My family is on vacation right now in Destin, FL.  I’m there too, but I’m working from the hotel room.  I still get a little bit of vacation though

Anyway, I decided to have a little mini vacation of my own.  First, I decided to drink as much Diet Coke as I wanted.  And, 2nd, I decided to pick an evening, go completely off plan, and have some fun.  This post is to describe those two events . . . neither of which went how I thought they would.

First, I started with the Diet Cokes.  I love having them around. . . I tend to drink way too many, but, I enjoy them, and, they tend to really be nice when I’m feeling a bit hungry. . . or so I thought.  After the third day of drinking Diet Cokes, steadily, I noticed that I was starving — ALL THE TIME.  I know that aspartame is supposed to mess with your insulin response. But, I’ve never noticed it, personally.  Until now.  By the end of the day on Tuesday, after drinking sodas heavily the weekend, and Monday, I noticed that I was absolutely starving between meals.  And, when I drank a soda, I was sated, for about 10 minutes, when I either needed food, or another soda.  Very scary.  At least now I have a definitive reason to stop them all together.  They are still a treat when I’m eating out, etc.  But, my decision to keep them out of the house was 100% correct . . . . way more than I thought it was.

Next, the evening of debauchery.  Besides a bit of pre-pigging out due to Diet Coke hunger, I snacked on the following Tuesday evening . . . and, amazingly, most of it, especially the sweets, rated a “meh”.  That was extra surprising, since I LOVE sweets.  I should have forced down some ice cream (Blizzards are my demise), but, I simply had no more room

• Fried pickles – as good as I remember.  This one was a “wow, I miss that” food.  But, I only had a few . . didn’t pig out like I used to.
• Fajita Nachos – My normal staple meal.  One of my favorite things in the world.  They used queso fresco, like I like too (white cheese).  These were still as good as I remember.  This is one of the few foods that I still need to be careful of.
• Coconut Fried Shrimp – still all kinds of goodness here too.  I only had one, but it was good.  I’m not a huge fan of shrimp, so, this indulgence won’t cause me many problems in the future.  But, they were good.
• Buffalo Chicken Wrap – I’ve had better . . and . . It was only ok.  I’m sure I can make a reasonably healthy version of this meal — the only really “Bad” part was the lard filled tortilla.
• Pollo Loco wrap – Big meh here.  Simply food.
• Fudge – I’m a huge fudge fan, but, I could live without it easily
• Praline – I had a pecan praline – I love these . . and, again, it was a “meh”
• Divinity – I think I’m one of the only people I know who loves divinity.  Most people say that it’s too sweet — as if there is any such thing as too sweet . . hehe . . but, again, “meh”.  Wasn’t too sweet, but, I just wasn’t impressed.
• Fresh pulled Taffy – Big meh.  Sweet, chewy, and I simply wasn’t that interested.
• Beer, frozen drinks, etc – Now this was all good — but, likely from the effects more than the taste.  Best beer of the night was my standby 420.  Others were “meh”, but got the job done

I think the biggest surprise, overall, was how little I missed things.  I didn’t get all excited about the food.  And, as I ate it, I had no regrets over not eating it the last few months.  It strengthened my resolve to finish what I’m doing, and, occasionally, I can eat those foods . . . . Fajita nachos just doesn’t need to be a staple — it needs to be an occasional treat!

Call it a mid life crisis.  Call it stupid.  But, whatever it is, I think I’m becoming a skate punk.

I have never been a skateboarder.  I have touched them before, though.  When I was in high school, my sophomore year, two friends of mine were skate punks, and they used to hang out in my dorm room with their skateboards.  It was about a 10×10 room, so, all I really learned to do was to balance standing still, and do . .urm . . not sure what they were called, but, 180 and 360 degree spins on the back wheels.  That was it.  I did try an outdoor downhill once — got going way to fast.  When I jumped off, I was going faster than I could sprint, and I pulled a hamstring pretty good, and somehow didn’t fall . . . Oh well, the joys of high school.

