Happy Happy To Be Alive Day!

A year ago today, Professor Taco and I were in a catastrophic car crash. We spun out on some black ice, headed into oncoming traffic, headed back into our own lane, but pointed backward, hit the guardrail, were flung into the air and rolled several times before the car finally came to a rest on its back in the snow. Catastrophic. The car was a write-off.

Except that not so catastrophic, because the professor and I? Alive. Very much so. And mostly unhurt. And as Valentine’s Day and its stupid overpriced roses and less-than-premium chocolate and impossible-to-get restaurant reservations approached this year I said, hey, let’s screw Valentine’s Day forever, and instead celebrate Happy to Be Alive Day.

And so we will. Taco will be home from work soon, and then we’ll figure out where we’d really like to eat supper (last year, we ate at Chuggles in Antigonish while we waited for Johnny Parker to come get us…bar steaks, fries, cheesecake and several Bloody Caesars since, hey, it’s not like we’d be driving home or anything). I’ll give him his presents (a few guitar gizmos; he already gave me mine, a shiny new waffle iron), we’ll gaze at each other across the table and laugh and laugh at how alive we are.

And it doesn’t matter tonight what I eat or don’t eat, what I drink or don’t drink. Because it’s all fuel for this glorious body which, despite being rather overweight, can dance, walk, kickbox, hug, swim, cook, clean the house, hold my nieces and thrill my fiancé. Sometimes I fight with my body, it’s true. Sometimes I think, knees, why are you so doughy? But I never, ever think things would be better if I didn’t have this body. As long as I’m in it, I’m alive, and that is a-ok by me.

So here’s to steak and cheesecake and vodka, and here’s to hitting the gym tomorrow and making this body sweat, and here’s to all of that making me feel so alive.

All of me, why not take all of me?

Parts of me that are getting noticeably thinner:
Lower legs, especially ankles
Feet
Lower arms
Hands
Clavicle
Groins
Underarms

Parts of me that are not:
Hips
Belly
Butt
Boobs

Ah, it’s so weird. It is so weird to be typing and suddenly to notice the bones in my hand, bones I’ve never, literally NEVER seen before. It’s so weird to lie in bed and realize I can feel more space at the intersection of my leg and my torso. Weird to realize that I have had not only fat hands and fat feet, but fat armpits. Fat armpits! Who has those?

And while I am glad to note shrinkage in these peripheral parts, I would frigging love it if my waist measurement would just go down already. It’s 33 inches and change, depending on the time of the month. It has been bouncing around between 33 and 34 inches for SO FREAKING LONG. And I am ready to see another number there.

Other places I would like to see a different number:
The scale
My bank account

The scale…perhaps it is broken? It refuses to show me anything lower than 206.4. Every day, I weigh in somewhere between that number and 208.6. The scale also never measures in odd numbers after the decimal. Yes, it was cheap. No, I am not buying another. Yes, I will continue to curse it. Lather, rinse, repeat.

As for my bank account, well. What with the wedding*, the house renovations, the starving artist fiancé* and the new (size 14!) lovely tweedy winter coat I bought (on sale, but still) I am feeling the pinch. Obviously, the solution to both these problems is to sell my fat. Any takers? Anyone? Maybe on eBay…

Anyhow. I am keeping the faith. Lifting weights, sweating it out on the elliptical, walking most mornings, stretching daily. I try to stay conscious of the need to work harder, to push myself. I have not yet dipped my toe into spinning. (But thanks for the encouragement, Ms Ess!) I will, though. I will. Because those numbers? Are getting old.

*Here you must imagine links. Links I would embed, but my web browser and Blogger apparently are not on speaking terms when it comes to links. I will edit this at work tomorrow if I get a chance. Otherwise...oh! I will put links in the sidebar. Fun times!

Challenging

So…I didn’t meet my goal for the month. I decided somewhat late in the month that I should aim to lose five pounds each month this year. Seems reasonable – it’s just a pound and a quarter a week. But it is the kind of loss that has eluded me since September. Ah, September, you held such promise.

But then I got all distracted by my life and stopped givin’ ‘er.

Now, it’s not a total write-off. I did recommit to the gym, to drinking water (to the point of buying a watercooler for the house and getting two 18 litre water jugs delivered every two weeks) and especially to tallying my food and exercise at wlr. And the result of that has been somewhat ethereal – I feel smaller than I was four weeks ago. And in fact, I am smaller – I shed a few inches, and four pounds. Not five, but four. Pretty close.

But no, as they say, cigar.

I ate French fries last night for the first time in ages, and they were pretty good, but I can’t say I really miss them all that much. Good once in a while, but not my favourite food anymore. I ate meat three times this week, and that feels extraordinary, and like way too much. I crave all kinds of exercise these days including, today, the dreaded plank and yoga pushup. I acknowledge these things as victories. They are not what my stats-obsessed mind craves, necessarily, but still, they are metrics.

The thing is, I’m sure I could push myself harder. As it is, I don’t push myself hardly at all. I like eating the foods I’m eating, I leave room for treats, I like, mostly, my work out time, I prefer drinking water above all other liquids. I am doing things that are generally easy for me to do. I do not, however, push myself beyond that. I will eat mostly vegetarian, but won’t fully commit to it. I will work out five or six days a week, but I won’t step outside my comfort zone with it…I do the same workouts over and over. The same classes, the same cardio machines, the same stretches. I eat roughly 1600-1800 calories a day, depending on how much exercise I’m racking up. It is comfortable. It keeps me mindful, but it doesn’t make me sweat very hard, you know?

Two things I am pretty frightened of: spin class and running. They seem really hard. I’ve done spin once and it almost killed me. That was about a year ago. I am much more fit now. Running…I’ve done a bit of it, and it hurts and is hard. I’m sure that appeals to some people, and I expect it hurts less and gets less hard as you progress. But right now, my knees and my ankles feel too delicate.

So…spin it is, I suppose. It’s time to quit fucking around. Time to quit learning the same lesson over and over. Time to challenge myself.

So. Spin classes. And five pounds in February.