Day 6! Day 6!

Dinner last night went smashingly. I told my friend to bring chips and salsa, which kept him and my Hub happy, and we made a slightly updated version of my Mexican Rice recipe and a salad with homemade yogurt-based dressing. Because the idea was to teach my buddy how to cook, so that between him and his boyfriend SOMEONE knows how to cook in that household, he hung out in the kitchen as I explained everything I was doing. He's a vegetarian and always looking for more ways to increase his protein intake, so when I sheepishly pulled out the unflavored whey powder he completely flipped out. "They MAKE stuff like that? Why didn't anybody tell me?"

It turns out that adding unflavored whey powder to canned diced tomatoes and Boca Ground makes something that smells astonishingly like pizza. Whoa. Next time I might just have to throw in some Italian seasonings, throw in some bulgur wheat and extra mushrooms. Experiments are good.

My buddy is all for me doing BFL. Bless his little heart, it was nice to hear that.

Also of the good: I've just made it through the second of the office food-based functions in two days. Didn't eat a thing. Claimed to have upset tummy. Apparently "I'm not hungry" isn't a valid excuse; people must always push. Grrr. On the up side, all I have to do now is deal with dinner and meal 6, avoid drinking or munching popcorn while we watch the new Star Wars movie, go to bed, and wake up on Day 7: Free Day. Hot damn.

I'm not going to go overboard tomorrow. Keep it in moderation. Remain calm. Relax.

I love knowing how many days I've been on BFL. I am completely enamored with my PDA software, which kindly beeps at me when it's time for me to eat a meal, which will time my rest periods during my weight-liftin' workouts and kindly display the next exercise I'm supposed to do (and how many reps, and how much weight). I love knowing when my next meal is, and what I will eat. I love working my ass off first thing in the morning and having my breakfasts already prepared and merely in need of a re-heat.

I am not, however, very fond of the idea of explaining this situation to most of the people in my life. I'm pretty sure that it is going to take a lot more explanation and dismissing of myths than I really feel like dealing with right now.

Like I've said, the majority of my friends are overweight. About half of them are on WeightWatchers right now, although considering what I've been hearing lately, a few of them may have become disenchanted with their lack of progress and fallen off the wagon. And, like I've also said, exercise is not their thing.

(As if it's ANYONE's thing at first. As if the enjoyment and the energy comes first and they have to wait for that to spontaneously appear before exercise can have a place in their lives.)

I'm just so very tired of talking food and diet with them. The closest I can get to a real conversation there is my one friend who's following the WW Core program-- she, at least, is keen on the lean protein/whole grains/fruits & veggies/REAL FOOD idea, not just searching for the next low-calorie fix. Everyone else, though-- dear God, you'd think that the ultimate plan was to make it so that we could eat continually without any calories entering our bodies at all. They put a lot of thought into the fat on their bodies and give no thought to the rest.

(Maybe that's where the key is. The more I concentrate on nutrition beyond fat & calories, the more this becomes about my health and muscles and the less it becomes about my remaining spots of flabbitude. Hrm.)

I'm excited about doing BFL, and really enjoying my discovery of the lovely effects of protein, and I have a lot to chatter about, and I feel like BFL would be an awesome program for some of my friends who have gotten stuck at a certain level on WW and just despaired. I just don't want to talk about it with them, because I don't want to deal with the stubborn push-back.

I might be able to sell them on the diet part. It's the exercise that they'll balk at. These women don't want to sweat and they don't like the idea of weights. I know everyone has to go at their own pace with these things, and there's no way that pushing would help, so fine, whatever-- it's just that it frustrates me so much that there's so much here that could help them, so much more than severely restricting their calories. Calorie restriction is all well and good, but it's like they think it's the only thing they have to worry about, and... well, there's only so hard you can squeeze your body on calories, so if something's not working you can bet the answer is not to squeeze harder.

Argh. Anyway, that rant brought to you by the fact that I have to spend Saturday with all of them, which means I'm going to be surrounded by the "this has barely any calories in at all, YAY" talk and I'm annoyed by it in advance.