Running For Fries

Dieting - Keep Calm and Carry On

2012-01-30T22:51:00.000-05:00

Last night i started writing in a journal again. Like manually writing. Foreign concept these days, right? My hand sure thought so. It was cramping before the end of the first page. As I was writing my first entry I thought it might be good to share some of it on here. Sorry, you won't get the full thing. We all know that somethings just aren't meant for the internet. Besides, if i put it all on there then what would be the point of having a journal??

There is just something about writing by hand that is so nice. Something about the perfect lines of text that are just too formal. I like to skip lines randomly, doodle, and sometimes even do a little sketch. I can't do that here in this ever constricting maze of black and white. I did learn that apparently i like to quote myself and blow them up and accent them like they do in magazines. I'll try to find a way to accent them on here but i can tell you, it wont be as pretty. :)

You know what's nice about writing by hand?

There's no auto correct to derail your thoughts.

...There's just other thoughts to derail your thoughts.

Write faster, hand!!

Of course my first journal entry would be about my biggest challenge right now, my weight. I have always struggled with my weight. I don't have it as bad as some. I'm not at any health risk, i'm just [forever] chunky. I don't know what it will take for me to get something done.

--- Dedicated --- Determined ---

I am constantly on and off diets. I'll count calories and make excellent progress only to crash and burn. It's a problem. I am aware but that doesn't stop me. I think "I should only have 1 cookie" or "I am full so i should stop here" but i still cram a second or even third cookie in my mouth and then feel horrible afterwards. Or i will eat everything on my plate because "it taste so good" like i'm never going to get it again... everything is mass produced.

It will be there tomorrow

It is like i don't have any willpower but it is there. I know it is. I've seen it! Hellooooo....?? I think it is almost like a form of depression? The more upset I get about eating, the more i eat. What sense does that make?? None I tell ya!!

For example just last week I was doing a great job on my diet and then i fell off a little on Wednesday because i was craving Far East Black Bean from Wok Hay. I was full halfway through but i just kept eating until it was all gone. I felt horrible that i ate the whole thing and i tried to get back on track but i was really down on myself. Then Friday i ate at a pizza buffet and then went to a party (aka beer) so i failed H.A.R.D! I don't even think Lose it can count that high. After that I lost hope and motivation. I didn't make a grocery list so i didn't go to the store.

I just wallowed in self pity instead of doing something about it

I know these things and i'm a believer that if something is making you unhappy that you should CHANGE it so why do i let myself wallow??? It MUST stop ---- there will be fail days and I need to just take them in and carry on.

Keep Calm and Carry On

That saying just took on new meaning...

Eating healthy is just so hard. It takes so much time to prepare and then clean up. Yes the food is delicious --- i feel 100x better --- and i'm never miserably stuffed. BUT time.... it is so precious and i'm trying to workout too.

They aren't kidding when they say healthy eating is a LIFESTYLE...

It takes up SO. MUCH. TIME.

"weh" right? Grow-up.

Maybe i could try one of those meal plan website that i got from Laura. I wonder if they generate grocery list? That's the annoying part.

Alright enough whining about my laziness and lack of willpower. It is my bedtime and sleep is very important to me. The important thing is that I don't give up.

Keep trying and keep changing!

//Stacy//

A Big Week of FAIL 1/16 - 1/22

2012-01-24T21:01:00.000-05:00

Hey there! Ready for an embarrassing recap? Great! Because i have one for you.

In a nutshell a fell off my diet after Tuesday and I only exercised twice the whole week. Yea.... Here's what it looked like:

Monday: Attended my mamaw's 92nd birthday dinner at Shoney's. I showed restraint and avoided the buffet. I picked a plain hamburger with sweet potato fries. No exercise this day.

Tuesday: A lady at work and I decided to try some weights. I badly need to incorporate weights into my workout routine because the more muscle you have the more calories you burn! I have a theory that the reason it is so much harder for older people to lose weight is because of all the muscle mass they have lost over the years. I know I am no where near as strong as i was in high school when i was constantly playing sports and it has only been 10 years. So you can imagine someone in their 40s would have considerably more muscle loss.

Wednesday: This was our planned "catch up on TV" night and I was really craving some Far East Black Bean from Wok Hay so i declared Wednesday a slight "cheat day" (dinner only) and totally veg'd out. Thus starting my downward spiral.

Thursday: I thought i was okay, I was back on track! I ran 4 miles because I'm training for a 10k in February. As a result I had plenty of extra calories by the end of the day. I was feeling good!

Friday: But then Friday happened... I didn't even make an effort to fit in exercise and a friend that i haven't seen in a very long time was throwing a house warming party. Before the party i went to dinner with 2 other friends and we went to a pizza buffet, need i say more? Then at the party i had my fair share of beers which were 100 calories a pop. I resolved just not to talk about Friday. Kapesh?

Saturday: I started the day by sleeping in and then went to a friend's baby shower. I had planned to do a Kinect workout and make a grocery list after i got home but it was so dang gloomy and i had a horrible headache (not hangover related, i swear!) So i ended up laying in bed all day and reading Mockingjay. I was even too lazy to finish logging my calories this day.

Sunday: Didn't even try to log calories this day. We went to breakfast at James' mom's house and she always cooks a metric ton of food and i think i ate a pound of bacon. When we got home all i could think about was finishing Mockingjay so i put the rest of my life on hold and just read for hours. It was really nice actually.
__

So, needless to say i really lost focus with my eating and exercise this week. I think it started on Monday. We didn't have anything to watch while we ate dinner so we decided to rewatch Battlestar Galactica. It was even better than i remembered! We watched both pilot episodes which are 1.5 hours each. I usually go to bed around 10 but we didn't finish watching those until after midnight. Then, i couldn't resist reading at least a chapter or two of Catching Fire so i stayed up until about 1:30am and had to get up at 6am. I have not been that tired in a very long time. I could barely put my thoughts together the next day at work. As a result of my loss of sleep, i dragged all week. This sucked my motivation right out of me. I've always made sleep a priority but the lesson here is sleep is VERY vital to living a healthy, active lifestyle.

I'm not going to recap the other resolutions because nothing changed. The whole week was a fail and I feel horrible about it. Emotionally and physically. Last week my run was really easy because i had kept up with exercise and eating the right stuff but when i ran this week i thought i was going to die before i reached a mile. I was breathing hard and my muscles were burning. Not to mention, my stomach problems are back this week with a vengeance. Besides all these physical setbacks, i am just really disappointed in myself and that's a horrible feeling.

I did realize that these recaps really help. I actually thought i was on target with exercise last week until i recapped it and saw that i only did something twice the whole week! i was shocked. Same with my eating, i thought i was fine some days because i was under budget but when i looked at what i really ate, it was not a pretty picture. One night for dinner i had 3 fried cheese wedges and 2 beers. What kind of dinner is that, people? I mean seriously! No wonder i only lost .4 of a pound even though i was under budget! It makes perfect sense now. I think it will help me keep focus and understand things if i do my recaps on time.

My game plan for this week:
It's already too late to go to the grocery store this week because Thursday is my birthday and i have more important things to do then cook and do dishes all day! :) Then we are hosting a friends game night on Friday and there will be lots of snacks and adult beverages involved. So i'm going to just try to make the smartest choices i can tomorrow (Wednesday) and try not to over do it on Thursday and Friday. Saturday I will make a grocery list and go to the store Saturday or Sunday and my diet will start back Monday!

As for exercise i plan to lift weights tomorrow with the lady from work and then run or do the kinect on Saturday if i'm not too hungover. (at least i admit it, right?) That's still an embarrassing amount of exercise but at least it is better than nothing.

My goals for week of 1/30 - 2/5
- Recap on time
- Get to sleep on time (around 10-10:30)
- Exercise 5 times

This is really early for such a huge backslide. I hope i got it out of my system. :(

//Stacy//

Resolutions Recap Week of 1/9 - 1/15

2012-01-24T19:48:00.000-05:00

Another post that is long over due is a review of my resolutions progress! I can't be held accountable if i don't track my progress! This recap if for the week of 1/9 - 1/15.

Work Towards Living a Healthy Lifestyle
I feel this resolution has been pretty successful until this weekend. For the week of 1/9 - 1/15 i went the whole week without going over my calorie budget once! I was very excited about this as it was a first for me.

My exercise schedule was as follows:
Monday - Kinect workout
Tuesday - Rest (run was cancelled)
Wednesday - Rest
Thursday - Ran
Friday - Rest
Saturday - Kinect workout
Sunday - Kinect workout

Let me tell you, those Kinect workouts are no joke. Especially the Boot Camp and Sports Training. I thought i was going to collapse by the end. But in a good "pushing myself" way. I would like to only have 2 rest days every week but during the above week you will see I had three. You can see that my activity was cancelled but really that is no excuse, i should have still followed through with an exercise of some kind. This is something to work on.

I also failed at portion controlled. James and I got a milkshake at Mooyah to share and i was only suppose to eat 1/3 of it but i looked down and i had ate 1/2 of it without realizing! Luckily i had the calories to cover it but still, it is the point that i had decided to only eat 1/3 and over ate.

On the positive side, during this week we ate at Panera, Olive Garden, and even ate at Mooyah but i held strong and pre-planned my choices. If i really wanted something a little higher in calories i countered it with more exercise.

On this same note, i feel i succeeded at marking smarter choices. I had a veggie burger at Mooyah, I had soup and salad at Olive Garden, avoided the breadsticks, and I really wanted a bagel at panera so I found the lowest calorie choice (French Toast at 130 calories) and downsized my salad to a half to compensate.

Focus on House Projects
Cleaning was a total fail. I cleaned the kitchen out of necessity as i needed the dishes to cook the next meal but i didn't do anything else. The good news is the house isn't that messy because I have been so busy. However, one rainy day we let the dogs in without wiping off their paws and now there is mud everywhere downstairs. It is sickening. Luckily, a friend at work owns a carpet cleaner and she is going to let me borrow it. I just hope it is strong enough. haha... /cry.

We did manage to work on the workout room a little. We bought an Xbox Kinect so we moved the smaller TV downstairs and shifted the treadmill to allow lots of Kinect space. As a result the pile of junk that had collected in the corner had to be moved as well. Woo!

I also found a really pretty linen cabinet at Ikea since we don't have a linen closet. How weird is that? Now we just need to plan a day trip to Atlanta to buy it since it would cost more to have it delivered.

Be more Organized
I really haven't done much with this except use Evernote more to organize my meal plans. I still don't feel like i am using it to its maximum potential though. However, i still love it! it makes it so easy to compile notes on multiple projects when the notion hits. I already think it is an amazing tool and I'm just starting to learn to use it.

Visit Grandparents
January has slipped by without me planning a breakfast with them so i need to look ahead and plan one for February.

Be More Positive
It is hard to give examples of this one but i feel I have made some progress. I have had some conversations where negative things came to mind and i remembered to shut my mouth before i said anything. This led to a few awkward pauses as my brain races to think of something else to say but that's okay. I'll get better.

Also, a co-worker was having a bad week and was being very negative so instead of letting it bring me down i offered some ways i could help and it not only kept me from getting down but turned his outlook around as well!

Blog
Well, you know how this one went. It didn't. But as i explained in my previous post, i was distracted so it wasn't just my blog that was neglected. My whole life was put on hold so i could finish reading The Hunger Games series. In the future, I'd like to try to get more than one post out a week though.

Keep a Journal
I still need to start this. I'm thinking of doing it for a few minutes while i eat breakfast in the morning. The problem is i often push snooze too many times and then i don't have much time after i get ready so this may not be the best time. It would be the quietest but not the most reliable. My hesitation with starting my journal is that i don't know where to begin. I know i shouldn't have any expectations and i should just let the words flow but i can't. I have a disease that i have to have a plan for everything and it has become more apparent lately. Even this post, I outlined it on a piece a paper before i even sat down at my computer. The same... i guess you could call it fear, struck me the other day when our book club was painting. We weren't suppose to paint anything in particular, we were just suppose to let the brush hit the paper where ever it landed and let our imagination run wild. But i don't think i have an imagination. Everything i think up is the result of research and planning. So, every stroke i made on the canvas was symmetrical to the previous rather i liked it or not. This probably sounds weird to anyone that knows me because i am usually very relaxed and go with the flow. I wouldn't consider myself OCD and i'm definitely not one of those super uptight planners that know every detail and have things scheduled to the minute and freak out if anything changes. I can go with the flow but i have to have a plan from the start and it can change from there. I just can't start. I can't make the pen move.

Okay... let's end that psychological rant. That went a little further then i planned. (see plan exceeded and i'm okay with that but i had a plan at the start!)

Learn to Knit
This one is obviously less important than the other resolutions so it has been put on the back burner until some of this chaos passes.

Pay off Scion
I still need to calculate the monthly payment to make this happen. Luckily, since this is a monthly occasion i can still fit this in before the end of the month.

Over All - My Challenges
- With such a busy schedule, it is hard to stay on top of making a grocery list and going to the grocery store. These meal plans require a lot of ingredients and some odd ball stuff that is harder to find so it takes longer than my usual grocery store trips. Not to mention, i typically went to the grocery store only about once every three weeks since we ate out so often so going twice a week is hard to get used to.
- Most of the recipes in my meal plan are for 4 servings. This is great for leftovers for lunch the next day but then we ended up not eating the planned lunches which wasted some food.
- I need to get to bed on time so i can wake up on time to fix breakfast and potentially write in my journal. I was doing great at first but lately i have hit snooze way too many times. I even had to come home and take a shower on my lunch break one day because i almost over slept by turning off my alarm in a sleepy daze.

Over All - My Success
- The Kinect has been an excellent purchase. It is fun, easy to use, and i feel like it really works me hard, believe it or not.
- Loseit! added the ability to log food items by scanning barcodes and it has made tracking things so much easier.
- I am really enjoying the Eating Well meal plan that i found. The food has all been delicious and easy enough for me to fix. They have been a little time consuming but it is worth it.
- With all this eating healthy I have felt amazing. I don't feel sluggish and running has actually been easier. Also, I have had very little stomach/Acid Reflux issues where before i was popping Tums like candy daily.

Well that's it for my recap. Now, i just need to work on the recap for the week of 1/16-1/22 and i will be caught up!

