bloated

 I woke up this morning at about 6:20 feeling completely groggy.  The stew I made last night was delicious but salty, and no amount of water could combat the bloat that was sure to happen.  When I shuffled into the bathroom and saw my puffy eyelids in the mirror, I wasn't surprised.

I dreaded today's weigh-in because I knew I was going to show a weight increase for the 3rd day in a row.  Argh.  Unsurprisingly, I'd gained a pound since yesterday.  Double argh.  I know it's likely just fluid retention, but it still bums me out.

Yesterday:

Net Calories: 1501 (252 over)

H2O Intake: 64 oz

Total Exercise: 30 min

Cardio: 20 min

This goes to show that another 20 min of cardio would have balanced out my food intake.  Gotta step it up.

ready to hit the gym

 I took the weekend a little easy with the workout, but not so much with the food.  The bacon party I went to did not help.  I managed to squeak a run out on Saturday, but Sunday was a wash.  Yesterday I stayed home, and spent much of the day indoors, doing light exercises (like 4 hrs worth, because I felt so guilty) and then got cabin fever and hit the pavement for a 3.5 mile run.  I ate about 1500 calories yesterday (including two cocktails I had on a date with Andrew), but since I worked off roughly 1000 calories, my net was around 500.  As it turns out, my calories came from a fairly balanced ratio, which is ok since I have a hard time hitting that recommended 50/30/20 ratio I've been talking about.

4 days away from the gym is quite enough to get me anxious to go back and kick into gear.  Today at lunch I scooted over there and snuck in 20 minutes of cardio - 10 on the treadmill and 10 on the elliptical.  It felt great.  I'm going back right after work to finish things off.  I've got a plan for 10 min on the rowing machine followed by my abs work-out.  I ate a lot, though, so maybe I'll hula hoop a little too before BL tonight.

Yesterday:

Net Calories: 501

H2O Intake: 40 oz

Total Exercise: 280 min

Cardio: 40 min
Yay!

first monthly check-in

So I'm off to a positive start.  I've lost 4 lbs, 3.5 inches from my waist, 2.5 inches from my hips, 11% body fat (holy moly!), and am down 0.6 points on my BMI.  I want to continue to work toward my goal at a faster rate, but I want to make sure it's sustainable and realistic for my lifestyle.

I'm also feeling the need to keep myself accountable with more hard numbers, so each post I'm going to report what I did the day before to work toward my goal, diet-, exercise-, and hydration-wise.

Yesterday:

Net Calories: 1,778 (529 over)

H2O Intake: 40 oz

Total Exercise: 40 min

Cardio: 20 min

a delicious nemesis

Yesterday I had a great day, workout-wise and eating-wise.  Mid-day Wednesday was gloriously sunny and crisp so I took the opportunity at my lunch hour to go out and run.  It was fantastic.  Plus, I'm still sore from my work-out the day before.  In that sense, I feel really good.

After work yesterday, in an effort to stay away as long as possible while my man hosted the fellas for poker night, I went out with some folks to belltown for a light dinner... and drinks.  The whole evening I thought to myself, "edamame, curried cauliflower, and sushi aren't so bad but these cocktails are gonna get me!"

Even with that in mind, I enjoyed three gin and ginger ales during the course of the evening.  They were fantastic.  When I 'fessed up to all of last night's indulgences on the Daily Plate this morning, I noticed I was 600 calories over my recommended intake - about 3 gin and ginger ales, I'd say.  I knew it.

This is just further confirmation that I need to cut down those cocktails that go down so easily and stick to wine, which is under 100 calories a glass and would have cut the impact of my "oops" in half.

checking in today

Lately I've been great with my eating - I still indulge a little, but I've really kept it in check.  I've made changes like pouring myself a glass of water when I wanted a second cup of coffee (with cream and sugar, of course), and I've limited my portions to half of what I was eating before, which was a lot.  I like to eat, I like going out to restaurants, and when something is delicious, it's easy to just keep going rather than setting it aside and boxing it up to go.  Not anymore - I've become so much more portion-conscious.

I've also taken to eating a morning snack at about 11.  I've found that it helps two-fold: If I go to the gym at lunch I feel stronger during my workout if I'm not starving, and if I have lunch with a friend, I'm much better about stopping when I've eaten a reasonable helping because I'm not starting from a rumbling tummy.  Today I ate a dressingless version of Ina Garten's grapefruit and avocado salad.  It's not low cal, but it tasted fresh and I don't feel guilty about it.  I figure as long as I get some cardio in, I'm good to go.  It's a glorious day today and a run to the Fremont Bridge and back might be just the ticket.

I'm finding that while I'm doing great with the diet portion of my life, I need to step it up with the work-outs.  I'm not getting 30 minutes every day like I want to.  Maybe it's every other day, or every two days.  Some of this is my busy schedule, some of it is my own lack of motivation on a given day.  Yesterday I did 40 minutes of strength training but zero cardio.  My goal is to make the cardio constant and the weights an additional bonus.  The trick is getting into a groove and making the time.

Friday is my monthly weigh-in.  Hopefully I'll have some good numbers to report to you.

(almost) guilt free salad

Guys, I LOVE salad. I do. And I've never really been one for those awful fatty ranch type creamy dressings. I think ranch is abhorrent, personally. I'm perfectly happy with a vinaigrette but the ones you buy have all sorts of weird coagulants and preservatives, and I'm not really into that. Recently I've been hooked on this glorious dressing. It's fresh and bright and relies on flavor rather than fat. My current favorite canvas for this is butter lettuce, toasted hazelnuts, and parmesan. And yes, I TOTALLY stole that idea from Le Pichet.

Zest from 1/2 lemon

Juice of 1 lemon

1/4c white wine or champagne vinegar (I ran out of this last time and used red wine vinegar and no harm was done)

2T prepared dijon mustard

2T olive oil

cracked black pepper & salt to taste

Put all of that good stuff in a covered jar, shiggidy shake it up, and toss a couple of tablespoons on your next bowl of fresh veggies. It'd also be killer as a marinade for chicken. Just sayin'.

guilty.

I couldn't help it.  Even greater than my popcorn weakness is my cheese weakness.

Last week our office was host to a group who used our large conference room as a classroom space.   The acoustics of our building amplify everything.  We're used to it and adapt our voices to the environment.  These folks are used to regular buildings, and therefore made a ruckus.  As a thank-you and a peace-offering, they sent us a giant cheese plate today.  Brie.  Chevre.  Stilton.  I sampled everything and then went back for seconds.

I'm bustin' outta my belt, folks.  This is not cute.  I generally have a rule - if I've had a tasty treat and enjoyed it, I don't need to go back and get more.  Cheese apparently doesn't feel that my rules apply, and it insists I continue to indulge.  I can't say no!  Argh!