Decisions, Decisions

Thank you again for all of your kind comments and e-mails. This has been a difficult decision for me, as I always have kind of looked at this option as a cop-out, which I know it isn't. From what I've researched, this is not a fly-by-night scheme. Most of the patients wait 6 - 8 months from the time of the first seminar to an actual surgery date. The clinic has you work with a dietician, they do testing (physical and psychological), hook you up with a psychologist, etc.

I did send my parents an e-mail letting them know I was taking the first step. I wasn't sure what kind of reaction I would receive. My mom and I haven't really talked about my weight, but my dad and I have with him expressing concern about my overall health. Of course, both my parents are in shape (Dad still swims competitively, breaking records for his age group, Mom has always been skinny) and I have felt like the black sheep of the family when we all get together. My brother packs on a few extra pounds, but he carries it off much better. Being adopted, and not blessed with their genes, just magnifies these feelings, although I would never admit as much to them. My dad was in NYC, and he called pretty much after reading the e-mail. He even called my mom, who was on her way back to LA from Las Vegas, to discuss.

They both expressed how proud they were that I was making this decision, and how they both supported me. After each call, I burst into tears. I didn't want to hear about how proud they were of their fat daughter choosing surgery over self-control. I mean, I was feeling like this is rock bottom; I couldn't get any lower. To me, having surgery is the same as giving up -- acknowledging that I cannot properly eat and exercise. Hearing them talk about how great this decision was just pushed me deeper into a funk.

And then I got to thinking about it. I've been told by two doctors, my old chiropractor and my old nutritionist that my body has stopped responding properly to traditional dieting methods. Heck, I can't even lose weight on a fast. For whatever reason, thyroid and genes are the leading suspects, I cannot digest glucose correctly. There may be other underlying reasons, but the bottom line is, no matter how much I diet and exercise, my body does not want to lose this excess weight.

Could I eat better? Yes. Could I exercise more? Yes. But it has been come painfully obvious that diet and exercise alone will not change my body. Emotionally and psychologically I want to change, but physically I'm having a hard time, hence the decision to explore a surgical option.

Maybe the nutritionist they assign to me will have some brilliant alternative. One of the comments came from Cara who has had great success with a medically supervised liquid diet. That's something I haven't tried. I don't know if that would work for me, but I would be willing, at this point, to try it before I had surgery.

This is an emotional issue for me, but with something so serious I cannot let emotions cloud my decision. My weight affects so many aspects of my life. My self-esteem and feeling of self worth is effected. I tailor my activities around my weight (for example, we're having a "Take Your Kids to Work" program tomorrow. I was all set to help with the tours of the building, and then they announced we'd have to wear tee-shirts. I took one look at the shirt and realized there was no way on God's green earth I could wear one and not be sent home for indecent exposure, so I backed out). I turn to food for comfort, and with this surgery that will no longer be an option. I'm afraid I will flunk the psych portion (she's far too crazy to have surgery). I mean, if I'm turned away from this, how will I feel then?

This is going to become a very interesting part of my journey. I hadn't really planned on going down this path. But now that I've taken the first step, I want to keep up the momentum, and move forward.

Making The Call

After sitting on the number for nearly 3 weeks, I have made a reservation at one of the local hospitals to hear their seminar on bariatric surgery. I did not want to have to make this call, but after another month of not losing any weight, despite my efforts, I think this has gone on long enough. The thing that put me over the edge was my blood work results. I am glucose intolerant, or pre-pre-diabetic. I will need to re-test this week, but I've walked the tightrope long enough. I cannot continue to play Russian Roulette with my health.

Don's biggest concern is that this is major surgery, and something might happen. But there's plenty that also might happen if I don't -- continued strain on my heart, knees, back; high blood pressure and cholesterol; decreased mobility, lung capacity, self-esteem; depression. My biggest concern is oh-so-vain -- I'm more worried that if I have the surgery I won't be able to afford the plastic surgery that often follows. Heck, I want to look good NAKED (hence the name of this blog) and I can't do that with excess skin folds.

