Happy Day with Russ and Shay
Posted: May 26, 2013 Filed under: Diet- comedy | Tags: Hom-a-gen, Russ, Shay Shay Leave a comment
One of the blessings of living where we do is that my parents live exactly one hour away at Hom-a-gen, the farm that has been in our family for, well forever. Hom-a-gen was one of the reasons we moved to Durham in the first place. When Russ was looking at business schools twenty years ago being close to the farm was a real draw, especially for Russ and now for Shay-Shay. See having acre upon acre to run free is paradise for a dog that lives on a leash in her home neighborhood.
Carter is studying for exams but Russ finally felt like he had gotten ahead of his work so he and I made a quick trip to the farm after church. My parents were free to join us for lunch at my father’s favorite Mexican restaurant in Danville, El Vallarta. My father is such a regular there that even though the place was full of people waiting to be seated he just walked right in and went to his special corner in the back and magically his regular table was sitting empty as if it were permanently reserved for him.
The wait staff greets him as the big tipper he is and brings the beer my father is known to order. No one asked why we did not have menus as all the people who were seated by the hostess did. No one questioned us seating our self or skipping the line. My father is clearly a charter member of the el Vallarta club.
After lunch we went back to the farm to run, walk and throw the tennis balls to Shay, which was the real purpose for going there. Shay loves to run after a tennis ball as fast as she can. She is also fairly good at catching it in mid air, but bringing back to you is not her thing. She usually will pick it up and carry it to her self-determined home base. This means Russ or I have to walk to were she drops the ball. We usually play with at least two balls at a time with her so that at one time one of us is retrieving and one is throwing. You would think that the labradoodle should be the retriever, but that is not the case.
After the throwing and catching session Russ and I walked down to the big lower pond led by Shay. She knows every inch of the place and only stops to look back to make sure we are following her every once in a while. I swear she is smiling as she walks. If she had a cartoon bubble above her head showing what she is thinking it would be one simple sentence over and over again, “I love the farm. I love the farm. I love the farm.”
After circling the pond, surveying the schools of new baby fish and enjoying the perfect sunshine we walk up the hill to go sit with my Dad outside the office barn. With Shay trotting ahead on the dirt farm road I look over at Russ and I think I see the cartoon bubble above his head, “I love the farm. I love the farm. I love the farm.”
A man and his dog in pure nirvana.
The Murder I Did Not Commit Today
Posted: May 25, 2013 Filed under: Diet- comedy | Tags: crazy mother Leave a comment
Here is the news that did not happen, but was so close. Russ and I have needed to buy a new mattress for a while. Russ does not care what he sleeps on. In fact since he hardly sleeps at all almost the worst thing gives him the best sleep. A small loveseat under a florescent light with an infomercial blaring on the TV causes him the best sleep. Not me. Princess and the pea would be my theme. Since he does not care and I do he has asked me to just go buy a new mattress alone. What Russ failed to understand in my princess role I needed him to come lie on each bed next to me and move around so I could test how well partner movement is contained, as they say in the trade.
Finding a time that Russ is free when stores are open is a difficult task so today, rather than enjoying the beautiful weather we went mattress shopping. After leaving disappointed salesmen in our wake we finally settled on one and started to cruise out of the mall. All this lying around had got me plum tuckered out so I asked Russ if I could stop at the coffee bar at Nordstrom to get a quick iced coffee. He happily plopped in a chair and read his e-mail.
I approached the order line and was happy that there were only a couple of people in front of me. As the first person spent a ridiculous amount of time discussing all the flavors of tea with the check out girl I began to become annoyed. Knowing that my blood sugar was low I used my best distraction technique and focused on the mother and her eight and ten year old girls in front of me. Big mistake. I should have pulled my phone out and read my e-mail rather than eavesdrop on this crazy mother.
She was a tiny woman in her early forties with long blond hair and no makeup wearing a strapless top and cargo pants. As I stood behind this mother the one characteristic about her that really stood out was that her bare back looked like a bag of oranges it was so muscular and void of any bit of fat to create a smooth look. I glanced at her arms and I could practically see the sinew in her muscles as if she had no skin covering her built anatomy.
She was the one I wanted to murder and it had nothing to do with her over worked out physique, but the conversation she had with her daughters that went like this, I swear to God.
Mother: What do you want?
Older daughter: I think I’ll have a pretzel
Mother: That’s good. Do you want to go upstairs to Aunt Annie’s?
Older daughter: No, this one here is good.
Mother: (To the younger one) What about you?
Younger one: How about chips?
Mother: No, what about a smoothie?
Younger One: What about a pretzel?
Mother: No. I don’t think a pretzel is healthy enough.
Older One: You said I could get a pretzel.
Mother: No, you can’t. How about edemame?
Younger One: I’ll just get a smoothie.
Mother: Who said you could get a smoothie?
Younger One: You did.
Older One: Wait, what about an Aunt Annie’s pretzel.
Mother: No, why would I let you go there?
By this time the tea discusser had been long gone and the clerk was waiting on this crazy mother to order. I strongly considered stepping in to tell her to stop contradicting herself and order something or step aside. I stopped myself because probably on steroids of some kind. In the end she got herself and iced tea and her daughters two waters. Was I wrong not to call social services?
Come Dunk Me
Posted: May 24, 2013 Filed under: Diet- comedy | Tags: Dunk Tank, HVCC 3 CommentsA few months ago a friend who belongs to our neighborhood club asked me if I would be willing to be in a Dunking booth on Memorial Day to raise money to buy an outdoor movie projector. Now I am always one for creative fund raising schemes so I said yes.
At the time I thought I would be one of many who would perch upon the unstable bench above a tank of water awaiting the baseballs being thrown at the tiny target. It is all in good fun, and I hate that we rent a projector to show outdoor movies so I was willing to join the team. Come to find out that I am the only woman being dunked and there are only five other men. To top it off, the weather has not been particularly warm so I am sure that the dunk tank water is going to be extra cold.
Now, I am beginning to wonder what I have gotten myself into. Our club is opening a greatly anticipated new pool complex, which is replacing the forty-year-old versions that were ripped out over the winter. Everybody I know is planning on coming up to the pool to celebrate.
My friend Lynn had wanted to take me new bathing suit shopping before the dunk tank and I said no I would just wear an old suit. Now I am not only regretting not getting a new suit, but also not working out much harder in the last month and being more vigilant with my healthy eating. Actually, at this point I wish I had a whole wet suit.
I am beginning to anticipate the screaming I will do while sitting on the bench. The only thing that will possibly make this whole episode bearable is if I can raise more money that all the men. My dunking time is Monday, Memorial Day at 2:30 at the Hope Valley Country Club. It costs $5 for three balls or any donation larger than that.
If you hate me come out and dunk me. If you love me come out and dunk me. If you love watching movies outdoors in the grass come out and dunk me. Make this whole crazy thing worth my while and come out and dunk me. I don’t think you even need to be a member of the club. Just bring your money and take your turn. The worst part is that I am at the end of the dunking time so I am going in after all those men have been dunked. I hope they have not drunk a lot of beer before they sit on the bench. All I can say is please pray for me and Happy Memorial Day!
Unplanned Good Days
Posted: May 23, 2013 Filed under: Diet- comedy | Tags: Jan McCallum 1 Comment
meeting Jan’s Australian friend Justine
There is nothing I like better than an unexpected good day. Being a natural born planner I usually know what is going to happen during every hour of the day. I like to keep expectations low so when good things happen I can fully enjoy them.
Today just happened to be one of those days when lots of good surprises happened and makes it just a really good day. It started with my trip to workout. My gym happens to be very cool about dogs and I decided that Shay needed some extra attention so she got to accompany me on my work out. Shay is the kind of dog who has never met a person she does not like and even people who normally dislike dogs take a shine to her. Working out with Shay made it go by quicker and feel less painful.
After working out I settled down to write two speeches and two letters that had been weighing heavily on my mind. Normally I don’t experience writers block, but these particular works had been on my list to do for a while without any inspiration. Check, check, check, off the list.
I then went downtown where I met a group of friends for lunch. I have been doing a lot of lunches and dinners out and all that fine dining has not been helping my waistline. Our group had chosen to go to the Art Institute’s cooking school restaurant, The District in the basement of American Tobacco, where my friend Paris was working. Since it is a cooking school restaurant I was not sure there was going to be a healthy choice for me. Boy was I surprised. I had a fabulous chilled melon soup and an avocado and grapefruit salad and all the tea I could drink. Fun friend lunch and really healthy too!
I headed home after lunch and my cohort Jan from Texas called and said she was at around the corner from me and to come and see her. Jan was making a quick two-day stop here to see her new Granddaughter Elliot with one of her Australian friends and business partners Justine. Since I had done a little consulting for Jan and her business I had only virtually met Justine so this was a fun treat to meet her and see Jan. It was a short visit, but as is all things with Jan, wonderful.
I rushed home to write my blog and stopped at the mailbox, which contained four thank you notes and three checks. That is the kind of mail I like. As I walked in the door my phone was ringing and it was one of Carter’s teachers. She said she just had to call to tell me about something wonderful Carter had done in class that brought tears to her eyes and made teaching her a joy; Music to the ears of a mother of a 14 year old.
I am writing this just before we run out the door to Carter’s final band concert. I am hoping that the day of unexpected surprises ends as well as it started. Even if it doesn’t I am cherishing each of the small joys I had today. They add up to a pretty great day.
I Need an Intern
Posted: May 22, 2013 Filed under: Diet- comedy | Tags: college, internship 3 CommentsWhen I was in college I worked as many real jobs as I could get in the summer so I could earn real money. I was getting experience “working,” but not trying out careers. Thus, I ended up selling lots of stuff door-to-door, like vacuums and cable TV. I made a lot of money and in turn my “work experience” helped me get a real job when I finished school. Employers liked that I had worked which they thought might be a good indicator of my actual “work ethic”.
Things certainly are different for college kids today than they were back in the olden days. Everybody is looking for internships in actual work places so they can see if they like that possible career path. I don’t know if the “internship path” is the better way to get your foot in the door when you go to look for a real job, or just something to do that you don’t get paid for. I know there are paid internships, but I also have been hearing a lot about kids who are willing to work for free just to get “experience.”
This week alone I have had three calls from college kids who are interested in writing jobs. Since I have been on sabbatical for the last year from real work I did not know that my magazine had already “hired” five interns for the summer. Publishing is such a tough field these days that kids are willing work for free to get published.
I got to thinking about all these out-of-work college students and I can think of about 5,505 things I could teach one this summer if I had an intern. Of course I don’t have any money to pay one, but if someone wanted to learn how to be a full time blogger-community volunteer-board member-writer-recipe creator-farmer-mother-organizer-speech giver-researcher I have a job for you. Tasks for this intern would also include the mundane like, driving places, practicing both basketball and volleyball with my daughter, laundry, dishwashing, purchasing, dog walking and iced tea making.
Spending time as my intern you would look for the absurd in everyday life in order to find blog topics. You would search out healthy new foods and be a taste tester for creative creations. You would chauffer me around so that I could needlepoint rather than drive, in exchange I will tell you life altering stories that will save you years of making wrong decisions. You will write blogs and if they are any good you will be a featured “Guest blogger” on Less Dana.
If you are my intern you will walk away from this experience hopefully thinner because you will have helped me drop my last twenty pounds. You will have learned how to live a healthy life that packs as much as possible in a day. You will have spent at least 63% of your waking hours laughing and you will have been published even if it is just on my blog.
Being a Less Dana Intern might not be the job you thought you were looking for, what with the no money and the decidedly motherly duties, but it could prove to be your go to experience when ever you are asked the interview question, “What have you done where you learned the most?”
Shay Shay’s Two Today
Posted: May 20, 2013 Filed under: Diet- comedy | Tags: Shay Shay 2 Comments
Today I went to Dr. Joe Moylan’s funeral. He was a great man, loved by many and will be missed by all. Although he lived a totally full life with a loving wife, six children, twenty grandchildren, fulfilling career as a Doctor, great educator and founder of the Durham Nativity School he left the world too soon.
I came home from the service and was truly sad about the huge loss to his family and the greater community at large. As I sat down to change out of my church clothes our sweet dog Shay Shay jumped up on the bed beside me and sensing my sadness snuggled up to me and rested her curly brown head on my shoulder tucking her nose under my chin. It was just the comfort I needed at that moment.
As I was rubbing her belly in her favorite way to be thanked I remembered that today was her second birthday. It is hard for me to imagine our family without our loving four-legged member. She makes everyday a joy, except when she chews up my reading glasses.
She can leap tall buildings in a single bound.
Fly through the air.
Not just catch a ball, but throw one as well.
But mostly she can love us. Now she loves Russ the most, but who can blame her.
Happy birthday Shay Shay.
