Motivation

February 21, 2010 - June 07, 2010.
Posture better.
Neck thinner.
Moobs smaller.
Stomach a bit smaller; I normally hold it in, but this is a "relaxed" shot.

Exercise Update

So, I didn't post last week, and now of course, I no longer remember any details....

I know I did pullups, and that was fun... oh well, that's what I get. Here's pic from 02/21:

And pics from tonight:

  

  

On Sunday, I did Nerd Fitness Sprints. I'm sure someone thought I was weird for running around the park randomly, caroming off trees, but it worked for me. I also did 2x2 alternate-handed pullups long some tree branches.

I'm doing the  Nerd Fitness 28 Day Challenge, as is Kristi. Although in general, I think only monthly picture updates is more fruitful.

Goals for March 1 through March 28:

Diet: get strict about my Primal/Paleo diet. No more refined sugar, no grains at all, no potatoes. (Potatoes are easy to give up, they're bland anyway).
Fitness:
M,W,F: Pushups. One of my 2010 goals in 25 pushups by my birthday (03/24), then completing the 100 pushup challenge. This takes up my full evening workout time allotment.
T,H: Sprints/Bodyweight. Ideally one of each, but it depends on the weather, and what I feel like doing.
S,S: Play, Walk, Rest. following MDA's guidelines.

Numbers:

Body Fat %: 18.5mm; 19%

Waist at belly button: 41.5 in
Waist at pants: 39.5 in
Right Thigh (at crotch, relaxed, propped up): 27.75 in
Right bicep (relaxed, hanging loose): 13 in
Chest Circumference (relaxed, exhaled): 43 in
Weight: 220.5 lbs this morning.

Day 1:

Breakfast: Bacon & Egg Burrito (before I started the challenge).

Lunch: Quizno's Black & Bleu Salad, Large, with Large extra meat. Delicious, and Primal as near as I can determine.
Afternoon Snack: Raw Pistachios. Totalled 14 for the day. Munch on them while driving.
Dinner: Mexi-loaf. Threw together a meatloaf, with Almond Meal instead of braedcrumbs. Used some leftover jicama, and fire-roasted tomato salsa in it, and green enchilada sauce on it, just cuz that's what I had around
Evening Snack: Managed to avoid the Girl Scout Cookies; ate Cocoa & Coconut Snacks instead. They're really very filling; 2 was more than enough for the evening. I made mine about ping-pong ball-sized.

Workout: 100 Pushup Challenge, week 2, day 1.

Day 2:

Breakfast: Cocoa Coconut Snacks (x4).

Lunch: Meatloaf leftovers from last night.
Afternoon Snack: Raw (unsalted) Pistachios (x14).
Post-Workout: MLO Whey & Egg Protein (2tbsp), Blue Diamond Unsweetened Vanilla Almond Milk (10oz).

Dinner: Leftover Paleo Teriyaki Pork. Bacon (x5).

Workout:
Beginner Bodyweight Circuits (modified: sub reverse crunches for pushups, since doing pushups on MWF)
Circuit 1: 05:40:32 - removed dog from room halfway through
Circuit 2: 05:11:32
Circuit 3: 06:11:81 - involuntary breather after crunches.

Valentine

So, I'm getting a puppy! Yay!

I went to the Galveston Island Human Society on Thursday, and saw a couple I really liked. The one that first piqued my interest online did not like me at all, but she's already adopted, sot that's ok. I went back this morning to finalize the process of adopting the one I had picked out. The web interface doesn't state it, but apparently this dog has heartworms. I called the non-profit clinic, and they said it'd cost about $200 to fix, which doesn't seem too bad overall. I talked to Matt and my Dad, and they both strongly advised against it, pointing out that it's not an insta-fix, and it's very possible to get this dog, commit to it financially and emotionally, only to have it not get healthy.

