Turkey Day

Wednesday Cat Blogging

Time?

Okay...I know what you're thinking...no post in a few days so I must be slacking.  Not so!  Just busy at work as this is the beginning of the season to be weird.  I'm also trying to finish up some home repairs before winter weather sets in.  I'm actually losing track of time.

Once I get the coming weekend out of the way, things should settle down.

Girl Scouts are Evil

Well...no...not really.  It's a fine organization, much better than the homophobic quasi-military group available to boys.  Still, I do wish the GSA would quit forcing me to buy their damn cookies every year.

Of course, Girl Scouts don't actually sell the cookies to me.  I get them from the mothers of Girl Scouts at my place of work.  They usually hit me up on my way to the vending machines or scouring the break room for some left over snack; when I'm so hungry that you could sell me gum scraped off the bottom of a chair.  The cookies seem good when I order but usually disappoint.  Dry, mostly tasteless, and expensive....about 15 cents per itty bitty cookie.

Yet, year after year, I buy a few boxes.  Absolutely not a good thing to be chomping on while trying to lose weight.

I do it for the girls.

Wednesday Cat Blogging

My Agenda

Well...actually...I did do quite a bit today.  I went to work early, attended a lot of meetings, and had an employee evaluation where I found out my agency still likes me.  A busy day but a good one.  Later this evening I facilitate a support group so I probably will not get home until 9 or 10 tonight.   No time for exercise but that's okay, because I didn't plan for it today.

Moral....missing a day here and there is not the end of the world.

.....or an excuse to give up

Leaf Grief

I didn't do my usual exercise today.  Not because I was lazy but because I had to do some yard chores.  One thing that is different about where I live now and where I grew up is the presence of trees...lotsa them.  Another thing that is different is that there is an actual change of seasons, and all the leaves on those trees fall to the ground.  So my day was spent raking and bagging.

You wouldn't think that tiny dried up leaves would be so heavy.

My back is killing me.

No Hiding Place

About a jillion years ago, I sang in a church choir.  It was in a Baptist church and, though my thoughts about religion have changed over the years, I still have very fond memories of belting out songs in that church.  There was absolutely nothing to do on a Sunday for a teenager growing up in the middle of nowhere Texas so....say what you will about Baptists; their services were entertaining and they knew how to enjoy themselves.  One of my favorite songs, one that had everybody in the congregation jumping, was "No Hiding Place Down Here".

I bring all of this up because it's pretty obvious that the posts on this blog have been a bit sparse lately.  This, my friends, is an indicator that I'm not doing quite all that I can toward my fitness goals.  I mean...really....who wants to write posts about being a slacker?  I stop writing.  I stop giving updates.  I'm hiding.

No more.  Daily posts everybody.  It's so dang easy to hide, to ignore, to build up that old familiar wall of denial.  I'm trying to eliminate all of my hiding places.

I went to the rock to hide my face, but the rock cried out: No hiding place.
There's no hiding place down here. 

Wednesday Cat Blogging

Two Months

No change at all from last month.  Well, I did somehow manage to lose half a pound....whoopdee doo.   My bodyfat percentage still hangs at 36% though.

I know what happened.  October was a busy month at work and I did a great deal of sitting during the day.  Feeling drained by the time I arrived back home, I was too tired to exercise.  So I put it off until the next day...then the next....then th.......you get the idea.

Diet is not enough.  I have to move more weights to get rid of my weight.

Halloweenie

This is a rough time of the year for someone like me who has a serious sweet tooth and trying to lose weight.  What to do about the tradition of giving out candy to groups of disguised little nose-pickers that come to your door, yell out "trick or treat", and stand there looking cute?  Take a stand against childhood obesity and early onset diabetes and give out apples and bananas?  I'm too soft-hearted for that.  Besides, I don't want to get my lawn TP'ed.

I thought of getting really cheap, really crappy candy....things like ribbon candy, butterscotch hard candy, and stale candy corn.  That would definitely deter me from sampling out of the Halloween bowl but, like I said, I'm too soft-hearted to inflict that upon kids.  They did go to all the trouble of dressing up in costume.  The least I can do is give out something to make it worth their while and to perk up their parents who have to drag their little darlings all over the neighborhood.

