Life After Hostess

I’ve said before that I’m a sweet in the morning person. I can tell you all about great breakfast cereals, muffins, scones, cakes in just the right points amounts to complement my coffee, fruit and yogurt and stay within my 10 point breakfast goal. One of the things I really enjoyed as part of my breakfast rotation was Hostess Mini Muffins, especially the Banana Walnut, although I liked the Chocolate Chip ones too.

I have a fairly regimented “choice from each column” system for breakfast. My dairy serving is usually yogurt, but on those days where I feel like a savory breakfast cheese and a breakfast meat take up those 3-5 points. Fruit is point-free on the Weight Watchers plan and that’s one serving of fruit, usually a banana because bananas are filling for me. We can talk about my issues with hunger and apples at another time.

Coffee is always a point with one tablespoon of Coffeemate. I’ll add that I use Coffeemate at home because I like Coffeemate. It’s not a torturous dieting substitution for cream. Honestly, if I could get Coffeemate instead of cream in restaurants, I’d order that.

The entrée column includes the cereal or other sweet breads, including muffins. That column is 4-6 points, so breakfast could go as high as 12 points, as low as 8. Trouble with muffins is a regular full-size muffin can be up to 15 points all on its own! That’s where the Hostess muffins were perfect; 5 tasty and sweet mini muffins in a pouch and 5 points for the pouch.

But alas, Hostess and their wonderful mini muffins are gone.

So last grocery trip I decided to try a new breakfast treat. I tried Entemann’s Little Bites muffins.

Same mummer of muffins per pouch, same number of pouches in the box, same points. They’re okay. They seem both a little greasier and sweeter than the Hostess. They’re not as banana-y as my favorite Hostess ones and no walnuts. I’ll probably try the chocolate chip at some point in my rotation of breakfast goodies on hand and keep the Entemann’s in the list, but probably not on as regular a rotation as the Hostess ones were.

So now we join Joyce at From This Side of the Pond for the Wednesday Hodge Podge!

1. It's National Bike Week...do you own a bicycle? When did you last ride a bike?

I haven’t ridden a moving bike since I learned how to drive. Do I get any credit for driving places I walked? I used to bike all the time when we lived in Southgate, MI, but when we moved to Novi, when I was 10, the neighborhoods were too far away from anything a kid would want to see or do that bikes were just recreation that Dave and I rode in our own little neighborhood.  It was too far away in a new place for us, or our parents, to feel comfortable using them as transportation.


2. What's something you learned in school that wasn't part of the curriculum?

Leadership skills. Oh, they started with staring protests outside the principal’s office in 8th grade and getting other kids into trouble with my ideas as a high school freshman, but then some awesome teachers helped mold me, and taught me to use my powers for good. I wrote and organized the literature skits in Humanities, arranged the advertising for the French Club croissant sales and even tutored a few people in English.


3. What's a food you've never tried, but want to try? What's a food you've tried and will never try again?

I can’t think of a food I intend to try that I haven’t, but I will often at least try things I haven’t without a necessary plan to try them. I tried snails and I don’t think I’ll be trying them again. The flavor was mostly sauce, but the texture was nasty.


4. Have you been more demanding on yourself lately or less? Why? Do you think that's a good trend?

I am pretty demanding on myself because I want to do everything I can to stay as independent as possible. I think that’s a good trend, an important trend, in keeping a positive attitude in dealing with my challenges. The positive attitude is necessary for dealing with the disease, so it’s an essential full circle.


5. Who is your favorite book, movie, or TV show villain?

Q from Star Trek The Next Generation.


6. How concerned are you about identity theft?

I have identity theft protection through my bank and honestly I don’t know who’d want to be me financially. Still I check my credit every couple weeks and keep an eye out in the news for anything questionable about security involving my bank.

I had my credit card information stolen about 10 years ago. I caught the errant charge on my card and called the bank about it. The charge was for a catalog order from a plus size women’s store. It was shipped to Mishawaka, IN. I lived in Michigan at the time, but had used the card to check into a hotel in Mishawaka a few weeks before the charge was made.

The charge was removed and I was instructed to file a report with the local police in the city where the card’s bills went to. I filed the report and a few weeks later I got a call from an officer in Mishawaka updating me on the progress. Here’s the fun part.

The address was for a man in transition of a gender-change operation. Of course she’d want larger women’s clothes for her formerly male frame. When the officer visited, there was a catalog on the coffee table for the very store the charge using my stolen information was made and delivered to that address. When the officer asked if she’d made any purchases from that catalog, the answer was to the effect of “I wish I could afford that.”

There wasn’t sufficient evidence to make an arrest, but there was to keep an open investigation. I was told I’d be contacted if I was at some pint needed as a witness.

The system worked for me. It was only a $66 and change charge, but the bank took care of that, gave me a new card and the police in both Novi and Mishawaka did a great job of follow-up with it and kept me in the loop or as much as they needed to. It was neat experience to see how the system worked and I got a great story; what’s the chance your credit card information is stolen by someone in the process of a sex-change to add some color to a tale of bank and police heroes?


7. I saw this last question on Dawn's blog a couple of week's ago and asked if I could share. Everybody hop over and say hi, but first answer this...would you rather have an ordinary home in an extraordinary place or an extraordinary home in an ordinary place?

I answered this on Dawn’s blog!

Being that the ramp, stair climber or elevator etc. would make an ordinary house extraordinary and that I need ordinary mass transit in an ordinary municipality to get around, give me the extraordinary home in an ordinary place, please.


8. Insert your own random thought here.

Yesterday was our semiannual trek to Cleveland to see my Neurologist. I’m doing fine and the best news is that the all-important blood work showed my liver levels had actually improved a little from the last two times they’d been checked. I suggested the Milk Thistle I was taking might be helping and the doctor agreed that it wasn’t hurting. The importance of that is there is no threat of taking me off the disease-modifying medication that’s been so wonderful for me. YAY!