My musings about life, happiness, technology, and what ever else comes along.
Well, my last post was on my birthday — November 20, 2007. I have been ill off and on since then and on a huge project at work that was taking up so much of my time.
My employer has graciously reduced my workload due to my illness.
For anyone reading, regular posts have started. I hope to log at least once every other day.
LEDs for Beginners - Instructables Make Cool How To and DIY [category: tech]:
intro LEDs for Beginners
This instructable shows how to wire up one or more LEDs in a in a basic and clear way. Never done any work before with LEDs and don’t know how to use them? Its ok, neither have I.
Planning on upgrading my PC, I have been itching to do some case mods. Searching produced the above article at Instructables.com. I pretty much knew the content but it helped refresh my memory.
My current system consists of:
got the new card).Because of issues I have been having (on board LAN is now dead) and apparent load issues, I had to pull two TV tuners I had installed. I have enough power to run everything and it was working fine for quite some time.
Here are the new parts I plan on purchasing:
Video editing, Photoshop, some programming, games — this should be able to do these for me easily. I picked the quad core that I can afford for the video editing and Photoshop work and from the reviews I have been seeing, it overclocks like a dream, which is why I picked the Tuniq Tower for cooling.
More memory will definitely help with video editing and Photoshop work. I may pick up a 750 GB SATA II hard drive for speed and capacity and move the two 500 GB ATA-100 drives to my server.
Alternatively, I may buy an ABIT IP35 Pro motherboard instead of the Gigabyte.
For the last two days, I have had a sinus headache to beat all sinus headaches. My doctor believes I have a mild sinus infection and so now come the antibiotics. I feel great this morning and so of to work I go. You see, I left early on Monday and did not go in yesterday at all.
So, Claritin each morning, antibiotics twice a day, and Aleve for the pain (or Tylenol, my choice). At least that yucky yellow mucus has slowed to a trickle (no pun intended).
I was surprised the doctor did not tell me to use a sinus medicine. He said that Claritin was fine and would keep my passages from clogging up and I could take either Aleve or Tylenol based on my personal experience with them. He also said there was no need to provide more drug strength than actually needed. This is refreshing as in my experience, most doctors prescribe to cover the symptoms.
Today I start logging my eating. I thought, “What better way than in my blog?”. And so, here is begins.
Logging your eating habits help keep your eating in check and make sure you are getting balanced meals. I need to get my weight down to something manageable. Even though I watch what I eat fairly closely, I don’t know if there are trends in my eating patterns or not. This should help me see any patterns and adjust or simply eliminate them by the fact I am now seeing what I eat everyday.
Breakfast today:
- 2 servings of Coach’s Oats — 1/3 cup dry per serving, 160 calories per serving, 25 calories from fat, 4 grams fiber
- 1 large banana — approximately 100 calories, 4 grams of fiber
- 1 medium Pink Lady apple — approximately 100 calorie, 5 grams of fiber
- My usual assortment of vitamins and minerals as suggested by my doctor
- 16 oz. of water
Total calories: 520
Total fiber: 17 grams
Total fat calories: 50 (approximately 6 grams)
This is typical of my breakfast. As I had blogged before, I eat ovo-lacto vegetarian for breakfast and lunch on most days as it really helps to keep the calories down and increases the fiber intake since you have to eat more fruits, vegetables, and grains to get enough to eat (and fill yourself up).
I try to eat until I am comfortably full and no more. I try to avoid special occasions I call white events. Usually they consist of foods with lots of white ingredients, like white cake flower. For example, birthdays. When I have to go, I politely decline or if they are insistent, take only a small portion and then don’t eat the frosting. Its not that these are bad for you. But in quantity, you will get fat.
Well, it has been over a week since my last post. Part of the issue was my daughter being home and the other was just being so busy.
The weekend was humdrum. That sums it up. The wife went up to Los Angeles to the Korean festival and to visit my daughter, who has started her senior year in college. That left me at home with my son, who graduated from college a few months ago and is now looking for a job.
