Starving day four!

Doing well. I can feel my stomach slowly beginning to just not care about food.

Breakfast: Tea
Lunch: Apple, 10 baby carrots, non-fat yogurt
Dinner: Tea, apple danish
Snack: Tea, toast with margarine

Hooray for not eating! I'm still 109 right now, but my tummy shrunk 2 inches, 23 inch waist! I'm hoping to get the fat off my thighs by summer. I'd like a nice slim 18 inch (or less) thigh to make a pretty pretty body. My arms looked a little dumpy in the shower this morning. I'm going to run this weekend, and I'll do some yoga to get my middle trim. I'd like to see some more bones there... bones are sexy! My clavical is looking so sharp I could poke someone's eye out. Skinny is happy.

Starving day three

Breakfast: nothing, water.
Snack:  200 cal breakfast bars (Special K)
Lunch: apple 50 cal, non-fat yogurt 80 cal, ten baby carrots, 70 cal
Dinner: 1/5 tuna sub.

All done eating!

Starvation day two!

Breakfast: nothing. Should have had a piece of fruit to get my metabolism going, but oh well.
Lunch: Apple, non-fat low cal greek yogurt, 10 baby carrots.
Dinner: bowl of low cal cereal non-fat milk.

Now, I did mess this up with a donut and a latte but I've taken care of that and will probably pass them soon.

Hooray!

Weight: 109lbs. I wanna stick with this for the week and see where I am by Friday.

109!

I'm getting there. My feet are freezing, I'm dizzy and I think I may throw up. But I'm doing this. 100 here I come.

Good food day

Today's diet:
Tea for breakfast
Apple, 10 baby carrots, 0 fat yogurt for lunch
Bowl of non-fat low calorie cereal with non-fat milk and coffee for dinner
Toast with margarine, orange and tea for snack.

The end.

I won't lie, I'm a little tired, but that's because of crap sleep last night. I was a little wound up over the oscars. I tried to make myself go to bed at 10:30, had to watch my namesake (Anne) get the best supporting. Glad she won, she looked lovely. But I wasn't able to catch any sleep until about 11:30, and getting up at 4AM is rubbish.  I've got to find a closer job. I can't handle this drive.

Anyway, the job goes fine. Had a good day today with the kids. Accidentally told them my diet, which was an over-share. I've got to resist the urge to share information with them. It can really just look wrong to people.

Anyway, back to work. I have to get fixated on work to keep from eating. Also I should really get the feedback on the think pieces back to my seniors. Ugh. I'm tired.

Oscars are going to suck!

I'm wicked excited to see how terrible the Oscar's are going to be. Seth MacFarlane is incredibly hot, and I will marry him and his billions of dollars in a second but let's all be honest. His hosting abilities are awful, and the Oscars are where comedy goes to die. This is going to be wonderfully horrific.

I wish I were skinnier.

Last mouthful!

I just had the last mouthful of real food I'll eat for a week. Tomorrow is Monday and tomorrow starts the raw food yogurt fast. So it's imperative that I stick to this. This week has been up and down with food. I'm probably sitting chubby at around 113. I don't dare jump on the scale, no need to be suicidal!

Here's a thought to keep me focused.

Search Party Insanity Zombie

That's what I'll be playing this coming weekend. Yes, I have finally landed a background extra role in a feature length film... after all the hard work and patience I've had to endure (all week since I started looking on Monday) it's finally paying off (not really, since I'll be doing this for free). I don't care, I get to pretend to be in a search party, and then I get to pretend to be a mental patient, or something like that, I'm not sure.
Saturday we are searching.
Sunday we are mental.
Right now, I'm pretty psyched.

Oscars, chruch and eating food...

Well, tomorrow I return to work. I woke up feeling fine about it. I have a lot of essays to mark up, but nothing that I can't handle...especially since I'm snow bound today. Yup, evidently God thought it would be pretty funny to trick me with the promise of less snow... then BAM! I got up in response of the alarm and saw that instead of the 1-3 inches of non-accumulating snow we were slated to get, 4 inches of very accumulated snow sitting outside my window. Needless to say it is parked on the remaining foot of ice. UGH!

No no church, thank you snow. I can keep my "evil atheist" status... at least for this winter.

The Oscars are tonight. I'm a little excited, I guess... I mean, who really cares? This year has been a little dull for films.  And the films that were entertaining aren't invited to the Oscars, so I have to watch Seth MacFarlane NOT be funny (because he's actually not that funny without his writers and they can't do bits for the show like they do on FOX), and a bunch of movies that I didn't care about win statues that I don't think is filled with chocolate.  I'm a little interested to watch it, but the TV is filled with nothing but babble of the upcoming night and everyone on it is talking like some kind of shaman to predict the winners... all speaking with little to no authority on the subject. Why bet on horses?

Sick as a dog...

