Friday, January 29, 2021

#2596, Friday, January 29, '21: Happy birthday to me

Post 2596
- 10 years and 29 days since I started this blog -
January, 2019: Boy Blues Bar,  Chiang Mai, Thailand
Daily Comment
It's a lot - I've far outlasted my expectations - up to the age of sixty, I don't think I ever thought I'd see seventy. So, seventy-one, which I reached at 1:50am this morning, seems like a real treat.

I am not concerned much with my mortality (or maybe I would have more accurately been able to predict my longevity). I am not afraid of dying (something brought home to me while I waited for three days in a hospital bed for my quintuple bypass). Of course, I am not looking forward to dying, either.

My just-concluded seventieth was a weird year, of course, for me and everyone else on the planet. The best things I can say about it were that, a) I survived it, and 2) I did a Spanish lesson every single day of it.

If there were ever a time to deal with serious heart problems, though, it was probably the best time - all the things I would have missed out on while recovering were missed out on by everybody. 

Which makes this an unusually hopeful birthday - things are going to get better this year than they were - the bar is too low to not to be stepped over.

I start my 71st orbit in good health, with almost no restrictions on my diet or activities.

I take none of it for granted, and today I feel I have more to be grateful for, just for continuing to show up
.

Food and Diet 
Today's Weight:                    
204.0 lbs.
Previous Weight (1/28/21):         203.5 lbs.
Net Loss/Gain:                     + 0.5 lbs.

Diet Comment
I finished my pork rinds late last night and knew I would see an increase in my weight today. I regret nothing.

Food Log
Breakfast
1:35pm, from CoreLife Eatery:
Korean BBQ Pork: Kale, quinoa, kimchi, cucumbers, spicy broccoli, Sriracha sprouts, fried egg, slow-roasted pork, and Korean bbq sauce.
Lunch
3:20pm: Pumpkin pie and a 'magic' chocolate chip cookie. 

Dinner
9:40pm: Veggie sloppy Joe (Quorn grounds mushroom protein, Wegman's Grandpa's Sauce, chopped kale and spinach) on black edamame spaghetti., and a Quest bar.

Liquid Intake
   Espressos: 1;   Coffee: 16 oz.;  Water: 72+ oz.; 


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Thursday, January 28, 2021

#2595, Thursday, January 28, '21: No comment

Post 2595
- 10 years and 28 days since I started this blog -
January, 2019: Boy Blues Bar,  Chiang Mai, Thailand
Daily Comment
I've got nothing to say, but it's okay.

Food and Diet 
Today's Weight:                    
203.5 lbs.
Previous Weight (1/27/21):         202.5 lbs.
Net Loss/Gain:                     + 1.0 lbs.

Diet Comment
I knew when I opened that bag of pork rinds late last night that I would see an increase in my weight today. It was unnecessary, I wasn't even hungry. I blame the pandemic and TV.

Food Log
Breakfast
2:20pm: LEO (lox, eggs and onions), avocado toast, brussels sprouts with cheese and balsamic vinaigrette.

Lunch
Skipped. 

Dinner
9:45pm: Greek yogurt with walnuts, two Quest bars and another (the last - for awhile) bag of hot and spicy pork rinds. Yes, I know.

Liquid Intake
   Espressos: 1;   Coffee: 24 oz.;  Water: 84+ oz.; 


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Wednesday, January 27, 2021

#2594, Wednesday, January 27, '21: No comment

Post 2594
- 10 years and 27 days since I started this blog -
January, 2019: Boy Blues Bar,  Chiang Mai, Thailand
Daily Comment
I've got nothing to say, but it's okay.

Food and Diet 
Today's Weight:                    
202.5 lbs.
Previous Weight (1/26/21):         203.3 lbs.
Net Loss/Gain:                     - 0.8 lbs.

Diet Comment
While still not moving the trend-line much, this little loss is comforting.

Food Log
Breakfast
6:05pm: Bacon and eggs and oatmeal+(Rolled oats, hemp seeds, walnuts, blueberries, blackberries, raspberries, oat milk, kefir, chia seeds, stevia). 

Lunch
Skipped. 

