100 Days

Dinner (7:45 p.m.)
2 slices of multi grain bread
1 can of tuna
2 servings of fat free mayo
Calories: 270
Fat: 2.5 grams

Snack (11 p.m.)
2 ounces of turkey
Calories: 50
Fat: 1 gram
Total Calories: 1,300
Total fat: 18 grams

Exercise: Good workout, 40 minutes on the elliptical machine, full body workout after.

You can file this under the “What the fuck did you think would happen?” file. But, it hit me today that I had very little trouble doing 40 straight minutes on the elliptical machine. I remembered back at my last semi serious attempt to lose weight, last summer. (I dropped 10 pounds, then put on 20 or 30 more in the coming months.) That was my first experience with the elliptical trainer. Back then, I struggled mightily to get in 10 minutes. I had to rest for at least five minutes afterwards and I absolutely hated that thing. I guess you get better at it the more you do it. I guess that is common sense. But still, I am happy that 40 minutes (and 740 calories) isn’t too hard right now.

I still wanted to quit today, but the thought was much less intrusive in my mind than it was yesterday. I think I am through that phase, at least for now. However Shep did give me some sage advice on the subject. He said “fight through it and stop being such a puss.” Good point.

This will be an interesting week to test my will. For the rest of the week, I will be covering three or four basketball games per day. It is the Colorado district tournament. That’s right, it is playoff basketball time in Colorado! Finally the waiting is over. YES!

What that means is that from about 5 to 10 p.m. each night I will be away from home with easy access to a very delicious and very free buffet set up for media types like myself. So what do I do? I guess I stay out of the buffet room. Honestly, I am much more worried about my eating frequency during this week. Just covering two games today (with a break to come home and watch 24) I went over seven hours between meals. That’s not good, but I won’t let it ruin a healthy day overall. I think I will be able to get through the buffets and long times. Maybe I will head to Subway between games or just bring my own stuff.

I just saw something on the local news (Local newscasts, by the way, are total jokes. I have never seen anything on the local news that provided any valuable information. Well, outside of murders and stuff like that. And it drives me nuts how the anchors have to be balanced by gender and race. If your skin is too dark or too light, you can’t report the news. No, that might be subtly offensive to the viewers. If you are a light skinned black woman, you’re hired. The key to getting a desk spot on the local news seems only to have to do with your percentage of racial ambiguity, and each anchor is neutered of his or her culture as soon as they sit down. That is bland and formulaic. It just bothers me.)

Anyway, I was watching the local news and someone said something to the effect that “Doctors say that if you cut out just 100 calories per day, you can lose 10 pounds in a year!” I rolled my eyes. What happens if you cut 2,000 calories out of your diet per day? I guess I am finding that out right now.

On the same local news story, they listed the five habits of naturally healthy people. I didn’t catch them all, sorry. But what I did catch was 1) They walk. 2) They don’t eat that much cheese 3) they drink a lot of water.

Did I need a two-minute piece to tell me that walking, not eating cheese and drinking a lot of water would be beneficial to my health? Really? If I don’t eat cheese I will be able to cut down on calories? Why didn’t anyone tell me that cheese was bad for me? Wait, people have told me that since I was 10 years old. Does news even exist anymore?

Of course, maybe that piece just seemed soft because the next story was so hard-hitting: the 200 pound cat.

America, gotta love it.