Wednesday, February 29, 2012

Wednesday

Lee's suffering from muscle cramps again, but I managed not to have any last night.  His are showing up in his back and shoulders, which is a weird place and very hard to do the kind of stretches these things need.  I've increased his potassium, and guess he should probably eat more bananas - for that and for the starch.

As for me, I'm down to 146.3 this morning - a lot of the lost weight was water, I believe, which points to the Mexican food on Sunday.  I'm a bit sore and inflamed across the board, so I need to give some thought to PUFA ratios, I guess.  Not easy when I don't really like fish much.  But I guess Elizabeth and I could have tuna-salad-stuffed tomatoes for dinner tonight, which would help.  Here's yesterday:
  • scrambled eggs
  • bacon
  • tea with cream
  • the usual supplements
  • cheese (maybe only 2 pieces?)
  • Godiva chocolate pearls - 6ish
  • ribeye steak (I'd guess it was about a pound)
  • salad with meat
  • dijon vinaigrette
  • 4 chocolate cherries
I took a brief look at Smashburger's nutrition site, and near as I can tell, the dinner the other night amounted to maybe 4 carbs, so if Monday's eating caused real weight to be gained, I'd lay it down to the nasty candy I had for dessert.

I haven't been reading much in the Paleo blogosphere lately, but what I've seen on Twitter indicates that the safe-starch-and-bland-diet folks are on the ascendant over the low-carb-insulin-hypothesis group.  Whatever.  I think they all need to step back and look at the big picture.  If we didn't have food manufacturing and refrigeration (or freezing, more likely - call it preservation), what/how would we eat?  I would guess that we'd eat fatty animals whenever we could get them, and roots and fruits when they were available.  So that would be a diet that leaned toward starch in winter, fruit in summer/fall, leaves in spring, with meat and fat sort of throughout the year.  With insulin mediating the weight gain that would result from the summer/fall fruit, so that we'd go into winter with more insulation and stored energy.  And we'd start Spring having used that stored weight up, ready to eat whatever Nature put on offer.  Seen that way, they're kinda both right, and the human diet would probably work rather well on that model.  It's not really how we eat now as a family, but by eliminating things-in-boxes from the category of "food", I think we're a lot closer to that approach than most of the West, and far healthier for it.  That said, I think I will continue to shift us in that direction as much as possible, so will be planting for salad in the next few weeks (yeah - I see the light at the end of this nasty tunnel, Winter!) and looking very much forward to the berry crop over the summer.  And I guess that means that we could increase our potato/carrot/yam intake right now, and maybe start looking at some of the other roots.

Tuesday, February 28, 2012

Tuesday

Well, bugger!  Things are back on the upswing again, darn it.  147.0 this morning.  And I didn't eat that much yesterday.  Ah, well.  I'll continue to increase my protein intake as much as possible, in hopes that things settle down.

Here's yesterday:
  • scrambled eggs
  • bacon
  • the usual supplements (Monday)
  • tea with cream
  • cheese (3 pieces)
  • naked classic smashburger (size, large) with cheese and pickles
  • wedge salad with blue cheese dressing and bacon bits
  • the remains of some rather nasty cherry chocolate-esque things I bought to eat at the movies - about 1/2 cup worth, I think (probably that 1/2 pound gain right there)
That was it.  Could certainly be lingering aftereffects from the Mexican food (another bout planned for Saturday coming up, too).  But I think if I can wangle another day or so of lean protein, clean fats (cream, bacon) and veg, I should be back on the downward trend.  We shall see.

It occurs to me that I've stopped exercising, too.  That kinda got lost in the midst of Mardi Gras and the job change.  No surprise, really, but I guess I'd best get back to it, since I have committed to doing the Bolder Boulder this May.

Monday, February 27, 2012

Monday

Pretty good weekend.  For one thing, I was able to kick the cold to the curb, and am feeling back to normal.  I also got some additional sleep, which my body has been screaming for - slept in nearly two hours yesterday and then went to bed (and sleep) early.  That was huge. 

