The Quest to be Fit

Tracking my journey to better health

Maybe Sabra does have something… August 16, 2009

Awhile back the great folks over at Sabra were kind enough to send me a few coupons for their delights, and Friday night I finally found Sabra products in my local Winco.  (Costco has them, too, but I couldn’t use a coupon there.)

Chris and I tried the variety shown here:

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Overall I quite liked the taste and texture, but there’s something in here that makes my throat tickle/burn a little.  I got over that and consumed a large blob with lunch, and many other unpictured tastes, mostly with cucumber as my dipping agent. 

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This week has been a tough one for me–I was especially unmotivated at work and feel like I just sat there all week doing nothing.  I’ve also been a tad depressed and listless at times 😦  Boo.  

On a positive note I worked out four times!  Monday was a full body weight sesh, Tuesday a hot date with the stairmill, Wednesday a walk/run with Lily, and Saturday a leg workout and stairmill sesh.  I was very happy to get back into the gym and sweat my little heiny off–hurt so good!

I mentioned Winco on Friday night.  I was feeling a little blah, and thought I’d venture out to Walmart (gasp!) to see what the store was like.  I haven’t been to a Walmart in over 5 years, since when I was in Klamath Falls with the ex.  Not my favorite place, but I was curious about their groceries.  I ended up finding a Danskin shirt for $5, and some leggings for $5.  No full-on grocery section, but they did have some things.  I picked up some tuna for Chris, a can of garbonzos, and some baking soda.  Woop-de-doo. 

Not in the mood to go home just yet, I ventured to Winco afterward.  I was saddened by their lack of organic produce, but very impressed by their bulk and organic bulk offerings.  Then I caught sight of the Sabra. Who woulda figured that the discount grocer would have Sabra?!  I also picked up Dreyer’s Vanilla Frozen Yogurt, which I promptly opened up and ate directly from the container when I got home :shocked:.  I totally didn’t need it, but was a bad girl and ate some anyway, only to feel a tad guilty afterward.

Let’s see, what else do I have here…

More of my own hummus and other goodies:

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An avocado tostada, jalapenos fritos, cucumber with lime and jalapenos (grown by the restaurant manager :)), and some of Si Senor’s new salsas from their salsa bar.

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Chinese food!  It had been a long time, but we were craving Chinese the last few weeks.  I should have gone with my intuition and ordered something with veggies as the base, but I’m a sucker for Kung Pao.  Here’s a vegetarian spring roll, Chris’ BBQ pork, and my Kung Pao Fried Bean Curd.  Yes, fried tofu.  I’ve realized I’m not a fan of the taste of tofu, but it was rather good fried–kinda chewy on the outside and soft/melty on the inside.  I forgot to ask for brown rice!

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I liked how the blueberries nestled with the apple here 😉  Did I tell you I picked a huge bag of blueberries out of my dad’s yard?  He was going out of town so I took the opportunity to be a blueburglar. 

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Thursday was Miracle Treat Day at Dairy Queen; what a fabulous excuse to go get a Blizzard! Of course I didn’t do so well when put on the spot–“What would you like?”  I was like a deer in the headlights!  I should have gone for the Tagalong cookie blizzard, but opted instead for a chocolate base with cookie dough added in.  Not too shabby, but Tagalongs or Reese’s would have been perfect in there.  Chris got the Thin Mint, and was kind enough to flip off the camera when I snapped the pic.  He’s so klassy 😉

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Roar!
Roar!

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 Last night we attended another dinner bonanza at Typhoon! Beaverton.  Our friends Eric and Benny coordinated the evening and got 17 of us around the chef’s table to enjoy like 13 delicacies and tons of wine.  There were quite a few veg options, but I still did have a few non-veg things:  crab pad thai (picked out the crab; didn’t like the flavor of the dish anyway); a green salad with chicken (picked out the chicken); Drunken Noodles with chicken (picked it out) and Bo’s Lemongrass Clam Chowder (holy yum!!).  Other than that, I had Miang Kum sans shrimp, a veggie spring roll, spicy green beans, veggie fried rice, white rice, broccoli, and a few things I’m sure. 

