I Had to Laugh

A Moment of Honesty

My gosh. I have struggled with my weight since I was younger. I've never been satisfied with my appearance and have yo-yo'd up and down (mostly up) for as long as I can remember. It's been difficult too because I can't pinpoint that there was anything that I was doing wrong. I wasn't eating fast food all the time, I was eating a pretty well balanced diet (as balanced as a girl can get when she only likes the following fruits and veggies - corn, green beans, berries, green apples, grapes, and bananas), but I couldn't control the weight. I've been working with my doctor on this for over a year and we've been stumped. She tested a bunch of things, which came back normal.

On my most recent visit she did labs on my cholesterol and something called C reactive proteins. Both are high. We all know what the cholesterol is but I was stumped on the C reactive proteins. What a high reading on that means is that my body is essentially inflamed. I asked her how something like that happens and she said people who have auto-immune diseases tend to show high levels. You know, things such as lupus, psoriasis, or eczema. I stopped her there and explained that I had psoriasis on my scalp from the time I was 11 until a few years ago. Since it had been years since I had psoriasis, I never mentioned it on my medical history. At that point all the pieces clicked for her. She said that the inflammation can have a negative effect on your metabolism and thus people with said inflammation also can have a difficult time losing weight. It also made sense for me because around 5th grade is when I remember first starting to struggle with my weight. She put me on a statin which I wasn't thrilled about, but all of the holistic approaches I had tried for the past 5 years hadn't really worked at lowering my cholesterol. With the inflammation stuff thrown into the mix, I figured maybe now was the time to say okay to it.

I've been on it for almost a month. Since then I've also rejoined Weight Watchers. I've already lost 6 pounds in 2 weeks. The last time I was on WW, it took 3 months to lose 6 pounds. So here is where the moment of honesty comes in. I'm going to start posting my losses (and any gains) on the blog. Not that I don't think I will keep with the program, but putting it out there for the world to see just adds another layer of personal accountability. I feel like this time, the goal is actually in reach.

Success!

Fall registration started this morning and went according to plan. After last semester's debacle, I was rightly nervous about how today was going to go. Fortunately, everything moved along just swimmingly and I can relax for a bit. I'm still a little nervous about tomorrow when the senior class registration window opens, it just goes with the territory. One of my supervisors told me, "what's to be nervous about - you've tested your set up, OIT has tested performance behind the scenes, it should be fine." "Should" is the operative word here. I know I tested and I know my set up was good, but what if there is an outage or a mass virus outbreak or the whole system crashes. These are the thoughts that run through my head the nights before registration starts. I can't help it, it's just the way I am. With good news from this morning though, I have hope that tomorrow will be A-OK.

Thursday Recipe

It's happy hour! Or Thirsty Thursday. Whichever you prefer. This week's recipe is for one of my favorite beverages - sangria. My mom and my aunts are fans too and since I am eagerly anticipating my trip home in a few weeks, this one is for them.

Vodka Sangria

Ingredients
1 (750 ml) bottle rose wine
6 ounces vodka
3 ounces Grand Marnier
2 ounces white grape juice
2 ounces lemon juice
2 ounces simple syrup
3 ounces pomegranate juice
3 ounces orange juice (no pulp)
4 ounces club soda
1 pint blackberries or raspberries

Directions
1. Pour rose wine, vodka, Grand Marnier, white grape juice, lemon juice, simple syrup, pomegranate juice, and strained orange juice in a large pitcher half filled with ice (entire mixture should be light pink).

2. Place a small amount of ice into serving glasses. Pour the wine mixture over the ice, top each glass with about 1/2 oz. of club soda; garnish with blackberries or raspberries.

Accepted

I am in! I received my letter of acceptance from NCSU yesterday. Starting in Fall 2009, I will be a doctoral student in Higher Education Administration. And another red school. All of the schools I have received degrees in have had a shade of red as their school color. Its not intentional, but a fun coincidence nonetheless. I am very excited about going back to school and have some trepidations as well. I'm super nervous about writing my dissertation. There are a couple of reasons for this: 1) I have no idea what I am going to research; and 2) that is a lot of writing. The longest thing I've ever written academically (and non-academically) was 45 pages. A dissertation is about three times as long, at least. I need to put that out of my head for now. Fall registration is right around the corner and I am swamped at work. I can't lose my head worrying about school when I haven't even started yet. For now, I am going to revel in the excitement of being accepted.

