Succumbing to peer pressure

Work is getting in the way of my blogging, and I'm getting pretty steamed about it. 

Truth be told, I live in fear of my computer being hacked into by the GPs of my employer (grand poobahs) and having them see all the time I spend doing important communication work!  Seriously, I think I'm respected and liked here at work and have been an effective and productive team member for 6+ years.  But I do, cough cough, use their time (aka my paid time) for personal crap important communication endeavors and such.  Like the daily Washington Post interactive crossword puzzle and sudoku.  That is usually my lunch activity when I'm not being mindful and intentional about my chewing and swallowing.  Hey!  Maybe THAT'S the reason I'm carrying around some extra poundage.

Okay, now 3 hours after above was written.  Siiiigh.  For my weigh in today for Tammy's End of Summer Challenge, I was down 1.4 pounds!  Yay me - I felt like despite the great graham debacle, I still had a decent week, and apparently I did.  Wednesday and Thursday were both good days (with the graham exception), and I've gotten exercise in at least every other day.  But get this...I had dinner out with friends both Wednesday and Thursday and did not get derailed.

Both of these meals represent radical change in my eating behavior, at least for these meals!  Turns out that both nights I went to Thai places.  The first night I went with a friend who'd never been to the particular restaurant, and besides each getting pad thai, we also split an order of the most delicious steamed dumplings in the world.  They are small and light, with a tiny dash of sweetness, and splitting the order gave us each 3 small dumplings.  Then, I'd eaten a little less than half the pad thai and ended up not eating any more, possibly because my friend stopped at that point and never picked her fork back up!  WTF?  BUT, the silent peer pressure of her dabbing her lips with her napkin at that point and proclaiming stuffedness helped me to leave the rest on my plate too.  Now I could easily have scared the rest of the noodles, but was happy to leave them be and NOT even take them home, because you can bet your Tom Kha soup that I'd have downed it upon walking in the door.

We did stop and get water ice on the way home that was delish and refreshing in the humid heat of the evening.  But once home, the all night diner that is my kitchen was shut down in favor of immediate flossing and brushing to discourage further inhalation of any edible item.

Last night was another Thai place with 3 friends, and we went at 5:30, so got in for the early bird special.  (Good grief, how old AM I?)  Anyway, the deal was soup, appetizer and entree (smaller portions than usual meals) for $10.  I ordered the aforementioned Tom Kha soup with tofu and veggies (amazing), a spring roll, and pad thai again.  I had just finished the soup and the spring roll when the 4th gal arrived late and asked if she had time to eat...she was going to get Pad Thai.  Well, I looked at the portion waiting for me to ingest, and offered it to her.  It was already on the table still hot; she was starving; I was satisfied; and we had to be out of there by  6:30 to go to a meeting.  TADA!!!!  I was done and just drank my huge glass of water while she ate the entree.  Once home I did have a Chobani yogurt, but that was it.  Now this was the equivalent of a bird riding a bicycle.  Unheard of  in the annals of Lesliehistory.  I woke up feeling good that I had no remorse for consuming mass quantities the night before, and even better after the weigh in.  So as my daughter would say, pin a rose on my nose!

This morning I tried something new for breakfast, or rather something old with a new twist (for me).  I was in a rush but knew I needed protein for b'fast because I was feeling hungrier than hungry, so I did a fried egg omelet (too lazy to wash a bowl after beating up the eggs), and in it I put a cut up wedge of Laughing Cow Lite garlic and herb flavor cheese.  It didn't really melt that well, but it was great!  I'm getting back into the LC lite stuff, using some on celery with lunch (but never again on grahams!!!)

So - I was going to post some pics of a couple things for shameless self promotion, but my battery is dead in the camera so it'll have to wait for next time.  Have a nice long walk planned after work, and I'm getting ready to head home as soon as I hit publish here...so bye!  Have a good w/e.