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November 29, 2005
Brief CR Panic
I brought my lunch, as usual, carefully and lovingly constructed by MR. Things are absolutely crazy at my office today, and I haven't had a moment to think... I am only writing now because I'm waiting on the final revisions from a co-worker on a flyer. Meanwhile, there are several substantive issues that my co-worker and I need to talk about, and our efforts to talk this morning have been thwarted by the ongoing ringing of phones and arising of crises. We have an important meeting to officiate at together at 4 pm about 45 minutes away, and we have to grab some time in here somewhere to plan. So I asked when we were going to meet, he said, "We'll go out for lunch and talk about everything then."
I paniced. Deer in headlights panic. What about my lunch? What about my CR? What am I to do? I've been doing so well, I don't want to blow it now. But we're in a big hurry, this co-worker has never brought his lunch in the eight years I've known him, and I can no longer suggest a picnic at my house because I moved and no longer live in the town where I work. It would be a little far to go to my current house, though MR would welcome us and it would be very nice to get to steal a quick kiss from my Orange One in the middle of the day. But alas, it's too far, so I'm stuck with going out. Here's my post-panic plan.
I suggest that we to go the RT (that's Ruby Tuesday's for those of you who are new to the blog) where I know I can get a great salad with cottage cheese. I eat only veggies and cottage cheese with a counted out number of olives for fat. [Look at me! I'm forcing myself to eat some fat, even in the midst of a crisis! I've come a long way, baby.] Then I'll eat my quotidian lunch for dinner, which will work out since I'll be at work till just before dinner time and have just enough time to prepare a simple dinner for MR but can save time by having my dinner already composed. I have enough calories in my quotidian dinner that if I eat my lunch for dinner, I'll definitely be safe even if lunch is accidentally high at the RT. And I'll get plenty of veggies, protein, calcium and fat.
Of course, I run the risk of shorting myself on calories, but since I was over during the holidays, a day or two that's short won't hurt me.
This seems like a good solution to a less than ideal situation, but life is full of less than ideal situations, and often times the success of our CR practice depends on how well we can deal with them. I pride myself on being able to work my CR into a busy, crazy lifestyle, filled with work, fun, friends, and organizations for which I coordinate things.
I take a moment, yet again, to be grateful for the fact that the person with whom I share my life and my home (and my kitchen!) does CR. That makes everything so much easier. These little bumps in my CR road are nothing compared to what most of you face at home. My home is an island of nutritional tranquility, the land of organic skim milk and eggwhites, a beacon to zoneless wanderers in the desert of gak...
Okay, the flyer's done... gotta run!
Posted by april at 12:21 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
November 28, 2005
Home to Salad
We had a wonderful trip, but it's a relief to be back to the familiar. Even though work is insanely busy (just got a new staff person... old staff person called out sick so entire plan for training new staff person fell through... first day back at work is 9 am to about 10:30 pm... you get the idea) I am comforted by my delicious MR-made salad. These days we're throwing 50 calories of chopped eggwhites marinated in balsamic vinegar, evoo and salsa onto my salad and yogurt mix, plus 10 g almonds, to further zone my lunch and make it more satisfying.
It's also just plain easier to do CR when I'm not tempted by old home favorites. I ate quite a bit of the Thanksgiving Day treats, including creamed spinich and Jack Daniels sweet potatoes, and the excellent wine that is always a-pouring at my dad's house. Even though I ate many fewer calories than I would have in years past, it was still enough to make me feel a bit out of sorts afterwards. The food is so delicious... all homemade by step-mother and my father, so it's hard to resist munching on leftovers while we clean up the kitchen. However, since I did a fair amount of the cooking, most of my meals were about the same as they would be at home... with the addition of some extra wine. Hey, it was a holiday!
Now I'm back on the straight and narrow, and enjoying my quotidian food more than ever. I just love my salad. I think I alarmed my new staff person by licking my plate after lunch... I forget that people aren't used to that. I promise I won't do it at the 300 member dinner! (Or at family Christmas, MoMR!)
Here's today's diet:
Morning shot of no sugar cranberry juice to wash down .5 teaspoon creatine, mixed with Diet Dr. Pepper: 20
Breakfast:
1 cup eggwhites, scrambled 125
1 teaspoon flax oil 40
2 tablespoons salsa 10
one-fourth cup fat free cream cheese 60
black Fair Trade coffee, which I now brew at home to save money
Mid-morning:
thermos of green tea
Lunch:
salad of kale, turnip greens, mustard greens, arugula, napa cabbage, tomatoes, red peppers, salsa, 1 teaspoon extra virgin olive oil, 1 tablespoon balsamic vinegar, eggwhites 181
1 cup non-fat plain yogurt with a dash of garlic powder (I mix this into the salad, along with the dressing and the eggwhites) 110
10 g almonds 60
After lunch:
herbal wild berry zinger tea
Afternoon snack: (escaping the office to meet with new staff person without phone ringing off the hook)
latte with skim milk 120
Dinner: (grabbing Subway on the way to a meeting for work)
Atkins turkey breast wrap: 190
Veggie salad: 60
I'm skipping my quotidian glass of wine tonight both because I'll be getting home from work so late and because I had more than usual over the holiday. So total calories du jour: 976. Lots of water all day. I feel so much better when I am hydrated, and it does cut down on hunger to drink enough fluids.
It's a low day, but between skipping the wine and making up for lots of extra holiday calories, I doubt I'll be hungry. My breakfasts and lunches are so much more satisfying now that I've zoned them and added more calories.