For now, i need sleep!
//Stacy//

The Hunger Games Series

2012-01-22T20:31:00.002-05:00

Well, a post is definitely long over due. Although I have a good excuse! I am in a book club and this month's book was The Hunger Games. I started reading and could not stop! Literally. I immediately bought the second book, read it in a little less than a week and then bought the third book and finished it in a day and a half! I have never read a book so fast in my life but it totally consumed me. I couldn't think about anything else and i have been really busy/productive lately so i just decided to put all my plans on hold for the weekend and do nothing but read. It was fantastic. The lazy weekend and the book, actually. Here is a very basic review to avoid spoilers.

The first book, The Hunger Games, was very good in itself. There is lot of action and characters you can relate to. Some of the problems/conflicts that occur are predictable but i didn't think the resolutions were.

The second book, Catching Fire, was still an interesting book but i didn't feel like it completed enough of a story arc to be a stand alone book. It was definitely meant to setup book three and because of that it felt more like "Part One" of book three instead of an individual book in a series. The love triangle angst was full force in this one.

Book three, Mockingjay, was just as exciting as the first with lots of action and thankfully less love triangle angst than the second. I thought the ending could not be more perfect. There were some parts towards the end that really grabbed me.

Katniss, the main character, is a strong female lead but is still very real. She has her weaknesses and often over thinks things which leads her to be wishy-washy and sometimes make the wrong decision. In fact, she makes her best decisions in "spur of the moment" type situations because she is so passionate and determined to do the right thing. She doesn't see her self as very compassionate but in reality she is compassionate constantly without even realizing it. She does have a lot of "relationship boy drama" going on throughout the series but i think that is realistic for a 17 year old girl.

I would comment on her love interest but i don't think i could without spoiling something. (Dang it!)

The books do a good job of building on the characters so i felt like i watched them grow up and mature. I experienced them coming into the person they were at the end and because of that I understood their actions and decisions based on previous things i had seen in them.

I noticed a lot of commentary on modern day society, especially in the last book, that were on the verge of being harsh but i felt had a lot of truth to them and were very thought provoking. However, what really drew me to the series was behind the angsty love triangle relationship, there was this unwavering love and self sacrifice for loved ones that happened repeatedly. It was having that person that will alway be there for you emotionally, do absolutely anything for you, and never leave your side. To me, that is unconditional love x100. Maybe this makes me sappy or a hopeless romantic but i just can't help it because what makes this hit even closer to home is that every bit of it makes me think of my husband, James.

I truly am the lucky one.

2012 Resolutions

2012-01-08T23:07:00.004-05:00

Evening Folks,

I said i would have my resolutions up this weekend and boy am i cutting it close. But, seriously, would Stacy do it any other way? Nope. Anyways, before we look forward, let's take a moment to look back at my resolutions for 2011 and how i did:

Complete a half marathon - SUCCESS
Work on Arm Strength - FAIL
Reach Goal Weight - FAIL
Educate Myself on Eating Better - FAIL
Use Less Paper - SUCCESS
Pay Off a Loan - FAIL
Be Less Selfish - FAIL

So... about those resolutions... yea, they were a big ball of fail. I know what really hurt me, i blogged about them (late) and then never thought about them again. I shouldn't even really say i had resolutions last year because really i just considered having resolutions and then dropped it. To make things even worse, not only did I not reach my goal weight but i made it 1.6 lbs (down 18.4 lbs) from my midway goal and then just quit and now i am very few pounds from my original weight. Talk about depressing. But that just goes to show that, yea, i lost weight but i did nothing to educate myself along the way. Once i stopped counting calories i couldn't make the decisions to maintain my weight. At first i started making a few exceptions for fastfood, extravagant desserts, and huge portions but eventually they worked themselves back into my normal routine and back came the weight.

Anyways, enough about 2011, on to 2012! This year i have a list of resolutions and i am actually very excited to work on every single one of them. Something just clicked on January 1st and i have been on crack (not literally!) ever since then. Not just at home either, I started a new routine at work and i have been kicking butt there too. I have finished my workload by lunch and left with a maximum of 3 emails in my inbox, all in which i needed a response before i could proceed. This is a change from a workload that i never completed everything in a single day and emails that i would have to work a 11 or 12 hour day to even get control of. Witnessing these accomplishments everyday has been very empowering! Luckily coming at a time when i was so down on myself and thinking that i may not be skilled or smart enough to handle the new position. If i can keep this up, i will rock people's socks off!

Oh yea, i guess i should stop flapping my jaws and list the resolutions so we can get to the meat of this meatloaf (what?):

Work Towards Living a Healthy Lifestyle

Less Fastfood
Practice Portion Control
Make Smarter Choices
Exercise Regularly

Focus on House Projects

Clean Regularly
Complete Sweep Twice/Year
Decorate
Home Improvement To-Do List

Get More Organized

Recipes
Contacts
Learn Evernote

Visit Grandparents Once/Month
Be More Positive
Maintain Blog
Keep a Journal
Learn to Knit and/or Crochet
Pay off Scion Loan

There they are in all their glory! Quite a list, huh? I don't think any of them are too complicated though. The Healthy Lifestyle section will definitely be my biggest challenge. There are just so many fad and fake sources out there for food that it makes it hard to find the true basic stuff. I'm thinking about just looking for some old nutrition textbooks to be honest. I think that would be the most genuine material. Maybe I could even find a non-credit nutritional class. Hmmm... (gears are turning!)

Anyways, that is all i want to touch on these right now or else i will end up with a blog entry that is gigantic. I'll post an entry on each resolution and go more in depth over the next few days. For now i am going to pack my lunch for tomorrow (planning ahead!) and get in bed so i can accomplish amazing things at work and come home to start my workout routine on the Kinect or Wii. (I plan to alternate)

What are your resolutions? I want to hear them! Point me to your blog post so I can read about them!

Good Night!

//Stacy//

2011 in Review

2012-01-08T22:25:00.001-05:00

Well here we are and a new year is upon us. How did that happen? When I was younger it seemed like it took forever for a year to pass and i would always hear my parents say that time flew by. Well, now i know what they were talking about. You blink and it is December again.

I wanted to do a year in review like i have seen several people do but i don't really feel prepared. I didn't really log anything along the way. But just on the fly, I do have a few major things that i can think of and i even happen to have a few pictures to match so here you go!

January was a good month for both me and my husband (Jams) career wise. His tiny company was bought out by a big corporation based out of St. Louis. This transition came with a 1 year guaranteed job and a raise. (Woo!) At the same time I received a promotion from Customer Care Lead to Supply Chain Analyst. This also came with a nice little raise and a bonus system! (double woo!) This was all new territory for me but i will go on that tangent in a post on a later date.

In April my friend Devon and I ran our very first Half Marathon!! It was definitely one of the proudest moments of my life. I will write about that on a later date as well.

I'm a little fuzzy on the date but towards the end of Summer Jams and I finally achieved a childhood dream and got a Jeep Wrangler! (Jams hates the color but i love it!)

Lastly, this isn't really a milestone but I still want to mention it. Suddenly Jams got bit by the "gun bug" and it has become his number one hobby ever since. (i think it might have had something to do with that Thomas fellow he's been hanging around.) He eats, breathes, and sleeps guns now. And of course i like to tag along. :)

Well... that's all i have. I told you it wasn't much. But now that I know i want to do this kind of thing at the end of the year, i can be better prepared. I will makes notes and take more pictures. For some reason I am excited about 2012. Maybe just because i really like the number 12. When i was younger i always wanted either 3 or 6 as my jersey number in sports but both of those are very popular numbers so i decided to go with 12 and it just stuck.

So here's to 2012! It's going to be a good year. I can just tell.

//Stacy//

Quick Update and Recipes

2012-01-04T21:16:00.002-05:00

Hey Everyone!

I had planned to post my resolutions by now but I have been in high gear kicking productivity's butt and just haven't had a moment to sit down and draft out a blog. (You know i can be long winded at times) But never fear, i have the list of resolutions so i am working on them day-to-day. I'll get them on here soon!

However real quick, i wanted to share two quick links with you:

The first is an amazingly delicious low-calorie smoothie recipe. I hate ice in my smoothies but this one uses frozen fruit to get a nice texture without the icy pieces. I absolutely love this!

The second is a couple different life saver 28-day meal plans. There are even different calorie brackets for each plan! It was 11pm one night and I still needed to plan out my grocery list when i stumbled upon those meal plans by Eating Well magazine. The only thing you have to watch is that the items are different serving sizes. Most recipes are 4 servings but every now and then you will come across a 1 or 2 serving recipe. So keep that in mind when you are making your grocery list!

I promise i'll get my resolutions up this weekend! In the meantime, enjoy the links!! =)

//Stacy//

Our Trip to St. Louis

2011-12-28T23:26:00.000-05:00

Hi there!

Now that the crazy holiday season is coming to an end, i can finally get back to a normal-ish routine. I've been wanting to blog about our trip to St. Louis since we got back but my schedule just hasn't allowed it (see last post). I wouldn't say i don't have anything to do now because my to-do list is still a monster but at least they aren't as time sensitive so i can work through them in the order i choose. Anyways, enough rambling!

James and I went to St. Louis two weekends ago because that is where his corporate office is for his job. They were having a Christmas party and was nice enough to pay for his trip up there. We decided this was a good opportunity for me to see St. Louis as well so we negotiated more hotel nights if he drove instead of flying and thankfully his company agreed. So begins our adventure!

Day 1
We (purposely) booked a hotel right next to Forest Park. I knew James would have to work on Friday and I would be left most of the day without a car so i wanted to be close enough to walk to somewhere for something to do. Turns out this "park" has tons of things inside of it. I made the joke while we were there that "it was funny what these city folk call a park" because they had an area with a bunch of buildings and roads and just because there was some grass sprinkled in between they called it a park. Seriously, it was a very nice area but it was like driving from my house to work every day. In my opinion, it wasn't a true park. Anyways, enough ranting, back to the trip!

If you know me and James at all then you would know our first stop was the Zoo. It was located in Forest Park so we were able to walk to it in less than a mile. It was huge! There were tons of animals and the best part is that it is FREE!! I don't know how an area gets a free zoo but Knoxville needs to get on that! They were doing some construction on the sea lion part and the future plans look awesome. I hope we get to go back up when it is warmer so the animals are more active. Here are some highlights:

A cool multi-animal statue outside the zoo. St. Louis sure does love its steel statues!

You could get really close to the Penguins!
These were like 3ft away. So cute!

My favorite part was the Hippos. They were super friendly
and got really close.

When we walked up to this fellow, there wasn't much space between us. All i could think about was the movie Aladdin when Genie warms Aladin about camels "watch out, they spit!" I think this guy was saving one up to nail someone!

Meet James' new favorite animal; the Bush Dog. They look like a mix between a bear /fox/dog.
They were very active too. I wouldn't be surprised if he shows up with one next week.

The moral of the story here is, if you go to St. Louis definitely make time for the zoo!

The walk to the zoo was nice and sunny but by the time we headed back to the hotel the sky was looking really gloomy and it was very windy. It was miserable. It was so cold that James' cheeks were turning purple and i am not exaggerating at all. We ducked into a nearby Jimmy John's to get warm and rest our poor feet. The sandwiches were delicious, I don't know why i don't eat there more often. I don't know if Mayo is an important item to have in the event of an apocalypse but Jimmy John's was, without a doubt, ready!

What you can't see in this picture is that they have a third shelf to the
left that is also full of mayo. What the???

After we were full, warm, and rested we decided to venture over to the Science Center. It was also right beside the hotel. We read on the internet that the Science Center was also free so we were excited. We ended up driving there because it was just too dang cold. Honestly, i would not recommend the Science Center unless you have kids. It says it is free but it cost $10 to park and only about half the exhibits are truly free. The featured (a.k.a cool) exhibits cost money, the fancy omnimax theatre cost money, and the planetarium cost money! All that is left is some little kid activities that are half broken. We were very sad.

Next we decided to venture to Delmar Loop which is suppose to be "the happening place". It ended up being several speciality boutiques that just weren't for us and also several unique eateries. One of them being Fitz's soda. They make their own soda and have GIGANTIC floats of all kinds. They had one called "A Better Brown Cow" that was chocolate ice cream in cream soda. They all made me drool but we didn't plan right and were so stuffed after the food that we couldn't even stomach the sight of a float. We did get a cool view of the soda making room. They just weren't making anything because it was late at night.

Day 2
This was the day that James had to go into work for his review and Christmas party. One of the activities was that everyone had to decorate their own wreath. Apparently we misunderstood the rules and it was suppose to be ABOUT james. Like we should have put some disc golf discs around it with a jeep and probably LOTS of animals but we just decorated it like a normal wreath. I thought it turned out pretty good but he lost the contest needless to say.

Notice the cardinals, you know, for St. Louis.

So off James went to work and i had planned to sleep in but i just couldn't. I was too excited to start my day. (What? that doesn't sound like me at all!) So i went down and had breakfast and got ready for my run! When Forest Park was developed they installed 2 trails, one for "heels" and one for "wheels". The idea was to have a separate trail for runners and bikers but it looks like everyone just goes on whatever trail they feel like. The trails don't always go the same way and the bike path was actually way less hilly. They had made the "heels" path out of limestone to be easier on runner's joints but overtime the material had crumbled so the path just wasn't as smooth as the bike trail. I started at the zoo and ran around the edge of the park to pretty much the opposite side where the history museum was and decided to check it out.

The history museum also boasted that it is free but again, the featured (again, cool) exhibits cost money. I am really getting frustrated at this point... I guess i shouldn't complain though, at least part of it was free instead of nothing. There was a 1904 World's Fair exhibit in which i learned that one of first official marathons were held there. It started with 30 something runners but only 14 finished and several people were caught cheating by taking short cuts. I also learned that runners would take a small amount of rat poison because they believed it would help them deal with the pain. Also, supporters would run up and offer the runners shots of brandy to help deal with the pain. When you think about it like that, it is kind of funny that we continued this tradition since they had to find ways to deal with the pain.

Another one of the free exhibits was about Charles Lindbergh. It showed all his different plane experiments and there was even a life size model of one of his first planes. It didn't even have a windshield because that was the only spot for the gas tank. He used a parascope to see where he was going like a submarine. What i found most interesting about this exhibit was that Lindbergh's whole life he had wanted nothing more than to fly and once he was able to he concentrated all his efforts on advancing the technology until his later years when he became a huge environmental advocate and this was one of his last quotes:

How depressing is it that he worked his whole life to achieve his dreams and he actually got there but only to realize that he regretted what he had helped create. Maybe we all need to take a minute to look at our goals and think about what is really important to us, what we truly want.

