Tuesday

I fasted yesterday until about 1:30, I think - so, assuming my carb binge on Sunday ended around 6-ish, I guess that makes for a 19-20 hour fast, roughly.  Broke it with a bag of beef jerky, then had another later in the afternoon.  Not much to them - 90 calories, 8g carbs, advertised as "low fat".  Dinner at Country Buffet, which is always a minefield, and stayed true to that last night.  147.0 this morning, so maybe it wasn't water.

Here's the breakdown:

• tea with cream
• the usual (Monday) supplements
• beef jerky (2 snack-sized bags)
• caesar salad, no croutons
• mixed greens with mushrooms
• "blue cheese" dressing
• cottage cheese (nasty, too - no tang to it)
• meat loaf
• green beans
• 3 pieces of fudge

Came home and worked on taxes and trying to fix the printer for Lee's laptop.  Before we knew it, it was bedtime.  And I slept miserably.  Hot flashes - or maybe warm flashes.  These aren't as intense as the ones a year ago, but I have no other explanation for what's happening.  I sleep on my right side and am fine, until I need to change positions.  Roll over onto the left side and I get maybe 2 minutes before the sweating starts and I have to get out from under the covers.  Once I've cooled off, I'm freezing, and can throw the covers back on and sleep on that side for a while - until I need to change positions again (unfortunately, this occurs rather frequently), and the whole thing starts over.  Very few issues during the day - maybe one episode while driving to work - but the lack of sleep is painful.  And on top of that, my right shoulder is starting to hurt again.  The massage lasted about a week.

Got my race package for the Bolder Boulder last night and am in a minor quandary.  It includes a chip to be attached to my shoes.  My don't-lace-up Vibrams; the chip has 4 holes in it and came with a nasty looking plastic jimmie to sew through them and attach it to shoelaces - at least, that's the impression I had.  I'm wearing the Vibrams - my traditional walking shoes make my knees hurt - and at the moment, I think I'm wearing one tennis wristlet on my ankle, with the chip sewn onto that (with satin ribbon or something - definitely not the plastic jimmie, which mimics a ball-chain in shape and would hurt like hell if it rubbed against skin for 6 miles).  If another solution emerges, I'm certainly open to it.  In the meantime, I'm in the market for a tennis wristband thingie.

Monday

We survived Easter.  Barely, but we survived.  Surreal weekend; on top of "Sunday dinner" (meaning it was lunch) for 12, I had a semi-crisis at work and spent intervals all weekend on conference calls trying to get some repair software to run faster by force of will.  In the end, it finished up last night, just in time, so that was good.  But I'm pretty tired - it was by no means a restful weekend.

I'm at 147.2 this morning, a little surprised (not all that much, though) to be there.  Had a carb binge yesterday evening after everyone had left, that I think explains it.  That, and some rather crap sleep over the past few days.  It may be all water, though; I was at 145.2 yesterday morning.  We shall see.

Here's a rough summary of yesterday's eating, as I recall it.

• bacon
• tea with cream
• the usual supplements
• ham
• baked sweet potato
• green beans with almonds
• sauteed brussels sprouts
• ambrosia salad (marshmallows, fruit, whipped cream, coconut)
• about a half-glass of Riesling
• flourless chocolate cake with raspberry sauce and whipped cream
• a couple of strawberries
• possibly a Reese's peanut butter egg
• cheese
• chocolate blueberries (absolutely the full 1/4 cup serving)
• tortilla chips and a sour-cream dip

I think that was it.  If I'd avoided the salad, the dessert, and the binge after, it would have been a pretty clean paleo day, really.  I made the croissants for dinner, and thought of having one, but when one didn't make it onto my bread plate, I didn't feel like making the effort to get one, so I went without.  I hear they were good.  For what it's worth, I have some lingering indigestion this morning from something and am fasting; a choice made in favor of sleeping in an extra 15 minutes.  That, and forgetting to bring cheese to the office with me.  So probably a real 20+ hour fast today.

We have lots of left-over ham (and I swear I bought a small one!) and the bone, which is simmering in the crock pot to make ham broth/stock.  No idea what I'll do with it, but it seemed foolish to waste it.  If I were to find beans suddenly a food again, I suspect it would make a great bean soup base.  Maybe I'll try cooking green beans in it the next time we haul out the pressure cooker.

The theme for this week is "sleep", I think.  Probably won't be getting any, truth to tell; I have some sort of "leadership conference" at work the last half of the week, where one night ends at 8:00, the next at 9:00 (they're putting us up at the hotel that night).  And Thursday morning (after the 8:00 night), Elizabeth is catching the bus to get the train to LA - and has to be downtown around 4 am.  So not so much then, either.  But I can shoot for a good night tonight and tomorrow night, and hope for a solid weekend.

