| As some of you know, at my work there’s a contest going at my work, for those who want to lose weight. It was created after Christmas time where we all ate like pigs and felt like lardos. The contest covers a 9 month span and who ever loses the most fat/gains the most muscle will win a $300 shopping spree! Talk about a great motivation! Each month a trainer from a local gym comes and measures our fat. After my first measurement in February I was told the following: Starting Body Fat %: 30.4% Recommended Bodyfat %: 26% February came and went and I really didn’t change anything in my workout routine. With the death of my grandma and getting sick I really wasn’t motivated to mix it up. I decided to get measured anyway, (despite the fact that there wouldn’t be a change); so that way at the end I would have all 9 measurements. In March, my second measurement was as follows: | ||||||||||||||||
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WHAT THE HECK? I already reached my goal of 26% body fat in one month by not doing anything different? This was too good to be true! And it was… I contacted the trainer and asked her to double-check her measurements because there was no way I lost 7 lbs of fat and gained 5 of muscle. She double checked and sent me the following data: | ||||||||||||||||
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Oh this looks much more practical (even though I was hoping that she didn’t mess up). Wouldn’t that have been sweet to lose weight just by thinking about it? In my dreams right? Well I am very curious to see what the measurements will be for this next month. This past month John and I have been working out to Billy Blank’s (Tae-bo dude) Basic Training. Let me tell you that it is totally kicking our butts! If I don’t see a change it is going to make it harder and harder for me to deal w/ Billy at 6am! Or worse his side kick Shelley, who has no body fat, and thinks the workout is the best thing since sliced bread!** I’ve also been walking during my lunch breaks w/ my co-worker Jen, who is also in the competition. I’m really not planning on seeing any physical changes until 2-3 months, but I’m hoping the measurements will show that I’ve been doing something different! Even though I have a very good record for winning contests at my job, don’t be surprised if I don’t win this one… I have the feeling that the sweets are not aligned in my favor. **Note: After viewing the video for the past 4 weeks there are some facial expressions and comments that drive John and I crazy… or make us laugh. Like when we do squats and the short lady squats lower and it looks like she’s a little kid. Or when Billy goes over to Shelly to use her as an example of how to do these abs twists. She instantly starts doing the move 5 times faster since she knows she’s on camera and wants to impress. Let me tell you that before we figured out what she did it totally threw us off! Or when she does her stomach crunches with the look on her face that says “I have the best abs in the universe and you all can eat it.” However I should cut her some slack since she does have a 6 pack **Note: I also found out that Maggie actually takes classes at Billy’s Gym and has taken classes from Shelly! I couldn’t believe that one! I mean I guess it makes sense, but I was totally impressed! |
Wednesday, March 28, 2007
One more set!
Sunday, March 25, 2007
Margars and Paparazzi
On Friday night John’s college friend Scotty came down from S.F. We got to go to one of our favorite restaurants in town Novo. Right when we went out onto the patio John Spots James Cromwell. Most of you may know him from Babe, Six Feet Under or 24. (You know John made me put that in). San Luis had also been hosting their film festival for the past week and he was the honorary actor for this year. (Last year it was Morgan Freeman).
It was so funny though, because at first John could not remember his name! First he just started listing everything he was in… then he called him something ‘Cromwell.’ So then I said ‘George’ being that Six Feet Under was the last thing I saw him in! It wasn’t until later John remembered it was James. I was kind of bummed I didn’t have my camera. I would have been tempted to bug him for a photo if I had it. But do you know he now has a pony tail?? EWWWW!! Maybe it was best I didn’t have my camera!
The next morning John, Scotty, Dave, and one of John’s co-workers went and played golf. They showed up around noon and then we all headed downtown to go to Firestone. Was there any question? Not when John’s college buddies are in town. They are OBESSED with that place! When they came down last year we went there both Saturday AND Sunday! Ok… I should cut them a little slack, because I’m sure I would want to go there if I moved away. Nory, Jessie and Molly all met up with us there so they could get their fix too. (Well Molly was a newbie, but she soon understood the frenzy).
After that we came back to the house and John made some mojitos that were supposed to be for the evening… however I think they were all gone by the time we went to dinner! I guess the party did start a bit early since there were already party peeps there.
Next we headed to John and mines favorite Mexican restaurant, Vallartas, for dinner. It was so good! John was so excited because he was finally able to order the 60 oz. margarita! There was some fierce competition going on as Scotty and Dave both got one too.
