Congraulations on a great start ! I am still holding at 3.4 pounds and happy about it. I bought half a rotissirie chicken at the deli, yesterday. It is a little difficult to figure calories on it but between the weight posted on the package and info from Calorie King and an educated guess I think I came close and at least did no harm, I still have some left for todays dinner.

I know what the scale would be telling me if I were on it - I had the cafeteria's chicken noodle soup for lunch yesterday and knew it was salty beyond anything I ever eat. This morning I feel like the Michelin Man! Green tea, much water, homemade lunch ... we all know the drill.

Bargoo and Allison - great job kickin' it into gear!

I'm not having a quick start on my exercise resolutions. I still pursue my toes daily, but my shoulder has reached a point that it's interrupting my sleep and all I really want to do when I get home from work is vegetate on the heating pad. Drives me nuts to wake up with no feeling in my left arm all the way back to my elbow - the only comfortable position has been on my back with no pillow. Here's to hoping that tonight brings me a few steps closer to getting this put to bed.

Oh, my exercise isn't quite what it should be, but I did take the dog for a brisk walk after work yesterday. It was quite refreshing so I hope to do that every day until it heats up again--sometime in the spring. After that, I'll have to convince myself that getting up half an hour early to do the treadmill or elliptical isn't that bad of an idea. I think my mind is set against it because I don't want to inconvenience the cats (their "cat" room is also our "exercise" room--aka, DD's old bedroom). I guess the weekly (and sometimes twice a week) golf game where we walk 18 (par 3) holes carrying our clubs, plus the dog walks and an occasional hike (got new gear!!!) will need to suffice until I convince myself otherwise.

Hey guys, I'm popping in here. I'm hovering around 136-137 following the holidays. It's under red line (138) but I'd still rather be 133. I started logging my food last week but then fell off the logging wagon because I made some different recipes that were a pain to log. In any case, I have been good about all other things -- haven't had dessert since getting back to Indy, amazingly, and haven't really been tempted.

Funny story: when I got back to my desk at work after being on vacation, I found a box of chocolates on my chair. Apparently they gave them to all the employees. I unwrapped it and looked inside, was tempted, then closed it and stuck it in a corner of my desk where I don't normally look behind a pile of sweaters and papers, since I couldn't bring myself to throw it out.

It has been there for over a week now. To be honest, I forgot about it. That feels like a victory in and of itself! We'll see how long I can let the chocolates sit there unnoticed. I'm suspecting they may tempt me this afternoon since I'm not sure my lunch will be filling enough. OTOH I brought a bunch of new varieties of decaf and herbal tea, so that may be enough.

Jessica if you don't want to eat those chocolates doesn't it make sense to throw them away? I too went through a phase where I "couldn't" throw away any treats I was given or that I bought in a weak moment.

Now they go to someone else or get tossed immediately. I don't do well on these tests of "willpower" and I've made peace with that.

Dagmar

I'd give away those chocolates, too, Jessica --- there must be someone in your immediate vicinity who likes chocolate, right? -- or throw them out. (I come from frugal folk & I still have problems with throwing out something that I perceive to have value, but I am fine with letting it go as long as I know someone else will get some use from it.) As I see it, just conducting my life in the usual way brings many occasions that test my willpower, so I don't need to deliberately set up exercises for myself.

I'm at a stupid weight again this week, but I know it won't be this way in a few more days. It's unquestionably hormonal. Like, no doubt whatsoever.[Some amusing female-oriented TMI stuff follows here ... warning ... Men may wish to avert their gaze briefly.] After some light, barely perceptible bouts of TOM, and one month where nothing much happened, right after the great stress of the flood salvage and removal to my mother's house, this time it came back with a vengeance. Like a lot had accumulated in the meantime and it all had to go, all at once. I understood why Victorian ladies are said to have reclined on their fainting couches and tried not to move very much on those days. I felt like the ultimate vampire bait. My gym-going resulted in near mishaps, fortunately averted each time. I was looking in mirrors, sure I looked paler. I thought I'd need a transfusion at a hospital afterward. I even sought out red meat this week under the archaic notion that would revive me. Thankfully, that has nearly ended. But from my swollen ankles -- I can barely find the ankle bone with my thumb when I press down -- I knew what the scale was going to have to say about the whole thing.

How will I ever know what I REALLY weigh, when the cyclical nature of being a woman means that for many days of each month, I'm on the verge of this, or dealing with it, or in the aftermath of it? More fuel for the notion that I just have to let go of the numbers thing, to some degree, and notice how I feel, and how clothes fit. But I can't use this as an excuse to eat my way back up in weight, either.

Didn't the government make people, at one point in distant history, declare their height AND weight on their driver's licenses?

