I'm melting in this humidity/heat - we have excessive heat warnings this week and while I don't want a pool (such limited use here) and it's not a possibility with our HOA, boy I wish I could sink into one today. I WILL be popping the hose in the kiddie pool and cooling off a lot this week, I'm sure. I just wish it was big enough for my legs to stretch out in it. DH threatens to put a "hillbilly hot tub" in our back yard - stock tank with water. I keep saying nooooo I wonder what he'd say if I called him on it and agreed
Food OK today! DH brought home a bag of raw cut veggies (celery, broccoli, carrots, cherry tomatoes) and a bowl of diced yellow/orange/yellow peppers from his farewell luncheon last week and used some of those to make fried rice for lunch. It's about 70% veg, 30% rice. I need to find vegan fish/oyster sauce and thai basil if I'm really wanting to get more authentic vs. just a good meal. Not sure I'm that committed on the fishy/salty stuff here at home.
Our financial move today was to sell back his car, so spent enough time outside in the heat cleaning his out, and it truly is like new. Offer from CarMax was, I think, just a little more than he paid for it a couple of years ago, so now we'll have my good car (it's a 2014 but still great and only 89,000 miles on it), and the truck from his folks (2007, 189,000 miles - a little work needed but should go another 100,000 he thinks )
Maryann - I had never heard of that new game (new to me) so had to hop right on it and thought, "I'll never get this" but my words were lucky and got all four in 6/37 guesses. I like that one - Thank you! Now when I get skunked, I might not like it as much! LOL. I LOVE word games. Have you ever played Quiddler (a word card game) ... it is my sister and my favorite game to play when together. I might have to adopt the red/yellow light foods ... My red light food is cake frosting, which, thankfully, I don't come across often. Crater Lake is one of my spiritual places; it really speaks to my soul. I hope you have a wonderful time there.
Karen - OMG we're just at your temps with the heat index today and I walk out and the sweat is running down my face. Was 96 with heat index of 105. I know you get out early to hike so not that extreme heat, but also know you do errands and regular life in these high temps! Whew! Credit to not just nap and watch movies. Do you have any good museums where you are? I'm aiming to get to our art museum with DH and DGS this week even just to walk through at a quick clip to expose him to some things. So he knows what a museum IS.
Bill - I thought of you - editing - when I hopped on my museum's site and see a press release that new admission increase will "TAKE AFFECT" July 1. It's a major museum and they can't get things like that right. I guess we're lucky it's not Take Affeck, which I've seen before.
CurlyJax - I hope you love your air fryer. One treat I love making are thick potato slices. I cut them pretty thick, then put in a bowl with a tbsp of olive oil, put my hands in and rub the oil on every slice, then add spices. I air fry and it's not oily and a fair amount of the oil is still in the bowl when I dump them onto the tray. I'm here for the potatoes, apparently. I detest cleaning mine now, my replacement one has a tray vs. a basket and it's not as easy to clean. Interesting on letting your body decide. I am not to a point to trust my body; my mind has to lead and let my body follow, but I sure wish I was there!
Penny - Sometimes it seems as if we need a little extra to let our bodies release some weight! Glad that your 6-week check up went smoothly. I wish you had longer before going back, though.
MommaMeli - Thank you for sharing about your veg; your harvest sounds wonderful. I have long wanted to grow Italian garlic and drool over the seed and bulb catalogs and then never start. I have had this roasted butternut squash soup in my "want to make" queue for awhile.
Joy - I hope the car repair went without a hitch and that you have a lot more miles left in it! I'm with you in breaking a sweat in this humidity. I used to LOVE "the air you can wear" but now, pfft.
Mrs. Calypso - I'm with you on the rigidity not being the best type of plan for some of us, but I know in some areas it is the only way to claw back when off track. But when on track, it does seem too limiting.
Wednesday - King John signs Magna Carta at Runnymede (1215, near Windsor, England)
Diet Coaches/Buddies - The Sugar Snaps are arriving all at once. Super sweet. Crispy. Just the best treat ever. I substituted Sugar Snaps for my evening snack. By my personal version of calorie counting, I don't have to limit them. I ate as many as I wanted. I do wish we could train them to arrive slowly over the whole summer instead of being in a burst in June. Dinner on the patio of grilled salmon making an on plan day with no daytime snacks, CREDIT moi.