Been thinking about lots lately, but very little time to write. About to kick off a fundraising drive for the CR Society (yes, we'll be asking you to join that too!), finishing the final details on the Kurzweil lunch auction AND the Three Hundred Member Dinner, running three campaigns at work in addition to training two new staff members. Thank the gods (or lack thereof, for you athiests among us) for the beautiful orange man who makes my lunch, makes my tea, and rescues me not only from the evils of gak-eating, but also from the terrifying centipedes that occasionally appear in our house. I am very blessed.
And I hope you have a blessed day as well.
30:40:30
Posted by april at 3:37 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
November 27, 2005
Family Dinners
Isn't everyone wondering how it went when MR met my parents?
It went beautifully, thank you. On Wednesday night, my step-brother, sister-in-law and niece came for dinner and to stay the night. I made pasta-less CR friendly lasagna that everyone seemed to love, followed by pears poached in port with cinnamon and nutmeg. I wrote already about our delicious Thanksgiving feast. The next day, MR, my dad and step-mother and I piled in the car to visit my grandparents and to take a trip to A Southern Season. My father wore his orange sweater too, so we had two orange men!
The sad part of the journey is that my grandfather, who is 91, is not in good health. He seemed glad to see us, but wasn't his usual self. He's been in incredible health until the last few months -- walking, going out to eat, even going dancing! But he's started to decline recently and has had to go to the hospital, something that never happened before. My grandmother, who is in her late eighties and has already survived a bout with colon cancer, seems to be in excellent health. I was glad MR got to meet both of them.
Onward we went to Southern Season, where we ate a fabulous lunch. I ate the house salad with grilled chicken on top, and I sampled the vidalia onion, sherry shallot and basil vinegarette dressings. Then off to shopping! We picked up some treats for our neighbors, who were wonderful in helping us with the locksmith issue on Tuesday before we left. There wasn't much at Southern Season that I wanted, as so much of it is high calorie gourmet food. But I did buy another baby two ounce Good Grips brand measuring cup as a mate for the one we have and love so much -- the one that MR measaures our morning juice for our creatine shot in. I suggested to MR that we have a non-marriage commitment ceremony for them. Every measuring cup needs a mate.
That night I cooked shrimp in Fire Roasted Muir Glen Organic tomatoes for the parents, along with cauliflower soup and steamed broccoli with olive oil and lemon. They seemed to enjoy the meal, and definitely appreciated my cooking. I enjoyed a vodka cranberry with my dad's Grey Goose vodka, my totally sugar free (as in so tart you can't drink it straight) pure cranberry, and some diet tonic water. We drank some excellent cabernet and then switched to a red zinfandel that was pretty good too but not as good as the cab. MR had three ounces and retired to prepare his salad for the morning.
The next morning we left for home, but not until we had checked three grocery stores to find turnip greens, which you can't get around here but are very common in the south. We stocked up, MR bought me a pair of wraparound sunglasses to protect my eyes, and drove home. We had planned to take two days for the trip but I was feeling okay, and so fortified by our second Subway meal of the day, I got us home safely by 9:30 pm.
This morning was Sunday breakfast (yea!) followed by a day of housecleaning to get ready for the week. It's amazing how much fur the cats continue to produce in our absence. Everyone had to howl and be petted. Kieffer has been extremely cute all day, cuddling and meowing at me. I'm about to go upstairs and pet Philo some more before bed. We (Philo and I) are currently reading a book called How to Simplify Your Work Life. We'll let you know how it goes.
For lunch I made cauliflower soup and a carrot-tatta for MR, kale salad with cottage cheese and tomatoes for me. Dinner was spaghetti squash with Trader Joe's marinara, oil, and a side of cottage cheese for me, eggwhites topped with brewers yeast and hazelnuts on the side for MR.
MR is toasting spaghetti squash seeds in the toaster oven and we are getting ready to head for bed. Tomorrow: back to work! But don't worry... exciting plans are afoot. Stay tuned for the story of April Cooks in Kurzweil's Kitchen...
Posted by april at 6:41 PM | Comments (3) | TrackBack
Sucralose
MR writes a short guest entry -- it may sound familiar from Mary's blog:
Scott,
Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the Law.
You have repeatedly raised fears about sucralose,but to date the only documentation that you've provided has been a highly pseudoscientific website page from Dr. Mercola. You're right that anyone with access to Google, or who reads any of numerous longevity/health oriented books, will have access to plenty of claims about the alleged "dangers" of sucralose, but I have yet to see any that have any scientific merit whatsoever. Do you actually have any evidence that sucralose is anything but harmless?
Thanks,
Love is the law, love under Will.
MR
Posted by april at 10:37 AM | Comments (4) | TrackBack
November 24, 2005
MR's First American Thanksgiving
At least the first one in awhile. MR had Thanksgiving dinner with my family, and it went very well. He had 150 grams of lean white turkey meat, grilled by my father on the grill, with some vegetarian mushroom gravy he made. along with 44 g of cranberry relish that my step-mother makes with splenda, a small serving of Jack Daniels sweet potatoes also made with splenda, 100 g turnips (it's a Canadian thing apparently) and his amazing pumpkin flan. I will get the flan recipe from him to publish on the blog because it really was delicious. Just as good as a pumpkin pie with less than half the calories. We had a lovely time with my step-brother, sister-in-law, and niece Madeline. I had very small portions of the family Thanksgiving farvorites: turkey, spinach, creamed spinach, cranberry relish (1 bag cranberries, 1 cup splenda, juice of one lemon: 283 calories for a giant bowl that serves more than six people) Jack Daniels sweet potatoes and stuffing.
