Singin' the Lenten Blues

Ah, so you thought your favorite FatMan had abandoned his blog just because he's all thin and sexy now right? Well wrongo baby! I've got something brand new to complain about and let's face it; this blog is only entertaining when I'm complaining.

So let's get this bitch-wagon movin'! First let me say that I did eventually re-lose the weight I gained during my Christmas sojourn up north. It took about a week and it was totally worth it. Sadly I haven't lost jack crap since then. Now that's partially my fault because I discovered a dirty little secret with MyFitnessPal. If you "forget" to log something in your daily diary... it's like you never ate it in the first place! And MyFitnessPal, while being a very supportive and well designed piece of software, isn't smart enough to know that you're full of shit and hiding things from it. Soooo... yeah that's a bit of a problem. I'm holding steady but considering the cravings I've been having lately I'd like to be seeing a little more bang for my buck.

 Now on to the real bug up my not-quite-so-fat-anymore ass. Lent. 40 days of mostly no change to my life at all, except for Fridays. For the non-Catholics in the crowd, Fridays in Lent are when Catholics go without meat to symbolically remind themselves how stupid vegetarians are (or something like that). Now in the past Lent was no big deal. My Friday meu options used to look like this:
Pasta
Pizza
Fried Fish
Tuna fish sandwiches

But thanks to my fantastic calorie limit, my new menu looks like this:
Pizza 
Pasta 
Fried Fish 
Tuna fish sandwiches
Something vegetarian

Oh goody.

Thankfully in times like this I can always count on my wife for some creative alternatives. Her brilliant ideas so far have consisted of millet (apparently people do eat birdfood), lentil soup and fish-type things. Let's just say that's a far cry from my carbo-loading loves. I shall keep you all updated on what I end up eating between now and Easter, but we are definitely not off to a good start.

The Results Are In

"Well... shit." That was pretty much my reaction to stepping on the scale this morning, one day after returning from the Great White North. To recap: *On Thanksgiving morning I weighed 200 pounds. *I challenged myself to lose SOMETHING between then and January 2nd (the official end of the holiday eating festivities) *I left for New Hampshire weighing 196.5 pounds. OK, are we all caught up? Good. Because now you can commiserate/laugh/cry right along with me when I tell you the scale read 202.5. Yes dear readers, yours truly gained 6 pounds in just 10 short days. How you may ask? Well it wasn't easy. Gaining that much weight in that short a period of time takes hard work, dedication and a willingness to eat long after you are hungry. There's a level of determination that only the most seasoned fat people can attain. Gaining weight is not for the faint of heart. No literally... if you gain a lot of weight your heart will pop like a zit. I'd like to blame this on one bad day, but I can't decide which bad day to blame it on. Let's see, there was Christmas Day and the Attack On The Noodles. There was the 26th and The Return of the Ravioli. There was also New Year's Eve and The Revenge of the All You Can Eat Option (A theme park offering unlimited fast food? Might as well hand out shotguns and beer while you're at it). To top it off there was New Year's Day and The Burrito From Hell. So many choices, so much food, so much indigestion. So here I stand, once again on the wrong side of 200 pounds. Well.... shit. But wait, not all is lost! I still manged to lose a total of 50 pounds in 2012 which is not easy to do. And now that the holidays are finally behind us I can get this carnival ride heading in the right direction again. Here's the new goal: 180 pounds. The point at which I will be considered "normal" (whatever that means) as measured by your BMI (Body Mass Index). I'd like to hit that by my birthday, but we'll see. Until then, I'm going to grab a cup of coffee, a laxative and a nap.

The horror... the horror.

Well gang, we're in the home stretch of the Greatest Challenge Ever.. my quest to lose at least some weight between Thanksgiving and January 2nd. Things were slow during the first few weeks, but on the day we left for NH I had gone from 200 pounds even to 196.5. That gave me a 3.5 pound cushion to play with during our 10 day stay here in the Great White North. No problem right? How could you possibly gain more then 4 pounds in 10 days.. right? RIGHT??

That's when it all started. Oh it began innocently enough. A Christmas Eve dinner at a Chinese restaurant. Not even a buffett, just a plain old restaurant. Several bowls of awesomeness later I knew I was in for a rough patch. That's when Christmas Day showed up and punched me in my special private place.

Before the orgy of present opening begin there were cinnamon rolls. Big, fluffy, delicious cinnamon rolls. But being the expert that I was, I stuck to just one of them because I knew what was coming. The next course was a good attempt at a healthy egg scramble. The scramble itself wasn't too bad, but it brought friends. Friends made out of cheese, and other freshly-baked friends with a soft crust. Individually those little bastards are easy enough to ignore, but when they all gang up on you like that... damn.

