Mist Cloudhunter

Checking in to say I'm still here. I'm experiencing some not fun emotional stuff at home right now, but I'll make a better post when I can.

Gah... Fudge. Now I want fudge. I missed a few checkins here, but I've been sticking to my plan and I did 42 sit-ups today. I hit a wall at 25, so now I do a morning session and an evening session. I'm starting to see a subtle difference in my core, which might be increased tone or better posture (or placebo), but hell, I'll take it. My weight loss has slowed to a stop, so we'll have to see if I hit my ten pound goal or not. If not, I'll look at my plan again for the new year. I am sticking to my calorie goals. I'm noticing some things in my life that I need to change to hit my long-term goals, and a lot of it has to do with time management, material clutter, and work-life balance. I work at home as a writer. My husband also works at home (he's in auditor). We also have two young children at home with us. The result is constant interruption, so I mainly used to do my writing in the evenings after the kids went to bed and catch whatever I could during the day. I developed a bad habit of staying up way too late--until 1am, with a 6am wakeup--because my husband would want to hang out and watch movies and do couples bonding stuff until 10 or 11. I would also complete a lot of other household projects at night because they can't be completed with kids around. And lately, my husband has been adjusting his schedule to mine, so he stays up (and steals my work time) later and later. I've decided the only way to beat these interruptions is to do the writing when no one else is around. (Which is never.) The only way I'm going to win this game is by waking up early, which I know my husband is incapable of. I'm shifting my sleep schedule to go to bed at 9pm and wake up at 4am for writing. The kids go to bed at 7pm, so that leaves two hours for clearing the clutter and movies and gaming, and two hours in the morning for writing before the chaos starts. I'm also moving the hard tasks to the start of the to do list. I feel like this is the kind of thing one should declare at the start of the next challenge cycle, but inspiration is with me now and I'm going for it. I'm also considering writing under a new pen name. I go through this phase every so often, so it may be fleeting, but I kind of feel like my muse is pulling me in a new direction.

12/2 Update I got on the scale today and I'm down two pounds. I had a better realization of progress when I was doing laundry, though. I've been asking my husband for weeks to fish out some stuff that fell behind the dryer. I couldn't manage to get myself on top of the dryer to do it myself. (In my defense, it's a tall dryer.) Today, I got up there, and I think it's thanks to the sit-ups. Woot! Sticking to my calorie goals has been tricky the last few days. There's a lot of holiday food floating around already, and it only going to get worse as the month goes on. I'm managing surprisingly well, though I did have a regrettable encounter with some cupcakes yesterday. I decided to rewrite the intro of the novel, and I'm much happier with the direction things are going now. I'm trying to figure out the ending tonight so I can drop in the foreshadowing on the first pass. What I outlined initially feels too abrupt, and I'm looking to tie it in with some subtle irony in one of the subplots.

Checking in--I'm still here--my routine is getting zapped by the weekend and I've been busy all over getting holiday stuff put together. I'll get a full report in tomorrow.

My evening routine got changed at the last minute tonight, but I'm checking in anyway just to keep the habit. I stuck to my calorie goals. Little exercise today, but tomorrow is shaping up to be much more active.

11/29 Stuck to the calorie goals once again. Otherwise, a pretty quiet day. I spent the morning crocheting, put up the Christmas lights in the afternoon, and I'll be moving more boxes around the basement this evening. I've yet to do my exercises, but the night is young. Well, I had my murder all planned out, but it felt a little boring. I'm adding a plot twist and another murderer.

11/28 I stuck to my calorie goals, but they weren't healthy calories today--all processed junk food due to a busy schedule. I'll do better tomorrow. I didn't get hungry at all today, which is kind of weird for me. I'm feeling unmotivated today, but I'm probably just tired. Today I walked around Walmart until Sam's club opened, did the family shopping, and took my kids to the zoo after school got out. We didn't get home until close to bedtime. I exceeded my fitbit step goal. I got in 15 sit-ups but I feel like I could have done more. My tailbone wasn't happy with the extra strain after the long drive home from the zoo. No leg lifts yet today, but I'll get them in before writing. I didn't get as much writing in last night as I had hoped. I had to set up my file chapters and then Scrivener had an update to install. The ~1k words I did write will probably get trashed because I need a more compelling start, so I'm going to spend my evening figuring out how to kill a guy, stage a dramatic crime scene, and then frame someone for it. Sit-ups: 15 Leg lifts: later. (We all hope.) Steps: 10k+ I love the Bernadette Peters stage version. It was one of my grandmother's favorites, and coincidentally, she also had a huge, unabashed old-lady crush on Johnny Depp. For those reasons alone I know I'm going to love this film. I'm waiting for a time to watch it without distractions. Thank you!