It was wonderful to have my Orange One at our family Thanksgiving. I have so much to be thankful for this year: it's hard to know where to start. I am especially thankful for MR and the happiness he's brought into my life. He makes me want to live as long as I can so that I can spend more time with him.
Tomorrow we're heading out to meet the grandparents. MR is putting on his orange sweater to be the Orange One in all his orange glory. My father had expected him to be a bit oranger. I knew I should have dipped him in pumpkin before introducing him to the parents!
Posted by april at 3:23 PM | Comments (1) | TrackBack
November 22, 2005
Road Food
Greetings from Shaunton, Virginia. MR and I are staying in a hotel for the night on our way down to NC for Thanksgiving. The original plan was to leave this morning at eight, but yesterday my car decided that it needed a new catalytic converter... you know, one of those things that makes the car go. So I had to wait for the shop to get the part from the dealer, then I had to pay about $1000 for the part plus installation. Luckily, they were able to get it done by noon today, so I drove home and we loaded the car.
Then the lock on our house door broke, so we had to call a locksmith, arrange with our neighbors to let the locksmith in, pay him cash, and distract the cat (who escaped twice while we were figuring this all out) while the locksmith fixed the lock. We got on the road by 2:30. It's a 9+ hour drive. Yikes.
We stopped for dinner at a Subway at our usual dinner time, 7. Subway is great for the CR'd. We had what was probably one of the biggest orders they'd filled all day, yet we had fewer calories than everyone else in the restaurant! I had an Atkins wrap with turkey breast, all the veggies, mustard and vinegar, plus a Subway Club salad, all the veggies, vinegar, salt and pepper. That's 190 + 160 calories! Not bad for a giant dinner on the road. Almonds on the side for fat. MR topped that with two turkey breast Atkins wraps and a grilled chicken and spinach salad (hazelnuts on the side that he brought from home for fat.) The sandwich artists seemed genuinely confused by the strange skinny redheads ordering giant mountains of food, but they eventually got our order right and we had a delicious dinner. MR busted out with his 3 ounce spice jar of wine halfway through dinner... I was driving, so none for me.
The amazing thing is: there's all this other allegedly healthy food on the Subway menu, everything from low carb to low fat, but some of it is so high calorie that it's not healthy at all! Sandwiches where the calorie content is all in the high carb, no nutrient bread. Wraps and salads smothered in creamy high fat dressings. Way to ruin a good choice. Meanwhile, the Atkins wraps at 190 cals are a filling treat, and the salads are all made with turkey meat and quite low cal but very satisfying. (Beware: some of the Atkins wraps have more calories -- up to 450, egad! - because they have dressing on them. Eater beware.)
We got back on the road and it started to snow. By the time we realized that we wouldn't make it to my dad's place until close to 1 am, we decided to stay overnight somewhere. Then MR fell asleep and I found a nice jazz radio station, so I drove till about 9 and we stopped here in Shaunton, wherever that is. We found a hotel with free wireless so I can say hi to you!
Tomorrow morning MR will make his salad and I will probably disembowel some hard boiled eggs in order to turn them into eggwhites. There's also yogurt on the free breakfast buffet, so I should be able to put together a decent CR breakfast. Then onward to my dad's where I'll be the chef for a few days!
A Happy Thanksgiving to all, and to all a good night.
Posted by april at 10:20 PM | Comments (1) | TrackBack
November 21, 2005
Proposed Menus for Thanksgiving Week
Well, I'm taking my Orange One home to meet the parents for the first time. He's met my mom already... she is quite convinced that he is actually her other baby, since she always wanted to have a boy too. He actually looks quite a bit like her, as they are both redheads, though she is not (yet) Orange. She lives nearby, so they go on frequent outings to BJ's to buy bulk eggwhites and cottage cheese together... but he's never met my dad and step-mother who live in North Carolina. To make life easier for all, I suggested that I cook the meals, so that I can take care of MR and my calorie needs while not making everyone crazy. My dad and step-mother will be doing the actual Thanksgiving dinner (MR and I will just weigh our serving of turkey and such, and I'll manage the side dishes to make sure we're Zoned), but I'm doing the rest.
Here are my proposed menus:
Tuesday dinner:
cream of fire roasted tomato soup
scallops in white wine with garlic and cilantro
broccoli with flax oil and fresh lemon
wine (my dad provides excellent selections of this)
Wednesday lunch:
half servings of MR's breakfast salad for lunch (my quotidian lunch)
asparagus and mushroom eggwhite fritatta
Wednesday dinner:
cauliflower soup
pasta-less CR friendly lasagna
wine
Friday we're going to meet the grandparents and also to my favorite store in the world, A Southern Season, where the baby measuring cup that I presented MR as a moving-in gift was procured. MR will pack one of his lunches: Dad, step-mother and I will eat at the restaurant. They actually have very good choices, like grilled shrimp salad and such. Then we'll most likely be stopping by a Whole Foods on the way home, so I figure I'll pick up supplies for that night's dinner. We're going to bring Quorn, and I might make one of our classic vegetable stir-fry dishes with Quorn tenders, just like the one that MR made me my first night in Canada.
My father and step-mother are both very good cooks and healthy eaters. They have long made meals that are de facto Zoned. My step-mother gave up bread ages ago, and a typical meal at their house would be a grilled fish served with steamed vegetables and olive oil with lemon and pepper. Over the years we've had some conflict about food, especially in the years when I was vegan, but they've always made me something that I would eat. My parents used to go to extraordinary lengths to create sugar-free birthday desserts back when I couldn't eat sugar for health reasons in college. They suffered through years when I wouldn't eat much of anything. Nowadays, it seems we eat more alike than ever before, so I'm really looking forward to cooking for the whole family. They've been very supportive of my CR from day one.
