Why Cats Need 9 Lives....

Monday, September 3, 2007

Ped-O-Cures



It occurred to me I'd never shown a photo of my pedometer, so there it is. The Omron H-112, which I am totally all shines for and I bought it here for a very reasonable $20.

All I'm sayin' is, if you are not happy with your pedometer or are looking for one that will store each day's readings (steps, aerobic calories, areobic steps, and miles walked) separately for 7 days, please do buy this model. It's worth the money, people... remember, I accidentally dropped this into the toilet and it still works perfectly! LOLOL A better testimonial than that is hard to find, LOLOL.

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Before I forget (again), let me tell you that last Thursday, I got very sick (which is why I did not blog for a couple of days). It was baaaaaaad, people. I still do not know exactly what it was, but I think it was food poisoning. Hubs cooked dinner that night and so we both ate the same dinner: I got sick, he did not. I looked at what I'd eaten that day that he did not, and so it was either a baked potato or my yogurt (I ate the potato with my meal, and the yogurt for a snack an hour or so before dinner).

Here's what happened. We ate dinner. About an hour or so later, I began having HORRIBLE cramps in my lower abdomen, way down there, like really low menstrual cramps, but about 3 times worse. Seriously, I had to do Lamaze breathing to just survive them. Then, about 30 minutes into them, they began moving north. I thought, how weird. Then, I suddenly began feeling nauseous. I managed to grab a half-full trash can by my scrapping desk with a bag liner and run to the bathroom before throwing up. Yup, had to sit on the pot and throw up, in case I began losing it on both ends, if you get my drift. OMG, it was horrid. I hate throwing up worse than anything in the world. But, thankfully, no dry heaves and no lingering nausea. I threw up twice and then felt really good, exactly like the offending poison had been vanquished. So, that's why I feel it was food poisoning. I did have more lower ab cramps and eventually pooped, but no diahrrea. Apparently, the poison was pretty much all upchucked.

Hubs thinks it could have been some stray dirt or something on the potato, under the skin, but I remember thoroughly scrubbing the dang thing before baking it. I believe it was the yogurt. I'd eaten the first one from a four-pack purchased a couple of days prior, with a Sept. 5th expiration date. I now think that pack of yogurt was what they call in the grocery store industry a "put-back".

Call me crazy, but my prior experience as a grocery checker at Safeway back in the 70's taught me a lot of useful things, one of which is to choose my refrigerated and frozen foods from the back of the shelf whenever possible. Why? Because the front items could possibly be "put-backs", that's why. A "put-back" is just what it means: you've all seen stray grocery items on shelves not where they belong, right? People decide they don't want something in their cart and put it back, but not where they got it from, and in the case of refrigerated/frozen stuff, this sets up spoilage if someone puts back one of them on the canned goods isle and it's not found by employees til 12 hours or 2 days later.

Well, those employees are instructed to put that item right back in the fridge or freezer section, as if nothing happened, as if it had never left. I'm dead serious. And 95% put it back right in front. It's just how it's done. And that spoilt item is sitting there waiting for unsuspecting you to choose it and take it home.

I've concluded that's what must have happened, because my Hubs has never believed me about put-backs and continues to this day to choose stuff from the front, although I did convince Missy to choose stuff from the back (she became a believer once she discovered you get the better expiration dates that way). When I told Hubs my conclusions, he did not disagree, which means in Hubs-speak that he agrees. I just hope he will become a back of the shelf customer from now on. He saw just how sick it made me and how well I was afterwards. I hope he realizes it could be him next, since he buys 90% of the groceries.

And if this is the first time this has ever occurred to you, I hope it makes you think twice about just grabbing climate-controlled merchandise from the front and going. Until the day comes when put-backs change color and glow once they are spoiled, it's just good sense to dig to the back. Trust me on this, cuz there are tons of put-backs in every grocery store on a daily basis.

Anywayzzzz, Hubs got me some more yogurt (with a Sept. 24th exp date), and I am happy to say that it's all gone down just fine.

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On the coffee front, I am still cream-free, peeps. It has been tough, but my teeth are feeling much less fuzzy between brushings, and man, I'm probably taking in several hundred less calories every day. Something else, I'm drinking much less coffee when it is black. But it seems to work as good if not better (the caffeine, that is). Weird, huh? Gotta love the Chemistry of Digestion. I can drink one cup of black coffee now and get about the same caffeine effect as almost a POT of creamed-up and Sweet-n-Lowed coffee.

