MoreyPee:The Time of My Life

February 12, 2010 (when I actually wrote this)

Kevin and I have been trying different tactics to lose weight and get in better shape. We workout, go for walks, go for hikes, and have even cut down the calorie intake. Nothing really seems to work. I haven’t gained any weight but I haven’t lost any either.

This past week we decided to go drastic, do some research, and then take some steps to more permanent lifestyle changes. Kevin found that the best way to lose weight and keep it off is to limit the amount of carbohydrates you eat each day.

Here is a brief history and the science behind the low-carb diet:

If you look at our ancestors many moons ago, their diet consisted of whatever they could hunt and gather. Meats, fruits, and vegetables. They did not eat processed foods, breads, or pastas for the main reason they didn’t have any available to them. This is the concept of the Primal Diet (http://www.marksdailyapple.com/definitive-guide-to-the-primal-eating-plan/), you can browse through this website and blog and get an idea of the science behind the diet. Kevin is really into the science behind things so I let him read about it and then condense it in layman terms for me.

The brief science behind low-carb: http://www.marksdailyapple.com/diabetes/) if you want to read it yourself or just remember this Carbohydrate drives insulin drives fat. What does this mean? Well, all carbs break down into sugar (glucose) in the body which runs through the liver and is transformed into glycogen, which is fuel for the muscles during exercise. However, we only need to eat a maximum of 100-150 grams of Carbs each day to burn off; otherwise all that extra glucose and glycogen is stored in the body as fat, saturated fat, which sits in the body and doesn’t seem to go away.

The thought process behind the low-carb diet (keeping yourself under 100-150 grams a day), is that with the lowered amount of glucose being produced, your body won’t be storing all that extra fat. And with the lowered amount of glucose producing, your body will tap into those stored fat cells and actually start to burn off some of that fat that’s been sitting around for years. Hence, you will lose weight and eventually keep it off.

When starting a new life changing low-carb diet, it’s a good idea to cut down your carb intake to no more than 20 grams per day for at least two weeks. This will force your body to tap immediately into those stored fat cells and use the fat for energy. Proteins are your body’s best friend, because proteins are what the body burns off as a last resort. So if you are eating more proteins and less carbs, your body has no choice but to pull all of its energy from those pesky fat cells and poof rapid weight loss. However, buyer beware, if you choose to go the low-carb route it would behoove you to keep it up after you lose the initial 10-15 pounds or it will all come back.

What does this new lifestyle entail? Well more meats and proteins, vegetable and fruits, and less breads, pasta, rice, snacks, and junk food. It means looking at labels and not buying things that have more than 10 grams of carbs per serving. However, don’t limit yourself too much or you won’t succeed. Its okay to splurge once in a while and it might actually help limit cravings. I don’t even think it would be bad to eat bread with a meal once a week; or make your own low-sugar bread. Cake at birthday parties, fine just don’t overdo it.

Over the next few weeks, I’m going to put myself out there and document the diet as it goes by. I’ll share what I eat and how much weight I lose each week. I try to only weigh myself once a week and take some measurements to track my progress. I also plan on taking weekly pictures, so that’s really putting myself out there; since women are so defensive of our weight. Hopefully, if this diet works for me it can also work for you.

Look for my posts, I’ll make a commitment to 1-3 posts a week for the next 6 weeks.

Mapi is probably the most spoiled cat around these parts. He has tons of little mice to play fetch with. He has two or three special forts build just for him because he likes to be buried when he sleeps. And he has many humans to pet him, cuddle him, and do his dirty work. Mapi Deuce is clearly the most spoiled thing in the house, besides maybe Trenton (but he deserves to be spoiled).

For weeks Kevin has talked about building Mapi a ramp across the living room wall up to a perch in the top most corner of the room, and the highest point in the house. Mapi likes to look down on his minions from his high perches.

Finally, Kevin found the time to build the ramp. Over the course of a few months, we slowly accumulated all the supplies we needed to make this happen. It became a matter of finding extra time to construct it.

Kevin spend a few hours on a Friday night putting the pegs in the wall, carpeting the wood, and hanging the wood to complete a masterpiece for a cat. Mapi watched with curious eyes the whole time; it was like he knew something amazing was about to happen and his life would never be the same.

