SEE Ya!

March, 2009.

Let's see.

Not a banner month for HotchPotchery. I wallowed in self-pity which led to a crazy-ass funk, got my "best" paper rejected which broke my work heart, ONLY lost 3.2 lbs (my 6 lb statement from the other day included a weigh-in from March 2, which was mostly February weight loss), sat through THREE completely rainy weekends (one with snow), AND had to wait extra long to get paid (I am semi-monthly).

But also: I ran 5K for the first time all in a row, did Body Pump, got a different paper accepted, bought and wore extra large workout pants (that is just ONE extra if you are keeping score) and watched a friend get married. All pretty good things, actually, really good things, but man, did I really pout this month. POUTED hard. I nearly got to the point where I was never going to get to pout in the Olympics...I almost turned pro. I had one endorsement deal but I decided it is going the way of March. This time in 3 hours, funk OVER. busted. moved on.

Tomorrow, I will be bright, shiny, and happy. I will still be a bitch, but I will be damn happy about it.

ETA: Tuesday nights we always watch American Idol with the highschool kid. Tonight as it was ending we got a scrolly thing telling us that our local Fox affiliate decided we weren't grown enough to decide for ourselves if we wanted to watch the Osbourne's new variety show. That really peeves me. a lot.

seven, seven, SEVEN

Got word of my seventh publication getting accepted this evening. Well, techically it is "conditionally accepted." I have a several hours worth of editing to do, but no biggie.

I have to tell you, my *7* dance for Mr. P looked a bit too !SUPERSTAR!. It really wasn't all that too hot. I must work on that.

I feel giddy with relief, for some reason 7 seems hugely bigger than 6.

HUGELY. bigger.

but really, probably not statistically significantly bigger. that's for you other stat dorks out there. cheers.

Oh, and I am about to google 30Something so I can watch it, I never did. I am 30something for another 4 months, so I better get my watch on.

Not quite the weekend we planned.

Friday I was SO sore from Body Pump I took the day off knowing I would have the 5K on Saturday, then we planned on Body Pump again for Sunday afternoon. Saturday morning it was pouring and thundering, so we slept in. No 5K. We tried to go to the BBQ contest but that was cut short due to all the rain. We ended up having a good Saturday night with tons of people we normally only see during football season, then Sunday we stayed in bed until 1pm, so while that was all good for me and Mr. P, not so great on getting (physically) healthier. Sunday afternoon we went to the gym to go run and do Body Pump, and we both made it 30 minutes WALKING on the treadmills, no Body Pump. We just destroyed ourselves this weekend...bad food, not working out. In fact, I didn't even journal my points for Saturday or Sunday.

I took my Fat Test this morning, and scored a scare lower than last week, with a 90.88% (down .2lbs from last week). I just looked back at March, and I can see that I have been half-assing it. I have lost every week, but for a grand total of 6 pounds. Don't get me wrong, 6 pounds a month is decent and if that is my pattern from here on out, I could live with it. BUT, I know how I am working the system, and I can do better. Mr. P and I have decided to work hard to get our healthy momentum back. We are stocked on good food, we have solid gym plans, and maybe this weekend will be a boating weekend with some camping...we can decide in a day or two once we get a somewhat reliable weather report.

In other news, Mr. P and I have decided to run the Disney 1/2 Marathon in January. Before I can begin that training, I have to be able to comfortably run 20+ miles per week, and if at any point during the 1/2 marathon I am not keeping up a 16 minute mile pace, they will pick me up and take me back and I won't get my medal. YIKES. I have.work.to.do. Right now, I can only consistently run 2 miles at a go, so upping that to 13.1 miles will be a significant hurdle, but I am up for it!

I am hoping that concentrating on the running (something within my control) will help me NOT focus solely on getting tenure (at this point, OUT of my control), and will keep me from being the brooding, moody basket case I have been the last several weeks!

ETA: Ummm. No iPod while running, and I would be stuck inside my own head with. "This hurts. This is stupid. This hurts. I am an idiot." ? I never saw that in the rules. I better check on that one more time.