I drank way too much wine, ate way too much rich food, and paid the price with an aching belly for awhile and some digestive repercussions.  I haven’t had meat/seafood/flesh for a long time now, and each time I’ve tried something with flesh in it, I haven’t liked it.  The only exception was the chowder, as that is just liquid crack.  Don’t believe me?  I had three small cups of it :shocked:.

Yesterday I picked up Skinny Bitch at the library and am about halfway through it already.  It has been interesting to read through the chapters and affirm a lot of the changes I’ve already made in my diet, exercise, and health overall the last 8-9 months.  Lately I’ve thought a lot about going vegan, but then I encounter foods I love and think, “No, I don’t want to go vegan, and that’s okay.”  Most of the time I don’t eat animal products, but some egg and cheese products give me great pleasure every once in awhile.  I don’t like milk, but the damn cheese!  And whipped cream, ice cream/froyo, and a few other things.

The book makes a point about the body’s pH, and specifically that being overly acidic causes a myriad of problems, including allergies.  I do love my morning coffee (drinking some now), but I know the acidity is not good for me.  Every time I think of reaching for tea I cry a little inside– no coffee? cup of joe? black gold?  But would it relieve the allergies I get? Joint pain? Skin problems I can’t get over lately?  Garhhhhhh… I will contemplate this further to see if I want to give up my tasty coffee with Silk Creamer.

Thinking more about vegetarianism and tough food encounters, Thanksgiving and Christmas have crossed my mind more the last few weeks.  Specifically, will I choose to eat turkey and gravy?  If there’s a big prime rib for Christmas I can avoid that no problem, but Thanksgiving dinner is my favorite.  What’s a newly vegetarian girl to do?! 

I leave you with a few more pics from last night.  Ciao, bellas!

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Best dinner ever! February 16, 2009

Let’s get right to the point, people:  dinner at Typhoon on Valentine’s Day was probably the best dinner I’ve ever had in my life.  I’m struggling to think of anything that continued to amaze me like the 15 items we ate Saturday.  Oh, and the endless supply of great wine.  I’ll give you all the details I can remember in a minute…

Saturday started with my headache being horrible and me feeling quite icky from it.  I got up thinking I may go to pilates, but just didn’t feel well enough by the time 9:30 rolled around.  I made coffee, and ate my traditional oats; this was the last of the Barney Butter. 

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I was feelin’ better after breakfast, but still not quite right.  I slept a little on the couch; felt so good 🙂

Lunch was two eggs scrambled (accidentally dropped in the 2nd yolk!) in a whole wheat tortilla with a wedge of LCL.  I also had my apple from Friday that I never ate.  Damn pithy Jonagolds got the best of me last week.

The afternoon rolled around and Chris and I mosied to the gym.  The basketball backboard wasn’t quite fixed yet, but they opened up the court and guys were playing half court games.  They got booted at 3pm, tho, for the boot camp class, no pun intended.  😦  That cut my cardio shorter than I’d hoped. 

After getting home I pampered myself a little by painting my toenails.  Sounds rather ordinary, but I haven’t done this in MONTHS.  Last time my little piggies were painted was in September if you can believe it!

Now comes the exciting part…after getting all gussied up Chris and I arrived at Typhoon around 7 for our special group dinner, and so the ecstasy began!  Wine abounded–no corkage fee and lots of people in the wine industry equals tons of great wine!  We brought Kim Crawford 2007 Sauvingnon Blanc, and we also consumed Willakenzie 2007 Pinot Gris, Vidon 2007 Pinot Noir (excellent for such a young wine!!), and some Mumm Napa sparkling white. 

First dish was some sort of mini roll served in a wine glass with a sweet sauce.  No idea what was in here, but it was yummy and hot!

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Next came spinach wraps, and vegetable spring rolls.  Mmmmmm!  The wraps had freeze dried shrimp, sliced hot peppers, jicama, peanuts, fried rice noodles (?), and sweet chili sauce to put inside as we pleased.  The rolls were perfectly yummy.

