The cleanse is going fairly well. I still have not had even a sip of the $70 veggie broth, but I am choking down the rest of it.
The smoothies have gotten marginally better with the addition of more fruit and less ground flax. I can eat half of one for breakfast and finish the rest a few hours later.
The first 6 days when I gave up caffeine, booze, white food and (as much) sugar (as I could stand while still eating ice cream ever night) I lost 3 pounds. Since Sunday, I have lost another 3 pounds.
But my willpower is failing quickly. I have never been one to come home and drink, but at the grocery store last night the sight of a bottle of wine made me drool. Looking at a loaf of bread I almost passed out. They said there would not be cravings…and I do not crave food - I crave texture, I crave chewing. My hope is that this will pass.
I find on these restrictive diets I lose my desire for food since I am not wowed by my choices. And that is no fun. I love food. I want to enjoy food. This cleanse/diet is taking away all the joy of food.
I am already planning my own phase 3 – where I incorporate a lot of what I learned through this cleanse, taking it slow to see if I am indeed allergic to anything, and then having the things I love in moderation.
I am liking the decaffeination. The money I will save on soda will be amazing. And I am sleeping really well, without the aid of drugs.
Part of the cleanse is a hot, hot bath every night with epsom salt, baking soda and lavender oil. My skin is smooth, and I am very relaxed after soaking for 20 minutes.
**
Remember the client that wanted to set me up with his business partner? Or more specifically, his wife wants to set me up with him? Sunday, at the open house, the client comes back to the house after leaving. I am sort of confused as to why he was there, in the living room, but I rolled with it. We chatted for a few moments and then he says that his hot biz partner is on his way over to pick him up so they can go work somewhere.
I just nod and continue the conversation we had been having about real estate. He hears a car and runs out the door with me in mid-sentence, stopping the perfect opportunity to introduce us. Now, I did not look my best, so I was pretty ok with it, but I was surprised by the clients reaction.
After the last talk I had with the wife he seemed very put off by me (I think he thinks I am more of a party girl than I am). So I am dropping it. At the open house, I had my laptop with me to write a flyer for another listing and I never even looked up when the client and the partner drove by in his silver convertible Mercedes (truth be told I am a bit put off with the car…rumor has it the guy is worried about gold-diggers….then don’t drive a flashy car, am I right?)
Anyway….when the wife brings it up again I am going to say “I don’t think Mr. Seller is comfortable with me meeting the biz partner, and I do not want to do anything to make him uncomfortable” putting it back on him.
But now I really do want to meet him!
**
And remember my Robin Thicke look-alike from tour last week? I figured out his name, company, MySpace page (gag) and maybe his home address. And I think I will be seeing him tomorrow. Oh god, I cannot wait! I have my line all rehearsed!
Filed under: Life in the Burbs
This is a problem. For others it might be a bigger problem (commuting and such), but for me, it really fucks up my social life. There is liquor to drink on the other side of that melted freeway. LIQUOR! AND FUN! AND LAUGHTER! AND CULTURE! And a lack of soccer moms in Hummers!
I guess Bart and I will get to know each other a little better.
I went out last night to a local bar that is known to cater to a more mature crowd. I thought it would be people in their late 30’s maybe early 40’s….nope. It was women with over-ratted perms and housewives letting their inner Pussycat Doll out (not in a good way) and men with too much jewelry and hair product. It made me want to cry.
Then we ended up bar hopping to the town next door. We were about to enter “our bar” when we both noticed that the young pup was right inside the door. Now, I am ok with running into him, but not sober (I have not had liquor in 8 days!) and not when I have to rub up against him to get into the bar. So we popped to a few more bars, not finding a scene we liked and made a pact to reclaim the bar once my cleanse is over and I am imbibing again.
So the cleanse….
Dear god, put me out of my misery any give me an IV of vodka ad french fries. Puhleeeze!
I was ok with giving up the caffeine, the sugar, the gluten. I was surviving. It did not make life fun, but it was bareable. This new phase is downright cruel.
I started the morning with 2 tablespoons of organic olive oil mixed with the juice of half an organic lemon. A rude way to wake up. I choked down half and gave up.
I then made a shake with rice protein powder, flax seed, flax oil and berries. It was not edible. I had a backup plan! I remade it with tofu instead of the protein powder. It still tasted like shit! But I ate half of it! Mostly it was too crunchy for me. Too many seeds from the berries and I guess the ground flax. I like smoothies…well…smooooooth.
As I sit here having had crab, asparagus and now choking down a half cup of brown rice, I wonder if a clean system is really all that necessary? Does my liver really need detoxifying? Does it care? Can I last 7 days on this? There is a promise of feeling great around day 3….but I do not know if I care.
Filed under: Being Mere
I bought this today. I got carded. Which thrilled me in some respects, but I think it had less to do with how old I looked than the big zit I have on my face.
I left the house at 9 am this morning and returned home at 8 pm. 10 of those hours were spent with a client showing him 17+ houses. I am tired. Dead tired.
I started wearing a pedometer today and reached 13000+ steps. 9000 of those were done during work hours.
I arrived home, starving and bone tired. I expected to be greeted by two very hungry cats. There was one. Not the one I most expected. I called to the little one. No answer. I called again…a muted mew. To my utter horror the little guy has been stuck in the closet under the stairs since 9 am when I opened it to grab something from my coat pocket.
He had TORN THE PLACE APART and I cannot say I blame him. I feel soooooo bad. So bad. Bad, bad mommie.