Sister C and Sister E
Posted: May 19, 2013 Filed under: Diet- comedy | Tags: Carter Lange, Ellis Toms, Lynn Toms 2 Comments
Almost fourteen years ago I was at church early saving two pews because my whole family was coming to witness Carter’s Baptism. A tall skinny blonde woman I did not know shimmied into the pew I was saving in the front. In my typically officious voice I announced to her that the seats were taken because my daughter was being baptized that day. She looked at me and said that her daughter was also being baptized that day, news to both of us that we were sharing the day. It was the beginning of a beautiful friendship that did not start out so friendly.
Carter and Ellis, now affectionately called Sister E and Sister C unknowingly started their life long friendship there and then. Today they were both confirmed together in the same church where they were baptized. This time their parents happily chose to sit together.
Carter choosing to join the church and be confirmed was not a slam-dunk. At first she was unwilling to agree to go through the classes. I told Carter that she did not have to pledge her allegiance to any God, Church or Jesus, but that she had to go through the classes to learn what she did and did not believe in. I know that she was challenging to her teachers in her questions. I am thankful that many smart adults, Taylor, Nancy and her mentor Jamie did not tire of helping this prove-it-science-type adolescent come to an understanding of faith and grace.
I ended up being asked to be Ellis’ mentor as a church elder. It only seemed fitting since I consider her my own bonus daughter. Ellis’ mother Lynn often says of Ellis that she is more my daughter than hers when Ellis is being her natural comedic self.
So today I celebrate not just Carter and Ellis’ confirmation but the years of friendship with the whole Toms family started there at Sister E and Sister C’s baptism and continued on today and for years to come.
Family Ramblings
Posted: May 18, 2013 Filed under: Diet- comedy | Tags: broken Leg, Carter, janet 3 Comments
My sister Janet drove down to Durham today to celebrate my father’s 75th birthday with us. My Dad just wanted to have a lunch outdoors so we went to the Washington Duke Inn. We went late enough that the rain had stopped so we were the only people on the terrace. There may have only been six of us, but we are loud enough to be a party of 20 so it was nice to have the place to ourselves. Who knows if we disturbed any golfers on far off holes, but luckily no one complained. My mother has spent her life being embarrassed about how loud we are, but now that she can hardly hear I think she appreciates the volume.
As is always the case when any two or more Carter’s get together we told stories of our childhoods, family trips and traumas or perceived traumas. I love to hear everyone’s different recollections of the same story or the true confessions about things that happened long ago.
Janet, being the youngest of the children by almost nine years, always had a lot of experiences that somehow slipped under the table. Today, she recounted how at age 9 she fell off a ladder onto a Danish friend and broke the girl’s leg. In normal Carter fashion my mother came out and told the girl that she was fine and just to get up and walk.
My mother, having no recollection of either this girl, or the leg-breaking incident said to Janet, “Was this girl living with us?” It was not such a far-fetched question since my parents always seemed to be the shelter for our wayward friends. I can remember more than a few holidays when we had a friend of Margaret or Janet’s living at our house with no apparent plan of ever returning to her own family.
In fact we talked about a girl today who lived with my parents more than a month after Janet had moved away from home. My mother did remember eventually calling Janet to ask her how she might get her friend to leave my parent’s house.
All these true confessions prompted Carter to remind us of a friend she had made once in St. Croix who had broken her arm. Carter said she had fallen on that girl and that was how she broke her arm. Why that child never told on Carter I will never know, but she must have been complicit in the accident to keep that fact quiet.
There is not much of a point to these rambling except as a warning to keep your distance from anyone of us in case we might fall on you and break something.
The Parent Lottery
Posted: May 17, 2013 Filed under: Diet- comedy | Tags: Ed Carter 4 Comments
My Dad, Ed Carter is 75 today
The other day I was having a discussion about the Food Bank with a group of fairly well off people. One of them expressed the opinion we should stop giving children food at school and make their parents be responsible for making sure they were adequately fed. I know this person is not the only one who feels this way so I went away from the meeting thinking about it.
Later that day the one word answer I needed earlier came to me; Luck. The people in that room were lucky to have born to the parents they had. Some of the children who are given lunch at school need it because they were just unlucky to have gotten the parents they have.
Today is my father’s seventy-fifth birthday and I know I am who I am today because of him. From as early as I can remember my father taught me as much as he knew so I could grow up to be a successful person.
It was often unsettling for me as an adolescent to hear him start a sentence with; “I’m going to tell you this now in case I die soon…” I am sure no one is more surprised than he is that he has made it to three quarters of century. His sense of urgency definitely molded me. In his book, children were never too young to take on what we now consider adult tasks. He made me learn to cook when I was seven, sew when I was eleven, could drive the tractor at age eight and therefore was expected to cut the grass, I was sent door-to-door to sell things, after all he worked at Avon, the company that empowered women through earning their own money.
My father is a great storyteller and he would keep his daughter’s entertained while we did yard work or scraped paint off our antique house which needed painting every year. His stories were more like parables about work and how to be a good employee or boss. He always used humor to teach us something because he knew that way we would remember it.
Although he has high expectations of everyone he also is probably the most generous person I know. That combination means that if you make the grade with him you know it, but if you don’t you know it too.
I recall crying on more than a few occasions when my father pushed me to be more or do more than my natural lazy instinct wanted to. He would gruffly ask me, “Why are you crying?” I would scream back, “I don’t know,” and run to my room. I do know why I was crying. He was always right. I could do more and be better. I was lucky I had a parent who taught me, pushed me and loved me.
Now when people ask me why I do what I do for hungry children I can tell them, it’s not because they just might not have enough food today, but because most of them were not lucky enough to have the father I have. My best way to honor him is to push the world hard to be a better place and not let our next generation depend the luck of the parent draw.
In Praise of Those Who Step Forward
Posted: May 16, 2013 Filed under: Diet- comedy | Tags: elizabeth Aldridge, volunteering 2 CommentsToday I went to the Parents Council celebratory lunch for Carter’s school. All parents at the school are part of the parents council by virtue of being a parents, but some parents step forward to do a greater share of the volunteering, organizing, fundraising, idea generation, table cloth washing, book sorting, cup cake baking and general fetching and carrying than others.
In today’s world everybody is busy. I don’t know if I even know anyone who is sitting around eating bon-bons watching soap operas. Oh, now sometime I wish I could, but I think that is just because I really like the idea of a bon-bon. I’m not exactly sure I really know what one is, but is sounds like something fattening and forbidden.
Despite how busy everyone is already there are a few people who generously step forward to do a job that they are neither getting paid for nor are getting thanked enough for. Being President of the Durham Academy Parents Council is one of those jobs.
At our lunch we had a gathering of past and recently elected Presidents who were there to honor our retiring Headmaster, Ed Costello. Chris Mark, Cindy Sundy, Martha King, Thecky Pappas, Anne Lloyd, Hannah Hannan, Michelle Beischer, Demtra Kontos, and Lisa Ferrari all joined this year’s President Elizabeth Aldridge is presenting Ed with the plaque that will name the Upper School conference room for him.
Collectively this group of women represented many years of selfless volunteerism. Although the President does not do this job alone, but leads many, she is still the one who has to cajole people to head committees, speaks at Parent gatherings, worries over budgets, fields parent’s concerns and a myriad of other things daily.
Our system for training people for this important job is fairly robust. Someone, after years of volunteering in key roles, is usually nominated to be the President Elect where she spends a year shadowing the current President learning the ropes. This generally ensures that once she takes over the role of leader she is comfortable with the job.
Sometimes even robust systems have snags and last year just as the President Elect, Margaret Jones was getting ready to ascend the throne her husband took a job moving them to Minnesota. Parents Council needed a new President, one who could step into the role without training. All the stars aligned and Elizabeth Aldridge graciously accepted the challenge and when others might have stepped back she did not.
Elizabeth has led the Parents Association with poise, kindness, respect and good humor. I think she has been an example to many not to fear taking on a big task. Certainly no one agrees to volunteer for something looking for praise, especially Elizabeth. But if you know her, consider sending her a message of thanks. Her willingness to volunteer is a beacon I hope others will follow. If you currently don’t volunteer in your community, look around and find something small to help do. You may find it more rewarding than you imagined.
Naughty Versus Nice
Posted: May 14, 2013 Filed under: Diet- comedy | Tags: Chapel Hill Neddlepoint, Nancy 1 Comment
Any one who has known me any length of time knows that I don’t need much incentive to be naughty. Misbehavin’ is my natural state, but motherhood and age have really mellowed me. I think I probably have a large number of new acquaintances fooled into thinking I am an upstanding citizen. It is a façade I have adopted most of the time.
Today, I stopped by Chapel Hill Needlepoint to ask one of my new favorite people Nancy, the owner, how to proceed with a project I was almost finished with. When she looked at the Santa coat ornament in question she said that I was actually done which was music to my ears. Since I had allotted forty minutes in my day to work at the community needlepoint table I just started work on my next ornament.
I love stitching at Nancy’s big round table with the store’s door open to enjoy the perfect May day. There never fails to be any number of interesting women who drop by to stitch and visit. Nancy has a great way of keeping the business running and being part of the conversation at the same time, which is quite amazing based on the large numbers of people who are in and out of her store all day.
Beside customers there are the army of different delivery people who you would expect at a store, the Post person, the UPS and Fed Ex men are normal. But then there is the CSA delivery farmer. If you don’t know, CSA stands for Community Supported Agriculture and Nancy’s store is a drop off/pick up point for people who subscribe to one farmer. So CSA customers stop by her store to get their eggs, veggies and meat.
One of my favorite regulars, Ann was at the community table working on a Christmas stocking today. Ann is a few years older than me and does not know me well, but that does not stop us from sharing stories. While we were stitching a young guy in his twenties pulled up to the front of the store in his F-250 diesel truck. He gets out and leaves the loud engine running as he comes into the store. Suffice it to say he is not the normal profile of Nancy’s customers, but Nancy gets up she and the young man go back to the storeroom where the produce is.
Ann and I look at each other, both annoyed by the loud engine and diesel smell disturbing the needlepoint nirvana we thought we deserved. It took more than a minute for Nancy to sort out which box belonged to this CSA customer. I looked at Ann and asked if she thought turning off a truck was hard to do. Her comment was perfectly Chapel Hillian in that it was also bad for the environment. My naughtiness immediately emerged when I said that I could teach him to never leave a truck running again if I went out and jumped in the truck and drove away with it. Ann loved the idea, but then we both agreed that the lesson was not worth my being charged with grand theft auto.
After the young man leaves Ann and I tell Nancy of the plan we held back on. Nancy is obviously much nicer than me because she said he was a cute guy and it probably hard to start the truck after turning it off since it was diesel. I obviously do not have the personality to have a store; I think you have to be a lot more nice than naughty.
Less Dana’s First Anniversary
Posted: May 13, 2013 Filed under: Diet- comedy | Tags: first anniversary 11 Comments
One year. One whole stinkin’ year. Everyday, not one day missed, I posted a blog for the last year about my journey to live healthier, lose weight, raise money for the Food Bank of CENC, tell some stories, make some people laugh and inspire others.
For the last 365 days I have posted a blog everyday without fail. Actually I post 370 blogs and I am not quite sure how that happened. I started the blog as my way of being accountable for loosing weight and raising money, but somewhere along the way it morphed into my story telling, recipe site.
I know that if you follow the blog even semi-closely you have learned More Dana than Less Dana, so I apologize now for anything you found unsavory or disturbing. Mostly I hope you got a few laughs, discovered some new foods, and if you needed it found some strategies to help you live a healthier life.
A few blogs get read over and over again almost everyday because they obviously have hit on a universal issue, like “Dana’s Bra Strap Shortening Station.” Based on how many random people are searching for this and reading it leads me to believe that there is a real business opportunity there.
“The Burst into Tears Gift” I wrote on Christmas day is one of the most read and reread blogs having been viewed over a thousand times. Clearly, “heartfelt” sells in blog land.
But anytime I wrote about clothes falling off like in “Will It Zip Roulette”, “Epic Zipper Failure Follow-up”, “No Boobs for Yoga” or “Advice for Dieting Travelers” I got more readers. People must find it extremely funny to read about other people’s mistaken nakedness.
Thanks to all the generous readers, over $53,000 has been donated to the Less Dana campaign at the Food Bank of CENC and awareness has been raised. I have readers from 183 countries due to the miracle of search engines and no one from the State Department had sent me a letter accusing me of causing an international incident.
I lost 70 pounds over this past year, but I know of at least a dozen blog followers who lost well over 500 pounds in total. I love when people tell me they have been able to do better with their eating after reading the blog. Even after one year of doing this I have not reached my goal. I want to lose 18 more pounds so I am going to keep the blog going. I am less concerned with doing it quickly and more interested in living a balanced life. As long as I am on the going-down-side of the scale and I am making a few of you laugh I am happy.
