Bottlecaps

Resolution Monday: Wrapup

So, I made my 8 weeks. Lost another pound. That's minus-11 over 8 weeks. Not the 16 I was hoping for, but hell.

Some things worked well: I've given up the Cokes and candy at work without any real problems.

Some things, not so well: My exercise really hasn't gotten off the ground.

Some things are hit-and-miss: My plans to be half-good on the weekends were sometimes successful, sometimes not.

Either way, I'm going to keep going and concentrate on the exercise more, but I'm gonna quit blogging about it, because these blogs just aren't very popular.

Tomorrow, I'll blog about my Saturday night out.

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So, last night I posted on Craigslist that I was looking for the 1996 Luckenbach picnic poster. It's a long shot, sure, but that's how I got the 2003 poster. So I thought I'd give it a shot.

Well, this morning I had an e-mail. Some woman was cheerfully telling me that she had found what I was looking for on eBay. She gave me a link, so I clicked on it.

The link was to an eBay search for Willie Nelson posters.

I resisted the strong urge to e-mail her, and say "Oh! Wow! I never considered looking on eBay! Never mind that I was looking for a specific poster! I'll just buy one of these! Maybe I'll buy the posters THAT I AM SELLING ON EBAY YOU STUPID BITCH!"

I hadn't had my coffee yet.

No, I didn't e-mail her back. Later, I thought maybe it was some automated computer program that just looked for key words in Craigslist postings and sent out e-mails. The e-mail seemed to cheerful to be from a real person.

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Happy Texas Independence Day.

Resolution Monday VIII

Last week. Lost a pound again. So, 7 weeks, 10 pounds.

That's all I got on that.

Now for my inspiration:

Resolution Monday VII

Lost one pound. Wahoo....

Last year, my goal was six weeks. And, over the course of the first three months of the year, I managed to collect six diet-acceptable weeks. Not in a row. Of course, that might be why it took me six months to lose 15 pounds last year.

This year, 9 pounds in six weeks. Got two more weeks to go.

I won't go on and on about it. But I did manage to finally get that video of the boy on YouTube.

Click on the link to play the video. (I'm not sure why it's so herky-jerky. No, not the unsteady camera work. I'm aware of that. But the playback itself is almost stop-motion. Maybe that's just on my computer. Either way, I'll work on that. ... Remember, I am a recovering luddite.)

Resolution Monday VI

For a solid week, no cheating, good exercise, straight by-the-book. And I lost zero pounds. After three weeks, I was minus-8 pounds and after five weeks, I'm still there.

I feel the sense of accomplishment of five weeks down, but kinda bummed that I'm stuck. Anyway, got three weeks to go … maybe they'll be like the first three weeks?

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I've gotten kind of bored talking about my weight-loss bootcamp. So let's talk some more about Ray Wylie Hubbard…

Finished going through my four Hubbard LPs with my vinyl-to-MP3 technology, and I've got a 17-song playlist in my iTunes library that I'm gonna burn to CD this afternoon. (Including one Steve Fromholz song that came off a compilation album that just needed a home.)

Here's my list:

1. West Texas Country Western Dance Band — lot of memories assoc. with this one
2. Portales — the earliest version
3. Bordertown Girl
4. The Lovin' of the Game
5. Texas is a State of Mind — kickass
6. Dallas After Midnight — the one that doesn't have poser Jack Ingram
7. Lowlife Companions
8. The Nights Never Get Lonely
9. (The Last Recording of) Redneck Mother (ever) — no, no it wasn't
10. Hello Early Morning
11. Gypsies Got the Right to Steal — fun sacrilege
12. Freeway Church of Christ — more of the same
13. Runnin' on the Wild Side
14. Hard Livin' — I wish it didn't come so easy to me
15. Shifting Sands
16. Fool's Gold — special guest Steve Fromholz
17. Redneck Mother — found this version on the Lone Star Records' "Six Pak" compilation album and not sure where it came from … it's not on any of Hubbard's other records.

