Impossible is a typoRunning my pants off and loving myself along the way

A new year and a new manifesto

It’s January right? So as a fitness blogger I should have my pompoms out in full in New Year Resolution Mode. Yawn. I’ve done that. I’ve ridden the New Year high to lose weight, run a 10k, blah, blah, blah. But there is something fundamental missing, not only in this resolution nonsense, something fundamentally missing in my life. Brace yourself, this may hit a nerve.

After all the work I’ve done on myself – therapy, self-help books, journaling, empowerment classes – after all that, at the end of the day, I’m still waiting for that delicious, glorious moment when I’m thin enough to finally think I have the right to think I’m pretty and sexy and when I can finally be happy.
Yup, that’s right, I don’t think I have the right to be happy because I’m not thin and because I’m not thin, I’m not pretty or sexy. You see, when I’m finally thin, all those things will just magically poof into existence.

I walk around most days thinking I’m basically invisible, no makeup on, schlummy (yes, it’s a technical term) clothes, hair like the Wild Woman of Borneo. After all, no one is going to take notice of me anyway so what does our matter? Translation – I don’t think I matter.

But what if, now this may get a little radical and scary, but what if, just what if, I claimed being sexy and gorgeous and happy as my birth right? Right now? Right this very second?. What if I made that my Excalibur to heave from the stone and raise into the air with a these-boots-were-made-for-walking kind of growl? What if I fought for THAT instead of ticks on the scale or calories saved? What if RIGHTNOW I declared I was one sexy mother fucker and lived my life that way? What would my life then look like?
See, I keep piling up all this evidence that that I’m not pretty. Like beans I toss in a jar which is about bursting at this point. I collect all these moments that provide evidence that I’m not pretty or desirable. The dates that stand me up, the boys that don’t return phone calls, the plus size jeans, the bad hair days, they are all collected and noted in my evidence file like I’m building this Hoover era dossier on why I suck. I never ever pay any sort of attention to the moments that confirm I am a hottie. I disregard them as flukes, freaks of nature, tricks of the light. Like the day three random strangers complemented my legs when I had the balls to wear a short skirt, I mean three men, stopped, turned around walked back to me just to say I had great legs and I totally blew that off as meaningless. Those moments get discredited as abnormal, aberrations, people talking crazy and obviously delusional and doing drugs.

But what if? What if I lived life right now as if I was perfect and glorious and oozing with sex appeal? What if I lived every moment as confirmation of being powerful and happy instead of hiding out and waiting for some future moment of ambiguous glory? And I’m not talking about goofy affirmations in the mirror or cheer leader pompom talks before going out on the town. What if I woke up in the morning and put my vampy red Chanel lipstick and my killer holy-crap-you’re-over-6foot-tall stilettos to work at my home office? What if I took on this manifest of keeping your head, heels and standards high? What would my life look like then?

I don’t know. But I’m sure as hell going to find out.

Well, it’s Christmas, with cookies, and presents, and food, and Santa, and more food, and wrapping paper, and snacks, and family, and dessert, and friends. It was probably really stressful getting to this day and it might even STILL be stressful.

But there is time to give one last gift…

You know there’s that person, that just did you wrong? It could have been yesterday or a year ago, or even a good portion of a life time. Yeah, THAT person.

Go ahead, forgive them.

It doesn’t make what happened right, there might be no justice, there might even be stuff you have to do about it. It’s really kind of a selfish gift, you don’t even have to tell them about it. Shhh, we can keep it a secret.

Give yourself the gift of no longer having that person or event have power over you.

Yeah, I know, it may be really really hard, and you might only get as far as “I’m trying to forgive you” and you might have to remind yourself a thousand times that you’re trying really really hard. It might require you pulling on an extra pair of Big Girl Panties.

And you just may find the person you have to forgive is yourself. Double points if that’s the case.

Happy Christmas.

“Oh so, you’ve been quiet on your blog, what have you been up to?’