Mother’s Day – Whose Day Is It Anyway?
Posted: May 12, 2013 Filed under: Diet- comedy | Tags: kid president, mother's day Leave a comment
I’m a Mom and I have a Mom so technically in my book it’s Mothers’ Day. For me Mother’s Day comes at the end of ten days that are all about me, with my anniversary and birthday leading the way. That usually means that everyone around me is sick of me, so Mother’s Day is like a big, aren’t-we-done-with-you-yet sigh? Exhale now and let’s move on to someone else. I get it. I get sick of me too.
For my mother I am sure that Mother’s day has never been celebrated in any proper way for her either. I am not good at sending cards, never have been, never will be. One reason is I hate spending $4.99 for a folded piece of paper that someone will read and then toss in the trash. OK, I’m cheep. For my mother this year I sent her a Jib Jab e-card staring her as one of history’s greats. If you don’t know what a Jib Jab is, it is a video where you insert the face of your mother in it electronically and then she appears throughout the video.
The second thing I sent her was a video of Kid President’s Open Letter to Moms.
(Go watch it http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pQ4Rnba85o8&list=SPzvRx_johoA-YabI6FWcU-jL6nKA1Um-t&index=1). All I can say is if you know my Mom thinking about her watching this hysterical little boy makes it even funnier.
There it is. I am not such a great daughter; two comical messages to my mother on mother’s day, no gifts, no cards, no flowers, but I do love my mother.
Then this morning my own daughter comes up to our room and presents me with an entire Mother’s Day brochure she created. Of course it is cry-worth, sob-inducing in the touching way she thanks me for being her mom. It is exactly the best gift in the whole world. One that is personal, and heartfelt and homemade. And makes me feel like the luckiest mother and the absolutely worst daughter all at the same time.
How did I get such a good daughter and my mother gets such a terrible one? The only thing I can think of is Carter is an only child so all the weight of Mother’s Day is on her and I have the fall back with my Mom of my two sisters to come through. And let’s face it. My sister Janet is the best child, so I am counting on her. Please God let my Mother’s three daughter’s “Happy Mother’s Day” wishes equal the one daughter’s I got.
Even Rechargeable Batteries Stop Working Sometime
Posted: May 11, 2013 Filed under: Diet- comedy | Tags: batteries Leave a comment
The other day I was talking on my piece o’ crap cordless phone in my bedroom when after a few little beeps that were only audible to me it just went dead. I placed the lightweight plastic handset into the charging cradle and reached over to Russ’ side of the bed and picked up the ‘ole reliable hardwire phone we have had for twenty years. I redialed my friend and she asked what had happened.
When I told her my cordless phone won’t hold a charge any more she asked how could that be? I explained that I needed to buy new rechargeable batteries for that phone; the old ones had just given way. The idea that a rechargeable battery would not recharge came as a total shock to her.
Not being any type of an engineer, nor married to one like me, actually I’m not sure she ever took any science or math in college I tried to explain to her that even rechargeable batteries had some finite lifespan and I was on the edge with this phone. I tried to find an example of something she owned that stopped holding a charge even after it had been plugged in. After quizzing her about cameras, cell phones, computers even toys we never could find anything she had that had stopped charging before she just threw it away.
I then moved on to try and find an example that was even more esoteric. How about her own body? Had she ever had to up her caffeine intake to give her the boost she needed to make it through the day? That seemed to hit home. I continued asking if she kept increasing the coffee or did she eventually get enough sleep to totally recharge herself? Of course the answer was the sleep that there was not enough caffeine in the world to keep her running.
The problem with most of us Type A’s is we think of ourselves as beings with rechargeable batteries that should work forever. But when you can’t hold a charge any longer or your charge is short lived it is time to do yourself a favor and change your batteries. For a human that means take a big break from the rat race and slowing down. Perhaps it means taking a vacation you don’t need a vacation from. Just give yourself permission to do nothing for a day or two or even three.
If anyone asks you to do something for them just tell him or her you are busy changing your batteries. You can always get back to them when you are fully recharged again.
Abercrombie and Fitch Has Never Been for Everyone
Posted: May 10, 2013 Filed under: Diet- comedy | Tags: Abercrombie and Fitch, micheal Jeffries, the limited 4 Comments
I know everyone is sick to death of hearing the play by play of my medical life. Since my colonoscopy went well and was generally free of any breaking news and given the fact that I am an apparent anesthesia lightweight and slept all day on one-third the amount they thought I might need, I am moving on to comment of the news of the day. At least it was news of yesterday that really was a spot light on a 2006 interview.
The excitement I am referring to is the comment Abercrombie and Fitch CEO Michael Jeffries made to Salon Magazine. To paraphrase his 2006 remarks, he said that the people he wanted to buy and wear his clothes were the “cool, beautiful and thin kids” and he did this by making only skinny and small clothes.
When I was a kid Abercrombie and Fitch was a high-end luxury retailer of safari clothes. If you were a rich, thin, WASP who was planning a big game hunt in Kenya, where you actually went and killed real life leopards and elephants, Abercrombie was the place you went to purchase the wardrobe needed for your killing rampage. Not exactly a huge market and one that thankful and literally died off with the whole notion of killing those glorious and magnificent animals.
That first Abercrombie’s went under in the seventies and then another sporting goods retailer bought their mailing list and name and resurrected the brand. I remember going in Abercrombie’s in Georgetown Park in Washington DC and looking at Viella plaid shirts for $495 that only came in size 4-8 and that was back when a size 4 was really like a triple zero now. I thought then that this store is really out of touch with the real world and the lack of customers and subsequent closing of the entire line of stores came as no shock to me.
Then in the eighties the group from Ohio that owned the low-end retailer The Limited bought the Abercrombie and Fitch name and they turned it in to the clothing company marketing to tiny teens and pre-pubescents it is today.
I love that a company based in the clearly uncool center of the universe Columbus Ohio is the one trying to dictate what is cool and is only interested in the “thin and beautiful” people. I am all for the free market corporate universe which the name Abercrombie and Fitch has always lived under. If their model is one that cuts down their potential universe of customers to only the richest and thinnest fine. You can do that by making everything tiny and expensive. It is a very small group.
But how can they only get the most beautiful? When Jeffries went on record saying he only wanted the “attractive” all American kids to shop in his store I wonder what mechanism he had to keep the ugly people out? I have not noticed an ugly meter in the store door ways, but clearly the blaring music and giant cologne misting machines shooting out the foul smell of their signature scent could be masking the sensors that alert the clerks when someone of the exact opposite of the A & F profile is violating their sacred space set aside for just the thinnest and most beautiful.
Sure only carrying thin cut shirts to size large and girls pants to size 10 discourages anyone bigger than the average Asian teen to leave the store feeling dejected and depressed. I am certain from having been forced to visit the store with a couple of adolescent girls that the clerks keep the back dressing room for only the customers they want and make the undesirable wait in line at the three dressing rooms the front hoping they will give up and leave.
I think the best revenge on store like Abercrombie’s, who openly bully fragile teenage girls about their body image, is to take as many middle aged women in them as possible and have us try on and stretch out every last one of those teeny-weeny, skinny cut t-shirts they have. There is no greater turn-off to the teen market than to think that their Moms have adopted a brand.
Now, I am not suggesting that Moms actually go and buy the Abercrombie wear because the actual worst thing is a Mom thinking she can rock the teen look. So if by chance you go in A&F on a vengeance, trying-on spree and discover you look good in one of those mini skirts please do not be tempted to buy it. You are really just falling victim to the pulsating music and mind-melding stench of the store. Remind yourself why you went in and go get that mini skirt in the next two sizes down and try that on and stretch it out. Then take a really good look at yourself and remember you are middle aged.
And if you are already a thin and beautiful teenager you can buy your clothes anywhere and still be thin and beautiful. Supporting a brand that openly has disdain for the average makes you look less beautiful, not more.
Clear Liquids Day
Posted: May 9, 2013 Filed under: Diet- comedy | Tags: colonoscopy Prep, laxatives Leave a comment
In the continued spirit of over sharing about tomorrow’s colonoscopy I thought I would list good things and bad things to do on the day when I can’t eat anything. Actually, it is not that I can’t eat anything; I just am only allowed to have clear liquids, coffee (without milk) tea, broth, Jell-o, popsicles, apple juice and Italian Ice. Oh yeah, and laxatives in multiple forms.
So far I have only had tea and seem to be doing fine. My plan is to have a little broth at noon, get in the car to go to a meeting in Raleigh and stop at Rita’s and get an Italian ice. I have to remember not to get a red or purple one since that is also a no-no. During my meeting I have to casually take four pills. Then when I get back in the car to come home I have to begin the chugging of the crystal light- Myra lax concoction I have in my thermos.
I am following the instructions to a T because the last thing I want to have happen is to get into the procedure tomorrow only to be sent home because of apparent unpreparedness. I have one close friend whom this happened to and believe me she was unhappy to have to prep twice.
Fasting is not something I like to do ever since I did the Medifast diet back in the 80’s. Medifast was the same thing Oprah did, I just happened to do it right before she did. It was a very fast way to lose a lot of weight, but I think it did nothing but train my body to be more efficient with less food. As soon as I started eating again my body feared it might never get food again so it held on to what ever I gave it. Thus the yo-yoing began.
I learned that to be good at fasting you need to do lots of non-food activities. Here are some of the things that are good to do:
Get Your Hair Cut
Walk the dog- just not too far or fast so you get light headed
Pay your bills
Answer E-mail
Write thank you notes
Do the Laundry
Talk on the Phone
Write a blog
Needlepoint
Get a manicure and pedicure
Anything that is not too strenuous that keeps your hands busy and your mind off food.
Things to do that are unhelpful:
Watch TV – There are too many food commercials or food related segments that cause you to think about food.
Go out to lunch
Clean out the refrigerator
Actually walk in the kitchen
Drive past a restaurant – even a fast food restaurant
Read Facebook – I never realized how many people post about food
Work in the Garden – bending over causes lightheadedness
Read a novel- you never know when a character is going to eat a meal causing you to want to eat.
Go shopping – food is everywhere
Anything where you might see, smell or have to touch food
Anything where you might not be near a bathroom
This is certainly no way to lose weight, but then again that is not why I am doing it. It is just the way to stay alive a little longer.
The Fattening Name
Posted: May 8, 2013 Filed under: Diet- comedy | Tags: Dog House, IHOP, Waffle House Leave a comment
Someone asked me if I could pick a restaurant that had healthy and good food based on the name of the establishment. I thought about it for a moment and I said no, but I certainly could pick an unhealthy restaurant based on one word being in their name that had nothing to do with food. My claim was met with a skeptical look until I listed a few of the restaurants that all had this same word, Waffle House, International House of Pancakes (IHOP), The Dog House to name just a few.
Now I’m not saying that every place with the word house is going to be bad, but chances are a chain named “something house” is going to equal high calorie meals. The International House of Pancakes knew that they were doomed with that name so they shortened it to their IHOP acronym. It does not fool anyone over 45 who knows that the “P” stands for pancakes and then there is the dreaded “House.” One exception to the rule is Fearington House in Fearington village, NC. It is too good to be a chain restaurant so the House rule does not apply.
Even in London there is a chain called the Bratwurst Beer House. I can guarantee you can’t find a single meal in the place under 1,200 calories and that is before you have the beer. When we lived in London in the ‘90’s there was another German restaurant my Dad loved called the Tyroler Hut. “Hut” is certainly close enough to “House” and the wiener schnitzel hung off the sides of the platter like plates in this underground eatery with the oompha band playing the chicken dance mid meal. Even the mandatory dancing did not work off a tenth of the calories in those heavy meals.
So next time you are visiting a strange city and looking for a good place to eat it is my general rule of thumb to skip any place with ”House” in the name, or “Hut.” For that matter add the word “Pit” to my list of non-starters recalling my favorite line from the movie Father of the Bride when the little brother says to the suggestion of having the wedding reception at the Steak Pit, “I don’t think you want the word “Pit” on the invitation.”
Fix, Repair, Restore
Posted: May 7, 2013 Filed under: Diet- comedy | Tags: colonoskopy, massage, repair, shutters, teeth cleaning Leave a comment
Pardon the expression, but up keeps a bitch. Our house is a little older than I am, but we both are at the point in our longevity where we are all about maintenance.
The house is easier than I am because we have Joe, our builder, fixer, miracle worker who doubled the size of our house, reworked rooms in our house and fixed just about everything that ever went wrong with our house with the expertise of a fine craftsman and the care of a beloved family member. Little did we know when we chose Joe to do our first addition that we were ensuring that we would have him as our lifetime handy man.
