Windfall and BBQ

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I've obviously waned a little on my blog .... which is sad considering it's about to celebrate it's second anniversary. Happy Birthday Yorkist Rose!

Two quick things: T and I are entered in a barbecue contest this weeknd: it will be our first. Planning for this thing has taken more strategy that the invasion of Normandy but we're finally getting there. We have taken measures to insure that we can put out a fire, sanitize, maintain appropriate temps and that T doesn't sweat on the brisket.

This is true KC culture, y'all. My friend TKAT designed us an official logo and everything. I'm having t shirts made. Very exciting.

Other thing: I won an essay contest at work. God help me, I wrote an essay called "What ESOP Means to Me." The last time I wrote an essay I was trying to get a scholarship from the DAR. This time I got $75 in Amex gift certificates. Hmmmm, what to do with this unexpected windfall???? It is my birthday in 25 days -- I might have to go to Sephora.

Dilemmas, dilemmas.

Blog entries that were never born

I've had a hundred wierd or deep thoughts over the last few weeks. That's how many opportunities I think I may have missed to post here. There's a lot going on these days but none of it seems to get blogged. So here's the reader's digest version:

• Travel - there was lots. Four trips in five weeks. Stopped now.
• Oil of Olay energy glow lotion - cool stuff. I'm not orange and I'm not white. Excellent news.
• Camping this weekend - his family reunion.
• Our first BBQ contest is next weekend - I make the chicken and T manages the rest. Hope we don't embarrass ourselves. Hope he has fun.
• LOST - wow. Did you watch that? What did you think?
• Weekend after next - 'nother family reunion, still his. Waaaay up in Nebraska, almost to SD. Anyone want to babysit my dogs?
• hot here. Hot there? Ugh. What happened to spring?
• I've got my hair somewhat under control now but I'm not going to get in to it. Let's just say I rethought the problem and came up with a solution I'm happy with.
• I'm still not smoking. Sometimes I miss it but mostly I'm ok.
• I want to see "Over the Hedge" and the "X-Men" -- no time, no time.
• Where did May go?
• I need to get back on my diet. I feel like an overfilled balloon. I've had Mexican twice this week. And I could have it again and be happy.

See? Nothing really very profound.

I had some profound thoughts but did not write them down. I need to get better about that.

Here's a fresh one from this morning:
Several times in the past few days and weeks I have made a mental note to myself, mostly regarding the passage of time. Actually, it's more like the lightbulb coming on. For instance, this morning as I was making our bed I thought about the last time the A/C was on. The last time I had the air conditioning on, our marriage was in total system failure and I was sleeping alone on a blow up mattress on the floor of a bare apartment across town. I was worrying every minute about money and the kids and my marriage and him and also myself. I was wishing I could fast forward myself 6 months and see how it ended. Well, it's been nine months now. This is my resolution and it's better than I ever could have hoped. It made T turning on the air last night seem monumental in some way, although only to me, I'm sure. Each little moment is another mile gone from where we were -- and a little closer to the new life we're making.

Well, that's probably all you'll hear from me until after the holiday. I wish everyone a great weekend!

I quit

It's been a week since I quit smoking.

I don't remember the last one I had, I know it was in Vegas. I have known for a long time that I should give them up but you know, I like smoking. Simple. I just do. But I told T and more than that, I promised myself that I would quit by my birthday and even though it's still 5 weeks away, I had one left and I got rid of it before we got on the plane. And then I decided not to buy any more.

I miss it. I didn't even smoke that much. But I know that it's the right thing to do... maybe my blood pressure will go down a little and get me out of the "pre-hypertension" category. I always thought 120/80 was good... now I guess it's not so much.

Even Mother Nature (I revert back to an old nickname for the former Frau Lobster) who has been laid up in the hospital all week has been trying to keep me on the straight and narrow. A coworker took the rental car keys when we were out of town earlier in the week, stating that "If you are going to smoke, you're going to have to walk to get them." It's been a long time since I sat in a Hampton Inn room all evening with crap on TV and no cigarettes.

Someone tell me I'll be better off. But I don't want to be one of those smug bastards who wrinkles their nose every time someone walks by with a cigarette... nor do I want to be huffing the second hand smoke.

Just another sign that I am grown up after all.

Back again ... and gone

I have a day between trips, just to clear off my desk and then go again... Vegas was fun but kind of long. I did develop a disturbing new taste for sour apple martinis though, just what I needed.

I would upload some pictures but the trusty little Canon has disappeared ... a victim of my carelessness or someone's pilfering while we were at the trade show. I'm devastated. I cried over that camera... I really want it back. Maybe, just maybe it will turn up??? No, I guess not.

I tried not to think about mother's day ... it's always tough to grapple with that same old demon -- I didn't have children of my own. Still for the last 12 years I never felt as though I'd missed out because I had the girls. And now that the relationship has changed, I miss them desperately and all my insecurities come swooping in... I'm just glad it's over for another year.

On the other hand, for Mother's Day T did give me a beautiful card, a little gold ring, a BBQ apron and a bright orange cone (pictured here).

We are amused.

He's such a good man.

There is no stepmother's day

I am evil.
I am an alien.
I am an archetype.
I am wicked.

I once dried tears.
Took you shopping.
Paid the tuition.
Gave advice.

I cleaned you up.
I held your hand.
I brushed your hair.
I made a vow.

I am no one now.
I am nothing now.

There is no stepmother's day.

Viva

Las Vegas.

I'm off for a week at a trade show. Hopefully a little fun but also plenty of work. Lots of long days. But I'm not complaining... hope everyone has had a lovely May so far and doesn't get too far in to the tequila while celebrating Cinco de Mayo.

It's kind of neat how we manage to work holidays and celebrations of our own cultures in to the American experience. St. Pat's, Oktoberfest, what else? Shall we start celebrating Boxing Day? I'm in favor. How about Victoria Day? Please feel free to add your proposed holidays below.

Until we meet again, hit me. Uh, make that $50 on red. Oh, maybe not.

Happy May Day

Odds n ends:
3 trips in 4 weeks has morphed in to 4 trips in 5 weeks. I've got the whole slip-on shoe, computer out of the case, driver's license and boarding pass in the left and a diet coke in the right hand thing down to a science.

It finally rained. We're still down for precip but at least the next time T mows, 1/2 the topsoil from my yard won't blow in to the living room. It's been like the freakin' Oklahoma dustbowl.

Wildlife spotted on recent trips: swans in Michigan and prairie dogs on the OK/TX border. V cool.

I have forgotten how good it feels to eat healthy food. My eating habits have been appalling lately. It has run the gamut from German chocolate milkshakes from Braum's to cherry sours and pizza and Zapp's potato chips. However, here's one arguement for eating the bad stuff -- just as I was fixing my salad last night, 60 Minutes featured a story about people contracting e. coli from bagged salad. Which, was, of course, what I was using. Lovely. I want to have my innards rearranged by lettuce.

People Magazine's Most Beautiful 100 needs to be renamed People's Most Beautiful Celebrities. But thanks, People, for not including Paris Hilton. I always think it's interesting that people "fall off" the list. Did they get less beautiful? I mean, how can a guy be the Sexiest Man Alive and then just fishbait? The issue is shallow and stupid, but dangit, I still bought it.

Tired, so tired. I get all rested on Saturday morning, only to ruin the feeling by staying up too late on Sunday night. I never learn.

United 93

I don't usually go to movies, since T's not a big fan. But this was one he actually wanted to see, so on Saturday we had a rare afternoon at the show. This was the first time I dipped in to my gift certificates from Christmas and I couldn't think of a worthier movie to spend them on.

A lot of people say it's "this year's Passion of the Christ". Well, to me there are no similarities -- except one. That feeling of wanting to crawl under the seat so you don't have to watch what's going to happen. My brain was literally racing and I know I missed details and dialogue. I will have to watch again when the dvd comes out. And this time I'll have a drink, because God, this is a hard movie to watch.

Saturday night after we got back from the movies I saw that A&E was showing their earlier version, "Flight 93". There was simply no comparison. "United 93" is harrowing, white knuckle, intense, indescribable. It's like being there. It's hard not to yell at the screen. The TV version is like one of those disease movies of the week. People should be sweating. People should be crying. Noses should be running. People should not be sitting there being all stoic and beautiful. Of course, credit to A&E because their version came out much earlier and had a harder row to hoe. But if you think you've seen "United 93" because you saw "Flight 93", you ain't seen nothin'.

A few observations from the peanut gallery:

1. This is a powerful teaching tool, both for the attacked and the attackers. Should this happen in the future, most assuredly it will not happen the same way again.
2. If I have the bad luck to get hijacked, I will never believe that they will let us live. Therefore I feel it's my obligation to tell my family that I WILL fight. I will fight. I will cry and I will probably pee my pants. But I will kick, pull hair, gouge with fingernails and do everything I can do to inflict some harm on the hijackers.
3. I shook through the entire movie.
4. I think a lot about the difference between here and not here. You are on the phone with someone you love, wanting to hold on to them wanting them to hold on to your voice. They are there. Then they are not. The ability for thousands of victims to grab a cell and say goodbye gave 9-11 a very different texture.
5. At the end of the movie, there was no noise in the theater. At all.
6. The choice to use "non-celebrities" was perfect. Known names would have been a distraction. I recognized a few of the actors, but I'm not sure from where.
7. This movie made me think more of Schindler's List than Passion of the Christ. If you've forgotten the shock and the horror and the confusion of that day, this will put you back there.
8. Absolutely wonderful acting from many non-actors. I am curious about their choice to relive that day. It must have been incredibly hard.