So, instead, I picked the 7 month old chocolate lab:

Her shelter name is Chloe, but I think I'm going to name her Valentine. I like to name my animals after literary characters that fit. Thus I had Puck the cat (when I got her as a kitten she was very mercurial), and we now have Scout the cat; Scout Finch is her full name.
I was originally going to go with Annabelle, so that I'd have my Annabelle Lee. I love the name, but I don't want to name a child with it, because the source is not very positive. But I realized that as fitting as the first stanza is, I really don't want to name a pet after it either... So I'm leaning towards Valentine (Wiggin), but am not 100% settled yet.

Wait, I guess I'm getting her on Valentine's weekend, aren't I? Guess that puts a lot of bonus points towards that name...

Exercise Update

42" circumference, 20mm calipers 222.0 lbs as of yesterday.

I really don't feel like I've done much this week. I haven't been cutting back on my grains as much as I should be, and I haven't been working out as much. I stopped wanting to do the Strength Training, and when I did make myself do it, I didn't feel very worked-out at the end of it.
I discussed this is Steve, and he suggested timing myself. This is something I did when I started it, just to get a baseline, but I had stopped. Instead, I've been watching TV and just kinda going through the motions. Next time I do Circuits I'm going to lock the door so that people will stop trying to talk to me, and I'm going to time myself so that I put forth some real effort.

On the other hand, I've been increasing my running. I went down to the beach the other day (last time it wasn't freezing or raining), and did 2.2 mi or so. Today though, I did 2.9. I'd have made it the needed 3.2, but I didn't want to half to walk through a parade crowd on my way back to the house, so I got off the beach at 27th instead of 23rd.
I really enjoy the beach! it provides some variation in scenery, it's softer on my feet, and I don't have to worry about traffic. The last "block" (44-45th) the beach was pretty much gone, leaving only the granite rocks. I decided to use that as a technical, natural area. I'm gonna need some obstacle-clearing ability for the Warrior Dash, and it's something good to do for the MovNat kind of exercise. I ran across them at a pretty good pace, and it was really fun! I think from now on, I'm going to incorporate running to the ends of the groins into my exercise; the first time will be a fast walk to test the safety though. I don't want to slip and fall into the ocean with my work iPhone, and I don't know how much I trust the Vibram's grip yet.

Seawall Parking Meters

First, the idea I had after the First Idea, since it probably makes more sense this way:

Now, considering the length of Seawall, and considering that metered parking should cover both sides of the street, from 61st back to 6th (right there at Wings I mean), then we have to minimize the equipment expense. I think this is simplest by having the actual meter devices at traffic-lighted intersection only. Signs notifying parkers of the need to use meters could be installed every 1/3rd block, or 100 ft - whatever distance is appropriate to make sure people have a reasonable chance of noticing without having a ridiculous number of signs installed.

Assuming Seawall Parking Meters would be installed as a "Phase 2" after the new WiFi meters are a huge, money-grubbing success on the Strand, a few things need to be clarified:

• The money needs to be going to the right place. If the Strand meters are being used to fund Strand-specific advertising, then this needs to be guaranteed by giving it to the Downtown Partnership, or other organization committed to doing this, not left in the city's coffers to be re-appropriated on a whim.
• The Seawall meters would therefore need to be given to an equivalent organization - the Seawall Partnership if you don't care about points for originality - for them to spend on advertising.
• Alternatively, all meter funds could be pooled, and used for advertising both of these area, or the island in general.

I personally like the private organization myself of course, with the caveat that the funds should work toward the betterment, as well as the advertising of said zone. For instance,

• Updating the silver map plaque on the Strand to the current century.
• Improving sidewalk, handicap access, benches, etc along Strand.
• Expanding the "painted benches" concept on Seawall.
• Paying for more porta-potties on Seawall.

Anyway, the First Idea:

On weekends such as the one we are currently entering (Mardi Gras), Fourth of July, and the like, where people are likely to want to park for extended periods of time on Seawall, I propose a Weekend Pass. This pass would be valued at $x+c, where x is how long the pass is good for in hours, times the standard rate (perhaps slightly discounted), plus a convenience/printing charge to cover not having to check your vehicle every 8 hours or so. This pass would be displayed just like a normal meter pass, but perhaps color-coded.

