A FEW MORE THINGS
YOU MIGHT ENJOY
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WEEK 418
Week Ending May 20, 2009
Weight Watchers Goal
(the top of my normal weight range)
200.0 pounds
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Week 418 Update
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| Weigh-In Date: | 05/20/2009 |
| Weight: | 213.0 |
| Body Mass Index: | 26.62 |
| Average Daily Points: | 35.14 |
| Average Weight for week: | 214.00 |
| Miles Walked for week: | 19.50 |
| Miles Walked in 2009: | 70.27 |
| Pounds +/- for this week: | +2.0 |
| Pounds lost total: | 26.5 |
| Pounds From Personal Goal (185 lbs) | +26.0 |
RESTART!
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DATE
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WEIGHT
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April 21, 2009
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219.5
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Week's Data
Wednesday |
Thursday |
Friday |
Saturday |
Sunday |
Monday |
Tuesday |
05/13/09 |
05/14/09 |
05/15/09 |
05/16/09 |
05/17/09 |
05/18/09 |
05/19/09 |
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211.0 lbs
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214.0 lbs
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214.0 lbs
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213.5 lbs
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213.0 lbs
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217.5 lbs
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213.0 lbs
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39.0 pts
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33.5 pts
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30.0 pts
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32.5 pts
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35.0pts
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38.5 pts
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37.5 pts
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CONTROL PANEL
GRAPH |
FUTURE
GRAPH |
60-DAY
GRAPH |
90-DAY
GRAPH |
1-YEAR
GRAPH |
Time
Capsule |
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It was 6:05 AM when I stepped up on Mr. Scale and he said, "213.0 pounds!"
It is hard to remember back to when I began, and my starting weight was 239.5 pounds, with a Body Mass Index of 30. While I am still more than 20 pounds below that number, I don't feel like I am doing all that much better than I was back then.
I am adrift even now. I set my mind to restart my journey, and I did, and then along came Mother's Day, and it knocked me right off the rails. I felt that circumstances were outside of my control for a day, and it broke my resolve. That fracture hasn't healed yet.
The low feelings that began in Tiller have not entirely left, and that doesn't help either.
When you are lost, what do you do? How do you find your path back? In this case, it is more a question of desire to get back, rather than how to reach that destination. I know what to do, I just have to want to do it badly enough to do it.
For the month of May, my Weight Commander Control Panel Graph is running along, almost level, but with a slight incline upwards. Daily weigh-ins bounce around, but the trend is creeping in the direction I don't want to go.
The numbers on the right of the Control Panel show that I am not doing a lot better than I used to do before starting my Journey. I have moved around, up, down, and up again, from nearly 220, down to just over 200, and I feel disconnected from the purpose that controlled my actions a few years ago. Part of me just doesn't care. (The same part no doubt that whispers in my ear that a pipe of tobacco would be desirable no doubt—the dark side of my being.) Now, the trick will be to push the negativity aside and nurture the positive side into controlling my life.
My Weight Commander Future Graph runs up to a few days before my 58th birthday. I have seen too many people die in their 60's to be able to pretend that it is just a number that is coming up in two years. It is this, probably more than any other factor that has held my resolve to not start smoking again.
Biology has youth in mind, the next generation. Once you are out of the reproduction game, nature really has no use for you. The species is advanced during your child producing years, and once you are no longer young enough to do that, your genes have little use for keeping you alive. You are born, grow up, have kids and then you are sort of "on your own" from a biological point of view, once you are in an "empty nest." The deck is stacked against you no matter what you do, but if you making it worse by smoking, or overeating, it only speeds up the inevitable process.
Fortunately, part of me, at least, remembers this and so far, I have made mistakes of omission for healthy choices that are not too egregious. But, the Future Graph lets me know that I will be looking at lugging around more weight as time goes by, unless I change my ways. It isn't the first time it has told me this, and yet, here we are again…
My Weight Commander 60-Day Graph is a restatement of the preceding discussion. I am moving back and forth through a 10 pound window that is more than 10 pounds over the top of my Normal Weight Range. (Normal Weight Range is defined as having a Body Mass Index of less than 25 and above 18.5. Today my Body Mass Index is 26.62, and it will not drop to 25, until I get down to 200 pounds.) Clearly this is not good, and just as clearly, I have been unable to do anything about it.
My Weight Commander 90-Day Graph indicates that the last 60 days have been worse, but even before that, I was above my Normal Weight Range. It has been more than 90 days since I last was not in the Overweight Category. The one positive thing that I can say about all of this is that I am still here documenting it, and at least part of me wants to change it for the better.
