weight loss 7 Comments

Diet & Fitness Update, Week Ending 9/16/06

Official week-ending weigh-in: 202.5

Notable changes in measurements in the past two months:
Bust: down 1.25″
Chest (below bust): down 1.5″
Upper Arm: down 1.25″

I also took in-progress photos today, and was pleasantly surprized at the belly shrinkage since July. My calves also seem to be more defined, and my collarbones might be even a little more pronounced than before. Or maybe that was just the light. I also think my upper back is looking less fatty, although that could be a function of not having a ponytail to hide the definition, too. At any rate, I’m experiencing visible progress, even if the numbers don’t show much.

This week was a slackeriffic exercise week, to a point. On Thursday, I think it was, I did a few sets of deep squats while I was waiting for my dinner to cook in the microwave. Just those two or three sets of ten deep squats worked my leg muscles like nobody’s business. Good stuff. Then, today, I went on a jog in the park with Aaron, and I got a lot farther than usual before I had to slow to a walk. Maybe it was just female machismo on my part, or maybe I actually am getting in better shape, but I’m satisfied with the progress either way.

Because I’m so behind on my PUSH DVDs, I’ve suspended my account for two months to give me a chance to catch up. I have quite the backlog. So, my goal this week is to do my PUSH workout three times, so that I can feel comfortable graduating up to the next disc for next week. I tried Disc 4 once, after a recent hiatus from working out, and it kicked my ass *bad*. I’m thinking that, if I get myself up to speed with the previous workout, the next disc shouldn’t be so daunting.

I’m also going to make a concerted effort to increase my protein intake. I’ve been good with keeping the carbs down to below 40% of my daily caloric intake. Unfortunately, my fat intake has probably been a little higher than it really should. I’m going to focus on increasing protein, though, rather than decreasing fat, in hopes of taking a more positive approach. If I add the right protein-rich foods, then, in theory, those should bump out the fat I’d normally be eating. I just need to make a conscious effort to go easy on the Vegenaise and the less lean meats, and this should work.

In other health news… I should really get myself to various medical professionals. Doctor. Gynecologist. Dentist. It’s been over five years since I’ve seen any of those, and I should probably do that before… well, soon, anyway.

anecdotes 1 Comment

The Perils of Suburban Life

There’s some sort of little-league football team that’s been practicing in the vacant grassy lot across the street from our house. Mind you, we live on a dead end, so when all the parents come to watch little Tyrone and Jamal play football, they park their cars / trucks / minivans / SUVs such that our comings and goings are challenging at best. They don’t seem to comprehend that it’s a big, open field, with plenty of room for you to park your vehicle. No, they have to park either on or in the street, often simply stopping to idle in the exact middle of the street, forcing me to come to a complete stop and glare at them until they get the idea and move to the side so I can get around their giant SUV and actually park in my own goddamn driveway.

We were upset on Tuesday morning, when the garbage men actually took the giant branch that had been sitting on our curb for two weeks; that branch had kept the annoying minivan fucker from parking in front of our house. Somehow, though, the inconvenience must have trained Minivan Fucker not to park in front of our house anymore, as she’s continued parking in front of our neighbor’s house.

We’ve had quite enough of the peewee football practice, thankyouverymuch. We’re ready for it to be over, or for it to move elsewhere.

This evening, they seem to be having some sort of cookout. There’s a charcoal grill puffing smoke and tables laden with buns and paper plates. The boys are playing football without their pads and uniforms, and someone is booming rap music out of their truck.

The good news is that this could conceivably be the end of peewee football season. The bad news is that I have to put up with rap music and hollering kids (and parents) for a few hours.

I think it’ll be worth it in the end.

otaku 1 Comment

Those Crazy Japanese

For anyone who hasn’t seen this yet…

Along the lines of All Things Japanese, this site was helpful for me in deciphering why it was amusing for an anime convention to be named Nan Desu Kan. I’d heard enough Japanese to recognize it (or, rather, “nan desu ka”) as a common turn of phrase, but the Learn Japanese website explained that it means, “What is it?”

