March Towards Victory
My weight was 207 this morning. Three of the five days were spent on Phase 1, so I don’t know how much of the loss was due to that. I’ll have to keep on to see how this progresses. And yesterday, due to the fucked up nature of life getting in the way, required me to eat a lunch out of the home, and to not eat dinner. I still got in the six meals, it was that they were out of order and messed up. Lunch was from Quizno’s, a small turkey-bacon-guacamole sub on wheat bread, with a side salad and diet Coke. Dinner was then, an apple and ten sips of coffee before I realized that holy shit, why am I drinking coffee, am I an asshole? The sub was delicious. I missed carbs. And since weigh loss still happened, and I shifted some food around, I will assume I’m on the right track. I am going to stick with this sort of nebulous Phase 1.5, because it feels like it’s working. Like I said, March is going to be the bitch. March is where I need to concentrate on watching what I eat. That’s where I’ll fuck shit up.
I think if I slowly reintroduce carbs, it’ll be on nights when I work out. Not that I earn the carbs then, but I’ll burn them better. I will only stagger in some carbs here and there. We’ve already reverted to egg breakfasts on the mornings. And the cereal is okay.
Higginbottom has introduced me to the glory that is Stevia. It’s a sugar substitute that supposedly doesn’t cancer up the labrats. I made a ricotta creme with it last night, and it tasted fine, so it’ll work. It just means that if I want coffee while I’m out of the house (and I do want coffee, heart a-splode be damned), I have to start carrying Stevia in my purse satchel. I’m also contemplating sprinkling Makara cinnamon and Stevia on my cereal. I’ve never put sugar on cereal, because I’ve always eaten cereal that’s been endorsed by celebrities (Reeses) or the Navy (Admiral Horatio Crunch).
I’ve also made my workout playlists. But the only way to really test out the workout playlists is by, well, working out. I’m actually posting about the workout playlists over at the other blog. It just feels more like a discussion best presented over there. But sufficed it to say, in true me fashion, I ended up making five fucking playlists. Like I’ll need that. Ah well, variety is the spice of life. Followed closely by Makara cinnamon.
The superbadgood news is that despite only shedding 2 pounds, it all came pretty much from the upper decks. I’m at 47 inches on my chest and 47 1/2 on my stomach. My manboobs are swiftly downgrading to training bra status. I still totally pull a Buddha when I sit down, because where else is the fat going to go, but I think the chest is still bulky is because it’s falling into my armpits. I have sideboob. That’s been the strange part about the weightloss. I always had a sort of Jell-O mold of fat around my waist and chest, a solid jiggly mass. But now, all the fat is breaking down and shifting, so I sort of look like a trashbag full of Jell-O squares. You know, something that creepy lady with the cigarette and wandering eye sends to picnics with her two dirty children. But I’ll take the victory. I look thinner, and I’m feeling good. Hopefully, I’ll be able to hit sub 200 for St. Paddy’s Day.
Uhns Uhns Uhns Uhns
Ironically, I just read Ms. Bend the Round’s post about proper workout music. Which I was just about to post about myself. Weird. Kismetic, perhaps. Or, because it’s damn silly hard to find workout music.
I’ve been using the Nine Inch Nails Year Zero album, and then Serj Tankerian (I know that’s not how you spell it, I’m just too lazy to research the proper spelling) Elect the Dead. Mostly because they’ve been the closest to fast techno stuff I’ve got. I’m not a big techno fan. My brother kind of eased me through what I do listen to. I like Gravity Kills and Stabbing Westward okay, but for the most part the whole transient beats thing escapes me. It sounds like noise. I tried a little Crystal Method and Chemical Brothers, but I don’t want the soundtrack to MTV’s AMP, you know?
So I’m working on trying to assemble a ska/punk workout playlist. I have no idea where to start, and I’ll probably just end up making a late 90’s angry-at-your-dad, stab-your-girlfriend playlist instead. But if anyone (and by anyone, I pretty much mean Bend the Round and Wolfe) has any suggestions, I’m all for it.