Eating Friday and Saturday were both awesome - cheese, eggs and bacon, meat and leaves, and not much else.  As a result, I was at 144.6 yesterday.  So, of course, we went out for Mexican food last night, and I chips-and-salsa'ed myself back to 146.5 this morning.  It will go, but it's annoying.  Here's yesterday:
  • bacon
  • tea with cream
  • the usual supplements
  • cheese
  • smoked turkey - about 3/4 lb of it
  • mustard BBQ sauce
  • cole slaw
  • m&ms - 1 handful, measured out and eaten slowly - leftovers from a movie on Saturday
  • chips
  • salsa
  • guacamole
  • a small margarita
  • pork fajitas without tortillas
  • about 1/2 cup green chile
Could have been worse, but it also could have been a good deal better.  Oh, well, back to it this morning.  Brought more cheese in to work, so I will be avoiding things that aren't food.  That really seems to work well.

I'm trying to work out an ergonomic seating arrangement for my work computers.  Two of them (eventually; so far, just one), and a cube with a "U" shape to it, so I have a lot of corners.  The problem is that one of my arms ends up resting on the desk surface, but not the other one, so I get lopsided strain on my shoulders.  I think I'm going to have to move the screens closer to the middle of the base of the "U", to keep myself well away from the edges, or something.  I'll get it figured out; I'd rather not get home on Friday with sore shoulders every week.

Friday, February 24, 2012

Friday

Yowza.  145.7 this morning; guess that fasting stuff really works, huh?  I made a valiant (and, I hope, successful) effort to increase my protein intake yesterday, and will continue to do so.  But, as seen below, I didn't eat much at all:
  • tea with cream
  • the usual supplements
  • cheese (2 pieces)
  • chicken (both breasts from a roast chicken)
  • salad (greens and tomato)
  • dijon vinaigrette dressing
  • 5 chocolate cherries (I know 1/4 cup has 26g of carbs, but didn't catch the rest, and 5 is not 1/4 cup; maybe half of that)
  • cheese (5 pieces) - not a mindless snack, but a response to real hunger, around 8:30
That was it.  79.4g fat (59%), 24.5g carbs (8%), and 98.2g protein (33%), so better than yesterday.  Very low carb, though - and I paid with leg cramps.  And with weight gone, in large swaths, so I'm okay with that.  I hope to continue the trend over the weekend, with more fairly simple meat-and-leaves dinners, even if eaten out, and very low levels of between-meal eating.  Which means I'd better find things that I need to do to keep busy.  And, since I know we're doing a movie on Saturday, I'd better work out the movie-food issue now.

Thursday, February 23, 2012

Thursday

Well, that makes no sense.  148.3 this morning.  Here's yesterday's eating:
  • scrambled eggs
  • bacon
  • the usual supplements
  • tea with cream
  • cheese (5 pieces - probably about 4 oz)
  • the meat and cheese off two large slices of pizza
  • hot tea
  • 4 chocolate cherries (as dessert)
I had a massage, which by rights should have reduced any retained water.  I slept pretty well, considering the 80-mph winds howling past the tightly closed windows, the latter of which made the room a bit hot. I opened a window around 2 am which helped a good bit, although apparently it was open wide enough for the snow to get in - periodically, I was partly awakened by a cold damp mist landing on anything not under a blanket.  So maybe I didn't sleep all that well.

A quick assessment put the day at 56% fat (105.5g) , 24% carbs (101.5g - elevated because I used the pizza whole; it was probably lower), and 20% protein (84.4g).  If I knock off 60g of carbs from not eating pizza crust (wild guess there), the carb percentage drops to 17%, the fat to 45.8%, and the protein moves to 36.7%.  That seems reasonable, although I'll have to go back and read some more; I'm guessing the raw protein gram count is lower for me than it probably should be.

