As I’ve mentioned before, I don’t write much here anymore. What little I do write I tend to put on twitter or facebook (other than my flight logs which continue to go here). What I haven’t mentioned is that I also have another blog over at myfitnesspal.com which is strictly devoted to my exercising/weight loss efforts. I joined the local gym on my last birthday with the intent of getting stronger/healthier (and by getting stronger boost my metabolism to dispose of some excess tonnage). I may eventually link that here, but haven’t done so yet. On my last birthday, I was up to a higher weight than I’ve seen in about 2 years. Since that time I have gotten stronger (though not at the pace I had hoped for) and lost some weight (also, not quite at the rate I had hoped for), but I’m not where I expected to be. Part of it is due to timing and injury (the trip to Scotland was great, but did through a bit of a monkey wrench in the workout plans). I also made plans to compete in the Columbus half-marathon in Oct, however, very shortly into beginning training for that I had the aforementioned injury (knee) that has thrown those plans into doubt (I will post on that here soon though) That being said, I expect to consolidate some of that stuff back here (and/or double post) on this blog in coming weeks, so if there is anyone other than bots from search engines reading this, I really will be updating soon (as soon ans I feel I can take the time from my SANSFIRE talk prep).
Category: weight
Working out
When I said yesteray, I planned on posting more, I didn’t really mean I’d do it daily, but I wanted to get this written down. I mentioned a couple of months ago, I’ve lost a fair amount of weight in the last year. I’ve sort of stagnated here the last 3+ months. First of all, we got a new scale because Sherry said she thought the old one was reading too light. She weighed herself here and then at the Dr’s office and the difference was more than could be accounted for by additional clothing. So, I bought a new one and sure enough the old one was reading about 3-4 lbs lighter than the new one. So, when I hit that 195, it was probably actually a 198 (I’ve actually hit 196.8 on the new scale, so I’ve been even lower than what the old reading of 195 would have meant) and the 232 when I started (this time) was likely more like 235. Anyway, since early May I’ve been sitting at 200±2 lbs. There isn’t really a problem with that, I actually am feeling pretty good at this weight, I’m wearing jeans that are 4″ smaller in the waist than I was a year ago (and I’m noticing that they are actually a little on the loose side). Also, hopefully tomorrow the jeweler will call and I’ll get my wedding ring back (it is being resized smaller). Several times this summer, I’ve nearly lost it in the pool and when I nearly lost it in the shower last week, that was the final straw, I took it to the jeweler 5 days ago. Now, I lost the first 15-20 lbs strictly by watching what I ate, cutting the caloric intake to 1500-1800 calories a day, but then I plateaued for a while. In Jan-Feb, I started adding in some resistance/weight training (starting with the resistance bands 3 times per week and later switching to the actual free weights occasionally for some variation) and more weight came off, another 15-20 bringing me to a total of about 35 where I am now. For the last two months, however, I’ve gotten out of the workout habit. It started around the time of SANSFIRE (maybe just before) and with all of my travels in July, it kept on. I worked out once while I was at my parent’s place and was very, very sore the day I had lunch with the college friend (I hope she didn’t notice I was moving like an 80-year-old). Then not again until Monday. I finally put the old DVD in and went at it. Obviously, I had to lighten the weight (or reduce reps) from where I was when I was doing it regularly and I was a little sore yesterday and this morning, but I hit it again today and I expect I’ll feel better tomorrow. Perhaps a little more will come off if I get back in the routine.
Random thoughts from Star Wars Day
I have a whole bunch of things I need to post about, but not enough time in which to do it, so I’ll throw a few of them out here and hopefully find some time in the next couple of days to write about some of the others.
Wow, it was more than 10 years ago now when our musician at Faith UCC asked me to do “Gethsemane” from Jesus Christ Superstar as a solo for Maundy Thursday. Since I am not now (nor have I ever been, well maybe I was briefly, anyway…) a tenor (are there any parts in the entire show other than Caiaphas for basses?), we took it down a little bit and changed the arrangement slightly (and I took a few parts down an octave), but I really like that song. The whole story of Gethsemane has always been one of my favorites because it shows Jesus as struggling with doing God’s will, just like the rest of us. I was reminded of this when John Shuck posted a link to this youtube video (it actually starts at 1:44).
The other thing I wanted to mention today has to do with my weight. I am just shy of 6′ 2″ tall and when I graduated from high school I weighed 147 lbs, yup not a lot of body fat there. Apparently, that is at the bottom end of “healthy weight” for my height. I remained there until about my junior year of college. I was still about 160 when I graduated from college. By the time I returned to grad school for the second time I was in the 190s. I topped out at 242 in 1999 (after my back surgery). Yup, at that point I was 95 lbs heavier than when I graduated from high school. In 2000, I talked to my doctor and devised a plan to take off some of that weight. I ended up losing 44.5 lbs in 7 or 8 months. I eventually got down to 197.5, but I didn’t stay there long. I was in the low 200s for a while, but over the next year or so, I gradually crept back up to the point that I was pretty consistently 227± 2 for about 3 years until last July. When I got home from SANSFIRE in July, I weighed 232 again. At that point, I decided enough was enough. I’ve changed the way I eat (limiting calories by watching portion sizes, increasing fiber, drinking lots of water — about 140oz/day) and I exercise regularly again (something I haven’t really done in a very long time). This morning, I weighed myself at 197.0 lbs which is the lightest I’ve been in at least 15 years (I was about 208 when we got married if I remember correctly). I’d still like to take a little more off, but I’m very happy with this. More later.
Oh, and may the Fourth be with you (yeah, lousy pun I’ve seen numerous places today).