If you wonder whether or not you should see it, go. Take kleenex. Those tears at the end aren't the manipulated Hollywood variety tears, they're real.

Bravo.

Dear Blackberry Guy...

I'm so glad that you were able to pull that little sleight of hand on the plane today. When the flight attendant told you to turn your Blackberry off so we could land you palmed it like a cheap magician and as soon as the wheels touched down you pulled it out from your armpit and resumed typing.

I'm so glad your life, my life and our fellow passenger's lives were less important than the message you were typing.

Loser.

End note: I'm traveling today... again. Trip number 2 of 3 in four weeks. The best part is I get HBO in the hotel so I can watch Elizabeth I. Helen Mirren rocks.

The perfect job

So in the enthusiasm of my youth I thought there would be such a thing as the perfect job. I wasn't going to fall in to some career like my father did, uh-huh. I was gonna plan for it and make it happen and spend the rest of my life making amazing money and loving every minute of my 8- to 5.

I think perfect jobs are a myth. Granted, there are some very cool jobs out there: greeting card writer, book editor, park naturalist, travel writer or a movie reviewer. There are people making a living as ice cream tasters, for pity's sake! But even those jobs probably have their drawbacks: writer's block, lost luggage, brain freeze.

Just for the record, while I never found the "perfect job", I did find one I liked. I feel incredibly fortunate when I have a day that feels more like play than labor. I do feel a little green now and then when I see people making a living as stage actors, Food Network execs, talent scouts and merchandise buyers. But all in all I feel pretty grateful that I didn't make a mistake when I signed up for all those writing classes and schlepped my way through my MBA. Granted, my career's taken some pretty wierd twists but all in all I think I'm one of the fortunate ones.

Not that I wouldn't still love to be the Wildlife Manager at the Hilton Hawaiian Village. But I'm pretty happy being a marketing geek at a Small-to-Midsize Manufacturer in the Midwest. If this is where I retire, so be it. But please God don't let it be with the same title, pay and position.

Feel Inspired: Love My Job

Friday afternoon again

I'd like to be anywhere but at work. Oh, OK. Maybe not getting day surgery or buying a car, but still.

I keep mentioning the four-legged senior center I'm running but it's becoming more and more apparent that some of my furkids are feeling a bit south of good these days. Dusty, my long-haired Maine Coon cat (that's him expressing his opinion of my blog lately) spends the better part of every day sleeping on the bed now. This does not make him unique among cats, I know. But lately it seems that he's hardly ever up. He doesn't stay by my side like he used to and when you walk in a room he gives you this groggy, disoriented look like he just not feeling well. Even T has noticed.

I know I will cry buckets when I lose him. I know I will be ridiculous. People will think I've gone fruitloops. But I'm crazy about him, he's hands down the favorite pet of my adult life. No critter on earth has made me feel better when I have been sad than this guy has.

By the way, pets are great therapy. Especially when you're lonely.

As for Friday afternoon: it's sunny. I'm inside. We need rain. Gas is expensive. That's what I'm worried about -- drought and fuel costs.

Oh, is it time to go home yet???

The end of the week

I am the only one here. At 10 minutes to 5 p.m. on Good Friday afternoon, I am completely alone in my department. 7 people are on vacation or otherwise absent. Not me. I'm like freakin' Lassie. Sit. Stay. Golly, I must seem stupid. It's 88 degrees! And sunny!

On the bright side, I've gotten a lot done this afternoon. My last post was about the inevitability of work-related fires. I didn't know it was a full moon this week or I'd have known, maybe, how bad it would actually get. It was much worse than I expected. It took me the rest of the week to get 3 things done on my list. One per day. And I added that many more just a few minutes ago. "Go to Jail. GO Directly to Jail. Do Not Pass Go. Do Not Collect $200."

A belated happy birthday to the love of my life, who celebrated his 42nd birthday with lots of Italian food and an early turn-in from food coma. Last night we extended the celebration a bit by going to see "Married Alive" at the American Heartland Theatre. It was a great date night. He never reads this blog any more because, well, he just doesn't want to know. But Happy Birthday anyway, honey.

So I'm hoping to take my blogging in a more professional direction (in addition to this highly unprofessional personal blog). My boss is really high on the idea of a blog for our retail animal health business. I'm excited about doing it -- or I was three weeks ago. I'm still waiting for the webmaster to set up a spot for me on the website and it's not his priority right now. Don't think it's even in the top 20, actually. So the shine is sort of off the penny but once we get it going it should be great. Very radical idea for a little company like mine. So very 21st Century.

Side note: if womens' clothing manufacturers want to put back pockets on pants to break up the wide expanse of my ass, that's fine. It makes total sense. But I will never actually use the pocket and in the meantime it's just creating a bunchy, lumpy, flashing neon sign that says, "look at my butt. And while your eyes are down there, check out my panty lines too." Ugh. I need to take In Style's advice and cut the pockets off and sew them up.

Sigh. TMI, sorry. As I said, I'm all alone. I've gone a little buggy. And now I'm going home.

Happy Easter. Happy Resurrection Day. And in all sincerity, thanks to God for Your gift. Only You knew how much we would need a Messiah.

The end of the day

Why does it always seem that I don't get really productive until everyone else's day is over?

I love, love, love the silence of an empty office. I love the act of getting organized for the next day. What I do not love is knowing that no matter how carefully I plan, tomorrow will come and bring with it another fire. And all my organization will go to blazes. Big bright orange flames.

I am this way at home, too. I do my best work at 9p.m. when T has tucked in for the night. I guess I am and may always be a bit of a hoot-owl.

On another subject, camping was the best... although too early for mushrooms. But we took the dogs and they did great. So funny, they were absolutely confused and delighted. Makes me wish that we'd made them inside dogs from the very beginning. Next time, we will have an inside dog -- but after the aging zoo I'm keeping dies off I'm limiting myself to one cat and one dog and no long haired cats or super-shedding mutts. Which means probably not the Sheltie I've always wanted. But that's ok. And hopefully, way down the road

Spring comes

...blogs go to hell.

Looking forward to the weekend... we are going camping for the first time since Labor Day. Seems a long long time and so much has happened since our last trip, but what a relief to get back to a routine that gives us both so much joy. I can't even tell you how happy it makes me to do this simple, normal thing.

Got a lot to get done between now and then... this will be the first time we've ever taken the dogs, too. Abby the famous D-O-G can't be left alone any more... afraid she'll get down and not be able to get up. Besides she needs her arthritis pills. Drugs for everyone these days. She and T are sharing a bottle of glucosamine, the good news is I don't have to coat T's pill with peanut butter for him to take it.

I hope there will be mushrooms but even if there aren't any at all I know we'll still have fun.

Inside my Head

Outside my head, things are very much as normal. The prep work is progressing on the home improvements we've planned. The taxes will be filed in a timely manner. We are eating our way through the ridiculous amount of food we have in the freezer. I am gaining weight, a temporary setback, I think.

Inside my head, things are peculiar. There is something else entirely going on.

Last Friday I attended a funeral for the Cat's grandfather. Her family was basically my surrogate family from the time we met as 8-year-old third graders. My family was pretty much imploding and they gave me a soft place to fall. I spent summers, holidays, weekends and sometimes weekdays under their roof and in the barn, creek, back fields and front 40. I pitched in with chores, got in trouble, got punished and got to be just another one of the kids. Despite the fact that I moved away in 8th grade, the Cat and I stayed tight and from age 16-18 1/2 I also dated the Cat's brother, a.k.a. the First. Since the First and I broke up in 1985 I have been very shy to go back for reasons I don't even think I can even put down "on paper". I've made only a handful of appearances.

But, on Friday, I did. I went back. I saw the Cat, her sister, the First and the parents. Also her cousins, her grandma and a collection of other fringe characters. I was ashamed: I cannot explain why I have been hiding all these years. But I have. I love them just as much now as I did then only with the appreciation of a grown-up who understands what a gift that time was. Yet I cannot tell them.

And so we spent a little time. We watched videos of us kids as preteens/teens (like having sharp nails dragged across my bare skin). We played cards. I took a long look at the First's kids. I felt the camaraderie of the Cat's kids, who were probably as overwhelmed as I but still pretty fun to talk to. I put the Cat in my car --- and at that moment it felt like we were 17 again and not a day, not a year, had gone by. I spent a day being buffeted repeatedly by the waves of memory and emotion. It will take time to sort it out.

Also K & A are in my head and not in a happy way. We can't all go on ignoring one another, although I'll be the first to admit this would be easier than dealing with our problems. I'm at a loss. I'm angry but I miss them.

Inside my head is the burden of mistakes made, of time, memory, sadness, regret, love, hope and hopelessness.

Outside my head it looks like just another spring day.

it's a new week

My WW week starts on Wednesday, so it's a new week for me. Thank heaven. Last week was San Diego. I did not journal. I did walk, a lot. I also ate gnocchi, creme brulee, a German chocolate cupcake (for breakfast, no less), fried fish, Ghirardelli chocolate and some other things that people on WW don't usually eat. It was fun. The gnocchi was from de' Medici and was good enough to make me want to cry for joy. The weather was nice for walking and the scenery was great. When I got home I did not stop eating but rather had T's smoked chops, subs, lemon cake, ice cream (in the 1/2 cup measuring cup, though) and more chocolate.