On a happier note, Lindbergh was given several gifts from his travels but the coolest by far was this tiny guitar that was actually functional.

It measured about 1.5 - 2 inches tall. That is a pick on the neck.

By this time i was getting pretty hungry and luckily there was a cafe in the museum since i didn't have a car. I got a reuben and a beer and it was $15 freaking dollars! (Also, as a side note, 20oz bottle drinks were $3! Talk about big city prices!) I had been craving a reuben for a few days so even though the price was retarded, i decided to get one. However when it was delivered to my table there was no sauerkraut to be seen. There was coleslaw instead! What the crap, you Northerners?! First you call an area "a park" that is clearly NOT a park. Then you put coleslaw on a reuben. This is too far. So I threw it across the museum! okay... not really.. but i wanted to dang it!

Next i ventured off to the Grand Basin and Art Hill which turns out is just a large pond with 9 fountains in it and it backs up to a giant hill that is infront of the art museum. Nothing exciting at all. Wasn't even worth taking my gloves off to take a picture. However, you are allowed to sled down Art Hill and i bet that is a blast!!

While walking about the park i kept seeing signs for the Jewel Box so i decided to go check it out. Apparently it is a fancy greenhouse (and i mean hella fancy) that is lined with plants but you can actually rent the middle for weddings and functions. You wont see any pictures of the inside because it cost $1 to go in. That's right, they charge to see plants. Not flowers. Plants. So needless to say i didn't go inside.

The Jewel Box (aka fancy greenhouse)

Cool druid-y statue outside Jewel Box

20,000 steps later I finally made it back to the hotel and immediately soaked in the hot tub. Then I went back up to the room and relaxed while I attempted to knit (which i am sucking at, by the way) until James got back from his work Christmas Party.

Day 3

All the adventuring caught up with us and we slept in and missed breakfast (nooooooo!) but that's okay. You have to sleep in at least one day per vacation. We decided to try out this mac and cheese place all Cheese-ology in Delmar Loop. They basically just had a bunch of different kinds of mac and cheese combinations and 3 salads. I got the bacon mac and cheese and James got the buffalo mac and cheese. They were AMAZING. We really need one of those here in Knoxville. Market Square would be perfect. Anyways... we finally made our way to the Arch. I have to say from the outside it was pretty dang cool. It is honestly just beautiful.

View from the base of The Arch

You are able to go underground at the base of the arch and they have a museum, a theater that plays a show about Lewis and Clark and you can also get on the lift that takes you up the arch. If someone asked me, i would tell them just to go SEE the arch but don't go up in the arch. The wait is 10 minutes per group and that doesn't include if there are groups infront of you. The shuttle is a tiny egg that barely fits 5 people and even i had to slump forward because i was too tall for the ceiling. (I am only 5'5"). The ride up (630ft) is 3 minutes and then you cram into a narrow area with windows on both sides. You look out of the windows for 2 minutes and then you have to wait another 10 minutes for the shuttle to come back. I'll save you the trouble, here are pictures of the view:

Left side out of the arch

Right side out of arch

We wanted to watch the Lewis and Clark movie but we had a beer to to get to! You would think we would have went to the Anheuser Busch tour but instead we opted for another local beer, Schlafly's. It was an interesting but short tour. However, i saw that they are Sysco customers, yay! Actually i think all the places we ate, including the hotel, were Sysco customers. Sysco St Louis must be kicking butt up there. After our delicious beer tasting we went to the restaurant they had onsite. We had received a giftcard from James' work so we had planned to get an app, entree, several beers, and dessert but the portions were gigantic. So we only made it through the bread, 1 beer, and half our entrees. I ordered ravioli and one piece took up my whole plate! I do have to say, in general, that the food in St Louis was much better. Maybe it was just the places we ate but restaurants seemed to go for a more gourmet style instead of just throwing something on a grill to reheat. Since we couldn't eat the rest of our giftcard money we decided to get each get shirts which was the smarter (aka healthier) thing to do anyways.

We decided to take it easy on our last St Louis activity, which was just to see Sherlock Holmes in a nearby theater. It was a cool style, it looked like an old performance theatre that had been turned into a movie theater.

Day 4

Since it was an 8 hour drive, we just ate breakfast and headed home on this day but i had to share one last adventure. We drove by Metropolis on our way home. That's right, the home of Superman! So of course there was a statue and a photo-opt! :)

Summary

Overall we had a great time and i look forward to going back to St. Louis. I believe a big part of the success of this trip was the amount of time planning i put into it BEFORE we went. I made a list of everything i wanted to do, completely researched the activities and any applicable hours and fees. Then i divided the activities over the days we were there being careful to take the hours of operations into consideration. I was also very careful about the location of the hotel i picked which as you can tell played a huge role in what i was able to do while James was gone. Sure, i could have called a taxi but that would have added up quick and with some planning i was able to avoid that expense all together. If you have never used Google to search and even book a hotel then you are missing out. Find something you want to stay near (ex. Forest Park) and google map "hotels near (Forest Park)". It will bring up all the surrounding hotels and even list 4-5 sites to book them on with prices! A-MA-ZING!

I would highly recommend our hotel for location and cleanliness. However, for extended stays it could have had a few more bells and whistles. I really missed having a mini fridge. As you can guess, my number one recommendation is the zoo and then, heck, check out that cheese-ology place for lunch and head over to Fitz' and get yourself an amazing float!

Okay, so this blog post turned out WAAAAAAY longer than i expected so if you made it this far, I commend you. I have almost fallen asleep 3 times just while writing it. (j/k!) I hope you enjoyed reading about our adventure! :)

Alright, off to bed now, for realz.

//Stacy//

(Update 12.29.11: added the picture of The Arch. I can't believe i forgot to include it originally!!)

My To-Do List Is Winning

2011-11-29T22:17:00.001-05:00

Ahhhhhhh! I'm a little stressed!
Lately I feel like my to-do list is getting longer and longer but i'm not actually getting anything accomplished. I just had a four day weekend and going into it i had a plan to do so many things. Like clean the house, do some Christmas shopping, level my DnD character, plan our St Louis trip, put together a healthier eating plan (this one has been on the to-do list for over a month now!), read my book club book, blog, and put up the Christmas decorations. However, Sunday came along and i had accomplished pretty much nothing. I found myself asking "where did the time go"? So i decided i should print out (yes, on paper) a calendar and get a visual idea of what my upcoming schedule was looking like so i could find some time to dedicate to my ever growing to-do list. I just got through the first week and immediately saw the problem. (See photo to the left) My social calendar is a little busy! I have something going on every night for the next two weeks except for 2 days! I love my friends and i'm not complaining but how can i ever start checking off my to-do list if i'm not home long enough to do anything? (Especially since sleep takes priority over everything.) Also, I have things i want to add to the list, like running 3 times a week instead of 2, a Yoga class, catching up on books outside of book club, and learn to knit (random!) but i can never find time! Then to make things worse, i start feeling so overwhelmed that when i do have a day to myself, all i want to do it loaf around and relax so i accomplish nothing. A cycle that just keeps getting worse. Something has got to change! I either need to become a highly motivated person that goes 100mph on very little sleep or i need to start planning out my days/weeks better and sometimes prioritizing not-so-fun things like cleaning the kitchen or putting shelves in the garage. Since, as i said before, sleep tends to take priority over everything then i'm going to go for option #2.

My game plan is to leave December just how it is and just do the best i can to get through the holiday chaos and then start fresh in January. Luckily this is our slow time at work so i can actually take a lunch break to do personal things and i can leave close to on time. I don't know why but I love the idea of New Year's resolutions. 2 years ago i made a few, blogged about them and my progress, and felt pretty successful and just overall good about myself but this year i made a list (late) and then didn't even think about them again so needless to say it was a big fat fail. So i'm going to be prepared for 2012! I've already started my list of resolutions and just need to flesh them out a little more. I'm super excited because I like goals. Nothing feels better than setting a challenging goal and then meeting or exceeding that goal. I'm a little bit of a dork that way. Now, if only i could get that enthusiastic about my weight loss goal... >.<

So look for this hurdle to be on my upcoming resolutions list and if anyone has any advice for balancing work/personal-necessity/personal-fun/social activities, please share! The internet and I would greatly appreciate it!!

As a side note: For some reason i had to fight really hard not to start every sentence with "So" in this blog for some reason... i think my brain is fried and i need some of that oh-so-lovely sleep. Also, i drank some Sleepy Time tea but i really didn't think it would have any affect. Guess i was wrong.

Zzzzzzz
//Stacy//

Doughnuts, Now Without The Shame!

2011-11-06T11:32:00.001-05:00

Just a quick note to let everyone know that I went through and labeled all post either "Fitness" or "Non-Fitness". If you want to read them all, that is great but i know that some people don't care about all the fitness mumbo jumbo that i put on here so now, you can just click "Non-fitness" and it will filter out all those darn healthy post. Then, you can read crazy Stacy posts while eating your doughnuts without feeling any shame! (I say this while i cram a cinnamon roll in my mouth...)

Happy Reading!

//Stacy//

Halloween - Plumber Style!

2011-10-29T22:03:00.000-04:00

Why doesn't Luigi have any cool catch phrases? Go ahead, take a look. There is actually a website with all the quotes that Mario and Luigi say. Not one of Luigi's is worth remembering. Luckily that didn't affect my decision to be Luigi for Halloween this year. Well, sorta Luigi... if he was golfing... and was a girl....

The whole idea got started when some friends and I saw Party City's version of what i like to call "slutty Luigi". My husband James and my friend Nick had already decided to go as traditional Mario and Luigi to a party. When we saw "Slutty Luigi" and "Slutty Mario" at Party City we joked that it would be funny if me and Nick's girlfriend Rachael dressed as slutty version of our significant others. We actually ended up tossing the idea but the more i thought about it the more i liked the idea and how can you pass up a mustache necklace?!

Party City ended up being out of my size by the time i decided to go buy the costume but they had accessories like the hat and blue suspenders. I decided to just wear a jean skirt with a green tank top and throw on the blue suspenders and hat. Luckily i was even able to find the mustache necklace on Amazon. Well, let me tell you that suspenders and a skirt is a horrible pair. Basically the suspenders just keep pulling the skirt up until it is around your neck and since there isn't a crotch, then there is nothing to stop it. After walking around the house for like a hour trying to figure out how to keep my skirt down i finally just decided to ditch the suspenders all together. Somehow i finally ended up wearing one of my running skirts that has shorts built in which was probably a great idea since alcohol and skirts usually tend to be a bad mix anyways.

So now, take the green tank, black running skirt, and green argyle socks and you have a sporty Luigi! At least that is what i am telling myself... ta-da!

Honestly, could I fit "Luigi" in that first paragraph one more time?

Happy Halloween!!
//Stacy//

Dammit...

2011-10-22T00:24:00.001-04:00

I still haven't started a plan for eating healthier.

Just wanted to give you an update...on my FAILURE!

GAH!
Stacy

I'm Back in Blogger's Arms

2011-10-15T12:50:00.000-04:00

I'm sorry Blogger! I never should have left. I was wrong, please take me back! What? I just have to remember my password... oh.. okay, awesome!

I had moved my blog to Wordpress for a while and it just wasn't a good fit. I can see how it could be great for some people but it requires some effort and skill. I think it was basic enough that i could have gotten comfortable with it but the problem is that most of the time when i want to blog, i want to just sit down, write, and move on. I don't want to have to look up how to use HTML to make a list or how to center my picture in the blog. I want just want it to work. (Which is why i'm a Mac person. ZING!)

My problem with Blogger in the past was that outside of the normal templates, there wasn't much customization that you could do. However, I come back a year later to find that they have totally changed things and you can now make a gazillion changes easily! I am loving it! So here i am again, back in Blogger's arms.

Since i'm reviving the blog, i hope to revive the healthy eating. My plan is to get my thoughts together today and to start tomorrow. (Literally tomorrow, not the proverbial tomorrow that never comes) I'm going to work on setting some goals, weekly and long term, that i can post here so i can be held accountable!

Stay Tuned!
//Stacy//

I Have a What?!

2011-10-12T21:42:00.002-04:00

I know at the first of the year i said i didn't expect this blog thing to last long but i didn't even make it a month! That's sad! I totally forgot i had it until i was changing my avatar on Twitter and saw that i had my blog listed in my profile.

The bad thing is i really do enjoy blogging and looking back over past entries years later. I definitely don't take enough pictures and i have a horrible memory so how else am i going to remember stuff when i'm 90??

Other than this blog, another thing that has fallen to the waste side is my diet. I gained back half the weight i lost and have totally stopped eating healthy all together. So maybe when i start this blog up again, i will pick back up with my healthy eating.

On a good note, one thing I have not given up on, is my running. I completed that half-marathon last April like a champ! Devon was right there with me the whole way too! A year ago i would have thought you were crazy if you had said i could run 13.1 miles but we absolutely did it and i'm ready for another! I don't think Devon would agree though... haha. Currently i run 3-4 miles twice a week and i want to get in the habit of running three times a week but I have a busy life so fitting in 3 runs is haaaaaard. I am very glad i started running though, it helps me de-stress which i really need with my job. But that is a story for another day...

Anyways, it is late so i'm going to keep this short. Oddly, I just had a strong urge to blog so i got out of bed and had to write something. Now that it is out of my system, see you in 6 months! (i kid, i kid!) We've got lots of catching up to do, you're not getting off that easily! ;)

Good Night!
//Stacy//

[Edit: Originally posted on Wordpress]

Jumping My First Hurdle

2011-01-11T21:41:00.000-05:00

It’s only been a week and i’ve already had my first challenge with one of my resolutions... and i kicked its tail!! Woo!

This past Saturday, Devon and I were suppose to start the training schedule but we chose not to go due to this ridiculous weather that Knoxville has been getting lately. However, if I have learned anything about runners it is that they are more persistent about running than the postal service is about delivering mail! So i knew i had to run even if it wasn’t with the group. I just couldn’t delay the very first run of my training. It would feel like a bad omen for the whole thing so i told myself i had to run 4 miles that day. I just had to.

