The Evolution of Bryce and The Greenhouse

How I Met The Dom

2011-08-04T22:43:00.000-04:00

So, as you may know Dom is my best friend from college. We met our freshmen year about 7 years ago.

Starting college I was a very very much different person than I am now. I wasn't quite all put together and had a stress induced facial tick. I was starting college and had a Freshman Seminar class called "Romantic Visions." This particular lecture was about "Big R Romanticism" which is about flowers trees and the sort of beauty and wonder of nature.

The class seating arrangement was a circle so from the get-go you knew that it would be pretty big on discussions and sharing. I was a huge fan of those sorts of classes because I could kind of BS my way through anything.

I was one of two commuters in the class. The other commuter ended up dropping the class so it was just me. The very very first day of class I was pretty nervous. My facial tick was out in force because of it and I was concentrating like hell on trying to stop it. I was failing but I did my best. Now across the room there was a cute girl and she was making highly intentional faces at me. So naturally this turned into a huge huge back and forth of one-ups-manship. Eventually the whole thing ended with Dom reaching behind her head, and making a "piggy nose" and Professor Venturo noticed which caused a sheepish grin on her part.

At this point I needed to hatch a plan to solidify the whole "remember me" thing so that even after class she'd have a reason to keep me in her mind. I used to be quite the evil genius when it came to flirting. So I tare out a piece of paper from my notebook and draw a woefully abysmal stick figure making a grotesque face. I then added the words "I win" at the bottom. I fold it up quickly and hatch the rest of my plan.

The class had been watching us the whole time and most of them were wondering how we had met and how long we had known each other. Dom naturally handled that with "We haven't been formally introduced."

I then introduce myself and press that square of paper into her hand and slipped away. I kind of figured that she'd be far too sheepish to open it up right then. I was right and I knew she'd open it up later. She did :) and we're still friends to this day.

Today we had dinner at the Indian place we had in Princeton called Tandoori Bite which we found and is really quite good. Lo and behold seated about 10 feet to our left was Professor Venturo. So before we left we went over and said hi.

He remembered us.
Me:"Hi we just had to stop over and say hello, we met in your Romantic Visions class 7 years ago."
Prof V:"Oh yes... Bryce right? And Dominique, you two were making faces at each other and I....:
Dom: "Was kind enough not to kick us out of class? Yes that's us!"

Some bad bad dieting and p90x explained

2011-07-24T23:57:00.000-04:00

So I've been a bad bad Primal Blueprint follower.

Things I've been doing wrong:

1. Lots and lots of ice cream.
No really when I say lots of ice cream I mean I've been managing to kill about 3-4.5 quarts of ice cream a week. This is horrible. I can only imagine how out of round my insulin levels and blood sugar has been. I'm sure that I've been throwing myself in and out of ketosis but on the bright side I've been able to keep up with the workouts.

2. Falling into generally worse eating habits.
I've been sneaking more carb heavy foods recently. Today was some absolutely fantastic bssmati rice with some Chicken Tikka Masala. And my cheat days have started working up their ways from the single meals that I was down to and back up to one heck of a day. And especially considering that I've been cheating during the week with the ice cream....

3.Eating less Veggies
I've either been pretty tired at the end of a work day, especially if I did P90x in the morning, or I end up doing p90x when I get home from work. So I'm way way short on frozen veggies and I haven't made kale (super nutrient rich) in far too long. I really need to suck it up and eat more veggies, and a bigger variety like I did back when this was all new and I was trying new recipes every week and Dom was cooking up super yummy treats every now and again.

So what is P90x
A 90 day work out plan that involves very very intense hour-ish long work out videos that push you to your physical max. There are lots of different exercises, some basic, some not so basic that involve not just weights and reps, but body weight and ensuring that you work your muscles with a weight that challenges them to an appropriate level of reps (8-10) and when not using weight that you push yourself to exhaustion.

P90x is a series of workout videos that are intense.... very intense, on a level of intensity that if you're not at the very least in decent shape will leave you gasping and panting, and most likely be unable to keep up with the whole workout. I've been going at it with having to make some seriously heavy modifications in some places. I work myself so hard during the chest and back exercises that I end up needing to do push-ups on my knees for some parts, and even then I can barely manage to do those stupid diamond push-ups.

Ideally after I finish up these 3 months I won't need to do this again. A quick google of "p90x before and after" give a great smattering of the sort of changes one can achieve when working themselves like that. After I reach that level I'd like to be able to ease into a Primal Blueprint fitness approved exercise plan and maintain the majority of my gains. We'll have to see how it goes.

What the... P90x

2011-07-19T23:55:00.000-04:00

So I've decided that I was feeling good enough and healthy enough to do something very high intensity and hard on my body. Then seeing as I've had the P90x videos and documents for years I am finally in a place that I can use them.

This is currently the very beginning of the 3rd week for me. I have however realized that I wasn't doing the correct Day 3 exercises.... So seeing as I've been feeling like a million bucks for the past 2 full weeks of this insane regimen I've decided that I'll just re-start from week 1 and make sure I do the proper stinking days this time. I think I'll actually make sure that I fill out the worksheets this time as well. Even though I can see some serious difference in muscle definition already I really think that re-starting it will be great for me. I'm a slow learner when it comes to the proper movements so it's nice to get a "second chance" and to top it off I've gotten to use these past couple weeks as good old pre-training for stamina.

I'm still not really sure how good an idea the whole p90x thing is over all. I've been eating more than usual (no shock or surprise there) but I've been going through carbs, and the current carb of choice is ice cream. I'm also currently trying out ursolic acid in the form of holy basil extract to prevent muscle catabolism. I have no idea how I'll know if it works, especially because I'm not taking nearly the amount (on a mg/lb) ratio that the mice did but even if it works a little bit.

I really should do the full on before and after pictures that are suggested, I have one of those douchey mirror ab shots from a monthish ago and compared to one I took from a couple days ago there's a noticeable difference, small... but noticeable.

I know this isn't a terribly coherent entry, but I haven't blogged in forever and I need to just get some stupid thing out there so that I'll hopefully get into a rhythm or get more consistent, or something.

Where oh where have I been?!

2011-06-29T23:18:00.002-04:00

I've been around :) I'll give a basic fleshing out of what I've been up to but I'll really need to take the time and give a proper update on some certain things.

So from June 13th to 25th was 1 week of preparing for Boys' State and one week of actually being there. This year was a super super busy and I took on a whole lot more responsibility than I have previously and I feel like I really really helped to make a difference. After 8 years of volunteering for the organization I was eligible to become a trustee in the New Jersey Boys State Foundation a 501(c)(3) charitable not-for-profit organization working in partnership with the American Legion Department of New Jersey to maintain American Legion Jersey Boys State tuition-free to its delegates by helping off-set the escalating costs of running the program. I've been working with the foundation since my first year on staff and I managed to be voted in as a trustee in my first year of eligibility. This is a huge deal to me and really encourages me to work harder for both organizations than I have before.
The week was pretty standard over all. However this year in particular the food was worse than I've ever seen, and especially given my new no-grains policy it made it nearly impossible to eat anything other than salad and deli "meat"! So naturally I ended up cheating.... but not with grains! My go-to meal was a huge plate of broccoli, some balsamic.... and ICE CREAM. I probably had a pint and a half of ice cream a day. Despite all this and the cheating that I ended up doing (I was in no way perfect and still had a cheat day friday) 2 days after the session I was right back to 223.6 and only just .6 lbs above where I started.

