Day 7

Today was the Team Challenge Mock 5K.  Mostly a timed 5K run to give everyone a sense of what a race day is like.  Would have been nicer if it weren't cold and rainy.  I set a personal best for a 5K, improving on my last time by 8 whole seconds!  About half-way through the race I realized I was running too fast, as I'd been trying to match my pace to people with mile times about a minute faster than mine.

Today's run:  http://connect.garmin.com/activity/163286999

At the finish line, getting my Popsicle stick

And as a comparison here's my last 5K:  http://connect.garmin.com/activity/156566594

By the end of the run my knee was bugging me again but it wasn't too bad.  After running though I hit the outlets in Wrentham, one positive of the weather was nobody else was there yet.  I got to pick up some new clothes that should fit me better, at least for a little while.  Eventually they'll probably end up baggy as well.

Food today:  egg and cheese sandwiches for both breakfast and lunch (300 calories each), a couple mini-muffins and a mini-cupcake after the run (300 calories), penne, sauce and garlic toast for dinner (1000 calories).  Exercise was the 5K today (500 calories).

Yes dinner's been pretty repetitive this week, but I'm still trying to load up on fiber a ton.

Today's Results:
Daily Food Total:  1900
Exercise:  500
Points Earned:  1600
Total Points Earned:  10655
Points to go:  189345

Day 6

So that one week off really took me out of the habit of posting my updates at the end of the day.  Got to start doing that again, so I don't have to get up quite so early.  Got to head out to run shortly so just a quick update again.

I decided to take yesterday off from exercise.  I'd twisted my knee a bit on Wednesday and wanted to give it a full day off to let it rest.  It had already mostly resolved by the end of the day on Thursday but it was still nice to take a bit of a rest.  The rest of the day went a little bit off-plan as I ended up going out to lunch with folks from work, but only after having already eaten my prepared lunch.  Ended up eating a little bit too much on the day but luckily not too terrible.

Food yesterday:  english muffin with peanut butter and milk (400 calories), PB&J (600 calories), half a small cheese pizza (700 calories), and then for dinner I cut back and made an egg and cheese sandwich (300 calories).  I did have a few little snacks with a mini-reeses and some peanut butter (100 calories).  No exercise.

Today's Results:
Daily Food Total:  2100
Exercise:  0
Points Earned:  900
Total Points Earned:  9055
Points to go:  190945

Day 5

So just a quick post for yesterday.  Nothing major happened, though I was nursing a slightly sore knee.  It's feeling better this morning, so hopefully it was just a day-to-day kind of injury.  Otherwise I made it through the day without too much of a challenge.

On minor modification to the scoring for this challenge.  I reworked the breakfast I've been having (peanut butter on english muffin with milk), and I'm pretty sure it's closer to 400 calories than 300.  So I've made a modification to the scores for each day which subtracts 400 points from the total that was posted yesterday.  No major deal, but wanted to try and keep it accurate.

Food yesterday:  english muffin with peanut butter and milk (400 calories), PB&J for lunch (600 calories), penne, sauce and garlic toast for dinner (1000 calories), some chips and peanut butter for snacks (200 calories).  Exercise was a lunchtime walk (100 calories) and kickboxing (500 calories).

Today's Results:
Daily Food Total:  2200
Exercise:  600
Points Earned:  1400
Total Points Earned:  8155
Points to go:  191845

Day 4

So some positives and some negatives for the day today.  It rained at lunch time, so as I was leaving work I really tried to use that as an excuse to skip the gym for the night.  On the positive side of things, by the time I was heading out the door I'd convinced myself that that was ridiculous.  Also a positive, the rain had stopped by that point so going to the gym didn't end up with me running while soaking wet.

The negative side of things is that I once again ate my lunch too early in the day, which left me looking for a snack later.  Not really a big deal, and my total calories are still fine for the day, but it's become a trend lately.  Partly that has to do with the PB&J sandwiches I've been bringing this week.  I've been eating them as a way to boost my fiber intake (peanut butter's a surprisingly good source of fiber), but for whatever reason as soon as I start getting a little hungry in the mornings I start craving the sandwich.  Other foods don't seem to do that to me, not sure why it happens with these sandwiches.