Who knows... maybe we'll get them hooked on Quorn!
Posted by april at 9:37 AM | Comments (3) | TrackBack
November 19, 2005
Another Potluck
I'm getting ready for another potluck, attempting to feed my friends healthy food and avoid being tempted by evil gak. I'm bringing a vegetarian Asian-ish stir fry with Quorn, Trader Joe's Harvest Hodgepodge, bamboo shoots, extra baby corn, cooked in a veggie broth with garlic and soy sauce and ginger. I'm also baking apples, guava, and pears in Captain Morgan's spiced rum, topped with cinnamon and Grains of Desire spices. Sneaking in healthy food wherever I can. I've decided that I'm sick of feeling sick after these events, so I'm bringing my own measured food for both me and MR, and bringing our baby measuring cup (2 oz, it's so cute!) to measure my wine. If I make it one of my morning CR vows to *not* graze on the potluck food (all of which will be very high calorie) I'll be fine.
I ate plenty yesterday... VLC was in town, so the old clique went out. We had tons of fun! She's going to be around the area all December and maybe in January too. More adventures with VLC...
Posted by april at 6:36 AM | Comments (2) | TrackBack
November 18, 2005
Your Tatta, Should You Choose To Accept It
All week I've been doing little birthday surprises for MR's birthday, and today's was lunch: a black bean and salsa tatta! I mixed 200 g black beans into 100 calories of eggwhites and four tablespoons of Trader Joe's pineapple salsa. He's been instructed to bake it in the oven at 300 for a little less than an hour, and then top with four more tablespoons (at 15 calories for two tablespoons, it's a steal!) of salsa and one teaspoon olive oil. Hazelnuts for added fat on the side.
We love the tatta. It's amazing how it turns out great almost no matter what you put in it: broccoli, tomatoes, apples, kale stems, black beans, salsa, you name it, I can tatta it.
It's been a great birthday week, I think, and I have enjoyed watching the Orange One age chronologically but not biologically. He's getting oranger every day!
I have so many things to be thankful for... CR, my friends and family, a job I love, the CR Society, the Mprize and all the fun I have coordinating events for people with vastly different dietary preferences, my Orange Angel, and last but certainly not least, the fact that my cat has not yet learned how to open the fridge and eat all its contents while I am at work. Please don't teach Kieffer that trick!
Posted by april at 10:02 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
November 17, 2005
Organizing Dieticians
It's after 11 pm, way past my bedtime, but I just got home from a meeting with nurses that didn't even end until ten minutes till ten, and I just finished my dinner (which I had been carrying around but never had time to eat), did my dishes, and put together a last day of birthday surprise lunch for MR. I still have energy, so I will write to you about the wonderful lunch I had today.
For the last several weeks, I've been doing quite a few meetings with various categories of health care professionals over lunch. We order food, have it delivered to our quaint but charming row house office near the place we're working to organize, and eat with the folks. I never eat of course... MR packs my lunch, and I wouldn't dream of chowing down on the pizza that I order for the others. But today was different. The dieticians were coming over.
Yes, I met with a group of thirteen Registered Dieticians. You can imagine my excitement as I assembled the lunch. I didn't have enough time to really cook, but MR did donate a couple of Sherm's Binging Brownies to the cause, which I heated and chopped into cute little cubes. I had heard that several dieticians were vegetarian, so I picked up a Middle Eastern feast at the local good grocery store: hummus, tabouleh, olives, sundried tomatoes, celery, carrots, grape tomatoes, pita (regular people eat bread, even dieticians). I also ordered some salads: two garden and two chef. I brought my own salad dressings from home... fat-free Caesar and Balsamic Vinegarette. The spread was gorgeous.
In marched the dieticians, one by one. Beautiful thin women, cute skinny guys with glasses. People who understood the significance of, "Per 100 calories, it has 10% of the RDA of EVERYTHING!" Basically, I thought that there was no point in giving the the Mprize cause I had already died and gone to heaven! They were so cool!
We talked about the union of course, and they seemed to like the food. I was a bit surprised that they were all slim: it is so common in health care to see people with truly crummy diets and horrible health habits. But the dieticians, at least these dieticians, were the exceptions. They looked healthy, vibrant, cheerful.
They loved the brownies, and asked if I bake them. "No," said I. "My boyfriend does. I lock him in the house and force him to bake all day."
This is of course not true, but it got a good laugh, and they ate the brownies with appreciation.
If only there were a union just for dieticians...
Posted by april at 11:16 PM | Comments (3) | TrackBack
November 16, 2005
A Feast for Birth
Last night we celebrated MR's birthday with a feast of his favorites. A lasagnatta: eggwhite with red pepper and arugula baked in, topped with fat free cottage cheese soaked in garlic and basil, then covered with fire roasted tomatoes (Muir Glen Organic) and finished off with a light sprinkling of part skim mozarella and a teaspoon of flax oil. Dessert was the twice a year treat: high quality organic dark chocolate, melted and topped with hazelnut oil. Very yummy.