It's taken me a good bit of time to get my wits back about myself, trying to catch up on the food shopping I missed and all of the cleaning that needed to be done. I did manage to complete two outstanding projects in this time away as well. I now have a water filter on the whole darn cold water line to my kitchen sink, so all of the nice cool water coming out is filtered of all the nasty nasty yuck yuck that it used to have!
In addition to the cold water filter I also put in a bath fan which ended up being a bit more of a project than I planned where I found out that my soffit vents are fake and just covering up shitty wood that should have been yanked to give my attic worlds better air flow.
I'll add a short post with pictures of these two projects at a later date.

Today however, was a lawn day. I have been terribly remiss in mowing and it had become nearly un-manageable. I usually like to just leave the clippings where they lay but I would have had to mow at least 3 or 4 times to have that work out so I decided that I would just bag, overall it worked out pretty well but took about twice as long and I still had to go quite slow. While I was just finishing up the back yard Dom came home and was playing around with her new camera (sadly ended up being defective). She grabbed some shots of me trying to jump and reach a toy of Herbie's a got stuck in some branches. Naturally that turned into me being a quick model and I've attached two other shots that I think came out well below. I'm amazed at how much weight I've lost.... looking back at pictures of myself from January it's super hard to believe!

Clearly still a decent bit that I'd like to use, but I'm impressed as hell with the progress!
Before Photos for comparison.

I'll be trying to catch up on reading blogs tomorrow and I'll try and get some comments in as well.

Animal Abusers should burn & Shadow the Lucky Puppy

2011-06-14T23:38:00.000-04:00

Sort of....

Click below for a little bit more info and some pictures.

Poor shadow was rescued by our friend Carolyn when she came in from the ASPCA to the clinic she was working at.

The collar had started growing into her neck and she wasn't being fed.

Some how despite all the crap she was put through for about the last three months she still craves attention, loves being around people and just want's to cuddle into you and never get up.

The only good thing to come out of this is that she has people lining up around the block to give her a loving home where she will never be hurt or neglected again.

More adorable Herbie

2011-06-06T07:33:00.001-04:00

This is the only way that I've found to be able to tire Herbie out when she doesn't get to go run around the farm with Dom. Usually this would go on for between half an hour and an hour.

(You)Tube Thursday

2011-06-02T07:51:00.001-04:00

I didn't get the chance to finish the blog entry that I wanted to so I figured that I'd post up a super cute video of Herbie after I exhausted her outside with a game of "chase-tug-tag" which really consists of me running around with her rope letting her catch it then playing tug of war, then chasing her when she manages to get it. I also work in some give/sit/stay drills so she isn't just a wild beast.

Healthy Living: How setting proper goals got me where I am.

2011-05-30T07:43:00.298-04:00

I find myself constantly writing these "healthy" posts and getting mired in the first two sentences. Constantly re-writing them because they're not cited or as well researched as I'd like. In an effort to stop that and re-affirm that I'm presenting "The World as I see it" I'd like to start with a basic but incredibly important subject.

Goals.

Feel free to read all of it below or skip to the very best bottom for some useful rules to follow for setting proper goals!

Goals can be specific: "I would like paint the bathroom today so it has time to dry before the weekend." or vague "My new years resolution is to be better." Naturally you would think that the more general the goal the easier it would be to reach and the more likely you are to succeed and feel good about having done so. It's not quite that easy.

The first goal is very very specific with a clear point of pass and fail. This kind of goal is a little more intimidating because you will know exactly when you have failed. This puts pressure to on you to succeed. Usually pressure is a good motivator for making sure you reach your goals.

With generalized goals you don't have any way to measure success or failure, thus you cannot succeed. You do however, always have the ability to rationalize why you didn't succeed and foster an "I'll get it next time" mentality. This seems like a very safe place to be because they cause very little stress. When you get into conversations you sound like you have a "solid plan" you can lay out before people and convince them that you're strongly motivated and on a path for success. What... a... LIE.

Worthless goals are set all the time, I routinely set them for myself without realizing it and I have to constantly make a mental effort to change them into a specific results oriented form. In December I knew I needed to lose weight. I was 280lbs on an bad day, tired all the time, taking 1 or more Zantac 150's a day for heart burn and I looked pretty terrible. I knew I needed to change. I also knew that Christmas and New Years were not going to be amenable to my waistline so I came up with a strategy. I wouldn't start worrying about losing weight until the new year.

I hate new years resolutions, but I didn't feel I had a choice. So in the time leading up to January 1st I decided to work on a plan of action and I set a solid goal for myself. Read Tim Ferriss' new book "The 4 Hour Body" I came to the conclusion to read this book after seeing an excerpt on about how it was re-searched. The author treated himself like a fancy computer where he would try new inputs (foods, supplements, schedules etc.) and carefully measure the outputs (body fat percentage,waste production,muscle size). A human guinea pig. I loved the concept. I'm a tinker-er by nature so I figured why not try out some personal bio-mechanical modificaiton. Before January first I had read all the parts of the book pertaining to weight loss.

I set my first goal. "I would like to stick to the 4 hour body "Slow Carb Diet" for one month and see how it works." I did no exercising. I simply focused all of my energy on doing that one thing properly. I knew I couldn't measure how many pounds I would lose following what could have been a fake diet. I didn't want to blindly believe any claim from the author so I set a simple easy to measure goal of simply following the diet. I had the dramatic success that I truly wanted. I went from weighing 273 to 259 in 14 days.

Small Success Check - Did I only eat Slow Carb Diet approved foods today?

Specific Observations - Measure waist/arm/thigh circumference. Record weight on scale.

Overall Outcome - 100% I passed every single Small Success check!

Common aimless goals commonsly set instead are "I would like to lose weight." "I would like to eat healther." "I would like to get fit." "I would like to start eating right and exercising." Each and every one of those goals has no benefit for you built into them. There's no plan and no direction. How are you measuring healthy? How are you measuring fit? What do you mean by eating right? Does eating oatmeal for breakfast instead of cereal count as success? Does completing a 5k run?

Goal Setting tip #1: Only make goals where you can measure how successful you were before starting and how successful you were after.

I set a goal to follow the Slow Carb Diet. Prior to when I started I was 0% successful, after I stared I managed a 100% success rate with a pass/fail graded per day.

Around the Middle of January, I set a two more goals for myself.

1)I would like to continue losing weight.

2)I would like to find a way to make slow carb tastier and more sustainable.

1)I would like to continue losing weight.

This goal seems worthless but it was actually right on the money for what I wanted. I wanted to continue to have the numbers on the scale go downwards. That was the only goal I was looking for. I didn't care if I was losing muscle to atrophy, fat to buring, or limbs to chopping. I just wanted those numbers to keep going down. Because as the number on the scale went down, my self esteem went up.

2)I would like to find a way to make slow carb tastier and more sustainable.

