Today was Errand and Chore Day. Most people hate this day of the week, I usually find it to be the best and most rewarding. What this says about my personality vs what this says about the other days in my week...hmmm...
Anyway: grocery store, bank, cleaning, laundry, blah blah blah. It's been nice. It's also been warm and sunny and just plain GORGEOUS, which always helps.
I've developed a new habit lately of taking a part of myself, a habit or a quirk or an instinctive reaction, and turning it over in my head and inspecting it and asking myself why do I do that? Through this, I've made two realizations the past week:
First, the backwards bullshit that is the fact that I've let the people who messed me up so badly back in middle school stay in my head and tell me lies...that I've given them power for the past, oh, 12 years. They hated me, laughed at me, mocked me, bullied me relentlessly...and I've given them power? When they're not even there anymore? THIS IS WRONG. Must fix.
Second, I'm allowed to be good at shit. A light bulb clicked on that I've always been afraid to acknowledge or act on the fact that, hey, I can take really good photographs. They're really good, and people really like them. Same with my writing. Putting it out there isn't stupid or naive, I'm not lying to myself when I think about trying to actually build my life around it. I'm allowed to be good at things.
The second is probably related to the first--one of the lies that got stuck in the gears was that I'm just another stupid worker ant, I can't be good at things--but they felt like two different light bulbs. Whatever. Good things to realize! Now to act on them...
Showing posts with label progress. Show all posts
Showing posts with label progress. Show all posts
Friday, May 6, 2011
Friday, February 4, 2011
My Mini-Vacation, Day 3.
Today I haaaaaaave
[o] picked up my prescription
[o] picked up Ryan's paycheck
[o] finished the week's grocery shopping
[o] went to the bank
[o] shipped a package
[o] finished writing and addressing thank you notes
[o] washed, dried, folded, sorted, and put away four loads of laundry
[o] rearranged the bedroom closet
[o] cleared out a lot of hoarded clutter
[o] broke down a gazillion cardboard boxes
[o] changed the bedding
[o] made dinner for Ryan and myself
[o] moved my favorite art photographs to my Mac so I could load them onto my iPad
I'm in the living room now, just finished that last task and will be hacking at an outline for On The/Running while, as usual for the past two days, Newsradio plays in the background. It might be hard to concentrate...I'm very tired, I had a big dinner to make up for missing lunch, and I might have had a delicious alcoholic beverage with that dinner....zzzzz.....
Tomorrow will hopefully be the social day of my little vacation, what with a couple of co-workers either visiting or wanting to hang out :) Either that or I'll write, or finally drag Ryan to the local pastry & coffee place, OR bang my head against my book some more.
....anyway! Right. Waking time. Writing time. Outlining time. Wheeeeee.....zzzzzz....
[o] picked up my prescription
[o] picked up Ryan's paycheck
[o] finished the week's grocery shopping
[o] went to the bank
[o] shipped a package
[o] finished writing and addressing thank you notes
[o] washed, dried, folded, sorted, and put away four loads of laundry
[o] rearranged the bedroom closet
[o] cleared out a lot of hoarded clutter
[o] broke down a gazillion cardboard boxes
[o] changed the bedding
[o] made dinner for Ryan and myself
[o] moved my favorite art photographs to my Mac so I could load them onto my iPad
I'm in the living room now, just finished that last task and will be hacking at an outline for On The/Running while, as usual for the past two days, Newsradio plays in the background. It might be hard to concentrate...I'm very tired, I had a big dinner to make up for missing lunch, and I might have had a delicious alcoholic beverage with that dinner....zzzzz.....
Tomorrow will hopefully be the social day of my little vacation, what with a couple of co-workers either visiting or wanting to hang out :) Either that or I'll write, or finally drag Ryan to the local pastry & coffee place, OR bang my head against my book some more.
....anyway! Right. Waking time. Writing time. Outlining time. Wheeeeee.....zzzzzz....
Wednesday, February 24, 2010
What Else Is Goin' On, 2/24/10 Edition
What else is going on with me:
…well, winter just won’t die, if that’s anything new. Looking back over the past, oh, 24 winters of my life, I’m fairly confident in making a self-diagnosis of SAD—Seasonal Affective Disorder. Every year, when spring rolls around, I get this blast of Happy and I feel like I can do anything—this is partly due to spring, yes, and partly due to the fact that the prior season left me feeling like I can do nothing, and that’s perfectly fine, I’ll just curl up on the couch and stare at a screen and turn into a spud, thanks.
To revel in the negative for a moment: I’m sick of being cold, I’m sick of wearing layers, I’m sick of frost-heaving back roads, I’m sick of dry skin and of small cuts never healing, I’m sick of wet socks and pant hems, I’m sick of hat-tangled hair, and I’m sick of having to deal with all off it whenever I want to leave the house. SICK. OF ALL OF IT. DONE.
*Ahem*
On a positive note, I actually have been more physically active in the past month and a half than in a long time. The day after Christmas, with Christmas money, I went out and bought a Wii Fit Plus. Ryan and I currently have Justin’s Wii on semi-permanent loan, so all I had to buy was the game and board, yay!
It’s been a slow, stuttering start, but I’ve been using the thing more days of the week than not. When I first recorded my information, the game gave me a BMI reading in the lower ends of overweight. In the past two weeks, measuring almost every day, I’ve been hitting normal more and more often (weight can fluctuate two pounds from day to day, just due to food intake or other factors). My current goal is to lose a very modest five pounds by March 10th, and I’m making slow but sure progress.
