Adamantium Claws

Wow, time flies. But if you've been checking your calendar, as I have, then you know that this week marks the end of my office Biggest Loser challenge. And the winner is (drum roll)... not me. Yeah, I'm basically a failure.

No, no, no. That's way too depressing of an ending. I actually doubled my original goal of losing 1lb a week, and finished with a loss of 20.9 lbs over 10 weeks. Not too shabby. I feel pretty darn good about that, especially since I had to eat out in NY for the week prior to weigh in. An entire week in NY, 5 days, and still stayed on track; it weren't easy. Now I know I've been lazy with the blog updates, but I swear I've been pretty busy (I just mentioned the NY trip, hello, so get off my back!). But I did write down a few notes that I wanted to touch and reflect upon after these 10 weeks. Most notably, why the heck did I wait so long to do this? I was truly a bit surprised at how much my waist went down after the first couple weeks. I did alter my diet, and I've always been into exercising during the week, but this was a bit alarming. I didn't have to work that hard to get these results. I promise, I'm not trying to gloat; I'm trying to impress upon everyone out there that this can be as easy as you want it to be. The one thing it did take was dedication. I made a plan, and I stuck to it. The plan was not complicated, which I think is key, and that's why it worked so well for me. After these 10 weeks I would like to share some of the comments and questions I've gotten and somewhat how I answered them. One of the main things I changed was my diet; I severely cut down my carb intake. As I mentioned in my previous post, this essentially means I eat a lot of salads where I had been having sandwiches. Then I started getting the questions 'Aren't you hungry all the time?'. Uh, no. I didn't just cut out the carbs, I replaced them. I still eat a lot, and possibly even more than before, but it consisted of a lot more veggies and lean meat. If you're changing your diet and you're hungry all the time then I'll let you in on a secret; that's not a diet. Its called 'starvation' and not only is it unhealthy, but its used as a form of torture. If your diet feels like torture, I bet I can take a guess of how long you'll last. Even with the sunniest disposition in the world, with the best intentions, and the strongest conviction, if what you're eating taste like bone dust and leaves you hungry then it ain't gonna last.

Which brings us to The Brain. You can't expect results overnight, and its depressing to think you can. Taking over the world takes planning and time; getting and staying fit is no different. If your plan is depressing, torturous, or otherwise unenjoyable then its time to re-evaluate. This also means you need something to evaluate in the first place ie you need to track your progress. I weighed in each week to measure my progress; this helped me stay focused and on target. I also did those 3 exercises at week 1 and 5; I'll get to those next week but I'm pretty excited to measure how far I've gone and the progress I've made. If you didn't do the math, a 20.9lb loss puts the scale at 178.9 when I stepped on it. That's a pretty sweet number, and I'm happy with that number. Butttttttt, what if we can do better? After all, that's only a few LBs away from actually making a passable weight for the Army fitness requirement. I'm hoping I can pass the fitness AND the weight requirement by the end of the month. Fingers crossed!

And one final thing (before the pics of course (proof is in the pudding)), the one thing that has weighed on my mind more than any other... why was this time different? I used to go to SNAP fitness gym, which is a fine gym, and almost 1 year before my wedding I decided to take up the trainer there on one of his offers. 6 months, 2 times a week for a couple hundred bucks. As far as trainers go, it was an apparent steal. I only plan on getting married once, so why not pay to look good for it, right? The training went fine, the trainer was fine, and the workouts were new and fun to do. But you know how much I lost? Not a pound. Not one stinking pound. I hired a professional for godsake, what gives? I paid $10 to enter this office competition and I lost 20lbs in 10 weeks. How did 10 bucks translate to 20 lbs in 10 weeks, while several hundred dollars, a personal trainer, and 6 months got me squat? Mind games. That's correct, my head wasn't right. I shoulda just thought of my old wilderness survival skills; survival priority number one: Positive Mental Attitude. I thought by hiring a trainer he would do the work for me; I was paying him after all so where is the miracle? He told me about diet, and I did the exercise, but I didn't believe it. If I'm being picky, the diet he suggested was a bit complicated to follow with high and low gluten foods, but when it comes down to it I just wasn't invested. With money on the line you'd think I would be. Nope; apparently all it takes is a competition. My closest friends are probably shaking their heads right now, because they know the Nathaniel Fox trick. How do you get Nathaniel to do something? Well, you're a random reader so I guess you'll just have to get to know me better, but lets just say that I don't like being told I can't do something. Turns out this competition was the spark I needed. For you it may be some new shoes, a fit bit tracker, a new watch, some sweet gym shorts, that new co-worker with the nice smile, your now too tight pants, your fat friend, your skinny friend, or that vacation coming up. That spark could be a personal trainer, or it could be an office competition.

