If I had hair, part 1

Those of you who know me (and many of you who don't) probably know that I'm not really a fan of the fact that I'm losing my hair. Sure, I often shave my head entirely and act as if I were all totally cool with the not having hair thing- but really I'm not.

So... I often wonder what I would look like if I still had hair. When I saw someone else had posted pictures of themselves with different hairstyles and colors that you can see on yourself when you upload a picture at clairol.com I had to check it out. And I must say, I look freakin hot with hair. I did screen caps of a bunch of different options, so every once in a while I will post one here- starting today with one of my favorites. It's a look I call "Fascist Harpy" named after my most favoriteauthor/pundit/self important crazy person since it's a version of the basic hair-do she sports. (Though her hair is much more bleached blond)




Yes. I'm definitely sexy. And, despite my beard, I'm also much less man-ish in this hair-do than the woman who inspired its name. (I suppose it's the lack of pure evil, or the less prominent adam's apple that's keeping me more feminine)

all apologies

Oh, and to anyone who does read my blog- I'm sorry for the long and boring posts.

I personally am a fan of the funny. I don't mind less than funny posts on other blogs when they aren't novel length. I don't mind novel length posts if they are funny. But man, it seems I'm combining the worst of both worlds.

So- maybe when I'm less focused on how fat I am there will be some funny. Until that time, look at this as a bitching about my diet blog and read at your own risk.

well damn...

Well, if you look to the left, to the left (all of my shame in a box to the left) you can see that I have gained just a bit more than the 5 pounds I predicted in my couple of weeks off- because not only did i not go to the gym during said time- I ate horribly. It was as though I consciously fell off the wagon and did the whole "well, I'll be better next week" thing to justify eating horrible food, and lots of it.

Having most of a week spent in a hotel and eating out all the time didn't help- but I usually did the big eating out thing and/or ate crappy food. No salad for me- unless of course the salad was just a precursor to much more horrible food.
OK, I'm back though. Frank won't be joining me in the gym till Monday- and this morning's workout made me feel like I was going to vomit. I lift a lot more doing the super squat machine I do with actual squats. (a lot more still being relative in that it's still less than 300 pounds- but my heavy set with actual squats is less than 200 so 270 seemed like a lot when I looked at the plates loaded onto the bar) I felt like I could do more weight because I didn't have the muscle strain "I'm going to fall over" type of feeling that you get when you are lifting those last few reps but afterwards I realized I really had exerted myself and felt pretty beat. Which of course made it hard to move on to other exercises afterward.

I still have no endurance- so running tomorrow should be fun. It is getting nicer out- but I think I may just do the treadmill anyway since I've got some sinus stuff going on and I hates my allergies when I run outside.

OK, so new goal: be back under 240 by the end of next week, and down to 235 by the 12th of May. That's real doable. It means I need a caloric deficit of about 1700 calories a day. While that probably seems huge to most normal people- it isn't that big a deal when you are a giant fat man like I am.
Using the BMR Formula, it seems my base metabolic rate has me burning 2335 calories a day. Using the Harris Benedict equation
I can then find out how many calories I burn at different activity levels. So, if I am very sedentary then I should be burning about 2800 calories a day. If I were to be extremely active (hard training twice a day) then my daily caloric burn would be just a smidge under 4450. That is highly unlikely- but with moderate exercise 3-5 days a week I'd average 3600 calories burned a day. Which means if I can just keep my daily calories around 2000 I should reach my goal. (although were I to step it up and work out like crazy I could be at 230 by the 12th instead of 235)

Really, I also know that I need to take into account the decreased base metabolic rate as I lose weight and that I will burn less calories. I still think that keeping at 2000 calories a day should be fine- I will probably train a bit harder than "moderate" exercise but not quite as crazy hard as full on twice a day. (honestly, if you aren't an athlete on a team training for a new season, two a day training just seems like a symptom of anorexia. While I'm in no danger of eminent starvation I don't want to get into habits that could become unhealthy in the future. I may occasionally do more exercise than once a day- but it will only be if I'm doing something like playing ball with friends as a leisure activity on top of going to the gym)

I knew there was a reason I'm up so late

My sleep schedule is way off lately.
Right now I'm avoiding finishing some work and trying to figure out if I should just go to bed - in the midst of it I've got the tv tuned to VH1 classic- where from 2AM-3AM they have a show called "The Alternative" which i described as "videos from unconventional bands of the '60s, '70s and '80s" when I press the info button.