Oh, this isn't the usual going-back-to-school blues, I'm sick. I got my period and feel like rubbish. I honesty wish I would get hit by a car... of course it would have to drive through the upstairs study so that's a little difficult, but at least the sick would end.

109 is just fine

Well, I'm not going to get the last 10 off this week... nor will I get the first five... but there are two reasons. One - I didn't stick to my diet at all. I didn't over eat, and I didn't go crazy with treats or sweets or anything like that. But I didn't force myself to eat less. I'll do that beginning next week, it's easier to eat less when I'm working. Two - I got my period and I always bloat up a few pounds then. Oddly, I didn't get the usual knee cramps or insane mood swings this time. Maybe with the new weight and almost all ray food diet I'm finally done with crazy-brain nonsense!

My department head wants me to come in an observe her teaching. I'm actually excited about that. She's a super teacher, and I am absolute RUBBISH at teaching writing in a workshop format. It confuses me, I can't help it. Teaching is a really hard profession. You go to college/university learn a bunch of completely useless techniques and lesson plan forms, then get hired, are handed tons of papers and books that other people have used (but lack any real instruction on how to implement these in your classroom) then thrown into a classroom and ignored for months on end. Most of us can swim, but that's not a great method. We've got to figure out a better system of helping new teachers get classrooms with teachers there to help them structure classes together. So a teacher who has taught Gothic Lit for years could work with another teacher, new to the subject, and talk about the development of the course and the goal for the curriculum. I've drunk the coolaid.

Goodbye food!

Finally! I've been ridiculous these past few days. Chinese buffet, a slice of coffee cake?  What the hell am I thinking? That's way too much damned food.

So tomorrow is hopefully the last eat out. I'm tired of eating this food then getting rid of it. I love work because then I can just fake eating. Michael is a great husband but he wants to eat food every time we leave the house. He's a wonderful guy, and I can't blame him. Food is fun. Eating is fun and a great date. But it's also really bad for you. Just look at that Honey Boo Boo family. Food is going to kill those people! They are honestly going to poison themselves with food!

Chinese food and taxes

We got the taxes done today. Hooray for almost 5 grand coming back to us. That will be a nice down payment on a car come April. The agent at HR Block was really nice, he scared me a little bit when he admitted to being dyslexic, but he was obviously had his A game on. He got three additional discounts we could get and changed our state return increasing our return by 100$. Huzzah.

We then ran over to Chopsticks for delicious buffet of Chinese food. I was able to have a bowl of soup and half a plate of food. I actually felt really good about the food and didn't feel guilty about eating any of it. Of course, I chased the meal with three laxatives so there's no need to feel guilty, it's going to leave soon. I felt good because I ate slowly and filled up very quickly. It was yummy! Michael just told me that he is approaching 210, so I'm going to have to get serious about the food that comes into this house.

So for a car I'm thinking of a cute little hatchback.  I just saw a commercial for a Chevrolet Spark and Sonic. Either of those would be great, I'm looking to go tiny after driving around in an SUV for so darned long.

Well holy cow!

I got a person from Exploretalent calling me to put up more pics. This could be the start of an amazing adventure, of course this could also be the start of a horror movie. It's probably just the start of a credit card scam!

Martin Guerre is actually not shite!

So two things: A. Made a big loaf of coffee bread which is sitting on the kitchen counter screaming for me to take a piece. I am resisting as best I can. It's for the class tonight, and B. Martin Guerre is actually shaping up to be a pretty okay book.

I'm not hungry. I've had my apple and am going to wait until 2 to have my second apple with the yogurt. But I think I can swing this. I've trained myself to go further on less for a while now so cutting my calories down should not prove to be too difficult. I think most people eat out of boredom anyway.

Okay, back to the book.  Michael is STILL at the auto place getting his car serviced. Poor man, been there since 7am. yuck.

Let's get serious about this...

Okay, today begins the five day cleanse. I'm going to eat a regimented diet and supplement the laxatives with copious amounts of water.

Breakfast: 1 Apple: 50 cal.
Lunch:      1 Apple: 50 cal.
                 1 nonfat Greek Yogurt: 100 cal.
Dinner:     1 Apple: 50 cal.
Snack:      1 bag of 10 baby carrots: 80 cal.

Total caloric intake of day:  330!

Okay, I'll let you know how it goes.

Skirt is almost done

I've made it, but managed to run out of trim. F! So I can't wear it tomorrow, but I might still try. I'm thinking tomorrow I'll 1. run out for pancakes (yup, embrace the fatty foods and then embrace the laxatives); 2. hop over to Joann's fabric and get more trim; 3. acknowledge that this does sound dirty.

I heard back from the producer of Dormant Rising and he will let me audition for the role of the nun. I have a weird feeling about this film, I don't know why. Probably I'm just fixated on it. But I have to admit I really want this role, I've never acted before and I'll not act after this but I want to do this job. I think this film will be a good story and I want to be a part of it.

