Posted on January 14, 2013 by janets123

Some great tips here for all of us. Part of a plan!

hungryandfit's avatarhungry and fit

The holidays are never easy for those trying to maintain or lose weight. Never ever. You’re typically surrounded by family shoving food in your face like ham and cookies. We’ve created a guide that you should follow to weather this tumultuous season. Let’s stay on track!

  1. Exercise or MOVE 30 minutes a day. Minimum. That sounds like a lot. It’s not. Walk the dog, take a brisk walk round the neighborhood, scrub the floors, hop on the treadmill or elliptical. It is worth it. 
  2. Limit yourself to 2-3 treats a week. This plays a big part in maintaining all of your progress. Don’t binge on treats all the time, it’s about moderation.
  3. Strength train 2-3 times a week. Whether that means getting on the floor and doing core work, picking up weights, or using machines in a gym facility, get your muscles working. Keep up the toning and strength…

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Fitness Failure

Posted on January 12, 2013 by janets123

Every January our gym has an influx of new people coming in to fulfill their New Year’s resolutions to start a fitness regime. For the most part, they don’t stay with it very long.

Resolutions don’t work for most people and I am surprised we keep making them and breaking them and never seem to learn.

I joined a gym over three years ago. When I started my exercise routine (after a hiatus of twenty-seven years) I found I not only lost weight but a lot of other unwanted things went away, like high blood pressure and achy joints. So I stayed with it.

They say exercise releases endorphins, too. I think I’m hooked on those. There for a while, I felt so good I could hardly contain it. I went around grinning like a fool, giggling at nothing and running across the parking lot with the shopping cart. I’ve calmed down a little now, but I’m still hooked.

I think a person has to hurt in order to get the endorphins pumping. These new people—the resolutionists—don’t like to hurt. The ladies show up in the latest form-fitting designer outfits but spend their time on a cell phone instead of the ab machine. Some of the guys expend a bunch of energy grunting and clanging the weights. Everyone ignores the grunters and they quickly go away.

My intent here is not to pick on people who resolve to get in shape, but to point out how ineffective resolutions are. A resolution is not a sustainable motivation to make lifestyle changes.

Doing something as a habit requires planning. That is, swapping a bad habit for a good one requires forethought. It won’t happen just because a person wants it.

The habitual unhealthy snack has to disappear from the cabinet. The new healthy substitute has to first go on the grocery list, then be washed, chopped, prepared & put in plain sight.

The habitual inactive activity has to be made somehow inconvenient. Hide the TV remote or remove the comfy chair in front of the PC—something to remind a person to change the habit. The new healthy habit must be scheduled, at least until it becomes automatic. A reminder on the cell phone, a scribble on the calendar or a pop-up on the computer are things that work for me.

I think one of the reasons I remembered to go to the gym, even when my schedule got hectic, was because I talked about it. Everyone who knew me knew I was working out.

“How are you doing, Janet?”

“Oh, I’m feeling great! I’ve been going to the gym and I’m losing weight and getting strong.”

The next time I’d see this person, she’d ask me if I was still working out. I wanted to be able to say yes. I had made myself accountable to everyone I knew.

For a time, I also planned my day around my workout. When I started out the door for the office, I had my gym clothes either in a bag or laid out on the bed. If someone asked me to dinner, I accepted if we could go early so I could still make it to the gym. Until the habit became habitual, I had to make it a priority.

If your New Year’s resolution concerns healthy lifestyle changes, I hope you make a plan that will make it happen. I would hate to see you become a fashion diva, a grunting, clanging, cell-phone-yakking fitness failure.

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Posted on December 25, 2012 by janets123

I *BLOVE* WHAT SHE SAYS ABOUT “a Southern woman’s dressing recipe!” Gonna try these biscuits soon.~ Janet S.

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Famous Last Recipes

Posted on December 25, 2012 by janets123

Holidays are times of feasting—days when we get together with friends and family to share food…and either conversation or football.

At every event someone inevitably turns up with a great new dish we all enjoy. He or she is rewarded with accolades and folks clamoring for the recipe.

