Wednesday, November 30, 2011

Wednesday

So we had Mexican last night.  Can I blame my parents' kitchen remodel?  I think I'll try.  They can't eat at their house, and my mom was on an ulcer regimen for about 2 months and it just ended, meaning she can break her drought of things-with-chiles.  They have been to this one Mexican place 4 times since she was given permission to eat there again, and I think we've been with them on 2 of those trips, there by ourselves a third and maybe 4th time in the recent past.  They have amazing good green chile - southern New Mexico style, all green.  All well and good, but NOT Paleo - I'm quite sure it's roux-based.

Last night, we all went again.  Unfortunately, we got there a good half hour before they did, and spent it eating chips and salsa, and (for me, at least) drinking a margarita.  Bad move - or something was (the main course was pork fajita meat covered with pico de gallo, guacamole, sour cream, and green chile - and is a particularly delicious way to keep it semi-paleo-ish).  I got home and found myself exhausted-feeling, weak, with a lot of lower intestinal activity, and freezing - had to take a bath to get warm, and after that, I just wanted to fall asleep.  I assume it was something I ate or drank.  143.3 this morning, as well.  Meh.

Here's the entire day's eating:
  • scrambled eggs
  • bacon
  • turkey sausage
  • tea with cream
  • the usual supplements
  • cheddar cheese
  • chocolate bar (1/4 of a fund-raising bar)
  • chips
  • salsa
  • small margarita
  • pork
  • pico de gallo
  • guacamole
  • sour cream
  • green chile
  • dark chocolate
Long list, but really not that much food.  Back to normal today, and, I hope, eating at home.

Tuesday, November 29, 2011

Tuesday

Huh.  Nothing much to share today, really.  Sleep continues to be challenging, and I'm blaming it all on hormone swings - I'm having warm flashes - nothing like the horrors from last spring, thank heaven - and they're making it hard to maintain a normal body temperature.  Sometimes they feel more like cold flashes, actually.  Anyway, I find myself partly awake about twice during the night - this morning, the second stint was at 4:30, which basically meant I was up for the day.  Despite that, and maybe because of the hormone swings as well, I'm losing weight in a mild sort of way.  142.8 this morning by the new scale. I think the only thing I've changed from a few weeks back when I was seeing 147 rather regularly is a mild downturn in my sugar consumption.  And that could certainly account for it - I find eating sugar reinforces itself, and I spiral upward rather quickly.  I've also cut way back on nuts - not consciously; it just happened.  Maybe now that Fall is turning into Winter, I am not storing energy for the long sleep anymore?  I looked at my records from last year, and it appears that the losses in October and November slowed down significantly - in August and September, I lost just over 6 pounds a month, in October, it was 4, and in November, 2.  Between November and February, I know I lost another 5-1/2 pounds, but I didn't chart my weight after mid-November.  Nonetheless, an interesting trend, and somewhat supportive of my theory that insulin-based fat storage enabled us to survive Winter by turning all of the ripe Fall fruit into fat.

Meanwhile, here's yesterday's eating:
  • scrambled eggs
  • bacon
  • tea with cream
  • Monday's usual supplements
  • almonds
  • dark chocolate with almonds (I bought some fundraising candybars last week and am eating them very slowly - this was one or two segments of a 4-part bar)
  • chile (no beans - yeah, Chili's!)
  • salad with blue cheese dressing
  • iced tea
  • french fries with ketchup (probably fewer than 10)
  • two chocolate almonds
  • one almond paleo "cookie"
I think that was it.  It seemed pretty carby at the time, but I did have a few feints at leg cramps overnight, so it probably wasn't.  And I'm down another one-fifth of a pound this morning, as well.  Got some cheese with me, so I may be able to avoid the chocolate bars today.

By the way, Gary Taubes finished his series on the Food Reward Hypothesis, here.  I'm no scientist, but he makes a very convincing argument that Guyenet has not proved much of anything.  Guyenet's response seemed peevish at best ("he's cherry-picking my cited studies, and has a book to sell!") - I found it hard to read, and I can't make his definition of "reward" anything but circular - a food is "rewarding" if it makes you eat more of it, so by definition, since the obese folks in one of the studies they contended over ate less of the liquid diet, it was therefore not rewarding, even if it was a source of significant sugar - more than a Coke - and (theoretically) tasted sweet.  Before I can buy the whole reward argument as valid, I would need a definition of reward that could be applied to a food without watching people eat it.  Oh, and could someone explain to me why, if the liquid diet was very unrewarding to the obese folks, the normal weight folks didn't slack up in their consumption of it?  Wouldn't they have found it unrewarding too, if it was fundamentally unrewarding?  Supposedly, this dialogue is finished (it shouldn't be - this is science, dammit!), but I'll keep an eye out for new developments.

