Late for Monday again. Today is Presidents' Day in the U.S. - we celebrate them all together on the third Monday of February. For some reason I'm struck by the similarity with North Korea which celebrates the birthday of each of its three leaders to date. When they reach 365, it'll be non-stop celebration.
I shovel snow. Boston has 8 feet so far this year. EIGHT FEET. None of it has melted yet, so the piles are high and the drifts higher. I expect to have a different topic on my mind some day in the future, LOL.
It's been cold all weekend in my apartment, which I haven't left since Friday's physical therapy session. Though thankfully not as cold as outside, where temperatures were in the single digits.
I have hunkered in like a small animal and probably even look like one, in a very pet-able dark navy velour track suit with a fur-trimmed collar. I tried not to eat, though I really wanted to. Instead, when possible, I drank copious amounts of hot tea as I finished off the first season of "Deadwood." I felt like an addict jonesing for all the food in the fridge and cabinets in the next room. I ate for a few times when I wasn't really hungry, and felt guilty for it, though the record will show that my perceptions of gluttony and utter abandon are exaggerated.
I am tired of struggling with myself.
This morning, I was thankful for the holiday because the bed was so warm and my will to leave it for the chilly room was very weak.
I will have to venture outside, which I need to do for my mental health, to open up my world and make it bigger, and for my physical health, for physical therapy. But it's so cold, I don't want to.
It's one of those adult moments where you have to make yourself do the opposite of what your bodily instincts are telling you, which is to sit tight, conserve energy, and eat and drink warm things.
Bill and Saef... Wishing you both warmth and an end to this terrible winter.... I'm hoping next week this time there is no talk of shoveling out!
I'm discouraged with myself and my lack of control over the weekend in Napa with my relatives. I know some is water weight but I'm up almost 8 pounds in two days! We have another dinner with them tonight and I WILL show self restraint. Dh and I are doing an early bikram yoga class before taking dd to the airport. Then I need to do some shopping and meal prep for the week to get myself back on track.
Your cold, wet weather would be a godsend for us here dealing with the drought. Now they say we're going to have a mega-drought. It's quite sad.
We went golfing on Saturday and it was quite evident that the course is taking measures because of the drought. All of the rough was dead weeds. The fairways were in fairly decent condition--a bit dry here and there but still nice. The greens were beautiful. They use reclaimed water on most courses here but they're still conserving. I do know of a couple courses that have closed due to the drought.
Trixie and I managed 15 minutes this morning - no wind and the temp was minus 23C. I'm hoping the no wind continues as the temp is going up to minus 12C and I'm going to take DH with us to the beach to show off Trix's off leash skills. Facing similar high temps for the rest of the week but the lows will be less brutal. Very, very glad it's a holiday today and that I didn't have to walk a client's two dogs this past weekend or next weekend.
I too would rather be inside, reading and sipping mint tea. Instead I will pull on about 20 lbs. (not an exaggeration) of gear every day and soldier on. This week I also have a puppy pee break late in the afternoon, cat visit following that, and dinner walk with two dogs.
I'm hoping DH steps up with the cooking. I'm gonna be beat every night Tues. - Fri. Then it will end. He goes away for the weekend and I will take in some movies I like, listen to a bunch of Stones albums, and hang with my girls Trix and Nat. I see a restaurant meal in the plan for Saturday night.
We've been on alert all weekend with the weather stations predicting ice storms, snow, disaster! Now it looks like lots of rain and not much else. Our county, one of the only ones having school today anyway, cancelled on Saturday night and I think they regret it.
We get a holiday today, which I'm trying to enjoy every moment of. I feel bad for all of you with the cold wet or snowy weather. Here we need more rain, and snow in the mountains. Alison, a mega-drought sounds pretty scary. It's already bad enough.
Saturday I went hiking, which I do almost every weekend. I'm training for an event on March 22 where I'll have to carry almost 40 pounds for 26.2 miles. Even though I'm pretty excited about doing this, I'm worried about my bad knee, which is definitely talking to me about this endeavor. It didn't complain too much Saturday until I drove home and got out of the car (very stiff), but Sunday it had a bit of soreness and swelling. My plan is to do one long hike per week with the heavy pack and then give my knee a break for the rest of the week. Well, I'll still try to get in my daily steps, but nothing else. I'm taking as little vitamin I (ibuprofen) as possible. Saturday I took one after I got home but none since then. On the day of the event I plan to take one every 4-6 hours and I'm hoping it will make a big difference if my body is not accustomed to it.
