Day 152

Its now one hundred fifty two days into a change in lifestyle that is proving to be one of the best choices I have made in my adult life. I weigh less than I have in I would guess at least 7 years and feel good physically for the first time in as many years as mentioned. moderate eating and exercise is to blame, well that and my determination to see this thing through to my goal weight. It has become somewhat of a game to me to finish this, and I am a poor loser so thats that.

Intake for Friday was good coming in at 1340 calories but not so good if going by the times I ate and what it was that was eaten, not terribly bad or anything just not as good as it could have been. I have been making this BBQ beans and rice with shredded chicken lately and it is quickly turning into my family's favorite dish, its sort of a mixture of the rice and black beans (seasoned) and topped off with shredded BBQ chicken and we will usually have a veggie with it on the side, Broccoli seems to go good with the BBQ, I will post that recipe up here in a day or two I just thought I would mention it today because as I write this we are making our Bulk grocery list for the month. here is my menu from Friday.

05/30/08

Breakfast
10:00 AM
smart ones meal 200
whole wheat english muffin 100
omega 3 25

Lunch
1:45 PM
1 dannon light yogurt 60

3:00 PM
1 tbsp peanut butter 95
1 tbsp jelly 50
2 slices wheat bread 140

Dinner
5:45 PM
2 cups home made soup 300
3/4 cups white rice 150

1 gallon blueberry green tea 80

8:00 PM
2/3 zone bar 140

Not so bad not so good, but the scale said I dropped weight from yesterdays weigh in so all in all I am happy with it. I also wanted to mention that the blueberry tea was drank throughout the day not at dinner time, its just where it ended up on my excel sheet. Thats my Saturday post and I hope anyone reading has a good weekend themselves.

As Ever
Me

Weighing in

Another Friday has come to Us so another day to record ye old weight, its funny to me that I choose a day of the week to represent my accomplishments for said week, it is after all just a day in the sea of days but it shall remain. This week I thought I was going to have a terrible week as last weekend I was very much not "on track" as far as my eating went, but I am happy with my loss for the week, this morning I hopped on the scale and it reported back to me that I weigh 427 pounds on this fine Friday morning, that is a 3 pound loss from last Friday, Not bad for a week that I honestly thought was going to be my first gain week. this 3 pound loss this week brings me to 107 total pounds lost to date which is 20.03% loss in 5 months, not bad for a guy thats not buying into the "miracle diet" craze eh? I thought that I would put an update on how wify was doing on todays post as well, she is down to 190 lbs as of this morning which is a total loss of 46 lbs since Jan 1st. She looks great and I am equally happy for her as I am for myself for losing all of this weight, collectively we have dropped 153 pounds off of ourselves in just 5 months thats more than both of our children weigh combined! Moderate exercise and diet is proving to be the way to drop this weight for me as well as my wonderful wife.

This 2002 Honda 919 weighs in at 427 lbs, this happens to be one of the bikes that I am considering buying when I hit my goal weight.

This here Pit bull weighs in at 107 lbs, the amount I have lost so far.

This weekend we have been invited to dinner at my mother in laws place, we are either having scallops and shrimp sishkabobs, or salmon steaks depending on the weather, were suppose to get some rain tomorrow and if that happens salmon will be on the plate. I am looking forward to a walk around the lake so I do hope the rain does not ruin that part of the visit for me. otherwise nothing in our plans for the weekend. My intake has improved from last weekend, as I said I was not "on track" then, but this one will be better. Thursday My intake was good and I ate a big ol pile of watermelon late in the day just to get in my calories as it was almost 8pm and I was still almost 500 calories under. Here is the menu for Thursday.

05/29/08

Breakfast
9:45 AM
smart ones meal 230
whole wheat english muffin 100
omega 3 spread 25

Lunch
2:30 PM
1 progresso soup 120
1/2 cup rice 100

4:00 PM
sugar free jello and cool whip 50

Dinner
6:30 PM
1/2 cup kidney beans 120
3/4 cup chopped broccoli 30
3oz chicken 180
3/4 cup white rice 150

7:45 PM
21 oz watermelon 189
6oz sweet potato 150

Grand total of 1444 calories for the day which is right where I wanted it to end for the day. I do need to start walking regularly again, I took more than a week off because I want to try this cycling one week on one week off with the exercise thing and see if it makes the weight come off in bigger chunks. This week is a hardcore exercise week so I look forward to being tired, sore and sweaty and I plan on having a smile on my face the entire time. Thanks for following along.

As Ever
Me

Two more days in the fifth month

This might sound odd, so you are warned, But when thinking about my weight loss I lately feel like I have started over and its because I am at a small number again, and what I mean when I say that is I am 100 lbs lost plus whatever I am above, last Friday I weighed in at 430 lbs which is a 104 lb loss, well I am stuck on the 4 lbs. see I told ya odd but I just can't get past feeling that way about it and I know that it is silly. I will just have to wait until I am in the double digits to feel good about the weight again, and yes I know that I am already in triple digits, I know its a mental thing.

I have been back on track this week as far a calories go because I feel like I let this whole past weekend get a little out of hand and went above too many days, so this week (since Tuesday anyway) I have been going a little light on the calories to help the average for the week go down a bit which my Excel sheet will tell me on Sunday if I have succeeded with that. I am into the twenties with this mornings weigh in so I hope to have a decent number come tomorrow morning for the "official" weigh in for the week, I am looking forward to it. here is my menu from Wednesday.

05/28/08

Breakfast
10:15 AM
2 whole wheat english muffins 200
sliced tomato 15
omega 3 spread 25

11:15 AM
1 pear 85

Lunch
2:45 PM
1 can progreso soup 120
3/4 cup cooked white rice 150

Dinner
6:15 PM
7 oz BBQ/garlic rubbed roasted chicken 350
6 oz baked sweet potato 150
1.5 cup chopped broccoli 60

9:00 PM
1.5 dannon light yogurt 90


Grand total of 1245 calories

I am just a guy that has had enough with being a "fat guy" and had enough with worrying about things that should not be worried about at my age, death being one of those things. in five short months I have lost more than 100 pounds of fat off of my body and have more than that still to lose and have improved just about every aspect of my life where weight could effect it. Lots of people have emailed me, and a lot more have left comments here or in private messages on a couple forums that I am a member of and I wanted to say thanks to every one of the people that have taken the time to do any or all of those things I just mentioned, it does help and it is a great tool in keeping accountable to know that these people, You people are there reading along and taking the time to send those messages out to a total stranger. So Thank you

As Ever
Me

Day something or other

I had a good day a far as intake went for yesterday, the calorie count was at 1335 total for the day and I ate often. My weight seems to be staying the same this week, if I have a 1 lb loss I will be happy with it, this morning I woke up at 430 lbs which is the same as Fridays weigh in, Saturday I was 429 and I would be willing to bet if I weigh myself this afternoon I will be closer to 428, I always weigh less in the early afternoon than any other time in the day which seems odd to me but it is what it is.

