Adjusted Reality

But it actually involved me getting pictures off the camera which I am too much of a lazy butt to do, so here is a picture of our iguana eating.  Nom nom nom!  So cute!

And because we spent too much money on all things ‘guana related, here is our Christmas tree.  Just as good, me thinks!  I’ve never been a huge Christmas nut, but I love the lights and sparkles.  So this is the best parts of the tree without the mess or cost!  This is Zliten’s creation he surprised me with when I came home last night…

It’s been a weird week, but not such a weird experience as Wednesday.  I got into the shower after my workout and a spider fell from the ceiling, bit me on the belly button, and then fell into the water and died a quick liquidy death.  Zliten was a little worried about how big it swelled at first, but then it stopped so we were happy and danced.  I am just waiting for my super spidey powers to develop.  Though I did feel like I handled the conference call with our president on sound stuff very well this week.  Maybe…too well.  Though “confidence in dealing with superiors” would be a useful superpower, I still think I’d prefer flying.

Anywho, campers, have a wonderful weekend, mine is looking to be full of relaxing and finishing up Christmas shopping, and hopefully winning at poker on Saturday!

First of all, definitely one of the best South Parks ever.  Second of all, I’d like to report we got our Xbox 360 on Friday!  I’d also like to hang my head in shame because of what I have been doing.  The first week I’ve had it I’ve made use of 2 things – playing Uno, and the large majority of the time?  Being addicted to streaming netflix.  We’ve watched the 2nd season of 30 Rock, a few movies, the first season of The Office, some Tripping the Rift, and now we’re glued to Weeds – we’re about 1/4 way through season 2 after finishing season 1.  So, it’s not that I haven’t had time to play games, it’s that I have CHOSEN not to play anything.

I find it sad, but I guess I can use the excuse that games are expensive.  Yeah, the economy is doing it, right.  This is from the people who spent 300$ on an iguana and an enclosure last week, and over 200$ the week before buying clothes.  I guess I have to accept, that at this point in time, my priorities are elsewhere.  I guess I’m just trying to figure out why.  I have, in theory, the time to dedicate casually to a game.  I have at least 2 hours on the weekdays where I’m not doing other things, even on workout days.  We have at least some time on the weekend where we’re just vegged on the couch, watching TV.  But I never feel motivated to convert this into gaming time.

There is a huge connundrum being a game developer.  You’re into your work because it’s fun, but after a while, it can feel like playing ANYTHING is work.  For a long time, we worked at SOE and played mostly SOE games (which were, I still believe, the best out there at the time and best of all, free).  When we started being involved with making the games, we’d get our friends and guildmates sending us bug reports.  We’d play through areas and make mental notes in our heads what to fix when we got to work (or would just log on right away and fix it).  Imagine your favorite get-away-from-it-all spot, could be a vacation destination, setting of a book, movie, wherever – it just has to feel like paradise.  Something I might name is a cruise, because we all know how much I love ’em.  Now imagine being there, all the time, with work to do and schedules to maintain, and being responsible for parts of it.  You have to capture and exhude the joy YOU feel for this place, and make other people feel it.  Suddenly paradise isn’t quite as footloose and fancy free as you remember.  I bet cruise ship employees probably don’t take their vacations there, and if they do, they hope to god a repeat cruiser doesn’t recognize them.

However, it’s very very important for those making games to play games.  Your ideas get stale if all you’re drawing from is real life and TV.  It’s hard to be passionate about a medium that you don’t spend much time enjoying.  I’ve seen the results of those who make and do not play, and I don’t want to continue down that road.  I also don’t want to live life like I used to, with my friends pixelated, my computer chair the most important piece of furniture, and my body a pile of blubber.  I have to come to a balance, and we all know how good I am at that, right?

I think the answer, in this case, is gaming night.  One weekday, I’m thinking Wednesday because usually it’s a day off working out (at least on the 4 day schedule), we are going to sit down and play at least an HOUR of a game after dinner.  It has to engage both of us, either we take turns, play together, or we play separate games.  I’d like to work back to regularly playing an MMO casually if we’re not really into something else, but there might still be a little too much scarring there for it to feel good and not workalicious.

