It’s Monday. In most cases, that would be enough. Not today. Actually my head started to spin around last night thanks to my wonderful, caring EX-husband. But, that’s another story all-together now isn’t it?

No, today (after last night), I decided to:

• Get up early - check
• Drink some coffee - check
• Have a nice long shower - check
• Do my do - check (thank God for Aussie Freeze) - check
• Actually put on some war paint - check

…and be somebody and have a great day…

Yah, right.

I managed to amp up on caffeine, have a shower and look like somebody today. Most days, I go to the office looking scary because who the ever comes in our office? Not a damn soul but the UPS guy and he’s used to seeing me look like something my cat just yacked up.

All is going well, I main-lining my Juan Valdez coffee, I get dressed and look pretty damn good for a Monday, drop my purse and coffee cup on the end table so I can run up to the kitchen and grab my lunch. I get back downstairs, I stick my lunch in my purse, grab my coffee and out the door I go. So far, so good, eh?

Well, not so much because as I hear that click that signifies the door is indeed shut and LOCKED, I realize my damn keys are in the house… Figures.

“Damn!” I said out loud to myself and the trees. “No biggie. I’ll just call OG and she can pop over and get me.”

It was already 8:30 and since 8:30 is merely a suggested time to get to work, I knew I wouldn’t be able to reach OG for at least another few minutes.

“Good grief. Here they fucking come.” I muttered to myself standing in the middle of the driveway.

THEY are my nosy neighbor and her moppy looking muts. I can’t stand her or them. She’s the one neighbor that everybody has. She knows everything about everybody in the neighborhood well, exepting us, as we avoid her like the plague.

I saw them coming at me, barking like there’s no tomorrow. I looked at the one taking a shit in the neighbor across the street’s yard and looked up to see NOSY in her front yard, yelling “No jump! No jump!” Whatever.
Those dogs don’t understand plain English because they still run and jump all over anybody that has the balls to walk anywhere on our road when she has them out.

I looked her dead in the eye and gave her my “you’re a skank” glare her before I made a snap decision to take off and walk to work.

Off I went, thinking I’d make it a little ways, be away from psycho neighbor and her mutts, I’d get hold of OG in a few minutes and she’d come get me. I try her again.

“Hey. Come get me. I’m a dork, I locked all the keys in the house…”

“Dude,” she said in a solemn tone, “You just take this like a man. But you’re F-U-C-K-E-D.”

I’m automatically assuming some more fresh cooked drama is coming my way.

“I rode my bike to work today.” She concludes. Excellent, no drama, but it appears I’m walking the 6 miles to work today in these friggin shoes…

They are Gloria Vanderbilt and they were expensive. These are the most comfy slides I own. However, I don’t think Gloria had me walking to work in them., cuz after the first mile and a half, my dang dogs were barkin.

I made many personal observations on my trek this morning.

1. I shouldn’t wear silky, thin pants in fall. It’s fucking cold and I might get locked out of the house.
2. I really, really don’t like my neighbor. Her dogs shit in everybody’s yard but their own (trained to do so by their proud owner I assume).
3. Random people who walk along the river in Oak Ridge are super friendly. I suppose I exchanged 10 smiles and at least that many “hello” and “Good mornings”.
4. Our ex’s are never going to go away. They are part of our pasts and we just have to learn to deal with it.
5. I can indeed do two things at once. I can walk and text at the same time.
6. People really do throw some nasty stuff on the side of the road. For example:
   • some dude chucked his Joe Boxer tighties out the window… Ewwwww…
7. There is too much roadkill for a Monday morning…  The count goes a little somethin like this:
   • One disemboweled and half masticated deer (bllluch)
   • Two squished baby skunks
   • A racoon that had just been plowed down
   • A poor bunny rabbit that being eaten by crows
8. Maybe I should go back to the gym.  All things considered, I feel all happy and refreshed after kicking every pebble for six miles.

Ahh, ya gotta love a Monday!

Peace!

SLOTH.

I went into sloth-remission last year and got into excellent shape.  I lost more than 70 pounds.  I was wearing slutty tight jeans and looking pretty good in them.  I had enough self confidence that I even scared me a time or three.  I was attracting ample attention from the opposite sex.  I wasn’t the fat Pirate anymore.  I blended in well with the other girlies.  I was becoming a certified hottie patoddie. 

