75 Crunches And A 6 Pound Ball

The only thing I love more than going on vacation is coming home from vacation where our couch, bathtub, and pathelogically insane kittens wait eagerly for us to return so they can systematically ignore, snub and revile us. Nothing like coming home and feeling the love.

Despite the rather chilly reception waiting for us at home, Thanksgiving in Mendocino was spectacular. Long walks along the coastal headlands in crisp fall weather, browsing through the bookstore, starring up into a cloudless night sky and counting the shooting stars, purchasing a baking soda powered submarine at the toy store, Dana spotting a 20 dollar bill o the sidewalk only to donate it a few hours later to an animal shelter (another reason to love her as if there weren't already enough), eating a leisurely Thanksgiving dinner in our favorite restaurant, long soaks in the jacuzzi tub, flannel jammies and a bedroom fireplace, and talking with Dana about everything and nothing into the wee hours of the morning.

A quality weekend and all the more so compared to last year's Thanksgiving that arrived while Dana and I were walking through a time of disappointment in people and a wider church we had loved and respected only to have been betrayed and abandoned by them. (Blog Note: If that sounds overly-dramatic, it's only because there are times in all our lives when the most critically-acclaimed soap opera has nothing on us and if you don't know what I'm talking about then count your lucky stars, throw salt over your shoulder and spit three times into the palm of your hand post haste. Exit parenthesis at this time to resume original stream of consciousness.) Looking back over the year we've come through Dana and I found ourselves expressing genuine gratitude for what God has brought us out of and where God is taking us, wherever that might be. There's a passage in the Hebrew Scriptures, words spoken by Joseph to the brothers who had once abandoned him, selling him into slavery; "Even though you intended to do harm to me, God intended it for good." I thought about those words this weekend and while by no stretch of the imagination do I compare my life to that of Joseph's, I think I just might know what the my slave-turned-Egyptian-prince-of-a-brother meant when he said those words.

There was something else that awed me this weekend. The night sky. I was blown away by it. Not just by the dazzling sight of all the stars but by the idea of how humongous it all is; that there are lights in the sky from stars that don't exist, whose light has only just reached us here on this puny little planet even though the star turned to dust long ago, like the spot of light that lingers in your eyes long after the flash of the camera. And the expanse of the universe, one galaxy beyond another one beyond another one after that. God without beginning and end, space without limit or boundaries. Doesn't the whole notion of infinite and eternal just rattle your brain on occasion? I love, I mean really wildly love how little it is that we know. Who needs to read reformulated stale mysteries when we're living right in the middle of the most incredible mystery of all!

Enough ruminations.

So. While I was spending a relaxing, and apparently, mind-altering Thanksgiving weekend in Mendocino with Dana, she, and you well know to whom I'm referring, was diabolically and systematically plotting how to make me suffer until I begged for mercy. Today I came close and in doing so I learned something important about myself and it is this; my breaking point, the moment I will morph from complete composure into a drooling, whimpering mess of a human being is somewhere just after 3 sets of 25 crunches. I don't know the exact moment because I didn't reach it. I only know I was teetering precariously on its' edge.

Apples and oranges you say but I assure you that my pontifications over the universe are not as unrelated to core training as you might first imagine because there is an interconnection between them that has led to a heightened self-awareness. It is this. I prefer mystery over misery and stars over sweat. Hands down.

Monday's Check-In on Wednesday

Monday, November 27 Check-In
205 Pounds (1 pound weight loss, 11 pounds total)
Chest: 41 (2 inches lost)
Waist: 43 (no change)
Hips: 48 (1 inch lost)
Thigh: 25 (no change)
BMI: 35.3 (down 1.9 points)

Weekly Caloric Intake and Exercise Log
Monday, 11-20
1469 calories, 60 minutes on Tread Climber, 40 minutes cross-training
Tuesday, 11-21
1301 calories, 60 minutes on Tread Climber
Wednesday, 11-22
1385 calories, 30 minutes on Tread Climber, 40 minutes cross-training
Thanksgiving, 11-23
2398 calories, 1 hour walk, 20 minutes core exercises
*Friday, 11-24
Undetermined calories, 1 hour walk
*Saturday, 11-25
Undetermined calories, 1 hour walk
*Sunday, 11-26
Undetermined calories, 60 minutes on Tread Climber

*Away from home for the holiday weekend so unable to accurately track caloric intake due to restaurant dining.

