Fasten your seat belts. It's going to be a bumpy night.

Ok - I had today off.

Breakfast: small bowl of raisin bran, 2% milk, and kefir yogurt
3 mile walk, very brisk, along the river, nice weather out
Snack: some cottage cheese, a piece of cheddar cheese, lots of water (my hands started swelling during the walk)
55 minute massage, thank you very much.
Lunch: Chipotle burrito, small coke
Watched All About Eve - This is a wonderful movie with perhaps the cleverest dialogue ever. If you appreciate really smart humor, please watch it.
Dinner: Donkatsu (japanese pork cutlets, breaded and deep-fried) served with raw cabbage and donkatsu sauce (the nectar of the gods). I also had it with a little rice and white wine.

I'm trying to ease off of the caffeine temporarily to do a little cleanse of my body's toxins. I don't know how successful I'll be, since I'm not really a health nut of any kind and using words like "cleanse" and "toxins" is extremely awkward for me, but ... we'll give it a go.

The little voice in my head won.

No ...

I won't update ...

No ....

I don't feel like it ...

I don't want to update ...

Well, I refuse.

Yeah? Well, screw you.

(My deepest apologies to Jen.)

"Housework is like bad sex. Every time I do it, I promise I'll never do it again ... until company is coming."

Have you ever watched "Can't Stop the Music?" It's the fake biopic about the Village People. Have you ever asked yourself, "how could America have been so naive?" "Was Hollywood prudish or were we?" Have you ever been totally surprised how much really obscene innuendo that you missed in a seemingly quaint movie? Have you ever seen "Lover Come Back," or "Pillow Talk?" Have you ever found it really, really, really hard to believe that Rock Hudson was gay and Doris Day was not? Did you ever ask yourself did the writers of these movies know that Rock Hudson was going to be in this movie AND that he was gay? Have you ever wondered if Bruce Jenner ever realized at the time (because surely he does now) that short, short cut-off denim shorts and a belly t-shirt are not a good look for an Olympic decathlete? and that this outfit is roughly akin to what Lamar wore in Revenge of the Nerds when he was throwing the javelin?

These are just some of the thoughts that I had while watching "Can't Stop the Music" and "Lover Come Back" because nothing better was on.

Yesterday:
Breakfast - blueberry muffin, coffee with cream and splenda
Lunch - frozen enchilada meal with coke
Dinner - we went out to celebrate my roommate being officially debt-free. I had quesadilla appys, sweet potato fries, half of a pulled pork sandwich, and half a tiramisu dessert. Oh and 2 blue moons. We also played trivia. We came in 4th. We might have done better except that Jason fully believed that Titan was a moon of Jupiter and I had a nagging suspicion that it was Saturn's. But I couldn't justify it and we put Jupiter.

It was Saturn.

Also we couldn't remember the name of the movie Minority Report. I knew that was the movie, but I couldn't remember the name. Clue: what Steven Spielberg movie was originally conceived as a sequel to "Total Recall" and is written by the same author? There was more to the question but that's the gist of it. Also, we missed the 2nd quarter bonus. What actor was originally approached to play Michael Corleone in Godfather? Hint: the person he thought was his mother was actually his grandmother. He thought he was born in New Jersey, but actually he was born in NY, NY. Also he was born in April 1939. He's been nominated for more Oscars than any other actor. A movie for which he won Best Oscar, also won Best Actress. His smile has been described as "sharp." There were more hints. We guessed Robert De Niro, but it was Jack Nicholson.

Can you imagine? Jack Nicholson as Michael Corleone? He might as well be gay.

So chard to handle

Breakfast: bowl of Raisin Bran with 2% milk, water
Lunch: 1 fried egg, 2 pcs whole wheat toast, water

Went for a walk - about 3 miles, 1 hour, with roommate and her friend. Very nice, along the river, saw geese fighting and mating.

