Hi all,

It's not my week for electronics. Luckily my TV started working again, my kitchen appliances are ok despite getting rained on, but my 3+ year old ipod mini just went out over the last few days at the gym. Looking at what I think the problem is, the potential repair cost, versus buying a new one, I just went ahead and ordered a new one. I found yesterday that I can power walk or do weights/strength training without the music, but running w/o music is impossible for me! I am so dependent on technology.

Shannon, glad you & your house are ok. I was watching the footage on the weather channel last night and hadn't realized how bad it was upriver - the rain caused problems down here, but no houses collapsing or cars being swept away, or worse. Stay safe!

Michele and Meg, I'm sure lots of water will flush that water weight away (funny how that works).

Pat, sorry you seem so glum about fall coming. Do you have any good fall recipes or traditions to look forward to?

Lily, I'm sure you'll have a wonderful Christmas with Shane. You always take such good care of your family. They're lucky to have you.

Off to work on a presentation I have to give to a class next month. Have a good one everybody!

Popping in... hopefully I'll have time to catch up later. Best to everyone!

Hi everyone, I'm still having a rough time. Last night I had a major craving for something sweet. So, I ate some watermelon and soon learned it's very high on the glycemic index. I felt horrible about 30 min's later and had to take more insulin. I guess my biggest problem is learning what I can eat and how it will affect me. I'm just so used to counting carbs, counting fat grams or counting calories this is very new to me. I pulled out some LF yogurt to eat yesterday and then saw it had 47 grams of sugar per serving! I had never even noticed that culprit before. If I get a chance, I'm gonna go buy me a diabetic cookbook this week and learn how to cook and eat foods that will satisfy me. I definitely think this would have been harder for me if I hadn't gotten my weight pretty much under control to start with. I weighed this morning and am holding steady at 149 lbs. One thing I'm very thankful for is that I haven't had a regular soda in about 4 years.

I see my Dr. again next Monday. She is gonna try to lower my prednisone dosage (which should hopefully help my blood sugars too). On 70 mg. of prednisone daily right now and I don't think I've had a decent night of sleep in at least a month!


Shannon, it's good to see you are doing OK amongst all that flooding. We had major storms again last night, but so far nothing is flooded.

Megan, yeah it's weird cause I'm already thinking about the upcoming holidays. Wondering what kind of diabetic dessert I can cook too. I have made a SF pecan pie once and it was horrible. Gotta find something better to fix this next time, lol. I am looking forward to seeing Shane at Christmas and plan to make it very special. (he was in Iraq last year at Christmas).

I need to clean my house again today. My floors keep getting tracked up by dirty doggie foot prints.

I also need to go pick up my new bifocals. My eyesight is drastically worse than it was a year ago!

Lily - my grandmother was a great cook and had a lot of recipes that she made diabetic friendly. She never seemed to be frustrated by the foods that she was eating, and I remember eating a lot of them myself. I'm sure it is a big help that you got your weight down in advance of this!

My head is killing me today... I'm sure it is a crashdown from all the sugar yesterday. I'm finding myself with serious sugary carby cravings, too. I've done okay so far - about to eat an apple or some prunes and see if that helps.

Shannon-- glad you are more or less okay with the flooding!

A pasta feed is like a crab feed. If you don't know what either of those are-- it is a get together where they serve you large quantities of pasta (or crab). Kind of like a carbo load before races if you know what those are. Often they are done as fundraisers. This one was done at a winery that dh has a "membership" to so it was members only. Therefore the pasta was really good (versus just cheap and plentiful)-- otherwise I would have stayed away. I am grouchy that the weight hasn't budged (yet) but I realized I have been too busy to drink enough water! Off to work again and to grab some water!!!

Slow chat thread this week!

Shannon, glad you're doing okay with the flooding. Doesn't WardHog live in Atlanta too?

I've been doing really well with my re-committment to my plan, and I think I'll even be able to move my ticker down this week. However, I'm going to a conference next week. :sigh: At least my hotel has a fitness center and is located right next to a park, so I should have somewhere to work out. Right now I'm looking at the info about local businesses to see if there's a Starbucks nearby so I can have oatmeal for breakfast.