The seminar is next Tuesday. I can't decide if I'm ready for this or not, but I figure listening in on the fact can't hurt. I really wanted to do this the old-fashioned way, but it's not happening for me, and while I'm inspired by so many of your successes, I am also a little depressed that (it seems) every one can lose weight but me. I hope that when they re-test my glucose levels, it will be borderline enough to warrent a visit to a dietician, and I can start there. But when I have easily 150 pounds to lose, I don't think my biology will let me succeed with any kind of urgency. I'm to young to feel this old, and my body is too old to let this go on, since it will only get harder.

While it's not a foregone conclusion this will happen, this blog my shortly change from a weight loss blog to a weight loss surgery blog.

Spring Cleaning Saturday

I am so procrastinating getting started in on round one of Spring Cleaning. The focus today is on the upstairs (office, 2 guest rooms, bathroom, master bed & bath) and tomorrow is the downstairs (laundry room, powder room, living & dining room, kitchen, family room). Luckily we aren't a dirty family, but I with two dogs, there is a lot of hair and we like to have the windows open, which creates a lot of dust. But instead of starting, I'm waiting for the Minnesota Vikings to make their first draft pick.

Don is covering the draft, and it will be a long day. The first round is all 32 teams taking 15 minutes each. The second round is down to 10 minutes per team, and then the rest of the rounds (round 3 today and rounds 4 - 7 tomorrow) are 5 minutes per team. It seems that every teams takes the maximum amount of time per round, so the first round could easily go eight hours, round 2 five hours and round 3 three hours. Pretty much, I will see Don either really late tonight or early tomorrow morning (after midnight). For the most part, the actual draft is boring -- reading the analysis tomorrow and Monday will be interesting. Personally, I'm hoping the Vikings pick USC's Mike Williams. I guess I might be one of the few that find this process tedious -- ESPN just showed the Vikings' facility where they reported 4000 people were there. A hint for any single woman out there -- a good place to meet men would be at one of these draft parties. The ratio has to be 15:1. At least. (ed. note -- the Vikings, making a huge mistake in my opinion, picked Troy Williamson, a much less talented WR than Mike Williams.)

I did my second round at Let's Dish, making 8 meals in under an hour. Gotta love that. I did 5 pork wrap dishes (Asian, Mexican and Southwest, Greek Chicken and rice, Jack Daniel's Beef tips and seafood chow mein. These are great dishes in the fact that most take less than 30 minutes to cook. The pork dishes are for the crockpot, so they take 8 hours, but with no effort on my part.

The weather here has really thrown us for a loop. Minnesota had a very dry winter in terms of snowfall (about 25 inches vs. the norm of 50+). We've been enjoying very warm temps, including hitting 80 last weekend (hence the sunburn). We're now closer to norm, reaching 50 (maybe) today. When we woke up this morning, it was actually below 32. The funny thing is that even when the night temps have been in the 40s, we've been sleeping with the windows open. Heck, I've been driving with my sunroof open most mornings when it's only about 45 degrees. I'm just happy it's sunny, and the days are long, with the sun rising at about 6:15 and dusk lasting until 8:30 or so.

Well, now that the Vikings have made their draft pick, I better get changed and onto my cleaning.

The Doctor is IN

I had no idea part of my job description would be marriage counselor. One of the Team Leaders who I'm pretty close to was in really early this morning. When I asked why, he said he wasn't ready to talk about it and then went right in to telling me all about it.

Basically his wife is on a girls' road trip, got very drunk and pretty much passed out in a guy's room (he's friends with the girls, married w/ kids). This is not the first time this has happened and he's pretty much besides himself. He might be a tad overreactive, but it seems that in the past when she's passed out, her friend and the guy hooked up and other stuff. I feel badly watching him go through this.

I can't really blame him. I know I'm a jealous person. Heck, I get jealous of the amount of time Don is spending on his job. I don't know specifically how I would react if I found out he passed out in a woman's room while on the road, but it wouldn't be pretty. I also know, if I did the same, he would have every right to be mad at me.

