Wednesday Cat Blogging

This or That

I had a comment a while back from Don who noted my difficulty with both trying to avoid junk foods and attempting to quit smoking. Don made the suggestion that I concentrate on giving up the cigs and worry about the diet later. The reasoning is logical....both are attempts to modify deeply ingrained behaviors and maybe doing both at once just makes everything twice as hard; hence twice as likely to fail.

This is where I do battle with one of my big character flaws; the idea of doing something all out or not at all. In my goal to get healthy I tend to want to do it all at the same time...diet, exercise, and getting rid of the damn smoking habit. Of them all, smoking is the one that gives me fits. I quit smoking and all I want to do is eat. I eat properly I want to smoke. I exercise but I can't do it with the intensity needed to do any good, so in frustration I want to smoke.

Bloody hell!

So what I'm going to do is focus entirely to quit smoking. Oh...I'll still watch what I eat and how much. I'll still exercise. I'll do those things but without a driving goal. I'll just do them so I can develop good habits for when I do get down and dirty with my weight. Until then...for a couple of weeks anyway...I'm concentrating on giving up cigarettes. The little counter in the upper left corner will be updated when I have smoked my last. Most blog entries here are going to be about quitting this filthy habit, my progress, my struggles, my (hopefully) success.

Because, let's face it, without doing that, I may as well just resign myself to dying in a very few years.

Wednesday Cat Blogging

Week 4 Day 3

A lot of people think, that when I counsel people, I just sit and offer up advice and solutions to various problems. More specifically...that I fix those problems.

Hardly.

My job, and it's much harder than fixing some one's problem, is to get the other person to realize that their solutions are not working. It's often a source of amazement for me to have a person desperately seeking my advice spend a whole session telling me why they are going to continue doing the things that got them into their unhappy situation in the first place. I often end up asking them the famous Dr. Phil question..."so, how's that working for you?". It's considered a major breakthrough when a person can come to the conclusion that "it's not working very well at all" and open themselves up to trying something different.

I'm no different. My very good friend, Boyd , made some observations and comments concerning my diet that I had been listing for a few days. Good, sound advice and given with his sincere desire to help me attain the goals I wanted.

But what did I do with all that great advice?

I argued. I rationalized. I read every comment he made with a "but, but, but" going through my mind to explain why I was doing what I was doing and why it was the right thing to do. Even while complaining that what I was doing wasn't working.

Geeze....how embarrassing. Time to take some of that advice which I make a living out of giving to others.

Insanity is doing the same thing over and over, expecting a different result. Sanity is the knowledge that if you want something different in your life, you have to do something different in your life.

Thanks Boyd.

Week 3 Day 4

Meal 1: bowl of oatmeal, pat of butter

Meal 2: small bag of Cheetos (my bad)

Meal 3: leftovers of meatloaf and wild rice

Meal 4: missed

Meal 5: pork & veggie stir fry, rice

Meal 6: handful of unsalted in-shell peanuts

Workout: jogging

Week 3 Day 3

Meal 1: Oatmeal with pat of butter

Meal 2: No time to eat

Meal 3: Kashi Mayan Harvest Bake frozen meal...it was really yummy

Meal 4: Homemade fruit salad

Meal 5: Meat loaf, wild rice, broccoli

Meal 6: Grapefruit

Water: 16 oz per meal

Workout: Lower body, at home with hand weights

Wednesday Cat Blogging

Week 3 Day 2

What I ate today:

6am Meal 1: 1 bowl oatmeal with blueberries

9am Meal 2: 1 cup cottage cheese, 1 yogurt

12pm Meal 3: 1 bowl homemade fruit salad, handful of nuts

3pm Meal 4: Protein shake

7pm Meal 5: serving of steak and peppers, 2 whole wheat tortillas, 1 cup sherbet

10pm Meal 6: 1/4 ounce cheddar cheese, 1/2 grapefruit

and 12 glasses of water (about a gallon)

Week 2 Day 4

It can be discouraging. Wanting to lose a bunch of weight, watching what you're eating, exercising, hunger, temptations, sore muscles....then stepping on a scale and thrrrrrpppppt! After more than a week on this challenge I've lost a grand total of 1 lb. I contribute that to the theory that I've already lost most of the easy weight and losing more bodyfat is going to be a slow process.

I am starting to feel better. Much more energy and not quite as hungry all the time.

Still sore though.

Wednesday Cat Blogging

Week 1 Day 3

I have difficulty eating breakfast. My usual habit is to drink several cups of coffee, supplemented with a few cigarettes, in an attempt to jump start my brain and body in the morning. That works for the short term...but very bad for me in the long view. So one of my challenges in this challenge is to start the day with a healthy meal. The photo above is one of my standards; two poached eggs and two vegetarian sausage patties. It totals about 200 calories with 32 grams of protein and 8 grams of carbohydrates. No butter or oil, just a bit of hot sauce on the patties and black pepper on the eggs with a glass of water on the side. The whole thing takes about five minutes to whip up so I can prepare it, eat it, and go.

It's pretty tasty too.