Still a good day as far as points:  english muffin with peanut butter for breakfast (300 calories), PB&J for lunch (600 calories), snacks included a bag of chips and some peanut butter (200 calories), dinner was salmon, noodles and green beans (1000 calories).  Exercise was an extra-long lunchtime walk (200 calories), and an hour on the treadmill (933 calories).


Today's Results:
Daily Food Total:  2100
Exercise:  1133
Points Earned:  2033
Total Points Earned:  7155
Points to go:  192845

Day 3

Added an extra challenge to running on the treadmill today.  Normally I run without an incline, today I added a small one.  It wasn't anything major, but it definitely was noticeable.  My legs started wearing down a lot faster than they traditionally do, and I had to keep pushing myself to continue running for the full hour.  Still did a full hour of course, but it was definitely more challenging than treadmill running's been for a while.


Food today:  english muffin, peanut butter and milk for breakfast (300 calories), PB&J for lunch (600 calories), penne, sauce and garlic toast for dinner (1000 calories), a granola bar and a couple pieces of candy for snacks (150 calories).  Exercise was a lunchtime walk and an hour on the treadmill (1072 calories)

Today's Results:
Daily Food Total:  2050
Exercise:  1072
Points Earned:  2022
Total Points Earned:  5122
Points to go:  194878

Day 2

So two days back into the diet and I seem to be back on track.  One nice thing about all of this has been that the changes that I initiated back in October really have become standard.  When I pigged out a bit last week I generally felt uncomfortable with it.  Mind you that didn't stop me from enjoying the hell out of the junk food, but even a week of lazy sluggishness didn't undermine my new habits.  Then on Saturday I still managed to get out and run 7.5 miles.  So overall it does seem like continuing the diet for another 5 or 6 months is plausible.

Food today:  english muffin, peanut butter and milk for breakfast (300 calories), PB&J for lunch (600 calories), snacks included a granola bar and a cookie at work (200 calories), dinner was salmon, noodles and green beans (900 calories).  Exercise today was a lunchtime walk and an hour of kickboxing (600 calories)

Today's Results:
Daily Food Total:  2000
Exercise:  600
Points Earned:  1600
Total Points Earned:  3100
Points to go:  196900

Day 1

So today's the first day of the new Challenge.  All in all the past week has been a demonstration on what not to do if you want to maintain weight loss.  Don't go crazy with junk food and hit all the restaurants you love from when you were 50 pounds heavier.  Don't stop exercising immediately after finishing the diet.  Don't keep putting off until tomorrow to get things back under control.

My first weigh-in for the new Challenge was this morning.  The result:  216.2 pounds.

Obviously that's a bit of a bump since last Saturday.  Some of that increase is certainly a day-to-day variation, but some of that is from eating too much junk food and not exercising.  Of course it also gives me a slightly higher starting point for this challenge, so hopefully I'll lose it quickly.

Food today:  breakfast was an english muffin with peanut butter and a glass of water with fiber (300 calories), snacks on the day included a cookie at work and some peanut butter during the day (200 calories), dinner was penne, sauce and garlic toast (1000 calories).  No exercise today as I took a rest day after a 7.5 mile run yesterday.

Today's Results:
Daily Food Total:  1500
Exercise:  0
Points Earned:  1500
Total Points Earned:  1500
Points to go:  198500

1st Challenge Review

So I was originally planning to start the 2nd challenge on the 20th, but thanks to illness and laziness it got pushed back to today.  This past week's been a little unpleasant thanks to being sick.  I also took the week off from exercise to allow for a greater focus on getting better.  Weeks like this aren't too bad so long as you don't allow them to stretch out, but between a lack of exercise and an increase in junk food I've gained a little bit of weight back.

None the less the new challenge starts tomorrow, but I wanted to post the full results from the old challenge here, so I can still review them in the future.

Starting weight (10/20/11): 265 pounds
20K weight (11/4/11): 252.2 pounds
40K weight (11/20/11): 247 pounds
60K weight (12/5/11): 242 pounds
80K weight (12/20/11): 236.4 pounds
100K weight (1/6/12): 231.2 pounds
120K weight (1/22/12): 226.6 pounds
140K weight (2/5/12): 225 pounds
160K weight (2/19/12): 221.8 pounds
180K weight (3/4/12): 215.4 pounds
200K weight (3/17/12): 212.8 pounds

Day 150

The diet's officially over but today's the last weigh-in.  I'm going to be starting a brand new challenge on the 20th, but for the moment I'm just happy to have officially earned my Emissary table.

