Week 71 Update

It was 47° when I got up about 5 minutes after 5:00 this morning, and Mr. Scale said, "185.0 pounds!" I was very pleased to see that number this morning, since I spent most of the week at 187.0 pounds.

I am not sure what is going on with the scale the last couple of weeks, but I had to drop my points per day down about 8.5 points in order to get my weight back to 185.0 for today's weigh-in. The weather is changing, and allergies are kicking in, but it is hard to say why the change. Since my 44.5-point Sunday, I have kept my points below 39.0 points each day. I even had one day in the 20s. I also stepped up my water consumption this week to help out.

Last week I was taking Advil and that would explain what was going on with the scale, but this week there is nothing that I have been doing differently that I know of. I am eating the very same type of meals, and just having fewer snacks to keep my points down. I did have some alcohol on Monday, and maybe that had something to do with it. It was well within my points, but it was a change from what I normally do.

Oh well, I will just have to keep a close watch on things the next few days and see what happens.

Our temperatures have been much nicer lately. Our lows have been in the low 50s on most days this week, and this morning it even dropped down into the 40s. The days have been getting up into the 80s but it is not oppressive at all. The dry wind has made the 80s feel like the 70s and it has been quite comfortable. We are two days from the start of autumn, and I am seeing more and more of the trees around the area starting to change color, and soon there will be an explosion of yellows and reds everywhere. When the wind kicks up, there are already a few leaves being blown across the road. My favorite time of year is finally getting here.

Last Saturday, Dotti and I took a hike. Her knee has been feeling much better and so we decided to go to Multnomah Falls again and see how far her knee would let her comfortably walk. We made it all the way to the top! She was more tired from the lack of exercise, because her knee has held her up all this time, than she was bothered with her knee. We had our walking sticks, and that helped take some of the strain off the knee. Coming back down was the real test, because the path is so steep that it puts a lot of pressure on the knee. We took it really slow, and Dotti leaned on the walking stick a lot, but she made it all the way down without injury or incident! We were really happy with how it went.

When we get over to our new place we plan to take advantage of all the walking opportunities that will be available. There are sidewalks all the way to shopping areas and even a movie theater. We will be able to safely walk a great deal from our house. (Here we are limited in where we can safely walk, because sidewalks are scarce, and traffic is heavy on our main road going by. We usually drive somewhere so that we can walk. It will be nice being able to go straight out our front door, and then take a walk for a couple of miles with no need to get in a car at all.

Thanks to the hard work of my lovely Dotti, our place is nearly all in boxes now. We are nearly all set to start loading things up into the truck. I am not looking forward to moving everything down the stairs, but from there on it will be fairly easy. It is a short trip to drive, and there is plenty of room on the other end to park the truck and everything will go in without dealing with stairs!

Tomorrow is my first anniversary of hitting my base goal of 200 pounds. That is when my BMI dropped down below 25.0 and I entered the "normal" zone for my weight vs. my height. A whole year has past and I can hardly believe it.

When I had my [link=www.dwlz.com/Al/pdfsheets/journalsheet.html]new journal[/link] printed up, I told the guy who did it that I wanted 50 sheets of paper copied on both sides, cut and bound into a book. That would give me 200 days worth of pages in the journal. He goofed up and used 100 sheets, which made for a very thick 400 days worth of pages. I thought I would give it a try, but I finally got tired of dealing with the thicker book, and I got some 5/8-inch "plastic binding combs" at Office Max. I then proceeded to tear the two thick journals apart and put them back together as four 200-day journals. Much better. :) For two of the new books, I had to create my own covers, but that seemed to work out pretty well. I really like the thinner format because I can fold the book back on itself and easily write on all of the sheets. With the thicker binding, it was difficult to do that.

I am not sure how much time I will have for writing an entry next week, with the move going on, but I will do my best to get something together.

This Week In Books

I once again continued on with the audio book Battlefield Earth this week. I shouldn't have too much trouble finishing it off this week, even with the short week because of our move.

Last night I finished Lieutenant by Rick Shelley. It is a continuation of the career of Lon Nolan, a mercenary in the Dirigent Corps. Really, so far each of the books has been a fairly detailed description of a single "contract" or battle campaign for the Corps. It takes you into battle conditions and the things a soldier faces during a war. I have never been a big fan of war novels in the past, but these have been fairly interesting so far. I am getting set to start Captain, in which I believe the young Lon Nolan will finally meet a lady and become engaged to be married. There has been very little personal life asides in the books so far. Since there are no women in the Corps, the only time Nolan would have an opportunity to meet a young lady to marry would be between campaigns. They have pretty much been focused on the wars the Corps was fighting in the 29th century, and some of the interpersonal relationships of the soldiers. I really seem to be getting the same sort of feeling from reading these as I did from the Hornblower books.

I started the The Case of the Baited Hook by Erle Stanley Gardner this week. Too early to tell where it is headed so far.

1 year, 132 days OP, a lifetime to follow!

-Al-

6'3" 239.5/185.0/185±2/BMI:23.1/WK-71
Weight Loss Graph/Maintenance Graph/Success Story