Weigh in

126.6.

Really bummed about that. Only a few days left in Phase 1, and in past successful SBDs I've been down 10 or more pounds. I have not cheated the smallest lick of anything, either. Hoping if I stick with it I'll get that "whoosh" people talk about, but for now I'm really depressed. It's been a lot of cooking, chopping, stirring, frying, grilling, mixing, blending, a LOT of dish washing, a lot of will power to pass up birthday cakes and ice cream and bread and ketchup and waffles and fruit, and pretty expensive too - our grocery bill last week was $160 and that didn't even last 5 days.

Weigh cool, baby

Have not eaten my arm yet, nor the temptingly delicious can of chocolate frosting, minus only a few knifefulls used for ToddlErations' valentines cookies, that sits so smarmily on the door shelf of the fridge. MistErations and I are counting the days until our glass of red wine (7!) and I have carefully planned London Broil for the evening before because it requires one-half cup of red wine, which will then conveniently be open for the Big Night.

Five-Spice Salmon and Oven Roasted Vegetables for dinner, black cherry sugar free Jell-O for dessert. The MistEr likes that flavor, I thought it looked like liver and tasted like Dr. Pepper.

Weigh in: 126.4.

Request

If you are reading this (and are not my husband), please have a glass of wine this evening. I have been concerned that with MistErations and I being on this diet, the surplussage of wine in the world will cause a crash in the market.

The South Pee Diet

I forgot how much the South Beach Diet makes you pee. Starting on Day 1, you can forget about getting a solid night's sleep because somewhere between midnight and 3 a.m., you'll be making your sleepy (and perilous, if you have toy-dropping midgets in your house) way to the loo. Amazing to me that even a single day on the diet can change your metabolism so much - it doesn't seem all that different from what I eat in a normal day, except for the Pop Tarts, M&Ms and wine, of course. From what I know of ketosis, it can't take place so quickly, so I don't think it's that. I just wish I knew why it happens.

Other than that, we (if I can speak for the MistEr, who doesn't have publishing permissions on my blog - Hi honey!) are doing pretty well. Day 3 began with an asparagus/mozzarella/sundried tomato omelette, chef's salad for lunch and - gasp! - steak is scheduled for dinner. We are only recently red-meat eaters, and so this is our first SBD on red meat. I'm still not really crazy about it, but the chicken, fish, chicken, fish, chicken for an entire month was never easy to take so this should mix it up a bit.

Weigh in: 127.8

Miss me?

OK, so I think I got up to get a snack or something 2 and a half years ago and lost my way back to the computer. I hope it's a testament to the South Beach Diet that I'm back to extol its virtues and whine about eggs and cheese sticks for the next two weeks. MistErations and I do the 'Beach once a year, to lose about 15 pounds that slowly comes back over the course of the year and then do it all over again. I don't think that's bad! It's a ton of work to cook and prepare everything, plus ToddlErations is now 6 and eats like a little filly and the "Baby" is now 4 and can pack away his share too. The kids don't seem to mind chicken nuggets, peanut butter and jelly, and pizza for a month while we eat spinach, salads, and all kinds of ooky things they won't touch.

So, tomorrow begins Phase 1, Day 1. Guess what, it's EGGS for breakfast! I've added The South Beach Diet Cookbook to my very small diet library, and it really takes some of the monotony out of the diet. I substitute Phase-appropriate meals when needed to avoid anything that I find ooky, like shrimp, bell peppers, too many onions, (ok, they come by it honestly), and so tomorrow it's sausage-cheese-egg muffin cups instead of veggie quiche cups. Lunch is already made, since I make MistEration's lunch to go so he can take it to work, South Beach chopped salad with tuna, he takes Ricotta Creme for lunch since Jello doesn't travel well, and we have the alloted Jello in the evening instead.

Starting weight: 130. Stay tuned, I'll be back before 2010 this time.

