It's really hot

I'll tell you how hot it is: it's 4:08 pm on a Sunday and I just now remembered to start writing this blog post. I was working on something else and forgot all about what I normally do on Sundays. Heat makes you stupid.

Actually, it's not as hot as it was. Today's high was, I think, 99, but now (it's 6:38 pm) it's down to 88, according to the National Weather Service. Tomorrow's high is predicted to be 93, and then 88 on Tuesday, and then it's going to stay in the 80s the rest of the week. So that's more bearable. 

But it's been so hot. This high 90s business has been hard to deal with, even with low humidity. Especially the nights where it only gets down to 68 or whatever. We need our cool nights in order to cool down the house. Tonight is going to be another hot night, only getting down to 68, and it's a little more humid than usual. Last night I could not sleep at all until practically morning, and I guess tonight won't be much better.

So, this won't be a long post. What happened this week, anyway? Can my overheated brain remember? Rocket Boy's birthday card still didn't arrive (it must be stuck somewhere in St. Louis mail purgatory), but his present did: a big box of soda from Fitz's, our favorite restaurant in St. Louis. Twelve bottles, assorted flavors -- root beer, cream, grape, orange, etc. -- and guess what? It's already all gone. When I went to the fridge to take a picture of what was left, guess what? Nothing was left. So I pulled some empty bottles out of the recycling bin and took a picture of them. And how much soda did I have? That would be none, thank you. Not the best choice for a diabetic. But good grief, that means the twins had 6 bottles each. I almost never buy them soda, but one day this week, hmm, maybe Tuesday? I bought some little cans of root beer at Target. Teen B, who was with me, requested them -- he reminded me that we hadn't had any root beer floats yet this summer. So, 12 mini cans of root beer, plus 12 large bottles of Fitz soda -- all gone in less than a week. And I had none of it. And no one had any root beer floats.

Of course, we (meaning the twins, mostly) also continue to consume large quantities of ice cream bars and Luigi ices. King Soopers doesn't carry Luigi ices anymore -- have to make room for all that beer and wine they now sell -- so I drive all the way to Safeway, MULTIPLE TIMES A WEEK, to buy Luigi ices.

Ice cream bars and Luigi ices come in boxes that you supposedly can't recycle, because according to Ecocycle they have plastic embedded in them. So we have to just throw them away, which means that our trash fills up much faster than normal. Of course, this week we have a lot of recycling, too -- all those Fitz bottles and root beer cans.

July is a weird month.

I know something else that happened this week -- there was a wildfire just up the hill from us, near Mallory Cave (which is a hike that I have never been willing to accompany Rocket Boy on, too steep). The smoke was visible from our backyard, but I don't have a good picture of it. Can you see the smoke in the photo? It's in the middle, just below and slightly to the right of the little white cloud. I think there's too much foliage in the way. It only burned for about a day and a half, something like that -- it was small and the firefighters got right on it and there was no wind. So we were lucky. Everything is dry as bone. With some wind, the whole hillside could go up just like that. But not this time.

I got some good news this week -- my braces are almost ready to come off! I'm still mad at Dr. Walker for not taking them off before our trip, but oh, well, guess I should let that go. My appointment to get the braces off is August 6th -- three weeks and two days from today! Every time I look in the mirror, brush my teeth, try to pick something out of my braces, I think -- this is the last month! If I think of it, I'll add a picture of how my braces look right now. Or maybe next week. Or I can just take a picture when I get them off, maybe that's enough. I am really excited to see what I look like without them.

Teen B and I haven't been walking as much as usual, due to the heat. He only got 9 miles in last week (the week ends on Wednesday) and so far this week we only have 6 miles. Three of those miles are from our second 5K, which we did at the Manhattan Middle School track. We went out there on Thursday after dinner and walked around and around and around 11 times. It was supposed to be 12 times, but because we were walking on the outside of the track, each round was a little more than a quarter of a mile, and it added up. It took us a little over an hour, and while we were doing it, all sorts of people came and went, mostly walking dogs. We just kept walking, around and around and around. Easier than a mountain hike, but so so boring. Even the MapMyWalk picture of the walk is boring.

I didn't lose any weight on Mounjaro this week. Last Sunday I weighed 248.2. The next day I went down to 247.2, but after that I popped back up to 248.4 and stayed somewhere around there all week, mostly 248.0 or 248.2. This morning I was 248.6, so I guess technically I gained half a pound, lol. It's OK. I think the heat may have something to do with it, but also, when you're losing weight you tend to go up and down a bit. You can almost feel your body saying, "No! We will NOT be releasing any weight!" Bodies really don't like to let weight go.

If I were doing Weight Watchers, I would get depressed by this week's results and perhaps eat a little chocolate to make myself feel better. But on Mounjaro you mostly don't want to eat chocolate, so that won't happen. I'll just keep trudging along. It's funny, actually -- I keep thinking I want to buy some M&Ms, because I like M&Ms and I like eating them while I'm reading. So whenever I'm at the store I think, oh, I could buy some M&Ms. But then I don't. And believe me, it's not because I'm "being good" or whatever. I just don't want them enough to bother to buy them. No motivation to stretch out my arm and grab a package from the displays by the checkout. It's pretty funny.

One thing I need to work on is protein. I'm told I should be eating around 100 g of protein a day (based on my current weight), in order to maintain muscle mass while losing fat. This is not easy for someone like me -- mostly vegetarian, often nauseated. I should sit down and try to calculate how much protein I'm getting, but I'm too lazy. What I thought might be easier is to have two small "lunches" each day -- a Siggi's (Icelandic) yogurt (15 g protein) or a half cup of Good Culture cottage cheese (14 g protein) in the early afternoon, and then a few hours later a Boost high protein drink (20 g protein). I used to drink Boost when I was pregnant. I guess I could try it again. This week I tried Chobani Complete Greek yogurt drinks (20 g protein), but they're sweetened with stevia and monk fruit, and they have an odd aftertaste. Also, I've never liked Greek yogurt.

Well, I can't think of anything else to write about and it's getting late, past 10 pm. Tomorrow is Monday, a day when I used to get a lot done, but on which I will probably not get a lot done. Is that being too pessimistic? It's honest. The heat, the Mounjaro... 

Oh, I know something I didn't mention -- Trump's almost assassination. But that was so weird, I don't know what to say. A young guy, a registered Republican who once donated to a liberal group, bullied in high school, not allowed to be in the gun club because he couldn't shoot very well (!!), apparently didn't go to college, in kind of a dead end job at a nursing home, not heavily involved in any kind of social media, his dad owned the gun... Hard to know what to say or think about it. I don't even feel sorry for the other people who were shot -- what were they doing at a MAGA rally anyway? They'd sold their souls to the devil as it was. 

Such a strange world we are living in...