The best part is the fact that I’m changing. My body shape is slowly but surely changing, my waist and belly getting subtly smaller. My muscles are growing, both in size and number, most notably in my thighs and calves. Exercises that used to knock me out don’t hurt quite as much as they used to—they still do, trust me, but less so!
I am getting stronger and healthier, and it feels fantastic.
On a geekier note: I’ve become even more of a WoW nerd. I hit 80 with my Blood Elf Mage, and I’ve spent the past two weeks gearing up, getting my rotation down, creating macros, fine-tuning my stats, and learning raids. I’ve also been making friends in the guild, since I can actually run dungeons and raids with them without it being a welfare-run to get me desperately needed gear or badges.
…to translate: I hit the cool part of the game, and it’s meant being geekier and more social. Yay!
Still, even with that, and the working out, this season has been getting me down. I have been in a pretty annoying funk for most of this month. For a small while, I was having really annoying and upsetting mood swings—I’d go from pleasant to enraged at the drop of hat. Literally, I’d go to place a hat, and it’d fall, and I’d get spitting-mad-frustrated. Or something wouldn’t close or open properly, or I’d bump into something, or any number of small, stupid things that would set me off for no reason other than You’re Not Doing What I Asked Of You, Stupid Object.
Fortunately, that seems to have scaled down by a large amount, so I’m in a much calmer funk. Hooray.
Overall, I’d love to blame the weather and the season entirely for the rut, but that wouldn’t be entirely fair. Part of it has just been me.
Last Thursday, I had work from 10 to 2 while the boss had a business meeting. I had a few hours to myself, just me and the computer, in the slowest part of the day. The funk had been deepening as the week went on, so I was feeling pretty crappy. In a rare moment of I don’t even know what, I opened up a notepad and started yelling at myself. I gave myself a damned good talking to about feeling sorry for myself, and not doing anything about it, and sitting on my butt, and so on.
This has again grown long, so tomorrow I’ll post the aftermath: my new set of rules for Getting Off My Butt, Literally & Figuratively.
…well, winter just won’t die, if that’s anything new. Looking back over the past, oh, 24 winters of my life, I’m fairly confident in making a self-diagnosis of SAD—Seasonal Affective Disorder. Every year, when spring rolls around, I get this blast of Happy and I feel like I can do anything—this is partly due to spring, yes, and partly due to the fact that the prior season left me feeling like I can do nothing, and that’s perfectly fine, I’ll just curl up on the couch and stare at a screen and turn into a spud, thanks.
To revel in the negative for a moment: I’m sick of being cold, I’m sick of wearing layers, I’m sick of frost-heaving back roads, I’m sick of dry skin and of small cuts never healing, I’m sick of wet socks and pant hems, I’m sick of hat-tangled hair, and I’m sick of having to deal with all off it whenever I want to leave the house. SICK. OF ALL OF IT. DONE.
*Ahem*
On a positive note, I actually have been more physically active in the past month and a half than in a long time. The day after Christmas, with Christmas money, I went out and bought a Wii Fit Plus. Ryan and I currently have Justin’s Wii on semi-permanent loan, so all I had to buy was the game and board, yay!
It’s been a slow, stuttering start, but I’ve been using the thing more days of the week than not. When I first recorded my information, the game gave me a BMI reading in the lower ends of overweight. In the past two weeks, measuring almost every day, I’ve been hitting normal more and more often (weight can fluctuate two pounds from day to day, just due to food intake or other factors). My current goal is to lose a very modest five pounds by March 10th, and I’m making slow but sure progress.
The best part is the fact that I’m changing. My body shape is slowly but surely changing, my waist and belly getting subtly smaller. My muscles are growing, both in size and number, most notably in my thighs and calves. Exercises that used to knock me out don’t hurt quite as much as they used to—they still do, trust me, but less so!
I am getting stronger and healthier, and it feels fantastic.
On a geekier note: I’ve become even more of a WoW nerd. I hit 80 with my Blood Elf Mage, and I’ve spent the past two weeks gearing up, getting my rotation down, creating macros, fine-tuning my stats, and learning raids. I’ve also been making friends in the guild, since I can actually run dungeons and raids with them without it being a welfare-run to get me desperately needed gear or badges.
…to translate: I hit the cool part of the game, and it’s meant being geekier and more social. Yay!
Still, even with that, and the working out, this season has been getting me down. I have been in a pretty annoying funk for most of this month. For a small while, I was having really annoying and upsetting mood swings—I’d go from pleasant to enraged at the drop of hat. Literally, I’d go to place a hat, and it’d fall, and I’d get spitting-mad-frustrated. Or something wouldn’t close or open properly, or I’d bump into something, or any number of small, stupid things that would set me off for no reason other than You’re Not Doing What I Asked Of You, Stupid Object.
Fortunately, that seems to have scaled down by a large amount, so I’m in a much calmer funk. Hooray.
Overall, I’d love to blame the weather and the season entirely for the rut, but that wouldn’t be entirely fair. Part of it has just been me.
Last Thursday, I had work from 10 to 2 while the boss had a business meeting. I had a few hours to myself, just me and the computer, in the slowest part of the day. The funk had been deepening as the week went on, so I was feeling pretty crappy. In a rare moment of I don’t even know what, I opened up a notepad and started yelling at myself. I gave myself a damned good talking to about feeling sorry for myself, and not doing anything about it, and sitting on my butt, and so on.