180K to 200K took 13 days. The two week period's included me being a little sick now and again, though nothing too major.  The big excitement was the focus on finishing.  It's hard to believe but I made my goal.

Weigh-in result:  212.8 lbs.

So that's 150 days after the start of the diet and 52.2 pounds lost.  I always knew that kind of weight loss would be possible, but I didn't think it was that probable.  Now I have a whole new set of goals.  Over the next few months I'm going to start another challenge, hopefully break the 200 pound mark and run a half-marathon.  All in all I want to thank everyone for their support, again.

Day 149 and Victory!

Well despite a bigger than normal lunch, and generally feeling very sick on the day, the Challenge is DONE!  It's taken 149 days instead of the 9 months I scheduled.  I've lost around 50 pounds and tomorrow's the last formal weigh-in of this challenge.  It's been an amazing success, I'm going to take a couple days off probably, but I'm planning to start a new Challenge on the 20th.  I want to thank everyone who's been  reading this.  I could not have pulled this off without you folks keeping me honest.

Food today:  egg and cheese sandwich for breakfast (300 calories), fish and chips for lunch/dinner (1300 calories), no dinner or snacks.  Exercise ended up being 20 minutes or so at the gym before I remembered running while sick doesn' t seem that fun (312 calories).

Today's Results:
Daily Food Total:  1600
Exercise:  312
Points Earned:  1912
Total Points Earned:  200576
Points to go:  0!!!!!!

Day 148

It seems weirdly appropriate to me that my final weigh in for the challenge is going to end up being on Day 150.  For the last month or so I'd been hoping to finish up on the 19th, since that would complete the challenge in exactly 5 months.  I did a little better than the average I needed and I was a little bummed that it wasn't going to be a round number or anything (yes I really am that lame).  So I'm excited to see that there will at least be some kind of round number associated with completing it.

Technically of course I might not finish tomorrow, but I only have 1300 points to go and a trip to the gym will pretty much guarantee it, barring me going on a crazy binge tomorrow.  So I've decided that I'm going to do another challenge.  I'll probably start it up again on the 20th for the symmetry (I told you I'm super lame).  Which will give me two or three days not to worry about it.  Sadly I already have some healthy foods planned for some of those days.  But seriously, one day to go.  Who would have believed any of this was possible.

Food today:  egg and cheese sandwich (300 calories), turkey sandwich (500 calories), snacks included a granola bar, a couple cookies and a cupcake (400 calories) thanks to a special event at work, dinner was lasagna without the garlic toast (800 calories).  Exercise was a lunchtime walk and kickboxing (600 calories total).

Today's Results:
Daily Food Total:  2000
Exercise:  600
Points Earned:  1600
Total Points Earned:  198664
Points to go:  1336

Day 147

Well a day later and my shin's not sore anymore.  It's possible I overreacted just a teensy-tiny bit in the last two days.  Seriously though I do worry about injuries a bit more than I used to with exercise.  When 20-30 minutes of exercise every couple days was the most I was getting I worried a lot less.  At that point my exercise didn't really push my body at all.  Now I am, running for an hour isn't natural for me and I can feel the stress after a while.  I stretch and keep active in a variety of ways, and I haven't had any significant problems in more than a year.  The threat is still something in the back of my mind though, and every so often my minimal hypochondria fuels it.

Today was nice and successful though.  Food today:  egg and cheese sandwich (300 calories), turkey sandwich (500 calories), two granola bars and a little peanut butter as snacks (200 calories), lasagna and garlic toast for dinner (1000 calories).  Exercise though made the difference.  I took a more intensive walk with some friends at lunch (200 calories), and an hour on the treadmill at the gym (910 calories).

Today's Results:
Daily Food Total:  2000
Exercise:  1110
Points Earned:  2110
Total Points Earned:  197064
Points to go:  2936

Day 146

Wasn't feeling particularly great last night, so headed to bed without an update.  Nothing major happened during the day.  I did notice that I had a little bit of shin soreness during the day.  As a result I decided to skip the gym and give it a chance to rest at home.  Probably not necessary, but since my job entails reading medical reports all day the hypochondriac inside started freaking out.  Oh my god shin splints!  That'll turn into compartment syndrome!  The surgical procedure to fix it will cause nerve damage!  Oh my God, THEY'RE GOING TO CUT OFF MY LEG!  Figured one night off from the gym probably wouldn't hurt.