So...I get the good stuff...stuff I like....hence the problem.  There's the bowl by the door.  Oooooh lookie, an Almond Joy, I love those things, just one, it's a small size.  Hmmmm..Reese's...yum...just one....dang that was good, maybe one more.  Kit Kat eh?  I bet kids don't really like those, they're more an adult candy.

and on, and on, and on....till I turn off the lights so that there will not be a chance of any more trick or treaters while I sit in the dark gorging on the last Toostie Roll.

Wednesday Cat Blogging

The Giant Killer

Once upon a time
there was a boy named Jack,
who was told to take a cow
to market and...
Yeah, yeah, we know,
said the crowd to the old man,
about the magic beans
and the beanstalk
climbing to heaven,
where you met a giant
and killed him.

It's true, said the old man.
When I was young
I climbed a giant beanstalk
to the clouds
faced danger and excitement,
gathered wealth
and slew the terrible giant,
the story is true.
The old man harrumphed
eyeing the smiles of the crowd
that did not believe.

There are no such things,
said the crowd to Jack,
as a beanstalk so high
or a giant in the clouds.
You're old and senile,
confusing your life
with a fairy tale,
and if it were not so funny,
it would be sad
to listen to your delusion
day after day.

How can you scoff,
said Jack to the crowd,
when I have proof,
such as the magical harp
I freed from the castle
of the fearsome giant,
or the stump
of that great beanstalk
out in the field,
as wide as a house.
Don't take my word
see for yourselves.

What you call a harp,
foolish old man,
is only a radio
and the stump,
what is left of a tree.
What about the goose
who laid golden eggs?
Show that,
and maybe we will believe.
So Jack stood
and held out his hand.

The goose died,
since they never live long,
but I traded the last egg
for these.
He opened his hand
to show three dried beans
and said with glee,
These are worth more
than any gold or jewels.
They are the same magic beans
that I used when I was young.

And the crowd laughed
and walked away,
leaving Jack standing
his hand outstretched,
holding his beans,
till he knelt on the ground
and pushed the seeds
into the earth
and waited.
I'll show them, he said,
and waited.

Homeland

Wyman Meinzer's West Texas from Wyman Meinzer on Vimeo.

I've lived in Kansas for over 20 years....but I still love and miss where I grew up.

Wednesday Cat Blogging

Vitamins

One supplement in which there is some controversy are vitamins. Do they help? Are they necessary? Is it a waste of money?

My opinion is that they help. I take a multivitamin/mineral tablet every day. I know that the purists will say that one can get all these nutrients through food but, realistically, I'm not sure that you can eat all the varied types of foods to get everything from A to Z every day. Vitamins are something of an insurance policy....it covers my daily requirements even when I don't get to eat all the right types of foods during a hectic day which, by the way, is pretty much every day.

I also believe that it helps keep the immune system working at peak efficiency. Oh, I get sick once in awhile. The usual colds, bugs, and whatnot; but I rarely get lay-in-bed-wish-I-was-dead type sick. It's kind of odd that, though I'm the oldest person in the group of people that I work with, I hardly ever have called in a sick day. I'm thinking that making sure I have my vitamins, while not preventing sickness, helps me fight it off and recover much more easily.

I take a blend designed for men age fifty and over. It supposedly has stuff in there to promote the health of body parts that are of concern to men my age. I just buy the generic store brand with the thought that vitamins are vitamins and that there is no difference between store and national advertised brands. In fact, I'm pretty sure they are made by the same companies anyway.

One thing that is odd though....they list all the vitamins and minerals on the back label in super tiny print. These are suppose to be for guys over 50! Don't the packagers know that most of us are half-blind? They might be trying to slip some crack cocaine or plutonium in there for all I can tell.

Saturday Push Ups

The challenge is how many push ups can I do in one minute, but I'm finding that my first challenge is to do a minute's worth of push ups.  Still....17 this week.  I'm getting stronger.

