Day 4 - Grocery Shopping

So mostly today had little of real consequence happen as far as the diet went.  I stuck to it, and avoided any setbacks, but that had as much to do with no one restocking the candy jars at work as my willpower.  With the snow melting walking into work was a little more of a challenge than usual as well.  Walking on ice and snow didn't really take longer, but I was definitely burning a few extra calories.  Unfortunately under the rules of the Challenge those don't "count."

The only thing of any real significance was finally getting to stock up on groceries after the storm this weekend.  I made the mistake of going shopping while hungry but that didn't actually hurt me any.  No chips, cookies, crackers, ice cream or french fries ended up in my basket thankfully.  Over the past few months all of those have ended up there, hence the need for the diet.  Mostly I bought the usual suspects, some pork chops, some pasta, bread, turkey, cheese, eggs and milk.  One technique that I will emphasize, at least for someone who lives alone, is to immediately sort out the foods and freeze what's going to be frozen, etc. 

Many times over the past few months I've gone to the grocery store and bought chicken, fish or pork and then got lazy after getting home.  Not a big deal, but then either the stuff sits in the fridge long enough to go bad (because of course I was going to "make it" tomorrow), or it all gets tossed into the freezer together (and then making a chicken breast means defrosting three or four extras).  As a result a lot of the time I would have healthy food on hand, but not want to make it because it was too much of a hassle.  Then I'd "solve" the problem by ordering pizza, or heading out to Wendy's instead. 

Other people plan out their entire week's meals or some similar equivalent.  I don't have that much forward thinking myself, at least as far as my food goes.  I've got a little too much impulse eating, even when eating healthy to try and schedule meals that much.  On the other hand, if you can do it it's a pretty awesome strategy and solves both of the problems I've discussed here.  It all still comes down to figuring out ways to control what you eat, the strategy by which you control it is about what works for you.

Food today:  pancakes for breakfast again (500 calories), Subway 6-inch meatball sub for lunch (500 calories), dinner was steak, noodles and green beans (1000 calories).  No real snacking or exercise on the day.

Daily Point Total:
Daily Food Total:  2000
Exercise: 0
Points Earned: 1000
Total Points Earned:  8624
Points to go:  191376