Work it Out, Work it Out.

So I jogged last night and it was fine. I was a little slower than usual, but not too far off of my usual pace of ... 13 minutes per mile.

Ha! Yes, you read right. I think the tortoise, the hare, and the entire fable-tastic forest would beat my ass in a race. But whatever, I'm doing it and I will be done in under an hour, which is all that the race people require. Done.

I'm jogging again tonight so that I can squeeze in three jogs for this week. We have Little Gym tomorrow night and you know, I just CAN'T miss that. Because nothing caps off a long workday like 20 simultaneous toddler meltdowns over who gets to do a forward roll on the cheese mat first.

So, yes. Three jogs this week and well on my way to hopefully not embarrassing myself on November 21.

Tonight when The Biggest Loser theme song asks me what have I done today to make me feel proud, I'll know. Aw yeah.

Church Giggles

I don't know what was up with me last night, but I had serious church giggles. Like shaking, no-noise-making, crying my ass off giggles.

What set it off? An innocuous scene from Community, where Chevy Chase's character is singing some jingle about hand wipes and the way he sings "at the PICNIC!" just set me off. I was a laughing ridiculous fool. You can check it out in Chapter 3 of the online episode (around 18:20)

I think I laughed about that scene all night, and then for like 15 minutes while trying to fall asleep last night.

I don't know if it's the stress getting to me or what, but it seemed hella funny at the time. I haven't laughed like that in a LONG time. I bet if I watched it back now I'd be like, "whatever." But that's the beauty of Church Giggles: even something mildly amusing turns hilariously funny when you are trying not to be loud or disruptive, or wake up your two year old.

I can remember being a kid and being yanked out of a dead sleep by my mom laughing at something on TV. From a floor down. My mom has one of the loudest laughs I've ever heard. It's like an opera singer. It is insane.

I don't want to be that.

Speaking of my mom, her birthday is this Sunday and we're going up to celebrate. I will make her favorite cake (carrot with cream cheese frosting), and it will feel like the official start of Fall. It's nice to have that tradition, especially right now when I'm feeling like everything else in my life is kind of topsy turvy (at least emotionally).

Sounds like I could use some more church giggles.

My Weekly Therapy Session is Back ...

... AKA The Biggest Loser.

The new season kicked off last night and as usual, there are some seriously overweight people with some serious problems. I couldn't help but tear up hearing Abby's story: She lost her husband, 5 year old, and 2 week old in a fatal car accident. I told my husband that I would not only be heavier than her if that happened to me--I would be dead and gone. How do you come back from that, much less decide to put yourself through this show? She is amazing.

Of course I had to do the "How do I stack up to the women?" when it came time for weigh-in. I'm happy to report that unlike last season, which started back in January 09, I am officially lighter than the starting weight of every female contestant this season.

It seems dumb, but that was a big motivator for me. My husband and I joke that we gain weight during TBL because the extreme workouts, crying, and drama just make you want to sit down and binge sometimes. Happy to say, I did not have cookies this time (though I did have a few cups of low-fat popcorn). And as I watched these people sweat their way through their first workouts, I was both admiring and grateful. Because I remember what it was like to be wheezing and sweating and wanting to die after 15 minutes. I'm grateful that even though I am the slowest jogger on earth, I'm doing it anyway and I'm getting better at it.

This season will be interesting; I'm hoping I can continue to stay ahead of the women for as long as I can. Too bad I don't have a Jillian to scream in my face.

The Usual

I have a a few post topics in my head, but life is kind of getting in the way right now:

• I'm moving offices for the 7th time in 2 1/2 years. Hey, at least I get a window this time; I'll make sure to enjoy it before my next inevitable move!

• We're trying to plan a short mini-trip to Williamsburg.

• Work is stressful. That's all I'll say about it.

But hey, the ASP is rolling right along:

• My little guy starts his first Beast class tonight. Should be fun and cute!

• We're still doing the local food thing; dinner tonight is pasta with homemade pesto and sauteed zucchini and squash. Yes I realize that pesto is so 90s but it's also nice and summery, so back off food snobs!
  

The only ASP bummer I'm experiencing right now is that I still haven't heard anything about my treadmill coming, and it should be here later this week or early next week. Need to call and harass a SOLE customer rep, methinks.

Oh and somehow I got sucked back into the Real Housewives of New Jersey. I guess I'm just a sucker for the accents.

At Least it Wasn't Woody Paige.

