Also while I'm in a good mood... or not.

(I just realized I have the annoying habit of not posting for weeks then posting multiple updates in a day. If you hate this, I hear ya. Skip along)

I remember that cold I told you about a few weeks back??? It's back. And It's a bitch.

When I spoke to my cousin the other day she gave me the whole "oh no you're not sick again are you" talk. I explained to her that I am not in the habit of faking my illness and I do in fact have an immune system likened to that of a cancer patent. Awful, but slightly true.

I will quote the next few lines verbatim because even if I made this up it would not be as offensive as the way it came out of her mouth.

K: Sick again huh? Well when what the last time you were on Lulu? (Lulu my beach cruiser)

S: Huh? What does that have to do with anything?

K: When was the last time you rode your bike?

S: Kel, I'm sick and it's 25 degrees why would I ride my bike?

K: Well you need to get on that bike. Everything I've read says there's a link to exercise and the strength of your immune system. That's why you're always sick.

S: Kel, even if I wanted to ride my bike it's FREEZING I'd get pneumonia and the sidewalks are covered in snow and ice! I don't even think I could get out of my parking lot!

K: I'm just saying, because I've been trying to figure out why I haven't been sick at all and I think it's because I've become so active. You can't make excuses because of the weather!

ok. I admit. it wasn't quite as offensive as I made it out to be. You're getting the version without voice affliction... also I'm being a bit of a baby. 

Let me just make these points though...

The high today was 28. twenty eight. not celsius. fahrenheit. that's damn cold. and it was the high.

The woman who is giving this exercise advice is living a sweet 600 miles to the south where the weather doesn't pack as much of a punch.

And here is my pièce de résistance, the cream of the crop in excuses: 

I am slightly jaded because my mother (along with her 2 cats and 1 dog) is currently residing with my husband and myself. Why, do you ask? Because two weeks ago, while clearing snow off her car in the parking lot, she fell and shattered her femur. She had surgery where a rod and pins were put in to hold it all together, spent 1 week in the hospital, another in a rehab facility, and will spend the next 4 weeks at my residence where she will require my assistance to shower, shit and shave. 

So honestly, I ask you, is it  so wrong that I am leery to hop on the beach cruiser in a Michigan December?

I ask you followers to pick a side. My side. The right side. 

I guess I don't have quite the same argument for the stationary bike. But if you give me a minute I'll work one up.

oh ya know sometimes I mosey into this place once a month

what. is my. deal.

I have been home, pretty consistently, for ohhh um... about a month.
On my ass.
Eating everything.
Never blogging.
All while trying to do as little actual physical activity as possible.

Sad but true.

I even caught myself doing that weird use your toes as fingers thing to avoid bending over to pick things up... even sadder... the thing I picked up with my monkey feet was my toothbrush.
WHO AM I??? 
My toothbrush is the last thing (next to instruments used in gynecological exams) I want to have my chubby sausage toes all over. I just threw up a little in my mouth.

I am trying to save myself from saying, or thinking for that matter, the phrase "I'll start fresh again in the new year!" ugh. I hate those people. Those people who crowd the gym just to stand by the water fountain and take the big stall in the bathroom. Those people who flirt with the people working at the front desk and wear three inch hoop earrings and full face makeup to break a sweat. The worst of these are the people on cell phones doing cardio. seriously. Thankfully these people die off around week three and I can feel the burn with out overhearing about someones latest STD. I appreciate your lack of perseverance New Years Resolution Breakers. I really do.

It is in all of this cynicism that I realize as irregular as I may be I am not these people. Or at least I hope not to be. I want to be that girl who looks like she belongs. Who looks like there's no where she'd rather be at 6am saturday morning. I would love to run on a treadmill in a shirt from an actual race I was in... As opposed to wearing my "I'd rather be napping" t-shirt.

It's funny how as I read this back I realize how superficial I am being, while chastising others for being superficial. Yuck.

Being fat makes me mean.

Here's to being nice in the new year. xox

A little story about love... and the desire to wear a turkey hat.

I don't know about all of you out there but my family loves with food.

Rediculous but true.

** If you're having a hard day a good meal will clear your mind.

** If you're having a good day, lets cook something to celebrate.

** Holiday? Surely there's a cake/ cookie/ pasta dish just right for the occasion.

** It's your birthday? Lets go out to dinner! (and make a cake)

** Wedding or baby shower of some sort? Have it at the restaurant with the good bruchetta.

And God forbid someone dies, we litterally eat for three days.

It's sickning really.

And I'm not talking a bunch of amateur eaters here. We are professionals. My grandfather owned a catering company, at which nearly all of my family members were employed. I spent my childhood summers hanging out in the walk-in cooler, sitting on a milk crate, drinking coca-cola out of a glass bottle with my cousins. Occasionally I would be incharge of stickering the sandwiches with neon colored lables (that I mostly stuck all over my body instead)

Some of my best memories of my family come from "the store" as we called it. My grandpas smoky office with the big blue metal desk where he would let me count and roll coins. Going out on a route with my cousins and meeting all the factory workers downtown. The first time I ever had Kielbasa was in the cab of one of those trucks and it was love at first bite.

