The Biggest Loser: Funny, crazy, inspiring

Sorry folks, I missed the first 30 minutes of tonight's episode of The Biggest Loser. You all will have to fill me in. I asked on Facebook and was told "Tracy is crazy!," which I'd already gotten a hint of. I came in to the show as Abby was talking to Dr. H. about the stress fracture in her knee.

Without giving a play-by-play of the entire two hour show (or at least the 90 minutes I saw), I'd summarize tonight's episode as funny, crazy and inspiring:

Funny
There were several funny things contestants said during tonight's episode, including:

Rebecca: "Damn you, sprinkles!," yelling at a cupcake that was tempting her.

Danny: "Oh my! I guess these (cupcakes) have real sugar in them!," trying to get the other contestants (including his partner Liz) to believe that he was eating the cupcakes to win the temptation.

Sean: "I wanted to take a cupcake and rub it all over my body!"

Rebecca: "I'm used to eating pizza, not running up hills," as she was carrying 10 pounds of weight up the incline during the fitness challenge.

Dina (to Jillian during the last chance workout): "Do me a favor. Don't talk to me," letting Jillian know she didn't need someone yapping in her face as she tried to finish her run on the treadmill.

Crazy
Whether it was creative editing or it was really that way, Tracy came across as being (just like someone said on Facebook) crazy. First, she gave up the chance for both she and Coach Mo to work with the trainers this week in exchange for a 2-pound advantage at the weigh in. And did anyone notice those crazy eyes she was making all night?

Then she ate four cupcakes during the temptation challenge so she could be the one to control whose weight would count at the weigh in.

Now, for the record, I don't think that eating 4 cupcakes was that big of a deal. They were told each cupcake was 100 calories. There are 3,500 calories in a pound. 35 cupcakes would only be one pound, which would take no time to work off in the Biggest Loser gym. So Tracy's 4 cupcakes were probably be gone in one treadmill run.

Speaking of crazy, what the heck, Jillian?! She totally wigged out when she heard Tracy ate the cupcakes. It was 400 calories, that's it. It wasn't 4,000. Jillian calling Tracy "crazy" and "bananas" is totally the pot calling the kettle black.

Inspiring
There were two really inspiring segments of the show tonight. The first was at the end of the fitness challenge. Each team had to carry 500 pounds to the top of a tall ramp. The first to finish won immunity. First team to raise the flag all the way wins.

After the Green team had won (Go Indiana's own Allen!), the other teams all finished and several players were interviewed who said that the Biggest Loser is teaching them to finish what they started (Except in the case of desserts obviously. Don't finish those. Probably don't start them in the first place.) When Coach Mo was the last to finish, all the contestants grabbed his weights and helped him finish his task. Just like last week, teamwork and unity. I'm liking this season.

The other inspiring thing that happened tonight was when both the Red (Antoine and Sean) and the Orange (Daniel and Shay) teams were below the yellow line. Antoine and Sean were all class. They basically sacrificed themselves so Shay could stay on the ranch longer.

Their sacrifice paid off. In the transformation moments at the end of the show, Sean had lost 124 pounds. Wish he'd lose the bad haircut. His wife is expecting a baby girl very soon and they plan to name the new baby Jillian!

For his part, Antoine has lost 105 pounds and I must say that he is looking mighty buff in the gym. He is dating Alexandra who was eliminated in the first week. I'm happy that he's happy, although I didn't care for Alexandra.

When both the Red and Orange teams fell below the yellow line, there was plenty of animosity toward Tracy. We'll have to see how it plays out next week.

5 reasons why Obama's "more school" idea is for the birds

I'm breaking my own rule here and am going to discuss politics on my usually fun-lovin' blog. But today when I saw the headline that President Obama is calling for longer school days and a longer school year, I just couldn't hold my tongue (or, more accurately, my fingers!).

I think this is a terrible idea for at least five reasons:

1. The parents and students who are engaged in school and who are driven to do their best, will continue doing so. But extending the school day or the school year won't make parents who consider school to be free (or, in the case of private education, paid) babysitting won't be any more apt to encourage their children to learn.

2. More time at school will just cause further erosion of the family. As it is, I only see my children for about an hour in the morning and anywhere from two to six hours in the evening, depending on which day it is (I only work until 2:oopm two days a week). Keeping children at school longer will keep them away from their families longer. I want to do more with my kids besides make sure they get their baths and fix their breakfasts.

3. Children are not little adults. Their brains should not be expected to be engaged in formal instruction for more than six or so hours a day. And there are plenty of people who will argue that even that is too long.

4. Isn't there an obesity epidemic in this country? Aren't gym classes being cut from the schedule in many school districts? What do you think is going to happen when we add another 2 hours of sitting each day? Paging Bob and Jillian...

5. It seems to me that we, as a nation, are losing the ability to relax. I know I'm guilty of being at work all day, coming home and at some point in the evening, getting back on my computer to do more work. We owe it to our kids to teach them that life is about more than work. They need time to explore cultural activities like dance and music, to learn about sportsmanship and hard work on the soccer fields and basketball courts, and to understand the joy that comes from digging for worms or swinging high enough it seems their toes will disappear into the clouds.

