[silverbirch]

Collected the car today. I now have a good relationship with the salesman as we’ve covered a range of subjects outside this particular car purchase. Re the car, all I have to do now is read the manual to be sure of all the amazing things it does. At a certain point, I couldn’t take any more at the garage and so we left it that I’d be in touch if I wasn’t sure about anything. I’m going to learn one or two new things every day, a more paced approach which will work for me. Today was the location of the headlight switch and a bit about the car locking system.

Food has improved. I’m hoping that fewer spinning plates in the air will translate to more time to plan, buy and make food. And less inclination to eat in a random and/or desperate fashion.

maryann, you’re right, you’re really great at the exercise part. Much credit! And I do agree, healthy food is the way to go. Interesting about Contrave. Fingers crossed it works for you.

Bill, I’m very impressed that you were thinking about almonds and the printer problem. I’m pretty certain I haven’t really evolved to the thinking stage yet because the evidence shows that I might just go and cram the almonds into my mouth. So unsophisticated. But it’s coming along. (I remember you used to struggle with tree nuts way back.) I did wear a scarf to pick up the car today but it wasn’t floating in the breeze. Oh no, it was warmly round my neck and I also wore a woollen hat pulled down and leather gloves. The rain was pelting down in torrential bursts.

curlyjax, interesting about the allergist. I’ll join you in cutting down on peanut butter. I have a bit of a feeling that it doesn’t suit me either and that I’d do better without it. I’d like to find a good protein alternative. I’m not too stable around nuts as nuts (see my comment to Bill).

gardenerjoy, sympathy with being awake in the wee small hours. I hope you’ve managed to rest and build up your strength today.

[maryann]

Good Afternoon, Coaches.
Started the Contrave ( actually a generic version that doesn't cost anything through insurance.) i feel like I am on a path with is a good feeling. 1 to 2 weeks before i can expect anything to change but my eating was great. I bought 3 dozen large baker's cookies for my class tomorrow and didn't eat or order one. Great start.

I am going to confession this evening in prep for sponsoring a former student. I am wearing gym clothes so I may work out on the way home from church. Busy week is making me cranky.

Wave

[BillBlueEyes]

Diet Coaches/Buddies - Eating was on plan with no daytime snacks, CREDIT moi. Was pleased because "a little something" to ease the problem of the moment seemed like such a good idea. Spent a bunch of frustrating time attempting to get the 'scan to file' function working on my printer/computer combination. Finally, before heading off to Staples to use their machines, I realized that I could just use the 'Copy' function. I'd have to save a stack of paper instead of a tidy .PDF file on my computer, but it'd be a finite stack of paper. And the time I'd save was would be worth it. So, COPY I did. Then stuffed all my tax info into one envelope. DW heroically accepted the job of going to the post office to send them off to our accountant. I'm done! (Except for the small task of signing the cover sheet when she's done so she can electronically file the taxes to the IRS and MA DOR.) Felt physically tired even though all the effort was in my head.

Dinner included Trader Joe's Gnocchi made with cauliflower. DW was casting about to add variety to our meals. These little buggers had the weirdest texture I've ever put in my mouth. They were super smooth, no resistance to chewing. Felt like swallowing them whole would have been more appropriate. DW could taste the cauliflower; I couldn't. Whatever calories was saved by using cauliflower instead of potatoes was lost to the amount of Parmesan cheese we dumped over them to try to rescue the taste. Cauliflower, itself, is a welcome item in our dinner menus. These wont' be. Now I want some real Italian Gnocchi to clear out my memory.


Joy (gardenerjoy) - Glad that you broke through the Catch-22 around your shot. Would current high school kids understand your use of "Catch 22?"

Silverbirch - Such fun to read the manual for a car to discover the features that we'd lived for years without. It's the remote that got to me. I was playing with the remote to my new car deep within the bowels of my kitchen in the back of my house only to discover that I'd opened the trunk; it linked up to the car through a long distance and multiple walls.

maryann - Super Kudos for buying cookies for your students without any for yourself. Encouraging sentence, "I feel like I am on a path."

curlyjax - Always encouraging to read, "I am determined to get back on track today." Good luck chasing down allergies - hard to pinpoint little things.