Twigs and Berries and Leaves
Being Italian and Irish, going carbless is tantamount to spiritual warfare. One portion of my lineage craves whiskey, potatoes, and beer. The other half NEEDS breads and pastas. So it’s difficult. Despite the unwary sabotage, and narrowly managing to waylay a second this weekend (what is so difficult for baristas to understand when you order a SKINNY latte. It even says Sugar Free syrups and Non-Fat Milk. I ordered IN THEIR CODE. Why they try to kill me, Dimmi? Why?!), I decided to go into the Phase 2 portion of the diet.
The interim phase between Phase 2 and Phase 1 is when most people fuck-up and quit the diet. I will not do that. Basically, the book itself sabotages you. They offer you a Phase 2 menu that’s all carbed foods. Which is what you might be eating the sixth or eighth week of the Phase 2. You can only reintroduce a small portion of very specific carbs into your diet. At first. Basically, the idea is, you eat some carbs for a couple days, check your weight. If you’ve gone up, you do three days on Phase 1 to settle your hash, and then go back to Phase 2 and try again. You also lose much less weight during this phase. A pound or two a week. Usually, it tends to be barely a pound. After the super phase of Phase 1. So some people waffle back and forth, between Phase 1 and Phase 2. Others get discouraged, make up their own plan, and start bargaining with themselves. Yeah, you know, if I just eat one or two Oreos, what’s it going to matter? Or, I’ll just eat less Phase 1 type foods and then have a whole pizza.
Now, the trick is to steady the course. To be smart. But it’s hard going carbless non-Atkins style for most of the diet. On Atkins, people could eat bacon or ribs and not care. But that’s why they die from heart attacks. This is a smart low-carb. Did you know cow’s milk has fucking sugar in it? Natural sugars, but still. Found that shit out this morning, blew my mind. You’d be surprised what’s in foods. Even organic foods. They use organic or evaporated organic cane juice. That’s sugar cane, my friends. That’s sugar. No shit.
Essentially, the farther down the ingredients list your evaporated sugar cane is, the less amount there is in there. Because we really like the Kashi Heart to Heart cheerio-like cereal. But that’s got sugar cane juice in it. But it’s the sixth or seventh thing on the list. Once it’s past four, it’s kind of safe.
I’ve become label savvy. And this is an experimental portion of the diet. It’s a diet, you’re supposed to eat in a manner that is not crash-diet specific. So I’ve started slow. I’ve actually started faster than I had previously expected. Essentially, I’ve gotten fed the fuck up with eggs and lunchmeat. I like lunchmeat, but when you eat it in roll-up form, you taste and tear the individual tendons of fatty muscle. It’s grossinating. It’s so disgusting I had to make up the word grossinating to describe it. So I replaced them with carb alternatives.
I am essentially eating the same stuff as on Phase 1, except I’m going to replace the eggs with cereal, and the lunchmeat rollups with a piece of fruit. I missed fruit like Joan Rivers misses being able to close her lips. Now, these are two carbs added to the meals. If it comes down to it, I’ll go back to the cereal. On the weekends, I’m eating eggs still. It’s just time consuming to get up in the morning and make eggs while making lunch and two snacks. I would like to sleep.
The cereal I’ve chosen is called Uncle Sam. It’s essentially flaxseeds and whole wheat flakes. There are 10g of dietary fiber in this bitch. I eat from a tiny little cereal bowl, with a bit of 1% milk. It does not taste great, but after chowing down scrambled eggs for 14 straight days, it’s a godsend. And with all the fiber, the carbs will be washed out in the inevitable colon blow that will occur. So we’ll see how this plays out over the next couple of days. I’m eating an apple today, and you have no idea how much I’m looking forward to that.
But lunch is going to be leftover chicken parmigian (which Jenny kind of improvised last night with organic sugar free roasted garlic sauce from Trader Joe’s and can I just say oh my damn! it’s just sauce, garlicked up chicken breast, low-fat mozzarella and parmigian and romano cheese, but it made me stop eating and concentrate on not crying with joy. And that’s shit’s Phase 1, son!) and a small no-frills salad. And dinner will be tacos and romaine. According to the SBD, that’s about what you’re supposed to eat anyway. And I cut out calories, because I don’t use mayonnaise or salad dressings.