I'm sure I'll hear more tonight when we all go out for happy hour for a good bye party for one of our other team leaders. I just hope he's able to work things out. If I were in her shoes, I would be so upset at myself for letting down Don. (ed. note -- Honey, if you're reading, this will never happen)

Anyway, what I was really going to write about was this new law where sex offenders would be tracked by GPS. An interesting idea, in theory. What happened to the two girls in Florida was horrible. I don't know if having these sex offenders wearing ankle monitors would have prevented the murders. It also scares me that, while it may seem like an easy decision now, how easy will it be to monitor former murderers or other criminals? What if the government decided to monitor "terrorists" or at least their definition of terrorists?

Some of us were talking at work about a new microchip for dogs that would include GPS capabilities (right now, any dog that is microchipped needs to be scanned by a vet or pound) and how that technology might be applied for Alzheimer patients.

Again, in theory, this seems like a good idea. I tend to be hesitant about getting 100% behind it because of the future implications.

Don and I have discussed how the American people might give up certain rights to curb crime. Would you want criminals monitored via GPS? Just sex offenders? Just juvenile sex offenders? Where do you draw the line?

Kind of a random, wandering post, I know....kind of like my week...

Pretty in Pink....and Green

Well, good news...I guess the gods heard my pleas and my former boss e-mailed me saying that the HR system rejected my bonus because I was listed as terminated instead of transferred. My bonus, and a generous one at that, will be on my next paycheck. She had to submit these bonuses about 2 weeks ago, so I don't know why she didn't just e-mail me that then, but I'm not going to get nit-picky now. Of course, the big question is what to spend it on? Since I'm the practical type, it will probably go to bills, new patio chairs, an outfit or two and getting the carpets cleaned. Not in that order, but something along those lines.

This was a glorious weekend. I did spend a lot of it relaxing -- catching up on mail, magazine reading, bill paying (not fun, but I will have paid off a few things by the end of the month, and that makes me really happy), dog walking, sunning, etc. One also should not laugh at the Minnesota sun, especially after a long winter. I am the palest I have been in a long, long time, and I plopped down on the deck on Sunday to read without sunblock (I know, I know), and actually turned a little pink around the edges. Plus, I now have funny tan lines -- I was out with my exercise pants and a jog bra so my arms, chest, feet and face are tan. I'll plan better next time.

This weekend is major spring cleaning. Don will be at the Vikings covering the NFL Draft (yawn) on Saturday and Sunday. I figure I will start upstairs on Saturday and do downstairs on Sunday. Mostly it's just airing out, dusting, bathrooms (ugh!), vacuuming and moving a few things around (I've decided I hate where my pots and pans are in the kitchen). We haven't really lived in the house long enough to gunk up the garage or basement, although the garage does need a good sweep.

Next weekend, I'll send the dogs out for grooming so I can get the carpets and sofa cleaned. We still need to hire a lawn service. The sprinkler guys were out and they have to move 7 sprinkler heads from the outside of the fence to the inside. I should get the vent ducts cleaned as well. There are a few other odds and ends, but we're pretty well caught up in general maintenance. Ahh, the joys of homeownership.

Anyway, off to tackle my tasks for today. It looks like it could be another long one, but at least I feel like I'm getting a lot accomplished!

T.G.I.F.

I have a To Do list a mile long, and I can only focus on how angry and hurt I am.

I believe I mentioned before that my company does yearly bonuses to reward us for our previous year's performance. Last year, I worked 10 months on the travel side (the same office I had been at for 8 years and 10 months) and 2 months on the financial advisors' side. When I had my review with my former leader, she gave me a middle rating, even though I thought I deserved a higher rating. I didn't fight it because I actually had 3 leaders last year, and she could only really review me on the 2 months she was my leader. I disagreed with it, but didn't fight it because my new boss (who I had only been reporting to for 2 months) not only gave me a high rating (and told me it would have been higher if he had managed me longer) but also a 5% increase. That was unexpected, and a very nice gesture.