In the autumn last year, my Weight Commander 1-Year Graph shows that for a few weeks I dropped down into my Normal Range, but both before and after that time I was Overweight. Time is passing by and I am making little or no progress on my weight loss Journey.
I like to call up the Weight Commander Time Capsule from time to time, I am not sure why. (Perhaps I have a touch of masochism buried in there somewhere. ) In December of 2007, I weighed 198.0 pounds. I was not overweight. Since that time, I have spun my wheels and slid into the ditch. I weigh 15 pounds more today than I did when I started using the Weight Commander.
The little window on the right side says that I have averaged 101 calories per day over what I was burning for this time period. That is around 2 Weight Watchers Points per day. It seems like such a small infraction of the laws of physics, but unlike a human run judicial systems, the laws of physics are always enforced, 100%, with no exceptions. A small breech of the rules, or a big one, will always have its unalterable reward. The wages of overeating is fat.
I have been doing more walking since moving to Spokane (this week I nearly walked 20 miles), but not enough to make up for the eating that I am doing. I have to control my eating first and foremost, if I am going to reach and remain at my goal weight. This I have not done, and so I have not had my weight drop on the scale as I would like to have seen it do.
Wednesday— I weighed 211.0 pounds. It was a fluke, because the last time I weighed 211.0 was on March 12. Also, I bounced right back up from that low number right away and haven't been back since. Still, it was nice to see it for one day.
I walked 3.0 miles, while listening to Paralandra, and audio presentation of the book by C.S. Lewis. It is the second book of a trilogy, and I started it after finishing the first: Out of the Silent Planet. The books were written many years ago, and so the science is outdated, and C.S. Lewis was not primarily geared towards science anyway. He was a great author and had an incredible imagination (as is demonstrated in his 7 Narnia books), so I just wink at the scientific gaffs and enjoy the story.
In Paralandra the hero visits Venus, and experiences a Garden of Eden, with a new Adam and Eve facing a temptation, in which the hero attempts to foil the efforts of the arch villain. I am approaching the end of the book and am already looking forward to getting to the 3rd book: That Hideous Strength. I have already been through the three books several times, but I never tire of them. They make good company on my walks.
Thursday— I weighed 214.0 pounds. Jump up was caused by a couple of things. First off I made a mistake all week long: I miscounted the Weight Watcher Points value for a snack bar I ate, and I ate a lot of them during the week. I thought I had eaten 35.0 points for the day on Wednesday, when in fact it was 39.0 points.
The second cause for the jump was that I had a lot of sodium during the day on Wednesday, with popcorn being a big part of that.
The third cause was, as I had mentioned before, the Wednesday weight was unnaturally low and really was a fluke.
I walked 3.0 miles again on Thursday, continuing to listen to my audio book. I thought I had done well on my Points for the day, by eating only 29.5, but the undercounting the snack bar lead me to eating over my limit of 31 Points, and actually consuming 33.5 Points instead.
Friday— I was a little surprised when I weighed 214.0 pounds. But I assumed that it was just a temporary bump that would fall out in a day to two. So, I tried even harder to keep my points within my limit, and this time I made it, although it was close thanks to the snack bars. I thought I had eaten 28.0 points, but really had eaten 30.0. But 30.0 is one Point under my limit, so it was okay.
I had needed to get going on my areas of the house to get them set up. Dotti had been doing really well on the upstairs, and I needed to do something with my books. Friday night I tacked putting together some more book shelves that Dotti and LeRoy had brought home for me. I had 5 already done, and now there were 5 more to build. That evening I was able to get 4 of them done, but that last one, which I finished after my normal bedtime, left me completely exhausted and ready for sleep.
Saturday— I got up at 5 AM and I weighed 213.5 pounds. I thought I was just a half-Point over my limit at the end of the day, but it was actually a Point and a half that I was in excess of my 31.0-Point limit. Still, considering our activity level on Saturday, it wasn't too bad.
I put the fifth and final of the new bookshelves together, and unpacked the last of my book boxes, so my library area is looking much more in order. My office is still far from finished, and my “music room” is also in need of more work, but things are coming along. As I said, Dotti has really made serious progress on the upstairs and it is feeling like home already.
