Category Archives: FitBlog

Day 477: Saturday Stuff

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Hello. Welcome to my blog.

So the Seminoles dominated another ACC rival today. Please file this under things that the Fotographing Fat Kid loves. I’m soooooo ready to go to a game! Okay, I know this isn’t a sports blog, either way it’s still an exciting time in Tallahassee.

I also have a confession to make: I haven’t done Insanity in the past couple of days. On Thursday, I wasn’t feeling that well and I went to bed early. On Friday I played racquetball with my friends Jonathan and Alex and burned about 900 calories. Today, I just kind of ran out of time. I’m at that point in Insanity when it has gotten a little repetitive (this is nothing new to anyone who does workout videos. It’s the circle of life) and eventually the program shifts to a different set of videos that are incredibly harder. For now though, I guess I’ll bear through it until then. Hmmmm… The issue is I love the results I get from Insanity, but the 40 minute workouts dominate the rest of your day if you don’t do them early in the morning or really late at night. It’s tough. Any suggestions? Has anyone else been in the rut I’m speaking of? Help a brotha out!

Breakfast: This morning, I went with Megan to Breugger’s Bagels which is pretty close to our house. They had a “healthy” bagel sandwich option with egg whites and turkey sausage with some red pepper pesto. It wasn’t bad, but then I read online that is was 9 points and had 38% of your daily allotment of sodium. I say healthy in quotations because while it’s still better than other breakfast sandwiches, 6 points of Kashi Go Lean is waaaay more filling and less points. Just kind of how it is. I also had a 3 point plain bagel later in the day. Even if you’re not on a diet but you are just watching what you eat, it’s still important to look at nutritional information online. The term “low-cal” and “healthy” are all relative. Just a thought.

 

 

That Time Megan and I Made TCBY Change Their Rules: (No, seriously.) So Megan and I are froyo fiends. It’s a little cray cray. Anyway, we have this coupon card that gives us BOGO at any TCBY and the one next to our house has a 30 cents an ounce promotion right now. Basically, we were getting froyo for 15 cents an ounce… that is until they issued a decree banning our extreme couponing of sorts (we also bought $122 worth of stuff at World Market today for $14, but that’s for another blog.) So I know what some of you are thinking “Coming Fotographing Fat Kid! They couldn’t have made that rule for just you and Megan!” Well get this JACK! So we go to pay and we told them we had a card and before we explained it the cashier said “BOGO right?” It’s like they had a picture of us behind the cash register or something. Coincidence? I don’t think so.

Oh yeah and the yogurt was good and that’s what we had during lunch time. We weren’t really in the mood for an actual lunch. Around 3 I had some spaghetti.

 

 

 

Free Pizza and Iced Coffee: While on our expedition out and about in the burg that is Tallahassee, we went to RedEye for some coffee and we found free pizza (don’t worry, it wasn’t on the ground. IT WAS IN A DUMPSTER! DUMPSTER PIZZA IS THE BEST!) Actually, there is a little place in Midtown called Luna’s  that had a trailer/pizza oven parked out in front giving away free pizza. They told us they were going to be selling pizza there on Friday’s and Saturday’s from now on and they were giving away free samples today! It was fantastic! The ingredients were fresh and their meat pizza was sinful. So many animals on one slice of deliciousness. I was impressed and I can’t wait for next Friday, Friday, getting good pizza on Friday!

Dinner: So after free pizza and afternoon spaghetti, we were pretty full for a good while. It worked out though because I was marinading some chicken breasts from Fresh Market in Stubb’s chicken marinade. They had been soaking in his delicious concoction of spices in the fridge for about 8 hours so it was sooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo good! Before though, we had a delicious salad with Bolthouse honey mustard that’s made with yogurt. It’s only 45 calories for a serving of dressing! We also had some sweet potato fries which were good but random :).

 

Overall, it was a good day. As always though, the first half of my week was good and then after Wednesday I make some bad decisions with my meals and my snacking. I really need to work on that! Anyway, I’m about a pound and a half away from being in the 230’s which would be so awesome. Just seeing a different second number would be so much more encouraging. I guess we’ll see. See ya tomorrow.