I walked an average of probably 4 miles a day while on the road. That's not treadmill walking but real walking with a heavy briefcase and sweat and everything. And God smiled. All my food sins and I still lost 2/10 of a pound. Enough to let me see the 158 on the digital scale. I didn't do much to deserve it but I'll take it anyway.

So then the question is, can I get serious and drop another 10 pounds before the next show on May 7? 10 pounds, 5 weeks? Possible -- but highly unlikely. I know of what my body and mind are capable.We shall see.

I just need to stay out of the River Market and away from this place: Frou Frou Sweets. Cupcakes to me are really perfection: not having ever been a big cake eater, I want tons of flavor and sweetness in a small package. I don't need a big hunk o' cake. Cupcakes fit the bill. I'm sure cupcakes are so 5 minutes ago in New York but here we like to take things a little slower.

don't feel like it

I don't feel like blogging.

I don't feel like dieting.

I don't feel like figuring out any more stuff that has to do with kitchens, windows, missing hair or venous lakes.
___________

The laser lady shot me up again yesterday and this time my lip swelled and got a very angry purple. I keep feeling like people can see it, though, like my hair, I'm sure it's my imagination. The laser lady says I should not have to come back, this time she thinks she got it. Yay.

I did have a nice lunch. I had the quiche and split the lemon cake. It's a very "ladies who lunch" kind of place. And I am so not. So I felt funny. Not funny wierd, but funny ironic.

My biggest regret of the day is that I didn't go down to the candy shop for jelly bellies before coming back to work. And that I didn't do something better with my hair, it looks stringy.

Ah, maybe it wasn't such a bad day after all. Those are pretty small regrets.

The Big Show

The show we're working is all about pets. I am amazed by the breadth and variety of products people will buy to pamper their furry friends. And I have to admit, it's fun to be in the company of so many pet people like myself, inventors and business people who have made their passion a vocation.

I've even found something I want to buy: Quick Finder. It's not out yet but when it is, I want one. It's like a stud finder but it tells you where the quick is in a pet's claws -- not an easy thing when they're black. This device will help inept people like me from clipping in to that vein that makes my deck look like a crime scene because I've nicked 2 or 3 claws and she's bled all over everything. It's something that Abby the famous dog will defintely benefit from. So PetSmart, please buy this device. I'm waiting.

Outside my window

Thank you hotel, for giving me free high-speed access so I can post more silly, rambling blog posts.

Landed fine in San Diego and hotfooted it to the convention center to set up our booth, which didn't take long. Stopped off in the press room to drop off press kits and decided if we are going to do this (and we should) we are going to have to jazz these things up significantly. But hey, we are a small company and this is better than nothing. Nothing was last year. I met a woman from CBS who needed live critters for one of her segments and had none. I of course thought longingly of my mostly useless and rapidly aging home petting zoo, 1600 miles to the east. It was a great opportunity that slipped helplessly out of my critter-free hands. Oh well.

At 1 p.m. local we finally found some lunch, this to supplement my ever so healthy breakfast of German Chocolate cupcake. Hey, a friend gave me a cupcake yesterday and I never got a chance to eat it. Cupcakes make an excellent breakfast. Flour, milk, eggs, it's all healthy stuff, right? Then we trekked back to the hotel after a quick stop at Hilo Hattie's for a suprise for T. And now I have dutifully checked all my e-mail, responded appropriately and am now killing time here. And outside my window? A Wyland Whale Wall, the San Diego Trolley and The Coaster. Oh yes, and a large Caterpillar jackhammer. It should be a fun, but not quiet, 4 days in California.

Spring and a Plane Ride

Diet update: despite my better efforts to gain, I have managed to lose what I gained last week and a little bit more. The slider is headed east again, I like that. We even had a traditional "Figgs dinner" on St. Patrick's Day (I learned a new term): corned beef, cabbage, potatoes, onions and carrots. I stayed heavy on the veggies and light on the beef.

Well, off to San Diego tomorrow for a work thing. This will take me through the weekend, which means working two weeks straight, always a bit of a bummer. I'll be back Sunday evening, just in time for work bright & early Monday. As always, I need to pick a new book to take, I'm somewhere between "Don't Know Much About History" and "The Doomsday Book" by Connie Willis. Two completely different reads, might take them both. And I still haven't finished "Time and Chance" or "Tales from the Scale" but I only have a few pages left on "Tales from the Scale" so that one doesn't count. Luckily I haven't got a big backlog of magazines like usual. This, not clothes, is why my suitcases are so damn heavy.

Our first day of spring came with snow. Gotta love this midwestern weather. It is some freaky stuff. On Sunday I ran around the yard picking up broken branches and cutting a vase full of the most beautiful daffodils: I figured the cold weather would ruin them and I may as well enjoy some inside. I am glad I did it, though I usually refrain from cutting flowers. I think I'm going to do it more often. They just look like springtime.

Thoughts pinballing around in my head:

• We've now expanded the kitchen renovation to include windows, 4 to start. We did locate a great deal on some appliances and a gorgeous slate tile. Just a few more steps to start in earnest.
• feline arthritis: my aging menagerie continues to pose new challenges. Dusty now has to be brushed daily and bathed with dry shampoo because he can't clean himself. He's like a former male model, fat and totally gone to seed. On Sunday, KC (my other cat) apparently found him so offensive that SHE gave him a bath. And his gimp is terrible to watch but I haven't figured out what to do for him yet.
• canine arthritis. 50 mg Rimadyl won't do it for Abby. We cut the meds and she's back to hobbling. So, though we know it will shorten her life, we have to choose between quality and quantity. She's already 11, I choose quality.
• The never ending cold. Is never ending. But the coughing is sooo much better than it was. I loosened a few ribs on Sunday but for the most part only sound like a multi-pack smoker when I laugh. AFV is just about killing me, although I watch it anyway. As I told T last night, people falling down is always funny.

What a shockingly dull post. Maybe something better later. Or maybe not. It's just me, after all, not Hemingway. ;-)

Oooh Sephora, what are you doing to me?

Is it SEPH-or-a or Se-PHOR-a?

All I know is that you used to only be in the rarest places -- the once-a-year I-can-handle-you places. You are in Las Vegas. Chicago. You showed up in Murcia, but you were small there, just a dainty cousin to your overblown Sin City counterpart.

Now, NOW you are coming to my neighborhood. I don't need this Sephora. You are stalking me. You are plotting, with your sexy French accent, to take all my disposable income.

Please, please Sephora, don't come any closer... I can't take it.

oooof

Sometimes I fall off the wagon. I've done that a lot this last week or two. Don't get me wrong, I like being down on the ground among all the naughty food. Last Friday, T and I wandered over to Granite City to have dinner and I had the most heavenly garlic mashed potatoes and a chicken sandwich with artichoke dip and cheese that must have been the size of my head. In the last few weeks we've also had Spanish food, Cheeseburger in Paradise and several other things I've probably blanked out.

I dropped to 159 and change for a minute or two and then have bounced back to 160.5, a small slip in the overall scheme of things and my first gain in 8 weeks. A day of laying all over the couch yesterday didn't help: I don't know how stay at home moms can resist the call of the fridge all day. All I wanted to do was eat, eat, eat. In volume. But overall I wasn't terrible. Oh, yeah, I was. Tha thump. Off the wagon. Tha thump. Ran over me, clipped me in the back of the head. Knocked the memory of the popcorn, cake and ice cream right out of me.

Ah, well. Back at it. Back at the diet, back at work, back at everything I guess. I had one day off from everything to just lay up and feel sorry for me. My only regret is that I didn't see that I could have gotten "In Her Shoes" on pay-per-view until it was too late. But I did get to watch "The Village" on regular cable.

coff*coff*coff

I shouldn't be so smug and superior to friends who fall prey to every virus out there. It's like I threw down the gauntlet to the entire viral community -- "Bring it on, bad viruses. I can handle anything you dish out!" It's true that I don't get sick a lot... I've had the unusual gift of resistence to every creeping crud T has had over the years, even strep. I also worked through mono and was bascially asymptomatic after 2 weeks -- a small miracle I hear.

But superhuman? Naw, not so much. What I thought was allergies turned out to be some kind of frickin' plague and I've had the special privilege of waking myself up coughing, on the hour, all night long.

So I'm super excited to be hear at work, leaving little virally fingerprints all over my office. I say my office-- because I've been quarantined-- to my office. Sorry everyone, I guess I am that annoying person who shows up sick and tries to spread my disease. Whoops.

do you know me? a love letter to my true friends

I want to believe that if you don't like me it's because you don't know me. Recently I was told that "there were a lot of people who didn't like me". I was also told that "a lot of people had changed their minds about me over time" and like me better now than they did. In the beginning, they thought I was snotty and stuck up.

Well, guys, I'm almost 39 years old and this isn't high school. I have consumed too much emotional energy worrying about who likes me and who doesn't. I have appeared stuck up because I was so afraid I wouldn't be liked that I didn't let anyone get close enough to decide for themselves if I am a good person or not. I have made myself hard to know. I didn't mean to, it just happened.

