Maintain.

It's been a good, long, exaggerated minute but I somehow pulled myself away from the machinations of life to update you on a few details.

First and foremost let me give this wonderful slice of delicious news. I met my goal weight on the day of dragon con. That's 190 pounds, 60 pounds total lost.  Even a month after D*CON I've maintained that weight. Here's a picture, try to contain your excitement (cause I can feel it from here).

Hot for Con was a success, and I believe I led you on to believe there would be more written about this but I'm a tease and tired, also there's places to go and stray puppies to deliver. I'll check in more often and let you in on my next handful of healthy goals.

08/10/2011

Days until Con : 22

I have to admit something to you, because I feel like we've got a good thing going here and I don't want to ruin our friendship, I ate pizza. Yeah. So I understand if you want to see other bloggers, or if you think we're just not right for each other.

I mean I did just post about this health revolution, then I stuffed my face with pepperoni and canadian bacon pizza for lunch.

But that's fine, I'll bring it when I work out, and I'll stand taller tomorrow (metaphorically). Pizza is the ultimate sin food for me, it's so bad for me yet oh so good. Like it just screams at me in this cute little voice "but but haames!" and i'm all like "screw you pizza, you're no good for me. we've done this before and it just won't work out for me."

Then pizza gets all angry and ghetto.

Then I have to eat it.

Then I get fat.

The end.

Welcome Back Stiver

08/09/2011

Days until Con : 23

Enough! I'm tired of not being able to post as frequently and I'm taking a stand. For the next 23 days I will keep this thing updated because I made a solem vow, to myself, and though the promises I attempt to keep to myself don't always pan out this will sure as hell will.

Besides, I just got an email from someone who was inspired by what I'm doing and things like that deeply touch me. Because I have become passionate about helping people taking care of themselves and helping them get into a position where they look and feel wonderful, a place I've recently just arrived at.

The feedback from my latest experiences out in the wild have been nothing short of emotionally awesome. So it's back to posting every day, back to the super awesome exercising (did some stupid awesome exercising for the last two days) and just doing everything that feels right and good in the world.

Since it's been a minute let me fill you in.

I've been taking my new found health, opening the doors and taking it for a test spin, not being a whore or anything like that, but you know going out there and being seen. Also testing my willpower against that bitter struggle against the super tasty bad for you foods.

And winning, because I own face like that.

You cannot believe how addictive it is to see people you haven't hung around in awhile and they say "wow" or "you got skinny". Yes, I can see how this can transform guys into d-bags, but I remain firm on being a nice guy who made a healthy choice in his life. Also, the temptations of eating unhealthy simply aren't there.

It's like quitting smoking though. (Which I've also struggled on)

There's always the yearn, that flamilar comfort and nostalgia of great food or a good smoke, but overall it's just not worth it. I shared a red velvet cake with three people, and that was okay. That use to be unheard of. I drink water with every meal now, WATER, I barely knew what that was last year other than it's a component necessary in coffee making.

I eat better foods while others around me gorge on the stuff I use to believe to be righteous and necessary. Did I just compare delicious food to religion? How far off am I really? Anyways, like cigarettes, there's this place you go to when you remember the moments fondly but accept the entire experience as negative. I do sometimes enjoy and indulge without shame yet I don't let it become habit. In one of the many health related postcast I listened to it was said that losing weight is simply exercising, eating right, and making it your lifestyle for at least 60 percent of the time.

I believe it.

Through my journey I've definitely indulged and got off track, but never so much that I couldn't get back on. Had I completely surrendered my entire diet or body to a restrictive plan I think I would've failed this entire thing. But I've lost a total of 51 pounds, and while that's not as much as some of the other weight lost stories, it's been a world of difference to me.

Now I have 23 days to finish the job. Roughly 10 pounds to lose, which use to seem like such a daunting task, now it's merely a fly I shoo away. Then I'll enter Dragon Con a man of 190 pounds, something that hasn't been seen since high school.  Long term I should be settled in at 175, which about 5 months ago seemed like an impossible dream but I now realize it's something I'll have accomplished by Christmas.