Day 473: Paula Deen and Other Fun Things

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I love Paula Deen. When I look in to those gorgeous baby blues, my soul just melts. Now, all I see is a PR nightmare meets a dangerous image of food that will kill people. (I won’t even get in to her being paid off by a pharmaceutical company. That’s for another blog.)

For those of you who haven’t heard, this morning Paula Deen was on Today this morning and proclaimed that she has Type 2 diabetes and that she doesn’t see it as a death sentence. Instead of recommending that those afflicted with the same illness should exercise and abstain from eating her fattening food, she believes in her support program and some medication that she (and Al Roker) is a spokesperson for.

The tone of the Paula Deen Interview was frustrating to me. She made it sound as if type two diabetes was like a cavity or a canker sore that you just bear with until it goes away (or kills you, or takes a limb like your foot, or… well you get the idea.) I understand her motive to down play diabetes, she has an image to protect and a product to sell. Sadly though, she represents the American ideal that it’s our right to eat all of the fattening crap we want and no one can take that away from us. Who cares if it rots our insides? Who cares if it builds up plaque in our arteries? Who cares if it makes us contestants on the Biggest Loser? As long as our taste buds are happy right? While Paula Deen repeatedly says in the interview that she stresses moderation on her show (which I have never heard her say that, but that’s beside the point) most people have no idea of what true moderation actually looks like. Heck, I don’t even know. I’m still trying to figure that out. I think this all really hit me hard today because I just dealt with the idea of food rewards this week and how crappy I felt after the fact. I know it’s cliche, but food really is fuel and nothing else.

On a lot of levels, I can relate to poor Paula. In an interview I heard with Deen on NPR a few months ago, she talks about each recipe and each meal as a way to commune with loved ones that she has lost. For the longest time, eating out equated to community. I’ll never forget all of the Taco Bueno and Pizza House I ate with my brothers in Frater Sodalis at ACU and the fun we had around those tables even though we were going through the hell of pledging. Since then, my idea of food has had to change. I’m now to the point where I finally am able to balance the social aspect of eating out while being able to stay within my points. With that all being said, coming from a family of diabetics, I knew the danger I was in when the scale kept climbing and my waist kept expanding. Even in middle school, I wanted to get tested for diabetes (I was 275 pounds in 8th grade with a 44 inch waist along with the genetic history. I was a prime candidate.) because I knew the dangers of it. I had already accepted that the Big D (and I don’t mean Dallas) was going to be a part of my life. Thankfully, the changes I have made in my life are constantly lowering those chances.

As a society, we need to rethink how we view food. A lot of us are still eating the way our grandparents did, except they were out in the fields or in the mines while we are sitting behind a desk in a sedentary lifestyle. I think this new concept looks different for everyone. Either way, you have control of what you put in to your body. Don’t let food have so much control over all of your life. When you are able to say no, it slowly (emphasis on slooooooooowly) becomes easier which helps you in turn make better decisions.

So Paula, (oh yeah, that’s what the post was about) you have a platform that could be used to show that diabetes could be overcome (or at least handled) with eating right and exercise. Instead, you are once again promoting the lie that pills make it all better. I guess we’ll see how that turns out for you. See ya tomorrow.

 

 

 

Day 470: Post Birthday Post!

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Hello dear reader! Thanks for being awesome!

So no post yesterday [awkward pause here] even though I had planned on it. Last night, we decided to make the drive down the gulf coast to the small town of Apalachicola, home of The Owl Cafe. It was amazing as always, and it made up for the crap I had eaten earlier that day. You see for lunch earlier that day I had a Fat Elvis burger at Tomahawks in Tallahassee. I know what you are thinking, and yes, the burger had fried bananas, peanut butter and bacon on it. I don’t know why I ordered something so fattening but I thought I wanted to treat myself. Little did I know that I was eating regret and grossness. That’s the last time I reward myself with food. Anyway, let’s talk about today.

