Dukan – Day 132 Hong Kong Bound!

Posted on December 31, 2011 by flamidwyfe

Friday was a PP Day.

Daily weight Loss: 0.4 lb/0.2 kg
Total weight loss: 57.8 lb/26.31 kg

HAPPY NEW YEARS EVE!!!

My friend Lucy and I are in Hong Kong to celebrate the New Year. They have a Times Square here, so we’re going to watch the ball drop and then the fireworks over the harbor… should be a great time!

We were picked up by the driver, Jerry, at 1030 and he brought my coat that he picked up at the tailors… Fit like a glove! So nice to have a coat made just for you. The tailor also knows that I’m losing weight and said he’d be able to alter accordingly 🙂

My gorgeous new coat!

Then off to the Hangzhou airport for the 2 hour flight to Hong Kong. Plane took off late due to mechanical issues and we arrived in Hong Kong at 530 and headed to our hostel. As part of my New Years resolutions, I’m going to travel on a tighter budget and this was a good way to start that off… LOL. Here are some shots of our room, some of them taken from OUTSIDE the room, since it is so small! The room is 12 x 6′ and the bathroom less than 3 x 3′, but functional and what do you need a fancy room for anyway?? (this is what I’ve been saying to myself over and over… I will eventually buy into it!)

Our ~~jail cell~~ hostel room door.

The SSS bathroom… Have to say the water pressure was amazing!

Then out for a quick bite to eat and then we found the Pause Cafe in the building we’re staying at… Total dive, but awesome coffee! We’re totally going back to play darts Saturday night, before going to Times Square!

Shooting darts at Pause Cafe

Lucy made me open my eyes for a pic!

Then off to bed for a rest up for Saturdays fun-filled day!

HAPPY LAST DAY OF 2011, my friends… It’s been a crazy year for me and I don’t regret one minute of it!!

Ciao!

Quote of the day: Make new friends, but keep the old, some are silver and the others are gold! (changed to my liking!)

One last pic… The “hotel” across the street from ours… Who only sleeps for an hour??

Dukan – Day 129

Posted on December 28, 2011 by flamidwyfe

Tuesday was a PV day.

Daily weight loss: 0.0 lb/0.0 kg
Total weight loss: 56.1 lb/25.11 kg

No loss is better than a gain. What an amazingly long day in the midst of a long week without enough sleep. I’m pretty cranky this morning, taking it out on my poor personal assistant Kitty and have Snow Patrol blasting Chasing Cars in my ear phones… Stress relief.

So Lucy, Silin (our amazing translator) and I took what we THOUGHT was a 2 hour train ride to Wenzhou in the morning. Well, apparently (this is a word I use when I’m grumpy) there was a train collision a few months ago on this route so they decided that slowing down the trains might lead to less fatalities the next time… So the frigging trip is now FOUR HOURS… EACH WAY!!! Apparently this makes sense, some how… sigh. So, up at 545 am, picked up by driver at 630 am, train at 745 am, arrived at Wenzhou at 1150 am, lunch from 1220 to 200 pm, because they take 90 minute lunch breaks here. Toured the hospital in a whirlwind 25 minutes, met with the CEO and head physician for about one hour (they are trying to woo Lucy here to work), got buzzed as hell off the local green tea that the CEO made traditionally for us (coolest thing about China is the way they serve tea, it’s awesome… That’s about the only positivity in this blog today run with it LOL) and then back in the van for the pot hole filled ride back to the train station at 330 pm, train at 451 pm, back to Hangzhou at 955 pm, delight to find KaKa waiting at the correct train station (we arrived back at the station as far from my flat as humanly possible in this city) and home at 1005 pm. O.F.F.S. what a long, exhausting day! We didn’t really get to see Wenzhou at all to make a fair evaluation og whether or not it would be a nice place for Lucy to go to. What we did see, however, made me very happy that I’m in what is APPARENTLY considered the greenest city in all of the great land of China.

I did eat some weird stuff today and ended up with an allergic reaction to what I believe was gluten.

