Weee Living healthy really DOES work...

218.0

Monday

This weekend was WONDERFUL. Well, it actually started off bad because my Lasik procedure didn't happen. Really frustrating. I took the day off work, and had it all scheduled to get a ride for my 11:00 am appointment. Then I got a call, the night before, from the clinic - one of those computer reminders - that said "just reminding you of your appointment at 1:15 pm." What? I thought it was at 11:00. It's like 7 pm when they call so I just go with it and call my ride to reschedule. So I show up at 1:05 pm on Friday. I get there and she says "what? you're appointment was at 11:00!" Oh hell. Turns out the call they gave me was for my follow up appointment on tuesday. Why they called me for THAT appointment the day before my surgery, I don't KNOW. But by the time I got there, the doctor was on his way out to other appointments and could do it. I was SOOO frustrated I actually cried in the stupid eye clinic. Grrr. But - I took the frustration home, allowed myself a luxury nap then got back to work on unpacking and eating right.

I've been very good for about 5 days with a little splurge last night at Longhorn. This Sparkpeople thing is working really well right now. I actually saw 216.6 on the scale yesterday. Then Longhorn and a few beers last night, but today - right back on track. I've had 1450 calories for the day AND ran 4 miles today on the treadmill, walking 1 more for a total of 817 calories burned! Hell yeah! So I know that's really not enough food for one day with that kind of work out but today is a detox day after yesterday's splurge. I'll balance out again tomorrow to a reasonable number. Hopefully I'll see that beautiful 216 again tomorrow!

I'm still going to keep weighing in with WW because I bought at 16 week at-work pass so I'm already paid. I just won't tell them I'm doing sparkpeople instead. It's still good for the weekly accountability and the pep talks. Besides if I lose 10lbs in the session my firm will reimburse 50% of my costs. I'm only down 3 as of last weigh in so I need to do 7 in the next 6 weeks or so to get that reimbursement. They way this week is going, though I think I'll hit 5 by Thursday.

Why is it that some weeks motivation doesn't seem to be a problem. Why are those weeks so few and far between? I'm going to ride this as long as I can...

Moved in and Funkdity funk funk

220.0


Thursday



This weekend was CRAAAAAZZY. Like totally crazy busy. I ended up taking off Thursday & Friday from work to get my house ready for "the move". Holly's husband Dana was a godsend and helped me both days buy a refrigerator, lawn mower & patio furniture and install all that and a dishwasher. He's very handy! Than Saturday began the GREAT MOVE. I had about 6 friends meet me at my old house at 10:30 to start loading up the gynormous U-Haul I bought. We got it loaded, with more friends trickling in, about 12:30 and headed to the new house. A few mor friends met us there for the unload. Half way through unloading we sent half the big strong guys off to my storage facility to empty that out as well (which included a pian0 - let me tell you they LOVED me for that one). By the time they got back with that stuff we had the U-Haul emptied. By 4:30 we had the trucks/trailers/etc. from storag emptied and the party commenced. In exchange for physical labor Erik & I supplied Pizza, Wings, Beer & Water throughout the day. And we started our celebratory poker tournament at about 6:30 for all participants.

Sunday was church, then easter dinner at Holly's then home for nap & unpacking. So much unpacking to do...

Then this week I've been car-pooling with Holly because I'm not allowed to wear my contacts. I'm having lasik surgery tomorrow morning and this week have had to live with a blurry world. It's really odd. My eyes aren't that bad compared to a lot of people but I do have to squint if the TV is more than aobut 10 feet away. Anyway, technically I'm not supposed to drive w/o contacts/glasses so I've been riding w/Holly. Why don't I wear glasses you say? Well because about a month ago my someone or something (read my crazy cat!) decided to hide my glasses and I haven't been able to find them - not even after the move. I think they took them outside and burried them. Grrr. So blind I am - till tomorrow at least.

Food-wise I was really bad this weekend. Got lots of exercise with moving, but balanced it with beer, pizza & wings. Not good.

