Holy Unbelievable Batman!

This is going to be a hot blogging topic amongst the WW GDTers this week...

Shrunk was DENIED as a success story. Is Weight Watchers out of their freaking mind? This chick is the truly inspirational epitome of a WW success! Who else can truly claim that they followed the program EXACTLY and NEVER went off-point during her whole weight loss journey? Who else would post on the General Daily Thread every day and congratulate others on their successes, yet blush away when anyone paid her a compliment? Who else chased her three kids daily while learning to run and counting her points to the tee? Who else's blog gets more visitors than Shrunk's does because it's truly amazing what she accomplished?

She could be the poster girl for the 20-30 something woman on the program for Christ's sake!

WW needs to take a step back and realize that it was their program that she followed which enabled her to lose an average of 2.3lbs a week. Their antiquated rules regarding what they will accept as a healthy success truly need to be revisited. (According to WW, they won't accept anyone that loses more than an average of 2lbs per week because it's considered too rapid a loss....WHATEVER!). This would all make sense if she wasn't following the guidelines as she was supposed to....but she did. Period.

Who knows what WW will do when they read all of the posts we have already started on the GDT, or when they see that members have already started an online petition as well as a Facebook page supporting Shrunk as our idol. All I can say is that they better open their eyes, pay attention and make an exception in this case because they are just plain WRONG this time.

Shrunk, we love you! Keep up the good work and congratulations on your SUCCESS!

One month down....

....and FIVE more to go....

That's right, my darling boyfriend has been gone a whole month now. So far, not tooooooo painful but the blue feelings are starting to creep in there when I'm not keeping myself crazy busy. It's gonna be a long, long, long summer.

Mojo the dog is a mildly OK substitute, however he does not respond very well when I ask him what movies we should get tonight....and DBF certainly doesn't require a leash for leisurely walks. Mojo does provide decent cuddles though, so I will take what I can get. At least I am going to visit in five weeks....can't wait!

Miss you honey!

Deja-vu

Seriously. Some fool stole my flipflops from kickboxing AGAIN! Who is this person and how dumb are they? Do they just not remember what shoes they wore today? I mean, they stole them once before and returned them.....and now AGAIN. Idiots.

Then I come home and those oh-so-cute little bastard raccoons have dumped my garbage can and strewn garbage all over the back porch. Gah. Friggin buggers just sit and wait til they know I'm not looking and WHAM-O. Grrrrr.

Glad I'm going to Pender to party it up this weekend. Apparently I deserve it!

Who you callin' "fruit"?

This is just so weird I had to steal it from Mikey.

http://www.swmoore.com/kt_fruitsandvegetables.html

Guilty Pleasures

Ya Ya. I know. Reality TV sucks. But it's totally true that some of the shows are like car wrecks and I just can't help but look.

Generally I stick to the slightly more intelligent ones such as Amazing Race (where actual skill is involved in the winning process)....or the talent related ones like American Idol or Project Runway (again, where they have to possess some sort of skill to get ahead)...although anything that involves the public being able to vote usually makes me want to smash my head into a wall.

Last night I happened upon Age of Love. Somewhat like The Bachelor (which I've only ever seen a few times) but with a twist. A 30 year old man is given about a dozen women to "date". Half of them in their 40s, the other half in their 20s. "Does age matter?"

First, I need to say that if I look half as good as those 40+ year olds at their age then WOOOOHOOOO! Them cougars are hot!

I'm definitely intrigued by this dynamic and will have to keep my eye on it to see how it ends up. Right now, the cougars (er, I mean 40-somethings) are winning his heart as the 20-somethings (AKA: kittens...LOL) are all coming off as vain self-centered bimbos.... but I guess we shall see.

(On a related note: my fave reality TV guilty pleasure, Big Brother, starts next week!!)

Back on Track

I don't usually post about my eating habits or my weight loss journey or any of that....but this past week was a binge of all binges and last night I kicked myself very hard and I have flown through the air and landed back on the wagon!

Don't get me wrong. I enjoyed my midnight grilled cheese sammiches this week. It was a tiny bit liberating not to count my WW points. And my nights in the with girls and our massive amounts of yummy snacks were fabulous this weekend. But if I actually added it up (which I have no desire to do) I'd bet I ate two weeks worth of points in the last 3 days. Yikes!!

