Friday

I am still fighting something that is leaving me exhausted right now - I have no idea what, but it's certainly unhelpful when my night's sleep breaks itself up, waking me at weird intervals 3-4 times for no reason other than my mind thinks it's time to wake up.  So I'm a rag this morning.  Here's yesterday's eating:

• fasted breakfast, just supplements and tea with cream
• cheese snacks (broke the fast at 17 hours)
• potato chips
• a scotch
• chips and guacamole and salsa (not very many)
• burger with bacon, swiss, and avocado on it
• cottage cheese
• pickle spear
• 4 chocolate cherries

I think that's everything.  146.0 this morning.  I have olives and sauerkraut with me for snacking purposes, or lunch, whichever fits better.  Probably doing a movie tonight, for which I'll bring coconut flakes and nuts with me, and avoid the popcorn.  And try not to fall asleep.

I think I'll plan on a fairly rest-centric weekend.  And maybe whatever it is will go away.

Thursday

If this week goes by much slower, it will be in reverse.  I cannot recall the last time we had one that took this long to get to the end!  It doesn't help that the mornings are dark and populated for the past two weeks by a charity fund drive on the radio in the slot normally occupied by an interesting current events talk show; 10 minutes a day begging us to support homeless kids' needs for backpacks or some such thing.  We donate elsewhere, thank you so much, now please shut up and return to our regular programming.  Makes it hard to get going.

146.6 again this morning.  No surprise, considering I seem to be fighting carb cravings at the moment - that, and I'm in a bad mood.  I thought I was done with that sort of thing, dammit; why else did I bother turning 50?  Here's what I can recall of yesterday's eating:

• scrambled eggs
• bacon
• the usual supplements - double fish oil
• tea with cream
• cheese snacks
• M&Ms
• hazel nuts
• giant salad with turkey and blue cheese dressing
• walnuts
• chocolate cherry (only one, I think)
• chocolate mint godiva thing
• cashews out the wazoo
• sauerkraut

Yikes!  This morning, I'm fasting, because we didn't have any bacon defrosted and it was just easier.  I've had my tea and cream, and my usual supplements.  The double fish-oil did seem to work, finally; I'm not as achy as I was yesterday - even including the flu shot, which made my left arm very annoyed.  Another night spent sleeping solidly - woke up for the first time around 4:30, which really isn't all that bad, given that we generally are out cold well before 10 pm.  And I drift in and out for that last hour or so.

I have cheese snacks with me, but I've put them away so I can't see them.  If I can fast all day, I'll eat them on the way home, as a prelude to dinner, which will probably be out somewhere.  I'm looking forward to the weekend - I need some time to get things organized again, and a road trip, however enjoyable, really interferes with the mechanics of life.

Wednesday

The weekend's weight is not disappearing as I would have hoped.  I'm back down to 146.2 this morning, which is better than yesterday, but not much.  I brought cheese snacks today; hope that they will sort things out on the snacking front, at least.

I'm less achy than yesterday - I should be; I took 4 fish oils throughout the day.  But I didn't have a comfortable night's sleep, so I think there's still some inflammation there somewhere.  Here's yesterday's eating:

• scrambled eggs
• bacon
• tea with cream
• the usual supplements; extra fish oil
  
• trail mix (peanuts, almonds, cashews, m&ms, raisins)
• bratwurst
• Boar's Head sauerkraut (I don't know for sure if it is a fermented product, but it's sold cold)
• smoked turkey with a mustard BBQ sauce (definitely had corn syrup in it; not sure what else)
• cole slaw
• cashews (very small handful)
• more fish oil
  
• walnuts

I think that was everything.  The trail mix was definitely boredom eating, and I hope it was better than the potato chips; neither was a good choice, really.

I was tired yesterday evening in a way I haven't been for a very long time - just foot-draggingly weary.  And a bit stupid, to boot - I was struggling to recall words like sauerkraut.  Food helped, and I fell asleep later than Lee did, but it was still remarkably easy to get to sleep, so I think I'm still tired.  The only thing I can come up with as a reason is that I was mildly sick last week; maybe it's lingering after-effects.