Readers -

Chapter 6 Stage 3 - The Challenging Situations Plan

Remain in Stage 3 until you've made that shift: ...

From Automatically Thinking This: I messed up. I might as well give up and eat whatever I want.
to -->
Thinking This: I made a mistake. It won't even show up on the scale if I get back on track now.

Judith S. Beck, Ph.D., The Complete Beck Diet for Life (Green book), Pg 166.

[curlyjax]

Credit for being totally OP at work yesterday, and I got some exercise in too. At home I made some chili as well as roasted asparagus, cleaned up all the leftover dishes, finally washed the kitchen floor and had a good chat with my BIL. I did get into the chocolate chips but didn't go crazy. Felt like an okay eating day and was satisfied that I felt like doing something after work instead of just sitting like a lump.
Yesterday I read that some allergy tests can have a false positive for peanuts which would make sense in my case as I've never had a problem with it. Still maybe i'll try almond butter instead. And that you can react to soy products one time and not another. I've never had any issue with tofu or soy sauce. At any rate I'm going to avoid store made granola and certain granola bars, as that is definitely what I had a reaction to a year ago.
Gardenerjoy-glad you got the shingle shot issue resolved. I still need to get mine but need to pick a time when I won't mind feeling cruddy after.
Maryann-yay for a good path and not eating the cookies.
Silverbirch- nice to have a relationship with the car salesman, makes the whole process easier. It is a challenge to find alternative proteins for sure. Do you like hummus?
Bill-good to know about that cauliflower gnocchi. I've eyed it in the store,but won't bother trying it now. Their potato gnocchi is good and I usually dump in some spinach to make it healthier.

[gardenerjoy]

I slept slightly better last night because I slept so badly the two previous, but I was up early with a headache (an expected side effect of the vaccine). It went away after about half an hour. I have a welt at the injection site. Makes it hard sleep on that side -- like sleeping on a baseball. My muscle aches and fatigue are improved, so that's good!

I tried my new breakfast this morning. Not as tasty as I hoped, but I can tweak the recipe. Also, I suspect that it's something I can get used to as being good for me. It was more satiating than I imagined. I felt satisfied until lunch time.

Exercise +30, 1350/1700 minutes for March

silverbirch: DH's method to getting to know a new car is to sit in the driveway (usually with an adult beverage), play the CD player, and figure out what all the knobs and buttons do.

maryann: Good for you for staying out the students' cookies.

BillBlueEyes: Years ago, before on-line library catalogs, I had a hard time finding Catch-22 at the local library. It turned out it was shelved in the YA collection. The explanation was that it was on the lists of summer reading for teens. So, I guess that some teens would know. I read the book, in part, because I knew the phrase but not where it came from. Major Major Major Major still makes me giggle.

curlyjax: Lots of credits yesterday. Good for you!

[silverbirch]

Went to the gymn this morning which was great, as always. Just me, my trainer, his dog, some music and the wind in an old cow shed. I’m making great progress at the moment which is wonderful. Less of the kind of stress that has no good solution is helping.

Having said that, it’s been a fairly stressful day. The car runs beautifully but may not be the right one for me long term. We’ll see but I’m missing about a square metre of space in the boot/trunk compared with the previous car and there’s a big lip when you open the boot/trunk which isn’t great for the back when reaching in and dragging stuff about. But we’ll see. It may be all right.

At the office the SO went to buy me a cup of coffee and a small quiche from the cafe nearby. When the quiche wasn’t available he bought a bap with brie, rocket, grapes and “onion marmalade”. Later on I felt pretty ill with a lot of flushing on my face which I put down to either shop bread (which reliably does a number on my tummy) or the “onion marmalade”. I felt so rough that I went to bed and fell fast asleep for a bit. It will pass but I could certainly do without an upset tummy.

maryann, good idea to wear gym clothes to church. Then you’ve got the choice whether to go or not.

