Day 19

Pleasantly surprised by a one pound loss this morning. That almost fixes all the damage from the weekend. Had a pretty good day as far as food went, and managed to fit in an honest to goodness road ride this evening. It was colder than it looked so hopefully the shivering and goosebumps increased the calorie burn.
For the record I discovered I like Tilapia much better than Cod today. Write that down.

Morning weigh in:

• 188.6
• 25.1%

Day 18

Sloth.
Sunday is supposed to be a day of rest but this is ridiculous.  Ended up eating pizza, leftover chicken and rice, and then BBQ Pork Roast for dinner.  At least I ate all my broccoli.  Speaking of which, the stems are the good part of broccoli.  Not the flowers/leaves.  If you force your kids to eat the nasty flowers, of course they won't like it.
Just thought I'd share that.
After Saturday's surprise loss, my body compensated by packing on a little Sunday morning surprise.  Although my peaks are all under 190 now, so I am making progress.  I'll be back at it for the rest of the week.  Even if they do cause setbacks, the weekends off save my sanity.  There is no loneliness like diet loneliness.  So being able to eat with my kids as well as what my kids are eating, is a nice concession to myself.
There are just over two weeks until St Patricks Day.  Why does this matter?  Because in my family St Patrick's Day is a bigger day than Thanksgiving.  Despite our tenuous at best ties to Irish lineage, we have been feasting on St Patrick's for as long as I can remember.  And as a matter of protocol there is Corned Beef and Cabbage to be had, but my mother also prepares a full Turkey dinner with all the trimmings.  Potatoes Colcannon, pies, Soda Bread and, ya know, green Jell-O and stuff.  It's mainly just an excuse for a big dinner.   I WILL BE EATING A FULL ST FATTY'S DAY FEAST.  The trick is going to be having lost enough weight that it won't send me into a full Carb and Fat relapse.  I see it as the deadline.  I would count anything in the 170's as a success by St Patricks Day.  We'll see how that goes.

Morning Weigh In:

• 189.8
• 25.1%

Day 16, and 17

Slacking.  Both on my "program" and on the chronicling of said program.
Friday(day 16) was bad. I woke up sore, and tired.  I flaked out on going to the gym.  When I did finally wake up and weigh in, I had gained a pound.  You may recall that I was predicting a gain on Friday.  Funny thing was that I was so pissed off I went into a childish tail spin.  Not only did I not work out, but I then headed back to my dealer and bellied up to a nice greasy steak,egg, and cheese breakfast burrito from the Top Stop in Lehi.  As the grease dribbled down my chin, I felt like I should have a belt tied around my bicep and be thumping my arm trying to find a vein.  I had to adjust the rear view mirror so I couldn't make eye contact with myself.
I will say this, a breakfast burrito tides you over waaaaay better than a green smoothie.  Come lunchtime I had come to my senses a bit.  Another Jared sub from Subway.  I had intended to go to the gym in the evening as I have children and no social life outside the home.  However before I got home I was informed that plans had been made for me to eat at my in-laws.  Dinner was a crock-pot casserole of the mexican variety.  It would have been a little less dangerous if I had held off on the sour cream, but I was pouting after all.
So to recap day 16:  No exercise and several bad food choices.
Morning weigh in:

• 187.8
• 24.5%

Moving on to day 17. From the beginning I had planned to take weekends off.  But both weekends now I have started early on Friday.  My favorite African-Canadian and diet buddy Jeff texted me about snowshoeing so we made plans to go.  When I woke up, I staggered in and stripped down to weigh in.  What joy and rapture filled my soul when I had LOST more weight than I had gained the day before.  Must be water weight.
Got my gear together and ate a quick breakfast of peanut butter smeared on these nasty little wheat-tortilla-flatbread thingys that my wife buys.   With the big storms the last couple days, the trails were all soft and fluffy, but Stan and the Velo Club had started early and broken the trail ahead of us.  We followed their tracks all the way up Pine Hollow to the second meadow, and then headed south-westish until we came out on Cascade Springs road.  Which meant we would have to climb back up to the summit before being able to drop down to the vehicle.  We headed up the road and when we reached the summit, Stan and the club were all standing at the summit parking lot.  The group split into the hard-cores who were heading uphill, and the rest of us who were heading down Salamander flat and down to the cars.  We took a less than direct route and ended up charging down an crazy steep slope trying to keep our asses under our tea-kettles with mini-avalanches sliding behind and around us.  Good stuff.
Here is a picture of me squinting  before we met up with the group.

