Since it's political season, go with the margin of error...

So. Freaking. Close. My goal for this morning was 282.1 lbs, for a 1.5 lb drop from last Sunday. The week actually started ugly, and at one point I was up 4 pounds from last Sunday's weigh-in. Late night snacking, and a Chinese buffet were the culprits. Or rather my will power (or lack thereof) was the culprit and the snacking and buffet were the tools of my downfall. But I battled back. I did my power train walk, I had 2 extra gym days in there, and had an hour-plus of walking around at the Encinitas Street Fair on Saturday. End result, 282.2 lbs. So close, but within that "margin of error" that the politicians so love, so I'm going to claim the victory! Given that 1.5 lbs down from what today's goal was would be 280.6 lbs (as opposed to 1.5 lbs down from today's actual weigh-in for 280.7 lbs), I'm making 280.6 lbs as my goal for next Sunday. Wish me luck!

And wonders never cease...

So. My goal for the 4/20 weigh-in was 283.9 lbs, for a 1.5 lb drop from the day after my birthday. Lo and behold that when I stepped on the scale this morning, the digital numbers stopped spinning at 283.6 lbs! w00t!!! I actually bettered my goal, and I really made it happen over just 3 days. Monday and Tuesday weren't good days. Monday was a working lunch and dinner with DAPGF. Tuesday, normally a train/walking day, didn't happen that way. I missed the train, so I drove to Santa Ana, thus eliminating my 20 minute power walk at the end of the day. I also didn't bring a lunch on Tuesday, so the day was more snack-laden than it should've been. Wednesday was ok until dinner. There was a 40th birthday party for the wife of one of my best friends, and it was being held at Cafe Sevilla, a local Spanish (not Mexican) restaurant known for both its tapas as well as its sangria. Topped off with dessert from Ghiradelli's Chocolate, Thursday morning's weigh-in saw me with a .6 lb gain over the 4/13 weigh-in. But I'd brought a lunch and caught the train, so the walking happened. DAPGF agreed to walk some more after dinner, and that helped immensely. Friday's weigh-in was down a pound from Thursday. More will power and train walking combined with after dinner walking knocked another .6 lbs off. Will power, a morning walk while the Jeep was getting the oil changed, a post-lunch walk, post-dinner walk, and then gym Sunday morning resulted in an additional drop of .2 lbs, for a total of 1.8 lbs loss for the week. Yay me! Next goal, 1.5 lbs down from this morning, for a weigh-in on 4/27 of 282.1 lbs. Wish me luck, peeps.

Happy Freaking Birthday!

To give an indicator as to how screwy my life has become, my birthday was actually last Saturday. Sigh. That is probably one of the things that I miss most about no longer working in real estate development and now working as a consultant...hourly billing. As a consultant, I have to track my time in 15 minute increments and for a solid majority of the time have a project to bill my time against. I haven't figured out which billing code I can put "blogging" into and get away with it. I am working on it, so when I figure it out I will let you know. Back in the formerly superheated San Diego real estate market, a lot of my time was wasted in the "hurry up and wait" game. I had plenty of work to do, but much of what I did was dependent on work that my consultants (architects, structural engineers, landscape architects, etc.) would prepare. It left me plenty of time to blog (see the 2005-2006 archives for What Happened and The Randomness). Now, not so much. But enough of that.

I am now 37. I. am. getting. old. As my sweet little sister so kindly pointed out, no matter how old I get, I'll always be older than her. Pbtpbtbpt! With said increase in age comes a corresponding decrease in my metabolic rate. Combine that with DAPGF not teaching as often, and Hoff has fewer opportunities for a workout at the gym (yeah, I'm really getting my $32/month out of the deal...not!!). And to top that off, one of the nights that would theoretically be a gym opportunity is one of the days that I work late in Santa Ana...a day that if I'm lucky I get home by 7. The last thing I want to do at that point is change clothes and head to the gym. One minor thing that is helping a bit, is that DAPGF is also getting older, and she claims (not that I can see it) that she's gaining weight. So I've convinced her to start walking after we have dinner (which is another issue entirely). So we do a half-hour stroll through some random San Diego neighborhood after dinner, to try and minimize the inevitable damage from dinner. Ah, yes, dinner. When DAPGF taught several nights per week, those were nights that I could hit the gym after work, and then come home to a simple Lean Cuisine meal (or two...some of those things are pretty damn small), and play some poker. Now, 3 or 4 nights during the week we go out to various restaurants (cheap ones...can't afford to do it up richly every night) where she tries to get us ordering healthy foods, but she's at least as much of a carbaholic as I am. Breads, tortillas, french fries, pasta, rice, bring 'em on. I'm trying to keep a lid on that behavior, but I love 'em too. Meh.

