MOLLY'S DIET RANTS! (ranting, raving, motivating & more)

RANTING BURNS CALORIES!

This is an open, ongoing, support-encourage-motivational-RANTING thread. Feel free to skip to the end, or spend days reading through all of this ...

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I have decided that "Diet" is a 4-letter word.

I find myself muttering and uttering the word around my house these days with loathing and vehemence previously reserved only for comments directed toward liberal politicians. In fact, I seem to be talking to myself a lot more these days .... sort of a running, sarcastic commentary on all the foods I can't eat, or on various other related topics. I wonder if there is a link between calorie-deprivation and Tourettes Syndrome? Grrrrrrrrr.....

I am now on Day 8 of the dreaded D-word. This is already the longest period of time that I have ever successfully remained on a diet. And I seem to be growing grouchier and feistier each day..... at least when I am alone and no one is around to hear my running rants. (My wonderful DH has heard some of my more memorable rants on the subject of broccolli and reports that I am hysterically funny when I am hungry!) I am counting carbs. I am counting calories. I am counting fat grams. Sheesh ... now my math anxiety is about to kick-in!

Mini Rant #1 .... what masochist decided that the serving size of cereal was anything less than 2 cups? Have you ever measured out 2/3 a cup of cereal? Or even a full cup? And placed it in a bowl? Those few little flakes and pieces just sit forlornly at the bottom of the bowl, shivering and lonely, even when we dribble on a few meager droplets of skim milk! Sheesh. Well, I can tell you that there is simply no way that my oversized body is going to be happy with that tiny amount of cereal ... so I have been eating TWO servings for breakfast. SIGH. And while the side of the box says that I can supplement the cereal with some fruit, they probably don't mean eat 45 cherries with your cereal -- much less 1/2 a watermelon, huh?

Mini Rant #2 .... Things NOT to say to someone who has told you that they have just started on a diet:

1.Good, you sure needed it.
2. It's about time.
3. Really? It doesn't look like it.
4. Again? Haven't we heard this before?
5. Gosh, how much weight do you need to lose?
6. What do you weigh? I've always wondered.
7. I never need to diet, I have a fast metabolism.
8. Really? I can eat all I want and never gain weight.
9. Is THAT why you are so grouchy?
10. I sure hope you plan to exercise a lot more.

AAAUGGH! All of these responses are just the thing to make me even grouchier .... so just smile and say something encouraging and supportive, ok? I will let you know how it is going.

_____

=^..^=  Molly 

WELCOME TO MOLLY'S MOTIVATIONAL RANT / CHAT THREAD ... FEEL FREE TO SHARE YOUR RANTS, TOO!  YOU CAN EITHER READ FROM THE BEGINNING OR JUST JUMP ON IN ON THE LAST PAGE ... JOIN US! 

OK, little rant for today: Why must I choose between morning exercise or punching in on time???

This morning I announced to my man that I would celebrate losing 30 lbs by taking an extra lap around the Mall before going to work. He was impressed, but the guys in the plant weren't. How come you're late so many mornings, they want to know??

Hey, I want to yell back...your arms aren't broken, you can answer the phone for a lousy 10 mins!! My choice: morning exercise!!

Molly, I agree about your writing.  You really have a gift.  Maybe even a quirky cookbook with your discoveries in the kitchen along with your musings.  Can you sy best seller?  About your veggies, I don't eat enough, so maybe I'll eat your veggies on Saturday.

I agree with mandango, you should have a cookbook, or better yet, a cooking show.  You are hilarious and informative.  This weekend, I am going to buy some Walden Farms dressing, Almond Breeze, Kashi products, and ground flax seed.  I am even going to try upping my veggie/fruit intake as well.  AND, I am going to step foot in a Trader Joe's for the first time in my life!  All thanks to you.  You are a very positive influence, embrace it! 