Monday, November 28, 2011

Monday

I somehow think it's a bit abnormal to lose weight over Thanksgiving, but it appears that we both did.  I am at 143.0 this morning on the new scale, and Lee reported being down a bit yesterday.  Crazy!  On the holiday itself, I had a fat-bomb smoothie, probably a few hunks of cheese to make it to the family meal, and then had chips and guac, rice crackers and Boursin cheese, turkey, salad, cranberry sauce, green beans, a baked sweet potato, and pecan-crust pie at dinner - and some wine.  Really pretty Paleo, all things considered.  Most of the rest of the weekend involved a big breakfast, no lunch or very little lunch, and dinner out, frankly.  Some of which was Mexican, but since I've got things under control, I opted for fajitas rather than enchiladas for dinner, to lower the carb count a bit.  Here's yesterday:
  • bacon
  • coconut-flour based "bread" made with leftover sweet potatoes (it was a bit dense, unfortunately, but didn't taste too bad - I toasted it and spread it with butter)
  • tea with cream
  • the usual supplements
  • walnuts
  • cheese
  • chocolate
  • ham with mustard
  • chips and salsa
Was that it?  It may have been.  Neither of us was very hungry at dinner time, so we reheated some leftover ham and ate it, pretty much by itself.  That's how it's supposed to work, right?  If you're hungry, eat; if not, don't.

Our new scale gave both of us a false sense of wonderfulness for a while this weekend - we'd positioned it so that one corner would rest on the floor molding if someone stood on it, and the result was to remove about 3 pounds from our weight.  At one point yesterday morning, I thought I'd hit 140.  It was nice to see, and if things keep going as they are right now, I probably will for real within the month.

Wednesday, November 23, 2011

Wednesday

Yes, it is Wednesday, but it's also the last workday of the week, so, in a way, it's Friday.  I'm so beyond ready. 

We bought a new scale yesterday, because our old one just started acting disinterested in turning on and zeroing.  The new one seems pretty consistent with what the old one was saying - this morning, it had me at 143.9 (this one goes down to full 1/10ths of a pound, rather than just reporting the 1/5ths), which is pretty close to where I was yesterday, down a little.  Supposedly this scale will bluetooth my weight to my phone, should I decide I want to do that.  Not sure what the benefit is, yet.

Yesterday went like this:
  • tea with cream
  • the usual supplements
  • cheese
  • a few Godiva chocolate pearls
  • a few almonds
  • caesar salad without croutons
  • bacon-wrapped grilled shrimp (not bad, but not immensely better than non-wrapped grilled shrimp)
  • peppercorn sirloin (I think) with bleu cheese sauce
  • steamed broccoli
  • a small amount of mashed potatoes
  • iced tea
  • a couple of almond cookies
  • more cheese (I was hungry again around 9 - undoubtedly Red Lobster was trimming the fat off some part of dinner)
That was it.  We were over at my parents' house after dinner to check progress on their kitchen remodel, and my sister showed up with chocolate cake for my mom's birthday.  It didn't look even remotely appetizing to me - and by that time, dinner was starting to wear off a bit, so I was a little hungry. Always cool, how my tastes have changed.  Lee had some - said it was really sweet.  I wonder if, with all of the sugary foods available to people nowadays, the desserts have to be over-sweetened in order for them to stand out as desserts?  Just a random thought.

Tuesday, November 22, 2011

Tuesday

Yesterday was proof that eating 3 meals in a day doesn't always prevent weight loss.  We had an errand to run during lunch, so Lee and I had Falafel King - which is to say gyro meat on salad with two other salads as side dishes.  Not bad stuff - lots of lovely garlic.  I had two Godiva chocolate pearls after in a futile attempt to stop smelling of garlic - nobody said anything to me, but that was probably politeness.