The other portion of my new health regimen is this product we picked up, Trader Joe’s Trader Darwin’s Complete Body Cleanse. It’s a liver, gall bladder, digestive system cleanse. Less drastic than the one Higginbottom has done before, so I’m all for it. It’s mostly taking a lot of pills. I’m going a couple days on it to see if I’ll stick out the whole week or not. It really hurt last night, because to cleanse the gallbladder means to rattle around the stones. But any sort of cleanse does cause discomfort. If it gets too bad, off to the free clinic I go!
I’m looking thinner, and feeling better. So that’s good. I just need to keep it up. Now is the challenging part of the diet. I wish I had more of a weightloss head start on this badboy. But it took me several years to build up an army of fat, so it’s going to come apart a piece by precious piece at a time.
Weak Cheese
209. One fucking pound.
I’m not asking for much. And frankly, that’s about all I want my body to shed every three days. But that’s on Phase 2. On Phase 1, the more restrictive phase, I’m supposed to be shaking off the fat. But nope.
Well, maybe, maybe it’s that I’ve been building muscle. Because of all the running and stuff. Nope. The measurements have all gone up an inch or so. Well, hips went down a half inch. Everything else? Nope.
I don’t know what it was that went wrong. My only thought is that I moved exercise from last night to tonight because we’re going to aim for a four day a week. And that on Wednesday, I was sedentary because of illness. I didn’t eat worse.
It could be because of the bacon bits. We’ve been using real bacon bacon bits on salads. And Wednesday, I ate a pretty fatty cobb salad. Hardboiled eggs, avocado, bacon bits, tomatoes and cheese. But it’s all the good fats, so I thought. And last night’s salad was huge. Asian marinated veggies over avocado, bacon, and tuna. The servings were huge. So perhaps that’s all it was?
I don’t know. And I did lose weight. But I tried doing my fitness deck (pushups, situps, squats), and I made it through SIX cards. SIX. I did about 15 pushups, 13 situps (well, a fatty crunch. It’s mostly me grunting and wiggling. It’s like a turtle on their back.) and 14 squats.
My goal for the next 30 weeks is to lose 2 pounds a week. This is alot but not undoable. But I didn’t take into consideration that doing moderate exercise would cause me to actually gain muscle in get into “shape”. Fuck me. I’m sabotaging myself with workouts! Bastard! He’s always one step ahead of me!
I felt fatter last night. Higginbottom thinks it’s due to the soy sauce marinade and peanuts we eat. Because of the sodium content. South Beach really doesn’t have much focus on sodium intake. In fact, if you look at the South Beach Diet meals, most of them have unbelievably fucked up portions of sodium. Seriously, the pizza I think has 1120 mg of sodium. I can’t believe they print that with a straight face. It should just say “Hahahahaah A LOT WTFLOLBBQ”.
Now, because of the supa dupa high blood pressure, I’m always vaguely wary of doing up the salt. I’ve been doing a pretty good job. And we mostly use mediterreanean sea salt. But, we use it a lot. So perhaps most of my weight is water retention. That would be good. And I don’t drink nearly enough water in a day. Mere mortals are supposed to consume 8 glasses or 64 oz. a day. But I’m Rubenesque, which is why I should probably be doing up like 80 oz. a day. Or 5 water bottles full. I hasn’t.
Ah well. I’m still well below my target goal weight for the week, which was 210. And I still have three more days of Phase I to do. Technically, I’m not supposed to actually end up below 200 pounds until April. So I’m totally on schedule. And it’s a lifestyle change, not a crash diet. So eat me. I’m high in salt.