I haven’t even had my treadmill for a month and I have already found myself thankful for having it repeatedly. On this almost training-disaster day i found myself, once again, thankful for having a treadmill as I was able to complete my run on schedule. BUT even better than that I pushed myself to 5 miles instead of 4!!

I had ran 3.5 miles on Christmas Eve and it almost killed me. I know that for the half-marathon I am going to have to decrease my pace if i ever hope to survive it so I decided to drop my pace from 5.5 to 5.2 for this 4 mile run. Just a minor change but it really made a huge difference. When I run on a treadmill I have to change the display or i find myself just staring at the distance. I was listening to music so I had given myself a goal of X number of songs and decided I would check the distance after the last song finished. When I finally checked the display it was at 3.4. I was feeling pretty good so i upped the speed to 5.5 and decided i would check it again after 3 songs. Just so happens that one of the songs was a really long Death Cab for Cutie song but i told myself 3 songs and would not let myself check it before then. I can be stubborn sometimes. [that might be an understatement] After the retardedly long songs i was at 4.4! I couldn’t stop there and just going .10 more to 4.5 seemed retarded so i set my sights on 5 and as previously stated I can be stubborn when i set a goal for myself so to 5 miles i ran and it was glorious, grand, and unbelievably gratifying! [believe it or not i did not use three “g” words on purpose, haha]. I haven’t ran 5 miles since my Junior year of high school and a year ago I wasn't sure i would ever run it again.

The very next day Devon pushed herself and ran 5 miles too! I don’t think either of us knew we had it in us. I definitely believe in pushing myself but never expected a 1.5 improvement.

I think you will surprise yourself more times than not if you give yourself the opportunity. Go ahead, give it a try. When you are done I’ll be here to tell you “I told you so”. :)

//Stacy//

[Edit: Originally posted on Wordpress]

Resolution: Complete a Half-Marathon (13.1 miles)

2011-01-10T21:39:00.000-05:00

I think this one is pretty self explanatory. I have been running a lot lately and have completed two 5Ks without any problem. It is time to step it to Big Dog level! okay... maybe not Big Dog because that would be a full marathon... so how about Medium Dog level?At this point I am not concerned with speed, i just want to finish without passing out and, by the end, have ran the majority of it. The most I have ever ran at one time is 5 miles. 13.1 miles is incredibly intimidating but luckily I have 2 “team mates” for this journey. Devon, my running buddy and Mat, my “unofficial coach”. Devon and I are both new at running and are stumbling through this adventure together while Mat is a far more advanced runner that i met through Toastmasters [the site looks cheesy but it is actually a really good club] so he gets to put up with all my 500 beginner questions. Luckily he has lots of patience. Ha!

[Game plan]Covenant Health and The Knoxville Track Club have a FREE training program for their Marathon/Half-Marathon in April. So Devon and I are participating in that. The training includes a run every weekend at a pre-designated place. That will keep us increasing our distance at a good pace and teach us new trails! Also, I have already signed up for the Half-Marathon in April so if I give up i will just be throwing money away so there’s a little extra motivation even if i have to walk the whole thing! But I guarantee that wont happen.

Any other runners out there?
//Stacy//

[Edit: Originally posted on Wordpress]

2011 Resolutions

2011-01-09T21:45:00.000-05:00

Welcome to my first official post! I think it is fitting that my first post of 2011 is about my resolutions for the year. I blogged about my resolutions last year and i thought it was helpful and i enjoyed it so, i decided to give it another try this year. While I had decent results from my resolutions last year i, however, did not stick to the blogging part of it. Sure, the resolutions are what really count here but i’m going to try to stick to the blogging part as well this go round.If you follow me on Facebook or Twitter at all then you could probably guess that fitness will have a big influence on my resolutions this year, however, i did include some that aren’t fitness related. Here is the list and then i will do a post for each that goes more in-depth. (I will link them too as i get them finished.)

FitnessComplete a Half-MarathonWork on Arm StrengthReach Goal Weight (half way there!)Educate Myself on Eating Better

Non-FitnessUse Less PaperPay Off (another) LoanBe Less Selfish

So there they are in all their glory and I’m excited about working towards all of them!
Questions for my readers:- Do you usually make multiple resolutions or just one?- Do you usually end up keeping your resolution(s)?- What have you decided on for 2011?
Assuming i have any readers... Hello? Hello? *crickets* :)

Happy New Year!
//Stacy//

[Edit: Originally posted on Wordpress]

2010 Comes to an End

2010-12-19T23:15:00.000-05:00

Well, it has certainly been forever since I blogged. I am, however, planning to try to start it up again. I am currently working on a redesign for my blog that should be up within the next few days. That is where I will really get into my new topics but before I left this one I wanted to look back at my 2010 resolutions since the year is coming to an end.

I have to admit I did better than I expected which is actually sad when i think about it because it means that i never intended to finish them all. That kind of defeats the purpose, right? In my defense though i did make several resolutions when people usually just make 1 or 2. However, I need to stop holding myself to low standards. Regardless if i make 2 or 10 goals i need to plan on reaching them all!

Success
Get Back to the Gym/Get in Better Cardio Shape - This is funny to look at now given my current stance on running. (coming on new blog!) I remember making this resolution with my goal being not to be out of breath when i reached the top of the stairs at work. I currently run 3 miles at least once a week and I am STILL out of breath when i top those dang stairs. haha.

Pay off Mazda - done! woo!

Semi success, Semi Fail
Avoid Fastfood - I wanted to knock it out of my diet completely but I will say that I have significantly decreased the amount of fastfood that i eat.

Become a Morning Person - I wouldn't say I'm a morning person as far as work goes but on weekends i do wake up a lot earlier than i used to. I think that should count for something.

Research Better Eating - I have been losing weight (coming on new blog!) so obviously i have learned something but I don't think I am at the knowledge level that I would like to be at eating right.

Big Ball of Fail
Volunteer - Honestly, i totally forgot about this one. Didn't even look into possible ideas...

Be a Better Granddaughter - probably the most important resolution and I didn't put forth any effort at all. So that means I, in fact, became a WORSE Granddaughter. I will have to make this one a high priority for 2011.

That wraps up the 2010 resolutions. Stay tuned for the new blog and new resolutions for 2011!

Merry Christmas to All!
-Stacy

(FYI - the web address for my blog will remain the same. Just the appearance will change.)

This One is for the Ladies!

2010-03-05T16:59:00.000-05:00

Do you prefer short or long hair on vacations? I can't decide.

Long Hair
Pros:
• You can braid instead of drying
• Nice beachy/wavy look
• More styling options

Cons:
• Hotter than short hair
• Can get BIG if humidity is up

Short Hair
Pros:
• Quick to style
• Cooler temperature
• No drying needed

Cons:
• 80s look if drys without styling (i.e. after swimming)
• Haven't had short hair in a long time... might be clueless

I just can't decide! Halp!

How Many Calories...?

2010-03-05T12:20:00.000-05:00

So as you all know I have been slacking in the calorie counting category. I am still watching what i eat and still losing weight but just not tracking how many calories I am taking in each day. This past week I just another .6 of a pound. Although I am happy that the scale went down instead of up that is really unacceptable since i hope to lose at least 15 pounds by my cruise vacation on May 17th.

Previously i was focusing on 1300 calories per day but knew that after i had lost 10 pounds i would need to lower that amount to continue the weight loss. 1300 calories was hard enough to stay under but with some discipline and lots of water i know i can do it! So here is the new scale that i looked up (source: Biggest Loser):

To lose weight:
Weight - Calories
150lbs - 1,050
160lbs - 1,120
170lbs - 1,190
180lbs - 1,260
190lbs - 1,330
200lbs - 1,400

In my non-educated opinion i think these seem a little low since I was told by several other sources that I needed to take in 1300 calories to lose weight and according to the scale above that would have put me at weighing about 185 and that is not true! I'm not going to tell you how much I started weighing until i lose tons of weight and I can use the number for bragging but I can assure you it was not 185! So I decided to take a mixture of a couple of different sources and this is what i came up with (Sources: Biggest Loser, Slimfast, Livestrong):

To lose weight:
Weight - Calories
150lbs - 1,100
160lbs - 1,200
170lbs - 1,300
180lbs - 1,350
190lbs - 1,400
200lbs - 1,500

It wasn't a big change, basically a little padding and some rounding. Also i dont know if this is correct or not but it worked when i was losing 2-3 pounds a week... I took the above numbers as a "no activity" day goal. If i did exercise i could add a little. For example, when my goal was 1300 if i ran i added 100 calories. (An 8 min mile burns about 110 calories) These extra calories aren't enough to allow for an apple pie but they cover the extra snacks used to fuel my workout. This is what my ideal day looks like:

(Note: Intake amounts are MAXIMUMS)
7:30am Breakfast: 300 calories
10:00am Snack: 100 calories
12:00pm Lunch: 400 calories
3:30pm Snack: 100 calories
5:30pm pre workout snack: 100 calories
6pm-7pm Workout: Burn at least 200 calories
7:30pm Dinner: 500 calories

Total Intake: 1500
Total Burned: 200
Net Calories: 1300 - goal met!

On days when i didn't workout i wouldn't have the 5:30 snack and would either cut lunch to 300 or dinner to 400 depending my groceries on hand. Like I said, this is method is not supported by any articles or research that i have found but it worked for me and my body.

Now that I am dropping to 1200 calories I plan to cut 50 calories from each lunch and dinner. When I drop to 1100 calories at the end I will probably cut another 50 from EITHER lunch or dinner (depending on my planned meals for that week) and then cut the other 50 from the snack between breakfast and lunch. I'm not usually that hungry between there anyways, i just eat the snack to keep my metabolism going.

Now, here comes the good part! There is no doubt that shaving calories sucks and I imagine that when i get to the 1100 range that i will run out of meal and snack options pretty darn quick. Honestly, i'd say the biggest challenge I currently face is not hunger (drinking the right amount of water takes care of that for me) but actually finding a variety of meals that fit together to meet the calorie goal! I end up repeating the same plans every two weeks and as a result i get bored with my food. You are probably wondering "where is that 'good part' you mentioned?!" Well, the Biggest Loser also has a chart for how many calories you can eat and maintain your current weight! Here is their scale:

Goal Weight
155lbs - 1,900 calories to maintain
145lbs - 1,800 calories to maintain
135lbs - 1,700 calories to maintain

Unfortunately for you tiny people it doesn't go below 135lbs in this article (i think you can see more on the website if you register). My goal weight is somewhere between 125 - 135. I actually haven't decided on an exact number yet. I think 125 would be awesome but I think i would be perfectly happy with 135 too. So i'm kind of waiting until i get closer to 135 and then see how my clothes fit and how i feel to determine if i want to go down to 125. Regardless, i think 135 will be my maximum weight and 125 will be my minimum. I weighed 118 once right after high school and was starting to get too skinny for my frame (in my opinion).

Anyways, i am so PUMPED about being able to have between 1700 (for 135lbs) and 1600 (for 125lbs) calories a day once i get to my goal!! After sticking to 1300 - 1100 that will be like a feast! I am so excited. maybe too excited... haha.

(i think i have too many tags on my blog... i'll probably trim those down when i change over to the new blog)

The Future of my Blog

2010-02-27T21:29:00.001-05:00

Just a heads up. I have 2 changes in the works for my blog:

1. New style!!
We have a new website in the works that will combine mine and my husband's blog. Currently our plan is to make the Home page a general news area for both of us and then we will have a tab for my blog, james' blog, and one for photos. So far it is looking pretty sleek! I just need James to show me how to operate it...

2. Expand a little.
When i started this blog (this time) I intended for it to solely be a way to track my resolutions and so far I have done just that. But as I look at others' blogs and just as a look over my own I realize I should share other things too. I want to. Even I get tired of reading only about this resolution stuff so i know everyone else must be tired of it too! (if anyone else even reads this still...)

So there ya go. 2 new things to look forward to! (or dread, haha)

2>1>0

2010-02-27T21:14:00.001-05:00

I have been a bad (lazy), bad (okay, really lazy) person! Tomorrow would make a whole month without me blogging. Not only have I not been blogging, I have also not been tracking calories or really been working out either! Here's my story:

My week 4 started like any other week and then Tuesday came along and it all went to heck in a hand basket.

Sunday: Worked out like normal
Monday: Normal Rest Day
Tuesday: Skipped Yoga because of Lost Premiere and dinner with friends
Wednesday: Skipped working out - dinner/tasks at Parent's house
Thursday: Skipped Yoga - worked late
Friday: Skipped working out - DnD night!
Saturday: planned to skip workout to go to JC and then ended up helping the MIL all day.

After a week of my workout plans being obliterated I honestly got a little depressed. It was mostly out of my control and i knew i shouldn't have let it get me down but it did. Then I didn't feel like planning a meal plan for week 5 so i didn't and everything just went downhill from there.

Here I am at week 7, by now i should have lost about 14 pounds and instead i have lost 9.2. There is one tiny good thing that has come of this. I seem to understand health eating a little better now. Even though i haven't tracked calories or stuck to my workout schedule for 4 weeks now I have still lost week every week except one and that week i stayed the same. Here is the breakdown:

POUNDS LOST BY WEEK
Week 1 - 3.2
Week 2 - 2.2
Week 3 - 1
Week 4 - .6 (hey every little bit counts! ha!)
Week 5 - .8
Week 6 - 0
Week 7 - 1.4
TOTAL LOST 9.2

So obviously I was a lot more successful when i was tracking and working out but at least, i think, this shows that I understand healthy eating a little better than i used to.

Does this mean I'm just going to wing it from here on out? HELL NO!! I'm getting back on the wagon tomorrow. This is going to be a little different though because James has decided he wants to cook some so I wont have as much control over what i eat for dinner but i told him to keep it under 500 calories if possible. I still have full control over breakfast and lunch though.

As of yesterday my back problems have started up again because I have been skipping yoga. So i HAVE to start going again. I can not afford a chiropractor right now since we found out we OWE taxes this year!! (suck!)

