The battle of the bulge
Over the last few months I have been slowly but surely trimming down and getting back into a regular fitness regime.
Last year I went though troughs and peaks of working out, more time was spent away from the gym and my eating habits became particularly bad too.
Over December and January my mid section and my waist totally ballooned from a size 31 waist to about 33 inch in a matter of two months of bad eating and almost 76kgs too.
Considering the obsession I have with my abs and general weight the mess I was letting body turn into was significant.
So for the last six weeks or so I have been dieting and exercising with an almost religious fervor!
I have been doing a lot of cardio in the form of interval training which has had a significant effect on the shape of my body. Interval training is sort of like a stepped up and down intensity level cardio workout.
The intention is to cycle up to your maximum exertion in short bursts, but also to make sure your body does not get 'used' to the exercise that you are doing.
You also only have to do twenty - twenty five minutes of interval training which makes it easier to fit in to an already busy schedule. Mind you it's bloody hard going doing interval training and afterwards I sometimes shake for a while from the intensity.
But all this has definitely started to pay off, the good old fashioned pinch test (and getting into my jeans and the belt buckle test) all show that I am trimming down. Probably not quite as fast as I would like, but I am still eating and have no intention of starving myself.
I am back down to 32 ish around the waist and about 72 kgs, although I still have some way to go to get to the perfect abs obsessed body I want!
On the issue of eating though I have swapped bad snacks for good snacks and no junk food either. I have become a bit of a pig with carrots, celery, apples and bananas. I have also found a strange side effect from eating all of that good fresh fruit and veg is that I tend to get bloated while my body breaks down all the cellulose in the food.
Part of the reason I want to get trim again is purely vacuous after all it is only two short weeks to Gay Christmas - Mardi Gras and I have every intention of looking good for the party season.
In fact I have even started the tanning process two weeks out too, so I have a nice deep tan by the parties.
After all tanned skin can hide a multitude of fat!
Labels: food, workout
Myth of Low Carb Beer
The myth that drinking "low carb" beers is better for you than drinking normal beer is pretty much being debunked.
As the accompanying article explains it's not about the number of carbohydrates in the beer it's the total Kilojoules and of course caolries. You know let's face it the more calories you eat or drink the more you have to burn off or the more your body converts to fat.
And alcohol has a high level of calories which means the more you drink the more you need to work out to get rid of the extra calories.
The difference in calories between a "low carb" and normal beer can only be less then 21 calories!
So for a bottle of beer (355 mls) the following calories are found in each:
Pure Blond (Low Carb) - 107 Calories
Average Full strength Beer - 128 Calories
Average light beer - 100 Calories
So in fact the best option for drinking beer is actually a light beer and not the low carb option.
Oh and my two favorite drinks, white wine has an average of 550 calories a bottle (750mls) and my fave vodka has a staggering 1750 calories in a 750 ml bottle. Mind you when you have a vodka you on average have say 32 mls which is a shot only has 75 calories, but then if you add in lime juice and or tonic it can add or sometimes double or even triple the calories.
Medium Glass of White wine - 108 Calories
Vodka Lime Slice and Soda - 75 Calories
Vodka Lime Juice & Tonic - 150 Calories
Labels: food, health
Technology Sucks
I am having one of those days where every piece of technology I come near fucks up in some way!
The company web server, mail server and Intranet all went down at about 9AM this morning which meant I had no email or customer management system all day!
Then clients started calling complaining that their systems where down too. The web hosting company we use are technically brilliant but not all that good in telling people what is going on so I had no real idea apart from "a server has gone down".
In the end it's all come back and now I have to wade through a full day of email to check for urgent stuff I have missed.
Then at home our main server which runs our media centre keeps crashing and not maintaining a stable connection to the router.
They say things always happen in threes and it did today!
My ipod chose today to fuck up and I spent nearly an hour resetting the bloody thing!
I hate fucking technology!
I should be working tonight to catch up with all of the shit I missed today, but I am simply not in the mood and I think I might do a small bit of more work and then give up for the night!
