Living Loose

Lately I’ve been living loose in terms of pants.  It’s great!  I don’t know if I’ve lost more than the 5 lbs I reported last time but am experiencing a MAJOR difference in how my clothes fit now and I’m loving it.

Minus 5

I lost 5 lbs!  Yay.  Though some of it may be related to medication.  Oh well.  I’ll take it!  It feels great.

Oops. Somebody Missed.

You know I just started this “regiment” last week so it will come as no surprise that I’ve fallen off the wagon just a teensy bit.

I was trying to work out on a Tues-Thurs-Sat schedule but I missed this past Tuesday and low and behold it’s Thursday and I’m about 2 workouts in the hole. Not sure why this happened. I think I wasn’t feeling good on Tuesday and said I’d just “wake up extra early” on Wednesday to make it up. Then I had a glass of wine and went to bed. Ok, I think I just uncovered half of the problem.

See, barring air travel or a project deadline, waking up “extra early” is about as likely to happen as a unicorn swimming with a killer whale. (This is unlikely because the killer whale would kill the unicorn.) Yet for years when I forgo evening exercise (my preferred time) I can let my conscience rest easy because I’ll just “wake up extra early” and go for that jog, gym visit, yoga session, etc. I think it’s actually happened a few times but usually only when I have some kind of workout “buddy” picking my ass up. It helps if this buddy is a little on the grumpy side so that I am afraid to sleep in and flake out.

But right now I am buddy-free (by choice, it’s ok) so it’s all on this buddy to make it happen. That’s where this little electronic journal helps because I pretend that you are my buddy. And YOU really want me to succeed. Thank you for that.

Ok ok I’ll work out tonight. I’ll just stick with the aerobics video because whenever I have lofty visions of jogging I just end up sitting on the couch and tuning in to Olympics track & field. Maybe if I had one of their snazzy outfits I would run. Hold on, I gotta go trim one of the legs off my running tights.

Alright I’m back. Turns out I don’t have any running tights….yet.

On a positive note, I have become a lot more thoughtful about what I eat. I did cave in to Taco Cabana this week but spread the portion out into 3 whole meals. And it wasn’t nearly as delicious as I had fantasized about so that will be good to remember next time that pastel pink building beckons.

I was having a SERIOUS chocolate donut craving at the supermarket the other night and did several passes of the starchy sweets aisle debating. It was rough. Entemann’s is the KING of these and sat there on the shelf, proud and regal in the white box with the navy trim. Coy Hostess tried to get my attention and Mrs.Baird (a local, I believe) smiled her warm grandmotherly smile.

I finally settled on this box of Entemann’s “Little bites” brownies which I honestly thought were light or fat-free or something. Turns out I was way wrong. When I got home I tore into that sucker like a starved beast and discovered that the brownies are quite fattily fattastic, just packaged into tiny servings of 3 mini-brownies per bag. And they’re not even very good as they have a super-processed taste. Yeah, gross. So gross, that like, I’ve started a bag a day habit.

But I did learn a valuable lesson and that is to read the fine print and not fall for these tricks next time.

Of Carne Guisada and other temptresses

Damn. It’s dinnertime and I am embarrassingly low on groceries. Quick! What nutritional feast can I whip up out of half a bag of cashews and a jumbo bottle of Jose Cuervo strawberry margarita mix?

I had to sit down and chronicle this moment because this is where one of the key challenges lies. Aside from S.A. being the 3rd most obese U.S. City, we also have this bad habit:

“Residents of San Antonio eat fast-food 20 days of the month, and had the highest frequency of the cities on our list.” This is according to Forbes.

I must admit that I went a bit wild on the fast food when I first moved back to TX. It was like seeing so many old friends. Good ole Whataburger from way back when with its familiar greasy orange-wrappered delights. Sonic, whose commercials would mysteriously air late at night in Seattle even though there was no cherry limeade flavored drive-in to be found in a hundred mile radius (that I know of). Chick-Fil-A, a tradition that I reward myself with any time I accomplish the great feat of going to a mall. The waffle fries are amazing but those nuggets….. What’s in them? MSG-flavored cocaine? My god, I could eat them all night.

Eat me I'm cute.

