Official Thursday Weigh-In

I ain't even gonna lie.

I've been avoiding y'all for the past couple of hours.

You're not going to believe it - I had another gain.

I thought that last week was "water weight" from "my period" and it would "be gone this week."

Nope.

It stayed. And brought over three of its friends.

I feel like I've lost focus the past couple of weeks. Really. And I feel awful, because y'all have been so encouraging.

And everyone tells me how great I look, but at this point, I know I'm doing something not right because I've gained four (!) pounds in the past two weeks.

Pray for me, girls. I've got a lot going on - with my parents, with my church, with my job.

Maybe one day I'll be at liberty to share some of what's happening around here. Suffice it to say, I've been trying to hold everything else together and neglecting my health. Eating too much junk. Not exercising enough.

I've got to get past this - both the challenges in my life as a whole, and this downhill slide in my weight loss.

Sorry for the Debbie Downer post this week!

You know you're on Weight Watchers when…

You have two teeth taken out, and you wonder how many ounces they weighed.

I had two wisdom teeth extracted this morning.

Oh.my.gosh.

Luckily for me, my dentist put some Oragel on my teeth before the Lidacaine shots.

I didn't feel a thing, but the sound of the cracking and popping ("That's normal," he said. "Don't let it bother you," he said.) was horrid.

And now, well, now, I can't smile.

I can't return phone calls, because I can't talk.

I can't eat for another hour and a half or so, because of the gauze.

I should be home now, resting, but I'm at work. I'm a trooper!

I'm supposed to go to a meeting for a committee I'm on at lunch, but I'm thinking I'm just going home and eat some soup.

And tonight, I'm meeting Marcia for dinner before we start a Joyce Meyer study, and I'm thinking it's going to be soup again.

I changed my gauze half an hour ago, and I have no idea if it's in the right spot, or even in my mouth at all at this point.

All I know is that my aunt was warning me Monday of the dangers of a "dry socket." EEEWWW!

And that next week, I get to go back and do it all over again.

The tragically unhip Turners

Now with bandannas!

No, we haven't joined the Crips or the Bloods. Even though my uncle, who recently retired from teaching at an inner-city high school in Memphis, asked if I was given any problems when I bought these.

Um, no. I don't guess the folks at Dollar General in Senatobia were too suspicious of me and a little red headed girl.

(Unlike the people at the Atlanta airport, who thought a nine-month-old Anna Marie and I were terrorists because we'd bought a one-way ticket. And made me miss my flight. So that we had a two-hour layover waiting for the next flight. And I didn't have a stroller because I thought we wouldn't be there long. But I digress.)

It was all in the spirit of Memorial Day, and I might add, Jason only wore his for the purposes of this picture.

Did I mention Anna Marie LOVES bandannas? They're so multi-functional. Not only do they enable her to be a rock star (like the Naked Brothers Band on Nick) they also double as capes.



Very handy.

And! And! Anna Marie had her first non-immediate-family sleepover last night! She was playing with my cousin's daughter, Savannah, and Savannah didn't want her to go home, and neither did my aunt (Savannah's Gandy). So, she stayed.



(She insisted on having the can of Sprite in the picture.)

No, I didn't call to check on them, because I figure that if she wasn't thinking about us, and I called, and she "remembered" us, it might upset her.

I guess everything went OK, because they didn't call me to come get her in the middle of the night.

Jason had to go to the auction today, even though the sale was moved to tomorrow, because he needed to get his food order. I sent him with some clean clothes, and he's going to pick her up in a few minutes.

I guess if she needed to have her first "sleepover," my aunt's house was as good a place as any.

Man, I love this girl

Thanks, Amanda!

Official Thursday Weigh-In

(subtitle: Two steps forward, one step back)

(sub-subtitle: Two and a half pounds lost, one pound gain)

So there you have it. You win some, you lose some, you gain some.

Back up to 161.

Guess I'll have to wait a little longer to break into the 150's.

How are y'all doing?

The Turners go partying

Saturday night, Jason and I had a rare occasion to get all dolled up.


We went to a gala!


Our local arts council has one every year, and this year I went to cover the event.

The house where it was held was spectacular. We pulled up, and there was even valet parking - to put everyone's car in the pasture out back.

(The house sits on 18 acres of "rolling hills")

Jason and I sat with our friends the Tallos. And a great time was had by all.

There was a silent auction, and a live auction, and of course, lots and lots of fancy food.

And for a few minutes, I felt like I was in the "upper crust" of society. Never mind that at 10 years old, mine was probably the oldest car in that pasture. Never mind the day-to-day struggles of our real lives.

We were just like everyone else. At least for a while.