I am happy when a diner asks for my recipe. I feel like I’ve accomplished my goal of making something exceptional, or at least I’ve created a foodstuff worthy of imitation or duplication.

All my recipes are written down. They are most specific. If I say to use a bag of marshmallows or a can of milk, I’ll tell you how many ounces because manufacturers can change their standards. I’ll tell you what size and shape of baking pan to use and whether or not to grease it. I want you to have success.

Often what I get in return is less than I’d hoped for. The cook may rattle off a list of ingredients as if he or she thinks I can remember all that. When I do get a written recipe with instructions, it may be full of ambiguities such as “a large can of beans” or “put in a pan” or “cook until done.”

I’m not sure if this is a subtle way of guarding a secret or a cook’s code I’ve never learned but recipes like this never seem to turn out right for me. What is “large” to my family of two might be small to the cook who routinely serves eight at her table. “Chop” can mean anything from 1/2-inch cubes to a fine dice. Results can vary widely. The whole point of a recipe, I thought, was to give instruction.

My late husband’s grandmother made a family-famous pound cake no one could duplicate, though she gave oral instruction to several people. Hers was moister than any recipe and the closest I ever came to it was a whisky cake or the Bacardi rum cake. I suspect the little teetotaler had a secret ingredient she was reticent to admit.

A couple of years ago, our bible study group was planning a Mexican dinner and we were asked to bring salsa. This is Texas; one does not bring salsa in a jar labeled “Pace.” We decided to try to make my sister-in-law’s salsa recipe. It was so widely sought after, she had typed it up and distributed it to all the family members. My husband had a copy.

This was one of those vague recipes using “big cans” of tomatoes, “full peppers” and a “bunch of cilantro.” After much discussion, we decided to leave the seeds and membranes in the peppers and chop the whole bundle of cilantro as it is sold in the store. All this was supposed to “fill a regular size blender,” yet contain “2 big cans” of tomatoes.

Our salsa came out green instead of red. It tasted decidedly like cilantro, even overwhelming the jalapenos and serranos, garlic, onion and cumin. Everyone politely tasted it; then we took it home and composted it. Whatever “a bunch” is, it is not the whole bundle. I kept the recipe but labeled it: DID NOT TURN OUT WELL.

This year I’ve been asked to make my mother-in-law’s popular cornbread stuffing. I’ve been told it uses a bag of Fritos, two eggs, some celery and onion and two cans of cream of chicken soup. Oh, boy!

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Feeding Bears

Posted on December 12, 2012 by janets123

For a few years, I lived in the foothills of the Winding Stair Mountains. From time to time a hungry black bear would wander down from his home in the heights.

I never saw any bears but I observed the evidence of their visit. One year was particularly a bear year.

Friends driving by saw a bear crossing the highway near our mailbox and sent a postcard to warn me. I freaked out when I found his huge footprints in the sandy soil at the bottom of our driveway. Whoever said black bears are small…well, he wasn’t comparing them to people.

About that time, a neighbor dropped in to tell us a bear had visited his cabin and torn the water-catching system all to bits. He tracked him to his mom’s place where Bruin had found her 35-gallon bird seed barrel, chewed it open and emptied it.

His mother was very fond of wild birds and enjoyed feeding them on winter weekends when she could get out to her cabin. Little did she know she was feeding bears!

During the same season, an acquaintance told me she had a bear visiting every day, eating up the sweet horse feed her husband had overstocked and stored under a tarp. After the feed was all gone, the bear went away.

I took extra precautions that year. I never went more than a few yards from the house without a gun. I led the dog to the tracks in the sand and gave him a stern lecture about the animal associated with the scent. I stopped putting out suet.

Now I am living smack in the middle of a huge city and there are no bears. I still think about the bear year when I fill the bird feeders.

I figure much of the birdseed won’t make it into bird tummies. Depending on what I throw out, I feed skunks, possums, raccoons, armadillos, squirrels, mice and gray foxes. There are semi-feral cats hungry enough to eat cornbread after dark. I’ve seen the foxes licking dirt for crumbs of stale bread, cooked rice and pie crust. Apple cores and corn cobs, thrown over the fence for the deer, disappear overnight.

