EY's Rants and Raves

I've not done well at eating what I should and moving like I should for some time now. When I took a job in Big City, I used the "I can't take time out of my day to exercise or I'll be here all night" excuse. When I got a job back in Town Where I Live, I told myself "Now you'll be *steps* away from the gym...no excuses now". I found plenty. I got thoroughly disgusted with my lack of energy, weight and flab a few weeks ago and started South Beach Diet (again). I'd done it a few years ago, but didn't really follow it as closely as I should have and (remarkably enough) didn't lose much weight.

This time, I'm paying attention to portion sizes, being more careful about the amount of veggies I eat and paying attention to how I feel after I eat something. Saturday, I got some additional help: Fit TV. It's a channel in the Discovery/TLC family with exercise shows. I tried one Saturday morning (ironically, turning it from a Food Network show I don't like) and it felt GREAT to work up a sweat. So Sunday, I tried another show. Monday, there was a stretching show on at 6:30 am. I hate getting up, but I do like stretching and flexibilty exercises. So I tried it. I don't have a stability ball so I couldn't do all the exercises the way they did, but it was still pretty good.

This morning's class was an hour and more geared toward "total body weight training". I like weight training; it's good for me; I got up at 6 to do the class. As I was getting ready to start, they mentioned it was more of an advanced class. Oh well. I didn't have all the equipment they used (stability ball, barbell, hand weights, tall step) but I still got a GOOD workout. Instead of sitting on the couch after dinner, I checked out FitTV Two 30 minute yoga classes. Did them both. Tomorrow am is an hour of lower body. I may not be able to walk into work, but I feel so good after several days of workouts that I absolutely HAVE to try.

When I got to Big Faceless Corp this morning at 9, I got here the same time as a team mate. We both agreed that we weren't interested in being here today and that if we were smart, we'd just go back home. Pretty much everything I've done since then has only heightened my belief that I was right earlier today. Why I didn't listen, I can't quite say; other than doing laundry and cleaning house aren't as communal of tasks as working and I did have a few meetings that I scheduled. Never nice to ditch those.....

Patience, that is. You see, I have relatively little of it. Timing, not really a virtue, but an important component of patience, nonetheless. On an ordinary day, I wouldn't mind that my Mom called me three times on two phone lines within a 25 minute span. Today, however, when I've dealt with idiots who can't seem to figure out that BFC isn't the Corporation for Supporting All Your Stupid ideas, I have even less patience for being at someone else's disposal. The Boy is out with the guys (good call there, dear). I have dinner ready to heat up, whenever I'm ready to hit the fridge and microwave. Then 2 voice mails about Mom needing "advice". Advice on what? I have no earthly idea. Cell phone cut out and she started mumbling at the same time.

I suppose I'd be much nicer about it if she and Dad hadn't interrupted 2 shows I was trying to watch Sunday and last night at crucial times in the storyline. Neither are on video, so I can't rent them to catch the last 5 minutes of each. Yes, I shouldn't have answered the phone if TV was more important than my parents (and how shallow of a statement is THAT?). See, they're in their 60's and have already started the "we're old and bad things happen to old people, so you need to be aware of what's going on with us" line. Granted, neither the call Sunday or Tuesday was anything important....but I don't know that without answering the phone.

Gaaah. I suppose I'll call my mother now.

Very nice (but totally clueless) lady I work with is talking to her grandchildren on the phone. It's amazing that she realizes there's a phone involved because her volume is, shall we say, "up". You can't yell all the way to TX (where her grands apparently are), but she's giving it her best shot. I've noticed (mostly because she has no volume control on her vocal chords) that she only talks to her GKs in a VERY high-pitched voice. Really, ma'am, I get that there are tonal ranges only kids can hear....but use your regular voice. She also made a point of repeatedly asking each (of two) kids if they miss her. Is this really a nice thing to do?

If this is what parenting, and grandparenting does to one, I'll stay in my "no thanks, I'll pass" mode. I'll also stick to my "all really personal conversations need to happen somewhere other than within earshot of other people" idea.