I took a comparison photo Monday night because it has been a long while since the last one (2nd week in April) and I photo shopped it together with my original pic from Jan 06 2008 and it brought a smile to my face to see the huge difference, my face looks almost completely different and if you were to ask me, I would say that I never looked like the first picture. unfortunately the original pic was taken in my skivvies and shirtless and I am not bold enough to post them up on this blog...yet. I try and take at least one compare photo per month and I have been photo shopping them together each month to see the differences, I am very happy that I thought to do this in the beginning so I now have a photographic time line to look back on when I hit my goal of 275 lbs. I was also going through my jeans to separate the larger sizes from the smaller etc and because I got use to how the 48's and 50's look and feel when I pick them up, when I picked up a pair of size 56 and held them out they looked extremely large to me compared to what I am wearing now and like the face pic, I cannot believe that I use to wear them, and without the aid of a belt even! Here is the menu for Tuesday.

05/27/08

Breakfast
9:15 AM
1 banana 105
1 tbsp peanut butter 95

Lunch
12:00 PM
14 oz water melon 126

3:00 PM
progresso soup 120
3/4 cups white rice 150

Dinner
5:45 PM
1 can tuna 150
3 slices whole wheat bread 210
1 tbsp miracle whip 35
7oz sweet potato fries 175
ketchup 20
dill pickle 10

6:45 PM
6 oz watermelon 54

8:00 PM
1 pear 85


All is well and I am roasting a chicken for dinner tonight with BBQ and garlic flavors, we will have baked sweet and cut green beans with butter and pepper as sides, or maybe a salad instead of the beans, either way it will be good I am sure. its about noon now and beautiful outside so I am on my way out to play in the yard with the kiddo for a bit before her nap and then its time for some exercise and some lunch so I will end this post here for now, maybe I will be back for an early evening post. until then eat well, exercise often and don't give into any urges, after all...its your mind, don't let your stomach be the one in control.

As Ever
Me

It places the lotion in the basket.

I am up 1 pound from Fridays weight, I have been over calories since about Friday and I have that to blame. no worries I am sure I will take it off in a quick as I am back on track as of today and I was under calorie for Monday if only by a few, Mondays calories came in at 1454 total, Sunday I was in the area of about 1700 and Saturday I was around 1700 as well. I say "around" because I did not count exactly how many after dinner on both nights and both nights included copious amounts of watermelon and or popcorn. not terribly bad calories but calories none the less and I am up a pound to show for it. with that said I do believe that I may be up a bit because of all of the outside combined with the not adding extra fluid for the sweat and movement.

With that said we had a very busy weekend and by busy I mean lots of hanging around the yard or a park enjoying the weather. I have some pretty good color going on my face and head from all of the sun. Saturday was low key hung out in the yard mostly and not a whole lot of exercise etc, just a beer or 2 and some watermelon with some playing with kiddos mixed in, Then Sunday we went to a park with Grandpa (my wifes Dad) and looked at Hartford off of a hill through a telescope for a while until the kids got bored with it, and by kids I mean Me and Grandpa. Thats when wify saw an opening to say "Hey dad can you take the kids to the play ground while we go for a walk" so thats what we did, we ended up going back to the stone steps trail that I had found last time I was at the park and found out where it went...straight up! this is where some exercise came in, wify and I hiked up the trail to the end of it which ended up being the top of the hill that we were just on with the telescope so it was a short but all uphill trek that gave us both a decent workout on our legs and we were both breathing heavy. we decided to hike back through the woods instead of following the trail back and ended our walk/hike wandering through one of the gardens. all in all it was a nice relaxing day at the park that included some exercise, so exactly what we were looking for. then we spent Monday morning running a couple errands and the rest of the day in the back yard relaxing with the kiddos in the lawn chairs and tossing a ball around, over all it was a fun weekend with a little bit of exercise.

It rubs the lotion on its skin, or else it gets the hose again.

Now for some business, I am down 105 lbs (104 actually but I hit 429 on Sat and I like the way 105 sounds lol) and I feel great about it, I am doing more with the kids and wify, I hurt less, my back feels better than it has in a while and basically things are just easier, but I am starting to see some of the issues with the losing this much weight and have to admit that I am not enjoying that aspect of weight loss of this caliber. a photo was taken of me yesterday and I can see the "loose skin" issues starting to present themselves on my body. Here I am floating around feeling great about dropping this weight and bamn! a wall that I will have to deal with, a wall that frankly sucks, and theres not a thing that I can do about it but watch as my suit of skin gets as loose as the clothes in my closet. I can't help but feel like Buffalo Bill would love to get his hands on me to make a complete 3 piece suit but thats just my sense of humor making light of a situation that nothing can be done about, a trait all of us fat guys have I think. I told my wife last night that I wish it was Autumn so that I could just hide inside my hoodie until I buy some clothing that hides it better, I do not want to go out and spend a bunch of money on clothes that will not fit in 3 months so I am making due with the old clothing that I have in the closet that is smaller for now. when I started this whole weight loss thing I was in a 6x shirt and size 56 jeans were starting to get snug on me, I now wear a 5x shirt comfortably and a 4x fits me just not well, 4x is still too small but I am getting there, and I can get size 46 jeans to button and zip (which is awesome because thats what I was wearing when I met my wife and was the size I was when I was working out and running etc) but wouldn't wear them because they are still a bit tight around the waist, but 48's fit perfectly. I have a lot of size 52's and 46's and a few 50's and a pair or 2 of 48's so I am doing ok with pants, its the shirts that I am limited with for now and like I said I don't want to spend a lot of money on clothing that won't fit in 3 months, and for those of you that do not know, clothing in these sizes isn't cheap unfortunately for me, so the frumpy look is what I gots for now.

Here is the menu for Monday.

05/26/08

Breakfast
10:00 AM
1 banana 105
1 tbsp peanut butter 95

12:00 pm
16 oz chopped watermelon 144

Lunch
3:00 PM
foot long subway club on wheat 640

5:00 PM
sugar free creamcicle 20

Dinner
6:00 PM
2 cups of Dads home made soup 300
3/4 cup cooked white rice 150

Grand total of 1454 calories for Monday, and I am going to get back on track as far as my intake goes for the rest of the week. I am going to try and get out for a walk today before the weather gets here, we are suppose to get Thunder storms and wify said she heard hail today so after that starts no walk will be possible, and if not then its an inside workout, which I want to avoid as its humid today bleh. there you have my weekend and feelings on my weight loss thang in a few paragraphs. Thanks for following along with me and thanks for the support.

