Well now Peg wrote a comment congratulating Barb and I on our weight loss program. But she raised the question of "what about the exercise program?" Well dear friend, the exercise program is something else indeed. We went out on a beautiful Spring day and (ahem) drove around the neighborhood to map out a one mile course. And we did find a nice route that measured somewhere between 0.9 and 1.0 miles .... close enough. The weather turned mean and snarly so that has been put on hold. We do have a treadmill at home and that represents another tale to tell.
Since we both have knee problems... I with both mine replaced and Barb with a split meniscus in her knee, so you can see that we want to ease into anything of that kind. Me, being the older, decided to test the treadmill first. So I decided to take it in 5 minute bites.. after all Romans weren't built in a day ya know. I got onto the tread and turned the machine on at the slowest possible speed. I looked and felt like Gary Cooper walking into Dodge at High Noon. Anyway that proved to be toooo slow. I only walked something like a quarter mile and burned all of four calories. The next time I cranked it up a notch as Emeril says and got a slight bit further and burned all of 10 calories.
Sooo I have got to ease this baby up to where I am walking for a half hour and covering a real honest-to-god mile.
In the meantime, I am swinging my dumbbells around like a champ. The first day I did three sets of 5 reps each for the waist, chest, arms and shoulders. This way I can re-build those muscles that I originally awakened some sixty years ago. The idea being that they will help me burn calories even when I am sleeping. At least this is what the internet Gurus tell me. The second day I increased to 3 sets of 10 reps and I died. Too fast, too soon. Luke tells me that I should do stretches before I made that comitment to kill myself. He is right I was so sore the next day that I decided to start all over at 5 reps per set... aaaah much better.
Anyway to sum it all up.... after 21 days on this diet and so-called exercise program I have lost
12 pounds and an inch or so around my... circumference. Too soon to call it a waist for now.
Wednesday, March 23, 2011
Monday, March 21, 2011
And the beat goes on....
Well folks... the beat goes on.. I hope you notice the larger darker print... cousin weak-eyes here is getting weaker. And that is probably because I have been working on my financial records over the last week or so. Now that the weather is getting warmer and I can spend more time out-doors I suspect that my sight will improve since I will be able to focus on things over a long distance. Right now I can't tell male from female at a hundred paces unless they stand sideways and I remember where the bumps are supposed to be.
During that same period, we have been on a diet program from a book titled something like..."The 17 Day Diet" by a guy named Mike Moreno.
I couldn't tell you what was in it because I just eat what Barb puts in front of me. And you can bet I eat it all because it isn't much.
As I have said more about this in the previous two posts, I won't beat this into the ground. But I would like to report that following this diet restulted in a loss of 10 pounds for each of us after the 17 days. This is interesting in itself because when we tried the south beach diet, we lost a different amount for each for the same number of days. Anyway, the diet is working well and I can safely say that I am down just about 12 pounds now for twenty days and I will definitely take the half pound a day rate for the time being. Of course I don't want this to continue forever or my forever will be up in about a year and a half. And I will disappear....poof.. at zero pounds.
During that same period, we have been on a diet program from a book titled something like..."The 17 Day Diet" by a guy named Mike Moreno.
I couldn't tell you what was in it because I just eat what Barb puts in front of me. And you can bet I eat it all because it isn't much.
As I have said more about this in the previous two posts, I won't beat this into the ground. But I would like to report that following this diet restulted in a loss of 10 pounds for each of us after the 17 days. This is interesting in itself because when we tried the south beach diet, we lost a different amount for each for the same number of days. Anyway, the diet is working well and I can safely say that I am down just about 12 pounds now for twenty days and I will definitely take the half pound a day rate for the time being. Of course I don't want this to continue forever or my forever will be up in about a year and a half. And I will disappear....poof.. at zero pounds.
Monday, March 14, 2011
Today
Well folks... I did not lie, I did not die but I did not try to write a post for about almost two weeks. My whole consciousness was taken up by this diet and my adventures in preparing for income tax time. More about that later.