Dinner
9:10pm:
Vegetarian sloppy joe (Quorn Grounds, Wegman's Grandpa's Sauce, spinach and kale) on riced cauliflower.. Not shown: A Quest bar, a bag of Hot and Spicy Pork Rinds 
Liquid Intake
   Espressos: 1;   Coffee: 24 oz.;  Water: 74+ oz.; 


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Tuesday, January 26, 2021

#2593, Tuesday, January 26, '21: Pot

Post 2593
- 10 years and 26 days since I started this blog -
January, 2019: Boy Blues Bar,  Chiang Mai, Thailand
Daily Comment
I smoked pot for the first time early in my senior year in high school. I was fifteen years old at the time (it was October, 1965). My friend Steve had been trying to get me high since the previous year. I had no idea what it was actually like. I'd had a bit of experience with alcohol (drunk more than a few times, sick only a few less times). I didn't understand anything about the culture. Not too long before this, a classmate called someone a pothead and I had no clue - I knew the name marijuana, but at that point didn't know it was also called 'pot' and users were 'heads'.

So much innocence.

For the most part, I smoked weed from that point forward. A few times, for work reasons (drug-testing), I stopped, sometimes for many months. One time, in my twenties, I stopped for a few months out of concerns that it was a morally bad choice. That passed. And when it did, I never had doubts about where I stood with it: I liked it and had no qualms about smoking it from then on.

I think cannabis is a beneficial plant, and there is historical and scientific evidence to support that. It is one, if not the, most useful plants known to man. There is almost nothing it isn't good for, industry, food, medicine
.

The big problem with pot is and has always been political. The act that made it illegal (via a tax you could be jailed for paying, or not paying) was based in racism, not public health, and was passed with no debate, at the last minute before a congressional recess. 

Later, it was made a class-1 controlled drug, meaning it had no medical value, even though it had documented medical uses (including a US government-held patent for its use). Cannabis history as medicine is thousands of years old.

Every evil I have personally experienced connected with cannabis had to do not with the properties of the plant itself, but from its legal status. When the move to legalize started, first with medical uses, it was proven that there were medical benefits.

So, I have almost never been troubled by my own use. If it isn't bad, why, other than legal paranoia, would using it be bad. Experientially, it has never been a negative in my life.

I like it.

I'm grateful for my good luck, that has allowed me to get high for more than fifty-five years without suffering any negative consequences
.

Food and Diet 
Today's Weight:                    
203.3 lbs.
Previous Weight (1/25/21):         203.5 lbs.
Net Loss/Gain:                     - 0.2 lbs.

Diet Comment
This little loss is not enough to prevent the year's first day of an increasing-weight trend-line. I have hopes for tomorrow.

Food Log
Breakfast
1:40pm: LEO: (lox - smoked salmon - eggs and onions) and brussels sprouts with olive oil and shaved parmesan cheese. Also, after a pause, a Quest bar.

Lunch
Skipped. 

Dinner
10:05pm:
Salmon burger with homemade seasoned mayonnaise on black mung bean spaghetti with olive oil and herbs. not shown: Salad (Spring Mix, cabbage, baby spinach, balsamic vinaigrette) and a Quest bar with peanut butter.

Liquid Intake

   Espressos: 2;   Coffee: 0 oz.;  Water: 74+ oz.; 


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Monday, January 25, 2021

#2592, Monday, January 25, '21: Better sleep

Post 2592
- 10 years and 25 days since I started this blog -
January, 2019: Boy Blues Bar,  Chiang Mai, Thailand
Daily Comment
The pandemic drags on and so do I.

No complaints, I still make my own choices, and I could be doing things differently. But that isn't really what I want, or I would be.

I have made great strides in being well-rested to do all the nothing I do every day.

The FitBit has been a great tool for addressing my chronic sleep issues. 

Another helpful tool is the Echo Studio ("Alexa, play Pure White Noise"), which addresses a problem I didn't previously know I had by masking other noise when I am trying to go to or return to sleep - even my tinnitis. I bought it as an early birthday present, and while it is supposed to be the most high-fidelity Echo, it's audio still doesn't please me (the main reason i haven't bought one earlier). 

The biggest problem I have with sleep is that I wake up at least twice a night and can't fall back asleep.

I've corrected this problem with breathing exercises and pot, and now I'm sleeping more than seven hours a night. When I first got the FitBit, that number was less than five.

I'm grateful for a good night's sleep, and for the means to learn and change
.

Food and Diet 
Today's Weight:                    
203.5 lbs.
Previous Weight (1/22/21):         203.0 lbs.
Net Loss/Gain:                     + 0.5 lbs.

Diet Comment
I did not have a great weekend as far as weight control goes. I found myself 'boredom eating' in front of the TV - Sunday I ate (literally) twenty dollars worth of snack food. Healthy snack food, but still, excessive.