As Ever
Me

A lazy Saturday afternoon post. or so I thought

Here I am its Saturday afternoon, its one of those lazy feeling days, a stronger than easy breeze is outside, fat white clouds floating through a blue sky. I woke up this morning and went out to get the things that I needed to fab up the seat bracket for my Mustang and I got the new front seats installed they look great and shes ready to go. have a pot of soup on the stove and as soon as I finish this post I am dragging the lawn chairs up from the basement and headed out to the back yard with a beer to enjoy the rest of the afternoon, I had a minute and I try to be as consistent as possible with posting each day.

Fast forward 3 hours...

Ok I am back, when I said a minute I guess I meant literally, its now 7:30 pm, I was dragged away from the lap top to help with dinner and ended up going outside for a while. but that is all done and I am back. I snapped a couple pics of the new seats in the car and since I mentioned it I thought I would post them what do ya think?

My new old leather seats, I had to fab the bracket a bit to get it to work but they look and function good.

Ok onto the weight loss, I am into the 20's with my weight. this morning I weighed in at 429 lbs, and I only mention it because its the 20's! I just can't wait until I am in the 300's and this brings me that much closer. intake was good for Friday 1354 counted calories which included a light beer, but wify rented National treasure 2 and we had popcorn with it, which I did not put into my excel sheet so I know that I was above calories for the day. speaking of popcorn, I ran out of the cheddar seasoning that I normally use on my popcorn so I used this as a chance to try something out that a fellow blogger had mentioned doing, and I gotta say Thanks to andeely for the suggestion of making Taco popcorn, and what I did was use the normal bit of Smart balance omega 3 spread that usually gets put on, but I substituted the cheddar for taco seasoning, I have to say that I was surprisingly pleased with it. The cheddar is the best topping for me but that taco popcorn hit the spot and is a great idea for a change in flavor.

I ran out of tea yesterday so made home home brewed, which is fine by me but the Arizona tea is just so convenient. here is a photo of my empties for the past week and a half, think I drink enough?

My empties

and onto the menu for Friday.

05/23/08

Breakfast
8:00 AM
1 pear 85

10:00 AM
3oz roast chicken breast 150
2 slices whole wheat bread 140
1 tbsp miracle whip 35
tiny dill pickle 5

Lunch
2:20 PM
1 tbsp peanut butter 95
1tbsp jelly 50
2 slices whole wheat bread 140

Dinner
6:30 PM
6.5 oz roasted chicken 325
1 1/3 cup green beans 60
3/4 cups cooked white rice 150
omega spread 15
1 coors light 104

11:00 pm
Unknown amount of air popped popcorn
1 tbsp Smart Balance omega 3 50
Taco seasoning 15

Grand total of Oh I dunno, more than I should have had I can say for sure. wify rented Cloverfield to watch tonight but there is no popcorn planned as I don't like to eat late 2 nights in a row, even if it is just popcorn. I will likely not get a chance to post tomorrow (Sunday) as my Father in law is coming by to visit with the kiddos and we may be headed to a park for the day. I wish you all a great weekend and thank you all for following along.

As Ever
Me

Weigh in day is upon us once again.

All week the weight seems to have been coming down steady, and for that I am appreciative. especially after the small drop from last week, which I was also appreciative because a loss is a loss is a loss. Talking to my wife a day or so ago I said something to the affect of how it is hard to believe that just a few months ago I was more than 100 lbs heavier than I am right now and that when I looked at myself in the mirror recently that I had seen a guy that I have not seen in a long while. There are lots of differences that are starting to show up some subtle, some not so subtle, for instance just last night I was laying on my back on the bed and wify came in and laid down on me to say hi like she always does and she said "oww" and shifted herself over a couple inches, and I just laughed because I knew that my rib had pushed against her and was uncomfortable so she had to adjust, those good ol ribs have not been an issue for a long while I have to say. right on down to the distance between ye old belly and the steering wheel in the car, I look taller as well, walking past a mirror last week I thought "wow I am looking all long" so with this more than 100 lbs comes a lot of things that are different.

This week as I have been leading up to has been a good one for the weight drop. I got on the scale this morning and it said 429.6 lbs, so of course I get on again and it says 430 lbs on the button, try number 3 says 429.6 lbs, so I shall call it 430 lbs for the week which is a 7 pound loss since Friday, 7 pounds! yesterday morning it was 429 lbs on the nose and I am sure if I wait 2 hours that I will be 429 lbs because I weigh less in the early afternoon than the morning, but the highest number of the morning is 430 so thats what it gets counted at. That is 104 pounds lost so far One Hundred four pounds! all I have left to say about it is...Cool..

This 1970 Indian Velocette weighs in at 430 pounds, and in my opinion is what a bike should look like

Here is a 104 pound halibut for your viewing pleasure, that is what I have lost thus far

Intake was good for Thursday, I stayed under calories and we had of a batch of Dads chicken soup for dinner along with some white rice, I am roasting a whole chicken today for dinner so I will have another carcass for a new batch of soup. wify wants me to try a southwestern style soup and of course I am who I am and I will not be looking up a recipe, wheres the fun in that? especially since I have such a good base of a recipe already so I may have a new recipe to post up soon.

Over all I am very happy with this weeks number and just generally happy about how I am coming along with the whole weight loss thang, Thanks for reading along I do appreciate the support.

As Ever
Me

Country casual part deux and some Green tea for me

The mystery has been solved! though it was only a day to you all, I have been pondering this for weeks and last night wify called her cousin up to ask. country casual is "linen shirt, nice khaki pants and sandals" was the response we got, so I said "oh you mean Romance novel coverish" a giggle and a yes later I have my answer. I don't wish to buy clothing that Fabio would wear, because it would be the single time that I wore it and meh to that, and I was ok'ed to wear a kilt am I crazy for actually considering it? I guess I can appease the bride and buy some cargo type khaki shorts, and a nice light button up shirt to go with the Fedora, hmmmm and maybe bare feet, we shall see.

This past Saturday we bought 8 gallons of green tea when we went shopping, it was on sale for $2.50 per gallon so we bought all that was in the store. I cracked open the last of the bottles this morning so unless I go back out shopping I will be having home brewed green tea for the rest of the week, which isn't bad, just not as convenient. I mention the tea because through this entire change its the one thing that I go to when I want to have something with zero calories that I actually really really enjoy the taste of. I was drinking green tea before I decided to lose weight and I think I have grown to like it even more now than ever. If I am drinking it, its going to be green tea or water, I don't think I have had anything but that in at least a 2 month period, barring a random and not often beer here and there. Green tea has a ton of positive reactions with our bodies, the Catechins in the tea have been shown to have anticancer and anti inflammatory properties which that alone makes it worth drinking, then go ahead and add that it has been shown that it affect cholesterol levels in our bodies in a positive way and boost metabolism as well, so whats the problem? why aren't YOU drinking it?


