Socal Mom by Donna Schwartz Mills

Look Before You Leap Day

Did you notice that it's Leap Day?

If you are like me, dates on the calendar only have significance in relation to your children's activities and your volunteer commitments. It takes me a while to put the calendar in the context of a holiday, or (in today's case) a rare day that only comes once every four years. So consider this a Public Service Announcement.

I mean, how many times have your caught yourself wishing the day had more than 24 hours so you might have a shot at completing all the tasks on your To-Do list? I know I've said that about a zillion times this week, as I haven't even made a dent in all the things I'd planned to finish.

So this year, we have an entire extra DAY. What are you going to do with it?

That's the question posed by Heather Cabot, publisher of The WellMom, weekly Huffington Post contributor, and the Web Life editor at Yahoo!. The latter company polled 2,000 adults to see what they would like to do with their extra day, and discovered this:

80% chose doing something fun like hanging out with family/friends, going on some wild excursion or shopping

63% said they might work, do some sort of organizing around the house or clean the garage

40% would do some online clean up, like cleaning their email box, their many online profiles or back up computer files

What about you? I'm with the 80% who would do something fun! Today is a minimum day for my daughter, so she and I and her best friend and mom are going to have a "ladies' lunch" and shopping.

Too bad we can't enjoy extra "Leap Days" more often -- or can we? Heather Cabot has some tips to help you make more time for yourself.

(This post is continued at my Review blog, SoCal Stuff.)

links for 2008-02-29

• The Down Fall of Main Stream Media=a few MOMS
  Erin Vest makes some interesting points about the power of the new media and how women are wielding it.
  (tags: politics internet twitter web mommyblog momocrats)

Just Call Me Hussein

I wish I was as funny and fierce as Stefania Pomponi Butler, who is one of the forces behind the MOMocrats.

Like anyone with a brain, she's outraged by all the brouhaha certain so-called pundits have been making over Barack Obama's middle name. So she came up with this great idea: Just Call Me Hussein Day.

Here's what Stefania says:

We here at MOMocrats have decided to make today an impromptu "Just Call Me Hussein" Day in response to people like Bill Cunningham... who is obviously still seven-years-old.

Read more here (including my own contribution).

New Beginnings, New Routines

Tuesday was my final day as a patient at the weight loss clinic.

From the time I started in mid-July until the finish of my third weight-loss module two weeks ago, I lost a total of 54 pounds, and shrunk from a size 14 to a size 2.

I know this for a fact - my new favorite hobby is going into clothing stores, trying on the 2's -- which look impossibly small -- and then marveling that they fit. (That doesn't mean they all look good on me -- just that I can zip them over my hips and zip them up.) Then I put the clothes back on the racks and move on. I have yet to clean out my closet and dresser, and I need to, because the clothes that do fit are about 20 years old and the rest are way too big. Then, maybe I can figure out what I really NEED and actually BUY something.

I'll get around to it in time.

Anyway -- my culmination from weight loss into Maintenance marks the end of the routine I've followed faithfully for the last several months: After dropping Megan at school, I swing over to the clinic for my weigh-in and counseling session, then to the gym for my daily workout (except on those days when I see my trainer, as he doesn't get in until the afternoon... and days like today, when it's convenient to go late afternoon while my daughter is in Hebrew school).

Now, my visits to the clinic are optional. They suggest I come in three times a week to start, eventually tapering off to once a week. I told them I planned to continue coming in daily.

Then I spent my first Maintenance day consuming 100 more calories than I was supposed to, and my bathroom scale this morning reflects it.

The routine I just finished only allowed me a very limited variety of food (adding up to a total of 600-800 calories per day). I kept track of what I ate, but only added up the carbs.

Now, I'm supposed to track EVERYTHING: Calories, carbs, fat grams and protein. I was given a new form to fill out for my food diary, and a new, very comprehensive, pocket sized book to aid me in this task -- which took me about a half hour to do after every meal and snack yesterday.

My new maintenance routine allows me a lot more leeway on what I can eat, and a calorie target of 1400. You would think that would be enough after practically starving myself for the last six months.

I know - one hundred calories isn't a lot in the long run, but if I do that every day, it won't take me long to regain everything I've worked so hard to lose. And believe me, those National Enquirer photos of Kirstie Alley have me spooked. I don't want that to happen to me.

Self-sabotage is one of my biggest fears, and I'm not alone. Carmen, who has achieved the incredible feat of losing 80 pounds WITHOUT the assistance of an army of nurses and trainers, also worries - as do the folks who visit her diet site. I understand and share the fear. Anyone who has succeeded in overcoming the weight yo-yo is going to worry that what's gone down will inevitably go back up.

So today is another day. I have a lot of work to get done (which is one of the stresses that might make me go off program), so I decided to skip the counseling session. If I finish the day below my target calories and work out a little harder tonight, I should be able to go for my weigh in tomorrow without much change.

Anyway, that's the plan. For the rest of my life.

In Over My Head

If you read yesterday's post, you would be forgiven for thinking today's title refers to my little 15-Minute post experiment. Sheesh. All I can say is that I think I was preoccupied with the specter of that dental appointment, and I never got to the point that I intended to make...

...which is that this week, I'm feeling that same old fear I've always had -- that people will see through me, think I'm a fraud or a total asshat.

In the fall, I volunteered to run for the parent board of directors' at my daughter's gym (which is a non-profit). The other members of the board -- in their real-world, non-parent lives -- have some high powered experience as business executives, attorneys, bankers. And me? Aside from some entertainment industry experience from 20 years ago (which never got any closer to an executive's suite than the secretary's desk outside) and a few years as a meeting planner -- consists of what you see right here. DIY web stuff and blogging.

I had thought that I could use that experience to do something about the gym's dreadful website and improve communication with team parents, but I've hit several roadblocks on the former, and all I've accomplished on the latter is to establish a little networking site for the parents on Ning. (And I've sadly neglected that -- it needs to be nourished to make it viable for everyone).

Tuesday night's board meeting was an interesting one (to put it mildly). There were issues that had to be dealt with. But I really couldn't contribute much wisdom or experience to the situation at hand. As the title says, I'm in over my head. And I hope the other board members don't notice.

I'm feeling that way a lot lately, and I have to remind myself that I DO have experience to bring to the table, even if it's not traditional. I've been asked to send a bio to one of the new collaborative sites I'm
contributing to now, and as I tick off my past lives ("radio producer," "interviewer of rock stars," "music video programmer," "WGA Member") I remember why I once thought of naming this blog "I USED to be Interesting."

I just wish I was interesting NOW.