Out n’ About

Yesterday was Weight Watcher’s meeting day.  I found the meeting room after one false start – tried to go in the back door.  That’s probably why it looked so deserted!  The meeting had already started, it was listed at the wrong time on the internet.

Even after what Dortha calls a “summer free-for-all” my weight has pretty much stabilized these days.  I’m a few pounds up from my lowest weight, which is not surprising because I’ve never been able to maintain that lower weight for long.  But, I seem to be able to hold my current weight and still have a life.  I’m not interested in looking or being skinny, at this stage and age of my life, healthy and comfortable is where it’s at for me.  That’s my story and I’m sticking to it!  Seriously, though, it’s important to me to maintain where I am now, and I still work at following the Weight Watcher’s program, journaling my meals, exercising, going to meetings and making healthy choices, at least most of the time.  Yes, there are times I indulge (as you will see reading down the page), but I’ve learned where the line between that and over-indulging is, and I don’t cross that line.

So, what does every good Weight Watcher do after the meeting?  Yes, you’re right – go out to eat!  In this case it was lunch time.  Jim did a little looking around the neighborhood while I was at the meeting, and he was waiting in the car when I came out.  We’d seen a Mellow Mushroom Pizza place not far away, and I remember they have really good portabella, spinach, and feta sandwiches, so that’s where we went and what I had.

I liked this guy hanging out on their balcony:

After lunch we took a drive over towards the east shore of Mobile Bay, where Clear Point and Fairhope are located.  This map shows where we went:

As we drove along the scenic road that runs right along Mobile Bay, we noticed that many of the beach houses just south of Point Clear are for sale.  I wonder what the asking price is on some of them.  Some are just ordinary houses in need of some TLC, and some are quite nice!

Once we got into Fairhope, we stopped at a city park to walk a little and take some pictures.  Jim got to practice with his new 300 mm lens and caught this turf war between a bee and butterfly:

The City of Fairhope has left the banks along Mobile Bay in a natural state to encourage butterflies – and we did see many flying around.  It was so much fun to try to get pictures!  We watched them flying around for quite awhile, but also just gazed at the bay, too.  What a peaceful, beautiful setting! Oh, our new header picture was also taken here.

We continued on to another section of the park, where we found there was at least one person out enjoying the breeze:

 

At the park there is a beautiful garden with roses in bloom:

After spending a while watching people going about their lives, fishing, walking, and like us, just enjoying the day, we headed to downtown Fairhope to see what we could find.

Pink Flamingo, anyone?

Jim was magically drawn here:

Yep, it’s a bakery! With ice cream, no less!  OK, I only had half a sandwich for lunch, maybe a little reduced fat ice-cream would be good.  The Fairhope Bakery, Heavenly Creations, does have a few spooky items in their case:

The owners were so friendly, and interested in our lifestyle!  If you find yourself in need of a treat in Fairhope, stop in to see them!  They’re located at 410 Fairhope Ave.

We each had a single dip of their reduced fat, reduced sugar butter pecan ice cream, and couldn’t resist bringing home 2 cookies for later.  But we resisted all those spooky Halloween treats!

I was up early this morning to gather my wits and my stuff to be at line dancing by 8:00.  I made copies of the music CD’s that are being used for the dance classes, but couldn’t get them to play on the CD player at the Clubhouse.  Today, I took my computer over to the clubhouse so we could at least have some music.  It worked out OK, but the volume on the computer speakers is pathetic.  We don’t have a portable CD player, so I downloaded the songs onto my mp3 player and will use our Bose Speaker to hook the player up to that and we’ll have some fine sound for Friday!  The Bose is designed to work with the I-pod, but with a cable connection it works just fine with our “other brand” players.

The rest of the day we’ve just tried to stay out of the muggy heat here.  We are looking forward to the cooler, drier air that’s been promised for the next few days.  Even the dogs are draggin’ after we’ve been out for a short walk.  I’ve been thinking about all the folks in the Midwest dealing with all the strange weather that’s been going across the nation and sending safe thoughts to everyone.  We hope you all stay safe!

Till next time…