Breakfast: Nothing like some awesome bacon and eggs for breakfast! I’ve missed that old standby for breakfast and I forgot how filling it was! Yumtastic awesomeness. 9 points.

 

Lunch: After running errands around town (AND WATCHING THE SEMINOLES FREAKIN’ DOMINATE THE TERD HEELS!) and before I played racquetball, I had a Boca chicken patty with an English Muffin. 4 points

 

 

 

 

 

Workout and Stuff: So I’ve been working out in my Zigtechs for the past 6 months or so and recently that have been really hard on my feet. I feel like my feet have been clamped in a George Foreman grill. Anyway, we went to the Shoe Box store to get our feet analyzed to see what would be the best fit for us. The salesperson suggested a pair of Vibram Fivefingers. I have wanted a pair for years so I decided to give them a shot. When I got up and moved around, I could immediately feel the difference. My weight was equally displaced on my entire foot instead on my heels and the balls of my feet. She told me to take it slow at first to adjust to them, so what did I decided to do? Why play racquetball in them of course! I didn’t know how that was going to go, but it turned out really well. I feet felt great and I had the right amount of traction. For my birthday, Megan bought me a pair of FSU Under Armour basketball shorts. They are freakin’ epic. (My wife is better than yours.)

Anyway, as I was saying, I played racquetball with my friend Alex who is in my department. One day in class, he had mentioned that he had came across my blog and that we loved racquetball. We had a blast playing and I burned a crapton of calories. Plus, I was in the fat burn stage the entire time. SAWS!!!

 

 

 

 

Dinner: Tonight, we tried a new recipe from Cooking Light magazine and it was EPIC! We tried the Maple-Mustard Glazed Chicken and had a side of green beans with almonds. The chicken was only 6 points a breast so it was a fantastic 7 points. I also had a Healthy Choice fudgsicle which was only 1 point. I also had 3 points of pretzels when I was watching football.

So today was really good in hopes it would offset a rough Friday. We will see how tomorrow goes, but whatever happens, I will keep on keepin’ on to drop those lbs. See ya tomorrow.

 

Day 467: Wordless Wednesday With Video!

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Day 466: Titillating Tuesday

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Today, I realized how ready I am to join the workforce, make a respectable amount of money and not have to worry about homework anymore. It feels like the end of the semester and it’s only the first full week. This is going to be a photo-finish, but what else is new?

(Deep breaths Nathan…)

So today was a pretty awesome day until it started to pour and I was sans-umbrella. No bueno. Overall though it wasn’t too bad, the class I TA didn’t start a mutiny or anything so that’s always a win. Okay I’m rambling. Let’s get to it.

Breakfast: I had a pomegranate Chobani with a 1/4 cup of Nutty Nuggets (Grape Nuts’ inbred cousin from Walmart.) This is a great breakfast when you know you won’t have a lot of time during the day because the protein from the yogurt makes you feel good and the fiber from the cereal helps you poop fills you up. 5 points

Lunch: Megan and I met up on campus for a quick lunch in between classes. We went with our old standby Pollo Tropical in the student center at FSU. I went with one of favorite meals, the 1/4 chicken with rice and beans. As always, I ditched the roll (empty calories are for trolls.) and went to down on some poultry deliciousness. Pretty awesome (but kind of greasy) lunch. 13.5 points

Snack: I got a late Christmas present from work today that had a few Hershey kisses so I had at most 2 points of candy this afternoon. Not gonna lie, I needed the sugar pick me up.