Happiness with myself and life, a gift I seemed to have opened early, because I deserve it.

On the Move.

08/03/2011

Days until Con : 29

I'm moving soon and couldn't be more excited. Okay, I could be more excited, like if a red velvet companion cube were promised as a first night welcome home gift. I'll be living by myself, no roommates and no significant others, it'll be a joy.

Things seem to be piecing themselves together nicely for me, which is a welcome relief. Not that things were terrible before, for awhile they were just kind of "eh". Moving is excitement, something new, something that lets me plan and strategize.

I'm convinced I can have a extremely well put together place without it having reek of bachelor. This time I make all the decor decisions, nobody else can stop me, no matter how obscene or seemingly tacky my choices may become.

Ikea shall know thy name, for it is Stiver of Sandy Springs.

As a major side note. Almost to Con! I'm on track to meeting my goal and maybe, just maybe, I'll be touched inappropriately by a zombie. One can only dream.

In the Wild

08/01/2011

Days until Con : 31

It has certainly been a wild ride in the last few weeks. I'm not use to, you know, the outside world and yet it has repeatedly knocked on my door and I answered more times I'm use to. While it was fun to get out there I'm happy to pull back a little and focus my efforts. This site needs to be updated more and I have a Con encroaching with a goal I'm on track to hit.

This (technically yesterday) morning marks the first time, in well over a decade, that I've weighed in under 200 lbs. It was extremely emotional for me and I would've cried had I not been visiting over at a friend's place and secretly using their scale. When I was able to get home and hidden safely under the blanket of privacy I forgot to cry and instead took a nap, and right now I think the crying moment has past but we'll see.

It's still very emotional. I swear.

I went to the beer olympics in Smyrna on Saturday and no, I didn't compete, but I did have one of those beautiful moments I'd been waiting a very long time for. I'd met up with a large group of friends who hadn't seen me in years and the reactions I got about my weight loss were extremely badass. Keep in mind that these are individuals whom one might be inclined to consider a little 'rough around the edges'. They're friends who pride themselves in the brutal truth, perhaps it should be called bludgeoning, and they tell it to the point that it often hurts literally. So the moment will forever be remembered.

I say that because I took pictures.

Also I made them sign statements.

Okay fine, that's a lie. They didn't have to sign anything.

One month left, and I have 9 pounds to lose in order to reach my goal for D*Con. I can smell victory coming and it smells of delicious rockin mixed with chocolate awesome.

Mwahahhahahahaha!!! [lighting strikes in the background followed by harsh orchestra strings]

Meditation Week

07/25/2011

Days until Con : 38

There's something slippery and oddly rough about time. But I'm not going to blame the elusiveness of it just yet. I've actually been going out there, you know, into the world. You should be happy for me, thrilled even, perhaps you should donate to the cause. Venturing into the world has its' side effects.

My weight-loss suffered as I hadn't been keeping this blog up which is a constant reminder of what the hell I'm trying to do...with myself. You see riding around on autopilot is what the average person does and if you're core isn't strong enough to support a healthy foundation, that cheaply built foundation will slowly chip away. This week was a chip, and one that I needed if only for the research.

I was okay overall on food and exercise, but it slipped. Slipping, even for a week, shows. There are a couple of factors that went into play that I'll be analyzing in my laboratory. Okay I lied, I don't have laboratory, but if I did that would be awesome and rest assured it would be filled with bubbling tubes and electrical du-dads that beep and print out slips of statistics.

This will be my regroup and calm down week. There's a lot of things in motion, emotionally even, and taking time to meditate can only be a good thing.

Besides, I'm broke until friday tired there's only so much waffle house I can stand.

Text (messaging) is Life

07/20/2011

Days until Con : 43

I've been without my cellphone all day today and I forget how disconnected I feel without it. On one point it's refreshing, but that's a novelty that wears off way too soon.

Anyways. I don't have much to report. I tennis'd with Jones, and had some pretty awesome wings for lunch. I kept myself busy with manual labor all day and I'm ready to stay in bed and devolve into a pile of sleepy goo.