This has again grown long, so tomorrow I’ll post the aftermath: my new set of rules for Getting Off My Butt, Literally & Figuratively.
Tuesday, February 23, 2010
What's Goin' On, 2/23/10 Edition
I started writing this last month, before the current semester had even started. Opened it again today, and had to edit it a bit. At any rate, this is my life right now:
WORK
Work is…the same. I’m not working Monday nights anymore, my schedule is just Fridays from 11-12-1ish to closing (when I start depends on the day), and Saturday from open to close. I find that I actually really miss working on Monday nights. In theory, the same regulars that work out that night work out on Friday night, so it should be the same. Except for two things: first, I work a longer day on Friday, so by the time they come in I’m ready to go home; second, it’s the end of the week, and they’re feeling the same way. I’m seeing way less of my favorite regulars, and I’m just feeling…apathetic toward work in general.
Although: last week and this week, I’ve gotten some more hours, due to my boss having outside obligations. There’s a chance I may start working on a weekday again, at least for a few hours before class. I’m kinda hoping—both for money, and for Time Out Of The House That’s Not Class.
I’ve also been doing housecleaning for my mom, who has big back problems and can’t do as much as she used to. Of course, I say I’ve been doing it, but I’ve only done one day of it. Weather, school, and lack of energy have made it rather difficult to get over there with enough time to be actually useful. But I’m trying!
SCHOOL
The reason I’m no longer working Monday nights is because of my classes: only available times for the two classes I need* are at night, MW from 6 to 9, TR from 7 to 10. Shoot me now.
*I actually have three classes left in the program, but Graphic Design filled up insanely quickly (I blame the way the computer set up the registration, but that’s a rant I won’t start).
Which leads me to the next school sub-topic: The Next Step. This has been a bit of a saga the past month.
I was looking at the colleges in the area (namely UConn and ECSU), focusing on the availability of three areas: Marketing, Editing, and Graphic Design. UConn has an official Marketing degree, enough classes for me to throw together an Editing degree through an Individualized Major, and the same deal for Graphic Design (there is a “Communications Design” major, but (a) it’s less graphic and more all-around design, and (b) the admission requirements are out of my reach). ECSU has a Visual Design minor, and enough classes for me to make a Marketing Individualized Major, but that’s it. So UConn looked to be winning.
Then this semester started, with the Advanced Computer Graphics class. Very first class period, we watched a short movie on a digital artist named Bert Monroy. This short blew my mind, and had me scraping my jaw off the floor. The digital paintings this man does are ridiculous, in terms of beauty, detail, and staggering talent. That picture on the front page of the web site? That’s not a photograph, that’s a painting, made entirely in Illustrator and Photoshop. Ridiculous.
That short got my mind working, and I did another poke at UConn and ECSU for anything involving digital media. Somehow, on my first search, I had missed the Digital Art and Design concentration at ECSU; reading it over, I fell in love. With the classes, with the program as a whole, and, thanks to alumnus Ryan, with the college.
Just this morning, not half an hour ago, I pulled together enough energy to do the Online Application - Transfer on the ECSU Online Services page. Thought I’d fill out as much as I could, and find out what else would needed to be done to actually apply.
Next thing I know, it’s saying I’m all done and hit this button to send it off. So I did. Surprisingly fast and easy, and I’m actually feeling a little dizzy because of it. It appears that all I have left to do is fetch my high school and MCC transcripts and send them off, and I’m set.
I’ve applied to college. … Eek!
Funny side note: There was a College Transfer Fair at MCC two weeks ago, and I popped by it to grab some material off the ECSU table. One of these materials was a postcard to send in asking for more information on a given major. One of the blanks to fill in on the postcard, along with name and address and college and what-have-you, was credits earned thus far. I went to my online MCC transcript to find out.
I have 84 credits. After this semester, I will have 90. 90 mothereffing credits. Every one earned at Manchester Community College.
I NEED TO MOVE ON ALREADY.
This has gotten a bit long, so I shall save the rest of the post (What Else Is Goin’ On, 2/24/10 Edition) for tomorrow.
WORK
Work is…the same. I’m not working Monday nights anymore, my schedule is just Fridays from 11-12-1ish to closing (when I start depends on the day), and Saturday from open to close. I find that I actually really miss working on Monday nights. In theory, the same regulars that work out that night work out on Friday night, so it should be the same. Except for two things: first, I work a longer day on Friday, so by the time they come in I’m ready to go home; second, it’s the end of the week, and they’re feeling the same way. I’m seeing way less of my favorite regulars, and I’m just feeling…apathetic toward work in general.
Although: last week and this week, I’ve gotten some more hours, due to my boss having outside obligations. There’s a chance I may start working on a weekday again, at least for a few hours before class. I’m kinda hoping—both for money, and for Time Out Of The House That’s Not Class.
I’ve also been doing housecleaning for my mom, who has big back problems and can’t do as much as she used to. Of course, I say I’ve been doing it, but I’ve only done one day of it. Weather, school, and lack of energy have made it rather difficult to get over there with enough time to be actually useful. But I’m trying!
SCHOOL
The reason I’m no longer working Monday nights is because of my classes: only available times for the two classes I need* are at night, MW from 6 to 9, TR from 7 to 10. Shoot me now.