Every Day Thanksgivings

There's nothing I could offer in the way of Thanksgiving gratitudes that would be more eloquent than those offered by Rose of Hit the Ground Running fame. Do yourself a favor and take a minute in this turkey (or tofuty)-filled day to read her Thanksgiving entry. It serves as a wonderful reminder that often our greatest blessings are hidden in the mundane of everyday life.

For all things, both that which brings us ease and consolation, and that which causes us to strengthen and mature, thanks be to God forever more.

"For from God and through God and to God are all things."
(Romans 11:29)

Monday Check-In

I've made a decision and there's no talking me out of it so don't even try. Every Monday, whether you want me to or not, I'm going to chart my progress in terms of weight loss as noted by my weekly check-in at 24 Hour Fitness, along with my monthly measurements. I'm also going to list my caloric intake and work-outs for the week.Why you ask? Let me give you two answers. One: Oh Heck, why not? I'm telling you everything else about my life as it is. Two: It motivates me to be accountable to others even the others are a ratty bunch of blogophites like you! And so, here is the first thrill-packed installment of calories and cardio.

Starting Check-In
October 27
216 pounds
Chest: 43 inches
Waist: 43 inches
Hips: 49 inches
Thigh: 25 inches
BMI: 37.2
November 13 Check-In
207

November 20 Check-In
206

Weekly Caloric Intake and Exercise Log
Monday, 11-13
1117 calories, 60 minutes x 2 on Tread Climber, 40 minutes cross-training
Tuesday, 11-14
1495 calories, 60 minutes on Tread Climber
Wednesday, 11-15
1503 calories, 60 minutes on Tread Climber, 40 minutes cross-training
Thursday, 11-16
1465 calories, 60 minutes on Tread Climber
Friday, 11-17
1481 calories, 60 minutes on Tread Climber, 40 minutes cross-training
Saturday, 11-18
1313 calories, 60 minutes on Tread Climber
Sunday, 11-19
1167 calories, 3 mile walk

Just a Baking Babe

These days when I'm not counting my calories, sweating on the cardio equipment to Annie Lennox belting out "Missonary Man", or submitting to some new torture designed for maximum burn by D_wn, my personal painmaker trainer, I'm standing in the middle of my flour-coated kitchen baking the sides, roofs, and chimneys for 30, count em, 30 gingerbread houses. Wrap your head around that for a minute. Imagine 90 cups of flour, 15 cups of brown sugar, 30 eggs, 18 3/4 cups of molasses, 8 pounds of butter, and a cereal bowl of spices. It took one day to pre-measure the dry ingredients, another day to mix the dough and most of today and tomorrow to do the baking before wrapping and freezing enough gingerbread walls that if laid side by side would reach all the way to somewhere and back again. And I, Phatgirl, am having a blast!

I'm rather fond of Christmas, it being the Baby J's birthday and all.
And children. I'm totally smitten by my waist-hugging buddies.
And church. One of my favorite hang-outs. Dio's casa mi casa.

Put it all together and you end up with a Children's Christmas party that's gonna rock da' house with games, a showing of Disney's "Small One" (my favorite Christmas animated film of all time and required viewing for all children in my life), a haute cuisine luncheon of grilled cheese sandwiches sans crust and chicken oodles' of noodles soup, concluding with gingerbread houses buckling under the weight of thick blobs of royal icing festooned with obscene quantities of candy and liberal doses of child spit from finger-licking and stolen nibbles. This, my people and peeps, is the good life in a chestnutshell.

Painful Pec Prohibitions

In the event you should ever find yourself burdened with pain in your pectoralis major muscle then let me share some wisdom gleaned today in my ventures through life.

