Vegas

We Got on the train this morning. I do love walking to public transport towards a vacation. David made all of the plans and I didn't have to think about anything (hooraayy). We landed in Vegas and were met by a woman with our names on a card (I have never done that before).

We checked in at the Venetian and unpacked then went for coffee. We then walked from the strip all the way to the old part of downtown Las Vegas. We figure it was about 4.5 miles

Along the way we wandered through the Wynn.

Down Las Vegas Boulevard past old Las Vegas
(or as I like to call it-The seedy side of the strip). We went past several wedding chapels and walked upon the Pawn shop from a cable TV show
(it was packed so we took a picture of the sign and kept trudging along towards Freemont Street. We had dinner at an Irish pub and after a peppermint Schnapps and hot cocoa for me and a bloody mary for david we kind of forgot we were supposed to wait for the ceiling lights to come on. We caught the bus instead and came back to the hotel. After a bit of chocolate from Godiva and a romantic gondola ride we popped up to our hotel room for a rest and picture download.

I think I am ready for some Gelato now :) More tomorrow.

xxxooo

I'm Hongry

Holy moly..I am Hongry..not hungry..this is some big Hongry. I keep joking to my family that I must have passed a big hairball down my stoma because I have not had this kind of hungry in years. I feel like hoovering everything in sight.

Methinks the fill is in order.

1. Weighing in at 172!!!!!
2. Hongry.
3. Can only eat 1/2 a cup but the food swishes through quite quickly.
4. aaaaaaaaghghghghghghg

Tomorrow morning we leave for Las Vegas. I am torn. I am happy that I can eat more than usual. I am scared that I will put on more weight. I will eat but I am going to do some serious walking in hopes of keeping the damage to a minimum before I get a fill.

xxxooo

When Do I Think Fill

Lapband Gal has a good topic on her blog today. I love it when someone unhinges my inspiration and her post has definitely done that. What follows is not a rebuttal but more a deeper explanation from the stand point of my brain anyway.

I don't things are as black and white as can't eat foods/can eat foods. Although we tend to want simple rules weight loss just doesn't. I use a bunch of variables to decide whether I need a fill. What can I eat? how much can I eat? how long do I stay full? Am I gaining or losing weight?

1. What can I eat? In the beginning I tried it on all the time and tried to eat things I really shouldn't have. I am a control freak and not in a good way :) I didn't chew well or stop soon enough on some foods. Hence I would PB (or throw up) when I ate them. It wasn't the food or the band it was my chewing and pushing the plate away when my stomach said so that was the problem. Those things were bread, scrambled eggs, potato and hamburgers. I can eat any of these things now because I am used to slowing down and pushing my plate away when I need to.

2. How much can I eat? In the beginning my fills informed the quantity I could eat. I was supposed to eat between one and two cups of food but eventually my pouch could only hold 1/2 c of food. If the food went through the pouch quickly I could eat and pause and eat some more but with good restriction the 1/2 cup goes in and sits for about 30 min. In the past I have used the grilled cheese test. I make a grilled cheese sandwich and my pouch holds 1/2 a sandwich minus two bites.

3. How long to I stay full? My fill level is really variable during the month. Water and hormones have a big impact. I go from pretty open to really tight depending on the week and day. During my period I am pretty tight. Just after I am really pretty open. I have really had to play with my fill level to decide how tight I could stand. about a month ago I had a little unfill (.25 cc's) and It has evolved into almost being too empty during my open week and just right during my tight week. Before the unfill I was perfect during my open week and too tight for two or more weeks.

4. How much do I weigh? I carry my weight in my tummy. When I gain just 4 pounds it is all in a tire around my waist. I believe that this greatly impacts the fat around my lapband. I can be tight to loose with just a couple of pounds weight loss. Because of this I have tended to get a little fill and tough it out for a few weeks in order to drop some weight and then I grown into my tightness (it basically gets looser). On any given fill I have rolled around 5 pounds. At this fill I am hanging from 169-164. When I was tighter it was 162-166.

When a pile of these variables is not satisfying to me I think about a fill. So my thinking goes something like this:

1. Oh my freaking heck I am gaining or not losing weight. I then ask myself a couple of questions. Is my eating where it hsould be? Is my exercise where it should be? Am I eating the right things? Am I eating too much? Too often? Once the initial thought occurs I wait on things for about a month testing one thing or another until I either revise my thinking or admit defeat and go in for that fill.

xxxooo

I am actually thinking about a tiny one right now (well after my trip to Vegas :))...I have recently dropped one of the pills I take and I think my tightness has decreased a little bit. I have been able to eat more and my scale popped over my top threshold (before I freak out in fear) of 169.

Wahoo--An Old Chapter

I did my student conferences today (A grueling noon to 9pm). They did very well as did I except for a minor hiccup when my document with all of their grades on it vanished off my computer. Sometimes a paper copy is worth the extra copying time.

I recovered (I think) and finished everyone. I left all remaining portfolios in the office for students to get on their own and came home. I only have final grades to upload on the school computer system and this job will officially be over. I can now concentrate on getting the shop ready to open May 1.