For his real birthday present (as opposed to a series of small birthday surprises, including a carrot gazpachzo that's guaranteed to make him even oranger than he already is) I took a chance and got him a beautiful ORANGE sweater! It's not bright, men-at-work orange; rather, it's a gorgeous burnt orange, leaves in late fall, roasted pumpkin with garlic and curry orange. One of our friends who is also a CR Society member works at Brooks Brothers, so I stopped off Saturday to purchase it from him. MR put it on and he is so beautiful!!! The Orange One is even oranger!
I'm extraordinarily busy with work, coordinating the Kurzweil lunch auction, the 300 member dinner and running three campaigns on my real job. So not much time to write. More as soon as I can!
Posted by april at 8:10 AM | Comments (1) | TrackBack
November 13, 2005
Buddhist Drinking Games
I've got to stop drinking with Buddhists. I always eat too many carbs.
I seem to have fallen in with a sect of Buddhists who believe in drinking. I'm all for that, of course, but between the carbs in the wine itself and any subsequent carbs that we eat, I always seem to have an anxiety fit following a night of hanging out with Buddhists. That seems rather contrary to the principles of Buddhism... shouldn't I feel all calm and enlightened??? Maybe that's just Zen Buddhism... I'm fairly sure these folks are Tibetian Buddhists cause they're always going on about yak butter salt tea. But the point remains... I'm no good at Buddhist drinking games. I seem to lose the higher reality in the blood sugar rush.
On Friday night I went out with a friend of ours for drinks after work. We're going to put on a play of sorts in March, and he's re-writing the script, so we wanted to chat about possibilities for my character. We met in a bar in Center City Philly. By the time I got there he'd already ordered a bottle of cabernet, and I was on such an empty stomach that the first glass hit me very hard. Then we went to Whole Foods to pick up some food to make for dinner... and we went crusing for samples. Whole Foods had great samples of cheese, grapefruits, crackers, etc. Then on the way back to his apartment we stopped off at his favorite bar and had another drink... I had something sweet in a martini glass called a French Connection. By this time I'm feeling quite tipsy... I am such a lightweight now!!! Good thing I am a cheap date, since I pay for myself and MR and I are saving for a house! After one drink we head back to my friend's house and eat pita with hummus, zucchini, feta (I only had one piece) and roasted red pepper and eggplant spread for dinner. TOO MANY CARBS! Sure enough, I wake up in the middle of the night (safely home with my Orange One) with the predictable anxiety. Can not do this carb thing!
Last night we had a bunch of friends over for a potluck dinner. I made a make-your-own-burrito bar with Trader Joe's low carb whole wheat tortillas -- no transfats! -- and black beans, Quorn, homemade guacamole, tomatoes, purple bell peppers, low fat sour cream, and salsas. Some of our friends brought tuna and ham and cheese finger sandwiches, which Kieffer attacked a little too enthusiastically... the sandwiches had to retire to the top of the fridge for their own protection. I made quesadillas for MR but ate a bite of this and that myself... a couple fingers of sandwich, a burrito, a bite of homemade pumpkin pie, a handful of wasabi cashews. I didn't eat too much, but enjoyed sampling everyone's dish, as well as a helping of the Vampire red wine one of my friends brought. I ate sparingly enough that I was still hungry for our delicious Sunday breakfast this morning.
Today we had a friend over for lunch and I made broccoli and mushroom tatta with mushroom gravy and apples with hazelnut oil and hazelnut (spiced with cinnamon and "grains of desire") on the side.
Now I'm about to make my tomato tofu for dinner... gotta go!
Posted by april at 4:06 PM | Comments (5) | TrackBack
November 10, 2005
When Our Actions Match Our Goals: Or Don't
I've been doing a lot of thinking about how I feel when my actions align with my goals. Or when they don't.
Lately I've been spending some time every morning in meditation. It really helps me center myself for the day, reflect on what I want to accomplish, and choose who I want to be. It's a great time to solidify my CR Vows du Jour. It definitely helps me align my actions with my goals.
It drives me nuts to see people whose actions don't match up with their stated goals, no doubt because I am working so hard on that particular aspect of my character. One of the things I love about MR is that he is the most rational person I have ever met: he decides to do something, and then takes that decision to its logical extension in his behavior. His goal is to live as long as possible, in as good health as possible, so he does hardcore CR, is a member of the Three Hundred, and avoids dangerous wild animals. It's relaxing.
I am so excited these days when friends or family members or blog readers or just random people I barely know express an interest in improving their eating, whether it's to live longer, feel better, or lose weight, or all of the above. I get all helpful and start giving them bags of Quorn and cans of no salt stewed tomatoes and little lessons in how to make a tatta. One of our friends who has decided to take off the weight he gained during a recent personal difficulty is coming over for lunch on Sunday, and I am so happy! I know how hard it is to change -- after all, I still have run-ins with the evil nacho and margarita fairy -- and I totally sympathize when folks who are trying to improve fall off the wagon and have a terrible day, night, week, or whatever. I am encouraging and cheerleader like, and I even volunteer to figure out how to turn their old high calorie favorites into low calorie, high nutrient treats.
There are so many things in life that we can not control: the weather, car accidents, unpleasant snoring sounds emanating from the condo next door. But our weight is something we can do something about! Sure, it's not easy, and I have almost infinite sympathy for those who make an effort and stumble. But some things are obvious. If you eat crap, all the time, you're going to either a) get fat b) stay fat c) have a heart attack d) age faster than you need to.