Finally - done!

Okay, I've attached my paper because, well obviously you'd want to read it. I'm going to take an hour to watch the episode of Supersize v superskinny that I missed then I'm going to finish my skirt. Yup, that's y life. Just watching fatties on the computer and making skinny bitch clothing.

One Crayon Coloring Book

            Europe. In fourth grade it looked like a coloring book. By the time I hit junior high matters had not improved but actually worsened to include some of Russia. Then high school happened and while Europe had a common currency, and language, it still looked like an incomplete puzzle. College and graduate school came and went and with it came the fall of the Soviet Union, which allowed Europe, the hungry beast she is, to gobble up more territories and colors into her belly. I remember reading Agatha Christie’s Evil Under the Sun and learning that there was a difference (evidently, very big) between being French and being Belgium.  There seemed to be more than colors and languages separating cultures in Europe, small traditions based on religion or region along with ingrained socio-economic differences divided people. However, Peter Burke’s theory of being able to look at Europe as a singularly defined entity allowed me to see that European culture isn’t the division of these small tribal communities, but actually how they bleed into each other and create interloping spheres of influence.

            Burke’s ambitious book, which now sits in its third iteration, seeks to establish simultaneously the reality of cultural cross-pollination without the temporal or geographic constraints that act as normal barriers.  In Popular Culture in Early Modern Europe, Burke argues that not only is it entirely possible to see Europe as a singular culture, and therefore a singular identity, but that it is imperative of the reader to assume that the cultures ranging from 1500 to 1800 would agree.  However, Burke manages to convince the reader that what ties cultures together and what throws them apart is something more important than governmentally applied borders.

            According to Burke it is important to look at the story as a whole, and acknowledges,  “more recently, in the case of early modern England, a number of scholars have stressed the importance of regional cultures[1].”  To break down the continent into smaller, more compartmentalized, regions one can see the cultures divided by social constructs such as environments, economies, religions and ethnic traditions[2].  Burke, looking at the continent as a whole, sees that these smaller divides only bleed into and influence each other to create a singular European identity.  Begging authority from pre-existing studies, Burke argues one can go even further back from the map to see Europe as Indo-European as he alleges the Grimm Brothers had.  However, within the same paragraph Burke asks, “is this going too far” which one can, and should read, as Burke asserting that yes, it is.

            Cultural changes among the common people is not as starkly divided as those of the people of elite classes, in fact the traditions of the common people bind together communities that could have been divided by lines on a map.  Burke’s goal is to “say something about the common stock, the elements from which the local patterns were made.[3]” Burke attributes this cross-cultural pollination of ideas to the mutability of people in common classes.  Discussing the every-day life of the common people of pre-industrialized Europe, Burke describes the society as “organized on a hand-made, do-it-yourself basis[4].” Culture, as Burke alludes, is transmitted not as a sentient idea but as the by-product of natural human interaction.  Crediting these people as being “active bearers,” whom he describes as being actively passive in their role as cultural ambassadors.  It is in this manner that Burke talks about the transmission of culture, discrediting the High/Low argument from many predecessors.

            Burke cites Jonathan Swift as a creditor for the belief in a sinking cultural ideology.  While this is a credible theory it actually is not entirely correct.   Looking at the recent Fashion Week in New York, and the sympathetic weeks in Paris and London one can easily see that what Hilfiger and Jacobs designed for Fall will show up on the streets of Manhattan immediately, diffusing down to the large suppliers of Macys in a few months and then appearing in knock-off form in Target and finally in ill-fitting misinterpretations at Wal-Mart. This idea of sinking culture is accurate, but only if one looks at it from an outside glance.  The real inspiration for these designers actually comes from the street fashion, or what Burke would argue as the common people.  Vogue, a multi-million dollar publication, working in a billion dollar industry devotes three pages (a large section in a magazine that half advertisements) to what is called “street fashion[5].”  These pages show what people who work outside the fashion industry are doing and what trends are being created at the “street” level. This is where the trends actually come from and what the elite classes will eventually emulate and polish into their own.  In other words, Madonna would never have vogued unless Paris had not burned first[6]!  Burke would identify this as proof that the high low was not a “sinking” transmission as Swift would assert, but a circular two-way street.

            While Burke does acquiesce that there are examples of sinking process, such as “the English yeomen of the late sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries” whom “built houses in the style of the local gentry[7]” it is logical that this emulation comes less from style than from substance.  Ultimately Burke dismisses the sinking theory as “too crude, too mechanical, suggesting, as it does that images, stories or ideas are passively accepted by popular painters, singers and their spectators and audiences. In fact they are modified or transformed, in a process that looks from above like misunderstanding or distortion but from below like adaptation to specific needs[8].”  Substance over style is the running theme of common people who worry more about farming trends than fashion trends.

