Countdown to the New Year

 

I want to be recycled, too.

Three days left in 2022!

The Prisoner was late celebrating Boxing Day.  But this time I got his photo in the act!

Wednesday afternoon it was a balmy 45℉.  The snow was melting, sidewalks were wet, not icy.  Kid sis Ace and I went for a walk through my neighborhood after she got off work.

We played catch-up on family news, as we do, and we had a couple of weeks to catch up, since LAST Wednesday it was just too blasted cold and windy to walk outdoors.  I'm grateful for every time we get a good walk in during the Winter months.

I made progress on two of my reading projects on Wednesday, too.  I'm now in the chapter about the sense of sight in An Immense World. The creature that fascinated me most in today's reading was the scallop.  For those of you who didn't grow up at the shore, and were not exposed to the Shell Oil symbol, these are the sea-creatures with the scalloped shell (funny how the shape is named after them).

The scallop, says the book, has eyes, inside the shell, at the edges.  These eyes can detect light and motion, and the scallop, alerted by these eyes (from a dozen to thirty or more, depending on the scallop), extends little tentacles to smell whatever it was that alerted it.

The senses of the scallop are used for feeding and identifying predators from which it needs to flee, by swimming away, opening and closing its shell. My imagination went off on that one, imagining the shell looking like an eyelid, closing to shut the eyes and opening to see if the threat was evaded.

The other book I made progress on was Fast. Feast. Repeat.  Very interesting read, simplified for those who don't want to delve quite as deeply into the science underlying the concept, but to at least be exposed to some of the studies that have been done.  I'm not going to gush too much about it, as this is one of those things you just have to be ready for.  

I know there are some fellow Spark refugees who got there long before I did!  I remember JEANKNEE when she discovered research on leptin (related).  I remember WATERMELLEN blogging about her journey to intuitive eating, which had similar roots.  And I remember Becky (KALIGIRL) when she was researching anti-inflammatory diets to help her husband (who unfortunately has since passed).  

As each of them found peace in this new way of relating to food, I just wasn't ready.  I wasn't ready to give up my "it's about calories, only" mindset.  I wasn't ready to give up my sugar-free alternatives that were still sweeteners.  And what I was then doing was working for me, so... I kept on doing it until I didn't.

But now I seem to be ready for this approach.  Not so much for the weight management, for the feeling healthier part.

Onward to Thursday!  I have my trainer appointment, and the weatherman is offering the hope of a little bit of snow, but also possibly freezing drizzle.  I myself am hoping it arrives late enough for me to have gone and come home, with Dexter safe in his garage.

Here's wishing all of you a good week "between", this time of assessment of the old year, and planning for the new one to come!

Life is good.  Spark on!

🔥🔥✨✨💖💖🎉🎉🥳🥳