Trip to the supermarket was boring. I did notice a whole cold case of non-meat "Burgers". Seems like the store is pushing them. The prominent ones were soy based; don't know if they are going to replace the pea-protein ones that began the current craze. They're not inexpensive - as I would think a soy product should be. Perhaps they're just following the uptrend in beef prices because they can. Excitement was getting four boxes of my favorite cereal at a good-enough price when I took them from the shelf. But they rang up at a really good price. Who am I to complain?
Joy (gardenerjoy) - Ouch for some serious humidity. Hope the car repair estimate is reasonable. Thanks for the reminder, if I wrote down "cup of ice cream from the ice cream shop," then that's "on plan" for that day.
maryann - Thanks for the description of your red, yellow, and green light foods. I, too, have some foods that I can't start and expect to consume only a reasonable serving.
nationalparker – LMAO at "hillbilly hot tub" - the images from google are so funny. Congrats for reducing your car inventory - by selling one for more than you paid for it! Enjoyed the will "TAKE AFFECT" July 1 blunder - yep, we have the right to expect our major institutions to proofread a bit more.
Karen (karenrn) - Glad that you've had a drop in temperature - even if still high. LOL that Gatorade "doesn't even have caffeine or alcohol."
curlyjax - Neat that you dove right in using your new air fryer - with Kudos for not trying a small cake to top it off.
Penny. - Wish you well fighting through the fatigue since you're on your way to getting back to work.
MrsCalypso - My take is that toward the end of the Pink Book, Dr. Beck leads us "to eat like a normal person" - just not unbounded whatever, whenever as our brain might urge.
MommaMeli - What a bountiful garden. If I lived nearby, I'd gladly accept a Summer Squash. Unless you mean GIANT Zucchini. Overgrown zucchini are pretty common around here from gardeners who can never anticipate how fast and furious they grow. Good luck with your canning season.
Readers -
Quote:
Chapter 6Stage 3 - The Challenging Situations Plan
challenging situation skills
You will now learn 14 skills that you will use over and over in Stage 3, particularly when you are eating out or entertaining guests at home. Practice them in each relevant situation:
Judith S. Beck, Ph.D., The Complete Beck Diet for Life (Green book), Pg 131.
Quick post as I'm on carpool duty for swim lessons today.
Credit for lots of exercise yesterday. Not only did I wipe out my storage area, I canned pickles, and went back to the garden last night to pick more. Second picking of green beans already. I'm delighted. The first tomatoes finally turned red. I guess we can thank the 100 degree weather for something.
Also credit for not snacking. Last night was the first night I didn't crave anything sweet. Also I literally said out loud 2 hours before dinner, "I'm hungry!" Then I realized with my plan to snack when hungry I could actually eat. I had an apple. It was so nice to listen to my body and not just white knuckle it until dinner!
Putting down my fork didn't go as well. I'm surprised that is so hard for me. I haven't been bringing my own to the table as planned, so I'm going to focus on that today.
nationalparker: We started the garlic harvest last night. It is so easy. We planted back in December and mulched it well. I'm sure you would need to plant later and deeper being further north. Over the last month it has flowered so beautifully. It is the easiest thing to grow organically, as nothing eats it and it doesn't need fertilized. And you can plant bulbs from the grocery store if you want!
The dollar amount for the car repair went from large to huge. I'm working toward gratitude that we can afford this and away from fear about spending so much money when all the economic news is so scary. It helps to remind myself that we can probably drive this car (a 2008 Infiniti with 108,000 miles) another five years or more. The repair is a lot less than it would take to replace the car with something that we could drive for fifteen years -- especially when it's a lousy time to buy a car. For most of it, there's no choice, anyway, because the car isn't going to pass the safety or emissions inspections unless we make these repairs.
For some good news, I fixed lower back pain with a yoga routine. This was from one of my DVDs, so I've used the routine before, but it was only partially effective -- a couple of the poses were really uncomfortable for me. After six weeks of daily yoga, I was able to find ease in even those two poses and when I was done with the routine, my back pain was completely gone.
Exercise +70, 705/1500 minutes for June
maryann: Thanks for the recommendation for Duotrigordle. That was the non-food stress reliever that I needed yesterday.
nationalparker: Scroll down in Duotrigordle -- they're giving you 37 guesses for 32 words! But make sure you have some time. It takes me 20-30 minutes to complete a round. Six guesses for four words is really good, though. You should try Quordle https://www.quordle.com/. That takes much less time.