Over the years, thanks to my career in the Navy and the needs of the jobs in electronics that I had after I got out, we have lived in 18 different homes, and we had to move 17 times since that day in June of 1976 when Dotti and I got married. I have watched Dotti pull together a home out of mobile homes, a cinderblock building on Midway Island, base housing at NAS Lemoore, California, apartments in Spokane, Peabody, Massachusetts, and Vancouver, Washington, townhouses in Beverly, Massachusetts, Virginia Beach, Virginia, with half a house in both Spokane, and in Tiller, Oregon, and houses in Spokane, Norfolk, Virginia, El Paso, Texas, Vancouver and now once again in Spokane, Washington. No matter if the space is large or small, Dotti makes it feel like home when she is finished—warm, comfortable, and full of love. She has a genius for homemaking, for which talent I have been extremely fortunate to have shared the fruits!
Later, we spent the day with Jim, Tammy, and Hunter, as we went out to visit Fort Spokane, a 19th century military post that was used to protect the local settlers from any Indian problems that might crop up. Fortunately, the problems were handled without battles, and the post was for prevention rather than conflict, which is the best use of the military whenever possible.
 On the way to Fort Spokane, we spotted this sign and thought it was cute.
Hunters, Washington is a little town of just over 300 people, but it draws in students and customers from several smaller towns around it, so it has a high school with about 77 students, and the high school and elementary school combined has a student body 228 strong.
Kettle Falls has over 1,500 people in residence, with a demographic makeup that is nearly an exact match of that of Spokane (and Hunters as well). I found it interesting that the Kettle Falls high school has about the same number of students my high school had when I attended: 300.
With little Hunter sitting in the back seat in his car seat, we laughed over the sign saying Hunters Kettle Falls.
 And speaking of Hunter in the back seat…
Hunter is a great joy to have with us when we go out and do things. He has a lot of fun as we do things, even when they are not specifically aimed at children. He added a lot of fun to our entire outing!
A satellite view of Fort Spokane, provided by Google Maps. The lot where we parked is located near the bottom just left of center of the picture. The balloon pointer with the letter A inside points to the entrance driveway from the highway.
 From the van we walked right to Fort Spokane's Stockade, which is now the visitors' center. (A much friendlier place. ) The center was closed up, but the restroom was thankfully open.
This sign shows a photograph of what the grounds looked like before the buildings were lost. It also gives a thumbnail sketch of the fort's history.
Heading away from the Stockade the group was getting ahead of me. This happened quite a few times over visit, as I let my camera lead me off in various directions other than the main trail.
One of the things I noticed about the trees was that there a tendency to to lean a bit to the right or rather towards the east. Apparently there was a strong westerly wind blowing through this area on a regular basis.
 Fortunately, as this sign states, the battles that they trained and drilled for, never happened. They were able to keep the peace without a lot of bloodshed.
Dotti, Tammy, Jim, and Hunter are looking at the stone foundation of one of the departed buildings. Off to the far right, in the distance is what remains of the Bachelor Officers' Quarters ( or as more commonly known: the BOQ ).
I was standing on top of the BOQ wall when I snapped this picture of Dotti and Jim discussing a camera question. They both have the Nikon D40X model camera.
In the meantime, Tammy had Hunter in her lap and they posed for me and my camera. (I am an outsider with my Canon 40D. )
Still walking along the wall, I snapped this shot. Dotti and Tammy are visiting near a door of the “room” they are standing in with Jim and Hunter.
The Stockade is off to the far left, the van is sitting quite near the center of the picture left to right, just a bit above the top of the wall in the foreground, and the trail we would be taking shortly stretches off slightly towards the right.
Looking down at a door through the stone wall, I captured my shadow, and reminded myself to be careful walking around up there.
 Finally down on the ground, I walked out behind the BOQ and looked back towards where I had been walking, and there was the most beautiful girl in the world looking at me, with my best friend behind her aiming his lens in my direction. We end up with those taking-a-picture-of-someone-taking-a-picture shots quite often with all of these cameras running around.
 They maintain a really nice trail around the grounds, as you can see. Off to the right is the driveway into the fort, which passes through the white gate.
I thought the logo for the fort was quite good. Uniform and hair were all that were shown in silhouette to call to your imagination what the soldier looked like who lived and worked here. The arrow shows the recommended direction of travel for the self guided tour of Fort Spokane.
 This stretch of trail is littered with pine cones and needles from this one untidy tree on the left. You can see the variety of scenery the trail cut through. We passed along huge open fields and then through the woods.
 And her is our grandson Hunter holding a pine cone for me, and trying not to get stuck on the sharp points all around it.
