I remembered to update the twitter food feed.  I’m going to start eating a little something for breakfasts in the morning.  Something, I haven’t done much of in the past.  I’m just not hungry in the morning. Before you give me all “Most-Important-Meal-Of-The-Day” crap, I’ll just point out that it’s almost worse to eat when you are not hungry.  Anyway.  I accidentally bought a box of Nutrigrain bars from Costsco this weekend, so I’ll have them for breakfast on the next month or so.

I am going to really start focusing on this weightloss stuff.  It really kind of hit me this weekend.  It’s really time to focus.

So in that vain, I brought all the clothes I need in do a couple weighted miles after work today.  There is a park not to far from here Murphy Candler Park, has nice loop around a lake.  I used to cut across the northern part of this trail, when I would walk to work last summer.  (I lived and worked in a different place at that time..)  Interestingly I was told that was a one mile loop, but according that that link it’s 2.2 miles.  I guess we’ll find out tonight, when I hike it with my GPS.  I’ve got about 30lbs in a day pack.  (two 12lbs, and one 6.6lbs (3kg) medicine balls)  I don’t want to make it too rough on this first hike.  I’d like to do at least 2 miles tonight, I’ve given myself about 2 hours to get it done, (I would like to be home by 6)  If all goes well, I’ll make this a regular thing.

This weekend was a good weekend I suppose, I didn’t do much.  It was a very soft weekend, as in rainy.  Some fantastic thunderstorms.  Which Saturday Morning I hiked in ( for about an hour before it cleared up ) and it was nice.  I was the only person on the trail, and though it was muddy and sloppy, it was still peaceful.  I saw a couple deer, and got in a little over 5.5 miles.

I forgot to download the pictures from my camera.  I’ll try to do that when I get home.  Meanwhile, here’s a link to a website that has some general pictures of the park.

http://www.groundedgraphics.com/hiking-trails/little-mulberry-trail.php

A sample Picture from the website:

This may be TMI, but either I have a fast metabolism or beets just run through me…

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So I realized that if I’m going to take this weight loss thing serious this year I should use this blog a little more seriously as well… It’s also a good place to capture Recipes.

So, I apologize in advance if this get’s repetitive, but I’ll be forced to post pictures of food, and recipes, and whatnots.  I also need to keep up on the stupid Food Twitter Feed.  I’ll work on that, but it’ll be tough to remember…

Lunch!

Jerk Chicken & Ham Sandwich (Sliced Honey Ham, Sliced Roasted Chicken, Mayo & “Jerk Sauce” on Green Onion and Cheddar Potato Roll), Oven Roasted Beets (Recipe Below), Granola Bar (Banana, Peanut Butter, & Chocolate / Monkey Brand), Water

So, If nothing else, this new job I started this year has me eating better for lunch.  The cafeteria is crap, and I rarely leave my desk for lunch…  Now I just need to get my Dinner healthified.

I think healthy eating may kill me… At least it’s an excuse to cook.

**Note** Remember that if you eat red beets at work, your coworkers may think you look like a feeding vampire.

Oven Roasted Beet Recipe

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Apparently I am half a Philly Cheesesteak, a handful of asparagus spears, an apple, and a granola bar.

Man, I’m a very complicated guy…

Yesterday was a pretty good day.  I needed it.  It had been a pretty rough week to be completely open and honest.  My stress levels over the week, where off the charts.  There have been a few times in my life I’ve been that stressed, and they have almost without exception, pushed me off into some deeper depression.  Sometimes, leading to life altering choices… Some good, Some Bad.

This time was different.  I had a really bad day Thursday, and handled it as I normally do.  ( in context of this blog, that included a pint of vanilla ice cream… )  I went to bed pretty early, and woke up in a strangely happier mood.  Things got dramatically better the next day.  There is a bit of history behind this statement, that I’ve talked about in other blogs, but simply put, I had to force myself to “Focus on and Enjoy the Now, and Worry less about the later.”  It helped a lot.

Yesterday, I got out on the trail.  The stars aligned in a few ways, and the hike was almost a perfect day hike.  It was cold, (30-45 degrees) clear, and sunny.  Great hiking company.  The Trail was challenging.  I mean, this was arguably one of the best hikes I’ve done for a lot of reasons.

