Day 24 of P5: Busy and Blogging took a back seat, but fear not, I'm Drinking the water, Eating at 1200, Exercising, and Waiting for my body to let the fat go (yes, another stasis phase)...visiting the Vatican Splendors Exhibition, Learning Japanese, and Keeping my Mouth Busy! How do you keep yours busy so you don't eat?

Scale...the same, though no overeating/binge-ing going on...

Exercise: Good. Walking/Pilates/Jackie Warner exercises (well, the ones my body is capable of).

Sleep: Spent two days pretty deprived (3.5 hours one night, 5 the next).

Food: Good. Had a small bobble on the weekend (stuff not on my plan) cause we ate out, but there it is. My decision and no excuses.

Mood...pretty good, now that I caught up on some lost sleep.

Monday was fabulous...such fun. Went to see the Vatican Splendors exhibition in Fort Lauderdale and spent 3 hours enjoying the offerings. My most fave were the mosaics/paintings and seeing the actual handwriting of MichelAngelo and Bernini. I got such a thrill, I felt it all up and down my body. My gosh. MichelAngelo's own letter/signature/calipers....

Spent a long time on some particular objects of interest and chatted up some strangers, pointing out particular items of note in some of the works (ie, the exhibition's weakness, even with an audio tour, is not pointing out some of the significant symbols/meanings, imo. Fortunately, I was able to decipher quite a bit on my own and for hubby and some strangers who were going at a similar pace to me.)

I thought of Allan with one painting (the angel appearing to some animals, people to announce the birth of Jesus) cause the only one paying attention to the angel was a cute doggie. He was "kneeling" and looking up and listening intently...and so the light of Heaven showed on his doggy face. How cute...

After the exhibit, since it was deep So FL rush hour, we headed to the nearby Fort Lauderdale beach strip and parked...and walked. :) Chose a lovely patio restaurant to have a meal. Our seats/table had a perfect view of the beach across the street. Tourists, para-sailers, joggers, kids running. The patio was elegant with jazzy music. Nice. Got to be there during sunset....watching the stars emerge...

Been reading and started my cd Japanese lessons yesterday, so didn't feel like blogging AT ALL.

Appetite is calm. On days when I go out and have to be in the car a lot, I cut back on drinking water until I get home. This means I have to cope with more appetite. I will never give up drinking the water afer 50 years of my life eschewing water. Why? I have seen it. I have seen the enormous difference it makes when I drink a lot, drink consistently, and drink BEFORE eating. I'm less hungry. I think less about food.

It is not theory to me anymore. It's not a fad. It's what works. Water/fluids works. Period. On days when I delay water (due to errands/driving in dense traffic--when I can't pee no matter what), I get hungry. On days I do my water drinking according to my system/level, I suffer very little hunger. I get fewer cravings.

So, call me a mermaid and throw water at me. :D I will open my mouth and drink it!

I love the sound of Japanese, and I've gotten better at pronunciation watching anime/dramas/listening to JRock. But I got the cds to learn the language more formally. I have smatterings of words and phrases, and I kick butt on the Japanese "o" and "u" and "f" and "r" sounds (which are not really exactly the way we say it, just like letters are different in Spanish, my original language). I love the Japanese "u" sounds. I kid to my husband that I want to adopt and bunch of kids and name them Kaoru, Noboru, Ryuu, Satoru, Hikaru, Shuuhei, Touru, and such just to pronounce the sound. heh.Now, every time my hubby notices a "u" name...he goes, "There's another one for the name list."

The "f " is interesting. It seems like more an exhalation of hair with the lips and mouth "just so"...a certain way that stops short of of how we say the F in English or Spanish. I remember the lightness of "h" in Greek when we were playing around with that in Bible Study, and the "hi" in Japanese has that lightness.

Nothing sexier than a man with a beautiful voice going all out in Japanese. Num. Manly!  If you haven't heard a great male voice using this language, behold he sexiness of Aizen (powerful BLEACH anime villain, recently defeated).  And Ulquiorra (my fave Espada from BLEACH and I felt sad when his character, though an adversary to the good guys, turned to ash in his death). He doesn't speak until about 45 seconds into this clip (death scene), but man, you don't need the subs. The voice. The voice.... with all those hard t's and k's and the soft s and sh sounds. Love it.

One of the benefits of doing this beginner's language course is that, well, you can't eat if you are busy pronouncing a foreign language. :)

Feel a binge coming on--hurry, go put on a language tape (pick your faves, natch) and go to it. Or head to youtube or online for a course. Keep your mouth busy.

Or sing. I do that, too, to keep mouth busy in the face of temptations.

If you like jazz, learn to scat. If you like antiques and stuff, learn to be an auctioneer (practice that super fast talking). If you like poetry, recite it.

Or, if you are hipper and younger or if you're just into hip-hoppy stuff, you can keep your mouth unbinge-y and buy doing this:


First saw this guy more than a year ago, and now he's been on tv shoes and has fans and has lessons on youtube. :)   For lessons in English by a cute Asian dude in his car, check out this one (and its follow-up lessons). Easier to do. He gives good tips.

Do you have "keep the mouth busy and not eating tricks like this? :)  They can be fun, right? (And I will not go into detail on one of my alternate "mouth busy" tricks that is only possible when hubby is home. Ahem. That one works REALLY well, as it's very, very, very distracting. Hmmm..there's one way of making your life partner very happy you're dieting. teehee)

So, while I wait for my body to release --and it will, as one thing I've learned from Allan and the Challenges is that consistency pays off. Eat less, move more, it will budge-- I'll be practicing my rudimentary Japanese lessons and watching more fun anime and reading more fun manga and visiting more museums and doing more walking and just refusing to stop until I get to where I wanna be....in all sorts of ways....

Happy new month to everyone. SPRING IS ALMOST HERE...become new!