Food Log
Breakfast
3:40pm: Oatmeal+: Rolled oats, hemp seeds, walnuts, blueberries, blackberries, raspberries, oat milk, kefir, chia seeds, stevia.

Lunch
Skipped. 

Dinner
9:40pm: Carrots and mayonnaise, manchego cheese and macadamia nuts.

Liquid Intake
   Espressos: 2;   Coffee: 24 oz.;  Water: 84+ oz.; 


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Friday, January 22, 2021

#2591, Friday, January 22, '21: No comment

Post 2591
- 10 years and 22 days since I started this blog -
Syracuse, January, 2018
Daily Comment
I've got nothing to say, but it's okay.

Food and Diet 
Today's Weight:                    
203.0 lbs.
Previous Weight (1/21/21):         201.4 lbs.
Net Loss/Gain:                     + 1.6 lbs.

Diet Comment
I finished the Keto ice cream. Will drop weight going forward.

Food Log
Breakfast
1:35pm:
Cheese and veggie omelet (3 eggs, shaved parmesan cheese, kale, spinach, mushrooms, onions, peppers) and brussels sprouts with butter, pepper, bacon. Yes, exactly the same as Tuesday because I liked it and the pic came out so well. 

Lunch

7:45pm: An organic beef burger with guacamole on Ezekiel 4:9 Flax sprouted grain bread and a salad (arugula cabbage, chard, kale, spinach, shaved parmesan, walnuts and creamy balsamic dressing). 

Dinner
11:40pm: Cottage cheese and a Quest bar.

Liquid Intake
   Espressos: 2;   Coffee: 24 oz.;  Water: 84+ oz.; 


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Thursday, January 21, 2021

#2590, Thursday, January 21, '21: No comment

Post 2590
- 10 years and 21 days since I started this blog -
Syracuse, January, 2018
Daily Comment
I've got nothing to say, but it's okay.

Food and Diet 
Today's Weight:                    
201.4 lbs.
Previous Weight (1/20/21):         200.9 lbs.
Net Loss/Gain:                     + 0.5 lbs.

Diet Comment
It seems like every time I eat Keto ice cream, I gain. So, after my next and last pint, I'm done. That'll be tonight.

Food Log
Breakfast
7:15pm: Roasted turkey breast with kale, spinach and lentils in curry sauce, on riced cauliflower.

Lunch
9:40pm: Keto ice cream and peanut butter. 

Dinner
11:40pm: Carrots and mayonnaise. Pork rinds (hot and spicy).

Liquid Intake
   Espressos: 0;   Coffee: 0 oz.;  Water: 64+ oz.; 


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Wednesday, January 20, 2021

#2589, Wednesday, January 20, '21: No new America

Post 2589
- 10 years and 20 days since I started this blog -
Syracuse, January, 2018
Daily Comment
I am glad for the change in government. I deplored 45 for thirty years before he became president, and I think it was the worst government I've experienced in my life.

I have little interest in politics. Which party, which president, has never been a big determinant of my situation. I have my ideas about what would be good governance, and I have little-to-no chance of ever seeing them manifest anywhere - and zero chances of having them realized in the US.

So, there's that. It is not that I'm completely apathetic - like I said, I have my ideals, but they are Utopian, and we are not close in this world to a Utopian society with an ideal (my definition) government.

And I see no danger of an outbreak of virtue in Washington, DC, even as its opposite has left town. 

I'm grateful for all the privilege that allows and has allowed such detached musings, and for my past political involvement, which has formed my present indifference to the same
.

Food and Diet 
Today's Weight:                    
200.9 lbs.
Previous Weight (1/19/21):         201.0 lbs.
Net Loss/Gain:                     - 0.1 lbs.

Diet Comment
This difference is just noise - it's the same as yesterday.

Food Log
Breakfast
3:40pm: Super oatmeal: Rolled oats, hemp seeds, peanut butter, vanilla whey protein, walnuts, blueberries, blackberries, raspberries, oat milk, kefir, chia seeds, stevia.

Lunch
Skipped. 

Dinner
9:40pm: Salmon salad: Wild-caught salmon, homemade mayonnaise, celery, arugula, cabbage, chard, kale, spinach, walnuts. Keto ice cream and peanut butter for dessert.