Well, onward.  Not entirely sure I'm over being tired yet, but I will see if there are other things I should do to clean up my eating a bit.  Maybe that will help.

Tuesday

I am inflamed.  No other way to describe it; I hurt from head to toe, just a little.  Fingers are swollen, my back aches.  I'm stiff.  No idea why.  I took double fish oil this morning in hopes that it will fix what ails me, but not sure it will. 

I was still really tired yesterday; Lee got back from a meeting at 8:30 last night and opted to watch TV in bed.  I joined him, and read for maybe 10 minutes before I succumbed - lights out, and I remember nothing until 4:25 this morning when the dog decided she needed to be outside.  And after letting her out and a few minutes to relax again, I fell back asleep, until the alarm went, and once again after that, I think.  I can't quite believe the trip to Seattle took that much out of me; maybe it's just Fall.  It's pitch-dark in the mornings again, dammit, for one thing.  I hate that.

146.6 this morning.  Ugh.  Still water, much of it, I think.  But I ate crap yesterday, which couldn't have helped much.  Something like this:

• scrambled eggs
• sausage (the last of the Jimmy Dean natural stuff - which was very good)
• tea with cream
• the usual supplements for Monday
• potato chips (bad salt craving)
• hazel nuts (boredom)
• stuffed green peppers with meat and rice and cheese and tomato sauce
• salad with ham
• nasty commercial greek salad dressing
• chocolate cherries (only 2 of them)
• cashews (small, controlled portion)
• cheddar snacks
• gouda snacks
• walnuts

I was craving salt badly yesterday - no idea why, especially when I'm already retaining water like crazy.  I need to resist the chips today, especially since they are cooked in seed oils and I'm having inflammation - I don't need to add n-6 to my diet right now.  Meant to bring cheese with me, but I forgot it, so it will be a Day Of Willpower, I guess.

Monday

Interesting weekend.  My GPS likes ferry rides, apparently, as she kept trying to get me to use them, regardless of the schedule.  I got to sleep Friday night at around 2 am Saturday, and was back up and busy by about 8:00, I think.  A can of coconut milk kept me alive, although without strawberries mixed in, I wasn't truly keen on the taste.  Taste-schmaste, though; I wanted my MCTs.

Overall, I ate okay.  I'm carrying a goodish bit of water today - I can tell because the tips of my toes feel swollen.  Plane flights tend to make me swell up.  146.2 this morning; could be worse.

Here's what I ate yesterday, as I recall it:

• tea with cream
• "taco" omelet - with taco meat, cheese, tomatoes, and onions
• bacon
• more tea, but with "creamer" - no ingredients listed on the container, but it did warn that it contained milk
• fermented pickles (I'm pretty sure)
• bison burger with cheese, mushrooms, onions, bell peppers
• fries and ketchup (and I ate every last one of them)
• iced tea
• a small handful of chocolate blueberries (which I will stop eating again starting now)

I think that was it.  The omelet and bacon were still holding me fine some 7-8 hours later, and I almost didn't want dinner (note that not wanting it did not stop me from practically licking the plate).  Saturday's food included commercial meatballs in BBQ sauce and grape jelly, olives, deli meat, cheese, veggies and dip, ice cream, steak, shrimp, and a baked potato, roughly.

I think I got close to 8 hours' sleep on Saturday night, and last night, I don't think I moved more than once all night.  Taking a 3-hour flight each way for a one-day visit does take it out of you, but it was fun.