So.  Yesterday's eats:
  • scrambled eggs
  • pork sausage links
  • the usual (Monday) supplements
  • tea with cream
  • gyro meat
  • salad
  • tzaziki sauce
  • greek salad dressing
  • two Godiva pearls
  • chicken breast
  • salad with dijon vinaigrette
  • hot tea
  • cheese
  • 3 almond cookies - still addictive
And this morning?  144.2 if the scale is to be trusted.  Not bad.

I slept like a wet rag overnight - actually, that's a very apt comparison, because we had a downslope wind and that makes the ambient temperature quite a bit warmer, so our bedcovers were way too warm.  Woke up at 11:30 and again at 3:30 - the latter time, I could not get back to sleep until around 5:20, I think, and the alarm goes at 5:30.  Finally got up at 6:15, but skipped breakfast.  I don't know what is messing with my sleep these days - or rather, I probably do and am just trying to make it go away (or finish up, already!) by ignoring it - in any event, I would like more and better sleep.  I probably need to hit the gym - good intentions and all that; I've not been going.

I don't think today will be much of a fast - I have some cheese with me for later.  What I really need at the moment is a Red Bull, I'm sorry to have to confess.  Or coconut milk.  Not that it matters; I have neither, and will have to struggle through the day on sheer willpower and English Breakfast Tea.

Monday, November 21, 2011

Monday

We kept things fairly strict this past weekend, I think.  Which, by and large, was a good thing.  Lee's suffering from some sort of digestive upset at the moment - has been much of the weekend; he thinks it has to do with his sinuses being hyper productive.  Maybe so.

I made another batch of Paleo banana bread - used a bit less sweetener than last time, so it's more savory, which I don't mind, but I'll probably follow their recipe next time - we went out and bought dates, so I'll be able to.  Bought them at Costco, so I have a lot of dates available, and not much to do with them.  Maybe stuff them with goat cheese?  Appetizers for Thanksgiving!

144.6 this morning; up from 144.0 yesterday, but our scale appears to be suffering from death throes, so I don't know if I trust it.  Here's yesterday's eating:
The cookies were from a recipe I found at Elana's Pantry, and I wasn't sure that they'd actually work - what on earth holds them together after baking?  But they did, and although not terrifically sweet, were pretty addictive.  I made one change - swapped out her agave nectar for maple syrup, hoping that the latter isn't pure fructose (I haven't looked that up yet).  If I'm going to make paleo food, I really don't want to try to make imitation SAD food with weird chemical substitutions, and these make the grade - maybe 5 ingredients, and no hoops to jump through to force them to behave unnaturally, apparently.  Definitely a treat, not something we should be eating daily, but also very acceptable.

Well, this is getting weird.  Yesterday, Lee pointed me toward this article on Cafe Hayek, which sure seems to point to one of their contributors eating at least Archevore-style.  My attempt to tweet it failed - I embedded a space or something.  So, going there this morning to find the link, and what do I see? This - posted by the guy who's changed his diet.  So the way I eat, and the way I think politically (conservative/libertarian-ish), and the way I think economically (Austrian school), all circle round on each other.  If nothing else, I'm consistent.

Friday, November 18, 2011

Friday

Airplane water, much of it, I think.  A day of sensible eating, and a chunk vanished - I'm at 145.8 this morning.  Here's yesterday's eating:
  • scrambled eggs
  • bacon
  • tea with cream
  • the usual supplements
  • a few dark chocolate "pearls"
  • a bag of peanuts - I was quite hungry late in the day
  • grassfed beef meatballs
  • spaghetti sauce
  • chocolate almonds
  • cheese
I think that was it.  Spent the evening doing needlework, which tends to keep me from wanting to raid the cupboards, and is something I should do a LOT more of.  We didn't go to the gym, although we did go to the grocery store for garlic and bulk cheese, so we weren't averse to leaving the house or anything. 

Weekend coming.  Not sure what we'll be doing, although Christmas shopping will probably be part of it.  That, and more of that sensible eating.

Thursday, November 17, 2011

Thursday

Yesterday's fast did not go all that well.  First, I had a banana.  Not bad, of itself.  At lunch, they offered blackened "Cajun style" salmon (salmon being such a big part of Cajun culture - in any event, I don't care for it), so I had an eggless Cobb salad with lots of bacon, and some green beans and carrots in a sauce that tasted of butter (I suspect no cows were involved in providing the flavor, though).  That left me hungry by mid-afternoon (not enough bacon in the salad, I guess), and in mid-afternoon, I was at the airport.  Of all the really horrid places to try to find nutritious food, Reagan National Airport, concourse A must be near the top.  In desperation, I ended up with a "big grab" bag of Lays, and a tin of Godiva dark chocolate "pearls".  Finished the potato chips, and have a few pearls left.  Does that mean the chips were more rewarding than the chocolate?  I'll leave that to others to determine.