So my weight has totally fluctuated this week. Way too high. But finally I got back on track yesterday. I'm trying something different. I'm trying Sparkpeople. I've read lots of blogs on people who use it and thought I'd give it a try. The problem with weight watchers I'm having is that I've done it so long, that I really cheat too much. I know how to cheat points - find the foods with the most fiber so it's lower point - eat two servings separatly so it's less points than it would be in one sitting - stupid stuff that doesn't lower the calorie content of the food, but just lets me abuse the program. I'm just in a rut with weight watchers and need a change. So Sparkpeople here I come. I logged all my food yesterday and even got a good run in last night. Today so far I'm doing well. I've logged breakfast and lunch and will find something good for dinner.

I've got 22 weeks till the wedding. 22 weeks. I started with almost 30 and I've wasted about 8 without any real weight loss. not good. I can do a lot in 22 weeks but I've got to stick with it. I've got to. This HAS to be important.

I was researching DJ's yesterday and one had a bunch of pictures of weddings he hosted. I saw all these beautiful brides. I hate pictures of me right now. I really don't want to hate my wedding photos. So 22 weeks to make it happen. I HAVE to.

Today's plan - 200-500 calories for dinner - good run on the treadmill and some strength training. Get to bed at a reasonable time - no alcohol - no Y-knots (bar we usually go to on Thursdays). Just good healthy living. i can DO this!

St. Patty's Day!

221.6

MONDAY

SO much has happened in the last week. - why don't I post more often?!? Oh yeah, cause I'm CRAZY busy with everything except work. Go figure.

Anyway, Wednesday I did, indeed, buy a dress. I ordered my fabulous wedding dress, and it will be here mid July. Yeah - time to totally get crackin on this weight loss stuff! Holly also ordered her bridesmaid dress, and I've instructed Gloria to get me measurements for hers. I think I've also decided on the junior bridesmaid dresses, but I'm still thinking on that.

Wedding invitations went out on Thursday morning. Or at least most of them. Erik is still getting me addresses for several people, and I dropped another 10 in the mail today, but for the most part they're out. People have started viewing our wedding website, which is exciting. One person (a very reliable guy) has already booked his room. yeah!

House is about 2/3rds of the way packed. We are living amongst boxes, people. And lots of them. We spent about 4 hours on Saturday and another 2 last night packing. We have maybe 3 or 4 more to go. Hopefully that will get done tomorrow. Erik's begged off a reprieve for tonight after our very productive weekend.

Closing is set for tomorrow, and according to my lender and realtor all is good. We do our final "walk-through" tonight at 7:00.

I had a weekend retreat for work last weekend that was wonderful information-wise, but I had WAAAY too much wine on Friday night. not a good thing since I was with co-workers. I absolutely hate that I did that. I don't "think" I did anything stupid, but there are fuzzy spots near the end of the night, that tells me I just don't know. No one said anything at the meetings on Saturday morning, but I hate that feeling of wondering if you said or did something stupid. Very bad. I'm actually really pissed at myself for this. I shouldn't get drunk ever, but it's relatively harmless when I'm with my fiance, or close friends. With work people it's completely inexcusable, even if they do provide you with unlimited liquor & wine in the hospitality suite...

So, understandably Saturday I was hung over and feeling crappy - and thus eating crappy. Sunday was Erik's son's birthday party at his mother's house (Erik's ex-wife). That went well considering, she's actually very civil to me to my face at least. Besides, she was too busy being pissed at Erik for getting Daniel there later than she preferred ("what's more important, Church or your son's birthday?"... huh?) Whatever.

Got a little sun burnt yesterday, but I could use it.

Today I'm super slow at work, again. I've asked for work and been told that it's "coming". Since it's slow, I signed up for a CLE (continuing legal education) class all day Wednesday in an area I'd like to work in (White Collar Crime). It's being co-hosted by one of the partners in my firm, so it's a good networking idea anyway.

Hopefully things will pick up later this week. I've got to get some projects to work on!

