Weekly update, 2/3/09

What's New:

• Yesterday was my birthday! I saw my shadow, so it's official: 6 more weeks of winter. (More or less...actually, it is whether Punxy Phil or I saw shadows or not, isn't it?) I'm now 41! Woo hoo!
  
  We celebrated over the weekend, and I ate a small piece of birthday cake. It was gooood. Good things on the actual day? Chatted on the phone with a friend at lunch time, got takeout from my favorite taqueria for dinner (Mr. Handsome-and-Handy had a trying day today), and then the usual evening of Thing 1-homework-noodging, punctuated by birthday phone calls. Thing 2 must have picked up on my feeling tired (I guess curling up in a fetal position on top of my bed was a pretty clear clue). She dragged her little chair into our room, set it next to the bed, and proceeded to "read" me stories....
  
  The festivities continue throughout the week. I'm going out to lunch with work girlfriends today, and I need to call the babysitter and arrange a date night for this weekend.
  
  
• Someone "moved my cheese": there's a new digital scale in our bathroom, replacing our old-school one that you have to adjust to zero every morning and whose lines are hard enough to read that I often had to squint-and-guesstimate. Even so, I felt kind of comforted by its vagueness, and it did a fine job of letting me know when I hit the 5-pound milestones. The new kid in town is not my new Mary Lou Retton Platform, but it may have been purchased in reaction to it. I'm not naming names, but the cheese-moving someone is an engineer, enjoys precision and numbers, and cringes at perkiness. The new kid is also accurate, I'm happy to say. I didn't want to go digital again, because our last digital scale was off by +20 pounds, so maybe this time will be different.
  
  
• I did a longer run (50 minutes vs. the usual 35) on Saturday morning. I usually take the weekend off; however, the family was sound asleep, the morning was clear, and I'd been going light on the cardio since BodyPump class on Wednesday, so I went for it. (I sure wish all runs felt as much like a gift to myself...this morning's most emphatically did not.)
  I passed many people out on the coast trail, walking/biking/running. One pair of ladies made my day: As we passed and hollered greetings, they added after I trotted past, "Looking good, girl!" They must be bloggers, or maybe Bumbling Band members incognito...I turned and hollered back, "Thanks! You too!" (Yes, of course I was thinking of the MizFit post on accepting compliments. BTW, Happy Blog Birthday, MizFit! I also thought of run4change's excellent blog post, "I can see it in your eyes-can you see it in mine?"...you know, that one made me get a little choked up. I too often forget that everyone carries a burden or faces a challenge in life, but they're not always ones that other people can see....)
  
  
• Mom got home from the hospital on Saturday! Yeayyy! It'll be a long recovery, but at least the hospital phase is complete (knocking wood there).

Progress last week:
7-day blood glucose average: 106 (met goal of <120)
7-day fasting: 104 average, all days <120 (met goal of <120 every day)
Weight goal: No change; weight-ins now being taken on the new scale. I've stayed the same for a few weigh-ins now; but, oddly, I'm not too bothered by it at the moment. I've chosen to view it more as "practicing maintenance" than as being on a plateau. (met goal of maintain or lose)
Food goals: Consumed 5 meatless, low-fat meals and 1 fish meals. (met first, missed second by 1 meal)
Exercise goals: 4x30 min. and 1x10 min. cardio, including 3 runs. Attended BodyPump class. (Met exercise goals except 1 day of arms & abs and 20 minutes of cardio.)
Misc. goals: Got adequate sleep except for Sunday night.

Goals for this week:
7-day blood glucose average goal and fasting numbers: below 120.
Weight goal: Maintain or lose.
Food goals: 4 or more meatless, low-fat meals and 2 or more fish meals.
Exercise goals: At least 30 minutes of cardio 5 days, plus 2 days of arms & abs strength training workouts. For cardio, do at least 3 runs, weather permitting (Weather-permitting=not raining and temperature over 40 degrees).
Misc. goals: 7 or more hours sleep/night. Set up my Mary Lou Retton Platform and give it a whirl!