75.3 kg

Made another new low this morning. It looks like limiting the junk, and eating slower after workouts is the key. Last weekend I ate three chocolate bars and a large Carl's Jr. Famous Star Combo, and that slowed my weightloss down to only 100g this week. Since it's impossible to be perfect, it's good to know that junk won't ruin me. I'm not really in any rush to lose the last few kilos, but I do wonder how low I can get.

Wheat Berries

I saw these in the bulk section of my natural food store, and I wondered if they were any good. Well, actually I wondered what they were at first, since I'd never seen them before. I figured it was something like unmilled wheat, which it is, but I was suprised it takes over an hour to cook.

I've made a few batches so far, and I like them. They have a nutty flavour, and are quite filling. They're probably better for you than brown rice, and probably have less calories. Anyway, I prepare them by soaking them overnight, then boiling them in beef broth for a little over an hour. Finally, I fry them up in the skillet after I make chicken or beef. They seem to go a long way. One batch will last the whole week.

Responsible Poker Addiction

Ok, it's Sunday morning, and so far I've spent most of the weekend in a poker room. But it's not like I'm abusing poker like Tobey Magwire or anything. At least I took time out Saturday morning for an OFC workout, and I'll probably workout later today. So often, when people sink into the poker subculture, they also inflate on the casino food that's wheeled up to their seat. It's a nice and convenient break from the monotony of folding hand after hand, as you grind away your life waiting for good starting hands. I've seen a lot of players quickly baloon up from pristinely thin to poker obese, then stay that way for good. It's the inactivity, the food, and the lifestlye. When you spend all your waking hours at the inactivity of sitting down and noshing on casino food, the result is pretty simple. And when you're new to the game, and completely taken over by it, it's the only thing you want to do. Poor Tobey.

I actually had fun in the casino this weekend. On Friday, I saw Anna, played for a few hours, and lost -$29. I had a bad beat (2-outer on the river), but really didn't care about the loss. Then I was bad, and had a Carl's Jr. Famous Star Combo with large fries. That's 1200 calories I didn't need.

The next day I didn't need breakfast before OFC, and I only needed a grilled chicken sandwich for lunch. I played a few hours at the Village Club, eating my sandwich at the $3/$6 Hold'Em table, and won +$140. I went home, did a few things, and took an hour nap before heading off to Denise's for dinner. She made steaks, then I had cookies and chocolates for dessert.

Of course at about 8:30pm, we head off to the dive known as the Village Club, because Denise had never been there, and it's actually closer than the other rooms, and the idea was to get back early that night. When we get there, it was actually slow, and they were really happy to see us, since a short-handed $3/$6 Hold'Em was about to break. So we prop the game for about 30 minutes at the overflow table in the Pai-Gow room, and even the Pai-Gow is dead. But after 9:30pm, it starts picking up, and our must-move game fills up, and builds into a long waiting list with people standing around. Pai-Gow overflows too, and what I figure out is that these people play all night, and sometimes they get a late start. Anyways, I start winning early, but by 1:30am, I'm only up +$105, and decide to just quit and wait for Denise.

It's a little strange to mill around a poker room in the middle of the night for an hour, walking aimlessly, watching games. I'm not the only one standing, I'm just the only one not playing. Make that I'm the only one not playing who has money. What's worse is everyone knows I'm a piker, and that I'm sitting out on winnings. Or at least they know I've decided to stop playing, which is an indirect insult in itself. To make things worse, I gravitate to the other relatively reasonable guys in the room, and we make loud esoteric jokes, like about the floorman Warren, who I learned today actually went to Yeshiva Driving School back east. Seriously. Then Jeff said he got kicked out of Yeshiva too (the real kind), and of course I had to ask, "For what, idolatry?" Then we start talking about Jesuits, Franciscans, and Benedictines. When we get around to Robert Noyce and Eniac, I start walking away, because I sense the conversation is hurting the $200 max and $1000 max No-Limit Holdem games they're in. It's just a matter of time before someone spekas for everyone and yells at us to stop talking. Denise finally finishes, and we get home by about 4am.