*I actually have three classes left in the program, but Graphic Design filled up insanely quickly (I blame the way the computer set up the registration, but that’s a rant I won’t start).
Which leads me to the next school sub-topic: The Next Step. This has been a bit of a saga the past month.
I was looking at the colleges in the area (namely UConn and ECSU), focusing on the availability of three areas: Marketing, Editing, and Graphic Design. UConn has an official Marketing degree, enough classes for me to throw together an Editing degree through an Individualized Major, and the same deal for Graphic Design (there is a “Communications Design” major, but (a) it’s less graphic and more all-around design, and (b) the admission requirements are out of my reach). ECSU has a Visual Design minor, and enough classes for me to make a Marketing Individualized Major, but that’s it. So UConn looked to be winning.
Then this semester started, with the Advanced Computer Graphics class. Very first class period, we watched a short movie on a digital artist named Bert Monroy. This short blew my mind, and had me scraping my jaw off the floor. The digital paintings this man does are ridiculous, in terms of beauty, detail, and staggering talent. That picture on the front page of the web site? That’s not a photograph, that’s a painting, made entirely in Illustrator and Photoshop. Ridiculous.
That short got my mind working, and I did another poke at UConn and ECSU for anything involving digital media. Somehow, on my first search, I had missed the Digital Art and Design concentration at ECSU; reading it over, I fell in love. With the classes, with the program as a whole, and, thanks to alumnus Ryan, with the college.
Just this morning, not half an hour ago, I pulled together enough energy to do the Online Application - Transfer on the ECSU Online Services page. Thought I’d fill out as much as I could, and find out what else would needed to be done to actually apply.
Next thing I know, it’s saying I’m all done and hit this button to send it off. So I did. Surprisingly fast and easy, and I’m actually feeling a little dizzy because of it. It appears that all I have left to do is fetch my high school and MCC transcripts and send them off, and I’m set.
I’ve applied to college. … Eek!
Funny side note: There was a College Transfer Fair at MCC two weeks ago, and I popped by it to grab some material off the ECSU table. One of these materials was a postcard to send in asking for more information on a given major. One of the blanks to fill in on the postcard, along with name and address and college and what-have-you, was credits earned thus far. I went to my online MCC transcript to find out.
I have 84 credits. After this semester, I will have 90. 90 mothereffing credits. Every one earned at Manchester Community College.
I NEED TO MOVE ON ALREADY.
This has gotten a bit long, so I shall save the rest of the post (What Else Is Goin’ On, 2/24/10 Edition) for tomorrow.
Saturday, November 14, 2009
The Great Calorie War of Aught-Nine.
At the beginning of this past year, I got two new things: an iPod Touch (thanks to Christmas money), and a free application called Lose It!. Lose It! is a tool for tracking what and how much you eat, how much you exercise, and what you weigh. I made a New Years resolution to lose weight and become healthier. The first time I entered my weight, it was 162 lbs. At 5’6”, that’s not obese—in fact, while at the high end of the “normal” BMI range, it’s technically not even overweight. It was still more than I wanted to weigh, however, especially since almost none of it was muscle.
For some reason, I decided that the best way to go about things was to eat less. Not eat better, or exercise more (or, for me, exercise at all), but just lower the amount of calories I was consuming. Despite logic, despite having a brain in my head, despite having a brand new program at work that taught us about metabolism and how cutting calories only works when you also work out to jump-start the burning of fat instead of muscle.
Obviously, this didn’t really work—especially since this was one of the worst winters I’ve ever gone through. I’m not good at winters as it is, and this one was long, it was cold, it was wet, and it included a death in the family. My great uncle Bill—my de facto grandfather, as all four of my biological grandparents had passed away before I was born—died in mid-February. It was the first time I had ever lost someone besides a cat. Needless to say, February did not go well in terms of…well, anything.
By May, I had gotten my act a little more together—I was doing better at cutting out calories, and best of all, I started exercising! After a year and a half of working at Curves, I finally got over my weird problem with working out at the same time as members, and started working out every night I worked. Funnily enough, the weight starting coming off a little quicker. Imagine!
Still, I was being dumb about food. I was still obsessing more over calorie count than anything else, such as, I don’t know, ingredients, protein, trans fat, sodium, etc. I had gotten it into my head that calories were evil, no matter what they were attached to, so less was always better than more. Period.
Ryan helped me get over that thinking in June. One day, while out shopping, we decided it was time to grab some dinner and head home. Ryan wanted to get Moe’s, which is like a combination of Subway and Taco Bell—you go down an assembly line and put together a taco, burrito, nachos, etc one step at a time. I consulted my little app, and said no, too many calories in a burrito, but how about McDonald’s?
The look he gave me was about the same as a smack upside the head. I was turning down a real wheat tortilla, real grilled chicken, real beans, real vegetables…for McDonald’s. WHAT THE FUCK.
That very night, after returning home and consuming my delicious, nutritious, not-McDonald’s dinner, I tinkered with my app. I changed it from “lose weight” to “maintain weight.” This was a trick to have a higher calorie “budget,” so there would be this big red bar if I went over a set number of calories. I had decided to start concentrating on quality over quantity.
Except I was still concerned with quantity. I started picking out healthier foods, but I was still concerned over not eating too much, no matter what it was. I opened up Excel (one of my favorite toys ever) and made myself a little chart for tracking daily calorie counts. One column would show the day’s number, and another column would show the difference from the previous day—had I gone up or down? By how much?
