Wheetsin

maryb - no sleeping change at all. I go to sleep around midnight or half past, and wake up around 6:20.

I can eat breakfast but I have to be careful. That's why I still look at Protein drinks - they go down, and actually do keep me full. I'm going in for another fill next week so we'll see after that. Never was a breakfast eater, but need all the metabolic help I can get.

Do my toes. I need to do that tonight, but I don't know when b/c we have dinner plans until pretty late. I'm starting to get what I call "ghetto toes". You know... where the polish is half chipped off, one or two broken nails, etc. I would normally go shopping but I'm trying not to b/c I just bought a bunch of clothes that are getting too big. Right now it's not a problem because of school. Four months' worth of class in 10 weeks. We have an assignment due every day. I need to spend more time cleaning. How about a hobby? I can always pull out my easel and paints, or my camera, or some clay and waste away a few hours. I'm not big on games but there are a few I can play for an hour or so before I get bored. Any movies you've been wanting to see? Anything for the 4th you can start doing early?

BTW - Holli, Cate, Robin, etc. -- what sizes are you guys in? (If you don't mind sharing) I ask because -- I'm probably a bigger size than any of you, but I have a ton of clothes I need to get rid of. Anything you guys are looking for?

I'm a liar I left Nola a message.

When we get home tonight, if I remember, I'll PM you the verbiage of the letter. It's pretty short. I also called Billie but just got her VM. I left her a message, but I don't know if she'll call back before I leave work for the day.

This is about what would have to happen, unless death penalties were tightened or sentences were greatly reduced. As I mentioned earlier, my father is an assistant warden. Fortunately he works in a minimum security facility -- people who have comitted minor crimes, people who are close to reaching the end of their sentences, etc. He may get a page because someone is on a hunger strike. However, I see the other end of the book because my uncle is the president of his union and is a guard captain at Leavenworth penitentiary. He may get a page because a guard was killed and his eyeballs were gouged out and another inmate was forced to eat them. Two totally different environments, and two totally different roles -- my father's being the administrator, and my uncle's being the enforcer. It doesn't matter which scenario you're in -- right now any prison in any state could be rioted and taken over by the inmates at any time. In a best case scenario, the inmate:guard staffing is something like 7:1. In some cases it's over 20:1. If there weren't some element of inmate compliance in place, it would be relatively easy for a prison to lose control to its inmates. That's a big part of why prisons put so much money, effort, etc. into placating their inmates - they have to. At least the way prisons are structured right now, they way they are governed, etc. So if nothing changed other than facilities, we'd need a heckuva lot more facilities to house people. If nothing changed other than policy (to the harsher side) we'd need -- what we have now, maybe a little fewer, but they could be staffed reasonably.

The way I read it, they can... but I didn't read it closely. I will have to look again. From my quick skimming it definitely sounded like a policy change that was in effect for everyone, and when my husband read it he got the same impression, but neither of us paid much attention. Hmm - actually, I'll call and see. What's your plan for fills Cate? Do you have family here you'l be visiting, and you'll get your fills while here, or do you have a fill doc in N.O.?

I posted about getting together somewhere and Holli suggested after the support group. Duh! Where is my mind? I didn't even put 2 + 2... of course we can do it after the meeting! Robin... my word... I lost track of this thread and had no idea you were still having problems after your most recent surgery. So -- was the tubing the problem to begin with? Or was it indeed the port the first time, and the tubing is a new problem? He needs to give you a frequent patient card -- 4 surgeries and your 5th one is free! BTW, did you ladies get your letters from the office? No more "free fills for a year". They're just giving you 3 months' worth, and since you don't get a fill until 5 - 6 weeks post, that's going to be about 2 fills. No biggie for me 'cause my copay is only $20, thankfully, but I kinda feel for the people who are self-pay and had surgery thinking they'd have a year free.