Things I learned from someone I never met

Picking up the mail today, I noticed one envelope standing out from the rest. Rather than a bland white business-sized envelope holding my current bill - excuse me, "statement" - it was bright red and the size that would hold a greeting card. Except it appeared to be empty, light as a feather. I examined it carefully. My husband's and my name were hand-lettered over our address. No return address. A 32 cent stamp and two 3 cent stamps were adhered carefully in the corner. I turned it over. There was a shiny band across the envelope flap. It looked somehow familiar but out of place. I realized the envelope had been turned inside out and glued shut. A few years ago, I would have ripped it open and solved the mystery at once. Today, with all the suspicion surrounding the mail, I held it up to the light. There was indeed something inside, perhaps folded, as I could see two layers of printing. After much turning of the envelope and squinting, I discovered it was my car registration, together with a handwritten note. I opened the envelope carefully. No shower of ricin. I removed the contents. It was in fact my registration, together with this note:

I found this at
the library. Keep it in
your glove compartment
so you don't lose it.
You wouldn't want
to be in an accident
without it.
Sincerely,
Mary L.

I had received the registration in the mail a few weeks ago, and was at the library with the kids a few days after that. I had put it in my purse with the intent of putting it in the car. It could have slipped out, or more likely, I had let my 2 year old play with my wallet to keep him reasonably quiet while people went about their library business. Or I might have used it as a bookmark, who knows. I hadn't noticed it was missing, but I was touched by the kindness of someone who took the time to return it.

I looked again at the envelope. So thrifty, so resourceful, so environmentally conscious! I peeked inside. In large somewhat shaky block letters, the red envelope had read "DAD" before it was inverted to carry my wayward registration back home. It had been so carefully opened, and so carefully glued shut. And the stamps! How old must 32 cent stamps be? But Mary didn't throw them out, no, she was still using them, combining with the .03 centers you can buy from the machine at the post office. I love that machine, it's one of the only machines I can think of that still takes pennies! I bet Mary loves that machine too.

I looked again at the note, torn from a small yellow spiral pad, the neat handwriting, the sweet admonishment not to be so careless in the future. There are few people who would take the time to return someone's registration, and fewer still who would include a handwritten note. What would I have done? Turned it in to the library front desk, perhaps. Maybe, harried by the children, even done nothing and left there on the floor, or under the desk, or shut it back into the book. WWMD?

Mary L., I don't know you, and I am sorrowful to say I may never know you. But I thank you for the valuable lessons I learned from you today, about recycling, about saving money, about pure kindness. And, if I ever do meet you, I owe you 38 cents.

Unplugged

I read in the paper this weekend that our local basic cable was going up from $39 a month to $43. Basic cable! Now you know I am all for saving money, and even $39 a month for the crap that streams into our house via that box was bugging me. This latest increase was the last straw. I called Comcast this morning and cancelled our cable. Completely. Didn't take their offer to discount my bill by $10 for the next two months while I thought about it. (Hint for those of you continuing with cable - make a quick $20 by calling and threatening to cancel; feel free to forward 5 bucks to me for the hint.)
We didn't watch much TV anyway. MistErations and I watch Survivor when it's on, but we have found we can get CBS with rabbit ears. PreschoolErations and ToddlErations watch PBS and Nick Jr, but not without a heaping serving of guilt for me. (Plus we get a grainy, staticky version of PBS if needed. Don't worry honey, Elmo is just playing in the snow.)
NPR had a story earlier in the Spring about a study finding that for every hour of television a child watches per day, his or her likelihood of developing ADD increases by 10%. That adds up too quickly for my comfort. TurnOffYourTV.com has some excellent links to articles and information about the effects that television, and its abundant, incessant advertising, have on children.
I feel great about it. Liberated. Unplugged. So Laura Ingalls Wilder.

Darndest Things

My 3 year old likes to tell "apple jokes". Usually they go something like this: "Why did the monster eat the apple?" "Because it was hungry!" [uproarious laughter] or "How did the apple get in the monster?" "The monster ate it!" [snort snort giggle giggle]. But she actually told one the other day that made me laugh.