What did I get done you might ask? Here is a list.
Very relaxing, I can tell you. This was the first weekend in ages where I got to actually relax — no “on the run”, go-go-go, git ‘r done.
The plan is to begin posting regularly again. Hopefully nothing will come up that prevents me from doing so.
Since 1992, I have not really been healthy. On a business trip to Washington DC for my employer of now 18 years, I caught Hepatitis A eating in a seafood restaurant (we think) in Georgetown. Luckily it was the curable type but it left my liver partially unusable. The vaccine was not available then.
Now, the doctors keep telling me that this has nothing to do with my ails. But most of my health problems started right after the 45 days of disability and quarantine from the disease.
My weight skyrocketed. I’m tired all the time. My blood pressure is now way up. Harrumph.
No thyroid problems. Human growth hormone at normal levels. Blood sugar fine. Blood pressure normally very good. Cholesterol up.
I know that I can get all this under control. But it has been hard.
I weighed 327 lb. when I joined the US Navy in the late seventies. They lied and put me at 289, which for my height was the largest I could be and still be accepted. I really appreciate the company commanders from Texas that kept me very busy in boot camp and watched what I was eating. I lost all the way to 200 lb. by the end of 12 weeks+ of boot camp. Now I know losing that fast is not healthy, and I did gain back up to approximately 230 lb., but I felt a lot better.
I pretty much kept it that way until after 1992.
I am now 300 lb. and maintaining it. I do exercise but it does not seem to do anything for me. Being in my late 40s, it is now getting harder and harder to lose weight. It seems my metabolism was messed up by the disease and it really never recovered.
I plan on weight training soon. My last child in college will graduate college in the spring. Once I get my two children settled on their own, I can concentrate more on myself. I certainly don’t want to leave my wife a widow.
And for any of you who might be reading this and are health/exercise nuts, yes I was maintaining heart rate and so on. I consulted several trainers to be sure. I even bought an elliptical machine due to pain in my knees and I still use it regularly for 30-45 minutes at a time in the fat burning zone 3-4 times a week.
My diet is simple and practically meat free to keep the calories down. Lots of vegetables, grains, and a little meat. Little dairy however as I became lactose intolerant several years ago. Essentially I each ovo-lacto vegetarian for breakfast and lunch.
For example, this morning, I am eating two servings of steel-cut oatmeal with a little Splenda® for sweetness and a little soy milk, a banana, my regimen of vitamins and minerals my doctor wants me to use, and a glass of water. Lunch will be 1 cup of hominy (60 calories per 1/2 cup with 6 grams of fibre — yummy) cooked in a tad bit of butter and olive oil (less than 1/4 teaspoon total), an apple, a banana, a low fat-low sugar pudding cup, and water.
I drink a couple of cups of decaffeinated coffee and lots of water during the day and move around as much as I can.
Dinner will be what ever I have enough energy to scrounge up. Since my wife works also, we usually each something quick but healthy. Last night for me was a 4 inch piece of turkey kielbasa (~200 calories and low fat), left over short grain white rice (1 cup), and some left over fresh green beans (about 4 servings which is around 70 calories).
Why am I telling you this? Well, it feels good to write about it. And I guess it validates what I am doing to see it in writing in public, even if few if any people are reading it.
Please comment with your own short stories on your struggles. Let me tell you, it is soul cleansing.
By the way, I am on cholesterol lowering medication. Normally I won’t take statins or the other forms of medicine to lower cholesterol as there is a lot of research showing lowering cholesterol is not necessarily needed and the benefits (including those dang statistics) don’t outweigh the harm they do to your body. But since I have these other issues, it makes sense to do so to be sure it is not an issue. Once I get my blood pressure down to normal without medication and my weight is down, off the meds for cholesterol I go!
Also, I urge you not to use anything with aspartame in it. The evidence is growing that a large number of people react poorly to it. It may be perfectly safe for healthy people but for someone who is not healthy I question its use.
Aspartame links:
