I'm really cheating here, because this a copy of a comment I posted on my brother's blog, but I have to give mad props to this restaurant:

Oh my God. We ate at the most evil, horrible restaurant Saturday night! I took my husband and brother-in-law out for their birthdays, and we went downtown to Texas de Brazil, a Brazilian grill house right next to the famous Peabody Hotel. This is the most unbelievable place. It is a set-price restaurant, and there are no menus. You pay about $40 per person (I think it was about $43). There is a huge salad bar in the middle of the restaurant with 40+ items on it, from sushi to artichoke hearts to black beans and rice to pasta to the biggest wheel of cheese I've ever seen. After you've gorged on the salad bar (which was awesome but I should have just skipped altogether), you take a deep breath and flip over a little red circular piece of plastic next to your plate, to the green side. Within moments an army of "gauchos" armed with skewers of all different sorts of meat and wickedly sharp knives show up at your table. They just wander around the room until someone flips over their little card, and then they pounce. They offer you their skewer, and if it has something on it you want to try, they just slice off a hunk and drop it onto your plate, or if it is something smaller they can just slide it off the end of the skewer. Filet mignon, leg of lamb, barbecued pork ribs, grilled chicken, shrimp, flank steak, parmesan pork tenderloin, Brazilian sausage, lamb shank, it just goes on and on. You take what you want, flip your card back to red to stop the insanity, and start eating. (They also put garlic mashed potatoes, fried polenta, and fried carmelized bananas at the table to cleanse your palate between the different cuts of meat.) When your plate is clear, you can flip your card back over and it all starts again. My God. And the hostess had the indecency to ask if we wanted dessert. Actually, both of the guys got dessert (it was free since it was their birthdays) and brought it home. My brother-in-law managed to eat his turtle cheesecake the same night (must be great to have a 19-year-old metabolism), and my husband consumed his carrot cake last night. It was fantastic. And best of all, despite my fear that this would be a diet-train wreck, I didn't gain any weight! Oh yes, the night after we ate I was several pounds heavier than before dinner, but that was actually food weight. Last night (after a day of kayaking, i must add--great exercise!) I was half a pound lighter than I was prior to dinner Saturday night. Whoo hoo!

After traveling this weekend for family purposes, I was struck by my husband's and my musical choices for driving. As we listened to the same CDs over and over, it occured to me that there are certain albums that I automatically associate with driving. There are albums that I use for long trips, albums I use for quick runs to the store, and albums I can listen to wherever, whenever, repeatedly. I do listen to a lot of comedy albums when driving for long hours, because the talking seems to help keep me awake. But musically, the best long trip albums are

*Songs You Know By Heart-Jimmy Buffet
*Greatest Hits Vol. I and II-The Eagles (I know these are two separate albums, but I think of them as one single album)
*Road Rage-Great Big Sea
*Hybrid Theory-Linkin Park
*Gordon-Barenaked Ladies
*Reunion-The Clancy Brothers and Tommy Makem
*Recollection-Concrete Blonde
*The Essential Johnny Cash-Johnny Cash
*Greatest Hits-Journey
*Black Album-Metallica
*Best Shots-Pat Benatar
*Primer-Rockapella

Frustrated.

I need to vent a little, more for myself than for the benefit of interesting reading. I'm in my sixth month of my attempted weight loss, and the past six weeks or so have been a total stand-still. I need to organize my thoughts and make public what my problems are so that I can better deal with them.

Since about February or so I have seriously lost motivation as far as working out. Originally, in November and December, and even January, I was doing pretty well with my workouts. I was working out every morning, either swimming or cruising on the elliptical machine at the gym. Most days I also made time for a second workout, again either swimming, doing some other form of cardio, or lifting weights. But my schedule changed at the end of February. Instead of staying at work until the late afternoon and then heading to the pool to swim before practice (I was still in the midst of swim season at the time), my lacrosse practices were scheduled right after school, meaning I could go home in the evening. I used my downtime during swim season wisely, getting my grading done so I didn't have anything to take home with me. I felt less guilty then, and was able to fit my second workout in without any problems. But since my schedule changed, I lost the time right after school to grade (and I'm notoriously bad about using my free periods during school for constructive purposes), so I always have work to take home with me. That makes me feel guilty because I don't have the time to spend with my husband. So instead of heading to the gym after lacrosse practice, I'm tempted to skip the gym and head home so I can grade some papers before my husband arrives. The other afternoon problem is that my husband and I don't really LIKE working out, and we're kind of enablers for each other. If one of us calls the other one before we get to the gym, we can usually talk each other out of working out, and then we just go home (or worse, go out to eat).

This problem with my afternoon workouts has been compounded by a morning workout problem in the past few weeks. The time change killed me. Under the best of circumstances I was getting up at 4, walking the dog, and then going to the gym from 5-6 a.m. But since the time change, I haven't been to the gym ONCE in the mornings. Every time that alarm goes off, I just roll over, turn it off, and turn on my secondary alarm. I've been able to justify it: you know, the time change makes it feel like I'm getting up at 3, so I'll just give it a week and then I'll be used to it; I've had a really bad cold the past two weeks and I just can't shake it; I haven't been sleeping well because I'm fighting a pillow problem that gives me headaches, so when it goes away I'll go to the gym again. Needless to say, I've justified myself right into a serious workout drought.

The workout problems alone are enough to cause my plateau in weight loss. But my eating habits are a problem, too. Since we started this weight loss program, I've been bringing my food to school. I eat those Healthy Choice soups for lunch, and I keep 100 calorie snacks around, like those little gummy fruit snacks, or yogurt, or sugar-free pudding, or granola bars, or those mini microwave popcorn bags, or raisins, or applesauce; I was doing pretty well at consuming about 700 calories before dinner. So I could have another bowl of soup, or actually pick something up on the way to swim practice, and be around 1200 calories for the day, which was helping my weight loss. But recently, since I've started lacrosse, instead of eating something small and low calorie for dinner on my way to the gym, I've been going out for dinner (we like to cook, but we're super-lazy, and the restaurant cooks stuff for you, isn't that nice?) or cooking at home. And a big problem I have is PORTION CONTROL. I have a binge-eating personality (which has caused me problems in the past); I'm not good at self-control with food. If there is an open bag of Oreos, I won't just eat one or two; I'll eat nine or ten, and I could easily eat the whole bag if left to my own devices. At restaurants, I eat whatever I order. I don't bother to box it up and take it home, or just leave the leftovers on the plate; I'll eat everything I'm given. At home I have the same problem. We always make more food than we need to eat in one sitting, but instead of packing it up in tupperware and loading it in the refrigerator, my husband and I will split whatever it is into two portions, and he'll eat one and I'll eat the other. This means a bag of frozen ravioli that is supposed to serve six will only serve two. So the ravioli that seemed healthy enough at 270 calories per serving suddenly becomes terribly at 810 calories. And that doesn't count the jar of spaghetti sauce we poured over them.

And my eating at work has started to suffer too. Instead of controlling myself and eating my snacks about every two hours, I'm "binging" and eating several items at once. I'll have a granola bar, and suddenly I find myself reaching for a box of raisins, and then a little bag of fruit snacks. Instead of a 100 calorie snack, I've just consumed 245 calories. If I do that every time I snack, I end up consuming over 1000 calories at work, and then of course I do what I've been doing for dinner, which puts me above my recommended intake for the day. Combine that with the not working out, and you've got what made me a fat cow in the first place.

So I am needing to refocus and remotivate myself. I can do this! I need to start working out twice a day, regardless of what that does to my free time at home. I need to get caught up on my grading and stay that way, and use my planning periods at work better, so I don't need to bring stuff home with me to eat up what little time I've got left. I need to stop my destructive eating habits before they get out of control again.

But knowing that I need to do those things and actually DOING them is the real problem. And I guess that's where I need to start. What is it about my personality that is causing me to do these things? How can I change that? I will start small: today I will try to control my eating. It is 8:10, and I've had 200 calories (yogurt in the car at 6:45, a granola bar here at work at 7:15). I will schedule one more small snack at 8:50 (I'll eat right before my next class), and then nothing until lunch at 11:15. Then I will wait until 1:30 and have another small snack, one at the end of the day before my faculty meeting, and one on the way to the gym this afternoon (no lacrosse on Wednesdays because of faculty meetings). That will give me about 800 calories. I will work out this afternoon, and I will eat a Healthy Choice meal at home, plus perhaps a yogurt for dessert. That will put me at about 1200 calories for the day, which is what is recommended for me in order to lose weight.