ETA AGAIN: From the Disney website:
For everyone's safety, baby joggers/strollers, bicycles, inline skates, skateboards, headphones, and animals will be prohibited on the course. I skipped RIGHT OVER headphones. jeez.

PUMP me up!

Yesterday, Mr. P and I went to the gym and got coerced...well dared actually, to attend a Body Pump class. Technically, Mr. P got dared and I went out of shear curiosity.

It was sort of romantic....we set up next to each other, used the mirror to make eye contact to check in with each other, laughed at how FREAKING hard it was. Then we went to check out a friend's new bar and ate fried pickles and chicken wings, drank beers and sang some pretty atrocious karaoke. Total Eclipse of the Heart? What was I thinking?

While fun, the evening wasn't great because Mr. P was crabby, but trying hard not to be which actually made it worse...he would try to joke, but it would come out sort of mean, then he would get defensive and I would too. Bottom line, Mr. P and I are out of sync. I am in a funk. Mr. P is in a funk....our combined funks have resulted in our coupledom landing squarely in Funkytown. We are just sort of bleh.

I am bored of this now and have (FINALLY) reached the point in my funk that I am sick of feeling like shit, and am ready to take some action to turn things around...I think Mr. P is there too, he brought home flowers today, and has said that we ARE going to the lake on Sunday if this dismal, rainy weather passes. For tomorrow, we are doing a 5K in the morning, then are planning to spend the afternoon mozying around a big BBQ competition where a friend is competing. All in all, I think we have an excellent chance of really reconnecting this weekend and starting next week with good attitudes and better moods.

Does this ever happen to you? What do you do to get out of it?

I thought I was four degrees from DINOSAURS

Astarte made a comment about Mr. P meeting Sam Shepard,...she mentioned how she has liked Sam Shepard since he was in Jurassic Park. I didn't realize he was in Jurassic Park and told Mr. P how excited I was to be 4 degrees from dinosaurs (dinosaurs - Sam - Mr. P - me).


Mr. P looked at me all funny and said, "Sam Shepard was not in Jurassic Park, that was Sam Neill. Plus, I met Sam Elliot."


mmm. oh. my bad. (in my defense he SAID Sam Shepard). I think.


Anyways, Mr. P also met Hal Moore of We are Solders (played by Mel Gibson), Basil Plumley, also of We are Soldiers (played by Sam Elliot) AND Theodore Roosevelt IV (great grandson of Theodore Roosevelt). All these dudes were at the grand opening of the big project Mr. P has been working on for three years.


So instead of being four degrees from dinosaurs, I am five degrees from cartoon Pocahontas (cartoon Pocahontas - Mel Gibson (cartoon John Smith) - Hal Moore - Mr. P - me) and only four degrees from The Hulk (The Hulk - Sam Elliot - Mr. P - me). sweet.


oh yeah. American History. I am pleased to report that my brother-in-law is at most 5 degrees from his very favorite president (wt - Mr. P - Teddy IV - Teddy Jr. - Teddy). He may already have established his own linkage, but just in case.

Last straw

Nope. This is not going to be another whiney post about how my life is too hard, when well, it just isn't. Don't get me wrong, I totally did cry at the park, getting healthy really sucks sometimes and I was devastated when my paper got rejected, but overall? I have got it pretty good, even though my DVD player spins the DVDs too loudly. Can't buy good electronics for $24.99 anymore. fuck.

Anyways, this is about Jon and Kate. Plus Eight. on TLC. Awhile ago I quit watching them because I just wasn't finding the show endearing anymore. Tonight I was flipping through the channels and I saw that Jon and Kate was on, so I decided to watch for a few minutes. They were getting ready to go see the Harlem Globetrotters, and Jon said he had to do some work. Piqued interest. His work was LOOKING AT THE ALLSTATE WEBSITE. what?!?!?!?

That type of "product placement" is annoying enough on Biggest Loser, when they have weirdly staged snack breaks, but for whatever reason, Jon calling that work made me so annoyed that I turned the tv off, but not completely off. Just changed over to DVDs.

Damn. That DVD player is SO freaking LOUD. the incessant whirring.

oh the humanity. the spinny spinny noise of that DVD player. I just need to start getting my porn on iTunes.