I also found out what happens if I'm even a little bit underfed and try to hike with a heavy load - I hit the wall! Wow, I felt like krap around mile 9 (of 14). Stopping to eat a sandwich, trail mix and some high sugar food made me feel better about an hour later. This coming Friday I will plan to eat more cals and see if I do better on Saturday. Maybe I'll bring donuts to work
Dagmar, what do you wear that weighs so much?? I am so used to my ultralight backpacking gear that it sounds super heavy!
Saef, do you have any friends who could stop by for a visit? I know you said it wasn't something you totally enjoy, but it would sure take your mind off things and introduce some variation into your day. And it would only have to be for a few hours. I grew up on Staten Island and went to high school in Manhattan, so I can easily picture you hunkered in your apartment.
Yesterday my modem kept losing internet connection and I really got a lot done - made cinnamon bread in the bread machine, chicken breasts in the crockpot, pruned some trees, weeded and watered my little garden of cool season veggies, and relocated an old hanging scale I have so that I can weigh my pack. Today I finally figured out the modem problem (simm card needed re-seating) and I'm not getting very much done. Better get to it!
Last edited by HowlinAtTheMoon; 02-16-2015 at 03:26 PM.
Saef -You have every right to feel that way with that awful weather and everything you've been through. What a journey you've had. All I can say is "one day at a time".
Dagmar- -23! Oh my gosh. I don't even know how you did 15 minutes.
Michelle- no way you gained 8 pounds that quickly. Only if you ate about 30,000 extra calories. It has to be mostly water weight. But I know we can all relate to that feeling of getting on the scale and seeing that jump. Shock, anger, disgust, despair ... in no particular order.
Things are okay with me. I seem to have gone a little extreme on exercising, because I have fallen in love with my foam roller which has been taking care of the aches I was having. I biked 34 miles Sat, then 42 miles Sunday. Then I've been running 3-4 times a week and strength training 2x a week. Yeah, it's a little obsessive.
Today is Fat Tuesday and so we are supposed to eat a lot because tomorrow is a fast day (just means no snacks and light meals, no meat). For Lent the only thing I can think of giving up is saying anything negative about people. But I like to not make Lent about "giving up " but more about "adding something good". So I am going to try to say only good things about people for 40 days. In other words, I'll be a mute. So I better get it all out today!
I've got five meetings today using my built-in laptop camera and an application called WebEx, which is all the rage at my office. So from the waist up, I have blown-dry hair, businesslike makeup, a silk velvet paisley shirt and subdued earrings. From the waist down, where I'm not visible to my colleagues, I've got on yoga capris, so that right after work, or during lunch, I can get in some physical therapy exercise.
It's cold again, with fine powdery snow blowing about the sidewalks. Aside from the meetings, my concern today is whether I can persuade my mother to drop me off at the gym for an hour & a half, so I can peddle a recumbent bike and do some upper-body stuff. She is asking sensible questions about this, which somehow turn it into an impossibility:
"Where do I drop you off? (Across from the door. It's a brief episode of double-parking with flashers on.) Where do I pick you up? (Same place -- there's a roundabout/circle nearby to make this easy.) How long? (Hour and a half should do it.) What time? I don't know if I want to delay dinner for this (Harder to answer that one, since I'm used to being flexible about my dinner and this is harder when there's another person involved who likes a formal sit-down with me.)"
Please help me negotiate this trivial and quotidian request which seems to have become a diplomatic task requiring skilled negotiators with experience in averting regional conflict, at the very least.
I've got five meetings today using my built-in laptop camera and an application called WebEx, which is all the rage at my office. So from the waist up, I have blown-dry hair, businesslike makeup, a silk velvet paisley shirt and subdued earrings. From the waist down, where I'm not visible to my colleagues, I've got on yoga capris, so that right after work, or during lunch, I can get in some physical therapy exercise.
It's cold again, with fine powdery snow blowing about the sidewalks. Aside from the meetings, my concern today is whether I can persuade my mother to drop me off at the gym for an hour & a half, so I can peddle a recumbent bike and do some upper-body stuff. She is asking sensible questions about this, which somehow turn it into an impossibility:
"Where do I drop you off? (Across from the door. It's a brief episode of double-parking with flashers on.) Where do I pick you up? (Same place -- there's a roundabout/circle nearby to make this easy.) How long? (Hour and a half should do it.) What time? I don't know if I want to delay dinner for this (Harder to answer that one, since I'm used to being flexible about my dinner and this is harder when there's another person involved who likes a formal sit-down with me.)"
