Feeling better

Okay, I took the rest of the week off. I could rattle off the excuses reasons I didn't run (it was cold, my ankles hurt and it was CHRISTMAS, for crying out loud!), but I wont. Except that I just did...

It's true, though. My ankles and knees really were bothering me for most of last week, and that helped nudge me into inaction. It works out, though, because on tonight's run, I felt pretty good. Even afterwards, I don't feel as tense as I did after last Monday's workout. So hooray for me. Hopefully it will last...

In other news, I got an iPod Touch for Christmas, and have been busy looking for apps that will help me in my efforts to not be such a slug. The one I want to mention tonight (because I actually used it) is Chronolite. It's a free app that allows you to set up to 4 separate timers. (The paid app allows more, and has some more flexibility, but I'll let that be for now.) So I set timer 1 for 2 minutes, timer 2 for 1 minute and timer 3 for 5 minutes (warm-up and cool-down). They worked pretty well, except that a couple of times I had a hard time resetting or starting the timers. I think that was mostly due to the fact that I have a screen guard on my iPod, and it was in an armband with a protective cover, as well, so the sensitivty was a bit low. As a result of that, I had one run and one walk session where I'm not sure how long I actually ran/walked.

The breakdown for tonight's workout: 2.36(ish) miles in 30 minutes, using 2 minutes run, 1 minute walk. Depending on walking speed, my running pace was somewhere between 8:30 and 10:45 per mile, and my average pace was around 12:45 per mile.

Hopefully, I'll be able to run 2-3 more times this week. I'm going to remain at the 2/1 pace since I missed last week entirely, and depending on how I feel, I may extend Saturday's run to 45 minutes... but we'll see.

2/1

First things first. I missed my run on Saturday. I walked out the door and to my staring point, jogged about 10 steps, and realized that my knees were screaming, "Don't you DARE!!!" So I stopped, turned around, and walked home, thus missing what should have been my last 1:30/1:30 run.

I did get out tonight, however, even though I was completely exhausted. Rather than try to make up for Saturday's run, however, I decided to plow on with my schedule, moving up to 2 minute run / 1 minute walk. My knees protested again when I started, but I thought, "Meh, I'll keep going and see what happens." Sure enough, by the time I'd been running for about 30 seconds, my knees weren't bothering me at all. (Wish I'd thought of that Saturday...) I did find myself adjusting my gait throughout the run. Every now and then I'd sense myself hitting the pavement too hard, or trying to cushion the blow too much with my toes (which seemed to bother my knees more, interestingly enough), so I'd tweak it slightly and move on. It seemed to work for me. My exertion level was on the high side of "medium" - with most run segments being 3 steps in, 2 steps out. I may decide later that this level is too low for a good workout (I haven't bothered to check my pulse yet), but for now I'm fine with it. Remember - three weeks ago, I hadn't run furher than 50 feet in almost 5 years.

I checked my numbers, and if my distance (found at USA Track and Field association) is correct, I did about 2.25 miles in my 30 minutes. Depending on how slow my walks were (between 2 and 3 miles per hour), my running pace was between 9:00 and 11:30 miles. I figure I'll get a more accurate read later on, after I've been doing this for a while. Right now, though, the focus is still on just getting out and going, rather than speed.

Ouch.

Today has been pretty busy. I worked late, then when I got home MB had to walk out the door, so I was stuck babysitting the wee one. By the time MB was home, it was nearly 8:00 - too late for a regular run, I thought. In fact, I almost bailed on today's run altogether, but I decided instead to go out for 20 minutes and work on speed a bit.

I kept up with my 90-second rotations, but I pushed myself much harder during the runs, usually getting down to two steps per inhale/exhale by the end of the segment. I felt pretty good, but only because I kept telling myself how awesome I was to keep pushing like this, even when it's tough.

Then I finished my run. I got home and my lower back was completely tensed up. I took every type of pain medication I had and laid down on the floor, but I was still really tight. I turned put the massager on my back and took a hot shower (not at the same time), and that seemed to help somewhat, but I'm still rather sore. My legs seem to have recovered (or the pain killers are working on them), but my back still hurts. I think I can feel one bunch of muscle fibers in particular that are still tight, but I don't massage my own back very well.