WORTHLESS! I didn't even know what I meant with this goal. It should never have been a goal in the first place. It did however end up being a great starting point. I started researching what diets were similar to slow carb, how they were similar and how they explained their benefits. I started looking into what other similar diets I could transition to. I found "The Paleo Solution" and "The Primal Bluerpint" right off the bat.

How could I possibly choose between two such well respected diets with rabid followings? I needed to solidify my goals. I wanted lots and lots of information explaining why this method was so successful, and why it contrasted so starkly against what I may expect. I also wanted lots of delicious meal suggestions that I could take and make my own. Mark's website had more information that I had ever hoped for and tons of recipes that all just looked so mouth watering. I chose The Primal Blueprint

By the end of February I manged to weight 248 pounds having done zero exercise. This was a great feeling but I knew that it simply wasn't sustainable. Starting In March I had to set new goals. I knew I couldn't just continue to lose weight. I needed to lose fat and gain muscle. Additional muscle would bump my resting metabolism in addition to giving me more energy and ability to do fun activities. New goals were born.

1) Continued fat loss through following the Primal Blueprint lifestyle.

2) Follow the SimpleFit program for increased Strength.

And these two goals have sustained me until this point. The first goal is easy to track because I know when I cheat and go "off diet" because I still maintain a cheat day or a cheat meal once a week. However to actually measure fat loss I needed to have a tool to do so. I settled on the largely inaccurate "fat calipers" method. I devised a simple and repeatable process for taking measurements. Now, even though I accepted I wasn't getting an accurate body fat percentage, I would be getting results that were relevant when compared to one another and I could measure success.

SimpleFit itself is inherently trackable. There are 10 levels in the program and ways based upon time and repetitions that can qualify you to move up a level. As long as I stay at the same level and improve my repetitions or speed I am succeeding. I also continue to succeed when I max out a level and transition to a new one.

Where has all this gotten me?

I now weigh about 227 . I've got tons of energy, I'm stronger than I've been in years. You can clearly tell there are some serious abs beneath my somewhat flabulous exterior. I'm gaining levels in SimpleFit at a solid pace and I have no problems sticking with the Primal Blueprint Diet, and I'll even skip a cheat day on occasion. I'm helping my friends get fit and healthy as best as I can. I can curl a 55lb dumbell 4 times with each arm. I'm a happier person.

Goal Setting Tips

Small Success Check - Did I succeed performing a specific task today?
Specific Observations - What characteristics that you're measuring have changed?
Overall Outcome - What percentage of my small success checks did I pass?

Set goals that you can measure on a very small scale. Did I eat according to XYZ diet today? Did I follow XYZ exercise plan today? Did I sleep for 8 hours last night? If you're keeping a physical log always include why's and anything else that you feel may be related so you can try and draw conclusions. Always find a way to measure and if you can't find a direct way to measure your goal find something you can and observe the changes you're looking to have happen. I couldn't tell how much weight I could lose at maximum if I followed the Slow Carb Diet. So I simply set the goal to follow the diet and made Specific Observations of my weight, and circumferences of body parts.

Silent Sunday

2011-05-29T07:06:00.003-04:00

Movie Review and a cheat Day!

2011-05-28T13:42:00.004-04:00

So yesterday was yet another beautiful but warm day after nearly a week of overcast, wet but not endearingly so days. Seeing as we had to cancel game night yet again this week Dom and I decided to have a couple people down and and go to the movies.
We wanted to see the new Pirates movie and so off we went. The most convenient showing was a 3d showing. I was a little leery of seeing it in 3d because it just didn't seem like a 3d movie.

Click below to continue reading about the movie and my cheat day.

The 3d was so damn well done. It was immersive without beating you over the head with it. Just such a fantastic job of drawing you into the movie. Not quite a spoiler but there is no Orlando Bloom or Kiera Nightly in this one... and that's what makes it awesome. The series finally fell back to focusing on Captain Jack Sparrow and surrounding him with a stellar cast that helps tell a story. They aren't just trying to throw you some comfortable characters and make them fit into a plot.

Yesterday was also my first cheat day in 2 weeks. Last week I just didn't feel like it but yesterday I ended up making a decent go of it. I had off from work so I ended up getting up when Dom's alarms went off. Dad was coming by at 9:30 to pick up the huge freezer from my basement that he was interested in as well as his tiling tools and hand truck that he had left here from helping me out with assorted projects.
I took herbie out to the back yard and started breaking down some boxes that I had laying around and was going to whip up a quick breakfast. Naturally I spent more time playing with Herbie than actually working so dad showed up just as I finished with the cardboard. We chatted for a while about my furnace and water heater and all the fun things that need to be changed and updated, especially if I want to add central air.
Eventually we packed up the trailer with the freezer and dad headed back for home. I had to head to Carolyn's to put the bulb back into her DLP tv. So I went inside, grabbed the bulb and went over and installed it. I chatted with Andre (her son) for a while and ended up leaving Herbie to play with Aiko (her lovely dog) and then proceeded down to my parents house to transfer my Dad from Windows 7 Professional to Windows 7 Home Premium.
I stopped at Tractor Supply to pick up some different mix of the Taste of the Wild food for Herbie and I also got her a new rope toy and outdoor bowl.
I was just about to check out when I saw my friend Bridget Sullivan from highschool who I hadn't seen in quite some time. We chatted for a while and caught up on what she's been doing. She has her own photography business going on and is hoping things get going now that wedding season is upon us. If I'm remembering correctly she also has a very sweet gig in Scotland at the Maureen O'Hara classic film festival.
Fixing Dad's computer went well. It was nice and straight forward. I ended up picking up some mail that had come for me and that was about it.
I headed out home and stopped at walmart along the way because I had run out of prunes. I looove prunes. So while at walmart I picked up a calcium & Vitamin D supplement, prunes, one small pouch of dried apricots, and that was it. I ended up eating the whole pouch of apricots on the way back to Carolyn's to pick up Herbie. That was a heck of a dose of sugar for me, usually I avoid fruit (and all sugar) so it was pretty noticeable. I stopped back and picked up Herbie and made it home just after Dom arrived.
Carolyn is wonderful and gives us farm fresh eggs often and this time a special treat of some farmers market Tomatoes so there will be some good eating there. I tossed all of that in the fridge and ordered Pizza for everyone to throw down before we left for the movie. Before the pizza arrived I polished off a pint of Chocolate Peanut Butter HaagenDazs. Then I had probably about 6 slices of pizza, then when we got to the movie I had a water and a small popcorn which was perfect.

It was a great close to a week of passing out at 10:00 and being exhausted. Expect a very cute Herbie picture tomorrow, I promise not to clutter it up with words :)

They let me fly the boat!!

2011-05-23T17:50:00.002-04:00

So Sunday was really really freaking awesome. As some of you may know Dom's father is a huge sailing guy and could live on a boat for the rest of his days and Dom herself has spent almost half her life sailing. I however had never set foot on a "boat" until last year when I went out on the lake in front of our friend Devon's house with his Pontoon boat... aka "The Floating Couch." And I had a blast where-in my favorite activity was when Dev would make it go round and round in circles.

Read more about my boating adventures below.

With the pontoon boat other than some cruising the main draw is you get to hang out, enjoy a couple beers (allegedly, apparently it's not allowed) swim and lay around in the sun in comfort. It's not a terribly challenging activity but it's fantastically relaxing.