I have not been feeling great, whether it is lingering cold symptoms or allergies, I don't know. It seems to have resolved except this very distracting nasal congestion, which is bothering more that I would like. I have a strong immune system and it's rare for me to get "schlonked" like this. It lead to some overeating yesterday, I was very crave-y. I didn't make TERRIBLE choices, but just felt insatiable.
Today is Day 20, Get Back on Track. This one talks about not throwing out an entire day when we step off plan for a moment. I had read ahead yesterday morning, so I had this idea in my back pocket yesterday afternoon. It helped me after some indiscriminate eating after work. I was able to reset.
Bill, nationalparker, karen, maryann, and Joy , thanks for sharing your perspective and experience with different definitions of "on plan". I am basically doing a general, overarching plan that works well for me on the day to day, but I'm not sure it's going to lead to weight loss. Time will tell. Generally, I am avoiding white flour, keeping sugar to a dull roar, keeping an eye on dairy (cheese can become my solution to life), and eating lots and lots of veggies and fruits. Most of my protein comes from beans, but I also do have eggs sometimes. It's basically the Mediterranean diet. I keep to healthy fats (olive oil, avocados, olives), but have those pretty liberally. My dream for myself is that I will be able to achieve and maintain a lower weight while eating exactly what I want, because I will naturally want foods that make me feel good physically, and in portions that let me feel good as well. External rules just don't have the staying power for me. Once I start to feel uncomfortable, I start thinking of all the reasons I don't need that external rule right now, in this situation, and it all goes to heck in a hand basket, so my focus is on the internal thinking changes.
I have jury duty today because I somehow didn't think I should ask for a postponement. It's the last week of work for me before our summer break. What was I thinking?! Here's hoping either I am not selected, or it is a one-day trial. I can't really afford to miss that much work right now. No one covers for me when I am gone, the work just piles up.
Woke up at 12:30 this morning with the thought that I didn't buy travel insurance for Ecuador. I looked through my emails and couldn't find any evidence. So I purchased some in order to sleep well. I think I was reviewing the Canada saga and worrying not so much about getting stuck in Ecuador but not being able to get to the tour. So, easy fix and I went back to bed. I have to pack and leave by 10:30 for Klamath Falls. But I will have a leisurely puttering hour first. Ah summer! Car is clean and gassed already.
I kept to my green light foods yesterday. No flour or desserts. Weight is down a couple of pounds which always happens after I fly. I went on the climbing stairs at the gym for 45 mins. Watched The Lost City with Sandra Bullock. It was fun.
Joy and Nationalparker: Yesterday I had a very relaxing morning interweaving duotrigordle with lots of laundry and other tasks. Yes, there are 32 words to solve. I used the practice boards and hit my personal record of +1 guess left. That took quite a bit of focus.
Yesterday was on plan and weight is down, thank goodness.
I started up my Peleton app subscription again and did 10 minutes of cycling, 10 minutes of "arms and light weights" without the weights. I did use the arms. lol it was enough. Then 20 minutes of walking to pick up my school kid.
A friend has me interested in taking the train from LA to New Orleans in a sleeper car with my youngest. We had so much fun doing the Portland to Minneapolis train ride, and I have yet to see New Orleans. I started reading Anne Rice as a teenager and have romanticized the area ever since but haven't done more than an overnight in Baton Rouge.
At the children's museum with my grandson, and while he's playing at a water feature I decided to catch up on posts. I am now so bummed because I thought I did so good on the four words :-) But to have to do eight times that? I thought I finally found a puzzle that gave me a lot of leniency for stupid guesses :-) In hindsight, that was really silly!
I packed our lunch along with a big bag of grapes for all to share at the lunch area at the museum, while stepdaughter and her husband bought theirs and DGS. Credits there! DH wanted a small oj and it was $3.25. my frugal self went into shock! They chose pizza and Mac and cheese and then I have to listen to her tell me her Dr is shocked that she just can't lose weight...I get frustrated. But keep my trap shut
Last edited by nationalparker; 06-15-2022 at 03:40 PM.
I had an off plan afternoon snack yesterday, but got right back on track. I didn't try to reduce my dinner portions, just back on plan. It seems to work best for me. I hiked today with a starting temp of just 76 degrees. It was heavenly. I'll hike again tomorrow and then take Friday off. It will be warmer and I'm taking my friend to the doctor. I think I'll get my labs drawn that morning too. I called today to be sure they have an order for the labs that are to be rechecked and they do. Fingers crossed that my food plan has lowered my cholesterol. I can't imagine that it wouldn't.