Since I promised to report on the progress in the modern Battle of the Bulge, I can proudly report that this adventure began on Mar. 3, the day after Mardi Gras... appropriately known as 'Fat Tuesday', I registered 259. Now this is a modest 8 pounds in eleven days, so I was beginning to become a believer. Actually, I have to use weight as a measure because I never measured my waist size ... at the time it wasn't a waist it was a girth and we didn't have a tape measure large enough. But anyway, I have cut my way though so much vegetation that I feel like George of the Jungle.
Aha but we have made concessions already. On Sunday, we drive, not walk or run forbid, to Panera Bread where we sit in plush easy chairs beside the gas fire log in the neat fireplace they have for good customers like us. We luxouriate by slowly consuming a bacon, cheese and egg sandwich on chiabatta bread. This is then washed down by a large cup of their good coffee with hazelnut creamer... just visualize that. This allows us to forget the boa constrictor of a diet that had us in its clutches all week. And with this downtime we can solve all the problems of the universe.. in our heads that is.
During that same time, I decided to put all the financial data that I had for last year into "Quicken" which is a financial software spread sheet. But that may have to be a story for next time since I hear the dinner bell and I don't dare miss my turn at the table... little things mean a lot.
Since I promised to report on the progress in the modern Battle of the Bulge, I can proudly report that this adventure began on Mar. 3, the day after Mardi Gras... appropriately known as 'Fat Tuesday', I registered 259. Now this is a modest 8 pounds in eleven days, so I was beginning to become a believer. Actually, I have to use weight as a measure because I never measured my waist size ... at the time it wasn't a waist it was a girth and we didn't have a tape measure large enough. But anyway, I have cut my way though so much vegetation that I feel like George of the Jungle.
Aha but we have made concessions already. On Sunday, we drive, not walk or run forbid, to Panera Bread where we sit in plush easy chairs beside the gas fire log in the neat fireplace they have for good customers like us. We luxouriate by slowly consuming a bacon, cheese and egg sandwich on chiabatta bread. This is then washed down by a large cup of their good coffee with hazelnut creamer... just visualize that. This allows us to forget the boa constrictor of a diet that had us in its clutches all week. And with this downtime we can solve all the problems of the universe.. in our heads that is.
During that same time, I decided to put all the financial data that I had for last year into "Quicken" which is a financial software spread sheet. But that may have to be a story for next time since I hear the dinner bell and I don't dare miss my turn at the table... little things mean a lot.
Thursday, March 3, 2011
The Real Battle of the Bulge
Well folks.. I have decided to write on the fitness craze that is of interest at least to us here in the United States by telling you my own personal tale of...."The Battle of the Bulge". I have mentioned here and on my Facebook page the amazing job that Luke has done with his interest in the BeachBody program. In the first 90 days he has lost over 70 pounds and reduced his body fat to a meager 7%. So when Barbara came home and announced that we were going on a 17 day diet to lose weight I agreed, of course, since there are only two of us and she was the cook. So for approximately the next 3 weeks I will report on the progress that I have made in this insane battle to do more with less.
First, I had to take stock of myself. Most people take a before and after picture. I considered that and immediately rejected the thought because there was no way to touch up the picture and flatter myself as motivation to keep on with this silly idea .....so I just decided to go with the numbers. At age 79 after both knee replacements and a double by-pass this didn't seem like a good idea but anyway... Onward and Upward
First step was the scale... ugly really ugly. The 'survey said' 267 pounds buck naked. Now that wouldn't be too bad if I were 6' 2" but unfortunately I am 5'2" with eyes of blue so I just knew that I had a long way to go and 17 days wouldn't do it. But I decided to be a good soldier and GO FOR IT. My body mass index would put a Texas steer to shame so I plain ignored whatever my % body fat would be. And I started day number 1.
Breakfast consisted of two eggs and an orange along with the juice of one half lemon. The eggs must have come from a pigeon or a bantam rooster at least but the lemon originally was of good size. I squeezed the lemon into a cup of green tea and it wasn't half bad... the half that was green tea that is. I followed that up with a cup of water and two cups of coffee with a little milk and a packet of Stevia. The rest of the day was green tea(3 more cups) and finally a cup of water before bedtime. That's 7 cups of liquid and that was as close as I got to the obligatory 8 cups. But ah then the lunch and dinner.