No food on the plane (not truly the world's longest flight, but boy, did it feel like it), and had "dinner" on the way home, around 9 pm.  Here's the breakdown:
  • banana
  • the usual supplements
  • tea with half-and-half
  • salad with bacon, blue cheese crumbles, and dressing that was probably ranch with soybean or canola oil in
  • green beans with carrots in butter-flavored sauce
  • way too many potato chips
  • dark chocolate
  • seltzer with lime
  • bison burger with cheddar cheese, no bun
  • pickles
  • fries with catsup
  • iced tea
And I ate all of the fries - no idea if they were tasty or not, I was just tired and hungry at that point, and they were prey.  As a result - 147.0 this morning, and a stomach that is discussing things with me in rather terse terms.

I think we're going to the gym tonight.  No idea what's for dinner, but if I have my druthers, nothing on that list above.

Wednesday, November 16, 2011

Wednesday

I managed to eat quite well, yesterday, as it turned out.  Surprisingly, the conference lunch offered baked chicken and wedge salads with blue cheese, so I ended up eating 3 meals.  Dinner was out, at a seafood place, and was very manageable, as long as one didn't inquire too closely as to ingredients. Here's the breakdown:

Scrambled eggs
Bacon
Tea with cream
The usual supplements
Baked chicken thigh
Wedge salad with blue cheese crumbles, blue cheese dressing, and bacon
Part of a crab cake
Glass of muscadet
Greek salad, in which I managed to avoid most of the chickpeas
Grilled shrimp
Mashed sweet potatoes
Roast butternut squash
Hazel nuts
Dark chocolate

Seems like a lot of food, but I think it was just that it came in lots of separable parts.  For what it's worth, I had leg cramps over the course of the night, so I think I stayed near ketosis.

I'm debating about a fast this morning.  Woke up with a headache and a stuffy head, so I've upped the vitamin D and fish oil, and had some Advil.  I should probably eat, if for no other reason than to protect my stomach from the last.  But I must say that I'm really not terribly hungry.  Maybe another cup of tea before I decide...

--
"Comforts that were rare among our forefathers are now multiplied in factories and handed out wholesale; and indeed, nobody nowadays, so long as he is content to go without air, space, quiet, decency and good manners, need be without anything whatever that he wants; or at least a reasonably cheap imitation of it." -- G.K. Chesterton

Tuesday, November 15, 2011

Tuesday

So far, so good - I think.  No idea what I weigh this morning - the hotel has bathrobes, but no scales.  But I'm eating okay.  Here's yesterday:

IHOP omelet, with ham, cheese, and tomatoes
Olives
Pork osso bucco
Polenta with butternut squash
Various root vegetables
Prosecco
A couple of hazel nuts

This morning, I have had scrambled eggs and bacon so far, and, depending on what's on offer for lunch, will probably fast until dinner.  Tea with half and half when I can - that should help if I do get hungry.

Read an article in USA Today this morning - intensive weight loss counseling of the obese, by their doctors, led to them losing and keeping off an average of 10 pounds.  It stayed off for 2 years.  Based on other information provided in the article, these were people weighing over 200 pounds to start with.  Sure would be nice if the doctors were even a little bit helpful...

--
"Comforts that were rare among our forefathers are now multiplied in factories and handed out wholesale; and indeed, nobody nowadays, so long as he is content to go without air, space, quiet, decency and good manners, need be without anything whatever that he wants; or at least a reasonably cheap imitation of it." -- G.K. Chesterton

Monday, November 14, 2011

Monday

We ate well enough over the weekend, I think, although Saturday did include a Mexican dinner, and we ended up getting a second basket of chips.  Oops.  Something to work on, I guess - I recall that, when we started this way of eating, we could skip the chips entirely.  Better choices yesterday - as a result I'm at 145.2 this morning.  Here's the breakdown:

Bacon
Paleo banana bread (from Make It Paleo)
Cheese
Ham
Salami
A few potato chips
Dark chocolate
Chocolate almonds
Salad
Dijon vinaigrette
Meat loaf

I think that was it.  Now for a challenge.  I'm in the airport awaiting my flight for a 2-day conference for work, at which both breakfast and lunch will be provided.  Obviously, I will be fasting some of it, though I'm not sure what.  I packed hazel nuts and a Lindt 85% bar, as emergency rations.  At a minimum, it should provoke some interesting conversations with the other 7 people attending from work.  