Russ and I save up all our around the house repairs for when Joe is between bigger jobs. He is a little like Eldon from “Murphy Brown.” We like having him around that we find things for him to do. Joe is so old school that when something needs fixing he does it right.
Right now he is taking care of our 60 year old shutters with peeling paint and rotting wood. Most fix-it types would have told us to throw the old wood shutters out and replace them with plastic, but not Joe. He has lovingly removed each one to paint and with Russ’ Internet search expertise, found a forge to supply us with replacement hinges for the ones that were rusted out. Even the forge was old school, sending us $400.00 worth of custom made materials with a note to send them a check back. Have you ever?
Somehow I scheduled all my personal upkeep for this week too. I had my dental cleaning yesterday where my hygienist asked me how much tea I drink. Tea is my last vice, I told her and I was willing to live with less than perfectly white teeth as long as I got to drink tea.
Back in February my gym had a casino night and I was the third best gambler there. So today I finally got around to having my black-jack-winning massage. The masseuse asked me what I did for a living that kept my shoulders so hunched up? Being a magazine editor on sabbatical sounds very lame in relationship to my poor posture. I considered lying and telling her I was a surgeon leaning over children on the operating table. After my treatment today my new pretend job needs to be prima ballerina so I stand tall with my head up straight and shoulders down.
My third upkeep comes Friday with the greatly anticipated colonoscopy. If I calculate this correctly I will have spent about 30% of my week on personal upkeep. I am quickly coming to see what retirement holds for me, more work than I do in regular life. Next time someone tells you they are retired don’t envy them for the non-work they are doing, they are probably spending more time repairing and maintaining than they ever spent creating.
Chicken and Egg Stuffed Poblano Pepper
Posted: May 6, 2013 Filed under: Diet- comedy Leave a comment
When we were in Mexico Russ and I tried many different Mexican dishes for breakfast that we thought were good for any time of day. This recreation is similar, but I added a little cooked chicken to make it more dinner like. This recipe is for one serving.
1 Poblano Pepper
¼ cup shredded cooked chicken
2 eggs – scrambled
2 T. Queso Fresco
1 T. Mexican Crema
3 T. Salsa Verde
Preheat the oven to 400 degrees. Cut the pepper in half and remove the stem and seeds. Place pepper on a foil covered cookie sheet and put in oven for half an hour. Put salsa verde on a plate and put the pepper halves on top. Sprinkle the chicken on top of the pepper. Put the scrambled eggs on top. Sprinkle the Queso Fresco and the Crema over the eggs.
Goodbye Fresh Fruits and Vegetables
Posted: May 5, 2013 Filed under: Diet- comedy | Tags: colonoscopy, raw fruit, vegetables 3 Comments
I just turned 52. In the world of medicine I am two years past due for my colonoscopy. I tried to have it earlier but apparently getting into to have a colonoscopy is a popular thing to do so I have had to wait. I’m sure it is the baby boom that is the reason the wait is so long and not the love of the procedure itself.
I recently read the instructions for my colonoscopy and wish that I had known before, what I was going to have to do in preparation, so I could have picked a month like October when the fresh fruits and vegetables are less plentiful.
For all you youngsters yet to have done this here is a preview of what’s ahead. First, no aspirin of NSAIDS for ten days before, that means no Aleve for my achy knee.
Second, for five days before, this important paper tells me, to maintain my regular diet… except avoid, corn, peas, beans, popcorn, nuts, seeds and ANY RAW FRUITS OR VEGETABLES. The writer of these instructions obviously does not know what my regular diet is. I eat fruit and cereal for breakfast, and a salad for lunch and dinner. Once I remove all the raw fruits and vegetables I will have three quarters of a cup of cereal, half a cup of milk, two skinless chicken thighs and one oz. of blue cheese left in my regular diet.
The instructions go on to say that on the day before I get to cut out all food and have broth and clear liquids with a non-red Jell-O thrown in for fun. That afternoon I am going to power chug as many laxatives as I can dissolve into 32 oz. of Crystal light, the diabetic choice over Gatorade and then get up at four in the morning and do the laxative chug again.
I am so OK with the final day of broth and crystal light laced laxatives, but five days without raw fruits and vegetables seems like a medieval torture. Sure, if I weren’t trying to push past my current plateau to lose twenty pounds being given permission to eat meat and white bread might sound good to some of you, but I don’t need to develop a tooth for that kind of food.
I am giving you all fair warning that I may be a little grouchier that usual this week. I can only imagine how out of whack I am going to be without my “regular diet” of a bushel of raw fruits and veggies a day. I feel the nursing home diet of applesauce and cooked carrots coming on. Getting old stinks.
Birthday Over Indulgence
Posted: May 4, 2013 Filed under: Diet- comedy | Tags: dessert, overeating Leave a comment
Thanks to all of you who sent me birthday wishes. Facebook has certainly changed birthdays, but still celebrating with real live friends is the way to go. I wish that I had remembered that is was the friends and not the food that make the party great. Last night I paid for my eat-whatever-I-want-it’s-my-birthday attitude yesterday.
After almost a year of considered choices I let myself eat whatever I wanted all day. Funny thing is that I ate my regular Special K high protein cereal with black berries like I do every morning and I was happy. I should have followed suit, but foolishly did not. I went out to lunch with a group of friends and not only did I eat the cheddar biscuit but I think I ate two. I had a crab cake with salad which if that was all I had it would have been a good choice, but then I ate homemade potato chips with some kind of onion dip. It was a birthday after all so the whole table had chocolate molten cake with rhubarb ice cream which sounds like a perfectly horrible combination but it was exquisite. Then the waiter brought the birthday cake with the candle.
That was enough food for the whole day but the birthday continued through dinner out with my family. I started with a tuna and salmon tartare duo. That should have been the end. It was tuna with beets and salmon with radishes and they were delicious. But then since it was my birthday and it is the season I had soft shell crabs. I think this was considered the birthday of crabs. Two desserts followed the main again, one ordered for the table and then the surprise, it’s-your-birthday one the waiter brought.
I came home crawled into bed and felt sick to my stomach. People ask me all the time if I feel better thinner and I say no. Now I know I feel sicker eating like I used to. I could hardly sleep. I had terrible dreams. I woke up still full.
Perhaps this birthday of over indulgence will serve me well and be a great reminder that not only should I not eat like that, but that I really can’t eat like that. I’m off to a Derby Day party tonight and I know that I need to skip the food altogether since I’m still full from yesterday. I only hope that I can sleep better tonight after only one day back on the wagon, but I fear my birthday binge is at least a two day payback.
Birthday Folklore
Posted: May 3, 2013 Filed under: Diet- comedy | Tags: Birthday, crying, folklore 2 Comments
Me with my college friends Suzanne, H & D in disguise back in the day
When I was in college there was a famous gut course called Folklore. Although I myself did not take this course two of my great friends, whom I shall only identify as H & D, to preserve their academic standing, did take it. How I missed taking a course, which is more or less about story telling and more importantly, how I missed taking the easiest class offered at my school, where very few courses were easy, I will never know.
Although I was not enrolled in Folklore, I lived ever class through my friends H & D because they would retell class stories at lunch everyday. Being a friend-group of storytellers we loved talking about how stories got started and continued through generations.
The only real difficulty in this class was at the end of the semester each student had to turn in a paper with 50 original folklore stories from their family. Now most families in America had similar folklore, like Santa and the Easter bunny so the idea that any one student could possibly come up with 50 original ones seemed outrageous. We were sure this professor was collecting all these stories for a future book of tall tales college students wrote.
Since we were second semester seniors when H & D took this course no one took this assignment too seriously, but in actuality coming up with and writing down 50 stories, including the 5 W’s about each story, is harder than any of us thought a gut deserved. The worst part was that any folklore that had been discussed in class was off limits. So things like baptizing babies, or jumping over brooms at weddings or even Price Charming was done, documented and untouchable.
Because I could type quickly and owned a typewriter, (yes I am so old that typewriters where the best technology available. Computers were just printing out on green and white striped paper back then) also because I was good at making up or enhancing stories, I was conscripted into helping D & H with their papers. I can’t remember how many hours we sat in H’s room like Morey Amsterdam, Rosemary and Dick Van Dyke writing the Alan Brady show, but it seemed like days and fun days they were.
We were writing at the time of a friend’s birthday so we came up with one bit of folklore entitled, “Cry on your birthday, cry all year long.” It was the story of how a girl who whined and cried about having a bad birthday doomed herself to have an entire bad year.
Although we completely fabricated this story for the paper, “cry on your birthday, cry all year long” continued to be a phrase my group of friends repeated often. It also became somewhat of a superstition with us that we did not want to test. So it may have started as a whim, but has since actually become folklore.
I used to hate my birthday feeling like it was more disappointing than celebratory. But after working with H & D on folklore I never tempted fate with being unhappy about my birthday again.
So on this day, which is my birthday, as well as the birthday of my cousin Sarah, my friends, Gussy, Tricia, Beth, Ashley and many more I am sure I am forgetting here, I am going to celebrate and promise not to cry. Tears of joy do not count.
Twenty-One Years of Love, Laughs and Laundry
Posted: May 2, 2013 Filed under: Diet- comedy | Tags: anniversary, laundry, Russ Lange, wedding 5 Comments
It was a sunny Saturday in Washington, DC twenty-one years ago today when Russ took the crazy step to marry me. I knew I was more than lucky to have recognized what a kind, smart, generous and funny guy he was, but mostly that he was willing to go out on a big limb and commit himself to life with me. We had no idea then where we would go, but we knew we would be going together.
We devoted to each other, just as ourselves. When the minster asked Russ if he would take me as his wife he answered in his quiet, steadfast way, “I will” and maybe our families in the front row could hear him. When it was my turn to answer the same question, the Georgetown tourists walking outside the church probably could hear my “I WILL”. Despite the obvious differences in our demeanors and volume, underneath something about our makeup works well together.
Certainly there were kinks to be worked out. When I first met Russ he only owned three shirts he wore to work. That meant that he was wearing one shirt, washing one shirt and drying one shirt at all times. To top it off Russ only ironed the collar, cuffs and just enough of the center button plackets that showed with a suit coat on. I only realized this when, one day, he took his jacket off and inadvertently revealed the wrinkles on the majority of his shirt.
The shirt rotation seriously ate into available time to be together. So for Russ’ first birthday after we got engaged I bought him ten new shirts and introduced him to the Chinese Laundry down the street from his house. That one act profoundly changed his life. Last month Russ was cleaning out his closet and held up one of the original shirts from that birthday and asked me what he should do with the now sleeve-ripped-collar-worn green striped shirt. Sadly, I told him he needed to throw it away. “I love this shirt, “ he said with a sigh.
It took me a little longer to recognize that Russ is almost always right when it comes to remembering things. This is hard for person like me with the “Not always correct, but never in doubt” personality. Once I finally came to accept his wisdom trumps mine things have been much easier. It was never really very hard because Russ has the “I know I’m right, but I don’t have to tell you” personality. I can only imagine that Job also had that same trait.
Not all things in life are as easy to solve as the shirt problem, but we rarely do much without laughter and I think that is the key to twenty-one pretty wonderful years. Today, on this anniversary I want to publicly tell the world that I have the best husband, for me. Russ, thank you for all that you are, all that you do and all that you are going to do. I think there is a load of laundry in the dryer that needs to come upstairs, please.
May, The Busiest Month
Posted: May 1, 2013 Filed under: Diet- comedy | Tags: may, parties Leave a comment
December used to be the most jammed packed month of the year, but sometime after I had Carter May took over as the craziest month. Actually, before I had Carter May was a big month for me since it is my birthday and wedding anniversary month. Mother’s day was always in May, but when Carter came along it changed from a month I do something for my mother to a month that something was being done for me too.
So far all those events are mostly celebrations for me which makes May a horrible month for my husband. But now let’s add my father’s birthday and Memorial Day, made even bigger by our club’s new pool opening and the calendar is getting fairly full.
Now throw in the end of year stuff at school. The parties for teachers, the thank you gifts, end of term performances, appreciation lunches, final exams and this year we have 8th grade graduation and the celebrations that goes with that.
May Garden Club dinner party, and Derby Day Parties, going away parties for friends who are moving. The amount of celebrating makes Christmas seem like a regular ‘ole time of year. The worst part about this all is that most of these events involve eating of some kind. How in the world am I going to survive May? Perhaps with so many parties already on the books I could change my whole eating plan to just eat at parties and skip eating altogether between them.
Why I Hate HIPPA
Posted: April 30, 2013 Filed under: Diet- comedy | Tags: Hippa, medical records 6 CommentsToday I got a call from a health care provider who I will be visiting in the near future for the first time. I really appreciate an actual phone call to tell me information about my upcoming procedure but unfortunately she had to ask me some questions. Maybe you can recount your whole life’s medical history, but I cannot.