My intake for Wednesday was good and I stayed under calories, I had 465 calories at the end of the day that I had not used up and wify was making popcorn so I had me a Gigantic bowl with some omega 3 spread and cheddar seasoning on it. though I did not add up the calories for this exactly, I know it was not close to the 465 that I had left so I am under calories, I just don't know exactly how much. I did have a peanut butter and jelly sandwich for lunch and that was my first one in 4 months, now I miss them. otherwise all is well and I am on track with this change, which as I type this I realize is a way of life now, I do not have to try and stick to it, I do not crave the "bad" foods any more, I mean would I like to eat a bacon and onion pizza with a big glass of milk and some jalapeños on the side? sure, but the difference is that I realize that its not good for me and choose not to. it is amazing how easy this is when you just let go of the, dare I say "addiction" to food, and just eat reasonably instead of gorging yourself with fried chicken, mashed potatoes, ice cream, cake and the likes. food is for nutrition not for recreation, and that does not mean that you can never have a good old fashioned home cooked high fat meal, it just means that it cannot be the norm. Thats what I have on my mind this morning and this is the end of the page, so again I thank you for following along and I thank you all for your comments and emails and support etc etc etc, come back again now Ya'll hear.

As Ever
Country casual boy

Country casual...Kilts and Fedora's

Tuesday went just as any given Tuesday would go, I did come in over my calories because of a Nutrition bar that I had later in the evening but not by much, total was 1540 calories. I did zero exercise as I am in the middle of an experiment with this weight loss thing, which may not be a good week to do it because of the light loss last week but, its Wednesday already so I am going with it. I am going to try to alternate an exercise week with a no exercise week and see how it goes, it seems to me that I lose more weight on average when I do that, results will be in in a couple weeks.

I have a wedding to go to in August, it is an outside wedding and the attire is "country casual" I don't claim to be a fashion expert so what exactly does "country casual" mean? and who in their right mind has an outside wedding on the hottest month of the year in New England? I have googled, I have asked an abundance of people and no one seems to know, I have gotten lots of opinions but none are the same and wify has not been able to get hold of her cousin to ask specifically what they mean (he is the Groom) so I have made sort of a game of this and am trying to figure out what this "country casual" means. I have got opinions from "khakis and a checkered shirt" to "country club casual, a polo shirt and try to look like you hang with people named Miffy" right on up to "maybe they mean Hee Haw" I am considering a kilt, of course with no skivvies underneath, with a bowling shirt and Fedora , thats casual for sure and the highlands are in the country right? if anyone that reads this has an opinion of what country casual is please comment.



Like the Salmon, I have received some inquiry as to how I prepare my sweet potato fries, so I thought I would pop that up here this morning for anyone interested, and this has to be the most simple basic recipe in the world and the end product really turns out well. first I take 3 sweet potatoes and wash them off, slice each one in half long ways and then lay it on the flat side on a cutting board. start cutting lengthwise into pieces approximately 1/8 inch thick, make them look like steak fries. once you have all of the potatoes cut like that you prepare the pan that you will be cooking them in by putting just enough Olive oil, or oil spray onto the bottom of the baking dish or pan (I use both a dish and a pan) and you want only to use a very very small amount of oil, just enough so that the fries do not stick. then I sprinkle a light coat of adobo into the pan over the oil, followed with black pepper, layer the fries in a single layer on the bottom of your dish or pan. then give them another shake of pepper on the side thats facing up and pop them into a 450 degree preheated oven for 10 minutes, after 10 mins check them out to make sure nothing is burning, usually I keep them in for another 2-3 minutes so 13 mins total cook time. make sure you check the under side because if they are going to burn they do it fast, make them a few times and you will figure out how long they take to be perfect. its really that easy and they taste great, its a super food and only has 25 calories per ounce, as with all of the recipes that I post, I hope if you try it out you enjoy the end product.

Thanks for taking the time to read along.

As Ever
Me

Tuesday...thats all I got for a title.

sigh, ho hum blah....

Not really, I would hate to jinx myself but the weight loss gods are on my side this week it would seem, last week was a 1 pound loss and since then I have dropped...well lets just say I am happy with it, You will have to wait until Friday to find out how kind they have been to me.

I am still doing all of the same things minus the walking and bike for the past week, I have only gone on 1 or 2 walks this week total. I am testing something out that I am suspecting happens with my body. I am noticing that if I work out steady like and week after week that the weight steadily comes off, it has come off each week since starting, I have yet to have a negative or no loss week since starting but when I workout hard one week and then have an easy week I seem to lose more per week than working out hard the entire time.


Dinner last night was fabulous...did I just say fabulous? wow it must have really been good and I finished up the day with 1453 calories. we had Salmon fillets and I prepared them with the recipe that I posted in an earlier post, we had sweet potato fries with them and I prepared the entire dish from taking the fish from the paper wrap to the table in about 20 minutes. I don't know if I was just craving it or if it was actually better this time but man it was good and I had a huge portion of it. I am actually considering switching to a fish only diet and abandoning chicken and Turkey all together, with that said, I am making BBQ rubbed chicken for dinner tonight with rice and either corn or Broccoli, or maybe a salad, hmmm decisions decisions.

Other than that its business as usual today, besides the later than usual post of course, Thanks for following along and I wanted to put it out there that if anyone that reads this needs help, support, or just an ear to listen, let me know.

As Ever
Me

Monday has come and 100 pound has gone

The Monday after the big triple digit win, I am feeling off today and cannot place my finger on why. I did zero exercise on Sunday and it was an extremely lazy day for me, in fact as I type this I am feeling very unmotivated to do anything at all today, which I cannot let happen. my calories came in at 1030 for Sunday but before you say "like omg you are like so totally eating too little calories broham" I have to admit to eating pizza that was not put onto my excel sheet (calories anyway) because I just don't care about how many it added up to, it was a freebie so to speak and I am not counting it (though I am because I only ate 1030 total cals besides the pizza) I will also admit that after eating said pizza that I did in fact have stomach pains for about 20 mins, lesson learned, do not eat 4 small (but thick) square slices of pepperoni pizza after eating only good foods for 4 months and expect to get away scott free, though the pains went away rather quickly so almost scott free.



Todays exercise regimen will be some light weights, calisthenics, and I am going to try out some core strengthening movements , the wind has really kicked up outside so I am not sure if I will be able to get a walk in today because my daughter really complains when I take her out for a walk in the wind, hmmmm that sounded a lot like an excuse, ok so a walk is in order as well. I am thinking about when I should start strength training again because I do not want to lose muscle mass. now I know that this will be a balancing act with the losing weight and gaining/maintaining strength and muscle mass but I have to do it at some point, I am just unsure that this is the point where I should start and the weight loss is priority one right now. Here is the menu from Sunday, it is not very good.