Bill, congratulations on getting the tax paperwork out of your hair! Those cauliflower gnocchi do not sound good so I shan't bother. Interesting your key fobs are so strong. I’ve bought a Faraday cage pocket to put car key fobs into at the other house so no-one can hack them and take the car away. (This house is too far from where I park the car.)

curlyjax, credit for doing something after work, especially the kitchen floor! Yes, I do like hummus but it’s a bit too easy to eat too much or the whole lot, you know.

gardenerjoy, the shingles jab sounds like heavy going. I can’t remember what your new breakfast is but great that it’s good enough until lunchtime.

[BillBlueEyes]

Diet Coaches/Buddies - “Call me Ishmael.”

Found my copy of Moby Dick. DW wanted to read it after we had learned that a dear friend of some 50 years has read it multiple times. Multiple times! I’ve read it once. More about whales than I’d ever thought could be written. DW casually asked to borrow my copy. Black hole. I had to find it. After a long search, including in unlabeled boxes, I almost gave up. Found a new paperback on Amazon for $3.95 delivered price to arrive tomorrow. I’d gladly pay $3.95 to be able to stop looking. Then, remembered one last place to look and . . . voila . . . there it was. She’s delighted and I’ve avoided adding yet another book to our house. It's a Norton Edition with copious footnotes - much better than the $3.95 version I'd have ordered. Interesting part of my search was to find books that I knew that I'd never read (or read again). I carefully put them back in their box where they belong. As much as I need a decluttering expert, I'd never recommend myself as a client.

Exercise, CREDIT moi, was walking at both ends of subway rides to get to the Seaport district of Boston for the opera, Béla Bartók's Bluebeard's Castle and Four Songs. The venue was a giant rectangular room in a cruise ship terminal with the audience on three sides. A set up for disaster. But brilliantly staged with the removal of sheets on the bed at the center of the stage to represent opening the seven doors in the castle. Was one dreary, morbid, tale that grew more dreary and more morbid as it progressed. Was fun to enter the area up an escalator marked "Board Ship." Felt that making the wrong turn would land me in Spain, LOL.

Eating was on plan with no daytime snacks, CREDIT moi.



Joy (gardenerjoy) - An improvement in sleep is a gift. Ouch for the thought, "like sleeping on a baseball." You sent me off to Wiki to be reminded, He was named "Major Major Major" by his father, as a joke – passing up such lesser possibilities as "Drum Major, Minor Major, Sergeant Major, or C Sharp Major". Can't stop laughing.

Silverbirch - Neat that you're joined at the gym by your trainer's dog. Good luck acclimating to your new car.

curlyjax - Trying to identify allergies has to be one of the hardest quests ever. Always Kudos for being OP at work.

Readers -

Chapter 6 Stage 3 - The Challenging Situations Plan

Remain in Stage 3 until you've made that shift: ...

From Automatically Thinking This: I wish I could have eaten more.
to -->
Thinking This: I 'm so glad I followed my plan.

Judith S. Beck, Ph.D., The Complete Beck Diet for Life (Green book), Pg 166.

[curlyjax]

Not a good eating day. I got into the dessert at work- a lovely moist cake and had potato chips as well. At least I ate my healthy salad.. I went to my BFF's (aka widowfriend) house for dinner-pork medallions with onions and spinach, so good- and wine. She had some bad news about her current job and I feel very bad for her. It is terrifying to be on your own as the solo parent and provider. I feel fortunate to be in a job industry that always needs people, even if its low pay and not enough money (working with elders). We went for a good walk with her dogs and she vented for a while. I was hungry when I came home, and I got into some junk. Slept in today which was lovely. Today will be getting groceries, dump and then i'm going out to dinner and then live music in a bar with some Meetup acquaintances. so that will be fun.
Bill-that opera set up sounds very interesting; theatrical productions are so creative.
Silverbirch-yuck for feeling bad from food, hope you're better now. Great that you have a personal trainer.
Gardenerjoy-I forget what your new breakfast is too. Glad you're feeling better.

[maryann]

Good Morning, Coaches.

