Day 203 - Trying Out Smaller Size Pants

I went to Target yesterday to pick up new socks, my old ones worn out.  Just for measurement purpose, I pick up a 42-20 pants to test.  I can comfortably fit in that size, albeit, it actually feel too big, which means that 46-30 pants I'm wearing right now is really too big.  I also tried out some belts, and 36-40 belt is too small for me, and they don't have anything like 38-42, so I'll have to live with this current belt size.

My meal yesterday once again appears to be too much.  I have another basil omelet for breakfast with latte (minus the protein powder).  I have too much left over beef/chicken from my brother's dinner at some Japanese restaurant.  As usual, dinner was spaghetti, so I just have the meat sauce with ground turkey.  I don't think I'm drinking enough yesterday, so I'm making a concerted effort to drink water today.

Breakfast: Protein Latte (362 calorie)
Lunch: Healthy Choice Cajun Chicken & Shrimp (260 calories)
Dinner: Left over Japanese food (no idea on the calories)

I'm also back on-call this week, so it's doubtful that I can make it to Rose Hills this week.

107/70/70 221.2lb 96 mg/DL

Day 202 - End of Week 29

08-07-2010 Front

08-07-2010 Side

02-27-2011 Front

02-27-2011 Side

Despite my stupendous eating yesterday (yes, 10 dumpling + 4 chicken nugget + soup for dinner is not a good idea), I only gain 0.2 pounds from yesterday.  I had 2 different days of large lunch last week (Brazilian BBQ & Friday's meal).  I guess I really need to take it easy this coming week.

Yesterday was so cold that my batch of coffee bean roasted lighter than usual.  Got to give a hand to that Global Warming.

104/78/65 221lb 89 mg/DL
Week to Week 4.4lb
Total Weight Loss 107lb
Body Mass Index 31.71

Day 201 - Basil Omelette

I have a craving for some comfort food.  So on Thursday, I went to the Chinese market and bought a bunch of basil for this morning's breakfast, Basil Omlette.  It's fairly simple dish to make.  3 eggs, beaten.  Minced green onion saute on the pan until slightly browned.  Add salt into the beaten eggs and basil leaves.  As I type this up and eating it, I realized that the amount of salt I put in was insufficient.  Nothing that some soy sauce won't fix.

I was originally planning to go to Rose Hills tomorrow due to the weather, but the sky looks very cleared, so I'll be going today instead.

103/61/52 220.8lb 90 mg/DL

Day 200 - Calorie Intake

I've never taken counting calories seriously.  Even after my surgery, I've always assume that I'm taking enough calorie.  But recently I began to look at the package label and come to a rather surprisingly discovery: I may not be eating enough calories.

From yesterday's post this is what I had for yesterday:

Breakfast Protein latte
Lunch: Healthy Choice Steam Kung Pao Chicken
Dinner: 6oz Grilled Steak, 1/2 Brown Onion pan saute, fishball soup with ginger.

The  protein latte consist of 8 oz of 1% fat milk 102 calorie.  Protein powder 260 calorie.  Kung Pao Chicken is 300 calorie.  6oz Grill steak is 304 calories.  1/2 brown onion should have about 16 calories.  Fishball I estimate to have 20 calories.  So at a glance, I ate 902 calories.  I'm not sure about the calories in the decaffeinate coffee I drank yesterday (over 8 serving of 8 oz).  But lets just say that the half and half I'm using should add another 16 calories, that still means I ate 918 calories, still a bit short of a 1200 calorie regiment.  Perhaps I should talk to a dietitian about this.

Today's Meal:
Breakfast: Protein Latte (362 calories)
Lunch: Filet Mignon (464 calories), Mash Potatoe (66 calories)
Dinner: Healthy Choice Steam Kung Pao Chicken (300)

114/72/74 221.2lb 92 mg/DL

Day 199 - Surviving Brazilian BBQ

There's a local Brazilian BBQ that I used to visit weekly prior to my surgery. It was on my restaurant farewell tour. Yesterday, my co-worker wanted to eat something nice within walking distance. So I figure it's time to experiment. I most definitely over ate. I had:

Small portion of rice with salsa.
Very small portion of salad.
3 Brazilian Sausage (this is one item that I was addicted to in this restaurant).
1 slice of Top Sirloin.
1/3 slice of Tri-tip
1 small piece of Pork loin
1 small piece of garlic steak
1 small slice of Brazilian steak

Even looking at this, it's amazing that I actually was able to walk out of there.  I'm not going back there anytime soon.