Then…  around turkey day… I lost my motivation or ate way to much turkey with dressing and punkin pie or something.  I started eating everything in sight that even looked like it had a carb attached to it.  I quit going to the gym like I was.  My butt went from being touchably firm back to jiggly like a bowl of jello.  Of course, poured into the jeans, nobody could tell.  But I could tell.

I’m still down several sizes from where I started.  Thank God, because I gave all of my fat clothes away and bought new.  They just don’t fit as comfortably as they did.  I find myself having to hold my breath… ALOT! Didn’t take long before I started to get more and more miserable. 

Now here it is summer.  The season I spent the whole of last fall dreaming of, only to wake up and realize… I had failed.  I’m not beach worthy.  I’m not bathing suit worthy. 

I honestly do know what the problem with my motivation is and I am actively working on a resolution to it.  I couldn’t beat ’em, so I joined ’em.

I have quit with the Taco Bell, Papa John’s and Booger King.  I have stopped sneaking into the kitchen and scarfing down a couple cookies here, a few chips there.  And most importantly, I’m not just spending ungodly amounts of money on a gym membership. No longer will it just be an expense sucked out of my bank account.  No. 

I have started doing cardio and group exercize classes again.  I have started eating healthy again.  For my health’s sake.

I had forgotten how good I felt when I was working out and eating right.  It wasn’t just the ability to wear skanky clothes.  It’s more internal than that.  I liked the way I felt.   I had energy. I had attitude. 

So, here I go again.  Wish me luck.  I have a wedding dress to fit into in 2 months and 19 days…

Once in while (wink, wink) I’ll hear, see or read something that just gets my panties all in a wad.

I have several ’sore subjects’, but the one that makes gets my dander up more than anything is the fat people of the world looking for something to blame it on. PLEASE.

As one who has struggled for just shy of one year to lose damn near 70 pounds, I can tell ya this:

• No, fat is not genetic
• No, you don’t have big bones
• No, you can’t lose weight by starving yourself or taking pills.

Fat people are fat because they have not made the decision to motivate and get moving.

There is no miracle pill that you can take to make fat melt. There is no miracle cream that you can rub on your thighs and make them magically disappear into thin air.

Short of surgery, which is an extremely ill idea to begin with, there is only one answer to the timeless question asked of the rolly-polly types: I wonder how I can lose this weight?

Here’s a few pointers (from the master, herself):

1. Step away from the donut. The donut is evil. The donut will find it’s way down your throat and into your guts, where it will then be disbursed and particles of that donut will live in your hips and double chin forever. Other foods that should be in diet hell are: snicker bars, cheesecake, lasagna, loaded potato soup, all mexican food.
2. Taco Bell has always been my weakness. However, one day whilst in a bored situation, I was reading what actually goes into some fast food food. EEEWWWWW.If the fact that most fast food is swimming in grease, lard, oil or someother non-digestable mess isn’t enough to keep you out of the french fries, then go one night around 10 and watch the fry guy at McDonald’s empty that big vat of yack that they fry everything in. MMMMMM, MMMMM, Good, I tell ya. Makes me wanna spew.
3. Starvation. Um, if you don’t give your body something healthy to eat, it’s wired up to know that your dumb ass is trying to starve it. Ask me, what’s my body gonna do if I don’t eat??? Your body is gonna hold on to every single nasty, blobby little molecule of cellulose that it can. You will not lose anything if you starve because your body will be freaking out thinking it’s never going to get to eat again, so it holds onto what it already has. One must eat to lose weight. Funny huh?
4. Get your fat ass on a treadmill!! My fat ass started out doing 15 minutes at 1.5 miles an hour on the treadmill. And amazingly, what those dang nutritionists and exercise therapists have been saying all along was true. YOU GOTTA DO BOTH DIET AND EXERCISE!!!!You can’t sit around and be a slug. Get off your butt and walk around a little amigo. Your body will thank you for it.

So, I guess the bottom line is, you’re only fat if you choose to be fat. I’m a sport, I can admit it, I’m still a little fluffy around certain sections. But I’ve learned that I can’t blame anyone but me for letting me get out of control. I was a scale tipper, and its a battle everyday.

This is why it chaps my ass to hear all this bull-caca about fat being genetic and fat being a disease…

I stand here today, calling BULLshit, DEFCON 5!