3 year old: "Apple!" (long pause)

Me: "Oh, is that an apple joke?"

3 year old: "No, it's a apple and peanut butter joke, only without the peanut butter!"

Yeah, and I used to have a shirt like that, only it was a different color and mine were pants.

Weigh out

Well, not doing so hot on the old SBD this time around. Weigh in this morning was 126.5, a whopping 2.5 pounds dropped after suffering a multitude of cheese sticks and turkey roll ups with no bread. I suppose pizza and wine Sunday night didn't help, but I'm just not very motivated. Food is just so darn good.

mashed potatoes crusty french bread frosted flakes chocolate chip cookies twix bar brownie new york superfudge chunk salt bagel dried pineapple fettucine alfredo french fries ketchup fudge sauce

Now I have that out of my system. Back to my lunch of chicken breast over lettuce with zero carb ranch dressing.

Weigh in #1

Well, 4 days of South Beach Diet under my (shrinking) belt, and though I never want to see another scrambled egg, I weighed in at 126.8 this morning. It's easier this time around, I am simply having eggs and a home-made turkey sausage patty for breakfast, salad and cheeses/deli meats for lunch and picking a vegetable-rich dinner from the SBD cookbook. Snacks are celery with soft cheese or a handful of almonds. A lot easier than gagging down that awful V-8 juice every morning like last time. I really do need to add in some exercise, I was mortified to find that I have cellulite on my thighs. I got some when I was pregnant but figured it would go away. I don't wear shorts much so I never noticed. Though I walk with the kids to the park from time to time, pushing the combined 60 pounds of child plus the weight of the double stroller, I am trying to get myself on the rowing machine each day. For me, that is a lot harder than changing my diet. I've never really enjoyed exercise and it takes up valuable napping time.

What I'm reading

In an effort to get back on the road to Swimsuit Shape, today I bought The South Beach Diet Cookbook. I've only had a chance to sit down with it long enough to make dinner, but so far, it's very motivational. Though we are not officially back on the diet, I'm making a Phase 2 Oven Fried Chicken with Almonds (still in the oven) and have roasted up a can of garbanzo beans per another recipe. The garbanzo beans smell great as they're cooking and are a good thing to have around instead of a handful of goldfish crackers. To fully embarrass myself into actually losing the weight, I'm reporting that I'm 129 pounds today, up from 119 in November. Ugh.

"Good Bye"

No, not my blog - I've finally said my goodbye, in a stilted, robot-like male voice, to AOL after nearly 10 years. I have no regrets, I've been meaning to cancel my account for a long time and just kept putting it off, making sure I had changed my email address with absolutely everyone. I've got a free Yahoo! account now and am perfectly happy with it, except for when some numbnut friend of mine sends me a gigantic MIME file internet joke (that I can't even read because I have a Mac) and it fills up my allotted MB, like an elephant in my little virtual apartment.

The customer service people at AOL, it's their job to convince you to stay when you call (yes, you have to call, you can't simply click a "cancel" button) to tell them you've had enough of them and their creepy "AO" logo, reminiscent of the spooky pyramid-topping eye on the back of a dollar bill. So poor Jason at AOL, it was his job to ask me why I was quitting after 9 years and 8 months of "You've Got Mail". I could have gone on about the spam, the cost, the speed or lack thereof, but I simply told him I didn't need it anymore. When I first encountered the Internet in 1994, I needed a little help interfacing, and AOL was a nice friendly ride to the great electronic void, like carpooling with your next-door neighbor. (I also used the short-lived eWorld for a while. Anyone remember eWorld? ...anyone?) I no longer need the help.

The funniest part of the farewell phonecall with Jason was that I was required to give the answer to my secret question in order to prove it was really my account I was closing. Nine years and 8 months ago, setting up my AOL account and my secret question, I apparently had quite a sense of humor, or perhaps had a few too many cheap beers in me. My secret question was "How fresh are you?" and the answer, which I had typed in as a younger, sillier me and never expected to be saying over the phone, to Jason or anyone else, is, of course, "Like having fresh panties every day." (Which was, once upon a time, the advertising catch phrase for Stayfree or Carefree or some other feminine product. Really.) I'm glad Jason got a good laugh over it, since he wasn't able to get his commission for keeping me on as an AOL member.