I had defrosted a piece of steak in the morning in preparation for dinner.   Naturally, I opted to skip that.  Instead, I made my breakfast latte shake and drink that instead.  I'm still feeling the effect of that meal 19 hours later.

Today's meal:
Breakfast Protein latte
Lunch: Healthy Choice Steam Kung Pao Chicken
Dinner: 6oz Grilled Steak, 1/2 Brown Onion pan saute, fishball soup with ginger.

114/65/56 221.2lb 91 mg/DL

Day 198 - Home Roasted Coffee

I mentioned that on Monday, President Day, I have a messed up schedule.  Instead of enjoying a nice day off, I had to rush out of the house to restart my own computer at work.  I picked up a large cup of latte from Starbuck Coffee.

It's the first plain latte I had from them in a while, and after drinking it on my ride to work, I got reminded why I roast my own coffee.  The bean from this batch was over roasted.  Small batch coffee bean roasting isn't hard.  I know what Starbuck Coffee was aiming at.  Their customer expected over roasted coffee, and they give what their customer wanted.  However, over roast coffee can bring consistency to roasting.  It's also one way of covering up blending cheaper bean into premium bean.

Small batch roasting isn't hard.  I do it twice a week with my brothers also drinking coffee at home.  I enjoy milder roast, which actually have far more caffeine than dark roast.

I was going to post something about my current bout of plateau, but lets not jinx it.

113/71/63 221.6lb 88 mg/DL

Day 197 - Odd Weight Fluctuation

On this past Sunday, I mysteriously gained 1 whole pound from the previous day.  I have excellent bowel movement that morning.  I watched what I was eating.  I drank plenty of fluid.  Yet, the only thing I can think of that could account for the weight gain is water retention.

Yesterday was a bit odd for me, for the second time since the start of my exercise routine, I have to skip my morning walk.  I ate one of the Healthy Choice steam lunch meal for lunch (breakfast was Starbuck latte and 2 fried eggs later on), and I have Chinese fried fish with spicy tofu for dinner.

Since today is a work day, I have to wake up at 5AM and start my routine.  Even so, my weight gain from the past couple of days mysteriously disappeared.  This is even with the knowledge that I'm not done with today's defecation yet.

Lets see what today's morning traffic do to me.

123/70/79 222.8lb 92 mg/DL

Day 196 - My Driver License Weight

Just the other day, I actually looked at my driver license's weight: 210 pounds.  Yeah, small steps.  Forget about my ultimate goal of 160 pounds, lets at least go back to what my weight that I filled out long ago (and I really don't know when I entered that figure).

I had work emergency which compounded with  my work computer going BSOD means that I have to at least drive into to work and reboot the work computer so I can continue to work.  This means that my entire morning routine is thrown off balance.  Lets see how this day pans out.

Addendum: I got the work I need done at the office, brought one of the Healthy Choice steam meal home for lunch.  And then I got dragged into more work related task.  Didn't do my exercise. 

135/87/77 225.4lb 94 mg/DL

Day 195 - End of Week 28

08-07-2010 Front

08-07-2010 Side

02-20-2011 Front

02-20-2011 Side

Ok, this is perplexing.  I really watch what I'm eating yesterday.  I drink lots of fluid.  Yet, I still gain 1 whole pound of weight from yesterday.  Well, today's meal is spaghetti sauce with meat sauce and mushroom (dinner) and Korean BBQ.  I'm interested in what that looks like.

117/76/60 225.4lb 92 mg/DL
Week to Week -1.6lb
Total Weight Loss 102.6lb
Body Mass Index 32.34

Day 194 - Stalled

Had a bit of unscheduled fun yesterday when my neighborhood lost power after the rain.  Good thing I stopped by Chinese restaurant to pick up my own food that my brother and father have something interesting to eat by the candle light.

My original plan for yesterday's meal was shelved and I opted to eat tuna sashimi for lunch, and fried pork chop with hot and sour soup for dinner.  The dinner itself might be a bit too much.

111/76/70 224.4lb 94 mg/DL

Day 193 - Re-hydration?

I was sick all of last week.  My life basically revolved around the nearest kleenex box of tissue papers.  Or at least that's what I think happened with my larger than expected weight loss last week.  I actually keep closer tab at what I eat this week.  My exercise routine is ramped up a bit and I drink lots of liquid.  Yet, I'm still stalled this week in terms of weight loss.  Perhaps the weight loss last week is just an illusion of dehydration.  We'll see with this coming long weekend how that theory pans out.