*And the Next Food Network Star is.....MOLLY!* 

heh heh heh .... I can just see ME on a cooking show, zapping everything in the microwave on paper plates so that there are NO dishes to wash ... hee hee hee. Sure, I've made a small investment in paper plates ... but that's what stores like Walmart are for, right? Besides, I don't spend any money at all on dishwasher soap or the power to run it. (Isn't that weird, we've lived in this house for 4.5 years and we've never, ever used the dishwasher!! I looked in it this morning and thought, "hey, look at all this storage space!") 

The other weird thing about non-cooking me .... we've never used EITHER of our ovens, either! Isn't that a hoot? We buy a house with TWO built-in ovens, and we've never used either one for anything except my DH's cookie / candy/ muffins/cake storage. (I never even open the doors, I do not want to be tempted!)  Oh, and we've never used the stove, either. If you don't use your oven, you never need to CLEAN your oven! (grin) Hey, the only reason I even have a kitchen is because it came with the house. All of my cooking is done using the microwave, a Presto oval-shaped, glass-topped electric frying pan, a Rival rice cooker, and a large crock-pot. Oh, and a nifty little toaster oven ... we must melt our cheese somewhere, how else would we make tuna melts and baby pizzas?

Somehow, I would think one of the minimum requirements to host a cooking show would be the ability to use a stove and oven, doncha think? hee hee hee

Here's a money-saving tip for you ... don't buy those special ziploc baggy-things to steam your vegetables in. Just stick your cleaned, properly-sized veggies on a paper plate, season them with wild abandon, and stick them in the microwave ... you don't need a baggy to "steam" them ... trust me. A plate full of broccoli? 3.5 minutes. A plate full of brussell sprout halves? 4 minutes. A plate full of sliced mushrooms? 3 minutes. A bowl-full of fresh spinach? 3 minutes (It falls off a paper plate, trust me ... I've tried.) A bowl-full of shredded cabbage? 3.5 minutes. Half an acorn squash? 4.5 minutes. A plate full of fresh green beans? 3.5 minutes.

I just posted today's 1500-calorie menu on my journal, if anyone is interested in what I'm eating today. I'm interested in what I'm eating today. Heck, I'm interested in what YOUR eating today, and I'm VERY interested in what I am NOT eating today. In fact, I now spend an inordinate amount of time looking at recipes and food labels, and thinking about spices. One of these days when I'm really bored, I think I am going to sit down and taste each and every one of the spices I have in my pantry .... and start to think about what would go good with what sort of food. This sounds like a great project for when my DH goes out of town next week to the wilds of ... Arizona.

After all, we all need to spice things up, right?

Rant on, peeps!

=^..^= MOLLY

*bump*

OMG...........i did NOT know that about the microwave......bless u molly.......u just made my month.......i thought if i dont cook and steam my food properly il get food poisoning collapse and die....worse.....when im dead i cant hold my tummy in so ppl will see how fat i actually am!!!!!!!

im so going to try the microwave today........!!

thaaaaank u!!!

Well, there's your premise for the show Molly.  "No stove, no oven, no clean-up!"  People will eat it up!

So, when your show's a success, don't forget about the lowly C-C ranter that gave you the idea.  I want my money!  LOL

i hate to burst bubbles, but micorwaving veggies removes vitamins, thats what the plastic bag is for, but if you don't mind that, then micorwave your heart out. i do. i figure, being a vegetarian i eat enough veggies to loose a couple vitamins here or there, plus we all take a daily vitamin don't we? you should. :) molly, maybe saturday i will eat twice as many just to make up for the ones you lost. you do think that will work? lol. i understand the veggie free day thing. sometimes i have to enjoy some pb and j, mac and cheese or other non veggie items just to get a break.

oh, by the way. i'd totally watch the show. please, give me just one show where i actually have all the items on hand to prepare the food with!

I don't remember saying show.....but Seriously......Molly people would buy a cookbook that has to do with someone who has actually lost weight and recipes that are so quick and simple and tasty and people don't have to use an oven or a range!!!!

