This morning at 5:15, Mr. Scale said, “Oh, was that your 50th birthday that went by last week? Well, here’s your present a bit late... 204.5 pounds.” He actually only said the weight part, but he must have been thinking the rest. :)

Yesterday, I was struggling to get down to 206.0 pounds early for my weigh-in, and then AFTER having my breakfast, and a cup of coffee, my bout with constipation finally let up, and my weight dropped down to 205.5. This morning, it fell another pound. It would have looked really nice on my weight loss graph, but if this week goes well at all, next week should really look good.

Dotti and I ran around and did some errands yesterday. Dotti ran a couple while I was still doing my journal in the morning and then we stopped at a used book store, where I picked out a few belated birthday presents. (Dotti knows just what I like!) The reason I really like this particular book store is that it has a very large non-fiction section. I have been doing some reading on philosophy lately and they had a couple of great books on the subject that I grabbed. I also found a math book that I think will be helpful. So many books, so little time...

We of course went to the mall and had an All American ice cream cone, and then walked around the mall for a while. We picked up a few DVD’s of some old movies we like. Dotti was looking at Lane Bryant, and said that she was so happy that she did not have to buy her clothes there anymore. (This journey is a perpetual source of joy -- moving you to a new place that is so much better than where you started from! Sometimes, when you least expect it, it drops a bit of it in your lap.)

When we got home we watched a couple of the old movies we had purchased, and had a nice evening. I even had some popcorn, salt and all. When I went to bed, I weighed 208.0, which is the lowest I have weighed at night for this entire journey: in fact I have not weighed under 210 at night.

Today they have still not yet announced the winner, if any, of the Powerball Lottery. I am struck with the fact that each of the people who are buying the tickets would be far more likely to provide a large sum of money to their heirs by buying a large amount of insurance on themselves, and driving to the store, because the odds that they will be killed and leave a lot of money to their heirs is much better than winning the lottery are. If people could hold in their minds the number 80,000,000 and actually picture how large a number it is, I wonder if they would still go out and plunk down $10, $20, or $500 for tickets. Do any of them wonder why it is that the government holds a monopoly on this racket in most parts of the country? If a large bank decided to have a multimillion dollar lottery, which would give a huge return on its initial investment, the government would step in and shut it down as a racket. It is illegal for you and I to steal money from people that way, or for companies to do so. Organized crime has been doing it for years. Why can’t you set up a game similar to the lottery? Because it is stealing! 99.99999125% of the people are going to lose, and the winner will only be taking home a percentage of the take. The game organizers win every time. They take your money, and put a part of it up for a prize and keep the rest.

I keep searching my mind for a good example to help visualize 80 million people. California has something over 30 million people. The entire country of Canada has fewer people than California has. So put the population of California together with the population of the country of Canada and you will have something over 60 million people. Throw in the greater New York City metropolitan area, and you might be getting close to 80 million. If you were told that only one person in all of Canada, California, and the New York City metropolitan area was going to die tonight, and you lived in one of those places, would you give it one single thought as to it being you? Would you lose a moment’s sleep thinking it might be you? The fact is that many people are going to die in those locations in the next hour. Many more are going to murdered and assaulted in the next day. But the average lottery ticket purchaser does not get all in a lather worrying about it. Instead he actually takes his hard earned cash, and spends it on a “chance to win” that is completely insignificant, when compared with the odds he faces of dying on the road, being murdered or assaulted. The odds that winning the lottery would actually make his life worse are far, far greater than the odds are that he will win at all.

What does all this have to do with weight loss? It is a study in the way the human mind works. What drives people to throw their money away on impossible odds? It is the desire for easy money, a statement of how unhappy they are, being tied to their current financial situation, and how much they would love to be freed from the slavery of a 9 to 5 job. It is desire for heaven on earth, a life of true freedom, and luxury. I would dare say that the average ticket buyer is not overly greedy, or looking to live a decadent life of a wealthy amoral playboy. The average ticket buyer is just plain tired of the way things are, and would love to make them different with no real effort on his own part. Win the lottery, and he will suddenly be transformed into a happy, care-free person. All his troubles will be gone, and he will be free to live his life as he always wanted to live it.

Does any of that sound familiar? It is the same basic inspiration that we find in the weight loss diets that run through our society like a virus, before they are finally exterminated by our natural immune system, only to have another one come along shortly thereafter. Coming home from work on Thursday I saw a homemade sign stuck beside the road that said, “I lost 40 pounds in 2 months! Call xxx-xxxx.” Only a desperate person would call that number. (That is a weight loss of a pound every day and a half, or nearly 5 pounds a week.) It is the same sort of attraction that the lottery has: the yearning for a quick fix to a much deeper problem.