Here is John showing off his and Scotty's... does Scotty look a little intimidated?
About a half hour into the party I started to get a bit worried as my surprise for John had not arrived! (No it wasn’t a stripper.) Then low and behold he showed!
John’s reaction
I had coordinated w/ John’s good friend John Farnham (who lives in NYC and was the best man in our wedding) to come to the party!!! I was SO excited! John was just stunned. He couldn’t believe that Farn was here!! What was great is that I managed not to tell ANYONE he was coming (which totally killed me), so the other peeps that knew him were shocked too! Molly was so excited she could barely sit in her chair! I was just amazed that he was able to fit it in his schedule, because a few days before he was in Hong Kong! It really worked out perfectly though.
Part way through the dinner Molly got a hold of my camera and gave a whole new meaning of the word paparazzi! She was a total wild woman and we were all seeing flashes everywhere! She then got inspired to sneak up behind all the women and get cleavage shots! I think I was able to block the first few, but then she got me. Don’t worry ladies, those shots will not make it into the ofoto album, but I may have to send the photos to you in an email. Some of you will be impressed at how good your cleavage can look!
Here are some of my favorite paparazzi shots:
Jen, Sam and I.
I'm not sure what is going on in this photo, but it looks like it was funny!
Two crazy people
Here is Hans giving Molly a shot of his cleavage! As you can tell Steph is more than trilled!
After dinner we headed back to the casa where I prepared the chocolate fondue fountain and Hans was nice enough to make us his awesome lemon drops!
Ellie, Steph and Sherrie diggin' in!
If the fountain wasn’t enough, we even had a cake! It was courtesy of my the company I work for. (It was part of the birthday package I won at our holiday party). It looked great, but tasted 10 times better than it looked! Can you believe it? Unfortunately some peeps left before we cut it, sorry suckas! But it actually worked out better that way because John and I ate it everyday for the following week! It was SO good… although every time I ate it I felt a little sick. It was either that or the huge amounts of left over food from Vallartas that my stomach was fighting with. This past week was a total detox!
At one point all of the dudes disappeared to the backyard to smoke two stogies. John and Scotty bought them the night before, but got a little distracted by Hustle and Flow, (you know it’s hard out here for a pimp…) , and didn't get to smoke them.
The paparazzi was at it again and got a few priceless shots:
We also got some really nice gifts. The paparazzi’s back up, Amy, got some sweet shots as well.
Here we are with our gifts from Molly. I am examining my new cute scrapbook supplies while John can already taste the curry he’s going to make w/ the new sauces.
Another good photo is of me opening my gift from Sarah. She got me a t-shirt from this one blog that we both read, Dooce. (She’s one of the original bloggers that got fired for what she wrote on her blog). It just totally cracked me up because it was something that I would like, but would never buy for myself!
We just hung out for the rest of the night and soon we were hitting the hay. We had an awesome breakfast the next morning (thanks to Molly). She brought up a ton of Noah’s bagels AND Krispie Kreme doughnuts! Heavvvvvvvvvvven! After we ate and did a quick clean up most people headed back home, but at 1:30 John and I headed to Bakersfield. Why you ask? Well stay tuned… that entry is in the future.
Overall, it was definitely one of my best birthdays, and I’m sure John would say the same. I must give a huge THANKS to everyone for coming and especially for those who traveled to SLO. It was really special to have everyone there. I just finished touching up the photos last night, so hopefully I will get them uploaded soon. There are some really funny ones! Stay tuned…
Thursday, March 22, 2007
Welcome to the Club!
Tonight after work we are heading out to Los Osos to go to our favorite Thai place, Noi’s. Then we are going to try to make it back into town to FINALLY go see Zodiac. I gave him the ticket below at the beginning of the month and we have yet had time to see it! I hope it doesn’t leave the theaters before we get to see it!
Monday, March 19, 2007
Don't Cha Wish Your Blog was Hot Like Mine?
I’m here!! Don’t fear!! But are you still there? That should be my fear! I can’t believe it’s been 11 days since my last post! AHHHH! I hate it when the blogs I read don’t get updated everyday, and here I go for 11 days! What the crap?