Snack: green grapes, 1 can coke

FINALLY did my taxes - can you believe it took me 4 hours? Well, actually trying to repair my computer took about an hour and a half. Then it took me about an hour to decide that I didn't want the Turbo Tax Premier; instead I wanted the cheapest one. I owed federal taxes and I get a nice chunk of change back from the state. Weird. I'll have to change my federal withholding.

Dinner: another can of coke, sauteed swiss chard (rainbow) with prosciutto and butter; salmon with dill (lots of dill), olive oil, and lemon, grilled in my lovely pan from Ikea!; a yogurt and dill sauce for the salmon; homemade whole wheat bread with butter - I'll be honest, I had 2 helpings of this. When the whole dinner was done, it was so good, that I had to pat myself on the back. Literally. I was craving that salmon all day.

Did I tell you that I started taking a fish oil supplement? My dr. said that my good cholesterol was low and I need to eat more Omega-3s. Hence, the salmon. But I decided to go with the supplement also because I don't eat fish all that often. I think ever since living in Japan, I'm just not that into it. But ...

I got the salmon at a fish market and all that fish certainly did entice me. Maybe this summer I'll explore ways to cook fish.

Another thing that I've promised myself is that I'm going to write down the recipes that I come up with. I'll have to remember to note that I don't need that much butter when sautee-ing chard. And if you haven't had it, it's my new favorite vegetable.

Buy this stuff without me actually having to convince you.

Breakfast: a bagel and a half with spread (lox and veggie); 2 cups of coffee with cream, one with sugar, one with the pink stuff
Lunch: no lunch, worked right thru it, was 3:30 pm before I realized.
Dinner: cottage cheese, about a cup, 2 cokes, salami (lost count), corn chips with salsa.

It was a productive day at work. I got to leave on time, if you don't count the fact that I didn't take a lunch. It was my fifth day in a row and man, I was dying. I have tomorrow off and I can't wait. If it's not too cold, I'll take a walk along the river.

How crazy is New England? Yesterday it snowed for about 5 minutes and then melted right away and the sun came out. People were wearing flip flops. Hmmm ...

Personal note: TV commercials suck lately. I mean, I am sick of those Orbit commercials. Why would that kind of gross-out induce me to buy minty gum? Or there's another commercial about a cellular service that entails a grown man being carried around in a Baby Bjorn. Was this supposed to entice grown men who don't want to grow up? Is this a significant sector of the consumer market? I'm disturbed.

Junkpunch

Breakfast: 1 bowl of Raisin Bran, with 2% milk; several swigs of kefir yogurt (yay!)
Lunch: P.F Chang's lettuce wraps, Fried Rice with combo meats (only ate about 1/4 of it - the rest is in my fridge - to be honest, it's just not that good), 2 glasses of coke.
Dinner: Sourdough bread cubes with colby cheese, salami, 1 can of coke, 1 beer

I don't know how many waters I had today. It was so dry in the store, I felt like I was running to the water fountain every 10 minutes. I usually have an empty bottle that I can fill up, but I don't know what happened to it.

Work was busy today, but I wish it had been busier. As it was, I got a lot of work done in the stock room.

Tonight I watched most of "What Happens in Vegas" and I laughed so hard at the extra scene in the credits where she punches his junk. Oh my god, I laughed so hard.

Liar, liar, pants on fire - ow, my ass is burning!