It starts today, because yesterday was full of fail.  I’ll keep you updated on how we fare.

I am not particularly patient.  I can seem patient, but in my head I’m counting the minutes, days, or weeks ’til I get what I want.  When I can count, I’m at least content.  When it’s something unquantifiable, like “when am I going to get a promotion” or “when is my weight FINALLY going to start falling off again”, I go nuts.  If someone would tell me I could do what I’m doing, lose an ounce a month, and be at my goal weight in 12 years, I might ALMOST be able to handle it better than the uncertainty.

I’m not sure what exactly caused the plateau.  Things were going along swimmingly all summer, then September hit and it was like the weight gain trifecta: extreme stress at work, my parents living with us for an indefinite amount of time, and everyone’s birthdays who weren’t in March were in September.  Plus a gaming convention in town with wicked afterparties.  So basically, apply a ton of unusual stress, and then give TONS of outlets to overeat and drink.  I think under the circumstances I did ok, but my mistake was to try that month, under extreme duress, time crunch, and lack of sleep, to STEP UP my workouts.  I’m tackling harder workouts now without a problem, but that was NOT THE MONTH to do it.

At the very least, feeling like such an extreme failure all month made me realize that I wasn’t doing my body and mind any good by treating it that way, so October saw me cut my cardio time, increase my weights and eating overall.  I just couldn’t keep feeling exhausted and cold all the time!  Well, it certainly FELT better, and while the first two weeks saw a bit of weight loss, it slowed and stalled out.  November, for my sanity, I decided to completely go off the grid.  That felt even better, and by the end of the month I finally felt like I had some gas in the tank and wasn’t running on fumes.  My lowest recorded weight over these 2 months was 164.8.  Considering I hit 170 in mid-August and hit 165 in mid-October, so the last month and a half, I’ve seen literally 2 ounces of loss.

However, there’s been other progress.  The weight training is really changing my shape.  In a space of 5 lbs, I’ve gone from squeezing into 12s barely to being comfortable in 10s.  My stomach is MUCH flatter, my arms are more defined, and I’m much more comfortable with my hair up.  Coats are fitting differently.  Also, I’m so so so close to an unassisted pull up, I’ve increased most of my weights, and I’m now comfortably running 5 miles in just over 50 minutes.  These things are all great, but sadly, the scale is still the ultimate measure.  I’m still too big overall for my likings.  I don’t want to stay at 165 lbs forever.  I don’t want to be petite, waifish, or modelesque, but I’d like to get a bit further away from hulking, stocky, and linbackeresque.

I’ve been tracking and cutting calories this month (just a bit – I seem to naturally stay between 1500-1700 on good days unless I’m splurging, trying to cut back to 1300-1400) and trying to be patient.  Today, I stepped on the scale for the first time in 5 days.  I was even questioning doing it because I felt bloated, but I’m glad I did, because I saw a new low – 163.6.  I have never been so dang happy over 1.2 lbs, but I’m practically giddy today.  It’s not so much the number, but that there is actual progress again.  What I’m doing is working again.  And I can totally do this!

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One of those things I’d always get stuck on when I would decide to lose weight is healthy eating.  I have not been a “eat at home” type of gal, well, ever.  How shall I say this… the cooking that came out of my house was not exactly to my tastes.  I would not say my mother was a horrible cook (at least not in public…kidding), but she was working with a lot stacked against her in my eyes.

My parents are both huge carnivors, prefering huge chunks of meat, with a huge salad (that had things I hated back then like radishes and onions, plus I hated all salad dressings – why can’t I still hate dressing???), and some veggies and MAYBE a baked potato if we were lucky (with molly mcbutter, anyone remember that stuff?).  I have always preferred to have meat as a condiment, with a healthy dose of carbs and veggies as the main dish.  Plus, my dad had high blood pressure, so everything was low salt.  Now I know how to flavor without it, but I still see the challenge. So there I am, eating flavorless dry meat, slimy veggies, the bits out of the salad I could pick out, and the highlight of my meal was a baked potato with butter flakes sprinkled on top.

