Weigh in Wednesday

Down 2.5 Current Weight 12st 5.5lb

Total Weight lost 21.5lbs

Monday, Monday

Yesterday was definitely Monday no doubt about it. I got to work only to realize that I had put my knickers on inside out.

At 11:30 the fire alarm in the building went off, apparently when one of the air conditioning pipes bursts spilling water all over the second floor it triggers the fire alarm. No one could go back in the building until the fire brigade came, investigated, and turned off the fire alarm. Now I am not an expert but I am pretty sure that a flood is not the same as a fire, some may even go as far as to say it was the opposite. This did not keep me any warmer as we stood outside for 45mins. My coat of course was in the coat closet on the floor above me and my mother always said it was more important to get out of the building than grab your possessions.

At 2.15 the e-mail server went out for more than two hours. This is a big deal as we book all the meeting rooms on Outlook and I needed the information for the next day’s visitor list.

At 4.36 Outlook came back online and my inbox was promptly filled with meeting room requests for the next day which had to be dealt with before I could finish the visitors list for the next day which was already half an hour late.

I managed to e-mail the visitors list with out attaching it to the e-mail. Then I attached it to the wrong e-mail.

At 5:56 I arrived at Liverpool Street train station only to find out there where huge delays on the one night a week I really need to catch a train on time for class. I managed along with about 2000 other people to shove myself onto the 6.04 train and enjoy what I can only imagine a sardine enjoys, minus the oil, plus BO.

So yes yesterday was definitely Monday.

Random Thoughts

So just for fun today I figured out I need to loose another 20% of my body weight be be at a "healthy" weight. So I guess I am a third of the way there. 1 down 2 to go

Weigh in Wednesday

Down 1lb for a total of 19lbs. Weight 176.

For anyone keeping track (only me) that is officially 10% weight loss.

Come have a pitty party with me

So the last few weeks have been a little disappointing. I don’t think I can really cut anything else food wise from my diet. I have cut all sweets with the exception of 1 WW snack bar a day which is only a point and a half and I have a serious sweet tooth so I really don’t think I can cut that out on a regular basis with out feeling like I am be deprived of what I love. I don’t eat ice cream, chocolate or baked goods at all. I have also switched to the low fat or no fat options for everything we use. The veggie mince was another attempt to cut calories and fat it has about half the points of lean mince beef. I don’t think I would even recognize a potato chip or French fry anymore as it has been so long since I have had one.

This basically means I need to up the exercise. I don’t like planned exercise to say the least; the gym has never been one of my favourite places. I am quite lucky that I walk over a mile each day between going and coming to the train station, so it is a little more exercise than the normal person jumping in there car only to sit down at their desk all day. I did really good over the summer and the fall when the weather was nice to get out and do some walking for walking’s sake but now that it is bitter cold that seems like it is going to fall by the weigh side.

So I am not really sure where to go from here, there is a kick start program offered by WW that you do for 2 weeks that is suppose to rev you up and get you in the right frame of mind I think I will try this. I think I also need to look at the possibility that with out some serious exercise (which I will have to really consider before committing to) or a seriously restrictive diet (which again I would have to give great thought too as I want to be able to enjoy eating, if steamed chicken and vegetable are my only choice to loose weight the cons may out weigh the pros) this may be where I am going to platue for a while. I don’t look at this as a defeat; I am still going to use all of the healthy eating habits I have learned I am still going to go to meeting so I know the weight is not creeping back on. I have lost 18lbs in 16 weeks this is a huge accomplishment. I think that I am just going to post loss or gains each week and maybe do the whole big chart once a month as it fits into my life better at this time. So I will be back to post a weigh in later this evening.

Oh yeah MK5000 this is week two that you have not posted you weigh in. I am watching.

No animals were harmed in the making of this cottage pie!

So after much consideration I decided to make a go of veggie meat products. They are called Quorn over here after a name brand. So my first trial with textured vegetable protein was cottage pie. I have yet to try the finished project but I did taste the “meat” first after I was done sautéing it and then the whole base for the cottage pie to make sure I had the seasoning correctly. Did it taste exactly like my normal cottage pie? That is some what of a loaded question since while a few ingredients always make it into the pie the rest tend to be a clear out of whatever is in my vegetable drawer, last night was no exception. It is pretty safe to say if it was in my vegetable drawer yesterday afternoon it is probably not there tonight. This particular cottage pie had fresh chopped tomatoes, carrots, onions, orange bell peppers, frozen peas and because I only had 1 tin of tomatoes it got two tins of baked beans. So it did not taste like my normal cottage pie base even though I used two beef stock cubes but it tasted just lovely anyways. If one was to sit and ponder for long periods of time you could say that the texture was not exactly the same as mince. I think some of this was due to the fact that there were no cooking directions on the package of vegetable mince so I just kind of made it up when I was prepping the mince. It was close enough texture for government work. The most exciting part of my veggie cottage pie was that with the exception of the mince we already had all the ingredients. The veggie mince was a whopping £2 and I only used half. This yielded 1 smallish casserole size dish that will be our dinner tonight and 8 medium ramekin dishes that are probably 3 dinners for my husband and two for me. So for £1 output we have six dinners!

