What a difference a flat road makes

It only took me two weeks, but I can now say I've completed Week One of Couch to 5K. A huge shout-out to Gingerzingi for inspiring me to begin it.

I know you're supposed to let a day or two go between workouts, but I got a little carried away yesterday when my husband and I were walking on Indian Creek Road. It's flat, since it runs alongside a meandering creek, and it was Friday and I was feeling pretty good. So I did back-to-back training runs smack-dab in the middle of a long walk.

My husband doesn't like to walk fast any more. There was a time when he would challenge himself to step up his pace, but those days are long gone. Nowadays he ambles. So yesterday's companionable walk turned into five miles for him and six for me, in the same amount of time.

Doing the Cto5K part on a flat road was a big improvement over my hilly route. See?

Here's the Thursday-to-Friday side-by-side comparison.

So I got home, had a little lunch and rested for a bit, with every intention of mowing the grass in the afternoon. I headed out at 2-ish, first to grab some antique software CDs for my husband to tie strings to. We're going to attach them to the fence around the garden, hoping they will scare the deer away.

As I was removing the envelopes from the pile of CDs, I heard an all-too-familiar sound. It was raining. Again. And a lot. Over the next four hours we had .8 of an inch.

And the grass – and weeds – keep on growing.

Jen asked in a comment how I liked The End of Overeating. Here's what I've written about it previously.

David Kessler, MD, points out how the food industry has employed sugar, salt and fat to hijack our collective appetite, which he contends has led to American's obesity epidemic. (Did you hear Mexico has overtaken the U.S. as the #1 fattest-country?) As a former head of the FDA, he has excellent credentials. But his advice on how to overcome it – think how bad you'll feel after you eat ice cream, for instance – isn't anything we haven't heard/read/said to ourselves before.

And it's not like food manufacturers are ditching their sugar-salt-fat formulas to make it any easier.

The book was published four years ago. I think there's been a slight shift in the last few years away from processed and fast foods, though I have no statistics to back that up. Maybe it's just that I hang out with people who cook at home and from scratch.

My own experience, from a five-year stretch 20 years ago AND over the past three months has shown me that going sugar-free is a very good thing. I also hopped on the low-fat bandwagon back in the day, and definitely lost weight, but also lost good skin tone and shiny hair. I've never worried much about salt, but I also don't use a lot of it.

In the end, reading the book was enlightening, but it didn't really change my eating habits. I was already a make-it-from-scratch cook, and the only thing I bought at McDonald's was iced coffee.

If you've been reading this blog for any length of time, you know what has been working for me. Ditching grains, legumes, dairy and sugar all at the same time would have been unthinkable to me until I was ready. I had to hit a point of frustration where I would try anything, and anything turned out to be the GLDS-free plan.

I sure as hell couldn't be approaching 12-minute miles (not that that's a fast pace, but it's fast for me!) if I were still hauling around 35 extra pounds.

Jen, I'll hang on to this book. If you don't want it, I can always take it to the library sale later. If you do, send me your address in a private message on Facebook and I'll pop it in the mail to you.

Friday Quote Day

The discipline of writing something down
is the first step toward making it happen.
~ Lee Iacocca

Studies have shown that keeping a food journal is one of the most powerful tools in the dieter's arsenal.

So why don't I keep a food journal?

I bought a nifty software program that I used for months (not that it helped me lose any weight or anything), but as I have shifted my diet toward eating more whole foods and fewer processed products, the program has become more cumbersome. In order to calculate the nutritional data in my Friday night pizza, I have to enter each ingredient incorporated in the crust and each topping, then divide by six or four, depending on how big I cut the pieces.

Much more time-consuming than just clicking on one of Pizza Hut's menu items or one of the frozen selections at the market.

I liked using it, 'cause I'm geeky and 'cause it did all the calculations for me. It even created a pie chart (mmm, pie!) displying the breakdown of protein, fat and carbs, which was very helpful when I was following a low-carb/high-protein plan.

As my meal plans have moved toward real food, I'm leaning toward using a notebook and a pencil to record my food data. But I'd still have to calculate the data for Friday night pizza one ingredient at a time.

So the ultimate question is: How badly do I want to be thin? What am I willing to do? I'll admit I haven't put my heart and soul into this lately. After three years of slowly gaining and/or staying the same, it has become more and more difficult to stick to a plan that feels like no fun at all.

I'm reading The End of Overeating, and have finally gotten to the last few chapters where the author really gets down to the nitty-gritty of developing your own personal plan for weight control. And while he says it must not feel restrictive (because restrictive diets are doomed to fail), I have to admit my mind isn't ready for such a complete overhaul.

But I wrote this stuff down, so maybe I'm taking the first step.