Catch up!

So let me start off by apologizing for the slacking on my part Blog. I know you enjoyed spending time with me and I’m such an asshole for neglecting you. Lisa Facebooked me last night and said that she spent hours talking with you about how hard its been being alone these last couple of weeks. I can’t promise that I can change all that much but I can assure you that I’ll never go completely away. I’ll leave that up to you whether that’s a good thing or not. Now, let me catch you up on my life.

I don’t remember a lot of individual details for the last 10 days but on Saturday the 7th we were able to get in our first game of Frisbee this year. I was stoked. To boot it was like 68 degrees out. This was my first time back at the field of my ankle injury since October. There was about 18 of us to start the game which was a solid number. I was able to sprint a bit but as the game went on, I could tell that my ankle was not doing too well with all the uneven ground. Apparently my arse needs some new shocks. I had to split two hours in so I could make the Caps game that night against Florida. I’m glad I did. It was fantastic stuff.

Since then, the Caps have been on a 3-game road trip which has me longing for some Phone Booth action. Mike Green solidified himself as a Cap to remember and FINALLY I know who my next jersey is going to be… Hopefully before the playoffs. I think its time I add a real current caps jersey to my collection so I can actually rock the red. Now for a short “Get to Know Mike Green” segment (watch out for those simpletons from Regina!):





Broke down and went to Circuit City to check out the liquidation and of course, talked myself into buying a Xbox360 Elite. Still expensive at $315 but that’s $85 dollars off the retail ticket price. Picked up NHL 09 too. Don’t have a HD TV yet but that will come with time.

Eating has been a mixed bag as of late. I’ve been doing okay during the day. It’s been a mixture of healthy leftovers and Harris Teeter. Unfortunately for the diet, Megan and I have been going out and actually attempting to not be hermits. We’ve done Macaroni Grill, Chili’s several times, and a couple other places I can’t think of at the moment. I’ve managed to stay fairly obedient but things like bottomless tortilla chips at Chili’s is tough to say no to. On the flip side, I’ve been banging down vegetables, whole grain pastas, and lean meat so as long as they don’t use 2 sticks of butter per meal, I should be alright.

Went to the gym for cycling on Saturday morning and a fight almost broke out between two women and the manager of the gym. Apparently they’ve been saving bikes for friends who hadn’t signed up for the class yet and people getting to the gym early couldn’t get a bike. It was one of the most childish things I’ve seen from fully-grown adults. On weekends now they’re going to call each one of us to enter the studio in order of sign-up. Fine with me as I usually get there with time to spare but damn people… It’s a fucking spinning class not the war on terror. Had another KICK ASS new teacher that day too. I like my man David but these two chicks the last two Saturdays have been a whole new experience. I am literally less of a man when they’re done with me. Good stuff.

Valentines Day was good. Not quite as planned but good nonetheless. Megan and I were planning on going ice skating at the Wheaton rink and then to dinner at Macaroni Grill. Well the geniuses at the rink decided that Valentine’s Day would be a great opportunity to close the rink, and cancel their adult skate. So much for all those hopeless romantics looking for something to do. Does anyone else think that’s weird? We decided that instead of the cheap option, we’d go to Best Buy and buy Guitar Hero World Tour for the Xbox so she and I could play something together on my new toy. After a horrible customer experience at the Wheaton Best Buy (I’m not longer going to shop there), we went home and got a couple rounds in before dinner.

Dinner was awesome because despite the hostess screwing up our reservation time, we got seated immediately in a VERY packed restaurant while the line out the door cursed at us passionately. The waiter, despite bringing us water glasses for our glasses of wine, left the whole bottle of house Chianti on the table and then only charged us for one (1) glass of wine @ $4.99. Can’t complain about that one bit.

I guess I should address the weight issue since this is a weight-loss centered blog. With all the eating out I thought I was going to be screwed but after a good spin this morning and some light weights, I came in at 248 lbs! I didn’t think there was a shot in hell I’d be under 250 and in fact was preparing myself for my first gain of the competition. With this bit of good news, I’m down 21.5 lbs in 6 weeks which keeps me slightly above my goal of 3 lbs a week. Solid.

Anywho… got staff meeting here in a couple minutes which reminds me, I never told you why I disappeared. My blogging schedule had me doing most of my penmanship during work hours… usually around lunch. Well on the 2nd of February, Strathmore laid off 6 people including 2 people from our department. Put those on top of Veronica, our Ops Assistant, who left earlier in January for another job, and that gives Miriam and I 5 jobs to split between the two of us with no relief in sight. My only work time to write now is when I get in early on spinning days and can get most of my narrative done by 9.

Hope whoever reads this finds it in their heart to forgive my laziness and are doing well personally.

It may not be the right venue for you....

But it is for me!



This is my current inspiration.

First Goal ACCOMPLISHED!!