So here's that pudding, or at least a slightly skinnier version of it. Week one first of course ;)

Week 1: Pudgy Bastard

Week 10: Magical shrinking belly!

Week 1: Shadows can't hide those boobs!

Week 10: Happy and Fit!

In conclusion, I'm very happy with the results and I see this as a stepping stone into the future. How tone can we get? I want to re-iterate though, I ain't special. This was work, and some times were harder than others, but there's nothing special about it. I can't fly, I can't run faster than a speeding bullet, I can't move metal with my mind, change the weather, or throw lightning bolts. I don't have adamantium claws, nor could I survive the procedure. I'm a regular person, just like you. And if you want, you can lose weight too.

Take 'er easy, and give yo momma a kiss this weekend.

Perception

So we've steam rolled past week 5 of the 10 Week Biggest Loser competition at the office, and I'm feelin' pretty good. I'm losing weight, inches off my waist, and still keeping up a fun and carefree lifestyle. On a minor note, I also purchased my first house with my wife the other week. Basically a footnote in my life compared to the huge pounds I'm droppin', but I figure I'd give it a mention since the blog was dry the last 2 weeks (more on house projects later). I used said move-in as a reason to kick back and take a break form my current low carb diet, and wolfed down some pizza along with a few beers; and by a few I mean as many as I could muster in the daylight and that evening. One little (or big) break didn't kill my progress though, and I was able to resume right after with a fresh conscience and revitalized attitude. I've been thinking the last few weeks about how my diet has changed, and how much of this I will be able to keep up afterwards. The biggest thing I've noticed about cutting out carbs like bread, pasta, and rice, is that f'in everything you eat has this stuff. 99% of food you order comes as a sandwich or with a side of rice. I've been eating a lot of salads lately, but that made me think, have I been eating a lot of salads? Was I just eating a lot of things between bread before? Maybe I was eating a lot of burgers and not enough salad, in which case I'm eating about the right amount now.

Is that 2 faces? Or a vase? Is it both at once? Even without the salads my other meals don't have bread, so I've essentially just been eating a chunk of meat and a side of veggies. When you think about it, this is usually under the entree list at a restaurant. Steak and steamed veggies, chicken with side salad; these are the 'nice' things on the menu; burgers and sandwiches have their own shunned corner, and it was a corner I visited often. Eating 'entrees' like this almost makes me feel fancy; more like proper and stuff, like a real adult. Sandwiches are for those lowly folk, those plebes. Fancy people like myself use a fork and knife to eat, not our filthy hands.

Any who, so its definitely changed my perspective a bit on what lunch or dinner consists of (breakfast is still as awesome as ever since I always loved eggs and meat). Its funny that I would think of a salad as such a diet food; a burger is a real meal. A man's meal. But when it comes down to it, I'm packing in more protein and nutrients eating salad than a 'regular' sandwich or burger meal could ever hope for. Isn't that better? More manly? Maybe manly is being a responsible mother fucker and not eating everything on the plate just cuz its there. And whats with these sides? Fries? Delicious they may be, but they are body killers. I feel like a king when I make a steak and have it with some roasted veggies. 'This is so nice' our dinner guests have said, but the truth is that steak tastes super good and is good for you. Chicken breast? Sign me up buddy! I buy chicken breast family packs like its my job. I should get more into cooking the whole bird, but that hasn't happened much yet. I still love pizza. I still love burgers. Juicy lucy? To die for. But I've come to appreciate a good salad, and I'm eating all these grown up 'entrees' as well. It feels like I've struck a really good balance.

