Hu-hah! I made it through another day. It was tough but I made enough modifications that I made it through, calorie wise that is. The exercise was on-track too. I seem to be better at that part. The scale is still stupid but the ketone test strips are cheering me along.

I'm feeling good about the holidays. I've got my major stuff at work done. I still have tons of stuff to do. I am still shopping for a couple of more gifts and I even have Christmas cards left to send. They'll never get there before Christmas but I will send them along anyway. Nothing is wrapped so I will be busy up through and past Christmas. My niece is coming to stay with us for a few days so I need to get the guest room prepared. Unfortunately, my teenager has been using as a dumping ground so there is quite a mess in there.

My friends are having their Christmas Eve holiday party this year. They didn't hold it last year due to Covid. I am looking forward to it.

Ticker weight: -30

On-track yet another day but I need to acknowledge that my plan is flawed. The scale is barely moving and that feedback indicates my plan isn't quite enough. I am going to stick with it through the holidays though because it is the best I've done in years.

I have a house guest coming the day after Christmas and I am very excited to have them come visit. I does throw my exercise plan off kilter. I am making plans to accommodate all of it.

Today was my last day of work before the holidays and I am off until January 4. I worked a long day trying to get everything done. Then I went ice skating. Tonight, I am still writing out Christmas cards. I will also wrap some presents. Tomorrow we'll need to get the stockings hung. I also need to get a couple of more presents. I'm having trouble figuring out what to buy for a couple of people. So that's my holiday rush.

Ticker weight: -30

Had a great Christmas Eve at a friend's house. I haven't seen most of these people for more than few minutes in two years. It was really nice to catch up. I had a tough time calculating calories so I just did my best.

Today was the day. It was the first day since the first lock down that I have been home and healthy but didn't do my three walks. I did go skating this morning. I'll see how badly this impacts me. Exercise will be totally off track for the next few days between the holiday and the house guest.

My last minute shopping trip went really well and I found great gifts for the last couple of people on my shopping list. One was a birthday gift and the person was really happy with it. I am still awake and wrapping gifts. I've also prepared a bake item and set the time for it to cook automatically. It is a type of cinnamon bread so the whole kitchen smells amazing. I usually prep an egg bake tonight that is also for breakfast but I will have to finish it tomorrow. One I am pretty tired and two the frozen hash browns I am using are frozen in a solid block. I can use them frozen but they still need to be loose not a solid block.

Merry Christmas everyone!

Ticker weight: -30

We had a lovely Christmas here. I hope everyone else did too!

On track even with all of the temptations. I spent most of the day getting ready for our house guest who will arrive tomorrow. My house is really disorganized right now. There is a too of stuff I can get rid of but the parts are spread all over. The things are worthless as each but have value as a set. I'd like to get things together so someone else can use them.

Ticker weight: -30

Another "whatever" official weigh-in. I literally did the best I've done in years last week and there was no change on the scale. Surely this isn't because I missed one round of walks.

I got everything done that I needed to for my house guest. Although, now we've decided to go skiing and will stay up in the mountains. So all that work and they are only here for one night. Hopefully, I'll be able to keep the momentum and get rid off much of my clutter.

Ticker weight: still -30

A great NSV. My ski pants fit comfortably, on an empty stomach at least. Also, I can get my ski boots on and off while standing.

Pipsicle!!

The scale is not always the best indicator of success!

Thanks Carol!

The scale will be up 2 pounds tomorrow. In general it goes up one pound per night away from home even though my eating is usually better. I am hopeful I am wrong.

I am 915 calories below my target calorie limit for the week. Plus in theory, I have an extra 1280 exercise calories in the bank. If the theory worked perfectly (as we know it doesn't), it would almost an extra half pound loss for the week.

Ticker weight -30

This morning I went ice skating. All was good when I went into the rink. When I was getting my skates off to leave, it really smelled like a bon fire. One guy even commented on it. Someone else told him that it was coming from outside. He said that he felt pretty safe in an ice rink during a fire. I hope he’s right but the reality is my beloved skating rink has been destroyed. All of the other businesses in the area have been confirmed as losses.

When I left the ice rink I could see smoke in the distance. I thought it was being controlled because it had turned from thick dark smoke to thinner white smoke. How wrong I was! By the time I had finished my next errand, less than twenty minutes later, there was dark smoke as thick as fog! Things have only gotten worse. Hundreds of home have been destroyed. Tens of thousands of people are under mandatory evacuation orders.