It was snowing hard most of the four hours we were hiking.
On the way down we decided to stop at Barbacoa(because it's my day off from the diet)  They do not have a Jared menu at Barbacoa, so I went ahead and got a gnarly chicken burrito, I deserved it.  I also got to try a new flavor of Cholula.  They had both Chile Garlic and Chile Lime flavor.  It speaks to how boring my life is that a new flavor of hot sauce made my weekend.  The Chile Garlic is good, but the garlic overpowers everything else and makes your breath smell like a goat.  The Chile Lime was borderline orgasmic. I wept.  If you need further proof of how wonderful Cholula is, go  here, where you will find two things that I have had dreams about, Gwyneth Palrow, and Cholula hot sauce.
I did alright the rest of the day, save a Butterfinger candy bar that I ate pretty much just because it was in the cupboard.  Then the neighbors called and wanted to go to dinner.  My social life doesn't extend too far beyond the bike shop, so it was a little weird to be going out with both a member of the Bishopric, and a member of the High Council.(For whomever you are in Germany that occasionally checks in with this blog, those are ecclesiastical leaders in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints,  you know, the Mormons)  Anyway, we ended up at Goodwood BBQ.   I just ordered a steak.  Not an awesome steak, but it was medium rare and used to moo, so I liked it.
Not even going to bother to add up the calories today, but I plan to spend most of next week trying to catch back up.
Morning Weigh In:

• 186.2
• 24.6%

Day 15

Down another pound or so. "It must be water weight." You'd be surprised how many people can't bear to recognize your achievements. They have a hard time figuring out how I can be losing weight this quickly. The fact is, I'M MORE THAN 25 PERCENT FAT. Coupled with what is a dramatic reduction in calories for me, and the fact that I'm working out every day, and twice most days. The point is, I can account for it without trying too hard. What's more, I can predict pretty closely what my weight will do based on my performance the day before. I am not going hungry, and I am getting stronger. A week ago, I struggled to do three bar dips. I'm almost up to three sets of ten.

I wouldn't go as far to say I'm looking good naked, but my pants are starting to fit a little better.

So cut me some slack eh?

Today I was oddly hungry. I ate a little more than usual, but still hit a negative calorie count by the end of the day, although it took two spin classes to do it(good Lord, I'm getting sick of spin classes). Oddly enough, I went to Taco Bell for some diet food today. Ordered from their "Fresco menu" for a total of 8 fat grams and about 250 calories. I don't really miss the junk food, but I miss carbs like a dead brother. Today after eating venison leftovers for dinner, I closed the blinds, turned out the lights and sopped up the drippings with one slice of white bread. Mmmm white bread. Then I made an appointment to go talk to the bishop.

Might gain a little in the morning.

Morning Weigh In:

• 186.7
• 26.5%

Day 14

Awesome, the pounds are coming off again. 2.8 lbs today! After two days recovering from the weekend, I am now lower than I have been since I started. Good for me.

The day started out a little rough, I missed my alarm and ended up not getting to the gym before work. That threw the whole day into a tailspin and I didn't get a decent breakfast. Grabbed a Muscle Milk and an apple at the C-store. Jeff tells me that when he has a protein shake in the morning, he's good till well after lunch. I am not. I was starving by 10:30. Jeff's success could be attributed to the fact that he is getting pharmaceutical grade help with his appetite. That's all I'm gonna say about that. Wasn't able to cheat since I was busy. Finally got a lunch of chicken,radishes,carrots, and yogurt and was good till I got home.

My son had his Cub Scout blue and gold banquet tonight. I have been edging more and more towards eating regular food for dinner and just controlling portions. I figured I could figure something out and still eat at the scout banquet. By the time the food came out I was starving. Luckily it was some form of prison food. I can only imagine they were trying to simulate a tin foil dinner for the scouts, because it was hamburger, potatoes, and carrots, cooked in an electric roaster. Oh, and bagged salad with ranch dressing. I had two scoops of the stuff, and felt shameful the whole time. Especially since I hadn't worked out at all today. This was the first potato I have eaten in weeks. Even though it was bland and terrible, the return to my ancestral staple food was strangely invigorating. The simplest carb I have eaten since starting.

Afterwards I called Jeff and we went to the gym to lift. It was a little heavy on the B.S. and not so heavy on the work, so we decided to expand our efforts to find the least masculine exercise we can. We ended up on the ellipticals so mission accomplished there. It kind of feels like riding a bike, but the motion feels really limited. Like riding a tiny, clown bike. The only cool thing is it tracks your calories burned, etc. Jeff ended up burning more than I did, but that's because he is both older, and fatter than me.