Catching up

Well, I'm back. A sincere thanks to the blog readers who kept checking up on me - both of you. ;-) I promise I won't give up blogging completely without notice, and I'm making an effort to update more often.

What has happened since I last blogged ... Well, I turned 35 over the weekend and had a great celebration. It had all the ingredients of a perfect birthday - massage, kid-free time with the hubby, and friends over for dinner (pizza). I'm not even going to brood over my age. So there.

We've had a really sick winter in our household, due, no doubt, to my daughter being in preschool and bringing us home all sorts of ooglie booglies from the other kids. It has been a constant stream of colds, sinus infections and coughing. I'm expecting an engraved Thank You note from the Kleenex company any moment now.


Ebay's been taking a lot of my free time, though I don't begrudge it a bit. I've gotten really good at spotting a bargain and being able to turn it into a good profit. Like the .50 SPCA-sale shoes now on eBay for for $42.50 and still going. By the way, if you have an ugly-as-heck big-headed Blythe doll from the 70's lying around, you know the one where you pull the cord on her back and her eyes change color ... you might want to ship her out in exchange for a nice wad of cash (alas, not my auction). Plus then your recurring nightmares might end.

EBay is a hobby for me, kind of a game, maybe even a little like gambling. I try to do my eBaying "in the cracks" of my day so I don't take away from family time, photographing and listing while the kids are napping, checking auctions and emailing buyers after the kids are in bed, wrapping and packing while the children are eating breakfast and hubby is in the shower.

I love eBay, not only the selling but the buying too. I am a saver and environmentalist at heart, and I love the idea of re-use. And then there's my well-documented obsession with vintage Fisher Price toys. I find a set from time to time at a garage sale or (even rarer) thrift shop, but eBay is the vintage toy store collectors only dreamt of in the pre-internet days.

If you love old stuff of any kind, you've got to love eBay. Antique glassware and china, vintage board games and dolls, '80s Izod Lacoste shirts, '20s bakelite jewelry ... you could spend a lifetime haunting antique and resale shops for that certain something or get it on eBay in a few clicks. You can get brand new designer clothes if you can't get to a mall or if they're not sold near you. You can buy used, indestructible plastic toys for a fraction of what they cost new. My kids don't mind used toys, if it's new to them, it's new, and a toy is a toy is a toy.

Besides being an convenient place to buy and sell, it's a fascinating window to the world. There's always something fun ("Addicted to Ebay Barbie"), appalling (a halted auction for 3 Vietnamese girls), controversial (Girl Scout cookies) or downright amazing being bought or sold.

Sure, you have to pay shipping. Sure, you have to look out for scammers. Yes, you can't turn an item over and examine it from every side. Still, it's truly a worldwide marketplace and with a savvy eye and good communication between yourself and a seller, you can avoid the pitfalls. I have been eBaying since 1998, and I have had one bad purchase, which I ended up settling with the seller for a partial refund. As a seller, I always recommend that a buyer purchase insurance if the item is over $15. If they don't buy it, I usually will, to cover my own behind. This paid off recently when I shipped an electronic toy that supposedly was working, but not working properly, when it reached the buyer. I had insured it at my expense and for $1.30 saved myself having to reimburse the buyer $35. Also, I purchase Delivery Confirmation for items I sell for over $25, or if I have a "gut feeling" about a buyer, to save me from the buyer claiming they didn't receive it.

