My Happy Hour

Out of nowhere after I retired, I asked myself:

"When will I ever stop watching my diet? "  

I never knew where it came from when I told myself that 

"I'm old, I deserve to eat what I want."

Maybe I got tired watching my diet, so I ate full meals, snacked on chips, cookies, cake, ice cream, dried fruits and nuts; everything that I've craved to eat but restrained myself.  I ate just anything and everything. The worse thing was that I ate a lot late at night, sometimes way past midnight while I read novels. 

How wrong I was! 

After sometime, I was diagnosed as "pre-diabetic" because my blood sugar was high and I developed a fatty liver.  From then on I avoided sweets as well as fatty foods. And because I needed to exercise, my doctor advised me to just walk, not run nor jog. 

It took time for me though to gather enough courage to start walking. Eventually, I forced myself to walk; and I found out that I kinda liked it; I even enjoyed it especially when I felt better, and I became more energetic and more enthusiastic to do things. Then I also realized that as I walk, ideas hit me; interesting things that I could do or write for my blog come to mind.  

 Soon walking became a routine, a lifestyle even; and that started my "happy hour".  Eventually, my exercise became more interesting because my husband joined me.  Everyday without fail, we walk for an hour. 

Recently, I read an article from HOLA! Magazine, lifestyle section writer Step Juan wrote that:  

"it is good to exercise with someone, after all exercise is considered as a social activity, pretty much like eating out.  Being with someone will prevent boredom and when enthusiasm wanes, your companion will keep you going".

Step Juan continues: 

"if you exercise together with your partner, you get  "double rewards". the reasons being that:

It means you have more time together, you don't have to choose between exercise and time with your partner; you can have both.

It gives you motivation, your chances of sticking to the regimen increase when you have someone to cheer you on..

It develops a stronger bond between the two of you as you work towards a common goal."

Someone asked me:  

"How many steps do you make, would you know?"

Since I don't have a Fitbit, Misfit,  Lark Life,  jawbone Up, Nike+FuelBand, or any kind of pedometer,  I counted the steps I made in five minutes and I arrived at 350; multiply that to a dozen and I'm doing  4200 an hour; and if my husband parks a little further from the entrance, then I'm sure that will round it off to about 4250 to 4300 steps for that hour alone. 

Our "happy hour" extends  to Starbucks where I enjoy my "reward" of green tea cream frap (no whip, sugar free vanilla, nonfat, more milk, less ice), while I read the newspaper or browse through a magazine. I really look forward to this activity everyday and I never want to miss it except on days that our granddaughter visits.