Yesterday was a good day

I've been obsessed by my shadow recently. Not for the first time. When The Main Man and I go for walks, it's usually something that I will notice at some point. We're walking along side each other, holding hands, and our shadows are also side by side. It's hard not to compare them. His is tall, lean and willowy (is willowy a word you'd use to describe a man? Don't get me wrong. He's very butch! :-) ) Mine? Hmmm. Well, I look like Ram Man!

Yip. That's a fair approximation of my shadow. Still, that's actually no longer the case. I've become aware of it starting to look more slender of hip (if not of thigh. I think I'm just always going to have chunky thighs, relative to the size of the rest of me. I blame all that trampolining when I was at university!) Now, when I catch sight of my shadow and compare it to TMM, it doesn't come up quite so wanting. I definitely could stand to be smaller yet, but it's getting there.

So, this obsession manifested itself at work yesterday. I was walking up the stairs when I realized that there was a good shadow thrown as I ascended. And guess what. I have a waist! Good grief, an actual, honest to goodness waist! In that particular shadow, I have an hourglass figure. Wow! I'll take that, thank you very much! I know shadows are, by their nature, distorted things. Of course it's not a true representation of my actual shape. But that never stopped me hating what I saw that was bad. So I'm not going to let it stop me enjoying the good. I love my shadow!

TMM brought me home a wee pressie from work yesterday. I'd mentioned a particular sort of sweets that I like, that they sell, and be brought me a bag. Jelly Meerkats. Nothing sophisticated for yours truly. It's a 250g bag, and I know that usually, once it's opened, I will eat the lot in one sitting. A greedy hallion? Me? Well, duh! Remember who's talking here. Having had dinner, I had 350 calories to spare and I figured the meerkats could get a bit of a going over. But of course, there's more than 350 cals in 250g of jellies. 870 cals to be exact! But I knew that going in, and I ate them anyway. Not a healthy, balanced choice, but one which I enjoyed to the full.

TMM says I humiliate my food. I like to eat things in a certain order when I'm savouring. So I eat chocolates from least favourite, to favourite (always the soft centres) and I eat jelly meerkat in order of colour, always leaving the reds and blacks to last. TMM finds this hilarious, and says he's never seen anyone expend so much energy on just organizing their sweets BEFORE they actually eat them. What can I say, I like them all lined up, in their colours, to await their demise!

The evidence of 870 cals of deliciousness

Having made the desision to eat the whole bag (and enjoy every mouthful) I ended the day about 500 cals over. No surprise there. I have been very good this last seven months at not deliberatly going over my allowance, and telling myself that I'll make it back before the end of the week. That way lies the destruction of all my good work thus far. So I've tried to be fairly strict with myself. I don't want to get sloppy now, when I'm feeling so good about myelf, my results and how I look. So I told myself that I'd get up for a run this morning. I worked out that I'd need to run for about an hour to make 600 calories, which would cover the 500 I went in to the red, and give a small comfort zone. Well, guess what. I actually did it. I got up and ran for fifty-six minutes, earning, according to Runkeeper, 596 cals. I am so proud of myself. I earned my meerkats in retrospect!

Do you know what was great about this run, apart from making back my calorie deficit? It was comfortable. Oh, I sweated and got out of breath. My legs got tired and I was glad to finish, but I ran for nearly an hour this morning, before work (polishes halo) and it was okay. Even though it was over two weeks since my last run. You know what, despite my sporadic attempts to get back in to it recently, I might actually genuinely be a runner! Me. Who's been over twenty stone at her heaviest (289lb). The ease with which I can don my gutties these days shows the difference weight loss can make to my movement.  It's a lot easier to run at twelve odd stone than when I was sixteen.  Mind you, at sixteen stone, I was running more consistently. So there's always something to work on. Even when I'm happy with my weight, I'll always be a work in progress. Sure that's as it should be.  I'd only get bored otherwise :-)

And so on to last night's dinner.  Wanting to keep it light, I'd already decided on cauliflower rice with my chicken curry when serendipity took a hand. A blog post Vegetabits came to my attention so I made it that way instead of my usual. I'm lazy about it. If I'm feeling adventurous I'll add onion and dried garlic. But this was on a wee level of its own. TMM even had some instead of noodles!

Chuck curry with delish cauli rice. Man, was it ever good!

I was cooking said cauli rice when TMM came home from work. And he did a double take at me! I LOVE double takes! He said it was the first time he'd looked and not recognized me initially. The man I love and have lived with for eight years had to look twice to check it was me. Magic!

Today's goal is to live by The Grit Doctor's rules from the book by Ruth Field, Run, Fat Bitch, Run which I've read a couple of times and love. I warn you though, you need a strong sense of humour.  It's abrasively encouraging. She states

1. Run
2. Drink water
3. Eat less crap (though "crap" may be me paraphrasing)
4. Get good quality sleep

Actually, #4 is my own addition. But hey, it's my blog :-) And I know I've said it before, but my sense of balance is very chuffed that rule one has one word, rule two has 2 etc. Obviously, I had to word rule four following the same pattern. I couldn't not. What do you think I am? Mental??? Anywho! Run, check! Water, semi check (the day's not over yet). I'm still drinking too much DFM* and black coffee. I'm an over caffeinated nightmare. Eat less crap, well the meerkats extravaganza will do me for this week I think, so no treats today. Sleep will always be my big challenge. So we'll see. I got about four hours last night, and that's sort of the norm. I will try to do better tonight. All the research would suggest that good sleep is good for weight loss, as well as general health, so it's a win all round. But I hate going to bed too early. I feel as if I'm missing out. Especially on a day like today when TMM won't get in from work till about 10pm.

That's it for now. Today, I will stick to 1200 cals. I'm feeling positive!


*Dark Fizzy Master i.e. diet cola of many different brands