Come back to me somehow

Hey All!
  Slim said she had a problem posting a comment under my Blogaversary Post. Please double check and make sure your comment posted and if it didn't, please re-post. You don't want Slim to win the super awesome prize! (I picked one of them out today.)

Happy Birthday to Me!

Yeah- it's my one month blogaversary. Look! The city of Davis put on an awesome display just for me.

The last one is what happens if a bug flies down your short leg just as your pressing the shutter. GROSS!

Anyway, in honor of my blogaversary, I'm going to have a super awesome giveaway!!! I haven't decided what it's going to be yet either, so it's a surprise!

In order to enter, just leave a comment by noon on Friday, July 9th about:
1) Should I give away one grand prize or a few smaller prizes?
2) What would you like to win?

If I get no comments, I'm gonna buy myself something awesome. Save me from that fate!

Oh say can you see by the dawn's early light

Whoohoo! Happy 4th of July all!

I'm going to recap the last couple of days quickly for you because I know you all were DYING to know what's gone down (literally down me- hahaha).

Food:

Fruit and coffee = breakfast guaranteed to make you hungry around 10 am.

Fresh tomatoes from James' garden made this cheese sandwich extra delicious. I've always loved cheese sandwiches since I was a little girl and this sandwich was a good compromise between comfort food and eating healthy. There was a smidge of butter used on the Oroweat Triple Heath bread and some gouda cheese from the Nugget Deli- it was gouda. Hahaha. I am a dork.

I was going to go walking with Ro but she was feeling under the weather so I walked the long way to Nugget and got burrito fixings since I was craving some "Mexican" food. This is a whole wheat tortilla with refried black beans, Canadian Black Diamond Extra Sharp Cheddar, half an avocado and some green taco sauce.

I liked it so much I had it the next day for lunch too! This time I added some tomatoes from James' garden and ate some cherries on the side.

I bought this awesome Blender bottle and tried the chocolate Tera'swhey again. This time I used chocolate almond milk to give it a little extra  chocolately taste and it was much better than last time. I still think the vanilla flavor is better but this isn't inedible.

I was a hunger monster yesterday in SF. I started out the day with cereal and coffee then had the taco/ burrito above. When I got to SF I made this plate with the last of the prosciutto and a little cheese. I had a few more pieces of cheese and salami and then James and I went to Twin Peaks. We did a teeny, tiny hike up to the top, I wouldn't even call it a hike it was so puny, and then went foraging for food at Whole Foods. I bought this bread:

and ate some of it in the car before coming home and making this wedge while I was cooking dinner. There's a story with this bread but I'm not going to tell it until tomorrow...

Finally I made some salmon and garlicky spinach for dinner. I just had sparkling water in my wine glass but my wine glasses are so pretty!!! I want to have people over just so they can drink out of my new wine glasses.

I topped off the night with more of Dr. Bob's handmade ice cream- chocolate chip with Scharffen Berger chocolate. I love these little stainless steel bowls Chuck bought James and I- they are the perfect size to hold 1/2 cup of ice cream.

This was some of that leftover bread with Andronico's homemade peanut butter (Store made? It's not really homemade is it?) and a latte with the San Francisco house espresso machine.

For the last 12 years James has had 4th of July in Community Park in Davis with his friends. They bring a grill and play sports all day and just generally catch up with each other. I threw some veggies on the grill for lunch and chowed down on iceberg salad, tomato and mozzarella salad, grilled zucchini and a grilled portabello mushroom. I also kind of munched on cherries and BBQ Baked Kettle Chips during the day.

For dinner I grilled some broccoli, some more zucchini (I could seriously eat it every meal), fresh white corn and top sirloin with Kinder's marinade- basically the same meat I had at Chuck's on Thursday. I also had 3 of these:

Bacon wrapped asparagus spears. It doesn't look like much here but it was good. Then we met up with James' momma and poppa and had a homemade chocolate chip cookie- yum!

Exercise:
I need to get on the ball! I was supposed to exercise with Ro on Friday but she was sick. I was going to just cop out but then I was stern with myself and made me walk anyway. I walked 2.9 miles in 46 minutes and ended up at Nugget where I picked up the fixings for my burrito/ tacos.

Saturday I wanted to go for a walk in SF but by the time James and I had moved all our stuff it was late and I was pooped! I figure I did get some exercise by moving things though and we drove to Twin Peaks and then climbed the tiny climb to the summit.
This was the view:

I thought this was a cool picture of the Mt. Sutro antenna.