Anyway, I know you don't care. But I always thought if I wanted my LPs on CD, I'd have to pay someone to do it.So I'm excited enough to just ramble on about it ...

Next up, a double CD with Waylon & Willie and Ernest Tubb.

Resolution Monday V

Stayed fat, er, flat, uh, whatever. Point is, I didn't lose any weight last week. After losing 8 pounds in three weeks, I guess I was due for a letdown.

Last week was clearly the hardest week so far. You see, every time I try to diet/exercise, something always happens. Either I get sick (took care of that the week before), get injured (please, I haven't started exercising hard enough to come close, yet), or something else (boy, did it ever).

The trip to San Angelo for Blaine's funeral and subsequent wake would have smashed the diet for two days (that day and the day it took to recover) — but I had all but decided to go anyway when Shannon got sick, prompting an emergency room trip on Monday and tests at the hospital on Wednesday. The boy has had the sniffles, and we'll top it off with finding out yesterday that my mom was in the hospital for breathing problems.

That, and the damn cold made it hard for me to get the boy out for exercise.

Suffice to say it was hard to stay focused and avoid temptation.

On Wednesday, home alone with the boy, I did good by getting Chick-fil-A's chargrilled chicken and fruit salad (which, as far as diet food goes, is the best damn thing ever), but failed by snarfing the boy's leftover nuggets and fries. By Friday, when I found out I had lost no weight, I kinda just drifted through the day, rather defeated. Did I have a Coke? No. Did I eat candy at work? No. Did I get the sesame chicken of deep-fried goodness? No. But I had the ham & cheese from Schlotzsky's, rather than the dry turkey. The shame....

Anyway, even with all that's going on, even a bit fuzzy from the Super Bowl, I'm fully committed to Week 5 and making it as good as possible. I kinda liked seeing those two pounds come off each week.

Here we go.

Resolution Monday IV

Two more pounds down. That's minus-8 so far.

So far, this has been extraordinarily successful. Despite being beset by temptations and handy excuses for "oh, we'll just suspend the diet for one day" ... despite all that, I've not faltered and have been rewarded for it, both on the scale and in how I'm feeling.

It would be easy to imagine continuing to lose 2 pounds a week, which would be 10 pounds over the remaining 5 weeks of the 8-week boot camp. But that seems a little hopeful. Maybe if I can lose 8 pounds in the next 5 weeks. I'm bound to slow down at some point.

So we begin Week No. 4. Or, in other words, after the Super Bowl, I'll be halfway done.

I told myself before I began this, that if I made it through the first four weeks, I'd give myself the Monday after the Super Bowl off from the diet. Both as a reward, and as a matter of practicality — there's bound to be leftover food and, perhaps, a slight hangover.

But so far, each Monday morning I've woken up ready to get back on the straight and narrow. With no burning desire to be unhealthy.

We'll see.

Resolution Monday III

OK, we'll keep this short(er than last week). Lost 2 pounds last week as I mentioned on Friday, bringing our total to minus-6.

Kinda had a hiccup in the nutritional portion of the week last Tuesday night, but not so much for me to think I blew it. We're on track, doing good.

It's been pretty easy so far. I don't know if that's because I've taken the heretofore-unprecedented step of sharing with the world that I'm trying to lose weight, or if it's simply because I've grown more patient with age and don't have a problem waiting until the weekend to have something unhealthy.

What I am concerned about is how my motivation will keep up once I really get into the exercise routine and start rebuilding some of the muscle I've lost.

Yes, 21 months of lugging around an-everincreasing wiggly weight has helped keep a little muscle, but basically I can feel 4 years of boxing lessons shifting from my shoulders and arms right down to that great waistland in the middle.

And it doesn't take protein shakes and barbells for me to add it back, either. My body is equally happy to put on muscle with the smallest aerobic exercise routine as it is to pack on fat with the largest order of sesame chicken.