Liquid Intake
   Espressos: 2;   Coffee: 0 oz.;  Water: 56+ oz.; 


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Tuesday, January 19, 2021

#2588, Tuesday, January 19, '21: No comment

Post 2588
- 10 years and 19 days since I started this blog -
Syracuse, January, 2018
Daily Comment
I've got nothing to say, but it's okay.

Food and Diet 
Today's Weight:                    
201.0 lbs.
Previous Weight (1/18/21):         201.7 lbs.
Net Loss/Gain:                     - 0.7 lbs.

Diet Comment
I thought I was being good over the weekend, but apparently not. I'm going to be low-carbing the next couple of days.

Food Log
Breakfast
3:35pm:
Cheese and veggie omelet (3 eggs, shaved parmesan cheese, kale, spinach, mushrooms, onions, peppers) and brussels sprouts with butter, pepper, bacon.
Lunch

Skipped. 

Dinner
10:20pm: Lentil curry on black soybean spaghetti, a Quest bar with peanut butter for dessert.

Snack
12:00am: Hot and Spicy pork rinds.

Liquid Intake
   Espressos: 2;   Coffee: 22 oz.;  Water: 60+ oz.; 


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Monday, January 18, 2021

#2587, Monday, January 18, '21: Sentimentality

Post 2587
- 10 years and 18 days since I started this blog -
Syracuse, January, 2018
Daily Comment
One effect the pandemic has had on me (or it might be aging, or my heart attack, but I think it's the isolation of pandemic safety) is that it has brought out and exaggerated a side of me that is very sentimental.

I cry at heartwarming stuff on the TV (can't make it through an episode of Atypical without tears).

I don't confuse sentimentality with nostalgia, either, although i have always thought they went hand-in-hand. I don't spend a lot of time feeling nostalgic. I have no longing for the past. I have no inclination to idealize the past. Yet it seems thata even without nostalgia, I am mawkishly sentimental
.

Instead, I find myself lingering over pictures of my great-niece Penelope as she becomes a person, delighting in her discovering new abilities as she transitions from infant to toddler. And watching heartwarming dramedies like Parenthood, This Is Us, and Atypical. And weeping happily.

I'm grateful for the acts of kindness, real and fictional, that I find so moving
.

Food and Diet 
Today's Weight:                    
201.7 lbs.
Previous Weight (1/15/21):         198.9 lbs.
Net Loss/Gain:                     + 2.8 lbs.

Diet Comment
I thought I was being good over the weekend, but apparently not. I'm going to be low-carbing the next couple of days.

Food Log
Breakfast
4:05pm: Greens and eggs (three large eggs, kale, spinach, mushrooms, onions, peppers) with bacon.

Lunch
Skipped. 

Dinner
8:40pm: 1/3 pound organic beef burger with cheese, coleslaw, salad (Spring Mix, baby spinach, shaved parmesan, balsamic vinaigrette) and a Quest bar with peanut butter..

Liquid Intake
   Espressos: 2;   Coffee: 0 oz.;  Water: 60+ oz.; 


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Friday, January 15, 2021

#2486, Friday, January 15, '21: Moving abroad

Post 2586
- 10 years and 15 days since I started this blog -
January, 2020 in Chiang Mai, Thailand
Daily Comment
I think I have wanted to live overseas, outside the US, for most of my life. The first time I remember feeling like that was in the late Fifties, when I saw the movie, "The King and I".

I was very taken with the story of someone moving to a country with strange customs and language, and, of course, the movie makes it all look gorgeous and exotic.

A few years later, for a report for my 7th-grade social studies class, I visited every embassy from a Latin American country I could find in New York, and collected all their pamphlets extolling their country's virtues
.

I got the idea for that from the early Sixties hit TV show, "I Spy". Like everybody, I was taken with Bill Cosby, first black lead in a primetime television show, but it was actually Robert Culp who intrigued me. And, of course, all the shows took place in foreign countries and were replete with travelog footage. I loved fantasizing that it was me in all those places. 

Fast-forward a year or so, to a family trip to Niagara Falls taken in the Summer of 1963. Canada! It meant a lot to me, just knowing I was in a foreign country. I swear, looking back I can see my delusion, but I thought everything looked different, a couple of miles to the other side of the US border. Better.

Side note: On the motel television in Niagara Falls, I got to stay up and watch the Jack Paar show (the immediate predecessor to the Tonight Show with Johnny Carson). This particular night, he showed a film he'd gotten from England, where 'the crazy teenagers' were going insane listening to a 'goofy-looking' rock'n'roll band. The first footage of the Beatles in the US. I started high school two months later.

