So much love

So today I got to run triage by myself and it was empty one minute and then wa-bam! Majorly busy! But, the nurses were amazing and there were lots of happy new moms. But, the most loving part of my day was how many of my friends took a moment out of their days to give me some love and encouragement. For whatever reason, the heavens aligned and I got a voicemail, texts, and blog comment loving. So, thank you for that - it made my day awesome!

My day was also awesome because I went to Zumba today with one of my fellow interns. I forgot how much I love Zumba! At the YMCA in Grand Rapids, I used to go to Zumba all the time - it was a TON of fun because the instructor used to incorporate a lot of popular music and her dances were super intense. Here, the intensity wasn't quite what it was in GR, but it was still a fun way to get a workout in. I'm super glad I went and coaxed a friend along - it's always more fun to go to the gym with a friend. Also, I scoped out the elliptical situation at this branch of L.A. Fitness and they have 7 of the good ellipticals (vs. 5 at the one I usually go to), so maybe I'll do my cardio days there and my strength days at the branch closer to where I live because their strength area is much larger.

Moving on to the eats part of my day - today I was waaaay hungrier than usual. I think it's because I'm a few days away from my period and right before my period, I want to eat all the things. And I was super tempted today. Thursday is our lecture/learning day and that means they bring in a carb tray and a fruit tray. The carb tray is loaded with bagels, muffins, and donuts. The fruit tray is loaded with lots of waxy-looking fruit: apples, oranges, and bananas (nothing that awesome when it comes to fruit). Naturally, I chose a blueberry bagel (it had fruit in it...) and later I had a blueberry muffin. I can't tell you how many times I had to talk myself out of a donut. There were several times when I was alone in the lounge with the carb tray and I almost went for it. Then I had to remind myself of my 6 pound shoe goal and I made it without grabbing any more carbs. And now, food photos pour toi:

Breakfast with the last of my farmer's market strawberries

Lunch: bagged salad, chicken cordon bleu and a spoonful of veggie lasagna

Probably the most delicious protein bar I've ever had - a Trader Joe's find
Definitely has to be an occasional treat tho - it had 200 calories!

Dinner: half a sandwhich(ish) and some dill pickles - yum!

In other news, tomorrow is my first meeting with my personal trainer and I've got a dinner date with some med school friends. I'm super pumped for that. I'm also super pumped because I just found out that in apology for an early Thursday, Fridays we start late - we don't sign out until 8:00 a.m., which means I only have to be there by 7:30 a.m. to round, rather than 5:30 a.m. like today. BALLER.

Since I got a lot of loving today, what's something you like to do to make others feel a little extra loved during the day? Also, what do you like?

Hail to the victor!

Last week, the scale looked like this:

This week, it looks like this:

Yup, same exact thing. Except my toes were prettier a week ago. I already knew this was going to be the case because of my crappy weigh-in yesterday, but boooooo. I really want this scale to move! So, I'm working on it. I went to the gym to do some heart rate cycling this morning and burned off 400 calories in 40 minutes. Not too shabby.


Work was super boring today. I didn't have much to do, so I sat at my desk and read the third book in The Hunger Games series on my computer via my kindle app. I also read it at the gym on my phone. Mark was not too thrilled that I found a way around my punishment. I told him that it must suck to lose, but that I wouldn't know because I always win. He pushed me pretty hard today to seek his revenge, but I performed beautifully despite him rocking the Bosu ball when I was standing on it, purposely counting wrong to make me do more reps, and winning the 100 ab/oblique challenge. Suck it, Mark. Not only do I still have access to my books, but I achieved every task you set for me and then some. Hail to the victor/me!


Anywho, backing up a tad. After the gym this morning, I made my favorite breakfast bagel.

It had two egg whites, turkey, and chive and onion cream cheese on an everything bagel.


During lunch, I went and picked up my bike since it was finally fixed. I am happy to report that it no longer looks like this. Thank goodness! I was in a hurry, so I didn't go on a test ride, but I did give the handlebars and seat a good tug to make sure they actually stayed put. We'll see for sure tomorrow morning when I take it out again!


Also during lunch, I made the first part of the fruit pizza I'm taking to Matt's house this weekend.