109/74/71 224.2lb 97 mg/DL

Day 192 - Another Plateau

So my weight has been essentially unchanged for the past 5 days.  Odd that I'm actually watching what I'm eating and drinking plenty of fluid.  Lets see what this weekend brings. 

111/68/60 223.8lb 96 mg/DL

Day 191 - Seat Cushion

As I mentioned in the post yesterday that I started to notice my tailbone when I sit in my car seat.  I use Herman Miller Aero Chair both at work and at home when I use computer, so that sensation isn't as noticeable.  But for long car trip, that tailbone sensation is really noticeable.

Yesterday, I got from amazon.com the Gel Seat Soft Saddle Cushion and made good use of it this morning.  It rain this morning, and that usually makes a dramatic differences on the morning traffic.  My commute this morning became 90 minutes, up from the usual 30 minutes.  While my butt still is uncomfortable, the tailbone managed to settle into the depression rather well.

107/66/79 223.4lb 91 mg/DL

Day 190 - Car Problem

Over this past weekend (and really, over the past couple of weeks), I've become acutely aware of my tailbone when I sit in my car seat.  That means that anything over 60 minutes worth of sitting in the same position on this kind of seat that particular bone (and surrounding tissues) hurts.  I was stuck in traffic for 90 minutes on Saturday, and it wasn't fun for me.

Yesterday, after I gave one of my co-worker a ride to the train station, my brother called me up and ask me to pick him up at work.  It turns out that he has taken his car into a shop near his work to repair air condition vent in his car.  Unfortunately they cannot put it back together in time for him to pick up.  So I drove the extra 8 miles out to Pasadena and get him.  By the time we were back on the freeway again, the traffic really became a crawl.  I got home with my aching tailbone sitting in the same position for 2 hours.  Good thing I went to the restroom before going onto the car.

I ordered Gel Seat Soft Saddle Cushion based on some recommendation from BaritricTV.com forum.  I should get it today, and I'll see what the result is tomorrow.  I don't have that much problem sitting with my chair both at work and at home.  But car seat is a different story.

Took some laxative last night to try to get the rest of my intestine cleared up, and this morning, it has the result I was looking for.  Even though I had a bowl of rice with saute spinach, my number still looks good.

106/71/78 223.2lb 90 mg/DL

Day 189 - Back at Work

So I'm typing this sitting in my office.  I've been sick this past week.  And while I did work on Friday, that was from home.

This morning, even before I hit the scale, I knew the number wouldn't come up right.  This past week when I've been sick, I got the luxury of sleeping late and having time for my digestive system to do its work.  This morning, I woke up at 5, and start my exercise walk at 5:40AM and weight myself at 6:15AM.  Well, the number came out 2 pounds heavier than yesterday morning.  Albeit, I weight myself yesterday at 9AM, and I did myself no favor with yesterday's meal.  Lunch was salad with salsa and guacamole, and chicken soup.  I topped that off 3 hours later with some kimchii.  I had spaghetti sauce (mushroom, onin and ground turkey) for dinner.  Today's meal should be more on schedule.

Speaking of exercise, I put myself back on 3.7 MPH pace again, and this time I don't feel as much pain as last time I try this pace.

111/70/59 235.8lb 92 mg/DL

Day 188 - End of Week 27

08-07-2010 Front

08-07-2010 Side

02-13-2011 Front

02-13-2011 Side

Other than being sick, this has been my best week of weight loss since November.  I cross the century mark in weight loss on my 6 month anniversary.  My belt size went down another notch yesterday.  My blood sugar is still in good control despite the experiment I had yesterday at Noodle King.  Now, with my new non-hair cut, I need to find some caps to keep my head warm.  Unfortunately when I went to the Dick's yesterday, I was surprised that their local facility has closed.  Time to find another place.

I went out a bit late yesterday for the weekly visit to Rose Hills.  So I opted to have lunch first.  I have my usual fried tofu and for experiment purpose, I ordered a plate of oyster omelette.  In Chinese food, oyster omelette consist of oyster, green vegetables and eggs, covered with sweet spicy sauce.  I was wondering what the sauce would do to my morning blood sugar measurement.  The number is still good.