What I'm really worried about, though, is the possibility that I've gone and screwed up my back yet again and will have to go in for round 3 of surgery. My one hope right now is that this doesn't feel like sciatica, it's just overly tense muscles.

Suggestions?

Just a short note...

...to document my last two runs. I ran for about 36 mins on Saturday (50% more than any other day, qualifying it as a "long run" in my weak workout book), putting in just shy of 3 miles. Again, not a very fast pace, but that's not my point right now.

Tonight I changed my run/walk ratio to 1:30 each and ran about 2 1/4 miles in about 30 minutes. I plan to do the same on Wednesday and Friday, then keep the same ratio for 45 minutes on Saturday. Here's hoping.

One thing I noticed about my workout tonigh was that by the end of it, I wasn't running all that fast. Let me clarify. I wasn't pushing myself as hard. When I first stared tonight, I was pretty tired after 90 seconds. I measure relative tiredness by how many steps I can take with each inhale/exhale. So "pretty tired" is when I reach 2 steps per inhale, 2 per exhale. That's where I was after my first couple of sets. So to keep from killing myself, I consciously slowed down. But by the end of my workout, I was still at 3/3, even after extending my run an extra 45 seconds. I obviously slowed down more than I meant to - at least on those last couple of sets. The question is, how do I find the balance between not pushing myself too hard, so I hate doing this, and not pushing myself hard enough, so I don't actually get any better?

Today's Run

I was copying some documents for work today, and since it was going to take upwards of 30 minutes to copy, I decided to knock out today's run. I took more-or-less the same route that I did Monday, but I had to take a very small detour due to work on the running trail (probably .1 mile extra). But I was more disciplined with my stopwatch, so my run time was almost exactly 24 minutes, rather than 25-26 minutes, like it was last time. So I think I may have run a little bit faster, but I'm not sure. (Speed isn't really my goal right now, so I try to avoid thinking about it as much as I can, squashing down the little voice that's constantly saying, "Hey, I think you ran faster last time. Speed up, or this run won't do you any good.")
Anyway, it went well. I'm pretty tired, but my joints are still feeling pretty good. And more importantly, I've now run three times in less than one week. Now, I just need to decide whether to run on Friday AND Saturday, or just Saturday.

I'm not dead yet.

I realize it has been 7 1/2 months since I posted last. It has also been just about that long since I last exercised, too. There's definitely a correlation there, possibly even causation. (I'm not sure which way causation might run, though.)

But I'm back, and I've got a new fitness project - running. I've never really been what you'd call a "runner," though at a couple points of time in my life I ran fairly regularly - mostly when I was on active duty in the Army and I either had a physical fitness test coming up or a drill sergeant ready to pounce on me if I didn't. When we first moved to Arizona, I ran several times a week, but that only lasted for a month or two. Then I stopped. Then I got out of the National Guard. Then I really stopped running. I don't think I've actually had a workout based on running since, oh, January 2005. Until now.

I read recently about some new research that seems to indicate that a lot of the problems people get from running are because all the running shoes we buy change our gait from a natural one (leading with the toe and allowing the bones of the foot to absorb the impact) to an unnatural one (leading with the heel, causing the impact to be sent straight up through the ankle and into the knee). The idea is that if we all ran barefoot (or, at least, with less padding), we would be able to run with fewer injuries, and therefore be able to run more.

So, I decided to give it a shot. Tonight was actually my second run (my first was on Saturday). Since it has been so long since I've run at all, and since I'm actively trying to change my gait, I'm going with a regimen where I run for one minute, then walk for two, repeated 8 times. I haven't purchased new shoes - the ones I'm using are about 18 months old and were bought at Payless for about $25.

Past experience tells me that my shins and knees should be killing me right now, for running in such awful shoes. But I actually feel pretty good. My calves are rather sore, having to absorb a lot more motion than they're used to doing, but they don't feel injured - just sore. My knees and feet feel fine. And the kicker is that when I run (as opposed to when I'm just walking), I'm running much faster than I used to. Tonight I did just shy of 2 miles in about 25 minutes - which is not too much slower than my firs-ever 2-mile run at Basic Training. (Remember when I said I've never really been a strong runner?) If I assume that my walking speed was about 3 mph, and my math is correct, that means when I was running, it was at about an 8-minute-mile pace. Not amazing, I know, but not too shabby for someone who has had 5 years and two back surgeries since his last workout.