It Had To Happen

I binged today. I stayed up too late watching the Olympics, since I got suckered into caring about the women's ice skating final, and thought there'd be some dramatic finish. It was kind of a let down, and almost all the girls made mistakes, and the winner was the finalist who didn't fall down.

So I woke up tired and on tilt today (not to mention I was already eating too much popcorn last night). I went to the supermarket and bought a bag of tortilla chips and a tray of 7-layer bean dip, where 3 of the layers are just sour cream. I basically ate all of this during the day, and ordered a $1.50 lunch consisting of a Hershey's bar and Reece's Peanut Butter Cups. By the end of "lunch", I just wanted to go to sleep.

To finish off my tilt day, I'm going to go to the casino to see Anna, and I'm going to tilt off some chips. Well, I might hold it together. I'm probably too tired to play well, and I'm getting a late start, but I'm in a better mood now, so who knows. I'll post again after I crawl back in this AM.

The Charles Lindbergh Of Our Generation (Pt 2)

I posted a while back about Steve Vaught about being the Charles Lindbergh of Our Generation, capturing the rapt attention of an overweight country as he solo walks across the country in a heroic attempt to lose the last few hundred pounds. I occasionally followed his progress, but I could tell while he was crossing the country, he wasn't really losing the weight. He's picked up tv coverage, book deals, and 700,000 hits/month on his website, but I kept thinking he'd have been better off keeping his life together, and coming to Outdoor Fitness Camps with us. Well, it looks like he stopped walking to get into the gym to lose the weight, and to learn about nutrition. It turns out keeping his life together might have been difficult anyways.

Actually, I think his book will end up being very powerful. The lesson won't be that you need to do anything drastic like stop everything and walk across the country to lose weight. In fact, he'll tell us that won't work unless you stop eating drive-thru food. And losing weight is a lot easier through simple exercise.

Still Haven't Binged Yet

It's been like 12 days since I've last binged, and what do you know, I'm hitting new lows. I've been under 76 kg the last four mornings, so I've definitely lost over a kilogram in these 12 days. So I guess that means I can lose another kg in the next two weeks if I don't binge. Well, I also need to eat right over the next two weeks, like limiting my candy and chocolate. Since, the rule is don't do anything you can't maintain, it's all about moderation. We'll see.

75.4 kg

Hit a new low this morning, as I didn't overeat last night after spinning. I ended up getting hungry at spinning, so I ate a PowerBar while on the bike. When I got home, I had 180g chicken tenders, a large cole slaw from KFC, about 50g popcorn, and some of the sweet potato fries.

Sweet Potato Fries, 2nd Attempt

Much better this time, thanks Cat. That ziplock bag trick was really cool. I figured out how to clean it too -- just pour a little dishwashing liquid into it, fill it with hot water, and shake. But back to the fries. I added garlic, cumin, rosemary, a little bit of olive oil, sea salt, and pepper. Tasted great, and pretty simple to make. And, sweet potatoes are pretty nutritious. For each 100g (uncooked), there's 86 calories, 3g of fibre, and 1.6g of protein. I used a 550g potato, so I figured I had about 500 calories, spread over lunch, snack, and dinner.

75.8 kg

Hit a new low this morning, even following yesterday's rest day, probably because I didn't binge this weekend. In fact, I only worked out once in the last three days. But, I didn't eat any pizzas, and I only had a couple of handfuls of candy. Also, I only ate as much as my body needed, and not for pleasure, or out of boredom, or out of custom. Last night at the Village Club, they served a foot-long hot dog and fries for the "free" meal. I had the two handfuls of candy, but was still hungry. So I ordered the hot dog, which was really good, because the bun was toasted, and the fries were done well. I ate about half the hot dog, and about a quarter of the fries. I didn't need any more, and I just left the rest. Now, were it a healthy meal, I probably would have eaten all of it, because I had to eat some more when I got home. But, I just needed something to tide me over at the tables, so I took advantage of the comp'ed meal.