Tonight after our walk-through I think we're going out, but I AM NOT GOING TO DRINK. Ok, I've said it in all caps so I have to follow through, right? I could probably lose 20 lbs b/w now and the wedding just by cutting out alcohol. Why is that so hard?

Life, Stressful Life

220.8 (very good considering)

TUESDAY

Oh my how life has gotten crazy lately. I was out of town for 4 days last week - Thursday through Sunday - in sunny California. It was so wonderful. Erik won a trip at work for doing a good job last year, and they flew us both out there. So nice. We ate like pigs, but did manage to hit the gym twice together, so that's good.

We got back late Sunday and yesterday I tried to catch up on work and life. The scale was really scary yesterday morning - 224.6 - showing lots of bloating from the trip it seems. Today's number, therefore, was very nice to see even if it is a bit up from last week. I've got a couple more days till weigh in to get it down.

I've got major deadlines this month, and very few of them relate to work, which is stressful in itself as I need to get some hours in this month. On my plate this month:

1) Wedding invitations: they WILL be in the mail on Thursday. I've got 60 addressed, sealed and ready to go, about 60 left, but of course I'm waiting on several addresses from Erik. If I don't get them by Thursday they're just going to have to go out late.

2) Work project: I have a big brief due soon and promised a draft to the partners by Thursday. I think this is do-able, but need to get cracking. I promised it out on Thursday because I'm out Friday and Saturday for a work-related retreat.

3) House Buying: We are scheduled to close on our new house next Tuesday (March 18), and now of course, mortgage rates are climbing, even though they should be FALLING. Add to the stress

4) Packing: We have 10-12 friends scheduled to help us move next Saturday (22nd) so I have to have the entire house packed by then (did I mention I'm out of town this Friday & Saturday?) We've done nothing so far. :-(

5) Lasik: I'm scheduled to have Lasik on my eyes on March 28th and am supposed to be out of commission for at least 4 days after that - doesn't help the stress at work...

6) Dress Buying: I WILL buy a dress this month. Hopefully tomorrow. I tried one on today and LOVE it. Holly is scheduled to go to lunch with me tomorrow to give a second opinion "ok" and I think I'm going to order it. I have seriously put about 60 HOURS into this dress shopping thing. And of course the one I'm buying is obscenely expensive. But it WILL be done. tomorrow I hope.

7) Weight loss?!? Oh yeah - the whole point of this blog? Somehow I'm supposed to be being meticulous about my eating these days. So difficult. But it too must be done.

So I'm a bit stressed right now. Add to that I had a scary occurrence at work today. I've been on this big case since the day I started last year. It's supposed to go to trial this summer and there are like 4 partners and 6 associates on the case. I've been helping out diligently and probably spending 60-70% of my time on this one case billables-wise. Anyway, I printed something to a shared computer today and happened to see a co-worker's email that she printed about a meeting on the case next week. A meeting I was not invited to - but every other associate that's been working on the case has been. This is not the first meeting I've been left out on. So I got all paranoid and thought maybe I'm doing something wrong? Why don't they want me working on this anymore? What the hell?

So, very uncharacteristically, I decided to ask some questions and get to the bottom of it. I went into the office of the partner who does the most on the case and asked why I appear to have been taken off the case -- did I do something wrong? She promptly assured me that no, I hadn't done anything wrong, that she thought someone had told me, but that the client was complaining about my billable rate. Here's the thing. I've been practicing law for 6 years. But the firm brought me in as a "Fourth Year" for partnership purposes. This was totally fine with me because I need time to learn civil law, and make my place here. That said, I think they're still billing me out as a 6th year due to my experience. This is the second time I've been booted from a case because I'm too expensive. Which is ridiculous because THEY chose what to bill me at, and obviously want me to bill lots of hours, but somehow are putting me on cases where I can't do that. Frustrating. Anyway, on this case we have a VERY high maintenance client who is very cost conscious notwithstanding the huge nature of the case. She wants me off, supposedly not because of my work (I've only even met her briefly once), but because of my rate. The firm wants me on, and it's not resolved yet. Probably I'll get kicked off. If that happens, however, I NEED to find more work.