As a little incentive to get back on track to lose weight we booked a cruise for May!! My goal is to lose 15 pounds by our cruise. At a realistic estimate of 2 pounds a week that should be totally obtainable! Yay! Wish me luck! /fingers crossed

Now...I know what you are thinking... "Stacy, i thought this Resolution thing wasn't suppose to be about losing weight. That was just suppose to be an added bonus". Well you are right. That is true. But let's me honest here, I was just trying to trick myself into not getting depressed if my weight loss didn't go as planned and let's face it I proved that didn't work in week 4. I shouldn't have been concerned with the fact that ALL my workouts were canceled in week 4 but I was. I woke up Friday (my weigh in day) dreading the scale and luckily I had still lost .6 pounds but I still felt like a failure because i had done so well the weeks before and i let it affect my motivation. I think that goes to show that this "healthy eating" side of this resolution thing is very much about weight loss and a little bit about being healthier in general (i.e. back issues, endurance, etc).

Speaking of Resolutions... i really need to start working on some of the other ones...

Week #3 in Review

2010-01-31T23:08:00.002-05:00

eww... it isn't pretty...here come the bullets...

ACCOMPLISHMENTS
• Sunday and Monday I started including a few strength exercises into my workout. They are simple ones that use free weights and a bench. I got them out of a Biggest Loser book that my Aunt gave me. I never knew this before, but apparently i prefer free weights to machines. I guess i have given too much of my life to machines before with no progress. Sure, it was probably all my fault but i just like simple, okay?
• Water intake has been great!
Some days I have actually drank more than 8 cups!
I blame these ------------------------>
I got them at Target (of course!) The silver one gets a little too cold when you first put water in it but it isn't too bad. They both have a top that pops up with a simple button and great mouth pieces that make it very easy and quick to drink out of. I haven't taken them to the gym yet, but I plan on it this week.
• No fast food again! Woo!
• Lost 1 pound. My goal is 2 a week but 1 is better than none!
• Since I gave up on doing better with mornings I did much better this week. Less snooze buttons and woke up around 8 all weekend! Who knew?

FAILURES
• I only met my calorie goal 3 days this week. Technically I get a free meal but that still means I missed my goal 3 days!! That is horrible! I could give excuses like, it was my birthday, it was james's birthday, etc but I should have planned ahead and made that my free meal of the week. There are NO EXCUSES.
• I only exercised 3 days this week. This I can allow excuses a little more than the calories because there was an outside factor that was out of my control: SNOW! Here is a breakdown:
-Sun-Tues: worked out
-Wednesday: This is my normal day to miss and it was James' birthday
-Thursday: an unexpected project came up at work and I was there until 8:30 so i ended up missing Yoga. I was really upset about this because Thursday is my most stressful day at work and I like going to Yoga to de-stress. Also Thursday is the end of my work week so it is a good way to end the week.
-Friday: I got up to take a shower before going to Zumba and the water heater was broken! It ended up being just a tripped safety but it took me a while to figure that out since I am new at this home maintenance thing. Then I was just going to go run and James came home from work and wanted to run a few errands and then go to the gym together afterward, i was fine with this because at this point i was starving so i wanted lunch! Before we even got home from our errands the snow storm started! So we did not attempt to get back out.
-Saturday: snowed in! Got about 5 inches of snow and all roads were ice! I actually did get a little exercise... I played tug-of-war with Argos (120lb dog) for 30 mins and some other general running around in the snow, building a snowman, etc.
So really, unlike the calories, most of these were out of my hands BUT a failure is still a failure and must be listed accordingly! I could have looked up some at-home workouts or something.
• I ate a piece of Pecan Pie that I think was 456 calories! This brings me to...

LEARNED
• Check calorie info BEFORE I eat something!! In week #1 i learned that i needed to pay attention to serving size before I ate after i accidently ate 2.5 servings of pasta. Well now the whole picture has come to surface. Check SERVING SIZE + CALORIE INFO = SMART CHOICES. duh! I don't know why i didn't think of the whole picture before now. n00b.
• This is another "duh" moment - i do best when i plan out my meals. During week 2 i planned out all my meals and did great but during week 3, I didn't plan one, just looked in the cabinet and fixed whatever looked best. I have to say I have done a good job about having healthy items in the house but too much of even healthy things can be bad.
• My Aunt gave me some Biggest Loser books that have actually been decently useful. I got some great exercises out of there and some yummy looking recipes. However the chart in there says i should be aiming for only 1200 calories! I can barely meet 1300 and it wants me to do 1200! /faint! I am going to still aim for 1300 calories until i drop 4 more pounds and then I will drop to 1200.

GOALS
• Get a few weights for home use or home videos so if i get snowed in again i have a plan B.
• Watch calories better!!
• Start consistently including strength training into my workout.
• Check out a Biggest Lower cookbook.

SUMMARY
Other than the fact that i failed miserably at my calorie and exercise goals, why do I think this week went so bad? It's simple, I just wasn't as motivated. Let me explain:

Week 2 was extra busy due to mine and my husband's birthdays being in the same week. We had both families to eat with and friends to celebrate with. Between all the extra social activities, meal planning, and workouts I didn't have an extra second to breathe! The weekend passed me by in a blink and before I knew it, it was monday and i was grumpy and tired. I worked out 6 days last week and for 4 of those i got home at 8 or later. As soon as I walked in the door I have to start cooking and then eat. (This is way too late to eat anyways but i havent found a good solution to that yet). Then I log my daily calories and activities and it is time for bed. I have no time to just relax or do something fun. Wednesday, the day i usually have free was spent with his side of the family celebrating. Friday was the night was spent 45 minutes making a dinner choice and didn't sit down to eat until 8:30. Lastly, Saturday was spent with my side of the family and friends celebrating. I honestly didn't feel like I had a weekend. I was driven to my max and i was burnt out. The important thing here is that I was NOT burnt out on exercise or on my food choices. Just too much stuff going on.

I'm glad it happened though. It made me re-evaluate my weekly routine to hopefully accommodate busy schedules in the future. I have a plan!...
-Sunday: I dont have to be at work until 12:30 so instead of working out after, i will work out before.
-Monday: Optional workout day - if the weekend looks light i can go ahead and workout here which will give me 6 exercise days. (my goal is 5-6 days a week)
-Tuesday: 6:30 Yoga class...not much i can do here. Maybe James cook?
-Wednesday: Normal off day. Relax
-Thursday: 7:00 Yoga class... I have time to eat before this one. James fend for self
-Friday and Saturday: Morning workouts!
This leaves me with only getting home late 2 days a week and on Thursday I will have already ate so the only day I will be eating late is Tuesday!! I hope to spend Sundays meal planning and blogging so i can start the week of strong!

Ya know, I'm finding out more and more that taking 5 minutes to review a situation can prove to be beneficial and those 5 minutes can be the difference between success and failure. I think this holds true for life in general.

Week #2 in Review

2010-01-31T22:04:00.002-05:00

Week 2 went pretty well over all and I was feeling empowered! In fact one of my tweets was "i am kicking a$$ and it feels goooooood!" I had just gotten back from the gym and had ran my normal mile but this time I had increased the last lap to 7.0! I was pouring sweat and feeling so energized that i was close to bouncing off the walls. Then week 3 happened.... but we will get to that in the next post. (NOTE: I am writing this post a week late due to schedule conflicts revolving around birthdays!)

And I present to you: Week #2 in Bullet Points

ACCOMPLISHMENTS
• I exercised 6 out of 7 days! (My goal is to workout 5-6 days a week.)
• I haven't technically researched restaurants that we frequent but I have been good about researching before we actually go.
• Tried the Zumba class at the gym and LOVED it! Also I confirmed I still have no rhythm.
• Zero fast food! Whoop Whoop!
• Jogged 3 laps at 5.5mph and last lap at 7.0 - no problem!
• Woke up Friday at 8:00am!
• Finished blogging about resolutions.
• Got my reading back from the last time I gave blood and my cholesterol was back to 181!!! yay!
• Lost 2 pounds

FAILURES
• Totally missed my calorie goal 2 days and possible missed it a 3rd day. On the day I am unsure about we ate at my Aunt's house and I can not for anything find calorie info on the stirfry stuff she fed us. She is on weight watchers and has been very successful at it so im thinking it can't be too horrible but still i couldn't find anything close on the internet.
• Ate 2 desserts!! One of them i accounted for because it was my birthday dinner with my family but the second i just pigged out and it unfortunately it was the beginning of a downward spiral into week #3.
• Water intake was hit or miss each day. Some days I would drink plenty, the next i would barely down 2 glasses.
• Snoozes all over the place! Ack! I continue to fail horribly at the morning person thing.

LEARNED
• Drinking enough water greatly reduces the hungry urge. I noticed on days i didn't drink enough water i stayed hungry and kept wanting to snack throughout the day. On days I did drink enough water I sometimes would be okay to skip snacks. Which is good on days i go straight to the gym after work because i end up eating 3 snacks to get some "fuel" in my system for the workout. I read somewhere long ago that the hungry urge and thirsty urge were actually really similar and a lot of people get them confused and end up over eating. After observing my water intake i totally agree with that statement.
• Beans are surprisingly fatty. I know they are good for the protein but you are looking at close to 150 calories just for a cup of beans. For example Kidney beans are 110 for a HALF of a cup!
• Last week i wrote that i learned that a grilled chicken breast has 430 calories and i was floored! Well this week i can happily correct that statement! I had gotten the 430 from "thedailyplate.com" which i thought was pretty accurate but when i requested the nutritional info direct from Tyson on their 5oz boneless/skinless chicken breast I found that it is actually only 170 calories! yippee!!! This just reaffirmed my issue with trying to find calorie info on the internet - it can be so drastically different so you dont know who to trust. I try to check at least 3 sources and take an average of them.
• Speaking of references to trust for calorie info, i found "myfoodapedia.gov" and i feel really good about it. It seems to have a lot of foods in there (except kiwi for some weird reason) and it lets you put in your own serving size so it is really flexible. Also I trust their info a little more because most of it (maybe all?) has been verified with the Department of Agriculture and i figure they should be good at determining that stuff, right?
• Last week one of my goals was to get a Heart Rate Monitor Watch for my birthday....well as I researched them i realized that the really accurate ones require the use of a chest strap and im not so sure about that. I would really like to find someone, preferable a girl, that has used one to see if they are more trouble than they are worth. They do have some watches that don't require a strap but those seem to be a lot less accurate and wouldn't be any different then the monitor on the machines. I want the truest reading possible and i think to get that i would need to constantly monitor my heart rate.

• If you skip all the other ones, read this one. I think no matter what diet you are on you will find circumstances where it is near impossible to make a good choice. Sure, there will be "best" choices but that doesn't make them good. I have two examples:
1. Certain restaurants just aren't healthy. One example is eating at Red Lobster, we were thinking about going there so I looked up their calorie info and not one thing on the menu was under 500 calories! Not one item! We didn't end up going there needless to say.
2. Social outings can be difficult. My husband and I have decently busy social lives. It is pretty much guaranteed that at least one night a week we will eat out with friends. For the most part we decide ahead of time and i can look over the menu and everything is dandy. However, one night this week some friends called us and asked us to eat and we were trying to figure out where to eat at. Several ideas were thrown on the table from both sides and we slowly vetoed each location because one couple didn't feel like that type of food or because i couldn't find one healthy thing there. This decision making process ended up taking 45 minutes!!! We didn't get to sit down to eat until 8:30! (and then we ended up changing our minds at the last minute and going somewhere totally different, haha) In the end I felt really bad because I felt part of the reason it took so long was because of my "diet" restrictions.
The most common solutions to this that i have read about are: To have one free day a week where you can eat what you want. (Use this day to fit in your weakness foods, like chocolate or fries.) Or after a goal has been met, like a certain weight, have a reward day.
Well, I don't like these solutions. Now that I have been eating better I feel really crappy when i eat horribly for a whole day and i also feel that would create a set back in a week's worth of progress that i have made. Also if I am so happy about meeting a certain goal, why in the world would I celebrate by doing that one thing that caused me to be miserable in the first place?!

I think I have found a good compromise: Have one free MEAL a week.
You can cushion this meal by saving up as many calories as possible before or after so you aren't completely defeating your over arcing goal but at the same time it isn't impossible to decide where to eat with friends. This would also help special situations like birthdays or family dinner nights since you don't want to be too demanding on what they cook and even if you were, who knows what they are cooking with (butter VS margarine, mayo VS light mayo, etc) Trying to figure out how many calories are in Grandma's famous meatloaf would be pretty much impossible. The key here is, as always, planning ahead. You don't want to use your free day on Tuesday with family night and then on Friday your friends call and want to go to Red Lobster for their birthday.

GOALS
Since i am blogging this a week behind I'm not going to do goals because that would be cheating since i already know what happens, haha.

SUMMARY
Well, even though I missed my calorie goal i really feel like this was a great week. I tried new things, I increased my workout, i learned a lot and theorized some new things. I might have actually done better during week 3 if I had blogged about this when I was suppose to because I feel pretty pumped about all my successes!

I can't change the past to I might as well go ahead and tell you about week #3... gulp! (see next post)

Resolution #8 - Volunteer

2010-01-31T20:52:00.001-05:00

When I was in highschool I was a member of the "Services Organization" and basically it was just a way for us to connect to volunteer opportunities. There was a book in the library that listed all the upcoming events and you just signed up for the ones you wanted to do. It was so simple.

Then I graduated and volunteering became a thing of the past. Not only was it a lot harder to find opportunities but I just didn't have the time. I could have joined a club in college but I wasn't outgoing enough to do it without anyone i know being there too.

Now that I have graduated college and gotten married I find that life seems to have leveled out some. I wouldn't say it has slowed down, just developed a rhythm. I think I would have time to volunteer now I just need to fond out where and how. So that is my resolution - find some places to volunteer and do it!

My plan is to start working on this one when it starts getting a little warmer and I get this gym thing more under control.

2 quick things...

2010-01-28T20:42:00.000-05:00

1. Most of the time when I go to the gym I go to the downtown location but the other day I went to the location that used to always go to before I got the job I have now and the girl at the desk was like "I havent seen you in forever!!" I explained to her that I had been going to the downtown locations and she was like "okay, well then i wont give you any crap" - ha! Does SHE read my blog? I like it!

2. I know i havent posted in a while and i haven't given up! I actually have my week 2 in review blog all outlined and i have been keeping notes on other entries but I'm trying to join a DnD campaign and right now creating and developing my character takes priority! (over the blog, NOT working out).

So have no fear i'm still keeping up with stuff and I will be back shortly with several blogs to catch you up!

