Well, I promised that I’d check in and here I am, checking in!! I did indeed go to the pool yesterday (no surprise there) and lifted weights (first time in a couple years) and stretched out for 20 minutes or so (unbelievable how short [read:tight] I’ve gotten). I didn’t go to yoga because frankly I was beat after my day and didn’t want to wait around until the evening to do it. My mind was in a serene place, my body was stretched out and I don’t like yoga enough to wait around for it so far from home. Today promises to bring pool time, more stretching and LOTS of homework!!

Okay, here, in narrative form you’ll find my responses to several of the messages that you’ve all left for me. Some question types are repeated, so I’m just going to answer in general terms. For the most part, we AB’s can’t seem to live without our coffee!! Here’s the deal (it is listed as a bennie in some places and an avoid in others), Dr. D wrote in one of his recent columns that it’s okay in moderation, but when combined with stress and other immune weakening avoids it’s no good. So there you have it. I’ve said this before about coffee and I’ll say it again. If I didn’t have it in the morning, the angst created within my soul would be more problematic than the darn coffee. I do try to balance it throughout the day with green tea and of course lots of water. Also, remember that it’s not necessarily the caffeine that the problem, but some ingredient in the coffee itself, so if you’re having gallons of decaf…that’s worse than a cup or two of full-strength java.

Moving along to other topics (though I could wax poetic about the personal virtues of café all day), let’s mention seafood. I’m also interested to learn that many of us AB’s (at least the ones who end up looking into ER4YT) have been vegetarians at one point or another. Just like me, several of you have been having a bumpy time adding “faces” back into your diet. I have two thoughts on this: 1- If it’s that bad, soy is HB, so keep up with what’s working (Remember, I’m not a doctor or a dietician, just an ordinary girl spouting her own opinions into cyberspace…my comments are opinions, not medical advice!!). 2-If you can tolerate some flesh, look at the actual serving sizes. It’s not much (just a few ounces of the stuff spread out through the whole week), and can be easy to “hide” among veggies, rice and such. Imagine if we were O type…we’d have to eat a whole cow!! Tee hee… Okay, cravings were an issue that came up a few times recently too in your comments. It seems that we can have quite the sweet tooth. All I know is that for me, when I’ve been eating everything in balance, my cravings don’t exist. When I’m out of whack with my eating, all I want is junk. It makes it worth it for me to take the time to get to the market, wash all the produce and plan out meals for the week. My main goal right now is to find that balance of busy life stuff and taking care of me and mine time. The learning curve on this goal is pretty slow, but I’m working on it.

Finally, there was a plea for a pineapple spelt muffin recipe. I checked RECIbase and CR4TY and didn’t find anything. If anyone has a recipe out there that you’re willing to share, send it to me through this site and I’ll post it.

Well friends, this wasn’t a terribly organized or witty blog, but such is the way with these things. I’m in the thick of finals season and by the end of the month (3 weeks, eep!!), I’ll have completed all of my coursework!! I’ll then have a summer full of travel and writing for that thesis project (this is a fun thing for me!!). Hang in there, my sense of humor is still here…it’s just not kicking as hard right now on-line. Most of my resources are going toward school stuff.

Happy eating to y’all…have a great weekend and be well…