Sitting under the stars, in the slightly chilly night air, we could almost forget our problems as we watched the local society types get into several-hundred-dollars worth of bidding wars over original art pieces and trips to New Orleans.

Life, at least temporarily, was good.

I didn't intend on being there long. I had sent Anna Marie with my mom and aunt, and promised to be back in an hour or so.

Then I looked at my watch, and it was 9:00.

We didn't end up leaving until it was over at 10:00, but that was OK - because the Coley girls took AM to Memphis, and had just gotten back when we left the party.

Anna Marie's bed was full of stuff off her floor (her version of cleaning her room) and it was 11:00 when we finally got home, so I put her to bed with me while Jason stayed up to work on the music for church the next morning.

And as I looked over at my daughter, with her hair in pigtails, sleeping on my pillow - life was good.

The inaugural pictures

So, I took a couple pictures. Like this one of a flower on Shirley's desk at work.



And this one, of the side of my office.

But the best pictures came when we went to Mom's to pick up Anna Marie, who was spending the afternoon over there. We drove up, and my aunt was standing under a tree looking up and clapping her hands.

We figured out pretty quickly that one of her cats had been chased up a tree by the dog who has started hanging around.

Jason took matters into his own hands - he got a ladder and started climbing.







Eventually, through some negotiations, Tinkerbell decided to come down. Or rather, she was yanked down. Whatever. She's down now.

I am VERY pleased with the camera. It has all sorts of neat features, like white balance and aperture controls, that Amanda is trying to show me how to use. I feel completely overwhelmed, but I keep telling myself I can learn to use this camera!



I (heart) it.

WHYYYYYY? A live-blogging event until my camera arrives

(Or at least until my publisher gets here and I can't be on teh intarwebs anymore.)

Why did I have the thing shipped to my house, and not my office? WHYYYYY?

2:24 p.m. - It's not here. Or at least it wasn't a few minutes ago when I called home to talk to Amanda about The Office season finale she was over there watching (Best! Ever! OMG!) He picked up the phone and immediately said "No, it isn't here." UPS and HSN both claim it's out for delivery. Why hasn't someone invented GPS for tracking my purchases? I want to know EXACTLY where it is. Now! This very instant!

Guess I should've followed my gut and tackled the UPS man when I saw him at Captain D's during lunch.

2:43 p.m. - Still no change. How am I supposed to concentrate and finish my last article, knowing that somewhere, in the heat, riding around in a bumpy brown van, is my new camera? Huh? Between that, and the music coming from the cubicle next to mine, it's a lost cause.

(Now technically, this isn't liveblogging, because I'm having to backdate it a bit. My boss just left).

3:00 p.m. - No camera, and now the boss is here! Yikes!

3:20 p.m. - Jason just brought me the camera. Of course, the boss asked to see it. He was very impressed - maybe he'll order one for the office!

My first liveblogging experiment is now over. And, in a few minutes, my workday will be too - and I can get down to biz-nass with my new camera.

Official Thursday Weigh-In

And it's still Thursday, y'all! Maybe that's a good sign!

Also a good sign - losing not just the pound I gained last week, but another pound and a half.

That's a loss of 2.5 lbs.

I now weigh 160, a total loss of 77 lbs.

Check in girls!

Take one little girl

Add some feather boas



And look what you come up with.



We were at Hancock Fabrics yesterday, and Anna Marie fell in love with the walls of boas. She asked me to take her picture.

When I took the camera out of my purse, the battery door (which barely stays shut as it is, because it's been dropped a couple times, both in this life and its previous life as Amanda's) popped open and I nearly lost one of the batteries under a pattern table.

Good thing Jason got me to order this for my Mother's Day present:



It won't be here until sometimes this week, but just knowing it's coming is a comfort.

It's from HSN, and it's on Flex Pay. We'll have to eat sandwiches a little more often, but that's OK by me. I also may be selling one of our extra cars, so that money can go for the camera.

We had a good day today - after church, we went to the local college cafeteria for lunch. I know, it sounds odd, but it's really, really nice. It's the last Sunday it will be open for the rest of the summer, so we thought we'd go while we could.

Then, we went to Mom's house, and now Anna Marie is spending the night. Mom is house sitting for my Aunt Debi, because she's in Texas attending a cousin's funeral. Mom had some other family obligations, so she stayed behind.

Anna Marie made me some presents yesterday at our town's MayFair celebration - a heart-shaped magnet with a butterfly made from her thumbprints, and a bear-shaped bookmark. She also made me a card that said "I love you mom, 1000%!" and had a "portrait" of me.

(Actually, she made the card twice - she couldn't find the first one, so she reproduced it this morning. Then she found the original, and said "Is it OK if you have two cards?")

