Halfway and Potatoes

Upon weighing in this morning, I find myself down a pound from yesterday.  So let's just ignore my panicky post wherein I whined about how I wasn't losing fast enough, shall we?  Though I do reserve my right to post panickily again at some point in the future.

Also, this morning's weigh-in puts me at -71 pounds, which is exactly 50% of my excess weight.  50%!  So I've decided to make it my goal to get to -100 pounds by the end of the year.  There are 20 weeks until 1/1/13, which means that I'll need to lose a little less than 1.5 pounds per week to get there.  Seems reasonable, right?  The stretch goal will be to lose -116 by the end of the year, putting me in Onederland for 2013 (the wife makes fun of me every time I call it that).  That would be a loss of 2.25 pounds per week.  We'll see.

I also kicked up the resistance a notch on the elliptical this week.  My hours on the dread machine were getting (dare I say) a little too easy.  I wasn't sweating as much as I did when I started on the elliptical (which is to say that instead of sweating the equivalent of Lake Superior, I was only sweating the equivalent of Lake Erie).  It's harder now, but still doable.  I've decided that I will take the resistance up one notch a week for the next 10 weeks and see how it goes. 

I do still love watching my Paula Deen while working out, though.  Watching her slather butter on every flat surface (and some not-so-flat ones) never gets old.

Now it's time for product recommendations! 

I always stop at Trader Joe's on the way home from a fill appointment, because trying to go to TJ's on the weekends here is just an exercise in frustration.  So on my way home from my fourth fill yesterday, I stopped in and loaded up on the basics - egg white salad, spinach and kale dip, fat free microwave brownie mix (!!!) and these:

I cooked them up in the oven and topped them with a shake of Hidden Valley Ranch Seasoning and they were delish!  The skins crisped up nicely and the cheese got all ooey gooey in the way that the best cheese-stuffed things do.  They were better than some restaurant potato skins I've had, and the best part is that there are 5 pieces in a serving for only 110 calories.  Not a lot of protein to be had here, though - it's pretty much a carb-fest (actually, a serving is only 8g of carbs).  But for 110 calories, it's a great indulgence. 

Here's another one - I stay away from carbonation these days, but I really, *really* miss the flavors of some sodas, particularly root beer.  I love root beer.  I've loved root beer since I was a kid growing up in Detroit (holla!) and my dad would let me sip on his Faygo (as a side note, Faygo Red Pop is like crack, guys.  I'm seriously convinced that Red Pop addiction is responsible for 85% of the current problems in Detroit).  It's also like 107 degrees here most days, which means I'm pretty much constantly craving something cold.  So when I saw these at Tom Thumb the other day, I had to buy them:

It's a root beer-flavored shell over creamy vanilla ice cream.  They're only 100 calories a bar and they stop my root beer obsessing dead in its tracks.  Yum!

Speaking of craving something cold, I like to keep packets of drink mix in my car so that on super hot days, I can just buy a bottle of water from wherever I'm shopping and flavor it up on the spot.  I've been drinking mostly the Market Pantry stuff, because I like grape and I haven't been able to find that flavor in other drink mixes (other than Hawaiian Punch), but I've recently stumbled upon this:

I'd never heard of this particular brand before, but I was in Garden Ridge (seriously, the most random store ever) and I was out of drink mix for my car, so I decided to try it.  LOVE!  It's sweet but not too sweet, with a nice tang.  When it comes to drink mixes, I like mine pretty weak and this is pretty strong, so I make sure to dilute it well - I put two packets of this in a 50 oz. bottle of Ozarka (which is the lamest name for a bottled water ever).  I couldn't find this in other stores for the longest time, so I ended up buying 10 boxes from Garden Ridge (that got me some odd looks, like, who comes to Garden Ridge to buy drink mix?  This girl, that's who).  Then I saw it in the $1 aisle at Alberton's!  I've tried other flavors by Wyler's, but I keep coming back to the cherry limeade.

Now, if you'll excuse me, I need to finish up my second 36 oz. bottle of cherry limeade before noon.