I don’t suppose it is my job to determine who eats what or how much. They are all God’s creatures, even little black bears.

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Posted on December 4, 2012 by janets123

I can relate. Maybe you can also. Words worth reading.

GinAndTulips's avatarGin and Tulips

Nobody knows what breath
is breathed
in the quiet of thoughts – whilst
secret smiles are adorned
in the privacy of letters

Eyes that look upon a word
with wonder, flutter with the anticipation of others; a pair that
seem to see everything
but them

Silent kisses wash reality with the
art of calligraphy
curling up and over with the desire
to be more than mere ink

But ink and words and letters
stain paper like the heart; drying
with a resonance that makes
birds sing whilst
Lovers cry love, to love

Foolish lips drink and daydream
whilst hands perfect the
fountain pen, pouring out lust
and adoration
all over the page

in fits of uncertified madness

from nature, itself.

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It’s a Short Life

Posted on December 4, 2012 by janets123

We met through an online dating service, chatted on the screen and exchanged phone numbers. We talked every night for three and a half weeks. When we prepared to meet face-to-face for the first time, my new beau asked me what I was going to be wearing.

“So you’ll know it’s me?” I asked.

No, he had my picture. He even had a photo of my car, albeit buried under snow. He was simply curious what I’d choose and maybe wanted a mental picture to feed his anticipation.

“I don’t know yet,” I told him. I honestly hadn’t planned. “It will be a dress or a skirt, though.”

“I like color,” he said. “Life’s too short for a gray t-shirt.”

I was a little bit insulted. “I’m not going to wear a t-shirt to our first meeting. It’s important to me.”

He told me what he meant was he liked to dress up. He said he sees people out in public wearing wrinkled clothes, blah things they simply plucked out of a drawer without much thought for appearance.

This man who would become my husband had not yet told me his shirt collection took up most of the guest room. His jeans are starched, he wears cuff links at every opportunity and he can color-coordinate with anything I pick out of my closet. He doesn’t even own a gray t-shirt.

His philosophy carries over into other aspects of life and I’m learning to adopt it as my own. I suppose I could say, “Life’s too short for canned soup. Life’s too short to stay home watching other people’s drama. Life’s too short for a bad attitude.”

Life on earth is brief, especially when one gets to the other side of fifty. I still want to see the Mediterranean. In the last two years I stood at the edge of the Grand Canyon and slid down a ski slope on my derriere. I took an ocean cruise to the Bahamas, saw manatees, sharks and dolphins. I finally went white-water rafting. I picked up sea shells at Corpus Christi. I rode a Jet-Ski. I fell in love.

Since I wed my husband and adapted his gray t-shirt philosophy, life hasn’t gotten any less short but it has certainly become fuller. I don’t think I’ll ever go back to gray t-shirts.

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When I Am Well

Posted on November 27, 2012 by janets123

My husband caught a cold while vacationing in warm, sunny climes. I didn’t!

Nursing him through two weeks of puniness, I lavished him with hugs and kisses and Echinacea and I still didn’t get sick.

Finally, the day he said, “I think I’m just about over this,” I came down with a sore throat. Next morning, well, it’s my turn and he’s not keen on kissing anymore.

It has been about ten days now and “I think I’m just about over this!”

For ten days, I have been wanting to do things and waiting to do them “when I am well.” My house is dusty, the bathtub is overdue for a scrubbing and there are cactus cuttings lying along the fence row awaiting collection and disposal.

I think being under the weather is great therapy for procrastinators. Curled up under an afghan, sipping Mullein tea, reading Edward Trencom’s Nose, I actually wanted to clean the bathtubs. I ached to get out there in the sunshine and wrestle those cactus spines into a plastic bag.

Today I am going to the gym for the first time in nearly two weeks. I dread it because I know my stamina isn’t what it should be. I’ll probably get sore muscles. I hope it doesn’t make me cough. Yet, it will be good to get back into my routine and feel normal again.

Yesterday I wrote a page for the devotional–the first in about two weeks. It felt good to be accomplishing something.

Thinking about all the things I was going to do “when I am well,” I think I’m going to be really busy for the rest of my life. Yee-haw!