Friday

Either the week's not-so-great eating caught up with me, or I am carrying water again.  Not sure which, but I was at 147.0 this morning.

Sleep seemed better - for one thing, my shoulders seem to have got over the pain yesterday and are feeling pretty good.  So all I was battling was the thermostat - probably my internal one.  Each time I rolled over, I got hot and sweaty, so my night was full of cover-adjustments.  Annoying.

Here's yesterday:

• tea with cream
• scrambled eggs
• bacon
• the usual supplements
• cheese
• a Hershey's bar with almonds
• about 1/2 pound of gyro meat
• part of a salad (we split it)
• one bite of pita with hummus
• tzaziki sauce
• strawberry/mango juice

I stopped after that.  It seems more or less healthy, although certainly carby-er than it could have been.  Dinner was at the local Mediterranean joint, and their hummus is wonderful, as are their juice drinks, so I had a little of both.  The Hershey's bar was a stress reaction - at one point yesterday, I thought I would be working through last night, tonight, and possibly tomorrow night, on top of hosting Easter dinner for the family.  As things turned out, the work won't be quite that bad, although I will probably be involved in something tonight (evening, though, not 2 am) and tomorrow some time (if all goes really well, early tomorrow morning).

Easter dinner is mostly healthy.  Ham, baked sweet potatoes, green beans and brussels sprouts (not mixed), ambrosia salad (okay, that's not healthy - but it has coconut in it!), green salad, croissants (for others, not for me), and a flourless chocolate cake.  I have the croissants started - they're a 3-day ferment in all, so they are probably less toxic than they could be.

I will try to get some sun over the weekend, as well - maybe some outdoor garden cleanup of some sort tomorrow, if work doesn't get in the way.  If it does, maybe I'll rig an extension cord onto the front patio and work out there.

Thursday

Yesterday started out well, but I made the mistake of reading through the "what garbage did you use to eat?" thread on PaleoHacks yesterday afternoon, and ended up adding a bag of jerky at the time.  Then, because we were out of potato chips at dinner (not that they're all that good, I know), I had Nacho Cheese Doritos instead.  And a bunch of the dark chocolate-coconut oil bark we made a while back.  So it was a mix of eating garbage and eating too much in general, I think.  145.9 this morning.  Here's the breakdown:

• scrambled eggs
• bacon
• tea with cream
• the usual supplements
• bouillon
• cheese
• one or two Godiva Pearls
• beef jerky
• 2 hot dogs
• a bag of Nacho Cheese Doritos
• more tea with cream (an attempt to head off what follows - it didn't work)
• 3 chocolate cherries
• aged gouda - 3 pieces, I think
• chocolate coconut bark - about 5 pieces
• walnuts - not very many

I was really hoping to report further improvements in my right shoulder, but I can't - it's starting to bother me again.  Made for a night of much more broken sleep and I'm just tired and cranky at the moment.  Add to that Lee's initial plunge into allergy season (or a bad cold; hard to tell which), so he was snoring a good bit as well as thrashing around and periodically waking to blow his nose noisily, all of which was despite a dose of Advil PM (for the sleep and the benadryl).  I won't catch it, or at worst, I won't have enough symptoms to fill a thimble (thank you Vitamin D!!!), but he doesn't like suffering in silence, so I'm very tired this morning.

I think I start Easter preps tonight - I'm going to make the croissants to be baked late Saturday rather than on Sunday, and that means starting the sponge tonight.  They're very easy once you get the technique down, and only require sporadic attention - and a 3-day rise in the fridge means that some of the anti-nutrients are wiped out.  I still probably won't eat one.

I would love to say that tonight's my turn with the Advil PM, but a) I'm fairly sure Lee will still need it, and b) I think I might be up half the night for work.  I hope I'm wrong on that one - especially since I don't think I'd add value in any way.  And I really need a good night's sleep right now.

Wednesday

This is proving to be a long week for some reason; at least, my brain wants desperately for this to be Thursday.  Not sure why. 

Had my all-shoulder massage last night; it seems to have helped quite a bit with overall mobility, especially on my right side, which was feeling locked up, although the therapist said I had a big range of motion.  Maybe for someone else, but it felt constrained to me.  So now I have to do something on an ongoing basis to keep it loose, yet strong.  I may ask Elizabeth to show me her rotator cuff PT exercises.

