A brief check in

If you ever thing that you do not need to change up your weight workout every few weeks, well my rear and thighs would like to argue with you. Oh ow, I changed my leg and arm workout yesterday and today I am very sore. Basically I added an extra stretch on my lunges and a slight extension on my squats by finishing them off by standing on my tiptoes. Then I ran this morning which has no doubt increased the soreness. The first five minutes of running was hell on earth because even with a warm-up, one of my legs cramped up. However, it did improve and I managed 30 minutes. On Sunday I hit 161 so I am on target again. Work is very stressful right now so I am just trying to stay on plan and on track, so far it is working.

The weekend

This is my weekend to work so I am actually at the office. Yesterday despite feeling really exhausted and out of sorts I did actually manage to run for thirty minutes on the treadmill at 5.5 mph. So, I ran 4 out of 5 days this week and added an extra hour and 30 minutes of cardio into my schedule. I am still holding at 161.5 but I am wearing a size 10 dress and I am going to have to get rid of one of my size 12 suits because it is too large, so I cannot complain. I went out for drinks last night with my friends from work and as a result I never had dinner. I don't think large amounts of popcorn really count as a meal which is what we were served at the bar. Today is my day off from any sort of exercise which as always comes at the best time in the week because I am exhausted and tired from a very stressful work week. I am going to take the weekend easy because I expect Monday will be long and hard given the amount of work which is begining to pile up on my desk.

Conference girl

Tuesday and Wednesday of this week I was at a conference for my continuing legal education. I have some thoughts now that I am back at regular work. First, why do these sorts of events always serve pastries for breakfast? I swear there was not a piece of fruit within five miles of the conference room in the morning. I skipped all the baked goods and had coffee instead (I brought my own breakfast snack). Second, when did buffet lunches become an excuse for people to see how much food they can put on their plates? The one day they served lunch, I stuck to salads and a piece of chicken. I have grapefruit for desert, because in an odd move there was fruit at lunch. This clearly proves that the hotel had fruit in the building and could have served it at breakfast but I digress. The one great benefit of the conference was that it started at 8:30 am which meant I did not have to get to the hotel which is about 10 minutes from my apartment until a little after 8 am. So, I had an extra 30 minutes to workout. Tuesday and Wednesday I did 90 minutes of cardio instead of just 60. Today, since I am back on my normal schedule I did 75 minutes of cardio including 30 minutes of running at 5.5 mph. This week I have already run 3 times at 5.5 mph, maybe I will run tomorrow and make it 4 days for this first time in a long time. Running is definately getting easier and even though there was no air conditioning I actually felt pretty decent during the run. I hit 161.5 today on my scale, not sure how accurate it is but at least it is a move in the right direction.

Monday rambling

This morning, I put aside all my lovely little excuses and ran at 5.5 mph for 30 minutes. I always think it qualifies as a good workout when you feel mildly ill at the end of it. Mostly, this was a challenge to myself since I can never make myself run on Mondays for some reason and I always feel guilty about it. So, I ran and then I used the eliptical machine and kicked up the resistence level on that by 1 level as well. A bottle of water and an energy bar later, I feel almost normal now. I was attempting to make up for a party I went to last night at one of my co-worker's houses, even though I did manage my food reasonably there and skipped the desert. Saturday morning despite my copious whining I hit 162 on the nose and though after the weekend I have climbed slightly to 162.5. So, I figure that I am still averaging my 1lb loss a week which is all that I am aiming for in the long term. I can maintain a pound loss a week, more than that is hard for me to maintain in the long run. Oh, I decided that I am not setting mini-goals this week, I am just trying to live up to all my previous goals and working on generally increasing the difficulty of my workouts. We will see how that goes for this week.

I live on a tropical island and other excuses.

There was no running this morning. Want to know why? I live on a tropical island. Okay, maybe I should elaborate on that statement. I live on a tropical island and when the air conditioning is broken at the gym, I do not run. My gym rather resembled a small sauna this morning, and even though I have long ago adjusted to the heat here, I am not quite to the level of enthusiam required to run in a sauna for 20 or 30 minutes. The eliptical machine and I bonded this morning instead for a solid hour. I did however have a smaller cup of coffee this morning than normal, which I think can be considered as a small victory. I lifted weights last night and have a sore left shoulder to prove it, I think that must be due to poor form rather than intense lifting on my part. My body has entered the 163 plateau this week and is holding on for dear life, so I am just focusing on staying on plan and not worrying about it right now. 163 is a lot better than 173 which is where I was a little over a month ago, and way better than 250 where I start a year and a half ago, so I am not going to complain. Oh, and I am wearing suit pants that are too large which is always enjoyable, so overall life is good and what else can you really ask for on a friday. Plus, I live on a tropical island with all the beautiful white beaches and lush jungles I could ever want to explore.

Mini-Goal Review

1. 4 16 oz bottles of water a day and no soda-Yup, this one is still easy and has been accomplished. Once I got the soda out of the house it was easy to just drink water instead because there is not anything else available except for the soy milk for my cereal in the morning. 2. Drink less coffee (note the non-specificity, I'm just trying to cut down a little on caffine). I am not really managing well on this durring the week because I work in an office which feels like the artic tundra in the middle of a really bad cold snap. Therefore, I am going to start by eliminating coffee on weekends and drinking smaller cups of coffee in the morning on weekdays. I only have one cup of coffee a day so that is good. 3. Run 3 or more times this week (I think three times may be my limit) I ran this morning so that means I have actually accomplished this goal although I will probably try to run tomorrow as well. I have managed to work myself back up to 30 minutes of running and now I am working at getting back up to running the whole thing at about 5.5 mph (I am only running 15 minutes at 5.5 mph right now and the rest at 5.3 to 5.4 mph). 4. Lift weights 4 times this week. Once I lift weights tonight, this goal will be done for the week. It is pretty easy now that I have scheduled myself to lift weights on Sunday, Monday, Wednesday, and Thursday. I need to buy heavier and lighter weights this weekend because I only havy one set of 10 lb weights and I need more variety available for my workouts. 5. Have one really hard workout day-An attempt to ramp up how hard I workout. I am counting today as my hard workout day, I ran for 30 minutes and then did a pretty tough hill climb workout on the eliptical machine for another 20 minutes, plus I am lifting weights when I get home tonight. 6. Cut down on mayo-I really love mayo but I am trying to eliminate it from my diet again. So far, I have eaten no mayo this week, and I really need to remove it from my fridge so it is not sitting there taunting me to eat it. 7. Eat salad at lunch 2 times this week-here we go with cutting bread entirely out of my diet again. I brought salad for lunch today and I will probably have a salad on Saturday as well. I also had salad last night for dinner. I would have salad tomorrow but I don't want to go to the store to buy more lettuce today (I am basically out) and a co-worker is bringing in lunches tomorrow as a fundraiser for his son's school (the lunches involve chicken so I am just going to eat that bit and leave what does not fit in my diet). 8. No bread with dinner. This is pretty easy because I bought another roast chicken and I have been eating that and the fruit and vegetables in my house.

Catching my breath

This is the first time today I have really had a moment to catch my breath. I ran for 30 minutes this morning, along with another 25 minutes on the eliptical machine. Then I discovered that there was no hot water at my gym and ended up taking a freezing cold shower before going to work. I have been working ever since I got into the office at 7 am this morning. I spent all morning in court which always messes with my day in terms of getting paperwork done. Tonight, I am going to lift weights and then get to bed early because I am exhausted. Hopefully, I will still feel motivated enough to run tomorrow and make it three days in a row. We will see what happens tomorrow.

This is my day

This is how my day has gone so far, and it is only noon. Wake up with a horrible headache, stagger into the bathroom and take two pain pills. Forget to take pain pills to work in case needed later in the day. Go to the gym, run at a slowish pace due to combination of exhaustion and headache remnants. Use the eliptical machine, shower, go and buy coffee. Get asked the same question three times at the coffee store until actually realize the employees are speaking to you (helpful if only person in the shop at this point). Go to work, write two motions by 9 am and deal with very peeved co-worker about work issue. Decide you cannot live with your very messy desk so clean it off and discover many things which should have been previously dealt with only they got buried in mounds of paperwork. Make a molestation victim cry. Manage all this by 11 am at which time the headache has returned only without the pain medication option. Other than that I am fine and at least it is lunch time, so I am going to imbibe copious amounts of water now and see if that helps. Plus, I ran this morning and that it one day of running complete which is always a good thing.

Skinny Pants

Friday was bad in terms of food, I went out after work with co-workers and had bad food (which we can blame on the alcohol I drank). However, I was back on plan by Saturday morning and back at the gym this morning. Last night I lifted weights and did lots of lunges and squats, I really hate lunges by the way. Today, I am wearing my size 10 slacks which is nice, these are the slacks I bought 8 months ago, put them on every couple of weeks and then took them off because they were too tight and put them away. They are slightly tight still but definately wearable now, it is almost like buying new clothes without having to spend actual money. Anyway, now on to my goals for the week: 1. 4 16 oz bottles of water a day and no soda 2. Drink less coffee (note the non-specificity, I'm just trying to cut down a little on caffine) 3. Run 3 or more times this week (I think three times may be my limit) 4. Lift weights 4 times this week 5. Have one really hard workout day-An attempt to ramp up how hard I workout 6. Cut down on mayo-I really love mayo but I am trying to eliminate it from my diet again 7. Eat salad at lunch 2 times this week-here we go with cutting bread entirely out of my diet again 8. No bread with dinner I think that is enough for this week, more than that will be hard to manage and remember over the week. In terms of my weight goal, I am going for being 162 solidly this week which would be about 1 lb this week. I bounced up to 163 after Friday but I'm pretty sure I will get down to 162 by the end of this week. Okay, off to work I go since it is now after 8 am.

