Monthly Archives: August 2016

Screw You, Hostess.

Seriously, why?

Tasty goodness and shame.

Tasty goodness and shame.

I don’t even want to think about how many carbs are in those. And not individually, I mean the whole box – because that’s what I’d eat. The whole, entire box. Then I’d sit in the dark and sob.

But y’know, I’ll take my diet victories where I can find them, and I did have one last week. Lunch at Brewhaus, and I ordered a tasty chee’burger with no bun (perfectly acceptable on keto), and had 1 sauerkraut ball, maybe 3 little potato cakes (think, flattened tater tots), and about 1/6th of a pretzel. Yeah, slightly off diet, but just barely. Not even enough to qualify as a cheat meal. Following that, my no-tell lover Julie. Julie Darling. Julie Darling Donuts. However, I had exactly 3 donut holes. That’s it. Faced with racks of sweet, sweet donuts in all the colors of the rainbow, I had 3 holes. That is, indeed, a victory. Good for me.

Saturday, the epic bike ride – and it was epic. 35 miles total. Went to the gym at 4 AM (of course), then immediately got on the bike. Coolidge Park, across the Market Street Bridge, then out the new Riverwalk extension all the way to the Incline in St. Elmo. The new extension is great, although very different from the section I’m familiar with. This new extension runs through old (mostly dilapidated) industrial areas – not much of the pretty scenery or wildlife I’m accustomed to. But it’s still very compelling. Being down in St. Elmo for the first time in a long time was…nostalgic. It sure has changed. I guess time marches on.

Anyway, from the Incline, back through Alton Park (!) and downtown (and the new Station Street at the Choo-Choo), and on to the “old” Riverwalk, forking off at the recently-completed extension to Sterchi Farms, then up S. Access Road, Amnicola, back on the Riverwalk at the dam, and back to Coolidge via the Walnut Street Bridge. A really good ride, but I must find better bike shorts. I’m sore. Result of the diet: less natural padding. So, I guess shopping.

Today, yard work. Lots of yard work. Mowing, weeding (really, I should have thought about all the trimming that would be required around the new Pupville area!), spraying weed killer, clearing & hauling brush. I chopped down quite a few trees, and I did it old school, with my mighty axe. No chainsaw; I wanted the exercise. I’ve been watching the deer, and I know where they come in the yard from the Way, Way Back, so I’ve been clearing brush so the pups (and me) can see them better. I have 3 regular visitors, but there’s probably more. Now, we can see several thousand feet into the Way, Way Back, so hopefully, I’ll spot them more often.

Tomorrow, back to it. Going to be another busy week. Gotta keep it up at the gym, but I need some R & R. Maybe I’ll put the boat in the water one evening; have a quick paddle around downtown or something. Who knows, maybe I’ll take the motorbike out, even. We’ll see.

I’ve Got a Crush…

I had the most satisfying workout I’ve had in a long time this morning. Just absolutely crushed it. I’m not sure why my motivation has come storming back, but it has. With a vengeance. I did a very aggressive HIIT workout (good for 7 miles), plus a full circuit with the weights. A good 2 1/2 hours at the gym, good for a stunning 1300 calorie burn. Following that, 20 minutes of freestyle on the Bowflex, good for another 237 calories. And that’s 237 calories measured – because I’m wearing my Kutting Weight gear, it was probably 10% more than that. Regardless, over 1500 calories just from my morning routine, and I’m feeling pretty flippin’ awesome. There’s just something inherently satisfying about leaving the gym completely soaked – it’s a feeling of accomplishment, and I need all those I can get, as I try to shave percentage points off my already-low body fat percentage.