I just read the continuing saga of a man who won $30 million in Ohio in 2000. He subsequently was arrested for not showing up at a DUI hearing, he sued a woman to get back $500,000 he had given away in a drunken stupor and he was being sued for back child support. He had always dreamed of moving to Australia, but because of his “mounting legal troubles” he was unable to tell when he might be able to do so. Winning the lottery was not going make this man happy. He brought his personal problems along with him as he moved from middle class to upper class. Who can tell the future? But my guess is that he will be penniless in a few years and die young from alcohol abuse. The lottery is no more a solution to happiness than a diet is a solution to being overweight. If you are a happy person even though poor, you have a good chance being happy when you are rich. If you are a miserable person when you are short of money, you will probably be miserable being rich. As the bumper sticker says, “This is not practice, it is life.” All of it is real and all of it is life. We don't start living at some point in the future, but we are alive today, and this counts as much as any point in the future will.

In order to be happy, you must have a stable emotional platform from which to operate. Happiness comes first and foremost from within, not from a bank account. How many stories have you read about wealthy people who died from drug overdose or other self induced causes? Wealth will open doors of opportunity without a doubt, but only a healthy mind, and an emotionally stable person can be happy as a wealthy person. The same is true for a middle, or lower class person. Wherever you find yourself on the financial scale, what you have inside will determine your level of happiness. A lottery ticket -- even a winning lottery ticket -- is not a magic carpet to happiness. And for every winning ticket, there are well over 80 million losing tickets.

I think that the average American looks at a lottery ticket as if it contained some sort of magic, blessed by the gods with the ability to bring joy and happiness. As many winners, and an astronomically huge number of losers have found out, this is not the case. The easy path to happiness is as mythical as the easy path to weight loss. If you do not do the work, life has a way of taking the prize away from you.

As the years pass me by, I grow ever more certain that making the right choices will bring to me what I most want in life, while any attempt at a quick, or magic fix will only waste valuable time, and make things worse. Since I can never remain in one place, and time wasted is not moving me forward, it therefore is a move backwards whenever I attempt to do things the shortcut way. This has been a hard lesson to learn, and I have still not learned it completely, but I am learning. As the date of having my last cigarette recedes ever farther into the past, and as my weight is drawing down towards my goal, I have clear concrete evidence that hard, correctly aimed work, produces the results that wishing, and attempting to take the shortcut path never could.

I am reminded of Tracy’s signature, “A year from now, you'll wish you started today!” What does that mean? In just 9 words it puts the whole thing into perspective. Procrastination only makes things worse, by delaying any progress and actually allowing things to deteriorate further. Working, that is taking the correct steps, will produce the results you would like to have right now. You cannot have the results right now, but you can begin a process that will bring them to you in the future. That is life in a nutshell, and I only wish I had learned that lesson, in its fullness, when I was a much younger man.

For eating yesterday, I had my standard breakfast (5.0 pt.). For lunch, I had a 6 inch sub (6.0 pt.) that my lovely Dotti picked up for me at Subway. I also drank a diet cream soda (0.0 pt.) with it. For dinner it was 3 tostados (6.0 pt.) and another diet soda. (0.0 pt.) That brought my meal point total to 17.0 points. For snacks I had a cup of decaf (1.0 pt.), two fresh plums (2.0 pt.), an All American ice cream cone (2.0 pt.), a Mr. Cookie Face (3.0 pt.), a bag of Jolly Time Healthy Pop popcorn (2.0 pt.) and I split another Mr. Cookie Face (1.5 pt.) with Dotti. That brought my snack points to 11.5 points and my total points for the day to 28.5.

For water yesterday, I drank 9 cups or 72 ounces.

Last but not least, Dotti bought me a brand new pair of 36-inch-waist blue jeans, and I wore them all day yesterday. YES!

Off to enjoy my first Sunday as a 50 year old. (Dotti bought me a cup on my birthday that said, “Why did the 50 year old cross the road? No particular reason. People your age tend to get disoriented from time to time.” Such supportive thoughts are truly appreciated. :) )

106 days OP, a lifetime to follow.

-Al-

106 days OP, a lifetime to follow.