I did pop by today and say hi to Mark from At my Worst and Best as I was rushing in between places in the city. I haven't seen him in ages and it was nice to very briefly say hi, even if it was for less then five minutes! He did put me on to a new porn site, Straight Fraternity, and OMG I think I might need to join! I so love straight boys showing it off LOL
Anyway...
I had a nice complement today from one of the girls in the office. She said that my waist looked like I had lost weight, which is fantastic since I have been controlling what I eat and drink for a while to get back my abs. I was totally stoked by the comment and it's made up for the rest of the shitty day.
I think I have gone down about two belt buckles and about the same in kgs, I will be happy when the "pinch" text comes back with just tight skin.
Labels: food, porn, work
Pretty exhausted
My tonsils have pretty much sorted themselves out with lots of antibiotics, liquids and vitamins. The downside though is I am pretty much exhausted.
Amazingly the meeting on Friday resulted in a nice small juicy contract, and even better the client pulled a cheque book out and paid her 50% deposit up front right then and there!
The down side of course is that the project needs to be complete by Wednesday! After a two hour meeting with the client I almost collasped athome for a few hours before starting the project and pretty much working solidly over the weekend to get the majority done by this morning.
My eneregy levels have been up and down, we had friends for dinner on Friday night, went out for a friends Birthday Drinks on Saturday night and then dinner with the boy's parents and my parents on Sunday night.
Oh and to top it off we did some shopping for new clothes on the weekend too.
Did I say I was still feeling unwell?
Today back at the office I simple plowed through the day of work, catching up on faxes (yes some people still send faxes and I am too lazy to have them emailed to me).
I am about half way through my To Do list for the day, but I am going to behave myself by staying away from the gym for a few days.
I have decided that even if I am not going to do the whole nasty diet I am back on the detox plan and taking all of the yucky pills and potions. I reckon even if I only get 50% of the value of the detox, that's 50% more value than I am getting now!
This day in History
I thought it should be said that today is the 62nd anniversary of the use of an atomic weapon on Hiroshima. Now a good day for humanity.
Labels: food, work
Weight Watchers points
My sister is currently on the weight watchers diet and is doing pretty well in her first two weeks.
Overall she has managed to lose 3kgs so far which is a pretty good feat. Personally I am the fattest and heaviest I have ever been, somewhere between 74 - 76kgs, when with my current musculature I should be about 70 - 71kgs or there abouts. So I can stand to lose between 3 -5 kgs of fat
In my ever increasing obsession with getting back in shape I was researching on the web the whole points thing. Apart from the site I found of circa 1970s weight watchers recipe cards (yes the image is of frozen coffee on a stick) that reminded me of my mother's collection of these cards I did find some fascinating other information.
Based on my weight I should be getting somewhere up to 27 points a day which would be approximately 1200 calories which personally I think is ridiculous. But the whole concept of points as opposed to calories is a lot easier for me to understand.
That coupled with the fact that I can still have some chocolate and alcohol.
Which brings me to the other issue, I think based on how much I drink that I really should cut it down significantly to maybe either only vodka lime and soda (that's actual limes not lime cordial) and one glass of wine a day or only one glass of wine in total.
It's a choice I have to decide I want to make how important is regaining and then maintaining my body vs eating badly. Mind you the positive health outcome of eating well is also something for me to think about too.
While I think of it there is picture taken of me in about 2000 when I was visiting the girls in Finland where one of them had lifted up my shirt and I had the best abs I ever had. I really must find that photo and scan it so I can show what my obsessed body looked like back then!
I think what I really need is to find a regular dependable gym buddy, someone who can help me at the gym and I can help them.
Crap I seem to get really obsessed every winter about this!
Labels: food, workout
Thoughts on the Detox
In the end I stopped the diet on Saturday after six days of eating only organic foods in the de-tox. From Friday mid afternoon the side effects of the diet and pills were quite full on.
I was getting almost crippling stomach cramps and going between feeling nauseas and normal.
Reading the comments about the detox have been really interesting. Yes I agree that a careful diet with less alcohol is a better option.