Nationalparker My frugal self doesn't like to purchase food at those kind of venues either. It's usually expensive and rarely any good. It's 100 degrees this afternoon (fairly cool), but our humidity is 16%. It was about 28% this morning. Believe me it makes a huge difference to have the low humidity. I've seen it as low as 3%.
Penny It's fun to have some ideas of things to look forward to. Glad you're getting back to your exercise. I'm sure it will help build your endurance up again.
Maryann Have fun in Klamath Falls. How long are you staying or did you already tell us? Glad weight is coming down per usual.
Mrs Calypso I hope you didn't get chosen at jury duty and that you're feeling back to 100% soon. I guess we both had an off plan day. Well it happens.
GardenerJoy Sorry about the car repair. I just hate that. Dh had a pretty pricey one six months ago or so, but like you said it isn't the greatest time to buy a new car. On the other hand, I'm so happy for you that you were able to fix your back with yoga. That's wonderful!
MammaMeli Great that you remembered to just eat the snack. So much better than feeling hugely deprived and starving. Your garden is just sounding awesome.
Bill Your sugar snap peas sound delicious. It would be fun to have a garden. I had this crazy idea that we sell our house and move up to my sons place in Oregon and have a big garden and things. Dh put the kibosh on my crazy idea for an adventure. I will have to get a wench to get him out of here if it ever happens. I will say that our "dry" heat is so much easier to tolerate than the humidity that most of you have.
Well time to take Otis out in the yard to do some retrieving before dinner. He likes to do it even in the heat, but dh is careful to give him plenty of rests.
Thursday-Monterey Pop Festival catapults Jimi Hendrix, the Who & Janis Joplin (1967)
Diet Coaches/Buddies - Eating was on plan with no daytime snacks, CREDIT moi. Dinner on the patio was grilled salmon, fresh corn-on-the-cob, green salad, and Sugar Snaps with humus. The lettuce is as good as it ever gets; the Arugula (volunteered Arugula) is as strong as I've ever tasted. An annoyed Catbird buzzed out table - it's her space out there. We dawdled as I told DW where I am in reading the book Colliding Worlds: How Cosmic Encounters Shaped Planets and Life. She's already finished and groks to hearing my joy in the discoveries. There isn't a solid belt of asteroids between Mars and Jupiter, it's five distinct belts. Small asteroids that drift out of those belts get catapulted by the planets to become near-Earth asteroids and then meteors. Which the world sees, picks up any meteorites that remain to become studied by planetary scientists. And the sheer joy of thinking of that moment when Kepler figured out that the orbits weren't circular, but ellipses. And, at that moment, knew he was the only person on Earth who knew that. All his calculations were done without a computer.
We missed our standard visit with the (6 yo) DGD - kindergarten is now over. Got some puttering done in time that that loss freed. The good news is that DW's toe is healing so my role as mule is decreasing. Good for her, but too bad for me; the extra upping and downing of stairs was good exercise.
Joy (gardenerjoy) - Ouch for the car repair cost. I do know the calculation that, in this car market, a steep repair is still a good investment. Yay for yoga for fixing your back. Thanks, sort of, for the link to quordle. I got stuck there for a spell. I think of it as stuck because I get so annoyed that I'm a lousy player. Thinking of a word to fit a set of letters comes slowly. Instead of doing something else, I was determined to get things right so get more sucked in.
maryann - Hope you had a nice drive to Klamath Falls which is on my Bucket List for its interesting geology and rivers and everything.
nationalparker – Kudos for knowing when to "keep my trap shut." Not everyone has that skill.
Karen (karenrn) - Good luck in seeing reduced cholesterol results from your diet changes. You're a good friend for taking your friend to the doctor.
Penny. - Love the notion of a train ride to New Orleans. Trains are such a relaxing way to see the countryside.
MrsCalypso - Hope you're feeling better. And hope that your jury duty is fast. I've never served on a jury because as soon as I answered that my occupation was "Engineer" I was dismissed.
MommaMeli - Jealous of your tomatoes turning red already - we're still watching. An apple sounds like a good solution when the stomach is actually hungry.
Readers -
Quote:
Chapter 6Stage 3 - The Challenging Situations Plan
challenging situation skills
Before the Event
1. Change your mindset. In the past, did you even think, It's okay to make exceptions on weekends, holidays, or special occasions . . . when I'm traveling, eating out ... when I'm stressed? How well did this "It's okay to make exceptions" mindset work for you in your goal to lose weight permanently?