Jessica-- are you going anywhere fun for your conference?

The thread is very slow this week!

Yesterday I perfected my title as klutzy queen. I got to work early... I was very tired and stressed and my boss met me in the parking lot to discuss something I was already worried about. I was walking with her and talking (and carrying armloads of boxes, my purse, etc.) and I totally walked into a giant concrete pillar that we have so parents won't drive through that part of the parking lot. I went up and over and down! Of course my packages went flying, my boss tried unsuccessfully to catch me, and I was totally humiliated. I thought I would have been badly injured but I seem to just have a bruised knee and a badly strained muscle on the inside of my leg. I wasn't about to miss spin class last night as I'm still trying to get off my wine country weight from the weekend! I went to see how it would feel thinking I would leave if it hurt too much. Surprisingly it didn't hurt much during class but when I got off the bike the pain returned. I'm taking anti-inflammatories and though it still hurts, it hurts less today. Hopefully I can still go to latin dance this afternoon! The scale finally was back to 123 this morning so my hard work paid off!

Still a crazy and hectic week here. I have a school project due that I'm finishing up (for my class I'm taking) and I have tons of school (work) stuff that is stressful. I have book fair coming and virtually no helpers. Anyone want to come help with my book fair??

I'm taking tomorrow off from work (another reason for stress as I'm trying to cram 5 days into 4) to go see an eye specialist for my Graves Eye Disease. Dh is going to go with me so I hope I find out something. Hopefully afterwards we are going to go look at cars. I have a lease that expires in a few weeks so I've got to figure out what to get!! Any suggestions?? I need an SUV size car due to my 2 big dogs and I don't want to spend too much. I currently have a Mazda CX 7 and that is a good size for me.....

We are quiet this week! I was out on the boat all day yesterday. I'm letting a lot of things at work cause me stress right now, and I need to either deal with the stress better, or deal with the situations causing the stress. Until I figure out how to do one of those things... stress is not an excuse for eating badly or not going to the gym.

Michele, ouch! I'm a klutz too. Last week I was once again "dismounting" less than gracefully from my jackknifes on the yoga ball and praying that the boxing lesson wouldn't start in the area where I was working until I was finished. I didn't need 6 "too cool for school" guys coming in and watching me! (Yes, I still have a few insecurities left over from teenager-hood). I hope you heal quickly!

Jessica, don't worry about your conference! You can stick to plan while there, I know it. You have a place to work out, a source for a healthy breakfast, and just remember to eat intuitively. Try to think about the positives of the conference instead of worrying about food.

Michele, mmm, that pasta does sound good to me right now! I hope you drink your water and those extra lbs flush away.

Shannon, did you manage your sugar cravings? Feeling better today?

Lily, I'm sure that you can figure out a way to make some tasty diabetic-friendly recipes that will help make the holidays lovely and tasty. Have you tried looking around the internet? I just did a search for "diabetic recipes" and came up with this site, http://www.diabetic-recipes.com/, along with many others. You've handled a lot of obstacles and tough times already, you can handle this one!

Is it Thursday already? In some ways it feels like it's earlier in the week, in other ways later... Have a great day everyone.

I'm about ready to tear my hair out right now!!!

My DH was kind enough to get us a job in Yakima, Washington, so I am in the process of trying to obtain business licenses, contractors licenses, etc., etc., etc. My desk is covered with stacks of printouts, instructions, forms, etc. and it's all so frustrating! Why is there a need to have so many different governmental agencies that you have to deal with?

We all sound like we are stressed out this week! I actually just found the stress smilie earlier today as I was posting on another thread...