Breakfast: 2 tea eggs and coffee
Lunch: at fancy schmancy restaurant… DUCK TONGUE (it’s the specialty of Wenzhou and I felt compelled to at least try it… It tastes like pork… I totally just blanked on what it was I was eating and focused on trying not to get teeth or bones in my mouth, as it comes attached to the jaw… LMAO). I also had tofu, cucumber wedges and they made a hot pot that was suppose to be sans anything but meat and veggies and they add meat apparently coated with flour AND they through in pasta for good measure, which I didn’t see because they also put in these super skinny long mushrooms that I so couldn’t wait to eat. I’m sure they also threw in a pound of MSG because within a minute of taking the first bite my lips and tongue were tingling, I had hives on my chest and arms at 3 minutes and I was fighting panic… Thank God for anti-histamines! Not sure exactly which of the culprits in the hot pot caused the reaction, but it was a bummer 😦 I finished lunch by eating a tea egg, made me feel better, lol.
Dinner: PEANUTS, I’m not kidding. We thought we’d be home at SEVEN pm!!! So I ate peanuts on the train… I’m not sure that was a really Dukan friendly dinner.
Lucy kindly made me a cup of Earl Grey and yogurt with bran while I sulked on the couch, too late to make phone calls home, too tired to move and not hungry enough to eat a real meal. It’s so wonderful having a friend like Lucy… Gonna miss her when she goes back to Dubai!
Then off to bed for a much deserved sleep. I hope the rest of you had a better day… I promise tomorrow will be a brighter day… After I bonk Kitty on the head a few more times for the 4 hour train ride in 2nd class EACH WAY!!!

Ciao!

Quote of the day: Forget what we’re told… Before we get too old. Show me a garden that’s bursting into life. ~ Snow Patrol “Chasing Cars” … Feeling much better after listening to this while typing (pounding the keys) to the beat.

A couple pics from the day…

This is a dad with 3 kids on the scooter. I affectionately refer to this as the Chinese Minivan!

Anyone want a SHIN rejuvenation?

The shitty road back to the train station made even worse by this guy pulling carts cutting us off!

Dukan – Day 125… I DID IT!

Posted on December 23, 2011 by flamidwyfe

Friday was a PV day 🙂

Daily Weight Loss: 0.7 lb/0.3 kg
Total Weight Loss: 55.2 lb/25.11 kg

Woo hoo! I hit my mid-January goal… this morning!!!! I wanted to be down 55 lbs before going home on vacation and I’ve done it. If I didn’t worry about hurting myself, I’d be doing cartwheels 😀

I’ve been working on getting this last 5 pounds off since December 5th, so 19 days ago, and this just goes to prove that it does comes off… perseverance is the key. And it doesn’t melt off, you’ve got to work it!

Breakfast: 2 tea eggs
Lunch: I made a tuna salad for myself and 2 friends… Tuna in brine, “mayo” made with dijon mustard and fat free cream cheese with a teeny bit of water and diced onions and salt. I mixed all that together and then placed it on the top of a small handful of mixed lettuce greens. Sliced a tea egg (each) into quarters and dressed the bowl with a drizzle of olive oil (it’s the one thing I haven’t given up, and I’m not giving up).
Dinner: Sashimi with the hottest damn wasabi I have eaten in my life! Seriously!
Snack: FF Cottage cheese with bran… BLECH! I’m out of yogurt and this was the only thing I could think of to put it in…. not recommended!

I had a WONDERFUL day off. Slept until about 715 (my body just won’t sleep later, dammit!) but stayed in bed until 1130… I even went downstairs to the tea egg vendor in my jammies (with a coat of course) and my flip flops which warrants you quite a few stares when it’s 37 F outside. I then climbed back into bed and had breakfast and a cup of coffee. Stayed there reading the news online, catching up on all the blogs I read and writing my own. It was AWESOME!