“Well you know, just little things… like a little house cleaning…

Day 3 of cleanup.

… a little gardening…

My backyard tree was not match for Sandy

… a little cooking…

A hot meal from the Red Cross

… a little home repairs…

In love with a hot water heater

… you know, nothing big.”

Just a little water

Here’s my tip of the week for you – Never ever ever mutter “what’s the worst that can happen”, because you’ll be sure to find out.

Hurricane Sandy ripped apart and submerged the town that I grew up in. Just to give you a little perspective on the flooding, I drew up a little map for you. The right shows an approximate line of how far the Great South Bay came into my town. Yup, everything below that squiggly blue line was under water for about 2 days.

Amityville and Sandy

We got off lucky. 3 feet of water in our basement and the house not completely surrounded by water. We lost the furnace, washer, dryer, hot water heater, clothes and craft supplies.

Just one street of thousands

Others? Not so much.

Houses are gone, and if they still stand, there’s nothing in them, not even sheet rock. Now, picture this happening not just in one town or two but for ONE HUNDRED MILES. “Long Island” didn’t it’s name for no reason. One hundred miles of the Long Island coast were under water. Let that sink in. And this ain’t farm land we’re talking about. Practically every scrap of  that hundred mile coast is densely populated. People’s dream homes, childhood homes, homes they’ve lived in for 40 years like my folks.

Can you imagine not being able to save anything from your home? Not even the walls and the floors themselves? Can you imagine having everything you cherish, even the knickknacks you hate, being flushed out to sea?

Treasures in Sandy mud

We couldn’t imagine it.

But there are some people who can.

As we were waking up, wading through flood waters, trying to find underwear (if you had them anymore), wheels were being put in motion… literally.

Sandy Arabie (ironic name, right?) watched the hurricane roll up the north east and didn’t have to imagine what to expect. Katrina already taught him that lesson.

“We know how a family can be impacted by a hurricane, and we know what it’s like to feel forgotten, and we had to do something.”

And when you’re the owner of a trucking company, what you can do it pretty big.

Sandy and his company, backed by the Lafourche Parish Government, suburb of New Orleans, came up with a pretty big idea. Send a big ole truck full of donations up to Long Island. They figure, who better to know what you need when you’ve lost everything, than people who have already lost everything.

Donation tents started popping up all over, in parking lots, shopping centers, in front of bars.

Donations from survivors to survivors.

And people stared giving. We’re not talking about corporate donations here. One of the truck drivers who is volunteering his time to drive up to Long Island was manning the booth in front of a shopping center. A couple parked a beat-up car and asked what was going on. When the driver explained they were going to drive truck up to New York with supplies for people who lost their homes during Sandy, the couple said they’d be back. And they did, with a shopping cart full of pet food, cleaning supplies, food, blankets and more, saying, “This is what we needed when we lost everything in Katrina. They helped us when we needed it. Now it’s our turn.”

From disaster survivor to disaster survivor. A truck full of love.

So a big ole truck full of Cajun love is about to make its way up the east coast. And I need you to do a few things.

First, share the love and give a big thanks on their Facebook page – Lagniappe from the Bayou. Go like that page already, will ya?

Second, help me get the word out to where Long Islanders can share in the love and get what they need. Here’s a handy Bit.ly link to share this post - http://bit.ly/1046vB3

The Amityville High School (250 Merrick Road) will serve as the donation center and the truck should arrive on Monday November 19.

I’ll keep updating this page with more information as it rolls in.

Don't hate me because I don't like it

CrazyInnerFatGirl: Nibble, nibble, grimace. Sip, slurp, blech.

VoiceOfReasonFitGirl: What are you doing?

FatGirl: Enjoying a Pumpkin Spice Latte and pumpkin spiced muffin.

Grimace, blech

FitGirl: Um, you don’t actually seem to be “enjoying” it. Air quotes.

FatGirl: What are you insane? Of course I’m enjoying it. It’s Fall. This is the only time you can get Pumpkin Spice stuff. If you don’t enjoy it now, it goes away and you can never never ever have it again.

