Just a brief update. The diet is going reasonably well; tonight right after dinner I had some milk and a pear and felt like I’d eaten too much, which is probably a good thing. The food continues to be tasty; the breakfasts have not been too interesting but the lunches and dinners have been quite good. I saw my first fake meat in tonight’s Tamale Veggie Pie, and the Black Bean & Feta Wrap I had for lunch was really good, as was the little wild rice dish that went with it, which had chopped pecans and cranberries. Yummy stuff, I’m enjoying the food on this diet. Still get hungry though; hopefully that will change.

I used to have a separate site for diet journaling, but I never kept up with it so I’m just going to make my comments here. I realize not everybody wants to read this stuff, so I’m going to hide it.
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This morning I signed up for Diet to Go, a frighteningly expensive diet plan. At about $435/month, it’s more than a Weight Watchers membership and probably more than Jenny Craig or anybody else. So why am I doing it? Well, I’m tired of seeing the scale go up instead of down. I feel quite frustrated because as far as I can tell, I have been eating pretty well, and it’s not working, which just makes me want to throw up my hands altogether. So on Tuesday and Friday evenings for the entire month of January, I am going to stop at their office near my work and pick up the meals for the next few days.

I signed up for the 1200-calorie/day vegetarian plan, for three meals a day. Someone who works for my company also uses Diet to Go and he said he started on the three meal plan but soon realized he could put together his own breakfasts more cheaply; I have decided to start with three meals anyway because I want to see if it really works. This does depend, of course, on not eating anything but what they supply to me. That’s how I’m going to look at it mentally: NO cheating. There will still be other food in the house, of course - I don’t live alone - but I think I can mentally handle the concept of “no, you can’t have that, it’s not on your plan.” But that has to apply to everything - I think my weakness has been the “eat what you want” attitude of simple calorie counting and Weight Watchers. So I’m going to try the approach of not eating anything I want.

I’m still sedentary, and I need to change that too, but meanwhile I’m going to start Diet to Go and see how that goes for a month.

I started a new blog, bringing me to a total of three blogs I write, on three subjects. There’s Amanita.net (the main site, mirrored at LiveJournal), the still-fairly-new CyDy Blog (part of the Cyber Dyke Network), and my brand-spanking-new Diet Grrl (it’s pronounced like riot grrl…get it?).

Yes, it is a weight loss blog. Those aren’t always interesting, but I’m not necessarily writing it for a huge audience. In fact, I’m pretty much only writing it for me. I do, however, welcome friends to read it (there’s an Atom feed available) and comment if they are so inclined. It’s at Blogspot because I already had that account (since early 2001, actually) and I figured I might as well do something with it, but I wanted to keep it separate from my own domain. So if you’re a friend, and you’re interested, feel free to visit Diet Grrl…but don’t feel obligated, because you’re not! It’s just my own babble about my diet.

Yay, I am proud of myself! The nutritional information sign in the cafeteria today said that a serving of Pad Thai was 12 ounces, for 399 calories and 16 grams of fat. I ordered it with tofu and brought it to the counter, then put it on the scale (usually used for salads) to see how much it weighed. (This puzzled the cashier at first, because the Pad Thai was a flat $4.99 and not sold by weight, but she figured out what I was up to.) It was 1.4 pounds - almost 18 ounces! I was pretty annoyed that the cook behind the Pad Thai line was giving more than the suggested serving, but I managed to only eat half! I threw the rest of it out rather than saving it for later. So I ended up having nine ounces (still 9.5 WW points) and I’m pretty happy with myself for taking portion control into my own hands.

I am down one pound from last week, having weighed in this morning at 164.5. Actually, the scale was playing games with me this morning, as I’ve heard digital scales are wont to do. First it said 167, and I didn’t like that so I got back into bed and lay awake thinking about my weight. Fifteen minutes later I got up again, got back on the scale, and was dismayed to see it read 167.5! I stepped off, let it clear, and got back on - 164.5, and when I repeated the process I got 164.5 again. Given what I’ve learned in the past week about appropriate eating habits, and the best way to work the Weight Watchers FlexPoints plan, that sounds right. I figure two out of four tries having the same result, and knowing what I now know about eating, a one-pound loss sounds accurate. I have exactly 49 days until my goal, which is October 18th, the day we leave on the cruise. I want to be 150 when we go on the cruise, which means I have to lose 2.07 pounds/week between now and then. I don’t realistically see that happening, so I won’t be at 150 for the cruise, but I’m going to keep it as my goal and get as close as I can. Heck, with the 160s plateau I’ve been on, I’ll be glad just to make it into the 150 range, and I know I can do that!