Breakfast
10:00 AM
1 banana 105
1 tbsp peanut butter 95

Lunch
1:00 PM
smart ones chinese meal 230
whole wheat english muffin 100
tiny bit omega spread 15
sliced tomato 10

Pizza x 4 square pieces Dunno calories


Dinner
5:45 PM
1 gortons fish fillet 170
3/4 cup white rice 150
2/3 cup peas 70

8:00 PM
1 pear 85

Grand total of 1030 counted calories, and whatever the pizza was. over all it was an ok day besides the fact that I did nada in the way of exercise and had some pizza that I did not count, maybe it wasn't such an ok day after all. either way it just one more day in the life of a fat dude tryin to change that fact. sort of a blah post for sort of a blah day followed by the fact that I am in a blah mood right now as I type this, and by blah I mean content with where I am. blah blah blah blah blah...

As Ever
Me

100 pounds lost as of today

Today I have been very lazy, just hanging around the house so I figured I would hop on the scale and see what she said, well this morning it said 433.6 pounds and in my usual routine I get off and try again, 433.6 pounds again, one last time for accuracy sake and bamn! 433.6 pounds so it is official! that is 100 pounds that I have lost since Jan first 2008 101 lbs if I take that its under 434, we shall call it 100 pound at this point since I round up. Just 139 days worth of moderate eating and some more movement and I weigh 100 pounds less, who wouldda thunk it would have been this fast? this do I dare say, easy? I was thinking this morning after getting on the scale about what I may have been doing if not for this getting healthy thing that I started in Jan, maybe just sitting around and watching tv? perhaps sitting on the back porch watching my kids play instead of Playing WITH them? and the little things that get taken for granted by normal sized people, or even me at this weight are a plenty, four and a half short months in my more than 3 decades that I have lived on this planet. that four and a half months has likely given me more years in this world, and at the cost of what? some cake? a few giant servings of ribs? its amazing and I can't think of one thing that I could have been doing that would have been a better choice than what I've done in these last few months. Imagine this if you will for a minute, I have just lost 100 pounds off of my body, even with that great loss I still have 159 pounds to lose to reach the goal of 275 lbs that I have set for myself, is that 275 lb goal ambitious? I think so but so what? if I had stated on Jan 1st that I would lose 100 lbs in 139 days you might have thought that ambitious as well but I did it.

I took this picture halfway through typing this post out. it now says 433.4 lbs and thats after lunch and breakfast and more than 1/2 gallon of green tea today. You can see my size 14's Just hang off the edge of the scale :)

I do think that my Ideal goal weight should be roughly 275 lbs, and the way I came up with this number is that my father stands 6'1'' tall and he weighs 270lbs currently and to look at him I do not think anyone could or would say that he is overweight by any means. I have the same build as he does and we are both muscular, besides the fact that I am 4 inches taller than he is we look alike. but I also think that after I lose as much fat a I can that I will have a skin issue to deal with and the skin removal procedure can take off a good chunk of weight so I may actually bottom out with the loss at a higher number than the 275. I AM shooting for 275 lbs on my own but nothing is set in stone and I will roll with the punches and make changes as necessary.

So thats it, My Sunday post, The day that I lost 100 lbs, you were there, I want to thank anyone that has been reading along with my blog to this point the support was and is helpful as well as appreciated.

100 pounds less.

As Ever
Me

Saturday morning, turkey and trains.

Hmmmm, so have ya noticed the new header? Boredom and the fact that I have been thinking about making a new one created that which you see above, I seem to have slipped into that state of mind, I feel unstoppable when it comes to getting healthy (which I know I not true but its how I feel) , so I thought that facing an oncoming train seemed fitting. Opinions? hows it look :) I like it and since it fits my attitude I think its perfect.

I also thought that I would toss up the directions for how I prepare my turkey burgers since there has been some interest shown through some of your comments. its very very very simple and anyone can make them this way and in my opinion they turn out great. first we start out with a 20 oz package of Shady brook farms ground turkey we usually buy whats on sale, which is usually the 97/3% lean, but we look for the 99% lean when possible, the difference is that the 97% has 160 calories per 4 oz and the 99% is 140 calories per 40z serving, when its on sale we will buy 3 packages and keep them in the freezer. ok ok back to how I prepare them, put the turkey in a bowl and fold in some chopped onions, I chop them very fine and mix them in good, after the onions are mixed in throughly shake in some Mccormick Grill mates BBQ flavoring (I go a little heavy on this as it gives it a smoky flavor), garlic powder and black pepper. mix that all together and separate the meat into 4 oz patties (we weigh each one to keep the portions equal). drop them onto a hot grill or frying pan, sprinkle the top with a tiny amount of adobo and grill until they are cooked through. I make mine with 80 calorie rolls (stop & shop brand) sliced onion, pickle, tomato and lettuce with some spicy mustard and a bit of ketchup to sweeten it up a little and I have to admit that this has become one of my favorite "healthy" meals that I have found. Usually it gets served with home made sweet potato fries, a dill pickle and my usual Giant glass of green tea. If you choose to follow my very simple directions I hope you enjoy the meal, I know we do.

This morning the scale had some very nice words to whisper in my ear but I am not going to count what it said to me until it stays that way for a few days, lets just say that the century mark was reached this morning, surpassed actually, but like I said its not official until its there for a few days, I will keep this updated as it changes. and there you have it, My Saturday morning post, we're on the way out the door but I wanted to get this up here before we left, Thanks for following along with my trip backwards through time.

As Ever
Me

Squeaked out a loss for the week

I feel that determination is to blame for the loss this week, I started the week off by being higher last Saturday and then Sunday I had that terrible meal at Friendly's on Mothers day and I hung around 440 lbs all week. Wednesday after seeing how much I was up I made the decision to just work out and see where the cards fall. This morning I woke up and straight to the scale to see how it all turned out, I hop on and she whispers 437.2 pounds this is good I think to myself, so I step off to get a second opinion, second time on it says the same number 437.2 pounds, so it appears that I have a 1 pound loss for the week, I'll take it. Submit you will fat, I am the one making the decisions now. Honestly if there was no loss at all this week I wouldn't have been too upset, I just said to my wife last night that I am ok with the weight and it not about a number but about the way I feel and what I am doing that matters.

This Honda CBF600 weighs in at 437 lbs

This American Bulldog comes in at 97 lb, which is what I have lost so far

My intake was decent for the day even though it was heavy with breads, ending at 1375 calories, Dinner was a bit stout but as it was mostly turkey and sweet potatoes I am not too worried about it. we made seasoned grilled turkey burgers on 80 calorie rolls with onions, pickles lettuce and tomato, and for a side I made sweet potato fries and a huge glass of green tea, I was very happy as that is quickly becoming one of my favorite meals since starting this new lifestyle. here is the menu from Thursday.

