A pretty good indicator that no one reads your blog any more

I SHAVE MY HEAD and one person posts a response.  (Thanks, Dave C.!)  To be fair, I did get a couple email responses, and my mom called to see if I was out of my mind.  But really, that's it?

I actually had another good week this week, down another 2.4 since last Thursday.  That's two down weeks in a row, which hasn't happened since mid January.  This weekend might be tough, since today's my birthday and I plan to celebrate accordingly.  I'll just have to hit the frisbee that much harder tomorrow morning.

I figured out why I wasn't losing weight!

A lot of you "know it alls" have been saying it's because I eat too much and don't exercise enough.  Shows what you "experts" know.  Turns out is was because my hair was too heavy!

Let me know what you think of the new look!

Hit me, I need the money!

So I got $500 for "pain and suffering" yesterday from the lady's insurance company, as well as $ for a new bike.  So I guess I could take the $950 and get a really sweet bike.  But more than likely, I'll just put it toward the 4 grand I'm out on a BMW transmission and try to fix my current bike.  I called the local bike shop to ask how much a new rear wheel is and they quoted me $180!!  For just the wheel, no tire or tube or cassette or labor or anything.  So I'm looking online and on ebay.  The frame is only very slightly bent so I think I can just straighten it myself.

I did weigh in a little lower today, at 257.8.  Monday morning I was 268.4, so that's down more than 10 pounds in three days.  Of course, I should never have been 268 in the first place.  I'm getting excited about the good weather and softball and frisbee seasons coming up.  I ran outside today and it was absolutely perfect.  Hope to see you all on the frisbee field Saturday!!

That didn't go so well

So in only my 2nd time out on the new bike I got hit by a car today.  I'm not seriously hurt, but the bike is pretty messed up.  Hopefully the driver's insurance will pay for a new one.  I was in the crosswalk and she had a red light but was turning right.  She looked back to check on the baby and just didn't see me.  I have some cuts and my wrists and neck are sore, but nothing too severe.  C'est la vie.  At least I was having a fairly good ride until that point.  I was about 12 miles into a planned 15 mile ride, and I felt good.  Oh well.  I still have my old 50 pound upright steel bike.

Hoping to bike outside tomorrow

Forecast for tomorrow is 69 degrees!  Forget trainers, let's see some open road!  Time to take advantage of the "work" at home!

Stagnation, they name is James

If I was at my goal weight and had gone four months without gaining anything, I'd be really happy.  But since I'm only HALF way to my goal weight, and have gone four months without gaining (or losing) anything, I'm not as happy.  I know, I know, many of you out there probably blame Dan Simpson for refusing to play racquetball with my last night.  I think that's unfair.  He's not the one that shoveled all those Girl Scout cookies into my mouth over the weekend, or ordered that reuben at Mackey's instead of the salad.  Also, it appears that the benefits of a full day of skiing are negated by Indian casino buffets.  Who knew?


One other blog-related matter:  For many of you, I've been manually emailing the blog postings b/c Blogger will only send each update to ten addresses.  If you look at the right side of my blog at the bottom, there's an "email subscription box" where you can put in your address and a third party will forward it for me.  For those that I was manually forwarding, I will put in your email address for you.  But you still have to opt in if you want the service.  So if you do, just click on the link they'll send you.  The email will come from:

FeedBurner Email Subscriptions

Not weighing myself this week

I've always heard you should just weigh yourself once a week.  Normally, the only time I don't weigh myself every day is when I'm eating like a fiend.  This week, I'm going to try not weighing myself even though I'm working out more.  Maybe it will increase the suspense and make me work harder, since I won't know how I'm doing and I won't want to be up.  I will have to weigh in on Wednesday morning since I'm heading out to Colorado for 2 days of skiing Wednesday night.

Back to the 250's

So my official weigh in was this a.m. and I was at 259.6.  I'm please b/c that's down 6.4 since Tuesday and also down from last week.  I put my bike on Therse's new trainer last night and rode for half an hour and watched the Simpsons.  It looks like my gears might need adjusting b/c they were clicking all over the place.  I could only find a few gears that were smooth and not making noise.  When I rode outside that one glorious warm day we had in January, there was only a gear or two that clicked.  If the Colemans push back Saturday's indoor ride to a more reasonable time so that I don't have to wake up my kids (i.e. 9ish), I'll have Bob look at it.

Pre-Lent weigh in

It's not "official," but I was 266 last night before basketball.  Yikes!  But have I mentioned before (probably yes) how much I like basketball as a workout?  My weight this morning was 260.2.  We only had 8 last night but we still ran full court and I think we played something like 8 or 9 games.  I was so spent at the end that my calves were tightening up like a charlie horse.

Turning over a new leaf

Well, Lent starts tomorrow.  I haven't weighed myself in a while, but I'm sure I'm up some more.  So my Lenten resolution will be to work out every day.  And to give up sweets.  And soda.  If I can do those three things, I will have made up any lost ground and then some.  And hopefully gained a good bit of will power.  I shall do a pre-Lent weigh in tonight and report back.

Jim's Weight Gain blog??

This cold weather and lack of basketball (including tonight) is not helping at all.  Peggy suggsted switching to Mondays for the weigh ins, and that makes sense from an incentive point of view.  It will, however, make my weekends suck.  I had basically decided to make the switch, then I realized that Sunday was the Super Bowl.  So yesterday was ugly when I did finally weigh in.  This is getting pretty depressing.  I need some sort of big incentive/goal to work toward.  Who's up for a Jim Telethon to raise money to send me to a tropical destination if I reach a certain goal??

Shoveling my way to fitness?