I saw this as a tool for keeping myself in check, making sure my counts didn’t start creeping up with the “freedom” I had given myself. Looking back, I just replaced one way of yelling at myself with another—there may not be a red bar anywhere on the screen, but there was still a number, and I was giving that number more power than I was giving myself.
Over the summer and into the fall, I’ve been making better food choices, and I’ve eased up on the tracking. The Excel chart ran out of space as of October 10, and I didn’t extend it. That was the last day I counted up my calorie count. October 26 was the last day I entered calorie information into the iPod app. At first I just forgot to, but it’s become intentional.
I realized that, if I kept up with the counting and monitoring and self-checking, I was going to end up with an eating disorder. Not because I hate my body, not because I need control over something, but because I can lose myself in obsession over keeping track of things perfectly, to the last detail. When I entered calorie information, I fretted over amounts, worrying that if I was off, I was doing something wrong. If I that red bar came up, if I was just a few calories up from one day to the next, I would guilt the hell out of myself. And that’s just bullshit.
I’m eating healthier now than I was six months ago, or even three months ago. Before I buy something at the grocery store, I check the label—not just for calories, but for protein, fiber, trans and saturated fat, sodium, vitamins and minerals. I check the ingredients for whole grains instead of “enriched flour”, sugar instead of high fructose corn syrup, real salt instead of MSG. I choose foods with real ingredients over foods with lower calorie counts, because I’m finally choosing quality over quantity.
Do I always eat perfectly? No. Do I sometimes eat fast food? Yes. But far, far less than I used to, and I choose different things off the menu. Do I still enjoy chocolate and alcohol and other treats? Yes, but only with or after a real dinner with real food, only as a treat, not an integral part of my day’s menu.
And you know what? I’ve been losing weight. I’ve been losing fat. I’m down to 153 lbs. My waist is making a comeback, and the Curves circuit doesn’t tire me out as much as it used to. And something interesting I discovered—I’m less hungry when I wake up in the morning after I eat real food instead of fake food. With the real freedom I’ve given myself, I feel happy when I eat instead of guilty, I feel really free and in control of what goes into my body for the first time in a long time.
I’m done worrying, I’m done guilting, I’m done obsessing. I’m done with putting the power of what I eat to a stupid little computer program. I’m done with not trusting myself.
I’m done counting.
BONUS SECTION!
In Case You're Curious/I Was Bored So Why Not:
The things I consume on a regular basis {plus flavors} (plus commentary) [plus nutrition]:
[o] V8 Fusion {Pomegranate Blueberry} [8 oz. has 100 calories, 100% daily value of vitamin C, no sugar added, and one full serving each of fruits and vegetables]
[o] Carnation Breakfast Essentials {Rich Milk Chocolate} [One bottle has 260 calories, 14 g of protein, 50% DV of vitamin C and Calcium, 45% DV of vitamin A, and 25% DV of vitamins B6, B12, D, E, K, and iron]
[o] Stonyfield Farm Yogurt Smoothies {Raspberry, Peach} [One 10 oz. bottle has 230 calories, 10 g of protein, 20% DV of vitamin B12, and is completely organic] (It also has a bit more sugar than I'd like (39 g), but it's the only smoothie I find delicious)
[o] Hood Milk (1%, sorry, just can't stand skim) [1 cup has 110 calories, 8 g of protein, 10% DV of vitamins A and C, 25% DV vitamin D, and 30% DV of calcium]
[o] Stouffer's Baked Chicken Breast (with mashed potatoes) [one dinner has 250 calories and 20 g of protein] with Green Giant Simply Steam No Sauce Baby Sweet Peas [2/3 cup package has 60 calories, 4 g of protein, and 15% DV of vitamin C]
[o] Woodchuck Draft Cider {Amber, Raspberry} (this is basically the only alcohol I consume, and it's, like, 3 a week. but DAMN is it refreshing) [one 12 oz. bottle has 200 calories)
[o] Guru Energy Drink {Superfruit} [one 12 oz. can has 180 calories, 1.5 g of protein, and just over 86 g of potassium. while it does include guarana, it’s pretty far down the ingredient list, which has is mostly comprised of water, juice concentrates (20% organic fruit juice!), and other natural substances such as echniacea, ginseng, and ginko biloba] (this is seriously good shit. tastes great (in my opinion), and it doesn’t jar you awake or give you the jitters)
[o] Nature Valley Granola Nut Clusters {Cashew, Honey Roasted Peanut} [cashew: 1 oz. has 150 calories, 1 g of fiber, and 4 g of protein; honey roasted peanut: 1 oz. has 140 calories, 1 g of fiber and, 5 g of protein]
[o] Peanut butter and jelly sandwiches with any brand of creamy peanut butter, generic grape jelly, and whole wheat bread [one sandwich has 350 calories, over 3 g of fiber, and 10 g of protein]
[o] Cashews, usually generic [1 oz has 170 calories and 5 g of protein]
[o] Vlasic Kosher Dill Snack'mmms [1 oz is about 2 gherkin-sized pickles and has 5 calories]
[o] Apples [under 100 calories, over 4 g of fiber, vitamins A and C and calcium]
[o] Baby Carrots, [1 cup has just over 50 calories, almost 3 g of fiber, over a gram of protein, vitamin C, and tons of vitamin A
[o] Mini Babybel Bonbel Cheese [1 piece has 70 calories, 5 g of protein, 6% DV of vitamin A and 15% DV of calcium]
[o] Sushi (tuna roll, shrimp sushi) [one 6 piece tuna roll has 184 calories, 2 g of fat, 24 g of protein, 3.5 g of fiber; one ounce of shrimp sushi has 30 calories, no fat, 6 g of protein, and 151 mg of omega-3 fatty acids] (I eat sushi about once a week, and it’s something I always look forward to. my regular order is one tuna roll and two pieces of shrimp sushi, for a grand total of 244 calories, 2 g of fat, 36 g of protein, and a ton of omega-2 fatty acids)
As you can see, REALLY not bad stuff. The only thing with high fructose corn syrup is the grape jelly, which is something I missed until after I had opened the jar (once this jar is finished, I’ll be buying a different brand, but I just can’t bring myself to toss the current jar). The "worst" food, calorie-wise, is cashews, and I rarely have that, and rarely more than a handful at a time. I don’t drink any soda, and the Guru is the only energy drink I touch, and that’s only a couple of times a week when I need to wake up a little faster I would naturally. I’m working on putting more protein and fiber into my diet, in the form of more cheese, yogurt, and fruits and vegetables. I also have a nightly supplement regiment of one super-B complex, one cal-mag-zinc, and one fish oil tablet.
