O-Dark-Thirty

Ooooh, can you say BAD BOY? 'Cuz that's what I was on my fifth day of Nutrisystem, and the day I decided this just wasn't for me. But I have a plan! Keep reading... I had two pieces of wheat toast for breakfast. That wasn't so bad. Let's keep in mind that the weather here all week has been stormy, so that gave me a low-grade headache that I just couldn't shake. Then we made a field trip to Fry's so I could pick up a little computer that was on sale. Aside : The reasoning for this comes from the Ecuador trip . A few months ago I bought a Surface tablet, which I really like (I still like my iPad, too, but for different reasons). I thought the Surface would be a good, light computer to take with me on trips. It is, but not outside the country, I don't think. The few pounds it weighs becomes oppressive when I carry it everywhere, which I did because I didn't want to ... misplace ... it if I left it in my hotel room. Things happen, you know. S...

Thursday morning I had two of the NS breakfasts instead of one. I skipped dinner Wednesday night (though I had my day full of calories anyway), so I was hungry by morning. I had the blueberry muffin and the breakfast bar. Surprisingly (to me) they both tasted good. For lunch we broke open the NS Three Cheese Chicken and followed the instructions on the package. Since it didn't even fill up half the cup, we each added broccoli to it. It was tasty, but small. Sometime during the day I had the NS snack cookies and half a coke. The cookies were sort of good, though I thought they were dry. The nutty flavor helped. For dinner we had the NS chicken pot pie. That's not really what it is. It is more of a chicken soup in a little container and then you add a crusty cracker to the top after you microwave it. It tasted okay. By night time I had to have a snack, so I had some yogurt and then had a tortilla with a slice of cheese. I added both of those to the...

Darling and I went on a mission trip with a team from Sagemont Church. The trip left Houston on July 7, 2016 and we (finally) arrived home on July 16, 2016. My entire trip log is in my Notes section. This is the summary I sent to our team leader, Gerry. General comments Gerry warned us to be flexible, then gave us ample opportunity to exercise that skill during the trip. I'm pretty flexible by nature, but it was still good exercise. Gerry also told us we wouldn't go hungry. We didn't. I gained weight. I blame that on eating near midnight for most nights. Gerry mentioned this was an easy mission trip, and the team agreed. It seemed hard to me. The hotel in Manta was comfortable and the A/C a welcomed relief at the end of each day. The Pacific Ocean view astounded me every day we were there. Breakfasts filled me, and that's about it. (Thanks for the extra toast, Gerry.) The mild weather helped me, but the temperatures still had me sweating by the end of...

After Tuesday night's pizza, Wednesday morning seemed easy. Oh, look! NS has a chocolate covered doughnut for breakfast! I took a bite and it was terrible. Absolutely, the worst doughnut I ever ate. Maybe that is why they call it a "donut," but I think I'll rename it as a "DO NOT" because that is the last time I'll eat it. Ever. It was so bad, I took Darling's bowl of almond milk and put the donut into it to finish it, hoping to make it edible. On my third bite I bit into this little charm. To give you some idea how my mind works, I thought it was a toy prize inside. Darling laughed at that. I didn't bite through it, but I sure did feel it on my teeth. So how old is this "DONOT" if they have to include this in the packaging? I had some coffee with breakfast and then went on a small spree of drinking water while I did some video editing in my study. Around noon Darling came and asked what we were going to do for lunch. Sh...

For the morning I ate the honey-wheat bagel shipped by NS. I liked it, but I'm not including the butter that was on it. Darling buttered it or I'd HAVE To include the butter calories! Had coffee also. Read some of Ecclesiastes in my Catholic Bible. Ecc 3:21 (NIV) says " Who knows if the human spirit rises upward and if the spirit of the animal goes down into the earth?" The implication is that animals have spirits. Matthew Henry says the spirits of animals cease when they die, whereas the spirits of men are immortal. I'm not sure how Matthew Henry knows that, but it a reasonable explanation. UPDATE: There is a footnote saying the same thing in my Catholic Bible, so maybe it is from the Early Church Fathers? That has nothing to do with my diet, but thought I'd toss it in there. For lunch we searched through the incredible shipped box from NS and found... Loaded Baked Potato! Ooooh. I like mashed potatoes and it looks similar. Okay, le...

I'm trying Nutrisystem. They had a pretty good offer, a week introductory package for $49, so I thought, well, why not? I sure need to lose weight and my trip to Ecuador didn't drop any pounds. So I'll track the days here, and my comments. Started yesterday. My weight when starting? 245 lbs. That's a lot, and it took a bit to type that into the public record. Fortunately, I don't think anyone reads my blog any more! So I guess this is just for me. For the Nutrisystem web site I have a starting weight of 250, which is what I weighed when I got back from Ecuador. An entire year of dieting on my own wiped out in mere weeks! I was down to 235 at one point, so that was really discouraging. Anyway the Nutrisystem (I'm just going to abbreviate that as NS from now on) package arrived. Sadly, the box was MUCH smaller than I hoped. I guess that explains a lot. Yesterday was Day One. I made some stiff coffee and used one of the gift cups from Ramon and his lovely w...

In my post four years ago , I noted that the Romans built about 50,000 miles of road. I'm certain none of them were in Ecuador. We're off on a mission trip to Manta, Ecuador . Manta, Ecuador Our group leader from the church gave us what we need to use in our home visits there, including The Roman Road. His differed somewhat from the verses Ron Hindt gave us four years ago, but the message remains the same. Rom 3:23 for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, Rom 6:23 For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life through Christ Jesus our Lord. Rom 5:8 But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us. Rom 10:9-10 If you declare with your mouth, “Jesus is Lord,” and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. For it is with your heart that you believe and are justified, and it is with your mouth that you profess your faith and are saved. Rom 10:13 ...