Goals. Where would we be without them?

I'm never sure if goals are actually things that we establish in order to have something to shoot for or something we create to flog ourselves over if we miss the target. New Year's resolutions are a classic example. Fervently attacked January 1st. Sheepishly forgotten January 3rd.

Having said that, I am a great goal maker. I make New Year's resolutions like a professional and the fact that I've been making the exact same ones for 20 plus years with no success is a fiddle dee dee sort of thing. I also believe that if you're going to have a goal, you have to write it down because if you just carry it around in your head there is no proof you actually had the goal in the first place!

So here are a couple of my current goals. Weight, duh. Right now, as I write this, I weigh 133.3 pounds. I know this because the electronic scale at the Harris YMCA told me so. I believe it. My home scale says I weigh 135 but its sneaky and can not be trusted. Since 133.3 is such a nice round number and is the lesser of two evils, its my story and I'm sticking with it.

What do I want to weigh? Honestly, I don't know. There's a point at which you have to become realistic about who you are and what you you're willing to sacrifice in order to obtain an objective. For the past 20 plus years, my New Year's resolutions has been 105 but since I've never even come close to that mark, perhaps its time to wave good by to the fantasy and pick a number that's more realistic and therefore, hopefully, can be achieved. For my height..well sort of, all the charts typically start at 5 feet. oops..I should weigh between 105 and 124. I'm only a little over 9 pounds away from 124 and I can tell you that isn't going to be enough. Also, I want some wiggle room. You know what I mean, don't act like you don't. Those are the gimme pounds for when you go to a wedding, eat out too often, play too hard, ignore your diet and you don't want to step on the scale and cry or have everything you own suddenly feel as if you've washed it in hot water and had it draw up on you. So here's what I'm thinking. My range is roughly 20 pounds. Take half of that, 10 pounds stick it on 105 you get 115. Sounds reasonable and I can always rethink it as I approach that number. SO, and ya'll hold me to it, my goal weight is 115. That's 17 more pounds. Reasonable.

What's my time frame. 23 years! YEAH BABY! What, no applause? Hmm. Okay. So it took me 8 months to lose the first 25 pounds and those were the serious fatty pounds. I see you cocking your head to the side like you don't understand, but you do to. The fatter you are the easier it is to lose the top pounds, its as you start approaching a more normal weight that things slow down. Also, by that point, all the "water weight" is gone to so its more of an effort. But let me think about this. 25 pounds in 8 months is 3.1 pounds and small change a month (My high school math teachers would be astounded) and if you take 17 and divide it by 3.1 is roughly 5.5. Its roughly the middle of June (6.5) 6.5 plus 5.5 is 12 which is December. So, my objective is this - I'm going to lose 17 pounds by December 31, 2010 at 11.59.59 pm.

YEAH! A weight goal in writing!

Fitness. I'm already running 3 miles 3 times a week in under thirty minutes (hey 29:57 is too under 30 minutes) So I know I've got the 5k thing licked. My niece and I ran the Thunder Road 5K together last year and it was so fun. I came in 4th in my age group and truthfully, if I'd started closer to the front I would have won it. Now, Becky and I talked about running the half marathon this year to up the ante but I have to say I'm fearful. The last time I tried to do long mileage I got hurt and quit running altogether which I don't want to have happen this time. I also don't want to live my life wrapped in cotton. So here's what I'm thinking. I'm going to shoot for the half marathon and start training for it now so that I can go slowly. IF, I start feeling like my knee isn't going to be nice and play with the rest of the team, I'm going to slide back and shoot for winning my age group from the middle of the starting pack. Whoo Hoo! Goal Number 2. Carved in Stone!

So, if you haven't figured this out yet, my blog posts are time delayed. I'm actually writing this one on the 21st of June but it won't post until the 13th of July. I do this for several reasons. 1. When I write its usually in fits and starts and its usually more fit than start if I have to meet a dead line. 2. Writing in advance allows me to delete posts if I find for example instead of losing 17 pounds I gain them! No seriously, it just allows for a little more flexibility and 3. It allows for other things to come up without the blog going silent. So here's the last goal and I'll be in the middle of it by the time this posts.

