Tuesday, March 2, 2010

The Sweet Smell of Success

My original idea for today's blog post was highlighting my first Weight Watchers meeting, which I attended this evening after a 6-month hiatus.  Hiatus sounds so much better than I took six months off to pig out and not exercise whatsoever. 

However, I can't highlight my day without first chronicling how it began...at 3:45 a.m.

While climbing into bed at 1:00 a.m. (I was finishing up a crocheted blanket for my son's school fundraiser, for which I'm providing a gift basket featuring items from my online business, http://www.luluandcharlie.etsy.com/), I eagerly anticipated the decent night's sleep I was going to get on my brand new pillow.  I had just purchased new pillows for my husband, Christian, and me at Bed, Bath and Beyond.  These are the replacement pillows for the feather ones I purchased a couple of years back.  I've been cursing those pillows ever since I bought them, each time the feather quills would poke me in the face while trying to sleep.  It's a wonder that it took me two years to replace them.

But I finally did buy some new ones. And yet my satisfying night's sleep was abruptly ended at 3:45 a.m. with the sound that was a mix between a pig's squeal and a cat fight. I jumped out of bed, knowing darned well that it was the sound of a skunk. I knew it was a skunk because it was an earily familiar sound I had heard about a year back in our front yard; back then the sound was followed by a burning rubber smell that, once googled, I realized was skunk spray.

This time, that screeching sound was accompanied by a banging, coming from what sounded like our kids'  bathroom. We'd heard rustling from underneath that section of the house before, and we knew that some day we'd have to deal with it. But month after month, we kept putting it off until payday.

Christian said he thought the skunks were mating. Somewhere, during some random dinner conversation with friends, he had heard that skunks make that noise while doing it. I ran into my son's room, which is just outside that bathroom, because I knew he'd be scared. We sat there on his bed, listening to the creepy  sound of skunks banging and clanking on the pipes underneath the bathroom floor, accompanied by that creepy "mating call," or, what I've since learned, was likely a female skunk trying to fight off an undesirable suitor. Then, I heard the drain plug from the bathtub clank, like literally they were just under the drain procreating. 


The skunks' love nest is located just beneath this drain.  As you can see, poor froggy and June from Disney's Little Einsteins have been quite traumatized by the event, given their front row seats for the action.


I told my son, a fourth grader, that daddy thought the skunks were mating. "What's that?" he asked.  Already traumatized enough by the events that unfolded, I wasn't about to get into an explanation of the birds and the bees with my 9-year-old son.  

"Haven't you learned about animals mating in school?" I asked.  "Oh, yeah," he replied and smirked.  Just then, we were overcome by the grand finale of the 20-minute episode -- the skunk smell.

I'm telling you, it was the nastiest, creepiest thing I've ever witnessed in my life.  I'd seen Dolphins do it in front of me in their glass tank at Marine World before, all while looking at me and seemigly smirking.  That was creepy.  This was far worse than that.

Fast forward to this afternoon. Dennis the varmint catcher has since placed a skunk trap outside the hole that the rodents used to burrow underneath our house, which is just outside our son's bedroom window. So now, we wait.  And wait.  And pray that they are caught tonight, knowing full well that my night's sleep on my brand new pillow will, once again, be disrupted by the smell that will overwhelm us when the skunks are trapped.

But what stinks more is being 40 pounds overweight, with no quick fix like a "fat trap."  After starting my Jen's 40 by 40 challenge last Thursday, committing to lose 40 pounds by my 40th birthday on August 15th, I have lost five pounds!  There's something about bringing my plight public that has really replaced any craving for chips, chocolate or cheese with my sincere desire of not letting my one blog follower down (come on guys, follow me, please!).  And, of course, there's also my Facebook friends who have been cheering me on.

After my Weight Watchers meeting tonight, I told our leader, Norma, who shared with us that Weight Watchers employees MUST maintain their goal weight or they will be suspended from their jobs (how's that for motivation?!), about my plan to lose 40 pounds by my 40th birthday.  She cautioned me that it's an ambitious goal and that even if I lose 30 pounds by then, that will be progress.

What Norma doesn't know is that I have a logo. And you can't fail when you have a logo, right?!
And you thought I was kidding when I mentioned in my last post that my friend Eileen was working on a logo for me.  Check out her other great work at www.collinsdesign.com.


Also in my corner is my husband, Christian, who promised to make my lunch every day to help me achieve my weight loss and healthy lifestyle goal. So, I purchased a super adorable lunch pouch from my fellow etsy friend at Do-Rah Designs (http://www.dorahdesigns.etsy.com/), who makes super cute lunch totes that include a panel for personalized messages using a chalk pen.  That way, Christian can include sweet little love notes and messages of inspiration to me daily.  Christian's message to me today was...



Gotta LOVE that guy!  Five pounds down, 35 to go. 

3 comments:

  1. OMG! I was just winding down, getting ready to go to bed, I can't even write this because I am still laughing so hard!! I am now wide awake, needless to say! Who knew you were so funny! anyway, congratulations on losing 5 lbs already, Ya hoo. And I'll tell you my skunk stories another time. (thanks for the lunchbag plug)! Try to get a good nite sleep! debi
    still laughing.............

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  2. Thanks so much for sharing this story. I am so trying to loose weight. I lost 3 lbs last week...

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  3. Congrats Crochet Queen....that's great!

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