Ham Fried Rice

I’ve been busy. Ok, my eyes have been glued to the television. I am an Olympics junkie, always have been. When I was 8, I was absolutely head-over-heels in love with Mitch Gaylord, enthralled by him and the U.S. men’s gymnastics team. Check out the Olympics home page: http://en.beijing2008.cn/

Opening Ceremony was exhilarating. I absolutely love the motto One World, One Dream and the hope it instills. There is nothing more incredible than seeing the Palestinian team march a few teams after the Israelis, or Iraq march next to Iran, later followed by the United States. It’s simply amazing that for sixteen short days, the world can symbolically put aside its differences.

I am going to work a bit harder on my Chinese. After all, my husband is fluent and literate in two dialects, Mandarin and Cantonese, and he’s a white guy. As an American-born China doll, I can barely scrape by in Mandarin. Now is the time to start studying. Because, tong yi ge shijie, tong yi ge mengxiang. One world, one dream.

Suddenly life just got a little cheerier. I didn’t think this would be published for the general public’s enjoyment. I didn’t take into consideration the practice of opportunism. Let’s face it, money talks. But who’s complaining? This is excellent news! And if you really feel like splurging, there’s the Collector’s edition for only $100! (I will be purchasing the $12.99 standard edition.) Available on amazon.com December 4th. And by the way, the new HBP trailer is excellent!

And I wish I were referring to my abs. But unfortunately, I’m not.

I’m in the middle of week one of my new regiment and I’ve forgotten how difficult the first two weeks are. I’ve completely changed eating habits and started exercising. My schedule thus far:

Mon- Tae Bo with resistance bands, 45 minutes. Weight training and abs 30 minutes.

Tues- brisk walking 25 minutes.

Wed- Tae Bo with bands, 45 minutes. Ab work, 15 minutes.

Thu- I think I’m going to attempt some jogging tonight.

As far as diet is concerned, it’s amazing how easy it is to unthinkingly pop “junk” into your mouth. I took the kids swimming on Tuesday. I fed them some goldfish crackers and before I knew it, I had popped a handful into my own mouth. By the time I had eaten them, I realized my oopsie. Wow, bad habits are hard to break.

Mon- a bit of a wash, since I didn’t start the program until that night.

Tues- B: oatmeal, egg white, 2 glasses water. L: taco salad with a spoonful of salsa (no dressing), grapes, 2 glasses water. D: salmon burger on whole wheat buns (no condiments other than salt and pepper), steamed spinach, an apple, 2 glasses water. More water before bed.

Wed- oatmeal, protein powder, 2 glasses water. L: taco with lettuce, cilantro, corn. 2 glasses water. D: stir-fry chicken with red bell peppers and onions, brown rice, spinach. 2 glasses water. Snack: handful of raw almonds. 2 glasses water.

Thu- oatmeal, protein powder, raw almonds, 2 glasses water. L: chicken and brown rice, grapes, 2 glasses water. Snack: low-fat yogurt, raw almonds, 2 glasses water. D: grilled steak, zucchini, spinach with tsp. low-fat vinaigrette, 2 glasses water.

Sounds unexciting, I know. I’ve never been adverse to eating leftovers. In this case, it’s simply easier, because I have to make kids’ meals. But for most people (i.e. Matt) it’d take proper planning to create a week’s menu.

This week’s challenge has been:

1. Motivation to exercise, because I’m sore and tired. It’s easy to whine/complain and be tempted to “skip a night.” But I know the secret to life in general: consistency is key!

2. Don’t look too closely. It’s too early to scrutinize my body. Noticeable changes don’t occur for a few weeks. I only weigh myself at the beginning of the process and then check results based on how my clothing/jeans fit. But it’s hard not to obsess over the fat rolls.

2. Thinking before I eat. I’ve been trying to retrain my brain to see food as fuel, not pleasure. I’ve noticed the smells of food really hit me, especially when I’m cooking other things for my children. My best bet has been to write down my food plan the day before. It’s much easier to stick with something already in writing. As they say in Body for Life, “If you fail to plan, then you plan to fail.”

I realize this is just for me, but I feel like if I post it, I’ll somehow be held accountable. Because I absolutely loathe failure. And public failure is the worst.