No Pain...No Gain

Day 2 and, whilst cutting up strawberries for a fruit salad, I managed to slice into my finger. Okay...so I'm just a big wuss...hurts like the dickens though.

Week 1 Day 1

Only Hours Left to Go

Weekend

Weekend

Some Day Soon

Wednesday Cat Blogging

Eight More Days

Hail Storm

Happy Easter

Easter Dissonance

People spend a lot of time arguing about the damnedest things and, in the process, generally try to ruin things for others who don't follow their narrow viewpoints.

Case in point....Easter.

Easter means many things to many people. For some, it's a holy day. For others, it's a celebration of spring. For still others, it's a Sunday in April, big deal. For kids, however, it is a very big deal indeed and has nothing at all to do with religion...it's about candy. Easter eggs! Chocolate rabbits! Jellybeans and Peeps. It's a hunt, a hide and seek game played with a mythical rabbit that stashes goodies in the yard for girls and boys to find.

But that isn't good enough for some who insist that such activity is blasphemous to their idea of what Easter is all about. Somewhat ironic since even the name "Easter" is derived from some Germanic goddess. Then, on the other extreme, there are those who go nuts at any public display of anything that hints at a practice of religion. These are the people who rename things "egg hunts" and "spring spheres".

Above it all there are the retailers who go ga-ga in selling as much candy for the day as they can, knowing that another chance will not occur until Halloween.....a holiday that really sets the pious on edge.

Why destroy Easter? Pray at sunrise if that's your thing. Dance naked in a field if that has meaning to you. Sleep in and skip shaving if you desire. Let the kids have fun. Enjoy the start of spring. Easter is what you make of it not what you want to make it for others.

As for me.....I'm going hunting for a chocolate bunny.

Fraidy Cat

Completely off track. I finally got the wound on my leg to heal, came through a sinus infection, eased the pain of chigger bites all over my body....only to be laid low with a toothache. If it isn't one damn thing, it's another. The toothache is a particularly nasty bugger. The other ailments just involved pain; the toothache is pain on a whole different level.

Go to the dentist, you say?

Well...yeah....I will...I suppose.

Gawd, I hate the dentist though. It probably goes back to when I was a kid and had cavities filled by kindly Dr. Cherry. He really was nice but he had a bad habit of being very honest and let you know "this is going to hurt" right before he bore down on a tooth with his Black & Decker industrial sized drill.

But that was a long time ago and dentistry has come a long way. The last time I went, they gave me nitrous oxide. Great stuff. It wasn't so much that I couldn't feel any pain...I just didn't care. The dentist could have ripped out my tongue and I wouldn't have minded. The dentist that I'm going to gives some type of sedative that gets you so high you not only don't feel pain, you don't even remember going to the dentist in the first place after it wears off.

Still....old memories. Fear. Anxiety. Wait....my tooth actually feels better.

Wednesday Cat Blogging

Wall

I'm up against that dreaded brick wall...trying to break under 200 lbs. I seem to be hanging just above it; getting tantalizingly close then creeping up a couple pounds. I feel that if I could manage to slip under 200 then the weight would start falling once again and, in no time, I could reach my dream goal of 175 lbs....or maybe even my fantasy goal of 160.

Maybe it will happen this week.

Wednesday Cat Blogging

One Month

Not much difference. Well...maybe a little. Still have a couple more to go. Let's see what happens.

Grace Under Pressure

I think something is wrong with me.

My job is somewhat stressful. It requires me to think and juggle several tasks during the day. I deal with intense emotions from other people. I'm required to make on-the-spot decisions that are often seconded-guessed by my superiors if the results go astray. The paperwork load is so immense I can't go to the bathroom without writing a report about the experience. I have watched my job burn through a lot of people...some not even lasting a couple of months.

I've done it for 15 years and love it.

Here I sit after a very long and hectic day looking forward to being on-call for the next 40 hours or so and I can't for the life of me figure out why I don't seem to be affected by the same stress that makes so many others crumble. I'm not super-human. I don't have any particular skills in dealing with pressure. For some reason though....the more stressful my job is during the day...the happier I am. It invigorates me.

Like I said; I have a screw loose somewhere.

Works for me though.

Wednesday Cat Blogging

Yogurt,Yogurt, Everywhere

I like Yogurt. It use to be one of those "hippie" foods that were simple, cheap, and nutritious.

Use to be.

Yogurt has become a fad food item now, and it comes in just about any flavor that you can imagine.....and most of it is unhealthy crap. They are loaded with corn syrup, except for the low fat varieties which are loaded with artificial sweeteners. You can find a brand of Greek yogurt that has neither for the bargain price of a dollar for a little tub filled with about two spoons full.

Basically, I walk by the yogurt section in the grocery with much the same feeling I have in the cereal aisle.....row upon row of different packaging of the same junk. None of it the least bit healthy for a body.

Free Day Treat

Free day...or that one day of the week where I don't worry about what I'm eating or how much. I suppose I could spend all day eating all kinds of crap but that would kind of defeat the purpose of changing my habits; of eating healthy foods, even when I eat a lot of them. So I eat what I eat during the week but have seconds. I have treats as well, such as a delicious pint of chocolate milk.