I figured out how to noodle with my FitBit code so it shows net carbs, because I have a big, giant brain:

macros-aug10

Those are yesterday’s numbers, and they are quite good. I still need to figure out how to make the percentage show the total based on net carbs, but at least having the net displayed in the totals gives me a more satisfying visual. Nonetheless, even the low total carbs – 35.6 grams – all came from good sources: 2 casein protein shakes, full heavy cream (which I put in the shakes), Fiber DX shakes. Not candy. Or pie. Tasty, tasty pie. Reminder: on a 2000 calorie a day diet, 225 – 325 grams of carbs are recommended. You do the math.

Speaking of pie, this:

Cashier at Wal-Mart: “I gain weight just by looking at cake!”
My Inner Voice: “You must look at a lot of cake, then.”
My Outer Voice: “Me too.”

Heh.

In other news, I think I’m going to order this:
vurtego

…because of course I am. It’s Vurtego Pogo Stick, designed for adults (even fat asses like me). It’s supposed to be an awesome workout, and I’m already unicycling, biking, kayaking, juggling, Kangoo Jumping, hiking and so on, so why not pogo-sticking? Besides, doing flips looks awesome. At over $400, it’s not cheap, but you can’t put a price on showing off.

Hey Jealousy.

You know this thing on the Facebook, “People You May Know”? Mine really should be, “People You Are Trying to Avoid”. Really, every day, it’s people from the past, practically all of whom I have zero interest in connecting with (which is why I don’t list my high school, college or jobs – I hated those people then, you think I want to talk to them now?).

fb-people

Now, it is sometimes…interesting. I see these people from Long Ago (and sometime, Not That Long Ago), and really, it looks like most of them have just given up. Gained weight, involved with someone who is on the lowered expectations side of average, whatever. Complacent, maybe. If I ever get like that, just take me out behind the barn and give me the Old Yeller treatment. I’m trying to improve every day. I’m not too bad today; I intend to be better tomorrow. When someone from the past sees me, I don’t want them to think, “Eew, what happened to him?” – I want them to think, “Wow, what happened to him?!”.

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click for larger

I received the bike repair rack I ordered, and it’s a good thing, because Murphy. I went out to the barn yesterday, to see if the patched front tire was holding air (it was/is), but – you guessed it – the back tire was flat. Evidently, whatever punctured the front tire also punctured the rear, but it didn’t go flat because it was sitting just right to keep the air from escaping. So, after working on it over the weekend, and rotating the wheels from the test ride, it was then sitting in such a way that the back tire could deflate – which it did. Anyway, the repair rack worked great, and I learned how to remove/replace the rear wheel, which is dramatically more complex than the front wheel. And, since I had to pull the wheel anyway, I also installed the Mr. Tuffy tire liner in the rear, so hopefully I’m good to go for the ride on Saturday. I’m pretty excited to get back on the bike, but the weather (right now) is iffy, so we’ll see. I’ve got it all planned out – on the bike at sunup, right after the gym, explore the new section of the Riverwalk, maybe pop in the Hot Chocolatier, check out the new Station Street, the waterslide that’s going to be up on 5th Street, then onwards to the old Riverwalk segments (and probably a stop in Rock/Creek along the way).

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click for larger

I’ve really hit it hard the last couple of days at the gym. Really hard. And this morning, the Gin Blossoms popped up on my Super Awesome YouTube Good Job Playlist™. First of all, it seems weird that the 90s are “nostalgic”. Secondly, how awesome are the Gin Blossoms? The epitome of the “90s sound”, and when this came out, in 1992, I was still pretty optimistic about the future – of course, most of the rest of the 90s was all downhill from there, but there were at least a few bright spots. “And you know it might not be that bad, You were the best I’d ever had…”

Me Time.

My first real computer - an Amiga 500, which I got in 1988. Believe it or not, it was ahead of its time.

My first real computer – an Amiga 500, which I got in 1988. Believe it or not, it was ahead of its time.

