The Debate Exercising Game

Normally I don't like to bring politics up on this blog, but they are a pretty big part of my life. I care a lot about the policy decisions being made in Washington, and I an very excited to vote this November. In that spirit, I have come up with the following.

The first Presidential debate is tonight (9 eastern, on every news channel and streaming on the internet). Unfortunately it coincides with what would normally be my dance class time. So, because I would like to watch the debate live, I can't go to dance. Bummer! It's alright though, I have a solution.I make it a game.

Imagine a drinking game and a TV show. Every time some specific meme or theme is mentioned in the show, you drink. This will be exactly like that, but with exercises. Here's the breakdown:

[This debate is limited to Domestic Policy, so all keywords etc are domestic policy related]

*Starred items indicate time override. If one of these things happens, whatever other exercise has to be stopped and replaced with this. Any additional exercises incurred during the starred exercise are ignored.

Key words - 10 jumping jacks per mention

• Workers
• Average american household/ family
• Healthcare
• Jobs (5 per, since it will come up a lot)
• Taxes
• Military (veterans included)
• "Government spending spree" 
• Massachusetts
• seniors
• young people
• small businesses
• entrepreneurs
• private sector
• millionaire
• billionaire
• Reagan

*Big Concepts - 25 lunges per invocation

• The American Dream
• Obamacare
• Romneycare
• Medicare
• 47 percent
• Math
• Education

*Unexpected, but possible, Big things - jog in place during their discussion, the whole time

• Women's issues (covers abortion, contraceptives, PP etc.)
• Marriage equality
• Citizens United
• The 99% (or the 1%)
• Climate change
• Immigration
• Net neutrality

Romney gaffe - 25 high knees
Obama gaffe - 60 count plank

Romney "zinger" - 60 count plank
Obama "zinger" - 25 high knees

Obama interrupts Romney - Run in a circle left
Romney interrupts Obama - Run in a circle right

*Enthusiastic cheers or boos from the audience - reaches for the duration

Statistics/ Numbers -
in the millions- 5 crunches
in the billions- 10 crunches
percentage - 10 lunges

5 Push ups if:
Either candidate addresses his opponent in the 3rd person
Compliments opponents personal life or family
ignores a question by addressing the audience
argues with the moderator

Obama says:
Let me be clear - 10 reaches
References Bain - 5 lunges
Blames Bush - 10 jumping jacks

Romney says:
Plan to create 12 million jobs - 12 crunches

*Anyone goes over time - plank from when their time ends until they actually stop


I have no idea how I'm going to log this, but I'm pretty stoked to try it out!

Checking In

On time. Like a boss.

Anyway here's the rundown from this week:

The goals were:
Dance class Monday and Wednesday

Exercise:
Totally did it! I love dance class. I mean, it makes me super duper tired, but other than that I haven't found that it does horrible things to my evening schedule. So yay! The extra walking to and from dance is cool too.

The only concern I have is still walking through the Mission by myself. It's actually kind of funny because the area I feel the least comfortable is the part of my walk where there are the most people, just outside 16th St Station in those plaza areas. Headphones do seem to work as a deterrent, for the most part. And I always keep my phone tucked away when I'm walking, even if I don't like the song Pandora gave me. When it's still light out, sunglasses. But still dude, can be scary. No incidents as of yet, though.

Food:
Normally, if I had eaten the way I have for most of this week, I would be super duper upset at myself for eating too much of the wrong things.
But the 700 calories burned in the combined dance classes make me feel way better. Mostly I think it's because I know that when I was skinny in high school, not including the times when I was not really eating, I ate basically the way that I eat normally now, complete with the back and forth between frozen lunches and purchased lunches, large amount of pasta mixed in with a random smattering of home cooked dinners (thanks mom), the occasional tiny tiny breakfast, and the vending machine type snacking. It really works out about the same. You could even substitute alcohol for sweets and it would round out.
So basically, as long as I'm dancing, I don't think I will be feeling so bad about food.

Motivation: 
I'm pretty psyched, and feeling a bit better. Partly because I weighed myself earlier this week, after my usual 14-hours no food super-sleep, and I have lost a pound! Woo!

Anyway, rundown for next week:

What- DANCE CLASS
When- Monday, 5:45; Wednesday, 5:45; FRIDAY, 6:15

Adding the Friday. I was thinking of adding it just for kicks this week in addition to the others, but I decided that I was too tired generally speaking and I have some social plans for this evening so it would be better for me to go home and take a nap instead. Plus, I think it will be better for my body to ease in on the frequency/ amount. I've already done nearly 3 hours of extra exercise this week (with the walking to and from), which is really way more than my usual. So, in the mind of not killing myself, I will start the 3 days a week next week and do that up until my next meeting with Tim, and probably not change it for a while after depending on what he says.

In other news, almost have tickets for Hawaii. Was going to buy them yesterday, but the situation keeps changing so I have to wait until it settles a bit. Luckily, price would have to go up by at least  $100 a direction for me to have a problem affording it, and I can always push it out to the cheap tickets. So, time isn't a big issue.

Oh and since I succeeded, I get $10. I think this puts me at $20? Counting leftover from when I went and bought things in August? Anyway, dunno what I'll spend it on yet. Something cool.

Dance class!

I know it's Monday and Monday's are no longer regular update days but...

I just finished my first dance class since High school, and oh my gosh. Sure I could only follow half of it, and the other half I was sort of just flailing, but boy was it fun. Plus, flailing is what you do when dancing... Until you finally learn it and you look fricking awesome.
I seriously didn't realize how much I missed it.

My excitement aside, the class itself was 45 minutes of fast paced jumping around choreography learned on the fly. They have big set of songs and the choreography is repetitive but intricate and really cool (not so much of the exercise type moves and more dance, with spins and travel). I'm guessing that each class uses whichever songs out of the 30 years of repertoire they want for any class. There's a huge variety. There were 70s songs mixed in with dub step, hip hop (gasolina for example) and samba. The choreography reminds me a lot of the kind of stuff that we came up with in Dance Team in high school, that is a mishmash of jazz, hip hop and modern with salsa thrown in for kicks. It's a lot of fun, even when you have no clue what's going on.

So, we did crazy cardio for 45 minutes with a couple short breaks inbetween songs, and then the last 15 minutes were floor work. First we did some arm isolation dancing exercises. They wre easy, but my arms still hurt. Then we did some pretty hardcore abs that the instructor called the hardest abs ever, I managed it ok with some mods, so I imagine I'll survive anything else. Then we did some legs, which was really more butt, but I am totally ok with that.

It rocked. I'm going again. I'm going to take hip hop too. This is the plan.

Alright, lets try this again

I failed the plan this week. To be honest after a certain point I expected myself to. I suppose that's a good part of why I did. But never fear I have a solution. But first, lets go through the usual sections

Exercise

So, I kind of balls'd it up this week. The plan was to dance at home last Friday, Sunday and Monday and possibly sometime later in the week. I managed it on Friday, and did a tiny bit (not the full half hour by any means) on Monday. Pretty much total failure. 

Most of the problem was that Youtube did not provide quite the way I wanted it to. The easy videos I could follow along with tended towards too much repetition, super simplicity (as in not very interesting moves) and they were too short (usually one song long). Any other video of the same sort was just some random person being like "I choreographed this, here's the moves and count. Learn it from my full speed dancing." And me responding "uh.... that's a lot more work than I want to put in" and moving on. 

I also grouped it all together at the beginning of the week, because I was unsure about my tiredness for the rest. And honestly, I was super tired for the rest. 4 day weeks suck. They are only good when they end. I've gotten a good amount of rest this weekend and I think I've rebalanced since my severe offset last weekend (3-day weekends and sleep are not friends). So hopefully this week won't be so bad. I also can't shake the feeling that I'm so tired because of my lack of exercise. But I think I have found a solution (more on this later).