Liberating or not, I sooooo have to track my points.... cuz I tend to go way overborad when I don't. So last night I got out my handy-dandy spreadsheet and have menu-planned for the entire week so I have no excuses. This coming weekend I have a stagette to attend and a birthday weekend on Pender Island for another girlfriend....but I've planned for those too and come next Monday I will feel proud that I got through it unscathed!

Happy Monday!

Recipe - Spiked Pink Lemonade

Thanks Rachel Ray!

This is for the whole punch bowl, but just modify the amounts to make a pitcher for girl's night in....or a day on the patio....or an after-work get-together....or well, whenever you like!!

Spiked Pink Lemonade Punch

1 - 26 oz bottle vodka
5 cups lemonade
2 cups cranberry juice
3 cups Ginger Ale

Make sure all ingredients are well chilled before mixing (keep vodka in the freezer for this one!). Add the Ginger Ale right before serving so it doesn't go flat.

Make ice cubes out of lemonade to float in the punch bowl (or pitcher, or right in the glasses) so they don't water down the punch.

Serve in a tall glass with a lemon wedge!

Sooooo yum!

Recipe - Stuffed Mushroom Caps

Hungry-Girl.com had a recipe for Stuffed Mushrooms in their newsletter this past week. Now, they tend to use fat-free everything which I don't love...so I modified the recipe a bit and here's what I came up with. Quite tastey if I do say so myself!

Creamy Seafood Stuffed Mushrooms

12 large brown or white mushrooms (stems removed)
100 grams fresh shrimp or crab (or both!) shredded or chopped up
3 heaping tablespoons cream cheese (I use Kraft Light Garlic & Herb, but plain would work)
2 tablespoons light sour cream
2 tablespoons minced red or orange pepper
2 tablespoons minced celery
1 tablespoon parmesan cheese (+ 1 tsp to top)
salt, pepper, cayenne to taste

Spray a glass baking dish with Pam. Arrange clean mushroom caps in dish. Mix together all other ingredients together and spoon onto caps. Sprinkle with extra parmesan. Bake at 375 about 10-12 mins. Broil for 1-2 minutes to brown tops (thanks Jen!).

Sooooo yummy!

Can be prepped ahead of time. Just cover with plastic wrap and refrigerate until ready to cook. (for a few hours...not overnight or the mushrooms will go slimey!)

If you don't do seafood, just omit the shrimp & crab. Other variations are to add chopped frozen spinach and or artichokes. Or roast the red pepper and puree it before adding to the mixture. Jen added chipotle for extra flavour and heat. The possibilities are truly endless.

Enjoy!!

(WW = works out to about 1 point per cap depending on your specific choice of ingredients)

Damn neighbors....

and their asshole dog!

Stupid dog is always off leash. So today I'm walking my dog (on a leash!) and their shithead dog charges out of their yard and launches at me. My dog is bigger than theirs and just about pulled me over trying to attack back (my dog is NOT violent in any way). So they hear me yelling and come out to see what is going on. Asshole owner says to me "ya well your dog has been down here too ya know". Ya, once in the last month my dog got out and maybe peed in their yard. Theirs is always off leash wandering the neighborhood aggrevating all the other animals. I'm so pissed right now!!!

It's a small community and almost all of us have dogs... most of which have wandered the neighborhood at one time or another... so I don't want to be the bitch that calls animal control... but seriously, my dog doesn't charge other people! And if he did, I would take responsibility for it!

Some people are just assholes.

Girl with drill strikes again!

I did it! I built the big dresser. Make that big-ass dresser! This thing is HUGE!

Man, you have never seen so many bits and pieces and panels and nuts and bolts and screws and knobs and such. But I did it. And I am proud.

Now....which one of you is gonna help me get this thing down the hall and around the corner through the awkwardly positioned bedroom door?

Observant much?