I’d love to take a Japanese class. I don’t think there are any local evening classes taught by native speakers, though. I want to be able to do more than count to twenty badly, ask “what is it,” and other fun otaku tricks. If the Learn Japanese site had audio clips to confirm pronunciation, it would be even better. I’ll have to look into some of the podcasts on learning to speak Japanese.

Not like I’m ever going to make it to Japan any time soon, unlike *some* people I know. And, yes, I do know more than one person who either has been or is going to Japan. ^_^

weight loss 1 Comment

Averages

Isn’t that the nicest little chart you ever did see? It’s my average weekly weight, as calculated by my DietOrganizer program. I only just discovered that particular chart today, and boy, does it make me feel good about myself. 🙂

I’ve also been using the “Google 15” widget for my personalized Google homepage, which does a very similar thing by charting both your daily weight and your running average.

(I really only use the personalized Google homepage so I can see the headers of my Gmail at work, since accessing webmail is not only near-impossible with the web-browsing countermeasures they’ve installed, but is also an offense punishable by termination.)

At any rate, it does my heart good to see those numbers going in the right direction. It makes for less drama when I get on the scale every morning (o noes! i gained a pound overnight!).

In other news, my gut seems to be deflating. My upper abs not so much, but my lower ab fat is definitely shrinking like an old balloon. Maybe this Saturday’s bimonthly weight-loss photos will make me a happy camper.

P.S. – It’s interesting to me how difficult it is to share someone else’s weight-loss joy when you’re kind of in a rut yourself. For me, anyway. When James at work is all excited about losing weight, but I’m holding steady, it’s hard for me to give an enthusiastic attaboy. Likewise, when I showed him this chart today, he seemed happy for me, but seemed to remain bummed that he’d gained over the Black Swamp Arts Festival weekend, what with the fair food and friends in town and all. I can also tell it’s kind of awkward for Aaron to be excited for me when he’s not losing as fast as he’d like.

It’s kind of the negative side of having diet buddies, I guess. When neither side is very competitive about weight-loss, all bets are off.

P.P.S. – I took my bodyfat percentage and did some calculations yesterday, and figured that my current lean body weight is probably around 135 lbs. Interesting factoid. Assuming my muscle mass remains a constant, that means I need to lose about 6% bodyfat to reach my initial I’ll-be-content-here-for-a-while first goal of 190 lbs.

Getting down to my ultimate-ever goal of 160 would require me to be… *does calculations* …15.6% bodyfat. Hmm. Unlikely, but not impossible. Honestly, I can’t even imagine what I’d look like in that body.

randomness 2 Comments

I Give Up

I designed some stickers for Aaron’s podcast. They were adapted from the t-shirt design, which I also designed (with some editorial help from Garza).

The stickers were to be 4.25″ x 2.75″ big. The printer’s online instructions said to submit files at 300dpi. Since I’d resized the design from a larger t-shirt design, I opted to ignore their suggestion and submit the design at 1200dpi instead. This saved me from having to rework the entire design and optimize it for a smaller print size.

The stickers came in this week. All the fine detail is lost. The fantastic black background blends into the mascot’s hair and skirt, because my hairline divider stroke failed to print properly. The katakana surrounding the mascot is illegible. All because I can’t follow directions.

I spent two hours tonight reworking the design from scratch, which was harder than I’d expected. I created a layer of halftone dots (a la newspaper photographs) for shading, then went through the painstaking detail work of cleaning up said halftone dots around the edges of the drawing with the eraser tool. Only when I went to throw in the fantastic black background did I realize that I should have been painting in white instead of erasing. The mascot’s cute mug became akin to some sort of monster movie villain, being that half of it was suddenly filled in with black.

I wanted to have this done tonight. I wanted to tell Aaron I’m sorry, and that the next batch of stickers are on me, and here’s the new design. Instead, I’m going to bed without making my lunch. Again.

Excuse me while I go have a nice cry, then beat myself about the head until I fall asleep.