I annoyed our youngest today. Like all kids under the age of teen, she has a natural desire to help out and do stuff. However, because she’s a tween, she apparently only likes to help out and do stuff once.

She Who Must Be Obeyed and our oldest were off to visit schools today which left me in charge of our youngest and random chores.

The first chore was to hang the laundry outside but that involved a couple steps. The first step is to unpack every other item from mesh bags She Who Must Be Obeyed insists on putting things in and which adds extra complications to what should be a fairly straight forward process. (That’s another post. If I’m smart I’ll never write that post.)

The other step was to take down and fold the laundry from yesterday. (That’s another post. If I’m smart I’ll never write that post either.) I took the dry laundry off the hangers and handed it to our youngest and said “fold this”. I had to provide a little instruction but she did a good job.

Later, it was my job to throw together some lunch. I reheated yesterday’s mushroom rice and whipped up a wilted spinach salad with bacon, tomato, olive oil and a dash of lemon juice. Our youngest seemed to enjoy the meal.

After we ate I cleared the table and told her to do the dishes. She went into preteen mode and ignored me. Later, when I reminded her to do the dishes, I got the “why?” and, oddly, I gave her an answer that didn’t involve “I told you so”. I told her I’d cooked and she got to clean. Also, it wasn’t that many dishes and I would do the biggest and most dangerous things (frying pans and knives). She grunted a response (which is clearly proof she’s practicing to be a teenager) and did nothing.

Eventually, I had to remind her to do the dishes. At that point she did them and even dried them and put them away.

Now it’s my turn to do the dishes. (Insert grunted response.)

My unofficial weigh-in this morning was 85.3 kilograms/188.05. This means I’ve lost about 28 pounds since I started this lifestyle change 98 days ago.

That will almost certainly not stand after tonight.

Because I’ll be working Tuesday, my actual birthday, the girls decided to have my birthday dinner tonight. I have generally avoided cheat days, although I couldn’t resist sampling the resurrected meatball sandwich at Subway here in Japan. (The return of the meatball sandwich means Subway is no longer dead to me.)

She Who Must Be Obeyed asked me what kind of cake I wanted “tiramasu or chocolate cake” and my first reaction was “yes” but my second reaction was “chocolate cake”.

The result was a chocolate cake made from 60% cocoa chocolate topped with frosting made from the same. SWMBO got a good glaze over the cake, but didn’t like the top and covered it with cocoa powder.

The reaction to this was a debate between the devils over my left and right shoulders:

Right Devil: He’s almost reached his weight goal he shouldn’t mess it up now.
Left Devil: But chocolate cake.
Right Devil: He can eat a little but not too much.
Left Devil: BUT CHOCOLATE CAKE!

In the end I decided to do my weekly weigh-in a day early and  go easy during the day so I could go for it at night.

The main course was a 10 ounce sirloin served “freshly stabbed’, a couple steak fries, some bread and cheese, a couple fried oysters, and a lettuce/cucumber salad with olive oil and a little lemon juice as dressing. Oh, and there was wine, too.

I did eat less than I normally do on occasions like this. I only ate a couple steak fries. I cut back the bread and cheese and the slice of cake was a third smaller than usual (although it was still pretty big). I did drink the usual amount of wine, though.

Tomorrow’s weigh-in will be interesting to see.

Today was supposed to be a lazy day. The plan was for a do nothing but write–“write” being loosely defined as “any act that occurs at my desk, including game playing”–day. Unfortunately, although it kind of worked out that way, there was a twist.

Things started out well, more or less. I woke up later than usual, but after some coffee I got right to work. I wrote for a couple hours then took a break for breakfast and wrote some more.

After that I took a break to play a game and then was supposed to start making lunch. The twist was I got my migraine spot followed quickly by a migraine. I made lunch and then worked and, ahem, played through the migraine, but having a dull ache in the side of your head tends to steal away the rest and the recovery part of rest and recovery day. It’s one thing to be lazy and have a shameless good time doing it, it’s another to be lazy because someone is grinding a sharpened icicle  into your right temple and you don’t feel like doing much.

Even after taking medication and drinking more coffee, I still felt kind of blah, even though I didn’t get the full pain, just a hint of it. I got some of my pages done and played a little, but mostly I just sat around and pondered how awesome it would be to do something productive while my head went “as if”.

Now it’s bed time and tomorrow I’ll face the migraine hangover, which is a bit like walking through the day partly asleep. You know something happened that’s now over. Although  you don’t feel sick, you lack energy.

By the time I get my energy back on Monday, I’ll be back at work, which isn’t fun at all.

Lately I haven’t had the patience to listen to my iPod Touch.

I do not know why that is. As I’ve written before, I don’t listen to music on it very often but I do like to use it to listen to podcasts.

The problem  with podcasts, especially the few that are published every day, is I find myself getting bored with their formats and, in some cases, with the voices of the hosts.

For example, I used to listen to The Candid Frame. It is a photography podcast hosted by photographer Ibarionex Perello. He’s got a great voice, one of the best names on the planet, and brought on a great variety of different types of photographers. I binge listened at first, but one day I just got tired of his format. I still recommend him, and might one day go back and check him out, but I find podcasts are a bit like beer, booze or snacks: they are fun at first, but once you’ve had too much, it’s hard to go back and have just a little. Even days later.

In a couple cases I got tired of the hosts’ voices. They are either too nasal or too booming or too German. Those I can still listen to sometimes, but I don’t.

This time, though, I think I’ve just grown tired of having voices in my ears when I’m walking around. For a while, my routine was listen to a podcast until I got to the station, then leave the headphones in and read my Kobo Reader while on the train. I’ve increased my reading, but am not enjoying the podcasts.

Instead, I listen to a handful of regular podcasts when I’m at home on the computer. I still listen to the Pen Addict, Write For Your Life, and a few others, mostly because they have enough variety that I haven’t grown tired of them, but I listen to them at home.

I don’t know how long this will last. Some day I may put the voices back in my ears, or I may start listening to music again. That mood won’t last long, but it will come eventually.