            While Burke succinctly puts his psychological thumb on the pulse of the common people, he instantaneously acknowledges the incorrect use of the thumb.  While taking a pulse use of the thumb is never correct, as the reader cannot determine the difference between the subject and his or her own pulse. In his collection methods Burke runs the same danger. Burke has the danger of chasing down false leads, reading personal bias and finding accusatory documents pretending to be information in his quest for what he terms “an elusive quarry[9].”  Burke, boldly and intelligently, cuts his critics to the punch by identifying the problematic issues of collecting data through mediators.  Ideally, when a cultural anthropologist, such as Zora Neale Hurston[10], wants to study a culture she goes to this culture and collects the data first hand. The information is correlated in notes, which include not only the actions she witnesses, but the function it plays in the community, along with the interactions of group members, and in Hurston’s case, film footage of the events.  However, Burke has taken on the task of hunting down information from the dead. As he points out the folklore may exist, but what is missing is “the tone of voice…and so are the facial expressions the gestures, the acrobatics[11].”  What is lost with this form of data collection may be the most important information of the cultural tradition. How something is performed may be inherently more important than the words or actions taken by the actors.

            What Burke points out is even more dangerous is that the collection of the data, which is out of his hands as a historian, is that this information comes from outsiders.  “The only surviving seventeenth century texts of Russian popular songs were recorded by two British visitors, Richard James (chaplain to the English merchants in Archangel) and Samuel Collins (physician to the Tsar)[12].”  Burke uses this example to drive home to his reader the real danger that taking these documents as gospel poses.  First both of these men are outsiders to the Russian culture, however it goes beyond being just British. They are also there to serve people outside the common class and therefore are only observing this as entertain pedestrians.  James, a chaplain to the merchants, serves the well-to-do merchant class who would not sing folksongs, or perhaps hum them with no cultural understanding of the history or meaning.  Collins is obviously an outsider to this as his connection to the Russian people is the Tsar.

            Going beyond this Burke points out the problems of depending upon court documents, as often the collection of folk tradition was an attempt by the church to undermine or punish the practice of said tradition[13].  Any information from historical texts like this must be viewed through a suspicious eye.  However, while it is easy to accuse the elite class as being the downfall of popular culture, the common classes take the destruction of tradition into their own hands often. Culture isn’t static, it’s mutable and is often shaped and melded to the culture that it is moving into to better fit the people it will meet.  “The individual singer or storyteller may be a mediator in a sense, because in early modern Europe oral and written, town and country, great tradition and little tradition all coexisted and interacted[14].”  This idea can be chased back to Shakespeare’s work, specifically The Taming of the Shrew, which has three different endings[15] as the play was originally written, then produced, then reproduced over the distance of geography and outside of the original author’s control.  Aside from court documents, poems and scriptural literature also serve as sources of information for Burke.  While these are beautiful they can be problematic in poetry is often written with the audience in mind, and sometimes even for a benefactor, which can corrupt the authenticity of it as the work will reflect the views of the wealthy patron and not the common persons.  These are difficult enough but the temporal distance of the researcher and the research but that the value of this study is valid and worth the risks.

            By looking deeply and critically at popular culture and its affect on politics and social structure one can better understand the communication of common and elite cultures, and also see the needs, goals and fears of both.  For example, the division of Catholic and Protestants can be addressed by looking at the restructuring of Saint’s tales.  “The differences between the Catholic and Protestant approaches might be symbolized, if not summed up, by what happened to St. George.  A chap-book life of St. George, published in Augsburg in 1621, tells the story of his life and martyrdom without any references to the dragon, which was presumably rejected as apocryphal[16].”  While Catholicism would embrace the mystical quality of the life of Saint George, a modern day reader can clearly see that the Protestant reader would reject this tale. The cultural differences go well beyond Levi-Strauss theory of binary opposites. Protestantism came out of the rejection of the mystical ties to the ancient and Hebrew texts and rituals that Catholicism clung to. It was also a rejection of Catholicism’s willingness, arguably, overly accommodating, view to the induction of local customs into the rites of the church.  Burke gives the reader the lens to see this divide goes outside the scripture and actually is a cultural fight.  This also shapes the view of culture when the upper class withdraws from common interaction and the two-way street comes to resemble a tollbooth.  “By 1800, however, in most parts of Europe the clergy, the nobility, the merchants, the professional men – and their wives – had abandoned popular culture to the lower classes, from whom they were now separated, as never before, by profound differences in world view[17].”  This profoundly new world-view would the changing of socio-economic structures from that of the intrinsic to the international.  The common person could not participate in a global economy as the merchant, or professional man could at that time and this economic disability set the two classes at odds.  The natural aspiration of the emerging middle class was for social mobility upwards, which only widened the gap.