-Al-

239.5/206.0/200/BMI:25.8/WK-15/Weight Loss Graph

Mr. Scale said, “205.0 pounds,” at 5:40 AM. Goal is beginning to look pretty close.

Yesterday, Dotti and I went to the Oregon State Fair.

Click here for photo of my lovely Dot

Click here for photo of me in my 36 inch pants

We arrived about 10:30 AM, and then waited in a line to get into the fair grounds, for about 20 minutes. We spent the rest of the morning walking around looking at the displays, which included prize cows, pigs, and handcrafts. At one stand, I bought a new (shorter) belt, which will go well with my 36-inch-waist pants that Dotti bought for me.

There was one student rock “band” playing on a stage not far from the Subway stand Dotti spotted, where we bought our lunch at. We sat and listened to the singer who was flat and off key most of the time - singing songs that were old enough to have been oldies before her parents were born (in other words songs that were popular in my teen years :) )-- while we ate our sandwiches. They gave a good effort, and what more can you ask?

In the afternoon we found a couple of more goodies to purchase from some of the booths, and they also went into the backpack I was carrying. By 2:30 PM it was getting into the 80s and we were getting too hot and tired to do anymore walking, so we headed home. We had spent a good 3 hours or more walking around and so we had some pretty good exercise.

On the drive home we stopped at the Washington Square Mall in Beaverton, because Dotti wanted to check the Warner Brothers store, and see if it was going out of business like the one in our Vancouver mall did. Sure enough it was going out of business. (What will Dot do without her Tweety store?) We walked all over that mall looking for an All American Ice Cream stand but we couldn’t find one. :( But we got some addition exercise in anyway.

After a scenic drive along Skyline Boulevard (the people living up there could be on “Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous”) and then across the St. John’s Bridge, we made it back home, where we were ready to settle in and relax.

This weekend was definitely too short! I had a really good time spent with my lovely wife, and I could really use a few more days like the two I just had. But alas, it is back to work on a Monday morning.

The temperature is in the mid 50s this morning, but the house did not cool off as much last night as it usually does. It was still in the 70s when we went to bed and I still felt overly warm when I woke up. We have about 3 or 4 more weeks until the temperatures should fall below 80 until next spring or summer. I always start looking forward to that drop about this time of year. We have had a relatively cool summer too this year, but I am ready for the cool weather.

For eating yesterday, I had my standard breakfast (5.0 pt.), and at the fair for lunch I had a 6 inch Subway sub (6.0) and a large diet Pepsi (0.0 pt.). For dinner I had 4 fried egg sandwiches with cheese (6.5 pt.) and a diet soda (0.0 pt.). That brought my meal points to 17.5 for the day. For snacks, my allergies were really making my throat feel bad in the morning so on the drive down to Salem, and the fair, and on the drive back, I went through 9 cough drops (3.0 pt.) but it sure made my throat feel better. During the drive back home I had 10 Body Smart Chews (2.0 pt.) a fresh plum (1.0 pt.), and 5 Kedems cookies (1.0 pt.) and an Ice Cream Pop lollypop (1.0 pt.). That brought my snack points to 8.0 and my total points for the day to 25.5.

For water I drank 10 cups or 80 ounces. Dotti bought us each a large cup (24 ounces) of ice water as we were heading out the gate from the fair, and we both dumped the water out of the water containers we had in the car, and filled them up with the ice water. The car had turned into a pre-heated oven, and our water had moved up to a temperature that was not pleasant to drink. So, the ice water really tasted good.

Well, its off to face another wonderful Monday morning. :(

107 days OP, a lifetime to follow.

-Al-

106 days OP, a lifetime to follow.

-Al-

239.5/206.0/200/BMI:25.8/WK-15/Weight Loss Graph

On this warm morning, at 5:40 AM, when it was still 64 degrees outside, ten degrees above what is the normal low, Mr. Scale said, “205.5 pounds.” I seem to be moving in the wrong direction, but from day to day, it doesn’t make much since to worry about the scale. Too many things can throw it off. I know that I am OP and so I can’t be gaining fat. That means everything is just fine. I love that feeling!

Yesterday I spent the morning in the clean room. I was helping with a mechanical alignment on a machine, making sure that the 15 feet of beamline components were exactly in line. They were off a couple of millimeters, but they are not any longer. We will have to see if correcting that small amount of discrepancy will actually effect beam performance or not. The morning went by very quickly, and I was up on my feet the whole time, and doing some minor physical activity. In the afternoon I finally got all of my paperwork caught up, and so I was sitting for that half of the day. At lunch I took a very short walk, maybe 10 minutes worth. In the evening, I was on the computer the whole time.