Don’t worry… the blog about our party is still to come. Last week was really unexpectedly busy. I had some freelance work to do for the local web company I sometimes work for. That took up a couple of my evenings. I hadn’t done any work for them since last year, and man was I ticked off that I had to do some! How dare they take away 4 hours of my evening time! I would much rather be zoning out watching ‘The Search for the Next Pussycat Doll!'
I know… I totally can’t believe I watched that either!
But earlier in the week, John said ‘Hey I’d like to check out the Pussycat doll show.”
I was like “Yeah right you do! You just want to see half naked women strutting round in hope that one of their boobs will fall out of their tops!”
He tried to convince me otherwise, but I didn’t buy it. So we started to watch it, and about half way through John was over it and I was totally hooked!!! The intelligence levels of the future dolls almost made me turn change the channel, but the producers minimized their speaking rolls enough for me to handle.
I totally love this one chick, Sicily, that used to be the lead singer of a punk rock band (I think). I’m totally routing for her since she at least stands out from the rest of them. However I don’t think she has a chance.
The best was the chick that got the boot. During their dance practice their choreographer was like, ‘Listen chica, you are dancing like a stripper! Clean it up!’ (She totally was by the way).
Stripper want-a-be's response, ‘I have no idea what he is talking about. I can’t help it if I love my lady humps and he doesn't!’
So what happens? She gets the boot because the judges say she totally dances like a stripper! What a dumb-bo.
Ok… that was a major tangent! Let’s see… oh yeah… last week was really busy. After the freelance work, John needed me to make up name tags and business cards for some of his co-workers. They were hosting a broker event and have yet to receive with new Wachovia business cards. The cards were a hit as one of John’s bosses’ bosses’ now wants me to make him 100! Does the dude know I’m using my home printer?
See? I have totally legitimate excuses of why I had no computer fun time last week.
Well I hope this week will be a better blogging week. Hope you all had a great weekend!
Thursday, March 8, 2007
Men At Work
This past weekend/week John’s parents came to visit. They always come down ready to help out with the house, and this trip was no exception! John had made up a huge list before they got here and I have been so impressed with what they have gotten done.
First we made a dump run. Anytime we have a visitor w/ a truck we take full advantage of hauling large items or our crap to the dumb. I actually think the last time a visitor w/ a truck was here was last May?? So we’ve had about 9 months of crap collecting in our back yard. No wonder the flies had started to swarm! 1010 Yarrow was turning into the dump of SLO!
Two weekends ago I suggested to John that we organize our large storage closet since we had so much crap in it there was only a bout a 10 sq. ft. area to walk in. Once we started to clean it out, John got inspired to get it prepped so that he and his dad could install shelves in it this past weekend. Had I known this was going to happen, I would have taken a before photo… but instead I just have one of him painting.
He totally cranked it out… painting… new floorboards and electrical outlets… while I went through some of the boxes we had in there that had NOT been unpacked since we moved in! I know! Totally ridiculous! I did throw out some stuff, but there wasn’t that much junk since I had already gone through it all when we moved.
So the first trip to the Depot consisted of buying the shelves. They put them all up that afternoon and they look SO great! I had envisioned how I wanted this room to be, and it look so much better than I thought it would! You can now walk around in it the room and access everything. Too sweet!
On Sunday the plan was to finish the attic floor so we could actually use it to store stuff. John and his dad totally cranked that job out too! I was really impressed. John had already stored our Christmas stuff up there, by balancing the bins on the 2x4, but I feel much better now that there is an actual floor up there. There is even talk that during the next visit we might get a retractable ladder installed! That would be really convenient.
I’m sorry to report that I have no funny stories from this past weekend! It was all work. I also don’t have time to take any photos of the improvements this week. Now that the in-laws have left we are moving on to getting ready for more visitors this weekend and our joint birthday party. My to-do lists are huge, so there may be a mini dry spell of updates after this one!
Monday, March 5, 2007
Not Again!!!
Yes… I have another injury…. BUT it is not my head this time. This injury is on the complete opposite side of my body… my toe. Yes… a few nights ago I sliced my middle toe. I was just walking in our living room minding my own business when WHAM-O! I ran into the corner of our table leaf.
(What was the table leaf doing on the floor you ask? Well we were in the middle of repainting and fixing up our storage closet, so it was resting in the living room). Once again I collapse on the floor screaming in pain… but this time I was trying to say “I’m ok, I’m ok” in-between the burst of pain…trying to let John know we weren’t having a repeat of the head incident. John came flying out of the closet in two seconds flat! The last time I saw John move that fast was when he realized he was missing the Victoria Secret Fashion show on TV!