1. Do not attempt to stir milk into your coffee. Either hire someone to do it for you, ask for the support of a friend, or drink it black.
2. Do not consider lifting anything weighing more than 7 ounces over your head. This includes your own arms.
3. Do not attempt to get dressed and if you must get dressed, avoid anything that slips over your head, or uses a zipper, snaps, ties, or buttons. This will limit you to a poncho or a garment utilizing velcro.
4. Crying doesn't help but it doesn't hurt either. Unless you sob. Sobbing increases the likelihood of shoulder movement. Don't do that.
5. Do not engage in rigorous tooth brushing. This would be a good time to invest in a Braun Oral-B Advance Power Electric Toothbrush. To limit pectorial movement when using your new Braun Oral-B, bring your chin down to your chest before attempting minimal elevation of brush to mouth.
6. Take a lesson from our ape ancestors and drive with your feet, keeping arms dangling limply on your lap.
7. While coping with painful pecs do not participate in active sports that include, but are not limited to the following: bungie jumping, hand-gliding, para sailing, deep sea diving, and alligator wrestling. Fire walking and cat lassoing should only be attempted with extreme caution.
8. Do not polka. Even an Irish jig could result in undue suffering.
9. Take aspirin and plenty of them. This advice is contingent on being able to open the aspirin container in the first place.
10. Learn to type with your toes. How else do you think I could have made this entry?

A Pain in the Pecs

I was pretty sure it was just my imagination. A glint in the eye. A wink. A smirk. I was standing before a huge white metal freestanding cross-training contraption with pulley's and weights and levers and random bits and pieces. As I began the first series of reps she had just demonstrated for me, I could have sworn I heard her say, "You're going to feel these tomorrow in your pecks" and that's the very moment I thought I saw a glint, a wink, and a smirk. But I was sure I was mistaken. She looks too cute and seems too nice to take pleasure in the suffering of others. Besides, I didn't even know what pecs were and if I had any, and so I went ahead naively, trustingly, foolhardly and did precisely as D_wn, my personal trainer instructed me to do. And as the day wore on, I forgot all about what I thought I'd seen.

Until this morning. This morning when I went to push the covers off me I discovered I have pecs. Raw, throbbing, pounding, screaming, angry ones. It was foolishness on my part. I shouldn't have attempted something so reckless. If I had it to do all over again I would do it differently. Hinesight is always 20/20 they say and they're right. If only I had moved one blanket at a time but oh nooooo, I had to push all three off at once in my rush to get out of bed. I'll think better next time. After a session with D_wn, it's always best advised to move cautiously in the hours that follow. Speaking of which I'd write a longer blog entry but I'm beginning to feel a twitch and pull and ache in my pecs. Oh yes, I have them and I know just where they are, thank you very much.

Confession Session

The gracious comments of family and friends to my initial nine-pound weight loss requires that I share a teeny-weeny detail with you. While it's true I lost nine pounds in two weeks it's equally true that following the Portland Marathon I managed to pack on sixteen pounds in one month. Impossible you say? Perhaps for an amateur such as yourself but not for a professional Phatgirl! All it required was consuming the same quantity of food while mending motionless from my injury that I was consuming when logging 20-25 miles a week during training. Here's an equation that will help you avoid the same mistake. I'll wait while you grab a pen and paper. Ready? Okay, it goes something like this:

-Calories In
+ No Calories Out
.Weight Gain

There you go. Don't ever say I never did anything for you. Anyway, the plan as it stands now is to dump the remaining seven pounds as soon as is feasibly possible so I can move on to tackling the original forty pounds. Forty pounds. That translates as a four year old child. In other words, I'm carrying around a preschooler. Let's call her Edith, shall we? Even as I blog, I see a radical new weight loss book in my future. Know your fat. Love your fat. Name your fat. Someone call Random House so they can get the presses rolling!

Nine is Fine

Just when you thought Monday's couldn't get more brutal, D_wn, my personal torturer trainer decided to up the ante and designate all foreseeable Monday's in my future as check-in days.

