Though Heaven and Hell Conspire Against Me

So I just finished a weeklong vacation from work. It was wonderful, but I discovered how important a routine is to following my diet. I was eating at the wrong times! Oh My! I didn't have my soup and salad from work! Oh My! There were snacks in the house! Oh My! I did get a lot done, and I was way more active than I ever am at work, so I'm hoping that I maintained my weight. When I put on my clothes for work today, they felt loose, so that's a good sign.

Trenton and I climbed Azure mountain on Thursday. It was gorgeous! We had a snowstorm Wednesday night - only about 2 inches here, but about 8 inches at the mountain. We took our snowshoes and headed to the mountains at 7 AM. We got to the base at 8, and headed up. I felt like my lungs had shrunk. I was really disappointed in myself because I had to keep stopping. I figured I was really out of shape. I finally dragged myself to the top and found that it had only taken us 1 hour! That made me feel better. The snowstorm had coated all of the trees and we looked out through the clouds at a winter wonderland. We were the first to the top of the mountain after the snow, so it was still pristine. That's why we do stuff like that - how many people get to see the pristine beauty of the top of a mountain after a snowstorm?

The Plan: Part B

So, changing my eating habits is the first part. Now, I suppose I should change what I do. I sat down and thought about how I spend my days. I get up at 6:00, rush around, and leave at 7:00. I get home at 5:30, play with the kids, eat dinner, put the kids to bed, and then sit around because I'm exhausted. I often drift over to the computer and get sucked into websites like failbook.com. (my guilty pleasure)

So, to make changes: I can't eat a healthy breakfast if I don't have time to make it, so I have started getting up at 5:30. It's amazing what a difference that 1/2 hour makes! While my eggs are cooking, I do some situps and pushups. I am ashamed to say that on day one, I squeezed out 2 pushups and collapsed on the floor.
After school, I still come home and follow the same routine until the kids are in bed. Then, instead of sitting around, I go for a two mile walk. In the dark. It's a little creepy. But, what a difference that makes!

I started my new regimen on Monday, and I feel great! I have more energy, I feel lighter, and I'm happier. Is it for real or just a placebo effect? I don't know, but I'm enjoying it.

Oh, and the other change that I made is to start going to bed at 10:00 instead of 10:30. That way I still get a full 7 hours of sleep.

Speaking of which, I thought a lot today about how much money I could make if I got paid for my volunteer activities. I had a board meeting last night that got done at 9:30. I got home at 9:45 and hit the bed at 10:30. At 11:55 my pager went off for a chimney fire. I got back home at 12:45 and then couldn't fall asleep until about 1:30. Then the baby woke up at 3:00. Then I got up at 5:30. And yet, I had energy today, and no headache, which is different for me! So far, so good!

The Plan: Part A

So, how am I going to lose 40 pounds in 6 months?

I sat down and broke my goal into smaller, trackable mini-goals. It breaks down to about 7 pounds per month, which is between 1 and 2 pounds per week. That's pretty manageable, right? Then I took a look at what I eat, and my lifestyle, and identified some changeable things. First, what I eat:

I have a bowl of cereal in the morning. My favorites are Cinnamon Life and frosted Mini Wheats. Sugar, sugar, sugar. For lunch I eat a bowl of soup and a salad from the cafeteria at school. Sometimes I get some extras like french fries. My lunch time is 10:30. I get home at 5:30. As you can imagine, I'm starving when I get here, and I tend to snarf down way too much dinner. So, I am making some changes:

For breakfast, 2 hard boiled eggs, a slice of wheat toast with peanut butter, and a glass of chocolate milk. For lunch, I'll continue with the soup and salad thing, but I bought some fat free dressing today to take the place of the ranch that they give me. I'll also cut out the little extras that I like to buy when I'm hungry. Now, I don't like to deprive myself of yummy food, and so I didn't want to say "I won't eat any of ______." I decided for dinner, I'll eat whatever we have, but keep it to one reasonable portion and no more. And, in spite of what I just said about not depriving myself, I'm cutting out desserts.