I'm going to lie to you and tell you that the reason I haven't blogged lately is because I've been working sooooooooooooooo much. I'm going to lie to you and tell you that I've been eating soooooooooooo good. I'm also going to embellish the amount of exercise that I've been doing ... "I've been exercising a LOT! Whew! You'd be so proud of me!"
Yeah, and you won't know anything at all about the sliders and crispy green beens and 2 beers that I had after work on Thurs night (while watching the first half of the VCU-UCLA game - damn we almost had it!) Or the big ol' crappy cheesesteak that I had for dinner last night at an equally crappy beer garden. OR the quarter pounder with cheese that I had today! Yeah! You won't know anything about that.
What I will tell you is that I worked a "rounder" on Thursday (yes, I did that on Tues too), which means that I worked from open (or 8 am) to close (roughly 10 pm). I did have a 3 hour break in the middle, which I used to go home and try to nap but ended up watching Sense and Sensibility instead. Lovely movie. Actually, I got to work at 6:50 am on Thursday because that was the day of our bigwig's visit, which went great. I was the nighttime manager and I had to stay until everything was all done, which is why I was there til 10 pm. Which explains perfectly why I had to go to TGIF's after and get a couple of beers and sliders.
On Friday, I managed to work a normal day although the boss did catch me coming in late. I almost left on time. Almost. Today I got there at 7:30 am for a special event and I left about 5:30 pm. Almost. Hopefully, I can finally get a decent night's sleep because (surprise, surprise!) I have to work tomorrow.

I can't wait til Easter's over.

I WAS invigorated by my walk on Wed, so I am trying to do more of it. That is NOT a lie.

No, seriously, it's not.

In other, totally random news: The final episode of Battlestar Galactica rocked. I loved it! How much do I love Tom Welling - enough to watch the entire season of Smallville again on my Itunes! Was anyone else proud that Obama had actually heard of VCU, let alone picked them to beat UCLA? I'm so sorry that my alma mater let you down, Obama. And finally, when I was leaving work yesterday, one of the employees said as I was walking by, "there's goes our little singer." When I turned and smiled, she said, "Oh my god (imagine a thick Boston accent too) did you hear about Natasha Richardson? They dimmed the lights on Broadway for her! It's so sad." And it is. But ... secretly ... I was so flattered that her thought process had made the leap from me to Broadway.

I'm not gonna lie, I was thrilled.

Spin me right round.

So much is going on with the world. It's crazy and I'm confused. AIG, Natasha Richardson, Stewart and Cramer ... I can't take it anymore. Did you know that VCU in in the NCAA tournament? The sky is falling!

But what I'm concerned with most is ... my diet and exercise routine.

Breakfast: bowl of apple jacks with 2% milk.
Lunch: all the beef out of the leftover beef and broccoli (chinese) that I made last week. The broccoli was just too mushy.
Snack: 1 bottle of coke and and a big bag of chocolate-covered pretzels
Dinner: salad with romaine and iceberg, red bell pepper and italian dressing, 3 slices of cheddar cheese, 4 slices of salami, 2 cans of coke.

In response to your question, Jen: I can't give up the coke. I might could convince myself to drink less, but I can't give it up for diet. (yuck) Besides my goal is to increase my exercise, not necessarily change my diet.

So ...

I walked 3 miles today. The weather was nice enough. I walked to the library and post office, then took the route along the river and back. Round trip is about 3 miles. And it's a lovely walk in all seasons. Right now, it's bare-leafed and raging river, but it'll be nice to see the change as the year goes on. I stopped at the dry cleaners on the way back. So the whole trip felt productive. All in all, about an hour and a half of walking. My legs and feet hurt. I meant to get my taxes done, but ...

In other news:
Kalpana had a baby girl!
I got new eyeglasses (2 pairs of them!).

"The Return of Sauron"

I'm so sock of blogging. I'm so sick of it.

Ok, not really. I just don't want to exert the brain power necessary to recall what I ate today. But suffice to say, it was not good. I did take a 20 minute walk to CVS though.

In other news, I just heard from the director of our little short and he expects that he'll have a fully finished project in about a month. Woot!

Surrender Dorothy

Ok, so how do I classify the exercise that I do as part of my job, i.e. selling? I mean, I sell shoes for a living. That entails getting up & sitting down at least 3 times for every customer; running to the stockroom at least twice for every customer; and then on a day like today, I had at least 15 customers. This doesn't even include the trip up to Alterations, in order to make holes in a leather strap to buckle the shoes onto a narrow foot. As busy as today was and on days like it, I come home with legs sore.

So that's gotta be quantified somehow.

What did I eat? Good question.