No, I'm not bragging. It's not the type of muscle that would make a woman swoon or make me good at sports or get me on a poster or anything. It's just the type that makes me the person that friends think of when they need their appliances moved ... that's pretty much all it's good for.

"We've got to move these ... refrigerators ... we've got move these color TVs..."

So, I'm working hard at watching what I eat and concentrating on stretching and walking and doing maybe the smallest amount of jogging. I'm thinking, focusing on my inner 98-pound-weakling and staying far away from the weights and boxing gloves.

It's working so far. Let's see how I do in Week 3.

Resolution Monday II

I lost 4 pounds.

Perhaps not really: before my initial weigh-in I had already drank a pound of coffee. And I've long since decided to not count fractions. In my book 212.3 pounds is the same as 212.8 pounds.

And no, I'm a long way from 212. But ... 4 pounds closer.

Week 1 of my 8-week boot camp was pretty easy. I was ready. I had no problem sticking to the Weight Watchers code during the week (well, OK, Thursday was a little tougher than the rest, but not hard), given that I didn't intend to do the Weight Watchers thing on the weekends.

The weekend was even a success. Sure, I drank beer and ate pizza and watched football on Saturday night (and it was all damn good), but I had a salad for lunch on Saturday and a healthy sandwich for lunch on Sunday ... and what I would classify as a "wee bit" of beer on Sunday night.

It's not the excess that had done this too me. It was the excess of excess. It wasn't the cheeseburger for dinner. It was the enchiladas and chips and queso for lunch before it was the cheeseburger for dinner that had me.

And I sure felt it. I was dragging-ass around everywhere I went in, say, most of 2008. I felt terrible. And I knew I was going to have to do something.

So I drew up this plan. My 8-week bootcamp. And I was going to motivate myself by making a list of not just the Top 10 reasons why I wanted to lose weight, but also a list of the Top 10 things I could do about it. No, I'm not going to share them all with you. This is a blog, not a confessional.

But my No. 1 reason — I'll share this much — is that I want to be able to play with my kids. I don't want to hear myself say in 10 years "No, son, Daddy's too tired to throw the football. Say, will you hand me that remote over there? And push that queso a little closer."

No, I want to hear my kids say "But Daddy, we're tired. Can we go inside yet?"

Of course, people point out that I didn't need to wait for the Monday after Jan. 1 to do this. That if it was a good idea, I should have just done it then. And they're right. But if I had that kind of get-up-and-go, do you think I'd be here in the first place?

So, here we are. Come to think of it, I feel a lot better already. My energy levels are higher — I think at work I was crashing from one sugar high to the next.

But there's 7 weeks to go. Maybe I shouldn't get too cocky yet.

Resolution Monday

I've been thinking about this for months, kicking off a New Year with a lengthy blog about resolutions and whatnot. But Shannon's been sick and today kinda got away from me, so you'll have to make do with something shorter.

• I'm kicking off the New Year with an 8-week bootcamp of diet and exercise. Or rather, proper nutrition and semi-random shuffling of body parts in a way that would resemble exercise if I didn't resemble a Weeble-Wobble.
• In a fit of desperation, I've decided to blog about it for the next couple months on Mondays. That way, I'll know that if someone who reads this blog sees me at work with a giant, beautiful, bubbly, effervescent Coca-Cola, then I'll know I've been busted.
• Seriously, maybe it will motivate me to share my progress online.
• Yeah, 8 weeks isn't going to do a whole hell of a lot, but I'm hoping that if I can stick with it that long, that some of the good habits and all of the exercise will stick and I'll be able to move forward the rest of the year, if at a slower pace.
• I haven't decided how I'm going to format this, or how much I'm going to share, but maybe next week it'll all make sense.

So that's that. Today? I'm halfway through the first day. How am I holding out? Well, it was too cold to take the boy out for some exercise, so we stretched a bit and I bench-pressed the boy until my arms gave out (2 sets of 10 was all I could muster).

Food is usually pretty easy on the first day of a diet. The hardest thing will be not having that 4 p.m. Coke.

OK, more next week.