes me suspect she will need them for her pending department evaluation and would be intellectually challenged to complete them herself. Plus I made a few dollars. My weight was down to 138 this morning but I am not sure it will stick so I am not moving my ticker at this point. It was nice to see that number in any case. I would love to leave the 140's behind.

Marie-I hope you are still considering posting the sunrise pics of the desert. You have teased my senses with your lovely description. Sorry to hear it is still chilly in your neck of the woods. I have lived in the Midwest, nearly Northeast and Northwest United States in my lifetime before settling in the Southeast. I love the seasons here best since each lasts very close to 3 months. It is warm and sunny here as it has been for awhile now. On the other hand, I will be mightily missing the Northwest when the summer heat and humidity kicks in here, which could be anytime now. I agree with your evaluation of the superiority of controlled splurges over mindless eating and appreciate the difference. Good for you!

Am2-Hearty well wishes for the successful completion of your Jubilee Maintenance challenge. Although such challenges may seem mundane, as you regularly declare in your signature-constant vigilance! May you continue to bask in your lovely 120's glory.

Tera, no clarification needed, I think we had the true picture of what had occurred. I had to chuckle at this: "... as I do not thrive in hostile environments led by unprofessional egomaniacal bosses."

Lol, neither do I. Congrats on having gained experience but being free to move on.

Congrats, too, on being down to 138! Woot! You are awesome! Love your consistency and attitude!

Lol, well, the July Jubilee Maintenance Challenge is off to a sparkling and rather more exciting than I would have thought start as I ate high all week and lost 1.4 pounds! Woot!

I KNOW the scale is not supposed to make me happy or unhappy but that really lifted my mood this morning!

For better or worse and unapologetically, I like keeping my weight where I want it to be.

I have been reading some things in the blogosphere of those who do not believe in losing weight and/or total acceptance of whatever weight they are and I totally am and have always been with them in this in a sense of accepting and loving one's body of whatever size. But I've always been in the camp that my natural size is smaller than I let it get two decades ago and it frankly does give me satisfaction to be doing well at the constant vigilance stuff. Mundane or not lol.