So it's safe to say that my caloric intake was nearing its limit for the day heading into dinner. Unfortunately what happened at dinner involved pasta and meatballs. I tried in vain to chase it all with a salad, but it was too late. Tastebuds 1... Diet 0.

So that's it right? The end of the craziness... back to the diet on the 26th. A noble thought my dear friends but it was not to be. The 26th, which will be forever be known in diet annals as The Day The Diet Died, turned into a 24 hour celebration of food insanity.
The first course... appitizers, meats, cheeses, shrimp, etc. Nothing too terrible, but when you eat a metric ton of anything, it's never a good start. The 2nd course was the world famous Rode Ravioli. An ancient recipe that's been destroying diets since the days of Kings of Queens. I tried to limit the damage wherever I could, but by this point I had pretty much thrown in the towel
When the ravioli was done, the beef wellington made an appearance. Amazingly there was room for 2 good sized pieces. Finally the savory foods were done and it was time to bring forth the desserts. Have you ever eaten maple syrup pie topped with bacon? I have and it's friggin awesome. Cheesecake topped with blueberries? Yes please. Pastries from an Italian New York bakery? Several. Random other cookies? Why the hell not! When it was all over, the caloric intake could only be calculated using NASA computers. I didn't even attempt to figure it out. It was bad and that was all I needed to know. Today I sit here realizing that the Greatest Challenge Ever is in serious jeopardy. I am both ashamed and filled with the greatest food ever so that's kind of a wash. The good news is, there are precious few leftovers and we still have 7 days left in the Challenge. Is it too late? Can the FatMan still turn this train around? We shall see. For now I'm going to put on 8 layers of clothes and run around in the now until my butt goes numb. It's not much, but it's a start.

Baby Steps

Well gang, we are two weeks past Thanksgiving! Two weeks into the Holiday Season, which means we're two weeks into the Greatest Challenge Ever. How are all of you doing? Anyone out there lost any weight? Stayed even at least? Not to brag or anything, but as of this morning I'm down 2 pounds since Turkey Day. A little off my normal pace, but at this time of year I think we all feel a bit like Bob here:

Yes Bob, baby steps indeed. Followed by lots of screaming and cursing. I forgot how hard it was to stay on any kind of diet in December. And temptation comes from the weirdest places. Take for instance my school's annual Fall Festival. My wife brings the kids so they can play a few games, win some cheap prizes and raise a few bucks for my school. My kids? They play the Cake Walk. (imagine musical chairs but when the music stops, they call a number. If you're standing on the number you win a baked good) My daughter? Wins a dozen cupcakes on her first attempt. Friggin' fabulous.

The good news? WalMart brand cupcakes with frosting are only 200 calories. They are also amazingly delicious if it's been a few months since you've eaten anything remotely bad for you. Not terrible, but not exactly conducive to weight loss.

This weekend we're attending the first of several Christmas parties. The food at these things is bad enough (from a caloric standpoint) but the real joy of these parties is the copious amounts of fermented beverages that one can procure. As it turns out... those little bastards are worse for you then cupcakes and fruitcake. So I get to go to parties but in addition to not being able to eat what I want... I'll have to do it sober.

Well fa la la la la, la kiss my ass.

Remember folks... baby steps.

One Week Down

OK, so I know you're all dying to know how I manged during the Thanksgiving weekend and the results are... well... um... damn it.

I woke up on Thursday morning and gave myself my official starting off point for this Greatest Challenge Ever:
Thursday morning weight- 200 pounds even. Perfect. Nice round number.

The actual gorge-fest known as Thanksgiving Day was not that bad. I sure as hell didn't count calories because I don't know anyone who has that much free time. On MyFitnessPal have to input most homemade things ingredient by ingredient. I don't know if you've ever broken down your basic casserole dish before but it's a long, long list of things that I really don't want to know about. I just want to taste the rainbow of deliciousness and move the *bleep* on. And I did. I made a big ol' plate full of everything I could get my hands on and it was freaking awesome and it felt great. Sure I probably crossed the 1500-calorie barrier, but that's OK because from Thursday night into the wee hours of Friday morning yours truly was shopping up a storm.

Oh and how we shopped! The wife and I did it all, Toys R Us, WalMart, and of course the mall. I can't imagine we burned a lot of calories walking around, but the energy it took just to keep my ass up and awake for nearly 24 consecutive hours must have counted for something right?

Friday morning weight- 201.4 pounds. Not bad. I can totally manage this.