Friday

143.2 this morning - possibly due to the bowl of strawberries I ate last night since I am gone this weekend and they would spoil.  Not concerned about the rise.  I'm more concerned about the upcoming weekend - travel is always tricky.  I can probably fast a bit here or there, though, since it's just me.  Here's yesterday's eating:

• scrambled eggs
• bacon
• sausage
• tea with cream
• the usual supplements
• cheese snacks
• hazel nuts
• meatballs with spaghetti sauce and cheese
• salad with meat
• commercial greek dressing (nobody told me when we ran out of homemade!)
• iced tea
• strawberries
• walnuts

I think that was it - it may not have been; I wasn't paying much attention when eating.  Interestingly enough, I had lots of leg cramps last night - haven't had those in quite a while.  At least one episode of rocketing out of bed - didn't wake me up permanently, but it was abrupt.  There might have been one other, but if there was, it didn't wake me up at all.  So I guess I would continue to say I sleep well, although I'm a bit tired this morning.  Bad timing on that, I should add, since I'm flying west, and should hit my hotel around 1:30-2:00 am my body time.  Ugh.  Not looking forward to that - I should feel just wonderful tomorrow.  So I'm taking a Mag Citrate with me, with the intention of taking it once I get close to the hotel.  I haven't used it as a sleep aid before, but it's supposed to be good, so I have my fingers crossed.

Thursday

I have been really cold this week, and a little of last week, having to drink tea and sit on my hands to get warm enough to function at times.  This, while wearing wool, too.  My illogical conclusion as to the cause is that I wasn't getting enough fat in the diet, and that I needed the cream in my tea.  Yeah, maybe.  I added it this morning, and Lee added sausage to our eggs-and-bacon to see if that would help.  And maybe it will.

142.6, I think, this morning, so no big change from yesterday.  Here's what I ate:

• scrambled eggs
• bacon
• tea without cream
• the usual supplements
• potato chips (salty-taste craving and the thought that a few carbs might start the heater.  they didn't)
• hazel nuts
• QDoba naked burrito with very light rice, no beans, double shredded beef, guacamole, green salsa, cheese, and sour cream
• iced tea
• cheese snack
• small portion of cashews

So, overall, not a fabulous day, but not wholly bad.  In addition to the cream at breakfast today, I brought cheese with me, in case the salt urge hits again.

I'm continuing to listen to the Robb Wolf podcast with Dr. Kurt Harris (it's a marathon - over 90 minutes).  Really a classic, I think - they cover a lot of ground, very sensibly, and arrive at a reasonable conclusion out of all of the churn in the Paleo world right now - there are probably more whole foods that "do no harm" than were originally thought, and humans have a lot of options for what they can eat to be healthy and fit.  They also are making a strong case for the food reward argument as a weight loss tool - I haven't heard the absolute end of the podcast, so I don't have the whole thing yet, but what they're saying really makes sense to me.

That, and over the course of what I've heard so far, I think they've just opened up the option to have twice-baked potatoes in the near future.  Yeah - I love those!

Wednesday - never mind.

I did let Lee know that I would be reintroducing cheese and heavy cream and butter/ghee to my eating, and he was okay with it - especially if I would let (not my job, man!) him have heavy cream in his coffee.  His decision - especially since he is generally the one concocting the coffee in the mornings.  He didn't include cream today, that I know.

Here's yesterday's eating:

• the usual supplements
• hot tea (no cream)
• hazel nuts (rather a lot - breaking an 18-hour fast)
• grassfed burgers
• salad with ham in it
• italian dressing
• green olives
• hot tea with cream in it
• strawberries

142.8 this morning, so the no-sugar thing seems to be holding out.  As it should, apparently.  I'm listening to the Robb Wolf podcast episode with Dr. Kurt Harris on it, and he's making a valid (to my amateur ears) case that starch and fat can - and should - swap in and out of a diet without increasing weight or the tendency toward the Diseases of Civilization, in an individual with a reasonably intact metabolism.  And I think I qualify.  Not that strawberries are a starchy fruit, that I know of, anyway, but his overarching claim seems to be that industrial seed oils and fructose are the big-bad disease agents, even over wheat (not sure I buy that one, and see no reason to reintroduce it), and that other whole foods are probably going to be less of an issue, in moderation. 

Lotsa churn in the paleo community these days, and I guess that's okay, but I hope we get some good studies and maybe some semi-definitive answers, at least, in the absence of a black swan.

Tuesday - Whole30 day 8?