Which sounds bad, but it feels oh so good.

Reliable. Like a Panda. Pandas are reliable right?

07/19/2011

Days until Con : 44

The last 4 days have been pretty non-stop. Usually I post with a reliability rarely seen in men of my caliber but I swear baby, these are forces outside of my control. Okay fine, I could've controlled it, but then I would've had such a great weekend.

For the first time since I started losing weight I went out into the public. Like where people play. Like to a bar in downtownish Atlanta, karaoke night. Though at first I had some social anxiety, I eventually calmed down (thanks to alcohol) and was able to have a completely awesome time with awesome people. A really attractive and wonderfully geeky chick flirted with me. I was perhaps a bit concerned that she could break me into tiny bits and stuff me in her scooter storage compartment (that wasn't sexual) but that's just a normal thing I get scared of whenever meeting anyone new. (strangers can be crazy)

We had coffee the next day. I gave her a panic attack (no really). It was a memorable night.

I've been pretty even on my healthy living. I didn't eat outrageously, but I did indulge a bit on everything else. Haven't really worked out and have had enough coffee to drown a hipster. That's fine. My cheat week was worth it, and you know what? I'm thinking of doing it again, only this time not making it such an extended celebration.

My schedule for the week is completely screwed...

Wednesday - Work/Tennis
Thursday - Work/Mountain
Friday - Work/Gaming
Saturday - Possible Gaming
Sunday - Laundry/Sleeping in/Work/Writing music

I have to squeeze a date in there, I'm sure it'll fit.

I also have to squeeze in some me time, or I'll snap something larger than a twig but smaller than a human in two.

I also need to finish reading Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Sausages.

Busy.

07/15/2011

I've accepted a 6 pack contest. Meaning the first one to get a 6 pack abs wins. What do we win? 6 pack abs. The person I'm in this contest with has a fairly good head start but I've never been the one to let that kind of thing get me down. I have tenacity. Like a wolf. Or a starving chihuahua. It was just the added incentive I needed to kick my exercise back into gear. 

Yesterday I tennis'd with Adam, and it was great to get out and do something active. Of course we didn't really play tennis per say, we just kind of hit the ball around until we were too tired to carry on. 

That's it. I'm done. It's going to be a busy weekend.

Because I Can't Think of a Better Title.

07/12/2011

Days until Con : 51

It's a bit late, and I've had a weird day of sleeping, coffee, and writing. So I'm not exactly in the mood for an all out topic to discuss. But I would, however, like to show you some of the progress I've made. It's hard to tell on my Path to Con section, so I've put together a few photos comparisons.

In a way this has been extremely motivating (and slightly shamefull) as I haven't really looked back at it all until now. It's like the older photos aren't really me at all...

 

Me. Sometime in 2010

Me. Sometime in 2009

So take a look at these, one from 2009 and one from 2010. Compared with the above current pic and wow. I mean, I didn't realize how different my face looks.

That's all. I have some shirtless photos I've been documenting once a month and I'm debating on showing those but it's kind of embarrassing showing some skin on the internet. It's one thing to proclaim you're fat and doing something about it, it's another to show your giant belly progression to the world.

The Most Amazing Shirt in the World (this is a tribute)

07/11/2011

Days until Con : 52

The problem I'm having, the problem I've been wanting to have for awhile, is that I'm not sure what shirt/pant size I'll end up at when I'm done. I'm well past XXL, and XL is starting to look pretty big on me. I went ahead and purchased a few things in LG but where does it stop?

No, I will not consult google, because I needed a topic dammit.

After LG is Med, and I've never seen MED. Never, ever,  in my life. I'm not sure I'd be comfortable buying that size. Like somehow the cashier will spot me as a poser and hit the red button under the counter that calls the police.

Do I buy clothes incrementally? Cause I'm not sure how long I'll be staying in LG. XL went by in  flash. I'll never be a small so do I build my super awesome "hot wardrobe" out of MED? Probably. I'll have to take the leap, and perhaps go ahead and buy a really awesome MED shirt, as my victory shirt. Because we all have a victory shirt. That one thing in the back of closet that if we'd lose a few pounds we'd fit in.