I had an amazing day yesterday. So many credits for a life I couldn't even dream about as a teen in a dysfunctional home:

1. Garage door broke trapping my car on the busiest day of the year. DH scurried me around, got the door fixed, dropped off my car and then walk home to get his truck. I grew up not knowing married people were suppose to be nice to each other.
2. I played in the student/staff basketball game. A crowd of thousands cheered me on. I was deliberately silly but played the game decently running up and down full court and making some assists. Former students came up after and hugged me. As a 60 year old woman, I look back at my 200 pound , 23 year old self in a pysch ward and want to tell her "There is so much life ahead."
3. I went to confirmation rehearsal with a student who asked me to sponsor him. I was overwhelmed with the honor and the god present with 90 confirmees and their sponsors and parents. Perhaps 10% of us had English as a first language. What loving and beautiful cultures surrounded me.
4. I went to an AA meeting to sit in a chair in honor of a past AA sponsee who was found dead at the River Bottoms. I sat in the meeting because she never would. Broke my heart.
5. And finally credit for not using food to dim or shy away from this bittersweet life. I have been been much better about snacking. maybe the beginning of medicine effects or maybe the hope of medicine working. I change up breakfast to savory - salmon nuggets and mustard. I am happy to try "different."

Silverbirch: Those car issues could be a big deal. I agree. I was a travelling art teacher for a year. i threw my back out by having to lift my stuff over a car lip. Hoping everything works out ok.
BBE: Credit you for sitting through Bartok. One of my least favorite composers. There are a select few atonal -ish composers that I can stand. He is not one. I can do Charles Ives and Poulenc. Debussy doesn't count as atonal in my book.

[silverbirch]

Torrential rain this morning and a beautiful sunny afternoon. Our clocks go forward tonight so we’ll meet together in springtime tomorrow.

I’m making good progress with getting to know the car by breaking it down into bite-sized chunks (up and down to the car which is parked in the lane), and just sticking it out.

Food suddenly seems a bit better, though this could be because the SO is in charge over the weekend. Or because I’ve got some time to pay attention. My new focus of interest is the research suggesting that eating 30 different plant foods over a week is a better bet for gut health than five a day or whatever your particular country recommends. “Plant foods” in this case isn’t just fruit and veg but also includes herbs and spices (counts 0.25 each), pulses/legumes etc. I’m including the plants in the herbal infusions I drink (counting 0.25 each). With my usual diet and also focusing, I seem to be doing very well and it’s only been a few days! Credit.

Research from the American Gut Project, an open platform for citizen science microbiome research with professional collaboration and specimens from US, UK and Australia, shows that people who eat 30 different types of plants per week have a more diverse gut microbiome than those who eat 10 or fewer plants per week. This is because plants provide prebiotics and polyphenols that serve as food for beneficial gut bugs. Great - all in favour of beneficial gut bugs! My digestion's been a bit off during periods of stress so this sounds good to me.

Tim Spector, King’s College London, specialist in epidemiology, twins study etc, is working on this too. He’s one of the people behind Zoe, a personalised nutrition programme, which also did some interesting work on Covid symptoms.

Rob Mansfield of the World Cancer Research Fund gave it a go and wrote up how it went, and so did Chloe Gray, a writer. It's interesting to read about them both. I like the feeling of this so I’ll be giving it a go too.

Bill, that sounds like a nice outing to the Seaport. Much credit for finding your copy of Moby Dick. We declutterers often find multiple copies of books, underwear, sunglasses, you name it. All bought because the client couldn’t find the orginal one. We also find money and other useful items!

As much as I need a decluttering expert, I'd never recommend myself as a client.

Um, yes, quite a few clients say this kind of thing. Credit for self awareness!

curlyjax, credit for exercise and a healthy salad!

maryann, many credits in your yesterday and credit also due to you for seeing them as such!

gardenerjoy, I'm glad to hear your achiness and fatigue are improving. In a good cause, of course, but still something extra to handle. Thank you for telling me about your DH’s approach to a new car, accompanied by an adult beverage! I don’t drink alcohol but I understand very clearly how it might be a good idea with this job. I’m happy to put in the time and solve the challenges but I’ve also got quite a lot else going on in my life at the moment! Anyway, I’m now following some of his example by having an adult hot drink of lemon and ginger tea and decompressing.