Think about it.  So many women I have met (not meaning to exclude the men) have skinny hubby's who can eat their double cheesburger's and don't want or need to eat the low-fat foods that are so important for us to fix.  So we are faced with a challenge of either cooking two meals (yeah right) or eating the same old same old stuff that got us here in the first place.  But if there was an easier, quicker way to prepare that second meal....with all the flavors and varieties AND nutrition information in your cookbook, it would make life sooooo much easier for all us frustrated ladies with skinny hubby's.

Have I sold you yet....since I basically just gave you your marketing pitch.....I want my money too! (hee hee)

I was the one that brought up a show, mandango.

Molly, Jazzy's right...what a great premise for a show it would be to demonstrate how many great things can be created with small kitchen appliances.  I imagine those appliances also use less electricity than the full scale oven, etc. so you could  build on the green angle. 

JJ :-) 

i microwave my veggies too!!  ive found that you can decrease the amount of time you need to "steam" them as well as make them less prone to dry out if you add about 3 tablesppoons of water to the bowl/plate that you are zapping them on. 

 

Rena:)

Original Post by silvraynebow:

i hate to burst bubbles, but micorwaving veggies removes vitamins, thats what the plastic bag is for, but if you don't mind that, then micorwave your heart out. i do. i figure, being a vegetarian i eat enough veggies to loose a couple vitamins here or there, plus we all take a daily vitamin don't we? you should. :)

Well, I get about 12-15 servings of veggies a day, and I take a multivitamin, and (if absolutely necessary) I am willing to lick the inside of my microwave to catch all those pesky, escaped vitamins.  If I cooked them in a plastic baggy, wouldn't I just have to lick the plastic baggie to get all those pesky, escaped vitamins? Do they ALL escape, just leaving the empty broccoli corpse behind? Where do they go? Are there then vitamin vapors lurking around my microwave? Should I be inhaling deeply as I open the door? Surely somewhere, there is a government-funded scientist spending OUR tax dollars on Broccoli Vapors: The Tragedy of Escaped Vitamins.

Hmmm... "Escaped Vitamins" would be a good name for a rock band.

But, a good reminder ... for anyone out there who is not a vegetarian (or who doesn't lick their microwave), please consider taking a good multivitamin to ensure that your nutrition is balanced. Heck, go ahead and take one even if you ARE a vegetarian and DO lick your microwave.

Confession: Sometimes, after I've eaten all of my microwave popcorn, I lick the bag for all that extra salty taste ..l. especially after I've added nacho cheese flavored popcorn sprinkles (like I just did!) Remember Cheetos and how they gave you orange fingers? How in the world do I explain my orange face to my DH when he comes home from work? Heh heh heh.  And I've been caught licking the wrapper from my Curves snack bars ... to get that last bit of chocolate.

Hmmm... y'all are inspiring me.... "The Lazy Dieter's Easy Cookbook"  ... saving the planet one microwave at a time? (giggles)

YAY .... it's just two hours until we get to go out to dinner at the Macaroni Grill! (I'm having the grilled salmon ... do you think they microwave THEIR asparagus and broccoli?)  Maybe afterward I will buy more veggies .... to make up for any escaped vitamins that are lurking in my home.

(Hmmm.... maybe THAT is why my cats are so healthy?)

=^..^= MOLLY

 

i lick my wrappers too. lol. you are not alone! i figure if i am counting the calories then im going to enjoy every last calorie! great point about the bag though. i will not be wasting my money buying any. i also think that sence we are all eating many more veggies than we used to it probably doen't matter if we lose a couple of those vitamins along the way. we are all still healthier now. 

According to Harvard, veggies will only lose nutrients IF they are microwaved in water.  Here is the link and article.

