Sheila - questionable mammogram here as well, on my very first one which freaked me out, and I've watched my mom have to go back for follow up on hers as well with no problems. to you, and hope that yours comes back fine, too.

Jessica - good luck with Carter! I've had a dog who would do the same things, it was easiest to just let her out and keep her under wraps than to try to lock her up.

Meg - bouillabaisse... yummy. Enjoy your party!

Pat - how did the exercise go yesterday?

Dagmar - sorry about the hypnosis. That is annoying about the traffic noise. You definitely have to be in the right frame of mind to be susceptible to hypnosis. Life coach might not be a bad idea, though therapy might help too. They do work in different ways. Good luck.

Got up and exercised this morning. Going downtown for our first ever random drug screens at our flagship location. Going to be a busy busy day.

Good day everyone!

Jay, thanks for the correction, I didn't actually know that about life coaches. I was just thinking that since Dagmar said she was being overwhelmed by stress and anxiety it sounded like the sort of thing you would go to a psychologist for rather than a life coach.

Dagmar-- sorry the hypnosis didn't work the way you planned. I know you had high hopes for it. I do think that some people can be easily hypnotized while others cannot be... a lot has to do with degree that you are able to relax and if you are an uptight person (not saying you are!), it may not work for you. I doubt I would be able to be hypnotized though I've never tried it.

Jessica-- we had a dog like Carter. She was a Doberman and the best dog we've ever ever had. We brought her to my in-laws for Christmas and they wanted us to lock her in a (tiny) bathroom while we went to church so their prissy obnoxious dog could have the run of the house. She wasn't used to being confined and when we returned she had clawed through the door. It was completely and totally ruined. I felt bad but I was kinda like-- I told you so.... Another time our dachshund was locked up at their house (see a pattern emerging) and she dug at the carpet at the door. We managed to fix that without the in-laws realizing (I think anyway!)

I have to share my funny hair stories this week. I work at a school and each day we've had a different theme for "red ribbon" week. Why I would trust my faulty memory without checking the schedule-- I'll never know... anyway, Wednesday I thought it was Crazy Hair Day. I have long, black, curly hair and a lot of it. My dd did my hair very crazy with ponytails, braids, buns, clips, you name it. I got to school and was told by our two office managers that it wasn't crazy hair day. I really thought they were joking but in the back of my mind, I was wondering why their hair looked normal. Quickly took everything out of my hair, thereby having a very bad hair day, and didn't participate in the planned day (Mismatched shoes and socks day). Yesterday WAS crazy hair day, so dd repeated my do, complete with straigtening part of it, etc. I got tons of great comments until a 5th grade girl asked me if I painted the white streak in my hair like she did. Guess it is time to see my colorist!!! I can usually hide the grey fairly well but not with all the ponytails, etc. Sigh... out of the mouths of babes....

Today I'm dressed as a cowgirl. I've got ponytails but a cowboy hat on to cover the roots!!!

Hope everyone has a great Halloween!!

Hello Maintainers! I guess it was high time I came back here, after having been absent for something like 6-7 weeks or even more? The truth being that since I've quitted my old job, I don't have nearly as much time to spend on the computer, and of course I automatically cut down on many things. But I sure hope I won't only have the time to come back every 2 months only!

So I hope everybody's doing fine, because I can't possibly catch up on everything I've missed since September... a-hem.

Everyone - Good luck regarding the Halloween candy to manage! I'm somewhat lucky in that I don't like candy, but we're also holding our own party this week-end, and raclette cheese will be a whole other matter to take care of. ^^

Dagmar - Yeah, hypnosis doesn't work the same (or at all) on everyone. I hope you'll find something that works for you.

Sheila - Crossing my fingers for you!

School holidays for me at the moment, and they're almost more stressing than school days themselves. There are so many people I want to see and so many things I want to do, I'm starting to think having no social life wasn't always so bad after all.

Teaching isn't easy, but preparing classes is interesting, and I still get up thinking "gee, I love this job", in spite of all my problems, so I guess it's a good thing. Also I dressed up as a witch to teach a class about Halloween and they loved it (when I say I've got the same mental age as my pupils... ). Seriously, a job where I can do that and have it considered in a positive light by my colleagues? Fun!

And then I took opportunity on the holidays to finally get the tattoo I had planned on having were I to pass my competitive exam. Now it's finally done, and I love it. Yay for life and all that. (No, I'm not hyper... er, well, maybe a little?)

Do share about your tattoo Kery!! What did you get and where?!?!