[gardenerjoy]

My new breakfast is a concoction from the blender: cottage cheese, yogurt, frozen berries, banana, and cinnamon. Topped with 1/4 cup of granola.

I liked it much better this morning. It helps to know what it's going to taste like and then have it match that. Yesterday, I thought I might add honey, but I think I won't since I can clearly get used to it without adding sugar.

I was too chicken to add spinach, but I'm going to try that and give it a couple of days to see if I can get used to that, too.

Spinach will add another plant to get me closer to the 30 different plants that I now feel challenged by silverbirch to eat each week. I did a quick count with my new breakfast including the spinach. That gets me to 19. Before the new breakfast it would have only been 14. So, we'll call that progress and start to think about how to get a bit more variety into my life.

Exercise +50, 1400/1700 minutes for March

silverbirch: Your hot drink sounds yummy and calming to me. I hope it helps you get to know and like your car.

BillBlueEyes: I read Moby Dick in college. We got to skip some of the more detailed whale facts.

curlyjax: Good for you for being a supportive friend.

maryann: I love how you looked at your day from the lens of how different it would have been in a more dysfunctional time and place. I'm proud of how you played basketball!

[BillBlueEyes]

Diet Coaches/Buddies - Eating was on plan with no daytime snacks, CREDIT moi. Dinner was consumed leisurely because the concert we had tickets for started at 8. Didn't have to dress up because it was performed in the studio of the public radio station for only about a hundred lucky patrons and some nine cameras. I declared that to mean that I was merely backstage and could wear a flannel shirt. In the olden days, I thought that I had to wear a blazer just to acknowledge that the tickets were pricey.

Boston Baroque performed three Mozart pieces: Symphony in D Major from when he was 18 years old; Sinfonia concertante from when he was 22; and his 41st Symphony (Jupiter) from just before he died. (Program notes for the curious.) Just a delightful listening evening without having to analyze why such an odd fable lives on as we did with Bluebeard's Castle. Martin Pearlman, Music Director and conductor, gave a short intro to the Sinfonia duet between a violin and a viola which told us that Mozart had called for the viola to be tuned a half-note higher to give it more brilliance against the violin. Mozart wrote the 41st as the third of three symphonies that he composed in a couple of months. My head nearly explodes every time I'm confronted with how much Mozart produced. And how quickly. Pearlman also referred to Symphony in D as simple, like an overture (as it was written), "By a brilliant teenager."


Joy (gardenerjoy) - Following your continued experiment with your breakfast with interest. Shudder to think of adding spinach to breakfast. As my SIL would say, "That's just WRONG."

Silverbirch - Such interesting stuff about our gut microbiome. I'm fascinated about how little we know other than how much it seems to matter. Might be a challenge to get to 30 different plant based foods in a week. Feel a tad like I'm cheating to go count all the different greens in the mixed-greens that I buy each week. Thanks for letting me know that I'm fully normal in thinking that I'm not ready for a declutterer.

maryann - What a thought provoking set of credits. Do admire your perspective. Methinks that you'd have thoroughly enjoyed our evening of Mozart.

curlyjax - A good walk while you listened to your friend sounds like a productive day. It is neat to work in a field where you know that you'll always be needed.

Readers -

Chapter 6 Stage 3 - The Challenging Situations Plan

Remain in Stage 3 until you've made that shift: ...

From Automatically Thinking This: What if I get hungry?
to -->
Thinking This: Hunger isn't a big deal. I'll eat again in a few hours or tomorrow morning.

Judith S. Beck, Ph.D., The Complete Beck Diet for Life (Green book), Pg 166.