Will someone please remind me the next time I go under the stairs (probably in late November when I want the xmas decorations) that he may have pooped in there? Because I am way too tired to clean out the whole closet right now.
Filed under: Cats
Yesterday was my first day with no diet coke as the first thing in my mouth in YEARS. And the first day with no caffeine (less than 30 milligrams) in longer than I ever want to know. I have always believed that if caffeine was my only real vice, and it did not have short or long-term health effects there was no reason to give it up.
I had always had a rule that I would not drink any caffeine after 3 pm because I believed it kept me up at night. And even with that rule I take benadryl or Tylenol PM more nights than I want to admit in order to go to sleep.
Last night was divine. By 9 I was having trouble keeping my eyes open. I turned on a great episode of Law and Order CI and assumed the position (the only position I can sleep in) and listened for about 40 minutes before drifting off. And I did not wake up once to pee.
I feel rested for the firsts time in a long, long time.
Filed under: Being Mere
I pulled a Mere today. I had to go on this caravan tour for work so that I can put my listing on the stupid caravan tour next week effectively wasting 2 whole mornings for nothing. But that is another rant.
There was a cute, cute boy on the tour. Oh my gawd he made my knees weak because he looked just like this guy. So I start singing to myself…Lost without youooooo…Can’t help myseeeeeelf……how does it feeeeeeel….to know that I love you baby…
So there I sit for 2 hours going in and out of 10 houses and NOT ONCE do I get the balls up to say “Hey, has anyone ever told you that you look like Robin Thicke?”
I suck. I had the PERFECT opener and I balked, chatting up everyone else and ignoring the cute guy in the nice suit with the hot car. Fuck.
****
Decaf update – 2 cups of green tea today, which is totally legal on the diet. Those cups of tea meant I had to pee while seeing the last 8 houses this morning with no break until 12:30 when I got back to my office.
I finally got a headache late last night, so I took 2 benadryl and passed out. I am hoping that was it.
Filed under: Being Mere
The end of Day 2:
In the spirit of nerdiness, I cannot just decide to stop (or ween myself off of) caffeine, I have to do research.
A usual day in the life consists of:
wake up – drink diet coke, also having a cup of green tea a few times a week
mid morning – another diet coke
lunch – diet coke
I never drink anything caffeinated after 3 pm.
In my research I found out there are 45.6 milligrams of caffeine in a diet coke. There are 15 milligrams in a cup of green tea.
That is an average of 145 milligrams of caffeine per day. In contrast today I had 1/2 of a diet coke and 1 cup of green tea for a total of 38 milligrams of caffeine.
And I wonder why I am in such a crappy mood and needed a 3 hour nap?
Filed under: Work
The mom was out of town last week leaving me with an escrow that was almost finished. I have not slept a decent night since Tuesday stressing about doing a good job.
If it was my escrow, much like the last one, where I had done all the paperwork and had all the discussions with the client I would not have been so worried. I am the type that sets expectations. I want people to know what happens next.
The mom? She sort of flies by the seat of her pants.
I did my best to catch up. I started trying to prep the client Tuesday night, before the mom even left. But when he got the total for what he needed to bring to close the deal, he was so surprised he reacted in anger.
The fact that this was a surprise to him shocked me. His lender should have (and I believe DID) go over all the numbers with him. Now weather those numbers stuck in his head, I have no control over. I do not get into the details of the clients available cash. That is between them and their lender – and I view a lender much as a priest. I take what I am told and use it.
Now what I can tell you is that when we wrote the contract I told him 3 times what the rest of his down payment was. He mentally lowered it $50K. For me, it was always the same number. I am not sure how I can be blamed for his decision to change that number.
In the last 30 days he has never asked me to re-explain the numbers. He has copies of everything from me (the contract and anything else he has been asked to sign) and copies of everything he and the lender talked about. He apparently never picked up a calculator. He never once looked at the paperwork again. Mr. I Know Where Every Dollar Goes did not run the numbers again.
But yesterday, after the open house, he TOTALLY blamed me for the number.
And the mom nodded and threw me under the bus.
My expectation would have been that she would either ask him where the breakdown in communication was, forcing him to think about why he was not aware of the number or why he mentally CHANGED the number. Or I would have expected her to say that maybe SHE could have reminded him of the numbers before she left, therefore having the team take the blame.
But she allowed it to look like it was MY fuckup. I was the one that ASKED for the numbers. She never did. And she would not have. She allowed them to shoot the messenger.
I feel betrayed. I came home last night, after my 12th straight day of work to take a hot bath and have a good cry.
She does not see that she has done anything wrong. So I went into work at 7 am to do all the things we had promised the client. I have told her she can go see them to do what needs to be done, seeing as I am obviously not competent enough.
How do you go about your job when you have just been shown to be the weak link? She effectively took away my ability to advise the client. I am pissed. I am sad. I want a new job. I want to win the lottery and move to a small island somewhere and eat pineapple and fresh fish.
Filed under: Being Mere
I am not sure if I am a genius or the lamest person alive.
I managed to time my de-caffeination (due to new cleanse) with PMS. I will either not feel any pain at all since my hormones are all out of whack or I will be crying in the corner at the open house I have to work today.
I think I will take an emergency diet coke with me just in case.
Right now the only thing I feel is heavy behind they eyes…and I am not sure if that is my body telling me I missed my morning diet coke or PMS telling me to stay in bed all day.