Snowboarding, however, has been trying to bring out my inner skate punk for a long time.  Since the first day I strapped one on, my eyes have always been looking outside of the groomed trail, more than anything.  Which, I should add, is COMPLETELY different to how I viewed the trails on skis — where I only cared about doing the run faster, but staying ON the run.  My last few snowboarding trips, I have spent a lot of time in the terrain parks.  Granted, I did very few of the obstacles, but I loved trying them.  And, I’ve started hitting the little jumps on the sides of the trails too . . . slowly, but I’ve been hitting them.

As some of you know, I bought a Ripstik G with the last of my birthday money.  A previous time when I tried to lose weight, and started getting near 220lbs, one of my goals was to get under the Ripstik’s weight limit, and buy myself one as a reward for hitting 220.  That particular diet, I barely made it to 220, then gave up, so I never bought one.  It had totally left my mind, when I was in Target, and saw it again.  I’m well under 220 now (185-ish), and what caught my eye was the first bullet:  “Carve like on a snowboard”.  I almost bought one that minute.  But, I decided against it.  Later that day, when I was in Wal Mart with the kids, I saw another one, this one the “G” with the grinding rail, and I bought it.  (I’ve later discovered that a Freebord would be a much closer alternative to a snowboard, but, that’s a toy for another day).  I was surprised at how hard it was to simply get up on the Ripstik.  Since it only has two wheels, you actually have to be moving to balance.  So, there is no “Taking it slow”.  I took the kids to Big Creek park, and we played on the concrete, and had a blast.  It is much easier than I remember skating on a skate board being.  I simply don’t get the kicking with one foot thing.

So, I remembered that the City of Roswell has a skate park, and I took Quinn to check it out.  It was closed, but all of the ramps looked very doable.  We were definitely going to have to check it out!  We made a family date to hit it the following weekend, on a Wednesday.  I called, and they were closed on Wednesday.  And, helmets are required, and I don’t have a skateboard helmet, just a snowboard one . .though, I guess I could pull out the earmuffs . . . So, we decided to try out Progressive Skate Park in Canton instead.  They had rentals, and I wanted Quinn to try a real skateboard.  (He has a spiderman one).  Quinn and Amy brought their razors.  Quinn brought his crappy skateboard.  I brought my Ripstik and inline skates.  I used to be REALLY good at inline skating . . but that’s a story for another day.

Progressive only allows (as we found out), skateboards and inline skates in their inside park. But, they allow anything in the outside park. And, they had a deal on Wednesday evenings. Free lessons for beginners. So, we rented two skateboards (for Quinn and Amy), two helmets (for me and Quinn), and signed up for the lessons at 7:00. It was about 6:15, so we decided to hit the outside park with the “illegal” toys. Amy was great on her razor. The girl has no fear. She didn’t even notice her bloody elbow till we were walking inside. (I had noticed it, but decided not to say anything since it wasn’t bothering her). Quinn finally came out of his shell, and started having a lot of fun too. I was a bit scared, but, did some ramps with the Ripstik. It was VERY controllable. Not at all how I remember feeling on a skateboard — I can really do a tight turn.

Then, we went inside for the kids lesson. I put on my skates, with all intentions of owning the park. I used to be REALLY good. I think the key word there is “used”. I feel like a truck hit me. Fell several times. But, still had a blast. As an absolute contrast to the razors, Quinn had almost no fear on the skateboard. And, it was Amy’s turn to be timid. We REALLY had fun. And, I kept eyeballing the skateboards.

So, now, I’m asking myself — Is it too late to become a skate punk? Wonder what kind of skateboard a beginner 41 year old man should get?

Monday

Monday I got to the slopes around 6:30.  I got my $16 ticket (found a coupon), and hit the slopes.  My board was VERY slippery.  I noticed a huge difference between it and my old board.  Unlike in Cataloochee, where the difference was minimal.  I think it’s because the snow in Utah is not as sticky as the snow in NC.  I also noticed that the condition of the Utah snow was starting to suck.  It was a bit icy.  (Way less icy than other places — but not the “perfect” Utah snow that I’ve come to enjoy.)  Looks like Utah has seasons too!  It was also snowing . . . HARD.  I was very glad that I brought goggles.  I also found out that my goggles don’t have much of a tint, so they work just fine at night.

I’ve started listening to music when I board alone.  I really enjoy it.  But, I have yet to find headphones that do not hurt when covered by a ski mask and my helmet.  I found some speakers mounted in earpieces made for my helmet for $20 on e-bay so I bought them.  Too bad I won’t get to use them till next season.

