As you know, I started this blog  with the intent of focusing on recovery.  But as of late, I’m not feeling all that brave, especially after recent events, and more especially because I’m just coming off a two-day food bender, and subsequently have gained two freaking @Q#(#@$(#@* pounds, which will take me four weeks and a blowtorch to undo. IF I’M LUCKY.

*insert a few more expletives.  Colorful, vibrant, grandmother-shocking expletives. 

UGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGH

Transitioning from a full-on binge to “normal” (read: diet.  re-read:  not) eating is tough.  Your body is coming off its sugar high, and the afterburn sends mixed messages to your brain.  And by “mixed” I mean that every voice inside your head, along with a few it’s recruited from the outside, are SCREAMING at you to EAT EAT EAT EAT.

Blah.

Two f(#@*F&G** pounds.

**More expletives, please.  Get creative, peeps!  Use your favorites as noun, verb, and adjective. 

So, while I’m sitting on my hands trying not to stuff my face with both Ben and Jerry, I’ll leave you with some of the other random thoughts in my head.

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A few days ago, Nikki at The Undiagnosed Warrior was kind enough to nominate me for the Encouraging Thunder award.  Now, Nikki is an amazing young woman who has been dealing with a debilitating illness – the cause of which has continued to evade many trained medical professionals.  Ya gotta be brave to face chronic illness day after day; that’s true tenfold when your illness doesn’t have a name.  So if you need a story of perseverance and determination, check out her blog!

DA RULZ:

When you get this award, you can:

• Post it and the logo on your blog
• Pay it forward by nominating others

You cannot:

• Abuse or misuse the logo
• Claim the logo is your own

If you receive the award you should:

• Give thanks via comments and likes in the blog of the person nominating you
• Mention the person who nominated you in your award blog
• Discuss your purpose in blogging in your award blog

I feel a bit like I’m cheating, because I actually won this award before.  But the rules don’t SAY only one per participant.  Not that this would stop me.  If I can scarf through an eight-serving bag of popcorn in one sitting, do you think I’m gonna even blink at a “limit one per customer” rule?

If you’re still not sure, ask the demonstrators at Costco how many Bailey’s truffles I scored last weekend.

Wait.  On second thought? Don’t.  I don’t think we need, like, an actual NUMBER here.  Never mind.

So anyway.  You can read about why I started this blog here.  Essentially, I was taking a wild stab at recovery.

As I mentioned above, though….these past two days were bad.

Very, very bad.

This weekend, ice cream and dill pickle popcorn were my binge foods of choice – namely, because I had them in the house. See, that’s how binges normally work:

Step 1:  I buy groceries like a normal person, taking time to select items that actually sound good.  (Side note:  I know the experts say never to shop when you’re hungry…but if I don’t, I won’t actually BUY anything.  I have to shop when I’m physically hungry, or I leave the store with new makeup instead of anything I can actually eat.  And if I don’t buy food that looks appetizing, it just sits about my pantry like ugly wedding gifts, and I just won’t ever get around to using it.)

Step 2:  I fall off the wagon and binge-eat a certain food item (or items.  Yeah.  More like items.)

Step 3:  I CAN NEVER BUY THAT FOOD AGAIN because I will eat it all in one frenzied nonstop session like there’s a prize at the bottom and getting it is my JOB.

This is why I can’t buy stuff like frozen pizza, ice cream, pudding, cookies, chocolate peanut butter, kettle corn, potato chips, anything from Culver’s, or cereal.

Especially cereal.

Cereal is the WORST.

One time?  I ate an entire fifteen-ounce box of Peanut Butter Puffins.  IN ONE AFTERNOON.  (Note to self.  Do NOT eat whilst Facebooking.  It’s trouble.  Especially when peanut butter anything is involved.)

And don’t let’s pretend “well, at least this is HEALTHY food,” mmmkay?  Because the second ingredient is – guess what? – SUGAR.  And the box is SUPPOSED TO FEED FIFTEEN PEOPLE.  That’s 1,650 calories of cereal, folks.  (And it wasn’t even the only thing I ate that day.  NOT EVEN CLOSE.)

So at the tail end of my dill-pickle popcorn binge, I was watching the Patriots totally SPANK the Cowboys, and between plays they announced that Jason Witten (tight end, Dallas) now has his own breakfast cereal.

(The stars were not so lucky on Sunday.  BOOYAH.  SUCK IT COWBOYS.)

So as I’m sitting there on the sofa, crashing rapidly from my sugar rush face-first into a carb coma, I started thinking about other cereals the NFL could market.

And they sounded…kinda dirty.

(Just in time, too, since apparently you can’t get your jollies from the pictures in Playboy anymore.)

What do you think?  Would you buy any of these?  Tape them to your face, go long, and not stop until someone calls a personal foul?

In Chicago:  Cutler’s Crispy Bits

New England:  Brady’s Frosted Patriot Power Os 

Denver:  Peyton’s Protein Clusters

Pittsburgh:  Big Ben’s Marshmallow Poofs

Seattle:  Wilson’s Brown Sugar Nut Toasties

I can’t say any of these splits MY uprights, exactly.

Yum, yum.  Guten appetit!

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For this award, I’ll nominate a2eternity, adjustremembered, and wehaveapples.  Thank you, ladies, for saying some of the many things that need to be said!