I'm thinking not, actually.  I've been eating in a Paleo fashion, probably 80% of the time, for the past year and a half, and have rarely felt as awful as I have this past week.  My sleep got worse, my digestion tanked (more on that later), and I got cranky.  Maybe I haven't given it enough time, maybe we weren't as compliant as we should have been, but, dammit, why keep on with something that doesn't seem to be improving things?  So, while I will continue to abstain from added sugar as much as possible for the next 3 weeks or so, I'm done with skipping the dairy and jumping through hoops to avoid processed foods.

I think I had a virus yesterday.  After spending about a half hour very near the bathroom in the morning, I felt all day like I'd been wrung out.  Got home with two goals: cheese enchiladas with green chile, and bed.  And that's what I did - we went out and got Mexican (Lee ate cheese, but was pretty restrained on the chips), and I went home and crawled into a horizontal position and commenced to bake.  By true bedtime, I was running a 99.3 degree fever, so whatever it was, was real.  Slept like a rock all night (still with the strange dreams, but they didn't wake me until about 10 minutes before the alarm was due to go off), and woke up this morning feeling normal again.

I'm fasting today, in solidarity with Lee, who has a physical this morning.  And to give my stomach the day off - I'm sure it will appreciate it eventually, even if it seems tetchy at the moment (I'm a bit hungry).

143.2 this morning.  Here's yesterday's eating:

• scrambled eggs
• turkey sausage
• tea (no cream)
• the usual Monday supplements (including K2)
• potato chips (I blame the virus - it wanted salt)
• hazel nuts (just the one handful)
• chips and salsa
• cheese enchiladas with green chile
• iced tea
• a wad of shredded cheese

Guess I've lost about 4 pounds on my Whole7, which is fine, even if the first bits were water from our weekend in Santa Fe.  I still think it's the sugar, which is why I will keep avoiding it.

Now to figure out how to reintroduce the heavy cream in my tea without it bothering Lee, who is sticking with the no-dairy bit for a while, since he's lost about 5 pounds over the week and would like to see it continue.  Cheese, I can sneak, but cream usually shows up at breakfast, and I don't want him to have to give it to me if he can't have it.

Monday - Whole30 day 7

Good weekend, overall.  I got a lot of little "to-do" items done, and we ate pretty well.  Both Lee and I suffered from digestive issues all weekend, though - I hope they're not due to the changes we've recently made in our way of eating.

I was actually down to 143.8 on Saturday morning, but ate a bunch of cashews late that evening, which was a mistake.  Eating cashews - their addictive nature - makes me thing that Guyenet's "food reward" theory may have more in it than originally apparent.  Once I start, I have a very hard time stopping them.  I think I'm adding cashews to my "don't eat" list for the remainder of the Whole30.  144.2 this morning, which is down from yesterday.  And down from Friday - always a nice thing on a weekend.  Here's yesterday's eating, as far as I can recall:

• scrambled eggs with ham, spinach, and mushrooms
• bacon
• strawberries (I'm looking for snacking alternatives, and this is one of them)
• salami
• a pecan
• green olives
• a glass of wine
• roast beef
• mashed sweet potatoes (I used coconut milk to thin them - worked pretty well)
• sauteed brussels sprouts (dijon mustard and worcestershire sauce)
• green beans with pimientos
• salad with my compliant italian dressing
• iced tea
• vanilla ice cream with strawberries

I think that was it.  Not a particularly good Whole30 day, but in our defense, we had the family over for dinner and couldn't put them on it, really - and I had them bring salad and dessert.  Could have been worse, and I think we did pretty well.

I did sneak a small amount of cheese over the weekend.  It tasted good.  Tried, especially yesterday, to stay off the nuts; I think they may be part of the problem I'm having with my stomach - too many of them, anyway. 

Saturday, I made a fairly amazing breakfast from the Primal Blueprint Quick and Easy cookbook - an egg "pancake" with sauteed berries.  There are definitely things one can do with eggs beyond scrambling them - and this was a cross between a dutch baby pancake and a souffle.  We will be eating more meals from that one, I predict.

