After 3 days, I am at 5 points in my little challenge, with a potential final score of 59/60. How’d I lose that point?

Self-Uniting Marriage License
Yesterday Kim and I were out getting our marriage license. We went to the Montgomery County court house to obtain a “self-uniting” marriage license, but in this county only Quakers and Amish can get that kind of license. I tried to fight it a bit, but thought (and read previously online) that is was easier to do things through another county. I wonder what would have happened if I would have just said I was a Quaker. (I went to a Quaker college after all, and the 4 testimonies is something I can definitely ascribe to.) Would I have needed proof? What would that proof have looked like?

Kim even noticed a bible on the desk there. I wonder if they made you swear on it before getting the license??

Anyway, we then hurried on over to the Chester County court house, which we heard was more friendly with their self-uniting licenses. There was no problem there. No bible either; just a promise to tell the truth as we asserted that we weren’t related, weren’t intoxicated, weren’t currently married to any other bodies. We also had to answer if we thought we were “weak minded”… not sure about that one, but I answered no. I think if it takes you longer than 5 seconds to answer that question, they consider you weak minded no matter how you respond.

Lunch at Iron Hill Yesterday. No Point For Me.
I was pretty hungry then by 5pm. The court house was near the “Iron Hill Brewery”, which Kim and I like, so we went there to celebrate a bit. By this point I had had a donut, some chips and salsa, and a small salad… coming in around 800Cal total. With 1200Cal left, I could have made it by just getting a salad or something. Instead I had half an order of the “cheesesteak eggrolls” (SO GOOD!) and a meatloaf sandwich with french fries. I estimated my daily calories at 2500-3000Cal or so.

I think I didn’t mention it yesterday, but in addition to giving myself 1 point every day I eat less than 2000Cal, I’m also going to dock myself a point if I eat over 3000Cal. So while I missed out on a point yesterday, my 3k rule helped me so I didn’t do too much damage. Even so, I felt kind of bad about the situation and spent a whole 2 hours at the gym that night to make up for the slip. I don’t get double points for spending more time at the gym. So just 1 point yesterday.

Yummy Nino’s, But I’m Still Good Today.
Today was a better day. A full 2-point day. Kim and I were in Reading for some wedding errands, and we went to eat at Nino’s on 5th Street with Kim’s mother. This could have been a disaster, as Nino’s makes the very best cheesesteaks known to man. Way better than anything you’ll find in Philly proper. I passed on the cheesesteak though, going for a cheeseburger (which is served on their home-made bread… that’s not healthy, it’s just delicious) which is slightly less calorie-intensive. I also had some french fries, bringing my lunch to around 1200. 400Cal for donut and milk in the morning, and 400Cal of cereal at night put me at 2000Cal.

I had a cheeseburger and french fries for lunch and am still on my diet. I’m also hungry as hell right now. That’s how this works for me.

Nutrisystem is Not Food.
But I still haven’t gotten to the story about how some nasty Nutrisystem food saved me from blowing my diet (and 1 point) today.

A couple months ago, I was visiting my Mom’s place and noticed a ton of cardboard boxes in her coat closet. The boxes were actually about 1 months supply of Nutrisysem food. The way Nutrisystem works is that they send you enough food to eat each day based on your calorie limits, and through portion control you can make sure you’re not overeating.

The problem is that it’s like not real food. The first hint should be that NONE of the food needs to be refrigerated. It’s all freeze-dried and who knows what.

My Mom said that she was going to try the diet, but just couldn’t eat the food. She said after a week of it, when you’re limiting how much you’re eating anyway, you start to crave it a bit. But it doesn’t taste good at all. Which is a shame I think, because I’ve had Lean Cuisines and similar microwave meals that aren’t half bad and have just as few calories as some of this stuff. Mom said the diet really works because you can’t even eat the Nutrisystem stuff cause it’s so disgusting.

Anyway, she gave us a little cup of pasta stuff and a brownie in a bag just to try for the heck of it. To suffer along with her I guess. The “food” has sat on top of our fridge for two months.

Tonight, I was so hungry that I was turning over the kitchen for a little snack. I figured if I ate something less than 200 calories I could fudge the numbers so it didn’t seem like I went over 2000 (terrible, I know) or at least not feel so bad. In my search, I saw that little cup of pasta. I started thinking about Ramen noodles and cup-of-noodles, and similar things and how good they taste. At just 190Cal, I thought this cup of pasta might do the trick. Parmasean and broccoli. Yum.

I boiled some water in the microwave and poured it into the cup. Stirred it and let it sit for 8 minutes as per the instructions. By this point I had already caught a whiff of the pasta and wasn’t too impressed. But I thought it would probably taste better than it smelled.

I never tasted it. After 8 minutes I went back and peeled back the lid. It still smelled funny and had a odd texture. It was no Ramen. It was no cup-of-noodles. It smelled like cut up cardboard, soaked in warm broccoli juice. I threw it out without even trying it. If that cup of noodles had been even half as tempting as… pretty much anything edible… I would have eaten it and been out another point. But it was nasty, and I’m in for a two-bagger today. Go me!

Pull Ups for Wimps.
I also had another good day at the gym. Lots of basketball and running, followed up by some lifting focused on my arms. I’m doing some assisted pull ups now. I set the little bar thing to get 60lbs of assistance and do about 4-6 pull ups at a time. For a little bit, I get to pretend that I weight 160lbs. I can actually do 1 pull up with just 40 pounds of help, which tells me that if I lose 20lbs and gain 20lbs of strength, I can do at least 1 unassisted pull up. That’s a decent goal to have. There was an older dude in the gym (60+) who was doing 10 pull ups at a time. The guy was totally ripped. I admit I was a little jealous, but mostly just impressed at how fit he was at his age.

Today on the scale, the little red thingy was a little left of 220. I think I’ll be breaking through this 220 resistance very soon. I’m pretty pumped and more motivated than I’ve been in a while… despite the challenges of the past few days. It’s like a war out there, but I’ve got some heavy artilliary. Tomorrow is another day out of the house, with one or two potential meals eaten out. So I’ll need the big guns.