Check-In (verb) chek-inn
1. register at a hotel - to register as a guest, or register a guest, on arrival at a hotel. Has my colleague checked in yet?
2. arrive for a trip - to register and go through the necessary formalities before beginning a trip, especially by air. All passengers should check in at least one hour before departure.
3. make contact - to make routine contact with a person or organization to exchange information. The patrols are suppose to check in by radio at half-hour intervals.
4. weigh in on scales - the occasion upon which an individual is compelled by their physical trainer to get on the scales, most commonly located in a high traffic area in the center of a fitness club to register their weight. The cruel and diabolical personal trainer made the unsuspecting phatclient climb on the scales to check in on her progress.

If you're leaning toward option four as the applicable definition then you're tonight's lucky winner and your prize will be arriving soon to a mailbox near you. Not your mailbox, but one near you so the sooner you start rummaging through your neighbor's mailboxes the sooner you'll find it. Go ahead. It will be fine. Really. Now, back to the topic at hand. Me.

The results of my first offical check in after two weeks of daily cardio, core training, and precise calorie tabulations have led to a nine pound weight loss. That's right Happy Campers, nine big ones. Step aside "Biggest Losers" because Phatgirl is nipping at your sneaker struttin' heels!

Soaking with the Snowman

Phatgirl is blogging on location from Kansas City, where I've been for the last five days while attending a work-related conference and from where my flight departs for home in an hour. The conference was a conference as conferences go. Five days of workshops, films, plenary sessions, networking, nametags, exhibit booths, and hotel food. It was much better than root canal surgery but not up to par with Disneyland. It would safely fall some where between the two.

The best part, aside from meeting some radically incredible people, was the hotel gym. For five dollars a day I had full access to their workout facilities and I managed to get my money's worth and then some. Every morning by 6:15 I'd be on the elliptical for an hour with a second hour clocked every evening. My daily cardio ranged from two to three hours a day which is way outside the norm for this girl. I also used the pool and jacuzzi which I mention here because on one of my jacuzzi dips I took a soak with Frosty the Snowman. A memorable experience whether in Kansas City or Disneyland though additional details are probably needed.

It goes like this. Follow along closely. The Westin Hotel where I stayed is attached to Crown Plaza. Crown Plaza is attached to Hallmark Headquarters. Hallmark owns just about everything within shouting distance. Apparently, Hallmark has an arrangement with the Westin Hotel allowing their card-carrying-card-making employees to utilize the hotel's cardio equipment, workout room, pool and jacuzzi.

This brings us full circle back to the snowman. Please discontinue reading if to this day you believe in Santa Claus, the tooth fairy, and the statement that "One Size Fits All" and rejoin us at the start of the next paragraph. Okay then, now that those people are gone, let me explain. Frosty the Snowman is actually a 18-year African American man named Gordon. Reverse that. Every winter Gordon, hired as Hallmark's official mascot, becomes Frosty the Snowman. In the jacuzzi Gordon appeared as Gordon, a very friendly, handsome young man, and not as Frosty the Snowman, a very fat, jolly and frigid fellow. I only know Gordon's other identity as Frosty the Snowman because it came up in conversation. I thought it was important to clarify the specifics for those of you who wondered how a snow-rolled character could hold up against a slow boil in 100 degree water. Okay. Now let's move on to the next paragraph so that our delusional friends can rejoin us.

Hi. Glad you're back. So what were we talking about? Ah. My workouts. You should be impressed by my dedication. I am. In addition, I kept record of everything I ate though I didn't blog it here, as fascinating as it would have been for you to read because of our previous in-ci-dent which, by the way, has been forgiven but not forgotten, but I digress. Rightly so, but a digression all the same. Anyway, between the workouts and intentional choices with my food, I'm going home without the standard sluggish feeling that results from the usual conference inactivity and away from home dining. That feels good. Really good. Speaking of which, I have a plane to catch. And that my friends, feels even better!

Orange You Glad It's Fall

I love fall. I love my crocs.

I love fall because of the crisp cool air, the crunch of fallen leaves under my feet, the colors of the season, rain storms, wearing long pants and sweatshirts after months of teeshirts and shorts, early sunsets that make for long evenings, foods that taste of pumpkin, spices, apples and the comfort of a bowl of hot soup at supper time.