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Here we paused for a little gift bag and drawing from our lovely hosts, Eric and Bennie.  We got a bag of Hershey kisses, and some of us got a number for drawing prizes.  Chris and I got to choose between wine, a gift card to Red Robin, and a gift card back to Typhoon…Chris chose Typhoon!  Perfect for me any day!

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Next was where the mind was blown!!  Bo Kline’s clam chowder with lemongrass.  Holy. Moley. I know it sounds odd, but if you ever get a chance to visit a Typhoon you MUST try this soup.  Even if you don’t like chowder or lemongrass, somehow I think you will like love this.  I really had to resist eating more than a cup of it.

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Up next was a cascading delivery of incredibly yumminess in the form of like 8 dinner entrees and sides. Forgive me I do not know the names of them all! Flaming fish, pineapple curry, green beans, beef with heavenly sauce and peanuts, drunken noodles, fried rice, crab pad thai, and another I can’t remember at this point!  Everything was soooooooooo gooooooood.  This really was heaven on a plate.  I had a little more of the curry since that’s my 2nd love…

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I ate plenty, and was full, but thankfully not gut-bustingly-uncomfortably full.  Dessert was really unexciting if you ask me, probably a good thing since dinner was so fabulous.  It was sticky rice and a custard; I had a few bites, but no need to post the pic since it wasn’t so pretty.

After dinner we went to a little bar called Friends in Beaverton, and proceeded to listen to and do some karaoke and drinking.  I didn’t do either, but had fun.  We left around 1am, and I didn’t end up getting in bed until about 1:45.  :sleepy:

Sunday

I was dead tired in the morning, but still got up for yoga 🙂  My breakfast was a cereal mess…inspired by all you fabu bloggers out there who display these frequently.  Barbara’s Shredded Oats, Fred Meyer Shredded Wheat, and chai spice cereal I can’t remember the name of now.  It was tasty!

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Yoga was great today, and since I knew I was heading back to the gym later with Chris I didn’t do anything else after class.  In between gym sessions I did a little cleaning and ate lunch.  A rather boring experience… one scrambled egg on a toast butt with 1/2 a wedge LCL, and 1/2 cup lowfat cottage cheese.  Sorely lacking in fresh fruit or veg, right?

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Sometime afterward we went to the gym around 3, and I started off with cardio so I could get in my full 45 minutes to an hour.  I did 35 minutes of fast intervals on the stair mill, and then about 10 minutes on the elliptical.  Chris got booted from the basketball court again, but for volleyball this time.  He was kind enough to let me do an ab workout before leaving, though.  This time I did the fitnessmagazine.com Your Flat-Abs Handbook, and it was great!  Lots of stuff for the obliques, and it seemed to be quite effective.

Once home I had a choc. protein shake, and we did some yard work.  I raked around the barkdust to prevent Lily’s footsies from being so messy when she plays catch.  She has done a number on the lawn, too, so I staked & twined off an area in the hopes that it will recover a bit.

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You won’t believe it, but we went to Mexican for dinner again. That is like 6 nights in a row we ate out 😦  Bad bad bad bad bad!  I tried to control myself and didn’t have a Casuela, and only had one chicken taco and chips & salsa.  I watched Chris eat a cheeseburger with a fried egg jalapenos, and fries on the side; I almost asked him for a taste at one point it looked so good.

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After dinner came shopping at PetSmart and Fred Meyer.  Nothing too exciting here.  Lily had fun sniffing around at PetSmart, and nearly pulled me over she’s so strong!

Once home I unpacked everything and dove into the work recyling.  It took me over an hour to sort out, wash, and put away all the stuff!  That was two weeks’ worth of recycling, and really wasn’t too bad to deal with.

Afterward I rewarded myself with some tasty fruit:  a beautiful Fuji, eaten European style with a knife.  Mmmmmm….. I’m so glad to have crisp, yummy apples again 🙂

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Chris later attacked my Maranatha with some Ritz, and I couldn’t forego that a.b. action, so I had one cracker with probably 1/2 a tbsp of a.b.  Very good indeed!