This is the sugar cookie crust. Now, normally when I make fruit pizza, a lot of the cookie dough finds it's way into my mouth and then my jaw seizes and I have no choice but to swallow the dough. Yup, that's exactly what happens. However, none of the dough found its way into my mouth this time because cookie dough clearly qualifies as dessert and I couldn't ruin my July Challenge. But man, was I ever wishing that it were August! Especially at work when some terrible person coworker of mine brought in a lot of cupcakes left over from their Fourth of July party. Gah. They looked awesome. But none for me. Booo.


Anywho, while the fruit pizza crust was baking, I made my lunch.

I had two pieces of sushi, but I forgot to take a picture before I ate one. Whoops. You can just look at yesterday's lunch if you want to know what two pieces of sushi look like...


So work after lunch was boring and then I came home early because my boss left early and with nothing to do, I wasn't about to stay there and hang out. Mark texted me to say he was going to be late, so I decided to make the rest of my fruit pizza.

This is going to be so freaking delicious! I can't wait to have a few small slices. Wooooot! Unfortunately, while I was peeling the kiwi, the peeler won that fight and I took a chunk out of my index finger which made finishing the fruit pizza a bit difficult. Then I got a text from Mark saying he was going to be on time after all so I had to scurry to finish the pizza without bleeding on it and get dressed for the gym. I still made it on time. I think that's why I won every little argument Mark and I had - because I had already started my awesome streak.


After my workout, I came home, cleaned my kitchen from the fruit pizza making and made dinner: garlic shrimp and sweet potato fries. Yum!

And now I'm updating you before I go read for a bit on my phone and then pack for my weekend in GR with Matt and his lovely family!


Has the scale ever stopped moving for you? What do you do to get it to start again?

I just want to be overweight

I'm going to start out this blog by saying, "Yay me!" I got my butt out of bed this morning and went to the gym. It took me about 5 minutes to convince myself that I wanted to go to the gym, but I did it. Once there, I did about 45 minutes of cardio and then did some upper body strength training. I also did some ab stuff that I've done with Mark, but I'm not entirely sure that I did it right...

After the gym, I came home and had the exact same breakfast as yesterday: eggs (only one full egg and one egg white) and little turkey weenies. Here's a picture just in case your memory is poor.

I got to work right on time and didn't have a whole lot to do, per usual. So, I decided to do some online courses that Lubrizol offers to teach myself a bit more about the industry. Then I came home for lunch. I had an English muffin pizza and some of the leftover beef tenderloin I got for dinner last night.

Amazing dinner from last night

Lunch for today

Also during lunch, I changed my facebook profile picture to this gem that google put up today to honor Bunsen's 200th birthday. Didn't you know I'm a dork?

After lunch, Sheli, Carrie, nor I had a whole lot to do. We hung out in the lab being dorks, and ended up unpacking our four ball machine which arrived today. It's $120,000 worth of sexual jokes and innuendos. Trust me, it's going to be awesome. 

After work, I came home and started making dinner right away because I volunteer at the hospital every Thursday night. Dinner was some Schwann's chicken, some potatoes, and some steamed broccoli. It was pretty good. I was more in the mood for a large donut, some cookie dough, and a side of cake, buuuut, since my goal until the next weigh-in is to log everything I eat (and stay within my calorie ranges), that fantasy meal wasn't about to happen tonight.

Not my fantasy meal, but still pretty good

After dinner, I was pretty pumped to go volunteer tonight. Photographic evidence right here:

There was actually stuff to do at the hospital tonight, but I still got sent home a bit early. So, I went to the mall to pick up my resized ring! Woooot. It fits very well now. I wear it on my right ring finger. So pretty.

Speaking of my right hand, I also wanted to show you my Power Balance wristband. Like I said before, it's supposed to improve your balance and range of motion. I'm still a bit skeptical, but I was able to balance on one leg without falling over for once when I was stretching this week, and I was able to do one of my harder arm exercises without feeling too strained. So I'm glad I got it. And it was a size small. Haha - I can't remember the last time I bought something in a small. And with my poopy progress this week, I'm sure I won't be buying clothes in a size small like...ever.