Food yesterday:  egg and cheese sandwich for breakfast (300 calories), PB&J for lunch (600 calories), lasagna for dinner (1000 calories), granola bar and some chips as snacks (200 calories).  Lunchtime walk ended up being the only exercise (100 calories).

Today's Results:
Daily Food Total:  2100
Exercise:  100
Points Earned:  1000
Total Points Earned:  194954
Points to go:  5046

Day 145

Nothing too exciting today.  I did get to wear my medal from the 5K to work today.  Would have been funnier if everyone else wore theirs, but a morale boost is a morale boost regardless.  No major challenges for the day, as I'm really looking forward to next weekend.  With the last few thousand points to go I'm already hoping to have everything done by Saturday.

So a couple thoughts for the next challenge.  I've been debating cutting the daily calorie allotment, since I never had a negative point day on the diet.  The extra points though did allow for a bit of cheating now and then, and over the course of the whole diet added up to almost 75,000 points by itself.  Cutting them out would probably result in making it more challenging, but I'm not sure that's really something I want to do.  One of the advantages to this plan was the daily sense of accomplishment.  Cutting several hundred points a day out would likely reduce that feeling.

Of course as the heart of the challenge is competing against myself for a prize I've been giving that a bit of thought as well.  One potential idea I had was turning the prize into a new car.  I don't actually need a new car, as my old one only has around 70,000 miles.  But the car is starting to get old (I bought it in 2005) and I wouldn't mind having something newer.  Anyone have some other suggestions for prizes?

Food today:  egg and cheese sandwich for breakfast (300 calories), turkey sandwich for lunch (500 calories), snacks included a granola bar and some peanut butter (200 calories), dinner was the other half of yesterday's cheese pizza (800 calories).  Exercise was a lunchtime walk (100 calories) and kickboxing (500 calories).

Today's Results:
Daily Food Total:  1800
Exercise:  600
Points Earned:  1800
Total Points Earned:  193954
Points to go:  6046

Day 144

Well it was pretty obvious that I pushed myself a little harder than normal yesterday.  I was weirdly sore all day.  I wasn't really in pain or anything, but I was definitely tired and a little blah for the day.  Losing the hour probably didn't help matters since it meant my day had to start a lot faster than I was expecting.  Took the day off from exercise, though I still had to go into work.  Hopefully by tomorrow I should be in better shape.  Otherwise things continue to go pretty well.  Hopefully we can keep these trends up for the next few months as well.

Food today:  egg and cheese sandwich for breakfast (300 calories), grilled cheese for lunch (600 calories), and half a homemade cheese pizza for dinner (800 calories).  Snacks included a granola bar and some peanut butter (150 calories).  No exercise on the day though.

Today's Results:
Daily Food Total:  1850
Exercise:  0
Points Earned:  1150
Total Points Earned:  192154
Points to go:  7846

Day 143

Today was my first 5K in Providence.  It was a lot of fun, though a very different experience than last year's half-marathon.  A half-marathon is long enough that you really settle into the event, a 5K is short enough that it's over almost before you ever get into any sort of groove.  Of course all my friends have joked about my attitude over the distance.  "Oh well it's only 3.1 miles, that's nothing."  It is one of the ironies of training for the longer distances that an unimaginable distance from 3 years ago is now kind of short.

So my result in the 5K was 31 minutes and 8 seconds.  My per/mile average ended up being 10:02, and my strongest mile was the last one which I finished in a little over 9 minutes.  All in all it was a pretty successful day and suggests that I may actually be able to hit my half-marathon goal when the time comes.

Route and the result from my GPS watch can be found here:
http://connect.garmin.com/activity/156566594

Food today:  egg and cheese sandwich for breakfast (300 calories), a couple small slices of pizza after the race (300 calories), a burger and fries while out with friends (1200 calories), and dinner ended up being a peanut butter sandwich and milk (700 calories).  Exercise was jogging to the race site, the 5K itself and walking home with a total distance of about 6 miles (calorie estimate is 750 calories).

