GOTTA GET AWEIGH

GOTTA GET AWAY.   This song was released by The Rolling Stones as a 'B' side to their hit single, As Tears Go By in December of 1965.  (I can't say I remember when this was released as I was 7 years old.) Is it just me?  Or does anyone else find it amazing that The Rolling Stones who released this song 50 years ago, is currently touring North America?  Actually, I know that it is not just me who finds this amazing, the thousands of fans who have purchased tickets certainly find this amazing - and this includes folks like me who have seen The Rolling Stones multiple times over the years and people seeing them for the very first time.

My weight was starting to go in the wrong direction and I said to myself, that I GOTTA GET AWAY from some of the less intelligent eating decisions that were beginning to consume me.  It amuses me a little bit, that in the old days I had no remorse, no anxiety, no guilt about walking over to the frozen yogurt store two blocks from my home and filling a pint container with high calorie frozen yogurt and pouring God-knows how many calories of topping on this tasty delight.   Was my delicious treat 800 calories?   1000 calories?  1500 calories?   I don't know - but it had to be quite a lot.   These days, I feel remorse, anxiety and guilt if I have eaten too many apples or other fruit.  I will tell you this - It would be quite challenging to eat 1500 calories just eating fruit.  (although it appears quite doable if one is consuming nuts and/or granola)

My point, and there is one, is that recently I have been eating with a little more reckless abandon.  Mostly good food.  The worst of what I have recently consumed is too much fruit, and too many nuts and too much granola.   I have also just wrapped up two national trade shows where I have had some delicious meals in restaurants which were usually preceded (and followed) by some serious drinking.   Once I discovered that a Tanqueray & Tonic was higher calorie than I had thought - I converted to Glenlivets on the rocks.  Only in my mind, do I consider this a low-calorie alternative.  Thank God, I don't battle drinking as an ongoing problem.  I am a true social drinker.  I NEVER drink alone.  NEVER.  I only enjoy drinking with others - and I have always been this way.  Back in my college days - it was never too difficult to find 'others' to drink with - so back then I drank much more. Much, much more.

Although I 'officially' weigh myself on Saturday (that is the day that I record my weight) I do occasionally step onto the scale mid-week to see where I am at.   After my swing of 3 different trade shows in five consecutive days in three different states - where I had too many wrong meals - I stepped onto my scale with great trepidation.  That scale displayed a number which gave me great hope and much comfort.  So here it is....Saturday morning....time for my 'official' weigh-in.

I GOTTA GET AWAY from some of the bad habits that have crept into my life and continue to embrace the good habits which I am trying to develop.  I do believe that I have been very successful making these lifestyle changes.  Still it is enjoyable (a little bit) to make a bad decision once in a while...

I am only human.  I am not a robot.

Robots have no trouble focusing on the task assigned to them.
For example, this robot, aka The TERMINATOR,  focused on desiring to terminate, Sarah Connor.
Thankfully, for Mankind, the robot failed in his task - but not because he lost his focus.
Human Beings sometimes have more difficulty staying on task.
Thankfully, we are not robots.
God gave us free will.
Some of us exercise our free will to eat too many cookies (among many other poor choices.)

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216.0 lbs

I weigh 216.0 lbs.
I lost 7.6 lbs this week.
(This makes no sense, I did suspect that last week's weigh-in was giving me a false number...)
I lost 93.0 lbs in 164 days. Today begins Day 165.
I have lost 14 inches from my waist. 
I will always be at the beginning of a journey that never ends.
I weigh 216.0 lbs. (164 days ago I weighed 309 lbs)
I have lost 30.1% of my weight since Dec 24.
Considering how different my calorie count has been - eating much larger portions of still mostly nutritious foods - I am satisfied.  I must consider cutting back just a bit to continue to lose weight.
I have a BMI, body mass index of 28.89 (far away from obesity!)
I had a 42.0 BMI on 12.24.14 just 164 days ago (Class III obesity)
I wonder about achieving a 'normal weight' - the charts say 186.8 lbs - I'm not too sure about that...
I know this, regardless of what the BMI charts show - Marc Jacobs is no longer a fat man!
I have three words to describe how I feel right now - back on track!

...I know how to begin this week... 
32 minutes ELLIPTICAL, but before that... I will take the elevator to the ground floor and climb up 25 flights of stairs to the fitness room...

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 FRIDAY MENU
breakfast     STARBUCKS low-fat turkey bacon sandwich, two apples  420 calories 
lunch           2 apples, fruit/grain bar, oat/honey granola bar                     360 calories
dinner          Yu Sing Teriyaki Chicken, 2 Oat/Honey bars                       510 calories
snack           apple, pear                                                                              192 calories
                        
total calories  1452 calories

calories burned
STAIR CLIMBING (ground floor to 25th floor)  65 calories
6AM ELLIPTICAL 25 MINUTES ONLY (level 16, manual setting)  527 calories
(I had just had an extremely vigorous workout at 9PM, late Thursday evening - using level 16, manual setting for the first time - and on Friday morning at 6AM - I simply ran out of gas and stopped at 25 minutes.  I didn't have the energy at that time to descend the 25 flights of stairs back to ground floor - BUT I DID CLIMB UP 25 FLIGHTS BEFORE I HOPPED ONTO THE ELLIPTICAL MACHINE.