After a rousing 3 hour nap/sleep on Friday we got up and believe it or not went back shopping again. Then we went home and started hanging Christmas decorations. Again... not exactly running a marathon but dragging my butt around on practically no sleep has to be burning calories somehow.

Saturday morning weight- 198.6. Woot! I win! I am going to kick this challenge in the nuts!

The next couple days were relaxing. Putting up the rest of the decorations, doing laundry, watching football and eating a normal amount of food.

Monday morning weight- 201.4. Huh?

No big deal, because now I'm back at school and running around chasing 5th Graders. And as all teachers know, it's way easier to stay on a diet at school because you're so busy. I'll dip back under 200 pounds in a couple days

Thursday morning weight- 201.4. Well shit.

So to recap... I made it through Thanksgiving just fine... but the week after Thanksgiving has been my downfall despite the fact that I haven't gone off the diet.

Welcome to the holidays... this is going to be harder then I thought.

The Greatest Challenge Ever!

OK blog fans... it's Game On! We are 1 day away from the World Series of Eating known as Thanksgiving Day. Turkeys are defrosting, desserts are being baked, and those of us on diets are crapping our pants.
I've been sweating this day for a while now, but then I realized that I was awesome and I stopped worrying. True story. No really. Need proof? Gaze at my hairy legs (and feet) and the scale beneath them!

That's right people, I officially cracked the 200 pound barrier last week and have officially reached my goal weight well ahead of schedule. Back in February I was north of 250 and wanted to reach 200 by Christmas. Well I kicked those first 50+ pounds square in the nuts and now it's time for Phase II. I have decided to launch myself head-first into the most ridiculous, crazy, insane challenge ever concocted by a fat man.

I am challenging myself to lose weight over the holidays. Boom!

The rules are simple, I will weigh myself on Thanksgiving morning and again when I return home from Christmas break in New Hampshire (January 2nd). The goal is to show an overall weight loss during the "Holiday Season", generally regarded as the hardest thing to do in the universe. Can it be done? Is the artist-formally-known-as-a-FatMan up to the challenge? To be honest I don't know, but if I pull this off a celebration will definitely ensue.

So how about you? Do you think you're up to the challenge? Drop me a line on Facebook or here on this blog if you want to join up. Let's all take this Holiday Season head-on, kick it in the teeth and start the New Year a little smaller than we currently are.

Ho Ho Holy Crap This Is Hard

Ah it's that most wonderful time of the year. My favorite time of the year without question. Soon, turkeys will be cooking, families will be gathering, and shoppers will be beating the crap out of each other over $3 bath towels (the wife and I actually saw that happen last year). Once that all happens, it will officially be The Holiday Season, that magical, special time when I can listen to Christmas music, decorate the house to a bizarre degree, and indulge in all of those delicious treats that come around this time of year.

Oh wait... I can't do that last one... scratch it off the list. And shoot me in the face while you're at it.

The lead up to Thanksgiving this year has been a mix of high expectations and crushing realizations. For instance, I can't wait to watch the Macy's parade. It is an absolute staple for me every year and I never miss it. However, a little piece of me died when I realized I wouldn't be eating my just-as-traditional pumpkin nut bread and cranberry nut bread while the parade was going on. With a thick spread of cream cheese on each moist slice. Whoops... another piece of me just died.

I am blessed to be celebrating Thanksgiving with my wife's family this year. An intimate get-together of somewhere around 40-50 people. I'm doubly blessed to be the one tasked with cooking 2 20-pound turkeys. I can think of no higher honor on a day like this. For someone who has honed his turkey-cooking craft to the point of perfection, this is like my Super Bowl. And Alton Brown is my own personal Bill Belichek.

Now as you might expect, the turkey will be the centerpiece of the festivities but my wife's family is a casserole-loving family. They have this stuff down to a science and their science is freakin delicious. But (you know there was a but coming didn't you?) as you might expect, casseroles are funny things. One does not simply ask what ingredients were used to create your casserole. Partly because the ingredient list is longer than the Macy's parade, and partly because there's a really good chance you don't want to know.

This, for the dieting man, presents a rather large problem.

Every time I imagine myself cooking not 1 but 2 perfect turkeys while my extended family rejoices, with tears of joy streaming down their faces... I get beyond giddy. Minutes later when I imagine all the casseroles, desserts, breads and stuffing that I won't be eating.... I start to feel like Charlie Brown kicking that damn football.

I'm inching ever closer to the 200 pound barrier folks... but I am dragging myself toward this finish line and it ain't pretty. And I haven't even thought about Christmas cookies yet.

Whoops... another piece of me just died.