Morning Glories,

I sit in my office on a glorious day that could be spent planting the rest of the bulbs on my porch or sitting and reading a nice mystery with a cup of coffee, but alas, there is data to check on...

I am hoping everyone had a nice Christmas and a few days off. I know I did, even with the dinners we hosted on Christmas and Boxing Day, I still enjoyed hanging out at home and peace and quiet.

I did very poorly on the eating front. I can't believe what I put into my mouth. It was not bad stuff, per se. It was the quantity. Oh well, back to the drawing board.

Susan, I am glad to hear you are in NB and not in Thailand. The devestation from the EQ and tsunamis is horrific. My heart bleeds for everyone involved. I worked on a tsunami mapping and hazards project last year, but we have really good warning systems in place here on the the west coast. The third world just doesn't have that kind of infrastructure in place. Yikes.

Well, not to end on a bummer. I am hoping that Lisa is enjoying her family, Susan too and that Melissa and Pam are also enjoying time at home...

lala

Good evening!!! It's strange being at home. I had a quiet Christmas and like you, Lala, my eating has been off the charts. Today I marked as "Back to Basics Day" and have to admit I started off rather well and then after dinner I had a little setback with some cookies. I've got to stop walking by the dining room table where the cookies are sitting out. One good thing is that the ones that are left are not my favorites so I won't be tempted

I'm off again tomorrow and am planning to do a little bit of running around as well as some "de-cluttering"...time to get rid of stuff that I've been hanging onto.

DH spoiled me again this year I can't complain at all. I did head up to the mall the day after and surprisingly it wasn't busy at all. Had to take back a couple of things and exchange a couple of things for DS #1 (I keep trying to keep him younger than he is and bought him a size smaller than he needs; the best part is that I did have his size marked down and still bought the smaller one!). He'll be moving out of the 'teens next Monday *sigh* where does the time go???

Hope everyone had a happy holiday! It's a chilly 18 here this evening. The temps have been pretty cold but at least the snow is holding off. By the end of the week we could see 50!

Hi Melissa --

Taking a mental health day today, I have a little bit of that left, mental health that is...

Its cold here, but not that cold. I'm going to spend part of the day putting things back in the basement and decluttering too. I'm decluttering my house of food too. Everything is going to work that isn't DP's fine french chocolate.

I'm going to weigh in now. I' think I'm about 11111111111111 lbs more than before. Wish me luck.

More later,

lala

Lala: Good luck with your WI...I hope it's not as bad as you think!

Hi to Pam, Susan, Lisa! Hope you're all enjoying the break!

Hi Ladies,

Another bitter cold day in New England although it is suppose to get up to 40 tomorrow...yeah!!! We had a very nice Christmas, a little crazy at times but still very nice. On Xmas eve at 5 pm I had the oven on and I heard a loud pop. The glass on the inside of the oven door shattered. Luckily my Dad use to be an appliance repair man so I called him over to take a look. He removed the broken glass and told me that I could still use the oven but not the self cleaner until the glass was repaired. I still had 2 layers of glass remaining on the door and the one that broke was apparently a heat protective glass for when you use the cleaner. Anyway, I was a little nervous while cooking the turkey on Christmas day but everything went OK.
Sounds like Lala and Melissa both had nice Christmas'. My eating was OK but I've also got to get rid of all the sweets around the house. Too many Godiva chocolates around to tempt me. I'm back to work today but not really in the mood to get much done.

Lala good luck with the weigh in..I'm dreading mine on Friday. Enjoy your mental health day!!

Melissa it is very traumatic for Moms when the children go from teens to 20 somethings. My son turned 21 in October and I still can't believe it. Time goes by so quickly. It's nice to have them home during the semester break.

Well ladies I should try and be somewhat productive here. If I get I chance I may be back later. Have a good day.

Hiya all...

Here I am at work, trying to get some inspiration. Found a class for next quarter -- Seminar in American Architecture with an emphasis on Paris? Huh? Hey, at least I know the prof and can probably get in. I should be working, I'm just a bit frazzled and bummed...

Our heating work hasn't started yet. I am a bit prissed. They called at 9 am to say the project manager was sick. They couldn't have called earlier? I could have gone to work earlier and left earlier. Oh well, considering the whole of South East Asia is in shambles, I guess I should count my blessings.

I did weigh in yesterday and stay for the orientation afterwards. I was up about 3 lbs, which would explain my tight jeans. I am now 19 lbs from the top of my goal range and what I would consider my lifetime fighting weight. I have chunked this into 5 lbs chunks and honestly, my first goal is to get back into my caslon boot cut jeans that are very uncomfortable in the middle. I will consider that a victory.

I need to find a good meeting time. I think the Tuesday meeting will work for me, the regular guy wasn't there, but his sub was excellent. I need you guys to keep me accountable.

I have a huge chunk of fudge in my drawer, I think I'll take it down to the mail boxes...

Let's hope tomorrow is better than today.

