Marcy and Dreams of Jelly Rolls

WEEK 2

Current Weight: 289.1 pounds
Pounds Lost: 6.9
Pounds Still To Lose For Goal Weight: 109.1
Progress Towards Tulum: 10.64 miles (approx. 3515 miles left to go)
Measurements: Waist (4" above belly button) 40.5" // Hips 58" // Neck 14"

I've been menu planning like crazy, and it's been working pretty well. I set up lunches and dinners for myself and B. along with plenty of snacks. There's a lot of repetition, but I'm one of those boring people who can eat the same thing for a week and not get tired of it. I love experimenting with food and new cuisines, but I'm also extremely tied to my habits - I'm a walking contradiction!

Week 2 included the following:

• Mid-week lunches of curried couscous salad (from The Barefoot Contessa Cookbook), apricot-orange-glazed pork tenderloin (from my online bible, cooksillustrated.com), 1/2 a cucumber and 2 cherry tomatoes
• Mid-week dinners of whole wheat pasta (thank goodness for Bionaturae, a whole wheat pasta I actually love), chicken, peas, broccoli and low-fat cheddar cheese with a side of Caesar salad
• Twice-daily snacks of curried chicken salad with fruit in half a pita or a quarter pita with carrots and sun-dried tomato dip (also from The Barefoot Contessa)
• Lots more water than normal, but still not quite 8 cups any particular day, despite my trusty BPA-free blue Nalgene bottle
• A weekend of Lancashire hotpot (lamb and barley stew) and salads
  
• The arrival of Marcy, my new BFF/nemesis

Marcy arrived in a big puke-green box on Wednesday, and B. kindly set her up during his lunch hour in our little family room facing the TV. She is gold and silver, slender and attractive...for an exercise bike. With her help, I will be in Tulum celebrating (approx.) 3,526 miles ridden sometime in the next three years. She is also a pain in my ass, quite literally. And a pain in my thighs. I ride her after dinner with Season One of Battlestar Galactica playing in front of me, and even Gaius Baltar's hilarious and disturbing insanity isn't enough to stop me groaning in pain. I'm doing 10 minutes a day so far, and I plan to keep that up throughout Week 3 - it comes out to about 2.15 miles a day. I love Marcy, but I'm pretty sure by the time I reach Tulum I'm going to hate her guts.

There are a couple of good things about Marcy, however. She's a smooth ride, she'll get me to Tulum, and she'll eventually let me eat a slice of this:


I love tracking cooking and baking blogs, and I stumbled across this gem. While normally not a huge fan of the jelly roll, I confess this has me positively slathering on my keyboard. Luckily, I'm too busy being lazy to be troubled into making my own jelly roll, and I'm certainly not going to buy a jelly roll from the store, so for now, I'll just dream of a jelly roll - eaten, perhaps, as part of a farewell dinner before I head off to Tulum, pounds lighter, muscles stronger, and bikini packed!