Practical things

I begin with something practical: I'm starting the Slow Carb diet tomorrow. Basically, the only carbohydrates I can eat are from legumes - lentils and beans. I can go to town with them. On top of that, I am supposed to eat roughly 20g of protein at each meal. That's 3 eggs, or a can of tuna, or a hamburger patty, or three servings of lentils, etc. Apparently this is very important.

I am also to avoid dairy. Tim (Tim Ferriss) is not entirely clear about this, because he talks about eating cottage cheese a lot. Actually, many things are a little unclear, but I get the general gist.

The best part is the cheat day, where you are encouraged to go off the diet with a vengeance, although he does supply tips on how to steer the binging in the right direction, too. This sounds kind of extreme, but my guess is since I will be dieting most of the week, a "binge" here means, say, half of what I have eaten every day I've spent in Las Vegas. He suggests something like 4000-5000 calories. If I have a normal, sensible breakfast with a lot of grapefruit juice (recommended for cheat days), that's like a medium pizza and a pint of Phish Food on top of it. Easy. I have done much worse.

I'm looking into getting a russian kettle bell. Tim says this is the most efficient strength training device. He gives instructions on how to rig up something entirely equivalent out of $10-15 of pipes and clamps, so I'm going to try that, rather than spending $120 on a piece of cast iron. Though they do look pretty cool and manly.

Why am I doing this? Because I am gaining all kinds of weight, and I am getting weaker. I want to forge a body that seems right to me. I want to lose about 20 pounds of fat.

There are two red flags to this diet: one is the disorganization with which Tim presents his methods. I think it's just sloppy writing, though - he backs everything up with scientific studies, is himself experienced in the field (sports medicine) and seems to know his shit. The other red flag, more important to me, is what I mentioned before: the marketing. I think that, ultimately, good health comes from balance. But I think it would do me some good to experiment with the way I eat. Maybe this doesn't work. I don't know. But one month of experimentation couldn't hurt.

Ok, I don't want to talk about this anymore today.

I spent less than 2 hours procrastinating today. About 30 minutes lying in bed before waking up. Then I spent about 50 minutes tooling around on the internet and watching the Office. It was satisfying, and it did not take up much time. And yet I feel like I had no time today. More evidence to me that I need to go easy on myself about the relaxation - the point is if I want to do it or not, not exactly how much time it takes up. I am doing good things with my life. If I feel I need to do more, then I need to find a way to do more, not waste any effort getting upset with myself for what I happen to be doing instead.

Next time I will go deeper. I want to report that blogging seems normal to me now; it doesn't seem like an imposition on myself, a chore. That's a good thing. I have a long way to go to make it more useful, but it's been a long way to this point.

By the way, this is the 100th post. Cue the roman candles.

Good night, all.