<p>Those are pretty good vices! :)</p>
<p>And not only do some increase your heart rate but they have no calories!</p>
<p>Bikes, heart rate monitors, low-fat, high-fat…glad to see the discussion continues! CC didn’t seem to like me very much for a while - I signed out, then I couldn’t get signed in, then it took forever to get a password link resent, then I got in and couldn’t post, then…well, I just kind of gave up. So @abasket, while some of us may not be wild about the new format, some of us couldn’t get into the new format! 
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<p>Bromfield, I wanted to let you know that the Garmin was really helpful to me this winter/spring. I don’t know that I’m ever going to measure my heart rate on a regular basis while I’m shuffling along, but it’s been a terrific tool for me. Far more reliable in measuring distance than the other options I’d been using. </p>
<p>Bunsen, belated congrats on Boston. Sounds like a great day and experience for you. </p>
<p>I’ve actually been struggling a bit with keeping weight on. Maintenance has always been an issue for me and balancing calories and exercise hasn’t been easy. I guess it’s better than eating too much and thinking exercise would burn those calories off. I just feel like I’ve been eating the same foods over and over and frankly, I’m just getting tired of them. Thankfully, no recent donut binges. Still no fast food. Just doesn’t have the appeal it once did. </p>
<p>Where is Deborah T? KMC, I’ve enjoyed reading your real life posts! I don’t envy you clearing the trail, however. When shall we come help you open the pool for the season? </p>
<p>The pool is open but you’ll want me to crank up the heat for you…it’s 51 degrees today
But you idea is a fine one…pool party trade for a wee bit o trail clearing! Except now, as of this am’s hike, I have a full sized tree down across the trail…right after the leaf mounds. It must have snapped last night in the sheer winds. So I will have to get hubby to lift the chainsaw band, I’m afraid…as I don’t need extra obstacles deterring me from my daily morning hikes!</p>
<p>Glad to see both you, sabaray, and Plant Mom resurfacing on thread 
gotta get back to work now.</p>
<p>Welcome back Sabaray! I’ve been here but STILL don’t love the format - glad you finally snuck back in!!!</p>
<p>Are you saying you’re having trouble keeping weight off or on?? Will summer foods open up some new food choices for you???</p>
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<p>Hah. I’ve got a sure fire way to fix that. Buy a 1 pound bag of roasted almonds or cashews and leave it out on the counter where it’s easy to grab “just a little handful” every time you walk by… :)</p>
<p>I’ve discovered that nuts are my gating item. If I have a bag in the house (and open), my wieght stays the same or creeps up over time. If I don’t have nuts open (or in the house), I tend to stay the same or creep down over time. It took me a while to make the correlation because there’s a lag. An open bag of nuts last week shows up on the scale this week or next week. This is a bit of a conundrum, because nuts are a fantastic hiking food. Really tasty. Good exercise nutrition: carbs, protein, and fat plus a ton of salt to replace what I’m sweating. The problem is that nuts for hiking leaves the open bag at home in the kitchen calling my name! I wish I could just ignore the bag except when I’m going hiking, but so far I’ve not managed to make that happen. I’m OK as long as the bag in the cupboard isn’t opened.</p>
<p>That’s one of the reasons I want to try the Generation UCAN powder mix for hiking. I don’t think I’ll be too tempted to nosh on that as a snack at home.</p>
<p>Apples are my other bugaboo. The big change I’ve made for 2014 has been a strict limit of one apple per day and I’ve been substituting a container of blackberries for dessert whenever the grocery has them 2 for $4 or 2 for $5.</p>
<p>Wonder of wonders, the problem is keeping weight on. I’m at my lowest weight in probably 30 years. A busier schedule this spring has probably had something to do with it. I still need to get into a regular weight routine which will most likely help. My exercise has consisted primarily of running…got to get some weighs in there more than once a week, I suspect. </p>
<p>I ordered the UCAN powder. It should arrive in a couple of days.</p>
<p>Welcome back, sabaray! DeborahT said she was taking a break, but I had hoped she would be back by now!</p>
<p>I’ve actually been eating LOTS of nuts. Lots of KIND bars. Bananas and peanut butter. More carbs, too. I just ate a snack I’m sure you wouldn’t approve of! Almonds glazed with honey mixed with dried cranberries and sea salt! But they were delicious. New favorite salad? Shredded kale with wild rice, dried cranberries, goat cheese, toasted almonds and balsamic. Really, I think I’m just tired of meat. Berries are a staple at my house, but I’ve had apples sitting on my counter that no one has touched in a week or so. </p>
<p>Welcome back, Sabaray! Congrats on the maintenance and additional weight loss. Welcome back Plantmom.</p>
<p>Worked out at the gym with my trainer today–TRX and heavy weights for an hour. Followed this with 45 minutes on the elliptical and another 2 miles on the treadmill. I was going to walk outside, but it’s cold and rainy.</p>
