Am going to be travelling over the next few months. This morning when I woke up, I thought of something I could do to make things a little bit easier while I was away:

Hi Mum,

I know you are leaving for Switzerland on Tuesday, and I’m pretty pleased with myself that I remembered to get you a card for Mother’s Day. But there is no time to send it, so–I’m posting it for you.

Does this really exist??? I know Dad would make one for you if you really wanted one.

Love you lots Mum. Have a great trip and I’ll see you in Normandy.

XO

Jennifer

GB jr has been out travelling for the last six months or so. In the dead of winter, he went to Yellowknife, NWT, Snap Lake Diamond Mine. After the dead of winter in Northern Canada, he spent New Year’s at Mt. Washington in Washington State. Then, he toddled off to Peru, Chile, Patagonia, and Easter Island. I think he passed on Machu Pitchu this time. Check out his photo albums on Facebook.

He looks like he could use a bit of rest. He’s lost some weight–and gained a wardrobe. Nice tuque GB! It’s going to come in handy when we get to the Yukon!

Here’s a song for you GB. Welcome home.

I have been occupied lately. Trying to make big life changes. Can’t really write about them yet, but I will. In the meantime, I’ll tell you a joke my mother told me the other day. I think my dad called me up to see how I was doing and then put Mum on the line so we could have our girlie chat. Which we did. But I could hear my dad clucking in the background.

“What did he say?”

My mum was snickering.

“What? WHAT? What did he say?” I’m insistent.

More snickering.

“He said: Why did the Easter Rabbit hide his eggs?”

Oh. I thought. “I don’t know. Why?”

She’s giggling now. “Because he didn’t want anybody to know…”

She can’t finish.

“Because he didn’t want anybody to know…ha ha ha….”

I wait. I don’t know what to expect.

“He was f@#$in’ a chicken!”

MO-THER!!!!!

I made a crock pot last night. It didn’t take much time, and it cooked while I was trying to work on my Intuit project. It was easy, and delicious.

Chopped vegetables in the bottom. I had carrots, red potatoes, celery, and a turnip in my crisper. I chopped until I felt good about the amount of veges in the bottom of the pot.

I layered on skinless chicken thighs after I’d cut the extra fat off. Sprinkled with Knorr chicken broth mix. Two cans of Campbell’s Cream of Mushroom soup, some water for the vegetables, and Worechestershire sauce. I grabbed some fresh rosemary from my plant out back.

Stuff it all in. Turn on the crock. And just let it go. 

Today, I would have added cracked peppercorns if I’d had them. 

It was just tasty. And comforting. And I think, just taking the time to make myself dinner did wonders for my sense of being.

My dad phones me up later in the week. He’s disappointed. “Those sheets are defective.”

“Defective, Dad?” I ask. “How can sheets be defective?”

“There’s no Ken more in the bedroom.”

My dad pops up on video Skype. Whenever he logs onto the computer, he checks email, then he checks to see if I’m online. If I’m online, he clicks and dials.

“Onscreen!” I mimick every time I answer the call. “Onscreen!” Click. And my dad’s video appears.

“Jennie.” He’s laughing. He’s usually laughing. “Jennie. Your mother got a great present today. We picked up the new stove from Sears.” And I think: “Yes. Nice to get a new stove. What’s so funny?”

He continues: “So I install it and we realize that it’s a Kenmore.” He’s still snickering. “I do most of the cooking anyway–and now she’s even got a stove: a Kenmore in the kitchen.”

And I laugh. My dad’s name is Ken.

My mum is standing behind him in the webcam view. She’s excited too–not only at the new stove and the fact that she’s got more Ken on a new Kenmore in the kitchen. She asks me: “What’s the highest thread count sheets you’ve ever had?” I know she must have got a great deal or she wouldn’t be so excited.

“Thread count?” I ponder. But I don’t tell them about my luxury items in my vacation rentals. “I don’t know Mum. What did you just get?”

“We just got 600 thread count sheets — FOR $79.99! (Canadian dollars). Did she count the GST? Probably not. BUT, she’s excited she got such a deal on such great sheets.

