The Culprit (Part 2): Wife

(Welcome back to another installment of my multi-part series, "The Culprit", wherein I blame various individuals and societal sectors for my lack of fitness.  After all, blaming others to assuage one's own personal guilt is the American Way)

Just when I thought I was safe in my own home... naively assuming I had a wonderful, beautiful, supportive wife who is a constant source of reassurance and encouragement, having my best interest at heart... or at least, so it seemed.......... (duh duh duhhhhhh)

Did you know that men who marry in their 20s gain an average of 30 pounds in the first 5 years of marriage?

Allow this anecdotal evidence to be a microcosm of that larger meta-narrative.  The other day, Kelly sweetly says, "I think I'll make you some home made granola bars".

Awesome.  I love granola bars.

And home-made ones will certainly be better than any of the other alternatives.  So she gets some ingredients, mixes 'em up, and bakes a pan of golden brown scrumptious granola bars which she then cuts into uniform rectangular size and even takes the time to lovingly wrap each individual bar.  Sounds great, right?  She's the best, right?  Yes, I thought so too... and that's just what she wants us to think....... ........ (duh duh duhhhhh)

So I try a granola bar.  It's seriously delicious.  Just the right amount of crumbliness and crispness, sweet and savory.  It's perfectly balanced, and it doesn't have anything stupid in it like raisins.  (I hate to be the one to break it to you if you were unaware, but raisins suck).  She even put extra healthy stuff in there, like flax seed.  It was so good that I wanted to eat several more.

.... her plan was unfolding perfectly................... (duh duh duhhhhhhhh)

Until, a sudden hitch, "Hey Kel, what's in these?"  She starts to list ingredients, and there are a few in there that are red flags to the wimpy dieter in me.  I'm not a nutritionist, but I hear "butter", "honey", "peanut butter", "sugar", and "corn syrup"... and I start to wonder... hey, wait a second, there might be some fat and sugar in this delicious tasting food item.  So I get the full recipe and enter it into fitday.com, a handy nutritional calculator I use from time to time. Here are the results for the whole batch:

• Calories: 5,766


• Fat: 396g


• Carbs: 469g


• Protein: 166g

Well a couple things might stand out here, but because this is for the whole batch we don't really know anything until we consider what a serving size is.  One bar.  How many bars did this batch make?

12.

That's right, twelve.  Quick math: One serving size (a bar a little smaller than a deck of cards), carries the following nutritional sledgehammers:

• Calories: 480


• Fat: 33g


• Carbs: 39g

FitDay doesn't track sugars, which is unfortunate because that's something I'm specifically keeping an eye out for.  I can only estimate the sugar content as "high".  Now we have some nutrition information, and it doesn't seem "great"... but how bad is it?  What can we compare it to?  How about something that is viewed universally across the world as "an unhealthy meal".  A McDonald's Big Mac:

• Calories: 590


• Fat: 34g


• Carbs: 47g

So essentially, the plan is for me to consume a big mac ever morning (in a much more compact package)...

SHE'S TRYING TO KILL ME!

The best case scenario is that this is a long-standing, complex, diabolical plan to get me to fail, and somehow break my will.  The worse case scenario, of course, is that she tries to kill me to capitalize on my lucrative life insurance policy.  Or fakes my death, gets a light conviction, only to escape and ACTUALLY kill me in some sort of elaborate Double Jeopardy scenario... I can't really remember the details of that movie very well.  At any rate, if it's a battle of wills she's looking for, then she's come to the right place:

[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qZ8GdV9GdlA&w=640&h=390]

"in the warrior's code, there's no surrender..."

Rest day today. Distance: 0

Food was good so far, little cereal for breakfast, veggies for lunch.  Food: B (pending)

Weight: 229.6 lbs. A significant and inexplicable rise.  Not sure why... but I'm sure it's Kelly's fault somehow...

Encouragement

It's not always easy to eat healthy, or eat less, or lift pitiful amounts of weights, or run embarrassingly slow in front of strangers... that's why I'm so thankful for the encouragement I get from friends.