Here I Am

Okay, first to answer the question that's on everyone's mind. (Well, everyone that is participating...) Last week I ended up with -16 points, mostly because I managed to gain about 4 lbs. I was really good up until Thursday, which was our annual pizza/chicken nuggets/strawberries/birthday cake shin-dig. So, I blew it that night. Friday we went out to a Japanese hibachi-style restaurant. I felt pretty good about the fact that my willpower kept me from allowing the chef to spray sake in my mouth, so I was pretty much done for as far as food goes. Then we had the weekend, which sucked, too. In addition to calories not-kept-track-of, I had a lot of salty foods, which did not help me lose weight, either.

This week had a better ending, but was about as bad overall. I was only vaguely conscious of my calorie intake, and only recorded my food intake on 1 or 2 days. But I did end up losing 1.4 lbs (mostly water, I'm sure), leaving me at 252.6 lbs. Better, right?

Now -- today. I'm on track to be well within my calorie range for today. I don't know if I'll get around to actually exercising tonight, but I'm going to give it a shot.

So, who won this week? It's looking like Eva's the winner by far, unless Rody's got a big surprise for us. Good luck this week, everybody!

Road may seem MIA...

But he's just a bit busy with work and school to keep up on adding his stats to the spreadsheet. He is, in fact, still a participant. He picked up a couple of GoWearFit (the Pharmanex version of the better-known BodyBugg) from work the other day. He was so excited to get them. I got more excited after seeing how it works. Unfortunately, we still need to enter in every bit we eat, portion sizes, etc. It does have a lot of brands and some take-out food already built in, but there always seems to be a bit of entry needed for stuff not on there.

Somehow, after seeing it add up the calories I use throughout the day I am more motivated to go through the bother of entering in the info for the food. I was happy to see that you can put in your favorite recipe and tell it the number of servings and it calculates everything for you. This is especially nice since most recipes' serving size is a little smaller when eating the food by itself (I don't often add salads and sides to the meals we have at home unless we have guests). Though I bet that would help meals to be more filling in a volumetric way versus a caloric way. Hm. I should reconsider my meal planning. Anyway, some other nice features to this little gadget is that it recognizes when you are sleeping versus just laying down. It measures not only your heartrate, but body temp and 'acceleration', or movement. Seems pretty accurate - like Saturday night it showed a nice solid blue bar for most of the night, while the last couple of nights have been choppy. I was for sure more rested this weekend than I have been the last couple nights. It calculates your 'sleep efficiency' based on the amount you actually sleep. It's nice to have the validation that I did or didn't sleep well on any given night. My only complaint is the software seems finicky. Seems like the driver for the device isn't always found on our computers by the website. Not sure if it's our computers of the website. Sometimes it's a matter of switching the browser to IE from Firefox or vice versa, or closing your session out and trying again. It's annoying. I blame it on slacker developers somewhere :)

So this is Road's method of tracking right now. I'll try to get it translated to the spreadsheet. He's just the mystery competitor right now.

Congrats to Eva for being the winner last week!!! I found this forum on some fun tips on when to find little ways to fit in an exercise here and there. The site has lots of workouts too, if you like to change things up. And how is it that Rick ended up in the negative???

Slowly but surely...

So yay to both Rick and Eva!!! Good work on gaining those points. I guess I really need to outline specifics for me to be evaluating myself against. I guess at this point, my goal is to do any amount of time dedicated to exercise. I was doing really good a few weeks back before our official contest. Weird eh? I do have to say that I have been really good this week about NOT eating out. And making more than just homemade goodies, (That's good for both me and Road), at least nothing since Sunday's late night cinnamon meringues that I made with Lex :) I am also trying to make sure that I eat some protein every 3 hours or so. I even ordered some protein bars that I used to always get back in my gym rat days. I usually read a health article, am I supposed to post a link on here to the info or summarize or just indicate it on my spreadsheet?

Here's a nice short slideshow of "Diet Mistakes". We are all probably aware of most of them, but I am visually inclined, so I liked it. And here is a sample recipe that has had a 'makeover', I always like to find cooking tips for making something a little healthier.

Good Day

Hey, everyone. I'm going to see if can do three things at once (let me know if you think this isn't fair...)