Its the shirt of which we measure our life by.

I had that shirt. It was a glorious day when I could put it on without fighting mass and gravity. It's a white button up thing that I could fit in at the beginning of this Hot for Con thing, and is now way too big. Perhaps I need another one, a shirt that will become the marker for my success, the crowning achievement to my self pronounced hotness. Aha! I just found something to do tonight!

I will scavenge the entire internet for the most amazing shirt in the world, buy it in size Medium, and add a new dynamic to my motivation. Sometimes I feel like a weight-loss villain, plotting and scheming my way to awesome.

What Hasn't Worked.

07/10/2011

Days until Con : 53

Weigh in day, and down two pounds from last week making me at 207.  It's a good day.

My nutrition is in flux and has been since I began this whole thing. But that feels like the natural order of things. Every person is different, has different cravings and body styles so it makes sense that you'd have to come up with something that works best for you. I'm much less in flux now then when I began. The problem I see with being on a  strict diet is that it's not sustainable over a long period of time. Making better decisions is. Whenever people ask me how I've lost the weight I've already lost, I tell them I'm very aware of what goes into my body, and I stay active. It seems like generic advice and sometimes there's a bit of a sigh from the other party because they're looking for a secret ingredient, but trust me when I say there isn't.

I can tell you what didn't work for me.

Diet pills are a sham. I tried them well before I started Hot for Con and I didn't notice anything different about my weight loss, and experienced side effects. Most of the side effects felt like I'd guzzled about 10 cups of coffee in one go (my heartrate increased on a constant basis and I couldn't sleep at night) You don't need them, they're mostly dangerous and the ones that aren't dangerous are expensive. You can save that money and put it towards better foods.

Calorie counting. If you've followed me from the begin you remember I counted calories on my posts, to be honest it was a gateway into being calorie aware, but calorie counting itself is tedious. You also don't get the full scope of a healthy lifestyle that way as foods are not created equal. It doesn't prepare you to broaden your horizons, to eat more veggies and fruits, it just teaches you to buy frozen diet dinners. This may work for most, and I see the benefit. As a long term solution, it wasn't what I wanted.

Starvation. This is ridiculous, and shameful to say, but I tried it. The problem being 1. The hunger pains, and 2. When you do eat your body, having gone into survival mode, stores everything it can. You cannot keep this up. You'll starve yourself all day long, then on your way home from work you'll get yourself something, anything, to eat. I found myself driven mad, literally, and grabbed the first fast food place I could find and ordered a metric butt ton of food. I'd end up losing absolutely nothing and being miserable in the process.

Fad diets. By the time I started sniffing around fad diets I'd already educated myself enough to just come up with something on my own. Fad dieting is, again, not something you can keep up forever so I wasn't too interested.

The way I see it. Starvation, diet pills, fad diets, and calorie counting is somewhat the order of things when you have absolutely no knowledge of healthy living and you're trying desperately for something to work. Calorie counting being the better out of the group but they all have fatal flaws that didn't work for me. I do suggest calorie counting as a launching pad, anything that gets you aware of what you're putting in your body, but stay the hell away from the others.

A few posts back I talked about fasting, and you'd probably try to call me a hypocrite because what's the difference between fasting and starving? When fasting your body never goes into survival mode, which is the key. You'll also know that I'm not exactly fasting anymore, I used myself as research and found that it's something that is interesting but ultimately not for me.

Rewarding Yourself. Better Yet, Rewarding Me.

07/08/2011

Days until Con : 55

I'll admit my blog posts haven't been exactly health related as of late, and to add insult to a sprained ankled, my posts have become  somewhat infrequent. So you haven't seen my lovely mug daily, which is fine, and you've probably even asked why I post a picture of myself with every Hot for Con post.