A few things I'm still undecided on: Should charge increase per axle? Per spot used? I know a lot of the extended parkers are RVs, and that they enjoy coming down here specifically because it's so cost-effective to do so, and I don't want to scare them away by milking them. By far the easiest thing to do would be to just have a flay dollar/hour charge on all vehicles, and leave it at that. I'm leaning this way just for the simplicity, and the users of the system would see the overall fairness. But, one could certainly argue that an RV taking up 3 spots should pay for 3 spots worth somehow.

Please offer your opinions.

Vibrams

So, I've had the Vibrams for 2 weeks now.

This is at the end of my jog on Wednesday, 01/27.

They took some getting used to, but only a couple days. At first, the sole under the outside of the ball and under the rear of the heel felt a little too thick, making it awkward and pushing my feet around. But after only one day of wearing them the whole day, I stopped noticing. Whether from breaking in, wearing down, or just fitting around my foot better, I'm not sure, but there you go.

I jogged in them only once so far. I adjusted to a mid-foot strike fairly quickly after thinking about it for the first block. I'd hit the heel every once in a while, but you really notice when that happens (ow), so I'd shift back quickly. But man, did my calfs ache afterwards. It was interesting that the ache was only in the top middle of my calf, just below the knee. It was obvious that it was that part of the muscle that was newly used with the mid-strike. The only reason I've only run in them once ties into my only gripe with them.

They have no insulation whatsoever. Intellectually, I knew this going in, but really, they have NONE. if it's less than 60 outside, they suck. Hell, they're cool on my feet even when I'm inside; I'm much better off wearing my loose fleece houseshoes, that let my feet form freely too. I look forward to running on the beach with them, but I'm really not gonna get a ton of use out of them for another month or so.

The only other gripe I have is that my right pinky toe still doesn't fit quite right. All toes slide in - though I still have to put them in place, since my toes curve outward. But once they're in, the fabric feels like it's pinching, or twisting on the right pinky, though not the left. I get used to it after 20-30 min, but it's very uncomfortable up till then. Hopefully as I wear them more, my feet will free up some, and the shoes will form up some.

Dual Monitor Bullshit

So, why the hell can I never just install Windows, and have both my monitors work?
It seems that the only way I can ever get them to work, in every iteration of dual-monitor setup I've had, is by unplugging the secondary, installing the drivers that are on the CD (god forbid you try and use updated ones), and reboot 3-5 times, then plug the 2nd in, boot into VGA mode, enable it, configure it, then finally go about my way.

I actually called ViewSonic yesterday; From what I read online, my issue is that my ViewSonic VA2012wb is not telling Win7 that that's what it is. Therefore, windows is pushing some unsupported resolution; This is corroborated because I can tell windows it trying to push to the monitor, because my mouse will go over there, though I can't see it. Also, when I have the widescreen plugged into port#1 on the card, It displays for the entire bootup. It even displays while Win7 is installing from disk, all the way until it reboots to do the 2nd step. As soon as it displays at greater than VGA/XGA/whatever, it shits on my face.
So anyway, I call ViewSonic, because I can't find drivers for the monitor. They tell me the monitor is too old, so they don't have drivers for x64Win7. Fair enough; I ask him if I can use newer drivers. He says yes. I download both the 'Signed Win7 x64' and the 'Unsigned Win x64' drivers. Neither work. The signed one says I don't have a monitor to use the drivers, so it refuses to install, while the unsigned one just errors out.

There's no way I'm going to buy a new monitor because it's "too old" it's a 20-bloody-inch widescreen that still works beautifully. I've never seen something this ridiculous happen before. Now, if I could find out how to specify frequency... Actually, I didn't check my nVidia control panel to see if I could do that. Ok, that's step 1 tonight. Step 2 is find nVidia phone support number...

Exercise Update #3

225 lbs, 41.75" circumference, 19mm fat pinch
These were taken Monday (it's now Wed).

