Food

What is the deal with people who can eat "regular" amounts of food? Why is it that some people eat 1/2 a chicken breast, a few bites of cauliflower and salad, then stop eating? Is it genetic? Is it conditioning? Both?

Sadly, I am on the opposite (and wrong!) end of the eating spectrum. It's all or nothing for me baby! I eat a whole chicken breast, have three helpings of cauliflower, salad and a piece of bread. And even when I am full, I could still eat dessert! I often do!

Arg. It is such a pain. I can fast. I can go days with out eating. And if I didn't have to cook for the fam it wouldn't be that hard.

But put a plate of food in front of me and forget it! It's gone and then some.

This makes body management more and more difficult as I near the big 4 - 0. I weigh less than I used to, but my old pants don't fit! I think all my fat migrated to my middle. Or maybe my weak core is now an old AND weak core, so it sags more.

And don't even get me started on my arms (Please remind me to NEVER wear a sleeveless top for family pictures). Oy. My friend calls it "the arm that ate New York". When you look at the picture, your eyes are magnetically drawn to my white, white, chubby arm. It blots out everything else.

I'm so tired of dealing with food and body stuff. My mom put me on my first diet at 13, so I'm going on almost 30 years of this BS. I guess it's just the cross I bear. My only hope is to keep doing triathlons. I figure if I can still do them, I am not too far gone. And maybe the other triathlete's coolness/healthiness/ability to eat lessness will rub off on me!

Here's to hoping!

You Never Know...

A friend of mine's son was home from school with a fever. It wasn't too high, about 101 degrees. When it didn't go away after several days she took him in to the doctor. They tested him for lots of different things, but couldn't come up with an answer. So they sent him home saying it was probably a virus - he'd get better in a few days.

Well, after two weeks of fever she took him in again. This time the doctor said he would have to be admitted in order to get a CT scan and MRI in a timely manner (apparently if you make an appointment, you have to wait 2 weeks).

So on Tuesday this week they admitted their son to the hospital. I don't know all the details, just that on Wednesday I got an email from her husband saying the doctors now suspect lymphoma. LYMPHOMA! Cancer. I think it is one of the worst kinds too. Man.

Last I heard her son's lumbar puncture and bone marrow tests came out clear. Next their going to remove one of his lymph nodes. Poor little guy. He's 6.

You just never know. You can have a strapping, happy, rambunctious kid one day and the next day - WHAMO! I'm going to TRY to appreciate every moment with my kiddos more. It ain't easy, but when you think about the possibility of losing them....man, can't go there.

A Pretty Nice Day

Woke up. Got out of bed. Dragged a comb across my head.

Beatles moment - sorry.

This morning I awoke all on my own. No "Mama, it's morning time!" today. My girlie slept in later than I did! Woo hoo!

After shuttling Rose back and forth from ballet and doing a few things around the house, I was off. I dropped of Richard at fencing and "aaahhhh" almost three solid hours all on my own! Did I use this time to sit quietly and meditate? Did I take a hike through the redwoods pondering the meaning of life? NO! I went SHOPPING!

I finally found and purchased a trainer for my bike. Now, I can ride, ride, ride to my heart's content with out going anywhere! I just hitch up my spiffy new bike on this thing and pedal away. Too rainy to ride? No problem! Don't feel like dealing with all those hills? No worries! Just hop on my trainer, crank up the tunes and pump. I'm mostly excited because last winter I rode my bike about, well, three times maybe. But not this year! I'll be spinning away in our lovely garage whilst the kids rid real bikes and scooters in front of my house. Nice.

In addition to that exciting purchase, I found some new and needed clothes for Richard on big time sale at Old Navy. It is very strange that my eleven year old son wears men's medium. When he hugs me now, his chin goes over my shoulder. And I am almost 6 feet tall. He is huge. But then we all are (except Joe). When I see my girl Rosie next to the tiny sticks at ballet, well, I'm just glad she's not in school. She is also quite large - in a healthy but unusual way.

