Since the age of 12, I have weighed less than 180 pounds in only two different periods of my life. The first was when I was wrestling my junior year of high school. I started out around 185 pounds and the intense training brought me down to roughly 160 pounds and probably single digit body fat percentage. I wouldn’t say I was in an unhealthy state, but I used unhealthy tactics to drop that much weight. Working out for three hours on an empty stomach is fairly brutal. So, the other time that I weighed less than 180 pounds? Today. As difficult as it is to eat clean, exercise properly and maintain other health parameters, it’s completely worth it. I haven’t worn a pair of size 31 pants… ever. It’s a good thing my current wardrobe isn’t expensive because if I keep this up, I’m going to have to replace quite a few things.
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Occasionally, during a bad day at work, I would get a comfort meal at the cafeteria. This meal consisted of a double Swiss cheeseburger and some steak fries. Of course it tasted great, but now that we publish the nutritional information for our cafeterias, I’m not so sure it was a good idea:
- Hamburger Patty x2 = 640 calories, 54g fat, 34g protein, 2g carbs
- Swiss cheese x2 = 214 calories, 8g fat, 8g protein, 0 carbs
- Bun = 270 calories, 5g fat, 8g protein, 48g carbs
- Fries = 600 calories, 32.4g fat, 3.8g protein, 35g carbs
TOTAL:
- 1724 calories
- 99.4g fat
- 53.8g protein
- 85g carbs
(those numbers don’t add up properly since a 67g/50g/50g ratio for the burger should actually be 1003 calories)
That single meal has more calories than I intake in a full day now!
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Random Zune thoughts:
- Is it a requirement to use the 200×200 JPG album art that is usually 10-12 KB in size? Stretched to 240×240, the quality is poor. If the average song is 3 minutes @ 192 kbps (roughly 4 MB) and the average album is 12 songs, the Zune can hold about 575 albums. Doubling the album art quality would reduce the Zune capacity by a whopping 1.5 songs.
- Zune Marketplace downloads are 192 kbps WMA files. Even played through $30 headphones, the audio quality over a 128 kbps MP3 is dramatic. I kinda wish I hadn’t ripped all my CDs into 128 kbps just to save a little drive space. I’d still use MP3 as support is so ubiquitous.
- The preloaded content is a blast. Having so many music videos, video clips, pictures and music right out of the box was a great idea. It will also introduce the musically-limited to some great bands.
- Losing the preloaded content sucks. Don’t partner the Zune up to any old computer thinking you’ll just re-partner to your media machine later. If you need to change the partnership, all content on the device is removed, including the preloaded stuff. I hadn’t even seen/heard all of it yet!
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I am down with brown… a brown Zune that is. I took some photos since people were curious how it really looks (product shots aren’t always realistic): http://mbibik.dyndns.org/gallery/v/2006_001/Zune+11_12_1006/
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If I’m a little grumpy and/or goofy lately, this is why.
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BAM! WOXY is back online! The free aacPlus 32kbps stream sounds even better than the MP3 64kpbs stream.
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It’s a bit long at a minute 30 (oh god I love the ADD generation) but it has a few laugh-out-loud moments: The Awesome Adventures of Wild Child (MazdaSpeed 3)
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In the ever continuous quest for improvement with as little effort as possible, I’m trying a new supplement stack:
Before breakfast
500mg Acetyl-L-Carintine (Nature’s Way)
3000mg Glucosamine Sulfate (Jarrow)
2400mg Chondroitin Sulfate (Jarrow)
600mg Methyl-Sulfonyl-Methane (Jarrow)
250mg Rhodiola Rosea (Nature’s Way)
500mg Aniracetam (Bulk Nutrition)
1 Multivitamin (Kirkland/Costco)
Breakfast
1000mg Vitamin C (Nature’s Way)
500mg Fish oil / 25mg GLA / 100mg CLA (Jarrow)
2400mg Lechtin (Jarrow)
Before lunch
500mg Acetyl-L-Carintine (Nature’s Way)
250mg Rhodiola Rosea (Nature’s Way)
500mg Aniracetam (Bulk Nutrition)
Lunch
1000mg Vitamin C (Nature’s Way)
500mg Fish oil / 25mg GLA / 100mg CLA (Jarrow)
2400mg Lecithin (Jarrow)
Before dinner
500mg Acetyl-L-Carintine (Nature’s Way)
500mg Aniracetam (Bulk Nutrition)
Dinner
1000mg Vitamin C (Nature’s Way)
2400mg Lecithin (Jarrow)
Post workout
Jarrow BCAAs / Creatine Surge:
900mg L-Leucine
450mg L-Isoleucine
450mg L-Valine
3500mg L-Glutamine
6g Creatine Monohydrate
1g Ribose
1g Taurine
35g Dextrose
25mg Alpha-lipoic Acid (haha, why even bother…)
24g Whey protein (Optimum Nutrition)
Before bed
3000mg Glucosamine Sulfate (Jarrow)
2400mg Chondroitin Sulfate (Jarrow)
600mg Methyl-Sulfonyl-Methane (Jarrow)
Effects:
I’ve slowly built this stack up over the last 6 weeks, trying to give ample time per supplement to make sure I’m seeing a positive effect. Most notably, the ALCAR has removed any tip-of-the-tongue verbal issues and allows me to remember at least one dream per night. The Rhodiola has brought about a definite boost in energy and a noticably improved mood (I don’t quite feel like a Greek fucking god, but I’m getting there).