Dagmar

Jessica, ditto on the chocolates! Around here, there's always the coffee station, so if there's a treat that needs to be "resourced", that's where it goes. The vultures will descend and the issue will be devoured. My dear Grandma finally took the hint at Christmas and did NOT buy a) the European cookie/candy/chocolate tower (one for each myself and DH), or b) the sausage/cheese ensemble, so I had less to contribute this year. Hooray!

saef, I hear ya. Over the past couple of years, good ole TOM has decided to gradually sneak in a day earlier, stay a day longer, and ratchet up the lovely side effects. I'm now averaging a 24 day cycle that lasts 10 days. I've hesitated to bring this up with a professional, because I expect to hear "That's what to expect AT YOUR AGE." :P Well, if that's the case, let's get on with it and get it over with - why must the process drag out for years?

Allison, we are truly two peas in a pod! DH has been talking about a dog, and maybe that would be a good kick in the fanny. I have the opposite issue here, in that it's unpleasantly cold outside and I need to commit to an indoor-type program. I have a wonderful treadmill, and I have the Kinect - but I've had a rotten start so far because any type of impact has made my shoulder unhappy.

On the massage front, I think I've found a good CMT. In an hour, she found all sorts of connective tissue hotspots, and convinced enough of them to let go that I had a fantastic night's sleep. It was all done very slowly and with almost no "pain" - though a lot of burning sensation. Today, I kind of feel like I've been in a combination car accident/hard workout - it's more of a general ache and exhaustion from literally everything on the left side of my torso. I'll definitely be going back, as this feels like it's the right thing to do for this problem. Hope is on the horizon!

Okay, I ate some of the chocolates yesterday. But not all of them. They were really good, and I went for a run afterwards, and my weight's not up today, so no harm done. I thought about putting them in the break room that first day to give away, but I hoarded them instead. I can't bring myself to throw out perfectly good food, but usually I can give it away to others. This time thought it was chocolates from a unique place I had not heard of before and I wanted to eat them eventually . . . just not then.

In any case I weighed in for our corporate "don't gain weight over the holidays" challenge at the same weight I was before the holidays. Which is funny because I am actually up 3lbs, but you know how these things fluctuate over the course of a day. I think before the holidays I had weighed in right after eating lunch or something. Oh well! I am now entered into a raffle to potentially win some free exercise classes.

They do in California, mine has not had a correct weight in years. That is one place I think it is OK to lie.

At the rate at which they make you get a new driver's license here in California, I'm sure no one's weight is correct. Mine was a lie at the time, too. It was taken about 15 years ago, I had weighed about 128 but had gone back up to what I now feel is my "comfortable, but hard to maintain, but still my goal" weight of around 140-145. Yet in my head, I wanted to be lower, so I said my weight was 135--and that stuck with me all the way through my upper weight of 173. It still says that as I haven't had to get a new license. And my hairstyle has certainly changed. They sent me a new copy of it when I moved, but didn't require me to go in for a new photo or anything. I imagine it'll follow me until I'm old and gray! Then the photo really won't look like me!!!

Onto day four of my Nutrisystem diet. I didn't lose anything yesterday, but then it's TOM, so who knows what's real any more. At least I'm doing my exercising! I think the dog appreciates it, too.

Becky~I doubt I'd be willing to walk the dog in frigid temperatures. A few years ago when I was faithfully running with him three mornings a week, we managed to go out when it was dreadfully cold here (that means around 35 with a chilly wind) and it was miserable--even with the proper clothing, hat and mittens. It's that time when the treadmill comes in handy, but I'm just not into getting up early to do that any more. I need to really get my head around that and figure out why.

This morning, after having gone to bed at 9 PM, my alarm went off at the customary 4:55 AM and all I wanted to do was go back to sleep, and I would have if I didn't have to get DS up and ready for school. Oh, yeah, and go to work. DH is taking the day off for his birthday (which was two days ago). He's going golfing with his parents. Wish I could go but I have an appointment with our new 401k people and I can't miss that. Besides, my office assistant has been out all week sick and I don't know if she'll make it in today.

Jessica, I'd fall for the "unknown" chocolate too. One never knows when something extremely special lurks. Probably the only thing that saves me is that my standards for chocolate are awfully high - it has to be deep and dark and pure! I can usually rule out of a lot of stuff by the label ingredients alone. I am spoiled because I have a friend who is a chocolatier and sends his trials out to us, and because we have a place called the Chocolate Garden in SW Michigan that has mastered truffles. Unfortunately, they ship - fortunately, they are outrageously expensive! :P

I was horrified by this when I moved to California! When I got my drivers license here, I weighed 170. I said 150 and left it that way until I realized I was well under. When my dd got her license, I changed my weight to 125. Even though I am now under, it is close enough.

I wonder what CA is trying to accomplish with putting weight on a license??? MI does height and eye color. Height doesn't change, but eye color? Easy to change, these days. Hair color would be equally as silly. Even weight is so dynamic (as we all know) - look how many 3FC'ers have lost 100# in a year. Bureaucrats. Sigh.

FWIW, Indiana makes you put your weight on your license too. Mine says 128, which is also false.