Earlier this week Dom got a call from here Dad about how he wanted to bring his boat from Spruce Run down to Maryland for this uber sweet mooring he got down there. Now in order to go sailing all he has to do is drive down, get in the dingy, hop onto the boat and go. Which saves tons of time per trip and makes it much more possible to go sailing for a weekend.
Naturally this means Dom asks me to come too. "Sure." I know just about nothing about sailing mechanics, and as a child in a fit of rage I ripped up my Klutz book on knots.... This should be an adventure. Naturally when I try new things it's new things like foods, places, sports or something I've seen but never done before or upon skills I already have.
The only "skills" related to sailing that I have are sitting, reading a gps, and a general good attitude. Oh yeah, I'm going to be in great shape, I can tread water for maybe 10 minutes if my life depends on it, and my swimming is abysmal.
"Sure"
The day starts out with us waking up killer early getting dressed and then scooping up Herbie and leaving her with Carolyn for the day. Naturally Herbie thinks that this is great as she'll get to play with Aiko (Carolyn's dog) and Andre (her son) all days. Carolyn is the fantastic friend of ours whom we got Herbie from and she is a life saver with being able to take Herbie when Dom and I need to run off for some reason or another.
I don't know about you guys but in my mind there were always 2 types of sailing, the ones on those teeny little kayak looking things where you're hanging half over it and your goal is to hit one million miles per hour.

Option 1

The other option is that you go sailing on a huge lazy yacht and just sip Mai Tai's all day. This is the kind of sailing you'll see in the movies a lot of the time.

Option 2

However as with all things you don't understand and have only seen in movies it's NEVER WHAT YOU EXPECT.

Now on to the boat. However "The Boat" doesn't really do it justice. It's a 24 footer with bathroom, kitchen, comfortable sleeping for 4, and some nice seating topside as well. Armed with my powerful google skills I found out that this kind of "mini yacht" (in my mind) is usually classified as "Day Sailer".
After I got past my first impressions of the boat it was onto the work of actually getting her set up to to be taken from where we launched over to the marina where she'll be kept.

I have no idea what goes into doing any of this work but I'm pretty ok at following instructions. The nice thing about rigging the boat was that my primary job was to pull of ties and fold up covers that were being removed. I got to watch everything that was going on and while I understand it a bit I don't think I could re-produce any of it properly. We also had some great assistance from Moe. Moe happened to be a HUGE easily 90lb black lab that was the biggest dope ever. He swam away from his owners boat, came to shore and hung out with us. He didn't really like listening to his owner and despite all their attempts to lure him back he ended up finding a stick and playing the "I can't hear you" game. I'm so glad herbie is better behaved than that... and even when she's not she at least has the puppy excuse.

There were quite a few nifty inventions that Dom's father put together that really made the whole process painless. On the back of the boat you could raise the mast up from where it was resting. When you raised it that would allow you to hook it into a hinge like part. Then on the front there was a winch that had a 3 in wide 20ish foot "car towing strap" with a hook on the end. This was hooked to the mast and instead of having to heaving up a 25 foot? 500lb? mast with sheer brute strength. It wasn't "easy" but it went very very smoothly. I can't imagine having gotten it done without all of the inventions to make it very straight forward. The whole job took about 3 hours with me just doing simple tasks through out the time.
I always kind of thought that the sailing thing was finesse based, but wow was I wrong. Sure there's a lot of finesse but you gotta have some serious guns to back that up.
We get the boat done and line her up with the "launch bay" because lord knows I don't know its actual name. Dom's father puts on a nifty trailer extension so that he doesn't have to drown the truck to launch the boat. And we're ready. I got to be ever so helpful with this process and help guide the boat off the trailer. So after the trailer+boat is in the water you just make a quick wrap around the rope cleat on the dock and then the boat just slides off as the trailer is pulled back to shore.

Not quite.

You need to remember to unchain the boat from the trailer... otherwise it just gets stuck there and nearly rips the ropes from itself. So after fighting with the chain to get it unhooked from the boat we attempt this re-launch again. Success! Dom and I proceed to take the 2 land vehicles to the marina while her father motors the boat over there. I'm in her car and she's taking her father's truck and trailer. after 6 lefts (literally) we were at the marina. We checked in bought some water and waited for no more than a few minutes before he showed up.
I got quite caught up just looking at all the boats around the marina and Dom's dad was finishing up paperwork while Dom was up to something.

Me just hanging out coiling rope on the boat.

Eventually we all get onto the boat and start underway. At this point Dom started spluttering sailing information all over me and it was just way way to much to even attempt to remember. About all I remember is that keep red things on your port side when leaving the bay, keep green things on your starboard. If you see the two liney things on the sail try and make them go parallel. When you switch tack the sail needs to switch sides.
Despite all of these things which I didn't know. They still let me fly the boat!!!! We only had the one "Jib Sail" up so we were putzing around (for them anyway, for me it seemed pretty quick) at 4ish knots. Dom's father is completely fearless and asked me if I wanted to try steering. I asked if I'd break anything and they were going to help me out if i started doing anything terribly wrong.
Despite the fact that I've never done it before I apparently did quite well. I manage to get one side to lift up a good bit (which apparently means you're doing a good job of grabbing the wind) and it was a total blast to steer. I could feel the wind changing but I couldn't really tell how but managed to correct for it pretty ok. I only had one time where I didn't know what was going on and almost switched tack but Dom's father tossed his hand on the rudder and corrected.
It was so so so much fun I had this huge dopey grin just plastered to my face the whole time... and for a while after. It was an exhausting day though. So we headed back to shore. This meant Dom and her father would take the dinghy, attach it to the boat, get the boat all connected to the mooring then have to row the dinghy back. Naturally me being huge precluded me from coming along for this last quick journey so I stayed pleasantly on dry land. I was however manning Dom's camera in the hopes of getting a good picture of her careening into the water as she capsized the dinghy.
Sadly she has really good balance and there were no hilarious drowned rat pictures to be had. We got into the cars and ended up going to a diner that Dom and her father had been going to for years. It used to be the only one around but now it's surrounded by tons of other chain stores. The food was great though. I got the special which was 2 pounded chicken breasts with hollandaise, butter slathered broccoli, coleslaw and a chicken gumbo soup. Other than the sweet of the hollandaise and the paltry amount of rice in the gumbo it wasn't even a cheat meal.

I had so so so much fun going sailing. I am super super excited to do it again, it's going to be an absolute blast. I'll probably do a whole lot of reading and learning so that I'm not such a dead fish when it comes to being able to help out.

Dutch Chocolate Coconut Flour Crepes

2011-05-21T14:34:00.001-04:00

Welcome to the Sweet Saturday edition of my blog. In honor of the rains finally ceasing I decided to whip up a very filling and primal breakfast for Dom and I.

Berry Cute Flowers

These are just as simple as they look. The trick is the home made whipped cream. I made a large batch of the stuff.

Recipes for the crepes and whipped cream below.

Yummy Whipped Cream
3/4 cup heavy whipping cream
1 1/2 Teaspoons Bakers Vanilla
2 measures of Now Pure Stevia Powder

Put all the ingredients in a bowl, get out a rotary beater (my preference) or a hand mixer and mix till the desired whippy-ness.