--
"Comforts that were rare among our forefathers are now multiplied in factories and handed out wholesale; and indeed, nobody nowadays, so long as he is content to go without air, space, quiet, decency and good manners, need be without anything whatever that he wants; or at least a reasonably cheap imitation of it." -- G.K. Chesterton

Friday, November 11, 2011

Friday

Back to 144.4 this morning; we went out to dinner last night, so I'm not too surprised.  Something about restaurant food seems to do it for me.  Something - in this case, it was the gravy; we both had turkey dinners (potatoes, mixed veg, cornbread dressing and cranberry relish) at Mimi's last night, and I found that steamed carrots with turkey gravy are actually quite good.  Well, tasty - no comment to be made on their inherent merit.

Here's yesterday's eating (other sins involved, come to think of it):
  • scrambled eggs
  • bacon and sausage (I think it was both)
  • tea with cream
  • the usual supplements
  • cheese
  • M&Ms (pure emotional eating)
  • turkey
  • mashed potatoes
  • gravy
  • carrots and broccoli
  • cranberry relish
  • chocolate almonds
  • walnuts
I don't know where it's coming from, but I woke with another headache today.  I don't think it's stress, although yesterday was a very down day for me - people picking on my kid, worries about the future, stuff of that sort.  I'm still fighting some temperature swings, and today, they feel very much like a fever, although that could just be the presence of the headache.  Took an extra fish oil and some ibuprofen, and I hope that will keep it under control.  But I would very much like it just to go away.

For what it's worth, I am paying for the gravy this morning - a touch of indigestion, to boot.  Just adds to the overall malaise...

Thursday, November 10, 2011

Thursday

I felt like I ate vast plates of food last night, and all for naught.  This is interesting, for reasons I'll get to in a minute.  I was at 143.8 this morning, so down more than a pound from yesterday, leg cramps and all - managed to keep a first one from manifesting, but not the second one.  It's weird; I don't think I'm eating that much different from the times when I wasn't cramping up, and yet, a) here they are, and b) I seem to be losing weight again.  Whatever.  I've said before that it's well worth the minor annoyance.

Here's yesterday's eating, as I recall it (meaning I will probably forget something):
  • scrambled eggs
  • bacon
  • sausage
  • tea with cream
  • the usual supplements
  • cheese
  • leftover flank steak
  • bone broth and wine reduction sauce with butter
  • two twice-baked potato halves
  • Southern-style green beans
  • chocolate almonds
  • walnuts
  • more cheese
Okay, I'm fairly sure that was everything.  All I know is, I got up from the table still feeling hungry, and the walnuts didn't do it for me, so I went for the cheese (Kerrygold Dubliner - I'm reasonably sure it's pastured milk).  And that seemed to help.

So here's why this is interesting.  The potatoes are not considered strict paleo, and probably took me out of zero carb for the day, as did the beans and the chocolate almonds.  I ate the walnuts absolutely mindlessly - just shoveled them in and went back for more.  I would tend to think that their prompting that sort of reaction was a hint that they might be a high-reward food, sort of.  And they did not assuage my hunger, either, leading me to forage for the cheese.  Which I had 4-5 pieces of.  Yesterday, Gary Taubes put out a new blog post in answer to Guyenet's Food Reward Hypothesis, which he says is still bound by conventional wisdom - the old calories-in/calories-out argument of weight.  He seems to be making a good case for his arguments (disclaimer: I tend to be a Taubesian in this fight to start with), and I had a sort of flash while reading it that they may both be describing legitimate phenomena that are more or less orthogonal to each other - the Food Reward stuff pointing to my mindless walnut gorge, in that there may be some foods that act like a drug on the brain, leading to addictive consumption - and the body-rules/hormonal theory of obesity (Taubes' side) pointing to the possibility that some of those highly rewarding foods might be fattening, but that others might not.  And I commented on his post to that end.  Not that he took up my points and replied to them, but I thought I would at least get it out there.  Last night, for me, certainly seemed to lend credence to my thinking (n=1 and all that, obviously).  So it was interesting.