Here's my catch 22, however. I'm going to miss a number of days this month due to 1-7 above. So it's tough to go to another partner, looking for more work, and say I want some, but oh-by-the-way, I'm not going to be around much this month. Very frustrating.

At least she repeatedly assured me that it had nothing to do with my work product. That's good news at least, and she apologized that no one had talked to me sooner, but still. Totally stressed me out.

So that's my life right now. Busy busy busy. I'm super stressed and find myself "down" a lot, which is ridiculous because so much is going "RIGHT" in my life (getting married, buying a house, great job...) I just have to keep reminding myself this is good stress...

Tired tired tired

219.4 (keep going down you sadistic scale.. and we'll be friends.)

TUESDAY

I've been so tired this week, for really no good weekend. Ok, so yes, I had a craaaazy weekend running around all over the world of Georgia, but I did get almost enough sleep Sunday night. Yesterday I left work about 12:30 to do "one more" dress shopping trip (yeah right). I hit two stores and think I've narrowed it down to 3 dresses at one store. Of course Holly couldn't go with me yesterday so I couldn't make a decision. Why I can't decide this on my own, I don't know, but I can't! Hopefully she'll be able to take an hour or so today to make one final trip at lunch to PICK A DAMN DRESS. I'm so over this.

I finished my dress hell, I mean shopping, at about 4:00 yesterday and was exhausted. I was going to go back to work, but just couldn't do it. I ended up going home and taking a nap, then laying in bed all night till I passed out again about 11:30. I feel a little better today, but still slept in until 8:00 and of course did NOT do my morning exercise routine like planned. Bad girl! So now I have to try to find the motivation to work out tonight. We'll see.

Good news is, that I had a decent lunch right before dress trying-on-hell and didn't really get hungry for dinner between naps and lazy bed lounging. I had a little lunch meat & cheese and a bag of popcorn, but that probably explains why the scale was friendly today. I'm not complaining. I'm going to try to do it again today. I want to see 218.something by Thursday!

Poker is Financing my Wedding (dress..)

219.6 (not bad!)

MONDAY

This weekend went by SOOOO fast. So much going on, again. This wedding planning stuff is hard. So, Friday night Holly & Dana come over for dinner & Wii for the boys and Tivo catch up for the girls. I had a bit too much wine, but not bad otherwise. Saturday Holly & I met up at 10:00 to start our crazy day of dress trying-on. I was determined to buy a dress on Saturday. I've probably tried on 100 different dresses by now, so it was time to commit. Our day started in Douglasville - a town about 25 miles west of us. We found a dress I absolutely LOVED. It's a maggie sotoro, and the rack size was a 14. It almost fit, but definitely was a little snug. After a conference with the seamstress who assured me that she could make that one fit, we decided it would be better to order one so I could add a few inches to the length. Being 5'11", almost nothing fits me off the rack, length-wise. So we did all the measurements, the store talked to the factory and supposedly was told that we could get that dress, plus 4 inches, in a 16 on July 7th. Not bad. but I didn't want to commit b/c I hadn't stopped by another store I had on my list. So I gave them all my information, got their card and assurances I could order it over the phone later that day, and we headed to carrolton. Just to be sure.

The Carrollton store was another 20 miles away, mostly south and a little west. We got there, tried on about 7 dresses, and were not wow'd by any of them. By now, it's about 2:45 pm and we're hungry and tired. We started heading for home, and I decided to order the one from Douglasville. I literally have the phone in my hand and it is ringing when Holly says - we have to go to Belles & Beaus - a bridal store in my own town that oddly enough I haven't been to and is where Holly got her dress. She's right. We never made it there. So I hang up and we trek another 30 miles back to Fayetteville. Well, Belle's & Beaus is under new management from when Holly got her dress, and they had a very small selection. Nothing the appealed to me. We didn't even try one one. By then it's 4:30 and we have another hour and a half before all the shops close, so we decide to try ONE MORE in Peachtree City (PTC). I'd been in this shop with holly about a month ago for her to try on bridesmaid dresses, before I was ready to try on wedding dresses, but hadn't looked at their stock.