Anyway, I was able to keep to my plan for lent yesterday, by having a measured quantity of dessert immediately after dinner, and nothing after that at all.  Granted, I was in a massage for a good hour of the evening, which limited my available snacking hours, but it's good to make the start.

I have been wondering recently if the protein content of my meals has been too low, lately.  I think I'll start paying more attention; if I recall things I read a year and more ago, I should be shooting for it to be closer to 130g/day.  Getting it back in that range might help with the dryness problems I've been having with my hair and nails, and could do a bit of tweaking on my lean body mass levels.

Fasting this morning from convenience - the radio traffic bimbo indicated that the commute would be very nasty, so I skipped breakfast to get out of the house as early as possible.  I have cheese here, so I'll break it when I get hungry.

Wednesday, February 22, 2012

Wednesday

This week is moving much more quickly than last - probably the back-from-vacation stuff wearing off.  Slept soundly last night, but still feel like I could use a lot more.  I don't think that's a good thing; wonder why it's happening?  I'm achy today - assume some inflammation from the cold, although I don't honestly know what it might be.  I'm currently waiting for 3 Advil to kick in, and hoping a massage will help - got one scheduled this evening.

147.9 this morning, which I am associating with the achiness.  Here's yesterday's eating:
  • scrambled eggs
  • bacon
  • V8
  • the usual supplements
  • tea with cream
  • cheese
  • one Godiva chocolate pearl
  • about 1" square of King Cake, to see what it tastes like (it tasted pretty good, but I didn't want more)
  • meatballs with stroganoff sauce
  • salad with meat in it
  • homemade zesty italian dressing
  • two chocolate almonds
For Lent this year, I'm giving up nuts as snacks and mindless snacking after dinner in general.  I think I've become far too lazy about sitting around the house pushing small bites of food into my face, and it needs to stop.  Not a very religious sacrifice, but one that I think will be fairly uncomfortable, so I am hoping it will be a useful one.  I will allow myself dessert in some form, but it needs to be in a discrete quantity and the eating stops when the discrete quantity is finished.

Tuesday, February 21, 2012

Tuesday

Fat Tuesday, too.  Not for me, though - still at 147.4.  The cold is ebbing swiftly; I feel like it's the last day of actual illness and that tomorrow will be nothing but cleanup.  At the rate it's been going, it's likely that this afternoon is when that part will start.  So, while I'm bummed that I got sick at all, I think Paleo is vindicated by the speed and mildness associated with this bout.

Yesterday's eating:
  • scrambled eggs
  • bacon
  • Monday supplements (still increased D3 and adding K)
  • tea with cream
  • cheese
  • chocolate (a few Godiva pearls that worked well to get rid of a headache and mildly feverish feeling - go figure)
  • burger with jalapeno and pepper-jack on it
  • miscellaneous tomatoes, pickles, and peppers
  • sweet potato fries (and I ate every last one of them - I was starving at dinner last night)
  • iced tea
  • chocolate cherries
  • cashews
Slept like several logs - but my dreams surfaced three or four times over the night, so it wasn't the most restful sleep.  It felt solid, though, even though I'm pretty tired out this morning.  Should be better tonight, if the cold really does give it up this afternoon.

Monday, February 20, 2012

Monday

I have a cold.  This is unusual - it's been about 2 years since I last had one.  Came on over the course of Saturday morning, leaving me just wanting to lay down much of the last half of the day.  However, it does appear to be a "Paleo" cold - fairly mild symptoms, and after 2 days, pretty much on the wane, I think.  Or hope, anyway.

Ate kinda weird all weekend.  I think it was the cold speaking - and it wanted cookies in the worst way.  It didn't get any, but it did get tortilla chips and rather more chocolate than I think was good for it.  Oh well.

