Let’s Try This Again, Shall We?

Okay, work got super busy and I was horrible about updating with the cleanse, but in essence I don’t know that it made me feel any better or worse, and having to take these huge “horse pills” twice daily was annoying

Well, back in the gym last night, for the first time in who knows how long. I’ll put that workout in a seperate post, but I really pushed myself. So, back to the trials and tribulations of trying to get healthy.

Countdown to Lucy’s Wedding: 64 days (until I have to wear a bridesmaid dress)
This is very important because are looking at black cocktail dresses that are strapless, so I’m especially trying to focus on my upper body.

A Quiet Day

Working from home today with a lot to do, but focusing is hard to do. Trying to listen to hard rock/industrial to keep my pace up.

9:00am: Total Raisin Bran with Skim Milk
1:20pm: leftover Tortellini with Peas & Prosciutto in a Creamy sauce (Weight Watchers recipe) and Green Giant Healthy Vision Vegetable Mix

Feeling Good

I just got back from a crazy few days in Vegas that included some good moments and some bad moments. Good moments included seeing friends I hadn’t seen in a while or had never met offline. Bad moments included going to the hottest club in Vegas and it sucked, wall-to-wall people and people smoking, which made me sick. And, despite the cold, dry air in Vegas, my skin didn’t dry out like it did last time!! A big thanks to my co-worker who recommended Earth Science cleanser and moisturizer! My skin is reacting well, getting rid of the dryness that always happens in winter, without setting off a flare up of eczema. And, it’s cheaper than the stuff I’d been using before, which I can really appreciate.

Luckily, after weighing in, I still lost a bit of weight after the last week *grin*. But, let’s see how tomorrow is after today’s office potluck.

WI: 185.6lbs

3.4lbs more to hit my Short-term Goal Weight #1! Can I do it by the end of the year? It’s possible, but I’ll just have to wait and see how my will power holds up. Signed up for the “Biggest Loser” contest in my office, it starts in mid-January and goes through mid-April. Hopefully it will be even more incentive to workout and watch what I eat, since someone else will be weighing me in weekly.

My mood has been pretty good, especially Sunday. I don’t know what it is about Sundays, other than the fact that they are the beginning of a brand new week, but I’ve been finding myself in a positive mood when I get up.

Breakfast: Oatmeal with fruit, plus a cookie given to me by a co-worker
Lunch: Office potluck, don’t remember it all, but I tried to eat in moderation, especially dessert
Dinner: Total raisin bran cereal with nonfat milk

Went to see the Punisher movie with Lu, too silly with lots of blood and gore. Definitely wouldn’t see it again. Ate a bowl of cereal for dinner before I went, so I wouldn’t give in and eat theater food or stop for fast food on the way home. Seems to have worked, although I’m a bit hungry right now, but about to head to bed, so just have to make sure to have a filling breakfast first thing in the morning. Talked to Lu for an hour after the movie, recapping Vegas, who we’re each interested in, general life and love things, as well as discussing plans for Christmas and NYE. Now we just have to come up with exactly what those plans are, lol.

Blah, Blah, Blah

Did I just not know what to write or is the title a reflection of my mood? At this point I just don’t know.

Did my weigh-in this morning and down another pound, but that’s probably more reflective of my being a bit sick yesterday. Don’t know what was wrong, just suddenly got extremely nauseous at work around lunchtime, so I came home. The nausea faded until late in the evening, when it came back slightly. But, I wasn’t able to eat much, so hopefully I won’t have a rebound after eating today. Especially considering this weekend was a total bust, diet-wise.