It's probably the yummiest sweet treat I've made to date. It was perfect with the berries and helps fill you up a whole ton because of the heavy cream.

Dutch Chocolate Coconut Flour Crepes

These things can be made in traditional pancake thickness, however they are FILLING. That plate you see there was mine and I'm a big guy (6'5") who's a big eater (yesterday I had a 1lb steak for lunch) and I couldn't finish the last crepe and left most of the whipped cream untouched.

Recipe:
3/4 Cup Water
4 Eggs
4 Tbsp Walnut oil
4 Tbsp coconut flour
1/2 Tsp baking soda
3 Measures Now Pure Stevia powder
2 Tsp Bakers vanilla
2 Tbsp Cocoa Powder (Use the Dutched kind like Ghiardelli, Droste or Penzeys)
1/4 cup (use less or more as desired) Dark chocolate baking chips hammered into bits.

Method:
Mix Water, Eggs, Walnut oil, Vanilla, stevia in a small bowl.

Mix Coconut flour, baking soda, cocoa powder in a medium bowl

Slowly add liquids to the dry and mix thoroughly with a fork adding a little bit of the liquids at a time making sure it's not lumpy. After you get all the liquids mixed with the dry take the rotary beater and give it a good beating to make sure it's thoroughly put together and thinned out.

Take a 6in teflon fry pan, heat coconut oil in the bottom (1/8 - 1/4 tsp is tons). Pour in some batter and tilt the pan to make sure it's thin (under 1/4 inch in center). Sprinkle some of those chocolate pieces Keep it on medium heat and once the center section starts to bubble through and firm up (2-3 minutes), give it a quick flip and don't leave it there for more than a minute so the chocolate pieces don't burn.
Then slide it out onto a plate. Continue until the batter is gone. Add coconut oil to the pan for each crepe made.

Enjoy!

Giving back to the community - American Legion Jersey Boys State

2011-05-20T01:22:00.001-04:00

So what exactly is American Legion Jersey Boys State? In short it's a one week summer program where approximately 900 rising seniors get thrown into a mock 51st state and are taught about and given the opportunity to implement municipal, county, and state forms of government.

Click below to hear more about the program.

Students are chosen largely based upon experience with leadership whether it's through sports as a team captain, through outstanding scholarship in school studies, or through extra curriculars like Model UN, Debate Team among others.

The students are broken divided into 16 cities, with two cities per county for a total of 8 counties. Each city & county is provided with a mock story that gives the students the history and current issues facing them. They then proceed to choose their type of municipal government and begin work on their "City Manual" and "County Manual" which is how they explain their plans to resolve the issues presented to them in the descriptions.

As the week progresses the students will then continue to re-create a mock government that mirrors that of New Jersey. Once they reach the State level the issues are no longer what was presented in the packets but it moves into discussions of the real issues facing New Jersey. Senators are elected that continue on to Boys Nation (Bill Clinton actually attended this program) and eventually a Governor is elected.

Most of my friends don't understand why this program is so important to me. It's hard to explain how much this program taught me about working with individuals that are very much used to being Alpha's. The confidence it gave me in assessing my own accomplishments and strengths against others and the ability to present them to others. The whole experience was great for me and really helped me grow, and I want to support the program and ensure that it will do the same for other students.

The work is all volunteer based. It takes up at minimum 1 week a year while the session is going on and beyond that I'm on the Technology Committee and Development Committee that both meet (usually via conference call) monthly. While I don't get to devote the sheer number of hours that others do, I continually try to find more time to assist with the program.

I spend the week before session starts unloading the crate that's packed full of donated laptops (formerly desktops) and assess their health. I will make any upgrades or repairs necessary to keep them working as best as they can. Handling donated equipment isn't easy, most laptops need a good bit of repair or re-work to get them back into a good condition. I help with setting up the Linux environment (a free alternative operating system to Microsoft Windows) that will be used during session and spend the day before check-in installing and wiring in the Laptops with the help of two others, one who is our designated Dean of Technology and handles the incredible burden of making sure that everything gets done, and also focuses on improving the services we provide the program.

We do a lot of custom work, our "webmaster" is really much more of a web developer and with the assistance of the Dean of Technology there is a web based Election Reporting System, Computerized Check-in, a mirror of election results on the public webpage for parents to see, on-line registration in beta testing, a staff management system and I'm sure there are numerous other contributions that I've forgotten to list.

I'm getting older now, 24, and much more responsible. I need to step up and really begin to contribute back and assist the Dean of Technology and the others in the same selfless ways that they have been doing for years. That's my primary goal for the upcoming year. Us counselors have quite a few tag lines that we push back and forth. One of them is "Don't drop ball" and is the universal quip for when you have a job that you agreed to do or take on but failed to complete.

Next year I won't be dropping the ball.

Herbie The Love Bug

2011-05-18T21:42:00.004-04:00

Goodness gracious I miss the nice weather. The above video is of the Herbie-monster having the zoomies and running all over the back yard. The PVC pipe you see hanging from my clothesline is for Australian Pull-ups. Also cute ball of fuzz will jump onto my back while I'm doing push-ups to make it a better workout.

Feel free to click on the "Read More" link to get the scoop on Herbie.

Now who is Herbie you maybe wondering? Herbie The Love Bug is the incredibly loving and adorable white pitbull puppy that Dom and I were "just going to puppy sit" for a while. Of course when you have a tiny little girl who just wants to follow you everywhere.... you find you just can't bring yourself to want to give it back.

Day one with Herbie and she followed me to the bathroom and proceeded to curl up in my pants while I was doing my business. I'm very good at saying no and keeping my heart of stone and making the responsible decisions when I need to. For as cute as she was (is) I was still pretty certain that we just couldn't really manage to keep her because we wouldn't be home as much.

So as the week of keeping her went by it became easier and easier to imagine keeping her around....

Especially when

she is

just so darn

CUTE!

So that little ball of furry wrinkles managed to convince me that as long as we could train her properly we could manage to make it work, especially now that I was coming home to make myself lunch so she'd at worst never be home for more than a few hours.

After having had her for quite a few months it's pretty amusing to think that I was worried about leaving her home. Any day she ends up staying home that lazy mutt just sleeps and sleeps. Then when I get home I'll try and take her for a nice long walk, but even that doesn't manage to tire her out as well as a good game of fetch.

And now after having her for 5 months I couldn't imagine her anywhere else!

Fast Five - A review

2011-05-17T19:33:00.000-04:00

Take one of the Oceans movies throw in some wildly entertaining car chases and you suddenly end up realizing you're watching Fast Five. The cast has fantastic chemistry and they really seemed to work well with each other. Dwayne Johnson does an amazing job of playing the hard ass and is the only casting option if you're looking to send someone after Vin Diesel.

While there wasn't a heavy emphasis on the cars and the racing like the other movies the whole idea really worked well and did a great job to expand the franchise. The supporting cast did a great job especially Tyrese and Ludacris who have really progressed as actors and had some seriously entertaining comic relief going on.

While I'd love to throw in some serious spoilers I won't. If you're looking for an entertaining flick with some sweet cars, awesome action, and some good entertainment give it a watch.