Please help me negotiate this trivial and quotidian request which seems to have become a diplomatic task requiring skilled negotiators with experience in averting regional conflict, at the very least.
Is there shopping nearby? or something else your mother likes? I tend to use bribery a lot and it works - for dogs. Humans are waaay more difficult but if there is an interest of your mother's nearby it might make dropping you off/picking you up seem less like a service task to her.
Dagmar, thanks. Yes, she can get to a grocery store nearby, among other things.
I hate being dependent on getting driven places. I feel like a whiny adolescent who wants to go the mall. "Moooom, can I please go to the gym? Please? Everyone else's mother is letting them go."
Saef-- any idea when you might be cleared to drive? I think Dagmar's idea is sound-- something nearby for her to do-- Barnes and Noble, Starbucks or such?
I know I can't gain 8 pounds in 2 days... but I also know that it will take me a lot longer than 2 days to lose it. I was down 2 today, so 6 to go... I won a battle yesterday that helped. We were going to drive back to meet the relatives for a 7 pm dinner reservation. It would have been 1.5-2 hours each way getting us home very late and having to go to work today. Dh is still highly jet lagged and his stomach is iffy-- happens when he comes home.... I persuaded him to beg off dinner claiming a stomach thing (pretty true). That way we were able to cook our own dinner and get to bed at a reasonable hour. We will have to deal with them later this week anyway....
Saef, I am not all that diplomatic, but in response to not wanting to delay dinner, I would have said, "Well, then, feel free to have your dinner whenever you like and you can pick me up after that. What time would you like to pick me up?" No way I would have adjusted my schedule or skipped the gym to have a sit-down dinner with mom at her convenience! Re driving - you may be able to drive using your left leg only and put your right leg up on the passenger seat. I did that once when I sprained my right ankle far from home.
Thank you all for the kind remarks about my photo. Here is a "before" photo so you can see why I'm so thrilled to finally be slim and why I intend to stay that way! I think it's from about 12-14 years ago.
I decided to "treat" myself to a photo shoot for my 60th bd. It actually turned out to be exhausting and somewhat stressful, but I'm very happy with how the photos turned out. I am definitely not a hair and makeup person, so I was quite apprehensive when they put false eyelashes on me and fixed my hair. I hadn't been to a salon since I got married 25 years ago.
Michele, I know how you feel with the water weight gain. My weight was up 3 pounds this morning from water and extra food. My extra food intake is because I've been burning extra calories, but it is still adding to the scale weight. Since this happens every time I do endurance-type hiking, I know it will be down by Thursday or Friday if I don't go off my normal eating plan. Sometimes it seems like we have to have a tremendous amount of faith in our plan, almost like a religion! So hang in there and have faith!!
Saef - oh my gosh, those questions from your mom cracked me up. My MIL is exactly the same way. I get so stressed out with those questions I want to scream "WHO CARES? JUST WAIT AND SEE! I DON'T FEEL LIKE ANSWERING 20 QUESTIONS ABOUT _______" Fill in the blank. It could be dinner, socks, cleaning up after a meal. Doesn't matter what the subject, it seems like every possible aspect must be questioned. It is just exhausting for those of us on the receiving end. But you've got it much worse with being dependent for rides. I keep telling myself ... don't get like that as you age. But I see little signs of it slipping in sometimes.
Alice- the same happens to me every weekend. I ride really far and need to eat a lot or I will be too weak and starving. So then, the scale goes up usually at least 3 pounds. But by Thursday it is usually back down. I read that it is because you are building muscle and the muscle hoards water to make it heal. But I think the eating more food makes more sense.
Last edited by CalCounter1003; 02-17-2015 at 06:12 PM.
Sharon, I think the weight gain is mostly water from muscle inflammation, as you said. But some from extra food too. No matter, it's not FAT and that's what matters! (Although sometimes water retention mimics jiggly fat in a most disconcerting way.)
Maintainers Weekly Chat February 16 - February 22
But I like to not make Lent about "giving up " but more about "adding something good". So I am going to try to say only good things about people for 40 days. In other words, I'll be a mute. So I better get it all out today! 