<p>Thanks for the suggestions Idad–taking the battery out of the activity band looked impossible–it required removing four tiny screws that I could hardly see. I deleted the app from my iPhone and then reloaded it. Waiting to see if that’s going to work. I have no patience for stuff like this.</p>
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<p>Mine arrived today. I got two flavors of the protein mix to try: vanilla and chocolate. None of my breakfast options right before hiking (bacon/eggs, MickeyD’s Biscuit or chicken sandwich, or KFC fried chicken) really sit that well. So, I’m going to try a half packet before hiking and then a half packet every two hours and a half packet for recovery (ride home) at the end. So a 4 hour hike would be 1.5 packets. A 6 hour hike would be 2 packets. I’ll adjust from there. </p>
<p>We’ll see how it works out. A half a packet of this stuff is 100 calories, 6.5 grams of protein, 16.5 grams of slow release glucose, and a bunch of sodium and potassium - nutritionally better than an apple. Not crazy about the artificial sweeteners, but I guess they have to do something to make it drinkable.</p>
<p>Great to “see” you all and thanks for the welcome backs. Saba, that’s great news on the weight. I went through a stage when I, too, felt I was fighting to keep weight on. Alas, that has passed, and I feel like I’m at a healthy place, maintaining–as long as I eat mindfully and keep the activity level up. </p>
<p>It is blueberry season here–so loving that! A handful of frozen berries is like a bunch of mini-popsicles. They’re also perfect for a post-workout smoothie. I’ve picked 15 pounds so far over the past few weeks. Apples (good apples) are so expensive now that buying two a week is enough.</p>
<p>Low 90’s outside, so I ran on the treadmill (5K) at the gym and followed up with some shoulder and back exercises.</p>
<p>IDad, you left out the bag of pistachios! And if they happen to be pre-shelled, watch out!!</p>
<p>Oh, yeah. I’ve been known to dive into a 2 lb bag of pistachios. I get those with the shell. Same with roasted peanuts. In both cases, the shell is a trivial impediment. I can still inhale them at a breathtaking clip!</p>
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<p>To the basement for me. Cable chops. ValSlide alligator crawls. DB snatches. Rear foot elevated split squats (TRX version). Chin ups. KB Swings. Alternating single-arm DB bench press. </p>
<p>Good solid workout. A little better than punch-the-clock.</p>
<p>Sabaray,do you belong to Costco?? For the first time ever ours has had Kind bars. The box had 16 or 18 in it for either 17 or 18 dollars - something like that. I put some in my kids Easter baskets!! The rest are in my desk drawer. :)</p>
<p>Finished my run just as a round of thunderstorms rolled in.</p>
<p>A pistachio company recently ran an ad in runners world touting pistachios as a low cal snack. I wonder if the calories are really NET calories (Food calories LESS the caloric effort it takes to open them!)</p>
<p>abasket, I bought that box of KIND bars at Costco - my home away from home. They are long gone. I really like the “low sugar” ones - 5 grams of sugar total. I think they’re nuts, dark chocolate and sea salt. They also have a chocolate/chili/almond that’s really tasty and a cinnamon pecan that I also really like. I think I’m addicted. I also love pistachios- particularly the salt and pepper ones that they sell at - you guessed it - Costco. </p>
<p>PlantMom, I’m glad to see you back here as well! I forgot to mention that earlier - I think I was just so excited that I could actually post! </p>
<p>Lots of rain here today. This past weekend I ran my first half marathon (my first “big” race ever) so I felt okay giving myself a break other than some dog walks. </p>
<p>After reading the various fat loss threads at CC, it is really striking how much people beat themselves up over this stuff. It’s the same thing on smoking cessation sites, where people batter and bruise themselves for their inability to beat an addiction with willpower. So now, they not only smoke or are overweight, but they have all the baggage of thinking they must be a “bad” person, on top of it.</p>
<p>This is why I have found it curiously liberating to view smoking and fat storage as being driven by physiology. It doesn’t help to beat yourself up over it. It does help to think in terms of what would make it physiologically easier to not smoke or not eat as much? What’s the easy way? Is there a way to steer the ship in that direction so it doesn’t depend (as much) on willpower?</p>
<p>At the very least, a group hug for anyone beating themselves up over this stuff. It’s really painful to see how hard people are on themselves. It’s why I really, really don’t like the scolding public policy, “Well (harumph), if you would just eat less and exercise more…” Thanks for the obvious!</p>
<p>Welcome back, PlantMom! We missed you. </p>
<p>sabaray, kudos for finishing your first half! Yay! You did it! Congrats.</p>
<p>Lots of city walking for me today. No substantial running. Worried about our CC friends in the states affected by the severe weather.</p>
<p>sabaray- congrats on the half marathon! What did you think of it?</p>