It looks like the winter of never ending snow continues tonight.  I hope we get a good turnout for hoops, since that's always my best exercise of the week.  I did a spin class yesterday and that was super tough.  I'm looking forward to when it's warm enough to ride outside. 

Quit my H&R Block job

Just couldn't take the hours any more, especially b/c of the low pay.  Plus some things have changed such that I don't need the extra income quite as much.  I feel like a great weight has been lifted, and I'm looking forward to using my extra time to work out a lot more.  Or maybe just sleep a lot more, not sure which.  I am very disappointed that it didn't work out, especially given how much time I put into the training class (70 hrs over 3 months).  C'est la vie.  At least I now know a ton about taxes!

Just missed it

I was up two tenths today.  I blame my stupid H&R Block job b/c I was going to go to the gym to work out after I got off Block at 9 but I ended up having to stay later b/c someone came in at 8:45.  I'm sure any activity at all would have burned off a pound or so and then I would have been down. 

I did work out with Peggy this morning and she gave me a plan that will definitely help me lose weight if I stick with it.  If.  But I need to justify my Freedom Center membership somehow, so maybe this will motivate me to go more often.

What a great day!

You have to love mid 60's and sunny in January.  After a weekend of two dinners out and a breakfast of Fr.-Wooten-going-away-party donuts while Will and I helped count the collection, I needed a workout or three.  So I decided to take my new bike out for a spin this afternoon.  What a difference from my other bike!  The rock hard (100ish psi) tires and lack of a suspension combined to pummel Jimmy's hind end pretty good.  But the lighter weight and more aggressive posture of the road bike definitely made me faster.  Granted, not as fast as Bob (or Joan.  Or Brendan, Peggy, Blaine, Carrie, or most likely, Lance), but faster than I used to be.  I did 11 miles on rolling hills and it took about 38 minutes. 

250s again

I'm back in baby's arms.  No, wait.  Back in the 250s.  Just barely, but it's official.  I've only been working out about twice a week due to the H&R Block job, so that's part of the problem.  My truly heroic intake of calories would be the other.  Starting next week I'll be at Block until 10 three days a week, so I can't even get to the gym afterwards like I did yesterday.  I managed to get out of there at 8:30 yesterday and played racquetball with Anil at 9.  (As a side note, how come people always beat me at racquetball these days?  I used to be the one giving tips and administering the beatings.  I wish you could bluff or go all in playing racquetball...)

As Peggy says, I'm going to have to give the morning workouts a try.  I'm not optimistic, though.

Still slacking in the posting department

Sorry guys, I'm just not used to this 60+ hour per week working thing.  Pretty much every single night of the week I'm either working at Block, or Therese is working, or I'm taking everyone's money at cards.  Here I am again at almost a week between posts.  Like last week, I'm not really down at all but still hanging right around that 260 mark.  Normally I'd find someone to play racquetball with tonight to get me over the hump for tomorrow's weigh in, but of course I'm working at Block until 9.  Ugh. 

On the up side, thanks for all the comments!  I think 8 is my most ever, even if one of them is a spam comment.  I guess I've truly arrived in the lofty company of the more famous bigwig bloggers now that I have my first spam comment.  Thank you Green Tea Weight Loss!

Congrats to my trainer Peggy Harris for getting a job at Sport and Health in Gainesville.  I know a couple of my readers are members there, so check her out.

Hello, also, to my high school friend Jess Angsten, who never has to worry about her weight.  Sorry, Jess, no Speedo picture.  I know Joe always looses a bunch of weight every Lent, so I need to do whatever he's doing this year.  How come he never plays racquetball or hoops with me any more?  I know the ankle's fully healed by now!

Weekly posts aren't going to cut it

I just realized that haven't posted since last Thursday, and yet no one called me on it.  Wake up, blogosphere!  Hold me accountable!

So I'm down a piddly .6 this week.  I guess it's better than being up.  Working H&R Block in the evenings is really taking up a lot of my time, and making things hard on Therese as well.  Thanks to Brendan for coming out and playing racquetball with me last night even though he had already worked out earlier in the day.  It's hard to get that guy tired but it definitely looked like he was fading down the stretech, which is probably the only reason I won a couple games.

Funny story.  I take my wedding ring off when I play racquetball to keep from getting a blister where I grip the racket.  Since we left Therese's birthday flowers in NJ by mistake, I went to the grocery store on my way home from the gym to get her another bundle.  As I was paying for the flowers, I saw my ring in the little change pouch of my wallet where I always put it.  Talking out loud to myself, I said somethingl like "Oops, better put this back on."  Then I realized how it must look.  Guy getting home late in the evening, buying flowers for his wife and putting his wedding ring back on!  Ugh!

Up? Down? Both?

I was 261.4 this morning.  Obviously that's up a bit from my last official weigh in, but it's down 3 pounds since Monday, so I don't know whether to be happy or not.  Either way I'm not proud.  My last big hurdle is this weekend with the big Nagle family Christmas in NJ, and then it's nose to the grindstone till Spring.  It doesn't help that until April 15th I'll be working at H&R Block a few nights a week when I could be working out.  I know Bob's answer would be to just get up in the morning and work out, but we all know Bob's insane.

Stupid New Years resolutioners

So I show up a few minutes late for hoops last night and there's 19 PEOPLE there.  We generally have 10-12.  I hope this follows the normal pattern and people fall off pretty quick.  I played so little that I hardly worked up a sweat.  (Of course, you could argue that I should have played better so my team could have stayed on the floor, and you'd be right.)

This morning I swam with Therese, and she crushed me.  That's getting old.  I'm going to have to play racquetball with her just to stroke my ego.

Tomorrow will be the first 2010 weigh in/picture, so we'll see where I am.  Hopefully down a little.