For eating yesterday, I had my standard breakfast (5.0 pt.). For lunch I did not get around to eating my Jell-O or my plum out of my standard lunch, and so it was only 5.0 points this time. For dinner I had half of a Heaven’s Bistro pizza. That brought my meal points to 14.5. For snacks I had 7 cough drops (2.0 pt.), 2 cups of decaf during the day (2.0 pt.) and Mr. Cookie Face ice cream sandwich (3.0 pt.) and a WW Just 2 Points bar (2.0 pt.). That made 9.0 points for snacks and a total of 23.5 points for the day.

For water, I drank 2 cups at work, during the afternoon, and about half of my 24 ounce mug while in my car driving. I didn’t drink any more until about 8:30 PM when I realized that I had better get going. I finished off the mug of water, which brought me up to 5 cups. I filled up my 24 ounce glass and drank it down, to bring me to 8 cups for the day, or 64 ounces. That is low for me.

Well I am off to face Tuesday.

108 days OP, a lifetime to follow.

-Al-

239.5/206.0/200/BMI:25.8/WK-15/Weight Loss Graph

I woke up this morning and found that it was still 65 degrees F (18.3 C, 291.5 K) outside, which is really hot for a Vancouver morning. Mr. Scale said, “205.5 pounds.” That sounds familiar. It seems that I have seen that before someplace.

I spent yesterday in the office at work and didn’t get in much exercise. The temperature was up into the 80s and that usually keeps me from walking outside. One of the things that I really miss about Massachusetts is the gym we use to belong to at the North Shore Shopping Center in Peabody. They had an indoor track where I could walk or run on nearly any day of the year with no concern about the weather outside. It is almost impossible to find a gym with a track in it here. Our local outdoor track is in a park that does not open until 7:00 AM (I am already headed for work by that time) and closes at sunset. During most of the summer it is still too hot at sunset, and in winter the park closes before I get home from work. I don’t like walking on the road (ask Stephen King about why that is a bad idea) and so I am still searching for a convenient and safe way to walk and/or run regularly. I will find it sooner or later. (We used the mall in Eugene, and that may end up being the solution, but that would be only as a last resort.) Probably what will be the final solution, or at least part of it, will be using my lunch hour at work to get my exercise in. Each place that I work has large parking lots with sidewalks around them, and/or walking paths close at hand. I just don’t like getting too sweaty at lunch, since showers are not available.

When I got home Dotti and I watched a video on how to use the new FoodSaver Ultra vacuum sealer she picked up at Costco for her 3-year-anniversary-at-goal present. It was fun practicing sealing things up with the FoodSaver. It looks like it might be a very useful device.

Before going into my study, so that Dot could watch a movie, I played one game of Snood (an addicting computer game that Dot downloaded some time ago) and it was one of those times when everything seemed to work right. I played the PUZZLE level and I reached a screen that I had never gotten to before called Olmek. I didn’t last long on that screen but I got my score up to 101,089 which was about 12,000 higher than I ever did before. Some days nothing seems to work and other days it all comes together. :)

Yesterday I had my standard breakfast (5.0 pt.) and my standard lunch (7.0 pt.). For dinner I had 4.5 ounces of hash brown potatoes (1.5 pt.), cheese omelet (2.0 pt.) and an English muffin with just a touch of Brummel & Brown blueberry creamy fruit spread (1.0 pt.). That made 16.5 meal points. For snacks I had 7 cough drops (2.0 pt.), a Mr. Cookie Face ice cream sandwich (3.0 pt.), 4 chocolate meringues (2.0 pt.), a cup of decaf (1.0 pt.), for a total of 8.0 snack points. That brought my total for the day to 24.5 points.

For water, I drank 8 cups of water (plus 2 cups of herbal tea, and 3 cups of coffee - 1 caffeinated and 2 decaffeinated). So I had 64 ounces of pure water.

Today I am off to a customer’s site and will be spending at least some time in a clean room. So, I should be less sedentary today anyway. :) And Wednesday is the day that puts us over the halfway point for the week. Pretty soon it will be the best time of the week: Friday night with a whole weekend ahead of me. Did somebody say 3-day-weekend? YES!

109 days OP, a lifetime to follow.

-Al-

239.5/206.0/200/BMI:25.8/WK-15/Weight Loss Graph

Mr. Scale said, “205.5 pounds,” again this morning at 5:45. I am surprised it isn’t a bit more because my hands are swollen up a bit, and that usually means extra weight.