111/74/65 223.8lb 93 mg/DL
Week to Week 5.6lb
Total Weight Loss 104.2lb
Body Mass Index 32.11

Day 187 - Blood Sugar Control

I went through yesterday without eating much carbohydrate (I think the milk in my morning coffee is my only carbohydrate).  Due to the office meetings (and the first one ran long)  I literally didn't have much time to prepare and eat lunch.  So my lunch consisted of finishing up the saute spinach from Wednesday night, and half a can of tuna with chopped green onion soy sauce and spicy sesame oil.  Dinner was grilled pork chop with onion.

Lets see what today's meal bring.

114/77/76 224.4lb 86 mg/DL

Day 186 - Getting Better

I went ahead and set my room's radiated heater setting down a bit last night to see if it could play a part of my right lung feeling stuffed.  Not sure if it's that or that the anti-biotic finally kick in, but this morning, I'm feeling well enough to go back to work...  From my home.  I want to have the full course of treatment before I venture back.

Have another experiment in yesterday's meal.  I had the remaining rice from Wednesday's dinner (which is actually over 60%) and some of the saute spinach for lunch.  We have the sticky rice wrapped in bamboo leaves for dinner.  Normally, with this amount of fast acting carbohydrate, my blood sugar level would've shot up.  It is more elevated than yesterday, but still within the 6 day norm of 93 mg/DL.

102/69/70 227.8lb 93 mg/DL

Day 185 - Still Sick

As the title mentioned, I'm still sick.  My right lung still feel reduced capacity.  So I'll go through with my anti-biotic treatment and hope for a quicker recovery.  My measurement this morning is still weird.  My blood pressure, which has been up for the past couple of days due to the cold is doing a bit better than yesterday.  I had rice and saute spinach for dinner last night, and my blood sugar level is actually really low. 

In yesterday's surgical follow up, my surgeon is pleased with my progress.  I had my lean body mass measured by InBody 520 Body Composition Analyzer, a bioelectrical impedance analysis machine.  I had one of these measurement done months ago, but I didn't ask for a copy of the measurement.  According to the machine, I should loose another 73 pounds, which is actually less than my own goal target.

121/80/65 225.2lb 85 mg/DL

Day 184 - Six Months Out - 100 Pounds Down - Pneumonia

08-07-2010 Front

08-07-2010 Side

02-09-2011 Front

02-09-2011 Side

Today by coincident is both my sixth month anniversary and a surgical follow up appointment. I don't think my vitamin test will be ready for this afternoon's check up.

Another milestone reach. I'm 227 pound as of weighting this morning. That's 101 pounds lower than the first entry on my online spreadsheet of statistics.

And as a follow up to yesterday's post, I know something was up when my primary physician ask me to repeatly cough as she does her comparison of my left and right lung function.  After that, she had the assistant write up an order for me to go down stair to the radiology clinics and get chest x-ray taken.  Waited 10 minutes, and got my chest zapped aft and side view.  Not that anything actually shows up on the image (digitized image will be evaluated by radiologist), but she's treating it as if I have Community-acquired Pneumonia.    I'm current on a 5 day course of anti-biotic treatment, and have another follow up with her next week. 

129/87/60 227lb 93 mg/DL
Month 06 14.4lb
Milestone 100lb

Day 183 - Feeling Sicker

I got Theraflu and some chicken soup yesterday. While I may be feeling a bit better due to the temporary effect of those two, I woke up this morning with the additional symptom of stuff chest. Now I can't even cough. At least my constipation seemed to be lessen.

It's strange that in the 6 months since I started this blog, I've never been sick to this extend. That's why I opted to go back and added the sick label.

127/84/76 229.6lb 93 mg/DL

Day 182 - Return of the Cold

Well, the cold on Friday return this morning with a vengeance. I knew I can't make it the whole day at work, so I just went and dropped off the frozen lunch that I bought at Ralphs (I don't have freezer room at home). My bowel movement also didn't come at my usual weight in time, so my number is a bit off today. I'll go and get some chicken soup and Theraflu to treat my symptom, but I really didn't get enough fluid in me yesterday.

126/86/70 230.4lb 93 mg/DL

Day 181 - End of Week 26

08-07-2010 Front

08-07-2010 Side

02-06-2011 Front

02-06-2011 Side

Superbowl Sunday.  I'll probably be leveling my hunter though :)  I started using Miralax this week, and the experiment I did yesterday (not taking Benefiber for one day) does convince me that I should continue to take that.  This coming Wednesday is both my 6th month since surgery and a follow up appointment.  Lets see what the test results from Friday says about me.