Lots of people don't want to CR. They're happy with the role food plays in their lives, and they aren't sufficiently horrified by biological aging to want to slow it down. Lots of men don't think it's worth the investment of time and energy, not to mention hunger, that it would take to achieve a weight where they meet my standards for male perfection. Very few men can meet my standards for male physical perfection no matter how hard they try. My standards are really rather unrealistic: it takes a person who is naturally skinny engaging in hardcore CR to fit into my narrowly defined idea of what a man should look like. If a guy isn't that skinny, I'm just not interested. I have tried to impose my ideals of beauty on the men of this country, and while it may not look it (to judge from the pot-bellied portly folk watching football on Sunday afternoons)I think I am making progress.
Point being, some folks are happy the way they are. Cool with me. I start to get a little antsy when their behavior is likely to land them with high medical bills that my tax dollars and insurance costs will cover just like everyone else's, but that's a giant public health issue for another day.
But it's hard for me to figure out what to do when I see friends eating in ways that they've got to know are unhealthy and lead to weight gain, while insisting that they want to lose. Mostly, I do nothing. It's not really my business. I'm kind of a walking advertisement for CR so it's not like people don't know that I do it. If they want more info, they know who to call. If anything, it just gives me more motivation to stick to the actions that I know bring me closer to my goals.
I know I feel more at peace when I make a firm decision at the beginning of the day about how I am going to eat and then stick with it. It's much easier to be a little hungry (and wow, the food is so satisfying at mealtime!) than to be constantly torn apart by desires to eat this or that while knowing that the result won't be what I'm looking for. I thought CR would get harder as I took my calories lower and was more vigilant about measuring and weighing, but in fact, it is much more simple! I know what I want, I know what it takes to get there, and I act accordingly. Even when there's a short term difficulty (can't eat the pizza, feel very hungry right before dinner, etc.) I feel like I wasted an incredible amount of energy before constantly negotiating with myself about what I was going to do (I'll eat the french fries off my friend's plate but make up for it with less wine at dinner... I'll have just one bite of that cheese plate... etc.) Now, I waste no time. I decide what course of action will get me to my goals, and I take it. No more ifs, ands or "but the pizza smells good and I'm hungry!"
My CR vows saved me from excess calories several times today. I didn't eat the snack mix a co-worker brought to lunch. I skipped the extra chips and salsa a friend had leftover from his burrito. I ignored the leftover salad in the fridge at the satellite office where I had afternoon meetings. When the Dunkin Donuts guy messed up and put cream and sugar in my small coffee, I asked for a new one made with no additives and gave the extra to a parking ticket writing person. Oh, and I took not one bite of the pizza that was delivered for my 3:30 and 5:15 pm meetings. I didn't let circumstances dictate to me how many calories I would eat. You wouldn't go home with a guy you met in a bar just cause he asked you to, would you? Why consume 50, 70, 100, 200 extra calories just because they're there?
MR made dinner tonight, and it was amazing. Quorn tender stir fry with so many veggies that I am stuffed even though I'm actually 200 calories under for the day. It's the dish he made me my first night visiting him back in January. It was fantastic then, and it's fantastic now. We just put away the dishes and I dealt with some Mprize, work, CR Society and other organizational email. Now we're off to bed with the (hopefully not howling) calico cat.
Posted by april at 8:10 AM | Comments (3) | TrackBack
November 9, 2005
Save, Restore and Extend
In Jon Corzine's acceptance speech after winning the race for Governor of the great state of New Jersey (in many ways, I'm still a Jersey Girl at heart), he talked about making Jersey a state that is friendly to stem cell research. He described the aim of stem cell research as finding ways to "save, restore, and extend" life.
I, for one, was ecstatic to hear a major figure in American politics both endorsing stem cell research, and mentioning the possibility of extending life. Too often, politicians hide behind the obvious uses of biotechnology to cure known diseases and disabilities, and shy away from talking about actually increasing healthy human lifespan. While I'm all for curing disease, too much focus on curing individual diseases can bleed all of the funding out of research aimed at taking on the single thing that will kill us even if we eradicate all the diseases out there: the actual biological aging process. As you read about in the repost of "Don't Ever Think That You Can't Change The Past and The Future," treating disesases is more profitable than creating anti-aging therapies, and it's easier and quicker to bring drugs to market. Huge lobbies exist for individual diseases like Alzheimer's and cancer. But when it comes to tackling the underlying problem, the root of most all destruction, it's hard to focus funding and research in the right direction.
I've blogged many times about how when you talk about actually extending healthy lifespan, you are often met with resistance to the effect of, "Isn't it selfish to want to live that long?" It's logically inconsistent: if it's not selfish to want to cure cancer or heart disease (which, after all, we may all be diagnosed with someday): why does it become selfish to want to cure aging? We can be absolutely sure that everyone around us will suffer and die as a result of biological aging if we don't do something about it... unless, of course, they get hit by a truck and die at a young age. (NOTE: I do not advocate hitting anyone with a truck in order to save them from age-related disability and death. I do, however, heartily support stem cell research that might someday repair the injuries of those injured in motor vehicle accidents.) Isn't it less selfish, more humanitarian, to fight a disease that kills everyone, discriminates not at all, and causes years and years of suffering before finally claiming its victims?
I'm proud of Corzine for having the guts to throw "extend" into his speech. The stem cell issue is controversial enough as it is, and to throw in one more element of controversy is courageous indeed. It's time that we realized that extending life *is* saving life. Most of us would put ourselves at great risk to protect those we love. If a lover, a parent, or a child were suffering from a life-threatening disease, we'd certainly go to huge expense to try to find the cure and acquire it, if it meant the difference between life and death.
