weight loss 1 Comment

Diet & Fitness Update, Week #11

This one’s a little overdue, so I’d better get it posted before I have to write two updates at once.

I did gain one pound last week, bringing me back up to 209.5 pounds. That wasn’t unexpected, though, since Aaron was on vacation last week and we ended up going out for dinner a few times. After my Friday weigh-in, we went off to the Anime Punch anime convention, where we proceeded to eat like crap, so I’ll be pleasantly surprised if I hold steady at 209.5 for Week #12.

Exciting things for last week:

  • Moved to Workout #2 on my PUSH DVD. Yay for side planks, floor dips, and other manner of bodily strain. I’ve been sticking with it, though, and can feel a bit of a difference already. Less shaking and quivering in the abs, slightly more endurance in the arms.
  • Did not eat any oatmeal for breakfast all week! Huzzah! Had yummy organic Apple Cinnamon cereal or a Slim-Fast Low-Carb Meal Replacement shake or… well, I think those were my two different breakfasts all week. Still no breakfast burrito.
    [Edit: I did make myself a peanut butter protein shake for breakfast one day. I didn’t use enough PB, though, so it was a little bland.]
  • Discovered almonds. OMG, Sheryl, you were so right. I can’t freakin’ stay away from the damn almonds now. I bring a baggie of them in my purse for my afternoon snack, and damned if I can’t keep my hands out of them. Good stuff.

This week, I’m focusing on lowering my calories again. I think I’ve been eating too many, perhaps. I haven’t been keeping track. I need to start doing that again.

This coming weekend, I’m hoping to get some whole wheat English muffins for breakfast. OMG, English muffins with natural peanut butter… Mmm, that sounds SO good.

Apart from that? Less than two weeks until I take new measurements and photos. (I should probably also take some measurements this week, actually.) Oh, and this time, I may just share one of my in-progress photos with the internets, as I just got myself a new swimsuit via mail-order. w00t! Size 18 Tall, black, underwire cups, pretty basic. But it’s made of this great, thick, stretchy Spandexy material that really holds my stuff in. Swear to god, I spent ten minutes just primping in front of the bathroom mirror, and that is so unlike me. And, holy crap, I didn’t have to order from the “Women’s” sizes! Sure, I still got an 18, but it was technically a Misses Long Torso, not Women’s. (The Women’s didn’t come in Long Torso.)

Thank the Flying Spaghetti Monster for Tall / Long Torso sizes. I’m 5’10”, and I hate getting a melvin from my bathing suit.

mormonism

Share Your Opinions

So, here’s how this random web of internetting came about: I read this post on Dooce’s site in which she wrote about her take on a recent HBO series called Big Love. Apparently, this series is about a polygamist family in Utah. Being that Dooce is a popular “recovering Mormon,” she ended up having nearly 300 comments — one of which, of course, was mine:

Diana Schnuth said at 09:09PM, 03.28.2006:

Back when I was a practicing Mormon, there was a woman in my Ward who had been widowed shortly after she was married, then had re-married and had several children. What bothered me was that she was still sealed to her first husband, and no amount of thrashing at red tape could get the Church to change that and seal her to her new husband and her family. Only men can be sealed to multiple spouses.

BTW, kudos to you for keeping comments open on such a potentially volatile topic.

I got a few hits to my blog from that comment, as I always do when I post a comment on a high-traffic blog like Dooce or WWDN, but none of them involved hate mail (thankfully) or exhortations to rejoin the LDS flock (even more thankfully).

I did receive one e-mail, though. A Dr. Michael Nielsen contacted me and asked me to participate in his study on religion and attitudes about marriage — specifically, Mormonism and polygamy. It took me less than the 30 minutes he had estimated in the Informed Consent form, and I actually found it very interesting.

Well, it was interesting to me, anyway. I enjoyed answering questions about my history with the Mormon church, and how I feel that the teachings are mainly a bunch of bunk, but that I do categorize Mormons as Christians, and that one of my most frequently-visited religion-based websites is exmormon.org.

When I e-mailed Dr. Nielsen to ask him to update me on the findings of his study, he e-mailed me back (or maybe his bot did) and encouraged me to get other people of differing religious backgrounds to take his survey. So, here I am, encouraging you all to take his survey. I found it intriguing, and will be very interested to learn the results and conclusions.

Update, 9pm: Just found this website, which I may have to refer back to later: Mormon No More. It gives instructions as to how to resign from the Mormon church. Well, Mom, I guess you really didn’t have to get yourself excommunicated, after all! 🙂

I wonder if I can get myself removed from the rolls by my 30th birthday. That would be a grand present to myself.

randomness 1 Comment

But The Flesh Is Weak

I have a laundry list of topics to write about. Anime Punch, last week’s diet and fitness update, my new swimsuit (!!), my poor dying hollyhock seedlings. Not to mention working on my poor neglected NaNoWriMo novellette, or Podcast #10.

But, damn, I am so fucking tired today.

It was a Herculean effort to make myself do my PUSH workout today, but I did it. And I’m getting better at it, too. Still, though, all I want to do is curl up on the couch and veg.

I’m gonna chalk this up to The Monday After The Time Change, and not worry about being slackeriffic today. Maybe I’ll manage to crank out a decent blog entry later tonight. If not, though, I figure I’ll at least get some decent Civ IV action going on.

memories 7 Comments

Five Years Ago Last Week

I’ve been re-reading my old diaries and journals, looking for blog-worthy tidbits to share from five, ten, or fifteen years ago. This one is just a little overdue for a Five Years Ago Today, but I’m going to share it anyway.

As a bit of a preamble: in the Spring of 2001, my step-Gary decided (for reasons best left to another blog entry) that he would go into business for himself. He hired me on contract for some graphic design work: logo, business cards, letterhead. Being in my final year of college as a Visual Communication major, I was grateful for the experience, and the pay.

This is one day’s worth of that experience, unabridged, originally written five years ago:

(BTW, Mom? You should probably skip this one.)
Continue reading →

randomness

Story of My Life

There are so many things I should be doing today. I’m overdue to produce episode #10 of The Low Carb Lifestyle Podcast, and I need to work on my cosplay helmet if I’m going to wear it at the con on Saturday, and there’s always work to do for the LSM website, and on and on.

Instead, I’m feeling mighty tired this evening, which is translating into bored and depressed. This is also causing me to consciously fight to stay out of the kitchen. I really, *really* want to make myself another bowl of macaroni, or at least munch on my yummy new organic breakfast cereal. But I won’t. I really won’t.

I’m going to chalk today up to a.) working on real brainpower-type stuff at work for the past few weeks, and b.) having my happy womanly time. I’m just going to let today go. Tomorrow has the potential to be just as productive as today should have been, even though Aaron will be home on vacation.

I hate these kinds of days, though. Meh.