We have a warm morning again (58 degrees F) although not quite as warm as yesterday. The high today is supposed to be around 80, which is a couple of degrees less than yesterday, and the next couple of days are supposed to be even cooler. I will welcome that.

I spent the day in the clean room nearly the whole time at work yesterday. It was not hard physical labor, but it meant no water all day. And a fair amount of standing. At home I was just not up to doing much last night, and so I ended up playing Snood again, trying some different levels and having a frustrating but good time.

For eating yesterday I had my standard breakfast (5.0 pt.) and my standard lunch (7.0 pt.). For dinner Dot gave me a cup of Pasta Italiano (2.5 pt.), 4 pieces of toast (2 pt.) and a WW Smoothie Shake (2.0 pt.). She made the shake with less water and ice, so it would have a stronger flavor and it all fit in just over 24 ounces. My meal points were 18.5 for the day. For snacks, I had 6 cough drops (2 pt.), 2 cups of decaf (2 pt.), and a Mr. Cookie Face ice cream sandwich. (3 pt.). That gave me 7.0 snack points, and 25.5 total points for the day.

For water, I drank my 24 ounce mug of water (3 cups) in the car, and then had another 5 cups at home in the evening for a total of 8 cups or 64 ounces.

I don’t know if it is allergies acting up, or if I read a little too late in my Perry Mason novel last night before getting to sleep, but I am feeling tired this morning. I am hoping that I am not coming down with one of the colds that are running around the office right now, especially since we are almost to the three day weekend. I will cross my fingers!

110 days OP, a lifetime to follow.

-Al-

239.5/206.0/200/BMI:25.8/WK-15/Weight Loss Graph

At 5:45 this morning Mr. Scale said, “205.0 pounds.”

Yesterday, I spent most of the workday working in the clean room, but it was light labor, mostly mental effort. At home it was computer time and reading for the evening.

For eating yesterday I had my standard breakfast (5.0 pt.) and my standard lunch (7.0 pt.). For dinner, we ended up eating late, and so I had a cup and a half of Life Cereal (4.0 pt.) and a cup of skim milk (2.0 pt.), for a dinner total of 6.0 points. That made 18.0 meal points. For snacks, I had 7 cough drops (2.0 pt.), a Mr. Cookie Face ice cream sandwich (3.0 pt.) and a Boston Cream Pie flavored yogurt (2 pt.) which was very good. So, that made 7.0 snack points, and a total of 25.0 points for the day.

I did a bit better on my water yesterday, drinking 12 cups or 96 ounces.

My computer bag has been collecting more and more paper in it and it was noticeably heavier yesterday. (I just weighed it, and it is 26 pounds.) I am going to clear out some of that paper before I go to work today, because slinging that much weight around at the end of a strap is becoming a pain, literally. (However it was pretty cool holding 26 pounds in my hands as I stepped on the scale and still weighing several pounds less than I did when I started my journey! :) )

I am really looking forward to a nice quiet, relaxing 3 days coming up on this long weekend. The weather looks like it is going to cool down too! The high today is supposed to be in the upper seventies, dropping down from the low 80s yesterday, and the mid 80s the day before. And tomorrow’s high is supposed to be 70. Yes! Only about 3 weeks are left until Autumn, and our temperature nearly always takes a nice, long term dive within a couple of days of the start of Autumn. The great things about the fall, winter and spring of the Portland/Vancouver area is that highs are usually in the 50s plus or minus 10 degrees F. The winter highs seldom fall below 40, and usually are in the 50s, and the spring and fall highs are in the 50s or 60s. The winter lows very seldom fall below freezing, and usually remain in the upper 30s or the 40s. Last winter we had one doozie of an ice storm. It took me over 3 hours to move 6 miles on the freeway, before I was able to find an alternate route to travel. It was a 4 hour drive home total that night. A couple of years ago we had a big snow storm that lasted about 3 days, and since Dotti and I had made a wintertime emergency run to Spokane, Washington we got snowed in at the Dalles for those 3 days (in the Columbia River Gorge) with the freeway closed on our drive back home. But that is a very rare occurrence, and even the rest of that winter was relatively mild. (And we enjoyed the 3 days together in the Shilo Inn too! It was peaceful, and it was great walking in the snow.) One winter storm is normal, zero storms is fairly common too in Vancouver, but two or more is not all that common. Other than when we get hit by a rare storm, winter time is pretty mild and pleasant for me. I look forward to it every year after going through the summer. I enjoy reaching the point of the year where we can pull the air conditioners out of the windows and return to having an open window as our only cooling device for the house.