Two down, four to go

Hah, two goals down already this week. I ran again this morning so that is one goal done. I lifted weights 4x this week so that is also done. Done is good to quote a famous saying from my college. Today, food is going to be a problem. There is a work function for lunch and I anticipate there being ridiculous amounts of food in the office. I am just going to try and be really careful because this is not something that I can skip. Normally I would cook for something like this, but I am not baking things right now because I don't want the temptation brought into my apartment. I think bringing chocolate into my house would be a really bad idea. I contributed monetarily instead to the lunch. Oddly enough when I start baking a lot, it is generally a sign that I am completely off plan and need to reign in my eating habits as quickly as possible. I wonder if there is a bakers anonymous program somewhere I could join (just kidding). So, lunch will be a problem and then there is another party this afternoon which will also be a problem. I shall get through it somehow I am sure of that fact. Anyway, I am off to court now.

The road to recovery

I feel better today, not 100 percent but better. Last night I felt very yucky so my weight workout at home was rather abbreviated, but the important thing is that I did actually lift weights. This morning I took it a little bit easy and ran very slowly at 5.2 mph (my normal speed is at least 5.5 mph). I was only going to run for 15 minutes but ended up feeling okay at the 15 minute mark so I ran for 25 minutes instead. I did five minutes of warm up and five minutes of cool down on the treadmill and then 25 minutes on the eliptical machine. Last night I did not think that I would be able to run three times this week, now I think I will probably make that goal by tomorrow which is my last running day. In comparison to the running, everything else has been easy to do this week. Mostly though, I am pleased with myself for sticking with the exercise this week, it would have been really easy to skip it based on how awful I felt. Even so I will be glad when this week is over and I can sleep in and rest up for next week.

Can you sense the theme?

In case you are wondering, the theme for this week on my blog is the following: Kat feels ill. Yup, day three of whining about feeling mildly sick is now commencing without delay. I actually took tylenol this morning before I went to the gym which is unusual for me since I only take medication as a very last resort (I never said I made intelligent decisions). Then after I sort of worked out, there was no running only a hour of not terribly hard eliptical work, I went to the store to see if I could get a thermometer and check my temperature. Nope, none to be had which is not surprising given the way shopping on this island works. Then I went to work and a cup of coffee and a bottle of water later I feel sort of functional. We will see how the day goes. I am still on plan, no slips on food which is probably solely due to the fact that I discovered that one of the supermarkets I frequent sell roasted chickens. This means I can eat chicken for dinner along with things like tomatoes and not really have to cook. This week that is really fabulous due to the fact by the end of the day I feel icky and almost totally non-functional. Oh, on the plus side, I am down to 162.5 on the scale today which indicates that I am pretty well on track since my goal for this week was to be 163. Okay, must go and find klennex now for my nose.

Dr. Kat's Wellness Prescription

This is the Kat method of dealing with a cold (I am thinking of patenting it someday). Feel horrible all day, so bad that you inform defense counsel that you may be out of the office sick in the next few days. Stay until 5 pm and then go run errands rather than going directly home and sleeping. Go home, read a magazine for 1.5 hours and then lift weights for 20 minutes. Somewhere in there have your one soda for the day due to the fact you feel like crap. Go to bed an hour later than normal for no good reason at all. Wake up at 4:40 am and reflect on the fact you still have a cold and breathing through your nose is not really working. Go to the gym. Remember on the way that one of your goals for the week is to run during three workouts. So, start out the morning running intervals on the treadmill. Do not do nice easy intervals due to feeling bad and the aforementioned cold. No, run at 6 mph for five minutes, walk 1 minute at 3.8 mph and repeat until you have run for a total of 25 minutes. Then cool down on the treadmill, wipe off any germs you got on it, and hop on the eliptical machine for another 25 minutes. This means with 10 minutes for warm up and cool down, total cardio time is 65 minutes. Then go shower, buy a latte and go to work (which will be air conditioned so you will have wet hair and freezing cold temperatures). Yeah, this was a really excellent plan for the morning. I think we should all be glad I am a lawyer and not a doctor, we will all live longer because of that fact.

I feel icky

I think I am coming down with a cold, I have all the initial signs, sore throat, headache, and a generally bad disposition. So, I went to the gym anyway this morning. I'm one of those people who will always go the gym unless I am really, really not feeling well. I am drinking a lot of water, although I don't think the large cup of coffee I just had qualifies as being helpful for a cold. Anyway, I have set new goals for this week which are as follows: 1. Only 1 soda a day (I only have three left in my fridge when they are gone there is no more soda coming into the house) 2. Four 16 ounce bottles of water a day (as opposed to just at work because I am not drinking enough water at home) 3. Bread 1x with dinner. 4. Coffee only in the morning. 5. Weights 4x a week. 6. Run 3x this week. I think that is enough for the week. I have an entire shelf in my fridge filled with water bottles. That's right people, an entire shelf of water. I had to reorganize my fridge to fit it all. On the plus side, I bought a dress this weekend which was size 10 and found another size 10 dress that I really liked but did not buy because it was rather expensive and not practical for work. Eventually I will have to get rid of my whole wardrobe again and drop down a size but I have about a month and a half minimum before that becomes an issue. Anyway, off to work I go again.

Scale games

Yesterday was a holiday here, so my gym was closed. So, no cardio because it was also raining all day long and I had no desire to go and run in torential rains. However, I did lift weights, thus completing one mini-goal, four days of weight (I also lifted on Wednesday). I had a wrap for dinner last night which is the first bread at dinner this week. I will make that mini-goal as well since I am only counting the week through Saturday (I start my workout week on Sunday so I count weeks from there). Other than yesterday, I have been drinking all my water, yesterday I was really lazy about it but I only had 1.5 sodas so that was okay. Oh, and I did run twice this week, once on Monday and once on wednesday. Anyway, I have also moved my scale in my apartment from my bedroom back to the bathroom. Now, this sounds like a small thing but my bedroom is carpeted and thus I weight two pounds less on the scale in there as opposed to the bathroom which is tile. As of this morning, my official weight is thus 164 lbs. Now, I moved the scale originally because I liked believing that I weighed two pounds less than I actually do in reality. If denial is a river in Egypt, I have been approaching a large lake in Africa for the last 9 months on actual weight loss reality. So, in the spirit of being actually focused on what I need to accomplish over the next 6-12 months I moved the scale back. This is the part that makes weight loss really difficult, the head games, if it was easy mentally we could all manage the physical part. Where people fail has way more to do mind tricks than food or exercise. So, the scale had to go back to the bathroom.

Earning it

Fergie from the music group the Black Eyed Peas said the coolest thing in a magazine (please I read everything, I already told you this fact). As I recall, what she said was "I believe you earn your self esteem and one way I earn mine is by working out." I read that and thought, yes that is it exactly. Actually, the whole interview was cool because it was a celebrity (in a position to really influence young woment) saying that she has to watch what she eats and work out to achieve the body she has right now, and if she does not eat right, hey she gains weight. I am completely stealing the above statement and using it from now on to explain why I work out. Part of my ability to look at myself in the mirror and be happy is the ability for me to say that I accomplished today what I set out to do. Working out is a huge part of that for me right now. This morning, I ran for 25 minutes and did another 30 minutes on the eliptical machine, I will lift weights at home tonight. I had no soda yesterday, or bread with dinner. So, one goal for the week is already done, two days of running under my belt. and so far so good on the increased water and less bread plan. Slowly but surely I am earning who I want to be, and that feels really good.

Small goals, day 2

I should note initially that I am doing just fine on the mini goals. Drank more that eight glasses of water yesterday and only the two alloted sodas (although I realized at some point yesterday that I was only drinking the soda because it was there, so I did not bring any soda to work today). I lifted weights last night, so that is two days of weight lifting done for the week. There was absolutely no bread with dinner yesterday and I think I even made the required 5 daily servings of fruits and vegetables. I did not run this morning, I am sore and tired so I took it easy and just did an hour on the eliptical and stretching. Tomorrow, I am going to run especially since tonight is a rest night from weight lifting so I should feel better. Overall, I feel one hundred times better than I did even a week ago, my skin is starting to clear up (thank you copious amounts of water), I have more energy and feel less befuddled generally.

Little Goals

I think in the interests of full disclosure I should make a confession, I spend my life reading random exercise advice. I have read magazine articles, books, online blogs, anything you can think of about diet and exercise. I read Dr. Phil's book, was not terribly helpful for me, I read the stuff by Oprah's trainer, I read a bunch of cookbooks, so on and so forth. So, this weekend I was at the bookstore, and I picked up the following book, G-Force by Gunnar Peterson. Now, I found it really useful, probably because his philosphy on exercise and mine match up, and also because I was looking to change my resistance workout and make it harder. I like a book where I can adopt an actual plan and lift weights at home because it means I can spend the hour at the gym doing cardio work. Oh, and today after using one of his suggested intermediate workouts, my rear is seriously sore. Many squats and lunges on sunday night were probably the culprit, plus I hate lunges so I avoid them usually. In other news (I suddenly feel like a bad evening news anchor, you know with the immobile hair) I am adding mini-goals to every week to get back to being fully on plan. This week, my goals are as follows:

1. Drink more water and only 2 diet sodas a day

(Long term plan is to once again elimintate soda from my diet).

2. Bread at dinner only 3 times this week

( I have been eating way too much bread and not enough

fruit and veg, this is my first step towards fixing that problem).

3.Lift weights 4 times this week at home

(Arms with definition, this is my ultimate goal)

4. Run at the gym twice this week

(I am working on not just meandering along on the eliptical anymore)

There you are, my goals for this week. So far, I have lifted weights once, run once (this am), and eaten one dinner without bread. Oh, and I have not had any soda today and I just drank a bottle of water, .5L plus I drank a bottle of water while working out. So, far so good, now let me see how the week goes along.