Friday - Whole30 day 4

I'm thinking that coconut oil and I should keep a wary distance from each other in the evenings.  I was uninspired at dinner time, especially as it was just me, and ended up having a smoothie made of a can of coconut milk, some vanilla, and a bunch of frozen strawberries, along with some walnuts.  The energy surge was helpful in the early evening, allowing me to pre-cook the breakfast sausage and put some of the tomato "crop" in the dehydrator, and review the recipes in the Primal Blueprint Quick and Easy Cookbook, and read through the Primal Blueprint fitness e-book, and try out some wall pushups and wall squats from it (surge? - yep!).  I fell asleep okay last night, but ultimately, slept very poorly.  Vivid dreams that kept waking me up, and the return of an old friend - the left leg cramp.  I think I was out of bed with it at least twice last night.

Blecch.

I came very close to reintroducing dairy to my diet on the sly last night - I really wanted some cheese.  But I didn't have any.  I stuck with the plan, as much as possible; I don't think we're doing the vegetables as intended.  Here's the rundown from yesterday:

• scrambled eggs
• sausage patty
• the usual supplements
• black tea
• hazel nuts
• coconut milk and strawberry smoothie
• walnuts

Not a lot of food, and not a lot of reward - and in the end, I'm another half-pound down this morning - 144.6.  So I guess it's "working" for me, in that sense.  I'm not seeing the improved sleep yet, and I'm feeling about the same as I did prior to trying this - no huge improvements in well-being.  On the other hand, I was being pretty darn well from our lacto-paleo/archevore style of eating in the first place, so I wouldn't necessarily expect that.  I will continue to hang in there - and after the recipe review, I've found a number of things that I think we can try, all of which are compliant.  I'll be doing some shopping and cooking to that end over the weekend.

I'm thinking deli chicken and salad for dinner tonight.

Thursday - Whole30 day 3

Ow.  I do not know what is going on, but I woke up this morning feeling beat up.  Tired, achy, mildly stuffed up, my ears felt pressurized.  I've heard of the "low carb flu", but I don't think this could be that - for starters, we've been eating low carb for well over a year now.  Maybe I have a physiological need for cheese?  Okay, probably not.  Lee said that he actually slept pretty well last night, which is a good thing.

I guess the Whole30 is going okay.  We consumed an entire batch of beef-vegetable soup last night for dinner, and I followed it up with coconut chips (earlier in the evening this time, so I was sleepy by bedtime).  I don't think we're getting enough fat, because I was quite hungry after that and had to eat some salami (probably a processed food with nitrates, but it had fat and wasn't dairy).

Here's yesterday's eating:

• scrambled eggs
• sausage patty (JD natural)
• tea
• the usual supplements
• hazel nuts (probably 2 Whole30 snacks' worth)
• beef vegetable soup (with tomatoes, onion, carrots, celery, green beans, beef stock, chicken stock)
• coconut chips
• salami (4 slices)

That's it.  I am down a pound from yesterday - 145.2 - which I guess is a good thing, although I feel stalled.  My guess is that the weight is the result of my having re-acquired a sugar addiction; I was downing the chocolate covered items pretty fervently there at the end.  If that's the issue, this should sort it fairly easily.

On my own for dinner tonight, or so I've been told.  Not sure what that will lead to, but I think I will get some more olives from the grocery store, and maybe have a coconut milk-and-strawberries smoothie, at a minimum.  That, and spend some time re-reading the Primal Blueprint cookbook, looking for ideas.

Wednesday

Day one of our Whole30 is over, with the intriguing result that I gained nearly half a pound from it.  Not auspicious (and yes, I did read the instructions and know I'm not supposed to be weighing myself - sue me).  146.2 this morning.