To the people who really know me, who hang around me, I think you do like me -- otherwise why waste your time? So I thank you for not judging this book by my cover. It would have been easy to do. I thank you for seeing past my defenses and being patient for me. I'm mystified as to why you would but profoundly grateful that you did.

Wrestling with God

It occurred to me this morning how far I've gotten from my old relationship with God. When I was constantly seeking him, attending church regularly, doing ministry stuff, really trying to walk the walk, well, it just seemed so hard. There was very little comfort there, just a nagging feeling that I could never be good enough. Read the Bible enough. Pray enough. Instead of feeling that I was worthy I felt more unworthy than ever. I never felt I was doing enough. I didn't read the right books, I didn't think the right way.

I put a little distance between myself and God last fall, I admit it. I couldn't focus on more than the crisis right in front of me. I didn't go to church. I still don't. I don't read my Bible at all. I don't set aside time to pray although I do pray for people when asked and I pray "on the fly", i.e. when things come to me. I do that in the car a lot. I feel more skeptical -- but not to the point of disbelief. It's more about the institution of religion and not about the players themselves -- God, Jesus, the Apostles. I miss having a church but my old church doesn't feel like home any more and I don't know how to find someplace new.

I used to wonder what God thought of me in His heaven. Now I just wonder if He thinks of me at all.

Having a relationship with a Diety is hard. It's not like you can just call up and say, "Hey God it's me. We haven't talked in a while but I was thinking about you and wondered if we could just get together. I'd like your opinion on some things and well, I just missed you." Yeah, God's never on the other end of the phone. But I don't worry very much. It may be stupid and arrogant of me but I believe that I will be renewed in my relationship with Him at some point. I believe this is inevitible. I don't want to have to turn to Him in another crisis though because getting through a crisis is hard enough without feeling as though you've been abandoned by the One who put you here. And yeah, I've read that "Footprints in the Sand" poem too. But there's what I know and how I feel and sometimes they are not the same.

Anyway I take encouragement from the story about Jacob wrestling with God. They wrestled all night and God even dislocated his hip. But Jacob refused to quit until he got his blessing. So even though God and I are doing a little wrestling right now, I'm not letting go until I get blessed.

Photo courtesy of this website: The Brick Testament

the real me

What? I didn't do it, whatever it is.

miscellaneous midweek mishmash

Too late for commenting on the Oscars I guess, although I liked the job that Jon Stewart did. I also love that Reese Witherspoon won and Philip Seymour Hoffman, too, although every time I see him I think "Dusty" from Twister so it's hard to take him seriously. Of course SHE was in not one but two "Legally Blonde" movies, so who's to say?

Well, weigh in day and down 12#. I wish that I felt it more, I'm in a constant state of surprise when I step on the scale and see it's gone down because I just don't feel it. I think my clothes do fit better and except for the below-waist jeans, nothing's falling off. Those below waist jeans are a bear by the way. I'm constantly hiking them up. I guess I need to dig out a belt.

So, other things to worry about. I think I've found some tile I like for the kitchen and in a totally non-related note, my hair is definitely falling out. This is nothing a 38 year old woman wants to face, by the way. But the old "Ignore it, it will go away" is not really appropriate here. Despite a year of Nioxin and tender loving care, it still is. Going away, that is. So next step will be to see a dermatologist, although I think it's fruitless, to be honest. I'm sure it's hereditary and the only answer is "tough luck". Guys are so lucky... they can just shave their heads these days and be sorta cool. But how many bald headed women do you see running around? Well there are a few but I think they may be in to some adult activities I'm not up for. That's a whole different enchilada. The easiest answer would be for falls to come back in to style. I used to have a blast with my mom's dark brown fall, I used to pin it in to my pixie cut and pretend I was a princess. My mother has a small collection of little hair enhancers now, less for style and more for necessity. Like my grandmother (the genetic culprit behind all this female hair loss) used to say, her head gets cold. Ah, it's not funny. But what else to do? Laugh or cry? I've already cried ...

So, jury duty went fine and quickly, thanks for that. A good thing too since I'm headed for San Diego in 2 weeks for another show and the work is backing up even as I waste time blogging. It's high season in the lawn & garden bidness so that means time to knuckle down.

And finally, there is rain in Kansas City.

consider yourself tagged

I love memes. I think they're fun. But no one ever tags me, which makes me sad. :-(

So I picked this one up from Pound. I stole it. So there. If you're reading this, consider yourself tagged. I think there are only about 4 bloggers that will read this anyway so I expect to see this in your blog next I check, OK? OK.

By the way, 2 days after the official weigh in (Wednesday) the scale reads 159.8. That, ladies and gentlemen, is the first time I've seen the 150s in a year. I have to say... I feel great.

On to the meme:

Four jobs I have had:

1. Waitress in the cafe the Cat's parents owned. Had a regular clientele that included two sweet elderly ladies who came in to eat noon dinner every day. I had the salads and tea on the table before their butts hit the seat.
2. Assistant to the VP of Marketing for a carpet retailer. Yeah, it was as crappy as it sounds. Only worse. I shared an office with a leering 2-pack a day smoker and I had to work half a day on Saturdays for the whole first year. I quit after 15 months.
3. Field Marketing Manager for Hardee's. One of my favorite jobs: involved a lot of travel, cool marketing stuff and the odd free ticket to a sporting event. It was also the first time in my career I got a huge raise.
4. Camp Counselor. The happiest 3 summers of my life. Netted me an ex-husband and 2 wonderful friends.

Four movies I can watch over and over:

1. The Philadelphia Story. I want to be Tracy's best friend. That girl can party.
2. Love, Actually
3. Pride & Prejudice (The BBC version with Colin Firth. Sorry Kari, all others are just pretenders.) I have seen this movie so many times I am embarrassed to say how many. Because it's 6 hours. But it's a lot.
4. Tie between Fantasia and Lady & the Tramp. Happy childhood memories, ya know.

Four places I have lived:

1. Independence, MO
2. Columbia, MO
3. Roeland Park, KS
4. Lenexa, KS (I don't get around much)
   

Four TV shows I love:

1. LOST
2. Survivor
3. I used to love the old Wonderful World of Disney
4. I have to say I'm kinda getting hooked on Grey's Anatomy but I don't know who in the world would find Ellen Pompeo cute. She looks squinty and runty to me. I like George. I think it should be called George's Anatomy.

Four places I have vacationed:

1. Spain: unforgettable and bears repeating, the sooner the better
2. Oahu: like heaven
3. Boston: great seafood, lots of history. I highly recommend the Cape in the off season. It's great to have a whole beach to yourself -- except for a sea lion & a horseshoe crab.
4. Halifax, Nova Scotia: feels a little like the edge of civilization. Cold and wild and very stoic, but friendly. OK, I can't explain it. Just go there.
   

Four of my favorite dishes:

1. Pizza with lots of Canadian bacon, pepperoni, olives and mushrooms
2. Phad Thai
3. Home made macaroni & cheese made with Velveeta
4. Tortellini Gina

Four sites I visit daily:

1. weightwatchers.com
2. yahoo home
3. the blogs on my list---------->
4. here, because I'm pathetic and I keep hoping one day I'll pop on and have like 100 visits in a day

on a less frequent basis I visit eonline, nascar.com, epinions, postsecret and awfulplasticsurgery.com. I'm not so different from anyone else, really. Also stuff for work.

Four places I would rather be right now:

1. Hanauma Bay, snorkling
2. Riding a horse which is something I haven't done for a long time
3. at home on the couch reading a book
4. a great big museum or art gallery, like maybe the Louvre or the Smithsonian

and one more thing

Lobster's rant about commercialized weight loss is just that, a rant. Bless him and his right to an opinion but here's mine: most commercialized weight loss is probably OK. I'm not a huge fan of Jenny Craig but you know how I feel about WW and there's evidence to support the notion that WW does indeed work. People do lose weight. Yes, sometimes they gain it back, not because the program failed but rather because they have failed to address the real stuff that goes on when they turn to food for comfort, happiness, depression, anger or for any reason other than hunger. They've dealt with the symptoms but don't always tackle the "disease".

We are a nation of people plagued by conflicting messages: be beautiful and thin and while you're doing it, grab a Snickers -- it satisfies. The great wave of lap band surgeries is even proving to be a failure, since many high profile LBers are now ... that's right right, say it with me, gaining the weight back. Even with those tiny, tiny stomachs and the risk of being horribly sick.

Lately I've noticed food companies doing some new things: taking the sugar and the trans fats out, adding fiber and going to whole grains. Even more shocking, a packaged goods company (Hey Kool-Aid!) made and advertised a low calorie product to children! Food companies are businesses, created to make money. Consumers drive demand and if we ask for these products and buy them then the Krafts of the world will make them. I never realized what an outrageous reliance we have on prepackaged foods until I tried to shop in Spain. We must be one of the few countries on the planet that doesn't believe in whole food any more. It's a shame really. Instead of exporting our food culture to the rest of the world we should be importing their eating habits. Their food tastes better.

When we get serious about our own weight loss and health and stop acting like it's a fad, the corporate world will too. The buck stops here.

Civic duty

Much as I'd like to duck out, I got pulled for jury duty next week. Again. I swear I'm called for jury duty more than anyone else I know. I'm about to go pro.