05/15/08

Breakfast
7:45 AM
4oz deli turkey 120
2 slices whole wheat bread 140
1 tbsp miracle whip 35
sliced tomato 10
blueberry green tea 40

12:00 PM
small apple 60

Lunch
3:00 PM
2 boiled eggs 140
lite roll 80
less than 1 tbsp miracle whip 25
small dill pickle 5
tiny bit newmans own lite honey mustard dressing 10

Dinner
6:00 PM
8oz ground turkey burger 320
2 light rolls 160
condiments 30
8oz sweet potato fries 200

Grand total of 1375 calories for the day, and this week is going to be treated as a gateway to harder workouts, I have been playing with some light weights and riding the bike regularly (which we may have run into a problem but that is for another time) and walking when I can. I am one pound lighter which mean one pound stronger and one pound closer to 100 lbs lost, I am just three pounds away from that century mark and looking forward to being able to say that I lost 100 lbs, and every pound of it was lost on my own, no miracle pill, no expensive diet plan or stack of books. I am feeling good about making this decision and the results are huge.

Carry on...

As Ever
Me

It's a State of Mind...

There is something in the air today; upon waking up I felt the need to move. So I did. We were expecting rain so I left the house early and went on a 2 mile walk to get the blood moving, upon reaching my door again I went straight for the bike, 25 minutes later I had a decent sweat going and onto the dumbbells, Concentration curls, Hammer curls, One handed triceps extensions, Behind the head triceps extensions, followed by 50 push ups 20-15-15. All before noon, Tired, weak and sweating I feel great. Will I be sore tomorrow? Quite possibly, and most likely, but it will be the kind of pain that makes a person want more of the same. I do miss my heavy bag, maybe I will have to look into picking one up, ending this workout with some time hitting a heavy bag would have been the ending it needed. There’s a 6’5’’ 438 pound freight train coming through, step back now madam we wouldn’t want anyone to get hurt. Hey kid It’s a state of mind, could you pick up your pity and step aside now son, I have things to do.

As Ever
Me

Don't worry be happy Mon'

Skipping exercise yesterday was hard for me, but I did it. No bike ride, no walking, no calisthenics, no anything that remotely looked like exercise. I am not sore any more and I weigh the same as I did on Friday, so hopefully worse case scenario I break even for my weight this week. The weather is not good today and I wanted to go to the park with my daughter, I guess that will have to wait until the weekend, because it is suppose to rain on and off today and tomorrow. At least a bike ride will be in my future today, I will also do some light work with the free weights so I am happy about that.

Last night I was taking a shower and when I came out I walked into my room and noticed that I had nothing to put on, so I started looking through a drawer and found a pair of Pajama bottoms that haven't fit me since they were new, and they didn't even fit then. so I thought why not, lets try them on just for fun. I 100% thought they would pull up but be too tight to actually wear comfortably, I was wrong and in fact I am wearing them as I type this! I am very happy that these pj bottoms fit me because they did not fit just a month and a half ago. while I am on the subject of clothing I thought I would also mention that I have nothing that fits me correctly right now, maybe a couple of shirts, but for the most part my shirts are either too big now or not quite big enough, when I make it down one more size I will have shirts a plenty but for now I am swimming in half of them and the others look like my little brothers stuff. I did try on a button up shirt that I have, and it fits again! this is my favorite "nice" shirt that I own, there is nothing especially amazing about it other than its a good color for me and when it fit It looked good on me and the last time it fit was in the year 2000 or 2001, and I know this because there is a photo of me wearing it at Thanksgiving either 2000 or 2001 so saying that I am smaller than I have been in about 7 years is an honest statement! which brings me to pants, when I started off I was wearing a size 56 jeans (I wear them below my gut) and I now for the most part wear 52 (because its what I have most of) but 50's fit me just fine, in fact I need a belt to keep the 50's up and that belt has 6 holes that I had to punch in it because it is too big as well. I have a ton of size 46 stuff but zero in 48 and I am coming up on size 48 soon I think. I hate to think about buying pants in 48 when I know that I will not wear them for long, but summer time is coming and I will need at least a few pair of shorts what to do what to do. Now that I have bored you with my clothing dilemma here is the menu for Wednesday.

05/14/08

Breakfast
8:30 AM
4oz deli turkey 120
2 slices whole wheat bread 140
1 tbsp miracle whip 35
sliced tomato 10

Lunch
12:00 PM
1 small apple 60

2:15 PM
1 can campbells soup 240
1 whole wheat english muffin 100
sliced tomato 10
omega 3 spread 20

3:45 PM
1oz tings 160

Dinner
6:15 PM
4oz deli turkey 120
2 slices whole wheat bread 140
1 tbsp miracle whip 35
sliced tomato 10
1/2 gallon blueberry green tea 40

8:15 PM
zone bar 200

Grand total of 1440 calories for the day, and I had to eat a zone bar later in the day to make up some calories, other than eating late it wasn't a bad day. it was in fact a Turkey kind of day as you can see but I love it so thats ok, gotta watch the sodium in the deli meats but I was still ok for the day. my weight has come back to what I was on Friday and I'm rockin my new old Jammies, all is well in my world for today.

As Ever
Me

No witty title, so this is it.

I woke up this morning feeling like I would surely be down in weight from yesterday and yet I am up 1.6 lbs from Fridays weight. I am very frustrated with this fluctuation upward the only thing that has changed is that I had that bad meal on Sunday and that I have my bike back and am working out more as well as adding the calisthenics in with some light lifting again, I wonder if there is a connection because I jumped right in instead of taking it slow, I guess it is possible that I am retaining water because of the extra working out, I am sore and have been doing some weight lifting and that can be a cause for retention because of the inflammation, I am unsure and will find out with the coming week but that is my best guess for now. My son has taken notice that I am working out and has become active with doing exercises throughout the day. last night he was doing crunches so I told him that I would do double what he could do, he is not the most athletic kid on the block so I knew I would be relatively safe from failing the super dad challenge. He only did 13 crunches, which surprised me, I thought it would have been more, so I had to do 26 which was an easy number. then he was feeling bold and started in on some push ups and I said to him "I could probably do push ups with you on my back" challenge accepted. 10 push ups later (even though they were not flat on the floor I used the stairs for leverage) my son looked amazed that I did it, I don't think he will challenge me any more for a while. I have lost more weight than he weighs so I knew I could do the push ups beforehand, but I don't think he realizes that fact.

Last nights workout consisted of 20 minutes on the bike at a decent pace, followed by 40 push ups and the above mentioned exercises with my son, not a bad workout, but it was later in the day 7:00 pm ish. I am taking a break from the bike today and I will not take a walk either I want to see if giving my body a break helps the weight, and I know that a single day won't give me a definitive answer but it helps mentally sometimes. Intake was pretty good for Tuesday and I stayed under goal.