On the way over the hill and back I listened to NPR shows about parents with seriously messed up children, and then another piece on adult children dealing with parents with Alzheimer and stuff. As depressing as that sounds, it helped me realize how important every single day is. And how much I love my Mom and my family. I cried a few times in the car.

Picked up Richard from fencing, where his coach told me how pleased he is with Richard, and how he almost beat the best (16 year old) guy on the team today. Nice. Back home I tried out my cool new bike trainer. Joe made me wear a helmet. Boy did I feel like a dork. Until I wobbled once and my bike came off the trainer. Then I realized that he was (urg!) probably right. I hate that! I look totally dweeby wearing a helmet on a trainer.

A nice shower and then a relaxed dinner making time with a glass of wine. Tacos were enjoyed by all. And a little ice cream after! Mmmmmm....

Here's where I'm not such a great mom. I love watching movies. And I probably let my kids watch movies that I shouldn't. When Richard was 5 or 6 he was so sheltered and sensitive he couldn't watch The Lion King. But over the years standards have relaxed and now my 7 year old Rose watches Lord of the Rings movies. And worse...tonight we watched part of Braveheart.

Remember that movie with Mel Gibson about the Scottish guy fighting the English. Well, I remembered to skip the sex scene, but I forgot about the:
1. hanging dead bodies
2. graphic slitting of throats
3. sexual content (English lords practicing Prima Noctis - ugh)
4. general bloody fighting

So, I'm like, "Close your eyes!" and "OK, he's going to kill her now". Rose keeps asking "Why are they doing that?" and "What is he doing?" so I have to keep a running commentary going the whole time.

It's a great movie. One of my favorites. But I think I let my enthusiasm affect my mothering judgement. I'm scared to see what I'll let my baby Marie watch. Already she walks around saying things like, "My baby is dead. She got killed by a soldier." I think she got it from Andrew's LOTR computer game. I don't know. I am a bad mom.

Joe is at a birthday party for a friend. His parting words were, "I won't be gone long". Yeah right! He loves parties. He'll be there for many hours, which is fine with me because at least he'll have been there long enough for any effects of whatever he drinks to wear off.

So all in all, it was a pretty nice day.

Good night blog.

Desserts

What is your favorite dessert?

I mean what really makes your mouth water and your heart go BOOM BOOM BOOM?

I know, I know....it is impossible to pick just one. So to make this do-able I have chosen 5 dessert categories. You can choose one favorite from each category. I have included my own.

Category 1 (the most important): Ice Cream
JAVA CHIP! The combination of sweet mocha ice cream with dark chocolate chunks........ oh yeah baby... (though a nice hot fudge sundae with mint chip ice cream is pretty dreamy too)

Category 2: cookies
This one is tougher. I think I have to pick chocolate chip cookies if they are made right (LOTS of chips and the perfect balance of chewy and crunchy). But then again, a good peanut butter cookie really hits the spot once in a while. Then there's Scottish short bread.......difficult.

Category 3: cakes
Chocolate ganache cake with rasberry sauce

Category 4: pies, tarts
Two way tie: lemon cream tart and ollallaberry pie a la mode

Category 5: candy
No brainer: Leonidas chocolate ganache truffles

How about you?

Back to School

I guess "back to school" for me has meant "away from my blog" this year. It must be that my thoughts are all over the place, and my schedule has been "kicked up a notch" as Emeril would say.

Sometimes I sit in front of my computer with a decent block of time to write, but just can't reign in the old thought process. When you are responsible for feeding, educating, clothing, cleaning, emotionally supporting, transporting and generally loving three kids I guess there's not always a lot of brain cells left over for poor old blog. Awwww....Poor blog.

Another stumbling block to writing is the fact that my hubby and my son read this blog. You don't know how many times I've started to dive into some really juicy situation going on in the fam, when suddenly......... "Doh!" I can't write about THAT!

If I do I'll either:
a) get a talking to from Joe
b) embarrass / traumatize Richard
c) both of the above

Hey, this is like therapy. Complaining about all the obstacles in the way of me doing what is good for me. How much do I owe?