Gym Phenomenon.

Err, yeah. It is friday therefore I am suffering from brain overuse and have nothing to say really about life. I will tell you this, I saw the most interesting phenomenon at the gym today, people drinking coffee while working out. I understand drinking coffee before working out, even drinking coffee immediately after working out, but while working out? Frankly I was rather boggled by it until I realized that one of the two individuals was not really working out hard , rather she was on what appeared to be a very leisurely stroll on the treadmill. In other news, I am starting to get past the whole sugar craving thing, I have now walked past the cinnamon rolls in the office 4 or 5 times without really thinking about it. The place where I do not want to eat sugar all the time is a beautiful location that I have not visited in months. I like it, I'm thinking of hanging out here for awhile.

You should work here

Somedays I really love my office. Now it is not just because the secretaries harass me and make me answer phones, or the fact that we have an amazing ability to amuse each other. No, it is for days like today when one co-worker brought in bannanas from her tree and another co-worker brought in home grown avocados. Only my two most favorite fruits in one day. I think if you have read the archives this would be abundantly obvious. Oh, and home grown avocados are a really good thing, trust me on this one fact. Normally, I have an office environment filled with every processed food imaginable but today is not that day. Now, if I could just convince the powers that be to put a treadmill somewhere in the building so I could jog during my lunch hour for stress relief purposes (I'm way too lazy to go back to the gym after I have been there once already), I would be totally set. I think they are going to put in a lunch room instead, sigh. Still, avocados and bannanas in one day, now that is a good day.

Beating a Dead Horse

I am still thinking about this whole "it isn't about the weight thing", probably because of the comment on the last post (which is lovely and thank you). I think however, it is important to me that it is not about the weight loss because of the following thing. Yes, I am completely re-hashing already covered ground, I am a lawyer and this is what I do in my regular life. Ultimately, I don't think it can be about the weight loss because that is not enough motivation (for me) to maintain the loss. More and more I am thinking about maintainance as a long term goal and the more I think about it, the less it can be about what I weigh on the scale. I do not go to the gym every day during the week at the horrific hour of 5 am because all I can think about is losing weight, I go because I feel better when I walk out of there at 6:30 in the morning. I am not tense, my body is awake enough to go to work, and I feel more focused. I don't watch what I eat just because I am trying to lose weight, when I eat crap I feel like crap. That is what it has to be about long term, because at 60 I don't want to be obsessed about what I weigh, I want to be able to hike through the alps or wander around Paris all day without my body completely betraying me. Heck, I just want to reach 60 without getting diabetes or having a heart attack. So, yeah I am beating a dead horse on this issue, but trust me, in the long run it cannot be about the weight, it has to be about the life.

The deals I make

Yesterday, after I realized that I would not be running around like a little stress ball today I promised myself I would do a harder cardio workout this morning. It was an admittedly odd little deal to make with my own brain but I went with it. This morning I ran for about 25 minutes at 5.4 miles per hour, walked for another 10 (warm up and cool down from running) and did 25 minutes on the eliptical machine. I am fairly certain that qualifies as harder cardio than I have managed since I pulled the muscles in my leg doing jumping jacks. I also lifted some weights before I had to run out of the gym and go to the store to pick up non fat soy milk for my morning cereal. In other news, I have been rereading my old archives from more than a year ago. Personally, I date my weight loss efforts to January of 2004 but I only started blogging in May of 2004. It is a little humbling to be reminded of where I was back then and where I am right now. I worked out harder a year ago, but I ate about the same, and I was much, much unhappier than I am now. I hate to be one of those people who points at weightloss and says "see how this makes your life better" because frankly I do not believe it. It just made parts of my life different, but then again so did getting my job which I have had for almost a year, and my cat, and half a dozen other things. Still, losing weight made me more comfortable in my own skin and I am grateful for that fact. It is the little things, like not worrying about what the people at the gym think when I show up in the morning, not losing my breath when I climb up a flight of stairs, shopping in normal sized people shops, and all the myriad little things that should not be a big deal but are in my life. I figure with all of that and good shoes I am pretty much content.

Then God said Ha

Well, actually the court said hah. So, my trial just got pushed for probably 3-4 months at a minimum. The sad thing is, I have three or four more lined up in a row so it is more like whose next rather than anything else. I think it is going to take a good three or four days before the tension from the last two weeks really leaves my body. Now at least I can push some paperwork through that I have been putting off and finish getting organized. Well, sort of organized only not really. Oh, and seriously people I now need a nap. I'm just saying.

My body is weird

My body has gone insane, at least this is what I have decided. Yesterday, I stepped on the scale in the middle of the day in an attempt to grab my cat who was playing in my shoes (my scale is next to my closet so this is not as odd as it sounds) and I weighed in at 164. After eating breakfast and having a huge cup of coffee. I decided that this clearly could not be right and could be accounted for by the fact that I was simultaneously reaching for a small furry beast and thus all my weight was not on the scale. So, I tried it again once I had dealt with the cat and nope it was right the first time, 164. So, I think I am not eating enough, I don't have time to worry about it this week but this coming weekend I am really going to have to look at what I am eating and adjust my food choices. This is actually a good sign for me, because it means I am eating pretty clean in terms of food (i.e. minimal amounts of really processed food) and just need to adjust upward. If there is one thing I have learned over the last year and a half, when I am eating really healthy food it is hard for me to hit the correct calorie amount. I almost always end up below where I should be in terms of calories. I aim for 1,500 but have a bad tendency of ending up at 1,200 which is less than I should be eating given my activity level. However, this week is probably going to be pretty hellish, I do not know a single lawyer who doesn't lose weight from going to trial and the associated stress level and so I am not worrying about it until the weekend. I will reevaluate on Saturday when I go and do my weekly grocery shopping and come up with a plan when I have some brain space to spare. Oh and in a side note I do feel it is important to point out the following to my brother, "Dude, you are really old now, Happy Birthday!" (On the off chance I forget on July 12 which is the start date of my trial and his actual birthday).

I'm at work on Saturday. Yes, I reall am that anal and I have a felony trial next week. So, I am at work because it is easier to get things done here than at home and I have internet access. Clearly this is why I am typing on my blog rather than doing actual work. Thank you everyone for the lovely birthday wishes, in the end I went out for a few drinks with my coworkers and then went home to bed. It was pretty much how I wanted to spend my birthday, a few extra calories in the drinks and I had some peanuts and a little bit of bannana bread but overall no major overeating and no cake. Today, I am not working out and already my one leg feels better than yesterday. I am a big believer in rest days to let your body recover from working out and heal itself. It is part of my whole theory that if I am going to do this for the rest of my life I should not do something really detrimental that prevents that from being a possibility. Anyway, back to work I go now.

Happy B-day to me

So, today is my 28th birthday. I have sneakily managed to keep this fact quiet at work, which prevents all sorts of things such as cake, b-day lunch, and other dietary problems from happening to me. Of course, I ate my lunch at 11 am which may lead to afternoon snacking but I will try to prevent that from happening to me. I am going to trial next week which is the only reason that I am currently at work, otherwise I would have taken the day off. I might go buy myself a work shirt and shoes for my birthday tonight, especially since I am planning on coming into the office tomorrow to do prep work. I am still doing fine on my diet and decent on my exercise since I still have a sore left calf from last weekend. Tommorow is my day off from exercise and I will probably do something light on Sunday like just lifting weights. 166.5 today on the scale which means I am begining to equalize in terms of the initial week of weightloss on plan which is comforting in an odd way. I was going to write a more interesting post than this, but it will have to wait until I am not doing trial prep like mad.

Oh will you look at that

The amazing thing is, if you watch what you eat and work out, you will lose weight. The minute I started really watching my food intake at work, my weight dropped. Today, I hit 167 which is a little freaky (we could argue about how often you should weigh yourself, but weighing myself a lot has worked in the past so it is what I am going with again) but I assure you I had enough to eat yesterday. I had a small sandwhich at lunch and then I went out for a salad with a co-worker (did not know I was going out to eat at the time I had the sandwhich) and then a small dinner to make up for the large lunch. I know a lot of this initial drop is probably water weight and I expect everything to equalize in the next week. However, it is impressive the change that I can make by not stuffing my face at work. Yesterday, someone brought a cake in, which I managed to avoid and really the only deviation was the salad and a large latte with equal and cinnamon. The restriction on food has also been good for me because I did a lot of jumping jacks on monday and my legs have been sore ever since, thus workout have not been particularly hard at the gym. I have still been working out but not able to muster much enthusiasm for the process. I have managed to lift weights three days this week though and do a lot of sit ups which is an improvement. Once again, I am forced to acknowledge that when I can actually get everything on plan, I do much better than only being partially on plan. I may not be smart about it all the time, but I am learning.

Addiction

Yesterday was entirely on plan in terms of eating. Stuned? Yes, me too. However, I probably should have eaten a little more because I think I ended up at below 1200 calories, which is way less than the 1500 calories I should probably be eating. Then again, after the last few months a week of 1200 calorie days would not be a bad thing. That is what I am going for this week, a strict no cheats week of on plan food eating. When I am on plan, whatever the plan is, it takes at least a week for it to not be a struggle and a month for it to be easy. I have come to think of my relationship with food as a sort of addiction, I have been overweight probably since I was five years old. I spent about 22 years eating for all sorts of reasons: because it tasted good, because I was bored, because I was happy/sad/depressed, as a social activity, and probably just because I could do it. I still have problems determining when I am really hungry as opposed to wanting food for a different reason. Still, I am making progress and at 28 to be around 168.5 lbs (as of this morning) as opposed to 250 lbs is tremendous progress for me. Still, I have been struggling with food for awhile now and what I need to do for myself is make it easy, no excuses, and no deviations. I made it through yesterday and I can make it through today and right now that is all I am focusing on, a single day, hour, and minute at a time.