The big question was about my bonus. Last year, I got the same middle rating and a nice bonus. When I asked my former leader about a bonus for 2004, she said she would look into it. That was in mid-March. I left two follow-up voicemails and sent 2 e-mails, one of which she responded to saying she was still looking into it. So today is the day that bonuses were to show up on the paychecks. It would have been nice, appropriate, and the right thing to do if she had called me and said, "Shannin, I appreciate all of your hard work last year, but I was not able to consider you for a bonus because you left the travel side before year’s end." I wouldn't have liked it, and I might have protested, but I would have accepted it and made sure I worked my ass off this year to qualify for a bonus. But that didn’t happen.

For weeks I've suspected that I would not see a bonus. I figured the longer it took my former boss to respond, the less likely the chance, so I'm not sure why I am so upset or why I even care.

I guess I crave that pat on the back, way to go acknowledgement I didn't get as a child. I also know that I have a habit of caring (loving) something (someone) so much, even if it couldn't care less about me. And I probably won't make too big of a fuss, because I need to have people like and appreciate me, even when they've shown in the past they don't.

I did leave my former boss a message. I don't know if she will get back to me or what I might do if she doesn't. I did speak to HR and they believe I was eligible for a bonus and it was up to her to give me one. I do have other avenues to pursue if she does not return my call or e-mail.

To top it all off, I heard from my old office that one of my former employees walked off the job after receiving his review, which I wrote. The interesting thing will be to see if it was exactly what I wrote, if it was changed and passed off as what I wrote or if mine was completely discarded. I've e-mailed him but have not heard back. I will feel terrible if he thought I wrote a bad review since I do consider him a good friend and hope he would give me the benefit of the doubt.

Oh, and the free food...today I ordered 260 sandwiches (7 different types) and sodas. Here were the complaints – didn’t like the type of bacon on the BLT, didn't like the selection of chips, why didn't I order water (umm, because it's free in the break room??), didn't like the selections of sodas (not enough diet Sprites).

On the bright side, one of my leaders knew I was not having the best of days and sent me a note of appreciation with this:

Who can turn the world on with her smile?
Who can take a nothing day, and suddenly make it all seem worthwhile?
Well it's you girl, and you should know it
With each glance and every little movement you show it

Regardless what anybody else may think or do, I hope you know how glad we are that you are here with us now!!!

Sometimes it's the little things that makes this job worthwhile.

Anyway, Happy Friday (get your taxes done?). Martinis for everyone!

Free Food Feeding Frenzy

First of all, I want to thank everyone who was kind enough to comment or e-mail. I really appreciate all of the support and kind words. For those of us on the long road to a healthy lifestyle, we know the ups and downs of the journey. I need to stop letting the number on the scale dictate my mood and let how I'm feeling -- physically, emotionally -- guide me.

It is amazing, whether or not you have weight issues, how food can incite people into doing and saying things that are just unbelievable. I guess because I am so conscious of how others perceive me around food (is she the first in line, does she take more than one serving, etc.) that I usually take an observer role when there are large groups of people and large quantities of food. Having been in the travel industry, where there are many chances to attend events where there is food, I was able to observe a lot.

For instance, one of my favorite stories was early in my travel career. I was living paycheck-to-paycheck (um, that part hasn't really changed....) so I seized on every opportunity to attend seminars where the vendor would serve food. I went to one at the Ritz Carlton in Marina Del Rey, CA figuring the breakfast would be worth sitting through a boring presentation. Not to malign my brothers and sisters in the travel industry, but most are greedy. They horde every free thing they can get their hands on. I have seen well-off women putting buffet food into baggies or a group waiting outside kitchen doors for the waiter to come through with a full shrimp platter. This one takes the cake, though. We were served a full breakfast -- eggs, breakfast potatoes, sausage and fruit. I had eaten my fill, but left the sausage on my plate. A woman, whom I did not know but did notice (she was wearing a velour track suit. The rest at the seminar were at least dressed business casual), ate her breakfast and then went from table to table eating off of other people's plates. I actually hadn't noticed the latter part until she came to our table and proceeded to eat my sausage! She did at least ask if I was going to eat it before she grabbed it off my plate. If I ever did something like that, my mother would have smacked me into next week. Anyway, in my 15 years in the industry, nothing changed.