Being as young as I am you would think I could remember all my previous surgeries, but apparently I am the perfect candidate for a medical information chip. Health care workers don’t like generalities. When I told the woman I had some kind of cyst removed and some other kind of laser thing to stop bleeding that could mean many things. As this health professional tried to suggest the type of surgery I said yes to every answer when I was only supposed to pick one. Hell, I was asleep during that surgery how was I supposed to know which type it was?
After all this questioning, where I certainly gave some incorrect answers, the woman asked me to get my primary physician to fax in my health records. If she is getting my actual records why did she bother asking me the questions? The answer sheet was going to be sent into her.
She started to tell me the fax number I should have my records sent to. Whoa, whoa, whoa. “You called me on my cell phone and I’m walking the dog. Can you just e-mail me the number?” I logically asked, this being the second decade of the 2000’s.
The answer was absurd. “No, we don’t have a secure portal.” Was I suddenly in some episode of Star Trek circa 1965? “Well, ” I followed up, “Can I just have my doctor e-mail you my records?”
“No, e-mail is not secure,” she informed me in that you-must-be-some-idiot-I-just-told-you tone. What did I not understand about the secure portal? “You must fax it.” HIPPA you know.
What century are we in again? I thought we had already established this. Let’s discuss what is not secure. She called me and although she asked if it was me who she had reached she had no way of knowing that I was whom I claimed to be when she called. Anyone who picked up my phone could have pretended to be me when she asked. So first, the phone call was not really secure.
Second, since when is a fax machine sitting in the middle of some office secure? Is it in a guarded locked room? Anyone working in that office could walk by the fax machine and pick up a load of medical records and no one would know they were missing because, hello, they just came in and got printed and sat there with no secondary verification system that they were coming or expected at that moment.
Have any of you ever tried to even get a message to your “primary” physician to ask them to FAX your records? It could take days before they even respond to the voice mail you had to leave and were told on the outgoing message would not be responded to for at least 48 hours.
The whole system is so broken and made more aggravating by these poorly thought out HIPPA rules. We have had to endure them long enough that we certainly have discovered six thousand flaws. Isn’t it time we readjusted?
I am all for people taking good care of themselves, but HIPPA causes me to need more psychiatric care it drives me so crazy. I am sure that the chip in my dog and the reader system that all vets have to pull the information off it would work great on humans. I am happy to be the first to volunteer to test it in humans if it means I never have to be questioned about my medical history or worse have to get it faxed anywhere ever again. Maybe I should just see if my vet could take me on as a patient?
Note to all my non-US readers– HIPPA is a governmental regulation that tries to protect peoples medical information privacy. Heaven forbid you enter the hospital unconscious.
New Habit Needed
Posted: April 29, 2013 Filed under: Diet- comedy | Tags: habits 1 Comment
Today I drove our tiny Smart Car while Russ took the hybrid in for an oil change. I have been driving the new car for a few months so it was only fair that Russ got the chance to drive it and get the service. When I got in the Smarty I went to start it by pushing the start button like I do on the new car, but then realized I actually needed to put a key in the ignition to make it go. For the previous thirty-five years I have had to put a key in the ignition to start a car, but after only a few months of key-less driving I forgot how to drive an old car. It only took a little while for me to create a new habit and throw my old one out the window.
Changing a habit, be it something mundane like starting a car, or something pleasurable like putting sugar on your breakfast cereal, can be done just by repeating it over and over again for just a short while.
The word habit seems to have gotten a bad reputation. People talk about smoking as “their habit” and we all know how the world feels about smoking. But smoking is more than just a habit it is an addiction.
Some habits are good. I wake up every morning and go in the bathroom and the third thing I do in there is brush my teeth. You can guess what the first two things are. That is my habit. Actually it is also my addiction. I really can’t start the day until I have brushed my teeth. I don’t know when this became a habit because I can clearly remember as a child lying to my mother when she asked me if I had brushed my teeth. Why would I lie about that? When did I realize how much better my mouth felt after brushing? I must have gotten up enough mornings in a row and brushed my teeth that I created a new and frankly better habit.
So where is the line between a habit and an addiction? Is something only an addiction if it is bad for you? No. Yet I hardly know anyone who will tell you they are addicted to spinach, bacon yes, but mustard greens, no.
Thinking about trying to start the car got me wondering if I could train myself to create one healthy new habit during the summer. Just a few months of doing the same thing every day and I think it would be enough to make something a habit. I have no idea what habit I want to pick up. I already work out four times a week and eat a fairly healthy diet. So I need suggestions from you as to what good habit I should try and pick up. What would improve my life and be simple to do everyday and not take too much time?
Taking More Than You Need May Be The Death of You
Posted: April 26, 2013 Filed under: Diet- comedy | Tags: crow, golden corral, rat Leave a comment
These days I am usually driving a hybrid car. I really love the gas mileage, but am a little disturbed at the stealth-like quietness of the engine. Today I had a disturbing event happen as I was driving through my neighborhood.
I was on my way home from lunch with a friend, enjoying the perfect spring sunshine, car windows open, when a large black bird, probably a crow, flew directly across my path. Certainly this bird did not realize that my silent black car was something that could end his life. The low flying bird was eye level with my windshield and as I approached at the 25 mile per hour speed allowed on my street I could see a huge rodent hanging from the beak of the bird. The mole or rat was at least half the size of the bird.
Being a rat phobic ever since the movie Willard, I screamed loudly certain that I was going to smash both of them and the crow, turned and looked me directly in the eye as he struggled to fly above the car. I looked up through my glass roof just as they passed over and could see the rodent thing squiggle as the crow flapped its wings hard. I know the bird barley averted death because as it passed over me I stopped and looked in the rearview mirror just in time to see the black creature sink down a few feet behind me, without letting go of the rodent, but landing on the road.
That bird was determined to hold on to that food it had found even if it was going to kill him to do it. I did not get out of the car to see if everyone was all right because I quite frankly was afraid the bird might decide to take me to task for almost hitting him and possibly making him lose his dinner.
As I drove away it occurred to me that the rodent that crow had caught was probably more food than he and his entire family needed but he was willing to risk his life to keep it. The bird reminds me of people you see at the Golden Corral buffet. Certainly very few people should eat all they can, but once they are given the option they want to get their money’s worth, whether they should or not. Sure hunting is nothing like saddling up to dessert bar but the principle is the same. Taking more than you need may kill you.
Next time I am faced with an unlimited amount of food I am going to remember almost being the grim reaper for that crow who thought it was more important to hold on to the rat than ensure he lives another day. I wonder if the crow learned that lesson and let the rat go before trying to fly off again?
The Fun of Starting Over
Posted: April 25, 2013 Filed under: Diet- comedy | Tags: gardening 1 Comment
I came home from a Food Bank Board Meeting tonight to find my driveway vegetable garden stripped of my spent winter vegetables and all the weeds that had recently taken over during this early warm spell. It was not a surprise since I had hired my friend Renee’s nephew Bobby to do the backbreaking work, but our agreement as to when the work would get done was lose. I was hopeful that it would be done by the weekend so to have it done today was a bonus.
I must have known in my heart that Bobby would come today because before I went to Raleigh my friend Thecky stole her husband’s pick up truck and we went to the Rock Shop to buy a bed full of certified organic compost. I have no idea what it is certified to do, but I do know that my garden last year had the best yield of any vegetable garden I had ever grown so I was sticking to the same formula.
Surely Thecky had no idea how much work it was going to be to shovel all the compost out of the truck since it only took a minute for them to dump it in with a backhoe. Washing the truck out of all the “certified” evidence took as long as driving to buy it did. I can’t wait to bring Thecky and her husband some homegrown cucumbers and peppers as a thank you for the black gold compost.
Now that I have a cleared vegetable bed and a three-foot high pile of chicken poop mixed with dead leaves I am ready to start my summer garden. I have no idea exactly what I am going to grow until I go to the farmer’s market and the local seed-feed store to see what plants catch my eye.
Once I started plants from seed, but found that it was way too much work with disappointing results. For most of the seventeen years I have had this garden I have not planned exactly what I grow or where it goes in the garden. I know it would be better to plan my beds and keep track of what grows well and what fails, but that would make it too much work. Instead I like to pursue different seedling vendors and buy a smattering of varieties.
I know I will grow arugula, lettuce, cucumbers, peppers, both hot and sweet, basil and various summer squash. I have trouble with tomatoes, although last year I was able to get a few so I might try again. I have tried cantaloupe, sweet potatoes, pumpkins and watermelon with varying degrees of success. I just am not sure until I start shopping.
For me the fun in planting this garden every spring is that although it is many years old it is new again every spring. I don’t have to relive past mistakes, I get to start over fresh. Nothing is more beautiful than the freshly tilled black soil with dozens of little plants, put neatly in rows with not a weed in sight. It does not stay that way all summer as I tire of weeding or come home from a week away to find that some unwelcome animal has visited.
Even with the heartaches that can come from gardening it is always more exciting to eat a zucchini I grew than one I bought. And if come August the garden is a huge mess I will just rip it out and start over again with the winter vegetables. It’s the one thing that is fun to start over again.
Good Infrastructure
Posted: April 24, 2013 Filed under: Diet- comedy | Tags: durham, hope valley 1 CommentTwenty years ago when Russ and I were looking for a house to buy before he was starting Kenan-Flagler Business School we could not find anything in Chapel Hill and turned to Durham. My Dad told us to look in Hope Valley because he had fond memories of coming to the Hope Valley Country Club for parties while he was a student at UNC. They must have been some parties back then for my father to have any memory of them at all.
Being This Old House addicts we asked our realtor to show us old homes. We had no idea that old was not so popular with her and she would show us things that were maybe five or ten years young. I told her that they were not “old”, but merely “used” houses. I’m not sure she ever really understood the difference. Given that there was not much on the market we went into the houses built in the 80’s that she thought we would like. The floors would creak, the walls were paper-thin, and the style was, well, 1980’s. Russ and I would whisper to each other about how much we hated these homes hoping that our agent could not hear us three rooms away, but knowing it was possible.
As our Chapel Hill realtor reluctantly drove us through Hope Valley we were hopeful. There were houses built between the wars and I mean the big wars. We could not afford one of the really beautiful old houses, but we definitely liked the neighborhood of various styles and age of homes. I was reading the MLS listing of our current house and said there was no reason to bother to stop and look at it because it only had two bedrooms and was split-level. We pulled up to the front and Russ looked at the MLS and said that it absolutely was wrong, the house had to have three bedrooms and the split was due to the slope of the lot on the side and we should go in.
Thank goodness Russ was quick at finding a major mistake in the listing because when we walked in the then fifty-year-old house we immediately knew this was it. The quality of the craftsmanship was evident. The hallways were twice as wide as newer houses and the details in things like the molding and the windows gave us confidence in how well built this house was.
Russ, as an electrical engineer, was particularly impressed with the wiring. I video taped our walk through of the house and when we got to the furnace room I caught Russ on tape saying, “Nice Panel,” in a way a teen age boy might admire a girl in a bikini, as he looked at the electrical system.
We bought the house that day and have loved it ever since. When we realized we were staying in Durham we decided to add on to the house because we loved our lot and location. Our builder Joe told us that our house was one of the best-built houses he had worked on and we asked him to match that quality in the addition.
This past week a huge maple tree in our side yard fell on our sunroom and was lying on the roof for a few days until I could get the tree guy with a crane to remove it. After working for hours to secure, cut and lift the three foot diameter tree off the roof the tree guy reveled a practically perfect roof with only one six inch shingle out of place. Shocked was the word he used when he told me that he had never seen a house take a hit from such a large tree and sustain so little damage. Good infrastructure I told him. Buying for quality really paid off.
This story of my house could be a lesson in doing the right thing for our bodies too. A strong infrastructure, with good upkeep and high quality materials will pay off in the end. At some point in life a tree may fall on you, but if you have eaten healthy food and created a strong body you can withstand the blow with barley a shingle out of place.
There is No Such Thing As Balance
Posted: April 23, 2013 Filed under: Diet- comedy | Tags: chill, laid back, slacker, type A 1 Comment
Reentry is a hard thing. Three days ago I was lying on a giant beach bed while nice Mexican men brought me iced tea and my only worry was if I had applied enough sunscreen. Now it’s back to laundry, meetings, obligations and cooking dinner.
I quickly got used to having someone else do the cooking and more importantly the shopping. I wonder how mad Russ and Carter would be if I told them to just eat cold cereal for dinner? Really how lazy can I be? I did not have to go to work or school today but I seem to have vacation hangover. Even spending my daily twenty minutes writing this blog seems taxing. I’m not complaining, just contemplating changing myself from a type A personality to another letter further down the alphabet.
Would anyone notice if I just continued slacking off a little more every day? I could use the need for more time to concentrate on getting these last twenty pounds off as my excuse to decline every plea for help. That could really backfire if I did not use my time to exercise harder. More exercise is not inline with the slacker life style I am drawn to at this moment.
