Xtine on: The South Beach Diet -- Phase 1

Set your South Beach Phasers to ONE! Fire when ready....

I saw the author plugging his book on one of those morning TV shows, and it worked. I bit. It's time for me to grow up, stop living on grilled cheese sandwiches, lose a few pounds, get healthy, energetic, better looking, more youthful, smarter, happier and taller, all while eating good food, never feeling hungry and learning to live "in the real world". To this end, I bought myself a copy of the newest South Beach Diet book, which promises me all these great outcomes and, if I play along, learning to live "in the real world" to boot (I swear that's in there, I'll quote it with the page when I find it). I always wondered why I had problems with "the real world". Turns out it's because I wasn't living the South Beach lifestyle. Who knew?

A little bit of my dieting history:
I've never been a dieter, because diets seem like, and have been largely proven to be, self torturous ways gain weight. My first experience with diets was in about 8th grade, a late bloomer compared to today's girl who starts dieting approximately right after conception. My youthful diet experiences went like this: starve, feel like crap, get really tired, get cold, lose 5 pounds, lose "willpower", resume eating, pig out, gain 8 pounds back. I learned my lesson after only a few episodes of this and stopped trying to "diet". Also, I hate self discipline (the true reason I don't diet). If I'm going to gain weight, I want to enjoy it! Hence, at the ripe old age of mid 30-something (YES, 38 is MID thirties, in a certain mathematical sense), I only need to lose about 15 pounds, instead of say...much more.

Just for fun (and because nobody's paying attention anyway) I'll keep the blogosphere posted on how it goes. Here is a short summary of the first week of my diet.

Day 0 -4 (zero minus 4): Going on a diet soon, must eat everything in the house that isn't allowed...pig out on steak, bacon, candy, ice cream, chocolate, cheese.

Day 0 -3: Going on a diet soon, must go out to breakfast, lunch and dinner and eat WAAAAAAY too much, and drink several beers too.

Day 0 -2: Going on a diet soon, must eat an entire bag of sweetened dried cranberries while reading the diet book. mmmmm, cranberries...glglglglllllllll

Day 0 -1: Going on a diet soon, must shop for the food whilst still eating all the stuff I'll have to say good bye to.

Shop for first three days of diet (I mean, new lifestyle): glglglgllll. Nothing EVER smelled as delicious as food you cannot have. The first two weeks of this South Beach diet look suspiciously like the Atkins diet to me. Low carb to ween me from my sugar cravings. No bread for two weeks, no rice or spaghetti for two weeks (no great loss), no fruit for two weeks, no sugary anything for two weeks. Oh GOD...how incredibly delicious those oranges smell,and are those Kumquats? Oh gees.....get me out of here.

Pay for first three days: $158. shee-eesh. So far, weight lost: $158 from wallet. My bad, we went to Zupans, the yuppy store with the free range, happy (until recently) meat.

Still on Day 0 -1: Give cranberry products to neighbor. Get these away from me.

Summary so far: I'm going on a diet, so I have to eat more and worse than EVER, and spend two week's worth of food budget on three days' worth of food. Makes sense.

How it's going ON the diet:
Diet, day 1 (yesterday): Ok, I am already NOT keen on the no carbs thing. Yeah, vegetables have carbs. But they are NOT my beloved cranberries. Most of the day goes ok, but I made this yucky healthy dinner crap. Expensive too, with the fancy pants free range ground sirloin and organic edamame we put in there. If I am going to make this a lifestyle, I am going to have to find food I like better than this. Yes, mashed cauliflower LOOKS a little like rice. So do ant larvae...

Joke #1: How do you confuse edamame (a vegetarian's best friend)? Answer: Cook it with hamburger.
Joke #2: How do you waste delicious sirloin burger? Answer: Cook it with Edamame and mashed cauliflower.

Diet, night 1: I miss my cranberries. Who knew? My biggest sugar craving is for cranberry things, not candy, not cake, not ice cream...cranberries. I've always loved cranberries, now it's my confirmed true love (shh, don't tell Taylor). My forced separation from them is going to be hard. All night, didn't sleep well. Dreamed about cranberries (not making this up).

Diet, day 2 (today): Got on the scale. 142.5. Only lost .5 of a pound. Hmm. Taylor says this is good. I think it's probably just water weight. Well, whatever, I'll take it. Feeling a little odd without my sugar. Feels similar to caffeine withdrawal. Eat what appears to be a normal breakfast, eggs and veggie sausage things, just no toast or juice. Lunch, vegetable stuff, snack, vegetable stuff, dinner...I don't even LIKE vegetables all that much...vegetable stuff. Desert, blended up fake sugar, vanilla and ricotta. Interesting concept, kind of chalky. I don't feel hungry, but I don't feel normal.

8pm... BAM (needle ripping off record sound)...off the wagon for the first time. I cracked....chocolate milk. Taylor had some too. Should've given the chocolate syrup away with the cranberries.

There's already talk about scrapping this low carb nonsense. We'll see. I do like the promises of "fast weight lose in phase 1". But for truely effective fast weight loss, you can't beat amputating a leg. Take it off, keep it off. That's what I say.

Taylor is coming along for the ride to be supportive in this whole diet debacle, lifestyle adjustment. She doesn't need to lose weight (in fact, needs to NOT lose weight). But she is jazzed that maybe I'll expand my culinary repertoire past grilled cheese lunches and steak dinners.

There you go, close to two days into the South Beach Diet Phase 1, and mostly complying. And now that I've divulged this publicly, I guess I HAVE to go through with it. Ugh.

You know....Photoshop would be a much easier way to get thinner, and taller too.

Dammit, I want cranberries.

Xtine on: The Art of Zen

Periodically, I attempt to be zen (or is it just: attempt zen?). It's part of the American identity, being too busy and adding one more thing to the to do list: zen down. My most Zen time, based on recent observation, is when I'm driving my Miata like a maniac with Madonna blasting on the stereo. This is as "in the moment" as I get. Picture it: driving like a maniac (uncharacteristic for me) while belting out "Like a Virgin". At that moment, it hits me: this is ZEN! Blammo...moment ruined. Uh oh...self, go back to being ZEN! But it just goes downhill from there. The problem with Zen is you can't MAKE yourself be zen. Because then you are not being zen, you are trying to be zen. Being versus trying, you get it. Next, I am thinking about zen and about blogging about zen and about the nature of zen and how to get zen. Then, I catch myself again: you're still not being zen! Ok...be zen...1 2 3 GO....Like a virgin...WOO! zen for the very first time. Crap, made it zen for 4 words. Oh well, zen for four words is better than a sharp stick in the eye.

Suggestions for (legal) zen inducing activities:
The Classical:
Meditation
Yoga
Tai Chi
Rock garden
Say OOOOOM

The Contemporary:
Try to NOT be zen
Say "Terwilliger Curves" ten times fast (also works as a sobriety test)

The Effective:
Drive like a maniac singing your favorite song