A night of way too many drinks on Friday night, although I didn’t have much dinner, but the calories from drinks add up. Saturday, I only ate 1 major meal, but it was good ol’ Southern comfort food, chicken fried steak, 2 eggs over medium, country potatoes, toast and grits, along with a corn muffin with butter. Then my friend Grace took me to her favorite place for pie and I had a slice of the banana cream she recommended. Went to a friends place to watch a boxing match and avoided the pizza, but did have a nice glass of wine. And then Sunday, went to dim sum with a couple of friends, followed by half of a cheeseburger for lunch (took the other half home) with some potato salad and some cookies and other sweets from a wonderful bakery. Dinner was at a Korean sushi place, where I had some spicy pork with some tuna and salmon sashimi. So, now to recover over the week.

WI: 186.8

So, on to a better week, hopefully. But, how do I stay on track while in Vegas this weekend?

Breakfast: 365 (Whole Foods brand) Nonfat Peach Yogurt
Lunch: Organic Bistro Sockeye Salmon Cakes Whole Life Meal with Ginger-Bean Medley and Confetti Pilaf. I really wanted to like this more than I did, but then again, I got it knowing that I’m not a big fan of salmon, but I’m trying to teach myself to like it. I did like the medley with ginger-scented (couldn’t taste or smell it) edamame, sugar snap peas and green beans, but the pilaf was ‘meh.’ At least this meal had tons of vegetables, as do apparently all of the meals in this line. The lack of non-carb heavy meals in the diet frozen dinners usually annoys me, but is this meal worth the higher calorie count and larger price tag? I’ll try some of the other meals by Organic Bistro to find out. Otherwise I’ll just stick to buying frozen veggies and stirring them into my frozen meals.
Dinner: Amy’s Organics Black Bean Tamale Verde with Rice Whole Meal. Yum! At least for the verde sauce, really tangy and perfect. The tamale was good and moist, but otherwise lacked flavor, other than the verde sauce and the masa. The rice was pretty decent and moist.

The Holidays are Coming!

It’s that time of year again, the time eat, drink, shop and be merry with friends and family. The signs are becoming more obvious year after year. Christmas decorations being put out in stores immediately after Halloween?! Crazy! For me, it’s not really time until after Thanksgiving, at the earliest. I’m not saying you can’t get started on shopping for presents earlier, but come on, no decorations on Nov. 1st!! I have actually started my shopping, even sent one present to the receiver, but it was a combination birthday/Christmas present (no nagging about that, people!) of little things I see for him during the year. The “I won’t hurt you… Much” t-shirt is perfect for him, as is the Jesus packing tape and Nun-zilla (both sacreligious, just like him). I bought a necklace for another friend who is always wearing cute ones. I bought it from a co-worker’s sister who has her own jewelry business and makes some absolutely beautiful pieces, I even bought a necklace for myself at the same time (grin). Her site is a bit out of date, but you should check it out at WayJazzyJewels.com and if you don’t see something you like, she can make something else for you to go with that special outfit. I’ve also got plans for other gifts going about in my mind, but can’t leave too many hints or my friends might figure out what I’m getting them, if they ever read the blog, lol. My co-workers are putting up the holiday decorations on their cubicles, so I guess it’s time to pull mine out, gotta remember that tomorrow, if I’m able to wake up after tonight’s Yelp Holiday party.

Breakfast: My usual oatmeal with dried fruit and nuts, with 1 bottle of water
Mid-morning Snack (okay, it’s actually lunch time): Honeydew, cantaloupe, watermelon, pineapple, strawberries and a blueberry muffin top, with 1 bottle of water
Lunch: It was 3pm by the time I ate lunch, so willpower was low. Had part of the office catered lunch from Specialty’s, Turkey-Cranberry sandwich, sea salt chips and a cookie, plus some asparagus and strawberries from one of the other team’s catered lunches

Emotional Outlook: In a good mood, the Yelp Holiday party is tonight and I’ve been looking forward to it for weeks
Physical Outlook: Sore from my workout two nights ago. Sort of glad that I didn’t make it to the gym last night because Jung had to work, I was exhausted!

Just got assigned to a new project and it’s going to be big, but at least the O/T will be worth it.