Which brings me to the moral of the story: a birthday is a perfect time to set some new goals. To set the stage, I decided that my birthday would be a blowout of sorts. Friday night was a poker night with a bunch of friends ($20 buy-in, by the end of the evening I'd pretty much tripled my money), so that was a beer laden evening. Saturday started off at me and DAPGF's favorite tapas buffet, Azul La Jolla. I really tried to maintain some semblance of portion control, but if you saw the spread they laid out, you'd understand. The day was gorgeous, so we walked around La Jolla for a bit, and then dinner. Steak at Lou & Mickey's in the Gaslamp District. The meat is so flavorful there, it's almost painful. And their scalloped potatoes (more carbs) are a cheese-laden delight. And it was topped off with a piece of layered chocolate cake so moist and rich that you'd think it wasn't cooked all the way through. Oh so freaking good. So Sunday morning, I weighed myself before hitting the gym. 285.4 lbs. Yikes! But there's my starting point. 285.4 lbs. I want to get down to 240 lbs by Thanksgiving (just in time to put it all back on!). That's 45.4 lbs to lose over the next 7 months. Approximately 6.3 lbs per month, or just about 1.5 lbs per week. I think I can make that work, so dammit, I'm going to do it! Admittedly, I'm not off to a great start. No gym on Monday, and I drove to Santa Ana today so no walk back to the train depot, but I've got plenty of week left to get through. My goal for next Sunday morning will be 283.9 lbs. Fat and stupid is no way to go through life. Not sure what I can do about the stupid, but maybe I can at least work on the fat. Wish me luck, peeps!

The one in which we continue to yo-yo

So. My last post on 3/19 saw a weigh-in of 284.4 lbs. Over the past two weeks, it was slightly up, then slightly down, until last weekend. Knowing that DAPGF and I were going to this fine establishment for the champagne brunch to celebrate her birthday, I worked extra hard to try and drop a few pounds...just to prepare. It doesn't matter how good the food is (and holy crap was it good!), buffet is still an evil word. Sunday morning, I was down to 281.2 lbs. But the 12:30 hour was fast approaching, and it was bringing crab claws. And omelettes. And prime rib. And seared ahi tuna. And 15 different types of cheeses. And 5 chili mole chicken breasts. And several different types of caviar. And smoked salmon. And porcini mushroom tortellinis. And you get the idea. End result? Monday's weigh-in was 285.8 lbs! Holy porcini mushrooms! Monday saw a slight drop off, as did Tuesday, but neither as much as I would've hoped. I still eat too much, and the only physical activity I got on Monday was 45 minutes at the driving range. Side note, as I noted, work had been crazy busy and it had been at least a month since I'd been to the range. My swing, which was far from perfect, went from a solid meh to a screaming WTF!. Tuesday helped somewhat, because I had to do my 20 minute walk back to the train at the end of the day. End result, this morning's weigh-in was 284.4 lbs...right where I was two weeks ago!

Normally, today would be a gym day, because DAPGF sometimes goes out with friends on Wednesdays. Hoff likes those days because I can go to the gym and eat a Lean Cuisine for dinner instead of going to a restaurant. Unfortunately, it doesn't look like that's going to happen...so no gym and restaurant food. Not a good recipe for weight loss. At least I made it to the driving range at lunch. If I can minimize the damage today and make progress tomorrow with my walking, I might be in good condition to enter the weekend making some progress. My recent goal of losing 10 pounds in the month of March has obviously gone out the window. I've got 10 days until my birthday. My goal is to be under 280 lbs by the morning of my birthday (4/12), which is basically 5 pounds. So, .5 lbs per day. Theoretically, that should be an easy one. However, if it really was easy, I'd already be down to 240 lbs, so take from that what you will. Wish me luck, peeps.