Food

Oh god, I don't even want to talk about it. I mean I guess I haven't been awful everyday, but I've been tracking less because I'm guilty about what I've eaten and I don't want to see the number on the calorie counter, because I know that it will just make me feel bad. 

Part of the problem is that I have been buying my lunches this week, and that causes a huge huge calorie boost, because purchased lunches are usually at least 200 calories more than any lunch I could bring in. Luckily I have been able to balance that with light dinners for the most part, but certainly not always. Several times this week I've had dinner when I wasn't hungry, or eaten enough to nearly make myself sick (though this happens with basically any full, restaurant sized meal now, it's definitely more mental than physical at any rate). So I have to work on that. I also need to go grocery shopping... I keep saying maybe tomorrow. Maybe I mean it this time? Who knows. We'll see. 

Motivation

I'd say I am still pretty motivated. The trouble is finding the particular methods of succeeding, and finding things that motivate me beyond my desperate desire to get the weight off. Honestly this particular motivation is not sustainable and is easily worked around when faced with some taunting food or another, or when tiredness confines me to the couch or bed. I am motivated in that I want to do stuff, but not so motivated that I have true reason to do it. I'm hoping that my solution for the exercise problem will also help with this.

So what is this solution I have been mentioning? Dance class. I have decided that enough is enough and I can make the investment and go ahead and pay for dance classes. I found a place in the Mission       that's pretty easy for me to get to from work (short BART ride plus 4 block walk) and has classes basically all the time, so they're convenient for me to get to from work. Tomorrow I am going to one of their Rhythm and Motion classes, which is basically a dance workout class but I talked to the receptionist and read about it online and it's a mix of semi-complicated choreography and a bunch of different songs so there's variety. She said that I should take the class about 5 times and then decide if it's for me, because it might take that long to pick up on the choreography and adjust to it. So, I'm going to do that. If it turns out that that's not what I want, there are all sorts of other classes I could try that are at my level and conveniently timed. So, I think that this will work out great. My only concern is walking through the Mission in the evening by myself, but it is on two main streets and in a little bit of a nicer area (I think) so it should be okay. 

So yeah, here's the plan for this week:

what- dancing

when- Monday, 5:45pm-6:45 pm and Wed, 5:45pm-6:45pm (Both nights the same class, with the same instructor)

If anyone in the bay would like to join me (and srsly, please do), the place I am going is ODC Dance Commons, near 16th St BART in SF. The first class is free and after that they are pretty cheap (max $14/ class I think), plus apparently they have showers, lockers and the whole shebang. I'm pretty excited. So excited I bought new dance pants (mostly because all of my old ones are either too short or fall down). So yay! Dance class time for me.

Counseling: Why didn't I do this sooner?

As everyone who's ever been to a good counselor knows, and as I have just learned, there really is no substitution for the amount of knowledge they have and their objective eyes on your situation.

If that wasn't enough to tell you that my meeting went well, I don't know what is. I won't go into terrible detail about the whole thing, but he picked some things out about my behaviors that I didn't even think were bad. And I don't even mean things like food.

He pointed out that I am terribly hard on myself. But it's very subtle (usually). I think that I "should do" such and such and that I'm "lazy" if I don't. When really its just that whatever it is isn't fun for me, so I don't want to do it, or that my body needs rest. It's not called being lazy when I sit on the couch and watch YouTube. It's resting.

He told me that the best way to make a routine sustainable and most importantly EASY, is to be doing things that I actually like to do for exercise. Things that I would do for fun. There is no "I should do this" only "I want to do this because I like doing it."

His system is a triangle, one focus at a time thing. The three areas are tracking, eating and moving. His process is to focus on one part of each of these at once, and build it into my regular routine. Since I already have the tracking pretty much down, and I at least have some sort of start (perhaps even an overdone start) on the eating, the issue is the moving. The final goal is to get half an hour to 60 minutes every day. But I'm obviously not going to start with that.

He gave me a worksheet for each week, to set a goal. Here's the run down, starting yesterday. So my weeks now start on Fridays, rather than Mondays.

What will I do: Dancing! - I'm supposed to do something I like to do, so that it's fun and I keep it up. I'm going to start with choreography on youtube. Does anyone know of any good ones? I'm not looking for dancing fitness videos, but actual dancing stuff that will teach you steps (SLOWLY).

Why- Because it's fun.

Days of the week: Friday, Sunday, Monday and one extra day sometime later in the week if I can

Time of day: Afternoon/ evening

How I will track: myfitnesspal.com (midna07, if you'd like to friend me. Then you'll get all the juicy details of what I eat.)

Who will I share with: YOU. THIS BLOG. You are important and stuff. (Jon also gets special notification of course)

How I will celebrate: The usual way I have been. $10 into the pot.

I already managed to do it yesterday. It was pretty fun. I found some videos on Youtube, but I think I will mostly do different videos every time I do it, with a couple possible exceptions. There's certainly plenty there.

In conclusion, another note from the meeting. "Don't fight your body, your body will always win. We're going to work WITH your body to get where you want to be."

Next progress report will be on THURSDAY, not Monday. So check back then!

Monday Funday

It's Monday again! Hello!

Thank you all for your support this last week. It has helped. I'm no longer emopants and I feel a lot better.

I did in fact set up an appointment with what Kaiser calls a Clinical Health Instructor who can talk to me about nutrition and exercise and such. My appointment is on Thursday. I just hope he doesn't say "You have to eat less cheese," because seriously, it's part of every meal, I don't know what I'd do.

Anyway, here's the roundup from last week:

Food

I think I may have cheated a little bit too much. I mean, I succeeded in calorie counts almost everyday, give or take 50 or so, and for the most part I ate healthy things. I don't think I can say that I ate "clean" though, which is the general goal. I think I need to look that up or have it defined for me, but I assume it means fresh lean everything and it's better if you make it yourself. My leniency towards cheese and ranch dressing probably don't fall under that category. Nor do the lazy restaurant meals. At least not the kind of restaurants I've been to. I'm already attempting to fix this though.

I bought a bucket of veggies yesterday. Ask Jon. He came home last night to a fridge with basically only veggies in it. And no lettuce. He looked at me like I was crazy and then made himself a spinach salad. I'm thinking I may need to go get some proteins for the week, probably mostly lean sausages and things that if they absolutely must can sit in the fridge for a little bit. I also need to simultaneously relax and tighten up on finances. I think it's mostly a matter of tightening the eating-out budget and losening the grocery budget. I'm working on finding some balance there.

Exercise

I kicked ass last week. Seriously. I did exercise almost every freaking day. Mostly it was playing damage control against my calorie counts. I mostly did POP Pilates, and I have discovered a couple of her routines that I really like and can do most of with some mild alteration. They also focus on toning some of the biggest problem areas for me so if I keep it up, I'll actually start to see a real difference. For some extra cardio I've been trying to do jumping jacks, though being on the second floor they make me nervous about disturbing my neighbors. I think I may switch to some WiiFit cardio this week.

I have been using My Fitness Pal. You should too! I'm midna07, if you'd like to friend me.

Motivation

Gosh, after all that work last week you'd think I'd be seeing a difference on the scale, but no. No change. I have also realized that I absolutely must weigh myself after 14 hours or more of no food, otherwise I am not at my bottom weight. The only time I go that long without eating is Friday evening to Saturday afternoon. So, Saturday midday before I eat is my weigh in time. No change this past Saturday. Maybe the veggie heavy week this week will help.

So, motivation wise I'm a bit grumpy at my scale for not showing me some progress, but I have some faith in other sorts of progress. I did a waist and hips measurement, and I think, though I didn't specifically record last time so I can't be totally sure, that I have lost some inches on both. It's not a lot, but it is a minor victory. Hopefully I will see more of that this weekend.

