A Challenging Friday

I was faced today with the usual two challenges, exercise and diet, but in much stronger degrees.  Challenge one came when I went out to lunch with my family at a wonderful restaurant situated along the Cape Fear river.  All week I've been eating clean, but I'd been to this restaurant many times before and had already worked out my battle plan of what I was going to order.  No problems then right?

Wrong.  My grilled tuna and side salad came out just delightful, but also along for the ride was an old tempting enemy:

There they were, french fries, in all their crispy, salty deliciousness.  Let me say this: I love french fries. Back in the bad old days, they were a normal staple in my diet, and today they called to me.  Since I've changed my ways, I've been in this situation before and how I avoided temptation was to simply sweep them off of my plate onto another plate and move that other plate as far across the table as I could get it.  Today I felt I was strong enough to avoid them.  I resolved to go through the whole meal eating only my tuna and salad, with one of my biggest temptations there in front of me, and not eat a single one.   I guess I was testing myself, and here's how it turned out:

 

Tuna gone. Salad gone.  Every fry still intact.  Jenn: 1. Fries: 0.

The day's challenges were not over yet.  Because of the holiday weekend, work was letting out at 3pm.  Because I went out to lunch, I was faced with working out after work, alone with my music as everyone else was beating quick tracks out of there.   Motivation was waning.  Enter Lakshmi.  My wonderful friend agreed to join me in the gym and said I was motivating her to go as well.

However, at 3 when I went to her office to gather her up for our workout, I could tell her desire to exercise was fading.  So was mine.  I was ready to get out of there and let the weekend begin.  Sinking down into a chair in her office, I said, "Laks, I don't want to do this."  She grimaced and said, "I don't either." We looked at each other like two kids contemplating skipping school.

Then I said, "We need to go.  Come on let's get it done."  She agreed and said, "We are in training.  We can't skip."  Together, we went to the gym and got things done. Because that's whatcha gotta do to get results.