Raining bad times.

The thundering weather in Austin sets up a good metaphor for the bullshit that has been happening to me lately. So, as much as I wanted to, the mini-vacay was just not in the cards because of some unforeseen medical bills, so that sucked. On top of that, my phone decided to be an ass and stop working, my hope is that it is just the battery and that I can get it replaced soon. So the consequences of that have been that I have had to put my GymPact on hold, because there has been no way of checking in via RunKeeper or through the GPS. Sucks, I really liked having that accountability. In general, I have been pretty depressed, too. I have to have hope that this is the end of bad things and better things will start happening, but then again it has been a long stretch of bad. 

Weight has been pretty stable at 126-127, but then again I have been eating mostly beans, veggies, and rice (I was able to basically feed two people for like 5 days on $15, crazy huh?) I know like weight loss, life has a way of working out, if you make the right choices, but being stressed out all the times certainly doesn’t create the right environment to make those. I made it 15 days smoke free, and this past Saturday I relented “socially” to indulge in those awful things. The cognitive dissonance doesn’t work on me, I know they are terrible, fatal, and it is not likely that science will help me grow a new lung. Yet, give me a mint julep (my way of celebrating the Kentucky Derby) and a bloody Mary and those concerns just melt away. Pathetic. Stop doing stupid shit, Lauren. Self-destruction isn’t cute anymore. Ugh, can someone cheer me up, please.

 

Yoga, Tan, laundry

The good news is that I finally got my lazy ass to hot yoga, and if I really focus my efforts into going the rest of October, no days off, and even with one day off, I can still get the Svadisthana chakra recognition, by the time Halloween rolls around, so that I can celebrate with my orange bracelet. Oh, how such little things amuse me. Also some success came out of my practice serendipitously, I was not able to make it to the room early enough so I was not able to find a place close to the front or side mirror where I normally use so that I can see myself for poses. Well, it seems like that was actually a good thing as I felt like I was able to nail most of them, when I quit worrying about how I looked, and also I felt like I was less obsessed with the skinny young things in my weirdo imaginary thinspo competition that I have in my mind. I guess like the Glitch Mob song is entitled “Starve the ego, feed the soul”:

So, what is the bad news? Well, weekends are notoriously bad (even for all the other bloggers it seems) for food, just in terms of not wanting to stick to a diet, even though I baked asparagus, boiled and blended the sweet potatoes and even poached some chicken, when you sweat for an hour doing push-ups, sit-ups and leg lifts, you tend to get hungry like super hungry.  So, I succumbed to the Domino’s $7.99 pan pizza deal, oh my god, how fantastic this pizza was! Seriously, as James Norton has noted,  they have stepped up their game. I do feel like this pizza is analogous to how good fettuccine alfredo is, vis a vis something with that much butter, cheese and carbohydrates will never suck even if you are a terrible cook. Well, here are the sausage and mushroom calorie bombs (plural!!) in question:

So on a little less horribly unhealthy not, I tried eating something light on Friday night, and I always have a challenge with the Eggvacado oven dish, so I tried whisking the egg, only used a single one this time,  a bit before pouring the mixture into the avocado shell. It turned out pretty well, however a small amount of the egg spilled out on the pan as it always does when trying to balance these halves on the pan. I need some sort of ramekin to snugly hold the halves into place while the eggy-TexMex goodness gets formed. Another good idea would be probably to do sort of like a deviled-avocado mixture like with eggs but have it encased in the skin, not sure how that would be executed, but it certainly sounds good to me.

So, squatober hasn’t really been panning out how I would like, it seems like after the Whole 30, all of my dietary and fitness goals kinda fell through with them. All of my habits dissolved. I tell you one thing that really derails me is going out to drink, not that I do that very often anymore, but even just occasionally it seems that the apartment gets messy because I am too tired to clean, and I become regretful because I spent too much money furthering the cycle of depression, and I just have a general fog about me. Invention idea: some sort of drunk preparation kit, e.g.: cash for drinks so that you know how much to spend, a good hour of cleaning beforehand so that you aren’t stuck with chores in a neurochemically depleted state (hey they don’t call it “wet brain” for nothing),  and perhaps food prepared in advanced with b-vitamin and 5htp supplementation, the former to prevent thiamine deficiency and the later for any serotonin correction you need. So glad, my psychology degree has helped me in some fashion, hyuck hyuck.

I haven’t really had the kind of money to drink, so at least there is that keeping me on the straight and narrow, probably would just be better to be a bit of teetotaler for a while, at least for my wallet’s sake, if nothing else.

Whole 30 – Day 27

Only about 72 hours to go, and I was almost about to cheat today. I do not think that I have slain the sugar dragon by any indication of the ideal Whole 30 and how it should make you feel. In fact, I had to pound a coconut water just to keep from going insane this evening. I am not sure what I am so stressed about, either. Everything seems to be going okay, but I feel very agitated and angered. Right now, I should be at the gym getting the rest of my steps (around 3300 to the 10k mark) but here I sit. Hey, I don’t feel so bad not having really given up sugar substantially because of the excessive fruit consumption, as I have successfully been able to give up tobacco and booze, and while I kind of already did that earlier this year, I have been able to go over 3 weeks straight (something I hadn’t been able to do with cigarettes), and for someone who would smoke everyday last year, I think it is pretty impressive, while losing weight to boot!