The runs were “ok”.  I kept doing things wrong when I got scared and froze up a bit.  I pretty much side slipped the moguls when I did them twice.  And, when I hit the little canyon run I was so proud of doing before (it’s like a little channel, 4′ wide, that has hills / jumps), I went too slow, and barely made it through.  Not a good night.  But, I up from 2:50 AM local, and vry tired . . so . . .   I left a little early, around 8:30.  And, I even broke for a snack around 7:30 . . all in all, not a terrible day of boarding, but nothing to write home about either.

Tuesday

I found half a testicle Tuesday night, and finally started boarding more “right”.  I got a late start again — didn’t get onto the slopes till 7:00.  But, I did a full two hours of boarding, non-stop.  Monday I kept sticking to an edge.  This is especially obvious on cat tracks with a drop off.  It really sucks to know that you could do it right, know that you are being silly and scared, and still not be able to go to the right edge.  Very strange.  Mind over matter, my ass.

I found that I tended to have good non-turn slides to the heel edge, but whenever I went toe edge, I would get almost horizontal.  So, I started working on it, and cleaned it up quite a bit.  (i.e. when going mostly straight, but slowing by making small S turns (not really turning, but grinding that edge), I found that I would grind properly heel edge, but I would do a full grinding turn toe edge, and end up side slipping for a sec)

Anyway, I finally started to consciously work it out.  I noticed a couple of things that were contributing:

1. When toe edge, you’re looking up hill — it’s hard to see where you’re going.
2. I was obviously going too fast for my comfort . . . my unconscious mind wanted me to slow down.

I jumped once last night . . . w/o a ramp.  Did not feel very good, but at least I got to check that notch off a bit.  I need to start doing this more.  Brighton has a huge terrain park, but, it’s not like the noob park at Cataloochee.

I have also noticed that I’m burning muscle on my downhill quadriceps.  I think it’s from sticking to heel edge too much.  Or, it’s from starting to bend my knees more.  Or, it’s because I’m finally getting lots of speed.  Not sure which, but it’s full of suck.  I’ve noticed it happens more often when on a relatively flat area, where I need to stay on an edge, w/o grinding, to make it across the flat.  By the time I get to the end of the flat, my quad is on fire.

Wednesday / Thursday

Wednesday, I want to use my second print-at-home ticket ($25).  I’m hoping to get there a bit earlier, so that I have time to take things slow, work on my failings a bit more.  I want to get comfortable doing straight jumps.  I also want to start working on ollies & butters (I’ve never done either).  But, they both scare the crap out of me.  And, finally, I want to work more on using the “other” edge when on a cat track with a drop off.

Finally, on Thursday, I’m going to treat myself to a B-Day Boarding lesson.  They start at 6:00, so, I should be able to get in an hour (or two — not sure) lesson, and have plenty of time to practice afterward, as the season closes for me.  I’m going to see if they can help me start working on beginning tricks / jumps.  (Ollies / Butters / Jumps)

Todays Pain of the Day (PotD) includes a bit more bloggage.  My workout went fine, but, weight loss has stalled, and I’ve even started gaining a couple.  Now, there are several possible reasons for this — I have not been on my “A” game.  So, I thought this would be a good place to list the reasons I think I could be stalling, and what I can do to remedy it.

But, before we get into the “plateau” discussion, here’s today’s workout:

Workout Logs

Warmup:  5 mins on the treadmill. Stronglifts 5×5: Squat: 65#, Bench: 145#, Power Clean: 55#, Bardips: 12/7/6 Cooldown: 5 mins on cardio machine. Calories Burned: 384

Squats are still REALLY light.  But, I didn’t even have to think about form today.  Knees were wobble free.  The unload is really helping get my form right.  Bench is getting REALLY slow on the 4th and 5th sets.  I may have to start making sure I get enough rest.  Power clean is starting to get tiring . . which is good.  I can’t wait to see how my form behaves as it gets heavier.  For now, the form looks ok, but, since I can reverse curl the weight, it won’t really be a clean till it gets a bit heavier.  And, finally, the bar dips are still improving.  I did the same total number of reps as on Friday, but I managed to get 12 on the first set, versus 10 last week.  I did notice that the picture on the machine had the guy only going down till his arms were parallel to the floor.  I usually go down until my range of motion stops me.  I’m not sure which way is right.