Today's Results:
Daily Food Total:  2500
Exercise:  750
Points Earned:  1250
Total Points Earned:  191004
Points to go:  8996

Day 142

So tomorrow is my first 5K.  I'm doing it with friends from work so I'm planning to pretty much match my pace to them, but I'm curious to see how I'll do.  I'm kind of using it to see if I can't set my pace and stick to it for the course.  If I can, then it becomes merely a matter of stretching that ability out for another 10 miles.  On the other hand a 5K just seems kind of short.  I regularly do longer distances on both a treadmill and out in the real world.  Last week's Team Challenge training did more than 5 miles, so a 3 mile distance just seems a little weird.  I'm not going to try and sprint it or anything.  If I can finish in 40 minutes I'll be pretty happy with myself.

Food today:  egg and cheese for breakfast (300 calories), PB&J for lunch (600 calories), snacks were a granola bar, a couple tootsie rolls and a couple jelly beans (150 calories), dinner was penne, sauce and garlic toast again (1000 calories).  Exercise was a lunch time walk and an hour on the treadmill at the new speed (1059 calories total).

Today's Results:
Daily Food Total:  2050
Exercise:  1059
Points Earned:  2009
Total Points Earned:  189754
Points to go:  10246

Day 141

So a friend made a comment the other day that I thought was kind of interesting.  According to him I've actually been a lot happier over the last few months on this diet than I had been before.  Obviously that's just his impression of me, but it did get me thinking a bit.  Initially I laughed it off, because it seemed kind of silly.  While I've changed my eating and exercise habits, my basic personality hasn't changed obviously. 

What I did realize though is that I have generally become a lot more active, people in general have been complimentary, and above all else I have had a steady series of accomplishments on the diet.  If those aren't recipes for being happier, I don't know what is.  I can point to a few other life changes as well, of course.  I'm doing well at work, living on my own for the first time in a few years, and otherwise have seen some unrelated positive changes in my life.  But I wouldn't be surprised to discover that the diet, and more importantly the success of the diet, is carrying positive changes over to the rest of my life.  Pollyanna-ish, sure, but plausible.

Gave myself a night off from exercise tonight though, and ate a little more than necessary:  egg and cheese sandwich for breakfast (300 calories), turkey sandwich for lunch (500 calories), granola bar and some chips as snacks (200 calories), steak and french fries for dinner (1200 calories).  Exercise was just a lunchtime walk (100 calories).

Today's Results:
Daily Food Total:  2200
Exercise:  100
Points Earned:  900
Total Points Earned:  187745
Points to go:  12255

Day 139 and Day 140

Well I made it four and a half months without missing an update.  It was bound to happen eventually.  No really good reason for it.  A new book arrived from Amazon yesterday, so I got kind of obsessed with reading it.  When 2 am rolled around and I realized I still hadn't done a post, I just decided to squeeze one into the morning instead.  Unfortunately oversleeping doesn't help that plan.  All in all it's not a big deal.  I've still got it tracked in my spreadsheet, but it just didn't get a post for yesterday.

I'm going to be running a 5K on Saturday and I'm kind of looking forward to it.  The only formal race like this I've ever done was the half-marathon.  I'm kind of looking forward to seeing something a little shorter, and to see how I do over that distance.  Also I'm doing it with a bunch of people from work, so it'll be nice to run with a different group as a change of pace, even if it means missing the Team Challenge practice that morning.  Hopefully I'll get some pictures from the race that I can post here.

Food for Tuesday:  egg and cheese sandwich for breakfast (300 calories), turkey sandwich for lunch (500 calories), cheeseburger for dinner (800 calories), granola bar and a couple small sourdough rolls as snacks during the day and evening (400 calories).  Exercise was just a lunchtime walk (100 calories).

Food for Wednesday:  egg and cheese sandwich for breakfast (300 calories), turkey sandwich for lunch (500 calories), penne, sauce and garlic toast for dinner (1000 calories), snacks included a granola bar, some chips and some cookies (400 calories).  Exercise was an hour on the treadmill with the speed kicked up another notch to 5.5 mph (957 calories).

Yesterday's Results:
Daily Food Total:  2000
Exercise:  100
Points Earned:  1100
Total Points Earned:  185088
Points to go:  14912

Today's Results:
Daily Food Total:  2200
Exercise:  957
Points Earned:  1757
Total Points Earned:  186845
Points to go:  13155

Day 138

So we're somewhat back into the daily grind of diet and exercise.  Not that it's actually unpleasant.  I miss being able to eat like a pig of course, but just looking at the photos from a couple days ago points out where that led me over the years.  I've found a set of meals that I enjoy, even if they are a little bit boring at times.  I've also finally begun to realize that as long as I stick to the diet and exercise as my default, a few days of cheating here and there won't hurt me too much.