One of the things I really want to try to do is to feed my family (4 humans) for a month on a budget of $400. I don't know if this is even possible but I want to try it. Here are my self imposed rules and regulations.
1. I'm not including the cost of booze, household products etc. This is just going to be food. Period.
2. I'm not including party food. July is a big party month and I always cook something to take so I'm excluding that, though I will keep a running total and will post the recipes I fix during the month.
3. I will not rely on processed foods or cheats, like Hey kids! Mashed potatoes for breakfast, lunch and supper again!
4. I promise not to go to the store on June 30th and buy $1200 worth of food. This will be a legit experiment.
5. I don't know what five is yet but I'm leaving myself a get out of jail free card here.

So the goal is $400 for the month of July to feed a family of four a nutritious and balanced diet. I want to do this for several reasons.  1.  Our food bill is ridiculous, largely because I get bored easily, am an impulse shopper and now that I'm writing a weight/food blog the desire to go nuts and cook around the clock is huge and that would be prohibitively expensive.  2.  Because of all of the above reasons, we waste a lot of food and that seems sinful to me.  I'm hoping that by really cutting down the cost that it will focus my attention on amounts so I don't have as much leftover to toss.  3.  One of the things I always hear about being a vegetarian is, "that must be really expensive, because fruits and vegetables are so pricy".  I hope to dispel this myth so follow along for a second. Yes, I agree fruit and vegetables, if you don't have a good farmers market (and I do) look pretty steep price wise at times, especially if you're buying things out of season.  BUT!, you're already buying fruits and vegetables and you're probably buying enough to make meals out of especially if you're buying grains too, so what you're really talking about if you decide to be a vegetarian, isn't adding things to your grocery list, rather its about switching out your proteins.  Considering a bag of dried beans is usually somewhere around a dollar a pound, that certainly sounds cheaper than any meat you can find in the meat case (with maybe the exception of chicken thighs on sale) and is significantly cheaper than fish of any variety.  What's more,  when you cook a pound of meat, because you're cooking off liquids, the usable weight ends up being 3/4 of a pound.  So, that hamburger meat you bought for 2$ a pound on sale ends up costing you $2.50 at the table.  A pound of beans on the other hand, becomes 2 pounds of beans at the table because it absorbs water, so a dollar pack of black eyed peas is 50 cents when you finally get to dig into it.  4.  I like challenges. 

Let me tell you about us so that you'll know who I'm feeding. I'm the only vegetarian. My husband is a good eater. My youngest daughter is picky. My oldest daughter can put it away like a linebacker...and I say this in a loving and kind way because my precious little linebacker only weighs 105 pounds soaking wet. We're pretty boring about breakfast. My husband eats the same thing everyday. 5 Egg white omelet with one piece of American Cheese. I typically eat the same thing everyday. Oatmeal, Soy Grits, Milled flax seed and Cinnamon cooked up with a handful of frozen blueberries. The kids forage like wild animals. Lunch is leftovers, maybe some tuna for them, hummus on a pita for me, or a wrap that we've all fallen in love with - whole wheat tortilla, peanut butter, apple or banana, honey and maybe some raisins or flax seeds. Dinner, I typically only cook big time maybe 4 days a week and we eat leftovers. We usually have a big salad and I love soups so in the cooler months we have soup too. I'm working on some summer soups because they are filling, nutritious and usually cheap (wait till you try the vegan tarragon scented vichyssoise I just made). I'm not changing much of that. Let me restate, I'm not changing any of that. I will keep records of what we're eating and I'll keep recipes of what I'm fixing for dinner and if I recycle it into something (black bean chili becomes black bean chili pizza). At the end of the 30 days I'll post what I spent and the recipes I made complete with pictures if I remember to take them! I also should be down a few pounds and running a few more miles.   By the time you guys get this, I'll be well into July so remind me to let you know how its going!

Three goals. One Blog entry. Nothing too overwhelming and who knows maybe this year, for New Years I can take my weight resolution off the list for good! WISH ME LUCK!