24 Hours of Gluttony

So just as I'm coming out of Birthday Season... Thanksgiving hits. And then Christmas.

This weekend we went to ATL to celebrate the birthday of one of my girlfriends, and I think we had a pretty good time. I missed out on the Petit LeMans race at Road Atlanta -- a ten-hour endurance race, where the winner came in first by ~4.5 seconds -- but I spent some good time hanging out with my grandaunts, who are both in their nineties.

Sounds odd, but it was kind of fun. They live in a building like a dorm, but don't have to get out of bed to go to class. They show movies, have a cafeteria, have classes, like yoga, Tai Chi, crocheting/knitting... it's actually kind of cool. Let's face it, though: not many boys make it to the retirement homes, so there's a lot of girlie activities. But I think Ava and I both had a good time with the aunties. Especially Ava since she stole Aunt Trixie's walker and ran around the building with it. She had a blast.

Except I left my damn camera. AGAIN.

The hubby made some AWESOME lasagna. And okay, I could have NOT had some, or I could have asked him to make some low-carb lasagna, but... food is a part of the whole "having fun" experience, in my book. Not only that, but he only makes this stuff ONCE A YEAR. For MY birthday. And that's after I beg him. For weeks.

I do get it one other time of year. His mom makes it for Thanksgiving, as part of the four or five-day holiday. If things work out to my advantage, she makes it earlier in the week, and the morning after, I wonder downstairs, in almost full zombie-mode, pull open the fridge, cut myself a HUGE slice of the stuff, warm it up a little in the microwave, and then chow down while everyone stares at me over their eggs, cereal, coffee, and muffins. Then for lunch, I repeat the same process, except a little less zombied, and with turkey sandwiches instead of breakfast stuffs. Midnight snack? You guessed it. Lasagna it is!

So when an unexpected opportunity for mozzarella-covered Pasta Bliss came up, I couldn't say no. It's bad enough getting the stink-eye from the hubby when I order clearly inferior lasagna at a restaurant. But he doesn't MAKE it, and when you're jonesing, a fix is a fix. So I said yes to the pasta this weekend.

And yes to Chick-Fil-A... and potato chips with Ranch dip... and cheesecake... and two coffees, both overloaded in sugar... oh, and a Chipotle burrito where the tortilla looked like it was going to explode, if I asked for a single extra ingredient. Normally this would all kill me, but for some odd reason, my pants weren't tight in their usual places. So I don't feel bad at all, and back to the diet on Monday.

I've even got some portobello mushroom burgers already made up for the week, thanks to making too much stuffing for my stuffed steaks on Thursday. I made six stuffed steaks, so I had dinner made for Thursday and Friday, too. Leftover ingredients are pretty awesome sometimes, really.

My cheesecake turned out okay, too, I guess. I tried a variation using yogurt cheese, instead of cream cheese, because I can't bring myself to use reduced fat anything unless I know it tastes great. But yogurt cheese is made from fat-free yogurt, and it's loaded with vanilla, so I thought it would work better than reduced fat... but it wasn't entirely up to my standards as cheesecakes go. I think next time I'll use a combination and see how that works.

My daughter also proved how well she pays attention to things, as well, this weekend. I went upstairs and turned on the computer, because I refuse to order food over the phone. Whenever I do, the order is always wrong, they can never understand me over the phone:

ME: So I'd like an extra large pepperoni and onion with extra cheese and a hand-tossed crust.

THEM: Okay, that'll be a Medium with pineapple, anchiovies and no sauce on a thin crust, right?

I just don't get it. And THEN, it takes me a half-an-hour to try and get them to correct it, and it still ends up wrong. So I quit ordering food over the phone. I make the hubby or friends do it. I would even go so far as to accost random people with a phone, if I'm really desperate. (if that seems crazy to you, please refer to the title of this blog.)

So anyway, back to the story: I am half-way through and happily clicking away my order over the website when all of a sudden, the screen flips over to the Windows-standard green fields and blue skies, and shuts off. I look down and find my daughter looking very pleased with herself, as she pulls her sticky little ninja fingers off the power button. So I was forced to abandon my order and actually go in and order in person. But the line wasn't too long, so it worked out. And Ava got an extra thirty minutes of nap, which is always awesome... for us!

And, like I said, back to the diet tomorrow. The net loss is what I'm going for, and one 24-hour window isn't going to kill me. But I also know better than to weigh myself after Moe's or Chipotle.