Newnan’s Largest Lessener 10

We’re right in the middle of it and I am feeling the drag.

Every plan, no matter the quality of it, suffers when those implementing it lose faith.
-Me, 2012.

It’s the thing that happens to me almost every time I try something new and it works.  I think “hey, this isn’t so hard, what if I just ease off on it a little and see what happens.”  What happens is badness and failure.  I can see every reason diets fail and resolve slips.  It is just so much easier to do the easy thing.  I don’t mind making a lunch and taking it to work, but it’s so much easier to buy a double Whopper with cheese combo (king size – natch).  Two months of near fanatic eating plans and pill routines are dragging me, not exercising – not really wanting to try – is dragging on me, and all the little things like paying bills, cleaning my apartment, even watching TV (WATCHING TV!!!) is dragging on me.  I am definitely in the midst of winter blahs and it’s bleeping April.
I’m blaming this on a lack of Peeps in my diet this Easter.

Now the numbers:

	6/21/2009	2/9/2012	3/23/2012	3/30/2012	4/6/2012	4/13/2012
Neck	21.00		17.75	18.25	18.00	17.50
Left Arm	18.25	16.50	15.00	15.25	15.00	14.75
Shoulders	58.50	58.50	53.75	54.00	55.50	55.00
Chest	58.00	56.75	53.75	53.00	52.25	53.00
Waist	60.00	55.00	50.00	50.00	49.50	49.00
Hips	52.50	49.00	46.25	46.50	46.50	46.25
Left Thigh	34.00	28.50	24.75	25.50	25.50	25.50
Left Calf	18.50	18.50	17.75	18.25	17.75	17.75
Left Ankle	11.50	10.50	10.00	10.25	10.25	10.25
Left Wrist	8.50	7.75	7.75	7.50	7.50	7.50
BP	170/115	159/104	134/88	120/76	145/92	138/89
Pulse	78.00	70.00	60.00	70.00	73.00	70.00
Weight	350.00	319.20	292.20	293.00	289.00	287.60

See!  Ennui burns calories too.  Probably not, but I’ll take it.  This is setting the new, new bar…no more over 290, ever.

And I am attributing the slight increase in chest measurement to having hard nipples this morning.  It was cold!

So that was the goodish news and now the bad.

The Exercise Routine:

Exercise:	Fri.	Sat	Sun	Mon	Tue	Wed	Thu	Goal	Actual	Pass/Fail
Bike (mins)	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	4-5	0	Fail
Pilates	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	1-2	0	Fail
Walk (mins)	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	4-5	0	Fail
Elliptical (mins)	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	4-5	0	Fail
Jumping Jacks #	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	4	0	Fail
Push Ups #	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	4	0	Fail
Sit Ups #	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	4	0	Fail
Stretches - AM	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	4	0	Fail
Weights - AM	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	4	0	Fail
*Bold for exercise goals that are a combination of the exercises over the course of a week.

 No, this isn’t a formatting issue (unless this didn’t paste correctly).  I did no exercises last week.  Tangentially related to exercise I did change the layout of the sheet to follow these updates in the future.  So the Friday on this report is last Friday and the Friday on next week’s report will be from today.  Simple, right?

 So now I have to punish myself for this.  Without consequences I seem unable to motivate myself to move.  So, from today on I will treat myself like a good parent handles a good child.  No TV, books, games or computer time after work unless I’ve done one of the top four activities until the goal is reached each week.  I really have to stop using the computer in the morning anyway, so I can only update the iPod in the morning and nothing else until I knock out the AM exercising.  Updating the iPod is a two click process that sets up my whole day and I can’t stop that.

We’ll see how that works, otherwise I’ll have to look at cutting the cable or computer out entirely.  I almost had to do this for financial reasons before but now I may want to do it because without these time sucks I’ll have to do something else, right?

So the week was a bust exercise wise, but diet and measure were both good.  So now I am wondering what if I stop with the pill supplements for a while?  If it wasn’t for self-sabotage I’d have no sabotage in my life at all.  Either way, nothing changes until after I win this contest at the end of May.  I figured it out that the contest was 112 days and last week we crossed day 56 and now we are marching to the end, a long and grueling death march.  It’s cook-out and ice cream weather already and the smell of bratwursts will soon be on the wind.  When does this get easier?

Diary of a Fat Kid

Easter candy, Memorial Day cook-outs, Graduation cakes, July fourth cook-outs, Birthday cakes, Halloween Candy, Thanksgiving Dinner, Christmas cookies, Christmas dinner, Christmas chocolate calendars, New Year’s Eve (okay that’s mostly about drinking – also see St. Patrick’s day), Superbowl Sunday spreads, Valentine’s Day chocolates.

This country celebrates everything with food.  Congratulations on that job, let’s go out to dinner to celebrate!  Thank you lunches at work, doughnuts at work, candies, cookies and cakes at work for no reason at all sometimes, we do love to share food.  It’s really not hard to see why people develop an emotional attachment to eating and they almost always start out positive.  My baby pictures show me with my face stuffed with cake at my first birthday party.  I don’t know how much of your entire life is determined in the actions of the earliest days, but a whole party just for you that ends with you stuffed with delicious cake has to have an impact.

Then as you go through school, every major school holiday was tied to those major food holidays.  Thanksgiving dinner with all those foods you only get once a year AND no school, hell yeah eating must be good for you.  Eating to excess wasn’t always a bad habit, I imagine less than fifty years ago when you legitimately had to worry about getting meals or having a variety of food choices and being fat was a sign of wealth and leisure.  I know I am not that old, but according to my mother I was born a ninety five year old man and I just keep getting grumpier.

So yeah, Easter came and went this year and I shed a little tear for the younger me who loved the marshmallow Peeps, the chocolate bunnies and even the jelly beans.  All put together lovingly by parents who then hid it and held it hostage.  Charging me a piece of candy for every clue to its whereabouts until I either found it or gave up and sat crying until my Sunday clothes were soaked with tears.  Oh your parents didn’t do that?  They didn’t hide your Easter basket in the clothes dryer, the bottom of the garbage can or hidden in the winter overcoats hanging from a hanger several feet higher than you could see?

Yep, in my house the Easter bunny was a son of a bitch.

The Plan:

So this week is more of integrating the exercise plan into the weekly routine in a hardwired way.  Also, I really have to clean my place up and open some windows, damn it’s dark and depressing in there.  I’m probably going to need to come up with some more goals too.  Oh, and I also need to buy some new clothes for summer, shorts and casual shirts.  Jorts are still cool, right?