Birds

I am officially old.  I have become a bird feeder/watcher.  If you'd have asked me 6 months ago if I wanted to put up a bird feeder and keep an eye on birds, I'd have snorted derisively and said, "Hell, no."

Well.........I have put up a bird feeder (now 2 feeders, for crying out loud) and am keeping an eye on birds. I wouldn't say I'm watching them...maybe I watch them for a maximum of 4 or 5 minutes, but I look at them several times/day. And I have a book on identifying birds, and some binoculars next to the window that looks out on the bird feeder. As of today I've identified 9 different bird types, and have one quick little nondescript brown bird that I haven't identified.

It started with cardinals in the bush  at the corner of the pool. I looked out one dreary day and saw 9 cardinals in it. Got the binoculars and looked at them up close. WOW. the females are really, really pretty, with that blush-red color on their tails and wings.  So I put up a feeder, and viola!! Now I have a flock of birds to rival Alfred Hitchcock!

I still like the female cardinals, but I also love the doves.  I like their soft coos, and I get a kick out of the way they sit around, not stirring much, all puffed out. They look fat and docile and serene. Then I thought of how probably I like them because they look so fat, like me.  So I identify with them. But I'm not serene or docile, so that connection doesn't work.

A friend told me she'd like to come back in another life as a bluejay: cause they're beautiful and mean.  ha. Got a big kick out of that.

So...my birds (they're "mine" now.  Geez) are eating me out of house and home. I'm afraid they'll get too fat to fly, at the rate they're going. Then they'll get killed and eaten and it'll be my fault.  Always the pessimist.

Oh yes, and we had 9 buzzards (vultures?) on a dead tree near the house the other day.  ICK.  Made me step lively on my hike.

Husband and I are off to AZ tomorrow for 10 days of hiking. Hope no one thinks the house is empty. Our son is here and has a loaded gun; trust me on that.  Anyway, I've been having some seriously scary arthritis-type symptoms in hands, knees, shoulders this past week. I'll see how the hiking goes.  Pretty scary.  I WILL NOT CURTAIL MY RIDING AND HIKING TO ACCOMMODATE ARTHRITIS.

Well, off to the "salon" to get my gray roots covered.   ...........   Again.

Heck, forgot to figure my mileage.  Well, just subtract another 8 miles from the last total.  Those would be up and down steep hills mileage.  And for a good laugh, let me assure you that I've now lost 3 lbs in about 5 wks. If that isn't enough to depress the hell out of me, I don't know what would.  Geez.  Optimists would say, brightly, "But that's wonderful!!!!  insert toothy smile here.  At least you're not adding weight!!  insert eyelash batting here. Yea for you!!).
That would be a skinny optimist, for the record.

I was told there'd be no math.....

Red letter day yesterday (well, at least it was until I got a call that our horses were out, thanks to a considerate hunter who cut all strands of a fence so he could walk thru.....cretin {said with disgust and the upper crust Boston accent like Charles' in MASH}).

Anyway, I  did my treadmill 2 miles with my shirt OFF.  I LOVE THAT!!!!!!!!!!  No one else was at home, so  I locked the doors, warmed up, and stripped!  It's soooo nice to do that.  Try it.  Seriously, try it.

The annoying part was that I was walking at a 1.5 incline, at 3.5 mph, and it took me 35+ min to go 2 miles. I finally did the last quarter of a mile jogging at 4.5 mph 'cause I wanted to be finished. Walking with your shirt off is fun for only so long, and 30 minutes seems to be my limit of fun at this time.  I'm not going to do the math, but it SEEMS to me that it shouldn't have taken the extra 5+ minutes.  And really,  doesn't it seem logical that if you decide to walk 2 miles in 30 minutes at 3.5 mph, it should happen?

Mondays

Another Monday.  As in, the day after our "fat day," which is Sunday. For years and years our house has had fat day on Sunday. You can eat anything you want on Sunday. No calories. If you've been craving a Snickers, have one.

Now, 10 yrs ago, when I was running 10-20 mile/wk and starving myself, that was a great thing. I would usually eat pizza and ice cream on Sundays. Loved it. LIVED for it.  However, now days, I'm afraid it may have gotten  a bit out of hand. Sometimes it sneaks into Saturday a bit, and there is a slight possibility that I occasionally get my days mixed up and labor under the misconception that there are several Sundays in any given week.  Just maybe.

Yesterday I had cereal, the demon, devil cereal, with blueberries for breakfast, then a hamburger and fries for lunch, couple of small pieces of chocolate (that have been in my jewelry drawer for months; the little sh*ts have been calling to me all week), and ice cream for dinner.  And I may have had a handful of lowfat potato chips as a snack. {Let me just say for the record that we have low carb Heinz catsup with the fries. It's good.  And it must be room temperature. Absolutely NO refrigerated catsup.  Yuck)

So, back on the wagon this a.m.

1300 miles to Moab.

Reunion?

Man oh man, how I wish that the former classmate who called me last nite to encourage me to come to our class reunion this summer had called BEFORE I got desperate for sugar and put that handful of mini marshmallows in the microwave to eat with a fork!!!!!!!!!!!

HA !

Breakfast

Have you ever "put off" eating breakfast only because you are so hungry, but get so little food, that it's almost not worth it?  Or you're afraid you'll eat such a big chunk of your calories or points that you won't have enough for the rest of the day?

I love cereal...healthy cereal, but it's still a grain, and always a sweet grain at that.  But a serving of cereal, almost all of them, is microscopic.  So if you have a decent portion, add healthy berries, and skim milk, you've almost shot your day.

All the nutritionists advocate eating a big breakfast, smaller lunch, and much smaller dinner.  Hard to do, because if you're hungry from, say, hiking your fat ass up and down some hills, after shoveling a barn-full of horse manure, by the time you get to the evening, you'd eat anything, and a lot of it. Of course, those nutritionists sit in the office all day, with maybe a little excursion to the gym for a self-absorbed "workout" in trendy "workout attire,"......throwing a cute trendy sweater or matching jacket on to go"from the gym to errands."  How cute. 

Oops, but I digress.   Have to go eat breakfast.  What to have, what to have...........stressful.

I am sooooo tired.  The past 3 or so days I've hiked my fat butt up and down hills here on the farm.  It's going well.  "Well" meaning I'm doing it and haven't been carted off to the emergency room.  The dogs are pooped, too. They hike about twice as many miles as I do, exploring smells and looking in vain for a skunk to rustle up.

On the way back up the hill to the house, I kept checking behind me, looking for some fat to be leaking out onto the ground, like a car leaking oil on the street, but.......nope.  Then I came in and had a banana with some peanut butter on it......oops.  HaHa!

Still.......  criminy, all that sweating and working ought to have used up SOME calories.

1304 miles to Moab

Bleh!

This is soooooooo bad.  I received my Medifast giant box of dreck last nite. Got up this a.m., called the company for a return authorization (surprisingly easy), boxed it up, and am on my way to mail it BACK.  haha  Just couldn't face it.

I'll try Lean Cuisine instead.

And keep picturing my poor little darling horse hauling my fat ass over those Colorado mountains!