It was starting to get foggy.

Market Street is very distinctive. I just need to bring a map up here and I could map out the whole city.

James was silly. He just wore a t-shirt and shorts even though it was very cold and windy- I have a feeling it's always cold and windy up there since the weather was actually really nice near our apartment.

No exercise today- I was too busy sitting in the park watching James exercise but I'll be back in SF tomorrow and I'm going to drag my butt up the hill once more.

Stay tuned guys and check out my post tomorrow- It's almost my blogaversary!

Death or glory becomes just another story

Chris from A Deliberate Life wrote a post about mental toughness and in it she said:

I was willing to never lose a pound, just to KNOW I had control over what I ate and how I moved my body, it was enough.

I am having a hard time with this. I keep projecting forward: What will I look like when I'm below 200 lbs? How long will that take? Can I get to 132 lbs? (For some reason 132 is like the magic number I've always thought I am supposed to be even though I've never been 132 lbs in my entire adult life.) And all in all it doesn't matter. That number or what I look like at a certain number shouldn't matter. It's about being healthier. It's about being able to be active and play with James. He said the other day he would be so happy if I played soccer with him in Golden Gate Park and I am going to make that happen. It's about fueling my body so it can do those things and live longer. THE NUMBER DOESN'T MATTER. Maybe if I say it enough, it will become true.

Another ditch in the road, we keep moving

Food:
Breakfast? You ask. I tried a new cereal this morning. It's Kelloggs new Fiber Plus with antioxidants in Cinnamon Oat Crunch.

It's kind of like very cinnamony, very crunchy (because of the extra fiber) cheerios. Not bad. Now, Fiber One makes a Caramel Delight cereal which is like fibered up Cinnamon Toast Crunch and it is delicious BUT it comes with a high calorie pricetag and a LOT of sugar so I tend to steer a little clear of it. This was a good compromise- not too sweet but not too "healthy" tasting either.
On a side note: GO AGS! I haven't used my old UC Davis mug in a while.
I tried to eat lunch super quick so it was just a Bagelthin with the classy smoked salmon cream cheese.

I'm not sure about this cream cheese. It doesn't have a very salmony flavor but that might be because it is not as salty as the Phily cream cheese?
I grilled with Chuck and Ro at Chuck's house:

I did two things today that I think really showed some progress. See, I ate the plate above and then had 1 1/2 more slices of beef and another couple of pieces of broccoli and I thought I had eaten soooo much. And it's true that that's a lot of food but it's a lot of fresh food. A month ago I would have thought nothing of eating  that plate almost entirely full of meat with few veggies. This time, I'm not going to lie- the beef was really tasty, but I wanted to eat all that fresh greenness too. I had a few yogurt stars after dinner and then, of course, they stayed at Chuck's house so I couldn't eat the entire bag.
The second thing that happened was what I chose when I came home.

Instead of going for that ice cream, which is just waiting for me in the fridge, I wanted this bowl of cherries instead. It wasn't like I redirected myself to the cherries. I didn't say "No self, you can't have ice cream but you could eat these cherries." (Because we all know the tantrums that result when I have to tell myself no.) I just went for the cherries without even considering the less healthy options and that is exactly what I wanted to teach my body to do.

Exercise:
None but I did make a walking date with Ro for tomorrow. :)

And the clock on the wall has been stuck at three for days and days

Ugh, well the power of positive thinking didn't help me yesterday. It was still a billion degrees and though I wanted to go to the gyms, I just couldn't stomach the hot, sticky ride there. Finally today I IMed Ro and got her to walk with me! So I have moved, thankfully. It felt really good to get out there. Am I actually craving exercise?

Two days in one post again:

Yesterday
Food:
I gave in and drank James' coffee for breakfast. I really dislike his coffee, it has no taste, but I wasn't going to survive if I had to live another day without coffee. (We're not melodramatic around here or anything.)

The orange was ok but I've had better. I think I like oranges refrigerated and this one was just out on the counter. Around lunchtime I made a chik patty from Morningstar Farms and some potato wedges. Pretty processed but I was hungry! I was actually starting to get some hunger pangs.

Mmmm! BBQ sauce. This was super good. I also munched on a few of James' tomatoes from his garden. Does this balance out the processed frozen stuff? ;)

Ice cream! Mid-afternoon. 90+ degrees in my house. The ice cream was needed.