I snort. I know I shouldn’t snort, but I think I snorted.  Dad asks: “What’s so funny Kid?”

“Well,” I tell my mum. “Looks like you got a Ken more in the bedroom too!”

What do Bridget Jones and I have in common? We’re both single, 30-somethings. Singletons I believe she calls it. I don’t live in London. But I do live in Healdsburg, California. Not quite the same thing, I know.  She chronicles her love life, her obsessions with alcohol and cigarettes, and just general life commentary. I chronicle my life (a tiny bit of my love life–OH!–I had a total Bridget Jones moment when I was dating a guy last year–does that count? I really have to organize and relaunch that site, sigh. So many things to do, so little time). I could chronicle my obsession with wines and the internet and give general life commentary too.

The main thing Bridget Jones an I have is our obsession with our weight. Today. I’m mortified at my weight. I haven’t been taking care of myself as I should be. It’s partly because I’m a consultant and my bills don’t get paid if I don’t consult and I usually have three or four jobs going on. BUT TODAY. Or rather, this week. THIS WEEK, I reached the tipping point. A mortification tipping point.

After all this running I’ve been doing, you’d think the last thing I’d be worried about is my weight. But, quite the opposite. I like to eat. And I’m pretty stressed lately. So–um–I eat more. Stress eating. You know what that’s like, right?

After the marathon, I thought I should focus on rebuilding my upper body and I finally dragged myself to my gym in an effort to feel better about myself. Out of curiosity, I weighed in. I WEIGHED IN. Shall I announce it publicly?

Obviously. That’s what blogging is all about. Living out loud. So. SO. Guess what?

I weighed in. I weighed in at 151 pounds. I could convert it to kilograms (68.5) and get a lesser number–but that wouldn’t make a real bit of difference. The fact is: I weigh 151 pounds.

UGH.

UGH.

I have gained an ungainly 15 pounds since last May. I have to do something about this. Today. The first time I decided to do something about my weight was in 2004 and that something worked was when I kept a food diary. It was this little notebook where I could record line item by line item what I’d eaten that day. And it had recommended calories and foods that I could reference to I could calculate accordingly.

Basically though, what really worked was being conscious about what I was eating — and being accountable for it. Making conscious decisions about what I was eating and learning about portions.

Right now, according to this BMI calculator I found on Google, I have 25.1 percent body fat and by some sort of arbitrary chart, I AM OFFICIALLY OVERWEIGHT.

Here’s my plan. I wasn’t blogging in 2004 when I kept my food diary. But I am now. I’m going to use my blog (with all of my official and unofficial readers) to help me account for my eating and exercising habits.  I’ll really be living out loud.  I’ll even start a new category. What should it be called? Living Out Loud?

Ok. Here’s the stats for today (cringe):

Up at 6h am. Didn’t even make breakfast before I started working on a proposal.

Worked until 9am on proposal before I took a break and made a half bagel and coffee (with milk) for breakfast. Somebody showed up at my door and I didn’t have time to put anything healthy on the bagel. It was just a dry, half bagel. Normally, I like crunchy peanut butter and slices of apple on it.

Worked all day. Had a meeting in Petaluma at 3h pm. Meeting until 6h pm. Ended up being tired and hungry and dehydrated.

Thought about getting a burrito from Whole Foods–and only eating half of it. But — got side tracked by a Chinese place because I actually wanted soup.

Had mixed vegetable soup and a plate of mixed meat stir-fry on crunchy noodles. I didn’t finish the entire plate, but I made a good dent in it.  Green tea. I think I really was dehydrated.

OK. All of that isn’t terrible. Right? In general healthy–but not as regular as it should be (breakfast, lunch, dinner). The kicker is the fact that on the way home I stopped to buy a gift for a friend. I bought a chocolate bar at the checkout. I didn’t really need that chocolate bar, now did I? Especially since I didn’t make it to the gym.

The worst part about it is. I don’t really like chocolate. OR until last September, I never really ate chocolate. Now it seems, I can’t ever get enough. UGH. Something else to work on.

Well. Tomorrow is another day. I guess I’ll let you know how I do.

Wish me luck.