So I have lived here for just shy of 8 months now. I'm pretty nosey about anything I can see from my office window (or the kitchen window, or the living room window, or out the front door...). I look out every time a car drives by or a dog barks or I hear something outside. How is it that I never noticed that our neighbours have a teenage son? I see the adults come home from work every day! Apparently he is the elusive 15 year old boy. Either that or my nosey neighbour private eye skills are slipping. Yikes!

Little Old Lady?

I snap, crackle and pop like a critchetty old woman these days. Ever since I lost a few pounds (OK, 20 is more than a few I guess!) and started being way more active, my body talks to me every chance it gets.

I stretch, something cracks.

I bend, something pops.

I yawn, something snaps.

Nothing hurts, but what's up with this?!!

Return of the To-Do List

Do you ever feel like you just can't get anything done? Gah, I have about a bajillion (yes, that is a real number! ...in my world...) unfinished projects on the go.

Remember a while ago I reorganized the office....well it's only half done cuz I need someone to help me hang the bracketless Ikea shelves so I get all these boxes of crap off the floor. And I'll need to unload and move DBF's dresser... but I can't do that until I finish building the dresser for our room. I started that last night, but it's like a 6 hour job...all those pieces of drawers to put together! So that's two rooms on the go at the same time.

Then there's the spare room. The place all our junk goes to live until we can figure out what to do with it. I want it to be a lovely guest room with pretty white shelves and tables, but right now it's a pile of boyfriend's stuff that he didn't take to Halifax and random boxes of photo albums and recipe books with no home. I think if I can get someone to help me lift the bed, get the area rug down and move the guitar amp outta there, I can knock out the rest of the stuff pretty fast.

I'm determined now. Let's hope I don't lose steam before I get'r done!

I gots new shoes!

Now, normally this would be about some cute new strappy sandals, or fun wedges, or croc-print pumps....but today the excitement is about comfy shoes! Now that I'm walking the dog at least 5 days a week, plus whatever other wandering I can get in the nice weather it was time to suck it up and put out the bucks for some new sneakers.

My old New Balance cross-trainers are just too clunky and for some reason (I've heard various opinions on this) they always put my toes to sleep....so those are no good to me anymore.

I had a few criteria when I set out to find these:

1) proper walking shoe - not a runner, not a crosstrainer

2) lightweight - because I have size 10 feet, athletic shoes tend to be clunky

3) proper fit! - pretty sure that even though those New Balance feel like they fit, they really don't

4) slim fit - something that fits close to the foot without a lot of extra rubber, etc sticking out

5) cute and fun - sick of wearing ugly athletic shoes - I'd be more likely to wear em if they were stylish

So I went to the Walk in Comfort store and got the salesman to help me pick out a couple of things that fit my criteria. It only took 3 pairs and I fell in love! Cute, comfy, roomy and lightweight. The Merrell Waterpro Ultra Sport. Love them! (the waterpro part means that they can be worn in water if necessary which makes them way lighter because there is a lot less fabric) They won't be fabulous for shitty weather, but that's OK because I'm planning to wear them out before winter!

It's glorious!

Last night I was watching a couple of episodes of Sex and the City (yes, I have them all on DVD...it's what I watch when DBF is away and I'm feeling especially quiet)...and it occured to me that Carrie is constantly moving around her apartment while working on her laptop. They always have her sitting in different chairs, with her legs crossed or curled under her seat, or laying on her bed looking all cute and comfortable.

So I thought "why don't I do that? I work on a laptop all day, every day!" Oh right, I'm almost 6 feet tall and this is not television. If I sat like that, I'd be visiting the chiropractor every week instead of every month. Reality bites.

However, after walking the dog today and feeling disappointed that I would have to come inside to work while it's so gloriously sunny outside, I decided that I was going to suck it up and work outside for a while. Fantastic!! Me in my lounger with my laptop in the warm and sunny front yard! Conveniently, Tuesday afternoons I'm mainly proofreading our company newsletter so not a lot of typing to be done.

Now if I can just figure out how to shade the screen a little better so as to not have to include the Opthamologist appointments with my chiro appointments, I'll be good to go!

Oh Britney.....

So I'm reading through the MSN Windows Live Entertainment news, and surprise surprise there's something about Britney Spears. No way!

This article is written so tongue in cheek, I don't know how much of it is true. But if these are seriously Brit's choices for album titles....well, OH MY GOD!