 

 

Dinner: So my birthday is on Friday (please note: I love Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and Pokemon cards) which means FREE BIRTHDAY SWAG! Megan and I decided to go out tonight and redeem some of the awesome stuff I’ve gotten so far. We went to Qdoba for dinner since I had a BOGO meal. I went with the Queso burrito, now I usually avoid the queso, but I remembered that it wasn’t too many more points so I went for it. I came not thinking much of it because what I get at Chipotle is bad..ish but bearable. Not to smear Qdoba, but holy caloric intake Batman my pathetically crappy birthday burrito was a whopping 26 points. I know what you are thinking and yes, my daily allotment is 28 points in the old Weight Watchers system. The worst part is that it didn’t even taste good. Also, I might add that only 100 calories of this 1150 calorie monster was queso. This is further proof that you need to have a strategy and do your homework before you go out and eat out. It also proved that this is a learning process, no matter how many days you’ve done this whole weight loss thing. On the bright side though, I found this awesome owl lamp at World Market. The Owl’s name is Hudson.

Workout: So unbeknownst to me, I had a lot of calories to burn tonight, so I’m glad I went crazy on some Insanity tonight. We did the Pure Cardio session tonight and while it is pretty brutal, the burn is addictive. I felt awesome after. I think the best thing about Insanity is that it makes the most out of your work out time unlike at the gym when you say you’ve worked out for 40 minutes while in reality you used a machine for 3 minutes, looked at yourself in the mirror for 10 minutes and you texted for 27 minutes. 8 exercise points

Post Workout: I had another Chobani and Nutty Nugget combo for 5 points.

So overall, except for the glutton burrito from Qdoba, today wouldn’t have been that bad. We were going to eat at home, but we didn’t have a lot of time so we went out instead. I’m not mad about the burrito, this is the biggest mess up I’ve had in a good while, but it’s just a part of the learning and growing/shrinking process. So today I ate a ginormous 51.5 points. With the work out points that brings it down to 43.5 (which is still grossly over) but luckily I still have weekly points! In my program, you have 35 weekly points so I have about 15 weekly points left. Awe well, here’s to a healthy Wednesday (a Wordless Wednesday I might add!) See ya tomorrow.

 

Day 464: Weigh In Day Time!

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Why Hello!

Sorry I didn’t post the last couple days. Even though I haven’t been blogging, I have been really good with my points and I’ve been drinking water like a fish. So last week I burned a bunch of calories and I can feel my body changing (no, not like puberty change) and it paid on the scale. This week I lost 1.8 pounds this week. Like I said earlier this week, I kept telling myself not to get mad or down if I didn’t lose a lot this week, but all things considered I’m really happy with my loss this week. I mean, I did lose three times as much as I did last week. I am down 115.4 pounds and I’m at 241.6 pounds. I feel like I have been stuck in the 240’s for a looooooooooooooooooong time and that’s because I have. My birthday gift to myself (which is Friday. Take note.) is to break through the 240’s for good and never go back. I know a while back I was hoping to be in Onderland by my 25, but you have to respect and understand your body because it will do its own thing (whether you like it or not.) I feel like we have a good thing going with Insanity right now. It is (very) hard, but you make really good use of your exercise time and when you work out like that, your body begins to crave healthy fuel which makes the diet portion of our lifestyle a whole heck of a lot easier. It also helps that our lives are going to be grad-school-strength crazy for a while so we have had to plan out our meals so we don’t eat out every day. The crockpot is going to be used a lot this semester. Yumtastic awesomeness.

Breakfast: I just had two low fat Eggo waffles (much better for you than the Walmart brand) and a tablespoon of peanut butter. It was a pretty good breakfast for being on the go. 4 points.

Lunch: After church, a couple of the young professionals from church went out to Red Elephant for lunch. I had the standard awesome Oriental Salad with seared Ahi Tuna. It was magical. 10 points (from what I calculated)

Snack: I had 4 points of chips and salsa. Hooray for awesome stuff!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Dinner: Tonight, we decided to hit up Super Perros for a little Colombian awesomeness. I decided to go with the veggie plate which had rice and beans, salad with honey mustard (random I know) and sweet plantains. I also had a chicken empanada which was good but a little greasy for my liking. Pretty awesome and filling dinner.

So overall today was pretty good food wise. This week is the first full week of school which will be insane, but it will be fun nonetheless. We also start back up Insanity tomorrow (Sundays are a rest day. A much needed rest day might I add.) which will be awesome. Should be an interesting week. See ya tomorrow.

