Tuesday, December 01, 2009

Things I'm thankful for in 2009

  • My wife: I live a much richer life because of Helen. She's patient with me and cares about me.
  • My family: always fun, but more importantly always loving and supportive. I always know I'm not alone.
  • Modern medicine: my grandfather got a 12 months to live prognosis 24 months ago. I'm going to visit him this weekend.
  • Airline prices and being financially stable: I will make 6 trips to New England in 2009 to visit my family and grandfather.
  • My trainer, Nick: I lost over 100 pounds this year, and owe a lot of that to Nick's interest and skills.
  • My friends: they've always been there for me, listening and helping. No questions asked, they help. They make my life richer and I enjoy their successes.
  • The ability to go to the Inauguration of Barack Obama: an incredible experience, made possible through frequent flyer miles and Helen's aunt and uncle.
  • My employer: they are flexible and treat employees with respect and appreciation.

Wednesday, March 11, 2009

Training

I started with a trainer about three weeks ago, and he's laid out what I can and can't eat. Basically everything I eat must have a purpose, nothing can be empty calories. (Helen's going to the same trainer, so Helen has the same diet)

My trainer doesn't suggest how much I eat, but I can consume no pork or other red meats, no cheese, no sweets, no mayonnaise or mayo-based products, no cream, and no white bread. I can have limited white rice, but brown rice is much preferred. Whole grains and whole wheat are really preferred to white flour.

I can consume as much fruit and vegetables as I want. I've replaced sweets/after dinner desserts with nuts (I found a canister of macadamia nuts at Costco. Pretty awesome.). 

We've been eating a lot of chicken fajitas on wheat tortillas, grilled chicken, and lots of salad. I'm excited that we're going to be eating more fish!

Last week was pretty bad - Helen and I both somewhat detoxed from sugar while ramping up on the exercise. My digestive system had quite a shock ramping up to eating tons of whole grains, vegetables, and other things that actually exercise the digestive system.

Working at Google has been a major help in this endeavor. Every cafe has healthy options. There's always salad options, there's always healthy meats. 

Living in Northern California is also great for this - grocery stores have great ingredients, and bay area restaurants always have healthy options.

However, going out to eat in Truckee was very difficult last weekend. My favorite ski area killed off their salad bar. The Mexican restaurant we went to had no meals without either cheese or pork or flour tortillas. 

Anyway, the training is going well, and the food is going pretty well too. I'm guessing we're going to have to tweak the food better eventually, but I feel that it'll be OK. It appears that travel is going to be a bit of an exercise in the lesser of two evils when choosing food.