I love crocs because of the wild choice in colors, the ease of putting them on, the comfort of wearing them, and that I can wash them with Windex and rinse them under the faucet so that they shine like new.

Put the two together and that is one sweet moment in life.
And Christmas is going to be pretty spectacular too! Just wait and see.

Tickled Pink by Autumn's True Colors

Okay, THIS is why I love the internet! Autumn, of Autumn is More Than A Season fame found my blog entry on her finish in the Portland Marathon, and along with a host of her compadres posted a comment to my blog! How insanely cool is that?!

If you remember that particular entry, and how could you not considering the unforgettable quality of my verbiage, take a moment to digest that while I remove my tongue from my cheek, I compared the individual victories of Mike Heidt and Autumn Jones, two marathoners who crossed the finish line with times that separated them by nearly eight hours and twenty minutes. I read about Mike in the local paper the next morning and so I knew the story that brought him to the marathon and carried him across the finish line in record time. But there was no article about Autumn Jones. I'm still wondering why. Isn't the story of a solitary athlete who perseveres to the finish line after most of the crowds have gone home, the roads have been re-opened, and the aid station tables folded and stacked away just as compelling as the elite athlete who crosses the finish line to the cheers and applause of thousands? The story the newspaper failed to provide, Autumn offers in her own words. I think so.

Thank you for posting this. It was very inspirational.This was my first attempt at a marathon and I am very proud that I've completed it. I did overcome some obstacles to get to the finish line. I came down with a horrible case of bronchitis half way through my training. After the marathon I had a hip that needed some therapy and the worst blisters. I threw the towel in at mile 21 and called around for a ride home. I got to mile 22 without anyone picking me up and I decided to push forward. I will do this again next year. Thank you for writing about me. It's amazing what comes up when you google your own name.

First marathon. Bronchitis. Blisters. Painful hip. And she's going to do it again next year. Now, you tell me if that isn't the story of an athlete! And if I may be so bold, I wish at this time to extend my personal thank you to the person or persons who failed to pick up Autumn when she called for a ride out of the race at mile 21.

And you shouldn't thank me for blogging about you Autumn. I'm the one who should thank you. Thank you for helping me get out of my DNF pity party to find inspiration in your story. Thank you for encouraging me to not give up. You are a big part of why I'm trying again next year. I tell no lie.

Every story is different. Never discount yours, whatever it may be, whoever you are. Everyone overcomes something. Everyone climbs over obstacles. Everyone has a motivation and purpose that drives them to do something that at one time they never believed they could do. To finish a marathon is to finish a marathon. If you walk, if you run, if you crawl and whine like a baby every step of the way, you've done something so remarkable, and this phatgirl salutes you!

D_wn Is Whomping My Hiney

I realize there's a tendency for exagerating in the blogosphere but this is not one of those times. She's trying to kill me. I'm not kidding. The woman is brutal and relentless. All 103 pounds of lean muscle mass cuteness. Cute to the point where I want to slap her but instead I cower in her svelte shadow because she has the power to add ten crunches or five squats on a whim. And so she says "Jump!" and I say "With or without a net?"

The truth is I'm loving the gym and working with a personal trainer. On the days when I can shift my work schedule around I'm getting to the gym for an hour in the morning and an hour in the afternoon. Me. The gym. Twice a day. I'm motivated and sweating like a wild woman. Not a casual sweat, not the genteel glow on a dainty lady's pallid flesh, not a summer's heat perspiration. I'm talking about bare arms glistening, tributaries of salty sweat flowing freely across the facial terrain from forehead to eyes, and rain forest humidity under the hair dangling over the nape of your neck. What really pushes my sweat button is a solid hour on this bad boy, the Nautilus Tread Climber. For the uninformed by appearance the Tread Climber looks like a treadmill that's split down the middle so while one side is going up the other side is going down. Think of it as the love child of an evening interlude between a treadmill and an elliptical machine. It burns abought 17 calories per minute which is a nice click up from my usual burn rate on 100 calories per mile walking. The downside is that I can't get an arm swing going because my klutz factor has me holding onto the handlebars for my sweet life, with my full attention on my foot fall. Perhaps one day I'll get comfortable enough to release my death grip but in the meantime, my profuse amount of sweat can be attributed to equal parts cardio work out and ice-cold fear sweat.