Yeah, I know, there is a lot of opinion about whether milk is good for you or not. The chemical flavored stuff in cardboard cartons you buy in stores that come from cow factories, loaded with hormones, and spiked with corn syrup...yeah....that stuff is poison. The stuff pictured above though....mmmmm. It's from a local dairy. No additives. No hormones. Just fresh milk in a glass bottle that tastes like I remembered as a boy.

Once a Sunday. I wait all week for it.

Wednesday Cat Blogging

Wednesday Cat Blogging

I Love My Toys

Day One

Warning! Semi-nude old fat dude content toward the end.

Wednesday Cat Blogging

Wednesday Cat Blogging

Advice for Men

Men are at a distinct disadvantage in any encounter with women, and I think I've figured out why. We don't speak the same language. Most men that I know are pretty straightforward when communicating with each other. A guy comes up and says “man, I feel like shit today” I can respond by saying “yeah, dude, you look like shit too” and we understand each other....a man stated that he was a bit under par that day and another man offered confirmation and support. Try telling a woman she looks like shit and see where that comment will take you. What's good for the gander is definitely not good for the goose.

So...after a lifetime of being around women of all shapes, sizes, ages, and personality types; I've distilled a few key phrases that, while obvious when spoken man to man, take on a very different context when spoken by a woman to a man. Pay attention guys. Life is easier when you know this stuff. The first phrase is what a female will tell you. The second is the translation you should be hearing...or else.

“Nothing's wrong”
translation --- something's wrong, you have 10 seconds to figure out what

“It's not you, it's me”
translation --- it's you

“I don't care what we watch on TV tonight”
translation --- give me the remote

“I don't want to talk about it”
translation --- no TV for you tonight

“I'm not upset”
translation --- no sex either

“You're so manly”
translation --- you're a slob

“That girl is so pretty”
translation --- don't look

“I don't need a gift”
translation --- I better get a good one

“You don't listen to me”
translation --- stop arguing

“I guess it's all my fault”
translation --- last warning, quit arguing with me

“Fine then, I'm sorry”
translation --- you'll be sorry

Wednesday Cat Blogging

Snow Walk

Monday Cat Blogging

Hardcore

Monday Cat Blogging

Monday Cat Blogging

First Day

Wow....2011. Seems hard to believe that not only is it past what use to be the premier book of the future for me, Arthur C. Clarke's 2001, but even past his sequel 2010. There are a lot of things that didn't come to pass just as there are many others that I never expected or dreamed of...being overweight among them.

I didn't really do too bad during the last year. Despite several unexpected events and injuries, I managed to lose about twenty pounds and keep it off. Still fat. Still out of shape. Yet I haven't gotten worse. That's something, I suppose.

My project this year is to chronicle every day. That's boring, I know, but though the devil is in the details it's also where the dullness lies. I'll be putting my weight number on this calender every day. I'm not really obsessed by scale numbers but it is a measurement and I want to see what it trends out to over the course of weeks and months. I'll also take photos every day for the same reason. I want to see what happens to my body composition over the course of a year.

My exercise plan is three days of weightlifting alternated by three days of cardio. One day of rest. I will be going slow at first to avoid injury. I'll write a bit about diet though I won't really have one. I'm merely going to do portion control while sticking to healthy carbs, proteins, and lotsa veggies and fruit.

And...of course....Monday cat blogging.

Monday Cat Blogging

You Better Watch Out

For most very young children, theology and religion is way too abstract to really understand. Oh...you go to Sunday school, sit with your parents during services, do all the other stuff that goes along with whatever particular sect you're brought up in....but it's not real....not really. It's just what's expected and, being a kid, you go along. What choice do you have?

But Christmas...now there is some rock solid faith. I may have had an iffy concept of God but I had complete certainty of who Santa was and what he was all about. I didn't need a church to bolster my faith and soothe my doubts. I knew!

Let me tell ya why.

Long, long ago, around Christmas time, my parents dragged us to the Sears & Roebuck department store for a dreary day of shopping. Usually, the one highlight to these annual excursions was a chance to sit on Santa's lap and clue him in on what you wanted Christmas morning. This is important stuff for a kid. If Santa doesn't get your order right you might wind up with nothing but new underwear and a couple of shirts. Still...on one particular day....I was terrified at the thought of facing Santa. You see, I had been recently naughty. I don't remember what it was but it had something to do with something happening in the first grade; so I must have been about six years old or something. All I do remember is the fear that I had blown it for myself for Christmas. I was convinced that as soon as I sat on Santa's lap, he would look into my eyes, tell me what I had done, and call security to have me thrown out of the store.

He keeps a list. He knows if you've been bad or good. I was screwed.

Well...despite my protests....my Dad ordered me to sit on the man's lap or face a whuppin when he got me home. So I did. I walked up to Santa, sat in his lap, dared not look at his face, and blurted out in a soft mumble "I'm sorry Santa. I was bad but I'll be good from now on".

The man dressed in costume patted me on the head and replied "Santa knows you are a good boy". Then he ho-ho-hoed and handed me a candy cane.

The exquisite joy of being forgiven!

Religion often claims to provide that.....Santa delivered.

Monday Cat Blogging