It'll be spinning tonight, and we'll see how much I really need to eat for dinner.

Good Rest Day, Good Poker Night

I followed Anna's advice for Saturday, and went home after camp and rested. No poker at Barona. No internet poker. Just relaxed and got myself back together. I woke up early on Sunday, and went through all my backed up mail, and started preparing my taxes. It felt great to get something accomplished, instead of limping in the night before, getting half a night's sleep, eating poorly, and trying to work it off. Instead, I only ate when I was hungry today, and took another rest day.

When the evening came, I had my fill of taxes, and I took off to The Village Club to relax. I had a good time playing with the other degenerates in a $200 max buy-in, $1/$3 blind no-limit game. Jeff showed up carrying a laptop. I asked if he was doing taxes, but it turns out nowdays there's a few people that play online poker over cellular broadband. So, he plays online while he's waiting to get into a live game. It's not as bad as you think. He puts it down once he gets into a real game. And at least he's not like floorman Cowboy, who plays the Sunday tournament while he's driving home from his morning shift.

Anyways, I win $70, and had a good time. But doing my taxes and mail, and eating reasonably felt even better.

Still Haven't Binged

Someone give me a medal. No tacos today. No pizza. Instead, I made a roast, tofu, and baked sweet potato fries. And I've only eaten some of the roast so far. When I was at Whole Foods, and asked for a roast, the butcher asked how many people I was serving. I told him I was eating the whole thing. He looked at me, but didn't say anything. Geez, they never ask you at the drive-thru who the 12-piece extra crispy meal is for. Can you imagine this conversation at Krispy Kreme?

"Hi, I'd like some donuts."
"How many people are you serving?"
"Ummm ... Well the 6 raised chocolate are for the Jones', and the Smiths like the 6 custard filled ..."

I'm pretty sure the last time I went thru the Krispy Kreme drive thru at 10pm, they knew who the donuts were for. And they expect everyone to buy a dozen. I think if you try to buy six donuts a la carte, it's more expensive than a dozen to go.

Good Rest Day, Bad Poker Night

I made it through my rest day without binging, and not eating chocolate. After working out for the last six days, I finally took a rest day on Friday. Usually, I'd end up eating something bad on rest day, then I'd feel guilty, and figure I'd have to make up for it at the next workout. Well, I avoided that part of the vicious cycle so far, so I can take it easy today, and only do one workout. I'm not sure if there'll be an OFC today, since it was raining last night. There probably will be camp, since it's not raining now.

I had a bad poker session last night, and dumped -$200 USD. I ran into pocket aces twice. I didn't make any hands, which would have been alright, but I made a blunder holding QQ on the big blind. Pocket aces (AA) opened for a mini-raise of $6. There were about 4 callers, and I looked down and saw pocket Queens (QQ) in my big blind. I raised to $70, which was way too much. Pocket aces went all in, and I knew I was beat. I should have folded, but called another $80, hoping to hit a Queen on the flop. Sure enough, he turns up AA, and I go home now. I probably would have lost the same with them, because the flop was all undercards, and I was in early position. It might have worked out the same. So actually, my raise was good, I just didn't make the correct laydown for $80. It's a hard play to make. And it'd put me on tilt, unless he showed after I folded.

I dumped off half of what I won last week. It sucks enough to make me not want to play poker tonight :) Well, at least there's a new Full Tilt Poker client for the Mac. Now I can play anywhere on my PowerBook. That's the good poker news.

The other good news is that I didn't add injury to insult by getting a carne asada burrito or Super Star combo with large fries at the drive-thru. I just ate my loss instead.

Taco Fried Rice

I thought I was inventing a new dish tonite, but after tasting it, I realised I'd already had it before. I took a pound of ground beef, and browned it with an onion, a green bell pepper, cilantro, and a package of taco seasoning. Then I fried it in a skillet with some brown rice and roma tomatoes. It tasted pretty good, but in the end, it was very close to Rice-A-Roni, or Hamburger Helper. It didn't take long to finish all of it, which probably had about (400g ground beef)(1.8 cal/g) + (100g rice)(4 cal/g) = 1120 calories.