As for working out, I will hit the gym this afternoon. Tomorrow I have a half-day at school (gotta love working at a Catholic school during Holy Week!) so I can spend all afternoon at the gym if I want. Friday we have no school at all, so I can make several trips to the gym. When we go visit family for the Easter weekend, I need to make sure I take running clothes with me, since I won't have a gym available. I'll need to be extra careful about food, since we'll have Easter candy around, and my sister-in-law will be making garlic mashed potatoes just for me. Get thee behind me, Satan! But I can do this. I have to.

What is up with all these teachers who are sleeping with their students?

All of these women say the same thing: "He's so mature. He's more of a man than any man I've ever met. Even though he's only 13/14/15, we're in love, and I know he'll wait for me."

OK, a couple of things. I've met middle school AND high school boys. I was friends with them when I was in middle and high school, I've coached them, I've taught them, and I can tell you: NO MIDDLE OR HIGH SCHOOL BOY IS THAT MATURE. It just doesn't happen. They are interested in skateboarding and roadkill and Jackass: The Movie and calling breasts "boobs". (Note: Yes, I know there are plenty of adult males who are interested in those things, and I am not interested in those males, either.) What grown woman in her right mind would find that mature? (Note: Yes, I know, the whole point is that these women aren't in their right minds.)

If these boys are "more of a man than any man I've ever met", where the hell are these women hanging out? Other than the playground? These women desperately need to fill out an E-Harmony profile and find someone to date who is more appropriate. Really.

And as for the "he'll wait for me (until I get out of prison)", of course he'll wait for you; you were willing to have sex with him even though he was a total idiot kid. What boy wouldn't be impressed with that? Of course, as soon as the boy actually DOES grow up and mature, he'll realize that there is something seriously wrong with you for being willing to sleep with a kid, and he'll dump you for someone normal. (Note: Except for the little freak Mary Kay Letourneau slept with. And there is something not right about him anyway. Perhaps they ARE soul mates.)

What ever happened to the world where men were men, women were women, and minors who should be off-limits were minors who were off-limits?

Constantly debating the usefulness of single-sex schooling.

Having taught eighth grade at a co-ed public school, I can see the benefits of single-sex. The boys were totally distracted because the girls mature faster (mentally and physically), so the girls were all gorgeous and dressing (what I considered) inappropriately for school. Consequently the boys did what eighth grade boys do best: act like complete idiots competing for attention from girls who were totally not interested (they were interested in the high school boys, because middle school boys are like so totally immature, you know?). At a single-sex private school that requires uniforms, you don't deal with those distractions on a regular basis. The girls have no boys to impress, so they rarely worry about hair and makeup and things like that (we're lucky they shower once or twice each week). They roll out of bed, into their uniforms, put their hair up in some form of ponytail/bun/rat's nest and call it done. In class they aren't afraid of sounding too smart in front of the boys, or too dumb, or whatever, because there are no boys. It can be a really great thing.

The problem with a single-sex environment is, the girls go CRAZY when a boy is introduced into the mix in any way. Once, we had a student step in front of a MOVING BUS to try to see a boy across the street. If she hadn't been yanked back by a teacher, she'd have been a smear on the concrete. They lose whatever intelligence they have as soon as they see a boy. I can't open the mini blinds on my classroom windows because my room overlooks the area where the lower and middle schools have their recess, and the girls will actually look at and squeal about the eighth grade boys (whom they wouldn't have touched with a ten-foot pole when they were actually IN eighth grade, because middle school boys are like totally immature, you know?). It hurts my head. We had some boys from a local (single-sex private) school come as an a capella group to perform for us. Poor kids. The girls couldn't keep quiet. They kept giggling and pointing and whispering to each other. Imagine how those boys felt. Standing on a stage in front of 400 people is intimidating. Standing on a stage in front of your peers is equally so. Standing in front of all those girls, about to do something as uncool as "singing" must have been nightmarish. The girls didn't seem to understand that, since the boys were singing without music, the girls should keep quiet so they boys can hear themselves and each other. They did really well in spite of all that, but I couldn't help feeling sorry for them.

I think the lack of boys is one reason the girls do such stupid things when they are with the boys, like being promiscuous and stuff like that. They think they need to pack as much co-edness into their lives as possible when they get the chance.

So I can't decide which is better, a co-ed environment or a single-sex one. From a strictly educational standpoint, the same sex environment is great, because it is purely academic. But from a social development standpoint, it seems like more frequent CONTROLLED contact with boys might improve their uncontrolled contact with boys at other times. I don't know. Maybe I'm just old and cranky.