T-Rex In Effects
Next week, I will be easing out of Phase I into Phase II. All I’ll really be doing is eating some fruit as an afternoon snack, and possibly oatmeal or Kashi cereal for breakfast. I’m starting to get a little egged out. And I’m not going to eggs-agerate, Higginbottom and I are fucking egg geniuses. The key is to season the eggs when you scramble them. Cheesy scrambled eggs with an Olive Tapenade we bought at Sam’s Club. It’s basically black and green olives, red peppers, and capers, minced into a delicious topping. I believe it’s South Beach savvy, because I’ve been eating it and mixing it with my hummus, and I’m still losing awesome amounts of weight.
That could also be because of my exercise regimen. I’m considering ramping it up to 4 days a week. We shall see. Once I breach the 200 lb. mark, I think I want to start doing pushups and situps more often. With crunches. I haven’t been able to, mostly due to my own laziness and forgetfulness.
My workout the other night was pressured by the fact that the fucking Y was crowded to capacity. We had to park at the Burbank Media Center and walk. So I did my 20 minutes on the bike, then I did 30 on the treadmill. I did 3.0 for 5 minutes, 3.2 for 15 minutes, and 3.5 for 10 minutes. My legs were on fire. Then I had to wait for the fucking elliptical. The wait may have been partially responsible, but I was able to go 10 minutes. I think an hour is a good start. Now the trick is to do more faster. I’ve been pushing my treadmill speed, and I’m proud of that. I’m inching towards the steady jog speed.
But I’ve learned something. And this kind of relieved and pissed me off. See, I’ve got little T-Rex arms, so it’s hard to do somethings. But I’ve also got little weiner dog legs. There’s two feet between cock and concrete. And so as I’m running on the treadmill, kicking my ass, I look over at the dude next to me. I’m steady pacing him: my foot hits at the same time his does. But I look up, and he’s doing 4.0! And then I realize, well, duh. I have less of a stride, so my legs have to move faster to make up the distance. I remember in high school, I was friends with a basketball player named Dave. Dave was 6′ 6″ easy, and so we’d walk to health class together. And he would take these long loping strides, and I’d practically have to sprint to keep up with him. So while normal mortals are going 4, so am I! I just have to go twice as fast.
Weigh in tomorrow. I daresay, I believe I’m in the single digit deuces. I’ve decided to reward myself upon hitting 200, 175, and 150. My reward to myself for 200 is going to be new workout sweats and sweatbands. I sweat like a whore in church, and I need something to prevent it from running into my eyes. I was thinking of getting one of those doo-rags you see all the street kids wearing. Or maybe an American flag bandana with a Harley Davidson logo. Because I just don’t think I’m getting beat up enough at the gym.
A Pound A Day Keeps The Cardiologist Away
I weighed myself this morning, dreading it after the damned “hippie conspiracy” of this weekend, but it turned out I was weighing in at a merry 210. Well, it was a bobbling between 211 and 210, but I’m taking it at 210, BECAUSE I CAN. That’s a pound a day since I started. Not just that, but I’ve dropped another inch off my chest and an inch and a half off my stomach. Awesome-O.
But that’s probably due in part to my having walked 3 miles yesterday. I had some thinking to thunk, so I walked the 1.5 miles to the library. It wasn’t until I was actually standing in front of the library that it occured to me that it was Presidents Day, and thus, the library would be closed. So I instead sat at a picnic table and read for a little bit. Then I walked back.
I’ve been feeling impending sickness coming on. It’s been hitting me in weird places. Allegedly my gallbladder has been giving me stomach pains, which sucks. Also, my heart has begun doing it jittery thing again. Totally independent of anything. The only thing I might be able to figure is distress or stress causing it. But I don’t know. I don’t know why my heart hurts and it scares me. And I’m afraid to go to the doctor, because I need to save up money. I don’t want to get expensive tests to find out that I’m fat and it’s making me die. I know that. That’s why I’m working out. It’s totally irresponsible of me, but I’m trying my best to get better. I don’t see how by working out lightly and losing weight I’d be doing bad things to my body. And I don’t want to go on medications. I don’t. I’m not against herbal remedies, but I am against pharmaceuticals. I can’t do that to my body. I don’t want to be dependant on a pill that makes me need to take other pills to counteract the side effects of the first pill. I just don’t.
