14 Days and Counting

14 days.

That's it.

Just 10 plus 4.

And then......FREEDOM!!!

Ahhh...summer vacation.  So close, and yet so far away.

I think I'm more excited about summer than my students are.  No, I know I am.  I don't think my students know how close summer vacation is, actually.  I haven't mentioned it at all.  Most of them didn't even know that field day was this week, because I have kept it secret so they wouldn't be all crazy on me.  Yesterday our principal let everyone know that field day was cancelled because of the rain this week, and my students looked around at each other saying, "We're having field day?"

Yeah, I keep secrets.

I think I'll let them know about the last day of school though....

on the day before the last day of school.


It keeps chaos to a minimum.



So, back to being a secret keeper.  There's some irony in publicly admitting that I keep secrets, but I do.

Here's a secret that no doubt will come up this Saturday at Weight Watchers when I weigh in - I haven't been following the PLAN to the T  very closely  AT ALL for the past 3 weeks.

It all started a few weeks ago when I pulled a muscle in my neck and wasn't able to turn my head.  Well, that turned into daily visits to a very busy chiropractor's office, where I usually sit and wait for an hour before my approximate 4 minutes of adjustments.  I've had to go every day for some intense therapy, and it's eaten directly into my workout time.

I'm a busy person.
I only have so much time allotted for working out.
And when it's gone, it's gone.

So, it was a choice between either not being able to turn my head to the side, or take a few weeks off of working out.  I chose to be able to check my blind spot while driving...not that I always do, which is a totally different conversation all together.  And you know what happens when I stop working out, right.  I also stop following the plan.  I stop caring.  I stop weighing the costs and benefits like I do when I work out.  Because by gosh, if I'm going to get nasty and sweaty, and suffer through the torture of spending 45 excruciating minutes on the elliptical, then by golly, I am not going to throw that time away by eating crap.  However, if I don't go through the pain of working out, then anything goes...into my mouth, that is.

I hear some of you sniggering out there in virtual reality land.
"Why don't you exercise after your visit to the chiropractor?"
"Why don't you get up earlier?"
"Why don't you just make the time?"

The short answer to all of these questions is simple: because I don't want to.

The long answer is that I get terrible headaches after adjustments, but I still have to pick up the munchkin, drive 35 minutes home in rush hour traffic, make dinner for her and me, work on my homework for my online classes, give the munchkin a bath, get the munchkin in bed, and work some more on my homework before I go to bed around 1 am so that I can get up at 6 am and start it all over again the next day.

So no, I didn't exercise.
I took a break.
And, I'm going to be okay with it.

And just so you know, I did work out on the weekends when possible.
When I wasn't staying up for 36 hours straight making sugar cookies for the church bake sale.
Yeah, I was that person last Friday night.  That was insane.  The only people who should be pulling all-nighters are college students and call girls.  And since I wasn't get credit, or getting lai paid, I should have just gone to bed.

But, tonight is not a night to make excuses.
Oh wait, that's all I've been doing so far.

Tonight is not a night to ONLY make excuses.
That's better.

Tonight is a night to celebrate, because I FINALLY WORKED OUT, and I EVEN TRACKED MY POINTS, and there's more!  I STAYED ON PLAN the whole day.

I know, I know.  I'm somewhat shocked myself.

And it's all due to the fact that I didn't have a chiropractor visit tonight.  The three weeks of intense neck popping and back cracking is over, and I won't have to go quite so often starting next week.  So, I took the time I have been sitting in the doc's not-so-comfy waiting room chairs, and took my ever increasing hinder down to the gym with Lily in tow.

Since I knew that I would be working out, I said NO to pizza this afternoon when the class next door had leftovers.  And I tracked all my points for the day.  And, the best part, is that I got to download the next season of HEROES to watch on my iPod.  I couldn't ask for a better gym-going day.