Well guess what, friends. Everyone you know is suffering from a life-threatening disease. Your lover, your best friend, your parents, (but not my cats: they have assured me that they will live forever, or at least as long as I do!) are all dying of aging. Surely we should support politicians who are fighting for a cure, especially those who support stem cell research. We should also support, with whatever resources we can allocate, the most effective way to mobilize public, political and scientific will to tackle the problem.
That means... you guessed it... I still think you should donate to the Mprize.
Save lives. Restore youth, health, vitality, beauty. Extend healthy lifespans.
And enjoy your fall squash... while you still have time.
Posted by april at 4:19 AM | Comments (1) | TrackBack
November 8, 2005
I Love Pumpkin!
Thanks to Zeynep for a delicious sounding pumpkin recipe! I must make it while pumpkin is still in season. I love all the ingredients, so I'm sure I'd love them together. Do you eat spaghetti squash where you are? I do love squashes of all sorts.
I've also been thinking about a way to make a pumpkin dessert with no added sugar. Last year I tried to make a frozen pumpkin pie with vanilla yogurt, and it wasn't good. Reader suggestions?
Meanwhile, I've had a good few food days. I've been eating my quotidian diet, which I find yummy and satisfying. Thanks to the making of CR vows each morning and meditating on them, I've resisted appetizer plates at Applebees, bread samples at Panera, and jujubees at my mom's house. It wasn't easy yesterday when I watched nurses eating fried mozarella (yes, they even fry cheese in America), nachos, and artichoke spinich and sour cream dip. But I did it, and I was glad. Eating high calorie, saturated fat filled food now leaves me with a feeling a lot like a hangover. It's not worth it!
Off to assemble dinner. Tonight I'm making MR some Asian vegetables in a creamy mushroom sauce with Asian mushrooms, baked apples topped with hazelnut oil for dessert.
Keep those recipes coming!
Posted by april at 4:37 PM | Comments (2) | TrackBack
99.9% of Cardiovascular Disease Is Lifestyle
I heard that line on the radio this morning as part of an advertisement for a hospital. Then I came into work and saw this article in Slate magazine.
Uh, yikes! 99.9% of cardiovascular disease is caused by lifestyle, yet the "fat acceptance movement" is gathering steam? We're not talking about hardcore CR vs. moderate heatlhy eating -- we're talking about life and death here!
I like the way the author of the article, Laura Kipnis, wrote in detail about the role the food industry has played in shaping American's food preferences and waistlines. Tastebuds can indeed be ruined by overfeeding of processed foods, as Zeynep points out (though I can assure her that Judith is not suffering from that problem... she's an amazing cook and feeds her family healthy and delicious foods. We may just have to agree to disagree about eggwhites!) and from school cafeterias and McDonald's kids' meals on, Americans are trained to love junk. Even those who try to improve their diets face obstacles. It can be very difficult to navigate the maze of processed foods in grocery stores, saturated-fat laden fast food, and cream sauce drenched pasta in restaurants. Portion sizes are out of control, finding healthy food is like a treasure hunt, and no one has any time because we're all working too darned much just to put "food" on the table for ourselves and our families. No wonder Americans are fat and on the verge of heart attacks!
Over the weekend, I went out with a group of non-CR'd friends, and after eating the only thing on the menu that was even vaguely CR friendly, a chicken fajita salad, I was still hungry. And after a margarita, my inhibitions were significantly lowered -- wow, I am such a cheap date now!!! It's amazing how much less one can drink at 101 pounds than at 140! So I ate some nachos off a friend's plate. Nachos and margaritas -- the old evil combination. Anyhow, she asked me how I stay so thin. I pointed out that I certainly don't eat nachos everyday, but that since I am very careful with my diet, both in terms of calories and nutrition, I can afford every once in awhile to go out and eat junk.
Fact is, though, if I ate in restaurants nearly as often as most people I know do, there's no way I'd be able to even maintain a healthy diet, much less a calorie restricted, nutritionally optimized one! The food choices tend to be horrible, and even when they're not incomprehensibly bad, there aren't many high protein, low saturated fat, high volume vegetable choices out there. The food I make for myself and MR at home is delicious, and when friends come over they rave about both the quality and quantity of food served. (In fact, I've just been appointed Ministrix of Hospitality for a social group I'm in -- a vote of confidence that I appreciated!) But you take the same people, plop them down in a restaurant, and they're going to eat food that will eventually land them in the CCU. That's Cardiac Care Unit, for those of you who don't do nurse-speak.
I feel very guilty when I eat junk when out with friends, not so much because it will damage my CR since a once a month forray into a few bites of nachos isn't a life-extension disaster, as long as I balance out the calories and make up for missed nutrients in other meals, which I always do. But I feel like I'm setting a bad example. I'm very happy that this group is getting it's own space for events, so we will be eating potluck style instead of going out to restaurants. I love to cook healthy food that fortifies the body and mind, and sharing it with those I love. But I hate being hungry because the menu choices are bad, and then sitting next to someone eating a pile of junk food. It's hard to resist, especially when I know how easy it is to make up for it in other parts of my CR plan. Still, I feel crappy after eating that way, even if it's just one meal and not that large a volume of sub-optimal food. It seems to make the brain sludge somehow. I'm sure there's a technical term for this.
It was a joy to get back on the straight and narrow, cooking favorites on Sunday like our CR Sunday breakfast (giant vegetable and eggwhite scramble with low carb buckwheat pancakes fortified with whey protein), my beautiful MR-made salad with yogurt for lunch, and a delicious spaghetti squash topped with homemade tomato sauce with olive tapenade for dinner. Yum!