I kept telling him I was ok, but man did it hurt! He took my sock off to tell me that I had split open the skin on the edge of my toe. It wasn’t bleeding but it there was blood.
2007 is the BEST!
Sunday, March 4, 2007
Big Race for a Little Town
Here is a photo of what he saw this year:
It rained most of the day, and that is why I think the crowd was smaller than last year.
Here is a photo from last year:
This spot was the total primo spot. John waited here for 3 hours too! It was very exciting watching the bikers come in, but it was over in 10 seconds!
Hopefully they will come through town again next year, and I will be able to watch it.
Friday, March 2, 2007
What is that Smell?
One of my gifts to John for Valentine's Day was concert ticket to go see Tenacious D in Santa Barbara. The concert was really good, as Jack Black and Kyle Gass were born to perform.Side note: We actually saw them in 2001 when they were on tour w/ Jimmy Eat World and Weezer. That was one of my all time favorite concerts. It was the first concert where each act was great.
Anywho… the concert was held at the Arlington Theater, which is a cool place in it's self. It normally shows movies, but it also hosts other performers such as Jerry Sienfield.
Even though the show was great I must tell you that it was the crowd that really made me step back and take a look. I didn't stop and wonder what the crowd would be like, but I do know that the people I saw were not who I expected!
First I see a wide variety of punks! Ummmm… am I at the wrong show? Punks and the D… I do not see the connection.
Second I see the typical preppy Santa Barbara peeps who think they are too cool for school. They are typically there to meet and hang out with their friends, not to listen to the music. This was somewhat expected.
Third I see a slew of heavy metal head bangers! We are talking flannels and mullets! Well I guess if The D's music was close to any genera it would be rock…but definitely not head bangin' rock!
Fourth I see hippies! Are you kidding me? Did they find the tickets on the sidewalk? My mind was being blown at each turn!
So we get into the theater and all is going well, until the seats around us start to fill up.
First I see some punks to our right… they look harmless, but the odor that is drifting our way is not the most pleasant. It's kind of hard to describe. It definitely wasn't a clean smell, but it also wasn't B.O. I'll call it stank.
Next a big group of people sit behind us, with aromas of cologne, perfumes, shampoos, and who knows what else! At least it was better than stank!
Then a couple of collage guys sat next to me, and every time the guy would open his mouth it REAKED of salami! Totally nasty! Somebody totally needed to give that guy an Altoid!
So we sit waiting for The D. It's bad enough we have to suffer through the opening acts, but smells were over the top!
After the second opening act finish John and I got a strong whiff of B.O. Now who is it? We've got hippies two rows behind us!
Once The D take the stage the nice aroma of marijuana tops off the whole hodge podge of odors. Ahhhhhhhh how refreshing! Don't forget… the concert was indoors, very warm, and we had to stand the whole time.
Needless to say it was one concert that I'm sure I won't forget for a long time.
Thursday, March 1, 2007
22 Days
Here is the arrangement of gifts I set out for him this morning. Having all the gifts together looks like so many. (And there are still a few missing!) Since his birthday is on the 22nd I decided to only give him 22 gifts so he could open the best gift on his actual birthday. I also had to wrap each gift and not use any gift bags, as he enjoys tearing off the wrapping paper more! Such a sucka.
I did try to choose gifts that all uniquely represented something that reminded me of him. However I had to take on the issue of making all of the gifts practical. He is VERY particular when it comes to gifts and ALWAYS emphasizes that they should be practical.
He was very excited and shocked when he saw them this morning. But he did manage to do a jig of joy.
For the first gift, I printed out Cal Poly's baseball schedule and told him he can pick any game to go to. I was hoping to go this weekend, but we found out earlier this week that John’s parents are coming into town. We still may get to go if the house projects don’t interfere.
A few weeks ago John called and told me that a co-worker reminded him that the CP baseball was in season and that he wanted to go to a game for his b-day. I was SO mad because I had already thought of that for a gift! So when I reminded him of that conver that this morning, he said he already forgot that he wanted to go! Ha ha ha
Hopefully these gifts will add to a very special birthday month for him!
P.S.
This weekend Zodiac is coming out in the theater. GO SEE IT! My sister-in-law Molly worked on the costumes for it… and it looks really good! Make sure you look for her name in the credits!