Coming up on a Milestone

2011-05-16T23:42:00.001-04:00

After I manage to shed 2 more pounds I'll have hit the big 50.... 50 pounds of weight that has dropped off the scale. Now I can always console myself with the fact that I've put on a good bit of muscle so I've actually lost more "fat" than "weight".

I'm a little lost on what to really blog about, maybe that's why I just end up just not blogging... because it gets really frustrating not having a real clue for what to say.

I could really use some ideas to blog about so if anyone happens to read this let me know.

Things I haven't (and won't) give up.

2011-05-16T00:20:00.001-04:00

There are quite a few non-primal foods that I haven't given up and at this point I have no plans to. I'm doing great at losing and am making great gains with strength & slimming down. Maybe I'll ditch some or "all" of these later but for now, naaah.

1. Cheat Days (justified a-la "4 hour body" mostly now have just become cheat dinners)
2. Red wine daily (probably 3ish glasses)
3. Spirits (Whiskey,Rum,Tequila) weekly
4. Coffee daily
5. Cheese
6. Beans
7. Protein Shakes (Love my yummy Dymatize Elite Whey to bulk my protein intake up)
8. Peas (semi-contested Mark refers to them as a Super Food and as something to moderate)
9. Rice (only rarely, just with sushi, I justify it via "The Perfect Health Diet")

I'm pretty sure that there are more and I'll add to this list when I get the chance.

Just FYI, If you see me mention a brand it's mostly because I really love it. I'll be making a post that has all the brands and places I purchase at soon which I will keep updated. For instance I used to be 100% netrition.com for my Dymatize and they recently changed their prices so I hunt and usually end up on Amazon.

I'll be picking up The Perfect Health Diet (The PHD) book for my mom because she loves these sorts of books (yes I already got her The Primal Blueprint). I'm currently reading Body By Science on my kindle and will grab The PHD when I finish BBS.

I'll hopefully be expanding this blog into 1, being actually updated and 2 more general self improvement. Like I've been doing simple fit and I regularly watch Al Kavadlo's blog and love his post on "levels" of body weight only exercies.

I'm very big on Price/Performance or "More Bang for Your Buck" so I'll take 10 fish oil capsules a day instead of investing in Grass Fed beef for daily consumption (saved for special occasions). I'll have a protein shake instead of gobbling some turkey (see what I did there, soo clever). I don't want to pay for a gym membership so I look for body weight exercises or equipment I can make on my own. I've been following SimpleFit for a few weeks now and I've been making huge progress. All my pushups are done with my feet 6 inches higher for difficulty. I do Australasian pullups but I do 3 for every one requred and my squats are done holding a cinder block.

Hopefully I manage to keep this blogging thing going and help just one person make their life a little healthier.

Stolen From Dom :)

2011-05-14T18:20:00.001-04:00

So I'm sure some of you fine folks staring at this page came here from Dom's page. Seeing as I'm a generally lackadaisical blogger so in keeping with that I've largely stolen Dom's most recent post, with her permission.
So I've personally been doing really really well on this diet. I'm finally at the point where I look pretty OK naked. I've got tons and tons of energy and am getting tons stronger all the time. Dom and I have started to cook together. Which is great for me as I used to do all the cooking. She likes variety and trying new things while I'm generally too lazy to really try out the new stuff. It's great that she keeps it interesting. So far I've lost 47 pounds and I'll be posting new pictures after I get a bit more muscle showing.

Here's the recipe for anyone who cares:
Beet soup (from Dom):
Ingredients-
6 medium sized beets
4 tablespoons butter
1 qt. filtered water
Diced chives
Sour cream
Spices, to taste
Cream, to taste

Preparation-
-Peel beets and cut coarsely.
-Saute in deep pot with butter until beets are tender.
-Add quart of water.
-Bring to a boil.
-Simmer for half an hour. Spice as needed.
-Blend. For a thicker soup, use less water. This is also where I added cream.
-Serve with diced chives and a dollop of sour cream.

Kale (Bryce's recipe)
Ingredients-
Kale - Enough to fill 10 in fry pan
2 Tbsp Walnut Oil
1 Tbsp Butter
1/4 cup Dried Cranberries
2 Prunes cut into small pieces
Salt/Pepper
1/4 cup Chopped walnuts
1/32 Teaspoon Pure Stevia Powder (helps kill any lingering bitterness)
Preparation-
-Heat the walnut oil in the pan
-Add in a bit of salt and pepper.
-Promptly add the prune pieces and cranberries
-Once there's a bit of
"sizzle" toss the kale over the oil
-Stir lightly and put a top on.
-Check it about every 3 minutes and once it's nice and wilty give it another stir and add the butter.
-Put the top on for another few minutes.
- Open it back up stir well and then sprinkle with the Pure Stevia Powder.
-Stir a bit more.
-Then stir in the walnuts and serve!

Yuck, the scale is climbing.

2011-02-23T11:01:00.000-05:00

So I seem to weigh 249lbs. That kind of sucks, but I've got a few ideas as to why that could be. I'll put them from most likely to least likely.

Ive been sleep walking and eating tons of carb filled goodies.
I'm gaining muscle and not fat.
I'm doing something wrong and just gaining weight.
There's some food I'm eating that secretly high in sugar or carbs and I have no idea what it is.
I've been having protein shakes as more of a rule in the mornings than an exception.
I'm storing more water because of the new supplement I started.

So the first one really isn't likely. I wear a night guard so i'd notice if it were filled with food particles. I seriously doubt I put on 2+ pounds of muscle. For as nice of a dream as that would be, I don't think some walks with the puppy and playing a bit of basketball would really do that much. I don't think I'm doing anything wrong but along that same vein there could some food I've started eating that has sugar/carbs that I don't notice. After my weight stabilizes or things go back to normal and I hit 2 consecutive days of loss I'm going to spend a whole week making egg breakfasts like I had before and only having the shakes after exercise.

I'm also thinking that the whole storing water thing is a big possibility because I've been drinking tons more water than I have previously and I haven't been drinking my coffee in the mornings or tea during work. Right now I just can't really pin down anything until I either find something obvious or I stabilize. Because I've got a good bit of correlation: I'm drinking more water. I'm having more protein shakes rather than real breakfasts. I started a new supplement. But no real way to be sure which is the cause just yet. Then I also have a cheat day tomorrow, and I'm not going to treat it any different.

I also found a basketball court only 1.5 miles from my house so it's super easy to get to. Pretty street but sadly no chain net.

One Month gone by....

2011-02-04T15:30:00.000-05:00

Today's weight is 256. I haven't been this happy in forever. I've been reading through "The Primal Blueprint" by Mark Sisson and It's got a whole lot of similar and interesting ideas that are in The Four Hour Body. I'm really loving it, the whole lifestyle changes and modifications are just having such a positive effect I couldn't be happier.

Day 32 But not quite a month.

2011-02-02T22:04:00.000-05:00

So it's coming down to that time. Tomorrow, despite being day 33 will be a full month (I started January 3rd) of of trying my best to do this whole 4 hour body diet/lifestyle.