Otherwise, motivation sort of just is. I'm sort of kicking my own butt out of bed in the morning, which is better. I made a canvas to provide some motivation (it says "It's a good day to have a good day" in happy yellow letters on blue), and I may change my alarm name to something silly like "If Frodo can get the ring to Mt. Doom, you can get your ass out of bed."

I think I'll be ok, since I want this change so badly and I know the only way I can get it. It's better when I don't have all the horribleness in my face, but I guess whenever I start getting upset about it the best option is to do a workout.

Also, I need some ice cream substitutions. Because I'm seriously missing Ben and Jerry's.

I will probably post again on Thursday or Friday and give a recap of what the nutritionist guy says.

See you all then.

Monday Update

Hi guys, just the usual monday update today. 

Food:

Is okay? I guess I did well last week, I managed breakfast all but one morning. Having the toaster has certainly helped with that. 

Regarding the vegetarianism post and your responses: The resounding answer was "no, going vegetarian will not make weight loss easier, it will make no difference whatsoever" if anything it might add hardship. So I have opted not to do that, obviously, though I have been eating a bit like a vegetarian the past couple days anyway. 

Mostly I think it's a matter of forcing self control and really only eating when I'm hungry. This is a billion times more difficult than it sounds, especially because I have emotional eating habits. On the bright side, I have learned to quell the emotional eats with healthy things like yogurt and dried fruit, rather than cookies (not that I have any cookies in the house to begin with). So that's good.

Exercise:

I can't remember if I did in fact do wii fit early last week. I'm thinking that I did, but I don't remember. With the end of the Olympics, I have nothing to watch on TV so the methodology has had to change again. I did YouTube fitness videos twice later in the week. Once on Thursday, and again on Saturday. Both videos pretty much kicked my ass, but I did what I could of both of them, and it still took about half an hour each. That's a lot of calorie burn there. For effort, I will give myself the benefit of the doubt  and say I did my 90 minutes a week last week and therefore earned the 10 dollars. That puts me at $20. 

Motivation:

I had a bit of a breakdown this weekend, honestly. I'm unsure as to what exactly brought it on. I've actually been down all weekend for unknown reasons. It's very weird. I don't like it, but I also don't know how to fix it.

I do want to lose the weight desperately. I feel heavy and gross and I think the reason I don't feel well and that I am getting what I have decided is heat rashes, is because of my weight. This drives me nuts. There is nothing else in the world that makes me more upset than this idea. For something so guiltless, accidental and easy (the gain) to become so much of a difficult, self-punishing responsibility is just endlessly unfair. And I'm only 50lbs overweight! I can't imagine what people are suffering at 100 or 200 lbs over. 

Having the reality of the health issues pop up makes me feel extremely powerless. Even if my numbers are (finally) going down, I still feel like it's not enough, and that there is so much reliance on my own responsibility and restraint that I will never make it as far as I want to. I'm scared of what will happen when I inevitably falter or give up, or decide that "enh, I can have this cake" too many times. I don't trust myself. [In reality, I don't trust myself at pretty much anything, but that's another discussion]. I'm thinking that it is time I got some professional help. Someone who will tell me "You have to do this" and not let it be a choice. I need to be under doctor's orders, because those I will listen to. If I make the order myself, or someone without that authority makes that order, the order doesn't have legitimacy and can be avoided. Yes. I need orders, because I don't trust myself to just do it. If I make the rules, I can bend them. If someone else makes them and enforces them, then I can't bend them, because I'm accountable to someone else. I would rather do this with a medical professional, because I know they will help me fix it and keep it.  So I need to get a nutritionist/ weight-loss counsellor. I will work on this this week. 

Goals:

Stop being so emopants, 90 minutes of exercise, work on portion control and healthiness of food (untracked). 

Vegetarian?

This blog post is here to pose a question, and ask for opinions.

Should I go vegetarian? 

Would it help me lose weight? Will it make any difference at all?

With this, I would like to add several caveats/ things to keep in mind

1) I do like meat, and I will probably still be cooking it and probably still have it occasionally. There is no way I am going to ask Jon to do this with me (nor will he choose to, I don't think), so the meat will still be around. I know I will just give in and have some sometimes, and of course special occasions are entirely off the books. The question here is not so much about strict vegetarianism, but a distinct effort to limit the meat in my diet. 

2) I am well aware that going vegan is an amazing way to lose weight and just generally eat better, but for reasons previously mentioned on this blog (ie, my love of cheese), I simply can't do it. I'm going for vegetarianism as a sort of halfway point that will still give me some benefits, without taking away the things that I love. 

3) Part of the reason I am contemplating this is because I want to be able to make the cheaper starches (pasta, bread, rice) a reasonable part of my diet without feeling guilty for eating them. If I'm vegetarian, there's all those meat calories to make up for, and therefore the carbs aren't so bad. Especially if I combine properly to make complete proteins out of them (red beans and rice ALL THE TIME). I think this will also help me to consider meals consisting of mostly veggies and starches to be complete meals, rather than them missing something.

4) I actually really like most meat substitutes. I like tofu, tempeh and portobello mushrooms, though I would like to try to stay away from soy as the estrogen is bad news for weight loss. Plus, I have been dying to try some freezer meal marinades, and I think those will take to them well. Also, those are cheaper than meat... right?

5) As mentioned in #2, I will still eat cheese. Lately it has mostly been goat cheese, parmesan (the kraft stuff, awful, I know but cheaper) and the occasional aged white cheddar binge. I don't drink milk regularly (makes me break out) and I've already moved to almond milk (or soy when I must). I could definitely do to eat more eggs generally, I don't usually have time in the morning. I'm still on the fence about seafood? 

So, thoughts on this? My concern is that because it is only a halfway point it won't be effective at all, but I'm really trying to find a way to lose weight that isn't an unsustainable diet that I will just balloon out of the second I drop it. Exercise will continue, obviously, but I need to get the food part right too.

In other news, I'm itchy AGAIN / still? Taking the antihistamines helps, but towards the end of the day they wear off and the itch returns. Lotions help somewhat as well. Still. BLERG WHY??!

Anyway, more on Monday. 

Sore Everywhere

I hurt in all the muscles, and some non-muscle places. I'm thinking that pretty much definitely means I succeeded this week, even if becoming sore was all I did.

Here's a recap.

Exercise:

Monday I did wii fit free step, Tuesday I did arms, Wednesday I was lazy. Thursday I did a lot of extra walking downtown, Friday I did wii fit again. Saturday I did a lot of stretching and yoga, Sunday I went bouldering/ did some cardio on an eliptical machine.

It being Monday again, the most recent damage is yesterday's attempt to climb things. My arms are kind of in the process of yelling "WTF!" at me. I'm not very good at climbing, being subconciously terrified of falling and lacking the strength in my arms to actually successfully climb past a certain point (because I am nervous I will drop myself should I slip). So, the climbing that I did do was super strenuous for my arms (and somewhat my legs). So. Ow. But the good sort.

Food:
Ugh. I almost don't want to discuss it. Last week was pretty bad. This weekend too. I mean, a lot of the exercise made up for it some. Part of the problem was that we were out of groceries. Yesterday was somewhat better because I was scrounging and a lot of what we had left could be construed as low calorie/ healthy, and then once I went shopping I ate like half a celery head. I have noted that I do mostly "shop the rim" now unless I'm going in for something specific (like Worcestershire sauce), pasta, or frozen things. I know pasta is kind of bad, but it's cheap (though my grocery bill doesn't scream that) and really really easy. The idea here is really to keep Jon and I from eating out/ ordering in. We've gotten a whole lot better about it, but it's still a work in progress. Admittedly that is more of a financial move than a health move, but one step at a time. I should also note that the pasta I buy is Eating Right Veggie Pasta (Rotini), it's really good and gives you a full serving of vegetables. I also buy frozen meals because they keep, they're easy and otherwise Jon and I wouldn't eat all that much protein. I buy fresh meats too (as well as have a constant supply of frozen chicken) but if I don't limit them to one or two per shopping trip, we don't eat them before they've spoiled and that's a horrible waste of funds.  So, last week was filled with burritos and ice cream, but this week will be better. Meal plans include bratwurst, steak and goat cheese wraps, celery salads, pasta and  shrimp stir-fry.

