BUONGIORNO

Today, tonight actually, we are picking up our Italian exchange student. R brokered a deal with a colleague in Italy whereby we swap sons. Giovanni is soon 22 years old and I really hope easy to get along with, as he will be living with us for 8 weeks. I'm secretly dying for him to be gay so that I have a shopping buddy for the next 8 weeks. Can you imagine, and Italian man to shop with, that wants to shop??!!

Walked miles today, don't know how many but I just set up an app on my phone to track that sort of thing. R hasn't said anything about noticing any progress. Although he doesn't usually mention things like that for fear of offending if he says the wrong thing, or the wrong way. Maybe he's worried that if he compliments me I'll think I'm good enough and stop. Maybe, worst case scenario, there's no progress.

Ordered two French workbooks online to get ready for my French lessons in the fall. I have to make sure I'm in an intermediate class, can't bare to go through another beginner French lesson learning how to tell time and ask where the train station is. The research for the book is going well, will work on Chapter three if time allows today, which is not likely but you never know where some spare minutes will show up.

Alarming Discovery!

I noticed it last week but thought, just ignore, it will go away. It was early anyway and maybe you didn't see what you think you saw. However it happened again last night so I can't help but believe it's true. R is getting abs, like a six pack, washboard. I have flabs, which may rhyme but is oh so different! I'm not sure how to handle this, and will have to get back to you. It's a problem that's only going to get worse as he is ramping up for a race at the end of the month. No amount of butter I add to his food will make a difference because he's burning too many calories.

He said this morning on our way to workout that he was concerned because someone had to be close for me to use my pepper spray. I had that well thought out and covered already. I said I would stick my hand out showing I had pepper spray if someone started to approach and simultaneously yell "I have AIDS!"

Lights and Sirens

Fresh back from our vigorous 5am exercise in the dark, 80 degree, 91% humidity temp. R and I were checking our email, finishing up our coffee. I had just made our protein shakes. When all hell broke loose. Firetrucks and an ambulance came charging up our street and stopped. Right in front of the building with all of the pretty twenty year olds.

R said "aren't you glad we don't live across the street from an old peoples home." But I was alarmed. The pretty people, what could have possibly happened. His response, while still reading and drinking his shake, "cocaine, there's a lot of cocaine in that building." Really?? I'm not convinced, but have always been a bit naive when it came to such things.

I don't want to be carried out of my home on a stretcher. If I'm sick, I don't want to be so sick that I can't say, hey, not well, please drive me to the hospital. I don't want it to come down to an ambulance and fire truck. You're fucked if it comes down to that aren't you? I mean, not every time, but generally speaking. Then the worst thing ever happened. The stretcher came out, loaded with a person, and no one was in a hurry. They took their sweet time loading the ambulance, and when they left, they didn't turn the siren on. Damn. I wonder if there is a dog over there now without a pretty person to walk it.

Hot, Damn Hot

I never thought I would say this, but I'm glad we're exercising at 5am. It's crazy hot right now and I think that 75 at 5am is as cool as it's going to get for a while. We didn't go this morning, had to take our darling son to the airport for a trip to the homeland. It was raining anyway.

Tomorrow I am supposed to be joined by my friend the writer because she lost a bet. We'll see. Nothing exciting to report today because we spent the weekend inside. Will try and do something thrilling today so I don't bore you to death.

Happy Place

So, the dreaded weight in was this morning, just me alone in the bathroom, light off, stepping onto the glass bastard. 4 pounds still lost :) - yes, I waited two weeks after my return to check. But let's not talk about that.

Today in the dirty South the temperature is set to hit 104, with a heat index of 108. No good reason to go outside as far as I can tell. So, instead I've spread a huge tarp over my living room floor, laid down a 4 x 6 canvas, and have been behaving like Jackson Pollock, although I'm not smoking or drunk (yet). While I wait for the layers in-between to dry, I'm writing. Hibernation in reverse, and it's great!

The hiking trip is off, the mountains are going to be just as stinking hot, so this weekend, we will simply turn up the a/c and turn on the Tour de France. There will be beer and napping involved.

Pepper Spray

The fashionable accessory for any 5am solo exerciser. I carry the car keys in my sports bra, R's suggestion, a bottle of water, my iPhone for tunes and pepper spray. I'm a pack mule. I have a runner's belt but feel like it's overkill to strap on something that you're supposed to wear during marathon's when I'm pretty much just walking. However, if someone ever did just jump out of the bushes to attack me, I would have to ask them to wait a sec so that I could put everything down to get access to the pepper spray.

Walking up a very lonely hill this morning I came upon a man and woman having an argument on the sidewalk in front of what I presume was their residence. I'm so glad I'm not in my twenties anymore, seriously people, not worth it. Go to bed, get up, give him the stink eye when you hand him his coffee (doesn't matter who's fault it was) so he knows you're still angry, and make up by dinner. Life's too short.

R said we might skip tomorrow. He might be just testing me, so I have to play my hand carefully. Just the thought of not getting up tomorrow at 4:30 is making my eyes well. Will buy one (or two) lovely bottles of wine tonight and ply him with liquor before bed so that he's in no shape to change his mind. Off to the mountains this weekend for a hike. Which is code for leave the 103 degree temps of the city.

Slight Problem with 4:30

And not what you're thinking either. That's obvious. At 4:30 you're supposed to be asleep. The less obvious problem is waking up at 4:30 gives me approximately 3 more hours in the day to be hungry and try to ignore it. Of course exercising also makes you hungry. I'm trying to eat what I normally do in an effort to lose weight. Calories in and calories out bullshit. But I'm hungrier.

I've never been a good snacker. It's like napping for me, totally unsatisfying. If I'm tired, I want to sleep, not nap, so I avoid it. Seems very unproductive to sleep for two hours in the middle of the day while everyone works. Snacking is more difficult. I have a snack, it is unsatisfying, so then I have  the meal that I was trying to avoid by snacking. Basically I just had an appetizer and added 140 calories to a meal.  So my master plan is to wait until I can't wait any longer and then have the meal, sans snack. The three extra hours is making this a challenge. But like anything, I'm sure I'll get used to it. Like being friendly to people I don't like, or telling a decorating client that the brown sofa they just bought is absolutely what their room needed.