When I came to the Financial Advisors' side, I knew that the opportunities for free food would drastically decrease. Vendors didn't come in bearing goodies. We would not be attending off-site events. I figured that what I witnessed with the travel agents was just something that went on in that industry. Oh, how wrong I was.

One of my duties as an administrative assistant is to order food, whether it be for a meeting for 5 people or lunch for the entire floor of 250 associates. In the 6 months I've been here, I've had to do it a few times, but the past few weeks has really been crazy as this is our busy time (tax week) and we're trying to reward and thank the associates. The litany of complaints is mind-boggling. Several people complained we have ordered pizza too many times. When I got sandwiches from a local deli, they complained we didn't customize them (for 250 sandwiches, I think not). We provided breakfast yesterday (yogurt, cut melon/berries, whole fruit, coffee/tea/hot chocolate, cinnamon rolls, sticky buns, doughnuts, bagels, muffins) and people complained that they didn't get eggs and bacon, sodas, the pineapple touched the honeydew, no bananas. Since we are phone operations, the associates have scheduled lunches. When we bring in something like pizza, they all rush into the room since they are afraid they won't get what they want (we usually bring in 3 deliveries so the pizza is hot for each lunch break and we order about 15 different types). I have seen people come back for seconds before some people have had firsts, and when you point this out to them they get snippy about it. When there have been leftovers, I have seen people take whole pizzas home! This weekend, we did boxed lunches, and we knew we would have extras, and so we offered a few to groups we didn't order for (security). People complained they should get the extras. Or asked if they could have some of the leftovers and would try and take 2 or 3, not one!!

It blows me away. I remember a temp in our old office (short-term temp at that) who helped herself to a catered lunch before it was set up and before the vendor arrived (usually we listened to a presentation and then ate). Or an agent who kept baggies in her desk to take dinner for that night.

I may be fat, but I do have manners. Off my soapbox for now....

Emotional Eating

The last two days are perfect illustrations of why I need to watch my emotional cravings as well as my physical cravings.

On Wednesday I went to see my new doctor, and it went better than expected. I felt like I could really discuss my lack of ability to lose weight. At this point, it looks like weight loss surgery is the only option, and as much as I hate to give up, I'm starting to think I'm going to have to give this a serious look. The good news is that my blood pressure is well within a normal range, so I'm happy about that.

I went to work looking forward to lunch. I had arranged two lunches from a local BBQ place. I had even predetermined what I was going to eat to stay on plan – chicken, corn on the cob (no butter) and some coleslaw. No ribs or corn muffins or French fries for me! It's common courtesy that the admin who arranges the lunch gets to eat, so that's what I was expecting. When I went to the second round of lunches, another admin was there eating and I was not invited to partake (I had done this lunch for her boss), and I didn’t want to overstep my bounds so I left, a little miffed. (Later, she really ticked me off when she sent a thank you note to all who participated but did not thank me for setting up the room, sending invites, ordering the food, etc. Not that I'm bitter or anything.)ed note...it happened again today....

It was not 1:30 and the café downstairs was closed. Did I give myself permission to run amok and eat anything from the vending machine? No. I ate a plum, some almonds and an energy bar. On my way home, I did pick up a roast chicken and some potato salad to go with the leftover green beans for dinner. I did succumb to a dessert bar and some Haagan Daas. I only ate half the dessert bar and two scoops of ice cream (I'm trying the everything-in-moderation trick). I stayed well within my caloric limit, even with the dessert and expected to be rewarded when I stepped on the scale on Thursday.

Did that happen? Hell, no! I saw a 2 pound gain!!