And they've made it harder and harder to get out of it. I sat through a jury selection last time where this guy tried for 2 solid hours to get dismissed by giving the most obnoxious answers possible to every question the attorneys asked him. He claimed to be completely biased about everything, hate everyone and basically had no redeeming human qualities at all. After two hours everyone in the jury pool begged for them to dimiss him. Either that or we were going to have to drag him out behind the courthouse and kick his ass.

Well, while I'm sitting for hour upon hour at least I can read. Or play Bookworm or Text Twister on my pda. And try not to think about the work that's piling up while I'm doing my civic duty.

Is it wrong to pray that everyone plea bargains next week?

three tenths and a new stove

That's all I got for ya this week, just a measly 3/10 of a pound.

Almost 2 months in to the process and down 10.6 pounds. I'd hoped it would be faster. But I'm not going to complain .. I haven't been a very good weight watcher. I've made some alarming mistakes on my tracker and I have been eating out a lot -- Chinese, Mongolian BBQ, Subway, Sweet Tomatoes, Taco Bell. Heck I started off last Wednesday (the beginning of my WW week) by consuming almost half my flex points in one day. So I'll take the 3/10 down. Better than 3/10 up, right? The twin set I'm wearing isn't stretched across my chest like a porn star, so that's a bonus. Last time I wore it it didn't ... quite ... fit.

On other fronts, does anyone want to renovate my kitchen? For free? I daydream about a lot of things and some do come true, some do not. I daydreamed about new houses for a long time -- now I've downgraded my daydreams to new cabinet fronts, appliances, a sink, new tile backsplash and a countertop. We have one of the world's oldest kitchens. OK, maybe not the world, but it's pretty aged. It's all original, from 1961. Except the floor, that's circa 1981. I've got appliances older than me.

I never thought stoves could be sexy, but someone just utter the words continuous grate, self cleaning oven, sealed burners, over the range microwave and man, I'm totally hot. But we have to do the taxes first which means a whole bunch of headache. And then we have to buy the appliances and the sink and stash them somewhere in our tiny little crackerbox. And figure out how to pay for it all. And then have a big mess, for like, a week. So the process just feels too big, too scary, too unwieldy.

Ah, new things to worry about. How I do love a problem to solve.

Miss Fix-it

(image from artchixstudio.com)

I'm a Picture straightener.

I can't help it. I'm a compulsive miss fix-it and the only thing I really hate is the thing I can't fix.

I can't fix things that happened in the past.
I can't fix other people.
I can't fix the weather.
I can't fix other people's money problems.
I can't fix what God has decided will be otherwise.

But I want to. I want to wave my magic wand and make people whole and healthy. I want to sprinkle fairy dust and make my friend's daughter slender so she doesn't have to face a lifetime of weight issues. I want some extra strength fairy dust for my other friends' children, both special needs kids, both with uncertain futures. I want a pocket full of magic to make marriages healed and families whole and the places I used to love to feel like home again. I want a problem I can solve. I want everyone I love to want my love.

Just dub me Glinda the Witch of Good Intentions. The bubbly blonde with the broken wand. How does one survive in a world where problems just won't go away?

I guess I'll continue to pick away at the things I can fix. Like small time home repair. My weight. My lame pack a week smoking habit, which I am psyching myself up to stop, soon. After all this time I still forget that the only things I can truly fix are the things within me.

Fat girl vs. Skinny chick

So I'm reading "Tales from the Scale" which is not really what I expected -- I expected more humor and less introspection. But it turns out to be a thought-provoking little tome about how women deal with a lifetime of weight problems. It's led me to do some thinking about my own inner fat girl and the skinny chick lurking around in there too -- because they do coexist, although badly.

The fat girl showed up in 7th grade. Special K had those "pinch an inch" commercials on TV and I reached down and, to my great dismay, grabbed at least an inch worth of flesh. I have no idea what I weighed then but things were already starting to go if only slightly, wrong. I get to thank puberty for that. I had always been a skinny kid but hormones changed everything. I also lived with a woman who had very serious weight issues and I had a lot of free access to pop and junk food. My skinny chick had always been able to eat anything and be a beanpole. But the fat girl demanded something different and a lot more of it.

In 8th grade I had my school picture taken and it was so awful I demanded they retake it. Over his vehement protests, the photographer took the picture again but it was no better. The truth was on film twice over. I looked pale, tired, bloated and unhappy. That year I had my last falling out with my stepmom and got moved to my mother's house. Living with my slender mother didn't help. My freshman year I was just over 5" and probably weighed 112 and thought I had become a complete cow. Each year of high school I tracked my weight: 116 my sophomore year, 121 my junior year and 131 my senior year. Not quite 5'4" and 131. I thought I was huge. Most of my friends were probably 10-15 pounds lighter. My mother called me porkchop if she caught me snacking after school. I knew I weighed more than she did: both my parents had weighed 118 when they married -- they were little people. I should have been too, but I was not. I had breasts. I had curves. I had a softness my mother didn't. I was zaftig. In my head, I was fat. But I still wanted food, so I snuck it. I bought the candy bars the cheerleaders were selling and ate them for breakfast. I bought girl scout cookies and hid them, polishing off a box of Thin Mints in 2 sittings. I ate spoonsful of peanut butter and cream cheese. I bought spreadable cheese my choir sold as a fundraiser and ate it plain because I didn't want my mom to see me with the crackers.

And so the rollercoaster began. College = pizza, booze and a five pound weight gain. Thankfully I had to walk a lot and I was broke all the time, otherwise it would have been much worse. My first year of marriage, my ex told me I'd feel so much better if I'd "just lose 10#". So I tried the "American Heart Association Diet". When that failed, I consulted a nutritionist and lost weight -- it was the last time I saw the 120s (16 years ago). After my first husband left, I didn't even think about the fact that I was back on the dating scene and carrying an extra 20 pounds. I knew when I slept with someone that the lights should be off so no one could see me but the inner skinny chick, still alive despite everything, told me that I didn't really look that bad. I never looked in mirrors. I ate canned soup and candy from the counter of the Hallmark store I worked in part-time at night and on weekends. I had Taco Bell if I could afford it. On special occasions, I treated myself to Velveeta Shells N' Cheese.

When T and I started dating I didn't own a scale. I remember standing on his and saying "if I hit 150 I'm wiring my mouth shut." After a very happy year and a half courtship, we married. I weighed 169 after our 18 month Dairy Queen dating ritual and when the pictures came back of me pre-ceremony, in sweats and in profile, I knew it was time I got serious. Enter Weight Watchers attempt #1. I lost 29 pounds in maybe 9 months and was thrilled but proceeded to put every pound right back on and add another 20 to it. Attempt number 2 (with many false starts in between) I lost nearly 50 pounds. I weighed 138 for about 3 minutes before I stopped weight-watching and piled it all back on. And this is how it's been for me. The fat girl says I'm not good enough and the skinny chick says I don't look all that bad. I don't look in mirrors, especially those 3 way kind where you can see your back. The back of my body from shoulders to knees is a problem. I don't listen to either one of them but they're whispering to me all the time.

Even when and if I ever reach 135# again, I won't be skinny. But I'll be good enough for middle aged. I'll still avoid looking at the rear view and I'll spend the rest of my life trying to squelch the skinny chick/fat girl debate going on in my head. The fat girl wants fed and the skinny chick wants to be pretty and in control. Unfortunately for me, they can't co-exist in peace. I will always miss the comfort of fudge, macaroni and cheese, meatloaf with mashed potatoes, pasta, pizza and warm chocolate chip cookies. Let';s face reality: cucumbers with hummus and high fiber granola bars will never replace the reassurance of the creamy, chewy fat-laden foods I love.

Nor can I separate the people I love from the foods I associate them with: Grandma Short and her lemon meringue pie and fried chicken, Grandma Skellenger and her blueberries and cream, raspberry milk and cinnamon toast. Even my mother-in-law with her pot roasts and homemade bread, my own mother and her unbelievable key lime pies. Dear sweet T, with his cream cheese pies and smoky ribs. I just know that there's more to love and relationships than food and the feelings it gives me. I've just got to learn how to relate to people without the food. I need to know how to celebrate without dinner and dessert. I need to know how to love someone without feeding them. I need peace with food. I need peace. I need food.

(Just not as much as I think.)

this Friday feels like Tuesday and I need a nap

I'm totally discombobulated. Being out of town Sun-Wed has messed up my schedule and so at 11:29 a.m. Friday I feel like it's only Tuesday morning and I wish it was Saturday afternoon so I could go take a nap until I feel better.

Remember when you'd get real cranky as a little kid and you'd start being super unreasonable because the dog licked you in the face or your brother made fun of you and your mom would say "I think someone needs a nap"? Oh yeah, then I'd start wailing "I doooooo nooooot neeeeed a naaaaaaaaaaaaaaap!" With tears down my cheeks and snot starting to run. Well, if my mom appeared out of no where right next to me and said that now I'd cry from relief. "Thank you mama, I do need a nap". And I'd toddle off with my favorite soft bankie and do it.

Man, I hate PMS.

just me -- stirred not shaken

A lot of stuff has happened in the last year or so and the latest thing, K's return to Lincoln, was a sudden, hard right that hurt almost more than anything I've ever experienced. It wasn't that she did -- a small part of me always believed she would. It's how it all came to happen that was such a smart slap in the face.