It's part of the triforce of rewards I planned for Hot for Con journey. Rewards, I believe, become an absolutely critical part of any health plan. As far as I'm concerned you need to grade yourself to know if you're getting better and you also need to see some kind of light at the end of the tunnel.

I planned three big ones. Each in their own right are things that will become the cornerstone of where I am in my life.

Reward 1: Being Hot at Dragon Con. 
The first reward, and this is one that's not a big secret, simply walking into Dragon Con with confidence. In the past I'd been self conscious and shy, to a crippling level. Will having confidence fix being shy? Maybe, maybe not, but the D*Con is my finish line. It's where I stop and take a moment to take in everything I've accomplished.

Also, it's where I'll be drinking heavily with like minded geeks.

Reward 2 : Visual Progression Video
I've been keeping the pictures, the ones in posts like this, and will be splicing them together in a picture a second video of my weight-loss progression, likely to be done and posted a day or two before Con.  It'll be nice to see in a few short minutes just how dramatic a handful of healthy months can effect your appearance. Perhaps the video can inspire others to take up the same philosophy, but when the video is done I believe the results will demand my emotional attention.

Like getting a degree, or a really good slow mo head shot on a zombie in Fallout 3.

Reward 3 : Tattoos
This will likely be the most shocking choice for those who've known me a relatively short amount of time. I don't talk about this aspect of my personality much but I've always wanted, and to some degree need, tattoos. I made a not-so-secret pact with Beau, one of my best friends and something of a tattoo enthusiast, that if I broke in under 200 pounds I'd finally get those tattoos I'd been saying I'd get since we were teenagers. Tattoos are deeply personal pieces of art that stay with you forever, and as I kick open the doors into a new era of my life I want to take with me something I'd always wanted to have but was too afraid to get. My life is litered with these moments, the moments where the act of doing/saying something outrageous or seemingly irresponsible drives me into a frenzied panic and in the end I give up on the matter. Because it's not what sensible people do.

I'm well past the revelation that my life isn't built for normalcy and for the first time in a long time I'm empowered by it.

The Smuggled Pom Pom Metaphor

07/06/2011

Days until Con : 57

I fully admit it. My workout routine has become a confused mess of chaos ever since my work moved locations. Though I got a gym membership (to LA Fitness), I haven't used it, because I'm not in the habit of packing my outfit. (which makes me feel kinda like a superhero) So I work out at home, which has been proving okay results, it's hard to gauge if it's my diet or exercising pulling all the weight in this losing relationship.

As I've come to learn, there's a lot of structure when it comes to a healthy lifestyle. If something rocks your world, it's hard to stand in the center and not fall over. That's where determination comes in right? Well determination needs to wear bra and panties and wave pom poms in my face because as it stands it's just a awkward guy saying, "Lose weight! I mean, if you wanna, if not that's cool to..." That guy, otherwise known as my motivation, needs to be replaced.

Not to say I'm losing steam, more like smuggling it. I do x number of situps and pushups while watching Girls Bravo (my how the mighty have fallen)  and then I go to bed. Sometimes I change it up with jumping jacks and nobody is watching me so I'll pretend I know kung fu moves...moves. I guess what I'm getting at is that surviving a shake in your routine is more important than maintaining intensity. You can always build back up, and I am, I even made progress with my gym bag. I put it on the couch closest to the door, instead of on the floor next to the door. You see? I'm getting there.

The Story of Everything.

07/04/2011

Days until Con : 59

Back when the Universe was pregnant with Earth, there were certain ground rules that had to be established. No longer could the Universe go out late and party or see R rated movies unless it had a sitter. Course the Universe, fearing said responsibilities, said to itself, "screw this" and shoved Earth into a section of the Galaxy where it had abandoned a few other planets. A little dumpster in a the redlight district of space called The Milky Way.

Yeah, the Universe is a cold sneaky bitch like that.

What the Universe had not intended, was for the Earth to actually survive. Numbers, as it turns out, is not the Universe's strong suit. Probability, chaos, the eventual birth of Michael Jackson, were all mathematically undeniable truths. Being that, for example, if you leave a infinite number of monkeys alone with an infinite number of typewriters, eventually one of them would write Moby Dick, or anything in this blog. So the Earth survived, because Michael Jackson had to happen.