So we get to J. Andrews in PTC, and find out they carry Maggie Sotoro - the designer that made the dress I fell in love with in Douglasville. Now PTC is MUCH closer to where I live now and our new house than Douglasville. Like about 20 miles closer. So I decided I'd try on their dresses, but if I didn't like them I'd order my Maggie from them. Now starts the trouble. Of course none of their dresses compared, so we started trying to figure out how to order my dress. It's about 5:30 now. Maggie has a great website, but for some reason I couldn't find my dress on it. So I called the Douglasville store and asked them for the design number "so I could show my mom online". They put me on hold for like 20 minutes (ok, maybe 5) and then came back and gave me a very odd model number. I said, ok, thanks and hung up. Of course that model number wasn't found on the website either, so this time Holly took my phone, and playing me, bullied them into giving me the right number. They really didn't want to, obviously for the exact reason I wanted it, but finally she got it out of them. She basically said she's not buying a dress if her mother couldn't see it and if they don't give it to her she'll go somewhere else. I worked. Unfortunately, that's not the end of it.

We still couldn't find it on the website, though the number is of the right type. Finally the owner of J. Andrews discovered that it was a discontinued design. Through all her "inside" resources, she discovered that they didn't have any in stock in my size and weren't making it anymore. Unfortunately, by that time the factory was closed, so she couldn't call them directly. This was so confusing as I thought the Douglasville store had talked to the factory about this specific dress. Turns out, they may have just talked to them generally about how much additional length was, and when the ship date would be. Odd. I just don't know. So we ended the day very depressed. The J. Andrews owner is going to call the factory today and call me back, hopefully with good news, but I'm just not confident. So depressing! I was ready to buy and then it gets snatched away. The worst part is that the dress I fell in love with was almost $300 cheaper than any other one I've liked. Booo!

So by then it's 6:00 and we're beat, frustrated, and starving. We met Dana for dinner at Longhorn, and then I headed off to a poker tournament I had won entry into through the company we play with. It's was a free tournament, but had a $1000 prize pool to the various winners. By 1:00 am I had won the tournament, and after making a deal at the final table, took home $500 of the $1000 with the rest being divided among 3 other players. Very cool. That $500 will definitely be going toward the wedding, and this stupid dress hunt. Here's a picture of me after I won (very tired!)

Lots of fun, but very exhausting. I didn't get home till about 1:30 Saturday night (sunday morning!) and got up about 9:00 for church with Erik & Daniel. After church we dropped off Daniel and then Erik & I had lunch and then spent 5 HOURS registering for our wedding at Dillard's and Linens & Things. We were SOOOO tired after that. Who knew it would be such a chore to pick out things for people to buy us?!? Crazy.

We got home and totally vegged out the rest of the night. Watched a couple movies, played a little online poker, and passed out.

This morning, I'm proud to say, I got up and did 30 mins on the treadmill. I'm still not nearly up to the ability to run all 30 yet, but I did run 1 mile, then did a hard walk on incline for the rest of my time. I'm hoping to be up to running a full 3 miles in 30 by the end of the month. I think I can do it.

So, this morning's scale is probably pretty accurate. Although I did drink Thursday, Friday & Saturday nights, I had only one meal on both Saturday & Sunday with all the running around we did, and boy i can say that trying on those heavy wedding dresses, and trekking around huge box stores for a registry gives you a work out. Sheesh. So I'm hoping to get the scale down another couple pounds this week. I think I can do it.

Erik & I leave for California for 4 days on Thursday, so I've got to really kick butt at work and at this diet before we leave. I'm absolutely planning on using the 24 hour gym at the resort, but I'd love to go into this mini-vacation seeing under 218 on the scale. Here's hoping!