Maybe slacker is not the right word, but chill. Carter opened a lemonade sold at Prêt a Manger in London and inside it read, “Best served chilled, as we all are.” I think there is a lot to that. Perhaps my best self is my more laid back, I don’t really give a damn, do what ever you want, please let me do what ever I want self. But I guess that is not really fair to my family. What if Russ just decided to stop working so much and expected me to get a job that made up the difference in income? That would only be fair. If I had to get a real job again my type A personality would have to turn into a type A+.
I am quickly seeing that this whole laid back lifestyle could backfire on me. I am not sure if I was so laid back that I could stick to my diet, but then again I got so fat being type A. Maybe letting go of the reigns is healthier. How will I ever know?
Finding balance seems to be an impossible thing. As I write this I am wondering where the tree guys are who need to remove the tree lying on the sunroom roof with the crane. They promised to be here this afternoon and I am almost sure that 4:50 is too late in their workday to show up and start working. Oh, and the laundry in the dryer has been done for a couple of hours and the washer load needs to move over or else it will start to smell and need to be run again. I don’t think I am capable of moving very far away from type A. Is there and A minus personality? Can you be type A six days a week and Type D the seventh? Can I just go back on vacation? One that someone else plans and I just show up for?
Another Devastating Syndrome
Posted: April 22, 2013 Filed under: Diet- comedy 1 Comment
I was listening to the radio the other day and learned that the North American Bat population was in danger of collapsing due to a fungal disease called White Nose Syndrome (WNS). Whenever I hear about any of the syndromes with three letter acronyms I am reminded of things like RLS, restless leg syndrome or business acronyms like TQM, for Total Quality Management. There is even one called TLA for Three-Letter Acronym syndrome, but I am really getting off the path now.
Anyway, this White Nose Syndrome sparked my interest not because of my obvious love and concern for bats, which are our best natural pest control against things like mosquitoes, but because WNS causes bat’s metabolism to increase. They don’t just increase, but bats don’t hibernate as long, they fly much more, to the point of losing all their body fat and starving to death.
This sound like a horrible way to go and scientist have not found any cure, which is serious, especially if you are a bat or a farmer who needs the bats to eat the bugs that eat their crops.
See, I think that pesticide manufactures don’t really have a vested interest in finding a cure for these bats. If we don’t have bats people will need more artificial ways to kill insects. Sure academia can get in on finding an answer, but we all know that those ivy tower folks are very thorough and methodical, so it might take a while.
My idea to this problem is to get the giant Pharma guys to study it to see how they might turn this bat killing fungus into a diet drug. Nothing smells like money more than a natural weight loss program and what’s more natural than fungus? While the Galaxo and Johnson & Johnson folks are at it they can find a cure for the bats because they are going to need to learn how to control the fungus.
It would not be good if they just gave humans the fungus and we stopped needing so much sleep and needed to eat a lot more forever. I am just looking at this as maybe a weekday drug. I could be so much more productive five days a week and then on the weekends I could drop back into Non-White Noses Syndrome mode so that I could rest and maintain just enough body fat to stay alive, maybe like Swedish body size.
Until WNS is under control do everything you can to help keep the bat population around. Right now the word is that it is only passed from bat to bat contact, so consider putting up some single-bat houses and not those giant bat condos that would be a breeding ground for the fungus. Also consider adding the bat population to your nightly prayers. I’m adding the Pharma scientists to mine.
If Only Everything Had Fried Bugs
Posted: April 19, 2013 Filed under: Diet- comedy | Tags: Guacamole, Mexican food, tacos 2 Comments
In my heart of hearts I knew when Russ told me that we were going on a company incentive trip to a really nice place in Mexico that I was going to have a hard time eating like I eat at home. It has been almost a year of clean eating that has resulted in a 68 pound weight loss, but I know that in a blink of an eye the tide can turn. If there is anyplace that can happen faster than Mexico I don’t know where it is, especially a resort that claims the “best guacamole in Mexico” and they are right. The first day we ordered it and a giant mortal and pestle stone bowl came out with at least 6 avocados in it and a platter of accompaniments. I was able to skip the fried pork skin and chorizo sides, but dared to eat one of the fried grasshoppers. I think that I have finally found a Mexican food I do not like.
I am doing my best to eat fish and cerviche, fruit and veggies, but I have to admit that a couple of communion sized desserts have been sampled and lobster tacos are a treat I felt I could not resist. Being faced with anything with cheese is just a killer. I really like having a pablano pepper stuffed with scrambled eggs and melted cheese for breakfast. I guess if it did not have the cheese it would be good for me, but then the cheese really makes it.
The good news is that since I don’t drink alcohol I have been able to refrain from liquid calories. The bartender here was quite disappointed that he could not find something for me so I made up a drink that he perfected for me of fresh ginger, lime juice, a little pineapple juice, club soda and splenda. It has become so popular amongst our group that we have named it “the Dana” and anyone can order it by name from the bar.
Russ and I did take a good four mile walk today on the beach. That had to burn off at least a third of the guacamole I had for lunch. I’m off to dinner now and am going to do my best to return to my monastery like eating ways. The island of Arugula is awaiting me at home. At least there are no fried grasshoppers there.
Diet Bird Battalion
Posted: April 16, 2013 Filed under: Diet- comedy, Uncategorized | Tags: breakfast, Maroma, Mayan rivera 2 CommentsAs a major reward for their team Russ and his business partner Rich are having their team meeting on the Mayan Rivera and the spouses get to come along for fun. I consider this a major reward for the spouses who endure keeping the home fires burning while the team is out on the road. I am thankful for this trip and all the trips that keep their company going and the team of people who work so hard.
In order to make sure everything here at Maroma, the resort we are taking over, is up to snuff we had to come a day early, a hardship for sure. I am doing my due diligence by writing this blog from the hammock on our porch over looking the ocean and the tops of the coconut palm trees. The wind is blowing a warm breeze and the sun is strong, but the thatched roof of my terrace keeps me cool.
Russ and I awoke to a tray of coffee and iced tea set on our terrace so we lay around on the cushioned sofa and contemplated what we should do this morning. It was so pleasant to be warm after the months of cold at home and not to have an agenda for the morning that we decided to order room service, or should I say terrace service, for breakfast and spend a little more time just lazing around.
Edwardo, arrived with a giant tray of eggs and fruit, just what we having-to-wear-bathing-suit-for-the-first-time-in-months gringos should have. Then he pulled out a basket of toast and sweet breads and he said he thought we might also like them with their homemade guava, papaya and strawberry jams. Sure we would like it, but certainly we should not have it.
As Russ and I enjoyed the guiltless part of our yummy breakfast the carb fest basket sat on the table. A number of birds came and sat on the ledge of our terrace watching us eat. One would squawk, and another would answer. “That white woman does not need that toast.” The chief of the diet bird battalion seemed to say. “Certainly not,” replied his lieutenant. “Private, retrieve the temptation.”
And with the final order one of the birds flew in and snatched the twice as big as him toast out of the basket and flew away with the whole squadron of birds following behind him. I’m hoping the diet bird battalion stays assigned to me for the whole week.
Fly Skinny
Posted: April 15, 2013 Filed under: Diet- comedy | Tags: Airplanes, seat belts Leave a commentFairly regularly someone I know, usually someone who has always been skinny, will ask me if I feel so much better being thinner. Actually it isn’t usually posed as a question, but is more like a statement with a big assumption. “You MUST feel so much better now that you have lost so much weight.”
These well meaning people are almost disappointed when I tell them that actually I always felt fine and really don’t “feel” any great improvement. See, when I was fatter I did not notice how much I was carrying around because it was just what I did. Quite frankly I have more aches and pains now from some sort of torture exercise so I really feel worse skinnier.
I hate to discourage people from losing weight if they need it, but in my experience if I waited until I felt bad I might never have lost weight. There is one exception to that statement… The only time I really hated being over weight was when I flew on commercial airplanes. Since I never fly on private planes I guess I should say, when I fly.
American, and I mean all US airlines have done everything possible to fit as many people as allowed onto each plane just as every American getting on these planes has gotten collectively larger. When I was fat I hated disappointing the the poor soul who had to sit next to me because I’m sure that my thighs squished under the armrest over into their allotted few square inches. I never had to worry that my seat belt was not tight enough because I was barely able to buckle it. Leg room was not a real issue because there was no way I could cross my legs in the space provided.
So now I guess that when someone states that I must “feel” better I need to tell them, “absolutely, every time I get on an airplane.” I am certainly not thin in anyone’s book, but I am amazed at how spacious my Delta Economy Comfort seat is right now, with my seat belt resting loosely around me and my legs crossed. I guess I need to worry about developing deep leg thrombosis now that I can cross my legs. There is always something to complain about when flying.
The Perfect Cajun Diet Food
Posted: April 14, 2013 Filed under: Diet- comedy | Tags: Beignets, Cajun, Crawfish, New Orleans Leave a commentLast night Russ and I were the lucky guests at a New Orleans dinner put on by Big Easy Native Bennet and his wife Jane with help from Jimbo, Emmy, Jay, Kim and Fraser. Russ and I have a particular fondness for all things New Orleanian.
The first time I visited was with my Dad when I was fourteen and he let me drink two hurricanes at Pat O’Brien’s and I promptly threw up all night. The second time I went to a trade show with Russ, but I was dating someone else at the time and paid no attention to him. He said that he sat next to me at every company dinner and I laughed at his jokes, yet I foolishly did not recognize him as the man I should have been interested in. Thank goodness he kept after me.
In my fifty plus years I have visited the Crescent city at least a half dozen times and I have to admit that one reason we keep going back is the food. From the Oyster Po boys to the gumbo there is hardly a meal there that I would not want to repeat multiple times except that I am almost certain that I gained a pound a day on every visit.
Last night our hosts imported all the makings for a perfect Cajun meal with the alligator and crawfish being flown in from the bayou. After passing on the appetizers, especially the ones fried in Bennet’s new industrial-driveway-three-basket-no-waiting- fryer I was sufficiently hungry by the time dinner came around.
I was thrilled to sit down to the figure friendly shrimp cocktail with a healthy dose of horseradish laden cocktail sauce. A yummy gumbo followed and I did my best to leave a little rice. The grilled alligator Tabasco Cesar salad was next. I left the croutons in anticipation of the main event- the Crawfish boil.
I was seated next to gulf cost native John who was a crawfish pickin’ and eatin’ machine. After giant platters of the red mudbugs were placed between us, John instructed everyone how to retrieve the tiny meat from the tail, which was no bigger than my pinky from the last knuckle to the end of my finger. It took us armatures ten times longer to pick the meat than it did to eat it. This morning I looked up that calorie count for Crawfish – 70 calories for three ounces. I have to say that after a good twenty minutes of picking I do not think I ate three ounces worth. Delicious as it was I clearly burned more calories getting the food than I ate therefore making it the perfect food.
I wish that I had known last night how few calories there were in my main course because I only allowed myself one tiny bite of the homemade-driveway-deep-fried beignets which was orgasmic, but probably best I kept that sentiment to myself.
Thanks to Dave and Sara for sharing the experience with us. And hats off to the chefs and servers – It was a really fun evening and guiltless to boot.
Thankful for My Mima
Posted: April 13, 2013 Filed under: Diet- comedy | Tags: grandmother, gratitude 2 Comments
As Carter and I passed some neighbors walking their very old dog she asked me, “Do you think that dog is depressed because he is old?”
“No, I think he just walks slowly and you are interpreting that as depression,” I told her.
“Do people get depressed when they get old?”
“Some do, but not everyone. My Grandmother Mima was the happiest old person I ever knew.”
I went on to retell Carter all about my wonderful maternal Grandmother who despite becoming a widow in her fifties, losing her sight to Macular Degeneration and not having much money her attitude about life got better and better the older she got. Very late in life she volunteered at a suicide hotline. I wish that I had recordings of her helping people find to bright side because she was very good at drawing out of people what they had to be thankful for.
She had a strong faith in God that I know served her well, but she did not press that on others, but rather lived her beliefs. Everyday was a great day for her almost until the end. She was diagnosed with a very painful back cancer and given two weeks to live. She announced she was good with God and ready to go trying to keep up her attitude until the end. But somehow those two painful weeks dragged on for four painful months. One day Mima woke up and looked at the nurse who sat vigil by her bed and said, “You said I’d be dead by now.”
It did not seem fair that she had to suffer when there was no hope for a different outcome, but despite the situation she still had a good attitude. The last time I saw her was when I brought the newborn Carter to meet her. Knowing that it might be the last time I saw her I wanted her to tell me the secret to being so happy.
