Heart Attack

We went to Vegas last weekend.

It was kind of a last minute decision on Thursday afternoon.  We didn't even book the hotel until Friday morning.

We stayed at the Monte Carlo.  The room was average, the bed wasn't the most comfortable, but I've been in worse.  The pool was amazing!  They have three pools and a hot tub at the Monte Carlo. There is a "lagoon" which is a basic pool.  They have a "lazy river" which is pretty awesome. If you've been to Seven Peaks, it's just like that. It's water that goes around and around and around the same course over and over again.  They also have a wave pool, which is also like Seven Peaks' wave pool.  We went in each pool, and I had the most fun in the wave pool with Lily.  She liked it too.  After being in the deep part for a while, we went out to the shallow part, and I stood her up where the water reached her feet.  She had a good time walking and splashing around.

This is not my photo, but it shows the four pools.

Monte Carlo's location is really good.  It was a short walk to get to the Coke store and the M&M store, which is something Lance and I always do when we visit Vegas. The stores were literally right across the street. In fact we could see the stores from our "strip view" room.  By the way, "strip view" isn't very cool. I'd rather see a vast blanket of sparkling lights, rather than the construction and crowds on the strip. So note to self, ask for pool view or city view.  Anyway, the location was nice.  At the Coke store we did the ice cream float variety where they put a scoop of vanilla ice cream in eight different types of soda.  My favorite this time was Fanta Strawberry.  It just hit the spot.  I also like Mello Yellow with ice cream, and just plain ol' Coke with ice cream is good too.

Included in our hotel reservation were two free buffets.  We could choose from several different hotels' buffets, but we chose to eat at the one at the Monte Carlo. It was really delicious!  I had some sushi that was amazing... I think it had cilantro on it.  I'm not sure about that, but it was really, really good.  I also had the most amazing dessert I've ever had at a buffet.  It was a small portion of chocolate pudding, inside a chocolate shell, with a little bit of whipped cream and a chocolate decoration on top.  I don't normally go for the chocolate desserts; I prefer fruity ones.  However, this chocolate pudding was so delicious! It had a real, rich, decadent, dark chocolate taste to it.  I can't even describe it well enough, it was just amazing.

We visited Fremont Street.  Lily had fun staring at all the weirdos. Hinder was in town giving a free concert, but neither of us are fans so we didn't stick around. We ate at the Heart Attack Grill. We had heard about the Heart Attack Grill a while back when a guy suffered a heart attack while eating there.  Kind of ironic, no?  This place kind of has a sick sense of humor, which I believe was how it was decorated before the heart attacks and deaths were associated with this restaurant.

This is also not my photo, but you should eat here.

You have to pay with cash.  There is a sign saying, "Cash only, you might die before the card clears!"  When you walk in, you are greeted by a "nurse", she puts an arm band on you that says, "I had a bypass at the Heart Attack Grill!" Then they put a hospital gown on you.  I'm not kidding. All customers have to wear a hospital gown.  I felt a little ridiculous, but everyone in there was dressed the same so it wasn't really a big deal. Bonus - if you get messy, your clothes aren't ruined! :-D

If you weigh 350 pounds or more you eat for free.

How was the food?  I loved it.  Absolutely delicious. I got a Single Bypass, with no chilli, and no bacon.  I finished just a little over half of it.  I'm pretty sure they try to make everything as unhealthy as possible.  Here's their menu:

These burgers are huge. Each patty is a 1/2 pound of beef, I think.  The fries had a really good flavor, but I didn't eat much of them. Lily chowed down though!

I don't know about you, but a butterfat milkshake sounds wonderful.

Lance got a Double Bypass, with chili and bacon.  Both of us underestimated the size of these burgers, we should have shared the Single Bypass, and that would have been a normal sized burger.  If you add bacon, they add 5 slices of bacon for each patty.  So there are 5 slices on the single, 10 on the double, 15 on the triple, etc.  Holy cow!

If you're curious about the deaths associated with this restaurant, just do a search and you'll find all you need to know.  Obviously this food is unhealthy. I didn't go here to order a salad, I came here to have a delicious, juicy, fattening burger.  I would eat here again.

If you eat here, I recommend walking the entire length of the strip afterwards. That way, you might burn off half of the calories you will consume.

After Heart Attack, we walked half of the strip. We wanted Lily to see the Bellagio fountains and the Mirage volcano.  She liked the fountains. I think it's so cute when things catch her attention... not many things do. She is a busy girl!  The Mirage volcano never erupted, so that was lame.  2 hours of walking for a little 3 minute fountain show?  Worth it.  Mostly because of the calories we needed to burn off from dinner.

This is probably our last visit to Vegas. It makes me a little sad.

No Change

Monday morning came and the scale hasn't budged.

But, I decided I don't particularly care.  It's nice to have a visual of progress, but other than that,my weight doesn't mean much.

I can run longer and harder, so I know I'm improving.

Exercise

I've been doing really well with my (low) exercise goals.  I've been working out every night after work for 30 minutes.  I'm still only doing the Insanity warm-ups.  I'm improving!  But I'm not yet ready to commit to the entire workout.  I'm not sure I'll ever be ready... However, next week I'm going to do the warm up, stretching, and the first circuit from all of the workouts.  My idea looks like this:

Weeks 1 & 2
Monday: Plyometric Cardio Circuit warm up & stretching
Tuesday: Cardio Power & Resistance warm up & stretching
Wednesday: Cardio Recovery (entire workout)
Thursday: Pure Cardio warm up & stretching
Friday: Cardio Abs (entire workout)

Today was Tuesday of Week # 2. 

