This is actually a good combination of threads for me this month. This week I started on a diet to drop a few pounds quickly as I adjust to some healthier eating as recommended by Dr. Weil in his book 8 Weeks to Optimum Health. I'm reading it now, and there is yet another Harvard report out this week that suggests that for every 2 pounds a woman is overweight, it considerably impacts her future health. 20 pounds overweight can lead to a significant health risk, and I have to loose more than that. So I'm getting more exercise and my next door neighbor is also working on the same thing, so we hope to influence each other in a positive way.

And in the house, I'm considering the domino effect. Work on one room, get it in shape, and then move on. And a lot of that shape-up involves decluttering and selling on eBay. So I do have concurrent tasks running this month that can both be reported here.

It's raining (a drizzle) today so I will watch for an opportunity to get out and walk. The mowing will have to wait till it dries again, though that is probably my best exercise here with a very large yard. I can break it into two tasks, the front one day, the back a couple of days later. Do any of you remember Covert Bailey, who used to be on PBS with lectures about "Fit or Fat" and various exercise programs? I pulled out a book of his and I remember his lectures talking about exercise every other day because you don't want to end up with sore muscles, that is counter productive. And he suggests, in a chapter about overweight people doing wind sprints that he doesn't mean all of us should go out and race down the street in all of our chubby glory. He said wind sprints are simply the act of pushing yourself a little harder in your exercise to make yourself a little breathless. So if you're walking, push yourself a little harder for part of that walk so you're breathing hard, then cut back down to your slower pace. You won't burn fat with your exercise unless you hit that breathless point for at least a little while.

I can do that! And since I've been thinking about getting a new leash for the dogs for a while, I went over to PetSmart yesterday and bought a tandem Y-shaped leash (one handle that has a junction half-way down and it splits to a separate leash for each dog.) This is a very sturdy leash (there are some little things on a steel loop that I'm afraid my dogs would demolish) and I have one dog that always wants to be a little in front, and I can adjust for that also, if I need to. I live next to a creek so everything is up from here, and I have just the hill to puff up. The dogs won't be working any harder, but I will.

Let's see if we can't knock off a few extra pounds before the holiday season comes around, and let's see if we can't list our seasonal things on eBay and continue the de-clutter of the house.

Onward!

SRS