“Lambykins,” that’s what she called me, “I was a miserable younger person. I always wanted things I could not have. I don’t know when that changed, but I know the second half of my life has been much happier than my first. I just am thankful for whatever happens.”
I try and remember this everyday. Gratitude is the best attitude.
Nut and Berries
Posted: April 12, 2013 Filed under: Diet- comedy | Tags: black berries, nuts, raspberry, strawberry Leave a comment
In the 1960’s Yogi bear used to complain to Booboo that he did not want to live on nuts and berries that was why he wanted to take human’s food. I can only imagine what kind of Velveeta on Wonder bread sandwich and cheese doodles Yogi was getting in the 1960’s picnic hampers. Today all I want is nuts and berries. There is no greater treat than a handful of pecans or cashews. And I think I could live on raspberries, black berries and blueberries if I had an unlimited budget.
Nuts, not peanuts, which are really legumes, and berries, are now in the super food category, meaning that they are the healthiest things you can eat. My problem is that they are hard not to eat. Once a nut has passes my lips I naturally want another.
How is it that the idea that living off only “Nuts and berries” was ever a bad thing. Perhaps it is because if we had to actually forage for our own food you would expend quite a lot of energy just to find, gather and shell those nuts and berries. It was less about the actual food and more about the amount.
As a child visiting Hom-a-gen, my grandparent’s farm, I spent many hours picking blackberries and cracking black walnuts. It was a lot of work for a little bit of food. Doing all the work gave me a great appreciation for the small cup of blackberry cobbler after dinner. Learning to break open the tough walnut shell carefully so that you did not smash the meat was a studied art at the farm. Children would bore of this job long before they were full from eating nuts. Eventually the hammers and the burlap bag of dried black walnuts would be abandoned at the old store we used to crack them on in favor of going on the swing that hung from the walnut tree.
Finding, gathering and preparing the food is probably the best diet ever. Having so much food at our fingertips takes away our appreciation of the labor it took to produce it. I have never seen a wheel of Brie in the wild. It takes an incredible amount of milk and or cream, expertise and time to make a good cheese. I think that I would cherish it and eat a lot less of it if I had to make it myself.
Next time you want to enjoy some nuts consider eating pistachios in the shell. Having to do a little shelling will make you appreciate the bounty you are eating just that much more. And strawberry season is almost upon us. Picking your own warm berries on a sunny afternoon makes your after dinner berries that much sweeter.
Don’t Wait
Posted: April 11, 2013 Filed under: Diet- comedy Leave a comment
Tax day is coming. I know it, you know it, every American knows it. Somehow getting my stuff together for the account to do our tax returns is a job I hate. I don’t know why. It is not that hard to gather the paper work and turn it over to someone else to actually figure it all out, yet I still procrastinate. We usually get a good return so it is not like I am putting off paying the government more money. In fact I am letting them keep what they owe me a little longer. So why do I do anything but my taxes?
Changing your eating habits and workout routine is very similar to doing your taxes. You know you need to do it. It is always right there hanging over your head, yet somehow other things keep you occupied just enough so you don’t do it. Anyone who needs to lose weight knows it. You don’t have to go to the Doctor or have a loved one tell you that maybe you should pay attention to your eating. Yet even with it with you all the time, those extra few pounds, you do anything but diet.
I have been successful at the losing weight and working out thing by looking it straight in the eye and just dealing with it and you know it is not that bad. SO today I am going to go ahead and get those taxes done, right after I pick Carter up from school, take her to the mall and go to a birthday dinner. No really, I am not going to needlepoint tonight, I am going to organize the paperwork. It’s not that hard. Then tomorrow I will drop it off and I will not have that hanging over my head.
Taxes are so much easier than dieting. Do it, get it done. But then there are hard things that we don’t do that just hang around all the time. When was the last time we updated our wills? Cleaned out the attic? Had our tetanus booster shot? I am beginning to think that loosing weight is the easy thing.
The real message today is that thinking about doing something is so much worse than just going ahead and doing it. Right now I am trying not to think of all the things I need to think about because I’m late for pick up. So go forth. You know what to do, just do it.
Hell Yes, We are the Tastiest Town
Posted: April 10, 2013 Filed under: Diet- comedy | Tags: Amy Tournquist, Nana's, Scott Howell, Southern Living, Watt's Grocery Leave a comment
If you live in Durham this is probably not news to you, but we were just named Tastiest Town in the South by Southern Living Magazine as the rest of the world will learn in their May issue. Well, we actually won the voting contest that was between 10 great southern food cities, like Memphis, (number 2) and New Orleans. The Editors at Southern Living were very smart not to decide for themselves which city had the best food and thus piss off all the others. If you did not win it is your own fault that you did not go out and garner votes as Durham proudly did. We have so many chef/owner restaurants that asked people to vote for Durham. I have more e-mail addresses than fingers and toes I was able to vote many times everyday and I am sure I am not the only Durhamite who did.
Since I live here I agree that we are one tasty town, but I also find it ironic since at one time Durham was considered the diet capital of America. We have the Duke Diet and Fitness Center, the Rice Diet and Structure House, just to name three of the major diet programs in Durham. I don’t know if any other city has claimed the diet prize so for now I am proclaiming us the southern city with the best food and the most ways to get it off after you have tried it all.
Does living in a place that clearly has great food give one an excuse for carrying a few extra pounds? No, it just means that you have to choose carefully. I would bet that the city with the worst food in the south is collectively fatter than Durham because their options might just be McDonald’s and Burger King.
I want to give a shout out to my chef friends Like Amy Tournquist of Watt’s Grocery and Scott Howell of Nana’s who are just two of the great chefs we have in Durham who keep us at the top of any Foodies list. It is the supportive culinary community that helps new talent be able to make a living in Durham. Running a food business is nothing but hard work so it is nice when we can show those people who provide interesting and yummy food for us some love.
Congratulations Durham and thanks to all the people who voted for us. I am glad we are not just known for dieting, that would make us a place no one would want to visit. Instead we are an eating destination and that is something everyone has to do everyday.
The Beach Party, The Conservative Party and The Party Dress
Posted: April 9, 2013 Filed under: Diet- comedy | Tags: annette funicelle, Lilly pulitzer, margaret thatcher 3 CommentsIn the last three days three woman of my life in the seventies passed away and I can only imagine there is one big party in heaven. Goodbye to Lilly Pulitzer, Margaret Thatcher and Annette Funicello. I would love to hear their conversation as they are waiting in line to get in. They all liked a party of one kind or another.
Living in the world of real time TV and only five channels I used to watch reruns of the Mickey Mouse club with Annette Funicello everyday afterschool. I loved to sing along, “M I C, see you real soon, K E Y, Why because we like you, M O U S E.” Well I like you too Annette. She was tween I could relate to, one who developed early, but still liked to do kid stuff. Then I discovered all her teenage beach movies and I wondered where all the cute boys dancing on the beach were.
Then I went to boarding school and was ensconced in the prepster world that was big on all things Lilly. Pink, yellow and green were the colors of the preppy flag. We had a real Lilly store in Pawley’s Island and back in the days when Lilly still ran the business you could buy the brightly colored tropical cotton fabric by the yard. It was none to bright of Ms. Pulitzer to sell her signature cloth for only about $5 a yard when a $100 dress made out of the same pattern only took about a yard and a half. Being a seamstress out of necessity I was able to whip myself up many Lilly jumpers and shifts for a fraction of the price of a premade dress.
When I graduated from boarding school my conservative parents moved to London just as leader of the Conservative Party Margaret Thatcher was moving into 10 Downing Street to make Britain great again. In our house Maggie could do no wrong as she deregulated what she could and stared down the Labour movement. She and Ronald Reagan seemed to be what the times needed, although now with hindsight perhaps a little more watchdog might have kept us from the financial meltdown of 2008.
Somehow the passing of three iconic women makes me feel a little older. When the people from your impressionable years are no longer around, whether you actually knew them or not, it changes your world. They say things happen in threes so hopefully this is it for a little while. I can only feel so much older all at once.
No Boobs For Yoga
Posted: April 8, 2013 Filed under: Diet- comedy | Tags: shelf bra, yoga 1 Comment
I started taking yoga in January as a faux workout between my training torture days. Before all you yoga lovers jump all over me for using the word faux and workout in the same sentence as yoga, I am not saying your practice is not strenuous, just that as an unbalanced person mine is not perfect.
Today I went to try and get a nicer yoga shirt for my trip to Mexico. I was unsuccessful and now I am beginning to realize that I may never master Yoga because it is clearly not designed for anyone with big boobs or ones that need industrial support.
Here are the clues. First every “yoga” shirt I have ever seen is a little slip of a thing, usually with some sort of shelf bra built in and tiny straps. A shelf bra is really a training bra, in my view. If you have the lift and separate girls than shelf bra is not going to do much for you. Even if I got the tightest one that I could shimmy into the second I went into forward fold my heaving bosom would jump out of that shelf and try and plant themselves on the floor next to my hands.
The second clue concerns forward fold. I have finally loosened up those old tight hamstrings to the point the I can go into forward fold and keep my hands on the ground, but I just don’t look like I’ve folded up enough because my two widest parts, being my breasts and thighs, are at a meeting point preventing a really good fold.
If I were one of those small and tight breasted woman then when I threw my legs over my head and attempted plow pose I would not have any trouble with boobs covering my face and preventing me from breathing.
I am not going to let my bust keep me from my practice of Yoga, but I do wish the Yoga clothing community would recognize the opportunity to appeal to a large population of larger breasts. No body needs a strong core more than a woman carrying around a big endowment.
Closet Shopping
Posted: April 6, 2013 Filed under: Diet- comedy | Tags: old clothes 1 CommentNothing is better than finding great “new” clothes in your own closet. Not that they are actually new, but they have not been worn in a number of years because they were too small. Not any more.
Russ is taking me to Mexico and I finally get to put some warm weather wear on. It not only seems like it has been months since I have worn a bathing suit is actually has been at least nine months. I am still about twenty pounds from my ultimate goal so I don’t want to invest in many new summer outfits so I went shopping in my closet.
The thing about gaining and losing weight is that if you buy classic clothes you have a large range of sizes. Consequently I have black pants and white slacks in every size imaginable. It is hard work to try on what I find hiding in all the dressers, closets and shelves I have things stashed in. Anything that is slightly too big is getting weeded out. Anything too small is getting put in one inspirational closet and then there is the goldilocks closet, those that are just right.
The inspirational closet is giving me that push I need to keep on the downward trend. I just have to not love the goldilocks stuff too much so that don’t I feel content to stay where I am.
So here’s to spring and warm weather clothes, new and old. Thank goodness, I was beginning to get really sick of my sweaters. I hope you are going to enjoy beautiful weather this coming week wherever you are.
Brain Mapping, Hurray
Posted: April 5, 2013 Filed under: Diet- comedy | Tags: Brain Mapping, Human Genome Project Leave a commentI heard today that the President announced a project to map the human brain led by the same brilliant Doctor who mapped the human genome. Now there are about six million jokes I can think of about human brains or the lack of them in Washington, but I will leave that up to the late night comedians. Although I do think that in Washington they need to start with a more basic question of whether a brain actually exists in many of the politicians working there, but I digress.
Mapping the Human Genome Project was actually like a WPA for this century because for the $3.8 billion investment in the project there was a $796 billion output and still counting. So it seems like a no-brainer, no pun intended, for the government to invest in the basic research to map the most complicated and least understood thing on earth, the human brain.
Sure there are many ailments that are brain related, Parkinson’s, Alzheimer’s, schizophrenia, bi-polar disorder just to name a few, that could benefit from better understanding of how the brain actually works. Once scientists have those basic building blocks of a map then maybe they can pinpoint the domain of these disorders and help cure them. All great.
But I see this brain mapping as having a much bigger money making potential than the Human Genome Project. With the DNA mapping a person might be able to find out if they have a gene, which tends them to obesity. Just great, you are prone to fatness, but we can’t do anything about it. That just becomes an excuse; “I’m fat because I have the fat marker.”
But imagine if the brain mapping could figure out what the pathway is to stop cravings, or learn to feel full and satisfied with less food, or help change people from “live to eat” to “eat to live” types? The economic payback for this brain mapping could be way bigger than the Human Genome. The diet industry today just in America is over $60 billion a year and failing miserably.
Granted that if brain mapping could work to help people lose weight some people currently employed would be out of work, like Marie Osmond for Nutrisystem, Jennifer Hudson for Weight Watchers and Suzanne Somers for, well Suzanne Somers. But they could just fall back of singing and what ever else Suzanne Somers can do.
It took a long time to get that Human Genome thing done. I think Russ worked on it when he was in college or Grad school and that was like twenty-five years ago. So let’s encourage the president and this bright Doctor to work a little faster on the brain project. I think I want to short Weight Watchers stock, but I want to time it right.