145.7 this morning, while in "small" ketosis (up from "trace" or something).  Yesterday ended up being pretty fast-y.  I ate some cheese around 1 pm, along with bouillon at 11 am, and maybe a Godiva pearl or two later in the afternoon.  If the bouillon doesn't count, it was an 18-hour fast, roughly.  Here's the total breakdown:

• tea with cream
• the usual supplements
• bouillon
• cheese
• possibly Godiva pearls
• take out Chinese Green Pepper Beef
• Hot and Sour soup
• fortune cookie
• 5 chocolate cherries
• more cheese (3 pieces of Dutch Gouda)

I think that was it, because after that, I had the massage, and got home just in time to go to bed, basically.  I made a slight change in my supplements routine, though - took a mag citrate at bedtime rather than this morning (I'd already taken one yesterday morning), in hopes that it would prevent my shoulders from locking back up.  I think it helped with that as well as with sleep quality - I know I woke up at 11:38 because the double duvet got to be too much (I was cold when we crashed), and I recall waking up several times to roll over and thinking that my shoulders felt pretty good for a change, but I feel quite rested this morning.

I think I will also work on my mechanics while seated as much as possible - trying not to lean on my elbows so much, which I think was the origin of this round of shoulder issues.  Don't know how successful I'll be, truly; I might need to put spikes on the arms of my chair or something.  But I will try.

Tuesday

Fasting today - but not on my behalf.  The dogs had a vet appointment, for bloodwork of some sort, and couldn't eat breakfast, so we opted out, in solidarity with them.  I am now rather hungry, so it probably won't be a very long fast.

145.5 again this morning.  We ate pretty well yesterday, but I did have a small walnut bender after dinner.  Here's the breakdown:

• scrambled eggs
• bacon
• tea with cream
• the usual supplements
• cheese
• a very few Godiva pearls
• Grassfed London broil, marinated in soy sauce/ketchup/olive oil and garlic - quite tasty
• Southern-style green beans - pressure-cooked with onion and bacon - still need more salt, but I'm very close
• Cole slaw that turned out far better than I'd expected after tasting the dressing - I even had seconds
• about 6 chocolate cherries
• walnuts
• aged gouda

As predicted, it's snowing today, and the commute to work was a ruddy pain in the butt.  The roads are wet, a little slushy, maybe.  So, of course, everyone slowed to a 10 mph crawl.  Instead of 40 minutes to work, it was an hour and 20.  Just doubled.  It's supposed to snow all day, so I am guessing that going home will be similar.  I just hope it's not worse.  I have a massage tonight and I'm not going to miss it.  One hour, and if I have my way, nearly all of it on my shoulders - especially my right one.  Something has it all knotted up, and if I can just get it untied, things should improve rapidly.  I hope.

Monday

I'll just confess up front.  I have no idea what all I ate yesterday.  Bacon and strawberries, I think.  Lots and lots of tea - I went through at least a full airpot.  Walnuts here and there.  A couple of hot dogs.  Cheese.  Probably some chocolate cherries.

Breakfast was a sort-of-organized meal; we did sit down and eat together, at least.  Lunch was hotdogs and pickles.  But the rest of the day was catch-as-catch-can; Lee was not feeling well, and I'd spent the day fighting a headache, so last night's dinner will be held tonight, assuming we all are in better fettle.  It will be a marinated grassfed London Broil, southern-style green-beans, and cole slaw that may be a bit odd (I did some substitutions in the dressing that I sense are not going to work all that well).

It was 84 yesterday - and 80 in the house at 7:30 last night.  I can say with confidence that some of my sleeping issues of late have had to do with unseasonably high temperatures, so after we switched out the duvets (which did not help, at least, not on Saturday night), I also added in a light blanket, with the idea that we can sleep only under that on nights like last night.  And it helped a lot - until the cold front moved in; it's supposed to snow this afternoon, and looks it.  I did manage to get a bit of sun yesterday - not enough for any tan, but maybe some contribution toward my vitamin D levels.

145.5 this morning, so I can't have eaten all that badly yesterday.  We ate at White Fence Farm on Saturday, and I had two corn fritters and two helpings of their kidney bean salad, which is possibly my favorite there.  Call it a treat day.  I paid afterward - the headache may even have been part of the payment. 

Plan for this week is to get back into proper ketosis; it just feels healthier for me to be there.  I think I've overturned my need for sugar, at least temporarily.

On other fronts, the lettuce is starting to sprout in the garden, the carrots have been planted (they're my dirt-eating vehicle for the summer), and the berry plants are all leafing out.  I have hopes for a good harvest of all that, plus the tomatoes we will be planting in the next few weeks.