Breakfast: coffee with cream, no sugar, and a pecan roll.
Lunch: roast beef on ciabatta with organic greens, tomato and garlic aioli, potato chips, cookie, and a bottle of coke

That was at work. I participated in the store rally this morning and I used an Irish accent. I'm so multi-talented. I had another new employee start today, but unfortunately he didn't get as good a training as yesterday's new employee. But he was a good guy because he just jumped right in and started selling. Just what we needed. After work, I went to see a middle school production of Wizard of Oz with some friends. I didn't really have a good reason to do it other than the fact that one friend has a crush on the director. While I enjoyed the production immensely - it was so cute you could just die - it's a little creepy that we were there to see it and didn't actually know anyone in it. I'm not gonna lie; I felt creepy. But I liked it. The play, not the creepiness of it. After that we went to dinner at TGIFs.

Dinner: Prime Rib Stroganoff (noodles, ribs, mushroom gravy and sour cream); half of one of Jill's sliders; some crispy green beans with the sauce that they serve with it; one beer; one mojito; and a couple of bites of Jill's sundae.

Poor Jill.

Last Operations under the venue of the shopping center known as the mall,

Breakfast: none ... which would technically make
Snack: = breakfast: 1 banana muffin, 1 small coffee with cream and Splenda
Lunch: McDonalds cheeseburger, small fries, apple dippers, and large coke

20 minute walk around the mall, which really just led to me shopping in stores. Very dangerous. On the upside, the walk kept me updated on what new stores are in the mall. On the downside, there are no new stores in the mall and less of the old stores. Yikes, the recession is hitting hard.

Dinner: 2 pieces of pizza (gourmet pizza bought by roommate) and bottle of coke.
Lots of water.

Today was a good day at work. I actually did a lot of walking today. AND, I would like to point out, JEN, that it was in brand new shoes. (So was the walk around the mall). That's gotta account for at least 5% more calories burned.

I had a new employee start today and I got the chance to train her really well. Normally, I get new employees right when I'm busiest, hence the reason that I need new employees. But it also means that I don't really have the time to devote to training. But today, I got to give a full tour of the store; we visited all the right departments; I went over the entire stockroom. I'm sure she thinks it was overwhelming, but hopefully, she'll remember it if it's ever mentioned again. There's more training for her tomorrow. And I have another new employee that I hope works out. He was supposed to be there today but ...

Check out my friend's husband's new movie coming out in Japan. The trailer is on Facebook.
http://www.facebook.com/home.php?#/video/video.php?v=56487262346&ref=mf

It's so weird to think that the Americans are the bad guys.

Game night

Breakfast: 3 frozen waffles, with syrup with last of Kefir yogurt.
Snack: 3 chocolates (oops, I actually had 5 chocolates yesterday but I forgot) with water
Lunch: 2 hard boiled eggs with salt, water
Snack: 1 bottle of coke
Dinner: salad with romaine, iceberg, red bell pepper, and onion with sesame seed dressing, mashed potatoes, rice with gravy, pork ribs with a dry rub that I made up myself.


The dry rub was very salty. I used Kosher salt, white pepper, turmeric, cumin, coriander, thai curry powder, and garam masala. Next time, I will leave out the cumin and use less salt. From the drippings, I made a little gravy with milk and butter.


Today, I sat around and did nothing for a long time. Then I did my laundry, dropped off my dry-cleaning, and called Mom & Dad. I made dinner and I made enough for everyone. So Laura invited her friend Jeff over. After dinner, we played a game called Carcassone, which is named after a town in France, where Laura happened to live for 5 months. It is the oldest walled city in Europe and was used in movies like Robin Hood, Prince of Thieves. It's a fun game, kind of like Risk but easier. I won one round.


No exercise to speak of, but I did walk from the laundrymat to the dry cleaners which was about 20 minutes total.

Sorry, I missed yesterday.