Once the ramp was done, Mapi was a little unsure on how to proceed. Kevin put him on the ramp and then used the laser pointer to guide him to his perch. It took a few trys, but Mapi finally made it to his perch and peered down at us.

The ramp is a little narrow and sits against the wall, so Mapi had to back down the ramp a few times, which was hilarious to watch. He would get halfway up the ramp, get scared, and back quickly down. He hasn’t quite figured out that if he makes it to the perch he can turn around.

We also discovered the perch is a little small for Mapi to lay out on, so eventually Kevin will fix that and make it a bit bigger. For now, Mapi enjoys going up and down the ramp and overlooking his vast kingdom.

One of the biggest joys about living in Washington State are all the great mountains we have here. Real mountains, with snow and everything. Not dirt hills that are a little bit higher in elevation then the road.

My favorite mountain by far is Mount Rainier; this may be a biased opinion because I was born and raised in Puyallup, WA and this is the mountain I woke up to each and every morning.

Sunday morning-ish, Kevin and I decided to go hiking on this mountain. We checked the weather reports and the snow levels and found we could drive all the way up to Paradise which is at about 5400 feet of elevation, so not even halfway up the mountain. But it was covered in quite a few feet of snow though the roads were clear so the drive was easy and didn’t require chains.

We took Brian, Andrada, Trenton, and David with us. The wind was extremely chilly when we first go out of the car, but after bundling up it wasn’t so bad. Also, once we got on the trails the wind died down even more making it a bit warmer.

We walked around and played in the snow for bit, but none of us were really dressed for it. Trenton found a great hill to slid down. It was pretty fun for them for a few minutes, too bad we didn’t have any sleds or anything, but they seemed to do fine without them.

After hiking around for about an hour, we headed back down to the river where it was sunny. I packed everyone up some lunch, so we all ate our lunches by the river. It was quite a difference from Paradise. There was no snow and the sun was blinding.

We walked along the river. Trenton and Kevin made a bridge out of logs to forge the river and explore the other side. Kevin, my adventurous one, pole vaulted back across the river, but he wisely made Trenton and David cross back over the bridge.

All and all it was a fun day up at the mountain in gorgeous weather. In the next few weeks, we are hoping to go up there for a weekend and camp overnight. Of course that means buying new gear. I have no snow pants and no snow jacket, so I’ll have to get both of those things. Thankfully, we got a few gift certs. for Christmas that need to be used.

On Saturday, I made plans to kidnap my eldest niece for a few hours. I helped her set up a blog, like mine, and then we cooked dinner together. Okay, seriously, she didn’t need any help I was just making myself sound better.

Halie came into my life almost twelve years ago, give or take a few months. I was a whopping 21 years old then and I was excited to be an aunt. Halie was always a sweet little girl and she was fun to be around. When I moved to Vegas in 2001, Halie and I would write back and forth to each other a few times a months. I always loved getting letters from her over the years. Watching her handwriting improve, her letters got longer, and her pictures were fun too. In fact, I still have some letters she wrote to me.

(Halie when she first came into our lives)

Time has gone by and its easy getting caught up in life and forgetting what is most important, family. Now, I have 5 nieces and nephews (2 nephews, 3 nieces, and soon a fourth niece when I actually get married). It gets hard to try to have a relationship with all of them, but thankfully I do.

(All the kids together)

The past two years have been difficult because my brother and Halie’s mom got divorced, which makes it harder for me to see Halie. I have taken her out to lunch for her birthday, but that is only once a year and I really need more time with her. She is growing up so fast and I love discovering the women she is quickly becoming.

A few weeks ago, Halie asked me how to set up a blog like mine. I thought to myself, ‘what a perfect reason to get together with her’. So I made a date. Halie wants to be a chef so I added on a dinner making date to plan, so she could show off her skills.

I picked her up a little after 2pm on Saturday and headed up to my mom’s house (grandma wants to see Halie too). She looked through her Julia Child cookbook and found a recipe she wanted to try. Then, we made a shopping list and headed out to Safeway. It was a good way to have some one-on-one time with her.

We came back to my parent’s house and Halie started the cooking process. I’m impressed with her skills and though some might say cooking from a book is easy, I think it still takes some skill and timing to get things right.