I never realized until today how great those homemade gifts from your kids make you feel. I don't even care about the camera - her crafts are the real treasure.

So for all you mothers out there - and those who "mother" others - Happy Mother's Day.

Official Thursday Weigh-In

Man, these late Thursday nights have GOT to stop. Even though, I'm dreading this check in.

Just so you know.

I gain a pound this week, taking me up to 162.5. I'm not surprised, since I've had a really, really awful time of things this week and haven't taken proper care of myself.

I suppose that even those of us who know better slip up sometimes.

Somebody call the Labor Board

Because Anna Marie has been employed at Naw's Sweatshop.

She was visiting my mom and aunt last week (who live next to each other) and my aunt put her to work, washing dishes.

She was more than happy to oblige.

(The name "Naw's Sweatshop" was my aunt's idea. Her grandkids call her "Naw" so to Anna Marie she's Aunt Naw.)

Amanda was kind enough to send me these pictures. I hope you need a laugh as much as I did when I saw them!





Have a good Tuesday everyone - I worked 13 hours yesterday (getting home at 11:30 p.m.) so I'll probably be going home after lunch.

Welcome back to the work week

It's Monday. Again.

Here's a little something to get your work week started off right.



You're welcome.

Official Thursday Weigh-In

(Yes, that date says "Friday" not "Thursday." I had to work late last night, and then some other stuff happened, and the last thing I remember was taking two Benadryl and going to bed.)

Last week: 163

This week: 161.5

Loss this week: 1.5 lbs.!

Total loss: 75.5 lbs.!

Wohoo!

And to mark the "special occasion," Weight Watchers endowed me with a handy dandy "75 lbs." magnet.

My short-term goal is to lose at least another five pounds by the end of June, when my sister-in-law is getting married. The (sometimes) frustrating thing about weight loss is that sometimes, you can do everything right, and not lose any weight. Or, you can do not-quite-everything right, and see a loss. Or vice versa.

Check in time girls!

Tagged and bagged

Well, maybe just tagged.

I've been tagged by Jolene. Actually, she tagged me like, um, last week. I've just been a slacker.

SLAAACKERRR!

Anyway. Here's the deal.

Each player starts with 7 random facts/habits about themselves. People who are tagged need to blog about their seven things and post the rules as well . At the end of your blog, you need to choose 7 people to get tagged and list their names. Don't forget to leave them a comment telling them that they have been tagged and to read your blog.

Thus the reason for my slacker-ness. I don't know if I can come up with that many random facts, but I have lots of bad habits, so maybe that'll help.

1. My musical tastes are very varied. I mostly listen to Christian music, but I've moved from contemporary (Steven Curtis Chapman, etc.) to rap/rock.

Yes, like I'm 15 years old or something.

As I type this, I'm listening to Tobymac's latest, Portable Sounds. I bought it from iTunes the day it dropped.

It rocks.

Observe:



Anyway, I've also gotten into Barlowgirl and Superchic(k). Other than that, I like classic soul like Aretha Franklin, Stevie Wonder, and Billy Preston.

Yes, like I'm 50 years old or something.

I just really don't like most of what's played on the radio these days.

2. I write songs in my head all the time. All the time! It's like I can't help it. The problem is, I don't usually write them down, so they're lost. I made up one for Anna Marie one night when we were coming back from Georgia, and our alternator had gone out so we were limping home with no lights or sound, called "I See The Moon." It was just meant to keep her occupied, but it's one of her favorites still.

3. I've never had a cavity. Which is really interesting, since I never went to the dentist on a regular basis until I got the job here at the paper. I did, however, need major periodontal renovations when I did start going back. But, thanks to Crest Pro Health, everything seems to be hunky dory now.

(I'm almost halfway done! Yay!)

4. Bad habit alert! I twiddle my fingers all the time. Drives Jason buggy.

(Downhill from here!)

5. I love writing editorials. I did one in a college class, and I was hooked. Thanks to Amanda, my publisher knows this, and he "lets" me write one each week. Problem is, in our small town, I don't always have one, so sometimes I'm really grasping at straws.

6. On that note, my dream job would by syndicated columnist. I could work from home, and just email my column in to my syndicate. I have lots of important things to say, people! Believe it! I guess this blog is sort of an extension of that.

(Just one more!)

7. I can't cook. Well, maybe I could if I tried, but my skills are really limited to a few basic dishes. My main problem is that if I see a recipe has more than one or two ingredients that I don't already have on hand, I just pass it by and make spaghetti.

There! I did it! Now, for the "tagging others" part. I've lost track of who has and has not been tagged. So, I'm doing the poor man's tag, and tagging all readers.

Too late. You're it.