I remember the daily struggle culminated in a meal of liver and onions, with okra and eggplant on the side.  As a kid, there was literally NOTHING there I liked, and when forced to eat it, I spent the evening yakking over the garbage can (for drama only, it’s not as if I *couldn’t* eat it.  I just hated it).  Shortly after that, I was told that if I wanted something else for dinner, I had to make it.  I totally took my mom up on that.  When we went to the store I would have her buy me ramen, microwave dinners, cans of soup, anything chef boyardee, and canned tamales, and I would cook them.  She made me eat enough of the good stuff (veggies and forced some meat down my throat) but let me get the carbs they didn’t eat.  Which is probably a good thing for a kid that pretty much was active constantly.

Since I didn’t like what came out of the kitchen, I never really learned any recipes from my mom.  Since we were such different animals, there was no point.  At eighteen, I was thrust out into the world of making my own damn food, and I pretty much relied on things in cans or boxes, frozen veggies, and fast food and/or coffee shops.  I think I gained/lost/gained about 15 lbs until the last year of college, where I pretty much ate bar food or Applebees (because I worked there and it was 50% off).  Couple that with binge drinking and moving my partying from the dance floor to a bar stool, it was not pretty.  But, enough about my 21st haze of a year…the point I’m trying to make here is twofold.  First, I didn’t gain an excessive amount of weight in the first 3 years without eating at home, like, ever.  Second, if I, queen of the prepackaged meal, can learn to cook healthy food, so can you.

This revelation is very recent.  Two years ago, Marie Calendars prepared most of my meals if I didn’t go out.  It took a commitment to eating better, a kitchen I had more than 1 square of prep space, and being so sick of everything packaged and frozen that I almost would rather stop eating than make another Lean Cuisine Chicken Alfredo.  Only the first is necessary.  I don’t actually suggest #3 and you can still work with #2 unless you’re looking for excuses.

To start, don’t aim too high.  Take the packaged pasta roni you’re eyeing for dinner, buy a bag of frozen veggies and some precooked chicken.  Voila, you’ve got two fairly balanced meals – actually, and the calorie count isn’t that horrid.  Aim to add extra veggies to EVERYTHING, the packaged stuff NEVER has enough.  If you must have that can of chicken and stars soup, balance it out with a big leafy salad with lots of veggies and a protien source like beans or turkey pepperoni.  Love mac and cheese?  Add a mess of frozen veggies, a can of tuna, some onions and celery, and instead of a thousand plus calorie bowl of orange flavored carb, you’ve got 2-3 helpings with some better staying power.  If you can only do one thing, I suggest adding 2 servings of frozen veggies to whatever your eating.

Then, once you realize, hmmm, maybe I could make this better on my own, you’ll start branching out.  I started making my own sandwiches, wraps, and salads instead of ordering them – sounds easy, but it was a start.  After a while, the world was my oyster and I made my own tortilla pizzas and calzones, stir frys (though Zliten took those over and rocks them better than I can), soups, tacos, and burritos.  Then, we found the wonders of the BBQ and now dine on fish, chicken, kabobs…it’s amazing how much BETTER meat is on a grill!  Soon, you’ll never open a package again.  Yeah…right, like that could happen (for me at least).

This week, we have a particularly “package-y” menu, so it’s a perfect week to showcase!  Today for dinner, manwhiches!  That is extra lean ground beef, lo cal sourdough bread, manwhich can, fat free cheese, and a mess-ton of frozen veggies on the side.  Tomorrow, I’m taking a package of lipton fettucini alfredo, adding a chicken breast, and another ton of veggies.  Wednesday, we’re splitting a package of stouffers lasagna (the 3 serving size), and adding a huge salad w/a lo cal bread to sop it up.  Thursday, we’ve got some beef stew/pan pot roast thing, adding veggies and a big ol’ salad as well.  Friday is more of a home cooked kinda thing, but it’s so easy – fish tacos and garlic black beans.  Take 2 frozen costco tilapia filets, cook in pan with garlic, add hot sauce, cilantro, olives, lettuce, sour cream, and cheese to a corn tortilla, and feel good in your belly.