So I'm eating a bit better (or different anyway), I have my cheat days every now and again, and I moved. More specifically I moved away from my super sweet local Snap gym, which means I'm working out sans gym. Thankfully the internet is chock full of body weight exercises, and one of our local parks (Lake Hiawatha) has a pullup bar and dip station. Say WHAT?! Yup! After looking around for monkey bars to use for weeks, I found the jackpot right next to a beautiful little lake. I was so excited I decided to jog down there this week and do another round of Cindy to see how we're doing. You remember that from the benchmarks, right? Well I tacked on almost another 2 rounds, so I hit 17 complete rounds and 10 extra reps in 20 minutes. Truthfully, I was hoping for a bit more, and I'm blaming my push ups for holding me back. Maybe I'm still using too much arm and back on the kips, but the push ups are bogging me down. But progress is progress, so I'll just focus on my push ups and hopefully I can make it past 20 rounds in week 10. I also did another long run the other week after cleaning our old place which ticked off 6 miles in just under 50 minutes. That's almost 2 miles farther than my previous Lake Harriet run, and at 8:10 miles that's 10 seconds faster per mile to boot! That I'm pretty happy with. I'll knock out the PFT next week to get those numbers, and then we'll have our midway numbers totally filled out. Speaking of numbers, lets get to the number that gets us paid; my weight. I tipped the ever-so-accurate digital office scale at exactly 187.0 lbs this week. For those of you that are not die hard followers, that's a sweet 12.5 pound loss in 5 weeks, which is more than my original 10 week goal. So that's pretty neat.

You know whats also neat? That means I'm no longer obese! Yah!! Yup, now I'm just overweight, hahaha. So my new goal is to keep this weight loss gravy trail rolling, and shoot for an average of 2 lbs each week. That would put us on the right side of 180 at 179.5 lbs by week 10. I truly cannot remember the last time I was under 180. Maybe right before I moved to Minneapolis, which would put us at 4 years. And that's a maybe. For sure I know I was about 175 in college, so now we're talking about a decade ago. That's some serious time. They say proof is in the pudding, so here I am in pudding. Okay, its just me in my classy TMNT boxers again. 

WEEK 1                                                                                            WEEK 5

I tried to make the same blank face. Sorry, no Mina this time, and the lighting is a bit better in my new house (new house!!). And here's the other one.

WEEK 1                                                                                      WEEK 5

I know what you're thinking, and yes, that is a fantastic beard. And even though I'm laughing a bit in the second photo, there definitely seems to be a bit less roundness in the belly area. You can't see it from the photos, but I've also gone down a notch on all my belts, and my skinny jeans are now my comfortable jeans. At 12.5 lbs down, I'm at just over 6% weight loss. The first place guy is at a hair over 10% so I'm not exactly in the running, but I'm feeling great and who knows, 10 weeks is a long time so we'll see if we can all keep it together.

Now its time to relax, and enjoy the weekend. Take some time to set-up my garage, look for my Subaru replacement, look at paint color tags, put up curtain rods; its a fucking magical time. Take 'er easy.

Communication

Why is it that people make things difficult on purpose? I think we've all played the game of telephone sometime in our life. If not, its that game where you whisper something into someone's ear, and then they say something twisted and fucked up to the person next to them as if you told them to say it. You smile innocently, and then she'll never talk to you again. Its great. Anyway, we all know the game, and it can be super fun, but no matter how hard you try and how specific you are, the message is always different once it gets past 3 or 4 people. We know this; it is no secret. Why then, if people have this knowledge of  this very important game of telephone, do they still prefer to take the round about way of communicating? Its like they want the message to get twisted and confused; perhaps they don't even want you to receive a message at all, or at the very least know that it came from them. 

