Health Fair 1/22/05

I was waiting for KOB TV's Health Fair all year long! It finally came. This year, I wised up and skipped the workout and decided to arrive quite early. To my surprise, the door was open to let us in to avoid the wind and I got #24 for blood test. They were also doing flu shot for free for everybody. Looks like vaccine became widely available. This was already worth the admission fee of $5. I also got body fat content. This would be $5 at the gym. This year's concern was blood pressure. I don't recall it was that high when I took it in Japan, but the nurse who did for me was quite concerned and said I should use the machine they have in the grocery store to keep track. She said the lower number should be less than 85. This is hypertension, sodium. Ahhh. I took notes on fat content and will take time to compare from last Health fair, at Debbie's class and a couple of times I did at the gym.

mango smoothie 1/21/05

My new favorite show on Food TV is Kitchen Accomplished where a team of designer, chef and contractor remodel kitchens for different people. What makes this show for Food TV, rather than HGTV is the chef provides recipes that they can enjoy in the new kitchen.

I am a big mango person and I enjoyed making smoothie using frozen mango and other ingredients. I also need spinach for iron. (You may recall taking iron supplement gave me bloody nose in LA.) So I was glad to see Cat's mango smoothie. In the show, she said it may be easier to use frozen mango. You can substitute cranberry juice to other juice (then I can watch sugar content) and soy milk (which I don't see on the page) with non-fat yogurt. I usually have most ingredients. When the weather gets warm and I crave for smoothie, I like to try this one!

goal setting 1/19/05

I have been being a human being for a little over 38 years, most adult life as a teacher. Slowly I come to realize a lot of things in life are rather similar at times. I am a big cheer leader in my High Advanced class and today we had a visitor from the Learning Center. After her presentation, I had my students come up with a good goal (or two) that they want to work on this semester. I said good goals are:
1) realistic
2) measurable
3) meaningful
4) simple

Then you evaluate your goal after a while and modify it, if necessary. When you have something to achieve, you set a good goal with these qualities, keep track of your progress, modify your goal, keep track, modify more, keep track and this goes on. At the end, I had my students write in big cardboard paper and asked them to display it somewhere in the house where they see it daily to remind themselves.

So what is my fitness goal that is realistic, measurable, meaningful and simple? I sure keep track of what I do, but do I have a good goal? Hummm.

previous diets 1/18/05

As Channel 4's Health Fair approaches this weekend, I started to check results on lab tests. I don't have a whole lot of record, but I was comparing last April, last January at the fair and one from 1996. This reminded me that I was close to 20 pounds lighter in 1995. (Wow, 10 years ago) Back then, I did Slim Fast liquid diet. I had so many mini part-time jobs and I was driving around all the time, getting lunch was actually a problem. So I just replaced my lunch with a can of shake. When my life changed after moving to New Mexico, I didn't do it anymore, hence gaining more weight going into 30's. Previous to that, in 1990-91, I was trained to be a part-time manager and the store manager told me to lose weight if I wanted to become one. Reason? There was no manager uniform that I could fit. Back then I was working at McDonald's and teaching at a conversation school. I don't know where I got the info from, but all I did was to keep track of what I ate in a little book and didn't eat rice for dinner. I just ate side dishes my mother made me. Of course, this habit stopped as I moved to the US for graduate school in 1991. The other day Juan Carols Cruz, the host of Calorie Commando said he doesn't like the word "diet" because it implies it is temporary. Now my big four oh is coming up soon. Can I keep this fitness life style?

a visit to Whole Foods 1/16/05

Well, Whole Foods is not a place where a poor woman like me can hang out too often. But I needed to take a look how much other stores sell brown rice for. My transition to brown rice has been fairly OK. I am just so curious and cooking in my rice cooker has still been experimental. (That will be another entry.) Quest for brown rice, my new love for dried foods made me spend quite some time reading labels and calculating. I got Nappa (They only had organic. I guess I can just get those from Wal-Mart.) and I will use it to make quick vegetable pickles. Brown rice is 49 cents a pound and I think it is cheaper than Wal-Mart. I also found diet trail mix that resembles what I have been getting from Wal-Mart. Now I have some taste-testing and comparing prices. Whole Foods is a fun place to go, but maybe a little dangerous place to make regular visits. They have my favorite cream puff and I ended up buying one. If I eat it tonight, I will only do half and keep the other half for tomorrow. Another reason is right next door is Borders bookstore. That sure is dangerous. It is also a little out of range, about 15 minutes driving distance. OK, OK... There is Wild Oats in my neighborhood, so I guess I will check it out next week.

Yogi tea Green Tea Kombucha 1/15/05

OK, it is close to midnight and after over 8 hours of Sears, I should be tired, right? I am not sleeping yet. This is just like Jasmine tea! I have been experimenting with teas that I already have made into ice tea. Today I started with Yogi tea Green Tea Kombucha. It is nothing like 昆布茶 that I know of. The guy featured in the box looks Indian, so who knows. The box says, a bag of this tea has less caffeine. So what is this working on me? Could be ginseng? Grrr.