I haven't been keeping up as well as I should have. I didn't do anything over the weekend, not even take the dog for a walk. Been spending too much time playing Mass Effect; feel like I have to "get my money's worth", since I bought it new. I worked out last Wed I think, then Monday. Yesterday, I told myself not jogging was ok, since it was nasty outside, and I took Matt to Wal-Mart instead.

What's really telling is that last Wed (01/27) was the last time I worked out, and last Thurs (01/28) was my best weigh-in yet, at 222.5 lbs. Then, I didn't work out at all till Monday, and my weight's been creeping back, sitting at 225-227 so far this week.

Monday was a shitty workout too; I took almost an hour to do my Pushup Challenge because I kept doing crap on my computer, then I only did 2 circuits of the NerdFitness beginner; When I finished, I really didn't feel worked out, but by then it was 8:45 or so, so I gave up.

After this weekend, I had to make a new rule for myself: I can't eat dinner until I work out. Ideally, I'd be getting into the morning routine, but between Mass Effect, and watching backlogged tv shows, I'm really not getting to bed at a decent hour.

Exercise Update #2

Thursday, I jogged 1 mile straight!
10:38 min, which is a little slower than I thought it would be, since I had a 10:54 on Monday, with only block #14 (of 16) walked, but I did it!
The local Sun & Ski didn't have the shoe in stock, but one up on Houston does, and I'm on my up there anyway.

Today (Saturday, January 23, 2010), I measured 42" circumference, 21mm caliper. That's still 20% body fat, so hopefully the additional centimeter is just from loose skin...

Exercise Update #1

So, I'm jumping into this in the middle of things, but oh well.

This is me at the beach for my 22nd birthday (2006):

     Aprilish of 2009, I decided to start working out. I started by doing the Hacker's Diet workout. Not the diet part though; I never read that far. It worked well for a while, but I started hating running in place; it felt very awkward.
    Instead, I decided I would jog around my neighborhood, in a 1 mile square. When I started, I jogged for a block, then "powerwalked" for a block. Within a few weeks I moved up to jogging 2 blocks, and walking 1. I kept this up intermittently, never really holding a tight exercise schedule down.

This is June 2009:

     October 2009, I discovered NerdFitness by way of Art of Manliness. Both are great sites run by great guys. Articles like this on AoM got me realizing how bad of shape I was in. (Apparently, all it take for me to want to learn something is to know that it could help me survive.)
     I can't recommend those two sites highly enough. Because of Steve Kamb at NerdFitness, I bought a pullup bar and actually started using it. If you compare the above picture with the ones below, you'll see the difference in my upper arms.

    By November I was doing NerdFitness's Fitness Challenge, which is a good workout, but not really meant as an every day thing.
    Beginning shortly before Thanksgiving (I think), I started doing NerdFitness's Beginner Bodyweight Circuits Workout, which is amazing. What makes this very cool is that it's entirely modifiable. I started doing 2 circuits, did 3 one time, but wasn't workout out regularly yet. As cliche as it sounds, I've set a New Year's Resolution to workout 5 days a week, and walk at least a mile the other 2 days.
    DailyBurn.com has really helped me with this. They have the best user-assisted food dictionary I've seen yet, and the ability to see the correlation between calorie intake and bodyweight is very powerful. They have a little thing on their main page, where each day worked out in the past rolling week is either lit or dark; same for calorie goals. Yesterday, I didn't do anything but walk, and only did that so that I wouldn't lose a day on those little lights. Seriously. Today I did 3 circuits for the first time, and added crunches into the circuit in place of pushups. Instead of doing pushups as part of the rotation, I'm doing the 100 Pushup Challenge after my warmups, and before I start the Circuits.

    A couple weeks ago, I discovered www.marksdailyapple.com, via NerdFitness. He promotes what he calls the "Primal Blueprint" diet. Apparently there are a few different 'paleo' diets around, but they're all based on the concept of eating what we evolved to eat. That means tons of vegetables, tree nuts, and a good number of fruits. Also, tons of meat, all kinds. Avoid grains and refined sugars. Go easy on dairy. Go here for a linklist of all his "Primal Guides to..." and here for a quick guide to his eating plan. I think this has really helped me out these past few weeks. I haven't been entirely strict, but have kept my carbs in the 40-80g range every day, and protein has been over 100g every day.