I went, as an innocent tourist, to Jamaica in 1968. And then, almost every year after until 1983. I went to the same place every time. I got to know people. Mostly, I went with friends. A few times I went alone, and met friends, Jamaican or repeat Americans like myself.

At the end of the decade of the Sixties, December, 1969, I made a trip that set the pattern for all my traveling after. With no real plan, I went to Europe, specifically to Spain, and after a few days I ran down my friend Marco in Ibiza - which is a great story in itself, but not relevant here. Here, the point is, I started traveling alone.

I didn't stay alone, but that was the way I traveled, and I established that as my favorite mode. In fact, I never again had as good a time traveling with a companion or companions.

My Jamaican experience established another feature of my personal travel style: I always have only one destination. No multi-country, or even multi-city tours. This is less a hard rule, there is always the possibility of finding oneself with downtime in one place when something specific in another beckons. In the last fifty years, this has happened twice.

In the mid-nineties, I encountered a magazine, International Living, that actively promoted the idea (which had already occurred independently to me) that living outside the US, looked at by so many Americans as an undesirable compromise of a wonderful lifestyle, had many advantages.

At this time, I was very unhappy. I was in an unhappy marriage, and an unhappy job, and feeling a bit isolated from my roots, and the idea, in the back of my mind, took hold.

By the late-nineties, I had a list of places I was looking to 'retire' to. I didn't have a good idea of what that meant or exactly how I'd get there, but my financial prospects were pretty good, and I thought I might have an early retirement from my coming wealth.

That didn't actually work out, timing-wise. But I was hooked. Everything I read (and continue reading to this day) convinced me that getting out of the country was a good idea. Initially, it had been strictly a proactive move, now there was all that plus a very negative view of American politics and social structure.

These were the forces that kept the idea and my enthusiasm alive for these twenty-five or so years. I planned to leave right after I retired in 2016, then postponed it, primarily to stay in the music scene, and keep my band i am Fool going.

I visited the place at the top of my list, Chiang Mai, Thailand, for the first time in 2017. I stayed for a month. I loved it. It was better than I expected. I wanted to move there. Then, the next year, the government changed the immigration policies regarding residency visas, and it was hostile to my plans. It was still fantastic, but no longer a place I was going to live. 

In 2020 I discovered Cuenca, Ecuador, and, since in the previous year my two biggest musical projects had ended, in one case, and gone dormant in the other, I decided to move. 

Then came the pandemic. When I got back to Syracuse mid-May, I was set on my November departure (I'm going to vote, then leave). My best local friend (and leader of i am Fool) took it hard. He took the time to write me a long e-mail to convince me to stay. It worked, insofar as I decided, given the situation at the time (I couldn't get into any of the countries on my list at that time due to COVID-19), to postpone my departure until the pandemic was over.

Then came my heart problems. Now, I don't know. I still want to emigrate, I still dream, as I have for all these years, of waking up in a not-American place. The politics of the last decade in this country have been very troubling. My finances allow me to stay, but I would thrive (financially, at least) in a lower-cost environment. 

I still look at Cuenca's online 'newspaper' and classifieds every day. But... I don't know if I'll ever get there. And I never checked out Medellin or Montevideo, both real possibilities.

But now I have health concerns. And now, i am Fool is once again - for the second year - in a precarious place, and I love this band. I leave, it's over. 

So, maybe, if I live long enough, I can realize my dream of a life in a place where I can get everything I need and most of what I want, in a pleasant, winter-less  environment where my age is not a hindrance or severe limitation.

I'm grateful for my dreams
.

Food and Diet 
Today's Weight:                    
198.9 lbs.
Previous Weight (1/14/21):         199.0 lbs.
Net Loss/Gain:                     - 0.1 lbs.

Diet Comment
Pretty much the same, this ends the week on a good note.

Food Log
Breakfast
Skipped.

Lunch
6:05pm: PBVF protein smoothie with oat milk, kefir, large organic egg, chia gel, kale, spinach, frozen wild blueberries, whey powder (18g protein), hemp seeds, hemp protein (7g protein), raw organic cacao powder, moringa leaf powder, fo ti (mushroom powder), cinnamon, turmeric and stevia-inulin blend.

Dinner
12:20am: Macadamia nuts and parmesan cheese crisps.

Liquid Intake
   Espressos: 2;   Coffee: 24 oz.;  Water: 72+ oz.; 


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