Sunday, June 5, 2011

At The Lake

So this morning we got up and hit the lake with both dogs.  After watching Vladdy plunge into the water Piper walked bravely out to about ankle-depth and then decided it still sucked.  But we were out there for several hours and had a really great time.  The wind was blowing pretty solidly so I was able to get some fairly significant swimming in just by going against the waves.  I can tell I'm going to be sun burned but I drank water, not wine, this time so I don't think I'm dehydrated.

I'd let to do something else physical later this evening when the heat of the day has passed but it would be more fun if I could talk Snackers into joining me.  I don't know what to expect tomorrow.  I've done really good but my weigh-ins have just been so-so for a long time now and I feel like I'm kind of starting to lose faith in myself as a result.



Food:
7 glasses of water
1 cup of coffee w/creamer
1 chicago dog (breakfast, bad I know)
1 foot long chicken sub (lunch)
>>the usual, no mayo no cheese
1 serving taco pie (dinner)
>>minus the sour cream
-----------------------------------
Daily Caloric Intake: 1,291



Activity
4 flights of stairs
Swimming: Went to the lake with the dogs again
Playing: Went to the dog park with the dogs again.  Played chase with Vladdy until I couldn't breathe anymore.

Saturday, June 4, 2011

...And Taking Names

Well this morning I decided to lay in bed for 20 minutes after I woke up because Vladdy saw me stir and decided that I wasn't getting out of bed fast enough so he needed to help by barking at me.  Oh hell no!  So I ignored him completely ... maybe I'll get lucky and he'll think I'm deaf so barking is pointless.  When he finally gave up and laid down I left the room but still didn't pay any attention to him and, of course, he started throwing another tantrum but he gave up, again, and eventually got to go outside and have breakfast.

I've done two math assignments, spent an hour at work, did the dishes, cleaned the kitchen, and folded a load of laundry this morning.  Then I sat down to check email and noticed that my car insurance went up $150 all of sudden for no reason.  WHAT?!  So I called Progressive to kick some A.  As it turns out I had called for a home insurance QUOTE last week to compare rates on two of the homes that we were looking at (the one we put an offer on and another one) and the stupid agent that I talked to actually misspelled my name on the quote, thus entering me into my existing policy as a second person but their system couldn't find driving history on "shadow-me" so they jacked my rate.  I mean really?  How do you do a home insurance quote and add a second driver to an auto-insurance policy on accident?  Well we got that cleared up but oy vey right?

So now Snackers is at work and I'm debating whether I should put together a grocery list or wait until Snackers comes home so that he can contribute to the menu for the week.  Huh, just got a random "wtf?" text from him ... I don't think it was meant for me but it means he's probably having a lousy day :(.  Poor Snackers.



Food:
8 glasses of water
1 cup of coffee w/creamer
1 doughnut (shush, it's been forever since I've had one)
1 chicken/veggie burrito
--------------------------------
Daily Caloric Intake: 1,007



Activity:
5 flights of stairs
Grocery shopping
Cleaning
Not much else. :(  I am so irritated with myself!!!!!
**Just kidding!  After posting this I took Vladdy out, tied his leash to Piper's collar, grabbed his favorite rope toy and ran the length of the block and back with him chasing and dragging Pips in tow.  Wooh! I feel good!

Friday, June 3, 2011

The Waiting Game

Ok ... we have an escrow number on the house, I've confirmed with the lender and the Realtor that they have everything from me that they need and the appraisal has been ordered so now ... it's time to play the waiting game.  This sucks major duck bubbles.  I am not a patient person anyway and this has to be the absolute worst kind of waiting I have ever experienced in my life.  I've moved before.  I've been excited to move before.  But this is a whole new level of excitement, anticipation, anxiety, and tension.  I've had a perma-headache for three days, I feel like I'm going to start hyperventilating at any minute and when I do my heart is going to pop out of my nose.  We're watching all of these home improvement shows on the DIY network and they help because they give me something to focus on and provide ideas but they also make me even more anxious and excited to move.  Is it July yet?