Instead, I will read about capoeira. The four basic core movements of capoeira are: squats, back bridges, cartwheels, and handstands. Yeah, that shouldn’t be a problem at all. Since I can barely climb stairs without getting winded. Ah, well. At least I’ll leave behind a beautiful corpse.
Listen All Y’All This Is Sabotage!!!
Man, I was going strong. I’m really good about not eating sweets, or wanting to cheat. My only curse might be fast food, but since we’ve shunned that except in the necessity (we’ll get to that in a moment), it’s not an issue. You know, I really like bread, or tacos, so I don’t eat that, and it makes me sad. But other than that, everything’s been fine. Saturday, after going to work for six hours to make up for my sick days (love that shit by the way, fuck my boss in the ear. I’m trying to contract the bubonic plague that’s been spreading through the office so that I can go in and get EVERYBODY sick and then say, sorry. Guess if you gave me a sick day this wouldn’t have happened. I am not above using viral warfare to get what I want.), I decided that Higginbottom, in true nature to her british butlery, needed some mellow tea. There’s a place in North Hollywood at Lankershim and Magnolia called Independent Coffee and Tea. It’s an independent coffee and tea shop. Well, not really a shop. It’s more of an outdoor kiosk with tables. Since it’s California, it’s warm out, so it was nice out, if a bit breezy. The plan was to just sit there and chill a bit before going to the DGA to check out movies (the reviews are at the other blog). Higginbottom got a cookies and cream blended ice (it’s the less corporate murder way of saying frappacino) and I ordered a sugar-free mocha, non-fat iced coffee. I repeat. I ordered a sugar-free mocha, non-fat iced coffee. Upon receiving our beverages, I taste it, and think. Hmm. This tastes sugar perhaps. I even say aloud, This tastes too sweet to be sugar-free. I can usually discern the difference. But do I stop drinking? Well, of course not. I go back to order us two teas, a Sechung Oolong for myself and a Passion Mango for Miz Higginbottom. I mention to the very nice barista, hey, that was a sugar-free mocha, right? He gets a horrified look on his face. Oh, man, I’m sorry, I totally forgot. I smile, but inside I’m doing the Fuck Prospector dance (it involves stomping and throwing down your hat and shouting a lot of swear words, as if Tarantino wrote dialogue for Yosemite Sam.). Because I unintentionally fucked myself after a clean week of South Beach. The weigh in was 213, which means my goal of being under 200 pounds by the end of the month is totally still within possible. I definitely can do it by St. Patrick’s Day, which is in line with where I need to be by my heinous schedule. And during the course of the diet, the guy even says, you’re going to cheat on Phase 2. It happens. Vacations, celebrations, holidays. They come up. So, just go back on Phase 1 for a couple days, and all will be well But this is predicated on the belief that you’ve already adjusted your body chemistry on Phase 1. So here I am, six days in, and unsure if I need to scrap and start over, because of some wayward hippie too pot addled to understand the words sugar-free. That’ll teach me not to go corporate. If they make mistakes like that at Starbucks, their souls are fed to the Ghostbusters dogs hidden beneath each altar in the backroom. Now, it’s okay to go Phase 1 for longer than two weeks. It’s just harder, because you have no carbs. But our diet plan book is strong, and we are awesome. However, I am incredibly pissed off that my entire diet has been potentially waylayed by this incident. I also learned on the drive to the DGA that I was starting to get the heart jibblies. My chest gets that feeling like you’re climbing in an airplane, all on the left side. My left arm goes numb and tingly, and I start to freak out. Now, a panic attack, or stress attack has the same lesser symptoms of a heart attack. So does a gallstone attack. And they say a heart attack feels like an elephant is sitting on your chest and you seize up. It’s not that bad, it’s more like a really fat kid is sitting on my chest. But, I think this because of caffeine and stress. If I drink caffeine anymore, I get jittery, despite the fact that I’ve been taking blood pressure herbal supplements for over a month now. My blood pressure has probably gone down, but since all of the pharmacies have yanked their free monitoring machines in favor of selling $75 models, I don’t know for sure. So I guess its no coffee for me for a