Also, I have vowed not to spend any money either today or tomorrow, and that includes lunch, so I'll have to make do with my lean cuisines.

Motivation:

The Olympics have ended, which is very sad. There's 500 something days until Sochi. (which reminds me more of dessert than Russia). I hope by the time those 500 days are up I will have lost all the college weight and kept it off. I also want to be fit, but I'm hoping that's more a biproduct. So, unless I can find a channel actually showing the Paralympics on cable, the televisual motivation has ended. What next? Well there are still some lasting effects (I hope) from the Olympics in that while I don't think I'll ever make it to Olympic level fitness, I do have a place to aim for. I can look at an Olympian and say, okay, what parts of that can fit on me, and how do I get there? Right now, I'm working on my arms. I've always felt that my arms were the first place to react when I exercised them, particularly with swimming, but other things too. My theory is that if I can tone my arms first, they will serve as motivation for the rest of my trouble spots. Plus out of all the places to be really sore, arms aren't so bad. I'm still keeping up with the basics of course, walking of some variety and other such things to keep the rest of my body on the right course, but without the specific focus.
So, I'd say I'm pretty motivated.

In terms of last week, at the behest of several readers I have given myself the $10. That put me at $60. and then I hands down earned another 10 this week for $70.

On Saturday, because I had time and I wanted to, I took a trip to the Nike outlet that's close to my apartment. I finally bought that new pair of walking shoes (they are in fact, labeled as such) and I got a dryfit shirt so I won't get quite as sweaty and gross. I wore both yesterday and they worked out great! Overall I spent 60 dollars on them both, ( + tax, but I don't think that should be out of my exercise funds). A pretty good deal, especially on the shirt which was originally 40 something (it cost me 10). It was written down so much because it's an event tee with a name on the back. It's for the Olympic trials funnily enough, though it has "Decker" on the back, I think for Mary Decker who was a long distance runner in the 70's and 80's. Anyway, these expenditures bring my funds back down to $10. Now to build up to something else cool or useful.

Oh, also, I finally bought a toaster. Yay toast!

Questionable Success

It's Monday, and you all know what that means: update post!

As the title of this entry suggests, I am unsure as to whether what I did last week qualifies for a reward or not. I'm sort of asking for some reader participation here. You tell me if I earned it (and if I didn't tell me so! I'll try harder next time).

First, a little review. I spent pretty much all of last week being itchy (I'm still a little itchy now, but less). My skin became extremely irritated by something and went into super allergic reaction hyper panic mode. I didn't get hives, per say, but I did itch everywhere on my arms and legs, and I became especially concerned when it looked like I had been attacked by hordes of tiny mosquitos. So I went to the doctor. They told me to take it easy and apply steroid creme (plus take a massive dose of antihistamines). When the first round of relatively mild stuff didn't work, I went in again and came back with big guns (the same category of stuff, just more and better). They seem to have worked, though my skin is still hyper reactionary. I so much as poke myself and I get a red mark.

I was also told to try to keep myself cool, because heat would make the rash and the itching worse, so exercise of the extreme variety was pretty much ruled out for most of the week. Things finally came under control on Friday, when I did do half an hour of Wii Fit Free Step while watching the Olympics. I ended with something like 2600 steps on and off the Wii Balance Board. I hope to do this again this evening.

In terms of other exercise, I also did do at least one set (usually more) of bicep pulls and tricep lifts with the resistance bands everyday. Some days I did more than others. I'd say over the course of the week I probably pulled on the resistance bands about 250 times in various positions. We had friends over a lot and they can testify to the fact that I was using them all week.

Food... well. I didn't do any cliff jumping, but I don't know how well or poorly I did in terms of caloric intake. Some days I was just hungry. But I did really try not to over eat. Doesn't say whether I was successful or not. I didn't weigh myself either, so I have basically no idea on this front other than I was trying to be conscious of it without actually number crunching. I suppose we'll find out when I next weigh myself.

Lastly my motivation. Being itchy and uncomfortable does take a lot of wind out of the sails, as does being overly social (which happened too, whew need some space this week). But nearly all of this is made up for with Olympics. I really wish I had that kind of devotion to one thing. Unfortunately, all of my one things are forced out by a myriad of other one things... combined with life things and work which are both entirely (or at least mostly) unrelated. I imagine that maybe if I had all the time in the world, I would find a one thing that I could and would spend hours and hours doing every day.

I bet it would be on the internet. I bet it would involve art, music, writing and extreme nerdery. I'm betting it would be pretty cool. Now if only I had the time to dream it up and be devoted enough to take it seriously.

Anyway, my musings on how things would be if I ruled the world are irrelevant. I need to know for accounting purposes: My goal was, essentially "mild to strenous exercise for 20-30 minutes 3 times a week" which is what I told my doctor I do. Do the constant resistance band training sessions count? You decide!

I'll determine next week, based on comments, what happens with the floating $10 that I maybe get. The account stands at $40.

This weeks goal is the same. Reward also the same.
{For those that care, new Sample Society post this week sometime, the box will arrive tomorrow probably}

And The Routine Breaks again

Wow. I am just not very good at this whole "routine" thing. Consider the ball dropped. But that doesn't mean I can't pick it back up again, I just need to go for a couple weeks with a different one.

As I'm sure you've inferred, last week was a failure. Not completely, I didn't totally revert and I did move. I didn't laze about completely. I did have a whole pint of ice cream in one sitting though. Sometimes a girls gotta do what a girls gotta do.

What happened was that my old routine got completely turned upside-down because Jon was off of work for the second half of the week and he was therefore absent for several nights. We went out with friends Thursday (instead of me doing my walk) and then the weekend just collapsed on itself. But, I picked something else up that will suffice for the next 2 weeks, when the routine will inevitably change again.

I went up to my parent's house, and when I was there, my dad gave me a couple of resistance bands (because he has extras). He said that if I did 3 sets of 15 everyday I will become super strong. My arms are flabtastic, so that sounds awesome. Especially given how much I'm going to be in front of the television these next 2 weeks.

Now you're wondering why I'll be in front of the TV, given that I normally don't do television. It's true. I don't. I make a distinct exception for certain sporting events. One of those events (and my favorite of all of them by far) is the Olympics. I love the Olympics. If there was anything on my bucket list, it's to go attend them. If I were going to die in a week, I would find a way to get on a plane to London and get into those events. So, needless to say, while the Olympics are on, I live and breathe them.

So I spend a lot of my evenings watching primetime on NBC. Thats a lot of couch-potatoing... if I just sat on the couch. Now I have resistance bands and I can stand in front of the TV and do my reps while the Olympics are playing. I can also (though I have not yet) free step on Wii Fit while watching. I figure if I can do this for my usual six single servings worth, I will be golden until I have the time to get myself back out and walking. Remember I still need 2 weeks worth of money to go get new walking shoes anyway. This way no shoes required, no super effort required aside from getting up off the couch. And honestly at this point I think I can manage that :)

Food has been going ok. I haven't been especially fussy about it, though I am trying to be careful around things I know are suggary and nutrition lacking. Jon and I went to get burgers today for lunch, and I didn't eat my bun (though I did eat my sweet potato fries... yum). So. Continuing happily down that track. Doing my best to limit sugar 80 to 90 percent of the time (ice cream binges excepted of course). One of my biggest failures is midmorning snacking on goldfish. They're free at work so I have a hard time not munching on them when I get hungry around 10 am. Anybody have any good substitutes? Mostly the problem is that they're a lot of calories for not a lot of goodness, and they have some secret sugar involved. I'd like a snack I can just grab, is tasty and healthy. Pretzels spring to mind but I don't really like them all that much. Maybe I should buy some more of those multigrain crackers and bring those in and stick them on my desk. Or those veggie stick chips things? I can get those at costco. Thoughts people?