Sunday, and I finally have some time to myself. The past week has been – as Gwen would say – bananas. B-A-N-A-N-A-S. Work stuff. Specifically, migrating to a new corporate server. Great merciful crap, what an ordeal. Moving gigabytes of data, email accounts, IP DNS, SSL and 27 other things that are probably meaningless to you, with no downtime, was extraordinarily complex. However, worth it – the new server makes the old one look like an Amiga (and not in a good way). The old server was at the end of its life cycle; luckily, this kind of evolution only has to happen every 5 – 8 years or so (Moore’s Law notwithstanding). Still some loose ends to tie up, but for the most part, mission accomplished, and I’ve got Xenu and cFTP chugging along right now seeing what’s left. Bonus: I now know more about Postfix, Dovecot, TLS, Webmin, phpMyAdmin, cron and other nerd stuff than I thought was possible. My brain has become all big and veiny like an alien from the Star Trek.

mrtuffySo, I needed to get caught up on some other stuff. While I have been making it to the gym every day as well as hitting the Bowflex twice a day, I have been needing to work on the bike; the mountain bike, that is. I discovered it had a flat tire about 2 weeks ago (shortly after cutting some of the new trails, natch), and I just haven’t had time to fool with it. Because I was going to have to take the wheel off, remove the tire, yadda, yadda, anyway, I decided to add a Mr. Tuffy tire liner. This is exactly what it sounds like – a thick liner that goes inside the tire to prevent sharp objects from impaling the tube. No idea how well it will work, but hopefully, I won’t have a flat anytime soon – on the front, anyway; I haven’t done the back tire yet, since it was OK. Although I had a spare tube, I decided to patch the flat one as a test run in case I ever have to make a repair while on a ride, just to see how well it would work. Hopefully, the patch will hold; I haven’t patched a tire in forever.

And the reason I needed to get this done is because the new segment of the Riverwalk opens this coming weekend. This is the section that runs from Ross’s Landing down towards (but not all the way to) St. Elmo. I’ve ridden on some of it already (shh! don’t tell!), but I’m anxious to do the completed version. So, early Saturday – that bitch Mother Nature permitting – I’ll ride the new section, then probably head all the way back to Sterchi Farms. That should be a good 25 miles, maybe more if I decide to go to the dam as well. I haven’t ridden much lately; I’ve been in the boat most weekends, so I’m looking forward to getting back on the bike. I’ve got to put a new GoPro mount on the bike, since I took the old one off and put on the motorcycle. I guess I also need to go through my bike bag, and make sure I’m fully stocked.

bikestandIn the course of repairing the flat, I discovered it would have been much easier if I had a repair stand – so, a few clicks on Amazon, and it’ll be here Tuesday. Doesn’t help with the front tire since I already fixed it, but the front tire isn’t that big of a deal in the first place. Most high-end bikes are designed for the front wheel to pop right off – it’s the back wheel that’s a pain, because of the sprockets, derailleurs, and so on. The repair stand should make yanking the back wheel pretty easy, and I can add the Mr. Tuffy liner as a test. As fall approaches, I expect to be riding more, so being able to make repairs and perform maintenance will keep me going. First planned fall trip: the Mountain Goat Trail up on Monteagle. It’s still under construction, but there should be plenty to explore in the mountains. I’m sure I’ll still be paddling some weekends as well, but I miss being on the bike. Hopefully, this weekend’s ride goes smoothly.

I still haven’t hit my 60 minutes on the Bowflex – I might try to do that tonight. Just haven’t had the time. I’ve had nerds from Texas to Michigan to the UK on this server project, and just haven’t had an uninterrupted hour to spare. I have, however, been hitting my Max Intervals every day, with some freestyle thrown in. I also crossed 250 straight days hitting my goals on the Apple Watch. Diet, exercise, all that is going well – nothing really significant to report. Well…ice cream. That’s significant. I bought a Cuisinart ice cream maker, because I found some low carb ice cream mix from L.C. Foods. Less than 1 net carb in a 1/2 cup serving, so it fits right in with the LCHF diet plan. Now, if someone will just make a low-carb donut, all will be right with the world.