You're asking me this question? Or someone else? As for "Why don't you commit a crime to take advantage of their easy life and benefits?" - because I don't need to. Were my situation different, I don't know that I wouldn't. No one can know until they're in the position. And relatively few people can rationalize the impact that their personality would have on such a situation. You can say you'd never eat a cockroach, but starvation really hurts, and it wouldn't take too long before that cockroach started looking pretty tasty. You can say you'd never kill another human, but until someone else is trying to cut your baby's throat, you have no idea what you're truly capable of. When the reptilian brain kicks in, some amazing things can happen. I do believe that harsher prisons would deter more ciminals, but I absolutely do not think criminal minds think the same way I do. I have to believe this based on several factors, not the least of which is their own testimony -- and not the least of which is that we've been subjected to totally different conditioning (enter my belief that there is no free will). So - have to disagree with your claim. I believe that when you're talking about the types of behavioral (much more so than cognitive) processes of criminals, you can't disregard the behavioral aspect in preference of trying to build new schemata. Maybe don't focus on trying to "prove". Just sit back and enjoy the fact that everyone has different perspectives.

There's not much recipe since I tend to jsut throw things together. Here's another one I make & love: Crustless pizza Softened 4 oz of cream cheese 4 eggs (I use farm fresh brown eggs, just a personal preference and a steal at 25 cents a dozen) 1/3 cup heavy cream 1/4 cup grated parmesan (the dry, sprinkly stuff) 1 tsp chives (using fresh will make a difference!) 1/2 tsp Italian Seasoning 1/2 tsp garlic (fresh minced or minced in a jar work best) Pizza Sauce (I buy as brand called "Mama Mia". It's by far the lowest carb one I've ever seen that doesn't taste like poo. There's a regular & a mushroom version, I use the mushroom... and you can buy it in small jars... you'll use maybe 3/4 cup). 3 cups grated cheese (I buy either the garlic-flavored mozzarella, or there's an Italian blend that has Asiago, Mozzarella, etc.) Heat your oven to 375. Beat the cream cheese & eggs together. Add the cream, dry parmesan, garlic and seasoning. Spray a 9x13 with non-stick spray. Put 2 cups of your cheese in the bottom of the pan - spread it around evenly. Pour the egg mixture over the cheese, kind of poke at it until all the cheese is covered with egg. Bake for 30 minutes. Remove it and spread your pizza sauce on the top. Add whatever toppings you want. Here's what I usually add: Turkey pepperoni Hormel bacon bits (on 3/4 of it, for DH) Browned turkey sausage Browned hamburger (on DH's 3/4) Chopped onion Top with remaining cheese, bake until cheese is bubbly/browned, and let it cool for about 5 minutes before you cut it. Spicy Thai chicken (I'm approximating here, so bear with me - I'll try and get more specific in the "directions" part) Ingredients - A pack of chicken tenders. How many is that - 10? 12? Some orange juice. Some brown sugar. Some peanut sauce. Some soy sauce. Some sesame oil. Put enough sesame oil in a pan to coat the bottom. If you liek spicy, add a little chili oil. Get it hot, add the chicken, and baste with some of the peanut sauce (just enough to lightly cover the chicken - and I just "baste" it with the back of a spoon.) While the chicken is cooking mix about a cup of soy sauce, about a cup of OJ, 1/2 - 3/4 cup brown sugar, about 2 tbs sesame oil, and about 1/4 cup peanut sauce together. When the chicken has about 8 mins left add the sauce. When the chicken is done remove it from the pan, but leave the sauce. Turn the heat up - our stove is digital so I usually turn it up to 8 (of 10). The sauce will slowly start to thicken/carmelize. It may take a while, but it will get pretty thick. If it isn't thickening up, add a little more sugar - maybe a little honey, a bit more brown sugar, etc. Just be patient and it will happen. For DH I serve the chicken on saffron brown rice, and for me it's just the chicken w/ a little extra sauce. Grilled asparagus Buy a bundle of asparagus, rinse it well. On a cutting board or flat surface, pour about 1 tbs of good quality olive oil. Put the asparagus on the surface and rub back and forth through the oil until it's completely but lightly covered. Dust with garlic salt. Wrap with bacon or proscuitto and secure with shishkabob sticks OR make sure you have the "ends" in the same place, so you can put them face-side down. Then just grill it until the meat is cooked well & the asparagus is done. Bacon-wrapped shrimp Get raw, peeled & deveined shrimp. I make a "marinade" of olive oil, a Greek seasoning called "Cavendars", seasoned salt, a Tastefully Simple seasoning called "Garlic Garlic", parmesan cheese and just a pinch of rosemary. Toss it and the shrimp into a ziploc for about 30 minutes. Wrap each piece of shrimp with bacon and skewer, making sure you skewer both ends of the bacon to keep it wrapped around the shrimp. (Usually 1/2 piece of bacon per shrimp works just right). Then grill until done. May sound like an odd mixture, but bacon & shrimp are awesome together. BTW - I buy "Gwaltney" brand bacon. It's 0 carb and is not sugar cured. It's very hard to find bacon that is not sugar-cured. This was the only brand I could find, and it has a great flavor. Are you missing your Meatlover's pizza because you can't tolerate the crust? Here's a crustless version I make that people absolutely flip for. Everyone in my family who has eaten this asks me to make it rather than ordering out. And you can top it however you like.