What I am trying to decide right now is whether or not Taco Cabana gets to stand in a category that has a healthy edge over these other guys. I know it doesn’t. Who am I trying to kid? But the carne guisada dinner is a dinner. It’s complex and slow-cooked. It’s not deep fried. And it comes with rice and beans and 2 delicious warm thick chewy flour tortillas.

Alright that’s it. I’m out. I’ll go grocery shopping tomorrow. I mean, I would hate to run out of margarita mix.

No T.C., Thank YOU.

Insert “Before” Picture Here

There will be no before pictures and there will be no current weights or waist measurements posted (though I think Michael Phelps and I could maybe share belts…which I have mixed feelings about.)

I am young but I am too old to feel comfortable putting all my business on the Internet. I am “friends” with some early-twenty-somethings on a social networking site and I am continually amazed with the intimacy of their uploads. One such “kid” uses his blog as his journal and regularly spills out his fears, doubts, anxieties, and defeats with such brutal honesty that I get a little embarrassed for him.  It’s lovely to pour your heart out but if you’re gonna write it all down then it should probably stay on a nice safe shelf somewhere. Maybe I am just old-school like that.

And speaking of old-school, I did the 1987 Jane Fonda workout again on Thursday and it felt WAY better the second time around. A bunch of women warned me that it gets tougher to lose weight once you hit 30 and they were so right. But if loving peanut m&ms with a Dr. Pepper chaser is wrong then I don’t wanna be right. Just kidding.  It really does feel a lot tougher trying to jump back into shape nowadays then it used to.   I used to be able to forgo exercise for months and then when I finally made time for it, I could casually jog out the door for 3-4 miles.  Not now.  No way.  No ma’am.

The video, ironically named Jane Fonda’s NEW Workout, has both a 35-minute beginner workout and an 55-minute advanced workout. I am still on beginner and I still have to take a little break halfway through when they start with these crazy spaced-out jumping jacks. While they jump gleefully in their pastel short-shorts and clap emphatically, I have to stand there bent over breathless and praying not to vomit. So, with this I announce a short-term goal:

Do the whole beginner workout without stopping.

Today, the challenge is on!

**UPDATE** Mission Accomplished!

Jane & the gang are so supportive. Always applauding.

Welcome to hell. Here’s your accordion.

That’s the caption from a beloved Far Side cartoon. That line is preceded by “Welcome to heaven. Here’s your harp” for those who didn’t grow up with a healthy amount of Gary Larsen in the house.

San Antonio,TX is the farthest thing from hell but it can be sickeningly hot in the summer. And personally I love all the accordion music that we have here.

Conjunto Musician

I moved to S.A. recently after spending several years in one of America’s healthiest cities. But no matter how much REI gear I accumulated, lattes I drank and organic tofu I consumed, I couldn’t fill the void in my heart where Texas now sits heavy and proud.

Heavy, that’s right. Heavy like the FORD F250 pick-up that my drivers’ ed program used to teach us teenaged Houston girls how to drive. Mom and her friends always joked “Did they teach you how to toss your empty beer cans in the back too?”

Heavy also like the weight in your belly after consuming a delicious chopped beef brisket sandwich and ice cold Shiner on a 97 degree afternoon. Or a plate of sizzling steak and chicken fajitas washed down with a few frozen margaritas. How about a Myti-burger? Damn. That sounds Myti-good.

But! That is the type of thing I will now be steering my metaphoric F250 away from as I have recently turned a new page. Having been stuck in my house with the shades drawn on a recent 101 degree Sunday, a feeling of great restlessness suddenly came over me. I realized that I’ve become a bit fat. And that I couldn’t just hop on my bike or go for a leisurely jog as that would mean a great tan but also sudden death.

All I can say is that I found salvation in a vintage 1987 Jane Fonda workout video that Rob gave me as a joke many years ago and I took the first step toward a new fitness.

Hallelujah!

Seeing as I spend a ton of time sitting on my nalgas in front of this screen, I thought I’d create a blog to chronicle my attempt to be healthy and lose a few lbs. I think this will keep me accountable to my goal and I’d love to hear from family, friends and whoever else that wants to toss a “rah! rah!” my way.