For some reason, I decided that the best way to go about things was to eat less. Not eat better, or exercise more (or, for me, exercise at all), but just lower the amount of calories I was consuming. Despite logic, despite having a brain in my head, despite having a brand new program at work that taught us about metabolism and how cutting calories only works when you also work out to jump-start the burning of fat instead of muscle.
Obviously, this didn’t really work—especially since this was one of the worst winters I’ve ever gone through. I’m not good at winters as it is, and this one was long, it was cold, it was wet, and it included a death in the family. My great uncle Bill—my de facto grandfather, as all four of my biological grandparents had passed away before I was born—died in mid-February. It was the first time I had ever lost someone besides a cat. Needless to say, February did not go well in terms of…well, anything.
By May, I had gotten my act a little more together—I was doing better at cutting out calories, and best of all, I started exercising! After a year and a half of working at Curves, I finally got over my weird problem with working out at the same time as members, and started working out every night I worked. Funnily enough, the weight starting coming off a little quicker. Imagine!
Still, I was being dumb about food. I was still obsessing more over calorie count than anything else, such as, I don’t know, ingredients, protein, trans fat, sodium, etc. I had gotten it into my head that calories were evil, no matter what they were attached to, so less was always better than more. Period.
Ryan helped me get over that thinking in June. One day, while out shopping, we decided it was time to grab some dinner and head home. Ryan wanted to get Moe’s, which is like a combination of Subway and Taco Bell—you go down an assembly line and put together a taco, burrito, nachos, etc one step at a time. I consulted my little app, and said no, too many calories in a burrito, but how about McDonald’s?
The look he gave me was about the same as a smack upside the head. I was turning down a real wheat tortilla, real grilled chicken, real beans, real vegetables…for McDonald’s. WHAT THE FUCK.
That very night, after returning home and consuming my delicious, nutritious, not-McDonald’s dinner, I tinkered with my app. I changed it from “lose weight” to “maintain weight.” This was a trick to have a higher calorie “budget,” so there would be this big red bar if I went over a set number of calories. I had decided to start concentrating on quality over quantity.
Except I was still concerned with quantity. I started picking out healthier foods, but I was still concerned over not eating too much, no matter what it was. I opened up Excel (one of my favorite toys ever) and made myself a little chart for tracking daily calorie counts. One column would show the day’s number, and another column would show the difference from the previous day—had I gone up or down? By how much?
I saw this as a tool for keeping myself in check, making sure my counts didn’t start creeping up with the “freedom” I had given myself. Looking back, I just replaced one way of yelling at myself with another—there may not be a red bar anywhere on the screen, but there was still a number, and I was giving that number more power than I was giving myself.
Over the summer and into the fall, I’ve been making better food choices, and I’ve eased up on the tracking. The Excel chart ran out of space as of October 10, and I didn’t extend it. That was the last day I counted up my calorie count. October 26 was the last day I entered calorie information into the iPod app. At first I just forgot to, but it’s become intentional.
I realized that, if I kept up with the counting and monitoring and self-checking, I was going to end up with an eating disorder. Not because I hate my body, not because I need control over something, but because I can lose myself in obsession over keeping track of things perfectly, to the last detail. When I entered calorie information, I fretted over amounts, worrying that if I was off, I was doing something wrong. If I that red bar came up, if I was just a few calories up from one day to the next, I would guilt the hell out of myself. And that’s just bullshit.
I’m eating healthier now than I was six months ago, or even three months ago. Before I buy something at the grocery store, I check the label—not just for calories, but for protein, fiber, trans and saturated fat, sodium, vitamins and minerals. I check the ingredients for whole grains instead of “enriched flour”, sugar instead of high fructose corn syrup, real salt instead of MSG. I choose foods with real ingredients over foods with lower calorie counts, because I’m finally choosing quality over quantity.
Do I always eat perfectly? No. Do I sometimes eat fast food? Yes. But far, far less than I used to, and I choose different things off the menu. Do I still enjoy chocolate and alcohol and other treats? Yes, but only with or after a real dinner with real food, only as a treat, not an integral part of my day’s menu.