It's not the kind of hurt that heals quickly. If it hurts me this much I can't imagine what it's done to T but he's soldiering on in incredibly brave fashion and I think in some ways we're closer now than we were. I dream about the girls a lot now-- including a couple of vivid ones on this trip, made worse by that wierd disoriented feeling you have when you wake up in the middle of the night in a strange place. I dream of A regularly, on the road and at home. My dreams make me sad because the dreams are usually happy and I know it's just what I wish for and not what really is. I so wish she would call. I don't really expect she will.

On another topic, I managed to survive a 4 day trip out of town with my weight loss and my mind mostly intact. I have some seriously unattractive bruises from dropping boxes on myself, twisting my ankle in my cute boots and falling, and any number of other dumb human tricks I pulled these last 4 days. I never remember coming back from a trip feeling so beat up as I do this time. I am really out of shape. It was a good thing for all 3 of us that the trip was ending: I think we were all exhausted. Last night going from the convention center to the airport was stone silent, just watching the rain and the traffic and hoping against all hope we'd make the plane. It's good to work with friends who don't feel uncomfortable about the silences. Sometimes conversation just takes too much juice.

Anyway, home again. Back to some kind of normal work routine until a month from now when we head to San Diego for another show.

10 down

Since Sunday I've been in Nashville working at a trade show and I just want to say YEAH!!! I did it! I managed to keep off the weight I lost late last week for a total so far of -10.1# lost since the first of January. I don't know if I'll see the 140s by May as I'd hoped but I know it will be close and keeping the weight off while everyone's throwing cookies and candy at you for three days is a big win in my book.

I'm so ecstatically happy. Also very busy so I'll come back and do a real post later. Happy Thursday everyone!

sad little loss

The weight tracker up on top doesn't reflect fractions of pounds so it's rarely spot-on. I haven't quite lost 9#, more like 8.8. If you think that .2 pounds isn't important, that's all I lost this week.

I could have blown my nose really good and lost that much.

Losing weight isn't so bad if it's consistent but my losses have been all over the board and with a trade show to work Sun-Wed of next week I'm afraid the scale isn't going to be nice to me next Thursday when I finally make it home.

I am trying not to be sad. It's hard. It's a sad, lonely little .2# loss. It needed company.

Soon, soon, soon.

laser show

Almost forgot to mention, for the curious few, the laser thing went fine on Friday. I had a venous lake removed, basically a big ugly blue vein on my lower lip, left hand side. It's not gone but is now more like a faint grey bruise. I'm assured that if it's not gone in a month I can return for another shot of laser beam to rid myself of this thing for good.

The procedure itself was relatively pain free, like having someone stick me with a pin about 15 times, hard enough to be uncomfortable but not enough to really hurt. Worth every penny and pinprick if it's really gone by March...

Short ruminations on Valentine's Day

So is Valentine's Day a made up Hallmark holiday? An excuse for flower shops and restaurants to make a few extra bucks? There's a part of me that wants to remain above it all but then there's that other part that loves to have any reason to celebrate... Whether it's roses or a homemade card, I'm game for anything that comes my way and will just as enthusiastically search out the perfect expression of my own affection.

Valentine's Day has been celebrated since around 1400, the first commercial Valentine's greetings were popularized in the 1840s. I'm pretty sure that predates Hallmark and American Greetings so it seems that love expressions don't have to come with a red envelope and a $4.95 price tag. And who am I to buck 600 years of tradition anyway?

Beyond the horror of the classroom parties where you only got valentines because everyone had to give one to each kid in class, my Valentine's have been mostly good. I remember the Valentine's Days in high school sans boyfriend, when my girlfriends and I would comfort each other with dollar carnations sold by the student council. My best Valentine's Day, or at least the one I remember best, was a few years ago when T was on the road. I arrived home to find a bright red foil Russell Stover's box on the table. I was a little puzzled that the lid didn't seem to fit but figured he has snuck a piece. So I lifted the lid to find a black velvet ring box in the center and inside, a diamond cocktail ring (T is a big fan of Kay's holiday promotions. Bless the man who understands that jewelry is always appropriate!!)

So I will celebrate Valentine's Day with pleasure this year: I have a day to find a way to say "thanks" to the man who's put up with my butt for the last (almost) 13 years. It doesn't seem adequate but it will have to do for now.

oh yes, and ...

Someone said "you look pretty today -- but then you always look pretty". Now see, that just makes my day. See how easily flattered my middle aged self is?

Goody goody foody

I looked at my packed and carefully pre-planned breakfast and lunch this morning and realized that I have (gasp) started eating healthy again... and it's paying off... down 8.6 pounds in 5 weeks!

breakfast: fat free yogurt, Kashi chewy granola bar (which tastes a little like a piece of plywood), 4 points

lunch: Healthy Choice Chicken & pasta, cucumber with 2 tablespoons of garlic hummus, apple, 6.5 points

Dinner: probably a taco salad made with lettuce, 1/2 cup leftover chili, light sour cream, chopped onions, tomatoes, black olives, light queso dip and 13 Baked Tostitos. Also a light hot dog on a slice of light wheat bread. 9.5 points.

Snacks: a little weight watchers snack cake and maybe some sugar free Cheesecake pudding with fat free Cool Whip.

My Gosh, what happened to the Wendy's #1 combo with fries? Whither the pizza? The candy eaten with wild abandon?

Ah, well, looks like I can survive without that stuff after all.

God love America and our wretched excess!

As we were leaving Sam's Club on Saturday with our world record most expensive cart o' stuff ever, I had a few moments to reflect on the absolute excess of club stores. 40# of dog food, 40# of charcoal, 2 big plastic buckets filled with Baked Cheetos, enough grape tomatoes to string and decorate a Christmas Tree, a box of Tide that will keep our recently reduced household in clean undies for the next 9 months. There was other stuff, too, more than I care to recall. And then we went to WalMart to do our "real" shopping. One might look at our house and think we're children of the depression the way we hoard certain items. When I compare my 3' x 3 1/2' multi-roll package of paper towels to the single roll packages I saw in Spain, I'm ... so ... embarrassed. And a little giddy.

In another show of over-the-top American consumerism, let us reflect for a moment on the chili-and-chip-eating, rooted-to-the couch pastime that is the Superbowl. Only in America would companies throw down several million dollars for 30 seconds of TV time that consists of a pretty woman with a heaving bosom snapping the straps of her tiny shirt and some old guy hyperventilating. I still have no idea what godaddy.com is and if their commercials aren't outright offensive they're really stupid. But I did really like whoever had the commercial where the guy works with monkeys (and his friend works with jackasses). I have no idea what that product was either. But in a stunning win earned by blending brand, humor and frequency -- my declared Superbowl winner is Budweiser. Loved most of their spots and especially the Clydesdale spots (little one pulling the wagon and the football game/streaker spot). Bravo! Runner up? Disney World -- again with the frequency thing and the charming idea of the players rehearsing for their big moment in the spotlight. Makes me wonder why I'm not going to Disney World...

So now that we've snapped out of our food and football induced comas it can only mean one thing .... Speed Weeks. Ahhhh. More American excess, this time represented by big, loud, fast, fuel guzzling cars and sponsorships by beer, liquor and Little Debbies. Long live the USA!

One month update

One month since I restarted Weight Watchers - one month of obsessively tracking and planning and praying for the scale to budge. Freaking scale, what a tease. One time 164.3. The next time 165.6. The 165.5. OK so maybe I shouldn't just stand there, hopping on, hopping off, running to pee, hopping on again, making sure my hair is totally dry, taking my glasses off. Maybe I've gotten a little wierd on that count. This is nothing new, the wierdness.

But really, really, I have lost 6.1 pounds this month. It's not exactly like I got dealt a Blackjack or anything, but it's a solid "19" and I feel good about it. 6 pounds per month and by May I'll be 147 pounds again... and if I can hang in a little longer, by July I could be in the 130s. Unthinkable. Yet .... doable.

So, I feel good. My clothes still don't fit but underneath my winter fat, I'm a butterfly...

College Bands

I wasn't much of a music connoisseur in college -- I actually missed the ultimate college band -- REM-- all together since I was dating a guy whose tastes tended toward Wynton Marsalis, Spyro Gyra and Mannheim Steamroller. I guess I listened to what he listened to. But my junior year I started dating another guy who loved rock and knew a little something about the local talent. Through him I was introduced to Melissa Etheridge (when she had just released her first album and was still a "local" act) and the Rainmakers.

I thought about the Rainmakers today because the lyrics to a song called "Small Circles" just sort of came in to my head. The lyrics don't directly pertain to me but the idea of the song is how my life feels right now -- just moving in small circles, just sort of killing time until issues get resolved and things can move on. Small circles aren't productive but they're sort of comforting. So is thinking of old memories and listening to old songs that help me remember happier times. I guess that's why we still love our college bands, even after we've grown up.

Small Circles - The Rainmakers
She reached out, and twist my hand
And made me dance to some local band
But the beat was slow, so there we stand
As we move in small circles

We cut out before the night was through
Start my car and we drove the Loop
Talked about the things we were going through
As we move in small circles
We move in small circles

She said she didn't know the ways of love
I said "Neither do I; I thought you'd show me some"
We dilly-dallied like that for 6 or 8 months
As we move in small circles

A couple of times she stayed with me
And we worked it out on a single sheet
I can hear every painful squeak
As we move in small circles
We move in small circles

And she grew up, and I grew up
And she got tough, and I got tough
So much for love, so much for love
As we move in small circles

Now we make money, and we're all right
And we drive cars and wield our might
We make love to people that we don't even like
As we move in small circles
We move in small circles

And I don't even think about her now
I just said all this to be workin' my mouth
I wish I cared, but I don't know how
As we move in small circles
We move in small circles
We move in small circles
We move in small circles

Grouchy Poetry Day

Be warned: it's grouchy poetry day. My poetry isn't especially good when I'm in a happy mood. But mix one part Monday, 5 hours of sleep, PMS and cold feet and what you get is even worse than usual...