OK, I'm a logical type. I know that I needed to remain calm and not freak because the flippin' scale can't get it right. I did not allow this little set back to drive me headlong back into bad eating. I stayed on plan yesterday – fruit, veggies, salad, chicken, a sandwich. Heck, I didn't even eat any of the leftover ice cream.

And this was in the face of receiving a well-intentioned package from my mother. She sent me a slew of photos – from when I was a baby to the present – including some of my high school photos of me playing soccer and my crowing as Miss La Canada (yes, you’re reading the blog of a former beauty queen…LOL). All I could think was, "Why the hell did I ever think I was FAT?" Was it because my mother once told me, "I'd love you even more if you just lost 5 more pounds."? Ahhh, if I knew then what I know now, I would have celebrated that body, appreciated it more, took better care of it. Instead, I abused it by withholding nutrition, binging when that body did not respond by losing weight, abused it, hated it, resented it – all because I believed it wasn't good enough.

And, now, after two days of eating right, getting my water in, moving I would expect a little encouragement from the scale. I'm taking care of my body now. When I gained two pounds after just two scoops of ice cream, I didn't have any yesterday even though I so wanted to cover the pain with some Vanilla Bean. I felt confident that I would show some progress today; that I would be back on the right track.

All I can say is that if I wasn't crying so hard this morning, the scale would have been thrown out the window. It showed another 1.8 pound gain. So my reward for being good, eating right, NOT binging is almost a 4 pound gain from Monday.

My initial reaction is to grab that carton of ice cream, but I know that's not the right thing to do. I need to hold steady, stay on plan, keep on keeping on. Even when eating on plan means a weight gain, not a loss. Even when the ghosts of bodies past strike out at you unexpectedly. Even when your husband, whom you love with every fiber of your being, hasn’t touched you that way in weeks because of job stress, but you wonder in the deepest corners of your heart if it's because he doesn't feel that way about you anymore.

That's where my head is today. I am hanging on with all my might to this slippery slope, knowing that the answer to this is not in the bottom of a bag of chips (trust me I've looked).

Maybe Just A Bit

Advanced Global Personality Test Results Extraversion |||||| 23% Stability |||||||||||||| 60% Orderliness |||||||||||||||||| 73% Empathy |||||||||||||||||| 76% Interdependence |||||| 23% Intellectual |||||||||||||| 56% Mystical |||||||||||||||| 70% Artistic |||||||||||||||| 70% Religious || 10% Hedonism |||||||||||||||| 63% Materialism |||||||||||||||||| 76% Narcissism |||||||||||||| 56% Adventurousness |||||||||||||||| 70% Work ethic |||||||||||| 50% Self absorbed |||||||||||||||| 63% Conflict seeking |||||| 30% Need to dominate |||||||||||||||||| 76% Romantic |||| 16% Avoidant |||||||||||||||||| 76% Anti-authority |||||||||||||||| 63% Wealth |||||||||||| 43% Dependency |||||||||||| 50% Change averse |||||| 23% Cautiousness |||||||||||| 43% Individuality |||||||||||||||| 70% Sexuality |||||||||||||||||||| 90% Peter pan complex |||||| 23% Physical security |||||||||||||||||||| 90% Food indulgent |||||||||||||||||||| 90% Histrionic |||||||||||||||||| 76% Paranoia |||||||||||||||| 70% Vanity |||||||||||||| 56% Hypersensitivity |||||||||||||||||| 76% Female cliche |||||||||||||||| 63%

Take Free Advanced Global Personality Test
personality tests by similarminds.com

Stability results were moderately high which suggests you are relaxed, calm, secure, and optimistic.

Orderliness results were high which suggests you are overly organized, reliable, neat, and hard working at the expense too often of flexibility, efficiency, spontaneity, and fun.

Extraversion results were low which suggests you are very reclusive, quiet, unassertive, and secretive.


trait snapshot:

clean, secretive, does not make friends easily, observer, hates large parties, risk averse, perfectionist, reclusive, solitude loving, more practical than abstract, does not like to stand out, high self control, intellectual, mind over heart, very cautious, takes precautions, respects authority, irritable, emotionally sensitive

One Step Back, Two Steps Forward

The final tally is in, and I am up 1/2 a pound. Of course, that was yesterday, and I'm actually down today, so really it's 1/4 of a pound. Geeze, talk about nitpicking. Maybe I need to cut my hair -- that's got to be 1/4 of a pound. Obsessed much?