121/78/78 229.4lb 94 mg/DL
Week to Week 3.4lb
Total Weight Loss 98.6lb
Body Mass Index 32.91

Day 180 - Measurement Time

I messed up my routine this morning.  Instead of measuring my blood pressure first thing after I woke up, I forgot, and only managed to measure them after my morning exercise.  Naturally, they came up a bit high.  Lets see what tomorrow brings.

121/81/93 229.6lb 110 mg/DL

Day 179 - Fun at Bloot Test

My follow up appointment with the weight loss program is next Wednesday.  Typically I should have blood test done a week prior, since there's so much to test.  Unfortunately for me, I didn't get tested Yesterday due to the forms not being available.

So this morning, I went in at 7AM to get my blood drawn.  For some reason, they opted to take 10 tubes of blood instead of about 8 from last time.  After that experience is done, I drove to Jack in the Box and pick up something for breakfast (in the future, don't do this).  Half way to work, they called me back, apparently they actually want one more tube of blood for Zinc test...  On top of that, the receptionist at the clinic was getting overwhelm by the many people waiting.  Lets just say that she wasn't being professional.

11 tubes of blood drawn, and there apparently is a wide spread cold in the office that claimed 3 other people, myself included.  Even as I type this, I feel that I'm getting sicker, and not better.

115/75/79 230.4lb 108 mg/DL

Day 178 - Personal Finance Religion

I'm kind of surprised that I haven't mention my personal finance religion in previous 141 posts.  They're not dogma, but rather useful suggestion.  There's only 2 rules:

1. Never pay interest on credit card.  Always pay off full balance.
2. Never pay parking fee if you can help it.

I've never bought into the concept of credit card use as envisioned by the financial industry.  I don't take out small loan to pay back at 15% interest.  Instead, I use them as convenience alternative to cash, and of course for online purchase.  In my mind, the money I spend in credit card is already deducted from my checking account.  One way for me to be religious about avoid paying interest rate is to pay them off as soon as I'm allowed to.  For example, my credit card allow me to pay current account balance every 3 days.  So I pay off whatever my current balance is every Monday and every 3 days as needed.  I'm not their favor customer, since the last time I paid interest rate on a credit card is due to mailing issue pre-online banking days.  If I cannot afford to pay off that bill in 2 weeks, or if I have a big ticket item that I need to buy, I'll transfer money into my checking account before like I would if I'm paying by check.

Slight addendum.   It would appear that Penn of the Penn & Teller duo also subscribe to my first rule of personal financial religion.  Here's his Penn Point video on this subject.

As for rule #2, I used to work in downtown LA.  Parking is a premium there, even if you can find it.  I just preferred not to visit any place that requires me to feed the meter or pay for the privilege of doing business of just going there.  You can tell that I don't go to Pasadena often unless I have free parking line up before hand.

122/72/71 232.2lb 98 mg/DL

Day 177 - Muffin Experiment

In one short word: FAILED.  We had some left over muffins from Porto's bakery, and I was tempted to try one at 9AM.  I was in absolutely no condition of eating anything solid for the rest of the day (I had to skip lunch).  I also shouldn't have gone with my original dinner plan (grilled onion and steak with salt and pepper).  One thing I was doing is chucking down decaffeinate coffee with non-dairy creamer with regularity.  I believe I drank 8 8 ounces cup worth of decaffeinated coffee yesterday, with more water intake.

Today is also Chinese New Year.  Year of the Rabbit.  I'll have my damage report from today's dinner later.

121/75/74 231.2lb 104 mg/DL

Day 176 - Whey Protein

I know 1 day is too small of a sample size, but I alternate between the two different protein powder (chocolate and vanilla) on my morning latte.  The last time I bought the powder from Costco, I opted for the bigger package that's double in serving size for Vanilla.  Unfortunately for me, I didn't look at the underlining protein that's used, whey vs dairy protein.

It would appear that my digestive system is having difficulty processing whey based protein powder.  At least today when I'm using the dairy based chocolate flavor powder, I'm not having as much gas issue as yesterday.  Fortunately for me, my brother usually use the vanilla powder, so that flavor should be dispensed with faster.  I'll just stick with chocolate.

117/75/72 233.2lb 100 mg/DL