Like this gem from my friend Matt:



The ole "offer Dan Los B's before we sit and watch basketball" trick. Nice try, Matt. (his next comment may or may not have been a derogatory joke about my eating habits.) For the record, we had delicious spinach/mozzarella/ricotta filled tortellini in a basil marinara sauce. It was excellent.

And while I might get some temptation from friends (see my frosting fiasco last weekend), it's nothing compared to my local health club. Seriously, this is right outside the men's locker room:



Welcome to HealthTrack... where no matter what we say, we care more about making money than your health!

Not as appealing as Los B's perhaps, but it offers such immediacy, with the added bonus of almost unlimited hypocrisy. Brilliant. Anyway, I will never buy anything from this vending machine (and I never have)... but lest you think I'm strong-willed in regards to my eating habits, I feel compelled to admit the reason is pretty much because I'm cheap. Vending machines are a terrible deal.

My run, directly preceding my vending machine avoidance, was excellent (relatively speaking). Basically, I'm becoming comfortable running 5k, and just keep trying to run it faster. Once I plateau, I think I'll start doing some interval training to build speed (or whatever else Coach Jeff suggests)... but for now, I just want to figure out where that plateau is. This week I ran a 5k Monday, Wednesday, and Friday, and dropped about a minute of time each day. Distance: 5k

Instead of Los B's (yesterday) I had a bowl from Chipotle. Really pretty good & healthy stuff, if you're looking for hot food on the go. Especially if you are a master of avoidance like me and you pass on the (otherwise delicious) chips. Nutrition facts on the Chipotle Chips: 570 calories & 27g of fat. Ouch. Like I said... avoidance. If you stick with just a bowl, avoid the cheese, sour cream, guac, and tortilla, it's just chicken, a little rice, black beans, and some salsa... and still pretty delicious, considering it's really just half of the ingredients for a good burrito at that point. We had a grill-out at work, just grabbed a burger and then mostly fruits and vegetables, trying to keep it healthy-ish... but that will still dock me some points. Food: B+

Weight: 228.6 lbs ... I've been at this for about a month now officially, so I thought I would start posting this chart showing progress. Unfortunately, I don't have a *real* start point... but a couple weeks before my first official weigh it, I think it was around 245. (yikes!) So that first point is just an estimate... and could plausibly be a good bit higher. I'd say decent progress over the first month-ish. Honestly, I'd like the weight loss to be more aggressive, but I'm told this is "healthier"... you don't want to lose much more than 1% of your weight per week... according to people who know more than me.

Anyway, nice to see progress... and having a decent start (both with dropping pounds and gaining speed with running) is encouraging.

Cranking it to Eleven

I've been planning on incorporating some weight training with this whole fitness "thing"... mostly of the high-rep low-weight toning (or "wimpy") variety, but haven't really followed through because I wanted to make sure I was in a bit of a running grove first.  Well, yesterday was my half birthday (28.5 is an important milestone)... and I figured that's as good a day as any to start (I'm sort of a numbers geek).

So I ran a good 5k... actually a PR (again, not sure if I'm yet allowed to use "runnerspeak"), and felt good, and then went to go try to get slightly stronger.  I want to keep it pretty basic... abs, then just a round of upper body: bench, row, pulldown, butterfly, curls, tris.  Sure, Ideally, I would do more, but am slightly apprehensive to start too much, being worried that I won't carry it through.  So this will be sufficient for now, and we'll build from here...

Anyway, for abs I was doing reps of an exercise I'm unqualified to accurately describe... but it looks sort of like this (only more attractive, albeit a good deal sweatier).  Anyway, just when I thought I couldn't do anymore...

I was saved yet again by the ultimate motivator:

[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4eij5IGNNcc&w=480&h=390]

The Rocky IV soundtrack.  Incidentally, this is my 4th favorite song on the soundtrack... making it my 5th favorite song in any movie ever, just a notch behind "Don't You" from the end of Breakfast Club, and one notch ahead of "Your Eyes" from Say Anything.

Anyway, the song is right, not only situationally for me in that moment, but existentially for all of us in life in general... There is no easy way OR shortcut home (unless you mean from Escondido Elementary School, where I went attended the 2nd grade... then there's a sweet shortcut home through the woods).

