on the tale ‘o the tape …

photo © 2010 Bob Brown | more info (via: Wylio)

If I didn’t love New York City enough already, this morning I got one more reason to leave my heart in NYC. During the almost three weeks that I was in the city, I feel like I ate extremely well. Now, understand that by that I mean “well” in the sense that I ate an awful lot of awfully delicious food– not “well” as in “I ate well balanced meals with lots of fresh produce and whole grains.”  Anyway, in spite of my cheap but delicious eating tour of the city, I came back to LA six pounds lighter than when I left at the end of the school year. I think that there are several reasons for this:

1. I’m a boredom and stress eater. As much as I love my job, in the day-to-day world of work, I get either stressed or bored so I walk over to Scooter Kitty’s office and lower her work productivity by convincing her to go to the cafeteria for a snack.  This occurs once a day at the beginning of the school year, but it is more typically about three times a day by the end. It actually doesn’t usually take much convincing …
2. Free food. We are super fortunate that one of our wonderful fringe benefits is that our school gives us a food allowance to use in the cafeteria each year. “School cafeteria” may not sound like a great place to eat, but ours is a concession run by two Thai women so we get great Thai food, fresh baked scones and cookies, a sushi chef rolling fresh California rolls (I know, a tad over the top, but far be it for me to be one to complain about it) … It ain’t your typical school cafeteria. Anyway, I either have to use my allowance or lose it so being that I am so cheap, I always try to eat up my allowance. It is stupid and bad for my health, but it is hard to not do it.
3. NYC is a walking city. I will walk around NYC for six or even eight hours a day (almost literally). Just wandering around taking in the sights. Since I also do my regular gym workout, I actually exercise a lot more than when I’m sitting in the li-berry. In NYC, I think nothing of walking twenty blocks to my destination, but in Lala Land, I get in my car to drive three blocks to my gym.
4. Scooter Kitty.  Okay, now I’m not saying that Scooter Kitty pulls out a gun and forces me to put pastries in my mouth, but that girl really does have a way with baked goods.  She’s always blessing us with crumbles, and pies, and cookies, and cobblers, and other deliciousness that mysteriously appear on the count in the workroom and well … I eat them because I’m bored and stressed and because they’re so damned delicious!!!  DAMN YOUR TALENT WITH BAKED GOODS, Scooter Kitty!!!

Hopefully I’m on a roll and will be able to lose a bit more of the gut, but we fly out to Honolulu this afternoon. By far the dominant food group in Hawaii is the carb–think fried chicken cutlets, two scoops of white rice, a side of macaroni salad, with brown gravy over everything and you have the picture of the kind of “comfort food” I grew up on … photo © 2008 Arnold Gatilao | more info (via: Wylio)

With that in mind, you probably can tell why I tend to chunk out when I’m in Hawaii.

Please wish me luck in my battle against the evils of belly flab!!!  Oy!!!