So there's half of the puzzle. The other half is exercise, but I'll write about that tomorrow.

Thanks to those who have commented already! I appreciate your support!

Kilimanjaro Project

Hi folks! I'm getting back into the blogging thing in the hopes that it will keep me on track. I had an idea recently, and I'm hoping you'll support me in it.

First, some background.

When I was about 13, I passed 180 pounds. When I was about 15, I passed 190 pounds. I hovered at 195 until I graduated from high school and then I went up to 200 pounds. Then I did the college thing and the teaching thing and I maxed out at 230 pounds last year. I've gotten myself down to 215, but I'm still pretty overweight. I want to get back to 180 pounds: 35 pounds less than what I weigh now. And I want to do it by June. Just so you know, I've tried to get rid of the extra weight many times, but I've only succeeded in getting below 200 once.

Now, my life: I am a music teacher, currently producing a musical for the school. That means that I leave home at 7:00 AM and get back home at about 5:45 PM, with no breaks when I can go for a walk or work out. I am a school board member in the middle of The Budget Season From Hell. (Thank you, Governor Cuomo) I am a volunteer firefighter, and I was recently asked to be an Assistant Scoutmaster. So, I'm busy.

I want to prove that even being very busy, a guy like me can work off his gut through watching what he eats and finding time to exercise. Today I started a new routine that should help me shed some pounds. I am going to post on this blog regularly so that I have someone to be accountable to. That means that I need you to check in regularly and support me by commenting and encouraging. I'm calling this the Kilimanjaro Project. There are many things that I want to do that I can't because of my belly. Rock climbing, ice climbing, running, etc. Carrying an extra 40 pounds makes any task harder. One of my biggest goals is to climb Mount Kilimanjaro. I figure losing 40 pounds is the first step on the way to climbing that mountain.

So check in and keep me honest and let's see what I can do.

House remodel

My plan was to build new walls for the second floor of the house while the roof was still on, then take off the roof, erect the walls, and put the roof back on. Then I found that the 2nd floor was so uneven and poorly constructed that we would have to take the whole floor up and replace it before the walls were built. Since the roof was sitting on the floors, it had to come off first. Here's how the second floor looked before we got started:



Sadly, you can't see how the floor goes up and down with each floor joist.













So, the roof came off:





First the tin,













Then the rafters. That's what's all stacked up there.













And the floor was replaced.











We had wonderfully sunny weather through all of this. In fact, Jamie's head was burned to a crisp. As soon as the floor was redone, we started on the walls, one or even half of one at a time. Once the walls were up, we built the floor for the 3rd floor and then put the roof back on. However, long about the time that the second wall went up, it started to rain. And rain. And rain. Every day it rained. We bought a ginormous tarp that quickly tore and the rain came through. A lot. We had to set up some pretty creative ways to keep the water from running straight down into the sheetrock and insulation downstairs. More on this later.

Still alive

So, you may have noticed that I haven't posted anything in a while. Life has been a little bit crazy. Here's what happened since April. We bought the house and started MAJOR renovations. Things snowballed a bit, and we're still working on the remodel. I got a job teaching 7-12 choral music at Norwood Norfolk High School. We got pregnant and had a baby. I think that's about it. I'll try to post more details on the various topics.

Diaper Woes

The other day I was sitting here at the computer when Truman came up and pulled on my sleeve. I asked, "What's up, Bub?" and he pulled up on his pajamas and grunted. He hates to have his pants legs down to his feet, so I thought maybe that was bothering him, but he was wearing footy pajamas. I pulled up on them and asked if that was better, but he pulled and grunted again. I decided it must be he wanted different clothes on so I went to change him. Upon unzipping his pajamas I found that the right side of his diaper had come undone. It was hanging down around his left knee. It was absolutely soaked and he had also peed in his pajamas, so it had all run down into the feet. Both of us said, "eeewww!" and I went and plopped him in the bathtub.

Speaking of which, I just remembered that he was stinky while I was eating lunch. Bathtime!

(He went through a hands-down-the-back-of-his-diaper stage. Here's a picture, because everyone needs some baby cheeks to brighten their day.)