Week Sixteen: Challenge #3... "20! Valley of Death"

In college we had this little trash talking teammate that always found ways to bust our chops, usually at the amusement of all the other swimmers. The one time we turned it on him was around the restaurant table. This guy would always over order! Mom would say; "Your eyes were bigger than your stomach." Today, Jaron and I nearly over ordered off the menu of challenges.

As mentioned over the past couple of weeks, Jaron scheduled a travel to Vegas this weekend for numerous reasons: to reward me with two UNLV basketball games, contribute to the local gaming economy, lose a few liver cells, and to join me on challenge #3 "20! Push Ups - The Valley of Death" edition. Since my Russian followers have vastly improved upon their 80 years of communism, the box of Little Debbie snack cakes will be held for a future prize. The total number of push ups Jaron and I did... 420.

In all honesty, Jaron had talked up the pain points of this challenge enough that I had mentally and physically prepared for the :45 minutes of escalating misery. Like traveling rim to valley floor, going from 20, 19, 18, 17... 1 was actually easy. But those crazy hippie dirt people at the base of the Valley of Death must have stored a baby grand piano half way up the south rim. This is same lonely desert was the last known home of the Manson Family! At 13 or 14 that darn Steinway dropped on my shoulder blades. The last 40 push ups were in a fog. My arms twitched like a plate of spaghetti on "bring your own epileptic to work" day at the Oliver Garden. Completion had all the trappings of near death teenage stunts; nervous sweat, colorful metaphors, and the customary "Don't tell mom!"

December 24, 2012, Challenge #4: 300 Workout
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ggiYjRelWgc&feature=youtube_gdata_player

Weekly weigh in: 198.5
Lbs dropped since last weigh-in: 4
Total pounds dropped: 33.5
To hit 195: 2.6
Weeks to go: 1

Country Club for Sanity's Fringe

One of the interesting functions provided by my blog service is  country by country statistics. Jaron and I are thankful for all of the fans following our journey and reading the weekly progress reports. We love that the 51st state up north is representing really well... Go Doug Wake... C-eh. N-eh. D-eh, all day, every day! However, this week Sarah Palin's neighbors over the Bering Strait over took second spot of readership. To all my new Russian followers...  добро пожаловать Ни в какие Жирные Шутки Пожалуйста. I am really sorry about the constant replay of the original Red Dawn on Spike; but who doesn't love Patrick Swayz, Jennifer Grey, and Charlie Sheen as Wyoming freedom fighters.

This entry may read slightly disjointed to people who are currently enjoying the life giving force known as carbohydrates. However, those fellow carbohydrate amputees, this will read like doctrine. Yesterday afternoon I received the following series of text from the mad genius.

JBK "Gonna send you a tweak (overhaul) of the current nutrition plan. Hope you like chicken/ground turkey."
JT "Love it"
JBK "I'll have you 'carb cycle'  for the final 2 weeks. Gonna be rough days ahead!"

When I first read the text "carb cycle," it conjured up visions of Nilla Wafers Frisbee flying into my pie hole like alien space saucers while sucking down Cherry Punch Halfpipe Fruit Chillers faster than the family assembly line could open them for papa. I could not have been any more wrong.

Lets just say this, Jaron's planned "high carb days" compared to my old life (circa July) wouldn't even make it past the EASY OPEN PULL TAB on the family size Double Stuf Oreo pack. Today's mid afternoon nap was plagued by a dream of me pacing through the grocery store isles screaming at Little Debbie for her oatmeal cookie version of foie gras. If the rent-a-cop had not fish eyed me on my way to the bakery, I might have embarrassed my posterity by paying the nice cookie lady to eat a snickerdootle and describe the taste. AND IT IS ONLY THE FIRST DAY!!!... the first day in the carb cycle of doom.

On a bright note in this symphony of misery; I have dropped 30 grape fruits so far. Half dozen to go! This Thanksgiving will be the 10th installment of The Chronicles of a Lost Southerner, which will be the only material substance for yours truly. As I munch on string cheese, green peppers and chicken, I hope my family enjoys their stuffing and pies. It would be great if NicoDerm CQ launched a carbohydrate patch in the next few hours.

DAMN YOU LITTLE DEBBIE AND YOUR SWEET CREAMY FILLING!!!

P.S. Pray for Jaron and I this coming Saturday morning. We are rocking out challenge #3; "20! Push ups: The Valley of Death" (Google fractional and then double the insanity). A free box of Swiss Cake Rolls for the first person, other than Jaron, who can tell me how many push ups that will be.

Week Fifteen: Calamari and Cardio

One of the major changes to phase four of my program, Jaron added a fifth day of pure cardio that needed to be around :45 to :60 minutes. As previously mentioned last week, twenty minutes on the tread mill boarders on torture -- so doubling or tripling the time just about crushed me mentally. It was an easy decision to leave the climate controlled safety of Gold's Gym to hit the open sidewalks of north North Las Vegas.

I have a little running back ground to work from. Back in 2008, a previous company sponsored some of its reps to run in the Red Rock Marathon. There was no way I could complete the whole 26.2; I opted for the half. To prepare for the race my training consisted of four months of neighborhood running. So when Jaron threw out the extra long cardio day I just went back to my half marathon prep. The first run went really well, just a simple two laps around the two mile perimeter of my neighborhood. However this week's cardio day followed a work lunch that included fried calamari for an appetizer. BAD IDEA!