So lets see... Motivation. Well, I'm watching the Olympics and I'm really not sure what makes better motivation than watching a bunch of really fit people do really awesome things. Especially when most of those people are right around my age.

No rewards for last week, since I failed. But this week. This week I will succeed!

This Week's Challenge!

I know I am posting a bit early this week, but I have discovered a few things and I would really like to keep the motivation wagon moving. The more I write here, the more accountable I am when the wheels stop.

Motivation Status

Firstly, I did weigh myself on Friday. The results were that I have in fact gained back again all of what I lost in January and February, plus interest. I knew that would be the case. I was dismayed, but not surprised.

Age 18, 145ish soaking wet

I also discovered that one of the best motivators for me is going to be looking at pictures of myself from years ago. The only problem here being is that I have never actually felt skinny. I don't actually look particularly skinny in any of these pictures, but I know now that I was actually right around what I should weigh. I just wasn't fit, so it sort of doesn't look it. 

Clearly I have been the weight I want to be before in my adult life. Sure, I was still a bit chubby here and there, but I have quite literally ALWAYS had a belly. Ever since 8th grade, when I was shocked into body image consciousness. However, I think that with the right effort, I can lose the weight and the belly, I just need to do the right exercise.

From October 2006(?) at 135ish

I'm in the back, in the magenta. May 2007. My hips are tiny!

Exercise Status

Last week I went on 2 walks. 1 on Sunday, and another on Friday. I also went swimming on Wednesday. So I succeeded in exercising 3 times last week. 10 dollars for me (20 in all, I'm getting better!) Total I walked 3 and a half miles.

I absolutely love walking out by the lake. It's calm, quiet and usually populated with families, other runners/ walkers or people out fishing. Everyone pretty much keeps to themselves, and there aren't any shadowy hideaways for would-be bad guys. I feel safe there when going by myself.

Zombies. Run! has been a true godsend. It's the entire reason I have the motivation to go out and walk. My options in the evening/ afternoon have become: sit around, be lazy and play on the computer, or the xbox for 4 hours, or, go out and play Zombies for a while and also achieve your exercise. Zombies, being two birds with one stone, often wins. This is a good thing.

I hope to start seeing results soon, but I think I have a lot of muscle to build first. I have already noticed that walking is easier. It used to be quite difficult for me to walk long distances at any sort of reasonable pace, but now I can keep up with Jon. I've also learned that most girl pants and girl shoes are simply not meant to be moved in, just by comparison of my speed depending on what I'm wearing. I have a way easier time going speedily if I'm wearing running shorts and shoes, than if I'm in skinny jeans and Toms. 

In terms of the belly I referenced earlier, the plan at the moment is to focus on the walking until results start happening. I will worry about ab exercise at another point.

Food Status

Not much has changed since last week (though we did go grocery shopping on Friday), but it's only Monday. I have however, begun a detox.

I saw a thing on pinterest that was a recipe for super detox juice recommended by Jillian Michaels. I'm not following the recipe exactly, but I did get the jist. It's just water really. But simultaneously, it's more than water. I have a 32 ounce Gatorade bottle filled with the juice of a quarter lemon and cold water, with a tea bag of Detox tea, with dandelion leaf. I actually really like the tea. It's a very subtle flavor, but it's sweet, spicy and interesting with the lemon. The original recipe also calls for a bit of cranberry juice, but since I don't need the juicy temptation sitting around the house, I decided to leave it out. I drink 2 of these bottles a day, getting 64 ounces of water. Supposedly after a week it's supposed to have kicked out 5 pounds of water weight. I doubt this, but it is a great way to get lots of water and it does seem to be helping me somehow. It's been keeping me from getting quite as hungry at odd times. Actually, over the past couple days that I've been doing this, I've been finding myself wanting to drink MORE than the 64 ounces. For example, right now, it's 12:30p and I have just about finished my first 32 ounces. I will probably finish the next 32 before I leave work this afternoon, and then I will need more water for my walk this evening. I will drink ALL the waters!

I'll let you know later this week (or next) about how this holds up and how the rest of the eating goes.

This Week's Challenge

This week, I will exercise 3 times again, probably mostly by walking. My goal is 6 miles, which means three 45 minute walks. I get 10 bucks if I do this.

New Motivation!

When I started this blog, my big weight loss motivator was Burning Man. That fell through when tickets became near impossible to obtain, and well, everything sort of flopped.

Now, however, I think I have a new motivator, and this will do not only for the weight loss but also for work, making it extra good.

A trip to Hawaii has become financially viable. I will have a place to stay for free once the school year begins, which will greatly reduce overall cost of the trip. The plan (at least in my head, I do need to discuss this with Jon still) is to wait for the cheapest tickets possible, then promptly buy them, get the time off for a week and go.

This serves as a motivation for both weight loss and work because:

1) Hawaii means beach. Beach means bikini. You see the connection here with weightloss. One might be able to argue that summer in general should provide that motivation, but I'd like to point out that I live and work in San Francisco/ the Bay. The water here is cold, I am cold in the city all day, and when it is warm, I am usually inside. Sure, I go swimming every now and then, but then its only with my family/ Jon and it's at least semi private. Hawaii is much higher self-conscious stakes than that.

2) Hawaii is expensive. Not only will I need the money to shell out on airplane tickets, theres also the cost of food, travel on the island and general monetary freedom while vacationing. I'll need to do some calculations and make a reasonably sized budget. But, before I can do that, I need to keep earning money. To do that I need to work, and I need to work my full hours so I can earn as much money as possible so I can go to Hawaii and not be concerned financially. Therefore: I wanna go to Hawaii? I gotta earn it. Motivation!

So, back to our regularly scheduled fitness/ food update:

I didn't set any goals this past week, but to some extent I do feel that I met the undefined ones. Jon and I went walking last Thursday evening, just as I had said I wanted to. It was a bit more uphill than originally intended, but it was good and both Jon and I felt a bit better afterwards. Zombies. Run! is indeed excellent motivation for walks. We went again Sunday evening, to a different place that was much flatter and prettier. I think we will return there when we next go walking. I went swimming yesterday with my family. So I have been pretty good about getting in some real exercise (walking a mile or more, swimming for an hour) about every 3-4 days. It's not as awesome as it could be, but it is better than nothing and definitely better than before.

In terms of food, the tossups remain. I am generally trying to avoid sugar and carbs (or at least severely reduce consumption of both), but there are several aspects of my diet in which that doesn't work. I've had several run ins with lactose in the past week, and I think I am discovering that certain pills are more effective than others, despite the fact that I need to take them more often. I also have noted that the almond milk I love so much is sadly filled with sugar. So, as soon as I have consumed it all I will need to get the unsweetened kind and sweeten it myself with splenda. But! A good thing I have noticed is that I have started eating significantly less. On days when I am at home, I simply munch all day on whatever we have, often fruits, veggies, cheese and whole grains like oatmeal. On work days, I have breakfast before I leave home (oatmeal and almond milk or whole wheat bagel and cream cheese), a snack midmorning (goldfish), lunch of some kind, and then I don't eat again until I am home and I either make dinner, order dinner, or initiate varietal munching.