So I completed what I would conservatively estimate were about 8000 more medicine-ball-crunch-things (see previous photo), and went on my way to grunt wimpishly while looking wimpy, trying to lift wimpy amounts of weight.  I assure you... whatever it LOOKS like I can lift (and I'm not under the assumption that you think it's a lot)... it's less.  So much less.  I'm frighteningly weak.  Trust me.  I know things.

That said, I had a good run, and wimpified my way through some extra weight training, so I fully anticipate not being able to use my arms tomorrow.  Can't wait.  But for now, I feel pretty good.  Distance: 5k

Food was good today.  Small bowl of cereal, salad for lunch, veggie stir fry for dinner.  Bam.  Food: A- (only a minus because, on an enjoyment level, I could have used some chicken on that stir fry)

And the Magic Number: 229.4 lbs.

Spring

Spring is here (yesterday, officially).  Which means, among other things, that I get to ride my bike to work (note: it does not need to be spring for you to ride your bike to work!  just if you're a wimp like me).  My bike, in this case, being Grandpa Greenzo...



not to be confused with Greenzo...



who, if I may remind you, is being callously carved to pieces by the soul-less employees of Cannondale.

Anyway, I will certainly add more on this later... but for the sake of brevity and simplicity, I want to impress one simple fact: I love riding my bike.  Even if that bike, for the time being, is older than I am and has wheels that are most certainly NOT round.  There is just nothing better than being able to transport yourself wherever you need to go.  Especially in this case, it's just a short jaunt to work... which I can (and do) take at a leisurely pace.  By happenstance, this also coincides with the aforementioned wheel issue.  Due to age, lack-of-roundness/integrity, and rider weight, I am fearful that massive failure of the wheels (the front in particular) is an inevitability.  Considering this fact, the potential subsequent effect, and the overall geometry of the bike, I prefer to assume a casual riding demeanor (allowing me ample opportunity to "disengage" should the bike essentially crumble beneath me).

Today, I rode to work, home for lunch, back to work, and then home.  That's a solid 8 miles (2 each way).  Then I had dinner and went for a run... 5k.  Felt pretty good.  Although I'm getting a blister from my new shoes... not ideal.  Distance: 8mi (bike) 5k (run)

Small bit of granola/cereal for breakfast, a smoothie for lunch, and homemade mac & cheese for dinner (Kelly made a big batch for the YL team) Delicious, but not super healthy.  Side of broccoli helped... (thanks Kel).  Food: B

The magic number this morning: 229.8 lbs. Finally under than 230 mark... about a week late... but good to see progress (not sure how that's possible after this weekend, but oh well... looking to really see some improvement over the next couple weeks).

Weekend Confessional

In contemplation of my actions this weekend, I feel the stirring need to confess.

Forgive me, blogosphere, for I have sinned...

I watched a lot of basketball this weekend (an action, for the record, I am NOT sorry for), but also ate a lot of junk, and pretty much didn't exercise.  I really meant to, in fact, I was going to punish myself with a long run on Saturday, but my sister was in town and she ruined everything.  Oh wait... this isn't one of those posts where I blame everyone else (don't worry, Emily, you'll get your turn).  For now... the confession:

• I had Chipotle on Thursday, and not the healthy kind... the delicious quac and chips kind (my go-to at Chipotle, bowl with all the fixin's, throw some quac in there, stir it up, and it's an awesome chip-dip.  This is old hat by now, but just thought I'd mention it in case you've not partaken... it's a gamechanger).


• I ate at a place called Flip's on Friday... I had a huge delicious greasy gryo with a side of fries


• On Saturday, I tried to eat healthy... I had a small bowl of cereal, then a salad for lunch, and then some veggies and hummus for dinner.  Success?  Wait for it... then I had some chips and salsa while watching basketball.  And THEN someone (Lindsey Hankins) wanted "something sweet" for dessert and had frosting but not enough eggs to bake a cake, so someone else (wife) suggested graham crackers for dipping in the frosting (funfetti frosting, mind you).  The solution, thanks to my friends/family: dipping chocolate teddy grahams in funfetti frosting.  I must have had half the cup myself, and that was trying to restrain myself AS MUCH AS POSSIBLE.  I mean, everyone in the room knows I'm trying to lose weight... and I. just. keep. dipping.  You can almost hear them thinking "Isn't Dan trying to lose weight?  How come he's consumed 250 teddy grahams and half a cake's worth of frosting?  How can any one man be so undisciplined?"