Yesterday was interminably long.
Breakfast: 1 Egg McMuffin, 1 hash brown, orange juice
Snack: 1 bottle of coke
No lunch:
Dinner: 1 salad with shrimp, squash, hearts of palm, tomatoes and dressing, coke, cup of mushroom bisque, with bread and butter. I really didn't like the salad.

The reason that I didn't have lunch is because I only gave myself one break while at work yesterday. And I was at work from 8 am to 10 pm.

Yes, I'm crazy.

Today was less long.
Breakfast: fruit salad with melon, strawberry and pineapple, provided at company meeting, decaf coffee with cream and Splenda
Snack: Bagel with cream cheese, 2 hard boiled eggs, apple juice
Lunch: Chipotle burrito (same as before) with coke.
Dinner: shrimp with beans and rice, 1 beer, and water
I actually had a lot of water today. And I left work a little early.

Thankfully, I have tomorrow off.

They didn't believe that I minored in Chemistry.

Ooooooooohhhh. Today was bad.

Breakfast: 3 swigs of kefir yogurt before work, water. 2 donuts at work, small coffee with cream and splenda, 1 glass of crystal light ice tea. (provided for the manager planning meeting)

Lunch: 2 pieces of sbarro sausage pizza, 1 bottle of coke, 2 glasses of lemonade. (provided for the manager planning meeting also)

(the manager planning meeting was a lot of sitting.)

Dinner: TGIFridays sirloin steak with mashed potatoes and wild mushroom gravy, 2 blue moon beers, 2 glasses of water, and a chocolate peanut butter cheesecake. (necessary after the manager planning meeting)

But I got to hang with Jessica and Kati, so that was fun.

Linda owes me lunch.

Ack! I forgot that I had a piece of gingerbread for breakfast on Saturday morning. Maybe that's why I was so hungry. Got my metabolism going.

Today
Breakfast: 3 frozen waffles with syrup (no butter), water, 4 swigs (or thereabouts) of Kefir yogurt; 2 slices cheddar cheese

Then I got called to work. One of my employees called out and we were too busy to be down a person. Not to mention, two people can't do it alone anyway. The worst of it is that I missed the volleyball game. Man, it was busy at work!

Lunch: plain croissant, bottle of coke

Dinner: Chipotle burrito - tortilla, rice, black beans, bell pepper, onions, fresh tomato salsa, steak, sour cream, cheese, guacamole, and lettuce; 1 bottle beer

I love Chipotle. But I swear the service almost sent me thru the roof after the day I had. I think maybe the beer calmed me down a little.

Snack: three pcs Dove chocolate, water

Are the makers of Dove chocolate the same people who make Dove soap?

Loopy

Breakfast: A couple of swigs of Kefir yogurt; a ham & cheese croissant; small coffee with half and half and Splenda.

Today I taught 4 kids how to tie their shoes. It was exhausting. And really, mothers shouldn't try to help.

Lunch: (McDonalds) cheeseburger, small fries, apple dippers with caramel, large coke.

My roommate came to see me at work and was completely blown away by how awesome we are.

Snack: bottle of water

I ended up staying at work until 8 pm. OMG, my feet hurt. And while I didn't technically walk around the mall, 10 straight hours of selling shoes (not to mention the hour and a half of teaching kids to tie their shoes) has to count for exercise.

Dinner: a can of Ravioli, water.

I'm beat. I'm going to bed.

Bloccori

Ok, so today, I didn't get to eat until about 1:45 pm. I know, I know. I should eat breakfast. Well, normally I'm able to get away and get a coffee and muffin around 10 or 11, but my opener was late this morning and it was busy in my dept. So I didn't go. I normally can't go to lunch until about 2, but I switched my lunch with hers and went a whole 15 minutes early (whoopee.) I wasn't actually that hungry but I kept zoning out and couldn't concentrate. When I finally went to lunch, I couldn't stop yawning. I almost took a nap in the food court. I don't know why; I got a lot of sleep yesterday and last night. I'm guessing it's just that afternoon siesta feeling. But it's 9:30 pm now and I just want to go to bed. Maybe my body is trying to regenerate and I need massive amounts of sleep. Maybe I'm eating something that's making me sluggish. Here's today's diet:

Breakfast: We covered this - NONE. (Oh no, wait, I had 2 slugs of the Kefir yogurt before leaving for work.)