Eventually the authorities were called and Earth was put in foster care, the Universe became detached.

Later, in grade school, Earth misplaced its 'This is how shit works' manual, and instead of asking around it decided to just wing it instead. It closed its eyes and thought of all the wonderful things that it would create for itself. Unfortunately it could only think of really really hot rocks. Because Earth is special, bless its' heart, and had a slight preoccupation with rocks, even found a pet one floating out in space that it carries with it to this day.

One day Earth got the flu, a bad one. That's when genetics came into play, and through genetics microbes evolved to fish in the sea (which was created by the tears of earth when it thought it'd lost its pet rock). Later, the fish decided that swimming is boring and totally uncool, and evolved into snakes that slithered onto land.  Because snakes wear leather jackets, and thats cool, and they slither which is also cool. Then they evolved to porcupines (shut up, it's MY story!) and after being very cute and deadly for many eons they passed into oblivion due to a war of power. You see, after creating a rich history full of Kings, Knights, and Mages and after harnessing technology to unimaginable heights, they fell victim to their own progress. A flash, a boom, and they became all but instinct. Many unfortunate porcupines that were caught in the blast radios of the PorcuDoomBomb evolved instantly into apes who, driven mad by not being cute little furry spiked creatures, evolved into humans. Humans decided that since its' hands weren't tiny enough to be considered cute, to have lots of sex and kill animals and wear them as fur. They wrote books, created television, and even invented the idea of a self imagine.

Self Imagine, is what brought me to this blog.

A blog, which has now captured and consumed at least 5 minutes of your life. This is how I've lost 40 pounds in three months, I eat nothing but time and remain satiated via your hopes and dreams.

Okay, that's bullshit. I exercise and eat well, but I had you going there for a minute. Should've seen the look on your face.

Progress Time

07/03/2011

Days until Con : 60

Oooooh yeeeeah! (Macho Man died for our slims, so that's my tribute)

I've been ridding on the back of sweet success for quite a few weeks in a row, complete with lasso and cowboy hat, and this week is no exception. Though I wonder if metaphorically riding anything for longer than a week straight will cause shafing? I'll figure it out and get back to you.

Anyways, I've officially broken into 209!

This is the thinest I've been in a very, very, long time, and I'm extremely happy that this isn't where I'm stopping. This makes 9 more pounds until my original goal weight for con, and honestly I think I can get to 185 in 60 days. If you remember, last week I changed my goal weight to 190, because I wasn't trending 180, and I'd rather not do anything extreme to get there. The idea was to create a healthy lifestyle, not binge on a crash diet for half a year, because I'd rather not gain this stupid weight back as soon as D*Con is over.

In other news, you remember my original plans for this site? I was going to post my writing projects, generate some readership, then eventually attempt to get a  book out there. All awhile figuring out a way to syphon your money directly into my account. Well I'm happy to announce that soon, within the week, I'll start a new section on this page to house my non-fiction work. Remember that extremely over the top Scifi/Fantasy nior action mixer I talked about like three months ago? Space Mage? Well I've completed Episode 1! My plans are to release 1 episode every month for a year and call it a season. Each season I will release as a novella, possibly, or eventually combine them all into an epic. Should be fun eh?

If you're an artist, please draw me free art I can attach to Space Mage. Your motivation is simple, it's a hot lady mage, who has a spaceship, lots of lasers and explosions, the end. This will be published, you know, out there in the world, so it could be good for your budding photoshop career. Otherwise I have to draw it, and if you haven't checked out my James Art posts, then you should, and then sit in absolute wonderment as to what I could possibly cook up.

Tired is the Word of the Month (last month)

07/02/2011

Days until Con : 61

It has been a few days, and I apologize for that, but I've had a very full week of Geek. Monday night I brought my laptop out to Waffle House and wrote, for hours, but I had too much coffee and ended up staying up until about 4 in the morning. Tuesday I was off but ended up sleeping it away and then Beau got back from Indy and wanted to discuss, at Waffle House, our opinions on SWTOR. Which, for the record, hasn't changed in over two years but we have geeky quotas to meet here, so it was mandatory.