Okay, well enough ego stroking, I am just trying to make myself feel better for eating so many calories today, actually according to MFP it was approximately 1300 (sure it was actually more just due to human error) Ugh, was there a point to this. I write a lot better in the morning. All of my ideas get sucked out of my brain from the TV, I think. Last night, I constructed a delightful summer feast with grilled vegetables, marinated chicken with sautéed onions and mushrooms. Instagrammed for your pleasure:

This morning was very discombobulating with the lack of coffee. Wanted to skip the coffee so that I would not risk dehydration in my yoga practice. This was a disaster, combined with the fact that I did not eat anything (oops) I was highly unmotivated to stick to anything. Speaking of mornings, my mattress is not the most comfortable in the world, no padding, no sleep number, nothing fancy, just a 5 year old springy thing from IKEA, well this morning it was if cherubs had constructed it with gossamer clouds and my comforter was a warm embryonic shell to sustain me in a Matrix-like sleep, not really sure where that metaphor was going, but yes, I really did not want to get up this morning. The whole point was to be able to write and workout early. Getting up early in the morning never works out, get it, get it?

Well, I would post more, but I have to do my civic duty of 3 hours of TV watching and catch “Hells Kitchen”. TTFN!

Whole 30 – Day 26

Doing my laundry, brewing some chai, and just having a general bout of malaise, I am trying to get motivated to do some treadmill walking in defiance of the Texas heat. The sloth is winning, and I am feeling a bit discouraged because I let the temptation of processed meats (80% sure that the ham, salami, and pepperoni, which I all sampled was cured with something considered impure in the church of Paleo). Well, screw it though, in the face of brownies, cookies, and I don’t know how many overtly dairy and gluten products, I think I did okay. I would have graded myself with a C last night, I didn’t just flunk outright by sampling the sweets, booze, or any of the carbalicious gluten treats, chips, crackers, etc. I think D would have been dairy and some of the legume delights such as hummus, oh how I miss this snack! .So, I was left with meats, veggies, and fruits. My resolve started strong, A- most of my plate was filled with vegetables and a bit of fruits to give me some artificial energy, sue me.. it is the weekend.

As the night progressed, I started eating more fruits just because it felt like I knew hardly anyone at the party and the people I did know were mostly talking amongst themselves about none other than getting wasted, just really uncomfortable for me. This may have been something that was in my head, but it seemed like the people that were drinking harder drinks were a bit too proudly displaying them in their hands. Or it could just be something that you have to do when holding that kind of beverage. Either way, the bf and I hung out mostly outside and for me I was a bit asocial. It really disturbs me, because I had this perception of myself that I was this social butterfly and that is quickly shattered by one sober night. I should have just broken down on my diet and eating a goddamned cookie, but I had to be miss bitchypants clean eater. It wasn’t really that bad, but I missed out on some yummy food, and that makes me a bit bitter.

Oh and subconsciously since I knew I was going to maybe eat a lot (not sure if you count substituting smoothies for meals, though) I decided not to track my food. That was the first time in like 35 days I hadn’t logged anything. In a way it felt liberating to not have to be accountable to MFP, but in another it was terrifying because I was not sure how bad I was messing up on my eating plan. Part of the reason I think I ate so much is because I did manage to do about 80 minutes of cardio plus an hour of yoga and guess what, I got my pink bracelet! So at least there were a lot of steps I took even in the beginning of the day – though my lazy Sunday is starting to cancel out the goodness! – and yesterday I had my to-do list set. Consistency is key, just at least set the intention. I have been successful 90% of the time, when I set an honest intention to do something. Not so much in class, when I set the intention to not fall out of poses that I had intended to not fall out of, but for the most part yes, I do meet my goals when I know that I can do them, just have to really be honest with myself.

Well, because it is such a lazy day, here is some inspiration. GET MOVING:

Whole 30, Day 23

Stress, stress, stress, stress, stressity STRESS!! Was too busy at work to update yesterday, strangely enough I had one  my highest traffic days stats wise on the blawg. This morning I missed yoga, because I was fighting with my boyfriend. That’s always fun. So, what is the stress about, well, my dear readers, it is about money. I just don’t have enough of it. Admittedly, some of this is self-inflicted from purchasing a car in 2011 and having to finally pay back my student loans. There are other factors which make it difficult to get by, but I am not one to talk shit. I got a raise, and I am incredibly grateful for it, but it really wasn’t enough. I have to remind myself, however, that everyone is suffering, and to be brutal honest, even with my qualifications and skill, I am fortunate to have a job. Don’t let that detract from my awesomeness, though, because as you have read, the awesomeness of the Lauren is a force to be reckoned with, even if I feel mostly like this:

Okay.. now that this out of the way, we can just move forward. I know that I am still deviating from Whole30 (not enough to not count it, but enough to note it) by my consumption of fruit and coconut water. My boss had some Larabars, and I could have asked for one, but decided to use my own energy, okay mostly from coffee, to power through the day. So, my resolve is getting slightly better in eating sugars, but I know there will be at least one time it is truly tested.  My stepsister is having a dinner party this weekend, and it is so close to the end, I wish she could have scheduled it for September 1st, so I could have a least one martini, but life does not work that way, and sometimes you just have to put your big girl pants on and suck it up. The good news is that with the exception of this morning’s missed yoga, I have been able to keep up with my fitness. Yesterday, I almost made 10k steps with the help of some interval training. In Jackie Warner’s book, she said to just do jogging, sprinting and cool down rounds. Well, I varied it up a little bit and did: buttkickers, high knees, jogging in place, jumping jacks, and repeated butt kickers and jumping jacks for a total of  5 rounds.