Grimice, blech

FatGirl: Besides all the cool kids are doing it.

FitGirl: Do you actually like pumpkin Spice?

FatGirl: What are you insane? Of course I like it. It’s Fall. This is the only time you can get Pumpkin Spice stuff. If you don’t enjoy it now, it goes away and you can never never EVER have it again.

Grimice, blech

FitGirl: Just smile and nod.

See, here’s the thing. I don’t really like “Pumpkin Spice”, especially in my coffee. For all that is good and holy, please stop putting weird things in coffee, like Blueberry flavor. Seriously, that breaks laws of physics. I’m sure of it! And yet, I feel compelled to jump on the pumpkin spice bandwagon every fall hoping that this is the year I’ll fall in love with it.

And Pinterest is not helping. I found a pin somewhere about combining a package of sugar-free pudding, a can of pumpkin, cinnamon, and a tub of Cool-whip and Tadaaaaa “Best dessert eva!” “Only 2 WW points” and 740,733 pins later, it has to be good. So I tried it…

Simple to make…

Pumpkin Spiced Fluff

Just mix pudding with the pumpkin… fold in the Cool-Whip (Yeah, OK, hush, I know that stuff is the devil and barely qualifies as “food” but ya can’t fault a girl for liking a big ole spoonful now and again)

Pudding + Pumpkin + Cool Whip is meh

Graham cracker added flair…

Fluff + graham cracker still meh

and meh.

It was OK, I guess, if you actually LIKE pumpkin spice stuff. It was creamy, dense, just sweet enough. And I don’t, I just don’t like pumpkin spice. And I keep forgetting that I don’t like it and  eat it anyway. I know it’s a food fad with heavy marketing around it and boy does the marketing work. I feel like I’m somehow left out because I just don’t love pumpkin spice.

Fitbloggin’12 was last weekend. There was great people, great sponsors, great food, but it was kind of a weird weekend for me.

I'm angry, who knew!

First of all, I was presenting on building your brand. So I was nervous, and feeling unprepared. I missed pretty much the first day because I was fretting over my presentation. When it was over – whew – I could relax and do the conference thing.

FitBloggin’ is amazing because of the people who attend. It’s kind of like summer camp with out S’mores. I feel like I didn’t meet as many people this year as I did last year. But that’s a different blog post.

So the presentation went well, I chatted, hugged, laughed… and then…

Then came Tara’s panel “When you have a lot to lose” and I kind of lost it a bit. See, here’s the truth – I’m 30lbs heavier than I was this time last year.

Crap.

What do you do as a fitness and weight loss blogger when you are getting fat again? I got all emotional and messy. It wasn’t until that panel and a conversation with PinkyPie (AKA Renee) that I realized I’m angry.

I’m angry at myself that I have to do this all over again.

I’m angry that I let the pounds creep back on.

I’m angry that my clothes don’t fit.

And god help me if one more person says to me “if you did it once, you can do it again”

And I feel like a failure.

And to top it all off, I just don’t wanna! I know how hard it was losing it all the first time and I just don’t want to put that kind of effort into weight loss again.

I’m perpetually stuck in Monday mode right now. “I’ll start Monday”. “One last doughnut and I’ll get back on track”. “Oh look dumplings”. FatGirl has won and successfully beat FitGirl back into the closet.

FitBloggin was a week ago. Have run this week? Nope. Have I eaten doughnuts? Yup.

I’m angry. I’m frustrated. And I really don’t know what to do. So that was my Fitbloggin, how was yours?

I’m kind of a marketing geek. I’m the girl that tells everyone to shut up during commercials so that I can watch. Yeah, it comes with the territory when you own your very own marketing and social media company. I get gleeful and excited pouring over metrics and insights and data. You can see some really interesting stories in the data. I can tell clients things about their users that boggles their minds, like shopping habits and sleeping patterns. It’s awesome.