My weight was all over the place this weekend.  147.4 on Saturday, 148.5 yesterday, 147.2 this morning.  Whatever.  Here's a rough summary of yesterday:
  • tea with cream
  • strawberries with cream
  • bacon
  • vitamin D (15,000 IU, to try to beat the cold back)
  • cheese
  • salted almonds
  • olives
  • taco salad
  • chocolate (Godiva pearls, mostly, I think)
  • vanilla ice cream
  • carrots with ranch dressing (homemade)
I think that was it.  It seemed like more at the time. 

Spent the weekend drying strawberries and making salad dressing, since we were pretty much out.  "Zesty" Italian, ranch, and dijon vinaigrette.  Blue cheese later this week, I'd imagine.  Brought bulk cheese to work today, to see if having it around in a fridge will work for an entire week.

Friday, February 17, 2012

Friday

I didn't eat very well, yesterday.  Semi-busy day, someone cooking pasta with garlic in my vicinity at the office, and the downhill side of a very long week, with the result that I hit the machines in the afternoon.  Got some peanuts, and they helped.  Here's the breakdown:
  • scrambled eggs
  • bacon
  • tea with cream
  • the usual supplements (for now, I'm not doing the dessicated liver; not sure if there's truly a benefit)
  • V8
  • cheese
  • about 10 Godiva pearls - plain dark chocolate
  • a bag of peanuts
  • "Grandma Smith chili" - a concoction of ground beef, pork-n-beans, and V8, with seasoning.  Family comfort food.
  • chocolate cherries
  • walnuts
  • more cheese
I think that was everything.  Not the greatest low-carb paleo day.  That said, the scale said 148.7 this morning, so I am continuing to get rid of the excess water; my feet are starting to feel a bit more normal today, and my ankles are much more ankle-shaped.  I took a bath with epsom salts last night, and I think that helped a bit as well, although, for the first time in months, I had bed-vaulting leg cramps.  I tend to associate those with ketosis, but my eating yesterday was not all that low-carb, so I don't know if that was the issue, or if I was feeling dehydrated as a side effect of shedding the water weight.

Who knows?  I'm just glad to have things starting to settle down a bit.  Going to spend the weekend refreshing the stock of homemade salad dressing and dehydrating strawberries (my supply is running low).  Maybe going to the gym, maybe having a massage to work out the last of the car trip and assorted hotel beds (guess I'm getting old).  And sleeping.  My brain is tired.

Thursday, February 16, 2012

Thursday

I think it's Thursday, that is.  I've lost track, this being the first week back from vacation and all.  In any event, the family is home and we're working on eating more normally.  Here's yesterday:
  • scrambled eggs
  • bacon
  • tea with cream
  • the usual supplements
  • hazel nuts
  • a chocolate cupcake lollipop (my bad - I had it in my mouth before I realized it wasn't just chocolate candy)
  • meat loaf wrapped in bacon
  • salad with dijon vinaigrette
  • chocolate cherries
  • walnuts
  • more tea with cream
149.6 this morning - glad to see that "4" again.  My feet and ankles are still swollen, but are starting to resemble more or less normal appendages, and a lot of the overall achiness is subsiding.  I'm glad - I do not like feeling like that.

I brought some cheese to work today, to try to avoid the nuts and their Omega-6s.  I figure it can't hurt to try to keep inflammatory stuff down.

Wednesday, February 15, 2012

Wednesday after the long vacation and the start of the new job

Yikes - what's it been, almost 2 weeks?  We ended up leaving for New Orleans on Thursday evening, because a blizzard was threatening that we had to beat out of town.  Stops included Amarillo and San Antonio on the way down.  Lots of eating out - no alternative, really.  I did a reasonable job of sticking to meat-and-veg on the road, sort of; I'm having a sudden flashback to some sort of fried cheesecake dessert in San Antonio, and I ate more french fries than would have been strictly healthy.  Once in New Orleans, though, it got really hard.  I even ate bread on a couple of occasions.  I also had turtle soup, which was really good, but probably not something I would make at home, owing to the difficulty of acquiring turtle in these parts.