Resolution #7 - Research Better Eating

2010-01-24T22:23:00.001-05:00

There are two sides to this one:

1. Trying to eat healthy without being educated is like being blind. Some foods are sneaky. In the past I have tried my hardest to pick healthy things while eating out only to find out later that I picked something horrible. It is beyond frustrating.

2. I have acid reflux and I'm close to having high cholesterol. When I gave blood 2 times ago my cholesterol reading came back as 201! This wasn't the most accurate test but still it gave me a wake up call. Luckily the last time I gave blood (Christmas Eve) it came back as 184 which is much more comfortable.

So basically the goal is to:
• I want to learn how to make educated choices at restaurants in case i don't have time to research their menu beforehand. For example, this past weekend James and I went to a local diner and I ordered a vegetable plate that included corn, green beans, baby lima beans, and tomato/cucumber salad. I had kinda gotten an idea that most (all?) beans are high in calories but I had no idea until i got home that corn was so high in calories! So what I thought was an innocent vegetable plate ended up being about 400 calories!
• I want to learn the best foods for my specific health concerns.

GAMEPLAN
The best thing to do would probably be to find a book with general food facts. Finding a book about specific health concerns will probably be pretty easy. On the other hand, finding a book about foods in general may be rather difficult. The biggest hurdle here is that it is so hard to find a book you can trust because there are so many out there that are people just trying to sell their "fad diet" and make a quick buck. Maybe I could find a book by the USDA? hrmm....

Resolution #6 - Pay off a Loan

2010-01-24T21:54:00.001-05:00

This resolution I obviously can't go into great detail with for privacy reasons but basically we have 2 loans that are semi-close to being paid off:

• James' car (Mazda): Payment x 1.5 = 10 month payoff
• James' student loan: Payment x 4 = 10 month payoff

Both of these loans are close in balance remaining but the student loan's interest rate is half of the car loan so even though the student loan multiplier above looks ridiculous both payments to pay off in 10 months is the same amount. So basically I can pick whichever I think is best to pay off first.

I think I have decided to pay off the Mazda first because it has the higher interest rate and paying the minimum on the student loan will give me more money to pay on the Mazda loan. Then, in 10 months when I pay off the Mazda loan I will take that payment and add it to the student loan payment which will pay off that one pretty quick! Once I get both of these paid off I can put that money towards my student loans!! we wont even talk about how much is left on my loans!

Not that you have much info to go on but does anyone see a reason i should pay off the student loan instead of the Mazda loan first? If not, February is the first month of my MEGA payment as i like to call it. ha!

oh the irony!

2010-01-22T09:28:00.000-05:00

So as some of you may have heard I am failing miserably at this morning person thing and it is extremely frustrating. I started taking my showers at night and moved my wake up time forward from 6:30 to 6:50 to help every little bit i could but it isn't making things any easier. Every morning trying to get out of bed at 6:50 is like trying to move a mountain and i am often late to work because of it.

HOWEVER! On my day OFF i wake up NATURALLY at 6:38 and I'm AWAKE! can you believe that?!

I'm starting to think my brain just likes to eff with me! /shakes fist

Week #1 in Review

2010-01-17T00:03:00.001-05:00

Well, today marks the end of the my first week with my resolutions. Looking back i've had some failures and some successes and I've also learned a few things. Usually when I fail at something I get discouraged and quit but for some reason I'm not seeing these small failures as failures, I'm seeing them as experiences to learn from. The surprising thing is this wasn't a conscious effort... it just happened. Not only do I not feel discouraged, but I feel empowered this time! What made me change my view/outlook? I have no idea.

Here's my week in bullet points:

ACCOMPLISHMENTS
• Jogged 1 mile on Friday! (At speed 5.5) - My goal was to take it easy and slowly work my way up to a mile by the end of February and I did it by the end of my first week! I guess i under estimated myself. The funny thing is I wasn't even trying to jog a mile. I had walked .5 of a mile and wasn't really feeling challenged and was feeling good so i decided to jog a little. I was listening to my music, watching the TVs and looking around and before i knew it I had jogged half a mile and wasn't feeling tired at all so i kept going! at about .75 it started getting a little rough but i pushed on through to the end! I was so shocked that I actually tweeted a picture of the treadmill to make sure i was reading it correctly! So I guess I will bump my goal for February up to 2 miles!
• Mostly avoided fast food - Only had fast food twice this week and I normally wouldn't count that as an accomplishment except that one time was for breakfast and I don't really count that. James and I ate at Firehouse Subs when he met me for lunch on Tuesday. What I chose to eat there is a different story and you will find that under the Failure heading...
• I exercised 4 out of 7 days - Technically my goal is to exercise a minimum of 5 days a week but since this is the first week that I was getting back in the gym I am counting 4 as an accomplishment! Going forward if i only make it 4 it will go in the Failure category, dont worry.
• Water intake! - I know it is important to drink lots of water but I hadn't actually planned to work it into my route yet but 2 days this week i drank 8 cups of water and 1 day i had 6 cups! It is funny though because one day i can be thirsty all day no matter how much i drink but then the next day I can't seem to make myself drink anything. I'm sure I will have more "thirsty" days as I work out more.
• 1 time snooze - A few posts ago I re-evaluated my snooze button policy and decided that I couldn't stop using snooze cold turkey so I decided to allow myself 1 snooze. I successfully only pressed snooze once this week....except one day (in which i almost over slept!) which leads us to...

FAILURES
• I pressed snooze twice on Wednesday and almost overslept. - When i decided to stop pressing snooze i was able to move my alarm forward from 6:30 to 7:00 but then i decided to press it once so now my alarm is set for 6:50 to allow for the snooze. 7 is the absolute latest I can get up and still make it to work on-time. Well on Wednesday I hit snooze twice and therefore it was 7:08 by the time i got out of bed and as a result i clocked in at work at 8:04. Being 4 minutes late to work doesn't really bother me that much but what does is that i let myself down by breaking my 1 snooze rule.
• Slept in - For my quest to become a morning person to be successful i read that i need to wake up at the same time every day for 2 weeks. After those 2 weeks I could vary the wake times a little but basically i need to train my body first. Well i slept in on both Friday and Saturday!! Saturday was a little understandable because my friend Andrew had his birthday party on Friday night so we ended up staying out until 2am! But regardless Friday was unacceptable! On top of voiding my "morning person training" the YMCA has a Zumba class on Friday mornings at 10:15 and I want to give it a try but I couldn't because i slept too late! (i did still workout just didn't go to Zumba).
• Calories - I only met my calorie goal 3 out of 7 days this week and that is subtracting my calories burned during exercise from my calories intake! Also I don't mean that I missed them by like 50 or a 100! On Tuesday I missed my goal by 490 (after exercise subtracted) and on Thursday I missed it by 514 (no exercise)!! AHHHHHH! I'm trying to only take in 1300 calories and that is ridiculously low in my opinion but still that is totally disregarding even the idea of a goal. I think it is best if i just move on...
• Coffee calories! - This whole week i have been using a flavored coffee creamer and didn't even think to check the calories! Normal creamer has a pretty small amount so i didn't even think about it. Then this afternoon James asked me if i included my coffee calories so i went to check the info and it was 50 calories!! Luckily I only drink 1 cup of coffee but still! ack! that really adds up!!
• Firehouse - When we went to Firehouse I thought I was making a good decision by choosing wheat bread and leaving off the mayo but turns out it was still a horrible choice at 740 calories! Then on top of that I had a lapse in will power and picked regular potato chips for 240 calories! This just reiterates my point that a lot of my bad food choices stems from lack of knowledge. That is the reason for my Resolution to research better eating. I need to get on it! Which leads us to...

GOALS
• Research - My main goal over all is to research smart food choices in general (i.e. wheat or whole grain, reducing acid reflux, etc) but I also want to research smart food choices at specific restaurants or basically plan ahead. James and I had decided ahead of time to go to O'Charley's so I was able to look up their nutritional information and get an idea of what I wanted before we went. As a result I felt confident about my food choice and felt good about myself. Firehouse was a last minute decision and you see what it cost me.
• Snooze - Mondays are rough.... okay?! So I am allowing 1 snooze on Monday but for the rest of the week there will be no snooze allowed! NO SNOOZE FOR YOU!
• Zumba - If nothing comes up on Friday I would like to try the Zumba class (dance/aerobic) at the YMCA.
• Blog! - I still need to blog about Resolutions 6, 7, and 8. I just think it is important that I finish that. Especially if I am going to talk about their success or failures.
• New Toy! (long term) - I never really saw the point of the Heart Rate Monitor Watches until now. First, i didn't realize it kept track of calories burned. Secondly, I usually like to do my own thing on treadmills and as a result the estimated calories burned is not accurate because they are not based on my weight (some let you enter your weight but not all). Third, I rarely put my hands on the monitors. I think it would be really cool to be able to accurately monitor my calories. Lucky for me my birthday is just around the corner. I am going to try to drop the bug in James' mom's ear. I'm keeping my fingers crossed!

LEARNED
• Grilled chicken has way more calories than i thought! I realize your meat portions are suppose to be small but a 6oz grilled skinless chicken breast has 450 calories! that is like a whole meal!! That just really surprised me.
• Serving size, serving size, serving size!! Twice this week I blew my calories because i didn't pay attention to serving size. I HAVE to learn to look at that FIRST not after the fact!
• I took Yoga in college and really like it but that was about 4 years ago. Some of our friends have a Wii Fit and it has Yoga on there. They were showing it to us and let me do some of the Yoga. I instantly remembered how much fun it was and how good it made me feel so now plan to incorporate it into my workout twice a week. Which is great because I think that will really help me not get burned out so quickly. Also I have some back issues and Yoga will be great for that. I <3 Yoga!
• Even if you don't follow the Slim Fast diet, the website (slimfast.com) has a great tool for planning out meals and some really amazing recipes. You can plan out your week or even whole month if you want! And as a bonus it gives you a complete grocery list after you have picked your meals!! Another great website that has gotten be through this past week is Kraft.com. They have a healthy living section where most of the entrees are around 350 and they even have a "healthy living on a budget" section for healthy AND cheap ideas! Can't beat that!!

Well, I think that sums up my first glorious week with my 2010 Resolutions. It was pretty eventful and challenging, I must say. You know, now that I think about it, I think blogging may be the key to my change in the way i view my progress this week. With every mistake I made I found myself thinking "I can't wait to tell people what i learned". It seems my blog has inspired at least 2 people and that makes me proud and drives me even more. I want to keep it up. I feel useful. I want to help other people that may have struggles where I have struggled in the past. I want to find mistakes before others do to maybe prevent them from encountering that pitfall. Even if their goals in life are different I want my motivation to motivate them. These resolutions are very much for personal benefit and if at the end if I'm the only person that gains anything from this whole experience then so be it and I would still call it a success. But honestly, I think it is the thought of helping others along the way, even if just one person that keeps me going.

What it comes down to is - I'm motivated by you being motivated by me.

Just Want to Share...

2010-01-14T22:58:00.000-05:00

Today for the first time in a really long time i actually drank 8 cups of water! It's a tiny accomplishment but it's something! hooray!

Only 4 days and I've learned so much!

2010-01-13T21:39:00.000-05:00

First things first, when i really get to typing my fingers don't like to capitalize "i" so i know it is probably annoying to you perfectionist people but that's just the way i type and lucky for me most things auto correct it, unlucky for you Blogger does not. Alright, now that I have that out of the way, on with the topic at hand.

Week one with my new resolutions is only half over and i've already learned a few things...

1. Going from 3-4 snoozes to zero is impossible (yea, you heard me, impossible!) So i've taken a baby step and only hit it once. So instead of waking up at 7 I wake up at 6:50 and hit snooze once. Eventually I will get to the no snooze thing.

2. I've made some good food choices but have also made some bad ones. One was lack of knowledge and the other was just not thinking. James and I went to Firehouse for lunch on Tuesday and I love the Smokehouse Brisket there so i figured i would get it and just leave off the mayo and pick wheat bread. Well... I got back to work and looked up the calories only to find that it was still 740 calories even without the mayo! ridiculous! The other bad choice was that i didn't look at serving size so when i thought i was eating 300 calories i actually ate somewhere between 750 - 900!! I almost cried! (okay, not really but i was really upset).

So from this i reaffirm i need to look up the calories BEFORE i eat something. In both cases if i had paid closer attention to the nutritional facts i would not have made the mistakes. Lesson learned.

3. Always take my workout clothes with me. I unexpectedly had to work over on Monday and James had said he wanted to to go to the gym with me and we planned for me to swing by the house to get him on the way to the gym. Well during the middle of the day he decided that he didn't want to go workout because he didn't have any gym pants (only shorts) and was afraid he would freeze! I should have been able just to go straight to the gym but nooooo because I had planned to go back home so I didn't bring my clothes. Then since i had to work late by the time i got home to get my clothes it was so late the gym would be closing soon. There are 2 lessons here... always take my clothes and don't go home before the gym!

OVERALL
• I have done really well on going to the gym. I have decided to do Yoga on Tuesdays and Thursdays to add a little variety to my workout and i just really like it.

• I haven't done so well on the food. I didn't track my food on Sunday but on Monday i had 1320 calories which was great but then on Tuesday i had the outrageous 2090 and today i haven't fully calculated them but this was the lunch that i messed up on so I know it is WAY over 1300.

• The morning person thing is rough. I have been getting in bed at 11 instead of 1030 so i'm paying for it in the morning. I didn't expect it to be easy though.

• One issue I am having is I get home from the gym way too late so by the time i cook dinner it is already 8:00 which is way too late to eat dinner. I hope once i get better at this morning person thing that i can start going to the gym in the morning.

I'm not giving up hope yet. I can see this resolutions thing will be challenging but I'm still having fun! Wooooo!

Resolution #5 - Get in Better Cario Shape

2010-01-09T23:02:00.001-05:00

For the most part I am going to follow the points of Resolution #4 and just tag some goals on there:

• The first day I go to work and I am not out of breath with I climb the stairs will be my first small victory.
• Run 1 Mile by end of February
• Eventually jog a 5k without walking at all - 5k TBD after I kind of see my rate of progress

I guess I could have combined 4 and 5, huh?

Resolution #4 - Get Back to the Gym

2010-01-09T22:53:00.002-05:00

James and I have had a membership to the YMCA for all of 2008 and the later half of 2009 yet we go for a few weeks and then completely neglect it. I mean we don't even pretend to go. (At least we don't try to delude ourselves, right?) To make matters worse, my work has a work out "gym" and I barely even find the motivation to go there!