while. Which sucks alot. Painfully so. I really like coffee. Iced, non-fat with sweet and low. It’s good, it helps me to get energy, but I guess until I get back to a managable weight or lifestyle, that’s my punishment. We went to the DGA for a double feature, and because we’d be there past dinnertime, we had to eat out. We went to California Pizza Kitchen, because of the salads. It is VERY difficult to eat out on Phase 1. I don’t care what the book says. You can’t. Don’t bother trying. We ordered their CPK Cobb Salad, which is bacon, chicken, avocado, lettuce, beets, gorgonzola cheese, and tomatoes. The average salad is big enough for two people. So I ordered one to split, with the beets, cheese, and dressing on the side. And two waters. This is a great way to make friends with your waitress during a busy Saturday night. But she was a nasty bitch about it, so she got a sizablely less tip. Which probably proved her point, but fuck that noise. Just because I’m not running up a monster tab doesn’t mean you get to stop giving us service. The salad was good though.So I’m back to focusing on trying to be healthy again. Higginbottom and myself are due to the gym today, as well as possibly a walk later? And we’ve been playing Super Mario Galaxy. We needed three more stars before we can beat Bowser and then beat the game to play with Luigi. We now only need one. But it’s a motherfucker. Cosmic Comet in The Gold Leaf Galaxy. I hate racing Cosmic Mario. I just fucking hate Cosmic Mario. I wish he got Cosmic Polio. Let’s see you run fast in a wheelchair, you blackhole looking cockbastard. But the diet is working, and I’m going strong, and we’ve been hitting a doozy of creativity on the weekend meals. We made our own version of Ratatouille, that really isn’t, but it looked colorful like the movie. It was tomatoes, cucumbers, and part-skim mozzarella, made with olive oil and seasonings. Tonight is going to be Crusades salad. It’s flank steak with my secret marinade over a salad that’s tomatoes, avocadoes, olives, and lettuce over hummus and tapenade mixed. It’s superb, and I’m awesome for doing it.Let’s keep it fit, goddammit!
Work Harder, Not Smarter
Valentine’s Day fell upon our whirlwind Thursday, and we had to fit about twenty pounds of shit into a five pound bag. Higginbottom gets home around 6 ish, so we had to get groceries, work out, and be home in time to make dinner before Lost came on at 9. Now, dinner was not going to be a difficult undertaking, because we decided on an Asian vegetarian theme (my Asian veggie roll-ups sans carrots and some microwaveable edamame). But we still needed to supply the goods. And since it was Valentine’s Day, we wanted to be all romantical.
We managed to get out of the house by just before 7, after getting ready for the workout. Higginbottom was all set to work out this time, to try out the treadmill. She did, for a half-hour, so mad props to her. By the time we got to the Burbank Y, it was damn near 7:20. My workout usually takes almost an hour, because of the length of time I run on the machines. We had to be out of there by 8, in order to get to the Vons grocery store down the street.
So I decided, I’ll work harder in a shorter period of time. I did 15 minutes on the bike, but I tried to keep the RPMs to above 100 the whole time. My friggin left knee started getting this incredibly sharp pain in the left half, like a crackling pain. But I soldier on, easing down the 100 RPM qualification. I joined Higginbottom on the treadmill next to her. I did 20 minutes on the treadmill, starting out at 2.5, then boosting to 3 at 10 minutes, then 3.2 at 15 minutes, then 3.5 at the 18 minute mark. Not exactly a dead sprint, but for a fattie like me, it was a steady burn. I rounded out on the elliptical, which is my fucking Eliminator. I got in 5 minutes, but I felt like I could probably boost it to 8. But time was of the essence, and it was time to go.
We were out of the Y, down the road, and done shopping by 8:30. Because we pre-plan all our meals, all we really needed was some cheese and some veggies. And soy sauce. Everything we had to purchase was on sale. I love when that works out. Because I’d been a good boy, Higginbottom let me purchase a Diet 7Up for myself. Despite the recent medical study that says your body treats diet sodas and the fake sugars just like regular soda. I don’t know if you can turn the chemical goodness into fat, but leave it to my body to find out. Besides, I allow myself caffeine and diet soda three times a week. Once for each time I work out. I’m trying peoples, I’m trying.