I'm reading Will Leitch's God Save the Fan and really liking it. Will is the founder of Deadspin, one of my favorite sports blogs. The book is perfect business trip reading: funny, interesting, and most importantly for my ADD tendencies, written in easily-digestible essays so I can flit in and out of the book as needed.

But his book took me to an uncomfortable place. A place I had tried to ignore for a long time.

In a few of his essays he mentions crusty old-school sportswriters and how they've brought themselves over to a variety of ESPN's shows, most notably Around the Horn. Leitch can't stand AtH and talks about how many of the panelists went from engaging (or at least half-interesting) in print to scripted, screaming banshees on TV.

I used to watch Around the Horn almost every evening - my husband likes the show and again, it had that great ADD-friendly format. The point-keeping, yelling, and Tony Reali were tangential to the whole point for me: finding out, in a nutshell, what's up with sports for the day. At some point, we stopped watching because now my son is obsessed with Yo Gabba Gabba! and now that's the way we roll with our evening programming.

So anyway I'm reading this book and something popped into my head that I had kind of forgotten - but was no less embarrassed to remember. When we used to watch AtH, I kind of sort of had a tiny crush on Tim Cowlishaw.

I KNOW.

But he was so rumpled, and he had the salt and pepper hair thing going, and he wasn't as loud as the others, and he kind of looked like your friend's rumpled and kind of cute Dad. I couldn't help it. So I'd watch AtH and while other women my age were probably liking that little slice of intern Tony R., or that nice boy J.A. Adande, I was thinking that Tim was cute. Yeah, I'm not proud of it.

But hey, in order to make myself feel better, I read the title of this post. Repeatedly.

File Under Duh.

While watching a preview of The Real Housewives of New Jersey:

Me: "Whaaaaat? Did that chick just flip over a table?"

Him: "Yeah. You gotta go to the suburbs to get the good stuff."

On Dropping Hints

A friend of mine just mentioned that the people included in her nanny share have a filthy house and while she's kind of appalled about it, she doesn't want to be a total bitch and tell them their house is funkay. She jokingly said she might drop a hint about how her cleaning service is so awesome.

There is nothing more embarrassing (yes, I'm being a bit dramatic) than being overweight and saying that you love to watch The Biggest Loser. Because inevitably, the person you're talking to raises their eyebrow like "Oh yeah? Gathered any tips on how to deal with your chunky ass?" And the hints, they come a-droppin'.

How do you tell someone that you've been in a life-long battle and right now, with a crazy job, a toddler, and a husband you're trying not to forget in the shuffle that you're just TIRED? I mean, without unloading some seriously raw shit to someone with whom you're just casually chatting.

I've been fat since I was 8 years old. I was a skinny, skinny kid and then around third grade, I just got HUNGRY. I was 131 pounds when I was 10 years old. Although compared to TBL's Ron who just admitted that he was 200 pounds when he was 9, I guess I was pretty svelte, but not compared to my skinnier classmates back in 1988. And it just roller-coastered from there: Fatty-fat until age 15 when I went on Jenny Craig and lost a bunch of weight and was finally "normal"; developed a bit of a bulimia habit in my last year of HS and early college years; gained later in college and the first years in the workforce; lost a bunch before my wedding on Weight Watchers; gained; lost; got pregnant (at my heaviest weight ever, fun!) but had an awesome pregnancy and dropped the weight pretty quickly (about 9 months); now I'm working on my fat girl weight. 70 pounds to go.

But I've been working on those 70 pounds for a long time and I'm stalled right now. Not sure if it's the big drop in weight over the last year (about 60 pounds of both pregnancy weight and fat girl weight) or what. With so far to go it can get frustrating.

Until those mofos on TBL get on their scales every season and blow away past numbers of being huge. Even after losing 115 pounds, this season's Kristen is still heavier than I am. Granted, she will be a stick by the finale and I'll probably still be at my weight, but for now, this is solace. Yeah, it's inspirational that they are changing their lives and yay isn't that awesome, but some of my pleasure in watching TBL is in the small vindication I get when people have basically killed themselves and my ass is on the couch eating a cookie and we're the same. For one brief moment, we're same.

And I got to have cookies.

What I'd love to tell Kristen, though, is that I follow her because we are now very similar in weight and I do find inspiration in her--her efforts do push me to maybe eat one less cookie while parked on the couch. If nothing else, she's inspiration to stay at least a few pounds below her so I can continue my smugfest. Hey, it's inspiration nonetheless.