I don't understand the anti-eBay sentiment I so often see. Is it viewed as a bunch of opportunists selling overpriced junk to idiots? Idiots unbeknowingly selling valuable attic treasures to opportunists? I don't talk much about my eBaying to my friends, which is probably why I write so much about it here - it's my outlet. I've brought it up a few times here and there in conversations - "hey, did you know the XYZ you are going to throw away sells well on eBay" or "Where did I get my Little People collection? Mostly on eBay" - and almost always get a little snort of disgust. When I mentioned to the owner of a failing antiques shop in our little town that she might try selling on eBay to capture a larger market, she gave eBay the blame for her still, dusty shelves. Not one person I have personally spoken to has been interested in hearing any more about it, and I'm baffled. If you hate eBay, let me know why.

A case of the bloghs

Why haven't I dropped in to blog? Partly, been busy. Being a mother of 2 little ones, something simple like a dentist appointment can kill all the free time you have in an entire day. So last week, an extra work day at my daughter's co-operative preschool, a dentist appointment and being a little under the weather basically took up my entire week. Oh wait, during nap time one day, I peed, washed the lunch dishes and pushed back my cuticles before one child or the other woke up. Blogging while children are awake just isn't in the cards either. The little one fancies snapping the laptop shut with a bang, whether my hands are on the keyboard or not, and the older one, only 3, already knows to drone "this is booooo-ooooring" if she is left on her own for more than a few moments.
So, what's the other part of my bloglessness? Well, eBaying, selling everything that isn't nailed down and some things that were, nails and all. Been a little glum lately too, and I'm not sure why. Some days I feel that completely washed-out exhaustion as if I've been crying, but I haven't. I know I'm depressed over my cousin's partner, Kelly, the one with an inoperable lung tumor. I feel sad for my cousin, for Kelly, for their son; I feel somehow guilty. I'm looking forward to Spring because I am inconvenienced by Winter; Kelly is looking forward to Spring because if he is there to see it, he is still alive.

A Half-Day in the Life

I love reading blogs because they let me get in someone else's skin for a while. Jump on in mine for half a day. You might want to wear your grubby jeans and bring some hand wipes.

4:15 a.m. Wake up to baby crying. Cringe in bed with husband while baby "cries it out". We are determined to unspoil him, as we have created a bad habit of wee hour milk cocktail parties.
4:35 a.m. Baby goes back to sleep.
5:15 a.m. I go back to sleep.
6:22 a.m. Wake up to daughter calling for "Mama". Unprecedented late hour. If I hadn't lost that hour in the middle of the night, I might feel rested. Warm cup of milk for her, warm bottle for baby, who is now also awake, change night diapers and get children dressed for the day.
7:00 a.m. Breakfast, prepared by my husband. Coffee, blessed coffee, eggs and toast for us, Cheerios with yogurt for the shorter set. Eat while spoonfeeding my son.
7:10 a.m. Phone rings. Husband and I look at it with dread. Early hour phone calls, like late night phone calls, never bring good news. It's my cousin with bad news about her partner of 15+ years. Just past his 45th birthday, he went to the hospital with chest pain. The cause: a softball-sized lung tumor. Yesterday, he went for surgery to have it removed. Except that when they opened him up, after cutting 2 ribs and breaking another 2, they found the tumor wrapped around his aorta. Inoperable. They closed him back up. He does not yet know. My cousin is 36. Their son is 4. I don't mean for this to be the "all fatal illness, all the time" blog, but the world is screaming at me: LIFE IS SHORT! so I am screaming it back. Go hug someone you love.
8:00 a.m. Clean up breakfast dishes, fold laundry, shower, dress, do hair and makeup, kiss husband goodbye, do daughter's hair, compile 6 shoes, 6 socks, and 3 jackets and get them on respective owners' bodies.
8:45 a.m. Daughter, son and I rush out, late for preschool. Drop daughter off a few minutes late, chat with some parents, pick up gift card for school's fundraising auction, lend daughter's extra coat to child who forgot his.
9:10 a.m. Return home with son, stopping to mail package at post office on the way home.
9:30 a.m - 11:00 a.m. "Quiet" time with only 1 child. Fix snack, put baby on table while I check my running eBay auctions. Email high bidders, post 4 new auctions, wrap and address 2 sold items.
11:25 a.m. Pick daughter up from preschool, arriving 5 minutes early to make up for being late at the beginning of the day. Pick up collages, fingerpaintings, crayon drawings from cubby, load everyone back into car.
11:45 - 1:00 p.m. Pound pavement for school auction, son in stroller, daughter tagging behind scuffing her heels. Spend 15 minutes talking with owner of local coffee shop while taming children attempting to run amok, leave with $5 gift certificate. Drop by ice cream shop to pick up promised donation to find owner has "stepped out" for half an hour and has not left gift certificates. Talk with taqueria employees who suggest I leave my written information about the auction. I may as well leave it in the trash can, but I leave it with them anyway. Son is screaming bloody murder in the stroller, so we go home and I make a note to return to the ice cream place another time.
1:15 p.m. Return home for lunch. Prepare pizza for everybody, even though it's high carb and I feel like a bloated beast. Let the kids watch "Dora the Explorer" from 1:30 to 2:00 while I write this blog.
That's it up until now. Is it bedtime yet?

