Battle of the Bulges

That would be last night’s menu for what entered my stomach. It is not as horrible as it sounds because the three of us split each item and ended up with about 1/3 of a serving for each. I was so excited to have Olha (Ukraine) and Elena (Bulgaria) with me last night. I was so happy that I got to introduce them to some of my friends. Also, they were able to meet some natives or missionaries that are currently in their countries. It’s quite a thing to see the expressions of these girls who are experiencing the US for the first time. At the end of the night, the youth leader who is also chaplain to the NY Knicks gave the girls NBA t-shirts. What an awesome time!

My flex point status is closer to the zero than it is to the thirty five, so I need to be careful until Tuesday (but french fries and tikka masala are CALLING MY NAME). I’m still hoping to lose but if I don’t, I’m totally ready to begin next week with a bang!

Ok, so I have a confession. My lunch. Was intended to healthy. Packed in a handy little plastic bag and everything. Oh boy, I don’t know what gets into me sometimes. I didn’t end up eating the lunch I brought. Maybe the peer pressure of everyone ordering out (free lunch baby) or maybe I was rejoicing in the starting over of my FP (I love FP Tuesdays). Whatever the reason, I ate 10 pts worth of french fries and they were GOOD. I don’t think I’ve shared with you just how bad the addiction to french fries was (is) - I need a serious 12 step program. That’s the bad news.

The good news is that it’s a billion degrees outside and that tends to kill my appetite. So now I’m feasting on fruit and water and don’t think I’ll do too bad for the rest of the day. *fingers crossed*

Convention is still going on. Lots of peeps, lots of great int’l food. I’ve been dreaming about the chicken tikka masala which is about 8-10 pts per cup. YIKES. I think I need to dream about the garden salads instead. I plan to be up very late the next couple of nights so if I don’t get on here, I promise to this weekend.

I’m feeling sooo much better now that some of my peeps have found me or I have stalked them… Glad to be back.

It’s so weird not logging into my “watchen” blog. I think I’m experiencing a form of blog withdrawal which now will be known as BW. I’ve been able to view a bunch of your blogs and OMG, ya’ll are amazing. I can’t believe how much work you’ve done with yours already. I’ve GOT to get moving for sure. I miss my “regulars” who were such attitude boosters - and believe you me, I sure could use it today.

I do have good news (so I don’t know why I have a tude today - probably the above mentioned BW)… I weighed in this morning and was mentally calculating the loss and I came to 0.8 lbs. Trust me, after my small gain last week, I was more than happy with it even though it wasn’t humungous. But then I was driving into work and I had this nagging feeling that my math was off. So I pulled out my cell phone and found the calculator on it and recalculated. I was wrong but in my favor. It’s actually 1.2lbs!! Woohoo! I was talking to a couple of the guys at work about how I have 37 lbs until my goal weight. I was kinda saying “wow, that seems like such a long way from now”. My boss said to me, “Do you know how many people try and fail at accomplishing what you’ve done. You’re doing an awesome job!” That’s just sweetness right there. Again, why am I being such a stinker today?

So I can’t wait to reconnect with my weightwatchen family and my new blogger family. I’ve gotta figure this blogger site out! Love you guys!

Ok, so I’m a little nervous. Mainly because I feel as if I’ve gained weight. Do you know what I mean? Bloated, a little gross, haven’t dropped the kids off at the pool in a few days… someone’s gotta know what I mean. Well, I jumped, actually climbed carefully, onto the scale a few days ago (tsk, tsk) and I was up 2 lbs. Yikes! Hoping at the very worst that there is no change from last week. Will you cross your fingers and toes with me?

So I feel like it’s been ages since I’ve posted. It’s actually only been a few days. Let me tell you that my Russian, Ukrainian, Bulgarian and Romanian girls are keeping me quite busy. They are all so precious in their own way. I’m just starting to get to know one of the girls who is very shy around me because her ”English is not so good”. She does struggle but I want so badly to talk to her, laugh with her, tell her how pretty she is and just hang with her. Finally, I got her to a place where she stops running right by me (ant that’s literally…because she is nervous to converse in English)… we went to the mall today and thru her friend who is also Bulgarian I was able to share my heart a little with her. What an awesome time! They LOVED the stores and clothes. When they get their first checks, they will be sure to spend it all in one place. It’s funny because I realized we all have the same needs, no matter what nationality. We need to love and be loved by others. No conditions, no ridicule. Just perfect acceptance. Aaah, I think this is a lifelong lesson, even for ourselves.

Just so you know I’m thinking of ya’ll. I do need to get caught up on my reading.

Love, T

PS. Hey, does anyone know any Bulgarian restaurants in the Maryland area? Gonna have to do some research.

Has anyone seen The Devil Loves Prada? I absolutely loved that movie and all of it’s dysfunction. My weekend made me think of that line. It started out pretty good. I was finally getting past the worst of the cramps and feeling gross so I ventured out with our church’s teens on outreach to our Inner Harbor. I had spent all but 5 of my points that day and wasn’t really dying to use the rest. On a side note: I have this friend who is on what she calls the “Lean Cuisine diet”. IMHO her skinny butt needs to be on a Big Mac diet but oh well. To each his own. My point in mentioning her is because she has been saying after she got past the ‘hump’ of the first four to six weeks on her ‘diet’, she suddenly wasn’t feeling ravenously hungry all of the time. Well I was jealous because here I was entering week 10 and all I can do sometimes is think about and eat food. FINALLY, this week, I felt kinda normal. Hungry only a few times a day. Eating normal sized portions (that would be WW sized portions thank you very much) and I was completely ‘normal’, well as normal as I can be. No crankiness, embarrasing stomach conversations… I was good. That brings me back to Friday night. At the end of the night my friend suggested Ben & Jerry’s. Now, I’m not a huge ice cream fan. Give me cake, cookies, french fries (not all together - I’m not an animal!!) and I’m set. Ice cream I could take it or leave it some days. Well, I stood in line for about 20 minutes trying to figure out what I wanted. I decided I wasn’t in enough of a mood for ice cream that I wasn’t gonna completely blow it, if you know what I mean. So I got a small cup of Half Baked LF Frozen Yogurt. Blech! I did NOT enjoy it. But hey, at least I only used about 2 points on it because I barely made it thru 1/4 of it. That’s where Friday ended. Saturday I work a second job from 12-5 and I was doing fine until about 4ish when I felt one of my massive headaches coming on. Yuck! I finished work, went home, drew all the curtains and went to bed. I woke up the next morning with one of the worst stomach bugs ever! I missed both of my church services, a billion phone calls (mostly from my best friend who I swear acts like I’m a crack addict if I disappear for one day - no offense) and when I got on the scale the next morning I also was missing about 4.5 pounds. My real weigh in is tomorrow so we’ll see how that goes but I just wanted to get ya’ll caught up on the Tina “juicy”. Managed somehow to eat all of my points today although the stomach is really contemplating what it’s next plan is. I can hear the conspiracy. I’m good though. Missed writing to you guys. Thanks for all your comments - even though I suck at times writing back. I’ll work on that. PROMISE! BTW, do any of my friends out there do myspace? Let me know.