I'm sure there are plenty of other reasons why this "more school" idea from the POTUS is a bad idea. But these are the ones that come to my mind first. What do you think? Is President Obama on to something or does he need to be schooled in what America's kids really need?

Fit to be blogging

I really like blogging. I like the format - as casual or as formal, as humorous or as serious as my mood strikes. I like the choice to vary the length of my posts. Sometimes, I just need two lines to say what I want to say. Other times, I need more. I like the opportunity to interact with people who comment about my posts.

So when I was asked to write for another blog, I was all for it. Until I realized it's a blog about health and fitness. Who? Me? But, I agreed to meet with the woman and chat about the opportunity. And I'm glad I did.

The blog is the Fit City Moms Blog and, as Lisa Vielee explained to me, they were looking for "real" voices -- those of moms who are doing the very real dance of trying to take care of themselves and their families while also getting the laundry done, taking the cat to the vet and locating the lost library book.

I'll be writing about once a month at Fit City. There are four other moms blogging there, offering information and insight on fitting health and fitness into the job description of "mother." Though Fit City is an Indianapolis initiative, there are plenty of resources -- from recipes to entertaining ideas, to fitness tips that you'll find useful even if you don't live in Indianapolis. Check it out here.

You can read my first post, "Turning 39: The Year of Not Dying," here. If you venture over there, be sure to leave me a comment to say "hey!"

Tall tales by Robbie

Robbie woke up this morning and said "My eye hurts." Assuming this was one of his attempts to get to stay home from school, I said, "Oh, your eye doesn't hurt!"

That's when he turned to me and I saw this:

"Robbie, what happened to your eye?!"

"Well, I was skydiving and I ran into a bug that bit me in the eye."

There you go, more proof that skydiving is a dangerous sport!

The Biggest Loser: Teamwork Tuesday

Tonight's episode of The Biggest Loser was a nice change from all of the yelling and cursing of last week. This episode was a big success story of teamwork and perseverance.

While the remaining contestants were still in the elimination room after Alexandra had gone home, Allison Sweeney told them that they had the chance to keep everyone above the yellow line this week. No one would be eliminated if all 15 players could lose a combined total of more than 150 pounds. If they didn't reach 150 pounds, then 2 people would be sent home.

Historically, week 2 is notorious for low weight losses in the house (some of the players called it the "curse of week 2"), so the challenge was a tall order.

Back in the living room, Coach Mo gave everyone a pep talk. He told them they had to do three things: 1) stay together, 2) lean on Danny because he was the only one with week 2 experience and 3) let Coach Mo get in their heads to motivate them.

When the teams headed to the gym, Jillian played good cop to Bob's bad cop. Later, she took the brown team to the kitchen to help them with meal planning. Who saw the Ziploc product placement coming? I totally did!

Julio was made out to be this season's slacker and Shay was visibly frustrated with him and his lack of dedication in the gym.

Tracey returned and said her incident was a big deal and really serious, but didn't say what had happened.

Just when the goal of losing 150 pounds seemed impossible, the contestants met with Chef Curtis Stone who threw tons of nutrition information at them, including a suggestion to replace 50% of your pasta with veggies and the fact that there are 1010 calories in a fast food chicken caesar salad! Holy crap and it doesn't even taste as good as a hamburger!

The funniest line of the night was when Sean said, "I am the national spokesmodel for soda." I just know that PR people for Coke and Pepsi everywhere were ducking for cover.

After the chef's lesson was done, Allison came in and gave them a nutrition quiz. By correctly answering at least 5 of 8 questions based on Curtis Stone's information, they earned a 15 pound bonus at the weigh in -- 10% of their goal -- meaning they only had to lose 135 pounds combined to keep everyone at the ranch this week.

Once the teams successfully managed the first quiz, it was time to move on to a group challenge. They had to cross floating balance beams in the water and gather on rafts attached to the end of the beams. If one person fell in the water, the game was over. If everyone reached the 1st raft, the teams would win a 5 pound advantage at the weigh in. Reaching the 2nd raft would earn them another 5 pound advantage. Making it to the 3rd raft meant phone calls from home. Finally, if the whole team made it to 4th raft with no one falling in, they could deduct 10 more lbs from the total they needed to lose to keep everyone on the ranch.

I had two thoughts while watching this challenge. First, I didn't really realize or think about how difficult balance is when you are extremely overweight. Second, could't they have gotten some bigger life jackets for these people?

They pretty quickly achieved the first 5 pound advantage, but I bet they just wanted to yell at Allison Sweeney to just shut up! Here they were trying to balance and get across these beams and she was yammering on, giving a play by play of their every move.

In the end, they did it! They made it across all four balance beams and earned 20 pounds worth of weight advantage, plus phone calls home. It was really awesome to watch them work together as a team. No sniping and bickering. Just quiet enouragement. If I was the crying sort, that would have brought tears to my eyes.

