he's gonna give me a heart attack one day... plus diet stuff

my husband, that is.  It happens every single night.  You'd think I'd remember and be prepared for it.  I'll be at the pc, doing Lord knows what.  I waste so much time on here, usually looking at recipes or reading the latest cat-fight on whatever group du-jour.  I'll also have the t.v. on.  And he sneaks up on me.  Okay, he says he isn't sneaking.  His version: he's a 200+ pound man in a white t-shirt (not in camoflage) making kissy noises.  My version: he's creeping up behind me and all I hear is strange noises and see shadowy movements in my periphery.  It always scares me!  Okay, fine.  He does it every night to say goodnight to me.  So I shouldn't be so high-strung...  (and he shouldn't have that mel gibson crop circle movie on either)

But he creeps up on me at other times too.  He's very stealthy for a big guy.  The only time he doesn't startle me is when he's rubbing his feet on the carpet in order to shock me.  LOL! 

I've been MIA for a while.  It's because I'm on weight watchers (have I mentioned this yet??) and I'm doing the core plan, which has a little bit of a learning curve.  The rules are easy enough, but I need to learn a new way of cooking.  It takes a bit of time to plan meals and journal all you are eating and hunt and peck through other blogs trying to find recipes that I and the family will like.  I've enjoyed almost everything I've made.  I'm digging barley and bulgur, but the recipes out there are so limited.  People seem to think that tabbouleh is the ultimate bulgur recipe and that's about the limit of what I can find.  Well, I'm not wild about it.  I think the bulgur is too light and fluffy for it.  Like it's going to blow away in the trade winds.  (needs a good gravy to weigh it down - LOL!)  I know, that's a lame reason, but I definitely have my ideas of what is right and wrong food-wise, despite what the experts say.

Okay, what is my honest opinion of Core?  Well, I'm very proud of what I"m eating.  I feel like it's very healthy.  No sugars or breads etc.  I'm looking forward to my next cholesterol check.  It's a little bit (a lot) challenging to eat in a public venue.  This is definitely a fix-it-yourself lifestyle.  But I"m doing all right.  The first week cravings have dissipated drastically - but they are still there, just waiting to pounce.  Some old habits still nag at me.  I had gotten into the bad habit of buying a York Peppermint Patty at the checkout counter a little too often as a treat.  Before bed snack, either a little peanut butter or a little bag of fruit chews.  Very hard habit to resist.  I still "need" to snack a lot, but now I choose fruit or I get in my milk.  My bones thank me.

One of the big tenants is to eat to satisfaction.  Meaning, you have to be aware enough to know when you are satisfied but not stuffed.  I'm so used to stuffing myself, that I haven't quite figured out how I'm supposed to feel.  I've also learned that my satiety meter is slow.  I'll sit there after a meal wanting something to top it off.  Not that I'm necessarily hungry.  Logically, I realize I just ate a wonderful meal and ate plenty.  But I don't have that "done" feeling, and my mind is prowling like a tiger.  If I manage to get distracted and stop thinking about whatever I'm plotting, the satisfaction feeling eventually comes.  I'd say it takes 45 minutes to an hour.  That's too late, IMO.

Okay, as far as weight loss.  I'm not so sure about it.  I lost a whopping 4 pounds the first week.  That's huge for me.  The next week I lost 3!  Incredible.  The 3rd week I gained 6/10 pound (I had to weigh like 20 times to get the scale to settle on a number - I choose whatever weight that shows up 3 times).  You can imagine what a downer that was.  I tried to tell myself it was due to bloating.  I weighed myself all week and my weight was creeping up.  I came so close to throwing in the towel so many times.  So my weigh-in today was a bit better. I lost 4/10 pound.  But I don't totally trust it.  See, because I weighed a couple pounds higher throughout Sunday (I know,stop weighing myself!!) and went walking sunday night and sweated like a pig.  So in the back of my mind I'm saying it's water weight I lost.

Gosh, I hope no one is reading this because it is truly a stupid self dialogue here, but it's what I'm thinking.  No one said it had to make sense or even be sensible.

I know all the platitudes - you've started adding a weight routine, maybe it's muscle mass.  (yeah, right, those 5 pounders are really packing on the muscle)  Or, you should judge by how your clothes feel, not the numbers on the scale.  (well, my clothes fit just the same, thank you very much)  I have real doubts here.  But I HAVE to be doing better for my cholesterol.  I'm holding out for that number.  If my cholesterol goes down significantly, then I'll stick to it no matter what the scale says.

Augh!!!!  There.  I'll say it again.  I hate that I can't just treat food as fuel.  How on earth did my mind get messed up without me even being aware of it????  Who knew???  I always thought of myself as a well grounded, solid person.  Yet I can obsess about dumb stuff as well as the rest of 'em.  ('em would be nut jobs)

It's late.  I need my sleep.  THAT"S why I'm not losing!!  I need 8 hours.  Ha!  6 to 7 hours is more like it.  Actually, that's a good thought.  If I go to bed earlier, I won't be tempted by a bedtime sneak-snack and I'll be getting all my sleep.  Yep.  I'm gonna try it.  It'll have to start tomorrow because it's almost 11 now.  The boys are up at 6 despite our efforts to get them to sleep in during the summer...Obviously, we'll not have transition problems when school starts back...