The Trail itself was a 7 mile loop.  Effective half the Appalachian Trail, and half the Benton McKaye Trail.  It was a pretty challenging hike physically, at least for me and my fat ass.  there was a 1,200ft elevation change.  Meaning we went down 1,200ft and then back up.  (Technically speaking we had a loss of about 1200ft, and a gain of 1200ft since this was a loop.)  To give you some comparison, that is about an 80 Story building.. or a little less than the height of the Trump Hotel in Chicago.  This gain was in about 3 miles, which seems unimaginably long, when your gaining that amount of evelcation.

Also, and embarrassingly enough, another exciting part of this hike for me is I got to try out my new Garmin ForeTrex 401.  This was my first Garmin Product, and the first real GPS tracking I’ve done on my hikes.  Up until that point, I’ve generally used the AGPS on my phone to track my hikes through “imapmyrun.com” app.  Don’t get me wrong, this worked well, but the battery life was tough, and without a phone signal the AGPS kinda sucks.  I have experimented with some other “Trail Computers”, which are kind of pseudoGPS, like the i-gotU GT-800 and the Locosys Genie BGT-31.  Both of which have thier strengths.  The major one being battery life, and USB Rechargeable (and thusly solar) batteries.  But they also have some quirks.  The GT800 has absolutely ZERO MacOSX support.  Which really sucks, as it has fantastic battery life, and a very small form factor.  And the BGT-31 froze up literally the first time I used it.  I had to manually unscrew the back (with tiny screwdrivers, like you would use on eye glasses.) and disconnect the battery to reset the device.  No reset button, or even an easily accessible back panel to handle this.

So far the battery life on the Foretrex isn’t awful.  With 2 brand new AAA Alkaline batteries it only lost one bar off the indicator after 5 hours.  I am supposed to be able to put Li-on batteries in the thing and it’ll charge them off USB.  But I haven’t got around to getting those batteries yet.  Next time I’m out I’ll look for them.

Anyway I REALY like this foretrex.  Go Garmin, the hometown (Kansas City) Heros.

Here’s the map of the hike, off Garmin’s web-based interface.  Which is also pretty impressive.

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“It is better to take many small steps in the right direction than to make a great leap forward only to stumble backward.” -Chinese Proverb

I’m not sure I agree with the quote in the title of this post.  It to some degree implies that you won’t fall backwards if you take small steps.  Which I think we can all agree is nonsense.  I’ve fallen backwards many times after many small steps.  I dunno.  I’ll have to think about that a little more.

Anyway, on with the show…

So, The first week of the new year hasn’t been that steller on this whole weight loss thing.  To keep with the “steps and leaps” theme of the opening quote, you can pretty much say I’ve been moonwalking.  That is to say I have been doing little actual moving forward.  This needs to change I think.  I’ll work on that.

Today, we did a quick 4 miles on the low side of Kennesaw Mountain.  I’ve hiked this trail in the past, and it can be one of the more difficult hikes local to Atlanta.  It can be relatively easy, but this is one hike that can truely be as hard as you want to make it.  The last time I did 8  miles that kicked my ass. (Average Speed: 1.4mpg (43minute mile) with elevation gains of near 600 ft in 2 miles.) The worst part about that hike was that the all the serious uphill happened at the END!  Seriously, most of the first 5 miles was flat or a little downward.  The last 3… Up and Up and Up.  All the way to heaven.  Then quickly down… to Kennesaw.  Talk about a let down… Here’s a link to that hike if you are interested.

Yet I digress…

Here’s the basic stats from the hike today:

• Total Distance: 4.74 Miles
• Total Time: 1h44m
• Avg Speed: 2.7/mph (22 Minute Mile)

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Well, here we are.  A Brand new year…  2012…  Another year, another pledge to focus on weight loss, and getting into less of a pear shape.

I think the important thing to note, is that the apocalypse is planned on December 12th, 2012.   Now this could be a firey death for all of us or as some more learned people have pointed out, it may just be a massive change.  So, I am going to work under the assumption that this year will be the zombie apocolypse.  Which means I need to be a lot more physically fit in order to survive.

I think we all know, by watching “The Walking Dead” what happens to the overweight during a zombie attack.  For those that don’t watch the show, I think we can modify a bit of sage wisdom to apply here:

“I don’t have to outrun the Zombies.  I just have to out run you.”