I may regret the "Scout Surprise" dinner in the morning. Hopefully I offset it a little with the late in the evening workout.

Spin class in the morning, where my sist-ahs at?

Morning weigh in:

• 188.2
• 25.4%

Day 13

Aaah, the scale is moving in the right direction again. One day of dieting and a little exercise seemed to do the trick. Although I have not yet dropped back into the 180's.

Hit spin class this morning, and packed a smaller lunch than I would actually need. A couple hard boiled eggs, some yogurt, and a cucumber.

I had to call an audible and hit the Jared menu at Subway again. This actually isn't too bad. A six inch chicken breast sandwich on wheat with veggies, then I go all crazy and have them give it a squirt of BBQ sauce. All that for 320 calories.

Another little secret I'll let you in on. Venison is extremely low in fat and calories. I had 8 oz for dinner, with some brown rice and corn and I was still below my calorie budget for the day.

Just to make sure, I headed to the gym for an evening spin class and some weights.

Evenings at the gym are frustrating. High school kids, menopausal women, and what I can only figure is a contingent from the Training School, make getting your gym time a pain in the ass. I got to the spin class ten minutes early, I was the second person in the room. Grabbed the bike I wanted, right in front of the fan and started spinning. Then Ethel and Gladys walk in. My prime location was a couple bikes away from the fan so I would get the full benefit. They sat directly underneath the fan. Class starts, people start to sweat and the fans come on. First thing Ethel does is reach up and turn it away from me and points it at a row of empty bikes. I didn't want to make a big deal about it so I focused on what I was doing. Soon I was dripping sweat from my eye lashes and the towel I brought was wringing wet. I turned around and asked politely if she would turn the fan my way a little bit and she gave me a startled snort. " I don't like it blowing on me." So, this woman sat right in front of the fan, pointed it away from her, and had yet to break a sweat while jiggling through the hour. I contained my anger and finished the class.

Then I headed out into the weight room. I couldn't get onto the bench, so I went over to the free weights to set up a curl bar. Got it all set up while Skippy the acne farm watched me. I did one set of ten, set it down and went to grab a dumb bell to work my triceps between sets. I walk ten feet away, come back, and he's pulling the weights off my curl bar. I told him I still needed it and he acted all put out. So he walked over and grabbed one of the other FOUR curl bars and put tiny little weights on it did three odd little exercises that I can't figure out what he was trying to work, and put it away. All before I was done with what I was doing. I finished, re racked the weights and started to head for the now open bench. Before I got there, Skippy and his buddy jumped on it, and loaded up a little over two hundred pounds on the bench. I knew neither of them would be able to lift it, so I kept an eye on them while I used one of the machines. Sure enough, they took turns spotting each other, the bar slamming into their ribs and then the two of them struggling to get it back up on the rack. They switched places and repeated this. They then headed over to the mirror to flex. I headed for the bench again, and they came jogging over to tell me they weren't done yet.

I hate people. Especially people at the city rec center.

Morning weigh in:

• 191
• 25.8%

Day 12(Posted on the morning of Day 13)

Oi. Back to work on a Monday. Lifting in the morning and back to the diet. As I expected, I had gained another pound and a half in the morning.

This is why a lifestyle change is so hard. I eat what I consider normal, and I gain. I really think it had as much to do with the lack of exercising Sunday as anything.

An apple for breakfast, some more fruit throughout the day and some pistachios(these are saving my life). Added some supposedly light yogurt today to help with another little side effect of the return to carbs and fats Sunday.

Some of you may be repulsed by the following, but I feel it bears sharing. I have what doctors have recognized as Irritable Bowel Syndrome. This is the diagnosis you get when doctors can't come up with a physical reason why somebody is more often than not, prone to violent bouts of diarrhea. Over the years I have found a distinct correlation to eating garbage, especially fatty garbage, and the coming and going of the symptoms. Like a smoker who can't quit despite being constantly doubled over coughing, I have chosen to deal with the symptoms and eat the way I saw fit.

The new diet of fruits, vegetables, and lean protein has predictably improved the situation. Moving from a minimum of four "episodes" a day, to two. And the two episodes have been, well, less disgusting. After my little backslide over the weekend, Monday morning served as the hangover and Montezuma exacted his ugly revenge .

I seem to be back on track,(digestively and protocol-wise) and other than missing my evening workout due to an unplanned but welcome two hour nap before bedtime I am completely back on schedule.

Morning weigh-in:

• 192.2
• 26%