Ten Thing Thursday

I don't usually do Ten Thing Thursday (I think it's Thursday, right?) because I don't have 10 things to post...but we'll give it a shot.

1. Has anyone noticed how freakin' long the word verifications have gotten??  It's absurd!  Now it's two words and in my opinion, harder to read.  Seriously...were robots guessing the other ones?
2. Speaking of robots, I'm getting spammed bad lately.  I think I'm going to have to block Anonymous posters from my blog.  I hate doing it because if someone wants to respond anonymously  to something I write, I have no issue with it but I'm getting 2 or 3 spam emails a day.  Ugh.
3. Big Hike on Saturday.  I'm a bit nervous.  Usually I would train for something like this but I haven't.  I wonder if I'm overestimating my abilities on this one?  I joined my work team for this one and one of the ladies doing it said that she does it every year but never goes up to the top.  She goes as far as she wants and then comes back down.  I say, what's the point if you're not going to reach the top?  But to each their own...I better not judge...that might be me on Saturday.
4. I went to mass for Ash Wednesday last night.  That was probably the first mass I've attended in over a year.  My girls wanted to come with me so I reluctantly took them.  Luckily, it was just a litury, not a full mass so it was only about a half hour.  They were great!  Sat still, listened, whispered if they needed to say something.  I was really surprised at how well they did and they were kind of excited that they got ashes just like Mommy.
5. Catholic guilt quickly set in though.  My oldest was fascinated by the statues, the priest, the responses from the congregation.  Maddie is very rule- and structure-oriented so she loved that there were things you were "supposed to do" throughout the service.  She had many questions about why we do this or that.  I actually couldn't answer all of them and then I thought to myself, "By the time I was six, I knew all the responses and was in Sunday School."  I had been thinking about my faith a lot lately (won't get into all that here) but I think I'd like to start going to church again.  Hubby has even agreed to come too (He's not catholic so that's pretty awesome of him).  I like that I was raised catholic and had that foundation.  I want my kids to have it too.
6. Back to the hike thing (speaking of Hubby being awesome) - I'm trying to decide if I want to go by myself or have Hubby drop me off.  Parking at the mountain is a pain so they have several park and ride places set up but it'd be nicer to just get dropped off at the event.  It would also be nice to have someone waiting for me when I'm done to say "Great job!"  LOL.  There's a festival at the bottom with music and food and stuff so they would have things to do but I want to get started right when the trail opens at 7 so that's pretty early to get the whole family out of bed and then the festival doesn't start until 8 so they'd be sitting around a bit.  I'm not sure it's worth disrupting the whole family's morning just so I have someone to say "well done!" at the end of it.  Hubby says it's up to me...whatever I want them to do... I don't know.  Will keep pondering.
7. Yesterday I stuck to my guns a lot better.  No Starbucks, cookies or chocolate and I got all my water in.  I feel good about that.  Shows that I do have at last SOME willpower.  
8. Starting to run out of things here at number 8.  So Monday is the day I start hitting it hard core again.  I hate saying things like that because it's very "old Panda."  The diet was always starting on a Monday, the exercise regime always started on a Monday, etc.  But as I mentioned before...I'm not going to waste all the food we've bought for this week to start right now.  Also, I don't want to jump back into the The 30 Day Shred and be sore for the hike.  So Monday it is.  I'm working on some March workout and food goals so hopefully that will help.  I need to get as focused as I was at the beginning of this journey.  
9. When I first met with my lapband doc, he gave me a book that was about losing the last 30 lbs.  He said it's really no different than losing the first 30 so it'd be helpful to read it.  At the time I thought he was nuts and I thought to myself, "Self, this doc's nuts!.  You've never been able to lose more than 30 lbs before so I really doubt if you only have 30 more lbs to lose to get to goal, you'll be all that upset about it."  I was SO wrong.  The first 30 were a lot easier because it's all new and fresh...you're motivated.  The weight is "flying off" (it never really FLEW for me but it was steady).  It's much, much harder losing these last 30.  I'm revisiting the book.
10. I'm supposed to weigh myself March 1st and I don't want to.  I know I haven't lost...I might've gained.  I really enjoyed the respite from the scale and I don't want to face the music.  I've been having that inner battle with myself where I say "Go one more month without getting on the scale - time to 'catch up'."  I know that's a bad idea.  I know eventually you just have to face whatever damage you've done and move on.  

What do you know?  I did have 10 things to post about today.  So I guess I should probably get to work.  Anyone else thrilled that tomorrow is Friday?  Me too.