            This gap in culture becomes one of elitism, changing the meaning of the word people.  “The term ‘people’, which was used less often than before to mean ‘everyone’, or ‘respectable people’, and more often to mean ‘the common people’[18].”  This change in terminology went hand-in-hand with a change in perception of folk tradition.  “A French writer, later in the eighteenth century, found the Paris Carnival an embarrassment even to watch, for ‘all these diversions show a folly and a coarseness which makes the taste for them resemble that of pigs’[19].”  Thomas Hardy would wait until 1891 to resurrect the pride of local tradition in his Tess of the D’Ubervilles, and then only allowing it to go as far as Victorian ethics would allow.

            Europe as a single color was something that Burke hoped to find in his search for popular cultural traditions. Ultimately, what he serves to do is show the reader that while this may have been a reality it is no longer, as the socio-economic ties have become the new culture. This division of people separated by the ability to purchase and not purchase was addressed by Burke, but was dropped in order to identify the more cultural dominant traditions. Unfortunately this aspect of cultural division proves to be the only crayon that counts.

---

[1] Peter Burke, Popular Culture in Early Modern Europe 3^rd Edition. (Burlington, VT: Ashgate Publishing LTD, 2009), 87.

[2] IBID.

[3] Peter Burke, Popular Culture in Early Modern Europe 3^rd Edition. (Burlington, VT: Ashgate Publishing LTD, 2009), 91.

[4] Peter Burke, Popular Culture in Early Modern Europe 3^rd Edition. (Burlington, VT: Ashgate Publishing LTD, 2009), 133.

[5] R.J. Culter.  The September Issue.  A&E Indie Films, 2009.

[6] Jennie Livingston.  Paris is Burning. Miramax, 1991.

[7] Peter Burke, Popular Culture in Early Modern Europe 3^rd Edition. (Burlington, VT: Ashgate Publishing LTD, 2009), 95.

[8] Peter Burke, Popular Culture in Early Modern Europe 3^rd Edition. (Burlington, VT: Ashgate Publishing LTD, 2009), 96.

[9] Peter Burke, Popular Culture in Early Modern Europe 3^rd Edition. (Burlington, VT: Ashgate Publishing LTD, 2009), 103.

[10] Mules and Men.  Harper Collins, 1935.

[11] Peter Burke, Popular Culture in Early Modern Europe 3^rd Edition. (Burlington, VT: Ashgate Publishing LTD, 2009), 105.

[12] Peter Burke, Popular Culture in Early Modern Europe 3^rd Edition. (Burlington, VT: Ashgate Publishing LTD, 2009), 104.

[13] IBID.

[14] Peter Burke, Popular Culture in Early Modern Europe 3^rd Edition. (Burlington, VT: Ashgate Publishing LTD, 2009), 113.

[15] Greenblatt, Stephen. Will in the World: How Shakespeare Became Shakespeare. W. W. Norton; Reprint edition (September 19, 2005)

[16] Peter Burke, Popular Culture in Early Modern Europe 3^rd Edition. (Burlington, VT: Ashgate Publishing LTD, 2009), 300.

[17] Peter Burke, Popular Culture in Early Modern Europe 3^rd Edition. (Burlington, VT: Ashgate Publishing LTD, 2009), 366.

[18] Peter Burke, Popular Culture in Early Modern Europe 3^rd Edition. (Burlington, VT: Ashgate Publishing LTD, 2009), 367.

[19] Peter Burke, Popular Culture in Early Modern Europe 3^rd Edition. (Burlington, VT: Ashgate Publishing LTD, 2009), 370-371.

Almost done...

I'm just so ready to be done with this paper! I'm tired, I'm cross. I want to watch Supersize Vs. Superskinny and be a lazy bum. But I have this paper and then I have to read a terrible book. Blah, wah!

I think I should probably eat something as I'm starting to feel depressed, but I also want to make sure I stay on my diet. I'm hopefully going to be empty soon. I hate this feeling of being full of food. I can hear my stomach rumbling up and down and side to side and all I can think is, good now get out!

Nashoba Winery

So had a lovely belted Valentine's Day Lunch with my husband, Michael. It was wonderful, a big delicious roasted veggie sandwich... which I hopefully will pass soon! I can't believe I'm sitting around with this much food in me. It was lovely and very romantic, but I feel that disgusting "full" feeling. I want to cry until I get the food out, but thankfully I'm not feeling compelled to purge. Hurray!

Anyway, while I was there I was talking to Michael about the book The Kite Runner and a woman at the other table heard me and commended me on trying to get my students to think for others. I felt good because it's nice to get compliments, especially since I feel like I'm not doing a great job. Her friend came back from the bathroom and told me I looked adorable.  Sadly, I thought the compliment about my looks impressed me more than the one on my teaching and thinking. Typical me!

Anyway, I have to get to this bloody paper. I'm almost done with it, only five pages to go, no sweat there. Then I can make that skirt I've been working on. I'd like to wear it to class tomorrow and then to work on Monday, or Tuesday. I'll post pictures of it when completed.

The New Jane Eyre is rotten.