Wednesday Cat Blogging

One Month

No drastic changes after one month.  In fact, hardly anything to notice at all if I go by the scale.  It turns out that I didn't lose a single pound....but take note.  Though I weigh the same, my bodyfat percentage went down 3 points. Whipping out my trusty calculator, I figure that I have lost six pounds of fat from my body.  That's fat, purdee blubber that I'm not carrying around in my body anymore.   Just a little reminder that a scale will not tell you squat about any changes to your body.  Like most things...it's the totality that counts.

Speaking of ---------

Neck     16 inches (no change)
Chest     45 inches (+1 in.)
Gut         47 inches (-1 in.)
Waist     42 inches (-1 in.)
Hips       42 inches (no change)
Thigh     22 inches (no change)
Calf        15 inches (no change)
Forearm   12 inches (+1 in.)
Bicep      14.5 inches (+ half in.)

Saturday Push Ups

Well...I'm up to 15. That's one more every week since I started doing this thing. I know it's not much but remember that I haven't attempted a push up in DECADES. I could probably do a lot more if I was sloppy with my form, but the memory of a screaming D.I. just will not let me get away with that.

Wednesday Cat Blogging

Saturday Pushups

 A really good friend of mine named Boyd has started a little something he calls "Push-Up Saturday".  The deal is to record yourself doing as many push-ups you can in one minute.  When I first started, I could only do ten.  Now I'm up to twelve or thirteen...depending on how you start counting.  Nothing that I'm really proud of but it's a start.  I'm shooting for a goal of doing fifty in one minute.

I'm probably going to have to practice quite a bit to get there.

Eating 9 to 5

The hardest place to maintain your plan to eat healthy is probably at work.  This is kind of a problem if a good chunk of the day is spent at work.  Unless I bring my own food, the photo above shows my only option if I happen to get hungry.  Gee-dunk machines, offering a variety of overpriced crap guaranteed to leave you still feeling hungry, a bit poorer, and maybe a little nauseous.  The candy machine offers everything from popcorn to Pop-Tarts.  At the very bottom are a few selections of gum and off-brand mints that have probably been there since the $1.25 candy bars sold for a quarter.  You can wash it all down with an ice-cold can of high fructose corn syrup infused water...or just get a bottle of plain water for a slightly higher cost.

For me it's critical to take, not only lunch, but something healthy to snack on through the day as well.  Stuff like fruit, cottage cheese, yogurt, maybe nuts....anything but the calorie dense but nutritionally sparse fare I might find in a machine.  Experience has shown me that when I don't have anything brought from home and I get that urge to munch....and I always do....those machines look mighty tempting.  I can convince myself that a bag of pretzels is healthy, that a Reese's Cup has protein so it's not so bad, or just plain out say I'm hungry and screw the diet.

I avoid the temptation by carrying my own food.  It means that I have to haul a cooler to work.  It also means that I have to make time in the morning to pack all the food I want to eat during the day.   Still....probably the best way I've learned to avoid using the machines is to make sure I don't have any money in my pockets which, considering my profession, is not all that hard to do.

Wednesday Cat Blogging

Stuff I Try Out

 There are all kinds of breakfast bars, drinks, and various dry cereals marketed toward those of us who are trying to get and stay healthy.  Most of them taste only slightly better than the container they come in and all of them are way overpriced.  You're paying for a concept rather than the food.

But I'm cheap....and I hate shelling out hard earned money for stuff that I have to choke down while convincing myself that it's good for me.

Enter oatmeal.  Pretty simple stuff.  I look at the ingredients and there is no long list of chemicals that I can't even pronounce, much less understand what it might be doing to my body.  Oats.  That's all.  Just oats.  Good protein source.  Great fiber source.  Fills you up and stays with you for a few hours.  It takes about two minutes to prepare.  I really like it with a bit of brown sugar but, if I'm avoiding sugar, I'll toss in a small pat of butter (real butter, not margarine gunk).  If available, I'll throw in a few walnuts.   A serving costs about ten cents.  How many meals are you able to buy for a dime?

PRO:  CHEAP!
            Solid basic nutrition
            No additives, no artificial anything

CON:   Okay...it's pretty boring by itself
           


Verdict:

Oatmeal goes along with my philosophy that one doesn't need to spend a great deal of money on specialty foods in order to eat healthy.  It seems to be the mindset that eating healthy costs way more than just eating junk food.  I disagree.  I feel that highly processed and packaged food, and I use the term food rather loosely, is actually more costly.  A bowl of oatmeal costs much less than some oatmeal breakfast bar.  A piece of fruit is far less than some super duper breakfast drink.

