No longer on the fence

I thought about having both Bernie and Hillary stickers on my car all during the primary season. In the end, I opted for neither and sported a Goodwin for Governor sticker.

Keepin' it local.

But last night? And last week? Secretary Clinton is and was on point in her two most recent major speeches. It's time for me to say #ImWithHer.

I hope Bernie says it, and soon. It won't make a difference here in WV. Trump is wildly popular among non-college-educated, low-income white men, which describes much of the population here. But Bernie's support for HRC could go a long way toward healing the rift in the Democratic party.

No candidate is perfect, which is why I wavered and couldn't commit.

But it's game on now, and if there's one thing I'm quite sure of it's #NeverTrump.

Done!

One of my favorite parts of any event is coming up with favors.
The blue item on the left is a tiny matchbook notepad using a
paint chip for the cover. My business card is on the right, plus
candy. Workshop attendees NEED candy, right?

If I made my living doing presentations like I did yesterday, I think I'd be very happy. The fun part was creating it. Actually presenting was kind of nerve-wracking – I've never watched a presentation that went 100 percent smoothly, and mine was no exception – but it went.

We had a pretty good turnout, and the feedback was positive. Now to see if any of these club leaders actually follows up and begins using social media.

Part of our meeting was also watching Hillary Clinton's campaign kick-off speech, and it was so fun being with a room full of like-minded people! It reminded me of the early Obama campaign. We had house parties for lots of major events back then. I'd love for that kind of enthusiasm to catch fire again. Honestly, though, Clinton doesn't have the spark that Obama did.

She certainly (in my opinion) has the credentials and experience to be President, though.

I was SO TIRED when I came home yesterday. Being "on" took more out of me than I'd thought it would. But you were right, Timi: It was, indeed, very satisfying to finish and present the project, and now I can say I'm not a Keynote (Apple's version of PowerPoint) virgin.

September 25 - H is for …

HILLARY!
Sticking with the political theme for today. Heh.

I'm running out of adjectives

Astounded: astonished, blown away, dumbfounded, flabbergasted, surprised, shocked, gobsmacked (my personal favorite)

It's Monday, I ate catered food all weekend at a convention and I expected a tiny loss, if anything, for this week's weigh-in. I ate lightly Friday and didn't work out, ate very little Saturday (because there was very little available to eat that fit the plan) and did work out, and was pretty close to normal yesterday – slightly under the calorie target with a five-mile walk when I got home. Still, I didn't prepare the food, which was definitely oversalted (everyone remarked on it) and I just didn't feel as though I was

4.5 pounds lighter

than last Monday.

I didn't believe the scale the first time I stepped on it, so I did my two-out-of-three thing, and it recorded the same number the second try.

That's a total of 33 pounds since December 26. Twenty-six of those pounds have been since I began the paleo plan on April 6. I'm losing nearly half a pound A DAY since I stopped eating grains, legumes, dairy and sugar. I had previously lost half a pound a week.

I wore a beautiful skirt with a light cotton knit twinset for Saturday's banquet – blue, of course, since it was the National Federation of Democratic Women convention. Everything was too big. The long-sleeved cardigan did a fair job of hiding how big the tee beneath it was. The skirt slipped around my waist easily. I think I'll alter the skirt and find a new top to wear with it.

I never liked that twinset anyway. Heh.

I ate some cheese over the weekend – a slice of Havarti on a grilled portobello sandwich (sans bread) and some goat cheese on a salad. My gut definitely rebelled, which makes me wary of trying Greek yogurt.

I really, really, really miss Greek yogurt.

Conventions = swag, of course, and among the swag now in my trashcan are a couple of cookies and some mints. The custom-wrapped chocolate bars are in the freezer, probably to be tossed at a later date. Each attendee received a large canvas messenger bag and at each meeting and meal we received stuff to put in it: several lapel pins and a cup and and a red/white/blue lei and a can cozy (which I didn't bring home because I don't drink from cans) and a keychain and a fanny pack and my favorite:

Time to redecorate my car … heh.

Of course, there's much more work to be done before 2016. And most of the women from my county group are understandably burned out on campaigning. Most people I know want to give politics a rest.

But if you bleed blue, and if you care about what's happening to workers' rights, the environment, education, the poor, children and especially women in states where the GOP has taken over state legislatures, well … we cannot rest.

We simply can't.