Dinner was spinach with garlic and a sautéed, marinated portabella mushroom. I also had a alcoholic beverage for the first time since I started this adventure. I figured I hadn't really indulged lately and James was drinking a beer. I kind of made an alcoholic Arnold Palmer with gin and it was pretty good! I didn't realize this until afterwards but I had a totally vegetarian day yesterday. I think it must be good if I don't even notice.

Exercise:
 This was lacking. It would have been nice but as I said... waaaaaay too hot.

Today
Food:
Brekkie was cottage cheese with more of James' coffee- gross!!
Around lunchtime I made a new Bagelthin everything bagel with smoked salmon cream cheese:

The Bagelthins are an example of a processed product that I'll make allowances for. They're low in calories and high in fiber and they satisfy me so they are a good trade off. I also brought this slightly upscale cream cheese over the Philadelphia stuff because it just looked more appetizing and I think I could get away with using less of it.
I met up with Slim around 4 and she was a Starving Marvin because I was like an hour and a half late to pick her up so we headed out to Whole Foods.

I love trying their deli stuff. I ate all the green veg, which was half spring steamed veggie mix and half broccoli with garlic, and about half of the pasta salad which was smoked mozzarella salad. A little heavy on the mayo for my taste but the mozzarella chunks in there were delicious.

I also drank this Honest tea with Goji berry and a cookie from their deli. The Honest Tea was great but I think I should have passed on the cookie. A) I was full and B) it wasn't that good- a little dry and crumbly. It was made with whole wheat flour though so I'll take that as a plus and remember that I wasn't that satisfied next time I encounter the same situation.
My eyes were bigger than my stomach so I brought home a few things from the Whole Foods.

Including this cucumber salad mixed with some "Gigantica Beans" which appear to be butter beans marinated in some italian style dressing. I had this after my walk with Ro. I love love love butter beans so those were really tasty but I'm not so sure about the cucumber. It's a nice crunch though- maybe I should experiment with it at home.
Another almost vegetarian day, surprisingly.

Exercise:
I went on a great walk with Ro. 2.8 miles in about 45 minutes. We were just walking along and talking so this was actually a pretty good pace.

When that whole mad season comes around

It is sooooooo hot in Sac today. OMG! Why am I not hanging out in my apartment in SF today where the high was 63 degrees? In contrast, the high here today was 103 degrees. 103. Kill me now.

I totally had an interesting thing happen re: food today. Around 5 pm I was trying to cool myself off with an icy cold bath and thinking on what to make for dinner. All of a sudden I had a terrible craving for Kettle Chips Baked BBQ chips and chocolate chip ice cream. I tried to convince myself that something else would do, maybe something green but myself was having none of it! "ME WANT ICE CREAM. ME WANT BBQ CHIPPIES!!!" myself cried. Well, I thought about it and kind of determined that the baked BBQ chips and a bowl of ice cream wouldn't hurt me, especially since it's like 1000 degrees and I was unlikely to cook anything else for dinner. High in sodium sure and definitely not the best for me but I wasn't going to freak out and get guilty, I'd deal with it.
Well, I got to Safeway and as I was browsing around I picked up some oranges and spinach and grapes. By the time I got to the chips and realized they didn't have my Baked BBQ chips I wasn't really that perturbed. The craving had been very specific, I didn't want just any baked BBQ chips so it was easy to just shrug and go "oh well." I did get some ice cream but I only had a small bowl (less that 1 cup) so all in all- not bad. I was kind of proud of myself for craving the greens and fruit once I was actually in the store.

Food:
For breakfast- NO COFFEE! It was terrible and I'll never be able to live without coffee again. Unfortunately, my beans are in SF and I am here and I HATE preground coffee, especially the giant canister stuff James loves. Also, we had no creamer so the coffee was just not meant to be. Instead I had:

Fiber One cottage cheese with the Valdosta Pecans (and dried cranberries which are in the mix). I love Fiber One products, especially their cottage cheese.
Around 1 pm, I was hungry so I made:

A delicious chicken wonton soup with tons of frozen veggies. It was basically chicken stock with green beans, peas, zucchini and a few garlic chicken wontons. It was really good but kind of hot for the weather. I wonder if this would taste good as a chilled soup? I would definitely make it again in SF though.

