The Culmination of Many a New Year's Resolution Unfulfilled

I actually don't usually make New Year's resolutions (why make a big deal out of a promise that you won't keep anyway?), but if there was a New Year's resolution that I would have made all these years, it would be the oh-so-cliche Lose Weight promise. I have always been of the rounder variety of Asian (not one of those tiny Asians that creepy guys are always seeking in personal ads), and I do find food to be one of the great joys in life, so I have always been somewhat resigned to being overweight. So in the past, my weight has always sort of gradually crept up--I'd stay at some plateau for a few years, and then I'd go through a bad stretch of emotional eating or sedentary lifestyle and gain a few pounds. A few pounds here, a few pounds there added up to probably about 30 pounds in the 15ish years since high school. To a girl who always felt that fat was her fate, it seemed like a normal pattern of events. Now, that's not to say that I didn't struggle against this weight gain--I have dieted and felt guilty and lost weight and gained weight my whole life. I'm just saying (and maybe this is a formula for failure) that I've never been surprised by the gradual net gain.

This year has been different. Shockingly different. This year, I slack on controlling my eating--I gain 10 pounds. I slow down the eating--I lose maybe 1 pound. I start on an exercise routine--I lose maybe another pound. I fall of the wagon and go out to eat alot--I gain another 10 pounds. I don't exercise for a week, I gain another 5 pounds. It's crazy. I guess this is what people talk about when they say their body changes suddenly when they get older? Because I also have been growing myself in areas that I never gained weight before--my ass is huge, my hips are super wide, my thighs have gotten big. I feel like Eddie Murphy in the Nutty Professor. Only I have no excuse (aside from being lazy, addicted to food, and apparently old).

So turning 35 and being at this weight has spurred me to get serious about this. I really would like a new body (or a smaller version of my own), and I vow to believe that I can achieve one. I am working on setting weight-loss goals along with incentives at each step of the way. I am going to eat better and eat less and think about consequences when I eat. I have enrolled in Busy People Fitness' Boot Camp. If it ever stops raining on Sunday and Monday, I'll be playing soccer twice a week, and I'm going to try to make it to the gym on the days in between. Yup, as much as I hate to admit it, this aging woman has no time to put this off anymore.

On a separate note, CGT finally ordered my birthday present!!! He was sweet and helped me research the different kinds and gave me his opinion (I finally settled on this), but I had to bug him and bug him to actually order the thing...even though I had sent him the exact links to the best-priced deal. So soon I can actually add some photos to this thing and maybe it won't look (be?) so dull.

Born Yesterday

Well, I suppose it's altogether fitting that I managed to set up this blog yesterday but didn't manage to post until today. My intention was to commemorate my 35th birthday with starting this blog so that I could begin to document (and thus keep track of?) my life's thoughts, reflections, philosophies, events...but it's okay if it's a day late, right? Nevermind that my Year 35 blip of wisdom is that I need to start measuring my life more carefully so that I make sure that I can do all the things that I want to do and not keep putting them off until "later". Off to a great start here. Oh well, better late than never.

My birthday was very nice--got up late, dropped CGT off at work and I went to the gym. I'm allowed to go to the gym instead of work on my birthday, right? So maybe yesterday wasn't the most productive work day as a result: I got to work around 11am, we all went to lunch at 12:15pm (Great Wall Mongolian BBQ and Leatherby's for dessert) and didn't get back til about 3:30pm. Then I spent the rest of the day goofing around on Blogger and filling out my knitting group's Secret Pal exchange questionnaire. I think I must have done some sort of work-like activity at some point, but I think it was pretty minimal. I took off from work around 5:30pm (late) for my knitting class at My Secret Stash, had a productive little knit-in working on the blocks for S's surprise. Next week I'll return to my sock endeavor...socks were the original reason for the class, but I have been taking a break due to various glitches and my fairly petulant response to these sorts of glitches.

After class, I rushed over to Tupelo to turn in my questionnaire, but no one knitty was there. Oh well, next week I guess. With dinner reservations at 8:15pm, I had to scurry over to work to pick up CGT, but for once, I was relatively early. We made it over to Mason's in plenty of time, AND found a primo parking spot on the street. Despite the general Sacramento-trying-to-be-Manhattan ambience of The Park, dinner was amazing. I would say that it was the best service I've ever had in Sacramento, with knowledgeable waitstaff that was both inobtrusive yet genuinely friendly. The food was excellent too, although my favorite part of my meal was actually the roasted beet, avocado, and citrus salad. Yum! Of course, I ate too much and CGT had to drive us home. I promptly fell into a food coma on the couch and didn't wake up until 2am.

No photos for the blog yet, I'm afraid. My requested birthday present does not seem to have made an appearance at any time during my birthday. I'm kind of sad, because this girl does love having presents to unwrap ON her birthday (who doesn't?). But with all that CGT does for me (and forgives me for) in everyday life, I really shouldn't be a brat about it, even if it's my natural tendency. He probably wanted to discuss so that we could make sure to get what I really want anyway. Very nice of him and practical too. Something to unwrap would have killed him though? A pack of these would have made a girl pretty happy...