I don't have jack time this week to write as we've had a bunch of lay-offs at work and those of us that are still left are scrambling.

Didn't go to the gym Monday or Tuesday but after back-to-back workouts Wednesday night and Thursday morning, I weighed in at 254 lbs with 27.3% body fat.

That's one pound past my initial goal of getting back to where I was when I started the last biggest loser.... Now to continue to average 3 lbs a week the rest of the way and the money will be mine!

Catch up with ya'll later. Hopefully this weekend.

Well this has been one long week....

Here's the cliff's notes to get us all back caught up:

-Monday- Eat decently, Went to the gym after work.

-Tuesday- Went to a spinning class (a good instructor), ate decently during the day but as the night went on... and the Caps lost in OT after leading the entire game, I ate a bigger dinner than I should have and had some xmas cookies

-Wednesday- Couldn't get to the gym because of the ice and the laziness. Took this day as my day of rest. Went to Starbucks in the morning. Ate some banging Japanese style veggies for lunch at work, went to Cosi for a 180 calorie Tandori Chicken salad (amazing) and a caramel latte. Then went over to Marco and Lisa's to see the kidlets and play some rock band.

-Thursday- On 4 hours sleep I went to a spinning class (fucking old man Bernie again!), did some upper body and abs, had the staff birthday lunch (fresh fruit and salad with "healthy tuna salad") and stayed away from the chocolate cake from Silver Diner (damnit I hate this crap). Got a haircut and swung by Subway for a 6 inch roast beef. I believe Jared made my sandwich so I'm sure it was healthy. Sitting here, writing to you, watching reruns of Highlander: The Series

-This weekend I have a planned break from the diet for one meal as Megan and I are going to Benihanna's for our anniversary. Other than that I plan to hit up the spinning classes and watch what I eat.

-Next week is going to suck and I'll tell you why on Monday night. Its going to involve lots of hours and ton of stress for the forseeable future... but hey... It could be worse. I could still weigh 270. :)

-I leave you with my new favorite friends... If you'd like to meet them they'll be protesting at Strathmore on Feb 15th. Oh boy!

Yet Another Weekend...

First off, Megan got up on Friday night and we made the 10:15 viewing of the Wrestler at Bethesda Row. I miss that theater. It has so many good movies. I need to pay more attention to the movies showing there. I'll add that to the list of resolutions. I highly recommend it. Marisa Tomei and Mickey Rourke were both amazing and, who knew, but Marilyn Manson's girlfriend was in it (Evan Rachel Wood). Don't go see it if you can't handle violence and nudity tho.... definitely a lot of both.

Onward with the liquidation of my obesity...

Saturday...

I got up WAAAAY earlier than I would have but it was for a good cause: my first experience watching my buddy Brian coach high school hockey. Carly kept me company in the surprisingly too-cold-for-my-liking rink at Cabin John. We had Starbucks to keep us warm for a while. I had my regular.

I was supposed to go to a house warming party at BJ's and Lisa's in Gaithersburg and was all siked about it. Too bad I thought it was at night and it was really at 1pm. DOH. I had already made plans to help move some things out of my grandmother's old apartment at Riderwood Village (she's now in an assisted living unit). My Christmas present to her and the rest of that side of the family was to work on digitizing all of grandmom's photos. I have about 12 boxes full with um. Needless to say I'll be sharing many of them as time progresses.

Also managed to get some decent furniture that I remember from my childhood that she couldn't fit in the new place. My prized possession from the search was her old table-top Asian lantern lamp. Its a perfect desk light.

Came home and had a Indian veggie burger from Trader Joe's on half a pita. Megan then went off babysitting (a job I'm glad Im not a part of), and I caught up on BSG, True Blood, Dirty Jobs, and watched the NHL All-star Skills competition while doing a good amount of laundry. During this time I was snacking on pretzel crisps from T.J.'s (insanely low calories!!) and some salsa. Megan came home at like 11:30 but I was already passed out.

Sunday...

Got up at 7:30 or so and went to a spinning class. Of the three I've been to, this was the first with a different instructor. His name was Bernie. I was expecting a big athletic black dude. I got a 60 y/o spindly white dude. He played a couple of P!nk songs and some Black Eyed Peas but for the most part his music selection sucked, there were awkward breaks between tunes, you couldn't understand a word of what was coming out of his mouth, and what you could wasn't enough to really keep me engaged. I ended up pushing myself through it harder than was intended which was good I guess. Good news is now I know he is always here on Sunday mornings... so I just wont come to them. Bad news is, other than saturday morning (David who is awesome), and Sundays with Bernie, the rest of the classes throughout the week are a random draw of 4 instructors. Guess I'll have to keep my fingers crossed I don't end up with him too often.

Came home, took apart and put away the Christmas tree, and ate another veggie burger and 1/2 pita. Ran some errands (grandmom's, Kohls, and SuperFresh) and now here I am getting ready to watch me some NHL All-Star game.