I had a full out crazy moment last night, don't know how else to describe it. I picked up DSS at daycare, got home, fixed dinner, daddy got home and I went upstairs to change the bulb in the touch lamp by DSS's bed. The replacement bulb wouldn't work - came on, but wouldn't turn off, got crazy hot and burned me trying to take it out. I had another of the little lamps that I had bought for him at his mom's house yesterday when I got the bulbs, tried it and the bulb burned out as soon as I turned the lamp on. I flipped immediately into 'have to go to the store and get a new lamp right now' mode. At 6:300 pm, in still partially flooded Atlanta, with lots of roads between myself and Target still closed and traffic still insane trying to leave our area to get into the more impacted Douglasville area. Went anyway, got stuck in terrible traffic, locked down picking out a lamp at Target because they didn't have a touch lamp. Bought one lamp, went across the street to Home Depot to look at another, realized it was almost 8, freaked out and jumped in the car to go home. I couldn't think about anything else but that stupid lamp. Totally wrapped up in my head over it. Really, DSS would have been fine without a lamp, but all I kept saying in my head was that I had promised him I would fix his lamp before he was at our house again (it blew out Sunday night when he was over) and by goodness I had to fix it. By the time I got home I could barely keep my eyes open, so my planned exercise went undone. No idea where all of that came from...

Today will be better. At least I was OP with food yesterday.

Jessica - Ward does live in Atlanta, yes. I don't think she is in one of the more impacted areas, but might have gotten hit with some traffic back ups. Not sure. Glad your plan is going well! And, you'll be fine next week. Does the hotel have hot water available? You could always buy instant oatmeal and get hot water from the kitchen? Or an inroom coffe pot maybe?

Michele - a pasta feed sounds great to me right now... Ouch on the fall! How are you doing today?

Megan - I did okay with the sugar cravings on Tuesday, significantly better yesterday. No headache today, so that is good. I'll say it with you "stress is no reason to eat or not go to the gym"! Maybe if we both say it we'll listen to it!

Allison - I hate hate hate having to go through all the hoolpa for permits and such. It makes me absolutely crazy...

Good day everyone! to all!

Michele, the conference is in Tucson. It looks like a pretty packed conference (activities from 8am to 9pm every day) so I don't know if I'll have much time to do fun stuff! Good luck with your eye appointment. If I lived near you I would totally help with the book fair! I loved book fairs so much when I was a kid and helped out with them some when I was older and my mom was teaching 1st grade.

Megan, don't let the stress derail you! If you really want to get off those extra pounds, then your weight is MORE important than work (unless they're going to fire you ).

Allison, LOL, sometimes I wish we didn't have states if only so that we wouldn't have to deal with that sort of crap when moving between states or doing work in other states!

Shannon, sorry about the lamp episode. You were just trying to be a good stepmom!

Morning. Count me in with those dealing with as well. I have to present my budgets before the review committee this afternoon, and I'm still getting figures on a few of them ( I have 7, though the Golf Course Manager will present his, leaving me 6).

I blew off last night's cardio, and then blew off a healthy dinner as well. Why? Who knows. DH left Tues morning and was supposed to be home today, but he came in about 9 last night. I always eat better when it's the two of us but I need to be stricter with myself when he's gone.

Michele - whoops! Glad you weren't badly hurt. Hope you're feeling better. I've done some klutzy things like that myself. I have a 2004 Honda CRV (my second one) which is a smaller SUV. They changed the style in 2007 so I'm not sure if it has the same amount of room. If/when I get a new(er) car, I'd really like to have a hybrid SUV, either a Toyota Highlander or the Ford one. But we tend to drive our cars forever, so it'll be another few years I'm sure.

Jessica - I second (third?) the idea of using the in-room coffee pot and bringing your own instant cereal. Why pay the premium at Starbucks? And non-refrigerated stuff is a good idea as well. A good plan will help (note to self - take this advice for business trip in October)

Okay, no more time here, must review the budgets. I have 4 hours to see how much I can get myself stressed over this.....

Lily, I would have expected your doctor to have given you advice on the proper diet for diabetics, but there is always google, you will come up with more info than you can use. I would recommend a diabetic cookbook, I gave one to my son for his birthday , it had really good sounding recipes that the whole family would enjoy,

Oh Michele, forgot to comment on the car question - DH has a 2007 CRV, loves it. It has plenty of room and drives very similar to the Civic I had. He says it is the greatest car ever.

Shannon and Pat,
We actually had a Honda CRV before my Mazda. I know everyone loves theirs but I had recurring problems with it. Not sure if I'll consider one again for that reason. I'm thinking of looking at the Toyota Rav 4 or the Hyundai Santa Fe (I think that's the model).

Michele