Muchacho Polaco

Great jam session on Saturday held at Matt and Dana’s. This was my first hootenanny. Sadly, Yun was in Mexico with her parents, so she couldn’t attend.

I found this credenza on Craiglist a month ago for $50 from a guy that bids on storage lockers. It was in terrible shape, but since most credenzas that I like are over $500, it was a cheap alternative.

I spent hours sanding it (nearly a month). It was scratched up all over. I initially thought I might be able to stain it, but there is a veneer on top that I sanded too far, so that ruled out that.

In the end, I had the plan to paint it black to match my office furniture. But as it turns out, black indigo is not actually black, but indigo (I bought the chalk paint from Amazon).

In the end it turned out fine, but it doesn’t match, so I will have to figure out what to do about that.

The last month has been really difficult. I have begun to plateau the last couple weeks, but I’m still losing weight. The gym by my house opens in November and the temperature is beginning to do under 100, so I well be able to bike regularly soon.

Today I hit 196.4 which is my lowest since returning to the US. My goal remains 185 and my hope is with regular exercise I can eat a more balanced diet.

Phil celebrated his (58?) bday last Monday. We celebrated with some great steaks and some keto-friendly bourbon.

It’s been a hot year. Now that it’s finally dropping down to 90s and 80s, I want to start riding again. My office is only 5 miles away, so that will be a nice ride each day.

After about a month we are still trying to get that skunk stink out of our dogs.

Two weeks ago I jumped on one of the faddish diets: keto. Normally I would avoid something like this at all cost, because if they’re effective, they usually don’t seem to be permanent (since no one is going to eat like this permanently). But after increasing the amount of exercise I was doing AND still gaining weight, I got desperate enough to try it.

I have watched dozens of videos online. Most of them are anecdotal, but a few seemed rooted in persuasive reasoning. With nothing much to lose, I gave it a try.

Beginning two weeks ago, I weighed in at 213. Today I weighed in at 204. A nine pound reduction in 2 weeks is pretty good, but I found that about 5 of those pounds was probably excess water retention.

I was 194 in Mexico for about 5 years prior to departure. It was pretty consistent, as was my level of activity (which was much more than here in the US). As soon as we moved back to Tucson, I have been gaining weight steadily and rapidly. Much of that could be related to the circumstances surrounding the pandemic. I was consuming much more food than I used to.

The results so far are great, but so has been the price. To illustrate:

That was my breakfast most of last week. To try and make meal prep more efficient, I just measured out the allowances for various items and then liquefied them. In this case, pork, cauliflower, and zucchini. It makes a hot breakfast drink. A glass of pork juice isn’t really as bad as it sounds, but it’s not exactly something I would naturally gravitate toward either.

Yun thinks there’s a lot I could improve upon in regard to meal options. I tend to agree, but don’t often like to spend the amount of time required to make it happen.

Overall, I am encouraged to continue. In part, because I feel great in the mornings. I used to wake bloated and miserable. That is all entirely behind me. Most of my cravings are gone and I eat much less than I used to (around 1200-1400 calories a day).  I am not exactly sure how one would sustain this lifestyle, but the reduction of weight feels good and I’m hoping to reach 185 within the next 3-6 months.

Nick hosted a surprise b-day party for Betsy last Friday. The best part was the food: carne asada from Guero Canelo. It’s the most authentic Mexican food (at least Sonoran) one can find in Tucson (and probably the US). However, being on the keto diet is not exactly ideal for a meal of this sort. I did the best I could.

It’s been years since I’ve bought a new phone. I inherited the Galaxy Note 5 when it was released years back as it was a gift to Yun (who preferred the iphone). I liked the Note quite a lot, but it is run down. I upgraded yesterday to the S20. That was a massive upgrade over what I was using. The camera (it has 4 lenses) is on par with my Nikons and it records at 8k (which is super practical given I have no such device to play at that size). The 5g is screaming fast and the big plus for me was the upgrade in storage (128gb + expansion).

Yun celebrated 3 months post-op yesterday, so we celebrated by going to Phoenix for some shopping. I waited in the car for nearly 3 hours so I could study and as I am not exactly a fan of shopping. I’m also not a fan of that drive as it is 4 hours round trip. But at least we had a good lunch at a Greek place. Lots of rain on the way home.