The fires are less than five miles from my house and the border of the mandatory evacuation area is a mile and half away. We are close enough we can hear muffled explosions from cars and transformers exploding. The high winds have stopped so it seems likely we will not have to evacuate. It is too awful for words! All of those poor families!!

Still digesting the enormity of yesterday's events. I was caught in the evacuation traffic but didn't realize what it was at the time when I was coming home. It is a miracle that there hasn't been any loss of life reported or any missing persons. For my errand yesterday, my alternate option was to go to the store that caught fire. If I had, I would have been one of the people running out into a burning parking lot. So scary! My daughter knows of four people that lost their homes.

A bit of good news, turns out the ice rink building is still intact and the reports of it being destroyed were incorrect. The area is still closed off.

Although it seems so trivial right now, my weight was down a bit this morning. It is looking like I will be able to post a loss for the month and the year.

For the month of December, I lost 3.5 pounds. For the year, I have lost 4 pounds. These were hard won losses and I have very proud of them. January to March of 2021, I gained 5.5 pounds. April to December of 2021, I lost 9.5 pounds. I am really hoping I don't gain this quarter like I did last year. Typically, this is the toughest time of year for me with regards to weight loss.

I have my notebook that I track my weight loss in all set up for 2022. Hopefully, this will be the year as I don't have enough pages left for another year in my notebook. If I don't lose it this year, I'll have to get another notebook.

I am surprised at my December success and am really curious to see what the "official" weigh-in brings tomorrow.

Ticker weight -30

It is a ticker changing day. I have confirmed another half pound loss and will change my sidebar to -30.5 from -30. While I am happy about this, it does feel like too little to late. It took nearly a month to confirm this half pound. In addition, my weight is up 1.5 pounds from yesterday. I'm not really sure why Sunday weigh-ins are so bad. I don't do much different on Saturdays aside from get a little more exercise.

I am off of work until Tuesday. Work is not going very well for me right now. I am overloaded with responsibilities and have little management support. As such, I am not looking forward to going back. The best answer is to find a new job but I am worried I will find a worse situation. Also, it takes me a while to land a new position.

New ticker weight -30.5
Previous ticker weight -30
__________________________________________________ ________________
EDIT:

3.5 hours until calorie reset. It will be tough as I am very hungry even after eating lunch!
2.5 hours until calorie reset. Super hungry but have managed to hold strong.
Whew! I have made it more or less. I've started nibbling a few minutes early.

Today I was over my limit by 60 calories but still have 190 calorie deficit. Hoping this overage will be non-impactful. Between now and the end of March is my challenging period. Last year I gained six pounds during this time and I barely got them off during the year. I would prefer not to repeat that this year.

It will be tough. I am over today and tomorrow is already at risk. I ate too much this evening and my appetite is still going. If I didn't feel hungry, I wouldn't be thinking about food let alone eating.

Ticker weight -30.5
__________________________________________________ _______________________
EDIT:

Jan. 4- Six hours until calorie reset. I have 150 calories left. It is going to be very hard to stay within that limit. Another bummer, I have a teleconference scheduled for the only time available for skating today. I will try to go tomorrow to make up for it but it is also a rec center day. Double exercise sessions in one day are hard. I do it on Saturdays but I have Sundays to recover.

Turns out my teleconference was canceled so I was able to go ice skating after all. I was very happy with that development. In the end, I was 70 calories over my limit. It is still a 180 calorie deficit for the day though. I've been over the last two days and I will be over by at least 45 calories tomorrow. I know I should adjust my planned meals but I need to keep me, myself and I balanced. Myself is really looking forward to the lunch planned for tomorrow. Maybe I can cut out a few calories at breakfast. Not a great trend though.

Ticker weight -30.5

Well, I broke even calorie wise today. Technically, it was a 20 calorie deficit but that is not enough to make any sort of dent on my weight. I am not starting off the new year very well. I will also be challenged tomorrow because I ate quite a lot this evening. Hopefully, tomorrow will work out and I will follow my plan.

The weather today for my first two walks was fine. However shortly before my final walk, it started snowing. Not just snowing, it was horizontal snowing because of the wind. It was dramatic. One minute there was no precipitation and the next minute it was sideways snow.

Ticker weight -30.5