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[misterqueue]

A bit of the old ultraviolence.

[Mite]

You pay a quarter and get a glass of milk. You do not get milked there, though you can go across the street and see the milking demonstrations. The butter sculptures of Princess Kay of the Milky Way are a few blocks away, however.

My friend and I had a long-standing bet to see who could drink the most milk at the milk booth, but sadly we never got to try it. That would have been a different kind of ultraviolence.

[Carlos del Vaca]

Or the Minnesota State Fair. Walleye, alligator, ostrich, deep fried candy bars, and spaghetti and meatballs are all available on a stick. Follow that up with a bucket of Martha's cookies and a trip to the milk booth, and you've got yourself the best day of the year.

DEEP FRIED CHEESE CURDS.
And MINI DONUTS.

[CortJstr]

You pay a quarter and get a glass of milk. You do not get milked there, though you can go across the street and see the milking demonstrations. The butter sculptures of Princess Kay of the Milky Way are a few blocks away, however.

My friend and I had a long-standing bet to see who could drink the most milk at the milk booth, but sadly we never got to try it. That would have been a different kind of ultraviolence.

I can't even wrap my head around a milk bar. Let a lone a milk bar drinking contest. I'll stick with the raw bar at the Ren Faire, thanks.

[side_show]

Wellness update: yesterday I continued with the horrible yard work: aka shoveling limestone into a wheelbarrel and wheeling it around the corner and then dumping it out and starting all over again.  Unfortunately, I over estimated my strength and filled the wheelbarrel so heapingly with limestone that I was unable to move it.  I had to get the SO to move it for me.

Also, I walked for over and hour, and got home just in time to avoid hail.

Also, what is the muscle on the lower inner arm between wrist and elbow called?  I'm only aware of it when it gets sore when I shovel or go bowling.

[jough]

Probably the Brachialis, which flexes the elbow, or (goes to anatomy book) Brachioradialis, which flexes and rotates the elbow.

Yeah, limestone is heavy.

Horrible yard work is probably not the best kind of exercise you can get. 

I totally skipped my walk yesterday.  I just couldn't get away even for fifteen minutes, and when I could it was too late.  I did, however, hardly eat at all, which also isn't really a positive but does mean that my overall calorie intake was really low.

I'm not going to beat myself up over "bad days" when I don't do the right thing - just try to focus, one day at a time, on doing the right thing.  Like Spike Lee.

[side_show]

You're doing Spike Lee?  No wonder you're feeling the pressure to get in shape - all those red carpets and such.

[theinevitable]

Jough... Always Do the Right Thing.

[AlohaDawg]

Horrible yard work is probably not the best kind of exercise you can get. 

It's probably not as good as something aerobic for sure. I think activity is good for you, though, as long as you don't strain or injure yourself.

I'm not going to beat myself up over "bad days" when I don't do the right thing - just try to focus, one day at a time, on doing the right thing.  Like Spike Lee.

A good positive attitude even toward your bad days is a good way to go. Everyone has them (My journal for last weekend is ridiculous) and sometimes it's just the circumstances of the day (moving!) but it's not a sprint, its a marathon so your attitude is a good one.

[Mite]

DEEP FRIED CHEESE CURDS.
And MINI DONUTS.

Stop! You're making me homesick!

[jough]

I am trying to remain positive, although when I slip a little I do feel badly about myself for a bit.  I mean, feeling badly about my body is not going to change overnight.  And there's no way I can "trick" myself.

I was reading a book by a dude who lost 200lbs in a year and a half, and he said that he was able to trick himself into thinking that he wasn't giving up anything.  I don't think that's really possible.  And why do I want to trick myself?

It seems to me that if I'm not enjoying the process there's no way I'm going to be successful.  And if not "enjoying" then at least not feeling like I'm punishing myself or straining to get through each day. 

I think the reason I'm focusing on general healthiness rather than weight loss is that it immediately eliminates plans or diets that cause weight loss (rapid or otherwise) at the expense of one's overall health - i.e. starvation diets, Atkins, the liquid diet, South Beach, etc.  Basically if it has a name and has lots or rules I'm not going to stick to it.  And if I don't stick to it, what's the point?