I don't want it

Pretty much this entire weekend I have been in a super pissy, whiny, horrid mood. Not necessarily outward, but inward.

I don't want to exercise so I have done it half-assed.
I don't want to eat healthy, so I have stayed in my points, but not making healthy choices.
I don't want to get my work done, so I have done the shear minimum to get through the day.
I don't want to comment on blogs because I have NOTHING to say.

I am in a super funk, and I seriously don't want it. I think it comes from 3 solid months of working out, eating healthy, getting a bunch done at regular work, and still being SO FAR from feeling like I can 'relax'.

Anyways, today was fat test day, and I scored 90.95% (which is a 1.8 lb loss). That B+ has been quite elusive, I have been floating above it for several weeks now. The college kid has one class that is on a 7 point scale...and in that class, I would have a solid B. But, no fair changing the scale halfway through....

Back to my funk. When you are in a superfunk, how do you break out? A movie? Pedicure? Sex? A puppy?

Help me!

Mr. P will be grateful for any idea that works since I cried after jogging at the park yesterday because I wanted to quit it all and just be fat since Mr. P doesn't care that I am losing weight. I went on and on about how he has time for marine stereos and rebuilding propellors and solitaire on his iPhone, but hey...no time to let me know he is proud of me....and really after typing this, I realize my ridiculousity because I am NOT DOING THIS FOR HIM and I really shouldn't be relying on him to make me feel good about this journey. I just wanted him to.

In his defense, he does care, but he isn't caring the exact way I want him to, so I went a little nutball on him. OH, and if you are curious as to what I want him to do so I can just tell him... yeah. I don't know. Hence the superfunk.

Weird HotchPotch

I think I might be spending too much time reading blogs. I have started dreaming about bloggers.

~Awhile ago Swistle asked her readers to guess her baby's real name. I guessed Owen. That night, I dreamt that she called me to tell me how ridiculous my guess was because clearly his name is Marshall.

-Last night I had a dream that I was at the aquarium and Bea worked there, and insisted on brushing my hair while we watched passers by. Then, she told me that she thought Kevin Bacon was hott and she was thinking about leaving J. for him.

****************

Today I went to a local pizza place for lunch (one slice of broccoli pizza with a side spinach salad). There was a dude sitting next to me working on his computer. He got a phone call and during the conversation he said, "Yeah, I am sitting at the bar, 3 hours from home, drinking tea and eating a salad." Here's the thing. He was eating HUMMUS and drinking a GUINNESS.

***************

I am very disturbed that my Thursday Survivor habit is pre-empted for basketball. I like the March Madness just fine, but NOT DURING SURVIVOR. That being said, my Aggies did win this morning. On the subject of sports, I think tomorrow will be a very sporty day. An afternoon baseball game, then my school is in the NIT (the basketball tournament for the losers who didn't make the big tournament) and we are thinking about going to the game. They have hotdogs there. 8 points baby, and worth every single one of them. I don't eat a lot of meat, but man, I love hotdogs.

**************

I really thought I had 4 bullet points, but I am out. OH, Mr. P met Sam Sheppard today. Now, I am out.

GIGO

I teach business processes and systems classes and I constantly tell my students that it does not matter how elegant the system, if what is input is garbage, the output will be garbage. Garbage In Garbage Out.

Tuesday night we partook in some revelry that included green beers and green shots, lots of karaoke, and then TACO BELL. Yikes. For those of you Weight Watchers familiar, that was every. single. weekly. point. Then yesterday I went for a run and it sucked. bad. I am on Week 6 Day 2 of Couch to 5K, which is run 1 mile, walk 1/4 mile, then run another mile. I got to the halfway point of the second mile and that was it. I was toast. I felt horribly dehydrated, nauseous, awful. I deserved it. GIGO, right?

I spent the rest of yesterday on a healthy mission, ate healthy food, drank lots of water, got good rest, and this morning got back out to the park to run. I was already working on this post in my head...after treating my body so well (for one day) I was going to be a jogging machine.

It is really pretty dumb that I thought that since I wasn't a jogging machine BEFORE. I did get through the workout, but it was s---l---0---w goings. I guess I am not quite as ready to switch to half marathon training as I thought. Stupid Biggest Loser.

