Little less conversation....

Been doing well.  Cardio every day.  Pushups daily.  Eating better-no bullshit.  Holidays make it tough to eat well for those of us addicted to food.  Oh well, let's do our best. 

On this Thanksgiving eve, I would like to give thanks to the following:

-The Guidance from Above

-My Wife and Children

-My Family and Friends

-The people who continue to read this blog and support me despite my inconsistencies and faults

-My Trainer (who I know loves me like a brother from another mother!)

-Dr. David Kessler (who helped me understand why I eat like a fat bastard)

-The McDonald's Corp. for releasing the McRib every time I try to climb back on the wagon.

-The people in my life who have cared enough to bust my balls about my eating habits.

-Elvis for being a stud!

-Health and Happiness

Happy Thanksgiving!!

Hungry

Too Much Change

Forgive me as I digress into a subject which strays away from the usual topic of my sedentary ass.  Today, I would like to talk about change.

You see, I was reminiscing today when I came to the realization that our culture has morphed into a state from which I see no return.  I miss the old days of black and white.  If one stops and thinks about the incredible shift from simple to complex, it is mind-boggling.  Entropy. 

Remember when tv was simple.  Good shows written with great humor and drama.  Gilligan's Island, Fantasy Island, The Love Boat, Knight Rider, Good Times, Quincy, St. Elsewhere, etc.  But these show didn't have enough sensationalism.  Things had to get more gruesome, more crude, and more violent.  Remember watching the original "How the Grinch Stole Christmas?"  It was about a rotten guy with rotten motives.  Simple.  Then we have a remake with Jim Carrey where we have to dissect back to the Grinch's childhood and how he was tormented.  This was the excuse for why he became a pessimistic, nihilistic, curmudgeon.  Did we really need to know why the grinch was a jackass? 

Other shifts in tv culture are evident as well.  We watched Quincy, M.E. and love the passion and relentless nature of Jack Klugman.  The plot was always rich with suspense and great drama.  How did society fix its need for MORE---I have the answer, do you?  CSI, CSI-Miami, CSI-New York. NCIS, Law and Order-SVU.  The styles have changed and they lack some of the old panache that the older shows had. 

Ever watch old Alfred Hitchcock films?  Truly the master of suspense.  My favorite movie is Rear Window.  No gore, no sensationalistic movie set.  But the development of character and suspense were incredible.  Now we have Texas Chainsaw Massacre, Saw I, II, III, IV, V.........Some of these movies lack true substance and make up for this deficiency with blood, violence, and gore.  Please don't pin me as a prude.  I love violent movies like Scorsese's The Departed, Goodfellas, Casino, etc.  He is an amazing director.  And although quite violent, the filming quality and substance of his films is superb.  I am, mostly, talking of the movies and shows which think up the most demented, nastiest, creepiest characters who think up the most demented, nastiest, creepiest ways of torturing and killing people.  No substance.  Boring.  Blah, blah, blah.

Next, we can talk about infomania.  Texting, emailing, facebook, myspace, twitter.  Text messaging is eating at the delicate core of society.  Kids and adults are jumping into the warm, inviting pool of de-socialization.  We don't talk anymore.  Whats the point in talking?  We can control how much we want to say and when we want to say it by texting.  Kids getting cell phones in elementary school is becoming the norm.  We have a festering problem here that is going to sneak up on us and bite us square in the fat ass.  What we should be teaching our children is the importance of inter-personal relationships.  How do you learn how to properly form relationships and interact with people without TALKING?  Learning to read people by the inflections in their voices or the tone is going to become obsolete.  Replaced by the mechanical text-message.  I'm a hippocrit.  Even though I don't embrace the idea of all of this fucking text messaging, I still text people.  It feels like if you don't keep up with the technology, you"ll get left behind.  Maybe getting left behind would be a blessing. 

I wish we could go back to the old days.  But change is gonna happen.  I have a hard time letting go of old ways as evidenced by my struggle with weight.  I am trying to be more flexible.  I am really trying.

Hungry

I've Been Moving

Over the last week, I have began to move.  I haven't commited to any distances.  I haven't commited to any particular regimen.  What I have commited to is to keep moving every day.  I will move my fat ass to a sweat every day-no bullshit excuses.  So far I have been running every other day for 30 min.  Starting from scratch again, I am walking-running-walking-running etc.  On the off days I ride a bike or do some circuit work.  No shit.  I have completed one week of this regimen and feel pretty good about it.  My friend Ben said "Look man, even if you can't change your diet right now, get moving."  He said-"if you exercise, you'll start seeing some results and then you'll want to eat better."  He is a smart dude.  He knows that I am an addict.  He knows that I have been unable to commit to anything, really.  But he hasn't given up.  Neither have I.  That is most important.  My friends and family cannot do this for me.  I gonna keep moving.  Simple.  Not complicated.  Just keep moving. 