First: I'm encouraging you all. Good job, Eva, on yesterday's performance. I also noticed when I updated the spreadsheet that you were on, too. Hope you got some good stuff to put in. Rody, where are you? You're not going to let me win this week without even trying, are you?

Second: I'm blogging, so this counts for that. I stayed within my calorie range and walked for about 40 minutes. (I'm going to buy some new running shoes eventually -- maybe when I lose 10-15 lbs.) I also kept my goals: Recording everything I ate and eating 5 fruits/veggies. So, I maxed out on points today. Well, I maxed the things that have limits, anyway.

Third: I'm giving a review of www.sparkpeople.com -- the updated site. If you haven't seen this, it really is a great tool. It lets you keep track of diet, cardio and strength training exercise. It has a LOT of articles (many of which I will quote as I post my articles in the future). Best of all, it is completely free. Its diet tracker is one of the easiest I've seen. The database has thousands of entries, so when you go to enter what you ate, you'll probably find it pretty quickly. If you can't find it, you can add foods yourself, which then become searchable by other users. When you first register, you set goals for yourself, and it gives you guidelines as to how to accompish those goals. And for motivational articles, it is excellent. As I said before, I'm going to find some of my favorites and send you the links. One thing, though: You do have to be a member to read the articles. Did I mention that it is free?

GAME ON!!!

Okay, after much discussion, we finally got the rules worked out, and we started the contest this morning. So, here I am writing about how everything worked today.

First, my starting weight is 250.2 lbs. I overshot my calorie intake by about 200 calories, entirely because I didn't plan well. I didn't plan breakfast well enough, so I had a granola bar. I didn't plan snacks well, so when I got hungrier than usual earlier than usual (see breakfast), I ended up going to the convenience store (conveniently located behind my building) and buying snacks. (I did manage to get trail mix, rather than Doritos, at least.) Finally, for lunch, I didn't plan anything at all, so when MB was at McDonald's with the kids, I had her pick up a burger and fries for me. (I think this one, by itself, pushed me over the edge easily -- even though I was relatively "good.")

I did OK in exercise. I pushed Aren on his bike (and ran along next to him) for about 15 minutes, and later on tonight (after the Amazing Whiny Baby goes to bed), I'm going to go on a walk for about 40 minutes.

How did you guys do?

Ice Cream for Breakfast!

Yes, I know this blog is all about me trying to become more fit, and that a big part of that is trying to eat healthy.

But every now and then, you just need to forget about it -- for a good cause.

When Aren went on his Make-A-Wish trip a few years ago, we stayed at Give Kids the World Village, which is dedicated entirely to children with life-threatening illnesses. Because it is all about, well, giving kids the world, kids who may not make it much longer (some have passed away just weeks after their trips), kids are encouraged to do things they would not get away with normally. The prime example of this is the Ice Cream Palace, which serves ice cream (free of charge) from 7:30 AM to 9:30 PM.

Tomorrow is Founder's day at Give Kids the World, so everyone with even a tangential relationship to the place is encouraged to eat ice cream for breakfast. Now, to be completely honest, the thought actually makes me a bit ill. I'm really more of an "eggs and bacon" kind of guy. Or if I really want something sweet, I'll have a pancake, or an english muffin with jam.

But for GKTW, and for the I will make the sacrifice.

A Cautionary Tale

I learned a valuable lesson. Last night, I learned that when eating at any restaurant, especially alone, you should always, ALWAYS, be sure you know what you're going to get.

I'm on a business trip, and therefore have been eating alone for the past couple of days. Tuesday night wasn't a big deal because I ate at a place that was more like a diner than anything else (even though it self-identifies as a "sports bar" -- but the only sporty thing I can see about the place are the flat-screen TVs hung on the wall, two of which weren't even showing sports). I ordered a hamburger and fries, and wouldn't you know it, I got a hamburger and fries. No surprises.

Last night, though, I decided to "treat" myself to Red Lobster. Stop laughing. The nearest seafood place of any kind to my house is about 90 minutes, and I can't go there because MB starts heaving about 10 minutes before I even think about suggesting that we go there. And besides, Sierra Vista is so desolate that I even look forward to going to all kinds of places that I would be embarrassed to mention.

So, I went, intending to order some salmon. The menu says I can get steamed fresh broccoli and another side, so I choose a baked potato -- splurging a bit, you see. The waitress also asked if I wanted an appetizer. Now, I was way too smart to try to order an entire plate of calamari or even hush puppies. But, I decided to splurge again and ordered a single cup of soup.

