Day 135: Book Review, New Books & Updated Measurements

So today my arms were SUPER sore! That’s what I get for not doing strength training for a couple weeks – DANG! Today I was back down to 116.5! Hadn’t been there since Dec. 16 – yay! Yes, I know it will fluctuate but still – trending down is always a good thing. Oh – and I measured! Here is my updated chart (click for it to get larger). It’s official – I’m a bit smaller than I was at the first of the month (TINY bit).


So my day started out great (working from home today) – had a yummy cereal breakfast, morning flew by working and then it was time for sandwich/chips for lunch and a 4-mile walk! I had a great walk and finished up Avalon High. It was a super cute book – didn’t realize it was a little mystery/buffy the vampirish book which made it different and fun read because I was like what is going on?!

(BTW – it must be said that I only read book jackets when I buy them… this was a library rental so I borrowed based on the author, Meg Cabot, and the cover, purple and pink… there, I sad it!) So I’d recommend it for a fun, quick read – and it was VERY easy to listen to and had lots of chapters which I like (my friend Stacy is reading a Jodi Picoult book and she can read forever and not finish a chapter – boo!). When I was searching for this image to add to the blog, I found this short, cute review that I thought was SO true – it has some spoilers though so if you like to be left out on the plot of books then don’t go read it.

My afternoon breezed by as well and before I knew it was 5 p.m. and Austin was home! I took a shower and we mixed up the meal plan and had pizza muffins tonight, but made the white chicken chili tonight for tomorrow, and I prepped the blackened chicken pasta for tomorrow – yay! Can’t wait to try both new recipes tomorrow. We tested the chili and it was GOOD – I’ll give a full report + recipe tomorrow once I’ve eaten it and see if it fills me up, etc. I watched lots of Law & Order SVUs today – WOW – that show, while I still love it, has gotten a bit graphic! The pedophilia episode just about upset me – wow! Aside from the SVU throwing me off, I had an argument with a friend. Crazy – I don’t feel like I’ve argued with a friend like that in YEARS, truly – like I can’t remember…. definitely not on my list of top 10,000 things to do. One of those situations where I was totally blindsided and had just had enough… so I told the truth. She’s probably still mad at me but I’m just not going to do this. I’m not going to argue with my friend simply because we disagree and I won’t do what she wants me to do. I respect where she’s coming from, and while she may respect where I’m coming from, she’s more concerned with getting her way and I hate it for her, especially for picking this tiny battle, because now even if I were to come around I couldn’t in principle because of all of the back and forth dramatic emailing, text messaging and phone calls that just about drained me of all of my energy today. Sometimes even when you feel deep down you’re right and you did the right thing, you still don’t feel good about it in the end. It was lose-lose you know? Damned if you let it go and damned if you took a stand. SIGH. Sorry for the vague randomness that is this paragraph but I really am thrown by this. I mean it. I don’t argue with my friends – do I get upset with them? Do I sometimes disagree with them? OF COURSE. But I like to think we all agree to disagree and move on… Anyway…

On a more positive note – here are the 12 books I got at Barnes & Noble online for a grand total of $53.88 (including tax & free shipping!):

Ivy Chronicles – sounded cute!
A Body to Die For – LOVE Kate White’s mysteries
How to Be Popular – Meg Cabot; nuf said for me!
Nanny Diaries – always thought this sounded cute
Last Chance Saloon – love Marian Keyes
To the Nines (Stephanie Plum) – love these little books; have listened to a few from the library
Twelve Sharp (Stephanie Plum) - dito
Ten Big Ones (Stephanie Plum) - dito
At First Sight – loved the notebook and thought Sparks would be good to listen to
Shoe Addicts Anonymous – sounded cute!
Speak Softly, She Can Hear – sounds SO intense… I’m intrigued
Eye Contact – ditto

At the end of the day I realized I was low on calories again, so I had some cheez its… then a bowl of frosted flakes! I weighed it though and made sure I stayed in range, ending up at 1,508 calories, 231 carbs and 31 fat grams. Great! Especially with the cardio factored in! Here’s what I ate.