Plateau Busting

I’m not sure if this is the start of a plateau, but, I want to be sure I don’t end up in the sam hell I was in last fall, so, I want to nip it in the bud, quickly.  First, I think it is best to recognize what I’ve been doing wrong, that could be contributing to the gain / lack of weight loss.  And, I won’t ignore things that could have been contributing that are not necessarily bad:

Problems / Symptoms

• I’ve been cheating on my diet, a little.  My protein portions have been getting progressively larger.  If I am at a steakhouse, and I feel like a strip, then I get it, and typically eat all of the 10 oz, instead of cutting it in half, and getting my 5.  I have also not been weighing protein at home.
• I have been substituting in meals . . adding a little protein here and there, playing with recipes.
• Last week, I had a bad cheat day.
• Last week, I also went snowboarding, where I had two redbull vodka’s (sugar free, but, the alcohol calories didn’t help)
• I started doing stronglifts 5×5.  I tried to up the weights a little, and add harder exercises to compensate for the fact that I’m not really a beginner.  But, it is still a MUCH easier workout than my previous one.
• I could be gaining muscle.  My %bf is slowly lowering, so, this little gain could be muscle related, but I really don’t think so.
• I started actually doing hard cardio yesterday.  We’ll see how that pans out doing running Tuesday & Thursday.

The Plan

• Follow diet plan religiously.  So, get more anal.  Weigh meats, and start logging food for a few days.
• Log exercise, including calories burned.  Compare numbers to my previous workout.  If they are less, supplement with cardio.

That’s actually about it, plan wise.  Start logging, and see if anything jumps off of the page.  Wish me luck!

I bought a new snowboard setup yesterday.  I just wanted boots, and could use bindings, but Tammy told me to get a whole setup.  Of course, she thought a setup would be about $300, when I was trying to explain that just boots and bindings would be $300 . . but I digress.

The sales guy immediately saw why I needed boots.  He called my old Morrow boots antiques.  And, by today’s standards, he was probably right.  I thought my gear was 10 years old, but, after checking, it is more like 6 years old . . heh.  He immediately went to some Shaun White boots.  That particular set was one of the few I knew by name, and I had only heard good things, so, I was sold before I heard the price, $249 with a 30% discount, giving roughly $175.  While this is likely a bit high, I needed the fitting, which was the most important part, and why I didn’t even bother with e-bay.

The bindings were Burton Custom white bindings.  I thought the White on white looked really cool.  (And, I went with white laces on the boots):

Finally, we looked at snowboards.  I was really torn between two Burton boards, that were about $30 apart.  I also looked at a Ride rocker board.  The rocker was interesting, since it was supposed to make things easier — i.e. harder to catch an edge, you just muscle the board around.  I didn’t think I needed that kind of help, but, figured it wouldn’t hurt.  So, I was stuck between two Burtons and the Ride.  Quinn was with me, so I let him choose.  He was already leaning toward the ride, but, when he (and, honestly, me too) found out that the graphic on the Ride changed when it got cold, he was sold.  So, I ended up with the Ride Crush:

The left image is the top, when room temperature.  The middle is the top cold, and the right is the bottom.  The artwork was all done by a 7th grade art class in Seattle, WA.  Tres cool.

I pretty much mirrored my existing setup, with a 15 degree and 0 degree.  My previous board didn’t have quite 15 degrees, so, this one will be a bit different.

I can’t wait to try out the setup on Thursday!

I am in Utah, with my iPod.  I normally only use it for the airplane, but I decided to go snowboarding with it.  I didn’t have any relevant playlists, so I just picked one band, Hollywood Undead (yes, I like them.  Not sure why), and it was great to snowboard with tunes.

But, I was now in trouble.  I loved boarding with music, but I didn’t have any way to create a playlist.  My iPod syncs with my iMac at home, not with my work laptop.  So, I got annoyed, and used an iPod  extractor to extract the music that I liked from it.  (I had itunes just “filling” the rest of the 80Gb with random music).  So, I pulled off about 2.5 Gb of my “Must Haves”, one of the few playlists that I actually use.  (Normally, I just fill my ipod / iphone with a “must have” playlist of stuff that I’m listening to at the moment).