I think in retrospect I am glad that I did the six days of detox, although I would have liked to have reached seven days, but I will not use the detox pack again!
I will however have a few nights a week with no alcohol and start eating more fish than the once a week we do now. The thing I was reminded about during this was there are a whole lot of healthy foods that I enjoy eating and was ignoring!
I suppose everything in moderation and moderation in moderation LOL!
Metabolic Typing
I did finally do the metabolic typing to determine what my type was and found that not surprisingly I am a Protein Type with quite a high certainty. This translates to my meals should comprise:
40% Protein
30% Carbohydrates
30% Fats
I was surprised by the fat percentage being so high, but in retrospect it makes sense for me as I do like foods high in fats (not necessarily bad fats though), nuts, smoked salmon, avocados etc.
The protein came as absolutely no surprise as I do crave red meat a lot and you know what they say, when you crave something it generally means you are missing out on something in the food that your body needs! One other surprise for me was I should avoid citrus and vitamin C, and instead dose up on Vitamin A. I generally take a lot of vitamin C, being an ex smoker your body needs the antioxidants to help repair all the damage that was done.
But more interestingly I can't take Vitamin A as I had a massive overdose of it through three separate course of Ro-Accutane which did some serious damage to my body over a ten year period.
I have ordered a body typing book on eating and I will go through it and find ways to tweak my eating habits into what's good for me. So thanks Nick :)
Labels: food, workout
Over this de-tox
I am totally over this de-tox now. It's the fifth day and rather than feel good or refreshed or anything else. I feel tired, depressed, hungry and bloated!
I am seriously considering ending the diet tonight, but staying on the pills for the full course.
Of course some people have suggested that I should just "suck it in" for a few more days, but I am unconvinced!
Labels: food
Hershey's and Crisco?
This was priceless, I was doing a search to buy some Hershey's for when I have finished my diet and I came across this ebay store.
I never never seen crisco anywhere other than the sex store LOL!
Labels: food, funny
Hump Day of Detox
Today is hump day for the de-tox. I have lasted three full days of dieting, pills and headaches without sucummbing to the evilness of processed foods.
Well I did have a natural wattle seed bar with honey, but although it was 'made' it was organic and no nasty artificial colours, flovours or preservatives were used.
Oh dear God who am I kidding?
I MISS CHOCOLATE!
Only Three days left and then I can start eating again!
Did you know that it's really difficult to get Hershey's chocolates in Australia? I have a real thing for Hershey bars, I just love them! Last year when we were in the States I stocked up on Hershey's, only a few.
Ok about 4 kilograms of chocolate! I almost had to get a back just for the chocolate, but in the end it was squeezed into the extra bag we bought anyway!
The chocolate lasted about two weeks, yes TWO WEEKS to eat 4kgs of chocolate.
OMG I was such a pig.
But for now I and craving a Hershey's bar so much I can smell the sweet sweet chocolate!
Labels: fitness, food
Pumpkin Seeds - Dry Roasted
I know this is weird but there is an organic food store literally 10 metres from my front door. It's been there for at least six months an until yesterday I had never ventured inside.
Not surprisingly since I can't eat any of my normal snacks I had a look inside to buy some yummy fruit. Being adventurous I went in again this afternoon and came across some Pumpkin seeds dray roasted sea salt (organic of course).
I had a look first at the eating plan just to make sure and yep, I am allowed pumpkin seeds and sea salt! And get this, not only are they good for you but they are Delicious! Yes a wholesome yummy snack that helps the whole de-tox and they taste great!
I had a look through the entire store and have been wondering ever since how come I don't shop there for stuff in general.
Off to the gym tonight for another cardio session, I normally would do a workout tonight, but I feel that I don't have the strength for it. So instead I am going to do a 40 minute cardio session and see if I can't get my good old lymphatic system de-toxing as well as my stomach, bowel, liver and intestines!
Labels: fitness, food
I am a thirty something married gay boy living in Sydney, almost on top of the gay scene but not in it!
Why Sometimes blue?, because I love blue, but also I am sometimes blue :)
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