As with anything it takes good judgment, and I'm hoping that will stick with me for the long haul but at least I know it's possible.  If I stick with it though, I'm really curious to find out where I'll finally settle in on weight.

Food today:  egg and cheese sandwich for breakfast (300 calories), 6 inch meatball sub and potato chips from Subway (700 calories), penne, sauce and garlic toast for dinner (1000 calories).  No snacks on the day, and exercise was an hour of kickboxing (500 calories).

Today's Results:
Daily Food Total:  2000
Exercise:  500
Points Earned:  1500
Total Points Earned:  183988
Points to go:  16012

Day 137

So today ended up being one of those occasional lost days on the diet.  I generally felt blah today so I ended up skipping out on OT for the day but also skipping on a trip to the gym as well.  I figure I'll pick it back up tomorrow.  Today was also a weigh-in day so I figured it made a good one to skimp on.

160K to 180K took 14 days again.  So for the last couple weigh-ins I've talked a lot about plateauing.  In the last 14 days though I've lost the second largest amount of weight since the diet began.  I'm hoping that it's a sign that I've passed some sort of threshold.  I'm not going to make it during this first challenge, but 200 pounds seems to be a believable goal, and the long term goal to no longer be obese on the BMI chart even seems possible.

Weigh-in result:  215.4 lbs.

Now to finish off the theme from the last couple days I figured I'd show a picture of myself in my running shirt from last year:

Photo of me in my half-marathon shirt today

If you look back to Saturday's post you can see me at the half-marathon wearing this same shirt (better image of me is also available at my fundraising page for this year's half-marathon: http://www.active.com/donate/virginia12newengland/VASDwyer ).  At that point the shirt was pretty tight on me.  Now it fits pretty loosely.  I tried on the XL Team Challenge shirt I was given at one point which I didn't even pretend to wear and that is now pretty comfortable.  All in all at 180K I think I'm doing pretty well.  But there's still 20K to go.

Food today:  egg and cheese sandwich for breakfast (300 calories), cheeseburgers on sourdough for lunch and dinner (800 calories each) and a roll and some Mike and Ike's as snacks for the day (300 calories).  No exercise on the day though.

Today's Results:
Daily Food Total:  2200
Exercise:  0
Points Earned:  800
Total Points Earned:  182488
Points to go:  17512

Day 136

So continuing yesterday's theme of photos I figured I'd show a couple photos from the middle of the diet this time.  Neither of them is really revealing, as they're both done with bad angles and bad clothes but they do show some of the changes.

About a week or so before Christmas this year.

So this first picture shows what I looked like about a week or so before Christmas.  Unfortunately I'm wearing a loose pullover shirt and that hides my progress.  It also unfortunately shows my receding hairline, but what can you do.  The shirt I'm wearing though is a 3XL, and is obviously pretty loose though, and you can see some of the changes in my face.

Christmas Eve with my cousin.  I'm so mature!

This second picture shows the remarkably mature guy here on Christmas Eve.  So at this point I'm a little over two months into the diet and have lost around 30 pounds.  It's become more visible in the face (and very visible when compared to the 2005 picture).  The shirt had actually been bought last year and as you can see it has gotten loose as well.  Size here of the shirt is probably 2XL.

Food today:  egg and cheese sandwiches for breakfast and lunch (300 calories each).  Snacks included a granola bar, some peanut butter and some cheese at various points of the day (400 calories).  Dinner was a small piece of salmon, noodles and green beans (800 calories).  Exercise was an hour long run with Team Challenge in the rain, slush and cold (600 calories estimated).

We've passed 180K today so the weigh-in is tomorrow morning!  20K to go!

Today's Results:
Daily Food Total:  1800
Exercise:  600
Points Earned:  1800
Total Points Earned:  181688
Points to go:  18312

Day 135

So the first 200K challenge is very close to being done.  Missed hitting 180K today by just a little (curse you free donut at work).  Because of that I'm looking both ahead at what to do next, and behind to see what's changed.  That'll probably be a theme over the next two weeks or so as well.  So in honor of looking back a bit first I thought I'd include a couple of pictures of where I was before this all began:

Me in 2005 or so.  Probably 300 pounds.