Plan what Plan

So this is the realization that I have come to people, at some point you have to stop saying you are actually back on plan and really get on plan. Possibly the fact that I am turning 28 on Friday brought this realization to me, or it could be that I ate entirely too much last Friday during the day and then skipped dinner (not a good method for compensating). Anyway, I know what my problem is in a single word "work". I snack at work on bad things and that must stop. Frankly, what I eat on the weekends is just fine but I am killing any weight loss durring the rest of the week. So here we go again, with a new date in mind, October 17, 2005. Why October 17, you ask, because I may be flying back to the U.S. then and I would like to be down a size or so for when I buy new clothing. Oh, and for the nice poster who asked if I was at goal weight yet, um no, as the above probably indicates, but I keep aiming for it. Oh and I don't expect to have lost all the weight I have to lose by August, frankly I am just aiming for 15-20 pounds which given my life recently seems reasonable.

The wonders of the DMV

Yesterday I spent two hours at that specialized circle of hell that we like to call the DMV. Well, to be precise it was more like an hour and a half because I had to drive to the Social Security office in order to prove to the DMV that my social security number is really my social security number. Now, mind you, I had three forms of ID, including a passport, a driver's license from my former state, and a local government id, two of which had my social security number on them. This however was not good enough so I went to the social security office to get a computer printout which said I really was not making up my social security number. Anyway, I eventually pried a new drivers license away from the DMV with a new photo. I looked at the photo and this was my precise thought pattern "Who is that? She's cute, well except for the extra chin". Seriously people, I looked like a normal person in the photo. Then I compared it to my id from law school and seriously I looked like my own sister. So, thank you DMV for putting somethings in perspective, but seriously people I am not going back there until dragged by my hair.

5.5 MPH

I am a little loopy today, that may be due to the fact it is only 8 am and I have already had a large cup of coffee and a diet pepsi which happens to be caffinated. I did discover this morning that running at 5.5 mph is not hard, which means I have been running too slowly for at least the last week. I am cutting myself slack on the running before that since I had to ease into it (or at least that is what I am telling myself). I am really focusing on my conditioning right now, rather than anything else, I want it to be about being healthy and not being a certain size. If I am a size 12 for the next year or rest of my life so be it, as long as I am a really fit and healthy size 12. Would I rather be a size 10 or 8 or 6, yes, but I won't get there by obsessing about it. So, I am working on the exercise this week and soon I will start working on the diet thing and we will just have to see what happens over the next few weeks and months.

It is all about the diet

One of the nice things about working out at 5 am is that the gym is pretty empty. Not today, it was completely packed because it was raining outside and one of the aerobics classes was cancelled. Ugh, it meant that I did an hour on the eliptical machine because there were no other free machines. It was still a decent workout and probably good for my body to work out on another machine. More and more, I am having to acknowledge that my workouts either need to become really intense or I need to once again adjust my eating habits. I will probably go with the later option with maybe one day a week where I cheat a little bit, but I have to tell you it is no fun to be getting back on the wagon in terms of eating. This weekend I am going to sit down and workup a meal plan for the next week and then starting on Monday I am going to stick to the eating plan religiously. I know what works for me, I just have to do it. So, here we go again for the 10th or 11th time.

Progress

So, progress is clearly something that happens to other people. Oddly, for the most part I am okay with that right now. I am still working out hard, I am increasing my running speed on the treadmill (my goal right now is to get up to 6 miles an hour as a speed) I did about four minutes at 5.5 mph as opposed to 5.2 mph. Tomorrow I am aiming for 10 minutes at 5.5 mph. I still have food issues, heck I am always going to have food issues, but I am trying to focus on generally being healthy and making small changes. As an example, I really like things like Mocha Coffees when I go to coffee shops (which I do sometimes before work) but I have switched over to just ordering regular coffee. I am eating more salads at home and after being forced to admit that we have horrible produce here and I am incredibly lazy in terms of food preparation, I am buying frozen peas and corn for meals (good for you and can just be thrown in a pot of boiling water). This is progress, and I am focusing more on healthy lifestyle and less on being a certain weight than I did in the past and that is a good thing. Everything else will come in time, for the first time I have faith in that fact.

Drowning

You should see me on the stair master, people, really you should. You would seriously laugh until you fell down and then laugh even harder. I look like a drowning person only without the water or fear of an immediate death. I grab on to the stair master rails, I breath heavily, my eyes roll around in their sockets and occasionally cross, and mentally I am counting the number of seconds until it gets easier. That is a lot of seconds let me tell you. Today, I .Almost.Died. on the stairmaster, no really (yes I am being a tad bit dramatic), then I staggered over to the treadmill and ran for 25 minutes. Now, I would like a nap but I sense that is not going to happen until after work. Plus, you probably do not get to take naps when you just showed up at work and have only been at your desk for an hour. This reminds me that I should now go do actual work rather than ramble on about the horror that is my early morning cardio workout. Oh and one more day and I will have run everyday this week, and that is a miracle given that I did not want to run this morning in any way (see above stair master discussion) but I did and at least it is a start to being back on track.

I woke up in the middle of the night to discover that I had two problems: a. A horrible backache and general feeling of ill health b. A small cat attacking my feet and head The first problem I solved with pain medication, unfortunately the second one did not get bored for a good 30 minutes. The result, I am remarkably sleepy today and in need of a good back massage. However, I still went to the gym and put in an obligatory hour of cardio. Actually, my run was really good, I managed to up it to 25 minutes mostly because it felt effortless. Now, that means that I will not have another good run for a long time because this is how my body works. My goal this week is pretty simple, I just want to run everyday for at least fifteen minutes. So far, I am managing to run for about 20 minutes everyday in addition to another 30 minutes on the stairmaster and 10 minutes warmup and cool down. My weight has not budged so I am refusing to pay any attention to the scale for a couple of weeks or I will make myself crazy. Anyway, I have to run and prepare for grand jury and walk the four blocks to court now.

In which I come up with ways to destroy the stair master

I may not entirely be on a roll with food but in terms of exercise, well the intensity is finally back people. I have discovered that if I spend thirty minutes on the stair master (which I loathe, oh let me count the ways that I hate it) it makes me really short of breath and I sweat like a pig. Both good things if you are trying to work out hard, then I take a five minute breather where I walk slowly on the treadmill and then begin to run or waddle (it looks pretty much the same) for about twenty minutes. Then I do a five minute cool down walk. Somedays, I am following this up with weight lifting for 10-20 minutes, somedays not, it sort of depends. I try to lift weights at least three days a week and I am also trying to use hand weights one day a week on the stair master, which yes, makes me hate it even more. However, I finally feel like I am really actually exercising again rather than just going through the motions. I am also doing better on food, just need to cut back on excess snacks and stick to the actual plan. Yeah, I'm not holding my breath on that one either, I am however working on it as best that I can each day. We will see what happens.

Noon is too early to think about dinner

Seriously, I just came up with 4 different ways to not eat dinner tonight. This seems odd when I have spinach for salad, salmon, a small number of croutons, and half of an avocado sitting in my refridgerator. In otherwords, dinner in under 10 minutes, and given the main reason I was not going to eat dinner was because of the length of time it takes to prepare food I think that we now have good evidence of my pending insanity. I do have to go to the store again today to buy cereal, soy milk, salad dressing, batteries (yes I know they are not edible), coffee and fruit. This makes me wonder what I spent all that money on at the store this weekend and the answer appears to be, soup for lunch, salmon, diet soda, and cat food. Oh, and I bought eggs so that I could make egg white omelets and hard boil eggs (although as we all know I really suck at hardboiling eggs). How I can cook and not be able to boil eggs in a pan with water I cannot explain. So, now that I have sorted out dinner, I just need to check my finances and see how much I can spend at the grocery store. I am poor what can I say, oh and I should probably do some work.

Tempted

So, my mom just sent me this invitation from my highschool. A reminder that my high school reunion is this November. Now, I hated high school, I hated everything about the entire experience. But I am tempted, because if I really worked my rear off and put in a lot of workouts like this morning (where I seriously wanted to pass out, no seriously) I could probably lose 20-30 pounds by then and blow some people away. Now, why I would want to blow the minds of people that I hated and who ignored me because I was one of the fat kids, I do not know. Still, I am oddly tempted by the whole thought. However, I probably will not go both due to the monetary expense of flying there and secondly because I really don't actually want to talk to anyone in my highschool class. Still, I think I have this persistant fantasy about the idea of showing up both really skinny and doing fabulously professionally. I kind of have the fabulous professional thing down, now I just need to work on the skinny thing.

Posting two days in a row, now there is a miracle for you. If you need to take a moment to adjust to the shock I would completely understand. In the spirit of new beginings, I should say that my food was horrible yesterday. I am trying again today to see if I can do better. I have my diet coke next to me and I am pretending that the snack area does not exist, we will see how it goes. I figure I burned about 500 calories at the gym this morning which I am attempting to not sabotage with large amounts of sugar. I have a pretty jam packed day at work ahead of me which you would think would make it more difficult to shove copious amounts of chocolate in my mouth, then again you might be wrong. I'm working tomorrow as well even though it is the weekend and that might actually be a good thing because when I work on the weekends I eat less (very strange phenomenon). Maybe I will actually manage to post tomorrow and let you know what happens with my will power today.