The beauty of these meals?  Nothing is over 500 calories, and they’re way easy to make.  Next time I talk about recipes I’ll get into some of the more complicated stuff, but from the start, I just wanted to stress that ANYONE can eat healthier with very little effort or knowledge in the kitchen.  The reason I’ve let this post sit for so long?  I never remember to let the food stay in it’s cooked/not eaten stages long enough to take pictures.  Ah well.  There’s always next time.

Haven’t done one of these for a while, so it’s a random Friday!

1.  Proud of myself: had to stay late at work for babysitting the build (the collection of new stuff that we are adding to the game) duty.  Between stuff I had to do, I made it down to the gym for a 30 minute interval and leg strength session, returned to work for a bit, then when I could, closed my office door and did a ab and arm workout.  I owe myself 10 minutes of DDR but all in all, I think I did good.  Not proud of myself: came home and had  bottle of wine for dinner, which resulted in splitting a can of store brand spaghetti with Zliten at 2am.  Oh well, you can’t win them all.

2.  I decided, fuck the weight requirement (was going to wait until 160), and went clothes shopping anyway on black Friday.  And I’m glad I did, because now, I fit squarely into size 10s, so I have been making progress.  I haven’t seen size 10s since I was in high school.  I know sizes are a little inflated, but I remember 2 years ago walking into the same store (Target) and buying size 24.  Now I have new brown and black pants, a billion new sweaters and long sleeved shirts in lots of colors (though I failed at finding anything in orange, yellow, or purple, which made me sad).  Of all places, we walked into walmart and I went through the clothes just on a lark, and found, on clearance, awesome suit jackets and pants.  I snagged a black jacket, pinstripe jacket and pants (and seriously, these are probably the most comfortable pants I own now), and a red dress shirt for like 40 bucks.  Now, Zliten and I have matching suits (his idea, actually) we can wear.  I think people might vomit with cuteness poisoning though.

3.  All of you people in the northern-lands I’m sure have soooo much sympathy for me, but damn, is it summer yet?  Last night it got down to the 30s and this morning on the drive to work it was in the low 40s.  I miss being able to sit out on my patio at night in a tank top, instead of being bundled up in a coat, scarf, and gloves trying not to freeze to death.  Give me 95 and humid any day instead of this crap.

4.  I spent some time reading gamer news this week, and I realized how bored I am with it all.  All the games I was excited for came out already and without the week of laziness over Christmas to get into a game since Scroogie McBoss man is making us work this year, I just don’t have time to really get into anything anyway.  However, I am really anticipating 2 things – we are getting an xbox 360 for Christmas (ok, so today) from Zliten’s parents, and I’m really excited to finally play Viva Pinata and Fable (yes, I know I’m late to the party, but at least my games are cheap!).  I’m also counting the days until February 19th when The Sims 3 launches, and I am going to potentially become a hermit for a while.  I guess I shouldn’t throw away my geek card just yet.

5.  I am excited about this, a new BattleStar Galactica spinoff.  I’m sure it will be as well written as the series, and hopefully as “edge-of-your-seat” tense…but I’m a little questionable about the premise (being a prequel, and being more of a drama than a sci-fi).  I am excited for this as well, though I’m not sure if Stargate as an IP is being stretched a little thin.  I’m hopeful though – and will gobble up willingly anything stargate.  Except the cartoon.  That shit was wack, yo.  Speaking of all things Stargate, my thoughts go out to the staff at Cheyenne Mountain Studios, who are now still at work on their game on their 22nd unpaid day, just trying to get the game finished because of funding issues.  That’s dedication.  I hope your game is great, and you’re rewarded in the end with big moneyhats. (thx Zliten for the tip on that)

Have a great weekend!