Wednesday, November 9, 2011

I must be getting old

Two days in a row I forgot a fairly prominent item consumed when listing out my day's eats.  Yesterday, I had a slice of pumpkin tart with pecan crust left over from Sunday's dinner.

Okay, now we're good.

Wednesday

Hey - it's not snowing today!  It was, however, very cold out - painful earlobes cold.  I don't know the exact temperature, but a chill wind is hurtling along some of the major streets outside, making it feel much worse.

I saw some tweets from Melissa McEwen yesterday, talking about how a cold environment helped her stay leaner.  I can see the logic in that, but emotionally, I'm not sure I'm on board.  I'm not pinin' for the fjords right now, that's for sure - maybe the saguaro.

Whatever.  It is late Fall, after all.  And I'm back down to 145.0 this morning.  Lee lost yesterday as well.  I think he had some ham and cheese around mid-day, and I had some cheese, so we basically ate the same thing:
  • scrambled eggs
  • bacon
  • tea with cream
  • the usual supplements
  • cheese
  • stuffed pepper with spaghetti sauce
  • salad with meat and blue cheese dressing
  • hot tea
  • chocolate almonds
  • a few potato chips
Oh, and by the way, yesterday's entry should have included hot and sour soup.  I don't know that it influenced anything or not, but I thought I'd mention it.

Sleep has been pretty much the usual - I have a short wake in the wee hours, and the leg cramps have resurfaced, much to my dismay.  They don't seem to be waking me up as thoroughly as the last bouts, though, for which I am very grateful.

I have a business trip next week, so I am already plotting.  Bringing nuts and maybe jerky with me, and going to see if I can find out what "breakfast" means to the conference organizers.  I'm sure it won't involve fat and protein, unfortunately, so I'll be doing my usual get up early and buy my own routine.  Kinda annoying, but in the grand scheme of things, bearable.

Tuesday, November 8, 2011

Tuesday

I made it all day yesterday without snacking between breakfast and dinner - not a huge accomplishment, but, perhaps, a tribute to the staying qualities of eggs and meat.  Also an indication that I had meetings pretty much all afternoon after lunch, so I would not be bored enough to start fantasizing about junk food.  I had not brought cheese with me, so it was a good thing.

146.4 this morning - a slight loss, unusual, considering I had Chinese food for dinner last night, and it normally is unhelpful in losing weight.  Here's the day:
  • scrambled eggs
  • sausage links (not turkey)
  • tea with cream
  • the usual supplements for Monday
  • chicken with garlic sauce
  • rice
  • hot tea
  • one fried noodle
  • fortune cookie
  • chocolate almonds
  • a square of Lindt 85% chocolate
  • walnuts
That was it. 

Lee's struggling with his weight again - gained some on his trip, and found himself up 2 pounds overnight after the Chinese dinner.  He had more of the carbs than I did - more noodles, more rice - and came home and, for some unfathomable reason, had a bowl of oatmeal because he was cold.  Well, that ain't gonna help anything - but I can't be his eating sheriff.  His stomach reacted badly and immediately to the meal, so something was off.  I imagine his 2 pounds are to do with carbohydrate digestion, and will be gone if he gets away from them for a while.  We shall see.  He's giving up lunch, he says, which should help him a bunch.  If he sticks with it, that is.

Monday, November 7, 2011

Monday

And here we are again.  Monday morning, seeming later than it is, after a busy and productive weekend.  I was 144.4 on Saturday morning, 146.8 this morning.  In between was a dinner of Mexican food, including a margarita, and a meal that included both potatoes and dessert, and wine.  I'm still down 2 pounds from a week ago, so I guess it's progress.  Here's what I recall of yesterday:
  • bacon
  • turkey sausage
  • tea with cream
  • the usual supplements
  • hot dogs with mustard
  • potato chips
  • cheese
  • a glass of red wine
  • flank steak in various marinades (we made 2)
  • a twice-baked potato half - sour cream, butter, cheese, bacon
  • southern-style green beans with bacon
  • salad with blue cheese dressing
  • iced tea
  • pumpkin tart with blackcurrant preserves on a pecan crust - included brown sugar, jam, maple syrup (and was damn good)
I think that was it for the day.  I spent much of it cooking, always fun, and I can say that the dinner consisted solely of ingredients, except for the blackcurrant preserves.