As per above, I ate this delicious, delicious ice cream and I don't feel one ounce of remorse for it.
Finally for dinner, I made some stir fry beef and green beans.

I'm kind of feeling on a green bean kick for some reason lately, even though usually I hate green beans and really will only eat them if there's no broccoli, brussels sprouts or zucchini I can eat instead.

Exercise:
None, it's hard to find motivation when it's 103 outside and by the time it cools down enough to go out, it's dark outside. I'm going to hit the gym tomorrow but that will only last until July 4th when my membership runs out. It was easy (and cool) in SF but not here! I have to find a better way of coping with this.

We don't talk about it- the little things that we do without

Ah ha! Are you curious about what I ate and how I exercised in the new apartment in SF?
Did you miss me while I was gone?
Who are you?
Who am I?
Please let me know... :)

Food:
This is by no means a comprehensive list from last week but I thought I'd include some of the best stuff:

I ate this burrito with Chuck before I left. Dos Coyotes makes the BEST lite burrito ever. It's essentially just pico de gallo, and grilled chicken in a tortilla. I asked them for some of their fresh roasted corn salsa and they put some on my lettuce and some inside the burrito.

The only thing that could improve this burrito would be a whole wheat tortilla but I don't think the Dos is ready to go that far yet.

I will probably miss Tupelo most of all. It, without a doubt, make the best mocha and the best coffee of any coffee place in Sacramento. I used to think Peets was IT but Tupelo is even better than them. Plus, they had free wi-fi right when I needed it.

Grilling with Chuck again! Fish tacos this time (tilapia) with cabbage and chipotle cream sauce and grilled zucchini and asparagus. I love the BBQ!

This was lunch at Provident Funding, Chuck's work (and my old place of employment for like 3 months). I really like this new kind of lunch- just meat and cheese with veggies- no bread in sight! It's satisfying, it tastes great, and I don't feel bogged down after I've eaten it.

One of my final meals before I left Davis for the new apartment- fresh corn, pasilla chile and feta cheese pizza. I forgot the cilantro this time but remembered the lime and it was ok but the one before with cilantro was better. Nugget's pizza crust is super good.

My first meal in the new place! After forgetting to eat like all day and locking myself out of the apartment as soon as I got in I was famished (and so was James). I did another plate similar to the one I ate with Chuck above. Proscuitto, manchego and Old Amsterdam cheese, fresh grapes, Andronico's beet salad and Andronico's roasted mushroom salad with parmesan. Both of the Andronico's salads were just fine and convinced me I'd be able to survive without a Nugget nearby.

Breakfast both mornings included a lowfat latte made with the espresso machine that wasn't earning it's keep in the Baywood house and toast with Andronico's fresh, all natural peanut butter that's made in store. The toast could have been better- the husband picked white buttermilk bread over a heart healthy bread but the peanut butter was excellent. Not too sweet with no added sugars.

I went to Peasant Pies, as suggested by Slim, the last day I was there, sort of mid-exercise. I got this Basque Beef pie with whole wheat crust and it was pretty good. I won't say it was the most delicious thing I'd ever eaten and it could have used some vegetables but it shored me up to continue on my walk and gave me a destination to walk to.
So that's it for the freshness. I did have a piece of cake with white frosting at the wedding shower (it was a small slice of cake but it had a lot of frosting) and though I thought I might not like it because it would be super sweet, it didn't taste that super sweet so I don't think my tastebuds have completely adapted to a life without sugar yet. I did have a moment of angst at the wedding shower but I'll save that for a different post.

Exercise:
I was actually really successful last week. I walked up the giant hill both days I was in SF. The day I actually arrived I didn't but that's because I was like dead from moving all of our stuff. Before we left for SF, I did the 1st week of C25K Day 1 at the gym and it went really smoothly. I think my lungs could have gone for longer but my legs were protesting and I wanted to be kind to my knees. This was way before I actually thought I would be starting the C25K but it turned out well.
I also walked 3.1 miles the last day in SF (including climbing up the hill). It took me much longer than I'm used to: 1 hour and 20 minutes but that did include the hill where I have to stop every 20 feet to be able to breathe. I also stopped mid walk to buy the Peasant Pie. Even without my big ass hill, the hills in SF are tough. Just walking back to UCSF from 12th and Irving was really tiring. It's going to be awesome living there and getting exercise just by doing my daily routine.