It is in fact more of a 80's alternative with the occasional instance of other decades thrown in- with more early '90s than '60s and '70s.

But I must tell you, it is fantastic. I smiled as the Pixies Velouria started- because I realized I had just seen some Portishead, REM, The Samples and The Pixies. In a row. On the tv.

I like music videos- I don't know why, I just always have. And I used to complain about MTV and VH1 no longer showing any videos, but I realize the complaint is kind of stupid. Despite that, this show is great. It goes beyond even what 120 minutes used to be. It includes some of that- but seems more like a video version of a 1994 college radio station. (OK, maybe the semi-commercial college radio station- but still... it's pretty nice)

I am way to much a consumer of pop culture. I often think I ought to exert a lot more mental energy into things that are, you know, productive. Instead of watching Fishbone videos.

Because really. Fishbone videos are pretty absurd.

But it's Fishbone.
On the tv.
I have to watch. (while I multi task in my time wasint by writing on my blog)

crushes

I have a bit of a man crush on:


My roommate Judd finds Brown's show Good Eats to be extremely annoying. I do agree that it is often over the top and/or stupid, but I enjoy it thoroughly nonetheless. I also think he's quite good hosting and doing the play by play for Iron Chef America.

Since being introduced to the blogging world a few years ago I have had a number of different blog crushes, but the most recent blogcrush is most definitely Amelia. If you don't read her blog, you should certainly go check it out.

No wires attached

I helped coach some of the speech kids before they went to Nationals- which meant I got to hear all of their speeches. One that was a mixed bag was the persuasion from the kid who's really the best overall competitor about personal internet security.

It made me decide I ought to check out some more info on it. There's a blog that seems to have a lot of info on wireless LAN security. It's clear there are a lot of things I really should do differently- but I wasn't too surprised that it seems I'm doing most things pretty much right.

There's a step by step on how to secure your wireless network, which is helpful. It's a bit bloated in some ways and seems to have more info than is needed, but don't let it intimidate you it's a pretty easy read. The big thing I've been worrying about lately is that WEP encryption though not perfect is far better than nothing. One thing it recommends that I don't do is changing encryption keys often. Were I in a more easily compromised environment (a company with a parking lot where people might pull up, or within range of the street and wardrivers) I would probably be more concerned.

In full disclosure, one reason I'm reviewing the site is because they have a contest to win a free router for writing a review of the blog. It's one that looks pretty cool, not too advanced, but the usb print server on it would be really nice. To be eligible I'll have to put the blog up in my blogroll- which really isn't a big deal since I think most people probably ought to look more at how insecure most of their actions on the internet are and what they can do differently.

fatter and slower

I "ran" 2 miles today in about 27 minutes. 3 minutes more to do the same distance as last time. The course was a bit different today, but one I thought was easier. I suppose my last run may have been a bit shorter than two miles. Today I felt crappier. I don't know if it was giving blood monday night, or just it being kind of windy today, but I kinda sucked. I spent more time walking, and the walking wasn't as fast.

Halfway through the second mile I sprinted for about 100 yards and it absolutely killed me. I was barely walking straight after that let alone walking quickly.


All that said, I do want to apologize for whining about my lack of progress when really I've been doing fairly well, especially considering how minimal my changes have been. I saw this commercial and thought it was funny since I've definitely known couples who go through this same thing. And really, I'm kind of that guy. I quit drinking soda, increased my lean protein intake, and started lifting sporadically and lost 15 pounds in a month and a half. I'm not a big fan of diet pills- though I won't criticize those who feel that they help as part of a diet and exercise plan- I just think too many people look at them as a magic bullet. If you haven't seen the commercial check it out.

wow...

words can not describe

Just a couple of pounds

Yeah- it's been a bad eating little exercising weekend extravaganza.
Friday, I ate poorly. Saturday afternoon was a wedding reception with great food (and one where I got to give the toast) Later Saturday night I ate at Chili's with friend. (I know, Chili's sucks. I also know they have some healthy options. None of the healthy choices were consumed, only crap was consumed. And it was delicious.)
Monday night I had wings.

And of course, there was a bit of candy eating spread throughout that whole time.
Which means I wasn't too surprised to weigh in at just a smidge over 241 this morning.

But that's alright. Tomorrow will likely include both lifting and cardio. It should, of course, be fun.