The week is crazy busy, and I was happy to come home last night to find that MR had already assembled my vegetable soup and cottage cheese dinner. I was very hungry because I got home past dinner time, so I dug into my cottage cheese with an enthusiasm usually found only in teenage boys attacking a large pizza. I felt totally satisfied after dinner, and went on to do another hour or so of work before finally crashing out.
You'll be pleased to know that Philomena the cat seems to have stopped howling all night. I think I can thank Trader Joe's Tuna For Cats. It's a special cat-friendly version of tuna fish, and it's a real hit in our household. When I fill the little calico's belly with it, she purrs and then sleeps peacefully until at least 4 am, which is an improvement over last week's 1 - 3 am howling start time. What can I say, I'm a kitty-mommy -- I live to serve!
Posted by april at 6:41 AM | Comments (4) | TrackBack
November 7, 2005
Putting Your Money Where Your Life Is
Well, the word is out. An anonymous donor has sent a cashier's check for a million dollars to the Mprize. That's serious.
The donor cited what he or she had learned from Fightaging.org and a growing awareness of the power of the Mprize to mobilize the public's attention and support as many small donors joined their resources to grow the prize fund.
I hope that my entry describing how I came to understand the value of the Mprize helps you see why I'm so excited about this latest donation. Thanks for the nice comments! It's been quite a year!
We have no idea who the anonymous donor is, and I think we can all admire his or her desire to keep the focus on defeating aging, not on his or her personal involvement. But I am wondering one thing, and I'm sure you are too:
Does the million dollar donor like eggwhites?
Posted by april at 7:33 AM | Comments (2) | TrackBack
November 3, 2005
Another Too Busy To Write Day
I already knew I'd have a day when I was running from the time I left the house until I got home at close to seven, but it just got busier, so no time to write.
I ate 625 calories of MR CR pizza last night. And it was delicious!!! I think it was one of the most enjoyable meals I have ever had.
Meanwhile, one of my readers made the Pizza Tatta! She and her dog both enjoyed it... and hopefully her husband did too when he got home from work.
Great suggestion from another reader if you can't find low carb no trans fat tortillas: serve the pizza ingredients over zucchini slices! Great idea!
Off to the meetings...
Posted by april at 9:13 AM | Comments (1) | TrackBack
November 2, 2005
I Gave That Up For Lent... Uh...
Well, I'm back to the strategy of making CR vows and sticking to them. It's amazing how well that works for me. While I might be tempted to eat a little of this and a little of that (the crust off a co-worker's pizza, a handful of jujubees) here and there under normal circumstances -- and we've learned that those calories really add up -- when I vow not to do it, I don't. I'm not really even tempted. It's like making the decision is the hard part, not sticking to it. I've moved my daily meditation to the morning (I've been getting home so late that it doesn't make sense to do it at night) and I use part of the time to get my Vows du Jour firmly embedded in my head.
Yesterday I did a four hour meeting at a bar/restaurant in Center City with nurses as they got off of work. Though I was tempted to put milk and sugar in my coffee, I resisted because I thought that would violate the spirit of my not eating between meals CR Vow du Jour. At the end of the meeting, one of the nurses got out some gum and asked if folks wanted a piece. I said sure.
Then I thought: oh no! That might violate my CR Vow du Jour! Quick! Help!
"Ooops, I can't," I said.
"Why not?" said the nurse, clearly confused at my sudden retraction of my request for a piece of gum.
"I gave up gum for Lent," was the first thing that popped into my head and tumbled out of my mouth.
The nurses, most of them no doubt Catholic (Philly nurses are overwhelmingly Catholic) pointed out that it is nowhere near Lent.
Luckily, one of them came to my rescue, saying, "You must mean you gave it up for Advent!" I heartily agreed, hoping that no one would notice that Advent doesn't start for awhile.
The nurses noticed that it's not yet Advent. I was hoping they'd confuse Advent with the holiday decorating and shopping season, which starts immediately after Halloween. No such luck.
As they argued about the start date of Advent, a great Peter Gabriel song came on the overhead soundtrack and I diverted everyone with chatter about eighties pop music. I did not take or eat a piece of gum. Situation saved.
Tonight I have a special treat: MR is making CR Zoned Pizzas!!! And get this: my calories between breakfast and lunch are so low if I don't eat my fat free ricotta in the morning (only 441 total) that I am going to have the same amount of pizza that he has, plus my larger glass of wine (MR drinks 3 ounces -- cute, but nowhere enough for a real wine drinker), and still be at my calorie target! That's three low carb tortilla sized pizzas! I am so excited. I will be hungry for it, as I've been under cals the last few days. Well, correction, I'll still be a little over 1200, but I ended yesterday at 1057 and the day before added up to 998, so I have room. I have one of those pizza meetings this afternoon, so as per Judith's suggestion, I will survive the smell of pizza knowing that healthy CR Zoned pizza awaits me with my Orange One at home.
Posted by april at 9:30 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
November 1, 2005
The Best Halloween Ever
Well, the Hallo-tatta was great, the kids were adoreable, MR was dashing in my witch's hat (some small children were quite frightened by the Orange Man in the witches hat in the window), the bat lights were beautiful where MR put them in our front window, and the calcium chewies went over very well. The kids cleaned them out before 7:30pm! All in all, the best Halloween ever.
And one of my readers made the pumpkin pizzas! Yea! And she has wonderful children who refused to eat gak and donated their candy to the local children's hospital. Now that is cause for rejoicing! There is hope for the next generation!
Gotta run to another meeting... more tomorrow.
Posted by april at 11:58 AM | Comments (1) | TrackBack