Take it back. I don't know what you paid, or if you even have the store there, but mine is "Taylor" brand and I got it at Sam's club for $30 or $40 US.

2 fills and I've been able to chug the entire time. I do take a little more time between actual swallows than I used to, and don't even try for the same volume, but haven't had any problems so far.

I love sushi. Since banding I opt for sashimi - I don't have the cajones to try rice yet.

For me 15 - 45 minutes, but it's not quite a sick feeling, it's a stuck feeling... and after the first 8 - 10 minutes the pain pretty much overwhelms everything else. For some it's hours. For others it's over in a minute or two.

That's kind of comparing apples to oranges. Having a "strong stomach" is a factor of being able to supress the urge or need to vomit. Being able to eat or not eat foods post-banding is a function of what can fit through your stoma, or what cannot -- requiring that the food come back up. Food coming up because it can't go through the stoma, and vomitting -- not at all the same thing. ...so I'm not sure if you're truly asking about "strong stomach", or if you're asking about tolerance. Based on "strong stomach" - what you can eat pre-op should not change post-op. Based on "band tolerance" - what you can eat pre-op may likely change post-op (if you're scheduled, you've been through at least one pre-op meeting, and should probably have already received information about foods that are likely to be problem foods).

Digital scales IMO are more consistent and reliable than analog scales, but do have some variance. It will also depend on the quality of the scale (remember price doesn't equal quality). The digital scale I have is guaranteed to be accurate up to 350 lbs by a variance of 0.2. When I confirm this with set weights, it is right. When I get on it, I fluctuate some, but can usually go with a "2 out of 3" approach and get a dominant number. Part of it is the nature of scales - to get the exact same weight you'd have to stand in exactly the same position, with your weight distributed exactly the same way, keeping completely still... even the classic medical "slide" scales can vary by 3 - 4 pounds based on where on the base you stand, and whether or not you shift your weight to the front or back.

I don't cook too often, but when I do, I like to do it right. Hmm, I wonder why I'm fat... :cool:

Greek lamb meatballs and feta with crisp pita and hummus (all homemade), or my homemade gyros. Spinach & ricotta stuffed chicken breast, on the grill with proscuitto-wrapped asparagus. Bacon-wrapped whitefish. Crab-stuffed chicken topped with carmelized onions and spinach.

Protein bars. Flaxmeal pancakes. Strawberry & low-carb vanilla yogurt parfait.

Chipotle chicken bol, no rice, with green chile salsa and easy on the sour cream/cheese. Jose Pepper's Pollo Magnifico (lunch portion, and I box 60% of it up) - hold the tortilla, double rice instead of rice & Beans. Today it's turkey pepperoni and cottage cheese - I like putting the cottage cheese on the pepperoni "chips" and eating them together, mmm.

5'11 about 75 lbs ago, 5'10 now. Right now I see 180 - 200 as my "ideal" weight.