[curlyjax]

Decent activity day yesterday. When I was driving home from the grocery store at 5, I received a text that we had to meet up earlier for dinner prior to the show. Apparently the venue sells out quickly and no advanced tickets. So I ended up eating a quick bite at home and met the folks (who i've met at a prior meetup) just for a drink; a glass of wine for 12 dollars! Oh well, it was a better choice than beer anyway. We ended up waiting for an hour which was a bit boring but it did indeed sell out. It was fun to dance to 70s music but the 5 of us left at intermission. Very loud,not the nicest venue, and definitely some drunk acting folks already at 9:30. I bumped into someone I knew from a mom's group back when my kids were little, so that was fun. It's so great that there's no smoking in these places now; I remember going to hear music back in the day and my clothes reeking of smoke afterwards.
Today is another grocery store, cooking some stuff for the week, and hopefully yoga this morning. I got into cookies yesterday that I bought for DD; I'm really need to figure out a way to ignore the sweets she has.
Maryann- yay for such a wonderful day! And huge credits for having a good relationship with DH after not having grown up with a good marriage role model.
Silverbirch-thanks for the 30 different plants a week idea and the links. I will check them out. Sounds like an interesting challenge! I could see it getting pricey as I tend to buy a chunk of things for one week and eat the same things for a few days, but I could see spreading it out over 2 weeks so I get a variety in.
Gardenerjoy- your breakfast does sound good, with lots of calcium and protein.
Bill-that program sounds lovely. So interesting to know about what you're listening to.

[maryann]

Good Morning.

Like Joy, I have accepted Silverbirch's challenge of 30 plants in a week. I printed out a checklist of foods from this link: https://lbhealthandlifestyle.com/eat...eek-checklist/. I counted 24 in my day yesterday. The necessary amounts weren't present but many of the meals will be repeated through the week. This is a good reason for me to keep posting here. I new I would add lots of foods if I made my Greger "groat bowl" which has all different grains, sorghum I add, walnuts, and roasted squash. I froze in my pyrex which usually equal two lunches. I'll have lunches into April. So simple. My paleo bars have about 7 seeds and nuts. I changed up my breakfast to savory with salmon nuggets and honey mustard. I have been reading Glucose Goddess for additional tips.

Credit yesterday was planning on dinner out before heading to Tahoe. My teaching neighbor was in a band playing at a brew house. I ate a small amount of groat bowl dinner and order only dessert by design. It was a huge homemade ice cream sandwich. I ate half leisurely, enjoyed it and left the other half. Credit me. Exercise was standing for nearly 3 hours at the confirmation service. You think if a priest wants to encourage the young to come to mass he wouldn't go on and on for 30 mins in addition to bilingual duplications and chanting what could be read. Sheesh.

Skiing this morning. very excited.

[silverbirch]

I slept well last night and the clocks were forward by the time I woke up. I did a bit of car wrestling whilst the SO shopped for food. I read a new book which was lovely because most of my reading recently has been around whether or not to keep them. And I did another draft of a piece for a long-standing client. Food has been interesting. A good breakfast. An OK lunch which caused a bit of tummy upset that I’m putting down to butter and peanut butter (both troublemakers). A good tea of lemon chicken and chickpeas, spinach and brown rice. Plus lime pickle. Nothing in between meals! I really like this new way of looking at food - the 30+ plant foods in a week. It seems to have liberated me a bit so that can only be good!

(I didn’t mean to challenge you all - that is so not me! But I’m glad you’re finding it interesting too.)

gardenerjoy, I love the idea of your new breakfast. Well, of course I do as it’s got virtually the same ingredients as my own breakfast! But I don’t use the blender and I eat muesli rather than granola. And cottage cheese is an occasional visitor though I’d be happy to welcome it more often if I could find nice cc regularly. Spinach is an idea but I think it would be better going through the blender, so I might say no for the time being. But I like the idea of cinnamon so I’m planning to add that tomorrow morning.

Bill, Mozart - what a boy! A lovely concert. Interesting you talked yourself into dressing casually. No, it's not a cheat - you’re allowed to count all the different greens in the salad as they all bring something different to the party.

curlyjax, credit for getting out and about. Dancing to 70s music - what a laugh!

maryann, interesting checklist - thank you. And I’ll be looking up Greger groat bowl as soon as I’ve done the washing up (my turn tonight). You mention it often and I’ve been meaning to find out about it but then time slips away. Glad you got through the confirmation service. Enjoy the snow.