Peace,

Hungry

Storytime

Once upon a time there was a man who had the world at his fingertips.  Wife, kids, and a dog.  The man loved his job and his family.  He grew up in the midwest.  He was quite active in highschool with sports and friends.  He weighed about 185 pounds as a senior.  In excellent shape, he felt invincible.  Everything fell into place.  Later in life, however, he struggled with overeating.  He struggled so much that he constantly put himself down and felt tremendous guilt for the way he cared for himself.  Life moved forward despite this man's continual struggle.  The man married and had a family.  His career blossomed.  Now, over 200 pounds, he felt there was no way he could feel like he used to.  Fast food, stress, and hypertension crept up upon him before he knew what hit him.  Putting on weight was part of getting older.  He was too busy to change his ways.  It would take too much energy to change.  Besides, he had tried several failed attempts to better his health but always ran back to his destructive habits.  His friends and family urged him to change.  He didn't.  His physician urged him to change.  He didn't.  He kept telling himself: Someday I will have the willpower to change my life.  Someday, I will take care of myself because I know my family needs me to be there for them.  Someday, I will throw away all of the excuses that have held me back from achieving my potential.  Someday.  The days came and went.  The man felt stressed much of the time.  He felt justified to eat poorly and remain sedentary.  He began to have chest pain, periodically.  He attributed this to stress/anxiety/tension.  Constant headaches were a nuisance to the man.  Someday, he promised to treat himself better.  Someday, he would be thin and active and feel better about his appearance.  Someday.  One day the man got up to get ready for work.  He felt tense as usual, but this morning something was different.  His chest was tight and the pain unrelenting.  He took zantac.  Driving to work, the pain increased.  He felt lightheaded.  Maybe he was just tired.  Maybe he just needed to get moving and he'd feel better.  But the pain didn't go away.  Staring him in the face was the culmination of all of the poor habits he joked about over the years.  Visions of his children in college, getting married, and having children all flashed before him.  As his car veered off the road, the visions disappeared.  What remained was a black curtain descending upon his eyes.  The pain was gone.  Someday never happened. 

.............Tick tock, tick tock, tick tock................

What if tomorrow is too late? 

Shame

What a shame......

What happened to me?  I let you down. I let myself down.  My weight is back.  My blood pressure is up (157/110) last time I checked.  I really fell of the wagon hard.  I stated in the very beginning of this blog that I would be true to myself and the reader about my progress (good or bad).  Well this is f*cking bad.  I'm pissed off.  I am angry that I can't keep commitments to myself for my health and well-being.  I have had some cough/swine flu/rhinovirus/being a f*cking pussy illness for a few weeks now.  I would like to blow smoke up your asses and say this is the excuse for my lack of motivation.  However, My lazy ass stopped being motivated long before I got sick.  It also doesn't explain why I eat 3/3 meals at fastfood joints.  Let me show you something staggeringly shocking: My bank has an online service and I noticed a item called "spending reports" on the website.  This function tracks your spending based on grocery, restaurants, gas, etc. I looked at my spending on restaurants and groceries for the last three months.  Here is the beautiful truth: 

August Restaurants:  $1302.58

August Groceries:  $634.45

September Restaurants:  $1262.98

September Groceries:  $817.88

October Restaurants:  $1082.33

October Groceries:  $823.06

Consistently, I spend twice as much money on shitty food as I do on groceries every month.  This is crazy.  I am throwing myself into financial oblivion all while enjoying the rapid descent of my health. This is insanity, defined.  Stupid, dumb, insane...call it what you want but I cannot stop.  Seeing these staggering figures won't be near enough to eliminate this selfish behavior.  Poor reports from an ultrafast CT scan, hypertension, and embarassment from my 3 chins hasn't been enough.

I look at myself in the mirror and my only thoughts are that I have gone past the point of no return.  Overwhelmed with stress, I look to food to give me the comfort.  It's something that seems to make no sense at all.  If eating fatty, fried, carbohydrate-laden fare is bad for you, why does it give me an intense sensation of peace, calm, and comfort??  I don't know if I subscribe to the opiate receptor theory.  Homeostasis, right?  If it feels good, it must be right.  Well I know this isn't true.  I look in the mirror and see the faulty reasoning that clouds my addict mind.  Where do I begin, again........

Hungry

I mean pullups.

I did 1.5 pushups today!!