But I'm going to keep working on it. As I said earlier, my goal is to log everything I eat and stay in my calorie ranges until my next weigh-in. I usually measure everything out with the help of my food scale and measuring cups, but I'm going to have to be extra diligent now, hence me drinking my chocolate almond milk out of a measuring glass.

So hopefully this will help me continue to lose weight and maybe even faster! And in 22 pounds, I will no longer be obese, but simply overweight. I know it sounds weird, but I just want to be overweight. There are a lot less health risks involved in being overweight versus being obese.

Anyway, how was your Thursday? Any fun plans for the weekend?

Willpower FTW!

Ever have one of those mornings when you don't want to get out of bed? That was this morning for me. So I was a tad late for work. But that's not really a bad thing because being that late means that I missed the majority of Carrie's daily unnecessary rambling about about her kids, which is typically the absolute last thing I want to hear about that early in the morning.


I spent most of my morning scrambling to finish an analysis on a sample that would have been done a week ago if Carrie would stop shoving her work off on me and then not updating me with the new information. Grumble, grumble (those are my angry noises). Frustrated when things just wouldn't work, I decided to do some of my own work and then relax a bit before lunch.


During my lunch break, I ran to Jack's, a fruit and meat market near where I work. I was out of veggies to eat with dinner, and I knew I wouldn't have time after work to grab some.


The thing I like most about Jack's is that pretty much all of its produce is waaaay cheaper than meijer's. Also, it's locally owned and all that jazz.

So, I got all of this lovely fresh produce for $4.78. I call that a win - especially since strawberries aren't exactly in season in Michigan...


For lunch, I made a version of my English muffin pizzas. I really like pizza sauce when it's not cooked, so I just toasted the English muffin and then added the sauce and cheese afterwards. I also ate a hunk of honey smoked turkey breast for some lean protein. And I had some strawberries since I don't need to ration them as strictly anymore (being that I have tons more).

And because I was craving it, I decided to have some fudge too.

So far I'm pretty impressed that this thing is still alive and well in my apartment. I'm practicing self control. Shocking, I know. I also practiced some self control later in the day, but let's not get ahead of ourselves.


After getting home from work, I ate some more Schwann's chicken for dinner with garlic potatoes, cauliflower, and some of the broccoli I bought at lunch. Also in the picture are my nerdy salt and pepper shakers that my sister got me for Christmas. In time I will show you the other dorky things I own.

Then I got all dressed up in my volunteer uniform to head to volunteer at the hospital like I do every Thursday night (last Thursday notwithstanding) from 6-9.

I always feel very matronly when I wear it. Probably because the jacket is very shapeless. Anyway, the ER was pretty swamped tonight. People had been waiting up to 6 hours by the time I left. Yikes. Since they were so swamped, they weren't discharging patients very quickly so I didn't have a lot to do. I ended up spending a lot of time in the staff lounge, staring down the delicious pizza sitting right in front of me.

Eventually, I caved and had one piece. Buuuut, I still stayed within my calorie range for the day, so it really wasn't that big of deal. It took a lot of self control for me not to have another piece, or two, which definitely would have thrown me out of my range. One piece packs a ridiculous 14g of fat - that's about 1/3 of the amount of fat I'm supposed to have in one day! I bet the resident who ate three didn't know that... However, one of the nurses ignored the pizza altogether and simply ate a banana when she came in for a quick break. I congratulated her on her self control and she said that she's been trying to lose weight with a group of friends in a friendly competition. She's lost 13 pounds in four weeks. That's pretty impressive. Then we got to talking about what sites we use to track our calories. She made a recommendation, but I really like SparkPeople and I have their app on my phone so I can track easily all day. I also have the app to calculate BMI, to look up calories in certain restaurants, and to estimate my BAC. Yeah...I was kinda bored at work today...


Anyway, after volunteering, I came home and caught most of Grey's Anatomy - for FREE since they still haven't shut off my cable - WOOT! Anyway, I totally predicted the ending. We'll see what they do with this predictable plot twist next week.


I'm really pumped that tomorrow's Friday. These last two weeks of work have been pretty terrible. I don't have any fun plans for the weekend, but I'm just glad that I won't be going to work. Do you have any fun plans for the weekend? Want to come to Midland and hang out with me!?