Today being a Lenten friday, we’re doing up some fish and veggies tonight. Lunch is awesome. I diced up some of the veggies from the Asian rollups, and we sprinkled them on the salad, along with soy sauce, avocado, and tuna. Had I thought in advance, we could have thrown some cashews on there. But since our afternoon snack is a bag of peanuts (to ensure we get necessary proteins) I thought it’d be nutty overload. We’ve been able to save money by buying some things in bulk and freezing them, but also by recycling meals. Whatever we eat the night before, we cut up and throw in our salads. It’s been working deliciously.
Though we do occasionally spoil ourselves. Laughing Cow cheese comes in French Onion and Garlic and Herb in the light flavors. And we’ve got an impressive menagerie of imitation flavorings for the Ricotta creme desserts. I had strawberry last night, but tonight is going to be Pumpkin Pie. Oh, hells yeah.
Weigh in is tomorrow, so here’s hoping I cracked the 215 barrier. I feel lighter, and my stomach is deflating slightly. And my calves are awesome. It’s my most attractive part.
Even Elephants Stampede
I’m feeling pretty good right now.
Yesterday, I hit the gym, which is against everything I believe in. I hate gyms. Alot. It’s like being in a pack of lemmings on cellphones. Quiet lemmings watching FOX News. Because I work out at the Burbank YMCA. So it’s also packs of teenagers from the high school down the street. I don’t like teenagers anymore. I can’t stand them in the gym. It’s worse than them being at the movie theatre or mall. Because here, I’m trying to kick my ass, and they’re fucking about and being all….dumbass. I know for a fact I was just as dooftastic at that age, and an adult would have been right to pound on me with a rusty grave-digging shovel.
I’ve decided to just start with cardio-endurance type apparati before getting into an actual honest-to-Buddha workout. Also, my days are waining before I have to seek gymnasticity elsewhere. Which I’m cool with, as I’m not too keen on the Burbank YMCA anyway. If Higginbottom can find a class she likes, perhaps we shall stay. Otherwise, lesson learned, and my boss can eat the cost.
So I’ve been just doing a routine that consists of seated bicycle, treadmill, and elliptical. I’m taking it easy, because I’m such terrible physical condition, I don’t know WHAT I can do that won’t break my body or give me a massive myocardial infarction. So I started low and I’ve been easing it up.
Last night I did 20 minutes on the bicycle, and I rode more than double what I did on my first outing. Then I jumped on the treadmill for 25 minutes, doing 20 minutes at 2.5 MPH, and 5 minutes at 3 MPH. Watching the other people at the gym, I felt like a douche. Dude next to me was running at flat out 8 MPH. But I’m in bad shape, and so I’m working my way. So fuck Speedy Gonzales. I’m doing what I can. I really wanted to up my elliptical time, but I could barely do the 5 minutes. My heart rate was getting up around 161, which is well over the HIGH INTENSITY RATE for my age group. And most people in my age group don’t look like a tauntaun waiting to be sliced open.
But I felt good about it. I even busted out 5 pushups and 5 crunches. My gut is far too big to actually do a sit up. It’s more of a press-in. But it’s a start. A little at a time until I’m there.
My weight this morning was 216, which is 3 pounds less. My measurements were all the same, except my chest went down by a 1/2 an inch. But Higginbottom thinks I might be measuring wrong, because there is no way there’s only a 1 1/2 in differential between my substantial belly and my mancans. But I’m wrapping the tape across my nipples and setting my arms at my side as best as I can. And my belly is across the love handles and around to the belly button. There’s a 10 inch difference between my stomach and my hips. Which is disturbing. I look like a mushroom right now.
But I’m fighting the good fight. And tonight, it’s steak! Mmm, with Broccoli ala Jenny, which is oven baked broccoli with chipotle and cheese sprinkled on it. Oh, hells yeah.