TOTAL CALORIES BURNED  592 CALORIES

Friday net calories  calories 860 calories

"As Tears Go By"
Single by The Rolling Stones
from the album December's Children (And Everybody's)
B-side	"Gotta Get Away"
Released	18 December 1965 (US)
Format	7"
Recorded	26 October 1965, IBC Studios, London
Genre	Baroque pop[1]
Length	2:45
Label	London 45-LON9808
Writer(s)	Jagger/Richards/Oldham
Producer(s)	Andrew Loog Oldham; engineer:Glyn Johns

WELCOME TO COLUMBUS, ROLLING STONES

Yesterday, Saturday, May 30th, the city of Columbus (OHIO) welcomed THE ROLLING STONES.  The Rolling Stones played in front of approximately 60,000 fans at the Ohio Stadium on the Ohio State Campus.  I was already in Columbus for the TNNA (The National Needlework Association) trade show.  I was staying at the Hilton Hotel across the street from the convention center.  Apparently, so were The Rolling Stones.  I did briefly meet their keyboardist, Chuck Leavell, which I mentioned yesterday.  I have known about this confluence of events since the day that the tour was announced in late March.  I would have had no problem going to the show alone, but I was sure that I would enjoy the evening more if I could convince my boss, my colleague, my friend at the button company to go to the show as well.  When I told him about the fact that The Rolling Stones would be in town on Saturday night when we were in Columbus he was, I think these words will work....uncurious, uninterested, unresponsive and unconcerned.  No problem, I AM a salesman.  I figured that he would go.  And I figured that if he went that he would enjoy himself.  Right and Right.  We took along another friend from the industry and the three of us made the taxi ride from downtown Columbus to the venue.  It did not take long before we found an honest ticket re-seller and we more-or-less paid face value for tickets which were about middle distance away from the stage, considering how far away one really can be at a football stadium-sized rock show.   Everyone had a good time.  Yes, I know....Shocking.

SATURDAY MENU

breakfast oat meal, eggs, bacon, granola, fruit cup                                         calories 1396 calories
lunch      two apples  (trade show)                                                                  calories   190 calories
dinner     MONGOLIAN GRILL, scallops, calamari, shrimp, salmon           calories  770 calories
snack      COORS Light (at Concert)  three Glenlivet's on the rocks              calories  550 calories

caloric consumption  2907 calories

CALORIES BURNED

Here is more proof that I am a nut. I knew that I would not have time between the end of the trade show and going to dinner early and getting to the Stadium to secure The Rolling Sones tickets.  I knew that I would not have time to exercise after the concert. I was out 'drinking' until around 1:30AM late Friday (early Saturday morning) and I knew that I would not want to get up early and exercise.

WHAT TO DO?  (small aside, 'What to do' is the name of an early 1960's Rolling Stones song)
The solution to my dilemma was easy.  I spent 35 minutes on the elliptical machine at 1:30AM in the morning BEFORE RETIRING FOR THE EVENING.  Surprisingly, the fitness room was uncrowded.

1:30 AM Saturday Morning - after a night of 'drinking' - This was a fairly productive workout!

1:30AM Hilton Hotel AMT elliptical machine 35 minutes                             645 calories

SATURDAY NET CALORIES 2262 CALORIES

The set list

1. Jumping Jack Flash
2. It's Only Rock'n Roll
3. Let's Spend The Night Together
4. Tumbling Dice
5. Doom & Gloom
6. Bitch
7. Wild Horses
8. Paint It Black
9. Honky Tonk Women
   --- Band introductions
10. Before They Make Me Run (Keith Richards)
11. Happy (Keith Richards)
12. Midnight Rambler
13. Miss You
14. Gimme Shelter
15. Start Me Up
16. Sympathy For The Devil
17. Brown Sugar
    --- ENCORE
18. You Can't Always Get What You Want (with choir)
19. Satisfaction

---

Show start :  9:30pm
Show end   : 11:38pm

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AND ONE MORE THING....

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Yesterday morning, I received an email from my Mom.

My Mom, whom I love dearly reads my blog each day.  

My Mom commented that calories aside, perhaps I should not be

drinking so much alcohol.

I have this to say.  THANK GOODNESS, THANK GOD...

...I was  not blogging back in the days when I was a university student!

Enough said.  See you tomorrow!

NOT FADE AWEIGH

NOT FADE AWAY was written by Buddy Holly and first recorded in 1957 by Holly's band, the Crickets. In 1964, The Rolling Stones recorded a cover version of NOT FADE AWAY. It was the very first 'single' released by the Stones in the United States and it appeared on the Stones' first US released album, England's Newest Hitmakers. Back in the 1960's the song served as the opening number at many Stones shows. During the 1994-95 Voodoo Lounge Tour - the song was again used as the opener.