05/13/08

Breakfast
8:00 PM
1 banana 105
1 tbsp peanut butter 95

11:45 AM
dannon lite yogurt 60

Lunch
2:30 PM
2 boiled eggs 140
2 slices whole wheat bread 140
1.5 tbsp miracle whip 50
1/4 tbsp newmans own lite honey mustard dressing 15
large dill pickle 10

Dinner
5:15 PM
6 oz deli Turkey 180
3 slices of light rye bread 150
1 oz Tings 160
1.5 tbsp Miracle Whip 50

7:45 PM
2 tiny apples 7.8oz 110

8:30 PM
1 quaker granola bar 90

Grand total of 1355 calories for the day, frustration is creeping in because of the gain this week so far. I will try taking it easier with the exercise for a few days and see if it evens back out and if that does not work I will become insane workout guy for a few weeks and force a loss. people talk about addiction to food and being under the control of the food, welp I think I am coming back around to the old me, the 22 year old me that was working out every day and when I was in workout mode thats all that I wanted to do. It would be very easy for me to turn into crazy workout guy and beat my body into submission, I am addicted to losing weight at this point in the game and a gain will be unacceptable. now maybe I am just in a mood this morning and feeling driven and determined or maybe the old me is surfacing because I have seen real results and I am feeling better so a different me...the real me is taking over the wheel, time will tell but it doesn't look good for the fat on my body either way.

As Ever
Me

The bike is back

I have an easy feeling over me because I have my bike back, so now I feel like I can get in a good cardio workout in no matter the weather. for the first time in probably 2 months I rode the bike and I have to admit that I must have come a ways physically in that time as I rode for 20 minutes and barely felt it, and back when I was riding the bike exclusively for exercise 20 minutes felt like a lot more work. In fact, I only stopped riding because of the seat hurting my behind, so with that said if anyone that rides a bike for exercise reads this and has a suggestion for a nice cooshy seat or knows where one can be had for a fair price I would love to know. Being limited by the seat making me uncomfortable is not good. the workout went like this, start the mp3 player and load it with some Bad Religion and turn that up loud, got on the bike for 21 minutes, 20 mins of riding with me sprinting for a minute at a time every 5 minutes and a 1 min cool down. I stretched and did 50 push ups, 20-15-15, and onto some light dumb bell work, 3 sets of 10 concentration curls, 3 sets of 10 hammer curls, followed up with some lateral raises, 20 to the front 20 to the sides (using fairly light weight for the laterals) . finished up with a nice stretch routine and a glass of water. Even though that was not what I would consider a hard workout, it was a good solid routine and I can really feel it this morning especially in my biceps. I want to try and work a routine like that into the schedule three times per week while keeping the cardio up, and the walks steady through out the week. I feel like I have made it to a point in this weight loss regimen where I can step the exercise up a bit to include some more strength movements because losing muscle and strength is a worry of mine with this much weight to lose. so with that said, even though I am very sore this morning its that good sore, and I will just ride the bike today without the weights, I may or may not do some push ups because I don't want to over do it this being the beginning of the soreness again.

My calories ended up at 1285 for Monday, I ate balanced and spread through out the day. I did not write down the times etc but the food I did, but because I don't have it structured on my excel sheet I am not going to post the exact times and meals for today, I plan on putting the menus back up here regularly in these posts. My weight has stalled at the same weight that I was on Friday, Usually by Tuesday I am down at least a pound so this weeks weigh in should be interesting, and hopefully I do lose something by Friday. I have to admit that I am slightly worried about it but it is what it is and if nothing drops so be it, but hopefully because of the reintroduction of the bike that will not happen and the weight will keep on dropping. the week is looking up because of the bike and yet down because of the no drop as of Tuesday, there is not a gain so I guess thats a positive.

Until next time...

As Ever
Me

Bird poop a movie and walking a plenty

10:27 am Editing in to say My pedals just got here in the mail!! I will be on that bike today!!!

It is just about eight am Monday morning, we went to Mystic aquarium yesterday for mommy's day. Saturday was uneventful starting with some cleaning around the house and ending with a trip to Joanne fabrics where I finally found a presentation box for my grandfathers American flag. Somewhere in the middle of that day I was up more than 5 pounds wth! I was very upset Saturday night as I headed to bed 7 pounds heavier than I was on Friday morning, I do think it is because I had a huge amount of popcorn with a salt/cheddar seasoning on it Friday night when we watched "The green mile" with Tom Hanks, it an older movie but I had never seen it, I have to admit that movie was Great! I loved it, but thats for another time.

I woke up Sunday Mommy's day and we were heading to Mystic Aquarium for the day, we left the house around 9:00 am and stayed at the aquarium until about 2:00pm it was a very nice time and the kids loved the whales and other fish etc. we took our time walking around through all of the exhibits and ended up with just over 250 pictures between Me and my MIL clicking away with our cameras. There is a bird cage which houses I would have to guess a couple hundred birds and you can enter the cage and have the birds land on you while you feed them, only an insane person would go in here voluntarily (we all went in btw) and I say insane because you are entering a cage with hundreds of birds and the chance to get pooped on is very high, Yes I was pooped on. all in all it was a fun day out which ended up with a late lunch early dinner that, well, was not the best thing in the world.

One of the 3 whales that were at the aquarium

This is not the parrot that decided to relax his bowel while sitting above me, so he gets his 15 minutes.

One of the about 5 jelly fish that were at the inside aquarium

Lion fish

The penguins were not cooperating for pictures, but this is one of the couple that I did get.

A tank full of Red bellied piranha

red sea Urchin (I think) lol

There was a Friendly's just up the street from the aquarium and we decided that since it was past 2:30pm and we had not eaten yet that this is where we would eat. lets just say I had the fattiest, greasiest, best tasting! lunch that I have had in just about 5 months, Fried chicken strips, with a big basket of french fries and for desert I shared an oreo cookie coffee sundae with my wife. I figured one bad lunch/dinner in a sea of great eating wouldn't hurt and I may as well enjoy it. I did stick with having just water to drink as they had no green tea so I did save a few calories there, over all it was a great meal and tasted very good.

I snapped a quick pic of the basket before digging in. the half of Giant burger in the top right corner of the photo is wifys double grease burger.

Today I woke up sore from carrying my daughter all over the aquarium for 3 hours (my bicep and shoulders hurt) and my weight is back to what it was on Friday, so everything has normalized back to where it should be and carrying the kiddo around will be considered "extra exercise". I did get a little more sun burned on my head and face and a great time was had by all. I don't even want to guess at my calories for the day (not as bad as you would think because of course I did count them) I know I am above just not as bad as I would have thought for having a massive basket of fried chicken and fries followed by a sundae, not to mention the ginger cookies later that night at My Mother in laws house. all in all it was a good weekend and I weigh the same as I did on Friday at the end of it all so I am happy with that, I am right back on track today and as a matter of fact I am eating my breakfast while I type this, which consists of a banana with peanut butter on it and of course my green tea.

As ever
Me

Weighing in and the Spiders have return.