Dignity. Ha! Integrity. Ha Ha! and that one with the shot at Lindsey Lohan is just weird.

Seriously, entertainment news has gotten so bizarre it's painful. Something intelligent needs to happen....SOON.

Late Night Traffic

So I'm driving home the other night. As previously mentioned, I live in the boonies. I mean, it's a decent sized community, but it's like farm country y'know. So I didn't expect ANY traffic.

First, the Murphiest Law of all Murphy's Laws happens. I'm driving along....not a car in sight....then of course, as luck would happen, two cars decide they need to pull across the road I'm driving on at the same time. It's 2:37am (exactly, I looked at the clock). Not another bloody car in sight and now there's TWO. And of course, the impatient-ass of a cab driver can't wait 14.2 seconds for me to go by....but has to pull out and turn left in front of me....hence I had to slow down. Did I mention there was no other cars behind me?!!! The other driver waited and turned after I passed....prolly cuz he knew there was no one else around.

Second, at a certain point you know you've entered the boonies. Street lights get fewer, road gets windier. You figure not much traffic around so you use your high beams. But wait, WTF? There is car after car heading toward you. High beams on.... high beams off.... high beams on.... high beams off. I give up! High beams off. There musta been a helluva party in Metchosin that night!

Yoga Download

I am so loving this Yoga podcast I found! 20 mins of sun salutations. It's perfect.

When I took Yoga at the Y a couple of years ago, I much preferred the "Power" or "Flow" classes over the Iyengar and such. I guess I like to get my lungs working (and trust me they are working!) and not sit still too much! So this podcast is excellent for me. There is a bit of slow stretching while it walks you through the two salutations, followed by a more intense flow-through. Love it!

Good stretching. Good breathing. Good strength training.

Namaste!

The One With All the Embryos

My absolute favorite episode of Friends was just on. The one where the girls bet the apartment and LOSE. I always forget how good the scripting was back in the earlier seasons and this one is a stellar example.

I will always think of Chandler as "Miss Chnandler Bong" and I love that Lord of the Dance scares the bejesus out of him. Monica will always be "Big Fat Goalie" in my mind. Ross as the game show host is perfect (I'm certain David Schwimmer will eventually host a game show or reality show at some point in his career!). Rachel trying to come up with Chandler's job is awesome....because when that line hit you know absolutely everyone watching immediately realized that they had no idea either. "Transpondster?!" LOL. And of course, you have to love Joey....with his most serious face stating "animals dressed as humans" are Monica's biggest pet peeve.

But my absolute favorite part is when they lose. Monica's completely distraught "Noooooooooooooooo" resounds in my mind and can make me giggle right out of the blue. I love it!

Share the love: I actually found it on YouTube! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yE1RUJWWFvY

Recipe - Peanut Butter Cups

This recipe is almost as easy as the Diet Pop Cupcakes!

As long as you are down with the fact that Cool Whip isn't really a food, then these little treats are pretty damn yummy!

Low Cal Frozen PB Cups

• 1 heaping cup Fat Free Cool Whip (thawed)
• 6 tbsp Peanut Butter (room temp works the best)
• 2 tbsp chocolate syrup (the kind that hardens on ice cream would kick ass, but any choc syrup will do)

Mix the PB with the Cool Whip. Line a muffin tin with muffin liners. Spoon the mixture into the liners. Drizzle each one with a little chocolate syrup. Freeze.

Makes 12 fairly big ones. Or 24 minis if you prefer.

WW = 1 point each if you make 12 (score!)

Wide Mouth Mason

Last night I went to the Wide Mouth Mason show down at Legends with a couple of the girls. It's been ages since I've even heard these boys, but I was always a fan back in the day. Tiffaney swore that they put on a fantastic live show and she was right! Massive amounts of energy and Shaun is an absolutely amazing guitar player. Lots of extended playing, jamming, and all out musical craziness on the stage. Great way to spend a Sunday night for 10 bucks!!