UPDATE: Cottage Pie was consumed last night to the delight of all those who tasted it (my husband and I). It was a big winner and veggie mince will be making repeat performances at the Y in E house hold.

Perks of living in England

I have to admit something shameful. Thanksgiving is my least favourite holiday, I know this makes me a bad American but I just don’t like Turkey. I don’t dislike the idea of spending time with family being thankful for the good things that have happened over the year, or being thankful that the Pilgrims made it through that hard winter so that my ancestors could come over to America. It really is the turkey, I have only ever had one really amazing Thanksgiving turkey and it was deep fat fried. Nothing says Thanksgiving like a gas canister and a five gallon pot of frying oil that you lower your turkey into. Cranberry sauce from a can also wigs me out a little. One of the benefits of living in England is I have no social or moral responsibility to celebrate Thanksgiving. So this year I am going to write out my list of things I am thankful for a little early and be done with it. Roll on Christmas music!

1. That I have successfully made it through one year of marriage. May all the next ones be better.
2. I have some of the best family a girl could ever wish for. I also have some of the weirdest but maybe you have to have one to have the other.
3. I have a husband who would do anything to make sure that we were provided for.
4. Little $*&", man I love my kitty.
5. A place to live that both my husband and I love.
6. Barrack Obama is the 44th president of the USA
7. Really great friends
8. A job that pays a decent wage and is stress free

Weigh in Wednesday, better late than never

Start Weight: 13st 13lb (195lb)
1st Weigh in: 13st 091b (191lb) -4
2nd Weigh in: 13st 07lb (189lb) -2
3rd Weigh in: 13st 5.5lb (187.5lb) -1.5
4th Weigh in: 13st 2.5lb (184.5lb) -3
5th Weigh in: 13st 1lb (183.0lb) -1.5
6th Weigh in: 13st 0lb (182.0lb) -1
7th Weigh in: 13st 1lb (183.0lb) +1
8th Weigh in: 12st 13.5lb (181.5lb) -1.5
9th Weigh in: 12st 11.0lb(179.0lb) -2.5
10th Weigh in: 12st 09.5lb(177.5lb)-1.5
11th Weigh in: 12st 09.5lb(177.5lb)0
12th Weigh in: 12st 09.5lb(177.0lb)-0.5



Total Weight Loss 18lb

So apparently slow and steady wins the race, well I should be winning then because I am loosing it half a pound at a time. Yes I am a little discouraged, more with myself because I know I am not being strict enough, at least not as strict as I was at the beginning when I was seeing really great weight loss each week. Some of it was when I started it was the only important thing I had on my plate and emotionally I was pretty stable. Right now I have lots on my plate with work, class, friends who are going through a life changing emotional event, I just learned my brother is heading of to Afghanistan, and there are some big changes going on in my husbands life. So basically what it boils down to is I need to find peace with the fact that I have new better eating habits that are allowing me to loose the weight slowly. No need to freak out until I plateau or start gaining weight. I also need to realize that while being overweight is bad that the majority of my extended family is overweight, I am probably predisposed to be overweight, this is something I am going to have to fight everyday of my life. Sometimes not loosing the race is just as good as winning.

Yay!

I can not tell how proud I am to be an American at this moment. I am so excited to see how Obama takes our country forward; he has a big job I know he can do it.

Y in E has big new too (not as big as winning the presidential election). I have changed jobs at the company I work for. It is a lateral move but one that makes a lot of sense for me. I will still be doing corporate reception but instead of being part of the cover team for 15+ sites I will just be cover for two sites to begin with, with the possibility for that to grow to four. I love the two sites which is mainly why I chose to apply for the position even though it was only a lateral move. When I heard they were looking for someone for those specific sites and I realized that once they hired someone I would no longer get to cover at them I knew it was a good move. I start officially on the first of December but will be placed at one on the two sites from the 17th of November.

I will post my weigh in result later tonight after weigh in.