Those sneaky little bastards waited until I was at the furthest distance from the casa to drop a massive gut bomb on me. Imagine having to throw up in a crowded mall with all the trash cans strategically located at another mall, in another city. Don't worry, I am not the puking type of guy... the last and only time I lost my lunch was in college after eating a crappy burrito with a chaser of crappier vodka. This time it was more of the horrible walk of shame having to wear the mask of agony. Dry heaves are worse than 3-D burps. If it was not socially frowned upon, I nearly flagged down the elementary school bus to hick a ride back to the gate.

Man, I was really worried one of the talkative retirees would see me zombie footing it down the street. Hindsight being void of near projectile vomit, I would've ignored a burning house and any tortured pleas, for the safety of my downstairs bathroom. Now that my gut is back to iron clad status, it might have benefited me to upchuck a bit since my stats this week dropped a big goose egg.

Weekly weigh in: 202.5
Lbs dropped since last weigh-in: 0
Total pounds dropped: 29.5
To hit 195: 7.5
Weeks to go: 2

Week Fourteen: A Creature of Habit?

When Jaron lined out my eating program there was less meat on the bone than a bulimic Ethiopian. It actually worried me. Weight lifting I can do, 5000 yard swims I can handle, and extra cardio... no problem. But I have issue with stagnation in my food selection. Even though my dear friend Kansas City Marty states that I lean toward the "food as fuel" camp, it is hard for me to eat the same thing every day. Don't get me wrong, Groundhog Day is in my Top 5 of the 1990's, but I would drive my local Subway manager off the cliff if my diet was the same, day in and day out. Don't drive angry!  

With all my complaining and whining, there is a part of me that enjoys pre-selected menus across the business week. To manage the caloric intake, having two or three options for breakfast and maybe five to seven for lunch and dinner has been fine with me during this period of resetting my internal set point. Once Jaron moves me to a maintenance program next spring, my diet will be less about an exact science, and more about controlling portion sizes with healthy alternatives.

In addition to the dietary regiment, I really enjoy the muscle memory of the gym. Being able to walk into a place that was once a road block my work life and relaxation pursuits. Now it is a decent environment that cultivates change and peace of mind. It is also good for the transition from structured work life to the the chaotic whimsy of home life. All I need is the clothing and running shoes and my body seems to go into a solid mode of "point A, to point B" mentality.

Even though the treadmill can be similar to a daily Chinese water torture; it can also provide a complete mental break from life. Its getting to the point where I can mentally track my progress for the entire twenty minutes, able to guess my time within a few seconds each run. It is comparable to when two guys hacky sack for months on end... their feet become extensions of their hands. For the past decade I have never let a cell phone hit the ground or one of our kids crash to the floor without a quick foot shooting out to soften the impact. This is the nature of a true creature of habit!

P.S.
The freaking circuit Jaron has me on during this phase is going to be the death of me. Burpees followed by push ups is the equivalent to switching grandpa's high blood pressure pills with the new 5-Hour Energy Drink in powder form and then yelling fire during his afternoon nap. I never knew my heart rate could get to 300 bpm and still be sober as a preacher on Sunday.

Weekly weigh in: 202.5
Lbs dropped since last weigh-in: 1.5
Total pounds dropped: 29.5
To hit 195: 9
Weeks to go: 3

Week Thirteen: Bite sized temptation

I swear Halloween was invented by satanic capitalist oompa loompas. They planted this faux celebration into colonial Europe out of revenge for the Dutch closing their boarders to them during the great Wangdoodle migration of 1752... Don't get me started on the theory that Willy Wonka is the straight man for the evil empire of short tanned foot soldiers preparing for a midget revolution. Yet I digress. 

Halloween has become the second largest grossing U.S. "holiday" behind the three month long Christmas season. Have you noticed that adults have hijacked this evening from the kiddies? What once was a night of sugar over dose for junior, has now turned into a festival of middle class sleaze. Halloween became lame for yours truly about the time my parents stopped letting me order off the kids menu at Bob's Big Boy.

We get it! You unhappy house wives desire deep down to be naughty librarian strippers! I'm not going to deny, its awesome watching grown adults in the uniform of their Id sashaying down the milk isle of Wal-Mart looking all trashy. The one day on the lap around the Sun that it is acceptable to wear devil horns and Lederhosen at the PTA meeting, I'm screaming "Roll play!"

As a parent, I still enjoy the time with kids as we go around the neighborhood snooping from door to door picking up pounds of bite sized temptation. Halloween is no different from the other days of this journey, as certain food vices float to the top others are mere background noise to the new diet plan.

I am cool with abstaining from Sneakers, Twix, Milky Way, and even 100 Grands... but for get about it when the little old Asian lady with all the cats drops a handful of Tootsie Rolls into the bucket. Just take a moment in your mind's eye to imagine me in the middle of the street, not caring a bit that all the soccer moms in their club attire were frowning at my behavior, as I'm rifling through each child's bucket for those sweet chewy chocolate goodness. If house wives can dress like a Hunger Games street walker for one night, then I can lose my willpower in front of the entire neighborhood.

Oh yeah... It is the end of week thirteen and the start of two weeks of hellish circuits. By the way, lunges are the death of me. Go Rebels!

Weekly weigh in: 204.0
Lbs dropped since last weigh-in: 2.8
Total pounds dropped: 28
To hit 195: 9
Weeks to go: 4