Keep it simple.

Home or Gym?

It's an age-old problem...or at least an old problem to aged me.  Where to exercise?  The logical answer is at a gym.  After all, these are places pretty much devoted to exercise.  They have a bunch of weights, machines, and people who seem to be there for the explicit purpose of exercising.

Therein lies my problem...or neurosis.  People.  I hate 'em.  Well, I hate being around them in a gym.  I know, I know; it's all in my head.  I get very anxious dressing up in exercise duds and getting on the machines, especially when I'm surrounded by fit young people pounding out twice my effort without breaking a sweat or interrupting their texting conversation.  I keep telling myself that I paid my dues at the gym, I have a right to use the place, and besides...so what if I'm horribly out of shape...that's why I'm at the gym.  Still doesn't matter.  I'm all self conscious about people who, even if they did notice my presence in the gym, could not care less about what I am doing there.

Then there is the hassle factor.  Working out at 5am is NOT what I really would like to do.  I'd rather be sleeping, having sex, drinking coffee, surfing the internet, washing dishes, just about anything but get dressed and drive to a gym.  In this effort to change my lifestyle any excuse at all to skip going out to the gym will rear it's ugly head and derail that effort with distressing ease.  Too hot, too cold, too dark, too wet, too sleepy, I woke up with a bad case of bed head.....the list goes on.

The one way out of this is to do my exercise at home.  I bought a few hand weights at Wally-World.  Nothing fancy and they are fairly cheap.  Just to keep them all together I also bought a stand for them, also fairly inexpensive.  I rounded it out with some wussy weights my wife had on hand.  This works pretty well.  There is no exercise done on a machine in the gym that you cannot do just as well, or better, at home with a pair of hand weights.  All I have to do is shove all the cat's crap aside, unfold my exercise bench, and go at it....no need to dress or wake up enough to operate a vehicle.  No waiting for somebody else and I can take my own sweet time.  I don't have to check my appearance or body aroma and, when I'm done, I'm home and a pot of coffee is ready for me.

And with gas prices lately.....

Wednesday Cat Blogging

A Look at Myself

YAAAHHHH!




I've been away for awhile.  Sorry about that but thanks to all the readers that expressed concern for my well being.  I'm fine...my computer wasn't, but it recovered.  One thing that I meant to do last week was gather up all the measurements for my body; kind of a starting point that I hope to quickly and permanently leave behind. Taking a look at myself is always a frightening proposition.  I tend to squint when looking at a mirror or at least not let my eyes travel down below my neck.  I also hate scales because they never have anything nice to say to me.  The thing is though, if you want to get somewhere, you have to know where you are starting.  Below is where I'm starting.

weight:     208.8 lbs
bodyfat:    39%

neck:      16 inches
chest:      44 inches
gut:          48 inches
waist:       43 inches
hips:         42 inches
thigh:       22 inches
calf:         15inches
forearm:  11 inches
bicep:       14 inches

I'm not posting any photos but suffice to say, my body resembles a pear with toothpicks for arms and legs.  I'll see if all of this is reversible....in only one year.

Day Before

Stuff I Try Out

If you are looking for a supplement with no additives, preservatives, and processing agents it is available...it's called food. However; sometimes it is just not feasible to whip up a balance meal when you haven't much time, nothing healthy on hand, or just plain do not want to cook. I'm not a big fan of supplements but I have to admit that meal replacement shakes are pretty handy.

The major problem is that most of them taste like lightly flavored motor oil. The Myoplex though is okay...provided you jazz it up with fruit and milk or yogurt. I generally make it with water, throw in whatever fruit I have on hand, and add a small container of fat-free frozen yogurt. It's quick, it's easy, and actually tastes comparable to a milk shake. There is an added bonus that the stuff is loaded with vitamins and minerals. It also has a lot of fiber which is good, but gives you the side effect of cutting some ferocious farts later in the day...so you may have to time your interactions with others.

