I’m oh-so-fickle when it comes to diets.  I’ll vascillate from one to another, never finding one that truly satisfies me long-term.  One of my biggest problems with dieting is that I have a raging sweet tooth.  I have a hard time eating foods in strictly measured amounts – for instance, if a two-inch square of cake equals x number of points – I’ll readily cheat by telling myself, “Oh, a three-inch square isn’t that much bigger, so it won’t really matter.”  That type of thinking invariably leads me to failure.  On the other hand, I can’t stay with diets that are TOO strict, such as the ones that require you to eat carrot sticks at 2 PM and radishes at 4 PM, or whatever. 

Several years ago, I learned of a diet called the 3-Apple-A-Day Plan while shopping for apples at Sam’s Club in Parkersburg, West Virginia.  Sam’s sells everything in large quantities, and nearly every 10-pound bag of apples in their produce section had a sticker that advertised the 3-Apple-A-Day Plan.  My curiosity was piqued, so when I got home, I did some research about the Plan on the Internet.  

I learned that Tammi Flynn is the nutrition director at Gold’s Gym in Wenatchee, Washington, and in a nutshell, she discovered that clients who ate an apple before every meal were shedding pounds like crazy.  Some people lost as much as 30 pounds in three months.  Well, I like apples, and I wanted to have results like that, so I bought Ms. Flynn’s bookat our local Wal-Mart.

Being the flake that I am, however, I followed the plan for a day or two, then promptly regressed into my old (bad) habits.  The 3-Apple-A-Day Plan ended up in my stack of unread books, and when I was downsizing last year, I even tried to sell it at the V-100 yard sale in Charleston.  Fortunately, the book didn’t have any takers and it ended up coming back home with me.  I decided to just hang onto it for awhile.   

The book surfaced again recently, so I decided to give the plan a more serious try.  Last Thursday, I followed the 1800 calorie meal plan from the book.  I wasn’t hungry all day, so yesterday I figured I could go with even less calories and I used the 1500 calorie plan, but I cheated last night and impulsively ate a Kashi oatmeal raisin cookie for an additional 130-or-so calories.  I really could have done without the cookie, though, since the apples seem to be curbing my cravings for sweets for the most part. 

My apple of choice is the Pink Lady, because it’s so crisp and tangy-sweet.  My second favorite is the Granny Smith, with Gala running a close third.  I must confess that I have a strange quirk about apples, though — I don’t like to eat them whole, out of hand.  I always feel like the apple is all over my face once I’ve finished eating it.  So, I always slice them up.  

At any rate, I hope I can stick with this diet for awhile and make it work.         

The kids and I met some homeschool friends at the Clay Center in Charleston last night to see a live performance of Charlotte Bronte’s Gothic classic, Jane Eyre.  The play lasted 2 hours and 35 minutes (including a 15 minute intermission), but it was so enjoyable that the time flew by quickly.

The play wasn’t held in the main theater of the Clay Center, where we’ve seen every performance — musical as well as theatrical — to date.  Instead, Jane Eyre was performed in a small, rather intimate area, almost in the basement of the Clay Center.  There were only a few rows of seats for the audience, directly in front of and to one side of the stage, so that everyone was only a short distance away from the action.

What confused me at first was that only a handful of actors and actresses were in the play, so that most everyone (except Jane and Rochester) played multiple roles.  For instance, Jane’s cousin, John Reed, was played by the same actor who played one of the teachers at Lowood School, in the next scene.  I wondered how Jane could bite John’s arm, and then end up having him as her teacher.  

Bertha Mason, Rochester’s deranged wife, was played by an actress who had the thickest, longest, most wavy head of carrot red hair I’ve ever seen.  While she was locked in the attic, she flung that red hair in every direction in a maniacal fashion that seemed quite credible.

As always, I’m amazed that theatrical performers are able to memorize so many lines, particularly for such a lengthy play.

Peter and Caroline have been taking riding lessons for a couple of months, and both are enjoying the experience.  I’ve lately been thinking about getting a horse, even though I know I’m not quite ready to embark on a commitment of that magnitude just yet.  Horses are expensive, not to mention time-consuming, and I want to make sure the kids are really interested in riding before I seriously pursue the idea of horse ownership.  In the meantime, though, I can still dream!   

As I was surfing the Internet the other day, I inadvertently ran across some articles on horse slaughter.  I guess I’d never really thought about what happens to older horses, ones who are no longer wanted as family pets or show horses, injured racehorses, or even young, healthy horses that don’t make the cut in racing.  What I learned was truly gruesome, and I can’t believe our government isn’t doing something to stop it ASAP.     

Although the remaining three horse slaughterhouses in the United States (two in Texas, one in Illinois) are now closed, mostly due to public outrage that resulted in legislative action, thousands of horses continue to be sold to “kill buyers” at livestock auctions for outrageously low prices ($100 to $500), and they are then shipped to Mexico and Canada for slaughter under truly appalling and primitive conditions.  The horsemeat is then sold in countries like Belgium, France, and Japan, where diners pay as much as $20 per pound for what they consider a “delicacy.” 

Horse rescue organizations throughout the United States are working on shoestring budgets to outbid the kill buyers at livestock auctions and rescue as many horses as they can from this horrible fate.  Since many of the horses that wind up in slaughterhouses are ex-racehorses, my search on the Internet led me to several organizations that offer retired Thoroughbred and Standardbred racehorses for adoption.  One place, which has two locations in Ohio, is called New Vocations.  Another, located right here in West Virginia, is called Crossed Sabers. 

Now I’m thinking that if we get a horse someday, I would really like to consider a Standardbred ex-racehorse.  In the meantime, I’ve been busying myself looking at the photos and reading the profiles of horses they have available.      

Jeff’s Appliances called yesterday to advise that the new glide for our LG front loader dryer had finally come in.  The secretary said the repairman would call us today between 8 and 8:30 AM to say what time he’d be here to fix it.

I woke up early this morning, and decided to finish an editing job while I was waiting on the repairman to call.  He finally called at 9:15 AM, and said he expected to get here between 11 AM and 1 PM.

I promptly left for the gym, so that I could get in an hour of exercise before the repairman was expected to arrive.  When I got home at 10:45 AM, he was already here and working on the dryer.  About 45 minutes later, he advised Alexander that the drum inside the dryer is cracked and will need to be replaced.  Of course, they’ll have to order the part and return to install it at a later date. 

I was seeing $$$$$$ signs, but the repairman thinks our dryer may still be under warranty.  Hopefully, that will be the case when Jeff’s Appliances looks up the purchase date.  In the meantime, he put the dryer back together and installed the new glide, which will at least put a stop that dreadful thumping noise whenever I’m drying a load of clothes.  Normally, our LG is a very quiet dryer (that’s one of the reasons we bought it, since Alexander’s home office is adjacent to our utility room), but it’s been extremely noisy due to that broken glide.