Two little splurges. I'm doing pretty well, right?

Then she asks what kind of salad I want.

Huh?

"It comes with a salad. Do you want Caesar or Chef?"

I go with the Caesar. I'm doing a bit much, but I'm still OK, right? I mean, it's a salad. How bad can it be?

Then she delivered the salad. The kind of salad where every lettuce leaf is coated in dressing. The kind of salad that would be too much for some people to eat for lunch. And she puts down the "cup" of soup, which suddenly looks more like a quart. On top of it all, right in front of me, she places a basket with four steamy cheese biscuits. This could be a decent lunch for me, by myself.

And I sat there, pondering the amount of food placed in front of me before I even get my entree when I suddenly realized that all the food was gone, and had been replaced by a large piece of fire-grilled salmon, broccoli and a baked potato. Where did the rest of my food go? I would blame it on the person sitting across from me, but there's nobody there. And then, just as suddenly, there is no food left on the rather large plate that was just delivered. I initially blame my invisible companion, but then I realize that I'm no longer hungry. In fact, I'm really quite full. Rather sick, even. What have I done? WHAT HAVE I DONE???

And I wonder how I've gained 70 lbs in the last 12 years. Actually, looking back on this, it's amazing I'm doing as well as I am.

Today's Exercise

I'm embarrassed to say it, but I exercised today.

Well, it's not so much that I exercised but that I worked up a pretty good sweat.

Okay, it's not so much that, but that I worked up a pretty good sweat by... er... uh...

walking.

Yes, I walked for 60 minutes and its the best workout I've had in a long time. And I only went about 3 mph. I'm a pansy, all right? I'm terribly out of shape (unless you count "rotund" as a shape), and I'm afraid to push myself too much because I don't want my back to explode again.

Once you stop laughing, I just want to point out that even though my average was a paltry 20-minute mile, and that if I were still in the army I would have to go more than twice that fast just to not get kicked out (assuming they hadn't already expelled me for being excessively convex), I did manage to burn nearly 300 calories. Yes, it's true that those 300 calories won't even cover one of the slices of pizza I had for lunch, let alone put much of a dent in the way-too-big dinner I had tonight, I actually made myself exercise instead of allowing myself to lay in bed and watch some crappy made-for-tv movie. Like I did last night. I also walked home on Monday, so for those of you keeping track, that's 5 miles for me this week.

Trying to Not Suck As Much

Okay, so I haven't written in a while. I haven't really done anything fitness-related in pretty much as long, so I guess it's only fitting.

Last week I had a conversation with Rody, and we've decided to re-vamp the rules. We also have added a couple of people to our little contest. I'll post the rules tomorrow (once we have agreed on them). Now, rather than just the long(ish)-term weight loss goals, we've added some things to do that we can keep track of daily. There will still be a prize for losing weight, but we have also added a prize for walking/jogging/running and weekly prizes for other types of exercise, staying with the diet and staying focused on fitness, as evidenced by writing on this blog.

Here's hoping that I will do considerably better over the next few months.

This Week

I'm trying to decide if I sabotaged myself this weekend or actually did something good. Let me explain.

Things have been crazy at work. I've been putting in long hours, and haven't really had time to stop for lunch or snacks. By the time I get home, I'm exhausted, eat just a bit for dinner then crash so I can repeat the next day.

So here is a day-by-day (almost) record of my weight this week.

Monday: 249.6
Tuesday: 248.2
Wednesday: 247.4
Thursday: 246.5
Friday: 246.0

By Friday morning, I had lost 3.6 lbs, averaging .7 lbs per day. This means that, had the trend continued, I would have ended up with a 5 pound loss this week. Now if I had been on Biggest Loser, and had been exercising incessantly over the week, I wouldn't have worried about it. But I hadn't even done so much as walk all the way around the block. I was concerned that I had just been undereating terrifically, and that if I kept the very low calorie diet going, it would come back to bite me in the butt.

With that thought in mind, I actually made a conscious decision on Friday and Saturday to eat -- a lot. So much that when I got on the scale this morning, I hit 247.8. I don't feel bad about that number, because it represents nearly 2 lbs lost over this week, which is generally considered a safe amount of weight to lose.