I’m Advocating Eating Spaghetti Just This Once
Posted: April 4, 2013 Filed under: Diet- comedy | Tags: kathy jacobs, sling blades 1 Comment
See Kathy Jacob’s halo
Most people I know don’t cut their own hair, thank god. If you have a hair stylist then you know how important that relationship is between you and the person holding the sharp weapon behind you. I feel a great indebtedness to the saint who listens to me every month as she works miracles with the pitiful hair I bring her to work on. Kathy Jacobs the owner of Sling Blades has been my hair angel for at least the last seven years. Not only does she give me a do I can do, but also I know she has also been listening to me. How do I know that? All on her own Kathy decided that she wanted to help make a difference for hungry people in our community.
Every month as I get all nineteen of my hairs trimmed Kathy and I talk about things we are passionate about. Food is often the hot topic and my work with the Food Bank of CENC. Kathy is a kick ass cook and loves to feed people so we have a lot in common. She has other clients who run food pantries and also hears from them about the growing number of people who are food insecure.
One day Kathy decided that she wanted to get involved to help feed her neighbors. Her brilliant idea was to marry her love of feeding people with fund raising and decided to hold a spaghetti dinner to raise money for the Food Bank. I have never seen Kathy so excited about anything, other than her daughter, as she told me about her plans to cook a fabulous dinner and serve it out of the Pleasant Green Community Center in Durham. She has gotten prizes to raffle, belly dancers to come and entertain and is making the most delicious of meals all to benefit hunger relief.
If you are looking for a great dinner this Saturday night and want to help hungry people at the same time think about going down to Sling Blades Hunger Relief Spaghetti Dinner and say that Dana sent you.
Regardless if you can make it Saturday or not there is an even easier way for you to help the Food Bank win $45,000. Wal-Mart is giving away millions of dollars to Food Banks across the nation, but the winners have to get votes on the Wal-Mart Face book page. You can vote once a day for the next 40 days. Just click on this link and like the Food Bank of CENC. bit.ly/VoteFBCENC. It won’t cost you a cent and if the Food Bank does get the money they can turn it into $450,000 worth of food. NO brainer – please vote and share it with your friends.
It takes all of us doing what we can to take of the world. Thanks to all of you who participate in making it a better place. Now go eat some spaghetti and vote.
10 Foods That Will Change Your Life –NOT
Posted: April 3, 2013 Filed under: Diet- comedy | Tags: acai, chia Leave a comment
Writing a blog about dieting makes me a huge Internet target for every weight loss quack. Search engine optimizationers think they hit the jackpot for selling me the newest and craziest pills, potions, foods, supplements and exercise equipment. Since my Internet fingerprint is riddled with all things weight loss related any dumb computer is sure I need to know what they are pushing.
Not so fast. If any of them would dig a little deeper they would quickly learn that I don’t buy any of what they are selling. What I know is that losing weight is not a quick trick. Sure, somebody may be discovering new “Super Foods” which are not really new to everyone, just maybe us in the over-processed world. The hot foods today like Chia Seeds, yes the very ones made famous by the Chia pet and Chia head, or Acai may be uber good for you, but since they are not native to North Carolina and are being touted as the next big thing you will end up paying a lot of money for them and really how great can they be?
Eating local food in moderation is going to pay off a lot faster than eating exotic seeds and berries which will probably just leave you wanting some real food, like a cheese burger.
As far as I know there is not just one single food out there that will change your life, unless you are allergic to it and then it may end your life. I am yet to find a “winning lottery ticket“ food. The only way I can think of for a food to change your life is if you are single and you make a really spectacular apple pie that the future love of your life happens to eat and falls in love with you for your cooking. They have not even tried that as the basis for a reality dating show so you know it is far fetched. All this is to say give up on there being one, two or even three magic foods.
If you are looking for magic try smaller plates and bowls. Smaller portions of regular food will dramatically help anyone be healthier more than any “Super Food” ever would. I am not advocating fasting as a portion control method. Some food everyday just makes our bodies run better. The last thing you want your body to think is that the food supply is dwindling so that it goes into starvation mode and learns to live on less.
Next time you see a headline touting “Life Changing Foods” skip it. Changing does not mean improving and most likely those foods they are enticing you with cost so much that they may be changing your wallet for the worst.
I’m The Narrator
Posted: April 2, 2013 Filed under: Diet- comedy | Tags: cooking channel, Food Network Leave a comment
I like cooking shows. Not cooking competitions, but the old fashioned kind where it is just a chef and the camera talking you through what they are making. Julia Child and Graham Kerr, better known as the galloping gourmet, were early stars in the cooking show world that I used to watch as a child.
PBS was the original source of those kinds of shows, then came the Food Network and now it’s the Cooking channel. Food Network has gone into shows with more production like Iron Chef, Chopped and Restaurant Impossible. Cooking channel has picked up the less expensive shows to make where it is just someone cooking in the kitchen telling you how. I like having the expert just narrate what they are doing as they are doing it.
When Carter and I were in London she brought it to my attention that I narrate what I am doing. “I’m just going to pack my suitcase now,” or “I’m going to write my blog then take a shower.” I guess Carter is right. I do tend to narrate. Those are just statements and not conversation.
Today I was watching Giada at Home on the Cooking Channel while I was eating my lunch and I realized that my narration sounds a lot like a TV chef, even when I am just narrating in my head. I wonder if I always narrated or if my narration has been influenced by watching cooking shows?
Probably my constant narration is some sort of OCD. I like to think of it as part of my storyteller personality and less of a disorder. Maybe it is tied to my extrovertedness since neither of the introverts I live with tend to narrate. Whatever, I am now on the lookout for when and what I am narrating because I am trying not to do it, at least not around my child. I know that one day she will have the authority to commit me to a facility and I don’t need to give her more ammunition for my needing full time care.
I think that my narration defense could be that I am just practicing for when I get my own comedy cooking TV show. Apparently I am very comfortable carrying on a one sided conversation. I think in the TV world it is called the monologue.
Easter Confession
Posted: March 31, 2013 Filed under: Diet- comedy | Tags: candy, easter 2 Comments
I am the oldest of three sisters. Margaret is three and a half and Janet is eight and a half years younger than I am. Being the oldest meant that I participated in childhood holiday traditions longer than I should have just to keep the illusion alive. But while I was keeping the secret on behalf of my younger sisters I was working the system to my advantage.
Easter in my house was always the same. The Easter bunny would deliver baskets to our bedrooms while we slept that had some candy, like peeps and jellybeans and a large chocolate bunny or big cream filled egg in it. Then the bunny would hide chocolate foil wrapped eggs all over the rooms we called the big living room and the little living room. These eggs would be for the “hunt” we would have at a reasonable hour before church.
Before Janet came along I always received a bigger basket than Margaret just because I was older, although I think the bunny put an equal amount of candy in each at the delivery. This is something no one could ever prove because Margaret would get up in the morning and before we were allowed out of our rooms for the hunt she would eat all the pre-basketed candy.
I am a real candy lover so Easter was a highlight of the year. But not all candy was created equal in my book. I did not and do not like peeps or black jellybeans. All things chocolate would be at the top of my must have list followed by red and pink jellybeans.
I do not know how old I was the first time that I rearranged the basket contents, but I do know that I took the older sister advantage more than once when it came to Easter baskets. See, I would wake up in the middle of the night, sometime between the departure of the bunny and sunrise. I would sneak into Margaret’s room and get her basket and bring it into my room where I would take all her red and pink jelly beans and give her all my black ones and all my peeps. Then I would quietly put her basket back beside her bed without disturbing her.
Then I would slink up the back barn steps that went from my room to the big living room and in the dark of the night I would look all around the two hunt spaces and scope out where the shinny foil wrapped eggs were. This ensured that when hunt time came I would be faster and better at getting more eggs.
This plan worked perfectly because Margaret always ate her whole basket before anyone could get a look at what was in it and since she ate it before she even saw my basket she was none the wiser. I look back on the hunt as the most unfair, not only had I pre-hunted, but I was so much older that I had a huge advantage anyway. Pictures from the time of us in our Easter dresses and hats holding our baskets, mine overflowing with candy and Margaret’s a plastic grass utopia are evidence of the unfairness.
I long ago confessed to Margaret and apologized for taking advantage. I was probably doing her a great favor by keeping some of candy from her. What I wish was that someone had taken my candy. I certainly did not need it and wish I never developed such a love of the sweet stuff.
A Cup Of Coffee On The Wall
Posted: March 30, 2013 Filed under: Diet- comedy 3 CommentsThis is a story sent to me by my friend and fellow Food Bank Board Member Ed Carney. It was sent to Ed by his good friend Joe Leveille. Other than that I do not know it’s origin, but felt that as Lent ends it is a great story to share.
I sat with a friend in a high-class coffee shop in a small town near Venice, Italy. As we enjoyed our coffee, a man entered and sat at an empty table beside us.
He called the waiter and placed his order saying, “Two cups of coffee, one of them there on the wall.” We heard this order with some interest and observed that he was served with only one cup of coffee but he paid for two. As soon as he left, the waiter pasted a piece of paper on the wall with the words written ‘A Cup of Coffee’.
While we were still there, two other men entered and ordered three cups of coffee, “Two on the table and one on the wall.” They had only two cups of coffee but paid for three and left. This time again, the waiter did the same; he pasted a piece of paper on the wall saying, ‘A Cup of Coffee’.
It seemed that this gesture was a norm at this place. However, it was something unique and perplexing for us. Since we had nothing to do with the matter we finished our coffee, paid the bill and left.
After a few days, we happened to visit this coffee shop again. While we were enjoying our coffee, a man entered. The way the man was dressed did not match the standard nor the atmosphere of the coffee shop. Poverty was evident from the look on his face and his attire. As he seated himself, he looked at the wall and said, “One cup of coffee from the wall please.” The waiter served a coffee to this man with the customary respect and dignity.
The man drank his coffee and left without paying. We were amazed to watch all this when we also noticed that the waiter took off a piece of paper from the wall and threw it in the dust bin. Then it dawned on us what this custom was all about. The great respect for the needy shown by the inhabitants of this town welled up our eyes with tears.
Coffee is not a need of our society, nor a necessity of life. The point to note is that when we take pleasure in any blessing, maybe we also need to think about those people who appreciate that specific blessing as much as we do but they cannot afford to have it.
Note the character of the waiter, who is playing a consistent and generous role to get the communication going between the affording and the needy with a smile on his face.
Ponder upon this man in need. He enters the coffee shop without having to lower his self-esteem. He has no need to beg for a free cup of coffee. He only looked at the wall, placed an order for himself, enjoyed his coffee and left.
When we analyze this story, along with the other characters, we need to remember the role played by the wall that reflects the generosity and care of the dwellers of this town. What a way to show compassion and maintain human dignity for all.
March is Freezer Month
Posted: March 29, 2013 Filed under: Diet- comedy | Tags: freezer, frozen food Leave a commentRachel Ray’s TV show was on in the kitchen this morning as I was passing through on my way to the garage. As I walked past I heard her say that March is Freezer month, which is only appropriate since it has been freezing almost all month. As I came back through the kitchen on my way to the sunroom I heard Rachel encouraging people to cook double amounts of soups and stew and fill their freezer.
Really? I am wondering how many of you have much empty space in your freezer. I know that a full freezer is more efficient at keeping things cold, what with all those frozen blocks of meat acting as chillers. What I think Rachel should have emphasized is that everyone should eat the stuff already in his or her freezers.
I have a problem with preparing too much food. It started as a child when my parents used to call me by my nickname, “Feed the 5000.” The biblical reference was lost on me then, but I knew it meant I had made too much. So the freezer became the refuge of the enormous leftovers. The only problem is that once something went into the freezer it rarely reappeared on the table. This is still the case today.
My child loves frozen food as long as it comes from a box with a pretty picture on it that is no way ever resembles the actual contents. She would rather eat a lean cuisine that almost any yummy homemade thing I concoct. Perhaps I need to print out the photos I take of food and paste them to the Tupperware of my leftovers in the freezer. Not only might Carter be more interested in them I too would at least be reminded of the work and cost that went into making the food and actually serve it again.
Since March only has two days left I am not worried about you celebrating Freezer month by rushing out and buying more frozen products. I am going to take it upon myself to declare that April is “Eat what’s in your Freezer” month. Pick one night a week, say Tuesday and just pull something out of the freezer every Tuesday for dinner until you don’t have anything left except Margarita mix and something wrapped in foil which is undistinguishable and then throw that away.
This might be the best diet tip I ever came up with since freezer burn might have rendered all my choices inedible. I will let you know how it goes from my end. Let me know if you find any hidden gems in your freezer. But if you find actual gems, don’t eat them. Just find another place to hide them. The freezer is one of the first places robbers look for valuables.
Less Dana, More Good 