Lee was sick yesterday - some sort of issue with his stomach.  Possibly food poisoning, but not from anything both he and I ate.  He had breakfast, but, apparently, not lunch.  I ate 3 meals, which may have been my issue - hard to say.  Here's the list:

• scrambled eggs with ham, spinach, mushrooms, tomatoes
• Jimmy Dean natural pork sausage
• tuna with mayo (real, unfortunately), and dill relish
• taco salad with grassfed beef, tomatoes, lettuce, salsa, and avocado
• a whole lot of dried coconut
• tea without cream (hot and iced)
• the usual supplements

I guess it went well, overall.  Learned a few things of interest:

• when bringing tuna with mayo and dill relish to work for lunch, make sure the container it is in seals tight (we had a spillage incident, now cleaned up)
• eating coconut and its MCTs late at night may not be the best idea (I had a difficult time falling asleep, and think it was the excess energy circulating)
• McCormick's California-style garlic powder with parsley also contains Soybean Oil.  WHY???

Commercial taco seasoning also contains soybean oil, interestingly enough.  I cannot fathom what purpose it serves in a spice blend, but there it is.  Not a set of labels I thought I would have to read closely.

Sleep last night came reluctantly, was apparently solid - I didn't wake up all night, once asleep - but doesn't seem to have been restorative, although I have plenty of energy this morning.  When the radio came on, I was instantly awake, but felt more like I was still awake, rather than as if I were waking up.  Not sure how to describe it, but it was different from normal.  Whole30?  I tend to doubt it, but I could be wrong.

After the lunch fiasco yesterday, I'm back to fasting through it - I'm happier that way anyway, and it's less of a hassle.  Other than that, we're taking it one day at a time.  Making soup in the crock pot for dinner - started before bed last night, and that may also have had something to do with my sleep quality, because we could smell it before the lights were out.  Not sure what we're going to have with it - salad, I guess.  I found a really good recipe for a "zesty Italian" style dressing that I was able to alter slightly to make fully compliant.

Tuesday

Well, we have begun.  Whole30, that is.  I've had no cream in my tea since Sunday, and my two cheese snacks around lunch yesterday were the last of that I'll consume until 30 days have passed, if all goes well.  Some observations:

• Next time I make Paleo mayo, it's back to the food processor.  The blender did not emulsify at all, and we had to toss it.  Consequently, we made tuna salad with Hellman's - not perfect (soybean oil), but coulda been worse.
• I hate taking lunch to work.  Said tuna salad leaked all over my briefbag on the way to work, despite the fact that I put it in a lunchsack thingie with a blue-ice.
• Lee's struggling with stevia, trying to come up with a palatable coffee version.  That may be his breaking point.
• We found that Jimmy Dean's "natural" pork sausage is almost Whole30 compliant - it has less than 2% sugar, and no nitrate/nitrates - so we got that rather than make our own.  Pretty tasty stuff!
  

We did eat dinner at Country Buffet last night, but I think I did okay - roast beef, green beans, and broccoli, and a bit of Lee's ham - they gave him too much - with mustard.  I don't think they could have infused much sugar or milk into any of those.

Here's yesterday's eating in total:

• no breakfast
• hot tea, no cream
• the usual supplements, plus K2
• two cheese snacks
• roast beef
• green beans cooked with bacon
• broccoli
• ham
• mustard
• ice tea
• walnuts

I'm back at 145.8 this morning, and grateful.  My stomach is not nearly as unhappy this morning as it was yesterday.  Lee said this morning, that he had gained a pound somehow.  It does say in the guidelines that we are to avoid the scale - I'm not sure I could do that, actually.

Monday

About time we got through the weekend - and I thought I ate pretty well.  Apparently not.  147.0 this morning, indigestion, and a wretched night's sleep last night.  Ah, well, we are about to fix things.  I'm fasting this morning because of the indigestion, and we are on the brink of starting the Whole30 in some fashion.  Need to go shopping first, though, get some ground pork to make sausage patties from. 

Yesterday's eating was not all that bad, just at restaurants.  Like this:

• scrambled eggs
• strawberries
• bacon
• tea with cream
• gyro meat
• greek salad with feta
• french fries
• ketchup
• cheese snacks
• chocolate cherries
• hazel nuts

The day before involved Mexican food, most of which was at least partly paleo, but I did eat rice at both occasions.  Oh, and part of a cheesecake at dessert for dinner.  So I can see where the extra weight came from (actually, I can feel it; I'm pretty stiff).