Roll over, boy

Last night we were getting ready to take the kids for ice cream after dinner when our across-the-street neighbor, Jon, dropped by with his energetic new puppy. They looked cute coming across the street, 6-foot-4 Jon and this tiny fuzzy puppy. It was hard to tell who was more excited, the children or the dog, as the kids were squealing and the puppy was jumping in circles and licking everything. At one point the child-dog love fest seemed to be getting out of control, and Jon leaned his large frame over and boomed "Sit!" My son took one look up at this man looming 4 feet above his head ... and sat.

Say anything

My husband reads my blog. Normally this is a good thing, it is always nice to have a reader. If a writer writes in the forest and no one is there to read it, should she really be folding laundry instead? Tonight he flipped his laptop shut with a snort - "You haven't updated your blog." Then he went to bed. So here I am, thinking of something, anything, to push that silly Quizilla entry down just a few inches.
Kids ... haven't done anything remarkably cute lately ... though the little one cracks me up because he shouts "BOB!" whenever he sees Bob the Builder and "DO-DA!" whenever he sees Dora the Explorer yet he still calls both my husband and me "Mama". Comes in handy at 3 a.m. - baby's crying "Mama!" and I just roll over and say "He means you, honey."
No news on my Mom, really, but she'll be starting her meds soon, though her disease is autoimmune and not cancer, she will still be on an anti-cancer drug, is likely to lose her hair, and will have a compromised immune system so that she might not be able to visit the grandchildren. There are a lot of unknowns, but she is a tough lady and I really do feel like it's all going to be ok.
eBay ... people are starting to get the first wave of tax rebates so it's a good time to start listing the junk you don't need. I found a thrift shop in town that is actually not totally disgusting and over the weekend I found 2 complete in the original box Fisher Price Little People sets from the '70s. I was beside myself.
Food news ... we haven't abandoned South Beach Diet but I haven't cracked the book in ages. I made a huge pot of albondigas based loosely on the linked recipe and Irish Soda Bread for dinner and let me tell you, it was carbolicious. Yeah, Mexican soup and Irish bread.
I guess that's it for now. Goodnight, dear, and everybody else too.

Raising the bar

Always striving for a higher level of nerdiness, I have outdone myself today by creating my own quiz at Quizilla, based on my strange infatuation with the Fisher Price Little People of my childhood, and yours, if you are say, between 25 and 40. I'm the Queen, but since I made the quiz, it should be obvious that I cheated.

Here are your results, your Majesty, and sorry to
keep you waiting - you're the Queen!


Which Little People figure are you?
brought to you by Quizilla

And they were Googled here ...

To the person(s) who occasionally stumble upon my site looking for a recipe for Praram Tofu: If you find one, please let me know. My peanut sauce addiction is costing us a small fortune and I can't seem to make it like our local Thai restaurant.

To the person searching for "blog Jen hand me down T-shirts": Huh?

Sorry for whining about the comments the other day. I wish I hadn't.