Monday

My goal for the weekend was to spend a large chunk of time outdoors, working in the garden. Sleep Friday night was awful, so I spent Saturday reading (and eating - ugh!), but Sunday, exhaustion from Saturday provided nice restful sleep and I got cracking. Got a lot done, actually, both days. Such as:

• made salad dressings
  
• started a new crock of sauerkraut (the original one succumbed to mold while we were in Phoenix)
  
• cut out 2 skirts to be sewn this week during evenings, I think
  
• rigged up my drip irrigation system for the garden boxes
  
• cleaned out the rose garden, mostly (my back finally complained so bitterly that 2 roses remain unpruned)
  
• restrung the back yard clotheslines which were cracking
  
• finished a Victorian novel
  

That was the activity for the weekend; I certainly feel like I accomplished a lot. I'm also hugely sore - in weird places. Like my big toes and the tops of my feet and quadriceps muscles that don't normally hurt. I'm certain that inflammation is working hard just now. Also, 157.0 this morning - part bad food choices, part hormones, part muscle aches. Here's yesterday:

• tea with cream
  
• scrambled eggs
  
• bacon
  
• stupid chocolate blueberries (way too much)
  
• cheese
  
• strawberries
  
• salad with blue cheese dressing
  
• bean salad (White Fence Farm for dinner)
  
• cottage cheese
  
• one half of a small corn fritter
  
• turkey breast
  
• a forkful of dressing
  
• minor amounts of cranberry sauce
  
• walnuts
  

I do think I mostly did okay at dinner; they have a "low carb" option there which I ordered. The problem is, if everyone else at the table orders the regular meal, the fun salad options are still there and available. So I had about half a cup of the kidney bean salad, which I am paying for today a bit. It's very tasty.

As for the stupid chocolate blueberries, I have finished the container; there is another one, but I am not going to be the one to open it. Really, considering that we are nominally Paleo eaters, it's astonishing how much candy is in the pantry right now - the blueberries, dark chocolate bars with and without almonds, chocolate covered coconut chunks (these are actually rather nasty and I am going to get rid of them), chocolate coconut covered almonds, TJ's dark chocolate almonds, milk-chocolate covered macadamia nuts, pralines, liqueur filled chocolates. Insane. We also have an entire shelf filled with jelly - that's a leftover from when we ate bread, but since much of it was homemade (by me), I've kept it for sentimental reasons. Think it's time to get rid of it, as well. Guess I have a project for next weekend.

For what it's worth, I hit my NikePlus goal shortly after noon yesterday - gardening racks up the points, apparently. And I'm not done at all; that was just one area, partly cleaned up. More to come this coming weekend, and maybe some evenings, now that the weather is cooperating more.

Finally, I've adjusted the menopause meds - just using the progesterone cream right now, twice a day, to see if it will work alone, now that I've realized (via research) that it is the "bio-identical hormones" I once thought I would try. Unfortunately, I don't seem to be seeing results. I'm going to give it the week, and if it does nothing, will stop and switch to just the herbal capsules for a week. But I'm starting to think that the main ingredient in both seems to be snake oil.