Just a quick update, to fill in status on a few things.
I made a resolution to leave my building at least once a day during the week day, back when school started in September. I'm doing that pretty well. I've been conscious of only two days when I chose to stay inside to eat my brown bag lunch and just work. My side of the National Mall has many fewer restaurants than the other, including much sparser pickings for sandwich and salad lunch spots. That has been remedied by food truck heaven. It turns out my corner is the largest concentration of the new food trucks in the city most days. We get a solid dozen different choices each day. Net effect on me? I walk less and eat worse. Food trucks have sandwiches, curries and kebabs and stir fries over rice, and cup cakes and frozen yogurt. Sometimes tacos. Almost no-one offers a salad. Yesterday's butter chicken (with spinach and cauliflower sides) was not the best I'd ever had, but it was darn good and spicy enough I needed the rice.
Running? Not so much. I tried to motivate myself by signing up for more races, but I went through a spate of feeling truly lousy and feeble. I even tried to run, and just couldn't do it. Maybe it was a mild virus, because the worst has passed and my energy is a bit up and I really want to do it. But the pace at work right now does not permit getting in any extra exercise. So the Dead Man's Run I signed up for? I went to Historic Congressional Cemetery and picked up my t shirt, and walked around a bit, and called it a night. Very cool T though - I'll be wearing it on Halloween. Perhaps I'll try to shuffle around the block on Sunday.
Snacking at night? Well, after just a few days, I've got a good record. But it may not really count - I leave the kids house each night (earlier than usual this week because I've brought work home every night), brush my teeth and that's that. But it doesn't count because before tonight, there weren't actually any snacks in my house. At least no chocolate ones. But I stopped at Trader Joe's to stock up before the storm, and a significant amount of my favorite junk food found its way into my cart and my house. (All shelf-stable of course, for when the power goes out.) So at this minute, the only thing keeping me from noshing is my minty-fresh breath. So based on a small sample, this strategy is working. I put everything away, out of sight, and none of it is opened. I know from my reading on willpower, that it definitely saps your reserves to have to see something reminding you, and each time quell the impulse to reach for it. Hopefully, I won't hear it calling me from inside the cupboard. (Which maybe begs the question, why did I buy it if I don't want to eat it? I'm not sure I'm up to exploring that question at this moment.)
And another new strategy - track and get social! I am currently using MyFitnessPal to track, and I've connected with a couple of friends (hoping to connect with more! let me know if you are in) and I'm liking it. It has a good database, a pretty good interface, it syncs between my iphone, ipad and computer, and it even sucks in my data from my little armband calorie-expenditure device.
Enough for now. I'm up at five to go move my boat before the hurricane gets here.
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