Had a conversation with my sister about her health.  She's battling Hashimoto's thyroiditis, and just coming off a month-long elimination diet that was not the Whole30, apparently.  Her healthcare provider determines food allergies/sensitivities by having her hold items in one hand and testing the strength of that arm - strong indicates no issues, weakness indicates an allergy.  This worries me - as far as I am aware, there is no scientific basis for such an approach - but I didn't say anything about that.  I did ask her if anyone is looking into healing leaky gut issues, since they're supposedly a factor in autoimmune conditions, including Hashimoto's and allergies of various sorts; she didn't know.  I worry for her - this is bound to be a time-consuming odyssey, and while the elimination diet was a good start, it would seem that she may not be in the very best of hands here.  If it continues not to work, maybe she'll ask me to point her to some resources, but I'm very hesitant to offer my non-expert opinion unsolicited.  I did show her my new cookbooks, both of which are very grain-free in nature.

Over the weekend, I had a sense that I may be about to go through another round of hot flashes.  I'm tempted to get the prescriptions for the HRT filled, just in case.  These don't feel the same as the ones during Lent, so it may be something else - and for what it's worth, when I've been hot, so has Lee, and I'm pretty sure he's not having hot flashes.  He's felt a bit off since getting home, so it's also very possible that we're both having a virus of some sort.  Will be keeping an eye on it.

Friday, November 4, 2011

Friday

Spent yesterday enduring an oh-so-mild migraine.  It was looming at breakfast, making my arms feel weak, and by the time I made it to work, had produced a sort of headache that lingered all day, influencing my tea-drinking (more!) and eating a bit.  Sometimes I felt hungry, other times, rather sick.  It was kind of nasty - and, of course, I had no Advil with me, so all I could do was suffer it out.  Got home, and took 3 of them - and with that, and an Epsom Salts bath and a bit of dinner, I got to feeling less awful - just wrung out.  Not pleasant at all.

Despite that, I ate marginally okay.  Here's the scoop:
  • fat bomb smoothie
  • tea with cream
  • the usual supplements
  • cheese
  • potato chips (salt cravings)
  • more cheese
  • salami
  • some very nasty gluten-free nut thin crackers, looking for some crunch
  • an apple
  • more cheese
  • walnuts
  • chocolate almonds (only 3)
Was asleep fairly early, I think - before 10, anyway - but slept rather roughly; some passing fasciculation/cramping in one leg, and an inability to get comfortable and stay that way.  I didn't exactly wake up at any point, but I wasn't fully asleep all night, either.  Woke up at 4:40 and put on an old radio playlist, which I remember hearing start, but no details of, so I suspect I went back to partly-asleep.

145.8 this morning - down a bit from yesterday.  Probably down to a weight zone where I will spend the winter, I'd guess - mid 140s.  I was looking back at this time last year, and I was in the just-under-150 zone, so I can't complain much.  I feel a bit thick about the middle though - my jeans are a little bit tight, and at one point in the past year, I can recall them being very loose.  Something to work on - we haven't been doing much in the way of exercise recently, what with the travel and everything, and we should be.  Maybe next week, things will simmer down to normal and we can get back to the gym.  For today, though, I'm just glad not to have that headache anymore.

Thursday, November 3, 2011

Thursday

It was 14 degrees out this morning.  Surely there's someone we could call about that.  On the other hand, it makes for perfectly wonderful sleeping weather - especially with the monster double duvet.  I woke up for the first time at 5:15 - just a bit ahead of the alarm clock.

146.2 this morning - the water is finally leaving me.  Here's yesterday's eating:
  • fat bomb smoothie
  • tea with cream
  • the usual supplements
  • cheese throughout the day as needed
  • shrimp skillet from Paleo Comfort Foods (seriously yum, even if I over-emphasized the lemon at the expense of the garlic)
  • rice
  • chocolate almonds (7 or 8 in total)
  • walnuts
  • more cheese
I believe that was it.  Finally got my copy of Make it Paleo last night and it has oodles of things that look extremely tasty - in fact, I lay my eating of walnuts and cheese directly at its feet - the pictures made me very hungry.  They even have instructions for making one's own almond and coconut milk - both look easy, although I don't see myself doing it.  As with the other cookbook, I will probably substitute butter or ghee where they call for coconut oil, but there's a lot of stuff there that looks very worth a shot.  Huge swaths of desserts, as a matter of fact.  And now that I have my coconut and almond flour, I can give some of the "pastry" recipes a try.