My personal trainer also turned me onto a great online resource, CalorieKing.com. For the past four days I've logged every minute of exercise and every ounce of food. I've used other online food and exercise journals in the past but this one is by far the best and is just another extra little motivator and keeping the motivation up keeps Phatgirl moving in the right direction.

Halloween Recap

I'm soon to be 50 years old and for the past month I've been driving around with a ghost strapped in the back seat of my car. There's nothing wrong with that. Is there? Seriously, it's not like I'm using a ghost to access the carpool lane in rush-hour traffic. I know how ridiculously wrong that would be. It's just that I get so lonely out there on the open road and Casper is a perfect passenger. No back seat driving. No whining for an ice cream cone every time we pass a Dairy Queen. No unplanned potty spots. No spilled soda or fingerprints on the back window. No Blue's Clues on the car CD player. Just a quiet and agreeable poltergeist to keep me company. I only hope I can find an elf to take his place soon.

Halloween. I was always a hobo; hobo being a socially acceptable word in the 60's. It wasn't that dressing as a princess or a Musketeer or a hippie wasn't more desireable but nothing could replace the ease of preparation in being a hobo. Dirty play clothes, a light coating of ashes from the fireplace, a pillow case tied to the end of a stick to haul the evenings sugar-booty, and you were good to go.

3.2 seconds after sunset and every door in our neighborhood swung open to release hordes of marauding children on the yearly candy pilgrimage. Call it Heaven. Call it Nirvana. Whatever your faith tradition, it was one entire evening of unrestrained bliss. Oh sure, it wasn't without it's downside. There was for example, the house two doors down and on the opposite side of the street that in one year went from handing out sticky, gooey, yummy homemade caramel apples rolled in peanuts to dispensing single shiny nickels the next and every year after. One nickel per child. What were they thinking? On all the Halloween nights after as we turned our backs to their front door we'd flick our buffed nickels in our bags and reminisce fondly about "the good old days."

But aside from that, these were the pre-snacksize days when a candy bar was a candy bar. Today's snack-size candy bars are barely big enough to fit in the molar cavities our full size, multiple bit candy bars produced. Caravelle. Nestles Crunch. Look. Big Hunk. Regular size bags of M&M's. Boxes of Jujubees that were so big you gripped them with your entire hand. We laughed at penny candy. Don't bother us with such empty offerings. Bring on the real stuff. Hand over the boxes of MilkDuds and Good & Plenty. Rustle up a herd of Black Cow suckers. Light up our candy cigarettes. Adorn us in candy necklaces, bee-stung beautiful red wax lips and black wax moustaches. We loved sour before sour was cool. It was the decade that gave birth to Lemonheads, SweeTarts, and Starbursts. It was sour enough to pucker your face but not to erode brain cells like their contemporary counterparts.

When the last house porch went dark, weighted under the burden of pillow cases ripping at the seams, we headed back to survey our sugar swag and begin the arduous process of negotiating trades. I was a shrewd sugar trader. I'd give up five non-chocolate items for a single coveted cherry cream filled Mountain Bar, my personal Kilimanjaro, but only after the acting performance of a lifetime.

"Trade my Jolly Ranchers?! No way! There's no way I'm letting go of my grape and watermelon Jolly Ranchers for. . .what? That one Mountain Bar? It's not even a bar. It looks like dog poo! I can't believe you'd even. . .sigh. Okay. Here's the deal I'm offering but listen close because I'm not going to say it again. I will give you 1, no 2 grape Jolly Ranchers and 3 watermelon Jolly Ranchers for that ugly chocolate mound thingy but you have to throw in a Tootsie Roll. That's the deal. You want it?"

