A Little of This ... A Smidgen of That ...

A few things to report and share ...

1. I'm at a low point in my diet. Lately it's been a struggle. My weight has been not just holding this past few weeks but even while I was being super disciplined it went up a pound. Now I know a pound can't really be figured into the big picture. A person's weight can fluctuate a few pounds naturally during the course of a day. Nonetheless, I've had a little set back mentally and will have to regroup and get back on track. Being extraordinarily tired this past while doesn't help. I feel too tired to lift a finger to prepare the correct meals at the end of the day. I do fine in the morning. It's evenings and social events that are my diet bugaboo. Today I ate a hearty but healthy dinner, indulging in the extra carb I gave up at lunch. Maybe I need to trick those fat cells into complacency and then come back at them when they've relaxed their guard a bit. Yeah, that's what I'll do. Tomorrow. Or the next day.

2. Did I say how tired I feel? I'm VERY tired. Bone tired. It makes my exercise regimen discouraging. I've been doing 2 minutes on the cross-trainer with a lot of huffing and puffing at the end but I've been able to do it and the goal has been to work up to 5 minutes by the end of the month. But this weekend I couldn't even do 2 minutes! The huffing and puffing wasn't the problem. It was my legs feeling so weak, I just couldn't do it. I don't know why they would be so weak. I thought maybe because it was first thing in the morning but I tried again in the afternoon with the same results. My lets don't hurt and it's not a problem with my joints. They just felt very weak all weekend. I hope this passes. But wouldn't you think my legs should be getting stronger? Sheesh!

3. Enough whining. Here's some information to share. Eileen sent me a message via Gail to remind me that it's a good idea to get one's Vitamin D levels checked at the same time each year. I hadn't thought about it but that makes perfect sense since one might expect their Vitamin D levels to be naturally higher (from exposure to sun) than in the dark, dead of winter. Thanks, Eileen. Good tip.

4. More information to share. New research has added more emphasis to the importance of eating broccoli and other cruciferous vegetables for cancer prevention. "The amount that you get in three to five servings a week -- that's less than one daily serving of broccoli -- is enough to have an anti-cancer effect," says the researcher from the University of Illinois. He also stresses the importance of eating plenty of prebiotics and probiotics as part of a healthy diet to help your body absorb the maximum benefits from the broccoli. Read about it here. And do you know about the antic-cancer benefits of Olive Oil? There's more new research in that department, which proves promising. I think all the research has proved that it's a "good oil" for many reasons, cancer prevention and treatment being one of them (read here - it can "halt the growth of breast cancer tumours") and apparently it also provides amazing liver protection (read here).

5. We stopped at HomeSense and they have a whole bunch of new stock in the organic and health food section. There were three different brands of chia seeds and white and black ones (tonight's reading tells me there's little nutritional difference between them, so the recommendation is to buy what's cheapest). This article talks about how chia seeds don't need to be certified organic because they attract no pests, etc. Interesting. While at HomeSense we also bought coconut oil for cooking. At the Inspire Health seminar, we were told to cook with olive oil or, for high temperature cooking, use coconut oil or butter. And we bought agave nectar. It's a natural sweetener from the agave cactus and is much lower on the glycemic index than the usual sweeteners. If I recall correctly, it's one of the recommended sweeteners. I'll have to try it. There were three flavours available: raw, amber and light. I didn't know which to get so I went with light, which means it has a lighter, almost tasteless, flavour. I just did a little research and learned that the benefits of agave are under debate but there are no studies confirming things one way or the other. Here's an article about the controversy. It seems that Stevia is really the way to go in terms of sweeteners. Note to self. We got a treat for Kevin, too -- organic sea-salted cashews. Oh, another thing I just read about chia seeds - how to use them to deal with acid reflux. The article suggests one way to use chia seeds is in spaghetti sauce. Just stir it in until the seeds dissolve and nobody will even know their healthy goodness is in there. Cool!

6. On the weekend, I got to hang out with my splurge pals on Saturday night. I missed the last splurge so I needed a splurge fix. On Sunday the Loopkeys came by to watch that awful Rider game with us. They had invited us to their place but I wanted to hand out candy. We were in Vancouver last Halloween so I've been really looking forward to handing out candy this year. Less than a dozen kids came by, which was a little disappointing.

7. Wanna know how my quilting projects are coming along? They're not. Nada. Nothing happening. It's not looking like there will be any quilts under the tree for Christmas. Maybe I can finish that sock monkey.

8. The sky is so pretty on my way home from work, I had to take some photos out my window both today and yesterday. Enjoy.