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Geese

Posted on November 12, 2012 by janets123

One of the things I enjoy about autumn is the apparent heightening of the senses. The increased humidity means smells loiter in the air. As the sun moves out of the way a bit, colors seem brighter. Cooler weather means more baked goods in the oven and stews that simmer a while, heightening our enjoyment of foods we haven’t enjoyed for a season. The sparse leaves block less sound; it travels farther and seems to linger longer in the damp.

Yester-eve I carried some leftovers out for the night creatures and discovered a plethora of birds waiting in the dense cover. The Juncos (snowbirds) are here already and joined the cardinals and jays in the pip-pip of settling down for the night.

I also heard an unusual bird sound I couldn’t quite pinpoint. The guttural, vibrating call was unfamiliar though I instinctively knew it was a bird. I stood still, trying to figure out where it came from and to see if I could spot the caller. The sound seemed to be moving from left to right.

Finally, I looked up. The noisemakers had arrived en masse and in flight. There were four big “V” formations of geese strung across the evening sky, merrily honking their way south.

Geese make me think of people, traveling in a crowd. Their lines are jaggedly forming, breaking and reforming. They seem to have a great deal to discuss.

“Have you been this way before? How long is the trip? Are there good places to stop over? Do you think it will be a long winter? Are your children with you?”

Two hundred geese make a dramatic impact on the evening sky. Autumn wouldn’t be the same without them and I feel blessed to be in their audience.

* Photo of migrating geese by Brocken Inaglory, shared on Wikipedia page: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Snow_geese_and_ducks_at_sunset.jpg

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Wobbly Walking

Posted on November 3, 2012 by janets123

Elissa thru glass of museum

Before marrying my fun, wonderful, affectionate, generous and kind husband, he told me he liked ocean cruises. I had never been on a cruise but I *blove* movies and books about ships and the sea-coast and anything to do with the ocean. I was captivated by “Blue Lagoon” and its sequel, watched all the “Horatio Hornblower” episodes and tried twice to read Swiss Family Robinson all because those stories involve ships and shipwrecks and the sea and shore.

Since I was a kid, I’ve thought I’d like to take a cruise on a sailing ship. You know, the kind with canvas sails? They’re the sort that sway and lean, get becalmed without wind and sometimes sink in storms. There’s something dreamy and romantic about the thick ropes, sturdy wood deck, stretched canvas on tall masts, big wooden wheel and polished wood railings with brass fittings.

I once toured the Elissa, a tall sailing ship docked at Galveston. Never mind she was built in 1877 and should have retired fifty years ago, she’s a beautiful sailing ship, with a mammoth iron anchor, masts and canvas and hammocks and everything kept sea-worthy. Occasionally, I dream of taking passage on a ship just like her.

 There’s just one problem, or maybe two. One—I can’t swim, even after twice taking lessons from a professional. Two—I get sick on a fishing dock with movement so subtle most people don’t even feel it.

I’m game for anything my honey proposes, so we cruised the Eastern Caribbean as soon as we got married and this year we saw highlights of the Yucatan peninsula, including Cozumel Island. We sailed, even if our ship didn’t have any canvas.

I didn’t have to swim, though I was particularly attentive during the emergency drill, studied the disaster evac plan and checked out the life jackets in our stateroom.

And I didn’t get seasick. I carried my Dramamine on board and never opened it. I did not enjoy the rolling of the ship but I guess I got used to it. The only time I found it worthy of negative comment was when seated at the dining table and when trying to walk down a long hallway to our cabin.

Ship passengers learn an adaptive walk that includes a wider stance and flat-footed steps. Sideways stumbles are accepted as necessary to right oneself when the ship doesn’t go the direction one expects. Everyone is staggering as if slightly tipsy. It makes me feel a little foolish, which makes me giggle, which generally confirms the onlooker’s suspicion.

We debarked (got off the ship) at several ports and I didn’t notice any difficulty getting my land legs back under me. Home now two days, though, I’m still doing the wobbly walk and still giggling. I’m starting to wonder if this might be a permanent effect of sailing without canvas.

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