Today, tomorrow, and the next day

I'm really not good at the frequent posting thing right now. I think I am managing to post once a month, so I cannot imagine anyone is reading anymore, however this is more for my own edification than anything else so I shall now ramble on at length about nothing in particular (I am a lawyer after all it is what I do). I am still working out every morning during the week for between an hour and an hour and twenty minutes. I am working on increasing my intenstity level and that means much as I hate it, I am going to have to start running again everyday. Not today though because I am exhausted, I was paged at 2 am in the morning yesterday by the police department who had an urgent legal question and then I never really got back to sleep again. For the record, I am not certain I give out the best legal advice at 2 am in the morning but I tried my best. Of course, then I got up a little before five am and so I estimate I got maybe 5 hours of sleep at most last night. I do not enjoy working out on five hours of sleep, my body is too tired to really do anything useful or productive. On the plus side, I still worked out which several years ago I would never have done. Also, I have begun to notice an interesting phenomenon as I work out. I may not be losing very much weight right now but I am way better shape than I used to be in the past. Now, it is no big deal to work out for 30 minutes on the eliptical and then run for 20 minutes on the treadmill or use the stair master. I don't pant going up and down stairs anymore and I definatively have leg muscles which is strange for me. Am I struggling with the whole weightloss thing right now, oh yes, you bet your sweet bippy I am having problems with it. That however, does not mean that I stop trying to lose weight. Also, I am forced to admit other than indiscretions with food at work, my diet is pretty different. I only drink soy milk, diet soda (yeah we could have a discussion about asparatame and its problems but I grew up on diet coke and right now I need it in my diet for my own sanity), water, and coffee (mostly on weekends). I have soy milk in my bowl of cereal in the morning and I now eat breakfast everyday. Lunch is pretty much lean cuisine right now, because it is easy and low calorie. Dinner, well I have salads sometime or cereal if I am completely exhausted or some kind of dish with rice and protien in it. Oh yes, I only have brown rice in my house no more white rice. Only whole wheat pasta, minimal amounts of bread, and I realized the other day that I have not had cheese in my house in months. Perfection, no, better than in past years, yes. Admittedly, I still struggle with having a lot of my waking hours consumed with thoughts about food and eating but I am working on it. I read someone at one point, can't remember who, that said something like (don't you love my specificity) "I work every day and every year on eating better, I eat better now than I did last year and I will eat better today than I did yesterday." That I think is what I am aiming for here, that I eat healthier today than I did yesterday, that I work out harder and more effectively today than I did yesterday, and ultimately I am physically and emotionally healthier today, tomorrow, and in the future than I was last year, yesterday or the day before. In the end, everything else is just fluff.

Whence our heroine attempts to get back on track

Yeah, so things have not been going as swimmingly on the diet or exercise front as one might have hoped. Okay, let me rephrase, I am doing just fine on the exercise front (with the exception of needing to lift more weights) but not so good on the food front. Basically, I work in a high stress environment and I tend to overeat when stressed and I work with people who are always bringing good food into the office and feeding me. I think really they swing between feeding me and attempting to marry me off to any single men that they can find. Anyway, I am trying and so far today I am doing pretty well which is all that you can ask from any one day. Tomorrow may be an entirely different story but today I am doing okay. Oh, and I look rather cute which is never a bad thing. Anyway, back to work I go for a few more hours.

It's been a long time baby

I assume at this point I am pretty much writing to myself because I have been gone for so long. My office moved, I lost all access to e-mail/internet for the last two months and I am working 10 hour days plus another 8 or so hours every weekend from home. In good news, I have gone back to the gym on a full time basis which means I am getting in at least an hour of cardio five days a week and I am finally recovering from some old injuries. Now, going back to the gym means I have to get up at between 4 and 4:30 am every morning to get there and workout from about 5:15 am to 6:15 am. Then a mad leap in the shower and I get dressed so I can make it to work by 7 am and then I work straight from 7 am to 5 pm with little or no break. It is a good thing that I love what I do for a living most of the time or I would be going insane with stress (okay, actually I am pretty close on that one). I am working on the food thing, I have always been a stress eater and that has been manifesting itself recently. However, I keep moving and working out which is more than I have managed in the past. I'm hoping to get internet at home some point so I can really start posting more regularly but it may take a little while. Anyway, I actually have to get back to doing work for the office now but I will try to get a chance to post again tomorrow.

Generalized Chaos

I'm going to be gone for awhile. My entire office is moving on wednesday and right now there are moving boxes everywhere and people running around like mad. I am going to lose internet access starting on wednesday until we get settled into a new office and that may be awhile. So, I won't be posting but I will try and be good while I am gone. On another note, lets not discuss the weekend and move on with life. My friend set the jungle trail on Saturday which caused me to (a) get a mild concusion from jumping off a waterfall and hitting the bottom (there was no path other than jumping off the waterfall and frankly I am just lucky that my rear hit the ground first and my head second or it would have been bad), (b) I got yelled at when I informed her that the marks on her trail had disappeared which was why I got in after dark along with three other people, she basically claimed I was making it up and (c) I spent all sunday sleeping to recover from the pounding headache I woke up with although all I had drunk the night before was water and a soda when they ran out of water at the bonfire after the run. So, in other words, nothing got painted although I did run a line of caulk around my tub and bathroom sink. I did not even make it to the store to buy paint and that means it is one more project that I may or may not have time for this week. So, frankly I am a little annoyed right now which is not helped by the fact that I have to be in court in a few minutes.

Oh look, I'm at K-Mart again

I make a mean onion and garlic soup, I just have to tell you. Anyway, last night went well although I was still running around in the kitchen like a chicken with my head cut off when my friends arrived. However, they have met me before so I don't think that it was really a surprise that I was a little bit disorganized. Today, the rest of the chocolate cake came to work and I in a moment of complete insanity picked myself up a piece to eat with lunch. Three bites in and I remembered that cake was definately not on my diet so into the trash it went and out of my office as fast as humanly possible. At least tonight I am going running and climbing around with a bunch of my friends which should help burn off some calories. Oh, and I am going to paint my apartment which has to qualify as a workout on some level. I am think it will mostly end up being gold and green because that goes with the small amounts of furniture that I currently own. I am slowly working on organizing my life but I just wish it did not involve daily and repeated trips to K-Mart to pick up what I forgot to buy previously because after awhile wandering around K-Mart gets pretty old and you need to get a life.

I'll have my cake and avoid it to

One of my friends turns 27 on friday (yes N. that officially makes you old like me), so tonight I am having him over for dinner along with his girlfriend and another friend. He loves chocolate so I am making him a chocolate devils food cake (the cake is made, just has to be iced) and onion cream soup and pasta. It is not in other words, a diet friendly meal but my plan is to eat in moderation and avoid the cake completely. If it is not friendship to make someone a cake that you are not going to eat and keep it in your refridgerator for multiple hours when you really love chocolate, I don't know what is at this point. I have all sorts of things in my apartment right now that normally I would avoid like the plague, including sugar, chocolate, cream, and butter. Still, this is part of my plan, eat everything in moderation and balance out heavy days with light ones. If I have to live like this for the rest of my life, I need to make peace with all different types of food. However, everything I do not normally eat will be out of my house by tomorrow evening at the latest which is also a sneaky trick to avoid eating it after today. Anyway, back to work and then I have to run to the store and run home quickly after work so that I can start cooking everything.

Daily update

Last night, I lifted weights, did some core fitness exercises, and practiced falling down (which as far as I can determine is an important part of aikido). What my neighbors below me think that I am doing in my spare bedroom at 9:00 pm at night, I do not really want to know at this point. I was decent on food and I got a nice walk in because my car refused to start (it has a bad battery which is currently being replaced) and I had to walk home from the mall. I also had to walk to the mall this morning to jumpstart my car and drive it to the dealership. Extraneous exercise is never a bad thing in my book. Tonight is aikido practice baring unforseen problems preventing me from making it to class. Thursday night there is a hash run and hopefully by tomorrow, I will have my car and be able to start going to the gym on a more regular basis. Food has been decent and will get better the more that I get back on track. Now, I just have to work on furnishing my apartment which I think will also help my mental state and cleaning up my office.

Finding my groove again

In case you missed it, I have been in and out of here posting only infrequently. Now, I could totally blame this on work, which has been insane for quite awhile. However, in fairness, I must say that it is because I have not been eating or working out the way that I should work out. Oh, I am the queen of the maintainers, bouncing around between 160 and 158 for at least two solid months, but when you are 5'2" that is not a healthy weight to be maintaining at for any length of time. Still, I am finally back, the drive is finally back. Partially, because I have a car which is making me much more mobile (although not at this precise moment because the battery died this morning and I will be having that fixed tomorrow) and partially because it is time to get my behind in gear. I realized this on the weekend as I was hiking up a mountain on the hash run and having to stop because I was out of breath, not acceptable. I could pontificate and explain by saying that I was 45 minutes into an hour and a half run which was basically all uphill but no, I just felt out of shape. I have been slowly losing my endurance and strength over the last few months because I have been doing less exercise and making more excuses. This weekend I bought a stability ball, weights, and last night I turned my spare bedroom into a weight room for the nights I do not make it to the gym. Once my car troubles are sorted out, I am going back to my old plan where I get up at 6 am and go to the gym on my way to work. This coming month I am going to start picking up an extra night of aikido and going on tuesdays and thursdays. I am going back to a stricter diet but something I can live with, which means more salads and less eating out. Basically, I am going to kick my own rear into shape and it is about time. Oh, and I am going to post every day during the week to keep myself accountable. The really anal exercise and diet girl is back people, and this time the inner fat girl is getting a little bit nervous.