So how has it been going for me? It's been going pretty darn well. There have been ups and downs (to be expected) and alot of my cheat days have just been way way too far over the top. Which is kind of nice in a way but in the end I'm still having trouble not sneaking chocolate after meals or going for chips of some sort. I did find some decent "cracker" type options that are low carb from netrition.com. The ones I got were Smackaroo's and Extend Crisps. They're decent options all things considered. I also picked up some Galeo's Worlds Best Miso Dressing. The caesar is fantastic, I use it instead of Mayo in tuna.

The lowest I've weighed at any point was when I was particularly dehydrated after some heavy drinking was 256.4. I'm expecting to weigh between 258 and 263 tomorrow. Mostly because my best bud Mike got me a heck of a treat. Venison. Lots and and lots of venison. Probably about 10 pounds ground beef, 5 pounds of "Bologna" (I swear it's more like a salami though) and some pulled venison. Eventually though I'll be getting some kielbasa and some slim jim style snack sticks which I'm pretty darn excited for. So, seeing as I've had (literally) 4 pounds of venison in the past 3 days I'm not holding out much hope of a low weigh in, but I'm totally ok with that. At worst I'll have "lost" 10 pounds, actual real pounds of waste fat in a month. Not water weight, or weight from purging but real fat.

I'll make a short post tomorrow at least with the weigh in status.

Cheers!

Day 14

2011-01-15T23:50:00.000-05:00

I apologize my dear follower(s). I have been remiss in keeping up with tracking my food and progress on this little blog. However I have made some incredible progress.

Just as a short little update today I weighed in at 259, my first time weighing in under 260 in over a year. I'm so so happy about that but more so than my weight I have lost 3 inches from my waist since the 9th. I measured 45in on the 9th and today I was only 42in around the belly button. I'm so happy with this improvement and I am so so pleased with it.

I will be trying out different supplements to suppress blood glucose response in the coming months. I'll be buying a glucometer as well to better track these changes as well as find meals that are better optimized to my body.

Today was a great day food wise and weight wise.
259
Breakfast (none, which i feel bad about I'd much rather have had a good high protein breakfast to start.
Lunch: Campbells Tomato soup 1/2 can with 1/2 cup peas
Dinner: Campbells Tomato soup 1 can with 3/4 cup peas and 3/4 cup kidney beans.

No hunger and totally totally delicious.

Day 12 & The Paleo movement.

2011-01-14T02:58:00.000-05:00

So I've been doing research online (shock) and the Slow Carb diet is a Paleo Diet with no legume exclusion and a fruit exclusion instead. This brought me to exploring the Paleo lifestyle and I've found that there are some things shoot off that knee jerk *ugh* reaction.

"I've never seen a fat caveman!"

"You've never seen a cave man.... Probably because he walked out of the cave, sat on his couch cracked a beer and flipped on a porno."

Now I'm sure that there is a certain validity to that statement (the diet gets rave reviews) however we really don't know in any way what the body condition of the average caveman was. I do have to say that after taking a look at a broad range of material I find much of it to make sense and I've even found a few blogs that I really want to take more time and go through based on some very interesting posts.

I'll leave links to them below so you can check them out if you'd like.

http://freetheanimal.com/self-experimentation

http://studentoffitness.blogspot.com/2009/09/all-your-questions-answered-email-to.html

http://cavemanfood.blogspot.com/2009/04/grain-free-almond-crackers.html

Day Eleven

2011-01-12T21:57:00.000-05:00

Dear god,
30g of protein in the morning is a fucking lot.
Seriously,
Bryce

I do have to say though, I'm not even really hungry by the time lunch rolls around. I'm eating so damn much less than I ever have. I'm eating tons of veggies instead of breads chips and cookies. I can really see why this diet works. I feel very, very full right now and for the day I've only had around 1500 calories.
On top of that I had tons and tons of energy today. Last night 8-10 inches of snow was dumped down and I shoveled the driveway and felt great doing it. Then I came in and worked with the T-bar "kettlebell" for a bit. It's a very very strange motion to get used to. I was (still am) having a lot of problems so I just did touches between my toes and touches between my heels. I'm working with 45lbs of plates on the t-bar. I'll probably drop it down to 25lbs and just work on form and video tape myself. Then watch it back to see what I'm doing wrong. I'm sure I'll get it with practice. Maybe I'll throw the videos up on here so that you guys can see what I'm doing.

264.2
2 eggs, 1/2 cup egg whites 1 spoon almond butter
1 Package Spinach .5lb ground beef
.5lb london broil 12oz cauliflower/broccoli/carrots

Day Ten

2011-01-11T08:30:00.001-05:00

Ugh, well I feel like crap. I would much rather not do that again.... or not quite so much in excess. I'm not hungry in the least. I had to almost force down breakfast and lunch wasn't much easier. I have remember to pick up some sort of fiber supplement to take but I just keep forgetting.

Today I picked up the steel pipe sections to make a t-bar and I gave a the simple swing a shot. It's a really weird motion to get used to. I'm 6' 5" so I think I'm staying too low or something. I've watched like five or so youtube videos and am going to try again Thursday. Why not tomorrow you ask? Because there is going to be a crap ton of snow to shovel and I don't think I'd feel like it but if I do I'm sure I'll write about it.

267.6
2 Eggs and 1/2 cup egg whites
1 box lima beans
.7lb Ground beef washed cowboy beans 2 Tbsp salsa and 2.5 cups broccoli/carrots/cauliflower

Day 9 - Binge Day!!!!

2011-01-10T23:47:00.000-05:00

So here we are, and I am here to enjoy a day of excess and hopefully some much needed satisfaction of cravings. I decided to start with the same healthy breakfast. I enter into this binge day with no fears despite weighing identical to yesterday. I'm assuming it is for certain reasons and I've upped my magnesium intake to counter all of this....
I've been doing reading and I found that in The Four Hour Body, Tim suggests strongly that you begin breakfast with 30g of protein. That, is a crap ton of protein. I didn't realize that there were only 6g of protein in an egg so beginning tomorrow I will up my breakfast to 2 eggs and a half cup of liquid whites, still short of the 30g, but still closer. I will add almonds to make up the difference or add some spinach or something. I'll try and pick up some pipe nipples to make a t-bar so I can do "kettle ball" exercises. I'm also gonna try and clean up by the bench and bring the weights down there to exercise with.

Tomorrow I'm expecting to weigh 266 or 268, I'm killer bloated and should shed this by Wednesday. I think I get the point of binge days... I'm not even looking forward to the next binge day... I think I won't over do it next time.

262.4
2 eggs scrambled in macadamia nut oil. for a good healthy start.
15 chocolate covered cherries
1/4 bag tostitos scoops with 10oz salsa
1 Pouch Knorr Rice sides Teriyaki
24 oz cooled yerba mate tea
3 slices sausage pizza
Many chocolates and candies
4 beers (3 kennebunkport blueberry, 1 Lump O Coal)
1 Rum and Diet Coke
6 mozzarella sticks
3/4 block of cabbot extra sharp cheddar
1 scoop almond butter
12oz Yerba Mate te

Day Eight

2011-01-09T21:19:00.000-05:00

I feel a lot better over all. I haven't been getting heartburn at all despite all of the powdered cayenne seasoning. Also the Alpha Lipoic Acid i'm taking (300mg which is the suggested) has been known to cause heartburn in some people, but I'm still doing fine.

