Today I am going to...

Goals for today:

·        Edit at least 30 pages of my, soon to be finished and published, novel, “Marooned”.

·        Start reading this novel, “Liar, Liar”, by James Patterson, I picked up at the Library yesterday. I want to see if I can at least read 100 pages today.

·        Start writing “Revenge”, part 2, a continuation of “Marooned”. Yesterday, I stared at a blank page for a couple of hours trying to figure out how to start. There are three stories within the novel. Last night I couldn’t sleep, so I started dreaming on an opening. I will see how that goes when I start later today.

In Actuality:

·        I have to vacuum all the carpets today. I usually vacuum every Sunday. And with the cats starting to shed and since I have been using Kitty litter that the cats have been tracking all through the house, it’s getting messy faster, as of late.

·        I have to wash another load of clothes today, and fold up the clothes I washed yesterday. Knowing me, those clothes would stay in the closet until I need some clean PJs, or something.

·        The college basketball game starts at 3:30 today, The University of Michigan Vs. Michigan State! A must watch for me. I went to U of M, and usually root for the Wolverines. But, State has beaten “M”; twice this year…I am divided on who will win. Heck, I will take the…

·        Oh yeah, gotta wash the dishes from last night and breakfast, this morning. Plus, the lunch dishes, to which, I haven’t eaten as of 11 am today.

·        I gotta, really, really, take a nap today. I know I probably will sleep through the game. I know me, only because, I was awake at 1 am, trying to think of a way to start my story, this morning and I didn’t work out or do my daily walk, today. Issues, issues, issues.

I can’t think of anything else that needs to done or worked on today. I am going to try and do everything mentioned, above, somehow. I have to stay busy or else…longer naps!

NO More JUNK FOOD!

OMG!! I have gained 18 pounds since Christmas and 8 in the last 10 days! (And it's not muscle). Considering I joined Planet Fitness and I have worked out 25 out of 31 days in January. I emptied the trash this past Sunday and found 3 empty large bags of chips. Plus, I took the past week off so I could just relax and let my body...relax.

Anyway, I have finished of the rest of those chips, and I finished, this morning, the rest of those cookies. I am going back to the old ways and eat the way I did the past 3 years, no more junk food! For real! NO more junk food! I gotta get rid of those last 18 pounds and more if I can.

Break -- Fast

I broke my five and a half day fast this morning, normally, for the past 37 years, I have fasted for at least seven day, but I wanted to go hiking and get out on the lake and kayak a little.

I went to the grocery store yesterday to get all the food that I needed to break my fast and what I needed for the next two weeks or so. I usually average $130 when I go grocery shopping, and I usually get a ton of processed food. Stuff like, veggie burgers, canned stuff, lots of frozen stuff, stuff like that, (cookies, donuts, chips…). I thought I would do something different this time…considering that I do this just about every time I fast.

This time I was going to cook, my meals, again. So, I got a lot of vegetables and fruits. I did end up getting some of those frozen veggie burgers, they taste so great, though. When I finished my total bill was only $79! What saved me a lot, I didn’t get a ton of chips and cookies and donuts and way too many other sweet things.

Another thing I did was download and print as many vegetarian recipes as I could find, considering I have a Pinterest page of nothing but vegetarian food and all of the veggie burgers I could find. Heck, I have plenty of time to do what I need to do every day so why not cook breakfast, lunch and dinner?

I just so happened to find a recipe for a bunch of soup, I love soup. I really haven’t had a lot of soup because they come in cans and are full of sodium. As it is, my blood pressure is/was high enough, now. I haven’t checked as of late but, it doing well and I have lowered it in past months.

In my life, I have never liked split-pea soup but, as of late, it is one of my favorites, and Tomato soup. I found recipes for both. I will be cooking up a storm this week.

The one thing I have to watch out for and have done this just about every time I finish a fast, I eat too much at lunch. I usually break my fast with an apple and then, at lunch I make something with a lot of things with protein and find it hard to stop eating. I eat too much and regret it in the end. Not this time. I will not fall into that trap again and, so far so good.  Well, I did have two extra pieces of…

In 2014, I stayed away from a lot of sweets, chips and a lot of other junk foods and lost 78 pounds. Of course I also ran, more often than not, walked, hiked and biked over 1800 miles that year. In 2015, I figure that I could now eat more because I exercised more, now that I think about it, not as much as the year before. I still ended doing about 1300 total miles. However, I gained 10 pounds.

I weighed in at 200 this year and have stayed that weight all year. Today I am 14 pounds under what I was last Sunday. Now, it’s back to the old ways, staying away from all that isn’t good for me, maybe…, I not give up beer, though, I love beer! I hope it won’t be as hard as it has been, my entire adult life but every day is a learning experience. 

Too sweet for me…

It has been about six days since I decided to stop eating sweet sticky stuff, you know, like donuts, cake, pies, and cookies and of course, my favorite, ice cream…vanilla. It had just occurred to me, even though I have thought about it many times in my lifetime that I really need to quit the sweets.

I figured, in 2015 and the earlier part of this year, for all the exercise I do I could at least have something sweet once a month or once a week. I really went overboard last year, though. However, I was doing three times more things last year than I am doing this year.

Another thing that just hit me, three weeks ago I weighed in at 199. Six days ago, I was at 208! During that time span, I had consumed three dozen cookies, a couple, half gallon, tubs of ice cream and a couple donuts. Eight pounds! The peanut butter cookies were 150 calories each and I had four with my coffee every morning.

Six days ago, I decided to pick up my walking and run at least one mile in between. Yesterday and today, I ran most of the three miles. As of yesterday, I weighed 202 pounds. I really haven’t included any extra activities this year, yet but I really think I need to. In addition, the best way to help drop those pounds, lift weights. 

Earlier this year I hurt my shoulder, playing racquetball, and it still hurts today, but not as bad as it did in March. That is the reason I stopped lifting. However, I stopped the lifting part and only walked, every day.

It’s funny, strange or just real…in 2014 I didn’t eat sweets at all, (at least I don’t remember eating any sweets), and I dropped almost 80 pounds. 2015 was a different story.

I am not doing this to look slimmer or great, not saying that I don’t all ready, but in 2013,  a visit to the doctor and I found out that my sugar level was super high, my cholesterol was super high, and my BP was elevated, higher that I have ever experienced in my life. The doctor put me on blood pressure drugs and I am not into drugs. So, I stopped the drugs at the end of 2013 and started my workouts.

Now, I am afraid to stop, well, not really, I enjoy working out, sort of. I would love to ramp my routines up, a lot, though. This, so I won’t be as weak as I was at the beginning of this year, I am going to join one of those gym, the $10 a month gym and stay on the bicycle so won’t get as tired and I’ll be ready for those long, long bicycle trips. 

I know I am not going to live forever, (most of my aunts and uncles, on my mother’s side have lived into their 90’s and the last living aunt is 98 and still gets out and dances and enjoys life), but I want to make the most out of the life I have now and if it means getting out and running, walking, hiking, kayaking, biking, softball, racquetball, and golf, (all the things I do now), then that’s what I am going to do to stay healthy and do away with sweets and stuff…oh yeah, and potato chips, too.