This is the last day of August, and that means my 50th birthday month has passed on by. I don’t feel any older than I did last month, and I feel quite a bit lighter. :)

Friday, here I come!

111 days OP, a lifetime to follow.

-Al-

239.5/206.0/200/BMI:25.8/WK-15/Weight Loss Graph

*** Weigh-in for WEEK 16 ***

Week Completed:	__16__
Weigh-In Weight:	205.0
Body Mass Index:	25.7
Week’s Average Points/Day:	24.7
Pounds lost this week:	1.0
Pounds lost total:	34.5
Pounds to go to 10%:	0.0*
Pounds to go to goal:	5.0
* Made 10% at 215.5 pounds on 7/14/01

___________________________

Mr. Scale repeated himself this morning at 6:45, but this one counted when he said, “205.0 pounds.” So, I lost a pound this week. I will take it!

The temperature was fairly warm when we went to bed last night, and this morning, when I got up, it still felt warmer than usual with the temperature in the low 60s. But a cold front is moving in it feels like. As the sun is moving up the temperature is falling. Our thermometer shows 58 degrees right now at 7:15 AM.

The three day weekend is finally here! The Labor Day weekend often reminds me of another Labor Day weekend in 1973. I joined the Navy on August 31, 1973 and just like this year, that day fell on a Friday. Early that Friday morning, I hopped on a bus in northern California, which took me to Reno Nevada, where I caught a plane to Oakland, where I was processed into the Navy, and then put on another plane down to San Diego, California. By the time the Navy bus, which had picked all us lucky recruits up at the airport, and pulled into the Recruit Training Center, it was well after midnight. By the time they gave us a bed to sleep in, it was after 2:00 AM. Along about 04:30 a trashcan was rolled down the aisle, and we were being screamed at to get our tired bodies out of bed -- right now!

The strange thing about it was, all the machinery that would grind us into “proper recruits” was off for the weekend. We didn’t have a Company Commander, or any way of getting our uniforms. They regulated where we could go (nowhere outside our little area), when we got up, when we went to bed, and when we ate. The one military activity that we were forced to perform was “marching” to the chow hall. (The rest of boot camp we laughed about how terrible our marching was those first 3 days.) Other than that we had to fill our own time, just waiting. We spent the entire Labor Day weekend in R & O (Receiving and Outfitting), waiting for Tuesday, watching the Jerry Lewis Telethon, which back then actually ran through the entire 3 day weekend. We also played some volleyball, and watched the “real recruits” out on the “grinder” marching around. We all were itching to be out there doing the same, rather than cooling our heals for 3 days, just waiting.

The next 11 and a half weeks turned out to be very interesting, and living through them was an experience that I am glad that I went through once, but I have no interest in going through again. When boot camp was over, it was nearly Thanksgiving and I had gone through some changes that it took me years to realize how profound they actually were. Boot camp was a school, an initiation, and a foundation for what was to follow. It is something that I will never forget, and one part of it that still remains clear in my mind is the Labor Day weekend of 1973, and watching about a hundred men, some with short hair, some with long hair to their shoulders, some with everything in-between, and all dressed in civvies, trying to march to the chow hall three times a day, and just loafing the rest of the weekend. I can still hear the orders begin called out, as if it were yesterday, “R & O halt!” It is hard to believe that was 28 years ago.

For eating yesterday I had my standard breakfast (5.0 pt.) and my standard lunch (7.0 pt.). For dinner I had 4 tomato sandwiches (3.0 pt.) and a WW Smoothie Shake (2.0 pt.). That brought my dinner points to 5.0. For snacks I had 12 cough drops for 3.5 points. So, my total for the day was 20.5 points.

I drank 13 cups of water for a total of 104 ounces. I drank 4 cups during the day and 9 during the evening. After the WW Smoothie Shake and the 9 cups of water, I was feeling mighty full until bedtime.

It was a fairly sedentary day yesterday. (I ran my high score on Snood up to 109,010 last night.) Starting with the DWLZ walk this morning with Dot, hopefully I can shake a little exercise loose this weekend. It us so much easier finding the time for exercise on the weekends.

Off to do the DWLZ walk with Dotti.

112 days OP, a lifetime to follow.

-Al-

239.5/205.0/200/BMI:25.7/WK-16/Weight Loss Graph