I'm sure you understand

I am wearing a belt over a sweater for the third time this week. It is never too late to readjust your style habits, people! Belted sweaters: Not as scary as you thought! Film at 11:00. Actually, no any film at all, because I neglected to get photos of this week's Fashion Combos. But I took some chances and looked...not bad in most of them. You'll have to take my word for it.

bart_calendar posted today that current reports show nearly one out of five residents of the U.S. experienced problems with mental illness last year. That's a lot. I'm not saying what you eat can cure all your problems, but it helps with a lot of them. My emotional eating and food obsessions are gone. The PMS bitchy/angry days are significantly fewer. It'll be interesting to see if my seasonal blues are lessened. I bet they will be.

Speaking of food qualities, a recently released study suggests that a calorie is not a calorie. During increased daily protein intake vs. control body fat percentage decreased with unchanged physical activity during 3 months of stable body weight. Stable body weight with decreased body fat percentage means they're either gaining lean mass (without additional exercise) or they're growing tumors. I'm betting on the added lean mass. I'm going to look into upping my protein intake just a bit. Since I don't weigh all that much, even an extra egg a day could make a difference for me. Worth trying!

The bloom is off the rose with Trainer Chris D. He's being flaky and his understanding of professionally appropriate behavior, while never great, has caused a small amount of irritation for me. I feel like I'm being treated like a second-class citizen because I don't see him on a weekly (or more) basis. He already asked to change our meeting date once this semester, I thought because of his class schedule. On Monday, I got this email: "My schedule is starting to fill up and I wanted to see if you could change to any of the following times as our new meeting time. I apologize for having to shift the schedule around, it's just that business is starting to pick up for me. I'm sure you understand." So because I hired him when he didn't have many clients yet, and because I can't afford (or need) to see him as often as some, I'm the one who gets asked to change her schedule. Not cool. And yes, I said as much in my reply email.

I've got three more prepaid meetings with him. If I wouldn't be out nearly $100, I'd say fuck it and cancel the remaining sessions. But I should be able to get one more three-week program out of him, and that's worth something. Well, provided he doesn't get his back up over not being re-hired and fail to get me the last program before he's officially on unpaid status. Which, sadly, wouldn't surprise me. Oh, Trainer Chris D, things started of so well. What happened?!?

Hm. You know what? I just thought about this. I think I'm going to make him an offer tonight. I'm going to explain why I'm irritated (in case I wasn't clear enough in the email) and ask if he'd be willing to take the time he would've spent with me in the gym and make me two more series of workouts (for six more weeks of programs). He can just email me those, and we'll call tonight our last night and he can use those other sessions for his better-paying clients. Yes, I think that's a grand idea. He gets all his time back, and I feel like I get my money's worth of information, if not actual one-on-one training time.

Last, an apology! I forgot an ingredient for the pumpkin casserole. Please check the updated post for the inclusion of 2 teaspoons of coconut flour.

McKitterick makes the big time

Y'all!!!! My partner, the famous Chris McKitterick, just got BoingBoinged! You are rocking this like a giant awesome rocking thing, honey!

Can you all see the glowing pride over here? Can you?!?!?

Edit: Woot! Woot!

Edit 2: This has totally eclipsed what was a shitty day at work. Who cares about shitty work stuff? mckitterick is made of awesome smartness and is being recognized for it. Woot! Woot!

How to fire your personal trainer

I sent an email to Trainer Chris D. Here it is:

I have been thinking about my annoyed reaction to your request for a schedule change, and my additional irritation that you offered no response to my stated feelings about the schedule change. I didn't expect any sort of drawn-out apology, but an acknowledgment of my feelings about the matter would have been very much appreciated.

From your comment about how your schedule is filling up with increased clients, hence the need for the time change, I feel my value as a client is diminished from those who see you on a more frequent basis. I am paying the same amount per session as the other clients and deserve the same consideration. As I understood it, our initial schedule change earlier this semester was due to your increased course work load. As a former student and current employee at the university, I completely understand that. Being told that my previously scheduled time is not as convenient for you because of newly increased clientele is not something I appreciate.

I feel a trainer/client relationship demands a certain level of respect and conviviality. I am uncertain about the productiveness of our remaining sessions when I feel devalued as a customer of yours. Seeing that we have only three prepaid sessions left, I am uncertain of the likelihood of rebuilding a rapport with you, and I hope you will accept what I think is a very fair compromise between my need to feel I am respected and appreciated and your need to build a larger client base.

Would you consider the following: Instead of working with me for my remaining three sessions, make up for me two more three-week workout schedules that I can do on my own time, with my own home equipment. We needn't make an appointment to review them--simply emailing them to me would be fine. This way, you are free to schedule more frequent or better paying clients while I receive my expected number of exercise programs.

Perhaps I will hear back from you this afternoon before I leave this office. If I do, and you are amenable to this suggestion, I won't come in for this evening's session or our two December appointments. You may also call me at my office: 8XX-XXXX (until 5:00pm) or my cell phone 7XX-XXXX (until 5:15pm). If I haven't heard from you before 5:15 this evening (Friday, November 19), I'll come to the gym during our appointment time to discuss this with you in person.

I don't mean for this to be a dramatic issue, but it's important to me--especially in a business relationship that affects my health--to feel I am respected and appreciated. I hope you will accept my suggestion or that we can reach an other, equal and mutually beneficial compromise to the situation.

I know I made the right decision on this, because here is his response:

I understand your frustration and I have apologized about the schedule change every time that we've been in correspondence about the schedule change. I'm also a bit frustrated by the fact that you've failed to realize how difficult it is to get everyone in the number of times per week that they'd like to train. Every trainer here is on the same page in terms of prioritizing clients. It's not personal, it's business and the other clients understand that. However, I know that by your argument that I'm still in the wrong and I'm entirely too busy to burn any more energy on this issue.

I will write two more 3-week workouts for you and send them to you tonight.

My thoughts:

Now, we emailed about this issue just twice. Once for each change. What all that posturing about talking about this in every exchange is about, I have no idea. Oh, and btw, his apologies amounted to "I'm sorry, can we reschedule?"

If all the trainers at this gym are indeed "on the same page" about "prioritizing clients" in the order of whomever pays more is worth more of their time, I am very glad to disassociate myself with Next Level. I like to think they aren't, that most of the trainers there are egalitarian and open-minded about their clients' needs and financial options.

Even if a person absolutely believes that s/he is in the right, it's not professional to say to a customer that you aren't going to spend any more energy dealing with her issues. I wish he'd simply taken me up on my compromise offer of how to resolve the situation (which he did) without adding the editorial. A simple "I, too, am sorry that there were misunderstandings. I am pleased to accept your suggested resolution" would have been a perfect and professional response. Eventually, this sort of passive-aggressive bullshit is going to have some unfortunate repercussions for him.

Frankly, I don't have high hopes for the quality of those two workouts. *sigh*