Week 177 Update

With Mount St. Helens silently rumbling 50 miles away, after its little eruption yesterday, I had almost slept in too late, when I got up at 06:06 and stepped on Mr. Scale. He promptly said, "183.0 pounds!" If I had waited much longer I might have fallen out of my target zone!

I ate fewer points this week, averaging 44.43 per day. I ate a total of 21 fewer points for the week, which comes to about a third of a pound's worth (21/70 = 0.3 pounds). My weigh-in weight dropped 2 pounds, but my average weight for the week only dropped 0.28 pounds. That rounds nicely to 0.3 pounds. So, my weight did what it should have done over the week for the amount that I ate.

When I average all of daily points totals over all 1240 days of my journey, it comes to 41.6 points. When I average all of my weigh-ins for the same period it comes to 188.8. My points average continues to slowly rise and my weight average continues to slowly drop. I expect that, if I do this long enough, the points will level off around 45 and the weight average will level off at 185. They both are moving in the right direction for that.

Looking at my weigh-ins for the week, I had one day that jumped up to 188.0. All the rest of the days came in at or below 185.0 pounds. The 188-pound weigh-in came on Monday, the day after I had had a large lunch the day before of breakfast treats at Shari's. You know, the typical healthy breakfast meal of pancakes, bacon, eggs (egg-beaters actually), hash browns, orange juice, and coffee. For Sunday, I only had 49.0 points, but I think my sodium content went through the roof.

Saturday our eating was a little different from the normal, because we took a hike at Silver Falls once more, and were really hungry by the time we got to Sweet Tomatoes in the evening. LeRoy joined Dotti, Joan, and me for that meal, and I had 22 points worth of food. When that was added to my snacking through the day I ended up consuming 52.0 points. However, on Sunday the scale held steady at 185.0.

The rest of the week I just tried to eat sanely, with no real goal for point level, other than not going much over 45 points. Thursday I tangled with Sweet Tomatoes again, and I was hungry. By day's end I had hit 50.5 points. However, I had just gone through two days below 40 points and so the scale moved down a half pound the next day. Yesterday I only ate 36.0 points and I had another 1.5 pounds evaporate by this morning.

For water I did fine. Tuesday my journal only showed 3 cups. I am skeptical that I only drank that much, but since it is what is written down, I will go with it. For the week, I averaged 54.86 ounces (6.8 cups) per day. That is near the middle of my minimum target range for water.

Of late, my primary focus has been on my walking. I am trying to get in all the miles I can, in order to reach 1,200 miles walked by December 31. September turned out to be a pretty good month. It nearly made up for July all by itself. (If I average July's 16.8 miles with September's 171.2 miles, I come up with 94 miles.) For the 30 days of September, I averaged walking 5.7 miles per day. The week before this one I had set the mark for the most miles walked in one week at 45.72 miles. This week I topped that mark with 45.99 miles, and I was able to bring my total miles up to 831.4 for the year.

At the end of September, my total miles for the year was 825.2, putting me 74.8 miles behind the 900 I should have had done to be on pace for 1,200 for the year. If I average 5.7 miles per day (40 miles per week) for the 31 days of October, I will reach a total of 176.7 miles for the month, and 1,001.9 miles for the year, putting me just over the 1,000 miles that I should have to be on pace for 1,200. So, it is possible that I will catch up in October and be able to cruise through November and December right to my goal. Even if I come up a bit short, as long as I make a good showing in October, things should be easier the last two months of the year. And as the year wears on, the temperatures will be dropping, making it even easier to walk!

I took 16 separate walks this week. The hottest temperature I walked in was 77º. I also walked once in 73º, and once in 70º. All the rest of the walks were in temperatures below 70º. I had one morning walk in 49º, and it was great! Soon, I will be seeing more 40s and nearly no 70s.

I have noticed that the leaves are changing color on many of the trees, and I have seen a few trees that have already dropped off all their leaves for winter. Other trees are just starting to show a bit of color. On the walking route around our neighborhood, most of the trees are evergreens, so they just stay the same all year round.

3 years, 144 days OP; a lifetime to follow.

-Al-

6 '3" 239.5/183.0/180±2/BMI:22.87/WK-177
GRAPHS: Weight Loss/Year 1 Maint./Year 2 Maint./Year 3 Maint./Miles Walked
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