So, it’s time to improve my chances of out running some other fast bastard.  In general I’m going to accomplish this by a few simple ideas:

1. “Move More” – This means less sitting on my tookis playing PS3 (Gamertag Paradox816 just in case I fail at this…) , and more hiking and walking… Maybe I’ll join an Athletic Cult like Crossfit.  However, this is a little difficult, as I don’t like people in general.
2. “Eat Less” – I think this is self explanatory.  Portion Control.  I also would like to do more fasting. I’ve gotten a lot out that on many different levels.  I would like to accomplish a “Biblical” fast, 40 day/night water only.
3. “Eat Better” - Avoiding late night eating, and more vegetables
4. “Earn Your Calories” – Violations of Rule #2, need to be earned with burned calories
5. “30 Minute Minimum” – At least 30 minutes of activity per day.  (Walking/Hiking/Elliptical/Biking/Other Cardio…)
6. “Blog More” – To help keep myself accountable

That’s the plan…

In that vain, today I got a nice hike in…

• Total Distance:  8.12 Miles
• Total Time: 3h39m
• Avg. Pace: 27m/mile.

Apparently my phone did not successfully track the route.  However, this was a hike on “Cook’s Trail” in Athens, GA.

Overall, it was  a decent hike.  A nice pace of a little over 2/mph.  I felt good overall, but it was a pretty flat hike.  My feet/ankles where aching around mile 6.  This’ll pass as time goes on, I know it takes a little bit for my feet to get used to moving again.  I took some ibuprofen, and that helped a lot.  I’ll like take some AdvilPM, so my body gets the rest it needs to walk normally tomorrow.

One annoying thing, is that this trail connects to another 2.1 mile trail.  (Adding 4.2 miles total to this “In and Out”), however I came upon a sign that says the connected area was closed on Mondays.  Seriously, mother nature closed on mondays.  Bah.

One thing about hiking in Georgia in the Winter.  There aren’t many colours, except brown, some dull greens and reds.  It’s quite monotonous.  Not Many Pictures…

Here’s some pictures:

I’ve been plugging along.  I haven’t lost much weight, but with some recent life events… I’m doing okay.

They opened a new gym at my work, so I’m going to that more often.  I’ve been hiking a lot more.  I’ll start posting the routes here.  (from imapmyrun.com)

I feel like I’ve been neglecting this blog, as much as I have been myself.  Time to change this.

So, I’m still working on it.

I’ve changed my eating habits over the last week.  Instead of 1-3 Large Meals a day, I’ve moved to eating 5-7 times a day.  I’ve also dramatically dropped my calorie intake.  A typical day this week looks something like this:

• 8am – Piece of Fruit or a Yogurt
• 10am – Piece of Fruit, handful of inshell Roasted peanuts
• 12pm – Salad, with small amount of meat.  (Like a Grilled Ceaser Salad From the Deli Downstairs, or Chef Salad with a few slices of cold cuts)
• 2pm – A piece of Fruit
• 4pm – Piece of Fruit, handful of inshell Roasted peanuts
• 6pm – Smallish Dinner.  (Chicken and Peppers, or Pot Roast Sandwhich, or 2 Egg Omlette, baby carrots, asparagus)
• 8pm – Maybe Some Fruit, especially if I’ll be up late.

I haven’t gotten on the scale, but I feel better this week.  I was getting to that “Holy Shit I’m Fat feeling.”  Which has started to wane.

I need to go by REI and pickup a workout-bench, so I can do some exercises in my apartment without have to go to the fitness center…  So, Instead of trying to track all the food and workouts right now. I’m just trying to get back into the habit of eating better and getting to the gym.  Then I’ll worry about starting to track things again.

Anyway, babysteps and minor progress.

I could not sleep all last night.  I tossed and turned.  It’s probably because I took a nap, earlier in the evening.  So about 6am, I decided instead of staring at the ceiling I would go check out my new apartment complex fitness room.  This isn’t really something planned, just something to sweat and get back in the Gym.

Here was the result

• Elliptical:
• Time: 30 Minutes
• Resistance: 20m@5, 10m@10 (First 10 minutes at level 5 then 5 minute Alternating intervals between 5 and 10 in   for remaining 20 minutes.)
• Weight Training:
• Machine Bench: 3×10 @ 150lbs (Speed Sets)
• DB Bench Rows: 3×10 @ 50lbs/Arm (Speed Sets)