Tomorrow, tomorrow, tomorrow

Today I woke up in the wee hours of the morning, ready to exercise.

I wasn’t tired when I got up; it wasn’t a struggle and I didn’t even wait for the alarm.

After I started moving, though, something happened. Laziness took over.

I made my coffee and sat on the couch and looked at the wall – for two hours.

That’s weird, because it’s usually only at work that I’m able to go into a vegetative state of prolonged non-productivity, but I’m full of surprises.

After an hour of staring I got up, put on my sneakers and exercise clothes, then I sat back down and stared at the wall some more.

Staring at a blank wall is really underrated. I feel like I could do it again for a few hours right now.

While I sat there though, I swear I could feel my stomach growing larger. Still I didn’t move.

I imagined my fat cells laughing at me, growing, bathing themselves luxuriously in my fatty acids.

For motivation I pictured myself doing squats, push-ups and bends. I imagined how strong I would feel after I exercised, the way I would examine my love handles for shrinkage.

Yes, I’m going to get up. I’m going to do it, I thought, but still I sat there.

Laziness is paralytic.

I thought about the dreams I’d had while I slept – one about a cute boy I went to high school with and adored.
In the dream I was thin and we were dating. We both had a lot of fun with my thin bod.

I knew I should get up and pop an exercise video in the TV.

Instead I did some laundry. I made more coffee. I ate breakfast. I tweezed my eyebrows.

Since I’ve began exercising my eyebrows are getting precariously thinner.

I lamented how by now the morning news shows were over so I no longer wanted to walk on the treadmill.

I thought about the benefits of various exercise programs.

I thought about all the people in the world that were probably exercising as I sat there staring. It made me tired.

I don’t know where the time went, but before I knew it I had to start getting ready for work.

Disappointed and ashamed, I promised myself I wouldn't tell anyone about my two-hour, wall-staring episode.

I took off my sneakers and other workout gear and placed them in a prominent spot for the next day.

I will do better tomorrow.

As Scarlett said, “Tomorrow is another day.”

Rollerblading Rhino

Today, as I spilled mycoffee at my desk, I realized I’ve had a week of PHAT misfortunes.

It started with the birthday cake.

I jinxed myself a month ago while plotting to use my birthday as an excuse to indulge in high-fat goodness.
My daughter overdid it while baking the double chocolate cake and I didn’t tell her, but that cake was drier than the average grandma’s elbows. I haven’t gotten over the dissapointment yet.

Later in the week we went Downtown for tortillas for my annual Crusin’ Downriver BBQ fajita party.

While Downtown we went to what used to be my favorite Mexican restaurant for some greasy, cheesy flaming cheese goodness - hey, it was a belated birthday indulgence because of the cake!

I don’t know what happened, but I think they started using Velveeta instead of traditional Chihuahua cheese. It was horrible and another PHAT disaster.

A co-worker, learning of my diet, gave me a chocolate fiber bar. I thought they were only for really old people, or those who have a problem with going #2, but apparently they’re good for PHAT girls too.
I’m told they’re tasty and I’m grateful for the support, but I can’t help seeing it as a omen of some sort. It was.

As that co-worker walked away, another started making fun of the “Rollerblading Rhino” title of this blog post and caused me to dump my coffee all over my desk, papers and oatmeal cereal snacks.

Another food misfortune.

I started calling myself the rollerblading rhino because of the Denise Austin exercise videos I've been doing. Austin talks a lot about “being strong and fit!” I got a little sick of listening to her prattle on so I started rollerblading on a track by my house in the morning to avoid her voice.

It didn’t work because as I forged ahead on the track when I wanted to quit, in my head I would hear, “You can do it! Feel those muscles working! You’re strong! And I thought,

“Yeah, strong like a freakin’ rhino.”

One good thing is that I’ve inspired another – skinny – co-worker to do more exercise via video. She says she loves it and is feeling strong and slim. She's received compliments right in front of me for how great she's looking.

Nice.

Afterall that’s all I set out to do with this blog – make the skinny people look and feel better.

(Oh, where in the hell in that fiber bar? I'm depressed. Sigh.)

I can't believe I ate the Whole thing

So, it’s birthday week, but the only cake I’ll be having is a rice cake.

My beloved co-worker Angie made me a “PHAT blog appropriate cake” out of rice cakes, marshmellos and coconut, since she knows how much I love to eat these (any many other) things at my desk.

Half a dozen people have walked past the cake and asked, “Where’s the chocolate?”
They were very nearly kicked in their chocolate-loving rear ends.

I told my other co-workers I’d be cutting the cake to share with them later, but they just looked at me as if I'd started stripping at my desk.
Thanks guys.

They don’t know how to appreciate a thoughtful co-worker, or a healthy diet, so I’ll eat the entire damn thing by myself. Loudly. Crunching on ever fiber-rich, low-fat crumb.

It’s not every day you can eat your entire birthday cake all by yourself.

Turns out you can have your cake and eat it too.

Cheers to all the PHAT friends.

Food Love Affair

Dear Food,

I miss you.

I miss all of things we used to do together.

Baseball game hotdogs, birthday cake celebrations, summertime picnics, late night dinners at favorite restaurants, trips to the bakery unable to decide just what to get and my favorite, cozy nights on the couch, just the two of us.

Life just isn’t the same without you

Everyday when I woke up you were there.
Bacon, sausage, pancakes with blueberry syrup and whipped cream.

At lunch we were together again. Fast food cheeseburgers, meatball subs, fried chicken carryout.

One of the best parts of my days was knowing I’d be going home to you, chicken enchilada, fettuccine Alfredo, BBQ spare ribs, warm apple pie.

Sigh.