Yes, that is correct, you read that right. I used to drink at LEAST a pot a day. Sometimes TWO pots. And I used to drink it out of a 16-ounce latte cup, special ones that I bought just for my coffee. I mean, drinking a whole pot of coffee would take forever if I had to add cream and sweetner to little 8-oz mugs, right? LMAO - sorry, but this makes me giggle...what a great way to cut calories and improve my healthy eating, yet I never even considered it until lately (yeah, I didn't wanna give it up is what that was). The reason I fought it was for taste, or so I thought. Turns out the taste of a good cup of black coffee is not that bad once you keep a clean coffeemaker and use decent coffee and cold (Brita) filtered water to make it with. So, if you are not seeing results with your weight loss, maybe it's that Starbucks addiction, peeps. (Yup, saying a prayer of thanks here that I never got into the whole Starbucks thing ... OMG, I'm not EVEN gonna think about that ...).

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I'm still managing to lose a pound or 3/4 of one every 2-3 days, an average of 2 pounds every 7-10 days, which is fabulous for me. Still weighing after I poop, which is usual within an hour or two of waking up for the day. I do not weigh every time I poop, but looking at my lil datebook (where I record everything), I see that I weigh myself about twice a week.

My big plan to add 200 steps to every day's count is a dismal flop. I was doing great until I had the food poisoning (which was like only a day or so after I began). Throwing up totally wipes me out for days afterward, and I totally wallowed in it, LOL. I didn't NOT walk, I just did not push myself to get to a certain step count. Looking back, I guess I should feel good about not quitting, and now I feel good about stepping it up again. Yep, I'm back on track now (altho I may not try to add a certain number of steps). Here's a great idea I've implemented to help me get my minimum done every day. If it can help you, try it!

Okay, first let me remind everyone I'm technically disabled and so I step-walk a very small amount compared to what we are supposed to every day. I basically walk 3K a day (versus the 10K a day we are supposed to do). Additionally, I have the lower back-hip pain, so I only walk a certain amount at one time, which means I have to get my walking done in bunches, not all at once. And also, let me say that until it cools down here and stops constantly raining, I'll be walking inside, thank you (and without a treadmill, darnit, wish I had one).

I have a circular "track" of sorts that I walk: I begin in the family room, walk thru the breakfast room, kitchen, dining room, living room, foyer, and then back into the family room. Or, the exact opposite, to vary it up. That's what I call one "lap". And I know how many steps that "lap" is. Then I just do it as many times as I need to get a certain number of steps in. And I do that several times a day.

Yes, I know that is a really hard way to get my steps, but it is the only way I've been able to do it. It works for me, and it works, period. For those of you who have physical constraints, try something like this. It does help, it does do you good.

Anyway, here's where my problem comes in. I get to going on my laps and then forget how many I've done! Was that the fifth time around or the third or the seventh? I love to just let my mind relax and run where it wishes whenever I walk, so you can see the problem, LOL. Here's what I came up with yesterday, and it works so good!

I do my laps in bunches of tens, so I got a tall coke glass and ten pennies. I put the glass on a table that I pass by on my lap, and I begin my laps there. I hold the pennies in my hand, and every time I pass the glass, I drop one in. When all the pennies are in the glass, I've done my lap bunch. Simple as that. I never forget to drop a penny in, no matter how spaced-out my brain is while I'm walking (and the more spaced-out, the better in my book, because I can walk a lot longer without it seeming to be drudgery).

Now, if I can just get more of my lap bunches in during the first half of my day, I'll be a happy girl!

Have a great Labor Day night, folks!

2 comments:

Tami Grandi said...

What a cool pedometer! I'm so sorry about the food poisoning! Makes me a little scared to go grocery shopping!!!

Maria said...

Hey that's a very fancy pedometer!! For 20 bucks, that's pretty good.

I believe it was the yogurt that was bad. I'm glad you feel better after puking it all out! Yeah, that's the best way to get rid of something nasty.

Well I'm glad you're back on track with your walking. . .it's okay to take a break once in awhile as long as you don't abandon it completely.

Wow, girl you drink a lot of coffee. With that much coffee, I would be bouncing off the walls. Do you have problems sleeping? You must pee a lot - coffee is a diuretic. When I drink coffee, I usually I have to use the bathroom within 10 minutes of drinking it.

Hope you are having a wonderful day!

Maria