And you know what? I’ve been losing weight. I’ve been losing fat. I’m down to 153 lbs. My waist is making a comeback, and the Curves circuit doesn’t tire me out as much as it used to. And something interesting I discovered—I’m less hungry when I wake up in the morning after I eat real food instead of fake food. With the real freedom I’ve given myself, I feel happy when I eat instead of guilty, I feel really free and in control of what goes into my body for the first time in a long time.
I’m done worrying, I’m done guilting, I’m done obsessing. I’m done with putting the power of what I eat to a stupid little computer program. I’m done with not trusting myself.
I’m done counting.
BONUS SECTION!
In Case You're Curious/I Was Bored So Why Not:
The things I consume on a regular basis {plus flavors} (plus commentary) [plus nutrition]:
[o] V8 Fusion {Pomegranate Blueberry} [8 oz. has 100 calories, 100% daily value of vitamin C, no sugar added, and one full serving each of fruits and vegetables]
[o] Carnation Breakfast Essentials {Rich Milk Chocolate} [One bottle has 260 calories, 14 g of protein, 50% DV of vitamin C and Calcium, 45% DV of vitamin A, and 25% DV of vitamins B6, B12, D, E, K, and iron]
[o] Stonyfield Farm Yogurt Smoothies {Raspberry, Peach} [One 10 oz. bottle has 230 calories, 10 g of protein, 20% DV of vitamin B12, and is completely organic] (It also has a bit more sugar than I'd like (39 g), but it's the only smoothie I find delicious)
[o] Hood Milk (1%, sorry, just can't stand skim) [1 cup has 110 calories, 8 g of protein, 10% DV of vitamins A and C, 25% DV vitamin D, and 30% DV of calcium]
[o] Stouffer's Baked Chicken Breast (with mashed potatoes) [one dinner has 250 calories and 20 g of protein] with Green Giant Simply Steam No Sauce Baby Sweet Peas [2/3 cup package has 60 calories, 4 g of protein, and 15% DV of vitamin C]
[o] Woodchuck Draft Cider {Amber, Raspberry} (this is basically the only alcohol I consume, and it's, like, 3 a week. but DAMN is it refreshing) [one 12 oz. bottle has 200 calories)
[o] Guru Energy Drink {Superfruit} [one 12 oz. can has 180 calories, 1.5 g of protein, and just over 86 g of potassium. while it does include guarana, it’s pretty far down the ingredient list, which has is mostly comprised of water, juice concentrates (20% organic fruit juice!), and other natural substances such as echniacea, ginseng, and ginko biloba] (this is seriously good shit. tastes great (in my opinion), and it doesn’t jar you awake or give you the jitters)
[o] Nature Valley Granola Nut Clusters {Cashew, Honey Roasted Peanut} [cashew: 1 oz. has 150 calories, 1 g of fiber, and 4 g of protein; honey roasted peanut: 1 oz. has 140 calories, 1 g of fiber and, 5 g of protein]
[o] Peanut butter and jelly sandwiches with any brand of creamy peanut butter, generic grape jelly, and whole wheat bread [one sandwich has 350 calories, over 3 g of fiber, and 10 g of protein]
[o] Cashews, usually generic [1 oz has 170 calories and 5 g of protein]
[o] Vlasic Kosher Dill Snack'mmms [1 oz is about 2 gherkin-sized pickles and has 5 calories]
[o] Apples [under 100 calories, over 4 g of fiber, vitamins A and C and calcium]
[o] Baby Carrots, [1 cup has just over 50 calories, almost 3 g of fiber, over a gram of protein, vitamin C, and tons of vitamin A
[o] Mini Babybel Bonbel Cheese [1 piece has 70 calories, 5 g of protein, 6% DV of vitamin A and 15% DV of calcium]
[o] Sushi (tuna roll, shrimp sushi) [one 6 piece tuna roll has 184 calories, 2 g of fat, 24 g of protein, 3.5 g of fiber; one ounce of shrimp sushi has 30 calories, no fat, 6 g of protein, and 151 mg of omega-3 fatty acids] (I eat sushi about once a week, and it’s something I always look forward to. my regular order is one tuna roll and two pieces of shrimp sushi, for a grand total of 244 calories, 2 g of fat, 36 g of protein, and a ton of omega-2 fatty acids)
As you can see, REALLY not bad stuff. The only thing with high fructose corn syrup is the grape jelly, which is something I missed until after I had opened the jar (once this jar is finished, I’ll be buying a different brand, but I just can’t bring myself to toss the current jar). The "worst" food, calorie-wise, is cashews, and I rarely have that, and rarely more than a handful at a time. I don’t drink any soda, and the Guru is the only energy drink I touch, and that’s only a couple of times a week when I need to wake up a little faster I would naturally. I’m working on putting more protein and fiber into my diet, in the form of more cheese, yogurt, and fruits and vegetables. I also have a nightly supplement regiment of one super-B complex, one cal-mag-zinc, and one fish oil tablet.
Saturday, November 7, 2009
Liam & Jer Progress: Nov. 7th, 2009
As of yesterday, my total word count for "final" chapters (all six of them) is 9,884.
(By "final" chapters, I mean the documents/text files that will eventually evolve into final drafts. I have many, many .docs and .txts that hold pieces of Liam & Jer, but these are older drafts, some dating back to my junior year of high school. These have either been drastically changed in to new chapters, stripped for parts, or scrapped altogether.)