My grandpa later sold the business and retired to Florida, where old people seem to like to die. One of my aunts started a restaurant with a friend and I worked there when I was not quite old enough, scraping dishes and taking old grease to the dumpster. One would think the experience would turn me off from food, but lets be honest... a cold, old french fry under a dirty napkin holds no flame to the crispy potato lovlieness that comes fresh out of the fryer and onto my plate. I could always distinguish. That was my problem.

None the less my entire family life has undisputably revolved around food.

I won't say (because it would be a flat out lie) that everyone in my family is fit and healthy, but you would think we would be a family of 500lb the way we eat. Sadly I would have to say that I am the fattest of them all and since I'm nearly the youngest it's beyond pathetic.

After that heartwarming story, on to the point!

Do you think a zebra can really change his stripes??? Can we go from being a family who eats together to a family who moves together? Everything in me wants to believe so.

Every year for the past 28 years the city of Detroit has held the Turkey Trot on Thanksgiving day (10k, 5k, 1k races for charity) and some 22,000 or so people participate... And every year we have sat on our asses and watched it on TV while sneaking ham rolls from the kitchen.

Well this year my cousin Kelly and her husband decided to run the 5k and a few of us went down to cheer them on. This is pathetic in many ways, but two specifically come to mind.

1) They don't even live in Detroit anymore. They live in Virginia. All of us Michiganders stood on the sidelines and watched out of staters run a fundraiser for our city. Fail.

2) I don't know if you remember but back in August (before I fell off the weightloss wagon) I had the BRILLIANT idea of training for a 5k. An idea that I was so excited about and shared with this same cousin who decided she wanted to run one for the first time too. Since August she has ran 3. The Turkey Trot was her 4th. *mental forehead slap*

I must say that the Turkey Trot looked much more fun than those boring Ironman competitions. There were costumes and signs and silly socks and.... wait for it... giant hats shaped like turkeys. Not the gobble gobble bird kind of turkey, but the beheaded, plucked, fresh out of the oven kind. You stick your head up what would be the ass (I think) and it looks like a good time. I want one. Bad. My desire to own that hat far outweighs my fears of being a fat girl in a 5k.

nearing the end of the race, chickens and young children on the sidelines

the only two (out of 15 of us) of us who raced.

the object of my affection, TURKEY HAT! :)

So I have decided, for the better health of my self and my family (and in the interest of owning millinery shaped like poultry)  next year we would all participate in some form at this event, be it in the 1k 5k or 10 k races and although I got a lot of grumbles, I think we're all in.

One day I hope that we can learn to love each other through mutual activity and friendly competition rather than mostacolli and I'm pretty sure we're on our way.

Are your families food habits anything like mine? I'd love to hear your stories :)

I'm a sick puppy.

I have mysteriously contracted a hellacious cold/ flu/overall horrible feeling some time in the last 24 hours. I have a fever my nose is running like a faucet and my lip/ nasal area is so red I am looking seasonally appropriate (a la Rudolph the Red Nose Reindeer). 

However in all of my illness I am staying focused on weight loss. Granted it's only been one day that I've been sick AND on a weight loss plan, but it's a one day win in my book. Water is good for me... when I'm sick or other wise so I'm drinking a ton. I'm not binging on my feel good drink of choice (hot cocoa with extra milk, extra chocolate, extra sugar, half pound of marshmallows) I've instead opted for Chai tea with a Truvia sweetner. So far so good.

Yesterday, before I felt like death, I managed to hit the grocery store and the gym. Both were a success. 

I avoided the evils of the grocery store, loading up on salad greens and yummy low carb yogurt. Also if anyone else out there is low-carbing it Kroger (and I'm sure other grocery stores) sells out of this world  wraps with an incredible 12 grams of fiber. The kicker is that they're actually very soft and pliable unlike so many others. I recommend highly, but I don't recommend eating more than one at a time. Trust me. Your colon will thank you.

The gym could have been better honestly. Granted my nose was starting to run and I was developing a fever so I probably shouldn't have been there, but at the time I didn't feel that bad. I started out really pumped up (a great playlist helps that) and thought I would see how long it would take me to do a 5k or 3.1 miles (I'll tell you why in another post) on the treadmill. Needless to say I didn't find out. I did a 5 minute warm up and alternated 60 seconds of jogging with 60 seconds of walking. I lasted 15 minutes until I sneezed something nasty all over the treadmill (thank God for disinfectant spray) and decided that was as good a time as any to call it quits. 

I worked on my back, triceps, and biceps then cooled down with 15 minutes on the bike before I left. Even though I felt ill, emotionally it felt good to follow through on my promise to "Do something active for 30 minutes a day. every. single. day." (even days when I feel like crap)

I must go now and do Bridesmaidy things with my good friend Laura... who's wedding is in June if you remember. She has just informed me that she would like me to order my dress by the end of December, due to my general forgetfulness, string of bad luck, and attraction to overall mayhem, "just in case". I can't say that I can really argue with her. I do happen to be a magnet for mishaps, but I did manage to haggle with her and get until the end of January.

Reason 865,713 why I need to lose some weight: I need not look like a stuffed sausage in a bridesmaid dress... and I only have two stinking months to make a difference. yeesh.