11/27 progress report I stuck to my calorie restrictions today. I was hungry by 9:30am, hung on until lunch at 11, and then felt full until dinner. I carried all of the holiday decorations up from the basement to keep myself busy. I also put up the tree, cleaned up my library, decorated the interior of the house, and determined the scarf I'm crocheting has a PITA of a pattern that I won't be using again. The scarf will be beautiful and substantial progress was made, but I won't be making a second one like this. Ever. I fixed a diaper genie, finally caught up on dishes after thanksgiving, got half way caught up with laundry, and listed a bunch of stuff from my basement on Craigslist to make room for the zen I'm trying to acquire. Last night I wrote a quick and dirty outline for my next book. Writing commences tonight, and I expect I'll hit about 3k words before bed. I was going to watch Into the Woods (the movie, which i have not seen) tonight, but I actually want to watch that so i'll probably opt for re-watching episodes of The Flash. I also need to carry empty boxes back down to the basement and build a Lego table to give to my kids for xmas. Sit-ups: 14 Leg lifts: 120 Stairs and heavy boxes: too many Thank you! I'll try not to disappoint! I greatly appreciate a good realty check, and I've failed several times, too. I am the Queen of Tangents, and my biggest obstacle is productive procrastination. I find other things to do instead of the thing I *should* be doing, and I get a manic amount of random stuff done... but not the things I set out to do.

I won't make a habit of replying during the day because the internet is one of my procrastinatory crutches, but I will here for the sake of clarification. I appreciate the concern and I will always take constructive critique to heart. Especially from those more experienced than I am. I do think the goals are achievable, and mainly because writing is my job. Doing a novel in a month (I write commercial fiction) is something I've done before, and something I stopped doing the last several months due to a mental funk. I have 35 days until the 1st, and that works out to 2k words a day. That figure is lower than my previous daily average. We're also talking first draft, not polished and finished. It's kind of like my own personal NaNoWriMo do-over, because I didn't participate in November this year. The other big goal is losing 10 pounds by January 1st. That figure includes ~2lbs of Thanksgiving bloat that wasn't there before November 22nd, which makes me believe it's probably water weight that will be easy come, easy go. (I could be wrong. It happens.) So, my goal is to return to work and lose (more like) 8 pounds in the next 5 weeks. That's losing 1.6 pounds a week while doing my job, and I think that's entirely doable. A challenge, sure, but that's why we're here, right? If I fail, I'll try again. I'm not doing anything extreme with my diet or exercise, and I swear my plan is approved by my doctor. I'm just cutting excess calories and moving more. I'm keeping a daily log. I'll see you again tonight for the progress report.

11/26 Update This evening began with the movie Megalodon (note: not The Meg, which I still haven't seen). I'm absolutely smitten with monster-in-the-water movies, and B movies, and especially the ones with sharks or crocodiles so large that boats look like bath toys, so this one was a no-brainer when I scrolled up to it on Hoopla. Just like the carbs I'm continually snacking, these movies don't even have to be good for me to enjoy them: I'm just scratching an itch. I turned it on while clearing the floor of toddler toys after bedtime and decided to do some leg lifts while I was down there. I'm supposed to do leg lifts anyway, because of a long history of hypermobility injuries and knee problems, so it seemed a good place to start. After doing my lifts I thought sit-ups would be a good idea. I thought wrong. Someone's going to have to clean the family of dust batties living on my ceiling and fan. Now that I know they're there I can't stop staring. Also, I rediscovered the injuries that my second pregnancy did something to my abs, hips, and tailbone. I used to have great abs because I did a hundred sit-ups a day in my high school gym class. My knees prevented me from doing most of the other warmups, so I subbed situps for everything else. Total Sit-ups: 6 Total leg lifts: 80 Megalodon: As ridiculous as expected. Still deliciously cheesy and enjoyable. I'm off to write an outline for my next book. I'll check in again tomorrow.