DEFENSE
• The YMCA location that we live closest to is too small for the number of members they have. After 6pm it is packed and during Jan - March (when everyone is working on their New Year's resolution) it is so packed that sometimes you can't even use the equipment that you want and that is annoying. Another annoying part of the gym is the lack of parking. They always have some kid events going on and even if the workout room isn't crowded the parking lot always is. (/weh)

• My work "gym" can barely be called that. They have 2 ellipticals and 2 treadmills, 3 bikes (I hate bikes), and a few weight machines. I'm not complaining because at least it is something but it basically makes working out during my lunch break impossible because a lot of people go to lunch at 11:30 (I go at 12) and take all the equipment. Then after work everyone else gets off at 5 and I don't get off until 5:30 so once again they beat me to all the good stuff. My only chance is to workout before work but that is unlikely since currently I can barely wake up in enough time to get to work as is. ***NOTE: That may change if I am successful with Resolution number 3! ***

Okay... now that I have my excuses out of my system I can get to business. Last time I tried to start working out again I really pushed myself thinking "I am young, I can handle it!" and I ended up with a hurt back and foot and 6 trips to a Chiropractor. From that I learned that I am still young and I can should be able to take a lot but I have really neglected my body since high school. I was very athletic in high school but after I graduated I didn't keep it up. I almost always start to go to the gym and go for 2-3 weeks and then stop going. I have lost weight before because of diets but I don't think I have ever went to the gym enough to lose weight. That is sad.

So I have to start slow. Not because I am a wuss but because I have basically neglected every muscle in my body for almost 10 years. My plan is to start January as cardio only. The first few times I will just walk (at an incline) on the treadmill then I can slowly move into jogging. After I get my cardio going a little I will through weights in the mix. My goal for mixing in weights in February.

I have heard a few times that working out first thing in the morning accelerates your metabolism. Does anyone know if this is true? If it helps at all? As we all know I am NOT a morning person so if I am going to lose sleep for something it better have some hella benefits!! :)

GAMEPLAN
I don't really have much of a game plan here other then making myself actually go to the gym. Here are a few things I could think of though:

• Goal is to workout 5 days a week.
• Go very light for the first month. I've been out of shape and out of the gym for a long time now. Also with my recent semi rapid weight gain I think my heart is under more stress. January = Cardio only.
• Get more intense for February. Look to one of my fitness magazines for workout plans that mix cardio and weights.

Official Start Date: Sunday, January 10th.

Resolution #3 - Become a Morning Person

2010-01-09T22:05:00.001-05:00

About 2 months ago I had decided I was going to try to become a morning person. The game plan then was to focus on going to bed earlier and so I could wake earlier. This included waking earlier on weekends then normal. I had a decent amount of success with this. For about 2 weeks it was perfect! I even woke up around 7am on weekends on my own which was previously unheard of.

But then the weekends become my weaknesses... I would stay up later thinking to myself "I can get back to my normal schedule tomorrow". That turned into me staying up late all weekend and then Mondays became harder and harder and eventually I was back to my old routine again.

A down side to becoming a morning person is the lack of excitement on vacations. When we went to Chicago, since we were an hour behind I would get tired at 9pm so I'm sure I wasn't much fun to have as a guest in a big city where there is always tons of nightlife. O'well, there are are downsides to everything, i suppose.

GAMEPLAN
• I plan on getting back into the routine of going to bed early (between 9:30-10).
• First two weeks: Wake up at 7am EVERYDAY, this includes weekends!
• After two weeks: Wake at 6:30 Mon - Thurs. Wake at 7:30 Fri - Sun.
• DO NOT PRESS THE SNOOZE BUTTON EVER!! Every morning I press the snooze button and every morning I feel groggier afterward and regret it. Snooze button is NOT allowed.

Ideally I would like have a job where I could sleep late and wear jeans everyday but until I find that job, I guess I better start working on making the best of what I have now. If I don't, I think Mondays will be the death of me.

Resolution #2 - Be a Better Granddaughter.

2010-01-09T21:38:00.001-05:00

This one is plain and simple - I am lucky enough to still have grandparents alive on both sides of my family and I take them for granted. I see my mom's mom usually only on holidays and I see my dad's parents about once a month. This is unacceptable!

Something I have learned about myself is that I have a horrible sense of time. James and I will be talking about something and I could swear that is just happened 2 or 3 days before and then when I really think about it, it has been over a week! I'm not making excuses for me ignoring my grandparents but having no sense of time definitely adds a challenge to this resolution. The only solution I know here is set a visit day and write it on my calendar and if something comes up make sure I reschedule right then.

I'm going to aim for 1 visit every 2 weeks for each set of grandparents. I'm not sure if I will visit in the same week or alternating weeks. I'll figure that out as I go.

First visit: Saturday, 16th.

Resolution #1 - Avoid Fast Food

2010-01-04T23:22:00.000-05:00

PROBLEM
I don't consider myself a bad cook but being young I just don't have a lot of recipes under my belt yet so mostly I end up making chicken, chicken, burgers, chicken, stir-fry, chicken, steaks, chicken, chicken, pizza, chicken, and repeat... I think my husband is about to ban chicken from the house! So since we get tired of eating the 5 things I know how to make, and we are decently busy people we end up eating out a lot. While eating out, I rarely make good eating choices and have found there to be 3 main reasons behind my poor choices:

• Lack of food knowledge - Some foods are sneaky about being bad for you. Like there are several salads that I get at different places and I thought I was doing good only to find out that they have crazy amounts of calories! For example the Buffalo Blue Zalad at Zaxby's... I would even leave off the bleu cheese dressing and I was still eating close to 1000 calories in 1 meal!!

• Lack of time/panic - Some places I know there are healthy things on the menu but as I'm standing in front of the register or have a waiter/waitress hovering over me I feel the clock ticking and panic and just go with what I know only later to find out that again it was a horrible, horrible choice.

• Lack of choices - There are some places that I just can't find 1 healthy thing on the menu! Basically almost all fast food places.

I find myself falling weak to these 3 issues mostly at fast food places, hence me making this resolution. Now that we have pin pointed the problem, we are on to the game plan (or at least a rough outline of one)

GAME PLAN
• Pack my lunch - I'd say 90% of the time that I eat fast food it is for lunch. Rather is be during my lunch break or just while out running errand on my day off. The fact of the matter is that I usually just don't have the time nor the money to always go to a sit down restaurant.

• Plan ahead - For the most part, James and I frequent the same restaurants so I need to just sit down one day and make a list of the best items at every place. I can download this list to my iPhone or Google Docs and it will always be within reach! That takes care of the knowledge and the panic issue! Also it works for fast food or sit down places!

• Avoid some places all together - The places that I can't find anything healthy I just need to buck up and stop going there. If I just think I am going to die if I don't have X item from X place then I will just have to eat a smaller portion. For example I LOVE McDonald's fries so if I am craving them with no will power in sight then I could either not get a cheese burger or get a kids meal so it still has fries but a much smaller portion.

PREDICTION
• The good - I think this resolution will actually be pretty easy to stick to. Eating at fast food places has been kind of bothering me in general lately. A lot of the time I leave there just feeling gross. Mostly it is all the grease. After I have inhaled my food I have time to reflect and think to myself "I can't believe I just ate that when I SAW grease drip from it!" Or I will go somewhere for lunch and then get back to my desk only to feel sluggish and unproductive for the rest of the day. So this fast food avoidance has kind of been in the works even before the New Year.

• The Bad - The biggest concern I have here is actually taking the time to make a list for "pre-approved" items. Some places make their nutritional info pages annoying, like when you have to click on each individual item and then it opens a separate window or when you have to "create a meal" to even get any info. I can get a little lazy if research requires too many clicks. However, on a good note, while I think this list would be a huge help I do not think it is imperative to my success so if it takes a little longer then it should I wont automatically fail.

Fast Food, You're a Goner!!

2010 - Here I Come!

2010-01-03T22:46:00.004-05:00

Happy New Year!

Every year, just like everyone else, I make a new year resolution or two and work on them for a month or two and then fail miserably at them. So this year I almost decided to save myself the trouble and just not make any resolutions. That thought lasted a whole 2.7 seconds because let's be honest here, that just isn't me. I love to participate in things like this just because! So the next approach would be "what would make me more likely to keep them?" Here I came up with a few things:

1. Avoid the "lose weight" resolution
Problem - Been there, didn't do that. I'm an instant gratification kind of person so every time I say "I'm going to lose weight" and then after two weeks I have only lost a pound I get horribly depressed and then eat my way back up to my original weight or above it!
Solution - So I decided to find some small goals that would give me instant gratification that would inadvertently lead to weight loss!

2. Avoid hugely "life changing" unrealistic goals
Problem - Don't get me wrong, I think most things are possible to start or stop cold turkey but it is going to be a heck of a lot more challenging than if you ease into it. So if I'm already prone to not keeping my resolutions why would I want to make it even harder on me?!
Solution - Instead of "stop eating fast food" I'm going to try "avoid fast food". This will hopefully prevent me from getting frustrated when I only have 30 minutes to eat and forgot to pack my lunch. Also, more importantly, this will give me a little wiggle room instead of completely throwing my resolution out the window the first time I get in a predicament where I have to grab some fast food.

3. Plan for failure/boredom
Problem - With only 1 or 2 resolutions if I fail at 1 or 2 then all hope is lost and I am done for! Or if something that sounded like a great idea and then later I realize I don't really care as much about it then again my resolution fun is over til next year.
Solution - Make several so if i fail or get bored of 1 or 2 then I still have some to keep hope alive! Or if one takes a while to get going then I have others to keep me in the "resolution spirit".

4. Be held accountable
Problem - If no one knows you are failing at a goal then who cares? Sure it sucks to be disappointed in yourself but it sucks even more to be disappointed in yourself and to let other down too! Also more importantly they can't support you during the difficult times.
Solution - I once read in a magazine to blog about your weight loss to give you a sense of being held accountable but I've never been much of a blogger nor felt like anyone reads this thing anyways. However, now that Twitter has came along hopefully if I post things about my blog on Twitter then people will read it and hold me accountable! Cheer for me when I do good, boo me when I do bad, and coach me when I need help! So....basically my success rate depends on all you Twitter folks.... no pressure. =)

**As a side note, I had those points formed so much better in my head but then James turned on Mythbusters and I caught myself staring at the TV ever so often only to glance back at the computer and realize I had totally lost my train of thought. Alright.... back to the resolutions**

So with these points in mind I have made 8 small resolutions this year, none of them including "lose weight" might I add. They are:

1. Avoid fast food
2. Be a better Granddaughter
3. Become a morning person
4. Get back to the gym
5. Get in better cardio shape
6. Pay off Mazda or Student Loan
7. Research better eating habits
8. Volunteer

(You can also find these resolutions on my right sidebar as i continue to blog and this entry gets pushed down into oblivion.)

As I said earlier I didn't make one of them "lose weight" but ideally if I succeed at 1, 4, 5, and 7 (geez, i didn't realize so many would affect my weight) then losing weight should come naturally and would be an added bonus! Plus that would make weight loss a life change instead of a fad diet which would prevent yo-yo dieting.

You may wonder why I listed 4 and 5 separately. While 5 probably relies on 4, 4 does not mean i would be doing Cardio. I mainly want to be in better cardio shape because every day I take 2 flights of stairs at work and it makes me out of breath! that is embarrassing at 26!!!

I would like to clarify that number 7 doesn't mean find a diet. It means looking at foods from all angles. Also researching what is best for me. Like there are things that say 1 cup of coffee is good for you but I also have acid reflux and even just 1 cup of coffee seems to make my acid reflux worse and give me stomach issues later in the day. So in that case I would look for another drink that would have the same benefits as coffee but doesnt increase my acid reflux. Maybe there isn't anything better, maybe i would just need to compromise and only have coffee like 3 times a week or something. Also I may be on the verge of having high cholesterol so I would like to research foods that would lower that. That might mean not cutting out eggs but just switching to egg whites. You get the idea? (Please note: at this point no research has been done so everything i just said could be completely wrong about coffee and eggs)

I plan to start blogging about these individually to go more in-depth and kind of outline a game plan for working towards each goal. I will probably break them all down into their own entry unless it is just really short.

Alright, time to get ready for bed. Right now my solutions and this new resolution method sounds like a really great idea and I like to think that I am good at analyzing situations therefore looking back at situations in my life and learning from them but only time will tell.

Getting older is all about getting wiser, right? I believe it should be.

Cool Stuff on the Web

2008-06-30T11:34:00.003-04:00

Here is a cool link, it is all the things i share via my google reader. I think people without gmail can look at it. At least I hope. If anyone has any problems with it let me know. Remember to keep checking it because I share new things daily!

Enjoy!

http://www.google.com/reader/shared/09556093616470166759

Well....His Name IS Argos

2008-04-09T09:05:00.005-04:00

For those of you who don't know this is where the name Argos comes from....

"In Greek mythology, Argos was Odysseus' faithful dog. He waited for his master's return to Ithaca for over twenty years while most presumed Odysseus dead." - Wikipedia

We chose the name Argos in hopes that he would be a loyal dog to us. Since he never listens to a darn word we say we chalked our idea up to a loss.

As most know we recently moved out to a property that has 2 acres around our house and then another 15 to the left (not ours) that is wooded and perfect for roaming. When we brought Argos over for the first time he ran and ran and ran until he literally couldn't take another step. It eventually got dark so James and I went inside for the night. We crossed our fingers that we would be able to find our dog in the morning. To our surprise he was laying right in front of the door faithfully waiting for us to return.

Then came the true test... we had to go to work. He chased our cars a little down the road but as we lost sight he just stopped and stared in our direction. (it was so heart breaking). Again when we came home we held our breath that he hadn't tried to find his way back to his old house. To our surprise we again found him patiently waiting in the porch for our return.

While there is evidence that he wonders while we are away (always a new pile of sticks on the porch), he always finds his way back before we wake/get home so he can loyally block the door so we can't open it...i mean, to faithfully greet us upon arrival.

So maybe he does live up to his name after all.

Poo...

2008-03-14T11:17:00.002-04:00

I was going to post a sample of a brochure I have been working on at work to bounce some ideas off people but it cuts half of the image off... I'm going to pick James' brain about this and hopefully get it posted soon! Stay tuned!