Working girl

Wow, I haven't posted for a really long time again. I have no real excuse other than the fact I only have internet at work and this is the first morning in forever that I have sat down at my computer for longer than ten seconds. I have been spending between six and eight hours everyday in court and then going home and falling asleep. Trust me, today will be very similar it is just that my court schedule is starting a little bit later that normal. I am exhausted and stressed but I was amused to discover the other day that my big food indulgence appears to be whole wheat pasta and 98% fat free cream of mushroom soup. In the old days it would have involved tons of cheese but lately I have been way more interested in putting tobasco into items. I go through food phases and now I seem to be into the spicy/salty food phase as opposed to the sweet food phase. Anyway, I am still maintaining and given the last couple of weeks that is a pretty big miracle right now. I have to get back to work but if I am lucky I will get a little time later to post (but if I disappear for a week again it will be due to the hectic nature of work right now).

The scary bug dance

Last night I had some friends over for dinner (by the way, you know you have good friends when they show up for dinner at an apartment with no furniture, poor lighting and a hard tile floor that they have to sit on for two hours). Anyway, it was rather warm and I opened up the door to my porch, and at some point a large bug made his way inside. I discovered this as I was cleaning up at which point I screamed like a girl and did the little dance around the apartment which can only be referred to as the scary bug dance. You know, the one where you lift up your feet, wave your arms around and hop up and down in the hopes that it will somehow make the ooky bug magically disappear into thin air. Needless to say, it never works and then you have to kill the bug anyway which is the problem with living alone, no one else is around to help. Anyway, I managed to kill the bug and was left wondering an odd question, do men do the scary bug dance? Alternatively, what does it sound like to scream like a boy? I am not sure but there we are, dancing around apartments killing bugs. By the way, I fit in a short walk today and tonight I am going to aikido so I am actually managing to get workouts in which is nice. I am working on the healthy food thing as well, I think tonight I am going to have a big salad and maybe the same thing tomorrow since I have tons of lettuce, onion and roasted red pepper left over from last night.

Coffee in the morning

It has been awhile I know, I find it hard to update while I am at work and I do not have internet at home right now. Anyway, I am really organized this morning, probably because I had coffee and that tends make me bounce off walls and get a lot done. This is probably a sign that my body does not tolerate caffeine very well and that I should not drink very many items which include it. I learned this lesson a long time ago so I rarely have anything which is not decaffinated. However, I slept really badly yesterday and today is going to be a long day so it is sort of a necessity (waking up at one am and falling back to sleep at 3 plus being in court for over five hours straight is not going to be a good combination). Fortunately, it is almost the weekend, I get to sleep in tomorrow although I am getting up early on Sunday to dive. It is my last day of training for diver certification since I have passed the written test (98%, highest grade in my class which only proves I am a nerd) and done the first few dives. The weekend will probably be crazy with activities, and trying to find everything from furniture to hunting for cars. I am still stable in terms of weight and slowly inching down the more I control my own food and the less that I eat out. So, life is good, just busy which reminds me that I have to go to court now.

Reflections

I think that perhaps when you are really overweight you end up conditioning yourself to certain things in life, to certain ways of interacting socially among other things. I know, I am being rather oblique and circumspect in my wording. Anyway, I will just say that I have been used to being alone, just me, and I am adjusting to not being alone and it is interesting. You could call it another door opened by my weight loss and life changes over the last year. Things happen for a reason, and in a particular order sometimes and I am just struck with surprise by this particular life change. Anyways, to be slight less confusing, he's a nice boy mom and you would like him. Great now moving on to weight loss, I am still slowly losing weight since I moved and get to pick my own food out. Last night I went to aikido and sweated a lot, more than usual because the room was really hot. Tonight, I have to do laundry and clean up my apartment a bit, oh and some of my friends may be dropping off furniture and other items for me. After that it will probably be an early night because I am going out tomorrow night with a bunch of my girlfriends for drinks and dinner.

Blame it on the internet

I have been without internet for a couple of days at work, most of yesterday and today and I have no internet at home, hence the late post. Anyway, tonight I am headed off to aikido to work out for an hour and a half which will be good for me. Last night I begged out of going to dinner because money is tight since I moved and I did not want to go all the way to the restaurant everyone had chosen. Moving has definately been good for me in terms of weight loss, I have seen a distinct downward trend which was probably increased by the fact I have not been eating out as much over the past few days. I should note that by downward trend I mean that I suddenly lost four pounds which was rather disturbing but I think is a result of the fact that my eating is begining to be more normal than it has been in awhile. I would like to finally get back and track and start making real progress so hopefully I will manage that soon.

So, I am basically moved into my new place now, although currently that means I have my clothing, some towels and an air mattress in the apartment. I have to go food shopping at lunch since I have no food really in the apartment and I need cereal for breakfast. Besides, I may actually want to eat dinner in my apartment at some point and that would require food (although not tonight because I am going out to dinner). Anyway, as to the weekend, the run on saturday was pretty disappointing, very short and mostly pavement but at least yesterday we got in a pretty good frisbee game. Then after sushi I went home and slipped on something and banged my head and side. So, now I have a nasty bruise on my thigh, one on my rear and a banged head. Oh, and I also ran into one of the walls in my apartment because the light is not working in the living room. So, basically I managed to injure myself in a completely empty apartment but not at all while running around in a jungle populated with tin cans and various other types of rubbish, not to mention vines which constantly trip you up. Anyway, back to work I go, especially since I have to be in court soon.

Somedays I know I am related to my mother

I am not perhaps the most organized person in the world, nor the most obsessive about it and I am certainly not nearly as organized as my mother. She has lists with things that she needs to do in them and calenders and everything. I know it's crazy right. Anyway, whenever I have a really organized day it is generally a sign that I am behaving exactly like my mother. Today, is one of those days. I think I have sent out 10 plea offers, cleaned my desk, interviewed a witness, and figured out my weekend schedule, all of that accomplished from 11 am until now. Tomorrow I am moving so I will have no internet (well that and I have not connected internet to my apartment) and I expect to spend the weekend cleaning and organizing (possibly interspersed with a tropical storm which is headed in our direction. Tonight, I will need to finish packing up my stuff, I packed a lot of my clothing yesterday and get prepared to move. Tomorrow I will be running around the jungle after I move so hopefully everything will get accomplished quickly and efficiently. Anyway, I have to run (one of the side effects of being like my mother is having no free time).

Again I am just rambling

So, I am officially moving this weekend (pending a walk through of my new apartment with the power actually on rather than disconnected). I expect that I will move on Saturday morning and take the weekend to settle into the space while I do necessary things like cleaning the stove and the rest of the apartment. My power and phone will be connected by Friday (it pays to have a very organized real estate agent) and that will leave me with moving in all of my stuff. One of my friends who has a truck is going to help move all my stuff from my current apartment to my new apartment which should only really end up being one trip. I think I will be going with minimal furniture for a little while until I figure out what I actually want to put into the space. In other news, the diet did not go so swimmingly yesterday, but today is a new day and I am back on track (not to mention that moving is going to really help with the diet since I will be eating out less than I have been since moving in with my roommates).

What I should be doing

I should be doing actual work right now, but clearly I am not doing anything of the sort. For the record, I have written up two plea offers this morning, scheduled three grands for tomorrow morning and I am about to move on to a stack of 10 cases which all need plea offers. Oh, and I have a sneaking sensation that I am forgetting a number of things that I need to be doing today, and I have to spend all afternoon in court. I am pretty tired this week, of course that could be just left over from the fact that I had a really hard workout yesterday in aikido. I am now decently good at not actually hitting people with a wooden stick and still not at all good at anything else. Anyway, I have to get back to work, maybe I will have some free time to post later on today but I will have to see how the rest of my morning pans out.

Rambling yet again

So, I am meeting my real estate agent in thirty minutes to hopefully sort out apartment stuff. I think we are going to do a final walk through of the place with the power on to see what is working and what is not working. Oh, and we are going out to lunch as well which should be fun. I am pretty tired, just a ton of work to get done this morning and the afternoon does not look any better at this point. This week is already shaping up to be incredibly busy, aikido tonight and then dinner at a friend's house, all of the hash women are getting together tomorrow night, thursday night we are going out and by Friday I will probably just want to colapse. If I am really lucky, for extra special fun I may be moving this weekend if I get the apartment and that will just add to the lack of free time. I was going to go to the gym at noon today but now I have to meet my real estate agent so aikido is going to have to suffice as my exercise today. Fortunately it is usually a pretty good workout. I will probably be exhausted by the time I get there but I always have fun which is a good thing.

Resting from the weekend

How was your weekend? Mine was rather exhausting (now there is a shocker) both with physical exercise and going out. Let me see if I can reccap, friday night we ended up just colapsing and not going out anywhere because of exhaustion from the night before and a long day spent in court. Saturday, we had brunch with some friends, went and ran errands and then ran the hash. The hash was an urban run and I would estimate about five miles long with lots of running and some climbing near the end. Then we went to the hash party afterwards until I insisted on going home due to a pounding headache from running so much. I figure that we made it home at about 1 a.m. Sunday, we went over to a friend's house to watch the playoffs and managed to see San Diego snatch defeat from the impending jaws of victory. Oh, and my roommate and I went and looked at apartments for me, I found a two bedroom that I want to rent so cross your fingers and toes that it works out for me. Then, we went and played ultimate frisbee for two hours and then on to sushi. At this point, I need a nap to recover from my weekend. Today, we are going to watch more football at our friend's house, I believe that the Green Bay Packers are playing somebody or other but I am really not sure who, nor do I really care (let me just say that the football team I root for has long since been eliminated from any hope of a playoff spot). So, that is my weekend in a nutshell and now I am off to do work.