So here's the question I posed earlier. Did I shoot myself in the foot, or was pigging out for a couple of days the smart thing to do? I guess we'll see.

This coming week promises to be very busy, as well. I expect to work long days every day, but I will also be away from the office for most of the week, as well. I think this poses some significant challenges. The biggest one is that when you don't have a refrigerator next to your desk to heat up the healthy meals you already prepared, it's much more convenient to eat out. And when you eat out, it's that much harder to eat healthy -- especially when you're on a military base, where most of the population runs 20 miles each week and actually needs extra calories just to maintain their weight.

Wish me luck.

Just a Couple Of Things...

Very short, to the point, boring post.

Thursday, I officially reached my lowest weight since mid-September: 248.9. I'm pretty happy about that.

So what do I do? Blow it on Friday. I did well until dinner, when I had a slice of pizza (only one, though!), a Domino's Chicken Parmesan sandwich (not my favorite sandwich, but still decent) and a couple of blueberry/lemon poppy seed muffins (MB was feeling adventurous). I had another one this morning, but other than that, I've been good.

Tomorrow is my official weigh-in, so we'll see how it goes.

Research

I'm going to throw something "out there" right now. This may shock those of you that have been following this blog, and have seen my sparkling personality shining through my prose, but I'm not a terribly popular person. I have two personal email accounts. One I use for subscriptions (it's the older of the two accounts), and the other I use for actual correspondence. The second receives only about three emails each week, mostly from old friends who don't really want to touch base with me as much as they want to spread the latest virus alert (don't open any more emails ever again or you will DIE!!!) or the oldest email petition out there (sign this and send it to all of your friends, or CBS will CANCEL TOUCHED BY AN ANGEL!). I don't even know when the last time was that my Yahoo account actually was used by someone who wanted me to reply to them. Well, besides the horde of Nigerian millionaire widows who need me to help get their fortunes out of the Bank Swiss Accounts and will "reward my generosity to the amount of $2m (dollars) for my help in this regard."

But just because it doesn't come from an actual person I know doesn't mean it's entirely worthless. I get almost weekly newsletters from Scientific American, and I found two articles that actually related quite well to this blog. This article discusses a study done recently by people who were on a weight loss program. Unsurprisingly, they found that those who ate healthy foods and exercised at least 30 minutes daily had lost at least 9 lbs at the end of six months. The interesting thing here (no sarcasm this time) was that those who recorded what they ate each day lost about double the amount of those who didn't use diet journals.

Now, I don't intend to log everything I eat. Nobody wants to read that, at least not yet. I do, however, plan to use this space to confess each time I eat something I shouldn't. (Which reminds me, yesterday, I had a bowl of Ramen noodles and two granola bars. Did I mention that already? If I did, just forget this parenthetical.) Today I've been perfect. Well for carbs, at least. But that's all I'm focusing on right now.

The other article indicates one way to be motivated to lose weight. Apparently, people who receive relatively small cash prizes for their efforts lose more weight than those who don't. This article puts a slightly different spin on it. Rather than gaining cash, the subject of the story bet his friend that he would lose a certain amount of weight each week. If he didn't, he would lose $500. Each week. That would motivate me...

I don't have the cash to pull off that kind of a bet. Fortunately, I do have that contest going with Rody. Hopefully that will be enough to keep me in line.

P.S. Speaking of staying in line, I want you all to know that when I left the convenience store next to my office today, I had NOT purchased chocolate chip cookies, Reese's Peanut Butter Cups or pecan pies. Thanks, I'm proud of myself, too.

Resolutions

If you are one of the three people in this world who read (or pretend to read) this blog, I have some an announcement. Even though I hate goals (because I'm too lazy to follow through on most of them), I've made one of those "...every day" types of resolutions.

I've decided to write something -- anything -- every day. At least 500 words. I'm going to divide those words somehow between this blog, my other family blog and my own laptop. I'm thinking that if it has anything remotely to do with weight loss, I'll put it here. If it's anything else, I'll put it over on the other blog. And if all I can come up with is 500 random words, I'll keep those on my laptop, sparing you at least a bit of idiocy.

However, to spare you readers from what could end up being a very boring blog (and already has, at least a couple of times), I will do my best to keep the stuff posted here (and over there) relevant or clever (or both, if I can swing it).

