Working Hard At Staying On Track This Week

It has been very enjoyable days off so far with more fun to come.  I am working hard to balance everything, committed to 100% tracking, and finding ways to squeeze it all into my WW program.

Tuesday was a meet-up with Brenda for lunch at Eight Thirty Commons.  The salad I picked was delicious and fit into the points budget for the day that I was able to earn four rollover points.  Wednesday was a meet-up with Phoenix to check out the new Green Acres Food Truck Park in Boise.  

We parked at the nearby city park and rode our bikes to the Food Truck Park.  Sadly, it was underwhelming.  I heard that it is a happening place to be on nights and weekends.  Hopefully we can try it again.  We shared some tacos from Kanack Attack, the only truck on the park that day, and then continued on bike to Payette Brewing to enjoy their outdoor patio space and share a beer flight.

With the decision to stay home for dinner, safe some money and calories, I earned a blue dot on Wednesday and had two days under my belt of feeling successful.

Thursday we picked up Grandpa for an afternoon ice cream date before running a bunch of errands in preparation for the family reunion on Saturday and also to get some groceries for the work week.  Sadly, we were not able to take the golf cart to enjoy our ice cream treat.

We had lunch at Cracker Barrel,  which I forgot was Turkey Thursday and one of my most favorite days.  The lunch portion was just the right side and extra delicious today.  

We continued our errands ending at the Albertson’s Marketplace for Hatch Green Chili Season and to acquire some fresh roasted green chile for Kenyon.  The Hubs was starting to get hungry and the Marketplace has a variety of food/food court options.  I was feeling a little hunger and got myself some smoked turkey breast from the BBQ place at the Marketplace.  While we were having our bite to eat, Kenyon noticed the cocktail of the week was a Hatch Green Chili Margarita.  Although I had not planned to spend points on alcohol, when in Rome right?!?

It was delicious.  It is a bit like a jalapeño margarita in that the sweet and spicy balance.  You also can’t beat the $5 price.  Since Phoenix’s boyfriend Stacey loves Hatch Green Chili, we deiced to meet up on Saturday after the family reunion for a margarita (or two).  Since I know I will be having this delicious drink again, I did the responsible WW thing to do and only drank half my margarita so I could save some points.  

Once back home, I prepped beef stew from our leftover post roast using turnips and radishes instead of potatoes, which is what Kenyon prefers with his low carb lifestyle.  It was not only low points but also delicious.

I’ve done some pre-tracking for the evening plans tonight with my cousins from out-of-town.  I know that tonight and tomorrow will most likely both be non-blue dot days and that is okay.  I save my WSPA for this reason.  

Weekly WI: Another Week...Another Gain

Another week has come and gone and I set here facing another gain.  

Womp:Womp.

I will admit this one stung.  When I checked in with the scale a day early on Monday, I was not prepared to see another gain nor was I prepared to see the number on the scale.  I was off track, way off track, Tuesday through Thursday, and then back on track Friday through Monday.  I had started to convince myself everything might turn out okay.  I mean I feel good so how bad can it be?  Thankfully it came down a little bit from Monday to Tuesday leaving me with a 1.4 pound gain.

Danger…Danger…Danger…

I am up 4.2 pounds for the month of July.  GULP! 

This is my M.O.  **side note, what the heck is M.O. and what does it mean?  I had no idea…

A modus operandi (often shortened to M.O.) is someone's habits of working, particularly in the context of business or criminal investigations; but also more generally, it is a Latin phrase, approximately translated as mode (or manner).  From Wikipedia

Okay, back to this blogpost…

Since this is my M.O., recognizing that these small-ish consistent gains are not productive to my WW program and getting a handle on them early is how I can stop the 10-ish pound gain from happening.  This will help me be successful in the long term because I am not constantly having to keep re-losing the same few pounds just to inch a tiny bit closer to goal at the end of the year.  Now, don’t get me wrong.  Any small progress is progress.  It is just that if I can keep myself from having to re-lose weight then I can inch myself closer faster.  Maintenance is the final goal of this journey.  I really want to get back to goal and just maintain for a while.

With all that being said, back on track ASAP!!!  This is a tough week with family in town and a family reunion, but I will stay committed to my WW plan this week.

Let’s do this!

Odds & Ends Of The Last Few Weeks

Good Morning!  

I am on day three of five this week with a family reunion on Saturday that I am really looking forward to.  It is giving me momentum to get through the workdays.  Friday and Saturday were hopping and I suspect maybe a slower Sunday.  Last Sunday, I brought cookies for my team to “celebrate” a new coworker joining the team in hopes of building more of a team cohesiveness environment.  I will have the same group for the rest of the year, unless something changes.  My Cookie Lady is awesome.  They turned out so great.

I’ve been dealing with some supervisory struggles and it has thrown me for a loop.  I was pretty down on myself last week and feeling better this week.  I value that I can experience lows but usually I try hard not to stay there.  I just hate feeling so down in the dumps for so long.  I also attended a First Responders Resilience training last week and I pride myself on being resilient and need to continue to cling to that.

I’ve been working on my July Apple Watch Activity Goals and am ahead of schedule after all the walking during Girls Weekend.  My food week wasn’t that great during my days off and petty much all of July has not been that great.  I am nervous about weight-in on Tuesday and thankful that I’ve been back on track since Friday.  I like being back on track and I know that overall, being consistent to my WW plan makes me feel so good.  