The following is my goal for the next two weeks:

Weeks 3 & 4
Monday: Plyometric Cardio Circuit warm up,  stretching & first circuit
Tuesday: Cardio Power & Resistance warm up, stretching & first circuit
Wednesday: Cardio Recovery (entire workout)
Thursday: Pure Cardio (entire workout) (this workout doesn't have circuits after the warmup, it's non-stop cardio!)
Friday: Cardio Abs

I'll figure out where to go from there after I see how I'm feeling on week 4.

Since I typically gain wait when I first start exercising, I won't be weighing myself again until next Monday morning, and then I'll weigh myself every other week from there.  Watching the scale go up makes me not want to work out.

At first I was going to work out on Saturdays also, for a total of 6 days a week, however, with working at night, working out after work, and then having 9am church, it just wasn't going to happen.  So, 5 days for now.  When I start Insanity for real, that will have to change, because I have this OCD thing where I have to be on a schedule that matches the one that comes with the program.  I'll cross that bridge when I get there.

FAQs

Recognize that skyline?  I don't.  Apparently, that's the skyline of where we're moving.  When I visited in the past, I never noticed a skyline.  There are so many trees!  I love this city.  I love this place.  I love that we're moving!

We're moving!  Ahhh!

Lance put in his notice at work, so I can finally scream it to everyone that we are leaving Utah!

So... some FAQs from the few people (mostly family) who we've already told:

Where?
Raleigh, North Carolina.

Why?/To be closer to your parents?
Sort of.  When Lance's mom was really sick, Lance said to me, "When she passes away, I don't want to be in Utah anymore."
 
What really pushed us happened while we were out there visiting my family back in December/early January. Our house sold the first day we were there. We both felt like we should just stay there.  "Let's move here!  This place feels right. We love it here. My parents are here. We've always wanted to leave Utah. Why not?!"

The first idea we had was to have me not come back from that vacation, and have Lance take care of everything, rent a big truck, and move us here by himself.  That didn't feel right, so we decided to come home, find the shortest lease we could, get everything in order (sell and donate most of our belongings), and then come out here after our lease was up.

So, my friends, that is why we came to San Moritz. It had the shortest lease we could find which was six months. It's up July 14th. We've already given our 60 days notice.  That is also why we found an apartment half the size of our house, so we could get rid of a ton of stuff beforehand.  We're still getting rid of a lot more (another couch, kitchen table, dressers, bed, etc.).

Did Lance find a job?
No. He's applied here and there, but he's not really in a field where they hire out of state people. He's in warehousing, and they don't really care that much about finding the perfect person for their job.  So, we're hoping he'll have more luck when we're out there.

Will you (Jenn) still be able to work for your company?
Yes!  My employers have been extremely generous.  They have already allowed me to work from home following the birth of Lily, and they have also agreed to allow me to continue working from home from another state.

Will you be living with your parents?
Yes, until we can afford to live somewhere else. Which means, until Lance finds a job.

Are you getting a U-Haul?
No. We thought about it.  We've tossed around tons of ideas.  For now, the plan is to sell our Dodge and keep our Ford.  We'll each have a suitcase, and we'll also bring my computer/work stuff, stuff for the dogs, and Lily's pack and play. We'll hire a moving company for the rest of our stuff, which will basically be appliances, decorations, clothing, Lily's crib and her changing table/dresser thing, and our futon.

When are you leaving?
July 11th. It's a Thursday. We can't afford for me to take time off of work, so I'll have to take off that Thursday and Saturday the 13th, then be back to work on Monday the 15th.  So, drive Thursday, Friday, Saturday and Sunday, about 9 hours each day. Luckily I can spend most of Monday re-cooping, since I don't work until 5pm.  The drive is 32 hours.  We'll be stopping a lot since Lily hates the car and we have dogs that need to be let out.  We'll probably end up with 12 hours of traveling each day.  I'm excited and nervous.

So, it's pretty much this unknown exciting adventure!  I've started setting aside more stuff to donate.  I've whittled away about 20 pairs of shoes so far, and I think I still have more to go.  Basically, if I haven't worn it since we've lived here, it goes. I just went through my makeup and gave a ton to Elise.  It's not that I didn't want that makeup, it's just that I have so much (more than I realized) and I really need to whittle every possible thing down that I can.

Just for fun, here's a picture of what I gave Elise:

Two make up bags, two lipsticks, two blushes, a pencil sharpener, foundation, powder, bronzer, 8 eyeshadows, eye primer and I added two eyeliners after taking the picture.

I took the picture to show her what I wanted to get rid of to see if she wanted it.

Elise is also taking our kitchen table and chairs, our bed, my Grandma Billington's china that my mother inherited, and a dresser that I inherited from my Grandma Keele.

My work desk is going in the dumpster.  It's been put together and taken apart so many times that it is trash.

This is all so exciting until we get a new place, have nothing, and have no money to get anything.

Video

Well, Lance posted a video I'd like you to check out.  See it here.

It's a little cheesy and outside of my comfort zone, and I'm not sure anyone who doesn't already know will care.  But, there it is.

More details to follow.