If there was talk about me fading away, that does not seem to be the current problem. Lately I have been overdoing it on snacking, overdoing it on some portions and overdoing a bit with some drinking at a couple of back-to-back trade shows.  My thing now is to make sure that all my results don't fade away.  I think I may need to return to a 1000 calories per day to correct the recent direction of my weight changes.

224.4 lbs

I weigh 224.4 lbs.

I gained 6.4 lbs this week.

I lost 84.6 lbs in 157 days. Today begins Day 158.

I have lost 14 inches from my waist. 

I will always be at the beginning of a journey that never ends.

I weigh 224.4 lbs. (157 days ago I weighed 309 lbs)

I have lost 27.4% of my weight since Dec 24.

Considering how different my calorie count has been - eating much larger portions of still mostly nutritious foods - I am not shocked at the recent weight gain - but this trend must stop...soon.

I have a BMI, body mass index of 30.02 (far away from obesity!)

I had a 42.0 BMI on 12.24.14 just 150 days ago (Class III obesity)

I wonder about achieving a 'normal weight' - the charts say 186.8 lbs - I'm not too sure about that...

I know this, regardless of what the BMI charts show - Marc Jacobs is no longer a fat man!

I have four words to describe how I feel right now - time to course correct

...I know how to begin this week... 

32 minutes ELLIPTICAL

It would be great to ascribe recent weight gain to muscle building.  And the truth is, there may be a small degree of that... I can feel my body hardening.  I can physically do things now that I would not have dared dream of doing just a few weeks ago.... for example....

RIDDLE:
When is a 12 story hotel equal to 72 story skyscraper?
When you climb its stairs beginning at the sub-basement level and continue all the way to the rooftop level and you repeat this exercise four times as I did at the Hilton Hotel yesterday.   I counted steps.  Each floor was 16 steps. The number of steps from top to bottom was 289.  I walked 1156 steps total.  That works out to the equivalent of one 72 story climb.  Unlike at home where I have simply gone up 25 flights of stairs, worked out on the elliptical machine and walked down the same staircase 25 flights, at the Hilton Hotel, I climbed the equivalent of of up 18 stories, and back down 18 stories, and repeated this four times.  I was not racing, nor was I resting between ascents and descents.  The whole event took 37 minutes.  Although I have loosely calculated that I might have burned nearly 400 calories - that is not the point. I have a mountain facing me in the not-too-distant future, and I think that I am going to need two things to be successful. I believe these two things to be stamina and confidence. My confidence is building each day, in direct proportion to increased stamina. I no longer fear this adventure. I embrace it.

On the same day that I did this, I had my best workout on an elliptical machine....ever.  I got into a groove and I kept up upping the time until my workout was exactly one hour. The specific elliptical machine (PRECOR AMT ADAPTIVE MOTION TRAINER) requires much more energy of its user and many more calories are allegedly burned on this machine than a standard elliptical machine.

And one more thing I did yesterday, after working out on the elliptical machine was begin to learn how to use dumb bells for muscle building in the upper body.

My physical strength and stamina have never been stronger.
This of course, makes it a bit ironic that I am seeing a gastroenterologist to determine the source of anemia.  Anemia does not outwardly appear to be anything that I am suffering from!

Yesterday, I received a phone call from the Gastroenterologist office advising me that all the biopsies of tissue sampled from my colonoscopy and endoscopy were negative.  Although the source of my anemia remains a mystery, pending the results of still more additional testing, some of my worst fears have been erased.

Yesterday, was quite a momentous day....
72 story stair climb, massively exhilarating accomplishment...
1 hour on the treadmill, massively exhilarating workout...
Call from Gastroenterologist, massively exhilarating news...

and one more interesting thing....

Last night in the Hilton Bar around 12:30AM I had the opportunity to meet the musical director of The Rolling Stones who are in Columbus getting ready for a concert tonight at Ohio Stadium.  Chuck Leavell has recorded and toured with The Rolling Stones for 33 years. On stage he plays keyboards and as musical director he is said to be charged with creating set lists for each show (with the input and approval of Mick Jagger and Keith Richards) I asked Chuck if it was really true that setlist creation was his responsibility and he confirmed that it really was.  The guy was extremely gracious and happy to pose for a photo with me. (Just look at the photo, he looks at least as happy I do!)

Chuck Leavell graciously poses for a photo with me at 12:30 AM (Saturday morning)
About 21 hours after this photo was taken, Leavell will be onstage with Mick Jagger, Keith Richards, Charlie Watts and Ron Wood in front of approximately 60,000 fans at Ohio Stadium as one more stop on the Rolling Stones 'ZipCode Tour'

FRIDAY MENU

breakfast   two bowls oatmeal, two apples, eggs, bacon, fruit                               1036  calories
lunch         Ahi Tuna Tacos, two apples, granola                                                      960 calories
dinner        lamb with noodles, beet salad                                                                 536 calories
snacks (drinking)  5 double Glenlivet's on the rocks                                                690 calories

caloric consumption  3223 calories

calories burned
stair climbing (72 stories) up and down                                384 calories
ellipical, 60 minutes                                                             1222 calories

total calories burned 1606 calories

FRIDAY NET CALORIES  1617 CALORIES