What does it mean?

So, my dad smoked a pipe. He used "Half & Half" tobacco brand and it had a distinctive smell to it. It was a nice smell, comforting even. After all, my dad was the greatest dad ever and when you could smell his tobacco, then he must be nearby. I loved my dad dearly and I hope my kids will love me as much as that. Anyway, on to my point...

I have the office to myself today. So I have some Cash playing probably a little too loudly and am in the "programming zone". All of a sudden I can smell his tobacco. Dad has been dead 22 years now and I can still immediately recognize that smell. It was here for a few, brief seconds, then it was gone.

hmmm....I wonder what that was all about.

The strangest thing happened...

I am setting here working and listening to Pandora. Johnny Cash's version of "Your are My Sunshine" started playing. Margret popped into my head and I couldn't stop thinking about her.

She is my sunshine. Without her I would probably be some (REALLY) fat slob, with no kids, wife, or have the gospel of Jesus Christ in my life. I don't want to imagine what life would be like without her.

That is all.

328 lbs.

Well, another good week has come and gone. I worked out Monday through Friday, but not Saturday. That day, I helped a great man move his family and then spent the afternoon with my boys. I also stayed under 30 points all seven days.

Because I didn't get to workout on Saturday, I weighed this morning with some apprehension. I think of Saturday as my "last chance workout" to use Biggest Loser phraseology. But, I stepped on the scale and I am down 3 more pounds! So now I am at 328.

One word of warning after a discovery I made this last week. Nexium INCREASES your appetite! I took a Nexium last Sunday evening near bedtime. That Monday was hell! My appetite was through the roof. It was better on Tuesday but still above normal. Wednesday came and things were pretty much OK. Nexium is not an option for me at least until I lose the poundage.

108 lbs to go.

331 lbs.

Lets see...where to begin. Oh, yes. 331 baby! I have been consistently losing 3 lbs per week for the last 3 weeks. I really hope I can keep up that pace. I have learned that the rule "Dieting is 80% about eating and 20% about exercise" is absolutely correct. Before this dieting journey, there were times when I would have myself convinced that I could have something (cheat) if I worked out harder later. That is B.S. my friend.

I am not trying to discount exercise though. So don't get me wrong. Exercise builds muscle. Muscle burns fat. We all know this. But, exercise has had another effect on me that I didn't realize until now. I have a very stressful job and my calling at church is also stressful. Exercise gives me a release from that stress. Where I would normally eat as a way to deal with the stress, now I sort of "channel" it through my exercising. And because the exercising alleviates the stress, I don't feel the need to eat (read cheat here) and I lose more weight. I think this is key to the reason I am averaging 3 lbs per week. My concern now is pushing myself to get stronger and faster without injuring myself. My knees seem to creak a little more but as I lose the weight I am hoping they can catch up.

111 lbs. to go.

334 lbs.

Well, I was dreading it this morning. But, I weighed in at 334. That's 2 lbs since Friday. I think I lost a lot on Saturday. I along with 3 great men went to Paragould, AR to help with the cleanup after the ice storm that went through there a few weeks ago. I got to wield a chainsaw all day. Lots of damage and lots of opportunity to be of service to those fine folk. We worked at four homes and removed damage from almost 30 trees.

Whenever, the church does service, they hand out a t-shirt to all the volunteers. It is bright yellow and has "Mormon Helping Hands" printed on the back and front. Think of it as free advertisement I guess. "Hey look, Mormons aren't so weird after all."

The one thing I was dreading on the trip up there was the t-shirt. I currently wear a 4XLT and I knew there was no way they were going to have that size waiting on me when I got there. Turns out, the biggest they had was a 2X. Funny thing though. I stretched it a little before putting it on and what do you know. It fit...sortof. It was too short and a little tight across the midsection but it was comfortable. It didn't bring back memories of "Tommy Boy"...the "fat guy in a little coat" scene. In any case, we were so busy I didn't have time to think about it too much.

114 lbs to go.

336 lbs.

I have lost 14 lbs. so far. I started at 350 and want to get to 220. Let's see that's 350 - 220 = 130; 130 - 14 = 116 lbs. to go. Wow, how depressing...

Today has not been a good day so far...

My trainer texted me at about 3:40 this morning that he has a stomach virus and wouldn't make it today. Man I feel for him.

I really worked out hard yesterday. 45 minutes in the elliptical trainer and my average HR was 133 and I burned about 670 calories. I really had to push myself to not stop.

So this morning, after getting the text from Johnny, I am laying in bed thinking there is no way I can get myself to do what I did yesterday. I don't have the discipline (yet?) to make myself do the things I need to. So, I opted to sleep in. Dammit, dammit, dammit.

Also, I have been hungry all freakin' day! Just before lunch time, I got this unbelievable craving for Arby's. I resisted but it took everything I had to stay in my chair. I hope this gets easier. I tried to talk to M about it but I don't think she gets it....how hard it is for me to resist.

Its hard to sell 3 lbs.

[Originally posted to Facebook on 2/2/09]

I have been pseudo-dieting since October of last year and have lost 13 lbs to date. If I had been serious that whole time about my eating, I could have lost 42 lbs or so by now. That's 30 lbs more. I suck.

So last week, Sunday to be exact, I decided to "get my eating under control." I have been diligently tracking my eating and trying to keep my weight watcher points to a maximum of 30. For my weight, I am allowed 31-36 points per day. So you see, I am trying to be aggressive; and its working. I lost 3 lbs last week. Tangible evidence of my commitment. Yes, I felt hungry a lot. Yes, I wanted to eat something for no other reason than I wanted it. But I didn't cheat. I didn't give in. And I lost 3 lbs. That is encouraging.

But, you know. Dieting, and yes this IS a diet. Not a lifestyle change, not a new day, not a new life. It's a diet. I hate the new-age spin people place upon the obvious. Dieting is won in the trenches. You make one big decision at the very beginning and that is to commit to losing weight. The rest of the decisions (and there are thousands of them) are small day-to-day, meal-to-meal, minute-to-minute decisions. Success and how much you see of it is the direct result of all those small decisions.

Saturday was Ben's birthday party. We had friends and food. That was a hard situation but not as hard as I thought it would be after a week of dieting. I worked out hard on Saturday morning, ate very little during the day, and that night at the party I had 2 slices of pizza and LOTs of raw veggies with 2 tbsp of ranch dressing for dipping. In total I had 39 points. Not too bad. Sunday I only had 21 points to help make up for the fact I went over my allowed points the day before.

What is discouraging is that I have to repeat last week's performance 39 more times to reach my goal. That's almost 10 months boys and girls! Ugh. I so need a montage.