And then there was the drinking.  You know you're celebrating Mardi Gras with gusto when you find yourself having a drink with three different kinds of alcohol in it, before breakfast - and considering having seconds.  So, from Wednesday through Sunday, it was just one giant cheat.  And I'm paying for it - although not solely in added weight.  I have nasty swollen ankles, thumbs, knees, elbows, shoulders, face - pretty much everywhere.  Inflammation.  Not a nice place to visit.  I'm starting to see it dwindle, having been home for three days now, but it's taking longer than I would like. 

More recent eating has included fat-bomb smoothies for breakfast, no lunch (two handfuls of hazel nuts yesterday), and a protein-oriented dinner - salami and cheese Monday, steak-and-wedge salad with blue cheese dressing yesterday.  It's been helping.  When I got home, I was at 151.4 (what is that, up 4 pounds for the week?), and this morning, I'm down to 150.1.  But, as I said, I'm still pretty swollen up, so there's more to be shed.

Wore the Vibrams as much as weather would permit, and they were fabulous.  My feet held up much longer and recovered much faster in them than when I had to wear more structured running shoes.  If they'd allowed for socks (or if I'd had toe socks), I would have probably worn them on the float, but it was pretty cold on Saturday, and I was looking for anything with insulating properties.

Don't know if I can continue the week-daily updates or not, but I'll try.

Thursday, February 2, 2012

Thursday

I was wrong, all the times before.  This week is the longest ever on record.  Unbelievable how long it is dragging on - but how often does one live through a week that is the last week at one job and the week prior to a week's vacation involving Mardi Gras, all at once?  Because of the former, I have very little to do at work, and I'm a bit stressy, what with jumping off into the unknown and all.  That leaves me brain-tired in the evenings, when I need some energy to do things like pack for the trip.  And prevents sleep, which compounds everything.  So I'm kind of a mess right now.

Weight went back to 147.0 this morning.  Here's yesterday's eating:
  • tea with cream
  • the usual supplements
  • salad with chicken and cheese and bacon in it
  • balsamic vinaigrette
  • a half-pound of smoked turkey
  • cole slaw
  • walnuts
  • chocolate cherries
That was it.   Seems like I could have lost more, with only eating that, but I think I'm fighting all the factors listed above right now, and need them to calm down a bit. 

I also realized this morning that part of my sleeping problems have to do with the room being too warm - I'd shut my normally-open window last week when it was so windy out, and had forgotten to re-open it.  Fixed now, so I am hoping that tonight will be better.

Wednesday, February 1, 2012

Wednesday

Back to 147.2 this morning - I don't think I'm much surprised.  Three meals yesterday, two at a restaurant.  But I think I did pretty well, really.  Here's the scoop:
  • scrambled eggs
  • pork sausage patty
  • tea with cream
  • the usual supplements
  • pot roast in a broth/wine sauce (not thickened at all)
  • potatoes (probably the equivalent of one large potato)
  • carrot chunks (maybe 1/3 of a normal-sized carrot)
  • iced tea
  • chicken fajitas, no tortillas
  • sour cream
  • cheese
  • guacamole
  • pico de gallo
  • chips (about 5?)
  • salsa
I fasted breakfast today, primarily because we needed to take one of the dogs to the vet without feeding her first, and that allowed us to delay the onset of hungry dogs looking for breakfast by a few minutes.  I have plans for lunch, so I'll end up with two meals and about an 18-hour fast leading into them as well.  I do feel like I made reasonably good choices yesterday, considering - the pot roast was pretty much pure paleo-with-starch, and I avoided most of the carbs at the Mexican restaurant this time.  An auspicious way to lead into a vacation period.

I can definitely feel the situps this morning.  I'd love to know why it is that it takes 24 hours before I can tell I've exercised.  Weird.