Once I had the music off, I refreshed my Rockbox to the newest version, and actually read the manual.  I was floored.  While it is not intuitive like the iPod, the rockbox software had MANY features that I loved:

• Car mode – when power goes off, the ipod shuts down.
• Pulling out the headphones pauses.
• Announcing of songs with voice (gonna enable that for when I’m boarding)
• Fade in/out when pausing / changing songs.

And, I also noticed one other thing in the manual.  The “Database” mode, which I had been using, is very limited in features.  Rockbox’s full feature set is mainly available when using the filesystem, not when supplementing it’s database from the iPod strange method of storing files.

So, I deleted all 80Gb of data from my iPod, added on the extracted music into a music folder, and moved to Rockbox.  I think the only functionality I have lost is podcasts & video’s purchased from Apple.  And, I can always reboot to the Apple OS if I need to use that.  I’m going to stop syncing music with iTunes, and make this a rockbox only device.

Happy times ahead.

I’m finally starting to get closer to my goal weight, so, I thought it would be a good idea to determine what my goal weight should be.  The insane BMI charts say 143 lbs.  I have no idea what they were smoking when they made those tables, but that can’t be right.

When I weighed 201lbs, my scale told me that my body fat was 25.6% Assuming that is accurate, that means that I have 51 pounds of fat, and 150 pounds of non-fat.  Assuming that 150 is my non fat true weight, and using the WHO tables, that state that my %BF should be between 8-18%, that means that my weight should be:

At 8% body fat, I should weigh: 163lbs At 18% body fat, I should weigh: 183lbs

Does this sound right?  My math was as follows:

NonFatWeight = Total Weight – (Total Weight * %BF) So, current weight: 150 = 201 – (.256 * 201).

And, the ideals give the above numbers.  Is that math close enough for a goal?  Or, should I be doing it some other way?

I have several iTunes issues, and, hopefully, my intar-web friends out there can help me solve some of them.

First, the setup: My music files are stored on my linux file server, and I can access them via AFP (netatalk – linux), NFS, or SMB. Currently, I’m using AFP, but, that may be causing some of my problems — see below.

1) iTunes Sucks — Is there an alternative?

Since my iPhone is jailbroken, I’m really not tied to iTunes anymore. The Pwn Player seems to work fine. And, while I’ll miss genius, as long as I have a decent shared playlist alternative, I can live with it. I have tried Songbird, but it hangs when importing my music.

2) Is AFP the best way to share the files?

They need to be accessible from my computer, my wife’s Macbook Air, and my kids computers. And, I prefer if new additions were all owned by the same user, to avoid issues.

3) I have some non-apple mp3 players, so, I’d prefer not having to have duplicate playlists.

And, this means that I’d like to be able to sync to a directory, not just to an ipod.

4) I would love it if the application keep the music organized for me, and downloaded album art on it’s own.

Since songbird doesn’t work, what are my choices? How would you set it up, so that you could get to your music on your computer, iPhone, iPod, and non-apple mp3 player? My iPod is also set up with rockbox, so, it would be more than hapy with a directory sync, instead of an ipod sync.

Because I still have way too much time on my hands, I decided to redo my workout again. Actually, I was tired of not being able to adequately track my progress using the Men’s Health Personal Trainer program.  While their circuits were good, I wasn’t able to tell if my new diet was robbing me of muscle mass.  So, I needed a change.  Also, I wasn’t getting in my cardio, so, my days off were really just days off.

I first made a plan based on a three way split:

• Chest and Back
• Arms and Shoulders
• Legs

But, the problem with that split is that I need a day of rest between Chest and arms.  And, no matter how you lay it out, you need an extra rest day between  the workouts (outside of the weekend).  There were several conflicts:  Pulldowns and Pullups (Back) also worked biceps (Arms).  Bench and Pushups (Chest) also worked Triceps(Arms) and Shoulders.