Anyway. A word count of under 10,000 is...kinda pathetic. If you also keep in mind that I set myself a goal of adding 50,000 words this month in honor of NaNoWriMo...*gulp* I'm actually pretty confident that I will NOT meet this goal, but that's okay. I'd be happy if I had 20,000 words, or even 15,000. Anything that meant I actually added to it.
I recently took my outline and transferred them to index cards. My plan is to take the cards and figure out the exact order of events. This would seem easy--A then B then C, right?*--except that I'm toying with the idea of a few of the chapters being flashbacks, looking at Liam's or Jer's past to get some insight as to why they're doing this or acting like that. I'm afraid that it could make it messy, complicated, confusing, etc, but I'm also concerned with what might be missing if I don't include them. I currently suck at "looking back" in the middle of a scene, although you'd think the fact that I'm writing it in present tense would help. Of course, the fact that I'm thinking of trying to fit this big, messy puzzle piece into the whole thing instead of, you know, growing as a writer and learning to fix what needs fixing in my toolbox may also say something about me. That something may start with an "l" and rhyme with "hazy."
I'm also trying to find a time to dedicate to writing. I set on the task of finding this piece of time months ago, and I even had one for, oh, two weeks, but it's gotten harder. The free time I do have has to be divvied up between school assignments, errands and chores, seeing Mom, seeing Dad, being social (HA!), and getting some quality time with Ryan. These pieces of free time are currently: Sundays and Mondays until 4, and Wednesdays and Saturdays after noon. Sunday is currently my day to catch up on Mom-home chores and see Mom, and Monday is currently my only day to sleep in, which is very precious to me. Wednesdays and Saturdays, Ry and I do one of two things: do chores and errands, or have a few hours of dedicated WoWing, basically my only WoW time the entire week. WoW might sound like something worth sacrificing to get some writing in, and maybe it should be, but it's also a great stress-reliever, and a little bit of being social (getting friendlier with the Guildies).
Keep in mind that Writing Time would more or less HAVE to be at Starbucks, where I'm disconnected from the internet, and able to just plug in to my music and my little world. Sometimes just the act of Going To/Being At Starbucks is almost enough to click in to Writing Mode. So it's not just a set time I pull out the laptop and get down to business; it's a set time that I drive to Starbucks, get myself a drink and a snack, and settle down at a table. On Mondays and Sundays, there would have to be travel time built in to get back in time for work or D&D.
So, there. My current writing status/predicament. I'll try to post something opinionated and ranty tomorrow.
*Yes, Dad, I know about time not being linear, but in this particular story, it's going to be, okay? ;)
(By "final" chapters, I mean the documents/text files that will eventually evolve into final drafts. I have many, many .docs and .txts that hold pieces of Liam & Jer, but these are older drafts, some dating back to my junior year of high school. These have either been drastically changed in to new chapters, stripped for parts, or scrapped altogether.)
Anyway. A word count of under 10,000 is...kinda pathetic. If you also keep in mind that I set myself a goal of adding 50,000 words this month in honor of NaNoWriMo...*gulp* I'm actually pretty confident that I will NOT meet this goal, but that's okay. I'd be happy if I had 20,000 words, or even 15,000. Anything that meant I actually added to it.
I recently took my outline and transferred them to index cards. My plan is to take the cards and figure out the exact order of events. This would seem easy--A then B then C, right?*--except that I'm toying with the idea of a few of the chapters being flashbacks, looking at Liam's or Jer's past to get some insight as to why they're doing this or acting like that. I'm afraid that it could make it messy, complicated, confusing, etc, but I'm also concerned with what might be missing if I don't include them. I currently suck at "looking back" in the middle of a scene, although you'd think the fact that I'm writing it in present tense would help. Of course, the fact that I'm thinking of trying to fit this big, messy puzzle piece into the whole thing instead of, you know, growing as a writer and learning to fix what needs fixing in my toolbox may also say something about me. That something may start with an "l" and rhyme with "hazy."
I'm also trying to find a time to dedicate to writing. I set on the task of finding this piece of time months ago, and I even had one for, oh, two weeks, but it's gotten harder. The free time I do have has to be divvied up between school assignments, errands and chores, seeing Mom, seeing Dad, being social (HA!), and getting some quality time with Ryan. These pieces of free time are currently: Sundays and Mondays until 4, and Wednesdays and Saturdays after noon. Sunday is currently my day to catch up on Mom-home chores and see Mom, and Monday is currently my only day to sleep in, which is very precious to me. Wednesdays and Saturdays, Ry and I do one of two things: do chores and errands, or have a few hours of dedicated WoWing, basically my only WoW time the entire week. WoW might sound like something worth sacrificing to get some writing in, and maybe it should be, but it's also a great stress-reliever, and a little bit of being social (getting friendlier with the Guildies).
Keep in mind that Writing Time would more or less HAVE to be at Starbucks, where I'm disconnected from the internet, and able to just plug in to my music and my little world. Sometimes just the act of Going To/Being At Starbucks is almost enough to click in to Writing Mode. So it's not just a set time I pull out the laptop and get down to business; it's a set time that I drive to Starbucks, get myself a drink and a snack, and settle down at a table. On Mondays and Sundays, there would have to be travel time built in to get back in time for work or D&D.
So, there. My current writing status/predicament. I'll try to post something opinionated and ranty tomorrow.
*Yes, Dad, I know about time not being linear, but in this particular story, it's going to be, okay? ;)
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