Lunch: Salad with carrots and orange bell pepper, 1 slice cheddar cheese, about 2 tbsp of dressing (which I packed myself - very proud of this); 1 small meatball sub with provolone cheese (bought this in the food court - not so proud of this). 1 20 oz. bottle of regular coke, 1 large M&M cookie.

Snack: 1 bottle of water; 1 pc of snickers candy stolen from Audrey's candy bowl. Another 20 oz. bottle of coke for the car ride home.

Dinner: 1 serving of beef & broccoli (about 1 1/4 cups) stir fry (homemade) with rice (about 3/4 cup), 2 glasses of water. Used up the frozen broccoli that no one seems to remember buying. Made enough for all the roommates.

So I guess I haven't exercised this week. But on the verge of falling asleep in the food court, I consider myself lucky that I made it back to work after lunch. I will have one more glass of water before going to bed (verrrrry soon) and I will try to take that walk at lunch tomorrow.

Enh, we'll see.

You'll feel a slight pressure.

Ok, so Jen wanted me to do the Self Challenge and I signed up for it and then ...

I didn't check in for like 2 weeks. So today I finally check in and ...

it's so slow. And there's so much stuff on it, I can't be sure what it wants me to do. I gather that the point it that it will tell me to do stuff every day and I should do it. Also, I can record each day what I ate and any exercise that I did. There's like a little blog section but ...

I already have a blog. So what I will do is ...

use this blog to share that stuff with you. I will update it each day so that Jen can make sure that I'm doing it. Honestly, I just keep forgetting to check in with the other website each day. I want to have better habits and exercise more. I really do. In fact, I just had a regular check-up with my doctor and (aside from a quasi-confirmation that the other doctors are idiots) her recommendation is that I need more exercise. Also, I have low good cholesterol and I can fix this with exercise and a diet rich with Omega-3-or-4-or-5-or-something. So ...

My goal is ...

Increased exercise: at least 2 30-minute workouts a week. I know this isn't a lot but it's doable and can be upgraded later. I can achieve this goal by walking during my lunch break at work when the weather is cold. Just walking around the mall. The great thing about this is one of the other managers wants to do it with me. She kinda has a goal of more exercise as well. So hopefully, we can hold the other accountable. When the weather warms up, hopefully I can go back to walking along the river and maybe increasing it to 3 or 4 times a week. Also I plan to reintroduce salmon into my diet. I've been kinda off salmon every since moving back from Japan (can you blame me?) I happened to have bought an AMAZING grill pan at Ikea (during the birthday weekend) and it would be awesome for salmon. It would be salmawesome. So if you have any good salmon recipes, please share.

To start it off:
Thursday, Mar 4
Breakfast:

• 1 1/2 bowls of Capn Crunch cereal with 2% milk

Lunch

• Fried Egg sandwich with 1 slice cheddar cheese, 1 egg, on 2 slices whole wheat bread.

Etc.

• 2 glasses of water so far.
• a couple of swigs of my Kefir yogurt

No exercise yet, but I am going to clean the bathroom, do laundry and go to karaoke! Exhausting.

UPDATED! Didn't do laundry but I did clean my bathroom AND my room. Oh, and we went to karaoke.

Snack

• another bowl of Cap'n Crunch
• 2 slices of cheddar cheese

Dinner

• 5 pieces of tuna nigiri sushi
• 6 pieces of salmon maki
• 1 pc shrimp tempura
• 2 pc sweet potato tempura
• 1 pc broccoli tempura
• 1 beer
• 1 coke (laced with rum so that we could sneak it into the karaoke place)
• 1 bite of Jillian's Snickers bar