I got my first one this year as well to commemorate the positive changes I've made in my life. I love it (and still have managed to hide it from disapproving relatives!)

I have a MAJOR case of the munchies today. I really feel hungry. It's almost lunch time and I'm watching the clock. Since breakfast, I've eaten a ton of raw baby carrots, some dried apple chips, and a bag full of 100 calorie popcorn. And had two cups of hot tea and some water. That is all since breakfast... Sigh....... I was super hungry last night too but I attributed it to spin class Wed. night. I didn't work out last night but I worked both jobs so I was working from 7 am- 8 pm so maybe that is also part of it.... I will not eat all of the Halloween cupcakes, candy, breads, and cakes that are floating around school today!!!

Michele - It's a mix between a dragon and an Ouroboros, on my left upper arm. The Ouroboros is meant to symbolize the end of a cycle and the beginning of a new one (me leaving a plateauing career to totally change my life and embrace another job...plus it all happened in my 30th year, which is another ending and beginning, after all). The dragon part is meant to give it a more 'aggressive' aspect—not in a negative way, but to reflect my committment and willpower to fight and not let life drag me down.

This is the picture I've taken some 7-8 hours after the tattoo was done, once the ink and lymph were cleaned. It'll probably be less dark in a couple of weeks; I just wanted to take a pic before I start getting scabs.

Hi all,

Another day of field work for me, and it was a very pretty day to be outside so I was happy. Tonight BF and I are going to celebrate the life of his good friend who passed away 1 year ago. He made it to 82 years old, but BF had a very close relationship w/ him and has talked about him not only all year, but bringing him up all month quite a bit. I just spoke w/ BF and he says he's doing ok, and genuinely seems like he is indeed doing ok. Anyway, his friend loved happy hour with friends so many of his friends are going to happy hour together. I will have a drink to toast him!

Yesterday the facial hair BF is growing out for his Magnum PI costume got to him, so he shaved the beard. I think he looks so funny with a mustache! I'll post pictures of our costumes next week!

Kery, I love the tattoo! It looks great, and what appropriate symbolism as well! I'm so glad to hear that you're enjoying your new job so much. You worked so hard for it.

Michele, would eating something with some healthy fats (nuts, nut butter, hb egg, string cheese?) help kill the munchies? Sometimes when I'm munchy I'll realize I haven't had enough fat, and I find it really satiating.

Michele, I'm laughing so hard at your accidental wacky hair day.

Jessica, enjoy your dinner party and I hope Carter does ok with the kids. It's probably good for him to be introduced to a few kids, and I forget how old the kids are - with young ones it might be good to have you and their parents show them how to pet the dog "gently" to make sure they know not to pull hair etc.

Dagmar, I'm sorry the hypnotherapy was such a disappointment. I think finding a life coach or therapist can be like finding a doctor. You might need to try a few to find one who suits you.

Sheila, the odds are in your favor that this isn't serious. When is your follow-up testing? I'll be thinking of you.

Meg, I hope you have a nice dinner party and the bouillabaisse comes out well.

Hi Amanda, Shannon, Jay, Gary, Iris, Forestroad, Pat, Midwife, bargoo, Allison, Gina, Ward, and everyone else lurking out there. Have a SPOOKTACULAR Halloween everyone!

Morning - or well, it's nearly noon here. I went this morning to have the stitches out from my mole removal. They had no definitive answer for me. The pathologist felt is was not cancerous, but had some other things he didn't like, so they've sent it out to Univ of Washington for a second opinion, so I won't know til next week at least. But in any case, it's gone from my body - and now with the stitches out it doesn't itch anymore either.

After that I had a meeting with the pastor of my church at her house to go over some planning stuff (I'm the VP of the Church COuncil (until Feb) and the president is away since his MIL died last week.

Work is very quiet - yay! My usual Friday lunch buddies are both otherwise occupied today, so I'm on my own. I'll be doing some errands so I don't have to do so much tomorrow.

Shannon - the exercise didn't happen last night as I ended up working late helping someone and then had a headache so I went home and rested (DH was out at a class). I need to do a good long session at the gym tomorrow morning, and my plan is to get up, eat a banana and go so it's done and not jammed in at the end of the day.

We have a Halloween party at our square dance club tonight. I'm bringing store bought cookies and hopefully they'll all be gone! I've borrowed a sweatshirt from a friend that's black and says "This is my costume." Sooo not into finding a costume this year. DH is going as a piano mover - complete with muscles made of doll stuffing material!

Kery - love your tattoo!