Pro:

Quick, portable, and easy, no cooking required

Nutritious and satisfies hunger

As far as supplemental shakes go, it is actually good tasting

CON:

Expensive

Requires a blender

Gas producer

Verdict:

Not great but not bad. Real food is always better but you can't always get real food. These meal replacement shakes help me from eating other things when I'm hungry so that I can stay on track in my diet aims.

Challenges

I've participated in a lot of fitness challenges. Well...to be more precise...I've started a lot of fitness challenges. I've actually completed none and I sit here trying to figure out why.

Oh, I start off like gangbusters. Most people do. We get all excited about a 6-week, 8-week, 12 week, whatever challenge to lose weight and get fit. Books are gathered. Diets are planned. Gyms are joined. We count down the days to the start of challenge and go roaring full speed with high expectations and bounding confidence.

A couple of weeks into it we peter out; tired, sick, overwhelmed, guilty, and disgusted with ourselves. We crawl away with the shame of failure. If you are like me and announce your grand challenge to the world, it's doubly humiliating and you really hope that all your friends won't ask you the dreaded question "so how's that challenge going for you?". The real pisser is that we usually end up in even worse shape than when we started.

What the hell is going on?

After starting and failing at so many challenges over the years, I think I have finally figured out what I (and maybe what a lot of other people) are doing wrong. I'm out of shape and trying to live the lifestyle somebody in shape overnight.

Think about it. I start a diet and exercise program which neither my body or mind is developed to cope with. As a result; I get hungry, tired, sick, and just generally feel a great deal worse than when I started. I get so discouraged than any excuse at all is enough for me to abandon the challenge.....rationalizing to myself that I've had unusual stressors or that I just don't have time in my busy day to do what the challenge requires of me. I beat myself up over an over about being unable to complete a challenge when, the simple fact is, I'm really just too out of shape to begin in the first place. Shawn Pillips' book Strength for Life notes this phenomenon and suggests a twelve day regimen to prepare a foundation for beginning a more intensive effort in developing long-lasting fitness....a sort of pre-challenge challenge. The idea is to adjust the body and mindset to the changes that need to be in place before taking on other changes in lifestyle and activity level.

This is what I will attempt at the beginning of my year long project in about four days. 12 days following a program of diet and exercise to prepare myself for the changes I wish to incorporate for the next year and the rest of my life.

"Life is occupied in both perpetuating itself and in surpassing itself. If all it does is maintain itself, then living is only not dying." --- Simone de Beauvoir

Wednesday Cat Blogging

I Need Energy

I don't know what's wrong with me today. I just have no energy to do anything at all. I'm not really tired. I feel rested well enough. It's not like I have any particular chore that I want to procrastinate about. I just feel sluggish. No energy. No desire. No drive.

I've been told that having a proper diet can maintain activity. I've also been told that exercise can rev up the mind and body throughout the day. I'll see if there is anything to those rumors.

But right now....I don't even have enough juice in my brain to change my mind.

Wednesday Cat Blogging

I Hate Wearing Glasses

I really do. It always feels like I'm wearing a mask, it screws up my peripheral, and with bifocals I'm continuously doing the head nodding routine to try and find just the right focal point. Plus, lotsa people already consider me a nerd and glasses do nothing to dispel that notion.

Still....I have to be able to read. My arms are no longer long enough so I need glasses for most of what I do every day. It can be embarrassing to be in a room full of people and squinting trying to figure out who is there, folks think I'm flirting with them. So off I went to get an eye exam. I haven't had one in about four years and figured that I may as well use some of my insurance which I pay out the nose for all the time. What I find out is that my eyesight is still crappy...but not anymore than it was four years ago.

I think that is the same goal I would like to achieve in this project. I don't expect to have the physique I had thirty years ago but it would be nice to not get much worse for the next several years. Maybe...just maybe....I can reverse a few things. I'm not trying to get the body of a teenager again, I just want to get the best body that a 55 year old can have.