Day 461: Thursday!

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Greetings!

About this time usually in the week, I begin to think about the good ol’ Sunday weigh in and what it might bring. I’ve worked out more this week than I did all this Winter Break and I’ve hardly tapped in to my weekly points so far. I’m worried that the scale won’t necessarily correspond with my success this week. I’m trying to comes to grips with that so I won’t get discouraged and derail off of the awesome progress I have made so far this year (yes, I am looking at it in the context of a year.) Whatever happens on Sunday, I am taking solace in the fact that good habits are being implemented towards the greater goal of losing weight like a boss!

Breakfast: I was in a bit of a rush this morning so I just grabbed a Nature Valley bar and a cup of coffee. It worked for the busy morning I had. 4 points

 

 

 

Lunch: So today I came to the sad realization that I had been calculating my favorite sandwich at Jimmy John’s wrong recently. I thought my Beach Club with half of the mayo was only 9 points but then I recalculated it and it’s actually 14 points. I have been recalculating to make sure I’ve been doing things write so I can stay on point.

 

 

 

 

 

Snack: I had some Nutty Nuggets (4 points) one serving of chips and salsa (3 points) half a Hershey’s Bar (2.5 points) and a partridge in a pear tree (too early for Christmas humor?)

Oh yeah, I had some fruit too. Super filling.

Dinner: For dinner, Megan and I met up with our friends David and Ana for dinner at Sonny’s. Sonny’s use to be a gluttonous orgy of deliciousness with plates full of meats and sides and other fantastic delights, so I’ve had to make adjustments to my eating habits there. Luckily (and ironically) they have a really awesome low point salad called The Big Salad. Even with the chargrilled chicken and the fat free dressing, dinner was only 7 points! And yes, that is half as much as my lunch.

SAWS!: Today was Cardio Recovery for Insanity. When you hear the word “recovery” you think “relaxation.” When I hear “recovery” I hear “death and sadness.” There is a lot of stretching and intense yoga. All I know is I feel much taller than I did this morning. 3 exercise points.

So today, I got to 34.5 points so with my exercise points I was a few points over today which is more than fine. Tomorrow is going to be another brutal day of Insanity, but I can wait for it! BRING IT SON! See ya tomorrow.

 

Day 460: First Wordless Wednesday of 2012

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[meow]

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Day 459: Tuesday Before Life Gets “Fun”

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The semester is going to be insane.

Tuesday through Friday I will be teaching a Public Speaking class. I’m a little nervous about it, but pray for those poor little students (maybe squeeze a prayer there for me too.) Anyway, it was day two of Insanity and… wow. More about that in a bit.

Breakfast: This morning, instead of granola I had Nutty Nuggets (a Grape Nuts knock off. Thanks Dave Ramsey for ruining regular Grape Nuts for me!) with some Stoneyfield vanilla yogurt. I had a 1/2 cup of yogurt and a 1/2 cup of Nutty Nuggets. It was really awesome. I also had a cup big cups of water and a cup of coffee to hydrate for the literal Insanity that was about to ensue. 6 points.

SAWS!: Day two was Plyometric Cardio Circuit was just as bad as I remembered. Working out when you are sore is terrible but the sweat that was gushing out of my pores like that wave pool at Schlitterbahn where you can jump out in front of the wave generator and get sucked under the current (anyone have a clue what I’m talking about?)  felt completely amazing. I burned a whopping 526 calories which means I got 8 exercise points out of it. Fantastically awesome workout.

 

Lunch: We had some leftover Hoppin’ John for lunch, which is super filling after a rough workout, and a glass of milk. Lunch was about 7 points.

Snack: After a meeting this afternoon I came home and had two Walmart waffles and two tablespoons of peanut butter. I was kind of stressed so I made a dumb decision and had that instead of a snack that would have been worth the points. My snack was 9 points! Kind of pointless snack but awe well.