Lost? Okay, you're lost. So my phone didn't turn on the other week. I know, right? My fucking phone. That little thing that stores our entire lives in the form of pictures, videos, some texts, definitely no voicemail, and Clash of Clans. Clash of Clans!! And I was in the middle of a war and hadn't made my attacks yet! Yeah, it was a bit frustrating. So I took steps. I made an appointment at my wonderful cell carrier (Sprint) for them to take a look. Do I have insurance? No, why the fuck would I have insurance? I thought you were going to sell me a product that works. Since the phone won't turn on, they can't diagnose anything. They offered me a refurbished phone of the same model, an LG G3, for 75 bones. Not a terrible deal, but not exactly a great deal. Mind you this phone was something like $600 and so I've been paying it off interest free for the last 18 months; which means I have 6 months of $25 payments to go til its mine. Too bad it doesn't work anymore I guess. Short insert here; what if I did have insurance? Well then they would replace the phone for free. Great deal, right? Insurance is 8 bucks a month, and I've had the phone for 18 months. Eight times eighteen is 144. So the 'free' replacement phone woulda just cost me $144. So not exactly a great deal. But lets not dilly dally here, the real culprit is LG. I've babied their product for the past year and a half and it repays me by up and leaving without so much as a note. No signs, no nothing. Worked great up until the moment it never turned on again. So here's where this communication game comes in. I go to LGs website and submit a request for assistance. They respond in a timely manner with some suggestions; all of the suggestions of course presume the phone can turn on, which I specifically noted is not possible in my initial request. The response was timely, but unhelpful.

This is one of those emails that you can't respond to, and they didn't give me any ticket info or anything to reference, so I have to submit another request. I printed the initial email to pdf and attached it in my second request, so they for sure know now that I need a repair. I also included the recommended phone info as well, and all my contact info. They respond in timely fashion once again, and again no info about what to do for a repair.

Round three. At this point I find out there is a separate email request form specifically for repairs. SO it was my fault for not finding that first, and not their fault for just forwarding my request and/or telling me about their own services. Anywho, so I submit that request, and their response takes a bit longer this time. I presume they took the extra time to formulate a more helpful response. Nope. Helpful response is not an option with LG. Apparently I have to call for an answer. 

Its not that I don't love calling in for support on products, especially to massive corporations, but if that was the only option to get this done then why do you even have other much more readily available options? I'm making an assumption here, but it must be to guarantee that you're upset when you call in for support. You know, make sure those customer representatives are really on their game that day. I'm gonna leave this little story as a part one of two, but just so as to not leave you hanging too much, I called into LG, got a repair ticket number, and then sent my phone in. They were specific that I had to write the irrational hexadecimal 18 digit ticket numeral down both on the package and in the package so that they can verify its me. Apparently my name and address on the package isn't enough. Oh, and they can't email or otherwise send me this ridiculously long and cryptic sequence of numbers and letters because then it wouldn't be secure. Nope, they can only tell it to me over the phone a single time, and have me repeat it back to them to verify. If I somehow write it down wrong then or in the future, then its gone forever and I have to start over. How on earth did this process get approved? And does this actually work?

So yeah, communication is fun. I actually work in tech support answering calls and emails for much of the day and it really just boggles my mind how poorly some companies have this set up. Anyway, lets talk about something more fun, cuz its the weekend. I saw Zootopia this past Saturday, and there is definitely reason to why people are going crazy for this movie. Its absolutely hilarious, the story is original and fun, its smart for kids and adults, and Jason Bateman is a miracle as Nick the fox. I started laughing at the beginning, and there was almost no reason to stop for the entire film. The animation is obviously well done, but the different city areas for the animals and the way characters interact really took some creative minds. The kids in the theater are just having fun and laughing at what dazzles their eyes, and the script is so smart that adults are laughing right along with their kids, yet for usually completely different reasons. The way they use the very obvious differences and stereotypes among animals to show discrimination really demonstrates how silly discrimination is, especially among a single species like homo sapiens. It also shows how real discrimination is; you may be able to describe someone as tall, smart, fast, white, black, orange, weak, or hairy, but to think that description defines them, that you can now label them and make assumptions about the characteristics you may not be able to see or perceive, well now you've just crossed over. I'm not going to go on about discrimination and how its a bad thing (hopefully you already know that), but I will say that this movie is great for showing it to us in very simple and approachable manner. Just because someone is small does not make them weak. Just because someone is big doesn't mean they're not cuddly. Just because you're born with one leg doesn't mean you can't be a track star. If you have the desire, then many things are possible. So when your 7 year old nephew or 27 year old cousin ask you why they shouldn't judge X because of Y, you can say 'because a fucking bunny can become a cop, that's why'. Seriously though, its a great movie and a great story that can be learned from many times over. For its great story, excellent characters, non stop laughs, and possible Vehicross clone cop car I give this cinematic feature 7 out of 7 fox tails.