Fingers crossed.

xxxooo

What the heck is the deal with booze and my stomach eh?

Does anyone else have trouble with alcohol? is it me? is it my band (cause I like to blame everything on that you know). I have managed to drink two peppermint patties over the last few weeks (hot chocolate and peppermint schnapps is SO Good). but last night I brought a bottle of wine to my friends and drank 1/2 ok most of the bottle. It was a bottle of sparkling. I didn't snack or eat anything just drank. When the bottle ran out I had a small (ok two) chocolate egg things. They were melty and still got stuck (what is the deal). I had pain and had to visit the oval office. Yup..new name for it. Arghghg..I just want to get a little drunk once in a while :(.


xxxooo

Great Book So Far!!!

I mentioned the new book I am reading in my post last night..oh wait that was this morning. The book is REALLY good. I have just read the first chapter but wow is it hitting home for me.

I heard about it during an interview with the author on All Things considered on the radio on my drive to work last week.

So so far i have read about how they have done this big study of people who successfully changed their lives. The key change was changing one thing at a time. The main example person quit smoking so that she could go on a cross desert hike. She focussed on the smoking but funnily enough in the process she ended up changing her diet, exercise, and finances not because she wanted to focus on it but because she picked those things up in order to avoid the smoking.

Researchers asked this woman to take part in their study and they imaged her brain and found over time that she has actually changed the way her brain works (lights up). Her new habits heat up different parts of her brain while the old areas no longer light up.

at least 40% of what each of us do is a habit (this includes big stuff like my morning coffee run down to little stuff like which shoe i put on first).

Businesses take advantage of our habit forming by changing one thing in what they do in order to increase business. For example Starbucks gives you a half off coupon to get you to come in twice a day instead of just once in order to get a new habit started from you that increases their revenue.

It is a good good book thus far.

xxxooo

4 am and all is well-BYOC

1. How do you feel about college? If you have kids or siblings - will you encourage or require them to go? How long did you go and what for?

I am a college teacher so of course I'm big on it. I learned a lot personally from the classes that I took. If I never earned a dime from it that alone would be worth it. I was the first person in my family to earn a Bachelors Degree, Masters Degree and Ph.D. I luckily had a free ride and have no loans to pay back on my own education. I figure that provided me with the opportunity to pay it forward and I have done my best to pay for most of my three daughter's college educations and I hope someday to help a non-family member pay for school.

I want my children to do what they want to do with their lives...but I hope that includes some educational training. So far I have a mathematician, a admin assistant (who has a bachelors degree in international political economy) and a nurse in training. Grace is 10 and says she wants to be a computer engineer like her dad.

Statistically those with bachelors degrees out earn those with a high school diploma and those with a high school diplomas out earn those with none. Beyond a bachelors degree there is no such earning link. It is a crap shoot. I push for my students and my children to dream big, work hard and I have their back in those pursuits.

2. Pink or purple? Coke or Pepsi? Pen or pencil? Cursive or printing? Ketchup or mustard?

Any color is great but I really like green best.
Diet Coke
Both depending on the job at hand. If it is math is is a high quality mechanical pencil. If it is grading or writing then a really nice pen. White board markers are fun (oh and I love purple the best when it comes to pens).
neither cursive or printing..I am a typer.
ketchup on some things mustard on others.

3. If you could live in any generation - which one would it be? I would live in this one for convenience, standard of living and all that jazz but as far as style goes I really like the forties. I love it that everything retro is stylish right now. We can pick our time and play for a day.

4. What do you sleep in?

Usually just underwear. I kind of have a hot flash problem at night. So I cannot even sleep under our duvet anymore. Just panties and a waffle blanket. When I am cold..like really cold I wear pajama bottoms and a tank top but by morning I usually wake up and find out that sometimes while sleeping I shucked them both.

5. Repeat question - summarize your week!

busy busy..I have done some reading and some posting but finals week is upon me. I am still up at this unGodly hour because I am a night owl but also because I was grading exams. On Monday I have conferences with my students and then I am full on to get ready to open my knitty/crafty shop. Stuff is moving in that area.

My weight..blah...a little up and little down same old same old. My biggest challenge is nutrition. I am more than happy to have snacks instead of meals these days but the problem is that I can totally skip any good protein, fruit and vegetables in the process. crap is easy to get down on the fly. Real meals not so much. I am trying to get at least one sit down meal a day and will do even better when I am not working two nights a week (makes excuses really easy).

Some things have hit home-Justines decision-making about whether she wants to stay or lose more and is the effort worth it. I think we all think about that every day. I know I do. I have also read with interest some of the bloggers (more than one) posts about thinking and having the sleeve instead of their bands. Oh and Im debating about Chicago for year three of the Boobs gala event. I did really have a good time last year.

Finally, I started reading a book about habits, how we form them and how we can break them. I am looking forward to learning more from the author. I will post about it if I gain any insights.

I suppose I need to try and sleep a little. nighty night all.

xxxooo

xxxooo