Judith S. Beck, Ph.D., The Complete Beck Diet for Life (Green book), Pg 131.
CREDIT for reaching the half-way point of my June exercise goal, half-way through the month.
We'll likely get thunderstorms tonight. In either case, the front will break the current pattern of at or near 100-degree highs. We'll get a few days near 90 degrees before heading back up early next week. So, indoor exercise, today, but I'll try to get outside tomorrow.
Food was on plan and weight is at the low. Now if I can just stay with the program. I headed out to hike this morning and then just wasn't feeling it, probably cause my sleep wasn't good, so I actually drove home. I've been to Trader Joe's, Costco and Fry's (the regular grocery store), so we should be pretty good for the week now. It just amazes me how full the fridge is and then how we eat it all. I think a big part of this is that there is so much produce that is quite bulky. I probably eat about 4 cups of power greens each day at lunch, but after steaming them it isn't so much. Dh asked me to get him some unfiltered apple cider vinegar which apparently he's been putting in his water a couple of times a day at work. I purchased some for home too and I'm going to try to take 2 tsp in water with meals. Supposedly it keeps blood sugars down a bit and helps a person lose visceral fat per Dr. Greger.
I'm too distracted to do personals, so hopefully tomorrow.
Another good day today with nearly-6 yo DGS. Food was OK. Cut into a new watermelon and my sister and i are going to track them this summer. So far I'm 3:1 good:bad. We made plans to go to a watar park tomorrow, one that does allow coolers with drinks and snacks. We have two within reasonable driving distance from us. I asked DH if he'd go with me on a regular day and he said why not, so that could be a good way to cool off. At least while we're in the water. DGS is really excited about it. Nana is a bit, too. haha. I never would have thought I was a waterpark person but I sure did enjoy the wave pool at the last one. We have the US Coast Guard approved float assistant for him, so that's good. The last place wisely didn't let anyone in with one that wasn't USCG approved.
Food was OK today - not perfect, but not too much off track. I did have some trader joe's cinnamon letter cookies this evening. Played in the sprinkler a long while with him. He does crave the one-on-one attention but realized now it's not that he is used to it, it's that he doesn't get it. He had some really funny lines today that I wrote down to remember.
I'm moving on to Day 12: Practice Hunger Tolerance. I was getting a little bored around here and finally starting to feel ready to face the scale and work toward some change. I'm pretty pleased with my progress not eating unless I'm hungry. Credit for not snacking after dinner all week. I definitely needed that change. I have been ultra tired from working sun up to sun down all week. Between swim lessons, the garden, and prepping the house for my daughter's First Communion this Sunday I've been pushing all week. I made some bad food choices yesterday afternoon- too much carbs and sugar. I really just needed a nap.
Practicing hunger tolerance is an easy one for me, because I fast regularly for religious reasons. I'm gla[bd to start back on an easy day. I'm starting to look forward to the planning my meals section of this book because I feel like that is when the weight loss will start for me.
MrsCalypso Watching to see how your jury duty turns out. I served on a jury when I was just out of college, and it was very eye opening. I'll bet whoever has the best lawyer wins 99% of the time. Definitely made me think that if I was ever accused of a serious crime, I'd spend all I had to get a good lawyer.
BillBlueEyes I'm an engineer also. Software Engineer, though I haven't worked in nearly a decade. My husband is self-employed and works very long hours. When we decided to grow the family, we had to pick one career for sanity purposes. I like my job, but he loves his. Turns out I love being a homemaker, so that worked out well for us. I do miss it sometime, though. Crazy to say, but the engineering problems were easier to solve than parenting problems. I guess parenting is more like HR. What type of engineer are you and what industry did/do you work in? I think you are retired, but can't remember.
Karen I don't know if ACV works for what you are wanting it to, but I tried it this spring when my family kept getting strep throat. I have gotten strep every time the kids have had it, except to the 2 times I was drinking ACV water every day. My friend also swears it is getting rid of her nail fungus. I definitely believe there are some health benefits there.
nationalparker Enjoying hearing about your time with your grandson. I think you grandparents have it made with all the life experience and perspective you bring to your relationship with the kids. Sometimes as a parent, I know I'm just getting through the day and missing the big picture.
Wednesday - King John signs Magna Carta at Runnymede (1215, near Windsor, England)