They all got to make their calls home and each person was interviewed about how much that meant to them. I know I must be sick because when they were all telling about their calls home and they were all crying, I kept looking at the pies and lollipops and and other yummy stuff on the wall behind them, thinking how good it all looked!

The next day at lunch, theywere all high fiving about only needing to lose 115 pounds as a group (since they'd secured 35 pounds of advantage) and Bob and Jillian came in and just sucked the wind right out of their sails, saying that was still pretty darn hard in week 2. They sent them all to the gym for the last chance workout.

Let me just say that if I had to do one of those last chance workouts, I'd end up in a puddle of quivering blubber on the floor and that's all I have to say about that.

In the gym, Bob got inside Shay's head asking her if she believed she had the right to be happy. While all of the inner turmoil/psychobabbly stuff seems a little hard to watch, a little fabricated even, I'm glad they spent time showing some of that because I think most people who are overweight are that way at least in part for some emotional reason.

The people who get fat because they eat too much pizza and drink to much beer just because they like it are the people who have an easier time getting rid of the extra weight. People with emotional baggage are fighting not just their physical selves, but the demons in their heads.

Finally, it was time for the weigh in -- They needed to lose 115 pounds to keep all 15 of them on the ranch for another week.

Here's how it went down on the scale:

Pink - Rebecca (-6) and Amanda (-4)
Purple - Tracey (-10) and Coach Mo (-9)
Red - Sean (-11) and Antoine (-8)
Green - Allen (-10) and Abby (-11)
Brown - Danny (-12) and Liz (-10)
Blue - Rudy (-14) and Dina (-8)
Black - Julio (-19)
Orange - Danny (-7) and Shay (-16)

What week two curse? As a group, they lost 155 pounds this week, so they didn't even need those advantages!

I thought this was a great show. What did you think?

If the Sand Man worked at Starbucks

As we were putting Robbie to bed tonight, I climbed in the bed and Mike left the room when Robbie pointed out that neither one of us closed the closet door. Maybe we'd confused him with Charlie who likes to have his closet door open when he goes to sleep.

So I got to thinking about bedtime preferences and what they would look like if you went into the Sand Man store and ordered up a bedtime, much like you order drinks at Starbucks.

Instead of a venti skinny half-caf mocha chai latte, what would a bedtime order look like if the Sand Man worked at Starbucks?

Robbie would order up a two-story closed closet open door with a side order of warm body snuggled close.

Charlie would ask for an open closet running vaporizer iPod lullaby tight tuck in with a cracked door.

Closed door lights on fall asleep reading Twilight for the 20th time: Annie's choice.

The kids aren't the only ones who have their bedtime preferences. Mike's is pitch black closed door fan on high fall asleep before the wife starts snoring.

As for me, I can pretty much fall asleep anywhere, under any conditions. I've even fallen asleep sitting up waiting for my nail polish to dry. When I was in college, we slept in a "cold dorm" on the third floor of the sorority house. The windows were open and nothing felt better than being cozy under the covers and feeling the crisp (sometimes downright freezing) air around you.

But my favorite bedtime "beverage" is pretty simple: comfy couch TV on.

How about you? What would you order at the Sand Man's Starbucks?

Eating my words

I should know better than to make broad declarations that start with "MY child will NEVER..." Doing so makes eating those words a little tough.

Today, I'm chewing up and digesting the statement "MY child will NEVER get a cell phone until she's in high school." Yep. Despite my outspokenness about how kids don't need cell phones, this afternoon I took Annie to Best Buy and we picked out a red LG Xenon phone just for her.

I'd started to soften my position on kids and cell phones last spring when she started babysitting and I felt like it might be good for us to be able to reach her where ever she was sitting. But, I reasoned that we could just call her on the house phone wherever she was.

Then, this summer, she got dropped off at the wrong swimming pool for a swim meet. But a nice person let Annie use her phone and we got her where she was supposed to be. No harm done.

The clincher happened this morning.

Mike dropped her off at a local high school for swim practice. It turns out the doors were locked and she couldn't get in. Apparently, after unsuccessfully trying to chase her dad down in the parking lot, she freaked for a moment, had a good cry and then sought out other options. She found an open door at an adjacent building, located an office staffer who let her use the phone and called Mike.

Of course, by the time he got back there a few minutes later, the swim coach showed up and everything was ok.

But it was enough for me to toss my declaration out the window and get the girl a phone. Adding her to our family plan will only cost another $10/month. That's money well spent for her safety and my peace of mind, I think. Plus, she's going to work that $10 off in chores or fork over cold, hard cash each month.

And we're not letting her go hog wild. No data plan. She can text (she's already sent 60-some text messages today. Good thing I upped the plan from 200 text messages a month to unlimited texting), but not send or receive pictures or photos. No taking the phone to school. Homework first, phone access second. Hopefully those are enough parameters.

I don't want to make too many "thou shalts" and "thou shalt nots." After all, I'm still trying to swallow the "MY child will NEVER..."