• On Sunday, I had pizza from Gino's East.  This has not been scientifically confirmed, but I am almost certain that there is not a more unhealthy recipe for pizza anywhere in the United States of America (and thus, the universe, since we're #1... U! S! A! U! S! A! U! S! A!)

and did I mention I didn't work out?

Yessir, it was a banner weekend for fat Dan Nicholas.

Unbelievable.

Distance: 0

Food: D

Weight: 230.0 lbs (according to Fat Friday's weigh in.  Saturday and Sunday both weighed in at 230.2)

Madness

Well this is it... the beginning of the best time of year.  Really, March Madness constitutes a high holiday for me.  Especially the first weekend.  It's the greatest weekend in sports, hands-down.  My enthusiasm is only tempered by the fact that I am writing this post a bit retroactively, after my beloved Spartans lost.  Pretty typical for the season really... terrible shooting, not capitalizing, and defense was lacking (at least early).  UCLA tried their best to give it away, and MSU still couldn't pull it off.  The comeback made it only that much more painful.  That said... I still love March Madness.  It's awesome.  (just wish the Spartans were still in the mix)... *sigh*

I ran yesterday and felt pretty good.  Knees still felt okay. Distance: 5k (although zero today)

Food (for the last few days) was pretty good.  Cereal, chipotle, a salad here or there.  Stayed pretty healthy for the most part, with a little cheating here or there.  Food: B-

Weight... first weigh-in since Colorado... frustrating.  231.4 lbs. Didn't really drop any weight with all that skiing.  I think that ancillary snacking hurt me more than I was expecting.  Damn.

Colorado!

This will have to be a multi-day blog, as I am out skiing in the beautiful state of Colorado.  Seriously... how did I come to be a resident of Illinois.  Folly of follies.

At any rate, vacations are always err... "interesting" for diets and fitness discipline.  Here is the goal: always eat healthy at home (and we're staying in a beautiful home, thanks to friends, so we'll be staying in quite a bit), always watch portion sizes, and ski really hard.  When we go out to eat, I'm allowed to be a little more relaxed, although still looking for a healthy option.  As far as beer... it's vacation.  I'm not having tons of beer, but I want to be able to enjoy some good craft brews here and there without worrying about it.  I'm hoping I can keep diet under control enough that I'll be burning significantly more calories on the slopes and have some expeditious weight loss.

---

Okay... That post was from a few days ago.  Ha.  Too busy having fun with friends and skiing to post on a blog... I think we're all okay with that.  Believe it or not I have not been flooded with reader emails lamenting "Dude, where is the blog today?  I've been reading every day, NOW what am I supposed to do?!?"

Anyway, at this point the vacation is wrapping up and I can begin to evaluate my efforts out in the glorious mountains.  Three amazing days of skiing... and I went pretty hard at it.  Chalk up three days of what I can honestly call "all day interval training".  Not necessarily incredibly aerobic... but a great work out.  Distance: ?

As far as eating... I did NOT go with the healthy choice when we went out to eat.  I couldn't find any in-between that looked good, so I just ordered something that I knew I really wanted... beer battered fish 'n' chips, with a Breckenridge Brewery IPA to wash it down.  Delicious.  Not healthy.  Also, I've been snacking a lot at the house, sometimes healthy snacks, but definitely some chips and dip here and there.  Breakfast and slope food were both very healthy... Overall grade: Food: C+

Weight?  At the risk of seeming uncommitted, I didn't actually bring my scale out here.  But I weighed myself on Thursday before I left, and the magic number is 231.6 lbs.

Oddly, I feel like I've actually gained weight this trip, despite the skiing.  I was really hoping to be below 230 when I got home... I guess we'll see...