Besides......nerds are suppose to be skinny

Stuff I Try Out

Okay....so I know that peanut butter is not exactly the food of choice for losing weight, but I love the stuff. Besides, like most everything else, it's not the food that's bad for you so much as the quantity of the food you eat. Peanut butter is a good source of protein and fiber. It has a lot of fat...hence the need to moderate yourself with a bit of common sense. I'm particularly fond of the Natural Jif (crunchy of course) because it is very low in sodium and contains no high fructose corn syrup.

Pro:

-nutrient dense food that requires no preparation and is tasty and filling

-natural ingredients and low salt content and no HFC syrup

-no need to stir; most natural peanut butter looks like brown snot and quickly goes rancid

Con:

-this is NOT a low fat product, they make low fat PB but it tastes like mud (actually, I have a more vulgar descriptive label..but you get the idea)

-not good if you have a peanut allergy

Verdict:

Yes, it's got a lot of fat. Yes, it's high in calories. Yes, it's one of those processed foods that I railed against in an earlier post.

But it's damn good. If I have to give up eating good stuff just to be skinny...quite frankly....I'd rather be fat. I'm pretty sure there is a way to have both.

Diet Fads - Paleo

I'm always amused by claims which state if one only eats certain foods, robust health will appear and weight will magically melt away. It is comforting. Who doesn't like to think that, by just eating, one can gain a great physique? And the logic is somewhat sound....after all....we ate our way into being fat...we should be able to eat our way out of it as well.

One of the hottest diet fads nowadays is called the Paleo diet. It goes by the premise that humans are genetically predisposed to eating lots of meat, a few plants and fruits, and perhaps nuts. I guess this idea comes from a concept of Conan like cavemen hunting down and grilling mastodons as compared to a modern overweight guy munching on Cheetos while watching TV. It's an interesting idea....but complete bull.

First off, prehistoric humans actually ate....pretty much whatever they could find. They had no "diet" per se, just a day to day struggle to get enough food to survive. If that meant killing something, great. If it meant finding something that was already dead, even better and safer. The knowledge of any plant that didn't poison grandma was passed down through the generations. How did this truly paleolithic diet work out for the health and fitness of cavemen? They had a grand life expectancy of under 30 years...tops.

What we do have a genetic propensity for is in storing fat when it is available. Humans that were able to do this had a much greater chance of surviving frequent lean times. Cavemen most likely went a couple of days or longer without food on a regular basis. Modern humans have difficulty going a couple of hours without eating and, since most of us don't have to chase down our food or be chased by something that thinks of us as food, the storage of fat gets a bit out of hand. The greatly increased lifespan also makes the long-term effects of being fat a lot more obvious.

So...is the Paleo diet good? The premise is. Cutting out processed carbs is definitely good for your health. Raw (as in unprocessed and fresh) vegetables are absolutely good for you. Lean meat is, I believe, a healthy part of any diet too....to a point. Most people eat way more meat than necessary.

I still believe the best diet is common sense. Eat a variety of fresh foods. Avoid processed and canned items. Treat high fructose corn syrup like plutonium and stay away from it if at all possible. Use small portions. Get up and move around once in a while to burn all the fuel you put in your mouth every day.

Pretty simple. Not exciting or sexy and it doesn't sell books.

Wednesday Cat Blogging

Exposing Myself

I haven't posted in a few days because I'm struggling with an conundrum. Just exactly how much of myself should I expose to the world through this blog?

I'm not talking about exposing my body. I'll probably do that through the year but it will be in an attempt to gauge progress and I'll give warnings to any reader who might be easily frightened. No, I'm talking more about personal exposures of my daily activities. I want this project to be a detailed account of all the stuff that goes on with a day-to-day journey to reach my goal in the next year. I can write about diet and exercise but can really only go so far with those subjects; besides, that can be a bit boring after a while for both myself and readers. What I need to do is detail the million and one things which pop up every day to derail us from attaining these goals that though we desperately want to achieve, somehow manage to fall short of actually completing.

One problem I have is my profession. I work in the mental health field and most of what I do every day is confidential. Not top secret as in national security but still stuff that I can't go into with much detail because it involves other people's private lives. I have to deal with a host of legal and ethical issues which force me to severely edit what I share about my working life....and that can be a problem if my working life is a big chunk of my week and the source of some of those things that might be hindering my progress.