So, that split was not going to work.  I instead went with a Push / Pull split, as follows:

• Pull
• Push
• Legs

So, these exercises have absolutely no cross conflicts, and can be done every day.  I only work out M-F, so, almost everything gets two workouts each week, and the cycle repeats every three weeks.  I did the Pull workout today, and I’m very happy with it.  I also created Documents and Spreadsheets over on Google Docs.  I can print them out, and take them to the gym to jot down my progress.  I still need to create a spreadsheet to track the progress . . . but I’ll do that today.

If you’re really bored, check them out — I think you’ll like it!

Workout Instructions Workout Exercises / Spreadsheet

Original Post

My last business trip to Utah, I did some creative flight arranging so that I would be able to hit the slopes the Saturday after the trip.  I spent all weekend deciding where to go, and ended up going to my first choice, Brighton.  But, I’m getting ahead of myself.

On Thursday, I heard a commercial about night skiing.  I have seen night lift tickets on price charts before, but I had never considered it before.  I looked it up, and it was $32 to go night boarding at Brighton.  I googled a bit, and there didn’t seem to be any basic skill requirement for night boarding.  So, I decided to go.  I looked at the resorts in the area, and Brighton was the closest one that had night time boarding, so I went on Friday night.

When I got there, I learned that there was some two-for-one deal going on, so, I ended up getting a lift ticket for $16 by buddying up to some locals.  (Score!)  I started out on the beginner slope to warm up.  It was SOOOO flat.  It wasn’t a typical green, it was the green where people first learn to ski / board, so, bad choice on my part.  (But, it was a bit nostalgic.  My second time snowboarding was on that Brighton lift.  And, I managed to bust really hard.  Now I wonder how I got moving fast enough to bust on that flat slope

After my slow run, I headed over to the Magestic lift.  It ran to the middle of the mountain, with green and blue trails all the way down.  It was still light out, and I loved the runs.  The blues were pretty steep, and really wide.  They reminded me of the blues on the California side of Heavenly.  As I was going down them, I kept seeing piles of powder.  The powder looked a few weeks old, but, it was still deep.  There was a bunch on the edge of Shoulder, if you cut the corner tight.  I started taking that instead of Shoulder.  The powder was not soft — it was more like ungroomed snow — very bumpy.  I loved hitting it, but, I did bust several times . . and, it was steep enough, that when I busted, I’d keep sliding . . . but it was still fun.  I never conquered it . . it was just too bumpy and too steep for me.

After I got around shoulder, I would usually head over to the left (facing downhill).  There were several places where you could cut across the powder onto another trail blow.  There were many busts, but it was all fun.  And, all soft.  It really did not hurt at all busting in that packed powder.

On my last lift of the night, I took Crest Express up.  I choose my path poorly, and ran into many flat spots.  Flats are REALLY hard on a snowboard.  If you don’t keep up enough speed to get past it, you have to unbuckle, and sasquach-drag-a-board all the way to the crest, so you can go downhill again.

I was stunned how many runs I got in from about 6:00 to 8:45.  I was about a normal half day of boarding.  I was wiped out!  And, the night part just made it fun.  There were dark shadows in some places where the terrain wasn’t easy to see . . . and it just added more fun.

Saturday, I slept in a bit, and got to the slopes around 9:30.  I went straight to Magestic, and starting having fun again.  I found about a 3′ jump.  (Meaning the ramp, at the high part, was about 3′ over the snow).  It looked like a perfect one for me.  I’m a little scared to actually jump with my legs, so, I needed a larger ramp so that my momentum would give me air.  And it did.  I launched.  And I did not land well.  I got scared by the air, and leaned back.  So, I landed looking like a slalom water skier trying to get up out of the water, with my board almost vertical. My second attempt was even worse.  I didn’t get lined up quite right, and made an adjustment while I was on the ramp.  Because of that I caught an edge, and fell from the top of the ramp.  The board caught, and pretty much slammed me into the snow.  Owie.  I decided to start playing on smaller ramps, and doing actual jumps with my legs

I had a nice lunch, and another couple of runs, and was getting tired.  So, I decided to buy a lesson to keep me on the slopes for another couple of hours.  The instructor pointed out that I wasn’t bending my knees nearly enough . . . so I have a lot to work on.  Rod a lot more of the blue trails up at the top of the mountain with her.  Finally, when the lesson was over, I boarded back down the mountain and went home.  Was a great trip.

And, now that I know about night boarding, I will get in MANY more!