Outdoor Fitness Camp was good tonight, Angie and Anna were there, and Jason not only brought the 10 lb vest for me, he also brought sandbags for all of us to carry and press. Mine weighed 45 lbs. Ahhh, nothing like stairs, sprints, and weights all together at the same time. But we're all addicted to it by now. Before, my Wednesday night OFC workout was a 'lite' day. I think those days are over.

Another Valentine's Day, Another TV Dinner

Well, at least the usual crowd will probably be in the gym tonight as always. Last night one of the girls in spinning said Valentine's day was a bad idea, since what was wrong with the other 364 days of the year to treat someone right? I guess some people find it as dissapointing as New Year's Eve. To me, they're all the same, except on Thanksgiving, I buy a frozen turkey dinner. Denise told me yesterday that John doesn't even recognize anything about the day. I brought her a Valentine's gift last weekend, but I had to give it to her daughter's little friend, who I didn't expect to be there. Denise thought I only brought valentines for the two girls, but of course one was for her. How could she think otherwise? Well, one day I'll bring over a pound of Godiva chocolate, and we can eat it while watching a movie on Lifetime.

Grilled Chicken Burrito @ Papacito's

The guy after me ordered a breakfast burrito with carne asada. It's off the menu, but they'll make it for you. I might have to start eating dinner here again.

Now If I Only Liked To Shop

Yesterday was a productive day, if you call working out twice, eating a pizza, napping, then playing 6 hours of poker productive. There's probably a better adjective to describe the nature of these activities. After spinning, Outdoor Fitness Camp was especially fun, because Jason brought a 10 lb weighted vest for me to work out in. You know you're addicted to exercise when you can't wait to try out the 20 lb vest. Afterwards we went to Indulgence for brunch with Anna, her cousin, and two other dealers from Barona. I learned about facials. No, not that kind.

There's nothing like wasting a Saturday afternoon watching a two-part made-for-tv movie like And The Sea Will Tell, ordering a large veggie thin crust pizza, and taking a nap. George called at about 5pm to see if I wanted to play poker. There's nothing like a co-dependent to make you feel better about committing your sins.

I got to Barona around 6:30 pm, and sat down in a $200 max buy-in No-Limit game, with $1/$3 blinds. I bought in for $100, and my first hand is QQ. I raise to $12 in late position, and flop a set. I make about $75 on this hand. Very soon after, I have AQh in the big blind. I flop top pair with the nut flush draw. I bet out $8, get a call, and a minimum raise to $16. I just call, and hit my flush on the turn. I slow play, and make $50 more on the river. Turns out some guy flopped a set of 5's, and he slowed down on the turn. I probably should have made a lot more on that hand. I probably should have made a lot more on the night. I made 2 or 3 mistakes where I either folded the best hand, or didn't maximize my profits with the best hand. Anyways, I ended up +$400 USD ahead, and finally got out of there at about 2:30am.

George sat down at a $4/$8 limit game for some bad reason, even though I tried to get him to sit down at NL. I knew he was in for a night of frustration in that game, and he'd lose money, and blame bad callers. In my game, you mostly thank bad callers. I looked around his table, and saw the usual loose callers that you can identify just by looking.

Now, I need to get off my reclusive *ss, and go shopping some time.

Send It

That was nerve-wracking. I though Pittsburg was trying to lose (against the spread). They had Seattle down to 1:00 and no time-outs, but they gave up a long pass, and then a fourth down conversion that would have otherwise ended the game. And then the last second incompletion at the goal line that would have killed me (Steelers -4.5 points). Too much drama. But it's over now. Hotdog time.

6:15 Left In 4th Quarter

My -4.5 Steeler bet is doing okay now, thanks to a lot of miracle calls we've been getting all game. Please kill the clock and send me my money.