Stilton cheese...the king of blue cheeses, if I recall correctly, is one of my favorite, favorite things. Just had some on a steak salad and the tangy, creamy, salty goodness made me swoon. (Yes, that I'm extolling the virtues of how a dairy product and not anything else is making me swoon is a sad relfection upon my life. But I'm not blogging about that.) Stilton....try it if you haven't.

And take a test. I suppose that after stepping on a cricket in the dark at 6 am and getting to the test site without my admission ticket made actually taking the test somewhat simple. The questions I've been studying have seemed to be "out of left field" so to speak. So when I pondered the actual test questions, I thought, well, these might at least be more rational. Not so much.

Turns out, there's something BEYOND "left field", a bizarre and confounding place where they write test questions. For some of them, the only rational answer I could come up with was "Walleye?", a word some friends and I say when we hear something bizarre and nonsensical. I have no idea how a fresh water game fish came to be our expression for this. I'm sure there was booze involved. For other questions, a perfectly valid, reasonable answer came immediately to mind upon reading the question. Unfortunately, it didn't happen to be one of my choices. For those, I exercised whittling down the "absolutely nots" and the "not unless aliens took over the planet" options until I had two "only if you made astounding leaps of logic" choices left and picked the better (in-my-completely-humbled-opinion) of those.

I don't like that kind of test. I've been assured by someone who has passed it that this is normal, they grade on a curve that only they understand and I have some time to wait. That bit is just fine with me. I've done my part. If I passed, I'll have an extra-fun birthday since I should know the results by then. If not, I'll start studying next February for the June aught eight exam. The next exam is actually in December, but that is *the* worst time I can fathom for taking it.

I *finally* take a test for a professional certification I've been working on for months, tomorrow. I'm sure everyone around me is tired of hearing that my brain has gone to mush (true, though it may be) and dealing with my nervously-tense personality that I've taken on the past few months. Despite the insistence of some that I have a "face of glass", I can hide lots of things fairly well. I don't, typically, because I'm lazy and put my effort into better things. However, the one thing that doesn't hide well for me is nerves. Pushed down and hidden, it oozes out elsewhere and not in pleasant ways. Left to froth on its own, nerves make me babble endlessly even worse than normal.

So I'll be trying to go to bed soon (yeah, like I'm anywhere NEAR tired at 10 pm), trying to sleep (which means I'm calling my fav "late nite phone buddy", although it will be too early to catch him since he's on the West coast) so I can get up hella-early and start my terribly-planned Saturday. The plans themselves are quite fine....it's terrible that I have to attack a perfectly good Saturday with plans that start "freak yourself out by trying to pass a test that could determine the direction and success of your career for the next 5-15 years" and progress to "do something fun so you'll forget about the past 4 hours". I'm soooo ready for K's birthday tomorrow night so I can relax and celebrate.

But not for vacation. Nope, I'm going back on South Beach eating because I'm too close to needing to move to "the size I swore I'd never be". Everyone has this size, be it realistic or not. Well, I'm dangerously close to mine. I have wine tastings this week and a test Saturday (that I'll NEED a drink after), so next week seems to be a good time to start Phase 1. I'll be having lunch with a friend Monday, but I think I have an easy way out for that (local farmer's market salad). Next Saturday won't be so easy as it's a local church's annual spaghetti and sausage dinner. Oh well, special occasions do come up. I'll be really good before, good after and won't beat myself up about it. Acceptance--of my potential, not my current weight--is part of the game. I didn't wake up this size one day. It took me some time to get here and it will take time to change my eating habits to lose it.

I spent some time on the message boards and read a lot of "nothing tastes as good as being thin feels". I suppose that's true. However, it's been so LONG since I was "that thin" that it's very hard to remember. While I DO have rather current memories of some fantastic-tasting food. Time to make some new ones, I suppose.

because it's very silly. Granted, I do, say and write about all kinds of silly things, as anyone who knows me can confirm. But this seems very silly and more than a bit indulgent. That, however, is what makes it a perfect blog subject. Lunch today was a steak salad. A fine steak salad with a retro cut of beef called a "flat iron" steak as the beef participant. Not just steak and greens, this salad had a stunning special guest star: stilton cheese. I'm a big fan of blue cheese in general and stilton, king of the blue cheeses, is a favorite. Supporting players included carrots, zucchini, radicchio and romaine.

Lovely lovely lovely lunch.