In other news, I saw London has Fallen. It gets 5/7 fox tails for being exactly what its supposed to be, but by passing on an obvious decapitation opportunity during a chase scene. You still rock Gerry.

And for those following along on my biggest loser campaign, I weighed in at 194.2 lbs this past Wednesday, which is a 5.3lb and 2.65% loss. I also was able to get out last Friday to do Cindy, and knocked out 15 rounds with an additional 15 reps (5 pullups and 10 pushups) in the allotted 20 minutes. I also attempted a max number of standard pullups this week, and reached 10 in a row. Now get out there and enjoy the weather. Take 'er easy.

Benchmarks

So week one of this whole weight loss competition is down and I gotta say, I feel pretty good. Of course my diet and exercise is pretty much unchanged from the last few months, so that's not much of a surprise. I decided to kick off the weight loss weekend by doing what I do best; kicking ass and taking names. In this case that means I went to Bad Weather Brewery for a pint in the early afternoon, and had defeated Shredder on their Turtles in Time arcade by late afternoon. What? You expected I was gonna start my marathon training? Go sow some alfalfa sprouts and quinoa? 

Lets just say I started with a cheat day. After all, you have to keep your mental health too, right? And possibly more importantly, we can't have the foot clan running the streets; not on my streets of Saint Paul. No no.

Okay, where were we? That's right, weight loss stuff. I have to say, I was a bit overwhelmed, surprised, and extremely appreciative of all the comments and support I've gotten so far. My readers are just as nice and supportive as my wife!

I had people give me recipes, share some workouts they like, and even send me some general weight loss and fitness plans they've used; apparently many of us have been here before. And since you guys have stepped it up, it has encouraged me to do the same. My previous post may have given some people the idea that I just want to lift and get ripped, but this is about whole body health, and that means helping my body with exercise and nutrition, as well as building strong mental and social health too. Whats the point of looking like Leonidas if you've got no life or friends? Pshhh. So it was time to set some benchmarks, some initial shakedowns if you will. Do something this week, and then see how I'm doing at week 5 and 10. The ultimate plan is to win the competition, but its fruitless if I don't track myself and learn how to keep it up. This week I decided on 3 exercises/workouts/things to test my physical fitness level, and they are long distance running speed (3+ miles), the Army Physical Fitness Test (APFT), and Cindy (Crossfit WOD). 

You know I have to use Zombieland, right? 

So its a wee bit cold out here in good ol' Minneapolis, but I decided to go all natural and strap on my lightweight performance shoes, a matching jogging suit, and hit the trail for a nice jaunt around the lake. Over to Lake Harriet, around the Lake (which was a beautiful overcast grey; seriously though, beautiful #blessedMN), and then back again. I ticked off about 4.2 miles, didn't have to flip off any cars, stayed warm, and it took me a few seconds shy of 35 minutes. Do the math and that's 8:20 minute miles. By ridiculous comparison, my marathon pace in 2011 was also 8:20. Sounds good, right? The first 13.1 miles of that marathon however, I was at a 7:10 pace. So I was able to run over a minute a mile faster for 3 times the distance in 2011 than today. So I have some room to grow; that's the point of this anyway! Lets move on and see how we fared concerning the military. I mean, its a gov't run organization so its gotta be pretty easy and accepting, right?

