My weight has dropped by just about 5 lbs to 165.

Exercise. Virtually none, just a little tennis. But I have really been focused on eating better and eating less. I have considered the “don’t eat anything after 7 PM” plan but I have to tell you. I don’t really see that happening. I’ll cut back other places or hold off on dinner.

I am in one of my phases where I just can’t make myself exercise. It will wear off but I can’t do it right now.

I have failed miserably at my plans to exercise. I could tell you how busy I am at work but we all know that’s a load of bull. If I wanted to do it I would have found the time…

On the plus side I have made some progress on my diet. Note that when I say diet, it is not in the “I plan to lose 50 pounds” sense but in the “I need to eat healthier so I don’t die” sense.

Ok, I do want to lose some weight -  10 pounds. I started this project at 170 lbs. My “normal weight” in my younger days was 155. I think a realistic target weight for me now is 160.

Over the last few weeks I have made a conscious effort to keep portions small and eat more fish, grilled chicken, salads etc. Avoiding fries and sodas. Lo and behold the scales now read 158ish. It could be a temporary blip but it’s something.

One thing I haven’t been good at is stopping the 10:00 PM eating. I usually am up until 11:30PM or 12:00AM and I get hungry. Latest plan is to eat an apple instead of junk. We’ll see if that “takes” on a long term basis.

Cardio tennis tonight.

Last night I hard boiled a few eggs and had two for breakfast with my tea. They weren’t bad. Although I was like a junkie on Methadone – as I ate the egg all my brain kept telling me was “This reminds me of a sausage and egg McMuffin. Mmmm, wouldn’t a sausage and egg McMuffin be good rght now? You’re driving right by a McDonalds…”

Shut up inner self!

Lunch: Plain McChicken and as I perrused the value menu what did I see but a $1 side salad. It was meant to be. Add in a 1/2 and 1/2 tea and that was lunch.

The salad was fine as far as salads go but it doesn’t hold a candle to a greasy hot serving of dollar fries. *sighs*

Full Disclosure: I follow up every lunch with 1/2 a pack of Lance Nekot crackers – one of life’s little indulgences.

Dinner: 1/2 piece of fried chicken breast, biscuit, potato salad and tea

Late night: Bowl of raisin bran

Changing what you eat is hard…

“Oh crap. It’s July 1st”.

That thought hit me as I stood in line at McDonalds for lunch. Today is the day I start “The plan” so I quickly rethought my lunch order and went with two grilled chicken chicken wraps (no sauce but I kept the shredded cheese) and tea (1/2 and 1/2).

Luckily my breakfast was unusually light. I grabbed a small chuck of some sort of gingerbread base bread thing. Not healthy at all but I only got a very small piece. And of course a smaller than normal cup of my home brew (tea of course – and I am still going half strength on the sugar.

Dinner was a ground tukey sloppy joe on rye bread. Quite nasty actually but I was trying to eat up the leftovers as is the job of s Dads. Also got into some cashews – couple of handfuls.

Late night snack: A bowl of raisin bran with skim mlk.

I also swung by the grocery store on the way home from work and got frozen carrots and broccoli plus some apples. I then made a salmon and vegetable foil wrap for tomorrow.

Exercise: I plain forgot about it.

I am not the kind of person who laughs out loud a lot. Granted, I find humor in a lot of stuff but I generally don’t let out a lot of guffaws. Especially in public when I am walking along all by myself.

During a recent trip to the DMV for a license renewal I took the mandatory picture and waited patiently while it was laminated into my shiny new drivers licencse.

The first thing i thought when I saw it was, “What kind of wise guy switched Nick Nolte’s mug shot for my photo? Where are the hidden cameras because this cannot be for real”. But alas, it is indeed true. The picture is so bad that I had people at the DMV staring as I walked out with my license in hand laughing like a loon. And if you’ve spent much time at the DMV, you know that that is a tough crowd to impress. But you have to admit it’s funny. Scary, but funny.

I went to the office and googled “Nick Nolte Mug Shot” and, well, the comparison speaks for itself.

Best news of all? This photo will follow me around unti 2016.

So I am walking into the drugstore (Rite Aid – Formerly Eckerd’s) to pick up my generic Zocor prescription (simvastatin) and there is a table set up on the sidewalk with two teens behind it. They are doing a raio station promo and hand me a pass for two people to see the new Will Smith movie – Hancock. Sweet!

I go to the pharmacy. Ask for my prescription, thinking to myself that I should have asked my doctor to select the cholesterol medicine that Walmart offers for $4, and guess what. She hands me my prescriotion and says “Thanks”. I ask, “How much is it?” and she says “No charge”. Double sweet.

I thought about going to test drive a car…

It has been quite hot around here lately so after a rain storm in the early evening when it was relatively cool I decided to take a run on a (paved) bike path around a local lake. About 2.5 miles total.

I decided to really vary the speed quite a bit. Sprint, walk, jog, walk,jog, sprint. Thinking that that might be better training for tennis. I didn’t set a time limit I was just keeping my heart rate at or above 180. Turns out after reading a bit about blood pressure (based on my recent BP results) on line that I should probably be targeting a sustained rate closer to 150 or 160.

Bottom line is that I doubt I can do running on a regular basis as my knees aren’t really up to it – but we’ll see.

Breakfast: 4 Fig Newtons (“The cookie that thinks it’s a fruit” per my daughters) and the 24 oz home brew of ice tea

Lunch: McChicken plain. Small fries. Large tea 1/2 sweet, 1/2 unsweet

Dinner: Taco Bell chalupa, apple empanada (sp?) and Large tea 1/2 sweet, 1/2 unsweet

Night: small (leftover) portion of iceberg salda w grilled chicken, some cheese and minimal ranch

My blood pressure is 116/74

According to this very detailed but easy to understand blood pressure chart I am as close to “optimal” as I can likely get.  To quote my doctor “It’s much easier to keep it where it needs to be than get it back on track”. He was bemoaning the fact that he has to treat high blood pressure in people who (historcally) would not even be at risk. A sad commentary on American diet and health.

My cholesterol is 183 LDL and 51 HDL for a total of 234

According to the American Heart Association a total cholesterol level of:

Less than 200 mg/dL: Desirable
200–239 mg/dL: Borderline-High Risk
240 mg/dL and over: High Risk

So that puts me, basically, in the high risk category (see I told you). So I will be going on 5mg of Zocor (simvastatin).

Side note: Walmart has 2 cholesterol drugs on their $4 prescription program. Lovastatin and Provastatin. I wonder if they are comparable. I’ll see how much Zocor costs.

All this is tentative but I am starting to see a plan form…

Start date July 1. Commit to 90 days.
- Cut out most sugar, high fructose corn syrup and other obviously bad food choices such as candy bars, ice cream, chocolate etc.
- For most meals I don’t plan to limit quantity but try to cut out some fats and eat more fruits and vegetables. Less bread.
- Exercise. Three days a week I will do a serious workout of at least a two mile jog (or cardio clinic)
- Exercise. Three other days per week I will do some sort of exercise. Plan right now is push ups and sit ups at home.

That’s what I’m thinking right now…Stay tuned