Just had to tell you. I'm watching it now, and it's dull, confused, missing half the story and frankly it's just badly shot. I get that it's this whole brooding psychologically taunt story but does it have to be shot as though the entire movie took place at 1am?

Damn you Virgin Mobile!

Michael's phone died today for no reason. Virgin mobile dropped him as a client because... I have no idea why. The phone just came on, and the little clerk just told me he couldn't fix it. This is annoying. There's a cool special on the Hobbit and I'm missing it because I have to deal with this nonsense. Wah, I'm officially throwing a temper tantrum.

History Teacher too?

So I just took the teacher test (online practice) last night for History and I passed it. Well, I got 71 out of 100 trivia questions correct, you only 70 to pass and I didn't do either of the essays. Which, let's be honest, I would have smoked 'em! So I think this spring I'll be able to market myself as both an English and history teacher. Not too shabby.

Also, in other, more interesting news, I'm hopefully going to audition for a horror movie to be shot in July! And there's another movie, Dormant Awakening that needs a short woman to play a nun. I dunno, there's something about the story that feels very compelling. I think I'd like to work on this.

Fingers crossed!

I love running!

So just got off the treadmill after 5 miles. Pretty good run, feel great about it, and better about life. I'm not that worried about my job...of course see me on Sunday night. I'll probably post every five minutes with "I'm worried" "I'm okay" "I'm getting fired" "I don't care".

Not going to do the yoga. First that Jillian Michaels is actually a little chunky. I know it's muscles, but that's not the look I want for my body. I want to be lovely and slender like Audrey Hepburn in War and Peace... or Audrey Hepburn in anything really. So I'm jut going to shower and take off.

Michael and I are going to order t-shirts for the club he mentors at his high school, he is a history teacher. Then I think it's off to the big mall in Holyoke. I haven't been there in a very long time. I do have to finish that damned paper for Sean, read The Return of Martin Guerre (terrible book, btw) and correct the Think Pieces for my students. Then I should prep for my Contemp Issues classes, not hard I'm already prepped out for handouts, but I'm tempted to prep for Gothic Lit just in case my student teacher is out.

Okay, if anyone is reading this I have a question, why do I smell like cleaning fluid after I run?

Hello Tuesday!

Woke up very good today.

Okay, exaggeration. I woke up better today. I'm not sad about my life, or terrified about my future or disappointed in my teaching. I woke up okay, and read for a half an hour. I'm about to get into my running attire and hop on that treadmill.

Weight 109! Which is just fine. Four pounds to go, but dammity they are going to be the hardest four pounds I've ever lost!

Made reservations for a wonderfully romantic lunch at Nashoba Valley Winery tomorrow at noon-thirty. Very happy about that. I am married to the most wonderful man in all of the world. He's smart and funny and cute and honest and strong and he loves me. Which is no easy feat, I'm a bundle of crazy. I just hope that I manage to keep my job (which honestly, I'll probably get nothing more than a letter in my folder and an official slap on the wrists...if that!) and to continue to make him happy. I'm going to start really focusing on a job closer to home. Monty Tech would be perfect! It's right down the hill, I could ride my bike to school on the days of fine weather and attend all of those lovely after school sporting events and bring my little tiny dog... in this day dream I have a wonderfully small puppy...named Cheddar. Husband picked out the name, more proof of his utter perfection!

Okay, I'm reading Bless Me, Ultima on the treadmill, got three chapters down and I'm really loving this book!

Dry Eye'll Kill Ya

Spent today on the couch trying to get rid of this headache and entire body ache. I feel pain, I feel sick, I can't see, I can't think. This is the worst. I hate dry-eye. It's seldom a problem but it's gotten worse. In the past I'd only get a case once a year, if twice it was a bad year. This year alone this is my fourth case. I want to talk to my doctor, but my optomotrist keeps telling me these are aural headaches. Since when do headaches cause nausea? Or body-wide pain? I honestly wish I could die. I'm not depressed but the way I feel isn't worth being alive.

On the couch, watching (listening to really) the fifth straight hour of Ultimate Guide to the Presidents.

Oh, good news! I just passed the MTEL History practice test. I'm thinking I should definitely get certified in history so I can be more marketable to other schools. I love teaching at Chaug, but the drive is just so long. I get up at 4am, and arrive home a 5am (on early days!). I'd like to get up at 5, leave the house around 6:15, 6:30 and arrive at 7. But then get home to my husband and cat and make dinner like a wife! I love being married and living in his home, now I just want the life that comes with it. And a dog! I want a big dog! Like an Irish Wolfhound, or a Mastiff, or Marmaduke! That would be fun to see, a 5'1" 105lb girl walking (being walked by) this world's biggest dog. Yup, I like that. Please universe let me work at Monty Tech next year.

Popular Culture in 16th Century Europe

Is just as dull as you might think.