I'm just having a difficult time transitioning from unhealthy to healthy living, and it's not like my body is already in great shape that I can go run a few dozen miles to knock off thousands of calories every day.  Even a walk around the block now, for fifteen minutes, walking at a very slow pace is draining.  I've had to do it every other day instead of every day to let my knees and ankles rest a little between walks.

Anyway, I've only been actively trying to do the healthy thing for less than two weeks now.  Oh, and I already missed a few days of tracking my eating with the software.  Right now I'm still writing down what I eat every day on a little note pad, but I really need software that works as fast or faster than I can write, because I type at least 10-20x the speed that I write, but it takes me easily ten times longer to look up what I am eating in these databases and keep track of it.

So I guess I haven't found the right software yet. 

What would be awesome for prepared foods or ingredients would be to just swipe the barcode and enter the quantity you've eaten.  Swipe the bread, 2 slices, done.

I'm actually surprised how poorly most of the nutrition and meal planning software works.  My mp3 library software (iTunes) is way way more sophisticated.

[AlohaDawg]

It seems to me that if I'm not enjoying the process there's no way I'm going to be successful.  And if not "enjoying" then at least not feeling like I'm punishing myself or straining to get through each day. 

It's difficult but maybe you can focus on enjoying the results. I just spoke with my friend who lost 290 lbs since bariatric surgery. There was no pleasant part of the process but he's really happy and upbeat about everything that has come out of that. Find out what's happening that's better than before and focus on the small victories. They'll grow into bigger victories as you continue.

What would be awesome for prepared foods or ingredients would be to just swipe the barcode and enter the quantity you've eaten.  Swipe the bread, 2 slices, done.

You should develop this. You would make a lot of money I think.

I'm actually surprised how poorly most of the nutrition and meal planning software works.  My mp3 library software (iTunes) is way way more sophisticated.

I'm doing OK with Fitday - at least it remembers what you input as custom. I'm just using it as a guide; it's approximating my nutrition for me because I don't want to obsess about calories and fat grams, but I do find that it has a good deterrent effect on me - if i have to log it, I probably will at least think twice about eating it.

[jough]

Yeah, I was thinking of making my nutrition/eating log public for the SHAME factor, but really, how could I be ashamed about eating something, especially if no one reads it?

Also, I should develop some kind of diet/nutrition thing, because the ones I've tried seem to all suck.

A number of them seem to have exactly the same things in their databases too.  I wonder if there's a big nutrition DB I could license...

Seriously, how cool would it be to just put "turkey sandwich: 2 slices Arnold's 12-Grain Bread, 1tsp Miracle Whip, 1 leaf Romaine Lettuce, 2 slices of tomato, 3oz. Dietz & Watson Smoked Turkey Breast, 2 slices Alpine Lace Swiss cheese" and have it calculate the nutrition, plus save the item as your customized "turkey sandwich."

Hell, that wouldn't even be all that hard to implement, other than parsing the different ways that people could describe quantities of foods.

But even then, how many different ways are there? 

I know you were taking the piss, AD, but I think I will start brainstorming about a nutrition app.  I figured they'd be out there, and I was right, but I hadn't really considered that the current penistraps all suck.

[Lister]

This is potentially a very good idea as a web app, with such as a free logging/blogging service but you pay to have the stuff automagically calculated for you by product name.  Build a community around it and such, or maybe find a site that has a user base but could use an app that doesn't suck.

As far as the bar codes thing, I'm seeing three problems to solve: 1) input -- bar code scanners aren't uncommon, but they aren't something you find for sale in Wal-Mart yet.  2) Linking the UPC code to the nutrition data: both should logically be in some giant national database you can license, but who knows if they are available to normal people... 3) Converting nutrition data per serving to per unit of measure.  If this mythical nutrition database exists, it might have info about serving size, which would be awesome, but it probably doesn't.

Given the amounts of suck that seem to be out there, I'm kind of doubting that there's a unified nutrition database available, even though the FDA or whoever *should* have it just for record keeping purposes.

[AlohaDawg]

Serving size is part of the nutritional labeling. As long as the user has a good idea how much they ate, the program should have no difficulty adjusting the output for serving size. I do this for fitday; generally I don't know ExACTLY the ounces or cups of food I ate but I can generally approximate it.