And for what may end up being the other 300 days this year, let me apologize in advance. Thanks for your patience.

I'm Back... sort of

The holidays are usually pretty tough for people who are trying to watch their weight. In fact, most people I know end up throwing their hands in the air after the third Christmas party they attend and just start hoping that they won't gain more than about 5 lbs by the first Monday after New Year's Day.

You know, that should be a holiday. We could call it "resolution day" because nobody actually starts trying to lose weight/get in shape until after they start work again, anyway. The logic rationalization goes like this:

Thanksgiving, 10:00 AM: "I'm only going to have one small plate of food, and most of that will be raw vegetables. I have willpower!"
Thanksgiving, 5:00 PM: "Pecan pie is OK. Look at all the protein from the nuts!"
Day-after-Thanksgiving, 12:00 PM: "I'm exhausted from standing in line at Best Buy all day. I'm sure my glycogen stores are pretty much wiped out. I wonder if we have any more chocolate mousse pie?"
December 15, after Christmas party #3: "Screw it. Maybe I just won't gain any more weight."
December 26, after standing on scale: "Honey, I think we need new batteries. This can't be right. Why does it say I gained 15 lbs this week?"
December 31: "Okay, this is my last hurrah! No more onion dip! EVER!"
January 1 (Thursday): "I heard that pretzels are good for hangovers. I can't do this yet. Besides, who starts a diet on Thursday? Sunday morning, it's on."

The strange thing is that it sort-of-almost worked for me this year. Actually, I can't really claim any impressive stores of willpower. Any weight that I've lost since my last entry has pretty much been beyond my control. We had a family reunion over Christmas, and stayed with my in-laws for nearly two weeks.

Now, before I go any further, let me make this caveat, and let me make it clear that I am not saying this just because I can't sleep on the couch. This is the honest truth: I really like MB's family. My sister-in-law (who we stayed with) was such a gracious host that as MB and I pulled into our driveway, we looked around and honestly felt like it was not our home. So, Sarah did a great job, as did MB's mom. If you are reading this, I really thank you sincerely.

Here's the problem, though. I don't like being a house guest. I always feel like I'm imposing, so I don't let people know what I really want, even though I know they would give it to me instantly. But since I don't let them know what I want, I never get what I want, so I end up feeling sort of mildly irritated. I know it's my fault, and I'm trying to deal with it. Two cases in point (that relate to this blog perfectly): Breakfast and lunch.

Like many (if not most) Americans, breakfast with my in-laws was usually cold cereal. This was a problem for me for two reasons. First, I was still trying to at least pretend that I was on South Beach, so cold cereal should have been pretty much out -- even for phase 3. Second, I'm not that big of a cold cereal fan to begin with. So on about 7 of the 10 days we were in MD, I skipped breakfast altogether.

Lunch entailed a different problem altogether. Lunchtime was usually spent not at my sister-in-law's house, but at my mother-in-law's. Not a big deal, you think? This is the part where I point out that for many of those days, there were no fewer than 34 people at said house. If you didn't move fast, everything would be gone before you even realized that anyone was even hungry. Translation: Get in there and throw some elbows, or you get cold cereal for lunch, too. If you're lucky.

So for the majority of my vacation, I only ate dinner and a few snacks. (Dinner could be sparse as well, with 34 people. But it always tasted great! Thanks, Mom!) The days I ventured into the District I made up in calories for the days I lost, though, so at the end of the trip I came away with no gain or loss, according to Sara's scale. (I don't know how it compares with my own, so all I can measure is the difference in the time I was there.)

Then came Sunday.

On Sunday, I woke up with some sort of stomach flu. I won't go into the details, but by the time I weighed in yesterday, I had managed to lose 2.2 lbs since 12/19, coming in at 249.8.
Now, before any of you decide to go drinking from cesspools, hoping to contract amoebic dysentery, let me mention that illness is NOT a good way to lose weight. Today I was up .9 lbs, most of which I attribute to the fact that once my appetite came back, it came back with a vengeance. I've eaten quite a few things today that I shouldn't have (to include my late-night snack of a very large bowl of Chocolate Chex, and two granola bars). Besides that, I still feel a bit off. So, hopefully my digestive tract will come back online in the next couple of days, and I'll be able to get back to business.
Until then, though, I'm sure we still have a bit of pie in the fridge...