R&R

Another work week behind me, and I'm happy to say that my lifestyle changes have made a bit of improvements.  I think my blood pressure has dropped a bit, and so have five pounds.  Not a whole lot, but every little thing makes a difference these days!  I'm still eating well, reaching for "nutrient points" when I log my meals.  Most days, I reach my goal of 80 or better.  Today ... not so much.

After a grueling session working in the back of the store, going through old boxes of retention paperwork, we nearly completed the task set before us.  The powers that be have changed how and what can be shredded after certain dates.  I knew there were "several pallets" in the back that needed to be disposed of, but how they are disposed has changed.  We counted 13 pallets, with an average of 30 cases per pallet, of things that had to be resorted by the category they belonged in:  "Daily Reports" vs Accounting Records, etc.  In the past, we sorted them by the destroy date, mixing the cases on each pallet.  Then they changed, and said nope, they need to be sorted another way.  After three hours of hard work, heavy lifting and many clouds of dust, we are getting rid of 8 pallets -- 240 cases -- of old records, and have only 3 more to go through.  But that's for another day!   I'm ready for a long hot shower!

And now it's Saturday evening; Friday and today being two very relaxing days of nothing but sunshine, reading a good book, taking long walks, and watching a bit of Netflix. 

Nothing gets more relaxing, however, than watching an Arizona sunset:

Tee-Pee'd

 

This morning's walk, and I was quite surprised at finding one of my neighbors' house got TP'd.  I didn't know folks still did that!  I chuckled at first, then felt sorry for them, because I could see what a cleanup job this would be!  

And it made me think about the one time I TP'd something.  My family was camping at Yellowstone Park.  It was a family reunion and all the aunts and uncles were there.  My own family slept in the tent trailer, but I slept in the camper shell on the pickup ... us teenagers need our privacy! 

Early one morning, Uncle John knocked on the camper shell and whispered "come out and help me!" We proceeded to TP our campground, winding around trees and the campers.  We giggled and ran around making sure each camper had something on it!  Funny, I don't remember anyone's reaction to all of this, but I remember having to clean it up.  

Other than that, it was an uneventful walk, followed by a day full of doing chores, another long evening walk, and the end of another weekend.   Why do weekends pass so quickly?

Lifestyle, Update

It's been a few days since I took the time to actually write.  I've been in a mode of taking care of myself, mostly working on my lifestyle changes.  I cut back by 250 calories each day, and have managed to finally drop three pounds -- nothing to really write home about, but every inch of progress is a step in the right direction.

My daily walks. .....  and here's Sadie again, scratching at me to pet her.  She hates when I get in a writing mood.  Or maybe she's so spoiled that she thinks all of my waking hours should be *her* time.  lol

Back to daily walks:  I'm walking 37-40 minutes pushing Sadie in her stroller, we cover nearly 2 miles in that time, and it feels really good to have that accomplishment each day!  At the same time, I'm making sure that the foods I eat put me at a good point on the nutrient scale via the Samsung app.   I've cut back my Diet Coke to one a day.  I'm drinking my Plexus Slim Pink Drink.   How long can I keep this up?  It's not easy but I keep telling myself that I'm eating to live, not living to eat.

After my last checkup, I'm on the borderline of having high blood pressure.  I know that dropping weight, exercise an cutting back on sodium is the answer to keeping it low enough so that I don't have to go on meds. 

So for now I try to remember:    A little progress each day adds up to big results!

A Daily Walk

"In every walk with nature 

one receives far more than he seeks."

That's a John Muir quote, and I agree.

Every evening, I have loaded Sadie into her stroller and taken an evening walk.  There's nothing like the smell of the desert, no matter the weather.  Even plants without flowers have a "spring" smell, if you take the time .....

As I walked, I decided to try to identify different scents:  the smell of someone's Asian-based cooking wafting out their window.  A few houses later, I could smell someone's spaghetti.  The forsythia that are blooming have a scent.  The yellow flowering of a palo verde.  The drifting scent of alyssum that blooms among a bunch of weeds. 

When we get to the grassy park, the smell of fresh mowed grass along with the earthy smell of the ground as it dries after these last rains.  Even the scent of cars on the road passing carries over the grass to our side of the block. 

Our noses are amazing - sometimes a smell brings back memories, especially good memories.  For me, the smell of dill and peas growing on the vine, warming in the morning sun remind me of my grandmother's farm in Minnesota.  I didn't live there, just vacationed a half dozen times, but the smells remain in my memory. 

Just as the scent of spearmint Dentyne reminds me of the paternal grandmother; she always brought a pack to share with us kids!

When you think of all the scents that cross our path each day, it's amazing how many differing scents we can cipher out.  Don't take it for granted!  Take a walk and see what tickles your nose!

Small Joys

This morning I woke up thinking about all the little things that bring us happy memories. 

Today's thought was back being a kid, traveling to Grandma's farm in Minnesota, and I remembered just how good the well water tasted.   We'd walk outside with the water pail and pump water from the ground.  There was running water in her house, but well water tasted that much better!  No matter the outdoor temp, the well water was always cold.  We'd dip it out of the water pail with a stainless steel cup.

Grandma always kept the water pail sitting on the counter near the back corner of the kitchen counter.  This is the only photo I could find where parts of the kitchen showed.  There's Grandma baking up some kind of dessert for after supper! 

Now that everyone (including me!) drinks water from a bottle, sourced from goodness knows where, or processed in some kind of facility, it's hard to remember how it was "back in the day".   I have to say that I think I miss those days.  Most of moments in every day was filled with little chores that needed doing in order to just keep going.   Living took thoughtful planning.  If you needed something for dinner, you didn't just open a freezer door and pop something in the microwave.  If you planned on a roast for dinner, most times you took it out of the freezer in the morning, left it to thaw, then began the cooking process in the afternoon.  If you wanted a cake for dessert, you needed to get baking in the late morning, or early afternoon, because both the cake pan and the roasting pan might not fit in the oven at the same time.   When the nearest grocery store was 20 miles to town, you made sure you bought what you needed for the week, because you couldn't just zip around the corner to grab something on your way home!  Although, if you were a mindful gardener, you could pick something out in the vegetable garden. 

"Sometimes, you never know the true value of of a moment until it becomes a memory."