Lunch was a salad.... a wonderful medley of greens and reds and yellows and the like. But it seemed to be endless. I was lost in a forest of lettuce and fetta bits and other nameless items that must have tested Barbara's cullinary skills to the limit. But that was nothing compared to dinner.
The good news was a nice chunk of salmon. The bad new was those hairy green hunks of vegetables along side it. But with grit and determination and Barbara looking over at me from time to time I managed to get it down and turned around to look for mycongratulatory scoop of ice cream. Viola! nothing. Somehow I will survive.
Now on to the exercise program. Fortunately I decided to start with 3-pound weights. This seemed like a piece of cake since I used to work out with 15-pound weights and lift barbells in the 100-200 pound class. But that was 60 years ago. Thee pounders as it turned out were more than enough challenge. But the real obstacle was the treadmill.
I decided to start slow. I put the motor on the lowest setting and started up the platform. It was like a Texas gunfighter walking into town at high noon. After 5 minutes of this torture, I shut it down and realized that my legs had been really strained after years of sitting on my ... computer chair. I managed to burn 4 calories and progressed a whole .01 mile in that five minutes. So I decided to call it Day One and crawled upstairs on four limbs and immediately crashed.
The next day dawned with the sun shining and all that and I weighed myself. Yippee I had lost 2 and a half pounds. Somehow it seemed all worth it as I plodded down the stairs to another breakfast of eggs and mushrooms. (to be continued).
First, I had to take stock of myself. Most people take a before and after picture. I considered that and immediately rejected the thought because there was no way to touch up the picture and flatter myself as motivation to keep on with this silly idea .....so I just decided to go with the numbers. At age 79 after both knee replacements and a double by-pass this didn't seem like a good idea but anyway... Onward and Upward
First step was the scale... ugly really ugly. The 'survey said' 267 pounds buck naked. Now that wouldn't be too bad if I were 6' 2" but unfortunately I am 5'2" with eyes of blue so I just knew that I had a long way to go and 17 days wouldn't do it. But I decided to be a good soldier and GO FOR IT. My body mass index would put a Texas steer to shame so I plain ignored whatever my % body fat would be. And I started day number 1.
Breakfast consisted of two eggs and an orange along with the juice of one half lemon. The eggs must have come from a pigeon or a bantam rooster at least but the lemon originally was of good size. I squeezed the lemon into a cup of green tea and it wasn't half bad... the half that was green tea that is. I followed that up with a cup of water and two cups of coffee with a little milk and a packet of Stevia. The rest of the day was green tea(3 more cups) and finally a cup of water before bedtime. That's 7 cups of liquid and that was as close as I got to the obligatory 8 cups. But ah then the lunch and dinner.
Lunch was a salad.... a wonderful medley of greens and reds and yellows and the like. But it seemed to be endless. I was lost in a forest of lettuce and fetta bits and other nameless items that must have tested Barbara's cullinary skills to the limit. But that was nothing compared to dinner.
The good news was a nice chunk of salmon. The bad new was those hairy green hunks of vegetables along side it. But with grit and determination and Barbara looking over at me from time to time I managed to get it down and turned around to look for mycongratulatory scoop of ice cream. Viola! nothing. Somehow I will survive.
Now on to the exercise program. Fortunately I decided to start with 3-pound weights. This seemed like a piece of cake since I used to work out with 15-pound weights and lift barbells in the 100-200 pound class. But that was 60 years ago. Thee pounders as it turned out were more than enough challenge. But the real obstacle was the treadmill.
I decided to start slow. I put the motor on the lowest setting and started up the platform. It was like a Texas gunfighter walking into town at high noon. After 5 minutes of this torture, I shut it down and realized that my legs had been really strained after years of sitting on my ... computer chair. I managed to burn 4 calories and progressed a whole .01 mile in that five minutes. So I decided to call it Day One and crawled upstairs on four limbs and immediately crashed.
The next day dawned with the sun shining and all that and I weighed myself. Yippee I had lost 2 and a half pounds. Somehow it seemed all worth it as I plodded down the stairs to another breakfast of eggs and mushrooms. (to be continued).
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