I try really hard not to get crazy with the analytics of my own properties. I can very easily be that kind of blogger that writes a post and then agonizes over why its bee 10 mins and I’ve gotten only three hits. So I pop into Google Analytics a few times a month just to get the lay of the land.

I could not stop chuckling when I saw this.

Fat girl in a pineapple hat? We don't need no stinking hats.

Not 1, not 2, but three people have arrived at FatGirlsCanRun.com in the past month by googling “a fat girl in a pineapple hat”. Say it with me class – WTF. I don’t think I have ever mentioned pineapples and I’m certain I’ve never talked about a pineapple hat, and I have most certainly never written the phrase “a fat girl in a pineapple hat”.

So being the marketing geek that I am, this is now an lesson in SEO keyword blogging.

Many, many things will effect where you show up in a Google search for any key word or phrase. If you want to rank well for a specific key word, blogging is an excellent way to do that. For a unique phrase like “a fat girl in a pineapple hat”, just one well-done blog post might be enough to get you to Page One. If you’re using a more competitive key word like “Blogging for SEO”, you’re going to have blog that sucker again and again with fresh content, as the new Google algorithm gives you demerits for duplicate content. So blog and blog often and really show that you know what you’re talking about.

There are a few structural things you can do in your post to give you an even better edge.

• Use the key word in the title
• Use the key word in the first paragraph (I didn’t do this here as I’m just kid of goofing around)
• Use an image and make sure you key word is in the caption AND the Alt text.
• Use the key word as possible in the post without sounding goofy and stupid.
• Use the key word as a tag or category marker

Now, I’ll be really curious to see how I rank for “a fat girl in a pineapple hat” in a few days time. Yeah, I make my own fun.

FitGirl: What should we have for dinner?

FatGirl: Bareburger.

FitGirl: Quinoa pilaf? Brown rice?

FatGirl: Bareburger.

FitGirl: No seriously. What are we having for dinner?

FatGirl: Bareburger.

FitGirl: C’mon, we can’t have burgers for dinner again. Salmon? Protein shake?

FatGirl: Bareburger.

FitGirl: For goodness sa….

FatGirl: Bareburger.

FitGirl: If you say “Bareburger” one more time…

FatGirl: Bareburger.

FitGirl: Look, I know Bareburger is tasty and organic, but..

FatGirl: I’ll buy you a milkshake.

FitGirl: Bareburger it is.

May I introduce Bareburger

Bareburger - Just your friendly neighborhood Burger joint, just bike on up!

A friend dragged me to Bareburger about a month ago. OK, fine. “Dragged” is a wee bit forceful.  Let’s go with “enthusiastically suggested and I capitulated”. Look at me with the SAT words! I’m not a big burger fan, not because I don’t like burgers but because when I want a good burger, 9 times out of 10 I’m totally disappointed in what arrives on my plate. She added “They’re organic by the way” to entice me further. And I’ll admit, I rolled my eyes at that. As a marketeer, I see “organic” tossed around with little care and used mostly to justify a price mark up. Yeah, I’m a bit biased, but more on that in a second…

So, we go to Bareburger on 31st Ave in Astoria. All the employees were so nice, it was almost uncomfortable. In New York, you sort of get used to pleasant but brisk and efficient service. Our server chatted with us like we were real human beings, like folks from the neighborhood, while also providing pleasant and efficient service. We had a 10 minute conversation about burlesque hair styles while we waited for our dinner. I began to feel there was something a little bit different about Bareburger.

"Bare-y nice to meet you!" Get it? Very... Bare-y... yuk yuk

It was all over the moment my burger and onion rings arrived.

Remember when I said that 9 out of 10 times I’m totally disappointed in my burger experience because it never lives up to my expectations? All burgers will now have to live up to the standard Bareburger created for me.

Picture... 1,000 words... you get the drift.

So, the service and vibe in Bareburger is exceptional and the food will make you an instant fan. But there was still something nagging at me.

Good vibes at Bareburger, cool and cozy

The whole “organic” thing. It’s hard for me to get past seeing it as anything but a marketing gimmick. Like my favorite coffee place features “organic” coffee. OK great, that’s awesome right? But the milk they serve for your organic coffee is not organic. So what’s the point of having one and only one element of your meal being organic when it’s overwhelmed by all the non-organic ingredients? It’s like what’s the point of having a diet Coke with your 3,000 calorie Blooming Onion? Sorry, I’m a bit soap-boxy about all this.

See, I WANT to fall madly, head-over-heels in love with Bareburger. I WANT to believe that its NOT a gimmick, and cheerlead the cause.

Keepin' an eye on things

So, I went to the source – Owner, founder, creator Euripides Pelekanos.

EP, as he signs his emails, shared that the ideas behind Bareburger started almost by accident. In 2001, EP opened Sputnik, a live music and art venue in Brooklyn. They served food, but food, while not quite an afterthought, wasn’t what Sputnik was about. Until they put an organic burger on the menu. Now, this was before burgers became the new cupcake, before Five Guys and Shake Shack showed up in NY, before burgers were cool and trendy. People started hitting up Sputnik just for the burgers and the music and art started to come second. In that moment, Bareburger began to take shape.

“But there was one thing that didn’t make @#$%’ing sense”, (Sidenote – Hanging out with EP is like hanging out with that kid you grew up in the neighborhood with, straight forward and very personable, relaxed but really passionate. He kept apologizing for cussing. It was cute). “It just doesn’t make sense to have an organic burger and then pile it with non-organic toppings.”

Hello Mind Reader!

“Organic isn’t just a trend, it’s where the food industry is going”. EP had me consider that all the processed, mass produced, factory food we grew up on was driven by big business in the 50s. World War II ended, the Baby Boom was on. We changed how we lived and what was important to us. We stopped shopping at local markets and started going for convenience and speed. Organic is now becoming big business and will (heck, already is) change the way food is produced and consumed. Now hold that thought…

Bareburger opened in 2009 in a TINY 1000 square foot former bakery that had been closed “forever”, EP says. And he would know as he, and the other owners of Bareburger, all grew up in Astoria. Back in those days, (yeah I know, “3 years ago” is not an eon but things can change really rapidly in NYC neighborhoods) Astoria didn’t have a lot of “fancy” food. You had your typical local restaurants, heavy on the Greek flavors, being an old immigrant neighborhood, but you wouldn’t find many foodie blog write ups about Astoria. Doing a fancy hamburger in a working class neighborhood was risky enough, adding the organic element was nail-biting. EP says they did ZERO advertising except for an 8 1/2 X 11 printout in the window saying “Bareburger. Organic Burgers. Opening June 12, 2pm”. On opening day, with EP in the kitchen, they expected 5 or 6 people at the door. About 60 showed up at 2pm. After a bit of a bumpy start, they knew they hit a nerve. Three years later, the 11th Bareburger will open very very soon in an undisclosed location (Yup, I know where it is, and Nope I’m not telling), and EP joked that they’ve probably served over a million burgers.

And now back to Big Business… EP said that sourcing ingredients and staying profitable can be a challenge when you’re talking organic and all natural ingredients. It’s a challenge on both the farmer’s side of things and the buyer’s side. Licenses and certifications are expensive, then there’s shipping, storage, and probably a bazillion things I’m not even thinking about. “Once you start dealing in volume, costs come down and you have greater control over the product”. Then we talked bacon. Ah, bacon, it always comes back to bacon. EP shared how, because of the volume Bareburger deals in with soon-to-be 11 shops, he can get suppliers to craft products just for Bareburger like special cut, cured and smoked bacon.

At Bareburger it's all about the ingredients

Bareburger wants to have that one-on-one relationship with their suppliers so they know exactly what they are buying. Why? Because they want YOU to know it too. Each table has an FAQ that gives you, in almost overwhelming details, the fat percentages, origin, chemical usage, certification of pretty much everything on the menu. It’s rather impressive.

Guardians of the FAQ

That little FAQ sheet will also tell you that Bareburger is about as green as you can get without building from the ground up. They use recycled vinyl for their booths, reclaimed wood for the tables, and recycled and re-purposed furnishings wherever they can. Again, EP noted how absurd it is to serve organic food on petro-chemical plastics. Bareburger has seen some crazy growth, but you probably won’t see Bareburgers popping up in your local mall. It’s a Main Street, neighborhood kind of joint. Manager Steve told me that one of the things he loves about working on 31st Ave is that it is a neighborhood, all the shop owners are buddies rather than competitors. “Its like you can go next door and borrow a cup of sugar if you need to”.

Green, sustainable and organic are not gimmicks

Yeah, I know your thinking “hey, this is weird, Amy isn’t talking about how delicious the food is”. Just trust it’s crazy pants delicious, but for god sakes, what ever you do, do not have a milkshake. That’s right, step away from the milkshake. Just back off, alright. I will go all Mr. Blonde on you if they are out of vanilla ice cream because you ordered the last vanilla milkshake. Just sayin’ – alls fair in love and war and milk shakes.

I'm not sure they have enough ice cream

OK, so you know the food is beyond good, the service is top notch, and they are organic as part of the fabric of the company. But this is what sealed the deal for me:

No, you can't have a bite.

I asked EP about the logo – what the heck is up with a bear riding a unicycle with a beer and a burger in its hands. He smiled and said “Why not a bear riding a unicycle with a beer and a burger in its hands? Look, after a couple drinks, it seemed like a good idea and it just stuck.”

Sold.

Why not indeed

I grew up on Long Island where you can’t drive a mile without passing at least 3 pizza shops. And we’re talking good pizza. The pizza all other pizza in the world wish they could be. Crisp yet chewy crust. Cheese that oozes all melty in your mouth. Sauce that bursts with sweet-tart tomatoey goodness. Whew, I need to sit down just at the thought. Mike’s was our local pizza shop growing up. I can close my eyes and remember the rich yummy smell of my dad walking in the house with a pie, half pepperoni, half sausage, with soda. Pizza night was one of the few times we were allowed soda growing up.

Pizza for me is the most perfect food on earth, and yeah, I’ll own it, I’m a total pizza snob and super righteous about it, which is completely justified as I had to suffer three years of pizza in Japan where “normal” ingredients were corn, potato and squid ink. Just sayin’ you don’t mess with pizza. I won’t eat pizza outside of a 50 mile radius of New York City anymore because what other people do to dough, sauce and cheese in the name of pizza can be a monstrosity.  Seriously, stop putting pineapple on your pizza, people! You want to go all crazy and put truffle and duck confit on dough? Great, call it “flatbread”, stop calling it “pizza” for god sakes! It’s just wrong and goes against all the laws of nature. No, worse than that, it breaks the Laws of Pizza Physics.

So when I got an invite to the preview of “SkinnyPizza” at Roosevelt Field Mall, I was concerned and dubious. “Skinny” and “Pizza” shouldn’t really be in the same sentence together unless of course you’re saying “Look at those skinny girls, someone should get them a slice of pizza”. I was more than pleasantly surprised by SkinnyPizza, shocked actually as it was really really good.

The shop is sleek and modern. Airy, with really clean lines, not sterile at all but also not a place you’re going to sit for a few hours with friends. This is a pizza joint after all, not a diner. They have an outdoor table area which is nice and not very common on Long Island.

SkinnyPizza Counter Service

“Shut up and tell me about the pizza!!!”

OK OK.

Sheesh.

SkinnyPizza is obviously thin crust pizza. So you’re not going to get that bready, doughy, crispy, chewy mouthful of my beloved Mike’s. Now, I’ve had a lot of “low cal” and thin crust pizza in my day, and with the first bite, it crumbles to dust, leaving your toppings to slide down your front, and you get home and find a random mushroom in your purse. Thin crust crispy pizza can be like having Saltines with pizza toppings – a serious transgression against the Laws of Pizza Physics. This is NOT the crust you’ll find at SkinnyPizza. The crust is crisp but still has the chew you expect when you bite into pizza and totally stands up to the classic New York Fold. What? You don’t fold your pizza in half? What is wrong with you? You have to fold your pizza in half or else you get sauce and cheese all over your face. Sheesh, that’s the First Law of Pizza Physics – Fold Thy Pizza. The Second Law, in case you’re interested is “If you have to eat it with a knife and fork, it’s not pizza”.

SkinnyPizza Classic - Big Flavor

The SkinnyClassic delivers on taste. The sauce is bright and bold (and that’s because they make it in-house with organic tomatoes), it comes THIS close to being overpowering but doesn’t cross the line. The cheese doesn’t do that scary non-melting thing you sometimes find with low fat cheese that makes you wonder if it’s a dairy product or a plastic. The flavor profile (I know, snobby foodie term) was exactly what you want from a classic cheese pizza just with out the calorie count. Yup, you read the card right. It says “253 Calories” and that’s for a whole slice. And not a shabby micro slice, but a real normal human sized slice.

SkinnyArugula from SkinnyPizza - BIG taste

The SkinnyArugula was the first slice I tried. HUGE flavor, the arugula adds something-something to the normal pizza experience. While it was super tasty, it was a bit hard to eat. I kept losing greens and those tasty little cherry tomatoes kept popping off and shooting across the store. Classy. Maybe salad on my pizza is beyond my hand-eye coordination skills. And salad pizza does break the first two Laws of Pizza Physics. Tasty, but hard to eat.

SkinnyBuffalo - I could eat this every day

OK, I won’t lie. I had a second slice and seriously considered a third slice of the SkinnyBuffalo. Yeah, I know, this breaks like 47 Laws of Pizza Physics but Holy Handbags Batman, this was crazy delicious. It was like eating a plate of the best buffalo wings you’ve ever had without the messy fingers and the morning-after regret. The chicken chunks were chunks. I mean CHUNKS. Look at it, those little chicken jewels, they’re moist and dipped in some crazy sauce that comes close to being too spicy but is just perfect with the blue cheese sprinkled on top. I know this was not a classic pizza but man, I seriously could eat this every day.

Pasta at SkinnyPizza

Just so you know, SkinnyPizza also does pasta, which I did not try. I mean, seriously, after two slices, OK FINE, three slices, I was getting the food woozies and couldn’t contemplate the choices. SkinnyPizza offers whole wheat and gluten free pasta options with their house-made sauces. Which is really good news as gluten-free anything is hard to come by locally. And topped with SkinnyPizza’s bold sauce, I know I’ll be back to try some. Check out their menu for salad, wraps and soups!

There was a secret hidden surprise at SkinnyPizza which, by itself will have me back at SkinnyPizza again and again…

Boylan Soda at SkinnyPizza - Best soda ever

Boylan Soda. I am not a huge soda fan but if I had a Boylan soda fountain in my house, I would never leave, I’d bathe in it, put it in my coffee and morning cereal. I discovered Boylan years ago and it’s hard to find and I’ve never seen it in anything but glass bottles. Boylan uses actual sugar, not corn syrup, in their beverages which gives them this crisp sweetness that is remarkable and distinctive. The diet black cherry is like a sparkling dessert. It’s that good.

Tasty and calorie conscious food should be enough to get you in the door but what the company stands for will keep you coming back. The owners and creators of SkinnyPizza are childhood friends and grew up in and around the restaurant industry. When they started having families, they started getting really interested in what ingredients were going into the food their families were eating. SkinnyPizza uses organic and all natural ingredients where ever possible and source suppliers that are hormone and antibiotic free. And they want you to know what you’re eating too and “we want you to have a second slice!” one of the owners said to me. Scanning their menu you’ll see calorie counts, notes as to what’s organic and hormone-free and even the fiber count of the pasta. Who does that? Apparently, SkinnyPizza does. OH and they do have Weight Watcher’s Points Plus values for most menu items if you ask.

Green SkinnyPizza

SkinnyPizza also uses as much recycled and green products as possible. I wish I grabbed a shot of the beverage cups, as they looked just like regular plastic cups but were made from plant based materials. The menus are printed with soy-based ink on recycled paper.

So, you’ve read this far and now I want you to do something. Here’s the problem. There are only 2 SkinnyPizza locations - Roslyn Heights and Garden City (Roosevelt Field Mall). Go to the SkinnyPizza Facebook Page, tell them you want a SkinnyPizza in YOUR neighborhood. Trust me, you’re skinny jeans will thank you.

Four years ago as the Olympics were approaching, there were endless media stories about Michael Phelps, the swimmer, and his 12,000 calorie diet. People were like “Of course he can eat like that, he’s working out so much.” But when you do the calorie math, it just doesn’t make sense.

So, an active, average man burns about 3,000 calories just being alive. And an hour of pretty intense swimming burns about 450 calories an hour. That would mean to burn off all those calories, Phelps would be spending 20 hours a day working out at high intensity levels. That just doesn’t make sense.

Then I read Tim Ferriss’ “4 Hour Body” where an engineer suggests that it’s not the physical activity that allows Michael to eat that much, it’s the fact that he spends so much time in the water.

That makes sense if you think about it. When you’re in the pool, your body is working to warm yourself up and the water around you, not to mention the physical exertion you go through.

Now, The 4 Hour Body is chock full full of crazy nonsense. Seriously. It was an amusing read but for me, I’m not willing “experiment” on myself to that extent.

I am however, willing to test out new theories and ideas and see if they make sense for me.

OMG? or freaking nuts?

Like the cold bath idea. I’m reading another book right now called “Six Weeks to OMG” and it recommends a regimen of cold baths every morning. Recently, I’ve been indulging in bubble baths that are on the cool side. NYC is great for many things, but summers can be brutal, especially when you live on an upper floor of a building. When it gets hot, it’s just hot and there is no way to escape the heat. I’ve been enjoying cool baths lately as a way to unwind and get my head on straight, and cool off.

So when I read about the Skinny Dip in OMG my brain started turning it over. Could 10 minutes in a cold bath really help you lose weight? Only one way to tell, and that is to test it out.

The author recommends a bath that’s 69degrees. That is CRAZYPANTS cold. Seriously. It’s cold. I started off at 80 degrees this morning and that was rough. There are some other really radical things this author suggests, that I’m going to write more about later.

There are tons of kind of wacky things out there that people do in the name of weight loss and fitness – Food combining, cranberry pills, carbo-loading, pole dancing, just to name a few. I once had a nutritionalist recommend orgasms as a way to end late night cravings. I won’t comment if that tip was successful or not.

So the question remains – What wacky things are you willing to give a try to get to the weight you want?

I’m terrible about keeping files all tidy and organized, especially photos. I have a tendency to drop files in one folder and then sort through them at a later date. And I actually do that, but not as often as I should. A few times a year I purge old computer files and ditch pictures that aren’t good or I just don’t need… During said purge, I stumbled across this little beauty…

They like me! They really like me! Thanks Larabar

I totally forgot that Larabar sent me a little surprise gift of their new line of Uberbars. I hooked up with Larabar at a blogging conference and I have to say, they are very good to bloggers. Every now and then I’ve gotten a little gift box from Larabar and it always makes my day. Just finding this picture made my day.

And the bars? Are they tasty? They sure are. The Apple one tastes very much like apple pie crumble with big nutty chunks and everything. They say they are “sweet and salty” and to be honest, I didn’t really experience the salty part. They just tasted sweet. I have to say however, I do prefer the original Larabars. It’s a texture thing. I really love that super dense chew of the original bars.