I'm going to explode.



Food:
7 glasses of water
1 cup of coffee w/creamer
1 healthy choice lunch
2 bratwursts w/bun
>>sauerkraut and mustard
------------------------------
Daily Caloric Intake: 1,007



Activity:
4 flights of stairs
Play: Dog park again

Thursday, June 2, 2011

The Size of a Puppy

Remember this picture?  This was me holding Vladdy at town square a little over a month ago when he got so tired that he pretty much passed out in my arms and started snoring.  Pay very careful attention to how small he is and how comfortably his little body curls up in my arms.  Look at the length of his nose and the breadth of his paws and the diameter of his ears and then ....

LOOK AT HIM NOW!  This was taken today, same dog, same position, even the same shirt (yes I do change my clothes, that was purely a coincidence).  Look at how much farther apart my arms are spread in order to accommodate his long body.  Notice how in the first pic his face is about half the length of my forearm and in the new pic it's about as long as my forearm?  Now ... even more disturbingly ... notice his paws are the same freakin' size in both pictures?!  And call me crazy but I think his ears look the same too.  So good news is he's growing into his extremities and will be less awkward looking but bad news is he's still got a LOT of growing to do.  Something tells me that by this time next month I won't be able to hold him like that at all, let alone get a picture of it.

So I'm actually not the only member of my little family trying to loose weight.  Two of my fur kids were put on diets a few weeks ago when we realized that their new younger siblings were having a negative affect on their weight.  Piper and Casper, who have always been able to free feed and stay at healthy weights had both started to pack on the pounds after we got Kody and Vladdy so we had to put them on a feeding schedule to monitor their intake and keep them from getting into the kitten/puppy food.  I am proud to say that Piper has lost 2.5 lbs and Casper has lost 1.  Yay kids!




Food:
7 glasses of water
1 cup of coffee w/creamer
1/2 serving sunflower seeds
1 leftover burger minus the bun
>>w/sauerkraut, mustard, and balsamic
Homemade baked chicken
>>2 legs, 1 thigh
2 home made truffles
-------------------------------
Daily Caloric Intake: 929



Activity:
4 flights of stairs
Playing: Went to the dog park again, walked/ran around with the dogs
Gave the dogs a bath: I don't know how many calories this burns but I'm sure it's significant enough to list because it is EXHAUSTING!  Piper is a wiley little shit and Vladdy is just pure muscle and neither of one of them makes it easy on me.

Wednesday, June 1, 2011

The Walk

LONG ASS POST ALERT but it's worth reading.  Funny, cool content!

So last night I decided to take just Vladdy for a walk and leave Piper home.  She was disappointed, I could tell but when she's around Vladdy's attention span goes completely out the window and all he wants to focus on is chewing on her ... plus I can't really take the firm hand with Vladdy that I need to when I have Piper because she's a very good dog and doesn't really understand why he's not so good.  When it's the three of us he tends to get neurotic and then I tend to get frustrated and then Piper tends to get confused and insecure and it's just not good so she stayed home.

Before I left I hopped on Google and mapped out a route that I had never taken before because I wanted a change of scenery and I wanted to make sure that I got at least 3 miles done.  So I headed out and it didn't start well ... Vladdy dropped a squat of the second kind in the parking lot right outside our building.  He's really good about not doing that in the house but he's not yet figured out that not every portion of "outside" is appropriate for pottying.  So luckily we were right next to the dumpster so I grabbed a subway bag and picked it up and then we headed out.  Much to my chagrin he popped a second squat of the second kind on the sidewalk about half-a-block away!!!  I didn't have a bag with me because I should mention that Snackers had taken him out about 30 minutes before we left which was also about 45 minutes after he ate dinner so I really wasn't expecting him to potty on the walk at all ... at least, not that kind of potty.  So I found a large flat rock and a pine cone and I scraped it all off the sidewalk and threw it into the bushes and then wiped up what was left with a palm leaf that was hanging over someone's retaining wall and off we went.  Cars driving by were probably rolling with laughter!