Here's a little clip I found on YouTube from a similar show they did in Edmonton. Sound quality doesn't do it any justice at all, but you'll get the idea:

Recipe Review - Crab Cakes

"The Gift of Crab" from Eat, Shrink & Be Merry (ESBM)

I heard a rave review of these so thought I'd give em a go last night. They wind up being a bit pricey to make as crab ain't cheap. I went with canned crab meat, but even that ended up being almost $10. On the upside, these were fairly easy to assemble and looked really good once cooked. I think they could have used a little more seasoning or spice, but all-in-all they were a tasty dinner treat.

I didn't love the sauce though....too banana-y for me (which is odd because I love bananas!).

Hmmmmm.....Blogger is messing with me today. I can't get it to link to the larger image so you can read it. Stay tuned.

Chatting with my honey!

So much better now that he has internet access in his room! OK, it's not the same as the real live guy and not even quite as good as talking on the phone, but at least now we can chat on Messenger and it's real-time! Up til now it was just stupid emails back and forth.

I hate this 4 hour time difference though. By the time I'm ready to settle in and chat, he's off to bed. Or when he has time after class, I'm still working. Stoooooooopid. Ah well, at least we get some time to talk and occasionally enough time to turn on the webcams and see each other's faces.

He did some serious complaining to the folks in charge of his accomodations and has managed to get himself guaranteed (of course, guaranteed has an array of different meanings in the military) a room in the better building later this month. If all goes well, he'll have his own phone, free internet access (right now he has to pay for his....), free cable, DVD, bigger TV and a bigger better bed. (Don't ask their reasoning as to why the guys that HAVE to go there for SIX MONTHS got stuck in the old building with fewer perks, and the guys that just flit in for TWO WEEKS get the skookum new building!)

One room at a time

It's only taken hmmmm....like 6 1/2 months.....but the office is slowly starting to resemble an office! It was one of those tasks that just seemed too daunting to ever get started. Boxes of crap everywhere. CDs, VHS tapes, books, computer bit n pieces. Gah! Ugly bookshelf I've been trying to part with for years, but never seem to. I just kept pushing the junk further and further into the corner. Unusual for me as I'm usually pretty organized. Also odd because I work at home and you'd think I wouldn't want to work in this state.

So a couple of days ago work was slow and I decided that I'd maybe at least get a few boxes moved to the basement. Then, the next thing I knew I had cleared off that ugly bookcase and yanked it out into the hall. Then I was scrubbing walls and baseboards. Then I moved the desk over by the window. Low and behold, it's starting to look like an actual office.

I'll need another pair of hands to hang the good shelves up, and maybe a dump truck or bulldozer to clean up DBFs stack-o-crap on/in/around his dresser, but it's looking good so far.

Yaaaieeeee!

(of course, now the basement looks like a junk bomb went off, but who cares about the basement, right?!)

Support Local Musician!

In lieu of this week's video link, I thought I'd do a little public service announcement for an up-and-coming local musician.

Check out Chantel Upshaw. Beautiful, soulful voice. She is the sister of a good friend, and we are out to get this girl noticed. She's made a couple of albums and is just waiting for the right person to discover her and launch her into stardom!

http://www.myspace.com/chantelupshawmusic

Quick, call Nancy Drew!

Seriously! Someone stole my flip-flops! While that may seem not such a big deal.... they stole them at my Kickboxing class! And so you know what that means.... I had to drive home barefoot.

Come on people. Do you not remember which shoes you wore to the gym today? I'm sure they were nicer than my $3 SuperStore flip-flops. And doesn't this mean you've left without your own shoes? How do you do that??? I'm thinking there was an extra hard left hook to the head tonight!

I can buy more, but it made it sorta difficult to stop for groceries on the way home tonight. They somewhat frown upon barefoot clients in the produce section!!

Bastards!

Perk to country living

Most of our friends think living out here is a hassle. Even after they see the ocean view, 3 bedrooms, huge yard, and hear about the cheap rent. And sometimes it is a hassle...and expensive on gas.... But for the most part I've gotten used to it and find it a pretty great place to live.

The other day I found one of the coolest parts of country living. Roadside farm stands!!! So many people out here have extra plants, herbs, flowers, etc that they have little stands at the ends of their driveways where they make a few bucks. I drive by a handful of these places every day and the other day I finally remembered to stop and check one out.