That was pretty much the bass line that wrapped around the song of my week. One night I'd stay up for some friend obligation, the next day I'd work while miserably tired, then get home and sleep until it's time to work.

It's no excuse, I'm on a journey here, a serious one, one that msnbc should write articles on. One that should be on the cover of EZines nation wide and once I get to Dragon Con should be flying high on a flag carried by a very nice looking lady Boba Fett.

Fine.
You win.

In the scope of the collection of lives that make up the earth's people and history, my vain attempt at being hot for once in my life will likely fly right under the radar fo existence. But that's fine, I'm a little peeved at the situation but otherwise unshaken. Which says a lot because I don't normally use the word peeve, it sounds like weapon, made of pee.

How has my diet and exercise been? Eh. My diet has been letting me break even, and my exercising has been non-existant. I blame my friends of course, because some weeks it feels like they all get together and said, "Hey, we haven't hung out with James in awhile, maybe we should all call him at the same time and schedule things all in the same week with him. This way he doesn't have time to work out or write his blog."

I've always suspected they had something against my blog. But I'm not sure why as I'm confident only about 10 people read this thing, and of those, 90 percent are nosey ex girlfriends hoping I fall tragically to my doom. Now I'm not saying they want me dead or wish me bodily harm. I'm saying they want what every ex really wants in their heart of hearts. That's to sleep soundly tonight knowing the new loser they traded in for the old loser (me) was a slightly better make/model of loser.

Well sleep soundly tonight ladies, but come Dragon Con you'll shake slightly as you're putting on your lipstick, and the new loser will ask you what's the matter, and you'll smile that smile ladies smile when they say " oh nothing",  but in reality they're questioning you and cosmos, and your beta fish. That's because they'd rather not have to explain this.

That's embarrassing, you couldn't see my arms, but I made this really cool look at me motion when I wrote/said this. It was totally badass and your jealously climbs to new heights, and likely threatens to jump.

Achievements, without getting math involved.

06/28/2011

Days until Con : 65

There are a number of achieves in weight-loss that pure stats just cannot give you. Okay, math is the one true universal language, sure, but I'm talking about things that have little more meaning than that. Here are a list of non-stat centric achievements I've gained/noticed in the last three weeks.

* Yesterday I threw out all my XXL sized shirts. They look terrible on me now, and there's no sense in having them. I can now successfully fit into XL and Large depending on the shirt maker.

* I can now sit in a waffle house bench sideways AND my belly isn't popping up like a giant pet turtle sitting on my lap. I can maneuver, I can turn, at no point does my belly hang over the table or get caught, or generally make things uncomfortable.

* I've gone from a size 40 to a size 36 pants.

* Getting out of a sitting position isn't a chore.

* When I stand, at no point does my belly hang down below my belt.

* I can climb/walk Stone Mountain with minium rest required.

* I have not eaten at Zaxby's or Boston Market.

* I might have become force sensitive.

* I use to think I had some muscle, like every man on the planet, but now I  actually see tone and definition and stuffs.

* Not once in the last three weeks has someone said to me, "Us big people gotta stick together!" or "They don't make these things for big folks like us."

* I think someone hit on me, she might have just been smiling while she rung up my book purchase, but we all know what smiling really means now don't we? "Do you wan't to join the borders rewards program?" Please, we all know that's just an excuse to get my number...

* More and more people have now stopped asking "have you lost weight?" and instead use the phrase, "Wow...you've lost weight." The difference of questioning makes the world sprout motorcycle riding puppy flowers in gardens full of happiness (zero calorie M&Ms).

The Stiver Warrior Diet

06/26/2011

Days until Con : 67

So for half of this week I've tried out my own version of the Warrior Diet. As today is weigh in day I was shocked to find that I lost 3.6 pounds. For awhile I'd plateaued to losing only 1 or 2 pounds, so it's nice to see a number like 3.6.