I consumed a lifetime of parleyed cherry-cream filled Mountain Bars before I retired from the trick-or-treat circuit. I knew my stuff.

Last Halloween Dana and I bought a bag of snack-size Snickers. No children came thus salvaging my humiliation at having succumbed to purchasing snack-size anything. It was a low moment in my Halloween career and so this year we went all out and bought seven nylon mesh bags, each one holding 5 foil-wrapped bloodshot eyeballs and 4 dismembered foil-wrapped fingers that makes a shiny new nickel look like the chumb change it is. And so as the sun set we waited and waited to dispense the gory sugar booty but no children came. It was only when I was in the middle of putting on my jammies that I heard the nostalgic sound of children arriving on their candy quest. From where I stood listening at the top of the stairs I overheard the following interaction:

Dana: Hello!
Very Small People: Trick or treat! Trick or treat! Gigglegigglegiggle.
Dana: Trick or treat huh? Well, I think I have something here for you. Here's something for each of you.
Very Small People: Oh Boy! Wow! Oh! Thank you! Thank you! Assorted exclamations of delight and overwhelming happiness.
Dana: You're welcome Kids. Bye!
Very Small People: Bye! Faces and hands buried in their bags as they walk away.

The bag of foil-wrapped chocolate eyeballs and fingers were given in loving tribute to the people two houses down and on the other side of the street. Kind strangers who once went to all the trouble to unwrap hundreds of Kraft caramels, melt them down into a sticky mess, plunge sweet apples on sticks into the sugary goo, and roll them in crushed peanuts before setting them onto individual wax-paper circles just to make a bunch of sugar-greedy little children squeal with happiness. They gave me more than a caramel apple. They gave me a perfect memory and for that reason, I'll forgive them for the shiny nickels. I'm sure they meant well.

She's Back!

Well then, I don't know about you but an hour at the gym and I feel all better. Shall we proceed?

After the disappointment of being a certified DNF princess at the Portland Marathon in October, followed by a full month of physical therapy and no training that left me withering like stale human vegetation on the vine, Phatgirl was feeling like Blahgirl. But no more! Phatgirl has her groove back and wishes to thank the following for contributing to her revitalization:

• Jeanne, and her incredible, glorious, hysterical, and at times stomach-churning marathon report of her adventures at the Marine Corps Marathon. Marvelously-made indeed!
• The new issue of Running Times and it's listing of 259, count them, 259 marathons in 2007. Bliss.
• An online preview of Land of the Gods: The Legend of the Marathon, a full-length documentary on five people training for the Chicago Marathon that's soon to be released.
• D_wn, my very own I'm-going-to-make-you-sweat-and-hurt-and-ache-all-over-and-you're-going-to-thank-me-for-it personal trainer.

It's all good my little fleet-footed friends!

It's dinner time so I better get into the kitchen and finish preparing the . . .oh wait. That's right. That's classified information reserved for those rare intelligent and refined individuals who appreciate the details of life and apparently that doesn't include any of you. I bet you're sorry now.

Are You Paying For This?

It seems you aren't interested in the thrills and chills of my daily dining. Okay. Fine, you bunch of elitist blogifites. I've removed my menu entries and won't ever again impose them upon you. But just be aware. Someday you're going to be gathered around a table with friends celebrating a special occasion, let's say your birthday or perhaps National Bunion Day, and as you lift a forkful of calves' liver with melted onions in marsala sauce to your rosebud lips you're going to ponder to yourself or exclaim to the entire company of guests gathered round about you, "I wonder what that sharply-witty and deeply-insightful Phatgirl is eating right now." And. you. will. not. know. Why? I'll tell you. Because when given the chance to enjoy, to relish, to, shall I say, savor, the magnificent distillation of my thrice daily fantastical consumptions, you considered it as verbal fodder to be cast aside. Therefore, no more, no matter how much you plead with me for another chance. Begging will get you nothing but sore knees.

I'm leaving now for the gym and while I'm gone I'd encourage you to use the time to take a long, hard look at yourself so that this kind of situation will not be repeated in the future.