 

 

 

Dinner: Tonight, we decided to go out for dinner because we didn’t have anything lined up. I forgot how hard it was to calculate points and even find a place that has nutritional information available, much less have meals that are calorically friendly. After much research, we decided on Chipotle. I cut out the guac (which I haven’t done in a long time) and Megan and I were going to split a cup of sou cream and we only got halfway through it! WE ARE BACK TO GOOD HABITS!  I feel like I’m back at Week 1 or something! Anyway, Dinner was still high, but the exercise points made it alright. Dinner was 14 points.

So today I got to 36 points which is just about exact with my workout points.

First Wordless Wednesday of the year coming up tomorrow! Get stoked. See ya tomorrow.

 

Day 458: Monday Post

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It’s Monday and there isn’t school. That is awesome. I’m basking in its glory before life gets fun, complicated and kind of sad. Don’t get me wrong, I love me some grad school, but I’m ready for a J-O-B! (You hear that future employers?) Anyways, I’m also ready to get my weight loss back in gear so my blog will be worth reading. That started all today by clearing off my dining room whiteboard made space for a place to tally my points and exercise points. Alright, here we go.

Breakfast: When we were out and about at Earth Fare this weekend, I found this dried raspberry granola cereal in the bulk food section so we decided to give it a shot. I had half a serving of the cereal and half a serving of Stoneyfield yogurt. It was really good and really filling. I miss yogurt and cereal as breakfast. It was 5 points (what’s with the bold numbers? I actually use to tally my Weight Watcher points back in the day. I’m back to that.)

Oh yeah, we also had press pot coffee. It was deliciously strong.

 

 

 

Lunch: Since I’m still kind of stuck on West Coast time (three hours behind) we didn’t have lunch until around 3ish so we went to Subway. Megan and I went with the classic Black Forest ham sandwich. It was really good with some light mayo and spicy mustard. It was 8 points for a six inch sub. Hooray!

Insanity Day 1… Again: So we have tried to get through Insanity a couple of times, but we have fizzled out since it is pretty rough. Today was take two (or three or something like that) of our Insanity excursion (that is if our friends The Wards still let us borrow their copy…) and it was brutal. Day 1 is the Fit Test which you wake every couple of weeks to track your progress through out the program. What I tested today is if I can survive. The results was yes, I can survive. Thanks to my new Polar FT7 heart rate monitor watch/chest strap, I am able to accurately track my average heart rate and calorie burn. In 27 minutes, I burned 284 calories. It’s good to know how many calories you are actually burning in your workouts so you don’t under or over eat. After our workout we ate a delicious salad with 1 point of this awesome Annie’s honey mustard. I forgot to take a picture but I’ll be eating a lot more salad so you’ll see it soon enough.

Dinner: For dinner I had two Boca burgers with the scrapings of what was left in a chip bag. On my WW plan (an older one, not the Points Plus plan) one Boca burger is only 1 point which is awesome. So with the bread, the chips and the burgers were 8 points. I was impressed (plus they are cheap at Walmart too!)

 

 

 

 

 

Snack: Tonight, we went to see The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo (also known as our generation’s The Silence of the Lambs) and they had $2 candy. We were planning on getting froyo after but instead we decided to split a box of Reese’s Pieces. As I looked on the back, it scared me a little bit because I would demolish boxes of candy like it was going out of style. An entire box was 12 points! Yikes! So Megan and I decided to split the box. Still kind of high, but not a bad treat for tonight. I had about 6 points worth. To quote my hilarious friend Sarah “No wonder ET was so lumpy.” Oh yeah, and these are my new glasses from Seattle Optical. You like?

After we got home, we had some popcorn (which is way better and healthier than theater popcorn) which was only 2 points (we are now watching Gilmore Girls to mentally decompress from a super intense movie… yes, we are watching the Gilmore Girls. Don’t hate.) I also had 3 points of waffles.

So today, out of my 28 allotted points (which I have over done ever since I was down to 28 points) I got to 33 points which isn’t at all bad especially since I have workout points. A great day. See ya tomorrow