What have I been doing?

I start the day off with a banana, and then I almost always wish I had had more food for breakfast, but alas I am one of those people who make a million excuses as to why they cannot have a bigger breakfast. I carry with me three pieces of fruit, or fiber one snack bars. Honestly fruit is the better choice but the fiber one bars I'd purchased in bulk awhile back and wanted to get rid of them. I eat every two hours until lunch. For lunch, I eat whatever I want, which honestly is still fairly healthy stuff. I mostly make my own salads, complete with lean proteins. Then I stop eating for the day.
Around 7 or 8 pm I work out anywhere from 30 minutes of intense resistance training to 1 hour of general aerobic activity. Intense resistance training though is the key, because you burn calories well after the workout. Also, you have to work out somewhere in the middle of the fasting period, which is why I say to work out around 6 or 7 hours after lunch.

This process I started around Wednesday, and I weighed myself on Wednesday and hadn't lost any pounds yet that week.

Anyways, so far I'm not feeling starved or weak, the 12 hour daily fasting cycles feel almost natural and trust me when I say I get plenty of food an in enough intervals as to not send my body into a starvation state. I do have to warn you, and myself, that a daily fasting diet can be dangerous, and if done wrong you will send your body into a constant starvation state which means you'll actually gain weight instead of lose weight and your insulin levels will become somewhat chaotic.

The exact diet I'm on is something more than a few doctors have debate about, but the results are amazing. In most weight loss scenarios you plateau after a month and begin losing very little, but all the research for the diet I'm trying (and modified) shows people losing just as much weight in the beginning as the end. I've decided to give it another week to see if that's true.

The basics of the warrior diet, as modified by Stiver.

* Eat every two to three hours from the time you wake up to lunch.
* Be calorie aware but not calorie counting
* Sometime between lunch and before you go to bed, work out. Preferably resistance training and preferably in the middle of the fasting time, so about 6pm. (it's a scientific thing I don't quite understand)
* No pastas, very little breads and rice. Though I work off the 80 percent rule, which means out of a week you can allow yourself 20 percent failure of your goal foods. So you decide when the 20 percent applies.


That's about it. If you decide to try it, let me know if you have any success. Or if you're a guru who believes what I'm doing is terrible for my body, then also let me know. Questions about the Stiver Warrior Diet? Let me know.

To Fast, or not to Fast.

06/24/2011

Days until Con : 69

It's raining, old men are snoring, and for the most part the dust has settled on my last two weeks of hell at work. From here things should generally be smooth sailing until Con. Sure, there might be some other projects or whatnots that'll cause me stress, but nothing quite like moving an entire corporation to two buildings. It's a lot more work on the IT side of things then you probably know.

I've looked into the pros and cons of fasting, and it's odd how there's a distinction between it and starvation. Starvation, as you may know, is not so hot when you're attempting to lose weight and in short will cause you gain weight easier as your body will hold on to every bit of nutrition you give it. Fasting apparently is healthier, because...it's a different word?

There's actually good reasoning behind it as close as I can tell and a few of the studies I've looked at shows that if controlled in ways as to not send your body in a starvation state can net you some pretty fantastic results. There are a few fasting techniques that have caught my eye, and some that I would be willing to give a try for the next week.

1. Fast for 24 hours every other day. Simply put, you eat very well one day sending all the right signals to your body that food is plentiful, then the next day you eat nothing but drink plenty of water. This only works if your body doesn't feel threatened by starvation, otherwise you'll even yourself up with no real gain other than being stupid hungry.

2. The Warrior Diet. Interesting indeed, and hardcore name (for a hardcore James). At its core you eat a great lunch and then nothing else.

I'm hesitant to try anything like this until I have more information. I've heard nothing but bad things about fasting up until today, when one of the podcasts I listened to mentioned new studies that show it to be an extremely effect weight loss tool. I'm cautious, but willing to try for a week. I'll be doing more research and will put together a fasting plan that suits me and I can realistically follow with low risk.