At last we reached the point where my planned route took us on a new path through a gated community that allegedly came out on our street but several blocks down the road from our house.  The gate was open when I went in so I figured I wouldn't have any trouble getting back out.  Nope.  I got to the outlet and the gate was chained and padlocked shut so I went back the way I had come only to find that gate closed also!!!  I walked the fence for a long time looking for an opening in the bars to squeeze through but to no avail and then waited awhile for a car to come along and open the gate but also to no avail.  I knocked on the door of a house right next to the gate to see if the owner would give me the gate code but the old woman shouted through the door "I don't open my door for nobody after dark" so I apologized and left.  I finally laid down on the ground and slid under the gate, then guided Vladdy between the bars because he was just barely skinny enough to fit ... thank goodness!  Well after all of that I wasn't about to go all the way around the main roads because that would have been an additional 3 - 4 miles and we were already exhausted so I headed back the way we'd come.

Now bear in mind this was a training walk so I kept doing a sharp about-face every time I could tell that Vladdy was paying more attention to our surroundings than he was to me.  This is the trick that my friend Tia taught me that she used to teach her dog who is a GOD among off-leash walkers.  Now I've been doing this with Vladdy on our walks but it has always seemed like it would never pay off but EUREKA he figured it out tonight!  All of a sudden I went to do a turn and he immediately turned with me!  It was so seamless that I thought he'd slipped his collar and turned around to find him next to my ankle, looking up at me.  I FREAKED OUT!  I started shrieking GOOD DOGGY and petting him vigorously and then he flopped over on his back in a clear display of glee and started kicking all four feet in the air with his lips flopped back in a big ol' doggy grin as I rubbed his tummy.  People driving by (because yes, we were on a main road) probably thought I'd lost my mind.  When I started to walk he jumped up and was actually looking up at me as we walked.  HOLY GREEN GODDESS ON A CRACKER BATMAN!!!  HE WAS LOOKING TO ME FOR CUES ... HE WAS PAYING ATTENTION TO SMEEEEEEE!!!!  I did four or five more turns and he was on my ankles like a 4H horse on a calf!!!  So we had another moment of good doggy shrieking and belly rubbing and paw kicking and then when he got up he grabbed his leash in his mouth and started trotting along next to me all excited that he'd finally figured it out!  I was able to loop the leash around my neck and not hold it with my hands for about a block and then puppy-brain took over and he lost all focus.

After that it was touch and go on the way home where some turns were instant and sometimes he wasn't paying attention but all in all it was a huge success!  Of course I had forgotten my phone and it was way past dark because my 3.4 mile walk had turned into an hour and 45 minutes so I ran into Snackers on my way home who was out looking for me.  He's so awesome!  He was all worried and irritated and said "you didn't take any ID, no phone ... something could have happened to you and I would have never known".  Isn't that precious?  It reminds me of my mommy!  Of course I reminded him that both my number and his number are on Vladdy's tags so if something had happened to me/us I'm sure the authorities would have given that number a try in the absence of other identification/contact info but still, he had a great point.  My bad, and it makes me feel good that he cared enough to be worried and to even get in the car and come looking for me.  Most guys wouldn't have worried like that until it had been several hours and probably past bed time.  Hell, at least one of my ex's probably would have waited until he got home from work the following day and I still wasn't home before he would have started to worry.  It feels good to be loved.



Food:
8 glasses of water
1 cup of coffee w/creamer
1 Healthy Choice Lunch
1 home made grill burger
>>1 lean beef patty
>>2 slices sour dough
>>4 tbsps saurkraut
>>1 tbsp balsamic vinegar
2 chocolate truffles
--------------------------------
Daily Caloric Intake: 855




Activity:
4 flights of stairs
Jogging/Playing: Took the dogs to the Bark Park again and ran around with them but then the wind picked up and all of the other dogs left so then it was boring and we left too
Walking: Left the park and went to the District to walk around the cobbled streets.  Not sure on the distance but it was a short walk because we got a late start (after 9 p.m.) and the sidewalks were pretty much rolled up.