Dinner remains somewhat problematic generally speaking, but it's mostly that I am cooking or ordering for 2, and Jon eats very differently from the way I should be eating. Jon absolutely hates being hungry, and so he likes to eat big, fortifying meals that will protect him from the hunger monster later. It makes him nervous to eat little meals, and he becomes worried when he doesn't think whatever food I'm making will hold him. This is somewhat contradicted by the fact that he doesn't want me to change whatever it is I'm making just because he's worried about being hungry later. Oh, and combine this with the fact that we don't go grocery shopping enough, so there's hardly ever anything in the house that he wants to eat that is simultaneously easy for me to cook or for him to make for himself. What I really need to do is to find some meals that are light in small portions and heavy in big ones, easy to cook and good for long-term storage. I can think of one right now, chili... but I will need more than that. Ideas anyone? Preferably I'd like to stay away from any "health food" ingredients (yes, even though they are delicious), since I am also contending with the "this food is weird, I'm not really all that hungry, you eat it" tendencies of a 23-year-old male who likes normal things and looks askance at whole wheat pasta. [I love you Jon, even if you don't like whole wheat pasta]

I have not weighed myself in a week or so, despite the seeming to stick changes in both diet and exercise regimen. I will probably weigh myself tomorrow when I get up, since I have the day off and it will be something like noon.

Anyway, I'm looking for dinner ideas, if you've got 'em, send them my way!

On the bright side, breakfast!

As you all have probably figured out by now, I don't post when I haven't done anything. And really, I haven't.

The running didn't happen again. I was never presented with a timely opportunity. It bothers me, especially because I bought the game ZOMBIES. RUN! for my phone and I just plain old haven't had the chance to use it. I am trying to figure out ways to get myself to go out and run, or walk for exercise (rather than just to get someplace) or even do yoga. And I've been having a really hard time finding the time... or more like the motivation when it actually comes around that I have some free time.

I decided yesterday that I am going to do SOMETHING tonight. I discovered two things relatively close to me: a yoga studio in Hayward that has regular classes at 7:15 and a sweet introductory offer (as well as a yoga bootcamp, which I may want to try), and also that there are a couple parks within 5-10 minute drive of my apartment. I think that, generally speaking, I will be more inclined to exercise if I have someone there doing it with me,and I'm going to have a much easier time convincing Jon to come walk around the lake with me while playing ZOMBIES! than I will convincing him to come to a yoga class. So, I will try to convince him to come with me tonight to The park to go on a walk/ run / saunter. If he cannot be convinced (or his legs hurt from work) I will either go by myself or I will go to yoga at 715. Sort of nervous about doing that by myself.

In addition to all this...attempts at exercise, my diet has been changing around constantly. I discovered about a month and a half ago that I have become somewhat lactose intolerant. It's not violent, but it is uncomfortable, and so I have been attempting to rid my diet of lactose. Here is where you should be saying "whaaaat? but Kiersten you love cheese!" And it's true, I freaking love cheese. This is entirely why I can't go vegan, or even get rid of lactose completely. So, what I've been doing is drinking almond milk (which is delicious) and taking a pro-biotic lactase pill once a day when I eat dairy. It amounts to most days. It has helped. Even so, I have cut back on dairy generally speaking. When I think about my lunches, I find myself calculating 3 different ingredient possibilities: dairy, sugar and carbs. It's pretty much impossible to avoid all 3 unless you get a salad, and the last salad I had wasn't very tasty, and totally turned me off to the whole thing. Not good. So what I have been eating has been a series of burritos, japanese, chinese and lasagna, mixed in with low calorie but high carb frozen meals from Safeway. That's lunch. [On the very bright side, there's a Chipotle opening a block away from my work some time this summer, yay!]

Dinner and breakfast are different stories. Dinner is, for the most part, still pretty low carb. I make the chicken and zucchini bake at least once a week, and have at least one night where I don't eat much other than grapes and cheese. There are of course, also many nights where I just microwave frozen cheese ravioli from Costco (easy AND delicious) and cover it in marinara sauce of questionable sugar content. I mean, it's delicious and theoretically healthy (sometimes I add veggies too), but it's a complete failure if I'm trying to rid myself of sugar, carbs and dairy, since it has all three.
Breakfast! I have actually started eating it. Last week I purchased some oatmeal (a whole grain!) and Jon bought me some whole wheat bagels. I figure, on a scale of 1 to clif bar, they're about a 5. Plus I like them better. I eat the oatmeal soaked in cold almond milk. I cannot describe the creamy deliciousness, you should try it. I of course, put cream cheese on the bagels. duh.

This past weekend, before Pride, I made cream cheese crepes. There's a recipe in the YUM pins on my pinterest. They were good! Sort of hard to flip, but good! I recommend them.

Related to that, I got a blender! It blends things! Like smoothies and other smooth delicious things. I am excited!

IN CONCLUSION: I have been bad, but simultaneously good in weird ways. I'm trying to fix it and find some consistency. I have achieved breakfast! I will achieve exercise! Then I will battle lunch and achieve it too.

Running

I am not a runner. My body is simply not built to run. My bones are too heavy to have a good relationship with the ground at high velocity.

However, running is a very good way to get aerobic exercise. And I can get the exercise at the level I need most efficiently if I run. It is therefore, perhaps, a necessary torture.

It has been pointed out to me that the best time to exercise is in the morning, before your body has a chance to figure out what's going on and initiate shut down. I have to get up at 5 all this week to take Jon to BART (we've had some...transportation related issues of late), so, I figured I would take the opportunity to trick my body into figuring out running again.

"Again"?

I had to run every day in middle school. It was part of our daily PE program to run for 8 to 12 minutes at the beginning of each PE class. Even on the hottest days of the year, we still did the 8 minutes. Now, I was never fast. I was always at the back. There were only a couple people slower than me. When I graduated 8th grade, my mother told me that she had a discussion with the PE teacher, and that he had said that I had done an amazing job keeping up with it, even though I was just not built to run. If we had a swimming pool, I would have been doing that instead, and pretty much everyone who ever taught me PE knew it. I knew it. I am an evolutionary swimmer (though, being of general northern European decent, I can only guess at where my ancestors needed that skill). So, I have a swimming pool, why am I choosing to run?

The pool we have is small, not open (really) until 8 or 9, and is in the middle of the other half of my apartment complex. That doesn't make it far away, but it does make it public, and therefore deters me from using it. Also, when I come home from work everyday, it's filled with screaming children. No good for the kind of intense aerobic exercise I need. For running, all I have to do is work up the guts to run the whole way around the block and not die of hyperventilation.It doesn't take long, though it may seem like eternal suffering.

I went on my first run this morning. It was...interesting. Aside from the body over heating, ragged/ difficult breathing upon return to the apartment (both quelled by an immediate cold shower), it wasn't too bad. Though, I either need a hardier sports bra or I need to tape my chest down, because there's a lot of force involved and it makes it hard to breathe while running. Any ideas?

The only long term/ day of effects I have experienced are increased tiredness, hunger and a sort of confused "I exercised earlier..." feeling. I say confused because it's not entirely as pleasant as I would prefer, but it's not bad. I imagine the fatigue is mostly because I'm not used to it, and the hunger partly because I still skipped breakfast. I need to figure out a way not to do that... hmm to be contemplated.

Update: I've been sitting at my desk all day. My hip joints are displeased. Unsure if this is related


In terms of last week:

I did exercise 3 times. I did a whole lot of Jackknifes against the Wii Fit Yoga Trainer. I did 40 of them last time. I'm working on making that the main exercise on Wii Fit, along with general yoga stretches and the Advanced Step.

So. Success! Hurray! 10 dollars for me! Thats a grand total of... 10 so far. Wow I'm awesome at this (sarcasm).

Anyway. This week's goals are a little bit late in coming, but:

Run Wednesday and Friday. Wii Fit Thursday and sometime on the weekend. If I manage the run on Friday, I get the 10 bucks, if not, no 10 bucks. Wii Fit is worth an extra 5. So, if I manage all of that I get 15.