I was going to post this last night (Sunday), but Chris and I kind of got into a tiff and I had to hold off.  Thanks for checking back and reading, though!  I’ll be posting about today (Monday) shortly…. stay tuned.

 

Blast off February 13, 2009

I looked up a bunch of workout programs today on fitnessmagazine.com and honed in on the following:

  1. The Ultimate Ab Workout Plan (4 weeks long)
  2. Get a Bikini Body in 4 Weeks
  3. Your Flat-Abs Handbook
  4. Lose Every Bulge in 3 Weeks (some Hollywood inspired thing)
  5. Bikini Body Workout:  Complete Cardio and Sculpting Routine

Tonight I did #2 and the first week’s plan for #1.  I am amazed that the moves look easy but are pretty challenging, and left me sweating a bit 🙂  I felt like a total dork at first busting out the routines, but then got the hang of things.  I’m desperate to blast off some calories and flab before leaving for my vacation, so I hope this change of pace kicks my ass into better shape a little faster.  I figured that I should be down about another few pounds by now since I’m three months in to working out and eating less…just more motivation to step it up a bit for the next 5 weeks.

Have any of you done these types of workouts (i.e. 4 wk program/fitness magazine programs) and had good results??  I’d really like to hear your take on them, so please de-lurk and let me know!

The Day’s Eats and Activities

Erin asked a question today about what we do first thing in the morning…today was really bad as I hit the snooze button for like an hour before getting up!!!  And I still wanted to go back to bed after that. 

Since I got a late start I ate breakfast at home again and made coffee.  Nummy steel cut oats, raisins, Barney Butter, cinnamon, almond milk, water.

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I was busy at work and didn’t end up eating until lunch until about 2.  My wrap was a little different today, and yummy!  Whole wheat tortilla, dried cranberry crusted goat cheese, peppered turkey, romaine.  My Jonagold was pithy again 😦  At least the Kashi TLC were tasty!  I ran out of turkey and romaine so my wrap was a little empty 😦

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After busting my ass to get ready for my 4pm meeting I was stood up 😦  Hey, it happens here and there…People get busy and forget about meetings sometimes, esp. when they’re scheduled a quarter in advance.

I guess Chris thought I agreed to go to Mexican again tonight, as he came in to my office around 5 and started speaking of such things.  Say what?  I thought he was crazy, but whatever, I was a kind partner and agreed to go as usual. 

We went to Si Senor, where I had a massive Diet Coke, chips & salsa, and one chicken taco.  Simple, tasty, perfect portion size.  ‘Nuf said.

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That’s Chris’ huge margarita in the background.

I hit up the gym around 8 and busted out the aforementioned workout, plus a 3-way cardio sesh of 15 minutes of intervals on each the stair mill, elliptical, and treadmill.  I was watching 30 Rock while on the treadmill and laughed out loud a few times…it was so funny!  I don’t watch it that often and was totally amused.

Once home afterward a little shaky-poo was calling my name…

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The all-star lineup, posing next to the finished product.  I used 1 cup almond milk, 3+ TBSP shake mix, ~1/2 TBSP Maranatha, and 1/2 a nanner.  SO yummy and satisfying!!!  BTW, I love my Braun hand blender and it’s multiple attachments.  It is powerful and really easy to use, and all the attachments can go right in the dishwasher.

Guess what?!  It’s after midnight, so technically that means it is Friday!!!  Yippee!  This week has gone by pretty slowly; not bad really, just annoying.

What are you all doing for Valentine’s Day?  V-Day is a tough one…so many people get caught up in the perfect gift or the perfect dinner… I like to just focus on those I love 🙂  Chris and I are joining a group of mostly strangers at Typhoon for a multi-course meal.  I’m totally hoping it is just 8 courses of curry and not too much seafood 🙂  I need to get me some curry on a more regular basis!!

Happy Friday to you 🙂  Toodle-oo.