I still have that t-shirt.  Though now it's gotten a little too big.  I still like wearing it to exercise just for the label, but I can honestly say it no longer fits.  It's a 3XL shirt by the by.  Within a year or so of this picture being taken I went on my first big diet.  Went from 300 pounds down to around 250.  Since then I floated up and down around there, though I only got down to 240 once in that time.

This next picture is me after my half-marathon last year:

Shayna and I walk/running a half-marathon in 2011.
Don't forget to support me this year at the link at the top of the page.

As you can see I've dropped a fair amount of weight between the pictures, but at this time I'm still around 250 or so.  The 2XL jersey I'm wearing is a little tight, and my gut is straining to bust out.  I still finished in 3 hours and 10 minutes.  When I looked at the first picture my reaction was, "Holy crap I was fat!"  This one surprised me less.  I know this guy pretty well, and up until October this was pretty close to what I looked like.

October 25, 2011 - 5 days into the diet

And this is me at the start of the diet in October.  At the start of the diet I weighed 265 pounds, this is a few days in so I might be down to 260 here.  Even so, this guy is very recognizable.  Sad to say, but looking back I used to have hair.  Sigh.

I'm going to try and get a couple current photos over the next couple days.  Wish I had thought to do a bit more of them during the diet proper, but there's some Christmas ones at least from around the half-way mark.

Food today:  egg and cheese sandwich for breakfast (300 calories), a doughnut as a snack in the morning (300 calories), two slices of cheese pizza for lunch (600 calories), penne sauce and garlic toast for dinner (1000 calories).  Exercise was an hour on the treadmill after work (861 calories).

Today's Results:
Daily Food Total:  2200
Exercise:  861
Points Earned:  1661
Total Points Earned:  179888
Points to go:  20112

Day 134

Today had some nice surprises related to the diet, plus a combination of cheating on the diet and extra exercise to make up for it.  First the surprises.  I had a couple doctor's appointments today including my first physical in a year and a half.  The doctor was very happy to see me down 40 pounds from my last physical (apparently I was a little lighter then, than I was back on October 20).  My blood pressure was a little elevated, particularly at the start of the appointment, but the later numbers put it in the higher end of normal.  Blood work was done, but I don't have the results.  All in all I'm healthier than I was at my last physical.

The big surprise came when I hit the store to grab a couple new pieces of clothing.  I decided to try on some new pants and found that the 40 waist I had thought might still be too small was actually too big.  My new pants are actually a 38.  I doubt I've been in the 30's since college, possibly high school.  Makes the 46's that I have in my closet look gigantic.  I also grabbed a button down shirt that was only XL but actually fit ideally.  No idea if it'll still fit well after a trip in the wash but it's an XL rather than 2XL.

Food today:  egg and cheese sandwich for breakfast (300 calories), some peanut butter as a snack during the day (100 calories), dinner was a trip to 5 guys for a cheeseburger and large fry (2400 calories).  I'd promised myself the trip after my physical.  Since I knew I was going there I got in some extra exercise today as well to help work it off.  One hour on the treadmill (829 calories) and kickboxing class (500 calories).

Today's Results:
Daily Food Total:  2800
Exercise:  1329
Points Earned:  1529
Total Points Earned:  178227
Points to go:  21773

Day 133

Ah winter weather.  I'd kind of forgotten what you were like.  Had to bike home through a bit of a snow storm today.  No major problems though it did tend to make me a little more nervous than I otherwise would have been.  I bike to and from work every day, and as with everything else on this diet there have been some subtle signs of the weight loss with that as well.  One of the biggest ones is that biking up hill has gotten steadily easier, and can be accomplished in a higher gear.  Have my first physical since the diet started on Thursday.  Hoping my doctor will say some nice things.

Food today:  egg and cheese sandwich for breakfast (300 calories), turkey sandwich for lunch (500 calories), a granola bar, peanut butter and a reese's mini as snacks (200 calories), salmon, noodles and green beans for dinner (900 calories).  Exercise was a lunchtime walk and an hour on the treadmill (958 calories).

Today's Results:
Daily Food Total:  1900
Exercise:  958
Points Earned:  2058
Total Points Earned:  176698
Points to go:  23302