I'm back to try again. My thread under the current challenge is here: https://rebellion.nerdfitness.com/index.php?/topic/112251-lets-try-this-dance-again/&tab=comments#comment-2442506

Okay--I basically ghosted my last (first) challenge, but I'm back again. I've modified my goals some, and I feel more prepared this time around. (Read here for my first attempt and background: https://rebellion.nerdfitness.com/index.php?/topic/110430-habits-in-creative-chaos/&tab=comments#comment-2411112) In short, I'm a writer, I'm sedentary, and I need to lose some weight. My goals for this challenge: - Lose 10 pounds by January 1st. - Write my next novel by January 1st. To attain these goals I will: 1) Eat a calorie controlled breakfast and do *anything* to exercise for 15 minutes every day. 2) Work on writerly things every day (business end or actual writing). 3) Check in here every night. I've yet to complete my day, so I may check in again later. If not, i'll report back tomorrow.

It's been a long while, but I'm back. Here's what happened: I was a long-term member of another forum, and that forum basically imploded. I lost my usual haunt and friends (writing is lonely work--no watercooler). I stopped writing. I crocheted four blankets and a slew of hats and scarves shaped like dragons and other woodland creatures because my fingers get constipated without a keyboard. I broke all of my old habits. I made new ones. It took me two months to realize I was at least mildly depressed and mourning the loss of my online community. I'm ready to res, and this time with a few new data points. When I stopped writing, I realized that writing had become my excuse for everything. I didn't exercise because Writing. I snacked at the computer because Writing. I didn't have time to clean because Writing. Can't go out today, Writing. After all, writing pays my bills, so it was an easy excuse. But when I stopped, I immediately and consistently more than doubled my daily steps on fitbit. The house got cleaner, and things that had been sitting on my to do list for months got done. I stopped snacking. And, as I previously mentioned, I still managed to do a buttload of crocheting. I think I got more done while slacking off than I ever did while working my hardest. That tells me that while writing was always my excuse, it was never my problem. Now I'm feeling it's time to put the crochet down (at least part-time--turns out that busy hands = less snacking), pick my writing back up, and try again. I'll post my revised goals at the start of the next 4 week challenge.

I'm still here, everyone, I've been under voluntary internet restriction because I'm trying to hit a hard deadline to get a manuscript to my editor. I did something I never do, and I tell everyone else not to do it, but I did it anyway because the series had a popular response and I was being dumb... I promised the next book would be done by Halloween. I need to get it to my editor by the 15th, or preferably the 11th. So I shut off my distractions (i.e. the internet) to facilitate more butt-in-chair and hands-on-keyboard action. I am resisting the siren song, juliebarkley, thanks for asking! I upped my calories for my morning shake, and that's helping some. I'm eating more salad--like, *a lot* more salad. I've found that consuming more caffeine has helped significantly with the cravings, but it also wreaks havoc on my sleep schedule. (My husband is sitting next to me on the couch eating Ruffles and gummi bears, bless his supportive heart...) Anyway, I will be around. Moreso after I finish this manuscript.

I'm here, I'm sorry--"creative chaos" and lacking a schedule, as the post implies, haha. Keeping the house clean is going great, and I'm still sticking to my goals of making and consuming shakes for breakfast and lunch, but I'm having a more difficult time with snacking. I need strategies for managing my diet distruptive SO who spontaneously wants to go somewhere or stay out longer than planned, thus resulting in eating fast food. Anyone? Thank you! I'll send you a private message (as soon as I figure out how to do that). Thanks for the idea! I'm going to try that. I have to pick him up again later this week. Exactly. I find it a lot easier saying "no" to fast food when I know I can have it again on "the day". In terms of diet I'm doing calorie controlled shakes for breakfast and lunch. It's not one particular recipe, but I stick to 180-220 calories per shake with high protein and/or fiber as the goal to control appetite. I'm not currently putting any restrictions on dinner, but I do avoid refined carbs because I crash afterward. I have about 45 dinners that I have auto-scheduled on my calendar, so I wake up every morning already knowing what I need to defrost, prep, or chuck in the instant pot for that night. Having them all on my calendar allows me to keep a tighter rein on my food budget: there's less impulse buying, because everything we're going to need for the week is already listed out. It also allows me to schedule the less healthy meals less often. I set up things like grilled chicken as a recurring event every week vs. fried chicken recurring once a month.