Wakie wakie eggs and bakie, ummm not really but the spiders are back..Last year around this time my wife walked out onto our back porch and between the wrought iron hand rails there was spiderwebs, and when I say spiderwebs, I mean a lot of webs and it was covered in about 2000 tiny yellow spiders with black markings on their abdomen. I opened the back door this morning to show my daughter that it was still raining outside and she says "look dad buggys" so I take a look at her eye level on our screen door and its covered in tiny yellow spiders again. She takes off running like in the cartoons with her legs becoming a blur, pausing for just a moment and I could swear I heard the sound track from an old Scooby Doo cartoon as she shot into the living room, and out came the 409 spray because bleach works well and they were all over the screen and in the jam so I gave them a spray and this set is gone, but if they are like last years batch we will have 4-5 days worth of huge ol piles of them at a time. ahhhh spring time, ya gotta love it.

This 1996 GSF600 Bandit weighs in at 438 pounds.

Onto the weigh in for the morning. This morning at wake up time I was 437.6 then 438 on the nose then 437.8, I always take the highest weight so we will call it 438 lbs, so I am into the 30's solidly. That is a 3 pound difference from last week and I am happy with that, even though it was a 4 lb drop on Wednesday. I know that I will weigh less in an hour or two because last night before bed I drank almost a half a gallon of water while watching ER. but since 438 is what the scale said thats what the weigh in will be counted at. I am 4 pounds away from being 100 pounds down now, that is very cool to me. each week I put up a photo of something that weighs as much as I do and usually its a motorcycle because when I hit goal weight (or close to it anyways) I am rewarding myself with a motorcycle, and since I am so close to 100 lbs lost and I feel its a significant enough number, I will be posting something that weighs as much as I have lost along with the other pic on weigh in days. here is the first in that series.

Eva Longoria weighs in at 96 pounds which is what I have lost so far.

I have to admit that I really did not think that I would have lost this much weight in so little time but I also have to admit that I am impressed with myself because of it. I also wanted to mention that my wife is down 43 pounds as of this morning as well, I am equally impressed with her loss and feel that I am very lucky to have someone that is following the same low calorie plan that I am. She looks great and we both feel better than we have in a long while. if you add together what we have both lost the number is 139lbs, that is truly insane to me that we were carrying that amount around just over 4 months ago, a lot of hard work and a ton of determination goes a long way it would seem. Thanks for reading.

As Ever
Me

Bike pedals and a Thursday morning.

We start the day off with the sound of rain bouncing off of the sill of my window, its gray its gloomy and the first thing out of my daughters mouth is "Daddy go park" sorry not today honey. so far neither mine nor my daughters days were looking like they would end the way we wanted them to. I had to run out this morning to Downtown Hartford and all of the little worker bees were running about trying to get to their respective offices on time. 9:21 am a nicely dressed man enters the cross walk, there he stood waiting patiently for the sign to initiate his forward motion. standing there in his suit, tie and very nice pair of shoes as I thought to myself about the fact that I would need a new suit myself soon given the weight I have lost, 2 steps into his journey across the street an SUV tears through the intersection and totally covers this man with puddle water. An umbrella flies in the direction of the SUV and muted by the falling rain and my windshield was the obvious curses and yells by this totally soaked if not well dressed gentleman. I think to myself, well his day is surely more disappointing than mine at only 9:21 am. onward homebound as I attempt to convince the kiddo that our day will be just as fun at home as it would have been at the park, she can totally see through my cunning ruse but I mention that an ice pop may be in her future and I enjoy a quieter ride with a smiling child in the back seat. There you have my morning summed up nicely, now to come through on the more fun day part of my earlier conversation.

The scale was kind with its words today when I woke up and I am expecting a pretty decent weigh in tomorrow. Keeping within meal plans is second nature at this juncture of the game, it is to the point where I can cut meat, potatoes, and pile veggies without a scale or measuring spoons or cups, I still use the cups and scales etc but I honestly don't need to. It IS a lifestyle change now, This is how I eat this is what I eat It is who I am now, pretty cool if ya ask me. Also I got an email today that stated that the pedals that I found for my bike are shipping today! this makes me happy as I will not have to rely on good weather to get in some exercise when they get here. once they get here I think I am going to email the fella that was nice enough to take the bike apart and ship me just the pedals a link to my blog and let him know that they are indeed going to a good cause.

Here is my menu from Wednesday.

05/07/08

Breakfast
8:30 AM
1 banana 105
1 tbsp peanut butter 95

Lunch
1:00 PM
1 pear 85

2:15 PM
4oz BBQ rubbed roasted chicken 220
2oz sweet potato fries 50
sliced tomato 10

4:15 PM
quaker granola bar 90

Dinner
6:30 PM
2 gortons fish fillets 340
3/4 cup white rice 150
2/3 cup corn 100
ketchup 20

8:30 PM
1 dannon lite yogurt 60

Grand total of 1325 calories for the day, not too bad over all but I do want to find an alternative for the Gortons fillets. slowly but surely I am fine tuning my intake to be as healthy as possible, I think I do a fine job but there are places it can still be tweaked. making dinner for a family of four which includes a 2 and a half year old, a 9 year old with type 1 juvenile onset diabetes and 2 adults following a low calorie intake routine has its challenges. as always I thank you for reading along with my trip to the half.

As Ever
Me

128 days into a trip that has no end

The week started off great for the loss, today I am back up a bit, still under Fridays weight but Up from where I was. I will not worry about it and I will treat it as "fluctuation" I also believe that the fact that I seem to use the bathroom less frequent lately has something to do with it. its been a day or 2 since a boat left port and rode the golden spin into the abyss, hopefully we can squeeze it into our schedule some time today. No pun intended.

My calories for Tuesday were slightly higher than target, coming in at 1565 for the day because of a large dinner. I made a BBQ rubbed roasted chicken breast with seasoned sweet potato fries and some sweet corn with black pepper and butter and just had to have my fill, it was incredibly tasty and when all is said and done not high calories at all, I was higher because I had an 8oz piece of the chicken. there is a 4oz piece left over that I am planning on having for Lunch today.

The sun shines a little brighter and things seem just a bit nicer over all, and the only thing that has changed is that my weight is down. I am at a weight that I am comfortable with right now and believe that what I weigh right now is just about where I have been for a long time in my life. I resemble many of the old pictures of myself now and my attitude has followed suite. I feel great my clothing fits looser and I wonder why it took so long for me to do this. walking through the trails at the park yesterday with my daughter watching her explore and spot details in the leaves and spotting animals in the woods is something I have been missing out on for a while, I am honestly starting to think about my time in CA and wonder if it effected me that much, and what I mean is that I was not happy in CA and maybe this played a part in my new found rotundness. Dwelling on the past has never been my style but I really do think just the fact that I was not "home" meaning in CT, played a part in my substantial weight gain. the injury did not help things along but I don't think its 100% to blame either. whichever way its rolled up doesn't really matter to me because the past is the past and nothing can change those facts. when you start noticing things likes your belly doesn't come close to hitting the steering wheel on the car while you drive any more, or that you have a lap to offer your daughter to sit on now while she just enjoys relaxing on Daddy, This is when one realizes just how important all of the hard work is...A calmness enters stage right.

As Ever
Me