Time to check back in with you, Dear Readers. Eight weeks in on my Noom program, I am down 13 pounds. I have faced large ups and incremental downs on the road to 13 pounds. In a day and a half at the 4th of July I gained six pounds, and I didn’t eat nearly as crazily as I have in the past. but it was salty, heavy foods. It took me a week to re-lose the six pounds. BUT it did happen with hard work and determination.

Then we traveled back to the beautiful U.P. to visit with relatives and friends. There are two foods that are prevalent in the mid-U.P. (Land of many, many Finns like me) that I choose to not resist: pasty and cudighi. And I enjoyed both twice while there.

Pasty consists of potato, rutabaga, onion, ground beef wrapped in a crust. The U.P. is Iron Mining Country. (Please, don’t call it the Rust Belt! That has a very negative connotation.) So when the Cornish miners came over to be the bosses at the iron mines, they brought pasties. They made a great miners lunch, kept warm in tin foil in their lunch pail. They could wash them down with hot coffee from their thermoses. Anyway, they were the meal of choice at least a couple of times a month when I was growing up in the U.P.

Cudighi is really only found in the U.P. It is like Italian sausage, but the spices are a bit different. There are many Italian descendants in the U.P. too. Cudughi is usually served on a crusty white bun, with tomato sauce, mozzarella cheese, onions, green pepper. So scrumptious!

Well, after five days away, I gained 10 pounds, yes, a shocking 10 pounds! It was mostly salt and retaining fluids, but it was still a shock. The weight came off in five days of eating well and walking more.

Do I recommend this type of binging? No. Do I regret that I did it? No. I made the conscious decision to eat and enjoy these childhood favorites while I was on vacation. I savored every bite.

Now I’m back home and recommitted to my Noom program and to my pilgrimage to better health. I really do want to be able to walk around Disneyland Paris with my family in 2021. This is the journey I am on. And, hey, today was really exciting because I dropped below another 10 pound mark on the scale. Woo hoo!

Meet me at the Kingdom.

Donna