I turned 50 over the weekend, and for the record, would just like to say how nice it is to feel better than I did at 30.  Thanks, Paleo!

Friday

Hmm.  I think I've hit a snag.  145.2 this morning, after a day in which I thought I'd eaten rather well.  Here's the list:
scrambled eggs with spinach and leftover pot roast

• tea with cream
• the usual supplements
• hazel nuts
• cheese steak without a bun
• cottage cheese
• ice tea
• cheese snacks
• cashews
• coconut
• chocolate blueberries

Ah, well, that explains it.  I hadn't eaten all that well, I just blocked out some things.  Not exactly where I would want to be on the brink of a weekend away from home, but there it is.  Perhaps I can fast some part of the weekend - skip lunches religiously or something.  Guess I'll be fairly careful.
I think our Whole30 has devolved into a period in which we avoid dairy scrupulously and cut way back on sugar (i.e., dump the chocolate everythings), but do our best on the processed foods.  And Lee will have stevia (if I can find some at TJs) but no cream in his coffee.  Crossing my fingers that we find it a valuable exercise.

Thursday

Four day workweeks are sort of annoying.  The first couple of days are a nice surprise - "Hey! Day two of the week is not Tuesday, it's Wednesday!" - but once that's done, something in my brain says that it should be Friday already, and it's not.

At least we got sleep last night - I woke for the first time at 4:45, which isn't bad.  No neighborhood midnight plumbing, I'm glad to say.  Although we would very much like to know the back story for that little episode, and we probably never will.

145.0 this morning.  Here's yesterday's eating:

• scrambled eggs
• turkey sausage
• tea with cream
• the usual supplements
• chicken and bacon wrap in a boxty - that's an Irish potato pancake, which I hoped would not have flour in it.  I was wrong.
• salad with blue cheese dressing
• Qdoba naked burrito with shredded beef, rice, cheese, salsa, sour cream, and guacamole
• hazel nuts
• chocolate almonds and blueberries

The bruise from dropping the water bottle on my foot is slowly dissipating, I'm glad to say, although it's still sore to the touch.  I'm also happy to note that I never had any stiffness at all from the 5K on Monday, except in the muscles of my feet - and I put that down to walking extensively in the Fives, and a good thing.  I've been laying off wearing them this week to let the bruises settle - there's a spot on my right heel that is still reminding me that we had to start out on a gravel road - but will probably bring them along this weekend - we're headed to Santa Fe for a spa/golf visit.  Massage, full-body scrub, hot-oil scalp treatment for me.  Green chile is a must, and then we come back and do the Whole 30 as far as one of us can stand it.  I hope we can stand it for a while.

Wednesday

Man, some sleep would be a very good thing.  We didn't get much last night.  At midnight, I moved my left foot in the wrong direction and had to exit the bed rapidly to stomp out a cramp.  At 2:00 am, the dog began to whine - and after a few incidents in the last couple of months, I know better than to let her keep at it; she needs to go out.  Shortly after she came back in, a loud diesel truck circled the cul de sac, and stopped and turned off its engine.  About an hour later, people began throwing sheet metal around the street.  Lee actually got up, fearing noisy (inept???) burglars, and reported that it appeared to be plumbers, making repairs next door.  At 4:00, they packed up, had some conversation in the street, and went home.  The alarm went off at 5:30.

What on earth would require plumbing services at 2 am?  We are baffled; the plumbers apparently cleaned up their mess when they left, so there were no clues this morning. 

145.2 when I stepped on the scale - my foot is still swollen from dropping the bottle on it, and I feel puffy all over.  Here's yesterday's eating:

• scrambled eggs
• bacon
• tea with cream
• the usual supplements
• meatballs with spaghetti sauce and cheese
• salad with ham and cheese and italian dressing
• green olives
• hazel nuts
• chocolate almonds
• chocolate blueberries

Not quite Whole30 compliant yet - it sounds like Lee is still planning on doing it next week, but doing it while complaining every step of the way, I think.  We shall see if it plays out that way.

