weekend update

the weight loss competition is going well. I'm down fifteen pounds in just over three weeks, good for a 6% weight reduction. I was originally hoping to lose 10% (25 pounds), but I'm thinking I'd settle for twenty pounds, or 8% and be just fine with that. realistically, I won't lose another five pounds in the next week. I've definitely plateaued. first week I lost nine pounds, second week I lost seven... last week I only dropped one.

I've started swimming at the gym, so I'm hoping that will kick things up a bit and I can drop another two or three pounds. the way things are shaking up, if I lose two or three and no one else loses more than five, I walk away with $400. the odds of anyone dropping five pounds in a week is slim, but I want to try to drop another couple just to be safe. that $400 would go into our vacation fund.

we've decided to use my parents' timeshare in hawaii this year, so we're going to need everything we can save up. airfare alone will be $1500 or more. even with free lodging, the trip could cost us three grand by the time all is said and done. we're taking miyuki's mom with us.

that was part of the weight loss goal. I figured if I could drop twenty pounds in may, and another ten in june, that would get me down to 220 by my birthday. if I could drop another ten in the three months before the trip, I'd be down to 210 and be in the best shape I've been in for over a decade. it's an audacious goal, but I think it's doable. we've been really good about going to the gym, and the diet has been pretty consistent. I haven't had any meat or beer in 23 days, and plan on gradually reintroducing it to me diet after the month is over. I'm only allowing myself one bad meal a week after the contest ends. my first "bad" meal will be a gyros, btw.

I decided to try my one-on-one training session at the gym tonight, we got one freebie when we enrolled several months ago, and I never used it. I figured it'd give me a little intro to some of the machines I've never used. turns out it was just a sales pitch. I was only shown how to do a half dozen leg exercises (the part of my body I need to work least), given numerous lectures on building "lean muscle" and the evils of cardio, and then got over twenty minutes of hard sell for signing up for more training sessions. at a minimum of forty dollars per session (with a year long commitment) and a recommendation of several training sessions per week, I had to bite my tongue to keep from laughing in their faces. even with doing a single session each MONTH (which seems kind of pointless, if I'm going to the gym 12-15 times a month), I'd end up more than doubling my financial commitment.

I'm sorry, but I'm taking the tack that ANY exercise is better than none, and if I'm not going to get "ripped" or "cut" doing my own thing, even if it's just half an hour on an elliptical four times a week, so be it. I'm also not convinced they had my best interest in mind, since they were REALLY pushing weights and slagging cardio pretty heavily. weights take help, any idiot can use a cardio machine. when the guy starting telling me that my target heart rate should be 120-160, I called bullshit on him. my resting heart rate is between 100-110. always has been. he told me when I get in better shape, it'll get back to "normal" of 70-80. even when I told him that when I swam 4000 yards a day in high school, was in the best shape of my life I still had a high pulse and my mom needs medication to keep her pulse in check, he wouldn't budge. I'm thirty years old, therefore my heart rate should be exactly the same as every other thirty year old. whatever.

the funniest bit was when they asked me if I'd ever take my shirt off in hawaii, thinking it would shame me into wanting to throw hundreds of dollars a month at them to give me six pack abs and eighteen inch guns. they obviously did not know who they were dealing with. I have zero shame with being a tubby bitch. if other people don't want to see my pale, hairy flab, that's their problem. if I leave my shirt on in hawaii, it's because I don't want to get sunburned, not because I'm ashamed of how I look.