Then Chiara came over and joined Lucy and I for the lunch I described above. Chiara and I then walked 30 minutes to the hair salon, recommended by my friend Velina. I had the following done:
Hair wash, head massage (20 minute), hair consult (in Chinese with lots of pointing and sign language and showing my pics of my previous highlighting job in Shanghai) then a cut, a blow-dry and then the assistant WRAPPED MY HAIR IN SARAN WRAP to high-light it… ummm, I was a tad nervous and thought I’d play it out before calling a “Time-Out”. What ended up happening is amazing… he gently and expertly pulled my hair through the Saran Wrap, without hurting me (at Toni & Guy I was in pain and ended up with a friggin’ scabbed head!) and then he applied the high-light solution. Afterwards they rewashed my hair, gave me a 5 minute head massage, the stylist dried and styled my hair with goop and I walked out very happy. My hair came out really good, better than the expensive cut and high-light at Toni & Guy ($221.00) I PAID JUST… $31.58 for all of this. I am a happy camper and will post a pic in tomorrow’s blog.

Today is Christmas Eve already here in China…. 645 a.m. I am working today and doing what I love to do the most… educating women and their partners about pregnancy and childbirth… should be a great day!

Ciao!

Quote of the day: FAMILY – Father And Mother I Love You ~ quoted by Jerry, my driver here in China… he doesn’t know the source, but I love it… never thought of the word like that before!

What 5 books have influenced you the most?

Posted on September 30, 2011 by flamidwyfe

This is an interesting topic for the WordPress postaday2011. I rarely do the suggested blog because I’m busy blogging about my Dukan journey… but here goes.

The 5 books that have influenced me the most:

The Bible … not just because it’s the Bible… but because it’s a historical retelling and even more influencing to me, it’s a life guide, and I like that 🙂
Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret, by Judy Blume… Wow… my mom checked it out of the Martin Co. Library for me when I was in sixth grade. It wasn’t in our school library… GOD FORBID!!! LOL. This book shows girls that all those weird gooey things we’re feeling are all normal… and yes, even though we think boys are handsome, they really do have cooties! 😀
The Five People You Meet In Heaven, by Mitch Albom. To get the answers of the questions that we so often ask would be phenomenal!
The Celestine Prophecy, by James Redfield. I have looked at life WAY differently since reading The Celestine Prophecy. One of the most influential lessons in the book for me was that there are no coincidences. Every single person we come into contact with, has a purpose in our lives… sometimes good, sometimes not so good, but a purpose none the less. One thing that I do is acknowledge people, nearly always, when they look at me. Might be was a nod, might be with a smile, might be with a kind word, but I always acknowledge. I have met some really awesome people in some awesome places, simply by acknowledging them and they have made my life richer simply from that gesture… I could go on and on about those non-coincidental contacts, but that would be a LONG blog!
The Pursuit of Happyness, by Chris Gardner. If you think your life is shitty, read this book! Chris puts things into perspective. His pull up your big boy panties attitude took him far in life… And he’s an amazing ROLE MODEL for fathers and where their priorities should be. READ the book, then watch Will Smith play the part in the movie of the same title… PHENOMENAL!

There are so many other books I could list… a few dozen actually… some from my childhood, some from my young adulthood and some from now. But I have to say after writing them all down, these 5 stick out in my head.

So… take your time. Take out a pen and write down the books that have influenced you and then pick the Top 5… Looking forward to your comments!

Edit: I wanted to add something here. Although it isn’t a “book”, The Road Not Taken, a poem written by Robert Frost was a mandatory memorization poem in 8th grade. It absolutely, completely and thoroughly has influenced me probably more than any of the above books… I have definitely taken the one less traveled by and it HAS made ALL the difference!

The Road Not Taken

Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveler, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth;

Then took the other, as just as fair,
And having perhaps the better claim
Because it was grassy and wanted wear;
Though as for that the passing there
Had worn them really about the same,

And both that morning equally lay
In leaves no step had trodden black.
Oh, I kept the first for another day!
Yet knowing how way leads on to way,
I doubted if I should ever come back.

I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I—
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference.