The long and winding road to fitness, day 16

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I hope everyone had a great holiday today.  I had to work, but it wasn’t bad.  We only had a few people working (it was a short day, closed at 6 instead of 9), but everyone had fun and got a lot of work done at the same time…nice.

I had a really good eating day, ended up eating 9 servings of fruits and veggies, more veggies than fruit (unusual for me) with my grilled veggies for dinner.

I had Patty pan squash, baby zucchini, mushrooms, sweet potato fries and a peach.  It was so delicious!!  I just may have the same thing tomorrow.

I ended the day with 1717 calories and 30 minutes of cardio (bike and walking) along with upper body strength training, 8 exercises, 2 sets of each.  One good thing about working on a holiday, I can usually manage to get in my exercise and eat fairly well whereas I’d likely eat a lot of higher calorie foods if I celebrated with friends or family.  See, there is always something positive about most situations.

So, how did everyone else do today?  Did you do anything exciting today?

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Sizzling Sixteen…summer reading fun

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Anyone who knows me well, knows I love to read.  I’ll read just about anything I can get my hands on, but I do have several authors who are my favorites.  One of those authors is Janet Evanovich.  She’s the author of the fun-to-read Stephanie Plum novels.  If you’re looking for something to stimulate you intellectually, these probably aren’t going to fit the bill.  But if you’re looking for books that will have you laughing out loud, look no further.

I’ve read the full series (with the exception of the latest, just released in hard back, seventeenth in the series.  I’ll wait until it comes out in paperback, no offense, Ms Evanovich, but I tend to be just a tad frugal.).  The book I just finished reading is Sizzling Sixteen…

Stephanie is a Jersey girl bounty hunter, although, even she would admit it, not the most adept bounty hunter in New Jersey (or anywhere else, for that matter).  She’s cute and funny, lives in a small apartment with her hamster, Rex, works for her cousin Vinnie (a bail bonds agent), is in on- again, off-again love with Morelli (a gorgeous hunk of a cop) and is in lust with the primo bounty hunter, Ranger (hot and dangerous).

In Sizzling Sixteen, Stephanie has to rescue Vinnie, who has been kidnapped and is being held for ransom until his gambling debts are paid.  Stephanie, along with her co-workers Lulu (a plus-sized former ho’ turned file clerk) and Connie (office manager and Jersey girl through and through), stumble along trying to find and rescue Vinnie.  They end up encountering an attack alligator in an apartment, big guys with big guns, explosions, car crashes (Stephanie is hell on cars..she’s destroyed more cars than I’ve owned), funny bad guys and dangerous bad guys all while consuming more than their fair share of donuts and fried chicken.  And I would be remiss if I didn’t mention the underlying sexual tension between Stephanie and both Morelli and Ranger…whew, hard for a girl to choose between those two…

I don’t want to give anything away…suffice it to say, there were times I was laughing aloud at the antics of Stephanie and Lulu.  And that’s just the escape I’m looking for during the hot, sizzling days of summer…

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