------------------------------------------
It's hard to go around the next corner
when each turn seems to take me
further away from where I want to be.

I thought you were right behind me
but somehow you got ahead
and now you're completely out of sight.

If you are going to keep on lying to me
stick the blade straight in and twist
fast so dying comes before I can think.

Stop, I want to get off

If my life was "The Zipper" I would say this ride is dumb. It is like I waited in line forever, all hyped up on adrenaline and caramel apples with chocolate drizzles and extra pecans -- only to throw it all up 45 seconds in. Now I have to finish the stupid ride all gross and icky and sick.

If life was a rollercoaster I would say it's too damn rough. It looked fun from the ground but when I actually get on it whips my neck and makes my butt hurt.

My life is artificial trying to be real. It's a sunburn on a high humidity day when all you wanted was to have some fun but somehow, everything's gone wrong.

I keep hoping that if I just hang in there I will get to enjoy the cool of the evening, holding hands with my love and maybe, just maybe, some fireworks and a deep sleep with wonderful dreams.

blogger as metaphor for life

About once or twice a year I get to messing around with my template while doing something simple (like a hedgehog weight tracker) and I lose all my formatting for blogger.

Lately I've gotten a little smarter and figured out how to save most of the good stuff and patch everything together quickly.

This is my life. Screw up. Fix. Start Over. Screw up. Fix. Start Over.

You have the right to ... oh, nevermind

I am very interested in the anti-smoking employment policies being instituted at many companies -- basically if you smoke anywhere, any time, you can be fired. Companies such as Weyco, Investors Property Management Inc., Schweitzer Engineering Laboratories and most notably, Scotts Miracle Grow have instituted "smoke and be fired" policies for all their employees.

Other companies refuse to hire smokers and a few have had these policies in the past and quietly dropped them: CNN, for instance.

I could go on and on about what an incredible infringement on our personal rights this policy is. About how if they say you can't smoke, what about drinking? Overeating? Skydiving? Having sex with the scary girl you picked up in a bar the night before? I could but I won't. Because here's the thing. If you're in a state that is employment at-will (and most are) you can be fired for holding your tongue wrong while using a yo-yo. Or any other stupid thing, so long as there isn't a statute that says it's illegal (like gender, age, religion, ethnicity). People can and do get fired for being too fat. People can and do get fired for buying a competitive product.

So just assume that you have no work rights.

That is my soap-box for today. Thank you.

PSA

Folks on the weight watchers boards are fond of posts that have the heading "PSA". It's what they do when they just want to rant a little bit about something that has really bothered them. I don't want to rant and rave or cry or anything. I'm tired of the sound of my own voice. I just want to say today I feel a little fragile. Be gentle with me please.

Aqualung (aka Matt Hales) said it best:

This is not the time to wonder why
Just let the heart and mind
Be still for just some time
This is the time for the rest
Just let it go
You know its for the best
If you're fragile,and if you're delicate
Take my hand but be gentle with me please

Let the river flow
Washing over me
for a while
But be gentle with me please

This is not the time to compromise
if you're feeling it too
Then you've realised
This is the time for a change
Yes you know it's true
Deep down within you
If you're fragile,and if you're delicate
Take my hand but be gentle with me please

Let the river flow
Washing over me
for a while
But be gentle with me please
Let the river flow
Washing over me
for a while
But be gentle with me please
But be gentle with me please
If you're fragile,and if you're delicate
Take my hand but be gentle with me please
Let the river flow
Washing over me
for a while
But be gentle with me please
Let the river flow
Washing over me
for a while
But be gentle with me please
be gentle with me please
be gentle with me please
be gentle with me please

Is it just me?

Or does January seem like the longest month of the year? Dear Lord when will it ever end?

I hate January with a passion usually reserved for the DMV and the dentist's chair. This one has been very mild but today when I got in the car it was dark, gloomy, drizzly, nasty and all together the kind of day where I'd like to go lay on the couch and watch bad Lifetime movies. It's supposed to snow later on.

I'm thinking of making it a Blockbuster weekend. I'm thinking I'd like to eat everything in sight. I'm also thinking that K's P.E. teacher is a sadist who enjoys punishing his students. She showed me the exercises they do in class and 3 days later I still hurt.

I'm thinking I need to quit goofing around and get some work done so maybe this day -- and the 11 left in this month -- will go a little faster. I'm ready for spring.

House of Geriatric Pets

I have a neighbor that used to be quite a collector of aged animals. She had, at one time, 2 antique poodles, an 18 year old deaf and blind cat and another dog in the backyard that was well past his prime. Since then I think all of her critters have died, to be replaced by other, presumably younger, models.

I think I've taken her place.

It is a sad fact of life that Abby the famous D-O-G (famous because she appears in the EMT Spray packaging at the top) can no longer make the "big loop" around our neighborhood without showing a very pronounced limp. T and I realized last night that her days of long walks with mom and dad are, indeed, finally over. My poor girl. We have grown older and fatter together, unfortunately her more so than I. This same gimp also affects Dusty, or Fatboy, as we like to call him around home. His jumper doesn't quite jump and he's got a definite hitch in his giddyup. KC, the oldest of the batch, still hops around like the superfit feline she is (even with questionable kidneys) and Penny, the baby of the bunch, hasn't slowed down at all.

The "people ages" of the critters in my household:
KC (cat): 73
Abby (dog): 70
Dusty (cat): 63
Penny (dog): 55-60

I'm the like the Denny's of animal care. The only sobering thought is that I fear that they will all go at once... except for Penny who will live forever, unless she sneaks out the gate and is flattened by a UPS truck. (She hates UPS trucks). I am afloat in a sea of Senior formula dog and cat food, treats for grungy teeth and glucosamine. But I am completely surrounded by furry soldiers of love, my aging but dedicated army of bodyguards. Lucky me.

what I had for lunch

There's something weirdly empowering about eating a predator for lunch.

I had a business lunch at my favorite Spanish restaurant and the fish special was Mako Shark.

Cool.

Having eaten Morcilla in Murcia (hahahaha!) I now feel emboldened to eat all kinds of new unusual stuff. It was good shark too, very mild and firm. Plus, it was SHARK. How cool is that?

On a completely unrelated note (and maybe TMI but it's my blog and I'll be strange if I want to), I have decided to go "under the knife" or should that be "under the laser" to have a venous lake removed from my lower lip. This is a disturbing blue vein that grew on my lip basically overnight some years ago. I have been very nervous about having anyone do stuff with needles or lasers near my face but after having a chat with a cosmetic surgery place it turns out that it's no big whoop and won't even require a numbing cream. Just a few zaps and $50 and I never have to have anyone ask me again if I've been chewing on a blue ink pen. Yay.

OK, maybe I'm feeling a little goofy today....

The cleaning lady

I had a cleaning lady a few years ago when I was in graduate school and working full time -- I had simply run out of time to do all of the things I needed to do. For $50 (she was inexpensive and my house was small) it seemed like a bargain to have someone come and scrub the floors and chase my dust bunnies. Also our cleaning lady was a friend and the wife of a church elder. For $50 she cleaned: for free she prayed and blessed while she did it.

On the flip side, I have been someone else's cleaning lady -- although mostly just empty rental property and the occasional helping hand for a friend. Cleaning houses is very hard and surprisingly intimate. There's no way you can scrub someone's kitchens and bathrooms and bedrooms and not know them in a very personal way. You learn their habits, their weaknesses, their likes and dislikes, the books they read, the foods they eat. You see but you try not to. It's like overhearing a confession or reading a diary. Your cleaning lady knows you in ways you probably don't want to think about, believe me.

One pretty fall day I spent a significant portion of my morning on my hands and knees scrubbing floors. It took a long time and it involved some not insignificant physical pain, as my softy office knees aren't used to that sort of business. After finishing, I stood up, bloody-knuckled, flushed and sweaty, pfff-ed the stray hair off my face and bragged to my mother (who is a cleaning lady full time and then some and had been cleaning circles around me all morning) about how beautiful it was. She said, "Yes, I do that every week. It's the only way to get a really clean floor." Well, the idea of my 59 year old rheumatoid arthritic mother on her hands and knees scrubbing floors really popped my bubble. I hated to think about her doing that and at the same time I realized that I really hadn't done anything special myself.

Don't misunderstand me. I don't pity her... but I really respect her. Mom is usually happy cleaning and has augmented her earnings or made her living for 40 years by straightening up someone's mess. I understand why she likes it-- I do too. I like the pop of a fresh sheet as I make the bed, the faint smell of bleach on my hands. I like the order and comfort of a clean room. It doesn't have to be antiseptically clean, just ordinary clean and clutter free. If I've done something really big like a basement or garage I'll sometimes go in to that room again and again just to enjoy the difference between before and after. In my own house I light scented candles in each room as I finish it... I don't know why, other than it's just part of my ritual.