(Yeah, Full Metal Jacket is the Marines. Its a gif; get over it.) The Army PFT consists of doing as many push-ups as possible in 2 minutes, as many sit-ups as possible in 2 minutes, and then a 2 mile run. I remember doing this kind of stuff in middle school; easy. Per Army guidelines I had a spotter count out my reps and time me, allowed 10 minute rest between drills, only used specific rest positions, and no music. I could blame the lack of music, my workout from the day before, or my immature attitude, but no matter how you cut it, I didn't do great in this test.

I knocked out 45 push-ups, 51 sit-ups, and ran the 2 miles in 14:56.

Feel free to checkout the scorecard charts here if you like, but I'll save you the suspense; I passed. My 12 year old middle school self would most likely have kicked my ass though. I thought I was in shape? So you have to score at least 60 in each category (check the charts), and I got 66 in PU, a 66 in SU, and 82 in the run for a total score of 214. However there's a height and weight requirement as well, and at 5'7" the max allowable weight is... 174lbs. Wowza. Yeah, not even close. So technically I failed. I'll have to tape off my neck and stomach before next week to see if I fall within their body fat standards. Yup, the superior United States military with its billion dollar drones and million dollar missiles calculates your body fat from comparing your neck to your belly. Whatev, lets move on to Cindy.

Now I think crossfit is an amazing workout and exercise idea, but that gif just cracks me up. Any who, Cindy WOD. For you non-crossfitters out there (come on, paleo diet dude) WOD stands for Workout Of the Day, and Cindy is a common WOD that people can use to compare themselves. Its a circuit of 5 pull-ups (kipping ones), 10 push-ups, and 15 squats AMRAP (as many reps as possible; f'in crossfitters love their acronyms almost as much as the military). I usually do a similar workout with standard pull-ups and inverted rows, but I wanted to try and knock this one out like a crossfit purist.

Okay, so I didn't exactly fail, but my gym only has one pull up bar, and its attached to the seemingly always in use cable crossover machine. I couldn't take it over for 20 minutes, so I went in search of a playground to use some monkey bars or something.

Yeah, yeah. At least I got a good bike ride in, but all these new age playgrounds are barely 5' off the ground to keep kids safe, and all the monkey bars look like they came out of a Dr Seuss book. What, we can't have straight bars anymore? Any who, I'm not giving up on this, and since Friday is the LEAST busy time for Snap fitness, I'm hoping to knock out Cindy tonite and get back to y'all with a baseline for the weeks to come.

I've once again blabbed on for way longer than expected, but I want to note that the wife and I went above and beyond in the kitchen this week too. Tried out stuffed peppers for the first time, btw they're super easy. Step one, buy peppers. Step 2, cook whatever you have in the house. Step 3, stuff and bake. We had some ground turkey, green salsa, a can of corn, and a can of black beans. They were f'in delicious, healthy, and carb free. We also used some leftover red pepper to place in a muffin tin with some diced ham, and then filled each cup up with some eggs. Then pop int he oven for a spell. Super easy again, and then we had egg and ham muffins for breakfast, instead of some sad ass yogurt. I put jalapenos on the top of mine too. Yum!!

Thanks again for all the fitness and nutrition ideas, and definitely keep 'em coming! If there are any workouts you'd like to compare then let me know and I'll try and work it in and post the results. Likewise with recipes. Time to take on the theater this weekend with the top rated Zootopia, and the bottom rated London has Fallen. So excited. Take er easy.