Finding balance

So, we went out last night both to happy hour/ dinner at one club and then on to another bar. I was out until about midnight which let to sleeping in until 7 am this morning and not having time to run. Maybe I will get the chance tonight, then again we may be having either game night or girls night out depending on people's moods. However, the bar hopping last night was done because one of my friend's is opening a bar near the beach (a non-smoking bar no less, very exciting) and we wanted to show up and check it out. The grand opening probably will not be for another month so we will probably end up helping to paint and clean to get it into shape. I swear, having an overactive social life makes it hard to fit in exercise on the level that I would like to fit it in at this point. However, I would not trade the friends for the exercise, I am just working on balancing everything as best I can manage right now. Fortunately, I have the weekend coming up where there will be lots of working out and also a chance to sleep in and recover from all of my late night outings. Right now, I need to go get ready to attend court this afternoon.

Finally getting off my rear

This morning at about 6:40 am, I finally put my proverbial money where my mouth has been. In other words, I got out of bed and since I was already dressed in workout clothes, I put on my shoes grabbed some keys and went running. I hate running but I have been really slacking on working out so it had to be done. I ran from my apartment complex down to the beach and ran up and down the beach for a few minutes. I estimate that it ended up being only a 20-25 minute run but at least it is a start in the right direction. My plan is to do the same thing tomorrow morning at about the same time and slowly begin working up the length of time that I am running again until it is more like an hour instead of 25 minutes. However, I am not complaining since 25 minutes of running is more exercise than I usually manage on a thursday morning before I head out to work. I should also note that last night I ate only about four pieces of sushi since I ended up not being very hungry. So, I am finally begining to get back on track with exercise and working out which was my goal for this week. This weekend I am apartment hunting, I have a bunch of prospects lined up to look at which seem promising and I am hoping to move in the next week or so if possible.

Life reorganized or the dangers of sushi

Ahh, bloggity goodness (as in, yes I know I am posting a lot today). Anyway, where was I? Ah, yes, when last we left our heroine (hey it is my blog, I can be the heroine if I want) she was nattering on about the great apartment hunt. Well, I was reminded again tonight of the reason for the great apartment hunt (which basically boils down to wanting to do my own decorating and cooking). My roommates have decided we should go out for sushi tonight and since I have no food in the house currently (long story) and didn't eat much lunch I am going along. Now, hopefully this will not devolve into a repeat of last night where we went to a friend's house and ate rather a lot of pizza (in a worrying development we are meeting up with friends tonight so bad food things could happen although I am going to try to prevent them). Anyway, I really need to be cooking my own meals and in a better position to sometimes turn down these invitations for ridiculous amounts of meals eaten out as opposed to made at home. So, this is part of the new urgency of the great apartment hunt to help me control my environment better. Also, I would like to be closer to a gym than I am right now. Also, my shoes probably need there own closet given that they are ever multiplying now that I have money to buy them. I am planning on being good tonight in terms of food, I will let you know how it all works out.

As part of organizing my life in the new year, I am trying to get my financial and personal life organized as well. First and foremost was paying off my whopping credit card bill. Now, the great apartment hunt is in full swing with the help of a friend who is a real estate agent. I have one potential place on the horizon which is requiring me to rework some of my finances but I am okay with that necessity. Besides I have friends who are willing to give away free furniture which helps with costs significantly. As my father pointed out sagely a while back, the quality of one's life is an important factor to consider. Right now my father is no doubt falling over in shock at my use of the word sage in connection to his advice, but he will recover shortly. So, I am hoping to get the apartment search resolved within the next couple of weeks and then move on to organizing everything else in my life. In case you were wondering, after an apartment, I will need a car but that is something I will be able to hold off on if the place I am interested in pans out. So, that is what I have managed to do today, along with a fair amount of work and the updating of the information in my checkbook which I now need to balance. Hopefully, I will still get some exercise in tonight and also over the next couple of days (really I know this is a weight loss blog still even if I keep writing about other things). So, I am off now to get organized on some other things at work.

Finding the track

So, I am relatively back on track now which is a nice place to be once again. Of course, yesterday I only ate breakfast and dinner (which was chinese food, so basically chicken and rice) which was not my intention but I have time today to sneak out and get lunch early and then I am going to have to work through lunch. However, tonight is aikido which is always a good workout even if I am still really bruised from this weekend's jungle run. Tomorrow, I have a lunch meeting (are we sensing a theme yet) but I am probably going to either get up early and go running, or alternatively go for a run after I am finished with work. I am probably going to start counting calories again which I have not done formally forever but it is a good benchmark for me about where I am and what progress I am making on weight loss. I would like to reach my goal weight in the next six months which I am pretty sure is a good length of time and I am setting my ultimate goal date as my birthday which is in July. So, there you are, I would like to be at my goal weight by the time I am 28 years old. Now I should really get on with the plan.

A little help and a small plea

I will say initially that I did not make it to the gym because I had to work through lunch. In a feat of spectacular planning I forgot lunch and now will not have time to go out and get anything until after I go to court at 2 p.m. However, all of this is really irrelevant to what I meant to write about here. I have been putting off writing about this topic but I thought I should mention it, and that is the devastation of the recent tsunami throught the part of the world that I live in right now. I should say that the island I live on was not in anyway touched by the tsunami but we are very aware of the damage nonethless. Every year I have friends here who travel to Indonesia, Thailand, India and beyond. What I know for sure is this, sad but true we would have been forewarned if the tsunami had been headed our way and that would probably have made a difference. However, I also know this, it doesn't matter now what could have been done to prevent this tragedy but what we can do to help the people who have survived to rebuild and repair the devastation. Later, there will be time to repair and create early warning systems and hopefully prevent a tragedy of this scale from happening again, right now aid is more important. I will be donating money, as will my friends. I am certain we will not be alone in that regard. My small part, you will find links shortly to a few organizations that I know are helping assist the injured and bury the dead in the links section of this blog. It isn't enough, but for right now it is the best that I know how to do for this part of the world that I am so very fond of already.

So, it is going to be that kind of day

I feel like shite today, to use a not very nice word. I did not really drink that much yesterday (although I ate too much) but I have absolutely the worst cramps and did not get very much sleep as a result. Note to self, when you have already taken four tylenol by 7:00 am, it is undoubtably going to be a very long day. Add that on top of my ankle hurting and a new case that just appeared that nothing has been done on and Monday morning is shaping up to be a doozy of a day. I am however still planning on heading to the gym and right now I am working very hard on pretending that there is no food in the office (which is a blatent lie and my body knows it) since it is no longer on my diet. Okay, I just managed to walk by the food again without eating any, of course I will be doing that all day since all the food is placed really near my mailbox and a number of other vital things (like my secretary's desk). Anyway, after spending all weekend with very fit people, I am motivated to get back on track with working out and keeping up this blog (which has a new spiffy look because I got bored of the old one). Now, I am going to start actually trying to accomplish work so I can sneak out and go to the gym a little bit before noon.

Bruised and battered

Once again on a Sunday morning, I am completely bruised and banged up. I guess running through rivers and crawling up mountainsides on your knees will do that to you. Anyway, it was a pretty decent run yesterday although a little long and a number of us got in after dark. Fortunately, while I may not have been a girl scout, I am pretty well prepared with a flashlight and a camelpack of water on every trail and so the dark was not much of an issue. Plus, you end up with a wealth of good stories about falling over logs and sliding down mountains on your rear. Today, we are off on a boat trip with a number of hash friends to just chill out and relax. I figure it will be three hours of getting a tan and harassing people that I adore more and more the longer I hang out with them. Tonight we play frisbee (although a little bit late because of the boat trip) and then tomorrow it is back to work and the regular grind. I am glad to be through the last holiday weekend and having everything get back to normal life so that I can concentrate on weight loss without as many food temptations around, we will see how it goes over the next few weeks and months.

Resolutions

It strikes me as I read other people's blogs today, that it is New Years Resolution time. I do not as a general rule make resolutions because (a) I do not actually follow through and then I feel guilty that I didn't do what I said I was going to do, and (b) either I will do something or I won't, resolving to do something is not really helpful. Anyway, I am going to make a small exception this year in terms of the weight loss goals. As of Monday, Jan. 3, 2005, I am going back to what I like to think of as "Kat's pain in the ass hard core plan". It pretty much works as follows: 1. 6 days a week of working out (that means 30 minutes minimum at the gym a day which I have been slacking on since I moved here) 2. No bread, sugar, and minimal amounts of rice (a huge staple in this culture). 3. No eating the food at work, back to strictly controlling my diet. 4. No alcohol, I am going with this one because I spend a lot of time going out and I think I am drinking a fair number of calories that I do not need. That is pretty much it, I aim for simplicity in all things, and this is very simple and straightforward so I know that I can abide by it. I have been letting things get away from me since I moved and started the new job but I am hoping to get completely back on track and lose the remaining weight that is hanging around. I have already bought new running shoes for my gym workouts (you really don't want to know how nasty my shoes are that I run around in the jungle in) and I should be all set by Monday with everything else. I picked Monday only because today and tomorrow are really hectic and there is no way that anything is getting done before then in terms of general life stuff, but I will be organized by Monday and so that is a good start date. Oh, and I am going to try and blog more regularly, no really I mean it this time.

Happy New Year!

Today is in fact New Years day where I live, it is a very nice Saturday if you were wondering about it. I am stuck at work , one of the joys of being an attorney is that sometimes you have to work on weekends. Since I was also out until about 1:30 am yesterday and got up at 7:30 this morning I am rather tired. Hopefully I will be out of work by four and I can go running on the hash. Yesterday we went on a pretty mellow hike and climbed down and around four waterfalls. I sort of view yesterday as my saturday since I am at work today while my roommates sleep in until about noon. On the plus side, getting up and going to work means that I have had to be pretty organized today and get things done rather than lazing away the weekend. The only bad thing about working is that I have the pager for work and I have to walk around with something that makes an awfully loud racket and requires me to hunt down a phone a.s.a.p. Anyway, I have to go check on work things now and probably sign some papers.

