After a long break… 2011 is going to be my year!  I’m finally going to drop 30 pounds!  Even though the number I should lose keeps going up, losing 30 pounds sure would be a great start

My goals for this year are going to be pretty simple…

1) Get my weight below 200 lbs.
2) Get my body fat percentage below 20%

If I can accomplish both of those, I should be back on the road to personal fitness.  I might even be able to play my favorite sports without hefting around all the extra weight.  This year I’m enlisting the moral support of some of my family and friends to go down the weight loss trail together.

Here’s to a successful 2011!

Well, it’s time to get back on the scale again…

I’ve neglected this blog for quite a while now.  That probably gives you a pretty good indication of what I’ve been doing with my weight loss effort as well.

I guess I got complacent with maintaining my weight, but now that it’s creeping back up a bit, I need to pay attention and get back to work!

Okay, so after a couple weeks of exercising, I’m down half a pound.  No, not even.  0.4 pounds.  Good grief.

So, I thought I’d try an experiment.  After dinner we get the kids ready for bed.  I decided I’d get myself ready for bed at the same time, including brushing teeth.  After that, I’m only allowed to drink water.

Now, this might not seem like a big deal to some of you.  Maybe a lot of you already do this (i.e. don’t eat after dinner).  AP on the other hand, well… he likes to snack.  We’re not talking casual snacking either.  Let’s put it this way, if snacking were an Olympic sport, AP would be a contender for Gold!

It’s not that I can just eat a lot of crap.  I happen to have a super high tolerance for treats and snack food.  Along with that tolerance, I have a strategy that keeps me going through the most intense of snack-fests.  Alternate between sweet and salty.  Yes, my friends, that’s the secret.  Along with plenty of water, if you alternate between butter & salt popcorn (a huge bowl, the equivalent of two bags of microwave popcorn), and then about 10 mini-candybars, then back to chips and salsa, then back to a dozen cookies, then back to pretzels, then back to a pack of skittles, then… well, you get the idea.

I’d put a conservative estimate at 1,000 calories per outing.  And this is after dinner, before bed.  Not every night, and not always in true Olympic fashion, but let’s just say often enough and with more than enough that it’s time to put the freakin’ breaks on this snacker!

I’ll try this out for two weeks and see what the results are.  I’ll keep up the same exercise routine and keep ratcheting it up slowly.  We’ll see what the combo can deliver.  My guess is more than 0.4 pounds in two weeks.  Ugh.

Wish me luck!  (although this reduction in consumption won’t do anything to help the current economic crisis — think of all the lost snack food sales! — *sigh* oh well, I’ll have to find another way to stimulate the economy that doesn’t stimulate a muffin top)

Dr Pepper Cans

Okay, so anybody who knows me knows I LOVE Dr. Pepper.  I joke that “I can quit anytime” so I’m not technically addicted to it.  Problem is, it tastes too dang good.  DP is so good, that even if there are 10 other soda options available, but no DP, I can stick to water.

My soda consumption has been up over the past couple years from maybe once a week to several times per week, which I’m sure hasn’t helped the cause in the rapid weight rise.  Switch to diet soda you say?  Nasty.  No thank you.  Besides, diet soda is pure chemicals, so even though I won’t get as fat, it still wreaks havoc on long term health.  So, my argument is quit (or at least reduce) drinking soda all together if you want to improve health.

So, perfect timing for an experiment.  Since I just got back from a week of vacation and really didn’t feel like working out much, I figured this week I’d lay off the Dr. Pepper and see what happens.   Tune in Monday for the weekly weigh in and see what happened…

Breakfast has pretty much always been a struggle for me.  I probably eat breakfast about once a week at best.  By “eat breakfast”, I’m counting anything more than my usual liter of water.  I like fruit for breakfast, but I’m really lazy about preparing anything.  I know, I know… you don’t have to “prepare” fruit, but come on… pull out a knife, cut the grapefruit in half, get out a spoon, dig into it… who’s got time for all that?!  So, I usually just rush off to work and fill up my water bottle when I get to the office.

Occasionally we’ll have some Naked Juice in the fridge, which is probably my favorite juice.  So much fruit packed into the bottle.  Tastes great, but man, it’s expensive!

So, in an effort to take in some breakfast and get some “good” calories in the a.m. to keep me going, I finally tried making my own fruit smoothie this morning.  It only took me about 3 minutes to make, even though I almost faltered under the perceived and anticipated “effort” (ridiculous how hard this is for me!).

Smoothie recipe:

1. 1 grapefruit (just peeled it, pulled it apart into a few pieces and threw it in)
2. 1 cup of baby spinach leaves (it was actually a “handful”, but can you say that in a recipe?)
3. 1/2 – 3/4 cup of frozen mixed berries (again, who’s measuring here?!)
4. 1/4 cup of water
5. Chuck it all in a blender, whip it up and ENJOY!

It turned out great!  This not-so-descriptive recipe turned out 3 cups of finished product: a medium thickness, cold, easy-to-drink smoothie.  A bit tart since there is so much grapefruit, but I loved it.  I drank it down over my ten minute drive to work and it really kept me satisfied till lunch and I had much improved energy for the morning work session.

I’ll look forward to a repeat tomorrow and maybe start mixing in some other fun things