Well, no. it's a marvelous class. I've got dry eye and am trying to write a paper. It's impossible. And painful.

Good morning Massachusetts!

Okay, had toast, tea and an apple. Weight 109 (hooray, the right direction)

I'm going to run and yoga in a little while. Then today has to be dedicated to writing a six page paper for my history graduate class. Yeah, I know six pages... my introduction to my thesis was 20! I'm not sure I CAN write something that small...and do a good job. But the teacher, Sean Goodlett, is a genius and broke down the set up of the paper for us, so upstairs to my little writing room I go.

I'm feeling better about the fiasco of Writing Workshop. I think this audience-free blog was a good idea. I don't like to put negative things in my diary. This experiment was a good idea. Also I think that I'm going to change my goal to 105. Only four pounds away.

Oranges make everything better...

So after being sad about my life I watched three episodes of Supersize VS Superskinny (best show) and ate an orange. Those things are the best food. It's like candy, but doesn't make you want to put a gun in your mouth.
Okay, see you tomorrow post run. Ankle still hurts and won't stop cracking.

I remember happiness...

I remember a time when I actually liked my body. It was 20 lbs ago. I can honestly say I think I was happier when I was a fat 145lbs. I also remember a time when I was happy and confident. It's a weird trade off. Like someone where in the background I was a happy person who didn't mind being a little heavy. I thought I was pretty, and I thought I was smart, and I thought I was worthy of that happiness.

Something happened somewhere along the road and I can honestly say most days I wake up ready to cry about my life. I hate my life, who I am, and what I'm doing. I get up early in the wee-hours to shower, dress and hurry off to school. Where I do a crap job teaching. There are good days, where I think I've done a good job and had a good day with the children. Some days I walk away thinking I made a difference. But then I also feel like I've wasted their time and talked about myself. I think that they are going to flunk out of college because of the waste of time they have.

It's probably the weather. Winter rages on, and on, and on. Like a nightmare that none of us can wake up from there's a snowstorm every two days. And today it was terribly cold, 19 degrees! Days like this you know there is a God and he's a mean old man living in Florida laughing at those of us stuck in Massachusetts.

I just hope I can hit the weight I want to be, so I can focus on getting happy again.

Measurements 5pm

Measurements:
Weight 111lbs
Hips/Bum: 34.5
Arm: 9.5
Thigh: 21
Waist: 24

Not too bad. My goals are 23 inch waist; 34 inch hips and bum; 20 inch thigh; 105 lbs.

I'd like to be 100lbs by my birthday, August 3rd. With a 18inch thigh. I'd really like to have lovely slender legs with thighs that never touch. They don't touch now, but I'd like a nice space between the two. My waist is little, but smaller is always better. My hips and bum are okay. My bum is actually pretty nice, not a flat white-girl bum, but a decent sized bubble. The hips are a little pudgy by my standards. I'd like to get all the flab off and make my hip bones really pop right out. My clavical is very noticeable, my chest is all ribcage and breast plate. My ribs are only noticeable when I raise my arms, but I'd like them to really stick out.

I feel good. I had a little bit of fish and some rich for lunch. So I got a good serving of iron and protein. Also, it's delicious! The rice was carbs and starch, but people don't realize that you need those things, especially if you intend on exercising. No desert.

We went grocery shopping and I got two bags of apples. YUM! I love the apple diet, it's a great diet, you get plenty of natural carbs and sugars and you feel fantastic. I've been eating predominately raw veggies and apples for months and I have to recommend it to anyone.

Okay, let's see if the running happens again tomorrow. My ankle feels terrible. Like there's a little hairline fracture just waiting to crunch and then BAM, no more ankle. Hopefully it's just weak muscles.

Correcting and watching Sherman's March to the Sea on H2. Love this channel and frankly, I actually really love reading and learning about The Civil War, well the American Civil War. It's a fascinating time period.

Post Workout Check In

Food: none, well water
Exercise: Five mile run (6 point incline); Yoga DVD
Weight: 111 (WTF!)

I'll put up my measurements after a shower, I'm a little gross as I type. So I've managed to gain a few pounds, but in honesty I'm aware that I'm heavy with sweat and my muscles are all taunt from the workout.

Review of that DVD - sucks. This is a ridiculous DVD and I don't care what it advertises, I'm going back to my hippie old lady Yoga DVD tomorrow... or possibly tonight. They have a run through call "Release the day" and I can use that. I teach, and it's stressful. My boss, who is a really good boss, is a terrible communicator and she freaks me out often. I mean, she can call me down to tell me the headlight on my car are on and make it sound like I'm getting fired. I'm certain she's not doing it on purpose but at the same time, how do you not know you have this effect on people?