Michele, that is hilarious about the hair! My mom stopped dyeing her hair a couple years ago (she's about to turn 62) -- she and I were actually both surprised that it wasn't as gray as we thought it would be! The grayest parts are right at her hairline and roots, which is where they always showed with the dye, so we thought she'd be 100% gray without it. Turns out she's still salt-and-pepper.

Megan, have fun at the happy hour! The kids are I think 3 and 5 years old, but they do have dogs at home so they should be okay. I'm mostly concerned Carter will either be afraid of them and snap/bark, or get too excited about playing and accidentally knock them down or scratch them with his paws (though luckily we finally have his nails under control). When he wants to play he tends to put his paw on you, and he's big enough that a well-placed paw could knock over a 3-year-old.

I'm grumpy because our lunch meeting at work had the unhealthiest food ever (I already complained in the Operation Take 5 thread) so I didn't eat much, but now I'm hungry and the only thing available in the break room is chocolate cake, which I certainly don't have room for in my calorie budget after that high-cal lunch.

Kery, welcome back!

Pat, I wasn't really into finding a good costume this year either. I just picked up a generic witch costume at the store.

Keri~my DD wants an Ouroboros. I think she'd like yours.

Speaking of my DD, she was home last week and we all went to the golf cart parade. Her old high school band was marching in it, so she stopped off before hand to talk with her old friends and she found out that IF she had her teaching credentials she could get a job at the high school today. That made her decide to drop computer science as a dual major, so now she's music education major only and it should shave 2 years off her education. She even went so far as to withdraw from the CS class she's been in all semester (with only 6 weeks to go). I can't blame her, she really hates it--she found out that CS is not her forte as she struggled with it constantly.

Pat~I had a mole removed about 14 years ago and because I scar easily, the cut and the stitches came out to look just like a spider! It's faded a bit over the years, but you can still see where each stitch was put in. One more reason not to wear a bikini! lol hope the results are favorable.

Allison, this one is where no one but me, DH and the doc will ever see the scar no matter what I'm wearing! The scar is quite obvious right now, but I'm sure it'll fade out a lot. I still had nasty red places from the band-aids they put over it last Thurs! My skin hates any kind of adhesive, including the so-called non-allergenic stuff.

I'm off to lunch - both my GFs that I usually eat out with are not available today. I'm thinking I'll get some soup from the sandwich shop. They usually have Hungarian Mushroom on Fridays. Then I'll do some errands. It's cold and very windy out.....

Driveby post. Shoulder is still aflame (will be for at least another 24 hours) but the world doesn't stop, so I had to get some yard stuff done. Which didn't help, but you know, was unavoidable (let's just say that this morning, as I worked out on my elliptical, I saw three kittens scampering across my yard...only to be completely submerged and hidden by my out of control grass). I sort of did a hack job, but at least it's better.

More work, possibly to library, going to get prescription...crazy day!

Amanda, I hope your shoulder feels better!

I had a mole removed from the top of my head! The worst part was that they had to shave a little spot, so for the next while I had this one patch of short hair sticking straight up in the middle of my head. There's still a little divot in my scalp where they took the mole out.

I had one on my cheek shaved down when I was a teenager (I have some genetic propensity to have a million moles all over my body, luckily they are not cancerous). I'm considering going in to have one on my neck shaved down because it kind of bugs me, but to be honest I'm not sure having it shaved down is worth having the local anisthetic injected in my neck!

Jessica,
I only started dying my hair about two years ago (I am 42) because my MIL kept asking me when I was going to dye it (RUDE). I think mine will stay more or less salt and pepper even when I'm older because I have my dad's hair and he was salt and pepper until the end. It is such a nuisance and an expense to dye it that I may stop at some point-- but I don't want to be thought of as older than I am-- vain I know.... I had my kids when I was quite young so most of my girls' parents are in their 50s. Now that I've worked so hard to get into shape, I don't want anyone thinking I'm 50 (someone actually asked me if I was 50 when I turned 40 and said it was a big one-- that one hurt).

Love the tattoo Kery! So original! Is it your first one?

Megan-- I think protein/fat would have helped but I didn't have any with me at work. I ate my lunch (which was low fat but at least some fat) and it helped a bit but I'm getting hungry again. I'll go home and make something soon..... It is possible that I'm not eating enough fat routinely. Is there a general rule as to how much we should be eating?

Michele - don't I remember from WW that there is a "desired" amount of healthy fats? I remember resenting the points they cost. I did find that whenever I cut them too low I stopped losing. I find that having protein with every meal/snack really helps me stay satisified, along with having enough fat each day.