Won't you be...my neighbor?

About a month or so ago, our college kid was walking to work from campus and saw this cute little white house that she thought Mr. P and I would like to rent for the two years while I either get tenure and we build, or I don't get tenure, try to get tenure again, then build, or try to get tenure two times then move. I tried calling and calling and got no answer and no call backs. Then a few days ago, Mr. P and I decided, you know what? We will just stay put, moving is a pain, blah blah. I was semi-sad because I really, really want to be able to walk to work. Really.

Then today, my sister calls me and asks me to check out a house she found online. I did. I won't steal her posting thunder regarding her new digs, but suffice it to say, I think they are going to really like living there.

While stalking my sister's house, I saw the little house the college kid told me about (that is 1.6 miles from my office without considering the across campus shortcut that would take me right by Starbucks) and I texted Mr. P and he called, and it sounds like it might be a match. We are going to visit it and talk to the owner on April 9th. So my sister and I might both be moving this summer.

Here is the crazy part. I would live 2 minutes from my sister. ON FOOT. LITERALLY. I Google Mapped it.

For the last 9 years we have lived hundreds and hundreds of miles apart. In 5 months we could live .1 miles apart. Right now we are both nearly giddy with the possibilities. If you could, would you want to live .1 miles from your sister? Keep in mind my sister has my (to be) 3 year old nephew!

Oh, thank you all so much for the kind words and pep talks over the last couple of days. What is weird is that today I am basically over the rejection, and still on track for healthy, healthy, healthy with no guilt on that front. I am actually about to go run to help counteract some green beers I will be enjoying this evening. Thanks bloggers!

I wrote the gospel of giving up.

Nope, I didn't give up on myself yesterday. The title is just lyrics from a song I was listening to when I went to the GYM for 2+ hours yesterday afternoon. (My sister LOVES references to song lyrics.)

Took my Fatty McGoo test this morning, and scored 91.61%. Not much of a change from last week (.6lbs) but still trending downward. I did lose 1.06lbs of fat though.

For the first time in a long time, I am letting myself feel my actual hurt. My hurt about my paper. My hurt about my research portfolio. My hurt over work that has to be done, perhaps in vain, for this tenure decision since my preliminary packet has to be submitted in two weeks. Hurting sucks. Hurting about something out of my control sucks so big. Nothing I can do about Alain. It is what it is, and my only choice is to get my shit together and move forward. I feel like I am pretty close to being able to do just that.

Normally though, my course of action would be to mask my actual hurt with food and perhaps an adult beverage or eight. THEN, I can hurt over my bad decisions, which I can control. I am not sure why that has been the better choice in the past, but I am glad it wasn't my choice yesterday.

I hope it won't be my choice today.

bumming hard.

Alain flaked and rejected my paper. Now I have to start all the way over in the publication process, and I am out. of. time. I feel so completely dejected. I want to eat a bunch of food. I want to go out and drink some beers. I want to crawl into bed and not get out until I get a lightning flash of an idea of what the fuck to do next. damn it anyways.

simple reminder.

Sunrise, Sunset

Thanks for all the wishes of broken bones flying the way of my boy. In the local community theater spring musical, Fiddler on the Roof, highschool kid will be playing the role of Perchik. I have never seen this particular play, and had to read the synopsis on Wikipedia. To be fair, I also had to do that when he got cast as Simon Stinson in Our Town, Officer Brophy in Arsenic and Old Lace, and random cowboy in Oklahoma!. The only part he has ever played that I didn't have to Wikipedia was when he was Uncle Henry in Wizard of Oz (he also played the dude guarding the Emerald City).

Best of all...he beat out his acting nemesis. In EVERY school production, this one kid has beat highschool kid out for the role he wanted. After highschool kid came in third in the STATE in a drama competition, and the nemesis didn't even make the cut, highschool kid asked his teacher what the deal was. She told him that with nemesis in the play, more kids would come to the production because he was more popular. Apparently, popularity doesn't mean jack in community theater!

Oh, did I mention that I have to volunteer for the theater group for a minimum of 3 hours so that he could be in the play since he is not 18? I hope I get to paint scenery. Tsarist Russia screams hot pink, no?