Microwaving is SO convenient ... I'll just have to remember to remove the water!  Or, alternatively, lick just the bowl they are heated in instead of the entire microwave!

http://www.health.harvard.edu/fhg/updates/upd ate0604b.shtml

Microwaving vegetables A study in the November 2003 Journal of the Science of Food and Agriculture caused a stir because it found that microwaved broccoli loses much of its nutritional punch. The researchers steamed, pressure-cooked, boiled, and microwaved about 2 cups of the vegetable with 10 tablespoons of water and then compared the flavonoid content by cooking method. Flavonoids are substances in fruits and vegetables with antioxidant properties that may lower your risk for heart disease, stroke, and some cancers. Steamed broccoli lost 11% of its flavonoids; pressure-cooked, 53%; boiled, 81%; and microwaved, a whopping 97%.

Heat from any sort of cooking lowers the levels of some vitamins. But water exposure is another major factor. Many nutrients dissolve in it, so when vegetables are prepared in water, some of the healthful elements leach out and get thrown away with the (veggie) bath water. That?s probably why steamed broccoli, which didn?t come into direct contact with water, came out on top.

But you don?t have to microwave broccoli in 10 tablespoons of water, as the researchers in this study did. Just a couple will do ? and frozen vegetables don?t need any extra water. You can have your microwave and get most of your veggie nutrients, too.

June 2004 Update

I never add water .... and my broccoli never dries out in the microwave. Water would make my paper plates all soggy .... and the whole point of microwaving on paper plates is to avoid washing dishes!!! I am relieved that I don't have to lick my microwave... one less weird thing I do to explain to my DH. ("What? Me? What am I doing? Just licking up all the escaped vitamins that are stuck inside the microwave.")

Totally off topic, but just let me warn y'all NOT to microwave a potato unless you've poked a zillion holes in it with a fork ... or you'll REALLY be licking the inside of your microwave. The exploding spud DOES make an impressive THUD sound as it crashes around in there. Just sayin' .....

Just 9 more hours until my new treadmill gets here ... I'd better get to bed!

=^..^= MOLLY

 

 

*whispering*

I am sitting here in my chair, waiting as the treadmill guy sets up my new treadmill! YAY! YAY! YAY!

I did my official weigh in today since my DH leaves town tomorrow ....

LOST THIS WEEK: 3.8

LOST TOTAL: 35.4 POUNDS IN 8 WEEKS (4.4 PER WEEK AVG)

STARTING WEIGHT:  369

CURRENT WEIGHT:  333.6

STILL TO LOSE TO HIT 10% LOST: 1.5 POUNDS

STILL TO LOSE TO HIT FIRST GOAL OF 40 POUNDS: 4.6 POUNDS

STILL TO LOSE TO "WIN" MY HAWAII TRIP: 14.6 POUNDS

STILL TO LOSE FOR ULTIMATE GOAL OF 119 POUNDS LOST: 83.6 POUNDS

=^..^= MOLLY

Hey, I successfully used my nifty new treadmill the first time without (1) falling off; (2) breaking anything; or (3) flinging a curious kitten against the wall.

All that AND I burned 100 calories.

(smile)

=^..^= MOLLY

molly you make my day :-) and are a great source of proscrastination on my bio homework

Molly, Congrats on the weight loss and I hope you have lots of fun with your new "toy" (the treadmill).

I broke down and bought a digital scale.  The good new is I weight 5 lb less on it than on the one at the gym.  The even better news is DH also weighed on it and pronounced it within one or two lb of the scale in the men's dressing room at the gym so maybe it's fairly accurate.  The bad news...well, there really isn't any bad news...if the scale's close to accurate, then I am at my previously all-time high and I'm glad to be back in familiar territory and I've lost approximately one-half pound a week for the last 9 weeks.  

I'm still seeing the doctor Tuesday AM to ask him about upping my synthroid dose!

I guess if I can go on eating the way I've been for the past 9 weeks and gradually lose weight then that will be OK.  I am after all establishing a pattern I can life with indefinitely, right?  (deep sigh...)

JJ