Super Bowl Sunday

Ok, I'm at John & Denise's, and John just won $10 on "tails" on the coin toss. So he's almost free-rolling for the day :)

I took the Steelers -4 1/2, for $120. Then I find out Anna took the opposite bet for $200. So, if I lose, I'll be happy for her, and visa versa. (What I really need is a quick score from Pittsburgh, then I might enjoy watching the game.) Denise made some real lemonade, guacamole, and other treats. I brought the chocolate.

Last night I lost -$14 playing no-limit at Barona. I was up $70, but by the time Anna hit my table in the rotation, I was barely ahead. It was another Amateur Night at Barona. Guys making bad bets and bad calls. People handing over all their chips on one hand. One time, a guy raises preflop with an obvious high pair. He gets two preflop callers. There's nothing on the flop, and his overpair is good, so he bets like $60, and gets two callers again. The turn pairs the high card on the board, and it's obvious one of the callers makes trips. Trips bets like $30, thinking he's making a value bet. A King hits on the river, and the preflop raiser checks again to the trip 8's, who makes a really stupid $15 "value" bet. He gets check-raised by the overpair guy for over $300. It's pretty clear this guy made the miracle 2-out nut full house on the river, but the trip 8's guy makes a horrible call, and pays him off. He blames the river, the players, etc. Never thinks his $15 bet on the river was a worthless risk.

The Biggest Loser, Special Edition: Families

Blue Team wins! Blue Team wins! For the first time, trainer Bob's team won The Biggest Loser, and trainer Jillian's Red Team finally lost. And, as I predicted, the losing team barely lost 20% of their initial weight. I'm sure others saw this coming as well. In the original format contestants lost 50% of their weight, then the couples lost 30%, and now the slacking, arguing family loses only 20%. It was pretty clear who won in last night's finale, just by looking. I don't know what NBC is thinking, but they're damaging the show with these non-inspirational competitors. People are going to stop believing.

Meanwhile, our local NBC affiliate was running a scroll on the bottom of the screen for a rescheduled open call for contestants this Saturday. If you haven't heard, the last open call here attracted so many (unruly) people, that the sponsors (Dave & Buster's) were afraid to open the doors, leaving about 1500 people bitterly disappointed.


This woman sums up the attitude of many TBL hopefuls

"I traveled 1,200 miles, took time off to come down here, and [it was] canceled for no reason, no good explanation, no nothing," said Dina Garcia. "Where's our chance to be skinny?"

You'll find more of the same on The Biggest Loser message boards. All they talk about is getting on the show. And not in some hypothetical "what if" kind of way. More like, "why weren't they nicer to me at the open call?", or "do you think I'll get a callback?".


At first, they told people to go to a make-up casting call in LA. But they probably received so many desperate, angry pleas from overweight San Diegans that they rescheduled for this Saturday at the Mission Valley 24 Hour Fitness parking lot, from 10am to 6pm. In the scroll, they made it clear that people won't be allowed to queue up until 6am. I think it's funny that the sponsor 24 Hour Fitness is probably just trying to sign up new members. I noticed that that gym cancelled all of it's Saturday classes. Maybe they're making the instructors work the sales floor.

From the boards, it sounds like the problems with last week's aborted open call was due to a few people who urinated on the side of Dave & Buster's, and others pounding on the doors to get in, probably because there weren't any available bathrooms. Now that they're hosting the call at 24 Hour Fitness, there'll be bathrooms available even at 4am. And while you're relieving yourself, why not take a look at our attractively priced membership plans?

Zone-ish Diet Day 1, + 0,4 kg

On the first day of my zone-ish diet, I ate more fruits and vegetables, no chocolate, and less crisps than usual. I didn't completely eliminate the "white carbs", and will probably not be able to either. But, the idea is I'm near maintainence, and I'm only looking for a plan I can live with forever.

I made some kind of stir-fry with ground turkey and brown rice. It was better than it sounds.

The +0,4 kg weight increase from yesterday doesn't mean anything. It'll come back down in the next few days. The first goal is to get down to 76,0 kg again, then to get below that.