In case you missed it I'll leave you with Alexander Ovechkin's skill shot winner from last night. (BTW they didn't mention it at all but Ovi's a right-handed shooter... he shot this with his left.)



Weigh-In is tomorrow. Keep the fingers crossed for me!

Yikes

So now with our assistant Veronica gone, the work has piled up and for the last two days I haven't even had the time to breathe, eat lunch, or read any blogs. My normal tradition of writing a blog entry sometime during the day has completely gone out the window. Let me briefly catch up and then hopefully, its off to a night on Bethesda Row.

Tuesday was nuts. NUTS. I made a ton of $$$ but I worked hard and some crazy hours down at the National Harbor. Cool place. I might actually check it out once it warms up a bit. We were loading out the Texas Inaugural Ball with, I believe, Bette Middler as the talent (from the previous night). Had a clif bar at about 12:30 during a 15 minute break. We got lunch break at around 3:30pm. We got some pulled pork and pasta salad. I had some of both with some pickles. I knew the day wasn't over and I needed my energy. Luckily, I was working all the bad calories off. Got sent home until 1 am when we were scheduled to load out the African Ball that had Patti Labelle as the talent. While I was home I watched the Caps lose to the Sens (damn you Semin and your stupid penalties) and had a wrap with lunch meat and mustard. Got back to the Harbor at around 12:30. The show wasn't over until about 2 and we worked until about 6am. Got home at about 6:45 am. Slept until about 8:45 and went to my normal job. Needless to say I told the gym to fuck itself this morning.

Jacked up on a sugar free, heavily caffeinated energy drink and a frozen clif bar I found in my car, I made it to lunch where I had a salad with some boiled spinach type stuff and a couple pieces of lamb. Not the leanest meat but it wasn't much. Went home insanely jittery and unable to sleep I cooked up some homemade pasta sauce and boiled some potato and onion perogies. Not great but not bad either and I just needed the carbs so I wouldn't be dead the next day. Watched lost and it was pretty good... but don't get me started on my opinion of them re-inventing time travel. I don't think I like where they're going with it.

Thursday brought the first day without Veronica and I hadn't really felt it too much because myself, the Director and the EVP of Ops were in meetings all day. We didn't get back to our desks much before 3. Sometime during that span I had a turkey burger salad with some mushrooms and onions. It was bueno. Went to the gym for about 90 minutes and got a smoothie afterward. Came home and ate the rest of the perogies and sauce. Went to Trader Joes to pick up my favorite flax seed pasta only to find out it was discontinued and that they had no clif bars that I hadn't tried already (the point was to buy a new flavor). I did find some really healthy salty snack foods for those tough nights and some cool veggie burgers. All for $28 bucks to boot! Not too shabby. I fell asleep at like at 10:15, fully dressed, smelling of gym sweat. Woke up the next morning. Way to go tough guy!

Friday had me crawling to the gym but made it. Used the treadmill for a bit and didn't like it. Didn't burn the kid of calories I wanted versus what my body could handle and my ankle didn't like all the impact. I finished with a hard cardio program on the elliptical. Had a smoothie to boost my pathetic energy level. Work was one from hell today... Worked at my desk ALL day minus one 20 minute tour around 11:30. Had a lean steak and cheese pocket. There was some crazy baby shower that there were leftovers from so I had some salad with grilled chicken breast and a little pasta salad... oh and a bite of a veggie quiche because I was curious. I ate more pasta than I should have (which should have been none) but I was having a rough day. Give a brother a break.

Here I am now about to finish the blog. Haven't had dinner yet. Megan is passed out. We were going to Cafe Deluxe for dinner but I guess thats not happenin'. Hopefully we'll still go to the Wrestler tonight. If not I may go see it myself tomorrow while shes babysitting.

Oh and throughout this whole contest I have been drinking a minimum of 64oz of water a day. Thanks to the Lipton tea-to-go packets I actually enjoy it (one even has caffeine in it as a main ingredient)! Gotta run but I'll add pics and crap later... maybe.

3rd Weigh-In... Kinda

So I didn't get a chance to weigh-in on the scale at Strathmore (the one that everyone is using for the contest) but after a vicious 6am spinning class I get home and weigh in on my bathroom scale... definitely says I only lost a 1/2 lbs for the week. Despite my food intake over the weekend, I doubted that was right. I used the scale downstairs before taking my shower and SHOCKER it says I was 10 lbs lighter. TEN! Not a chance that was right either (that scale is older than I am so w/e). So I'm hoping that I'm down 5 but no one will know until tomorrow when I get back to work. It may be a little late but I'm sure no one will grill me.

Happy Inaugural. I'm off to the National Harbor. Opposite of all the traffic. How money is that? I leave you with Mandy Moore.... and someone even cooler.