The Return of The Great White Whale
Well, my attempts to lose weight were completely countermanded by…well.
Part of it was probably the result of a crushing depression that had settled in. I mean, everyone’s unhappy. But I was just chemically so. But in reality, it was probably due in no small part to the deliciousness of fried foods. Since I’ve decided I want to live, and to do that you need a heart that works, and not to play the numbers game since 30 is peeking around the corner, I figured returning to a diet would be good.
So I’ve deleted my story from here (recap: did the NaNoWriMo. I won! Made it under the wire with a power slide beneath the security gate at just over 50.000 words.) and I shall be returning to my roots of fat reduction.
Since I will never, never again do the Master Cleanse (ugh, I can’t even look at a bottle of pancake syrup with getting violently ill. The same goes for big black women. Please know that was a Mrs. Butterworths referrence, and not the result of diet infused racial hatred), I’ve returned to form with the South Beach Diet. It worked really well the last time, and if I manage not to fall back into my fucking fast food lifestyle, I’ll be glorious. It improved my cholesterol, it improved my blood pressure, diabetes, and all the rest of the nasty little troublemaker that plague the vastly obese.
I started the “weight loss regimen” on Sunday. I weighed in at 219 lbs. I keep saying that once I get below 200 lbs, I won’t go back over 200. So I won’t say that this time. Karma works, tubbitches.
I went to the YMCA for the first time in…um, forever. I don’t have the money. But while I still work at my current job, I have finnegaled my boss into giving me a gym membership for myself and Higginbottom. Higginbottom hates our Y. The machines don’t have adjustable resistance, so they’re really hard on her. Also, she’s recovering from gallbladder removal. So she’s not doing South Beach as hardcore as I am, because it’s too much fat for her system. She’s doing what I will refer to as Southeast Beach. Which means, she’s eating digestive healthy foods and still maintaining the lowfat portions. For example, last night, we did tacos on Romaine lettuce. Well, I did. I slathered my portion of beef with various hot sauces, and put cheese with it, and then ate a bunch of olives and peppers and all sorts of good stuff with it. Higginbottom made herself some mashed potatoes which she sprinkled with ground beef and olives. As much as the Irish in me craves the tater, I am able to do the diet, because I genuinely like eating the food on it.
Anyway, the workout. I am taking baby steps on it. So I did 15 minutes on the seated bicycle, 20 minutes on the treadmill at 2 MPH (walk speed), and 5 minutes on the elliptical. The elliptical eliptikicked my fucking ass. Remember the no resistance? You can’t go slower than 4 MPH on it. Which jacked my heart rate up pretty damn keen. And as I said, I’m trying to ease on down, ease on down the road on this. But I lived. And I’m planning on going again tonight to give it another go.
Sunday night, we were on our last hurrah, so we ate El Pollo Loco chicken on tortillas with salsa and some mashed taters. It was delicious, and we needed the chicken for our salads the next day. So I wasn’t exactly dieting Sunday. This may have an effect on my weightloss. But I also shaved my head and cut about 2/3 of the grizzly adams beard I was rocking. So what if I like to tip the scales in my favor?
I hope this will also allow me to push aside my writer’s block. I write for therapeutic purposes. But instead of keeping a journal, I write plays and screenplays and short stories and shit. I consider it more helpful. Plus, who else gets to perform their neuroses? I’ve been keeping a blog called The Gospel According to Prisco over at http://gospelaccordingtoprisco.wordpress.com that helps me fountain my cultural rage. So that’s helping too.
I’m weighing myself every three days so that I don’t get too obsessive. Again with the measurements. We’ll see if this works. Hopefully! My goal is to be 150 by my buddy Wexler’s wedding in September. That’s 70 pounds in 33 weeks or so. So that’s a little over 2 lbs a week. Which if I stick to this and work hard, and also enjoy myself with the occasional delightful meal/beer outing is incredibly doable. My plan is to walk into the wedding, and see the friends I haven’t seen in a little over a year and have them freak the fuck out.