After much thought on the matter, I believe I have reached a solution. I will not describe the agency I work for (so don't ask). I will not talk about any client, even using a pseudonym. I will not give professional advice or observations; anything I write here is purely my own opinion, which you can take or discard as you see fit. I will write about my daily experiences as they pertain to how it effects my own state of mind, motivation, and periods of discouragement.

In a nutshell....I'll have no hesitation of exposing myself but I'll limit it to myself.

Stuff I Try Out

There was a time when I was a vegetarian for a few years. I eventually gave it up for a host of reasons but did discover one very important thing....I don't have to eat meat with every meal or even every day. While a vegetarian, I would search out all kinds of things to put some variety into my diet and perhaps even find replacements for meat. Most of the vegetarian faux meat products are pretty horrible. I think this is because they make an effort to taste like meat. Morning Star became a favorite because it doesn't try to mimic the flavor of meat. It tastes like...well...it tastes like Morning Star. If you are looking for a substitute for a fat laden greasy pork sausage patty, this will disappoint you; but if you're interested in some soy protein in order to cut down on your meat consumption, it's worth checking out.

Pro:

High protein with fairly low fat content.

Easy to prepare (one minute in the micro-nuker)

Great alternative to traditional breakfast meats like sausage or bacon.

Con:

Can be a bit pricey. Up to $4 or more for a box.

Sodium is high.

Does not taste like pork sausage. In fact, it's kinda bland. I use hot sauce to add zip.

Verdict:

As I said, I discovered these when I was a vegetarian and have continued to use them long after I had gone back to eating meat. It's not something that I eat every morning, but they are a good way to add variety to a breakfast and get good nutrition without loading up on animal fats.

Wednesday Cat Blogging

What's It All About

So what is this project to 55? Simply put, it will be a documentation of my effort to attain that elusive goal of health and fitness by the time I reach the age of 55....a bit less than 13 months from now. To that end I'll be posting every day (or at least every day that there is a computer available) about my progress, lack of progress, setbacks, breakthroughs, and whatever crosses my mind at the moment. There will still be the Cat Blogging Wednesdays because I like cats, especially mine. I'll do some product reviews to discuss which things are helpful and which are total crap. I'll probably post videos, particularly on days where I'm not feeling much like writing. I may put up some half-naked photos of myself during the year but I will limit that out of fear of being made fun of by friends and family.

Some of my more geekier friends tell me that blogs are dead but I'd like to think that it is still a good venue to express oneself. I'm especially interested in writing about this project because there just isn't a heckuvalot out there about people like me who want to get fit and healthy....people who start off with a lifetime of bad habits and very little, if any, exercise experience. I see a few here and there and, like myself, they fade away and give up for one reason or another. The main purpose of this project is to detail where things can go wrong and how to get quickly back on track. This blog will include lots of failures along the way but, hopefully, solutions as well.

What I May Be

That really is the question I'm asking myself lately. I'm pretty solid on knowing who I am having long ago gone past youthful angst and any so-called mid life crisis. I'm happy. I'm content. I'm comfortable.

Almost.

For the past few years I've been trying to achieve a goal of health and fitness. There are a great many things that have gotten in the way of that plan; work, divorce, marriage, finances, age, .....oh...that last one...age. I'm coming up on my 54th birthday in a few weeks and I'm being met with the reality that I'm kinda getting old. I'm starting down the backside of middle age. Jeeze, I'm an adult!

Now I know all the bull people say about "age is just a number". Yeah, and my number is getting high. I look around at other men my age and, you know what's happening?....they are dropping like flies. Massive guts, high blood pressure, diabetes, you name it.

How do we get here? Decades of neglect. The accepted wisdom is that there is nothing a person can do about it. Muscle loss comes with age and with that loss comes less activity. Fat increases each and every year. You can't turn back the clock and cheat the karma of bad living and bad habits.

I think that's wrong...and I intend to prove it.

Starting on August 30th I am launching a one year project to absolutely change my body. I will document what works and what doesn't. I will be fit by 55 is my goal. I have a pretty good idea of what I want to end up with but not convinced on this date whether it is a possibility.

"We know what we are, but know not what we may be." -- Shakespeare Hamlet