Life just isn’t the same without you. There’s no joy going home anymore if you’re not there.

Deep-fried appetizers at the bar are only a painful memory now.

Sure, now I have more money and time since meals with less than 500 calories don’t take much to prepare, but the flavor of my life is diminished.

I think of you every time I drive past the fast food billboard with the pictures of the tasty new milkshakes they’re offering this month.

Every time a co-worker puts a snack on the community table, you fill my mind, and when friends invite me to parties I wonder if you’ll be there and how I should act when I see you.

My heart aches for the way we used to be.The carefree days of grabbing life like a handful of peanut MnMs has ended.

While spreading the low fat peanut butter on plain wheat bread for lunch today I nearly shed a tear.

I wonder what you think about my smaller belly and diminishing thighs. Since you’ve gone away they're slowly leaving me too.

I know we can never go back to the way we used to be, but I wanted you to know I miss you and whenever I think of us, I’ll do so with memories as sweet as the molten chocolate cake that filled my many nights.

Love always,

Rene'

Photo credit: stock.xchng

The Exercise Banshee

Denise Austin exercise video = Devil.

This morning, as I finally put my first evil exercise DVD in the player, I couldn’t help but believe that my karma had come back to bite me.

I shouldn’t have slacked off at exercising as many times as I have.

The video I chose - Denise Austin’s Personal Training System - gives you a choice between low impact/beginner, medium impact and HIGH (areyounuts?) impact.

You use your DVD player to choose your selection – easy, gimme the lowest setting ya got.

Not quite that easy.

My remote apparently is broken and wouldn’t let me change off of HIGH (Idon’thaveaprayer) impact mode.

The thing about exercise videos is they’re tricky.

I decided I would go ahead and do the video on HIGH impact, but in my own slacker way.

I didn’t want to change the disc now, I was too invested, or lazy – plus it took me 10 minutes to choose that disk – does that count toward minutes exercised?

No matter how hard I tried to tone the exercise (way) down I kept finding myself trying to keep up with those smiling, sweat-free, zombie-like fake women behind the leader devil, Denise Austin.

“Come on, you can do it, feel that fat melting away!”

It’s a good thing my 5-pound hand weights were being used to balance table legs, or I’d be exhausted.

“Higher, higher! Come on, lift those legs!”

Yes, everything is said with a smile and an exclamation point.

Afterwards, while laying at the bottom of my stairs, staring toward the top where the coffee was waiting, I felt good about my workout.

Also, I’d found a new place to vent my anger in safe and productive way.

I should probably leave my weights under table though, because for as much as I dislike Denise Austin, I DO like my TV and want to keep it – in one piece.

10 of 1,001 excuses for not exercising

I LOVE exercise. I just hate doing it.

I wish I had someone who could do it for me (note to self: looking into inventing a personal exerciser).

I’ve recently decided to pull out some old exercise videos from my much slimmer, more ambitious days and they are now dust free – but otherwise as untouched as a nun on her 50th birthday.

I have truly amazed myself at the level of creativity I've displayed in making up really good excuses. Here are 10 of them.

1. I’m too tired. This excuse always applies and can be used in every circumstance.

2. My foot, leg, back, neck or some other body part hurts a little bit. I don’t want to make it worse.

3. I swear I’ll exercise tomorrow. (As common as "I'll only hit the snooze button once.")

4. It’s too hot. I don’t want to dehydrate/sweat/be too hot.

5. I’m missing a mandatory piece of equipment that I will only use one time and will hate, but must have before I can begin.

6. I don’t want people at the gym to think I’m fat.

7. There are too many people at the walking track and I will crash into them while on my rollerblades because they walk too slow and don’t get out of my way.

8. The exercise I planned is inside and I want to be outside/exercise is outside and I want to be inside. Rain and sunshine work in both cases.

9. I don’t have time. There are at least 1,001 other things I could be doing instead (i.e. tweeze eyebrows, file nails, clean refridgerator, brush dog, paint by number, check email, call mother, sister, brother, aunt, uncle..., wash dishes, go shopping, browse internet, write blog about excuses …).

10. I deserve some relaxation ... and a piece of chocolate, and a latte, and a burger, a beer, a slurpee, a break, a hair cut … Oh, I’ll just exercise tomorrow, I promise.

Organs for sale

Two pounds down.

While I will not horrify you with the details, I will say being sick has its benefits.

While in the throws of death during the last three days I learned what it’s like to have no care for food, to only see it as survival and not a party in my mouth (he he).

It’s sad, I admit, that even while deciding to go to the emergency room and fearing I may need surgery I was pleased that I wasn’t eating.

I even began to wonder how much gall stones or an appendix weighed and I was hoping a lot.

I didn’t have either removed and I don’t know the answer, but there’s always next time. Removal of my non-essential organs is one way to lose weight.

They sent me out of there with “diet” instructions. Ha. I didn’t laugh long.

No caffeine, no greasy (read: fried) foods, nothing spicy, tasty or worthwhile. Note: I drink about two pots of coffee a day. I'm not a happy camper right now.

The doctor advocated oatmeal and water. He expounded its virtues. I think he’s misguided.

Horses eat oatmeal and that’s only because they can’t talk to tell you how horrible it is. Horses also eat hay. Maybe they’re just not very smart.

Anyway, the point is, I lost TWO pounds and if I adhere to the garbage advice the doctor gave me, I’ll likely loose more as all of this oatmeal is low cal and very filling.

Plus, I’m trying to keep to the “only eat enough to keep your body functioning” theory and so far it’s working well, but I’m not feeling great. I’ll know I’m 100 percent when a bacon cheeseburger and double layer chocolate cake sound good again.

Sigh.

Sickness does have its benefits.