On Monday, the first cruise ship left the Port of Seattle enroute to Alaska.  WhoooHoooo!  It was a Royal Caribbean ship and while I have not been able to find much shared on YouTube or Instagram, my vicarious vacation travels are still happening.  The first Norwegian Cruise Line ship is expected to leave Seattle for Alaska in two weeks.  I can’t wait and I really do hope it actually happens.  With this new Delta COVID strain rearing it’s ugly head, I fear it will shut down the travel industry before it even gets started again.  I am anxiously awaiting our Alaska Cruise and I’ll be keeping a close eye on things in the meantime.

It was eleven years ago we took our first cruise, which was also an Alaskan Cruise.  I am just so excited to get back on a ship.

Girls Weekend Lake Tahoe - Part 3

You can read about Girls Weekend Lake Tahoe - Part 1 here <—

Also Girls Weekend Lake Tahoe - Part 2 here <—

With very little sleep Monday night, we were up and at ‘em on Tuesday with items on the agenda.  After brunch at The Original Mel’s Diner, we headed to Truckee, California to hike the Historic Summit Tunnels, which is a 4+ mile hike out/back though tunnels built into the sides of the mountain.  

The tunnels have wall-to-wall artwork and graffiti, some appropriate and some not and a few of the tunnels contain bats.  We never saw any bats but you could hear them and you could smell them.  Yuck!  The details we learned ahead of time suggested a headlamp and there are some dark places in some of the longer tunnels.  There are four total tunnels and while the distance to hike all of them is quite long, the end of the hike is worth the views as you get to see the lake. 

Our drive south back to Tahoe took us along the southwest side of the lake where we stopped in Tahoe City to share a beer flight and have a bite of lunch at Tahoe Tap Haus. Outside the brewery was an ice cream trailer that served the best ice dream in the smallest containers I’ve ever seen.

The drive south was picturesque and at one points we had 360 views of water on all sides of the windy road, we just had to stop and snap a few pictures. 

We made a final repeat stop at South Lake Brewing Company as Phoenix had a Groupon to redeem for two pints and two souvenir pint glasses.  We chatted with a few people in the beer garden and enjoyed the misters to keep us cool.  Tahoe was having unseasonably warm weather.  

With exhaustion on our side, we stayed in for the night and went to bed early.  

Our last full day in Tahoe included the beach and drinks!  We went out with a bang spending the first part of the day at the beach with a tiki bar.  We also visited with a gal from Virginia who was there with her kids.  

After we had enough sun (for Phoenix and Nicole, I pretty much covered up and stayed in the shade) we had a bite to eat at Fox & Hound before getting dolled up for our last night in Tahoe.

Thanks to Uber, we were dropped off to wonder around on foot and landed at X Crows, a BBQ place and a hotel all-in-one that had live music. 

PorterHaus Music, a trio of brothers that just happened to grow up in Idaho, put on a great set. We met people from Texas and Nevada as we sat around the outdoor campfire chatting. Afterwards, one of the band members and one of the Texans wandered with us to two other bars before grabbing a bite to eat and catching a Lyft back to the condo.  PorterHaus Music will be in Boise later this year.

We made our way home and a last minute decision to stop at Say When as we knew they had clean bathrooms and I had hoped to get something to eat.  I had already lost so much money gambling what is a little more?  I put $10 into a $1 machine and own $150.  I cashed out and put $20 into the $1 machine next to it.  I won $480.  With $630 in my pocket, we headed towards home and after traveling over 1,200 miles in the car this week, that wrapped up Girls Weekend 2021.

We had a fabulous time and I am so thankful for my gal pals that came along for the fun.

Girls Weekend Lake Tahoe - Part 2

If you didn’t read my recap of Girls Weekend Lake Tahoe Part 1, you can read it here <-

We started our second day in Lake Tahoe with donuts at Glazed and Confused and ended with ice cream sandwiches at The Baked Bear.  You know it is going to be an indulgent weekend when donuts and ice cream are involved.

My coworkers had recently visited Tahoe Bike Co. and shared all about their time with a four-person bike rental.  We used a rental like this during our Girls Weekend in Bend, Oregon.  It turns out this was both entertaining and a huge workout.  Naturally we needed to treat ourselves afterwards and on a recommendation from the guy at the bike shop, we went to Beacon Bar & Grill for their signature drink, Rum Runners.  They were delicious along with some amazing views of the lake. 

I had two Groupons that needed redeemed at South Lake Brewery, which turned into one a very large beer flight.  Afterwards, we made our way back to Hard Rock Cafe Casino where we used the free public parking to do some gambling, walked around the Heavenly Village Shops and took in some of the live music.  We finished our night with delicious pizza at Lake Tahoe AleWorX before heading back to the condo to relax for the night.

Monday we needed to head back to Reno so we could put Dawny on the plane home to Spokane, Washington early Tuesday morning.  With a late start to the morning, Dawny and I ventures out to find delicious bagels at Dragonfly Bagle Co.  Boy did they hit the spot.  I love bagels.  

Another Groupon deal secured our hotel at Sands Regency and included five free drinks.  That was a great deal.  After checking I, we went to Sparks, Nevada to visit a brewery and In and Out Burger was nearby.  This was a first visit for several in the group and we were a bit underwhelmed.

We visited another Boise Brew Buddy Hub, Great Basin Brewing, which was in this really fun shopping center that looked like a ghost town.   

Once we got back to the hotel, we made our way out on foot to walk the Riverwalk and stopped into The Eddy, a container bar for a drink.  We also found a spot to share a delicious top shelf watermelon margarita at some Mexican restaurant along the way, and lost a bunch of money gambling.  

With that, we said goodbye to Dawny and still had another couple days left back in Tahoe.