Pam -- yikes on your oven. I would call and get the glass replaced. I would be doing roasts in a bag for a while. I can understand the godiva problem. I am asking DP to take the 300 kilos of fine french chocs she bought in Paris to my parents condo. I am sick of looking at it. Hmm. Maybe I'll take a picture so you can all see what I am complaining about.

Anyone doing anything fun for new years?

lala

Hi everyone. Checking in again from home; I'm spending a lot of time in front of the TV staring in disbelief at the devastation in what was once paradise. We are spending New Year's Eve with the friends that we're supposed to be travelling with; I guess some tough decisions will be made then. The important thing is that her brother is okay.

We had a hurried but lovely visit with both DH's family and mine. A huge storm hit Moncton (where his parents live) on the 27th, so we left the evening before and managed to escape the brunt of it. They had no snow when we left and loads of it when we drove through yesterday on the way home. The storm also hit Halifax, so there was plenty of white stuff to clear away before we were even able to get into our home last nite.

Both families are well; we are so thankful for all of our blessings.

Later,
Susan

Hi Ladies,

This is my last day in the office for 2004 and it is so quiet, I think half the people are out on vacation this week. So ladies, any of you thought about New Years resolutions?? I think mine will be to eat healthy (of course) and maintain a good (reasonably good) weight, find a form of exercise that I really enjoy and stick with it, and lastly try and get a better handle on finances and try to save a little more $$ next year. a few stressful things to get through during the first 2 months of 2005, but I think by spring things will be better.

Susan when I heard the news of the tsunami I thought of you. What a tragedy. My heart aches for all the people affected. On a happier note I'm glad you had a nice holiday with your family. We still have not seen too much snow where I live and the weather is suppose to be fairly warm this week in the 40's.

Lala I hear you on finding a good weight watcher meeting to attend. We are scheduled to start another weight watcher at work session next month and I will be attending it. Can't get much more convenient than that! Sorry to hear about your heating contractor problems the other day...have they started yet??

Not too much planned for New Years Eve. I think we will be ordering Chinese food and watching movies. On Sunday I will begin taking down some of the Christmas decorations..hard to believe the holidays are over. I hope you all have a wonderful New Year.

Good afternoon ladies!

Like, Pam, a lot of people are off here and it's really quiet. I do have a student in the office who came back from break early so it's nice to have someone here. I am getting a lot done and I'm pretty much caught up so it's going to make for a looonnnggg afternoon!

No major resolutions for the New Year--eat healthy, walk more, budget $$ better are my 3 biggies and they're all achievable.

Lala: Hope you have your heating issue resolved. Good for you for getting to a meeting and hope you find one that works with your schedule. It's hard to find a good leader/meeting group. I've been lucky that my meeting hasn't changed. This past week the group was sparse but that happens this time of year.

Susan: I still can't believe the devastation of the storm--I feel so bad for those that witnessed it and those who have loved ones missing. We've been lucky with the snow, although we still have the ice ruts to deal with. I'm hoping with the warmer temps the next few days that they'll disappear!

Pam: It's hard to believe the holidays are over...we'll keep our tree up until after January 6th.

I went to my meeting yesterday and was up 1.4# which is okay considering I haven't been walking and my eating was not OP. Next week will be better.

No major plans for New Year's Eve. DH has to work tomorrow and it's hard to tell if he'll be working over or not as it depends on how many orders they have and if any restaurants call in orders (he's a meatcutter for a food service) at the last minute. I'm thinking about renting a couple of movies and getting some snacks that are point-friendly. New Years' day we'll have the traditional pork & sauerkraut dinner and that won't be bad. Monday is DS #1's b-day and that will be the end of celebrations, etc.

Have a Happy, Healthy & Safe New Year's!!!

Susan --- I think you have a very hard decision to make if you still have a place to go. I think they need tourists to bring in cash, but I think that the touristy areas are going to be very hard to be in if they still exist. I am glad your friends family is safe.

Pam -- I hope I find a good meeting. I like the leader, but he can be not very enthusiastic. I need a change.

Well, the contractors showed up this am, they are drilling away, finding places for piping, figuring out where the radiators will be placed. We scrapped one because we thought it was overkill. I hope we were right. They predict they will be done in two days at about 9500 a day, that is pretty good work if you can get it. I will post a picture of my new radiators. We will all be excited.

The dog is with me today, he had a down quilt in the car. He was not amused at being left in the parking lot, he is currently baying.

Resolutions:

Easy: I resolve not to start smoking, gas huffing, taking meth, heroin, crack cocaine, pot, cocaine and various and sundry painkillers that seem to be popular today.

Easy: I resolve not to fly as much as last year.

harder: I resolve not to let other peoples lives and issues affect me to the point that I take them on as my own.

Harder: I resolve to think before buying

Harder: I resolve to spend less time critizing myself

Okay, that is pretty good huh?

lala

Hmm, I am about to buy a ticket to go to London over president's day weekend. That way I am spending 600 bucks without hotels and flying another 12K.

Hmm, better buy that ticket before tomorrow huh?

lala