Preemptive goals for next week:
Jon goes back to working a little bit later, so it will make it a little tougher to get the run and a shower in, but I think I can still do it.

So run twice. However best fits my sleep, determination and confidence levels. It must happen twice to earn money though, otherwise no success.

Onwards!
. 

Zucchini and Chicken Bake

So, I made a delicious last night that I absolutely must record for posterity (and also so I can make it again, since I drastically altered the recipe).

I got the idea from this recipe, which I originally found on Pinterest.


Zucchini, Chicken and Cheese Bake


Prep time: 10 minutes
Bake time: 25 minutes
Total time: 35 minutes




Ingredients:
4 chicken breasts or equivalent
EVOO
3 medium zucchini cut into chunks (I did rounds)
1 large clove of garlic, minced
Fresh basil, chopped. (I used about 8 small leaves)
1 tablespoon (ish) dried oregano
Freshly grated pepper
Salt
The zest of one lemon
a handful of shredded parmesan cheese
4 tablespoons (ish) of goat cheese


Preheat oven to 425

1) Put the chicken, zucchini, basil and garlic into a baking dish
2) Drizzle EVOO over the top of everything (use about 2 tablespoons) and sprinkle the oregano, salt, pepper and lemon zest over the top.
3) Move everything around with your hands a bit to be sure the herbs and oil are spread evenly.
4) Sprinkle the parmesan over the top
5) Stick it in the oven!
6) After about 15 minutes, check on it, it should look mostly done. Add a smear of goat cheese to the top of each piece of chicken. Return to the oven and lower the temperature to 350 for another ten minutes or until the chicken is done.
7) EAT.

No Prize for you!

I totally failed this week. All goals failed.

I made a batch of flax bread tuesday morning, but didn't eat very much of it. I bought lunch 2 out of the 3 days I worked (I took friday off due to exhausted body rebellion), and I definitely did not exercise. So, complete failure, no prize for me.

I have yet to earn a prize, but I think it's more because I'm disobeying my own rules and giving myself too many tasks. I lack focus, and so it's bringing down my success rate. I'm simultaneously trying to not eat too many carbs (I'm not doing awful, but I'm certainly not succeeding either) and trying to get myself to exercise as well as dealing with just regular life things. So, it's too much and I need to back off somewhere.

So, for this coming week, exercise takes priority. I should pay attention to what I eat and be a bit careful, but it's not the priority of the week.

My goal is to exercise 3 days this week, hopefully MWF. If I can get some in tomorrow (sunday) I get an extra 2 dollars, making the prize for success this week 12 dollars.

-----------------

Now, on different, life related topics!

Work has... gotten worse. I've been reduced to data entry. DATA ENTRY. That's....intern level work. Now, if I were interning, that would be one thing, but I am distinctly NOT. Now, if they want to pay me $20 an hour to do data entry, then ok, but dear god am I unhappy. This is NOT what I signed up for. If I had known, or seen down the road that this is what I would have been doing, I would have taken the other job, because seriously? Not what I want to do, I am above fricking data entry. Admin for an internet start-up is much much closer than this nonsense. Sure, the data entry is vaguely VAGUELY marketing related (It's actually mostly accounting and admin related), but that doesn't make it better. I don't need experience with data entry, I need experience with marketing things and design things. I get those in tiny shreds, and the projects that matter to me get sidelined hardcore. I am upset and unhappy and I can't do anything about it. I have to wait until November to start looking for other work.

In the meantime though, I have purchased a set of classes from e-careers via a super awesome Groupon. The classes will teach me the basics of Web design and e-commerce. So, if I wanted to I can launch my own website and such when I'm done. If I can come up with any really cool possibly viable business constructs that I can hire my friends for, then maybe that is what I will do. At least for a bit.

Another thing that has come up recently in "argh life sucks lets change it" sorts of discussions with Jon, is something that a friend of ours is doing. Moving to Australia or New Zealand for the tourist season, finding gainful employment on a work and holiday visa, taking advantage of the benefits of higher minimum wage and less tax in those countries and earning a lot of money while exploring a new place. Our friend is going to Australia, Jon and I were thinking of going to New Zealand. This wouldn't happen for at least a year or so, because we can't both pay for it right now, and in order to enter NZ on a Work and Holiday visa, we need to show that we have both the minimum required funds to stay (to pay for the trip) and enough money for a ticket out of the country. That comes to about 5,000 NZ dollars each, not counting the original flight down there. I think that it would be a good experience for both of us, and there is a possibility that Jon could just internally transfer down there, so I would be the only one who needs to find a job. We couldn't really go until our lease is up here (next may) so that gives us a year to figure it all out. It might not happen, but it is something we both want to do, and that I think would be really good for both of us, both financially and life-wise.

So, by this time next year, I will have lots of Web design training, and we will hopefully be preparing to move to New Zealand. Now wouldn't THAT be cool.

Whew!

Well, this week has been a train wreck. I've been exhausted all week, been going into work late, I stayed home tuesday. Just not very functional in the general scheme of things.

I completed 3/5ths of my goal though... or I will this afternoon. I managed brief bouts of wii fit both monday and wednesday (half an hour each, a whole bunch of different exercises), and I plan to do it again tonight when I get home.

I also DID make flax bread (courtesy of my day off on Tuesday). I need to get a proper toaster, so I can toast it, because its a bit fluffy and airy for my general bread tastes. It's delicious with butter and honey though!

So, the goal next week is the same. I plan to make another batch of flax bread (perhaps 2 batches) on Monday (Memorial Day equals no work! Yay!) and also get some sandwich makings when I go to the store so I can take sandwiches to work, instead of buying lunch. On top of that, M-W-F Wii Fit. That's a lot for one week, so hopefully I can manage it.

I've been having a lot of trouble managing fatigue lately. I've been very tired this week, despite my going to bed early. When my alarm goes off at 7:30, I just can't will myself out of bed. Even if there's warm coffee waiting for me in the kitchen. [Courtesy of my super awesome boyfriend... who unfortunately goes in to work 2 hours before me.]

Part of the problem, I know, is that I am unhappy at work and I see very little point in going in these days. Today I heard about some possible progress and a possible return to my old project so, here's hoping I have purpose at work again soon.

Until then, I'm just going to work on getting my exercise in so that I can be healthier and sleep better. As well as just eating better generally speaking. With the flax bread I have managed to avoid the starchy carbs this week for the most part, but I have have executed a massive fail on the sugar front. That comes from it just being a rough week, though I know that at some point it does just make it worse. Doesn't keep me from eating the ice cream and sour patch kids though. Me and sugar have an instant gratification sort of relationship. We always have. I've eaten sugar like that since high school, and I know it's bad. I also know that the only way for me to defeat the weight at this point is to reduce the carbs and hit the relative gym (no actual gyms). And attempt restraint on the sugar front.

In terms of motivation... When I started up the Wii the other day it reminded me that, according to BMI, a healthy weight for me is 129. Now honestly, I think I would be a stick at 129, and I don't think I could sustain that weight, but I am curious as to what being 129 would be like. Keep in mind that that's a 60 pound drop for me, and at the current rate/ without me spending money on a trainer to kick my ass, laser surgery (they do that for being overweight now) or a diet meal plan thing, that will take me years. To be honest, at this instant a trainer doesn't sound so bad, but I don't have the money. I have also realized that as long as I'm doing the exercises that work for my body (ie, not running) it's actually kind of fun. Wii Fit works as a consistent, light weight sort of exercise, but long term it's probably not going to be enough... if I want to get down to 129, which is less than I have ever weighed in my adult life. The lowest I remember seeing on the scale was 133, and that was my junior year of high school when I was doing yoga and being on dance team, as well as basically not eating (I was one of those sleep study internet friends sorts, food was not high on the priorities).

