Day 4 - January 4, 2014 - a trip to Broadway

Starting weight - unknown - scale is officially dead.  ARGH.  Gotta get some batteries, although it may be nice not weighing in EVERY DAY.
Total weight loss - unknown

Breakfast/lunch - Leftover grilled chicken (no sauce) with carrots, broccoli and a little cous cous.

Now let's talk about the rest of the day . . . . . . . For Christmas, Kristyn got us tickets to see Newsies on Broadway (which was awesome by the way) and some restaurant.com coupons for dinner and drinks.  The issue with these is that you HAVE to spend a certain amount of money to use them.  Please keep this in mind.  It was a gift, and we had to spend a certain amount of money in order to use the coupons.

Playwright Celtic Pub - had 1 drink - Captain and Diet Coke.

Dinner - Traffic Bar and Grill - 48th and 9th - NYC

• Appetizer - we SPLIT Fried Mac & Cheese.  
• Meal -  got the only thing outside of a salad that was even functional. A Grilled Chicken Sandwich with bacon and BBQ sauce.  Got fries with it.  Here's the thing. . . . . . . . . . I know its easy to say "have a salad."  I am not against getting a salad.  I get salad at cresskill Pizza often when I'm eating healthier.  I make salads at home and bring them for lunch.  The issue is that i do not like the lettuce in most salads at restaurants.  I like the tasteless, healthless iceberg lettuce, crispy, light in color, thick, etc.  I do not like the other lettuce, at all.  And salads at restaurants have NOTHING that i like in it, so I am not spending $15 on a special shrimp salad just so i can pick out the shrimp to eat and leave everything else on the plate.  I will eat house salad as a pre-dinner thing, sure, with the right dressing - red wine vinegar or French dressing.  So, unfortunately, the healthiest option was the grilled chicken, which came with fries or mashed potatoes.
• Dessert - we split the hot fudge brownie and fried oreos.  (the only other option was cheesecake.)
• Drinks - 2 bud lites and a fair amount of water.

Ok, go ahead - destroy me if you want.  We had to spend $75 and go figure, this was a fairly priced restaurant in the heart of NYC.  We could have had our 2 meals with a drink each and then we would have only spent $40.  We had to spend the other $35, so we got an extra round of drinks, and app, and the dessert.  What would you have done?  Really?

Here is the good part of the rest of the night:

• Turned down a candy and soda snack at intermission of the show
• decided against going to the bar after show for unnecessary drinks.  I was still kind of full from dinner and felt like I would just be drinking for the sake of drinking.  
• Came home and avoided all food for rest of the night.

So far, on this 4 days of living with my new "rules," i can not say that I have made every right choice.  I can't say that I have done everything right.  I can say that I certainly have cut out a LOT of extra food and drink, driven past Dunkin Donuts multiple times and avoided it like the plague, turned down McDonalds, had salad, eaten 7 nice healthy meals at home (including homecooked breakfast every day,) and avoided red bull/soda/other unnecessary liquids. Remember, I am trying to do something I can keep up for the long-run.  I'm not looking to "diet" in an unrealistic way that will just make me blow up again in weight when i falter.  That is what i am constantly guilty of, the YO-YO Diet. . . . . lose 10, gain 9.  Lose 15, Gain 18.  Lose 5, Gain 6.  etc.  I usually lose 8-10 pounds the first week, and then gain it all back, because i don't last more than a week.  This time, I am going to take it slow and steady.  Realistic.  Successful.

Verderese - OUT