That's an interesting perspective, I had never heard that before. I guess there's no sense in starting my PhD program next year afterall. :cool: I have so many issues with government located faith-based initiatives it's not even funny (see previous "rule" on maintaing separation of church and state). There's a strong dichotomy here. 1) This man killed my child, and now the money I work hard to earn, and that I pay in taxes, is being used to give him a free education, when I can't even afford to educate myself. 2) This man killed my child, but if we use his sentence time to educate him, he is less like to repeat offend, and more likely to become a productive and contributing member of our society, so I will indirectly see a small benefit by educating him. So by that rationale, if someone is serving a life sentence with no chance of parole, it's pointless to educate him for "our" benefit, so he should not have the same educational opportunities as someone who committed a lesser crime or is serving a lesser sentence. Slippery slope from an ethical standpoint -- how do you deny the same education to two people, who committed the exact same crime, and just happened to receive different sentences. Or -- would there be a cut-off involved? Do we apply age valuation? Can you receive an education if you'll be released when you're 40 or younger, but not if you'll be older? Is there any point in giving the same educational opportunities to someone who will be 95 when they get out of prison, as someone who will be 25? Interesting! What about offering education in lieu of - say - weight on the grounds. Get an education, be less likely to commit a crime. Lift weights - be as likely (if not more, by nature of incarceration) to commit a crime, but now you can be a lot stronger/more intimidating when you do it. Or we could say, "Forget education. Forget leisure time. Forget air conditioning. The best thing to prevent criminals from being repeat offenders is to make prison the single-most unpleasant experience they've ever had." You only put your hand into the fire once or twice before you realize - "Hey! That's not fun!" and don't do it anymore. But then - if you have a population that has learned that robbery is the only way to put food on the table, and you do nothing to provide them with another means of putting food on the table, what can you possibly expect other than they rob again? I'll stop, b/c I could go on, and on...

I'm part of a really good team right now, and truly don't have a monkey or an ass. My last place, on the other hand, oh my... let me tell you about the person who sat in the cube across from me, my "next door neighbor". You're getting me off on a tangent. :cool: This guy, who will remain unnamed, would - in the middle of the day - pull of his socks and shoes and start clipping his toe nails. And they would fly. And one landed on my desk one day. So I tore into him a little because I'm a fairly nice person but enough is enough. From then on he was "considerate" and would actually ASK ME IF I MINDED if he cut his toe nails. One day our department is having a nationality potluck, so whatever your nationality is, bring a dish to compliment. My mother's side of the family is Greek so I brought a big dish of homemade baklava -- which represented about $50 in ingredients, and a total time investment of about 6 hours. An hour before it was supposed to start I went in to get it out and cut it into pieces, and this guy is in there with Gladware, filling up his gladware containers with my baklava. I ripped into him again, and he says, "This stuff is way too expensive for me to buy, and I could eat this much of ir anyway, so I just figured I'd take what I'd eat and bring it home." This guy would spend hours each day on e-bay. Since I sat next to him, any time I got up I could see his monitor, and over time I noticed he was spending a LOT of time there. Seriously - about 4 hours a day, at least. One day I get called into my director's office, and he's already there. The scoop was - she wanted me to take on his biggest project because he (he was hourly) was having to work too many hours to get his job done. She was an idiot too, BTW. So I look at her, stupified... and then ask him to leave, and then tell her that -- I will be the first person to volunteer to help a co-worker if they legitimately need my help, but I refused to take on his biggest project of the year (which happened to be one of only 3 he was responsible for, while I was responsible for something like 9), and add that workload and burden to my shoulders, because he couldn't keep his butt of of e-bay. I also told her it was a bad move on her part to even ask me to do it, because all it's teaching him is that he can do nothing, and it's ok because someone else will cover his butt. So she says, "Ok, we'll just outsource the project then." *sigh* That's not even the tip of the iceberg. But it is a few examples of the biggest "monkey" I've ever worked with. This guy was a low-life, in every possible sense of the word. Now I'm gonna go find my happy place.

Right now I'm averaging 4.8 lbs per week. I'm stall, go, stall, go... so I've gone 5 weeks with nothing, and then lost nearly 20 lbs in one week. Yes, that was an awesome week! During my first week post-op which was a few days of liquids and a few days of thick liquids (yogurt, cream soups, etc.) I lost about 30 lbs. Keep in mind I came to this with 200 lbs to lose, so though the numbers may look "wow" -- percentage-wise, when compared to bandsters with less to lose, it's probably right on track.