Call backs.

My highschool kid auditioned for the community theater production of Fiddler on the Roof yesterday. He had to go sing a song and perform a monologue in front of STRANGERS. He got a call back. Wish him bone breaking thoughts. Well, just until about 5:30pm Central time. After that, it would just be cruel.

Thanks to all the support I have gotten at home and from this blog, I also had a callback to my Couch to 5K workout that I considered a FAIL from yesterday. This morning? SUCCESS!

I just checked to be sure, and we are calling back LOST! from last week that Mr. P deleted JUST AS I was sitting down to watch it. He can NOT work his new HD DVR. So tonight is flatiron steak, baked potatoes and some deliciously confusing time travel.

My Dad sent me an email last night. He used "lol" in the email. That is just wrong. Not in the theme of callbacks, but wrong.

Mistakes in PEN

I am not good at slack. Cutting slack that is. Not for my kids, my husband, my students, my family and certainly not myself. I have extreme expectations and if they are not met, well you better prepare for the storm of bitchiness that will rain upon you.

My highschool kid has a 3.5 GPA that has earned him a great scholarship. I have to BITE MY TONGUE to not ask why A's and B's are in even amounts...why not a few extra A's? My college kid got a C in Economics last semester and that irks me to no end, even though, I also got a C in Economics in college and apparently that did not bar me from all future success.

About 5 years ago I did WeightWatchers fairly successfully, I lost 45 pounds in 5 months, and my exercise of choice was jogging. My body responds extremely well to running, and I was doing fantastic. Except I got plantar fasciitis and I couldn't run for awhile, and instead of doing the obvious and recognizing that my weight loss would slow down while recovering, I refused to cut myself any slack, and opted for the next best solution...gaining all that weight back, and 25 extra pounds just to show my committment to the cause.

Jump to yesterday. I got up and before I left for work I did the Couch to 5K workout for week 5, day 3. Warmup 1/4 mile, jog 2 miles no stopping. I did it. I felt great. I went to work, taught my classes, then met Mr. P at the gym where I did 30 minutes on the elliptical machine and my weights. All good.

This morning, I get up to go do my same Couch to 5K as yesterday, and after about a half a mile I could feel in my knees and my hip that it just wasn't going to happen today, so after jogging for 1.5 miles I walked the rest of the way home. I only did a 2 mile workout, and when I was getting ready for work I felt like such a failure. Then I started really thinking. Maybe I should cut myself just a little bit of SLACK. Dude, that was a 1.5 mile jog when that wasn't even on the radar just a week ago. It was a two mile workout that burned 399 calories in 30 minutes. TWO MILES. Why can't that be good enough?

If I can't do something PERFECT, then I don't do it at all. If I don't have time to clean my house that includes every baseboard, every floor, every cabinet, then I don't even bother with any of it. If I have a paper that won't work at the very best journal, I scrap it. If I do a Sudoko in pen and mess it up, I TEAR IT OUT OF MY BOOK AND THROW IT AWAY.

I need to figure out how to cut myself some slack and occassionally, even allow a mistake in PEN.

How about you? What are your perfectionist tendencies and how do they bite you in the ass?

Fatty McFlufferbut

Today is the first time in over a month that I was dreading my fat test, technically I was still on plan for WeightWatchers, but...well, it was more form over function if you know what I mean. However, Mr. P and I did another 5K this weekend (42 minutes!!), and with my other workouts, my bod did not let me down...I scored 91.82%!*

I am almost just VERY GOOD at being fatty mc fat fat fat. However, my BMI is still kind of a drag since according to that I am still EXTREMELY obese, which is a special category of morbidly obese for those of you keeping score at home. I am looking forward to being just plain old obese. That word sucks ass by the way. I looked all that up last night while watching part of 1/2 Ton Mom on TLC, but she was breaking my heart with a BMI of 113 and I couldn't figure out at what point you get that heavy and I got all morose so I had to turn that off, and I couldn't watch House because I was sort of afraid of that commercial coming on again, so I had to watch Everybody Loves Raymond DVDs instead.

*I lost .6 pounds, but 1.82 pounds of FAT. So there you go.