Time to Nut Up or Shut Up

As my good friend Tallahassee once said, 'Its time to nut up or shut up'. This concerns a couple things.
1) Haven't written a post in .... forever.
and 2) I've been telling (lying to) myself for some time now that I should trim down and take control of my body/health/fat ass.
They say that to achieve a goal you need to have a goal. And that you're then supposed to share that goal so that you stay accountable. Well I've been tip toeing around this idea, and I've laid some ground work. I started writing down the workouts I do each day, and how many alcoholic beverages I consume each day as well. So I've been collecting data, but I haven't actually set a goal or done anything about it. What can I say? I'm weak. I know I drink a lot, but golly gee I like that. Its fun (!). But that doesn't change the fact that my ass is growing disproportionately to my biceps. I don't live in a gym, so its goal setting time.
My office was the ultimate catalyst for this as they have issued a 'Biggest Loser' style challenge. So me and all my doughy coworkers can throw some money in a pool and see who comes out on top (or bottom depending on how you look at it). So someone other than me and my way too supportive wife (you're handsome honey) will be aware of this dealio. First weigh in was this Wednesday, and I tipped the digital scale at a hair under 2 bills; 199.5lbs. At 5'7", that puts my BMI at 31.2, which is technically obese. Not overweight mind you, but obese. I have to drop to 191 just to be overweight. Yup.

Like I said, I've been tracking myself for a bit, almost 3 months now, and I'm on the right track. Just the other day I was at the gym and a guy resembling an extra on Spartacus, with his entire midsection exposed from his unnecessarily large opening sleeveless shirt, asked me for a spot. I was like 'yeah, he sees I'm not a complete nimwhit'. It was a nice boost. Never mind that his only other choices were some small Indian kid in loafers, or the guy with the fanny pack that seems to be more impressed with the sound of crashing weights rather than how much he's actually lifting. Its SNAP fitness, okay? Not exactly where Schwarzenegger got his start.
Any who, lets circle back. Goal setting. I'm a stocky guy, and we all know that the BMI system doesn't take into account a lot of factors, but no matter how you cut it I ain't in great shape. My initial goal for now is to lose a pound a week. The challenge at my office lasts for 10 weeks, so that'll put me at 189.5 and about 5% weight loss. Is that enough to win? We have to check in at week five, so we'll re-evaluate then. Did I mention there's a cash prize to the winning individual and team? Almost 500 bones each. Yeah, that's quite the incentive. And also to be healthier, look good for Summer, look good for a mirror, cut grocery bills, get drunk on less, keep my smoking hot wife interested in me sexually, and to fit into those pants I've had in storage for too long. And fit into my bucket seat in my race car. Yeah, all those things, and a list a whole lot longer too.

So I wanna cut at least 10lbs. But how? I plan to work out at least 5 days a week, for at least 30 minutes each time. Also watch what I eat (portion control, some pizza, no ice cream for breakfast), and keep the drinking down. I'm still me, so I'm not gonna cut drinking out completely, but I've somewhat successfully been able to cut out pretty much all drinking during the weekdays these past few months. So that's a start. And I still like to drink to excess, so I've been limiting that to one weekend night, instead of 2 or 3. So that's neat too. Now I need to try and limit those big nights to only a 12 pack. Yeah, I'm a thirsty guy.

I actually got a personal trainer for a few months last year, so I've taken some advice form him. And otherwise I'm gonna stick to the basic 'Less input, more output' approach, ie eat what I need, and workout more. When I had that trainer he had me write up some goals. One of them was to put up some pictures (which I never did) of one of my wife's favorite bodies; Thor. Chris Hemsworth may play the part, but when you ask her who she likes she doesn't say 'Chris', she says 'mother freakin' Thor'.

So this is Thor.

And here's me.

 Twins, right? Yeah, you're right; he would look better in TMNT shorts.
Okay, so we got that out of the way. For now on I think I'm gonna pick my celebrity pics beforehand, and then try and replicate their pose and clothing so you guys can figure out who is who ;)
So she likes Thor, but I'm going for something more like this.

Sooooooooo, I'm basically there. Okay, I have a ways to go. But after 10 weeks hopefully we 'll be able to at least see a difference, right? Well I'll have you be the judge. Here's one more just for fun. Check your own self in the mirror. You likey? Or you no likey? Don't be like me and wait for some one to offer you money to lose weight or get healthier. I can't believe all the crap people have to pay for because they were unhealthy before, or possibly even still are. Lets nip this one in the bud.

PS Deadpool was awesome. 7/7 Foxtails easy. Couldn't stop laughing.