Another smoothie this morning - I made a whole batch yesterday and Lee wasn't up for eating, so I just kept it in the fridge - it actually works out very well that way.  Had some bacon with mine this morning, which may help keep hunger at bay a bit longer.

Wednesday, November 2, 2011

Wednesday

Seems like about this time last week I was bitching about the snow.  And this week?  Bitching about the snow again.  Not an auspicious start to the cold season, if you ask me - weekly heavy snowstorms (they're calling it a "blizzard" on the south side of town) in the dead center of Fall.  Will Winter be worse? 

I thought I ate fairly well yesterday, but only lost a small bit - 148.2 this morning, and my feet are still swollen.  This kind of reminds me of the cruise we took after Elizabeth graduated, when I had to get a lymphatic massage to get the fluid in my ankles to drain.  Nowhere near the magnitude, but definitely as persistent.  I'll add to it that my ears are stuffed up - inflamed.  Something is out of kilter, I guess.  As we will be working through several Paleo cookbooks for the next few weeks, I would anticipate that whatever it is will return to kilter.  And I will be cutting way back on the sugar, especially with the holidays on the horizon.

Here's yesterday's eating:
  • tea with cream
  • the usual supplements
  • cheese
  • a fun-size Nestle Crunch bar (I did not look at the ingredients)
  • turkey breast
  • mashed cauliflower with a bit of butter
  • "gravy" made from chicken stock, herbs, and potato starch
  • cheese
  • chocolate almonds (only 3 of them)
  • walnuts
I think that was it.  I had hoped to get a deli turkey breast, but they didn't have any, so I got a vacuum-packed thing from Jenny-O.  Not exactly the flavor I was looking for, but it filled me up, when combined with about half a head of cauliflower, cooked to mush with chicken broth and attacked with the stick blender (turned out pretty good).  I added a pat of butter to it, and that vastly improved the flavor.

Tonight we're trying another Paleo Comfort Foods recipe - shrimp skillet, shrimp with bell peppers, tomatoes, onion, and herbs.  It looks quite tasty, so I am hopeful.

Tuesday, November 1, 2011

Tuesday

Halloween is not the best day to try to get rid of water weight.  Just sayin.  I was - I think - pretty well-behaved; I had some chocolate almonds - either 8 or 12 (can't remember how many times I went back for more) - some dark chocolate, and 2 Halloween treats: M&Ms and an Almond Joy.  And didn't want any more after that - they were way too sweet.

My legs, feet, and ankles are still pretty swollen.  148.4 this morning, so I got rid of some of it.  I did not have breakfast today because of mild indigestion - guess the Almond Joy was just too much for me or something. 

Finally (!!!) slept like a rock overnight.  I think I woke up maybe 5 minutes before the alarm went.  I stayed up until 10, partly because I was finishing a movie on the iPad and partly to start resetting the body clock to deal with next week's return to sanity.

Here's yesterday's eating (junk):
  • tea with cream
  • the usual supplements
  • potato chips
  • two pieces of cheese
  • bacon and tomatoes
  • pecans and cheese spread
  • chocolate almonds
  • dark (85%) chocolate
  • M&Ms (fun size)
  • Almond Joy (fun size)
I think that's it.  Lee's home tonight - late, I think, based on when he left Phoenix - so we should get back to our regular eating patterns starting tomorrow.  I think I'll do a bit of grocery shopping tonight and aim to have something from Paleo Comfort Foods for dinner tomorrow.  Apparently, my copy of Make It Paleo finally arrived at my parents' house, so I should see it some time this week.

My sense this morning is that I've been struggling with weight lately due to an excess of sugar, more than anything.  It seems like the 3 times I've had to put some effort into getting back down to my base weight have been sugar-related - it's not poisonous to me, but it starts a chain of cravings that I have trouble controlling.  A useful insight, I think.

I brought the Halloween leftovers in to work today, as I did last year, and will spend the day eating cheese - not fasting this morning, so I will probably have one pretty soon, as the indigestion passes off.