The Power of Six, 365 better each day, and Winning by Losing

I haven't been reading much the last week what with dealing with a three week long migraine. I found it's a little hard to focus on the words when I'm half blind with pain. 

 The Power of Six is the second in the I am Number Four series. Because of my lack of competent thinking at the moment, I'm just going to tell you what I thought of it.

The series itself, while predictable sci-fi/alien/young adult fiction, is an enjoyable easy read. The Power of Six by itself was a little disappointing to me. It wasn't that the story wasn't good or the writing was bad, it's just that it was a middle book, if that makes sense. See this is where my migraine has me go on random tangents!

The book starts where the first book left off and had no real ending. It wasn't even so much a cliff ending to me, but rather just an abrupt ending. There was no closure whatsoever and it just left me feeling like there were chapters missing.

Now I know this is supposed to make me rush out and buy the next book to find out what happens next, but really I just felt like I had wasted my time. Sure I got to meet some new characters and see a little character  development with the previous people, but I just felt like this book was a series of random dialog and fights. I mean, several chapters were of the Numbers just kind of sitting around waiting to happen. And then when danger did present itself, it seemed fairly easy to handle. Not that they didn't struggle, but it just seemed like no big deal.

All in all, if you like the first book, you have to finish the rest, otherwise it's just a waste. It's an enjoyable time wasting read...but still wasteful.




This book had a lot of great ideas, however most of it could be found from just about any magazine on the racks for women.  Lot of it was also common sense, like go outside and listen to music that makes you happy. I had this as a 21 day check out from the library so I didn't have the time to read one a day as I had wanted. Reading a few "days" at a time, the tips started to become a little repetitive. I think it would have been a bit better if the book had been sorted by topic instead of randomly flipping back and forth between weight loss and depression. Overall, many of the tips were interesting and helpful. Actually, I would have liked to see this as a one a day desk calendar rather than in book form.

Unfortunately, my checkout of Winning by Losing expired before I was able to finish reading it, though I did put it on hold for the next available copy.

Going into this book I was expecting...I don't know, Jillian to be mean and yell at me or something. What I found instead was a good break down of really useful weight loss information.

Now I know what you're thinking, rapid weight loss is not healthy. Well! She actually only promotes 1-2 pounds of weight loss per week and the advice in the book is the as what you would find from other sources.

But like I said, I was unable to finish the book due to time constraints. I just have not reached a point where I am able to devote 100% of my reading time to non-fiction or in this case self-help. Anyway, once I have finished the book, I will be soon to update on what I thought of this book.

Spark People

  I've been focusing on my weight loss goals pretty hard core lately. The best resource I use is Spark People . This website has everything I need and it's free!

I'm sure there are many features that I am not currently utilizing, but here's some of the features that I love.

*Nutrition Tracker. Spark People already has a great database of common foods but I can also manual add stuff if I can't find it. I can also create food groupings which is just awesome...I mean really, who wants to add each ingredient that they used to make up dinner every single time?

*Fitness Tracker. Once again they have a great database of exercises. What's awesome though, is that the calories burned it based on ME. The treadmill might tell me I only burned 50 calories but Spark People tells me the truth.

*Meal Plans. You don't have to use the meal plans, but they are pretty awesome. I set my week up all at once and then print the grocery list. If there's something I don't like I can easily swap it for something similar (they give me a list of options!).

*Spark Pages. You get your own page to customize and make your own. You can have a weight ticker, photos, blog etc. It's basically like a Myspace page, but cooler. ;) (Really who uses Myspace anymore?)

*Community. The community is what makes Spark People so amazing. They have Teams you can join based on your needs and interests, community forums, challenges...The people are so supportive! With a small amount of effort (just start yapping!) you can make lasting friendships with people who have similar goals to your own.

If you're pregnant or breastfeeding, you can check out their sister site Baby Fit. Baby Fit focuses on your health as a Mommy. They have great due date clubs and a similar atmosphere to Spark People.

If you decide to join Spark People, be sure to add me, Smurfyabs!