I originally started taking the two lecithin caps as a single dose and noticed the lovely negative affect of a clenched jaw roughly 40 minutes post dose. Actually the first time it happened, I was balls-deep in studying a telephony spec and didn’t notice I had been clenching my jaw for probably an hour straight. The subsequent soreness and mild headache was enough to tell me something was wrong, but I continued to take the 4800mg dose of lecithin until I had pin-pointed it was the cause.
Aniracetam is the most recently added supplement and I will withold judgement until later. I do notice my heartrate is roughly 20% elevated for an hour post-dose so the stimulant claims for this drug are well-warranted.
Proposed Changes:
As my goals are generalized health improvement, muscle development and cognition assistance, this stack is quite varied. Everyone touts that ALCAR and nootropics must be paired with a free-radical scavenger for optimal effect so it looks like I need (more) lipoic acid. Why Jarrow even bothered to included 25mg of the stuff in their Creatine/Carb mix is beyond me, especially when their smallest recommended dose when taken individually is 100-600mg. The AOR / Geronova wank-off over ALA stereoisomers is cute, but I’m not sure I want to pay $35/month for the stuff. Maybe I could switch over to Ortho Mind since it has R-lipoic, ALCAR and a host of other fun mental amplifiers. What’s the logical fallacy called when someone tries to prove a point by showing facts about a related item to the item in question? AOR explains the various positive effects of the nootropics and how L-Pyroglutamic Acid is the core molecule behind the various “-racetam” nootropics, but Ortho Mind doesn’t actually contain a true racetam. I’m sure L-Pyro has a great effect on it’s own, I just dislike the spiel.
As for muscle development, I’ll probably add specific zinc and magnesium supplements to be taken before bed, along with a slow-acting protein (maybe just a late night snack of the cottage cheese I already eat at a rate of 5 pounds a week).
…and yes, I’m already eating clean, spread out among 4-6 meals a day, concentrating slow carbs in the morning and moving toward protein/fat based meals as the day progresses, little to no alcohol, and very few processed food sources. If you try to take away my Diet Coke, I will cry.
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I apologize that this post is not about cars, detailing or cameras.
Most of you know, I have terrible knees. It all started when I was still recovering from surgery and decided to try out for the high school football team. All was well until one morning, a 200 lb dude fell on my left leg, bending my knee inwards. One partially-torn MCL and a stretched ACL later, my knees have never been the same. A subsequent MCL/ACL injury from racquetball on the left knee didn’t help either! I’ve been in more and more pain, especially in the right knee which is a bit odd since all of the injuries were to the left knee. Turns out, a separate issue is at work here. Just due to genetics, my knee caps simply do not stay in place. Instead of sitting in a bone groove where it should, both knee caps sit toward the outside of the knee. This is causing grinding and wearing down of cartilage throughout the knee. This explains why anti-inflammatories help out to such an intense degree and why I’m in so much pain if I forget them a few days in a row.
I just got back from a consultation with an orthopedic surgeon. Physical therapy on my knees has failed and the next step in treatment would be to strengthen the inner muscle of the thigh (medialis). Both the physicians assistant and the doc said my medialis is well-developed so that wouldn’t help. Barring anything odd found in my MRI next week, I get to schedule surgery! Depending on a few factors, there are two procedures that may be used. The first is called a lateral release and the recovery time could be as short as two weeks. The second is much more involved, requires a slight fracture of the femur and implant of an artificial bone splint and the minimum recovery time is 8 weeks.
Honestly, I’m looking forward to surgery. I’ve been to four doctors about this and now they finally realize that this isn’t going to heal itself. I’d almost rather have the more advanced procedure since it has a higher success rate. This isn’t happening for at least a couple months, so I’m going to start counting the days until my knee problems are fixed for good…. hopefully.
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A bit of a sensationalist title, but Instant Messaging and Trashing Google exposes some very interesting numbers. I have used AIM as my IM client since it overtook ICQ in popularity. If people don’t have AIM, I talk to them though email. I’ve tried MSN, but since my core group of people uses AIM, I have no need for it! The numbers are eye-opening, showing that MSN has the largest userbase by far, 203 million. If I had a userbase of 33 million, I’d feel pretty proud, but AIM has but 16.6% the userbase of the class leader!
Since MSN and Yahoo recently joined forces, does that mean MSN is now a 280 million user juggernaught?