Disco Inferno

Last night after work my roommate and I went to aikido. Basically aikido consists of me being thrown around by higher ranked individuals and then developing bruises. Last night was especially good because I kept turning in the wrong direction and not moving quickly enough. However, after a good solid hour and ten minutes of that foolishness, we went home and then went out dancing. There was a big disco party at one of the local hotels so of course we went with a bunch of our friends. I figure that we danced for about two hours on and off (the first hour pretty much consisted of us jumping around the dance floor and the second hour we took a couple of breaks. Today we are going hiking, probably a pretty mellow hike because one of my friends is injured and is having her stitches removed today. Here, tonight is New Years Eve so we will probably go out somewhere but I don't know how late I will stay out because I have to be at work at 8 am on saturday. Saturday and Sunday are jam packed as well this weekend. I have to admit that my social schedule is becoming a little bit excessive, hopefully next weekend will not be this busy and I can get some more sleep in since I feel a little tired today.

Yet another party

My office in an attempt to help me gain ridiculous amounts of weight by holding yet another party this week (I think we are up to five or six office parties in the last two weeks). I am bringing fruit because it is both healthy and easy. However, I have no doubts that there will be a ton of fattening food which I will have to avoid because I am attempting to go back on my regular diet now that we are through the holiday season. Anyway, I feel more like I am back on plan today, I had tuna and brown rice for lunch (yes, I know all about mercury in tuna but I am choosing not to care) and cereal for breakfast and no snacking in between meals. I am going to eat fruit at the party which is the major reason that I bought it as my contribution to the meal. Tomorrow, I have the day off, so I am going to hopefully get in some exercise and working out (especially since I have to work on Saturday). Anyway, back to work I go until the party this afternoon.

Merry Christmas to me

I just gave myself a christmas present, I may never go shopping again. In case you are puzzled, let me explain in detail. I paid off my credit card bill to the tune of several thousand dollars (for the record, you try moving halfway around the world and then we will talk about your credit card bill). The only good news is I get paid tomorrow so that this whole experience will be slightly less painful by Friday or so. Anyway, I am very pleased with myself that I could finally take care of the bill, I have to say it is just amazing what you can do when you have an actual job that pays actual money. On other fronts, such as the diet wars I have nothing to report other than I am attempting to stay on track and getting interupted by parties and celebrations. However, I have been maintaining and I am getting back on track with my eating as best I can right now. I have been having some ankle problems but I expect to be going to the gym by the weekend. I can't go today because we have a lunch time work meeting but I may go for a jog depending on what time I get home tonight. Anyway, got to run to my meeting.

Out of the dark

I survived running around in the dark intact, then again I was not really running around in the dark since most of the trail was set through a well lit section of town. I think there is little better than seeing the puzzled look on tourist's faces as a group of men and women tear past them clad in athletic gear, camel backs, carrying flashlights, and madly screaming "On on". As one of my friends was heard to comment last night, we really look like a very strange cult. Tonight, I have aikido and then another birthday party (this one at a bar) for a friend. I am rather banged up after last night, but sadly not from the run, rather my air conditioning unit leaks and I have a tile floor, so I slipped on my floor last night. It was really rather graceful except for the moment where I totally banged up my wrist and ended up with bruises every where. So, back to work I go, I have to be in court in an hour and I have a lot of work to do before then.

All my friends

I have to say that this whole having a job and life thing is getting in the way of the updating of the blog thing. Anyway, I am back and have survived Christmas more or less, large amounts of food and beverage but I did alright. Besides which, my friends who were immensely tired of my whinining about not going to a gym got me a gift certificate for two months to the nearest gym. I am going to try and start going during my lunch hours. Not today however because I am going on a hash run tonight which will probably take about an hour. It is actually a run in honor of my friend R.R.'s birthday so I have to go and participate. However, this fact brought me to an interesting realization the other day which I thought I would share. ALL. OF. MY. FRIENDS. WORKOUT. No, really, they all do and most of the things we do together involve working out. I have friends who play rugby, friends who do aikido, friends who dive, friends who play frisbee, friends who run around in the jungle, and friends who do all of the above and more. I don't hand out with anybody who is sedentary or anybody who would consider just sitting around on the weekend. This is an extraordinary thing for the girl who grew up with friends who pretty much avoided exercise, (thus allowing me to avoid exercise). Anyway, it was a reminder that the best way to change is to surround yourself with similarly minded people who enjoy the same things. So, on that note, back to work I go for another hour and a half before I leave to go run around in the dark.

Where was I again?

Um, yeah, I have no excuse for having been away this long. Well, maybe a little excuse, I was in trial last week and that took up all my free time. This week has been equally insane at work, I never even stopped for lunch today. I have been working out, running in the jungle, frisbee, and aikido as always. Not great on food but it has been balanced out by a continuous lack of eating meals (not a good plan) yesterday I barely ate lunch or dinner. However, that was probably balanced out by the three hour brunch I attended this last Sunday. I had to celebrate my friend's upcoming birthday afterall. I have two parties this weekend, another one tomorrow, one next monday, and another one next tuesday. However, at least I worked out like an insane maniac at Aikido yesterday and sweated up a storm. One of my classmates at the dojo was doing a belt test so we did not get as long a workout time, which meant that my sensei decided to make us work harder when we were practicing. I have the huge purple bruise on my shoulder to prove it. Can you believe I actually pay money to get tossed around and bruised? I am really that crazy. Anyway, I have to get back to work now, I have huge stacks of paper all over my desk.

Incoming

Just popping in briefly to mention that I may not be posting for a bit. It appears that once again a tropical storm/typhoon is rapidly approaching my little corner of the globe. Power is always a dicey propostion during such events as is leaving the house. Today, we play frisbee but tomorrow we may well be cooped up and playing large amounts of trivial pursuit. So, today was a mad rush to the store to purchase all relevant items such as water and dried/canned food in preparation. A little hard to get really healthy food that does not require a lot of prep but I tried and purchased canned fish, low calorie snacks, and extra cereal (because seriously I could probably live on cereal even though it wouldn't be healthy). Anyway, if we are lucky the storm will miss us entirely, if we aren't lucky there will be a lot of wind, rain, and no electricity. either way, it is always an experience but at least the island I live on is pretty prepared for these sort of storms. Anyway, I am off to get a few more things done and I will be back later (provided I have electricity and a working internet connection).

Then again maybe not

So, I've been away for a bit, it has been pretty busy at work. Anyway, I went and observed rugby practice and I think that I will not be joining up after all. Too much potential for injury and frankly too much team sport focus. I think I will join the gym near work instead of killing myself by having people hurl their bodies at me. I am just really not competitive enough for rugby and I am frankly not sure that is a bad thing. Anyway, I decided that I have been trying way too hard to join team sports I don't really want to do and should get back to focusing on the type of exercise I enjoy (most of which takes place in a gym) and stop trying to prove that I have the potential to be the world's best athlete (because frankly I don't have any real athletic ability). So, that is my new plan as of today, we will see how it works out over the course of the next few weeks but I think we can definatively say that I will not be playing rugby or any other sport involving tackling and serious hand/eye coordination. Well, except for frisbee but that isn't really competive right now.

Working girl

I just want to mention that I have been ridiculously productive at work today. Cleared a bunch of cases off my desk and worked up pleas for others. On the other hand, I did not have to go to court today and that probably helped quite a bit. Anyway, that was totally un-weight related wasn't it? I ran around a lot playing frisbee yesterday, we were missing a lot of people and that always means a lot more running around than normal. Tomorrow, I have aikido and Wednesday is Rugby practice so I feel like I will be pretty active this week. I am working on the food thing still, especially since I ran out of breakfast food yesterday and did not have breakfast today. So, the secretaries brought in food and I ate some for breakfast but I have been okay for the rest of the day and we will probably go food shopping tonight so I can buy more food. I don't think that there is currently any real food in the apartment with is kind of sad but we have not been around much recently. Anyway, I have to get some more odds and ends tied up before I leave work for the day and go crash at home (well, unless something comes up and I end up going out which happens a lot).

Now doesn't that sound like a good idea

Today, in my true idiotic fashion I went hiking and ran around in the jungle and only ate lunch. No breakfast, no dinner, just lunch. Oh, and apparently last night when I was out, I agreed to join a women's rugby team being started by one of my jungle running friends. That is right, rugby, so when I severely injure myself at some point, remind me that this seemed like a good idea at the time. Anyway, I needed another athletic sport to help beat my body into shape. Anyway, I am going to go to bed now because I have a ton of things going on tomorrow and it is either go to bed or eat dinner and I am a lot more tired than hungry. Besides which ten o'clock is way too late for dinner in my view and really sleep seems a lot more important right now. That is what running around in the jungle all day will do to you.

My problems with food

So, you know my whole brilliant plan to balance out my meals yesterday with a bigger dinner. Never happened. Now, before you assume that I careened madly off plan and ate everything in sight, I remind you that this has not been my pattern recently. Nope, I just didn't really eat much dinner, I had some tapioca root, and a smoothing type drink (no ice cream involved). I think if I am really lucky I ate 1,100 calories total yesterday and that is only if I am really lucky Today, I am not doing much better, I ate breakfast, lunch, and admittedly some small pieces of chocolate due to hunger pangs prior to lunch. I think maybe I have hit 900 calories so far today, and again I think that maybe generous on my part, especially giving my lunch was a drink and four pieces of sushi at which point I was not hungry anymore and threw out the rest of the sushi. This is not a healthy dietary plan, I know this logically. I also know that I only ate the chocolate because I was stressed and hungry, so I am working on making sure that does not happen again. I having been slipping up too much foodwise recently and I need to get back on track and make what I am eating more nutritionally healthy (oh and possibly over 1000 calories a day, that would be good too). Anyway, back to work especially since I have some big cases coming across my desk right now.