Are you nuts?

The YOU doctors' eating plan suggests eating a fistful of nuts – walnuts, almonds, peanuts are recommended – as a snack. Nuts, in moderation, are a healthful in-between-meal option; just about everyone says so! [I can hear my mother saying, "If everyone jumped off a bridge, would you do it, too?" Only her example was a bit more, um, earthy.]

I can't [or won't – my mother also said "Can't never did anything!"] just do a fistful of nuts. I like repetitive crunching, and nuts are perfect for that, as are pretzels and dry cereal and any number of other unhealthy-in-quantity choices. So when I get a repetitive crunching urge, I head for radishes, baby carrots, red pepper strips and celery. Nuts are great, though, in recipes, and I include half an ounce of walnuts in my morning oats.

I recently received a tin of almonds from the California Almond Board filled with a single serving of almonds. [I can no longer find the link for the free sample offer.] I'm a sucker for tiny containers, and this one is about half the size of an Altoids tin. It holds 23 almonds, about 160 calories' worth. I suppose that's a snack for some people, but it's beginning to look more like a meal to me.

My calories in/calories out/poundage progress this week looks like this:

• Average daily calories consumed: 1275
• Average daily calories burned: 496
• Pounds gained/lost: None

Staying the same can be a good thing. I suppose.

But staying the same for weeks – nay, months! – on end is getting pretty old. I know, I know, it looks like I've got maintenance down pat, doesn't it? But [insert whiny voice here] I'm not ready for maintenance!

It's just nuts.

I imagine some of you might be thinking I'm just nuts for continuing to frustrate myself. Why not just call it done and be satisfied where I am?

The reason I don't is because I've lost this weight before, and I know I can do it again. I'm stubborn and, apparently, much more patient than I ever thought I was. I appreciate Anonymous's suggestion to add interval training; I can easily throw that into my training runs, I think. Wednesday's speed drills are sort of interval-like, but with longer distances on both the speed and recovery segments. It'll be good for both my mind and my body to try something New! Improved! Different! after all this time of same-old, same-old.

You can see from those numbers up there that I'm having trouble limiting my daily caloric intake to 1200 or below. One day last week it was 1201, and two days was much lower. Which means the remaining days were greater than 1200, and one day was much greater. I was ravenous all weekend, after the long run on Friday. I handled the Saturday-night party food very well, but Sunday was awful. I just couldn't get enough to eat. And, of course, with a Tuesday weigh-in all the good work I did earlier in the week was undone.

So today begins yet another do-over. The upcoming weekend includes a reception and dinner out of town, over which I will have no control, so I'll have to be extra vigilant to make up for whatever kind of food landmines I'll encounter.

Before I close, I want to provide a clickable link to the Cole Hahn/Nike dress shoes Jeannie mentioned a couple days ago. I would never spend that much money on a pair of shoes, but they really are cute. We just don't need dress-up pumps much out here in the Middle of Nowhere.

Also, I'm with M@rla, who said in yesterday's comments that eating normal amounts of healthful food without gaining weight would be so, so nice. We really are learning patience, aren't we?

Finally, I do have one good number to report. In one month following the YOAD plan, I've lost 2.75 inches from my waist. Take that, bathroom scale!