There is one difference between me and a real cleaning lady though. I choose to do it -- I don't need to pay my bills this way. If I had to do it day in and day out to put food on the table I'm sure I would feel differently. I never see a cleaning person without thinking of my mother and my own reddened knees and raw hands from scrubbing floors. To this day, I always smile and say hello to the office cleaning people, the hotel cleaning staff, the people spraying sanitizer in the public restrooms and scooping paper off the tables in the food court. They work hard and they keep many secrets. They clean up my mess and then they go home to do it all over in their own homes. The least they deserve is my appreciation and my respect.

playlist part 2

Well, I haven't figured out how to burn the cd's yet but I downloaded some stuff for my mixes:

Time to Say Goodbye - Sarah Brightman
Copperline - James Taylor
Don'cha - Pussycat Dolls/Busta Rhymes
What You Waitin' For - Gwen Stefani
Soft Place to Fall - Allison Moorer
Come A Little Closer - Dierks Bentley
Love Is Here to Stay - Harry Connick Jr.
Take Your Mama Out - Scissor Sisters
Little Miss Can't Be Wrong - Spin Doctors
Only Happy When It Rains - Garbage
If She Knew What She Wants - Bangles
Time After Time - Cyndi Lauper
I Melt With You - Modern English
Been Caught Stealing - Jane's Addiction
Clocks - Coldplay
Who'll Stop the Rain - CCR
Twenty Years and Two Husbands Ago - LeeAnn Womack
Rain King - Counting Crows
Hazy Shade of Winter - Bangles
Pictures of You - The Cure
Where It's At - Beck
Groove is in the Heart - Dee-Lite
Down on the Corner - CCR
Tim McGraw - Just to See You Smile
Whiskey Lullaby - Brad Paisley/Alison Krauss
It Ain't Me Babe - Joaquin Phoenix/Reese Witherspoon
The Dance - Garth Brooks
Freedom 90- George Michael
Hey Ya - OutKast

I grabbed the wrong Alanis Morrissette, which bums me out, but I'll fix it later. I'm still trying to figure out why Nero won't burn the cd right. Like all technology, I never read the instructions, I just get in there and push some buttons and stuff and see what happens. In the meantime I can listen to my playlist from Windows Media Player and the one working (tinny) speaker I have. Nothing like chair dancing to the Pussycat Dolls while writing catalog copy....

mix mania

I'm all in to the college era mix "tape" (OK it's a cd) at the moment. It's really just a poor substitute for the iPod I wanted but decided I shouldn't buy. So I made one CD which I am very satisfied with and am choosing songs for another.

cd #1

1. Aqualung - Brighter than Sunshine
2. Ben Folds - Landed
3. Damien Rice - The Blower's Daughter
4. Coldplay - Speed of Sound
5. Duran Duran - Ordinary World
6. Elton John - Tiny Dancer
7. Foo Fighters - Best of You
8. Josh Groban - Remember When it Rained
9. Kelly Clarkson - Miss Independent
10. Lee Ann Womack - I May Hate Myself in the Morning
11. Los Lonely Boys - Heaven
12. Black Eyed Peas - Let's Get it Started
13. Tim McGraw - She's My Kind of Rain
14. Joaquin Phoenix - Get Rhythm (from "Walk the Line")

so cd #2 and 2 1/2 might include:

1. Alanis Morrissette - Thank You
2. CCR- Who'll Stop the Rain
3. CCR - Down on the Corner
4. Counting Crows - The Rain King
5. The Cure - Pictures of You (thanks Kodak commercial)
6. Beck - Where It's At
7. Brad Paisley (w/ Alison Krauss) - Whiskey Lullaby
8. Lee Ann Womack - 20 Years and 2 Husbands Ago
9. Gwen Stefani - What are You Waiting For
10. Outkast - Hey Ya
11. Pussycat Dolls - that girlfriend song, I can't remember the title
12. James Taylor - Copperline
13. couple more Tim McGraw

I dunno, there's a few more but I can't remember what I picked and I can't look at it right now. I'm just looking for more suggestions 'cause there's a thousand songs I like but I can't ever remember who sings them or if I do, what the title was.

What are some of your favorite songs for a mix cd?

motivation

It's official. My life has passed into the pleasant state of "too boring to blog about". And I don't like starting a bunch of crap about politics or religion -- the only blogs out there more boring than mine are the ones who rattle on about Bush. Waaaah. Move to Cuba.

So I can only blog about my "diet". Sorry.

The WW thing is going surprisingly well. I wish I knew what this mysterious source of "motivation" is that causes me to up-n-make up my mind to lose the weight. I've done it twice already, which means I am disciplined enough but also a little bit stupid since I lose all the weight and then gain it back. And it isn't just a one-off orgy at Sheridan's that does it. It's a persistent but unrealistic belief that I can eat whatever I want, whenever the mood strikes me. And never exercise.

Mostly I think my motivation is coming from a deep degree of self-loathing for the way I look and owning a closetful of pants I can't wear. I should be forced to shop and try things on in a 3-way mirror every day until I get back to 135#.

I could say my motivation is all about how I want to get healthy and live a clean life -- but that's not it either, although I do find that I'm in such awful shape that certain things are becoming harder. This weekend I was trying to help T carry out our smoker, which is a monster stainless cabinet cooker that weighs maybe 125#. I tried to step down while walking backwards out of the garage, turned my ankle and went down like a punch-drunk prize fighter. I'm no longer allowed to walk backwards while carrying stuff, which, while it shouldn't, does in fact make me mad. And I swear that thing is getting heavier every time we put it back in the garage.

It's hard to admit I've got a problem. A food problem. I love it and it loves me, as evidenced by the fact that it stays with me long after I've consumed it. I have an unhealthy attitude about food and how it makes me feel, which is "better", that is, until I've eaten. I dream of all things salty, creamy, cheesy and chocolatey. Also crunchy and chewy. I'm making my own mouth water just writing all this down. Food IS my drug. Yet I still feel the motivation -- the drive to get the weight off. To feel the way I felt when I could suck in real hard and actually see my ribcage. To walk around in a pair of baggy jeans and have some people tell me my britches are too big and I should go buy something that fits. Ha! What an awesome thing to hear! That's a pretty good source of motivation, come to think of it. But no, I think the real source of my motivation is the perverse need to prove myself right. I said I'd lose the weight -- I said it aloud to someone who doesn't live in my house. If I don't do it, why then I'd be wrong. Can't have that! So, must lose. Must be right.

Wherever it comes from, I'm glad I've got it back.

And even so, I'm still thinking how good cannoli sounds.

silliness

make your own South Park character

hope everyone has a good weekend. All 2 of you.

so much for not being obsessed

Third day on plan. Food I haven't eaten:

french fries
whatever food was in the kitchen at work (pannettone I think)
cheese, croutons and more dressing on my salad
a second slice of T's meatloaf
Russell Stover's chocolates

Food I have eaten:
T's very good meatloaf
one chocolate covered cherry
smoked trout
mock mashed "potatoes" made with cauliflower (yum)
dilled potatoes and carrots (also yum)

I regret now that I don't have the ability to go to a fitness center but maybe when they finish the new "Y" we'll get a family membership. I also regret that it takes so long to plan and track and that even after I said I would not get on the scale every day, I did it anyway. (for the record, I'm down .2!)

I went back to see how much weight I'd lost last time in the first 4 months and I was surprised to see it was about 18#. I could feel almost normal again if I could get there by our trade show in Vegas, which is in May.

There is no way I can do this and not be completely obsessed by it. This is going to be a seriously dull blog.

But I really want to get the weight off ... and when I do I'm buying something from here.

let it begin

My, what a difference 24 months makes. The pic on top was taken in November, in size 12 pants. That other one is me feeling pretty sassy in size 6 pants, 2 years ago. I've posted the skinny pic before and sworn to the heavens that I would get back there again. This time I'm not kidding. If you care to follow the bouncing ball, I'll post updates from time to time and try not to seem really, really obsessed about it -- even though I will be. Before long I'll be walking and drinking water and freaking about points like a junkie worrying over her next fix. It's how I get. But it would be worth it, just to feel that way again -- the way I felt when he took that picture.

I can do it, I know I can. Bring it on.

family

Family is a complicated thing. There is the one you're born in to, in which many of us may never feel completely at ease. Then there is the one we create either by marriage or by long friendship -- that one always seems the better fit. Both you love.

When families break there is a sound and a feeling: a long rumble of distant thunder, a static electric shock, a deep ache in your bones like you've been kicked. There is that move to make people you once loved deeply into enemies. It is forcible removal by violence, like having a tooth pulled with pliers and no novacaine.

I have been in right in the middle of a broken family more than once. The pain was so profound that I never thought about anyone else's but my own-- I simply kept my head down and plodded on until it didn't hurt anymore, which was a really long time. I didn't realize that it must have hurt the people who had to watch me go through it. In the last year I've had cause to be a witness to other breaks that are not mine. In truth I think I would rather be hurt myself than have to stand by while people I care about suffer. It is a misery I would give anything to be able to fix.

I'm reading "A Million Little Pieces" and coincidentally I saw James Frey on a re-run of Oprah last night while I was taking down our Christmas stuff. She asked him about having dental surgery with no pain killers and he said (and I paraphrase): "I would rather suffer physical pain than have my heart broken again, because physical pain is fleeting but emotional pain stays."

I think I get that.