Actually, it’s heaven in a 1.2oz package (34g for you metric types). I am referring to the Reese’s 1 gram Sugar Carb peanut butter cups, designed for low carb lifestyles. Normally I would shun anything that promotes itself as low-carb, because they are not low-calorie. The only exception I’ve made so far is for a “carb control” bread for making sandwiches when the store didn’t have any other diet breads. But I saw the Reese’s cups in the snack bar at work, and I peered at the nutrition facts. To my amazement, this was worth getting! I promptly bought it ($1.40 is a small price to pay for peanut buttery goodness) and brought it back to my desk. Upon opening the wrapper, I was greeted by the familiar but infrequently-enjoyed smell of Reese’s peanut butter cups. I love Reese’s products - I rank them very high among my favorite foods, and I’ve been dying for a peanut butter cup lately. (The snack bar does have the individually-wrapped mini-cups, which are one WW point each, but I avoid those because they just leave me wanting more.)

Before I even removed a cup from the package, I dashed off an e-mail to my girlfriend telling her of my find and asking if she wanted me to save her the other cup. While waiting for her response, I pulled out the first cup and it smelled wonderful. As I peeled the paper wrap away, I could see that the chocolate was normal depth for a Reese’s cup, unlike the Dream bar which has a chocolate coating so thin you can see through it all the way around. There was one spot where the chocolate was thinner (this is typical even on regular cups) and I could see that the filling was a different color than the usual orangey peanut butter. It’s much more pale - a very light shade of ecru, actually. I ate the cup slowly, because it was good. The texture is different, too: it’s more dry than the regular kind, and perhaps a bit stiffer (less creamy). The taste is obviously not the same, but it’s not bad.

When I am on a diet, my standards adjust downward and I’m more accepting of a boring option if it’s lower in WW points than the full-blown kind. I think that’s what happened here: because I’m on a diet, I rate these low-carb Reese’s cups as excellent! If I weren’t on a diet, I’d want the real thing, but I will gladly pay twice as much for this treat.

[Nutrition facts for the regular cups are here. Nutrition facts for the new cups are here for now.]

I was at my usual workplace today - I’m normally only there Tuesdays, Wednesdays and Thursdays - so I brought my gym bag with me and did 30 minutes on the elliptical. It doesn’t make up for only going once last week and going off my diet for the weekend (we ordered Chinese food Saturday and went to IHOP on Sunday, yum), but I do feel better for having done it. I gained 1.5 pounds in the past week, but I’m trying to do better. A and I are thinking of getting an elliptical machine for home, because they’re so much lower impact compared to the treadmill. I basically can’t use the treadmill because it’s too high-impact - my knees are the worst joints in my body; they hurt after just two flights of stairs, which is why I often take the elevator even though stairs are better exercise.

I had my first workout today, and I spent exactly 30 minutes on an elliptical trainer. I burned about 330 calories, and yet I only got three WW points for it! (Each point is equivalent to 50 calories, so I feel I should have earned 6.5 points.) It was really hard on my knees at first, because of the way I was using it; I finally figured out a better way and fell into the routine. I was ready to quit after five minutes, though, until I realized that 75rpm was too many and slowed down to about 50. I made it halfway - fifteen minutes - without noticing it, and then just pushed on through to half an hour. I got a sheen of sweat but didn’t have any issues with actual wet spots on my shirt! It wasn’t easy, but I’m really proud of myself for making it through. One thing I couldn’t figure out, though, was the pain in my jaw. It felt like my lower teeth were loose or going to fall out! I’m not sure why that happened.

I went to an hour-long orientation for new members at the gym at work today. It was basically just an explanation of all the equipment and how to use it safely. The Jacob’s Ladder looked really cool, but the trainer told us it’s very intense and does not make a good warmup. She pointed out where the racquetball court is and showed us the free weights room briefly, and then we went upstairs to the cardio room - basically just treadmills, exercise bikes, and a rowing machine. I’m probably going to spend most of my time on the elliptical trainers, because even regular walking is hard on my knees and the elliptical is supposed to be low-impact. I’m also hoping to get an evaluation by one of the personal trainers, but I’m not sure I want to join any classes. Sometimes I feel like being a loner, and I think while I’m sweating is one of those times.