Wow! What a week. I stepped up on Mr. Scale this morning at 5:30 AM and he said, "184.5 pounds." (NS:180.5) Finally! I am back to within half a pound of my target weight of 185.0.

All week long I have been struggling to get back up to 185. Just yesterday (and the day before) I weighed 181.5. I pulled out all of the stops yesterday and ate 51.0 points, in an effort to pull my weight back up. I even had sauerkraut for dinner.

In looking over the data I see that I only ate less than 40 points on one day, and that was because I felt so strange eating 51 points the day before. I felt like I needed to pull back to avoid moving up too far. Obviously I needn't have worried about that. Between Tuesday and Wednesday, I averaged eating 43 points per day, and I dropped a pound and a half as a result.

Over the last 14 days I have a net change in weight of zero, because I weighed 184.5 two weeks ago. However my points per day average over the last 2 weeks was 38.54, while my points per day over the preceding two weeks was only 30.32. Over the last 7 days it has gone up to 43.43. Even so, it has been 5 weeks since I had a weekly weigh-in that was 185 or above. In fact I have had 8 weigh-ins in a row, at or below 185.0 pounds. Something has settled into a new groove, and the number of points that I have to eat to maintain 185.0 took a jump up.

Now, the question is: is this a temporary change, or is it what I have to look forward to in the future? Will I need to eat 43+ points per day to maintain 185.0? Or will my weight start to creep up at that point level and force my points back down? Stay tuned next week for the continuing saga of In Search of the Elusive Number...

This week and books…

Yesterday I finally reached the end of The Fellowship of the Ring. It has been a fun excursion into the world of fantasy, with elves, hobbits, men, dwarves, and even a wizard, all on a quest that is being challenged at every step by spectral dark cloaked riders, orcs, wizards and the Dark Lord of the Tower. JRR Tolkein has kept the story moving and things never get too quiet before some new danger suddenly comes upon them. He has created an intricate “history” of “Middle Earth” stretching back over 1000s of years, that is repeatedly referenced by the characters in the story. From the fair, golden haired elf Lady, to the evil Dark Lord, there is a wide range of interesting and morally varied characters populating this fantasy universe. Now that I have finished the first one (as well as the preliminary The Hobbit which is referred to repeatedly during The Fellowship of the Ring) I must continue on with the other two soon.

I completed The Door Into Summer by Robert A. Heinlein, during my lunch hour reading this week, and it ended happily with the main character marrying the girl of his dreams, but there was a bit of twist to that. (She was 11, and many years his junior at the beginning of the book, but when they got married, she was in her twenties, and he had only aged a year or so, due to two forms of time travel he had used; one of them twice.) The book was written in 1957, but it was set in both the 1970s and the start of the 21st century. The book ended just about today, as the main characters faced living happily ever after.

My bedtime reading is progressing nicely, as I am about halfway through Have Space Suit, Will Travel also by Robert A. Heinlein. Both of the Heinlein books I have been reading were written in the first person, which has given them a very personable feel. He handles that tough writing style exceptionally well. So far, the main character has gone from Earth (where he was taken prisoner by aliens), to the moon (where he nearly escaped to a human lunar base), and then on to Pluto where he is fighting to escape once again. It has been a light read so far, with one interesting memory aid: “A pint’s a pound, the world round.” That should help me to always remember that 16 ounces are in a pint. As long as I remember that 2 pints (and therefore 2 pounds) are in a quart I will be all set. :)

280 days OP, a lifetime to follow.

-Al-

239.5/182.0/200/BMI:22.7/WK-38
Weight Loss Graph/Maintenance Graph/Success Story