Not much to say today

Not much to blog about so far today, just the usual day at work. Did actually remember to bring breakfast and lunch today (gasp)! Busy day at the office, but getting a lot done after being “off” for a week. My skin is still going pretty nuts, the skin on my eyes is getting rough and irritated to the point that a co-worker asked if I was sick. And, the skin where I used the microdermabrasion is now much rougher than the skin I didn’t use it on.

Breakfast: Kashi Go Lean Honey & Cinnamon Oatmeal with added dried fruit and nuts, 2 bottles of water, plus a multi-vitamin
Lunch: Amy’s Organics Black Bean Enchilada meal with rice and beans, 2 bottles of water and Emergen-C for energy. 2 Snicker’s miniatures when I wanted something sweet (Gotta get rid of this Halloween candy!!!!).
Dinner: Taco Bell Fresco Style Bean Burrito and Crunchy Taco, plus a white cupcake from Sprinkles (does it matter that the cupcake came first?)

Emotional Outlook: Not good, not bad, just sort of blah
Physical Outlook: Not quite sore, but I can tell my body is ready to revolt over the exercise from last night.

Good Influences

I’ve had quite a few good influences in my life lately, when it comes to my health.

Burton – While traveling with my friends recently, despite being on vacation and up very late, Burton was up early every morning for his runs. Oh, and I should mention he has an amazing body!

Minh – Minh is fast becoming one of my favorite people, he’s very sweet and very intelligent. Minh lives a very healthy lifestyle, he’s very dedicated to his health and his kickboxing. Just a phone call with him, discussing health and fitness encourages me to be my best.

Arthur – Arthur is a new friend and also has a very healthy outlook on life. Arthur is also very smart and a brilliant conversationalist, I really enjoy hearing his outlook on life. Arthur has encouraged me to look at what I eat and/or drink and to decide if it’s really worth it. A good example is alcoholic drinks, which are pretty much just empty calories.

Susan – And of course, last, but not least. Susan nags me about my diet, constantly, which is what I need, since my willpower is easily overcome. Also, Susan will call me randomly to go workout with her or accept when I call her to go workout.

Food and Exercise Log – 1/7/08 & 1/8/08

I can’t post my food diary because I can’t quantify all of my meals for these 2 days.

1/7/08
I was bad, in that I skipped lunch and didn’t eat for too many hours.

Breakfast was the same as the day before:

• 1/2C Fiber One
• 1C Silk Vanilla Soy Milk Plus Fiber
• 2 sm Clementines

Total: 1.5 points

Lunch:

• Skipped, was too busy putting my wardrobe together

Dinner was fabulous, I was on a date and we went to a wonderful restaurant, Sino in San Jose, CA:

• 1 1/2 small crab cake – one of the best I’ve ever had, very little filler, very delicate, served with an aioli
• 2 Kung Pao Chicken Lolipops – these were ok, but fried and very messy, probably wouldn’t order them again
• Crab Risotto – with Enoki Mushrooms and yellow chives – ABSOLUTELY DELICIOUS!!!!
• 4 Orange Honey Roasted Prawns – The prawns were wonderful, but the walnuts were too tough, the ones on a similar dish in Chinatown was much better

Exercise:

• None today, other than cleaning and assembling furniture

1/8/08
Breakfast:

• Some Wallaby Cherry Yogurt

Lunch:

• Tired and slept through lunch time, then had to run errands

Dinner at the Cheesecake Factory:

• Hot Chocolate (although not hot enough for the cold weather)
• Grilled Mahi Mahi, lightly seasoned
• Steamed Broccoli
• 1/2 of the fries (I couldn’t resist the salt)
• 1 double shot of espresso
• (At least I resisted dessert)

Exercise:

• Again, none Overslept due to being out too late, then ran errands all afternoon and early evening. MUST go to the gym tomorrow!! I’m actually beginning to enjoy the gym, and feel droopy when I don’t go.