Seriously, this is not the way I want to be going, especially when I am off to see a new doctor tomorrow morning. I'm not going to miraculously lose 16 pounds between now and 8:00 AM tomorrow, so I might as well suck it up and deal with the fact that, once again, despite making some positive changes, it wasn't consistent enough to make an impact. I guess the good news is that the scale is down from mid-month when I was (cough, cough) 323. It seems like my pattern is start off strong, suck for 2-3 weeks in the middle (blaming it all on "THAT TIME") and then getting my act together for the last week.

Once again, I have started off the month strong (albeit, it's only day 5, still 25 more to fuck up). Water, exercise (2 out of the last 4 days), balanced meals, fruit and veggies -- all done well. Why is it so hard for me to stay in the groove? What knocks me off course? I don't know. I'm tempted to say laziness, but that's kind of the easy way out. Self-jeapordy? Can I really be that afraid of looking and feeling good? Way too many questions, and too few answers.

Not that it's much of a solution, but it seems like I've tried everything else -- I am back to keeping a spiral notebook of foods, water and activites. It's not foolproof, as anyone who has ever kept this type of diary can attest to. You can forget to write it down, or ignore it completely. One of my solutions to that is to write it down before I eat it. That means, if I am about to eat a bag of chips, I need to acknowledge it first which makes it premeditated. That helps take any "accidental" ingestion of crap out of the mix. It's tough writing down binge foods after the fact, but I think it's harder before simply because it gives me a chance to think, "Do I really want to do this to myself and my progress?" Of course, sometimes the answer is yes, and I will have to figure out a way to deal with that when the situation arises.

Onward to far more important things -- money. After some creative financing, I have figured out how to buy a new BBQ (we gave our Weber kettle BBQ to my mom when we moved) and 4 new patio chairs with no money. I was checking our AMEX bill on line and realized we had enough points to trade in for almost $700 in Home Depot gift cards. That should get us a 'que and some chairs. Plus, it's Dollar Days at Target -- time to stock up on my Spring Cleaning supplies!

I guess I need to be specific in my desires -- I want to LOSE weight, and GAIN cash flow -- not the other way around.

A Sign of Things to Come?

I participate in an on-line survey program. I got an e-mail asking for my participation on a fast food survey. I logged on, and the first question was, "How many times in the past 30 days have you visited a fast food restaurant for breakfast, lunch or dinner?" I could honestly answer that question with a big, fat zero. Yes, that's right, I have not been to McDonald's, Wendy's, Burger King, KFC, Taco Bell, etc. in over 30 days. In fact, I don't know when I went to one last. I believe we had burgers from Culver's, a local burger chain, about 6 or 7 weeks ago. It wasn't a decision I made, it just happened. Now, that doesn't mean my eating has been on track 100%, but it does mean I might be making better decisions, or at least not including over-processed, fat-ladened, sodium-saturated foods. It's a step.

In other news, I got my evalution from the chiropractor. He has a slightly different approach to chiropractic care, but he has similar philosophies on no drugs and no surgery. The adjustments are different as well, and it doesn't seem to have "fixed" me as quickly. My old chiro, Jay, could adjustment and I felt immediate relief. I do feel some, but it's not as big of a degree. I know from previous care that it can take several visits, so I don't want to rush to judge, but it would be nice to see some progress.

My only other firm plan for the day is to get my nails done. I would like to go for another walk tonight with Don and the dogs because the weather is so nice. I do need to so some housework, at least the minimum. I still have to plan a big spring clean, including getting the carpets shampooed. Any good spring cleaning tips out there?

I also haven't thanked everyone who suggested classic books. I have a huge reading list I will be posting shortly, but if there are any other suggestions, I'm still taking them, so suggest away.