They had so much good stuff!!! I got this awesome dwarf sunflower for $3!!! and a 6-pack of basil for $1!! I'm going back for a couple more sunflowers as they will be perfect in the front garden and I might even get one of the rosemary bushes they had for $2.

Next, I'm so totally stopping at the heirloom tomato stand....how cool is it to get a yummy tomato plant for $2?!!

Hopefully over the summer, people will have their produce up for sale too. So yum!!

Maria!!!

Please let me view your blog!! Puuuulleeeeeeease! :)

j.wilson@shaw.ca

Magic Potions & Serums

So I am not saying that I don't occasionally get sucked into beauty product gimmicks and new products, but as I was flipping through my current issue of Flare it struck me that a lot of the ads were for lotions and creams (especially ones that claim to get rid of cellulite). I mean, fashion magazines are always mostly advertisements, but there seemed a lack of ads for really expensive designer jeans and god-awful perfumes and all of the other stuff that I usually see. I decided that I would flip through and note how many of these ads are for "beautifying creams"....

- Olay Anti-Aging Lip Treatment
- Olay Lifting Eye Serum
- Olay Smoothing Facial Serum
- L'Oreal Revitalift Double Eye Lift
- Olay Thermal Pedicure
- BioTherm Celluli Peel & Patch
- Olay Touch of Sun (several products listed)
- Dove Pro-age Neck and Chest Serum
- Jouviance EcoRemondeling Gel - Proactive Cellulite Treatment
- Neutrogena Dry Touch Sunblock
- Vichy Podexine Podiatric Care - Reconditioner for Dry Feet
- Vichy Lipo-Metric - Lipo Sculpting Cellulite Treatment
- St. Ives Healthy Brilliance Firm & Glow
- Roc CompleteLift
- Palmer's Cocoa Butter

Plus several others for razors, teeth whitening, hair color, and waxing.

Seems like overkill. Maybe it's just me.

Sticker Challenge Results

Definitely no where near as good as I had hoped. Meh. But a good idea nonetheless, so I plan to continue on the challenge for June and see how I do. Tomorrow I"m getting some better stickers though...these ones I had laying around just didn't cut it.

The challenge was to earn 3 stickers per day (staying on point food-wise, some form of exercise every day, taking vitamins every day) for a total of 93 stickers. I also challenged myself to attend all of my kickboxing classes for the month to earn myself an additional 7 stickers for a grand total of 100.

On-point = 16 (omg, I suck)
Exercise = 18 (apparently weekends are a problem time for me)
Vitamins = 19 (actually pretty impressed that I did this good here)
Kickboxing = 6 (only missed one class due to it being right before Arron left)

GRAND TOTAL = 59 stickers (Bad Bionic!!)

June Challenge the same, but with only 30 days in the month = 90 stickers + 8 for kb = 98

Go Bionic Go!

Canadian Flights Suck

Argh. Who knew it would be so hard to find a reasonably priced return ticket to visit DBF in Halifax this summer? Or to find a ticket for him to visit his son in Winnipeg. I am quickly learning that the airline monopoly here is stooooooooopid.

So I finally find a seat sale that works for my outbound flight, but of course there is no corresponding seat sale for the return flight. And DBF's flight has the opposite problem....he can fly back to Hali on the Wednesday, but of course has to pay full friggin pop for his ticket out in the first place.

Pretty damn annoying to pay almost $800 for tickets for a 12 day trip. Especially considering he's never paid that much to fly from Victoria to Winnipeg.

For me, I was going to head home after 14 days, but since for some dumb reason there isn't a seat sale on that particular Wednesday I guess I can stay a few extra days. If the flight is gonna ding me $433 anyway, I might as well pay the $453 for the weekend flight and enjoy a few extra evenings with my sweetie (even if he'll be back in training during the days by then).

So even with the seat sale, I'm looking at almost $1000.

This is ridiculous within our own damn country. Christ, we could both get round trip tickets to London, England for this price!! They had better show me some good goddamn movies!!!

Pineapple Martinis

My weekly video and a yummy summer drink all-in-one! Happy drinking everyone!!

http://www.metacafe.com/watch/562889/pineapple_martinis/