A picture of "the" belt! and beans that will make ya drool!!

The beginning of a work week and for some its the beginning of a new week of working on healthy living and habits. I have many times posted about this or that and then I have posted my menus along with some recipes and such and I have said from the beginning that this is a way for me to stay accountable because of all of the eyes watching or reading in this case and it has worked wonders for my boyish figure. I was speaking to my cousin last night on the phone whom lives in California and has not seen me in about two years, I emailed her a copy of the photo that I posted in This post and she said to me that she cannot ever remember me that small, now understand this is a girl that I grew up with living next door to me ALL of my life, in fact we lived in the same house together for a couple years when I was about 19 years old and she says that she cannot remember me being this small (Me small?!?) she said that I needed to gain the weight back so that she could recognize me. That is a pretty amazing feeling to have someone not remember me being this size because its been a long time since someone used the word "small" and me in the same sentence.

There are things changing daily for me and how things fit and the ease at which I can do certain tasks since dropping this weight, for instance that 3XLT shirt my wife bought me for Christmas that fits now and I can hold that shirt up and don't get the feeling that I am holding up a sheet but instead a shirt. Then there is my belt, and this belt is something that I keep wearing because it reminds me how far I have come, I wore this belt when I was at my biggest size and I wore it on the second hole, meaning one more hole until it would have been too small for me to wear. This belt now wraps around me and is just about to the belt loop thats in the back side of my jeans, in other words I keep poking holes into it so that it can get tight enough to hold up my pants, have a look for yourself!

Yes I need a shave and please excuse the poor picture I took it with the timer, but man would ya look at that! I use to have to feed the very tip of the belt through the buckle and force it to the second hole all by feel because it was under my gut to get it on! I didn't measure it but that piece is more than a foot long!

Since I have a new camera I thought I would take a few pictures of dinner from last night, I baked a whole chicken after perfectly seasoning it, made a pot of pinto beans with pork neck bone in the crock pot and served it with white rice that had pueblo pepper sauce and sour cream on it. 6oz of the breast meat, 1 cup of the beans and 3/4 cup of white rice and the calories ended up at about 720 total which is a heavy meal as far as calories go but well worth it and it fell within my limit of 1700 total, have a look at some pictures that got my wife smirking at me and my son looking at me with that "why is dad taking pictures of dinner" look.

Pork neck bones $3.35, two pound bag of pinto beans $2.00, five hours in a crock pot on a cold winter day perfection! (I know I know I didn't say priceless)

Here is a look at my perfectly seasoned chicken just before I took it out of the oven, cooked to a perfect 181 degrees! man that camera makes our oven look dirty, trust me its not!

The finished product, white rice with some Pueblo pepper sauce and a tiny bit of light sour cream, 6oz of breast meat and some chopped onions on top of the pintos, it was much better than the photo lets on! and I just might be addicted to the beans.

I had a total of 1690 calories for Sunday so right on where it should be and I did get a 25 minute ride in on my stationary bike. I feel good and got a LONG nights sleep in to start the week off right, I am going to shoot for a loss this week (duh!) even though I seem to have hit a bump with this dehydrated thing or whatever it is. A Cargo shi.. ship has left port this morning and I am feeling better in that dept, lets see if it stays on schedule for the rest of the week, some more pintos for dinner tonight should help that along. As always as the post comes to an end so does your hydration or lack there of, hop on up and grab yourself a big ol glass of H2O, you deserve it. Thanks for following along and thanks for the support.

As Ever
Me