I've been sleeping alot better. Even on a day when I went to bed at 2:00am I still got right out of bed and made myself a nice little breakfast. I've also dropped from 3 whole eggs in the morning to 1 egg and a splash of pure egg whites. I've also been trying really really hard to eat slower, apparently that can help reduce your body from storing it.

Today was pretty hard though, lots of temptation. We went to cheeburer cheeburger for lunch and I managed to do ok despite my plate coming in heaped with fries. I did forget my supplements, but it shouldn't effect me too much. Then for dinner i ordered out for everyone and made myself peas and blackbeans with a side of spinach. I really really wanted me something sweet so I took cottage cheese and lightly lined the bottom of a bowl (built it up on the sides a bit to make it look more full) and sprinkled Saigon cinnamon (like regular cinnamon but sweeter and nicer) on top.

Then I managed to throw the left over pizza out without stealing a bite (I'm super proud). Monday is a cheat day though. I'm so excited, I'm still gonna do a high protein breakfast but after that all bets are off. I'll probably go through an entire bar of cheese hehe.

I really really want to get down to 235 by my birthday, I don't know if that's reasonable but I sure as hell wanna give it a shot!

After clicking on the read more you can see some "body condition" photos and a list of what I ate for the day.

Sunday Jan 9th 262.4
1 egg and splash of eggwhites
1 box baby lima beans (lunch ish just before dinner)
1/4 bag dole coleslaw mix with splash of red wine vinegar, balsamic vinegar, macadamia nut oil, mccormick salad seasoning, black pepper and oregano.
.4lb Top Round london broil
1/2 can tomato soup with about a 1/3 cup peas.
.35lb Ground beef with salsa
1/4 cup Cottage cheese and Siagon cinnamon

Day Seven

2011-01-08T12:56:00.000-05:00

Saturday Jan 8th 263
1 egg and a splash of pure eggwhites
10oz fatty ass beef at cheeburger with guacamole with coleslaw (could have been better i gotta stop getting coleslaw)
1 can black beans, 2.5 cups peas, 1 full box frozen spinach (no real meats which I regret) and the bottom of a bowl thinly lined with cottage cheese and siagon cinnamon shaken over the top.

Day Six

2011-01-07T12:54:00.000-05:00

Friday Jan 7th 265.8
1 egg and a pour of pure eggwhites for breakfast.
.7lb chicken kidney beans slowly
half pepper, cottage cheese and cinnamon
green beans with mac oil salt and pepper for final meal

Day Five

2011-01-06T12:49:00.000-05:00

So, for this morning, I took myself a good long wee and weighed in. 266 on the dot. Not up, not down, just about the same, and I'm very much ok with that. I've started taking the supplements suggested too. Then I looked at the cost difference between the vitamin shoppe ones I got and the place he suggested. I could have gotten the same quantity for about 80% of the price... damn. But on the bright side I have them at this moment so that makes it a bit better. I found a Great Bear store (natural foods and some of that stuff) that is right by the home depot and carries the Macadamia Nut oil. I used it with the eggs this morning. I used specifically less than the amount of melted butter I used to use and it worked really well. It did have a really nice light macadamia nutty taste and so far, no complaints. I'll be giving it a shot with veggies and chicken today over lunch and we'll see how it goes. I've also decided that other than beans and peas I it doesn't make sense to do canned veggies. I can put much less effort into making frozen veggies taste good. Another interesting thing is that I woke up with no problem this morning! Well... except it was at 5:30, but I was able to get right back to sleep and popped right back awake (still bright eyed and bushy tailed) so all in all i'm happy.

Thursday Jan 6th 266
Totally on diet awesome day, all veggies chicken and beans for the win.
3 egg brekers
.5lb chicken, curried limas, washed cowboy beans
peas chicken and kdney beans

Day Four

2011-01-05T12:48:00.000-05:00

Wednesday Jan 5th 266.3
3 eggs breakfast
fillet mignon, lentils, curried beans
Lasagna dinner with bread yikes!
Got Policosinol for night time PAGG dose started tonight and started AGG before all meals
Also got macadamia nut oil to use instead of butter (very buttery taste like unsalted butter)

Day Three

2011-01-04T12:47:00.000-05:00

Tuesday Jan 4th 267.6
4 eggs
lentils, black beans salsa, and chicken
Mike came down had chinese (sugary chinese foods, bbq pork chicken broccoli)
Got AGG supplements. Took after dinner

Day two

2011-01-03T12:46:00.000-05:00

Monday Jan 3rd 270.4
4 eggs
blackbeans, limabeans, spinach
Game night Dinner at dom's parents. Had potatoes and some sort of meatballs

Day one of the Slow-Carb Diet

2011-01-02T20:00:00.000-05:00

Sunday Jan 2nd

First day of a "Slow-Carb" diet, starting weight 273.2 (a low day ususally I'm around 277)

This day was fairly interesting. I wasn't really that well prepared. I had some frozen vegetables hanging around and had made a trip to walmart a few weeks earlier to pick up some canned things. This day I decided to try all sorts of foods and see what I liked. Carbs, which, I happen to think are the nummiest things ever, are a huge weakness of mine. Pasta, bread, cookies, crackers, potatoes, candy bars, chocolate, ice cream... anything sweet or starchy. I knew that if I were to have the slightest chance of succeeding at this I would need to keep myself well stuffed to avoid going for

I decided to start by eating a crap ton of veggies and beans whenever I got hungry. For breakfast I had 1 can kidney beans, 1 can spinach and 4 eggs. I was very well stuffed by the end. The next four or five hours consisted of packing the U-haul now occupying my parents driveway with my brothers posessions. You see I decided to start my diet on a day when I wouldn't be at home, a very good idea in retrospect.

After packing up the u-haul my father and brother went on their way. I had work the next day and further decided it would be time much better spent keeping mom company. Then it happens, "Lets go out for lunch!?"

In most families, going out to eat is a common thing, but it's not so in mine. So it's always nice to be able to go out to eat like that with mom so I wouldn't dream of saying no. So how the hell do I stick to this diet thing now....

Mom and I left for dinner at Chelsea's. I got myself a glass of shiraz to start and started looking through the menu. Mom ends up getting a "fish and chips" style meal with coleslaw instead of french fries. I finally settled on a good rib eye steak with coleslaw instead of fries and extra veggies. Looking back, the coleslaw was probaly a bad choice (mayo and sugar) but I figured I would do my best and see what happens. The food was delicious and after I finished it I didn't feel that "longing" for the potato portion I had foregone. Yahooooo!

So I end up leaving a little after 8 and arrive home around 9:30. Here's where the problems start.... I sit down at my computer start catching up on email and it happens.... I want a snack. In particular I want to get some ruffles chips and load them sky high with sour cream. Ugh... so what the heck do I do now. I decide that I'm going to see what canned options I have. My eyes keep resting on the peas so I try and think of something to do with them. So I wash them off, and heat them up with some tyme and basil with a little bit of butter melted in. I finish them off and.... I still want those damn potato chips. However, it wasn't a craving, it was just a "wouldn't it be nice" thought. I'll consider that some decent success.

After day one I had managed to make it work :) Just because I don't know if or when I'll get to write another entry so I'll give you a sneak peak of tomorrow's weigh in: 270.4

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2009-12-09T08:24:00.000-05:00