Stacy, retarded? Maybe.

2008-03-14T10:59:00.003-04:00

Have you ever laughed at your own joke and not realized it was your joke?
Let me explain...
So I'm picking my friend Beth up in Atlanta today and as we were coordinating it I wrote her an email that had a subject line of "HOTlanta here we come!" Well when she replied it kept the same subject line of course (and Gmail doesnt put the "RE:" infront of it in your inbox) and so when I was opening the email I read the subject line and thought "haha beth is so funny" then there was a brief pause and then I thought "wait a minute...I wrote that!" Then I laughed at myself for not realizing that in the beginning. I told James about it and his first reaction was "why did you think that subject line was so funny?" so then I realized that the subject line itself wasnt even that funny soooooo I think I might be mildly retarded at the ripe ole age of 25.

Catching Up

2008-03-09T20:56:00.005-04:00

O man! Where to begin?! I have been meaning to write a blog FOREVER but could never find the time. I actually have stuff to do at work now and that is where I used to do all my blogging. When I get home I don't even like to look at the computer because I'm in front of it all day. Anyways so this is going to be a little jumpy cause I'm going to try to cover a lot of points.

First I would like to brag a little and say that today I was able to get into a pair of pants that were previously too small! woot! now just....tons more to go...aww. I had hit a plateau for a while but then I saw these My Alli pills at Wal-mart and decided to give them a try. In case you don't know anything about them they are the only FDA approved diet pill and they don't speed up your heart or give you the jitters or make you feel not hungry to you don't eat. They simply bond with the fat so your body can't absorb it. Sure that also keeps you from absorbing some vitamins too so you take a multi-vitamin at night when the pill is out of your system. I feel a lot better about my self.

I moved up to Hard on Rock Band! I'm only playing BASS on hard right now but it is a start and I am proud! I didn't think I could ever use the orange button. Also I have been singing better too but that might be me just getting used to the singing system cause I don't think my actual singing is any better....and James will agree. ha!

It is almost moving time! We close on the 21st and then move in the next weekend! I am soooo excited. I just hope I can keep the place looking at nice as the current owner. I am going to have to give up some social time for some yard time. Owning a house means it is time to grow up.I am also worried about Argos messing up the yard but hopefully he will run so much that he wears himself out. He can't wait either.

James and I registered for gifts yesterday and it was a lot of fun! I am horrible at style so I hope it all looks good when it comes together! We are registered at Target and Bed, Bath, and Beyond. Also gift cards to Lowe's is appreciated because there will be several home repairs to be done.

Go here...
www.Expressionery.com
They have these cool rubber stamps that you can customize. We are getting one that has our address on it so we can stamp letters instead of using return labels. They are awesome!

TVA credit union got new debit cards and they are U-G-L-Y!! They are red and yellow with a see through purple center! gag!

Kamiya is still the cutest kid ever. I'm really amazed at how good she is. She just goes with the flow and smiles at everything. I hope if I have a kid it is that good and fun.

WHY IS IT STILL COLD?! Knoxville weather sucks a butt! It gets warm and teases you with 70 degree weather and then BAM the very next day it is freezing! it is sooo frustrating.

Have you ever noticed your taste just changing? One day you don't like tomato soup, the next day you do. Just like that! It almost seems like everything I have ever known for sure has changed. I'm talking music, food, friends, hobbies, everything! People have gone that I thought would be around forever and new people have come around. This is hard for me because I see those people slipping away and have no idea how to stop it. I miss them already and they are only getting further out of site. I used to dislike any band that had a female singer but now several dominate my iphone. Lucero, who I was a dedicated follower of, came to town last night and I had nothing to do but I still didn't go. Yet here I sit listening to Coheed and Cambria and hated them the first 500 times James made me listen to them. I thought at 25 I was pretty close to settling in my ways but apparently I'm just beginning to figure them out.

I'm thinking about going back to school for accounting. I am so glad I didn't go into a technical writing job right out of college. I do some at work and boy is it taking me a while to get my creative gears going. I would have been fired in the first week! I totally made the wrong choice in school. I love math and I had actually planned on going into math but the only thing UT had was math teacher and I knew I couldn't do that cause my grades were el suck o. So for some reason I picked a major I can barely speak. stupid stupid stupid. At work I have been doing some accounting and it has just made me realize how much i love it. I think an associates is good enough to get going in accounting so that wouldn't be so bad...maybe after the wedding.

O, the wedding... Now I am starting to get worried. I'm afraid it wont be good enough. That the food will be bad or there wont be enough entertainment so it will be boring. O well at least people will get to see Norris Dam, it's so purty.

I don't think I really touched on anything that I wanted to, I will have to start writing down the subjects but for now me and my smaller pants must do somethings around the house!

Chick-fil-a should be a standard!

2008-02-05T12:33:00.001-05:00

The older I get the more I think about how scary fast food is. James and I have been talking about this lately. It seems when we do go fast food the people working there seems a little...shady...or something. They are rarely well groomed, more times then not have a poor attitude, and their intelligence is highly questionable. We went to Hardees this past weekend and noticed their health dept score was 79, and as if that wasn’t bad enough that was the follow up! How low can these people go without being closed down?!!?! I was really in the mood for good biscuit and gravy so we stayed but after we ordered we noticed that NO ONE was wearing gloves! The lady beside me asked if they were hiring and the shift manager (who was running the register not supervising) said they had just fired about 6-7 people last week so they do need people. James and I figured they were fired because of the horrible health dept score and that made us feel better, at least they were taking action. Then as we were leaving we saw the date on the score was October 2007! So what else happened that cause the manager to basically fire half the workers?! Scary! (Incase you were wondering the food still tasted good though)

I think I might start keeping a log of various fast food places. I'm going to report their scores, the quality of service received (friendliness, willingness to help), quality of product received (food or item), and general observations (no gloves, neatness, etc...). I worked in retail for 7-8 years so I see myself as knowing enough to be a fair judge of these things.

The next place I would like to complain about it NTB (National Tire and Battery). Of course all car places are going to be jerks but I have been going to NTB for about 3 years now and I have always been pleased with their service. However, I had a blow out on the interstate in December and had to get 2 new front tires. The first thing I noticed was they had taken their prices off the wall. Anytime a business does not have a printed list of services it seems fishy to me. Then the guy tried to get me to buy these tires that were $20 more each claiming they were the best tires. The ones I had picked to buy had so many miles they were guaranteed so I asked about these tires he was suggesting and he said they don’t offer a guarantee because they don’t believe in their product. So the product he suggested doesn’t believe in their own products? Good job guy... Next he tries to sell me a lifetime balance and rotate that is like $14 and it lasts until I ditch these tires. From being a previous customer I knew they offered free rotation so I asked and he denied this service. They could have changed that service but I was suspicious so I called the other NTB location beside West Town and they said they still offered free rotations. So needless to say I will not be going back to NTB. However my story does NOT end here! I had a coupon for a 12.99 oil change and James took my car while I was at work and when he told the guy he had a coupon the guy immediately said "that coupon is only valid on Thurs and Fri". Of course it said nothing of the sort on the coupon but then James quickly responded "it doesn’t say that on the coupon AND IT IS THURSDAY!!" and slams it on the counter (good job, honey! I'm so proud!). There is apparently a new manager there named bucky or something like that and he is horrible! He is the guy that lied to be and I bet he was the guy that tried to lie to James. NEVER GO TO NTB at Knoxville Center Mall!! Anyone know a decent mechanic?!

I bet money that Chick-fil-A has never had a health dept score that was under 90 nor offered bad service! They always say "my pleasure" and more importantly give you as many nugget sauces as you want WITHOUT charging! They even stand up for what they believe in by being closed on Sundays and still are making tons of money!

Why are other fast food places allowed to get by with such crappy service and standards?!

People can be so Immoral

2008-01-23T16:49:00.001-05:00

So here I sit pissed...let me tell you why!

While at work today I get a call from a lady who says she is from the Yellow Pages Online Directory and wants to verify our information. I say OK. She reads off our info and there is one minor change but the rest is correct. She said I have to talk to an automated system to confirm the changes. She puts on the recording and talks over it! I ask her not to talk over the recording but she continues anyway saying she is summarizing what the recording is saying. The last question she says is to confirm the changes but I catch the recording saying netpagenow.com so I answer "no". She restarts the recording and tells me that it was just an ad. I tell her I don't feel comfortable saying yes to something that I think is signing me up for a service. She then tells me to just say "Yes-free service only" So I agree to that and when i say it she stops the machine from recording me after i only get out "yes..."!! (it made a beep when she stopped it) Then she says "A lot of people get confused about that ad at the end. Don't worry I couldn't sign you up for the service if you wanted to, I don't have that power." Then ends the call. I immediately go to the netpagenow.com website, call their customer service and tell them what happened. The rep looks up my number and says the lady DID sign me up for a website service!!! The rep said she removed me but can I really trust a company that KNOWINGLY gives their employees the power to 1. talk over the recording and 2. stop the recording whenever they want even though the system says to push #. I reported the problem to the BBB, which they already have an F rating with.
This makes me SOOOOO incredibly angry. It is one thing is I stupidly fall into a trap but to say you are with a different company, deny what is really happening when i ask right out, AND manipulate my answers to scam me, that is just wrong.

Does anyone else know a way to report a scam like this?

Evil turned Pleasure

2008-01-21T16:49:00.001-05:00

I'm sure everyone has said I'm going to start working out and then they do for 2 weeks, maybe even a month and then something ALWAYS comes up and they quit. Well I'm no stranger to that routine. I went to UT for 5 years where the gym membership was INCLUDED in the tuition and I still found reasons not to go (granted we didn't get the nice gym til a little later on). This New Years I made the same ole resolution, along with getting rid of clutter, and for some reason it feels GOOD.
I know, I know I'm still in the first month so it still has time to go downhill...Well maybe if YOU weren't so negative it wouldn't go downhill! How about that? (Kidding!) but seriously how about some support this go-round? It would be nice to have being saying "Good decision Stacy" instead of "You'll never stick to it".
Anyways back to what I was really trying to say. I started working out on Jan 7th officially and have been kicking butt ever since! I started easy with walking on the treadmill cause I was horribly sick but then I graduated to the elliptical and finally i got to my favorite, jogging on the treadmill. The first time I tried I ran for 7 mins then walked for 3 then ran for 5 and thought I was going to DIE! The second time I ran for 7 walked for 3 and ran for 7 (see that increase? o yea!) and since im a presistant mofo the THIRD time I ran for 10!!!!!! walked for 3 then ran another 7!
The first 10 was a whole mile! (I also increased my speed from 5.5 to 6.5)
I just kept going and it felt good. I'm finally digging this exercise thing.

Honestly, I blame my new workout pants.

Progress-to-Date: down 4lbs!

It's me again Margaret

2008-01-21T16:35:00.000-05:00

When I first started this blog I wasn't going to tell anyone about it and I was going to use it to get things off my chest that I didn't really want to tell anyone but then I wrote a few blogs and found that afterwards i just wanted to talk to people about them and i really didn't have anything to write that i didn't want people to see so I've decided to go public! i know i know exciting eh? I'm sure I will get 500 clicks within the hour of people continuing checking to see what is the next exciting article to come out of Stacy's mind! Also my hubby-to-be bought Stacyhacker.com for me so now it will be easy for all my loyal followers to....umm...follow.

I hope blogger can handle the traffic.

One Theory Among Millions

2007-09-20T10:43:00.001-04:00

Hello again.

I have found that a good time to think is when you are driving alone in your car. Usually you are driving to a place you have gone several times before so you don't need to think about the roads and I don't know about you but it actually helps me not get road rage because I'm focused on other things and with my driving record that is a HUGE plus.

The other day I was driving home and the thought of religion crossed my mind. Honestly I have no idea what I think about religion. I have no idea where to even look to figure that out. Religion is a funny thing because it is up to faith. Even if you go the scientific route, you are relying on proof that has been developed so far and there are changes in science every day. You could have two people that go to the same church and listen to the same preacher and their views would still be different, sure they would be similar but there would be differences somewhere. What I don't like about religion is there isn't a place to go to find solid answers, facts. Even in science there are loop holes here and there. Correct me if I'm wrong because I haven't done much research but if you go waaaaaaaay back in the cycle there still isn't an answer to how it started... If God made the earth and such how did he get there? where did he come from? If the big bang theory was the reason then how did the stuff get there to cause the big bang in the first place? trying to answer that question is like trying to answer "which came first the chicken or the egg?"

Even though I cant decide where I stand I have decided one thing... It doesn't matter where I stand or where any one does. No matter what anyone believes they will find the true answer when they die. Regardless of what I decide to believe, I'm not going to change anything about the way I am because I'm already me (and I'm stubborn and set in my ways). The way I see it people should live a decent life because they want to, not because there is "someone watching". I think the motto "don't do something you wouldn't want the world to know" is a good one to live by. Also there are just certain people in my life that I don't want to let down, including myself and that is what drives me to not rob, cheat, lie, kill, and all those other bad things. So I guess if religion is what you need to drive yourself then go for it, but do it because you believe in it not because someone told you to believe it or scared you with what will happen when you die.

No one has it 100% right

It Begins Here and Now

2007-09-17T11:48:00.001-04:00

Hello.

I'm new here. /wave

I'll be straight forward, I am starting this to ramble and ramble and ramble. I guess that is all blogs are good for anyways... expressing opinions and getting things off your chest. Lately I have found myself needing to talk but not to anyone in particular. I have great family and friends that would listen to me until the end of days but for some reason that's not what I'm looking for. Sure, I could open up Word and just ramble away there but I think there is just something about having your words out there for people to read that makes the difference. Is it the thrill of what might be commented back? or maybe the chance that your words could make a difference in a person's life, even if it was just one. Or maybe people just need to be heard even if they are not saying anything important. For whatever reason blogs offer a satisfaction that is unlike anything else.

I do not have much experience with blogs. I wrote a few things on Myspace but that is it and I still managed to learn a very important fact about blogs. They can cause drama. Anytime someone writes a blog in an atmosphere like Myspace they have to be careful about what they write because everyone they know will be reading it. This is why I chose to come to Blogger.com and not tell anyone about it. I want somewhere that I can write freely about anything or anyone and not cause any problems...I want a place to think.