My heart is POUNDING

from simply watching the trailer for "Something Scary Happened in Connecticut". That isn't the real name but I am too scared of what the website might be like to google it to find the real name.

Scary is not my gig.

Extra! Extra!

When my EXTRA EXTRA LARGE Christmas Eve pajama pants did not fit, my decision to get healthier began, and at the beginning of the year, Mr. P and I set out on our new healthy, healthy, healthy lifestyle which consists of the following three prongs of health:

Healthy: Eating better food
Healthy: Getting fitter bodies
Heathy: Drinking less beer

I have felt Mr. P's resolve fading, so I asked him if he was over being healthy, healthy, healthy. His response? "I think that two healthies would be good." After chatting a bit more, less beer and more exercise are jiving well with him, but he is seriously jonesing for his fatty diet to be restored (read fast food three-ish times per week). What about you? Which healthy prong is (or would be) your toughest to stick with for the long haul?

Oh, and while on the topic of extra, how about Daylight Savings Time? While I have a funky internal clock that takes forever to get used to the time change, I am very happy we get extra light starting tomorrow. I know technically it isn't EXTRA light, but since I get up after 7:30 most days, sunshine at 6:30am is really a waste.

Please pay for all your yogurt.

Have you seen the commercial for the yogurt that is just so delicious the lady snarfles a whole container right on the dairy aisle? If you check out the teensie tinsie print, it says something along the lines of making sure you pay for all your yogurt. That makes me laugh. Every time. Interestingly, I have NO idea what kind of yogurt it is. Too bad advertising dudes.

That commercial came on and I got sidetracked from the real reason I was posting...I saw Mr. P at work today and it was really amazing. He is my goofball with a capital GOOF, but at his work, he is super impressive Architect Man. It was pretty hot, and I went and bought the ingredients to cook him one of his favorite dinners. I thought maybe we would do a little 50's style improv (with ME as the housewife).

Then the highschool kid got home and he got a letter that says he got ANOTHER scholarship. More duckets for the Potchery kiddo. So now, instead of just being the doting wife, I am adding loving mother to my repertoire for the evening. Maybe tomorrow my guys won't be so awesome and we can just get takeout and not do the dishes or the laundry.

12:22

Twelve minutes and twenty two seconds.

I.
jogged.
a MILE.
in.
12 minutes.
and 22 seconds.
today.
outside.

I did that. I did jog a mile.

The fattest chick in the room

This morning I took my fat test, and I scored in the still quite good at being fat range: 92.04%. That being said, in college, if I scored that on a test, I would be concerned because that A wouldn't hold up even a small hiccup on another test or project.... but this morning I am not feeling proud or confident or anything even remotely positive.

I have been at this new lifestyle for two months...I have lost nearly 8% of my body weight (over 20lbs) and maybe more importantly, I have really improved my fitness. I am probably a month away from being able to perform a "jogging motion" for an entire 5K.

Regardless of all that, I am still the fattest chick in the room, and yes, I almost always take a census. My attitude today worries me because I truly believed when I started on this journey that my primary goal was to get healthy. Mr. P and I spend a ton of time out on our boat, and becoming more physically fit will only make those experiences better....more tubing, maybe water skiing, easier time getting in and out of the boat. We want to take a trip to the Galapagos Islands with snorkeling, sea kayaking, hiking, and horseback riding. We love theme parks and I want to go on the rides.

However, this last two weeks, I have started getting comments about how I look, and man, vanity can kick health's ass in mere seconds. I am afraid my impatience to look good may derail the more important goal of getting fit.

So, would you order HOT with a side of healthy? Or order HEALTHY with a side of hot?

Thundersnow

Yesterday we woke up to HORRENDOUS thunderstorms which dumped about as much water as we got when Ivan came up through Alabama several years ago. Then the day cleared up and was close to 70 degrees and sunny.



This morning we woke up to some thunder, not as intense, with this accompaniment:

The snow is having a bizarre effect on my appetite, and frankly, I am blaming Darwin and/or bears. There is snow. I need to build up my fat storage. I am going to HAVE to eat marshmallow eggs and McDonald's just to survive this treacherous weather. You see?