   So, here I am as of Wednesday, January 13, 2010:

     I calipered myself the following day, got 20mm, which comes out to 20% fat. I want to get down to 10%, just so I can see those magical abs.
     I measured my circumference (real waist, at the belly button) sometime back in the early fall, and had 52". Measured it Thurs, had 44".
     Today (the 15th) I weighed in at 228.5 lbs, having lost 0.5 lbs every day this week! I also dropped a belt notch today.

My Goals for 2010:

1. Have no more than 1cm of gut "pinch" by the end of 2010
1. Continue to cut refined sugar and sugar substitutes from diet
1. one soda/sugary snack per month MAX
2. Focus on more fruits and vegetables, lean meats
3. Exercise 5 times a week MINIMUM
1. Jogging 1x a week; Sprint Intervals 1x a week, Body Weight Circuits 3x a week
2. Jog 1 mile straight
1. Bring intervals/jogging into workout routine, at least one each a week
2. Work on maintaining a manageable speed, don't run too fast
3. Do 25 Pushups straight by birthday
1. Do 100 Pushup Challenge in place of pushups during Body Weight Circuit Routine
2. Sub Crunches in, to keep a spacer between Squats and Lunges

... So there you go. In 4 months I've gone from a 240 lb vegetarian, to a 230 lb omnivore.
I plan to post weekly updates, on "Measurement Day" most likely, so see you then!

Whole Wheat No-Knead Bread

http://www.breadtopia.com/no-knead-recipe-variations/#SteelOats

This sat in the firdge an extra day due to lack of time. Doesn't seem to have affected the quality!
It's not truly whole-wheat... That's an experiment that will be tried before too long though.
The steel-cut oats were purchased over a year ago from HEB's bulk section, but are still good. I don't know if that's normal...

Marriage Equality

This started as a reply to a forum post about xians/supers vs athiests/brights; I went off on a tangent on marriage equality, and posted it here instead:

I'm all about living and letting live. I define myself as a skeptical agnostic; I have yet to experience evidence of God, but am open to it. I honestly respect all my family who are Baptists, and my friends, who run a gamut of Catholic and Protestant faiths. I'm a "bright", you're a "super"; it's not a judgement of intelligence or rightness, it's just a definition of one part of my person.

The problem I have is when people attempt to place their moral definitions on others. First of all, I understand that you believe it's wrong, and therefore it's natural to you, and arguing it is pointless. I also agree that some "morals" are universal (it's generally unacceptable to murder someone).

To use a topical example, some people are trying to enforce their religious definition of marriage into our secular legal definition of marriage. I think every faith has a right to refuse to marry anyone they want to, just as any business has a right to refuse service to anyone.

Whether or not our country was founded on Christian principles (I think our founding principles fall in the 'universal' category), and whether a majority of our Founding Fathers were Christian or Humanist or whatever, we are *not* a theocracy, and our laws need to be founded in the Constitution and the Declaration, not the Bible, Torah, Qu'ran, or any other religious document. The Declaration calls for the inalienable right to Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness. The Constitution was written to "secure the Blessings of Liberty". I think that if anyone or legal age wants to marry anyone else of legal age, it's their Liberty to live their Life that way, and that precluding that precludes their Happiness.

I think that the laws preventing marriage equality are on par with the laws against inter-racial marriage of the early 20th Century, and that restriction of these rights is on par with Jim Crow laws.

I know it's a trite comparison, but many people who are against marriage equality state that it disgraces the institution of marriage. I think celebrity short-term marriages disgrace it more than a gay couple who've been together for many years who want to let the world know they are committed to each other. It's not about tax breaks or financial privileges, it's about common decency.

I look forward to the day that I get to marry a woman that I love, to show the world that I love her, and to have that bond. I cannot bring myself to not allow someone else that feeling anymore than that I could take a child away from their responsible parent.