Anyway, having a good conversation with two work colleagues about the book Bless Me, Ultima. Read it on the treadmill today (side note: do not read on a treadmill unless you have a nook, just don't bother with the book you can't do it) and I got the first three chapters down. It's really good, and I think would make a great read for my students over the summer. But then, the women in my department are the most closed minded judgmental crones you'd never want to meet. So they will probably argue and futz until it's something wretched like Siddhartha, or Are you There God, It's Me Margaret. Yeah, boys will really want to read that.

Anyway off to clean up. I'm yucky. I'll take measurements and weight in again, then report back.

WTF Barnes and Nobles, honestly, WTF!

Not an update about weight, but I was able to avoid food most of the day. I was in Barnes and Nobles picking out two books for summer reading (Bless Me, Ultima and How Are We Hungry) when I saw this display right next to the classics. It's a collection of slutty drugged out tweenaged dolls that drive cars and perform in some rock band. It's the Monster High Collect and frankly it was a "what the fuck" moment.

Anyway, food update. Started today off terribly, one piece of cold pizza and four bbg chicken bits (quite small). Chased this with four laxatives. Lunch was four pieces of chocolate, gotta get rid of that damned Valentine's day crap. Dinner was two bowls of Kashi cereal. Drinking water and sitting under a lovely hot water bottle.

Should be correcting but can't resist the urge to watch HEATHERS!

Tomorrow is a five mile run, then yoga and much healthier food choices.

First Check In

Height: 5'1", but I lie and say 5'2"... like anyone is running around with a tape-measure to check
Weight: 109 lbs
Measurements: Arm 9.5"; Waist: 24.5"; Hips and Bum: 35"; Thigh: 21"

About 8 months ago I began working out and eating right, as a result I've managed to shed about 40 pounds. It was a great eye-opening experience. The first 10 were, honestly, the hardest to lose. I was running about 5 miles a day and eating (what I then thought) was a healthy diet. After breaking through that first door, the rest of it came off rather easily. I stepped up the running and took it off the track and onto the streets. There were two reasons. The first was obvious to any runner, running on the street is a better workout because the environment changes and this stimulates you as a runner to keep going and keeps you from doing the inevitable count down (only two more laps to go, etc). The second is that the football team was finally claiming its rightful spot on the field. At first we co-habitated nicely but then it did become a little weird that a 37 year old woman was running laps around a bunch of high school boys. Granted I teach, so I passed a CORI report, but it weirded me out. The coach said he loved it, but I felt weird. End of summer I was 120 and very happy!

Then school started. I've had plenty of experience of very successful summers of weight "loss" only to come back to school and experience the regain syndrome. This year I wasn't about to let that happen. I examined what I was eating and WHEN I was eating it. Too much meat and crap. So I switched to a veggie and fruit diet. The weight came off, and a month ago I celebrated my 110 goal. Now for those of you reading this saying "really, 110, gimme a break on that" please remember I'm 37 and it's hard to be thin when you are not in high school or university.... well, okay, actually I'm getting my second MA degree so yes, I'm technically in school, but come on! Go into ANY graduate class in your school and look around, pretty much the opposite problem there. I'm the skinniest girl by far, the next looks like she ate me. Actually, it's me and the professor (a guy) running for railiest!

Anyway, back to this. Obviously something happened between 120 and 110. I started at 145, which on a 5'1" frame actually didn't look that bad. As many people joked, most of it was in my boobs... and actually yeah most of it WAS in my boobs. Thank god that stopped! I teach high school! At 145 my goal was 130. Then it became 120. Then it became 110. Now it's 100. I'm only worried that 100 will only turn into 95. The reality is that while my original body idol was Natalie Portman from Friends with Benefits (movie sucked, but she's incredible... so let's say it was actually Natatlie Portman in Thor, yeah that's better) but now it's Natalie Portman in Black Swan. I should never have written my MA thesis on that film. It only messed me up.

But she did look good, right?

So this week, I'm going to catalog and blog daily about my quest to lose the last 10 (well 9) pounds. I've got that silly video by Jillian Michaels, "something yoga blah blah blah" (clearly not the exact title) which does advertise (with no asterick, BTW) that you can "lose 10 pounds in a week". So let's put that to the test. I also have my lovely treadmill (it's cold outside... and covered with snow, bugger it) so I'll run five miles a day, coupled with the yoga DVD. Diet will consist of approximately 500 calories.

I also want to be honest about the emotional impact of this decision and process. I'm keeping it a secret from my family, including my husband, so fake eating is going to be practiced (just move the food about the plate, remember when you were 4, it worked then!). My brother's wife, whom I love and adore, battled anorexia her young life and even her adult life. She's lovely, she looks like Mariska Hargitay, she's just beautiful. So to see her destroy her body through lack of food is quite terrifying. But she's really tall too, like 5'7", really tall! (I'm only 5'1", anything is tall to me!)

So, for tomorrow, post workout update and weigh in. Measurements, diet plan for the day. Evening log in with effective eating log. Also my response to how I feel about this. As I said, I teach so no pictures what-so-ever. No thinspiration pictures either.