gategrrl

Hey there!

Let's see...my 48th birthday was on Friday! I wasn't exactly thrilled to see my age edging closer and closer to the big 5-0, but, hey, that's what life is. Right? Thanks to all who wished me a happy birthday here and on Facebook. You're all super, and even tho I've been distracted I still love you all. It's been over TEN YEARS since I've met many of you either online or in person, and I'm wowed by that. My life would be much less rich without my LJ friends (many of whom are also OS veterans). Just being here online with me for so long has been and is a tremendous gift.

What happened on Friday? Mermaid was all secretive and stuff, and had a surprise planned for me. Unfortunately, my car's battery died while I was at the gas pump filling up the tank! We sat in the car for about 40 minutes waiting for the tow truck guy to arrive. I thought for sure it was the starter motor, but luckily (?) it was was only the battery. He jump-started the damned thing. I dropped Mermaid off at home, and without turning the car off puttered over to Pep Boys (the nearest place I knew of to get a battery) and dropped about 45 minutes and $150-ish on a new battery. Ugh! But it ended well enough. Mermaid baked a fantastic Reese's Peanut Butter chocolate cake (I'll drop the recipe in at the end of the post) that was UBER CALORIES but WHO CARED?!! It was awesome. And we went out to eat at the Pizza Cookery where the Guy found a website with creepy Easter Bunny & kid pictures with the most hilarious captions ever, and we all just about died laughing at some of them. Brilliant stuff!  At least it was memorable, eh?

In other news, two years ago I weighed in at about 186 pounds (more or less, depending on whose scale I was weighed on, my own or the doctor's scale). These days, whatever I've been doing has been slowly working; I've been hovering at around 166. Luckily, I'm not getting "skinny-fat", which is what happens when you lose weight, but have no muscle tone whatsoever. I'd ideally like to go down another ten pounds or so, but really, I'm more focused on tightening and toning up my core and back muscles at the moment.

I found a fantastic DVD by Karen Voight which incorporates mainly Pilates moves (killer stuff, people, killer stuff!). The first time I used it, my sides, rib cage/lats, triceps, and abdomen felt the burn for two or three days! It's not so bad now--I do the routine about once a week. And there's another 50 minute routine on the DVD called Total Body, but what it really is, is an exercise in "torture" that works your butt and your *inner thighs*. I sure felt that the next day! Voight is an excellent teacher, gives great cues, reminds you to breath (yeah, you can forget to breath), and tells you where you should be feeling it AND what not to do so you don't injure yourself. Highly recommended:
Click on the image, it should take you to the Amazon page. And no, I'm not getting points from Amazon for this: I seriously LOVE this DVD. Oh, you can go to Collage Video, which specializes in fitness DVDs, to see actual clips from the workout.

What else...omg, yesterday Mermaid's boyfriend came over and they watched Sinister. Since there aren't many places to go in the house if you don't want to be either in your room or in the computer den, I stayed. I'm not a huge horror movie fan (gives me nightmares), this one...holy crap. While not huge on the gore and slash, it's atmospheric and has more than a bit of disturbing voyeurism in it, with these mysterious and horrible Super 8mm films being discovered in a house's attic portraying bit by bit, who and how the families in these films were murdered.  And now, of course, my mind is gnawing away at it like a distressed mouse. See, THIS is why I tend to avoid scary or horror type movies, because the images stay with me for a long time afterward (whereas books, *I* can control what I see in my mind's eye).

And for now, that's all that comes to mind. Hope everyone had a good weekend!

I can still taste the hydrogen peroxide in my throat, mouth, and guh, EVERYWHERE in my digestive system. I think I'm going to barf again, if only to get that bubbly taste out of my mouth! (uh, maybenot for real, but seriously! it sucks!)

Got a call from my RN (the type that can write out prescriptions-what are they called?) about my blood work results. My diabetes screening, and thyroid, came back clear, but she did say that my triglycerides were high, and I *seemed* to be borderline anemic. I think I've been borderline anemic my entire life, which could explain my entire life!  I'll have to go back in a few weeks for another blood-letting. I hope I get the same technician who drew it last time. She was awesome. The nurse doesn't want me to take iron on my own-something to do with iron over-dosing. Or, she wants to make sure about that.

So far on the SBD? Doing okay. It's a good thing I like eggs. But, in the interest of saving my cholesterol levels, I bought a big container of egg whites only. Mornings are my worst times, carb-wise. I mean, what else is there to eat in the morning besides cereals, pancakes, bacon, and so forth? I do get tired of eggs and omeletts every day. I haven't weighed myself yet, but then, it's been one week since my physical. I clocked in at 172 pounds on the scale at that office. That's a 1/2 pound less than two weeks before that, when I went in for a different type of appointment.

When I went food shopping all I could think of was, wow, this place is a sugar pit! Virtually EVERYTHING has corn syrup or some variation of corn syrup in it, or straight out sugar from sugar cane, or something that has a -tol ending. A few weeks ago, I read labels in the Italian pasta/sauce aisle and in the barbecue sauce aisle, and couldn't find a single sauce that did not have some kind of sugar in it. And I mean *corn syrup*.

Trader Joe's and Whole Foods, fortunately, stocks food not permeated with the stuff.

I still have to get my ass back to the YMCA for a few reasons: work out, and sign the kids up for camps today.