Birthday Wishes for Jack

My darling Jack is 4 years old today. I remember when he was a wee kitten with big paws. I lived in Boston then and he would sit on top of my old CRT monitor and spend hours watching the birds and the cars on the Fenway. He has been a great pet and I love him to pieces. Happy Birthday Little Man.

Lazy Weekend

The weather here in North Carolina is absolutely gorgeous. I am taking full advantage of not having a gosh darn thing to do this weekend. I went out yesterday morning and bought a chair for my balcony so I could sit outside and soak it all in. And I did. It was a perfect 78 degrees with a light breeze. Today is supposed to be even warmer. I've gotten all of the house cleaning and errands out of the way so I can enjoy another afternoon out in the sun. The kitties are enjoying it too. I've opened all the windows and they are pleased as punch to sit in the window sills and soak up the sunshine. Jack has always loved sitting in the window. Katie is now discovering it too. I wish my apartment had a screened in balcony so they could sit out there with me.

For the moment, I am going to enjoy the America's Next Top Model marathon. I have a little bit of work to do, so I'm going to get that taken care of. After lunch, the sunshine beckons...

Thursday Recipe

Nanner Pudding Squares

I am a huge fan of banana pudding. What's not to like? Whipped cream, bananas, and Nilla wafers. Yum.

Ingredients

35 Reduced Fat Nilla Wafers, finely crushed

1/4 cup (1/2 stick) margarine, melted

1 pkg. (8 oz.) Philadelphia Neufchatel Cheese, softened

1/2 cup powdered sugar

1 tub (8 oz.) Cool Whip Sugar Free Whipped Topping, thawed, divided

3 bananas

2 pkg. (1 oz. each) Jell-O Vanilla Flavor Fat Free Sugar Free Instant Pudding

3 cups cold fat-free milk

1/2 square Baker'S Semi-Sweet Chocolate, grated

Directions

Combine crumbs and margarine; press onto bottom of 13x9-inch dish. Refrigerate while preparing filling.

Mix Neufchatel cheese and sugar in medium bowl until blended. Stir in 1-1/2 cups cool whip; spread carefully onto crust. Cut bananas crosswise in half, then cut each piece lengthwise in half. Arrange over Neufchatel cheese mixture.

Beat pudding mixes and milk with whisk 2 min. Spoon over bananas. Spread with remaining cool whip; sprinkle with chocolate. Refrigerate 3 hours before cutting to serve.

Pet Peeve

I am a firm believer in personal hygiene. However, there is a time and a place for everything and I do not think that the office is an appropriate place to cut ones fingernails. Gah! It just grosses me out, I'm sorry. Do that at home. I understand if it's an emergency and you have a broken nail or something, but there is a guy who works in my office who cuts his nails here. Not at home. Here. Why, why, why? Every time I hear the nail clipper I cringe.

Okay, rant over. Back to your regularly scheduled day...

Krewe du Chaos

I experienced my first parade tonight. Mardi Gras hasn't officially started, but the Krewe du Vieux holds their parade a couple weeks before. Y'all - it was an assault on the senses. The whole experience. Sights, smells, sounds, touch - it was coming from all directions.

Let me back track a bit...I'm here in New Orleans for a conference for work. We heard there was a parade tonight so we decided to check it out. The fact that it passed right in front of the restaurant we had dinner reservations was just a bonus. Apparently the Krewe du Vieux is one of the raunchiest of the Krewes. They are an equal opportunity group and no one is safe from their satire and ridicule. Some of the floats were clever and some quite graphic. It made me wonder a bit about the parents next to me with their young children, but that was their call and I wouldn't want to be in their car on the ride home and answer the kids questions. And I know they had questions.

After the parade we had dinner at a fantastic restaurant, Carmelo's on the corner of Decatur and Toulouse. If you are ever in New Orleans, and you want good (and I mean good) Italian food, you need to go here. They have the best tomato sauce. But I digress...we walked back to the hotel down Toulouse to Bourbon Street. It was packed. I couldn't even imagine how crowded it would be when Mardi Gras starts. People screaming for beads, the smell of cigarettes and beer mixed with the sounds of the clubs and jazz bars combined with the push of the crowd. It was A LOT. Now, I like to go out and have a good time, but I have never been a crowd person or one for large parties and this is the biggest party I have ever seen. I'm glad I experienced it - I can say I did it, but don't look for me during Mardi Gras. It was crazy and chaotic, but that's Bourbon Street.

I am looking forward to exploring some of the other restaurants in the area and I'm hoping to convince Heather to take a trip to the French Market with me before I leave on Wednesday.