New photo stills from the upcoming film version of Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince are out! Eeeeeeeeeee!!!! I’m sure they’re on all the fan sites but I found them on yahoo.

I was just reminiscing this morning about the eight hour all-nighter I pulled to read The Deathly Hallows last year, after it’s release. I literally read from 12:45 a.m. until 8:30 a.m. the next morning. Matt has always been so good to go out at midnight and purchase the books for me. When HBP came out I was eight months pregnant with baby #2. When DH came out, I was almost eight months pregnant with baby #3. It has been immensely enjoyable to read (ok, devour) the Harry Potter series and I look forward to sharing them with my children some day. But first, the films!!!

It’s cryptic, I know.

This past Saturday Matt and I celebrated (sort of) our 11th wedding anniversary. Yes, we got married quite young by society’s current standards. But I had just graduated from college and Matt finished shortly thereafter. I say “sort of” in terms of celebration because we had a house full of out-of-town guests: My friend and her two sons, and her twin sister and her three sons. And those five boys plus my son meant we had six boys all under the age of six-and-a-half running around, plus my two little girls. Let’s just say my cream berber carpet is now quite black in some areas. Hopefully I’ll find some good carpet cleaner!

As they were preparing to leave, one of the friends mentioned her 2 year-old son had suffered constant diarrhea during the last 2 days. To my horror, I watched as he shoved his hands down his diaper and then touch all of the baby’s toys. After the herd of friends left, my OCD kicked in and I proceeded that very night to clean the bathrooms, the floors, lysol down the toys, door knobs and anything else that might bring upon the dreaded Montezuma’s Revenge. I don’t know why, but lately I’ve become a bit of a germaphobe. I noticed it kicked in after my third child and I’m trying to figure out why… I’m obsessive and insistent with the hand sanitizer and hand washing and I feel uncomfortable whenever my children play with toys that don’t belong to them or when other children play with my children’s toys. I worry that they’ll catch gross diseases. For example, last summer my two year-old daughter caught hand-foot-mouth disease from who-knows-where and passed it to my five year-old. Last winter my son caught the stomach flu, twice, and passed the vomiting/diarrhea to my two year-old, twice. I realize that’s just the nature of the beast of childhood diseases; it goes around and then around and around some more.

As for the “nuttiness” of it all, I use the term in reference to my OCD, to seven little kids running around my house for three days (the baby is still immobile) and to laughing and having a good time with our friends. We did conduct a blind taste test of peanut butter between my fave Skippy and her fave Jif. We both preferred Jif. It was definitely a “nutty” weekend.

I just finished watching part one of Andrew Davies’ adaptation of Sense & Sensibility and I’m not quite sure what to think, yet. I can say that I didn’t particularly care for the opening scene between Willoughby and Eliza with all of the steamy “ooh” noises and overt skin shots. Frankly, I was embarrassed by how hard they were trying to make it “sexy” in a modern-day sense. I watch period pieces for a reason. If I want a skanky modern scene, I can turn to any channel on my TV. Perhaps Andrew Davies hasn’t figured out that women don’t necessarily need or like explicit scenes. Unlike a dude, I don’t get turned on by visual stimulus.
The entire production dragged painfully and the acting was disappointingly mediocre. I also found Dominic Cooper to be too smarmy as Willoughby. “Willoughby! Willoughby!” The name can’t help but conjure an image of the gorgeous Greg Wise. (See inset picture of gorgeous, brooding man.) Unfortunately, I also could not help but compare this production to Ang Lee’s 1995 S&S, which was adapted by Emma Thompson, and one of my top twenty faves.

Thus far, this is my least favorite current adaptation of an Austen work… We’ll have to see if part two redeems the production. To Be Continued.

Jane-ites, Austenites, whatever you may call yourselves, set your TIVO/DVR/VCR for the next two Sundays as PBS’ Masterpiece Theatre airs the latest adaptation of Sense & Sensibility. I’m curious to see what sultry scenes have been added by Andrew Davies, the same screenwriter who gave us the Colin Firth “shirt” scene in his A&E adaptation of P&P.

And in case you haven’t checked it out yet, click here to to see the “Men of Austen.” It’s going to be a great weekend!