1500 WORDS A DAY?

          Writing 1500 words a day would mean in 30 days you've written a 45,000 word novel.  I think in Chris Baty's guide to writing a novel in 30 days netted 50,000 words in their endeavor (approx 1700 words a day).  He and 20 of his friends started the National Novel Writing Month - http://www.nanowrimo.org/ - concept that grew to thousands each year joining in - November being the writing month as the web site says.  Sounds like fun to me

But I am already doing it, not waiting till November.  You have to begin from scratch, with no outline, no plot, no characters, nothing in mind.  It is incredible how it just spills forth, it really works.  Baty's book "No Plot? No Problem!" is truly inspiring and it's lit a fire under me.  As if I need another novel on my plate.  But I believe the exercise is worth it.  I've written the first chapter and it feels like I planned it.  Just proves that you can sit down and start writing and it will take off without much effort. I think some of you have heard of and possibly participated in the 10-word game, where you pick 10 words, any words, list them and use them in a first paragraph starting a story. You won't believe how easy that is.  A very good exercise in creative writing. I've written quite a few short stories beginning like that. 

Anyway, back to the 30-day novel . . . the first line I wrote was: There he was again.  I don't know where that came from at all, but it certainly ignited my creativity and away I went. Followed by: She could see the edge of the green plaid shirt collar sticking above the blue windbreaker he must have put on somewhere along the line. He wasn't wearing the jacket while he was standing near the back door of the bus staring at her. His stark white hair and the green shirt caught her eye immediately in the after-work crowd. She got off at the head of the bus and hurried down the sidewalk, glancing back to see if he was still following her.  Now this is off the top of my head writing, no editing or rewriting, so it's raw . . . and exciting. I had no idea where I was going with it and that's the best part. 

I'm thinking this November I may write another during the writing month NaNoWriMo.  

I HATE BEING FAT! Part 5

Amazing!  I weighed in at 178 for the second day in a row this morning. I honestly don’t see how I don’t weigh more after yesterday’s binge.

Okay, I’ll tell you what I had that threw me into such a tizzy. 4 Nutter-Butters and 5 Lemon Thins.

I HATE MYSELF!

Alright, it isn’t the end of the world, but when I think of where I’d be if I hadn’t done the two days of bingeing . . . probably would have lost 2 more pounds . . . it really irks me.

I worked all night, by the way, till six this morning. So today I’m a bit frustrated and tired. But I did sleep four hours this morning.  So here it is noon already, time to start my day.

OJ and coffee coming up.

Oh, I know what I wanted to talk about . . . the FIT FOR LIFE diet. Do you know it?

Back in the eighties I followed the plan for a year, and along with it I did weight training at a Nautilus gym every day on my lunch hour. I was so fit you wouldn’t believe it. Wore T-shirts INSIDE my jeans. No muffin-top whatsoever, no bra rolls, no flabby arms, no gobbler neck.  There it is again, my FAVORITE FAB FORTIES

The premise on the FIT FOR LIFE diet is to eat only fruit in the mornings, salads and veggies at lunch, and a protein with veggies at dinnertime. Snacks are relegated to raw vegetables or other healthy tidbits. Basically that’s all it is. And there’re plenty of recipes to vary the intake, making it more palpable.

Diamond also encourages proper food combining, for instance never eat a potato with meat, eat a potato instead of meat. He stresses that 70% of your daily food intake should be water-based. Eat as much as you want of these water-based foods (fruits and vegetables – live food, as he calls it), leaving the other 30% for ‘dead’ foods, which are meats, dairy, grains, etc. Never eat fruit with ‘dead’ foods, surprise, surprise! 

The plan is relatively easy to follow, and I thought about doing it this time, but I’m liking the idea of counting calories and knowing exactly what minerals and vitamins I’m putting into my body, even though I’ve yet to do it right!!!!!  Yet to have the ideal day according to the program.

TODAY WILL BE THE DAY!

But first I’m going to toss out all the sweets, right now!  Oh, this is going to hurt!

Well, I made sure I wouldn’t think of digging into the trash bag of sweets later (which isn’t beyond me) by cleaning out the kitty litter box and adding it to the treat bag – now it’s a bag of candy and cat crap! 

Ha ha ha! There’s always a way to beat it. Works for me!  

DAY THREE

BRUNCH – Raw Juice

  84 Calories

    0 Carbs

    0 Fat

    0 Protein

    0 Sugar

    0 Sodium

After I had my juice and while I was out shopping, about mid afternoon I decided to stop at China City and have a meal. Hadn’t had Chinese for weeks and once the idea struck me, I had to follow through.

EARLY DINNER – Chinese Food

405 Calories

  43 Carbs

  16 Fat

  17 Protein

  28 Sugar

703 Sodium

Broccoli Beef, Chicken Chow Mein, Iceberg Salad & Italian dressing, Soft Serve Ice Cream and custard. Ooops! There it is again! The offender … DESSERT! 

Problem was . . . it put me over in my daily sugar allotment by 23 grams. The daily amount should not go over 24 grams, so I had twice the amount at one meal.

But with some exercise, some of that would be deducted. And with the walking I had done during the shopping, that helped. But I was still over. If I would have done the weight training like I’d planned, it would have been even better.  

But then when I got home, my friends called and wanted to pick me up to go have Mexican. I hadn’t seen them for a while so I went with them. I could just have something to drink, didn’t need to eat for I wasn’t hungry, and I didn’t want to foul up my day’s menu. It was a good plan.

Sure it was!

SUPPER – Chips & Salsa, Guacamole, Midori Margarita

  389 Calories

    54 Carbs

    23 Fat

      6 Protein

    11 Sugar

  294 Sodium

SNACKS

1001 Calories

    65 Carbs

    44 Fat

    34 Protein

      0 Sugar

1124 Sodium

When we came home after Mexican, we had some wine and conversation for a couple more hours before my friends left. Of course after they left, I went to the pantry and pulled down the Melba Round Crackers, got the cheese from the fridge and commenced to have cheese and crackers, I was hungry. Lordy! Lordy! 

You see how much I am out of control? 

Here’s what the day’s totals were …

DAY THREE TOTALS:

                                    Actual            Goal

CALORIES                2036                1200

CARBS                         183                  165

FAT                                88                    40

PROTEIN                      64                    45

            SUGAR                         58                    24

            SODIUM                   2214                2500

Double the calories allotted, over in carbs, double the fat, over in protein, double the sugar, I’m okay in the sodium department. So once again, the major culprits are CALORIES, FAT, and SUGAR!!! 

You know, if I would have taken into consideration a bit of the FIT FOR LIFE way of eating in combination with calorie counting, my day would have been much better, wouldn’t it? 

Obviously I NEED HELP!