She made us some Chicken in a Cream and Onion sauce. Mom cooked the broccoli and Kevin made the salad. Then, Halie also made deviled food cake for dessert. It was delicious, she did a great job.

After dinner, I helped Halie set up her blog (which I added to my blog roll if you want to read it). I gave her the basic rundown and she did the rest, she is smart like that. Then, she hung out with her future cousin, Trenton, and his friend David. They were drawing pictures and then taking pictures of those to make movies or something.

Sadly, I had to return her home. I think she was a having a really good time with everyone, and it was so good to see her again. I think next time we will have a girls night. Just Halie, myself, my mom, and maybe Halie’s BFF. It will be fun and we can cook again, watch some movies and just hang out…slumber party!!!  I hope to start spending some more time with Halie because I love being around her.        

I love to read fiction books. I love getting into the story, getting to know the characters, getting all involved in the drama, and feeling good when the story comes to a good conclusion. I have pipe dreams of writing many good mystery novels and giving this kind of joyous excitement to others.

I strongly dislike non-fiction books. I find that I read the parts I want to and then put the book aside. I have a hard time reading a non-fiction book from cover to cover, even upbeat memoirs are difficult for me. I can honestly say I have never made it all the way through a non-fiction book before (not even textbooks).

All this changed when two weeks ago (or so) Kevin bought me a book called “On Writing” by Stephen King. This is not Mr. King’s normal fiction novel, this one is non-fiction and gives tips and techniques for writing a novel.

I was intrigued when I got the book. I had been curious about it for sometime, but never brave enough to conquer a non-fiction book. I also have never read a Stephen King book before; seen some of the movies, but never read the books. I had no idea what to expect out of this book.

Since I am currently working on my second novel, Kevin thought this book might be helpful in my endeavors. Plus, he heard through the grapevine that it was a good read.

From the first page, I was hooked. Stephen King is a brilliant story teller. He had me laughing really hard at some points.

The first part of the book is a brief memoir of his life growing up. He tells different stories about when he first started writing, rejection letters, and trouble he got in at school for selling “inappropriate” stories to the kids. Eventually, he even tells how he came up with some of his story ideas. For instance, he thought of “Carrie” while cleaning the girl’s bathroom at a school. He came up with “Misery” after having a dream similar to the plot line.

The second part of the book, is the more technical portion of the book. This is where he talks about the writing. This part can be a bit mundane if you have no interest in writing a book or learning how the process actually goes…but for those that are writing novels, this is great stuff. He has a lot of good pointers and techniques that I will put into practice. Things I never even thought about. For instance, he says after you write the first draft, put it away for at least six weeks before even reading it through. This way you are more detached from it and are able to really tear it about and rewrite it.

Of course, everything he talks about are the techniques he uses and don’t have to be followed exactly. everyone has and will develop their own style for writing. But since this book comes from a multi-millionaire author, I stood up a little straighter and paid a bit more attention.

The final part of the book, talks about Stephen King’s accident in 1999. He was hit by a car while walking down the street. Again, I was blown away by this man’s ability to story tell. Yes, I know he is a popular author, I know he has some good books, and I know his movies are creepy, but he is a born storyteller…enough said. He retells his story as if I was standing on the sidelines watching. I laughed and cried a bit, this part was brilliant.

I was a little sad when I came to the end of the book. I had sucked up a ton of knowledge and I wanted more. I do feel I am a little more prepared for the writing biz, and I need to work on my craft a little more. This book has given me a better perspective on myself and my writing and I would recommend it to anyone who wants a good read, but mostly to those that are dreaming of writing some good fiction novels.

Five Things I Learned from this Book:

1) Rejection letters are the building blocks of your craft. Editors will often give you little tips on why your work was rejected and that is what you build on.

2) Ideas for books will come to you at the strangest moments, when two completely different ideas come together to form one.

3) Get through the first draft before you decide if your work is crap or not. Once the first draft is written you can always come back to it later. King almost didn’t complete “The Stand” because he thought it was crap half-way through.

4) Don’t worry about the plot, put “a group of characters in some sort of predicament and then watch them try to work themselves free.” The plot will naturally work itself out.

5) Aim to write 10 pages everyday. Your first draft doesn’t have to make sense, just get it all out on paper and revise it later.

Here is a link to the book on Amazon: On Writing