A lot of me would really like to get back to that lifestyle, but as an adult it's really difficult. Dance and yoga classes require money and time, cooking is a daily activity. Eating is built into the work day, exercise is not.

Admittedly, there is a 24 hour fitness in the basement of my building. Comparatively, they are a cheap gym and they do have Yoga and Pilates classes at times I could possibly manage (noon and 4:30). But I just checked and their monthly dues are 40 bucks. Yeah no. I need a Planet Fitness with good classes. But there aren't any that are convenient. Le sigh. Stupid gyms.

Anyway goals are

1) Flax bread sandwiches for lunch at least twice next week
2) Wii Fit MWF (and this coming sunday, double)
3) Zumba? Maybe?

Weekly Challenges

I know I have promised photos over and over. The problem is that the apartment is never completely clean, so I can never take the pictures. Don't worry though, we're having a gathering on Friday for Jon's birthday. The place will be as sparkling as possible, so I will take pictures Thursday night or Friday pre-party. I will post them when I next post after that.

This post isn't just to tell you all that I fail at keeping things clean. This post is to write down my new initiative. 

So, I have achieved step one of my 3 step plan for happiness. I am happy at home. There are still a few things we need/ it would be nice to have, but they're extras and they can wait. Home is a good place to be, and at about the 3 week mark, it's starting to feel like home too. Slowly building that threshold that demons etc can't cross uninvited. It's nice to feel like I have one. Comforting, even. Anyway, supernatural musings aside, I have a happy home and now it is time to address step 2. Myself.

Now, this has never been a personality thing. I am happy with who I am and the way I behave and react to things for the most part. Sure there are a lot of things I don't necessarily handle very well, but a lot of that is my youth and something that must be learned over time. It's not something I can simply "fix" in the way that I can sort of fix the other things that bother me about myself. I have 2. Both are difficult, both I have battled previously, both are tenacious and need a serious putting-in-their-place. The first is my weight, which I have obviously addressed here before. The second is my acne, which I will discuss later down the road when we finally get to step 2b. Right now, step 2a. weight. 

I just had an idea for a plan of attack, and I hope I will be able to pull it off. 

Weekly challenges. 

Each week, I will give myself one weight-loss related challenge. The challenge will be something that carries throughout the week like: make your own, low-carb, high calorie lunches all week, or go swimming for 30 minutes each evening, or go to zumba class twice, or eat carb-free dinners. 

My task is to, at least to start, complete that challenge and only that challenge each week. If I start doubling up, I will fail both. So, one challenge at a time, if I do some of the other stuff too, great! But it shouldn't interfere with my challenge for the week. 

If I am successful, I should earn rewards. I think the only legitimate reward that will motivate me is going to be money, so, I'm going to move a certain amount of money (say, 10 bucks) each week I am successful into a "buy something for Kiersten" fund. Eventually I'll have enough to buy one of the big things I want. (an xbox, a kitty cat, a bigger tv etc etc). 

So that's the plan. I'll start next week. I think with lunches. 

My Diet History

I wanted to write about myself and veganism/ vegetarianism/ other dietary choices I have made. Over the course of my growing-up as a foodie (which I am by no means done with) I have had various bouts and forays into the meatless and dairyless cuisines. Sometimes it was out of necessity, sometimes accidental and sometimes deliberate. My conclusion was, in the end, that very little less than a truly omnivorous diet is sustainable for me.

Towards the middle of high school, I made an ethical decision to seriously cut back on the amount of red meat I consumed. This meant no hamburgers, abstaining when my family had steak, and while not a true red meat, avoiding pork all together. I ate chicken and fish. Mostly chicken. Or I ate vegetarian. I think this might be where my love affair with cheese-as-a-protein began, as well as my forays into tofu and eggs-as-not-breakfast. I ate like this for 3 years. I would cave and have a cheeseburger from In-n-Out about once every 6 months, but for the most part, I never ate cow or pig.

In terms of body shape, during this time I was the skinniest I have ever been, but I think it was because of other factors. I was exercising regularly (bi-weekly yoga class, during school hours) and I was also skipping meals. I recently read a journal entry of mine from either junior or senior year where I had purchased a chocolate muffin as my only lunch (and then proceeded to pocket it for later maybe), but a friend went and got me sushi, and then I wasn't hungry at dinner time and so I skipped dinner. I probably didn't have breakfast that day either. Thinking about the way I sometimes ate in high school leaves me wondering if my friends were secretly concerned. I was on a pretty harsh medication at the time (Acutane, for systemic acne. This is the acne drug that frequently causes depression) and I think that may have affected a whole lot of the way I was behaving and eating.

Eventually, I started having awful cravings whenever steak appeared. It just smelled and looked so good! So I would have a piece or 2. You know how sometimes certain foods just taste like your body needs them? Like they're nourishing you in a new way that you had been missing. That was the way I felt about steak. I still feel this way occasionally. There are vitamins in steak that my body does not get any other way. So I went back to eating the way my family did.... when I was with my family.

At this point I was in college, and eating at the buffet-style cafeteria every night. Meat was generally untrustworthy. It was occasionally good, but for the most part, I stayed away. I ate vegetarian on weekdays. Steamed vegetables, salad, tofu, cheese. The occasional slice of pizza, chocolate milk. Potatoes and pasta. I would often eat chicken or seafood on saturdays when we went out to eat, but for the most part my diet was meatless.

Needless to say, since I've already said it on this blog, all that pasta and potatoes got to me. I gained weight like crazy. I was not really eating the right things for my body, though I wasn't particularly aware of it at the time. I knew I needed protein, but I grabbed fatty proteins that were then partnered with either sugar or massive amounts of heavy carbs. I wasn't eating what I will call a "clean-diet."

Towards the end of my college career, I took note of how much weight I had gained. I was unhappy, so I tried to change things. The summer before my senior year I went on the South Beach Diet with both of my parents. I lost 15 pounds because all I ate was clean protein and vegetables, with relatively limited dairy. Towards the end of this, I had been contemplating veganism. My thought process was that I would lose a lot of weight if all I ate was salad. There is, of course, much more to veganism than salad. Vegans rely on starches to complete their proteins. It's a necessary part of their diet to have both the beans and the rice. But I had learned at school (though not in class) that a diet of veggies and starch didn't work for me. Also, my love affair with cheese was in the way. I thought about it, but I realized that I would give up many things I love for a lifestyle that may not work the way I want, and that would in the end become a chore rather than a tasty new way of living. I couldn't go vegan, and so I had to find another way.

The South Beach diet did work for me, but it was very restrictive. While there are plenty of things you can make, it is both carb counting and calorie counting, to some extent. I found myself hungry nearly all the time. And while I could snack, the snacks were difficult for me to prepare and bring to work. Nothing is easier to snack on than free goldfish and pretzels. Celery sticks and ricotta, or lunchmeat roll ups left me feeling somewhat lacking for the amount of work put into their preparation. And so I caved, and dropped the diet.

At first I maintained the weight loss. When I first returned to college, I managed to eat right for the most part. Then the financial drain and the constant presence of pizza began to take its toll. It was cheaper for me to sneak into the cafeteria, and to eat the pizza that my friends bought, than to take the time and money to buy vegetables and clean proteins for myself. The diet fell apart, and I re-inflated.

This brings us to the time already accounted for on this blog, between graduation and now.

My dieting in January and February was mildly successful. My weight has somewhat come back since, but I haven't gained it all back, and with a little bit of effort it goes down again. I was having a discussion with a friend the other day about weight gain (as she has had some problems with it) and she mentioned that the hormones in birth control during the first couple months could be part of the problem. I restarted BC in December; making January and February months 2 and 3. The tough ones. Now that I have been on it for longer and my body is more used to it, I should be able to get over the weight loss roadblocks.

The plan ahead is low-carb, but delicious I am sure.



I will post apartment photos as soon as I have the chance to tidy up and take them.