I used Gmaps Pedometer to trace out the basic trail that I walked at the fort. It doesn't include some of the side trips and so forth, but even so, it added up to about 1.5 miles. We walked from the van (the pointer balloon with the big dot in the middle) up to the right to the Stockade, up to the left across the field and then on down and to the left to the BOQ, over to look at the river and some water cistern structures, and back on down and to the right, before heading right, back to the Stockade. We then walked back to the van and kept on going to do the lower loop on the map.
It was a great day for walking, not too hot or too cold, with plenty of sunshine.
 Here are our best friends for over 30 years: Jim and Tammy! It looks like they were having fun. (I know Dotti and I were!) It is good to see Tammy smiling, and Dotti has been doing a whole more smiling too ever since we moved to Spokane.
Behind them, carrying highway SR-25 is the last bridge to cross the Spokane River before it runs into the Columbia River close by. Fort Spokane was built very nearly on the confluence of the two great rivers.
There is a park down by the base of that bridge and that is where we went next after leaving the fort.
Here we were, now at the park, and was Jim relaxing while watching the 'children' at play.
Hunter was pushing the other 'kids' around and around the merry-go-round. It is amazing that he is big enough to push us adults around like that. He gets bigger and bigger every day!
I think Tammy and Dotti were having a really good time. What do you think?
Dotti says, “This is fun!”
Jim caught me sneaking around with my camera and having some fun myself.
In the evening, we dropped Hunter off with his mom, and the four of us visited at our house, watched a movie (Taken) and played around on the computers. It was a very nice end to a wonderful day!
Sunday— I weighed 213.0 pounds. I was happy to see the small drop on the scale, and I aimed at staying inside my points limit for the day. At the end of the day, I thought I was at 28.0 Points, and I was quite happy with myself, but I found out, after the fact that I had actually eaten 35.0 points, because of the snack bar. Ouch!
This was another day of getting the house set up.
We have a very tall window over our front door, on a wall that is quite tall, due to the staircase leading down to the door and the roof being at the highest level of the living room. Dotti asked me to hang a decorative angel in the window and then our Mt. Hood "sculpture" up over the top of the window. I had our long ladder stretched out pretty well by the time I got the top of it to reach over the window so it could lean against the wall.
As soon as I pulled up the blinds, so I could reach up to drill the hold for the angel's hook, Frostbyte jumped up onto the railing that runs along the staircase, and then leaped over onto the ledge of the window I was working on. He was maybe 8 feet or more in the air, sitting on a little ledge, maybe 4 inches wide, while I am working around him. The window was another 3 and half feet tall at least, and I had to reach up behind the blinds, blindly to drill a hole, and then reach up with the hook and feel around to find the hole I had drilled, so I could screw it in, because I couldn't see a thing.
All the while Frostbyte was looking out the window and also watching me. I was constantly thinking about the height that I am working at, and making sure that I didn't fall, but Frostbyte was unconcerned with that stuff; even though he had fallen from the higher ledge the other day, and we were worried that he might have hurt his legs. (He was fine though. Cats are real leapers and he was off playing with his toys that day, as if nothing had happened.)
Anyway, I was happy when Frostbyte and I were done with our high altitude work and I could close the blinds once more and collapse the ladder back into its normal small shape for storage.
I took another 3.0-mile walk, and it was nice.
Monday— I weighed 217.5 pounds. Wow! A 4.5 pound jump in one day. I had taken ibuprofen on Sunday, and that is the only thing I can put my finger on for a cause.
Once again I looked to stay within my limit, and thought I had just missed at 31.5, but my snack bar mistake sent up my real total to 38.5!
It is fortunate that was getting my walking in this week, or these Points mistakes would have been even more painful! I did another 3.0 miles on Monday.
Tuesday— I weighed 213.0 pounds. It was very nice to see that big bump go away on the scale! I thought I had my points under my limit, with 30.5 at day's end, but once again it really was higher: 37.5 points. At least I discovered the error finally and will be counting those bars right in the future (and eating fewer of them).
Once again I did a 3-mile walk.
I will keep looking for that Journey compass that I seem to have lost, and hopefully, get back on track soon.
8 years, 8 days on my journey; a lifetime to follow.
-Al-
6'3" 239.5/213.0/185.0±2.5/BMI:26.62/WK-418
Starting weight: 239.5
Target Weight Range: 185.0±2.5 pounds
BACK TO WEEK 417 On To WEEK 419
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