Tuesday

I generally do not work out.  We have done a bit of gym-trotting over the last two weeks, but nothing whatever strenuous.  This is important.  Because I did the 5K yesterday (scrubby time of not-quite 51 minutes - ugh) and am not in the least sore this morning.  Which is crazy!  Paleo, primal, archevore, low-carb, perfect health, whatever you call it - I LOVE how this way of eating makes me feel. 

I will be 50 on Saturday - and I feel better than I did at 30.  It's just crazy!

145.6 this morning - we didn't eat all that well over the weekend, including movie popcorn on Friday and a lot of snacking.  Yesterday went something like this:

• fat bomb smoothie for breakfast
• no tea (bad mistake - I had a nasty headache by mid-day and playing catch up with the caffeine did not work!)
• the usual supplements plus K2
• possibly a piece of cheese at some point?  I don't recall
• naked classic smashburger
• a few fries
• tea with cream (much too late)
• chocolate almonds
• Cracker Barrel hamburger steak
• salad with blue cheese dressing
• green beans

I think that was it - that was actually a pretty clean day's eating.

I did the 5K in the Fives, and that went generally well.  Two mishaps, though.  I dropped a 1-liter bottle of water on my left foot before the race, trying to avoid being stepped on by my sister's dogs, and I have a nasty bruise as a result, though it didn't cause issues with walking.  And then, I had to negotiate a lumpy gravel road as an early part of the race, and not having done that before, bruised my right heel a bit - still didn't really cause issues with completing the race, although I'm a bit sore there this morning.  All in all, it seems to have been quite successful - and far less prone to blisters or other issues of that sort than I was in more conventional footwear.  And, as I mentioned above, I have no stiffness and am not walking funny.  Very nice!

Friday

I am still retaining water, but I know why now, and it should disperse shortly.  145.0 this morning.  I'm very stiff and sore and tired today.  Here is yesterday's eating:

• fat bomb smoothie
• bacon
• the usual supplements (double fish oil)
• tea with cream (the dairy kind)
• walnuts
• M&Ms (dammit - but I made the choice, so what can I say?)
• sliced smoked turkey with mustard bbq sauce
• cole slaw
• iced tea (partly sweetened by a waitress convinced that only women order sweet tea, I think - ugh!)
• a few chocolate blueberries

I guess that's it.  Three-day weekend forthcoming, with not a lot to get done, so we'll see how that goes.  Got the 5K on Monday.  I think I'll do the smoothie as breakfast that day - it should be near perfect for creating and sustaining energy.

Thursday

Slowly but surely, last weekend is going away.  144.8 this morning, after a night spent trying to avoid leg cramps.  I was successful until 4:30 am, when my right leg insisted that I get out of bed and stand on it NOW!  I complied.  Up to that point, I wasn't deeply asleep much, just because certain movements or positions would trigger enough of a cramping sensation to wake me up a little to shift to another position.  A little rough.

We did another gym night last night and I got a mile and a half in with no problem - the stiffness I'd had on Monday night was gone and I wasn't fighting my own muscles this time.  Definitely an improvement.  I gave serious thought about doing a couple of sprints, just to see, but held off because I would have had to explain to Lee just what in tarnation I was up to - and I didn't have a good explanation.  I did shift into a jog briefly, and found myself running on my forefeet, without really having to think about it.

Here's yesterday's eating:

• scrambled eggs
• bacon
• tea with cream
• the usual supplements
• naked burger with cheddar and guacamole
• cole slaw
• a few french fries
• iced tea
• gruyere
• pork tenderloin with green chile sauce (chiles, chicken stock, heavy cream, pork drippings)
• salad with homemade no-sugar italian dressing
• grilled peaches with ice cream
• walnuts

Wow, that was actually rather a lot of food!  I tried the grilled peach idea from Everyday Paleo, and I think it would have been good if the peaches were a little riper.  It wasn't bad, just not very sweet.

We made our fat bomb smoothies this morning with Thai Kitchen coconut milk, which was so thick, it was practically a solid.  The smoothies were more like Wendy's frosties in texture - a challenge to drink.  But good - I really like that recipe.