#2991, Friday, March 31, 2023

Post 2991

- 13 years and 90 days since I started this blog -

Food and Diet

Today's Weight:                    196.8 lbs.

Previous Weight (3/30/23):         196.8 lbs.

Net Loss/Gain:                     - 0.0 lbs.

Diet Comment

No change is good. More loss will come.

Food Log

Breakfast
1:15pm:  Sweet potato and veggies frittata (eggs, sweet potatoes, mushrooms, onions, peppers, chia and hemp seeds, cheddar cheese).

Lunch
6:10pm: A 'One' protein bar and peanut butter.

Dinner
11:15pm: Big-ass turkey salad: Roasted turkey breast, walnuts, cheddar cheese, arugula, cabbage, chard, kale, spinach, balsamic vinaigrette.

Liquid Intake

   Espressos: 1;   Coffee: 24 oz.;  Water: 48+ oz.; and a lot of Jameson's Irish whiskey at Shifty's

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#2990, Thursday, March 30, 2023

Post 2990

- 13 years and 89 days since I started this blog -

Food and Diet

Today's Weight:                    196.8 lbs.

Previous Weight (3/28/23):         198.1 lbs.

Net Loss/Gain:                     - 1.3 lbs.

Diet Comment

Good one-day loss. After today, I should get down to what I hope is a new normal weight - 195 pounds. I'd still like to lose another 5 from here, but only organically, I'm not going to change anything.

Food Log

Breakfast
1:25pm: Smoked salmon omelet, with chia and hemp seeds and onions and peppers. With Ezekiel 4:9 Flax sprouted grain toast and cream cheese.

Lunch
5:00pm: A Quest bar and peanut butter.

Dinner
10:00pm: Vegetarian sloppy Joe (Quorn Grounds (mushroom protein), spinach, kale, and Wegman's Grandpa's Sauce Goes Vegetarian spaghetti sauce) on riced cauliflower with nutritional yeast and Everything But the Bagel seasoning.

Liquid Intake

   Espressos: 1;   Coffee: 24 oz.;  Water: 54+ oz.;

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#2989, Wednesday, March 29, 2023

Post 2989

- 13 years and 88 days since I started this blog -

March 17, 2023

Food and Diet

Today's Weight:                    198.1 lbs.

Previous Weight (3/28/23):         195.1 lbs.

Net Loss/Gain:                     + 3.0 lbs.

Diet Comment

This incredible one-day gain will be straightened out beginning with today's eating, as it is the result of a one-day high-carb, high calorie binge.

Food Log

Breakfast
12:10pm:

Oatmeal plus (rolled oats, chia and hemp seeds, wild blueberries, walnuts, kefir, whey protein powder, nutritional yeast, mushroom powder, cacao nibs, cinnamon, stevia). Not shown: Scrambled eggs with spinach, kale, and cheddar cheese. 

Lunch
3:00pm: A 'One' protein bar.

Dinner

11:15pm: Walnuts and smoked gouda cheese, curry ramen with kale and spinach (ViteRamen high protein, low carb ramen) and a Quest bar.

Liquid Intake

 Espressos: 1;   Coffee: 24 oz.;  Water: 48+ oz.;

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#2988, Tuesday, March 28, 2023

Post 2988

- 13 years and 87 days since I started this blog -

March 17, 2023

Food and Diet

Today's Weight:                    195.1 lbs.

Previous Weight (3/27/23):         195.7 lbs.

Net Loss/Gain:                     - 0.1 lbs.

Diet Comment

From a diet/medical point of view, it was a pretty disastrous day. I went to the open mic at the Maplewood, and didn't have a real good time, then got depressed talking with Debbie about not playing with the Jimi Marley Project any more. So I went home, got stoned, and ate and ate and ate, very high-calorie and sugary from the dried mangoes.

Food Log

Breakfast
12:10pm:

Oatmeal plus (rolled oats, chia and hemp seeds, wild blueberries, walnuts, kefir, whey protein powder, nutritional yeast, mushroom powder, cacao nibs, cinnamon, stevia). Not shown: Scrambled eggs with spinach, kale, and cheddar cheese. 

Lunch
4:30pm: Dark chocolate and almond butter cups.

Dinner
7:50pm, at the Maplewood Pub: Tortellini and shrimp salad.

Late night snack
10:50pm: A 'One' protein bar (similar to Quest bar, but better-tasting and cheaper on sale), a bag of chili-coated dried mangos (my favorite thing from Trader Joe's) and a half pound of smoked gouda cheese.

Liquid Intake

   Espressos: 1;   Coffee: 24 oz.;  Water: 48+ oz.;

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#2987, Monday, March 27, 2023:

Post 2987

- 13 years and 86 days since I started this blog -

March 17, 2023

Food and Diet

Today's Weight:                    195.7 lbs.

Previous Weight (3/26/23):         195.8 lbs.

Net Loss/Gain:                     - 0.1 lbs.

Diet Comment

This is my first official post-Winter-travels weigh-in. It's actually three pounds lower than my last official official, pre-Thanksgiving weigh-in from November 24.

Food Log

Breakfast
12:10pm:

Oatmeal plus (rolled oats, chia and hemp seeds, wild blueberries, walnuts, kefir, Greek yogurt, whey protein powder, nutritional yeast, mushroom powder, cacao nibs, cinnamon, stevia). Not shown: Scrambled eggs with cheese. 

Lunch
Skipped.

Dinner
9:45pm: Salmon burger with guacamole, and a big-ass salad (Super Greens, red cabbage, shaved parmesan cheese, walnuts and balsamic vinaigrette).

Liquid Intake

   Espressos: 1;   Coffee: 24 oz.;  Water: 48+ oz.;

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#2986, Monday, March 6, 2023: Actually, a week later, and then some

Post 2986

- 13 years and 65 days since I started this blog -

Journal

(written March 6, 2023)

Read this once (it won't change for the rest of the trip(s): I'll be linking this post to Facebook. If that's how you got here, here's some background: About 12 years ago I started this blog as a food journal. I had a medical situation and needed to lose weight. Initially, that's all I did here: Journal my food intake and my weight. It contributed to helping me lose 20+% of my body weight in 6 months, and continuing has kept me on track since then. I started adding commentary after a while, but lately it has become infrequent. 

While I'm traveling, I let go of the weight-tracking and food journaling, except for food shots when I've eaten something interesting or pretty. And that's where we find ourselves now.

I started writing this blog post in Guayaquil, in a pleasant hotel across the highway from the airport. When I left, in the middle of the night, the international part of the winter was done.

I spent the next week traveling. Out of those seven days, I got only 2 nights of good sleep. I was in transit 5 of the seven days. It was brutal, and I didn't get to finish the writing until I reached my last stop of this Winter trip, in Wilbur-by-the-Sea, Florida, just South of Daytona Beach Shores.

Getting back to my last week in Ecuador, It was a great week, although I don't have too many photographs to show for it. That's what happens when you get caught up in what you're doing. I wasn't good about stopping for pics. In fact, many of this post's photos are from friends.

Claudia, who has lived in Cuenca for three years, had never been to Capitán, my favorite seafood restaurant. So I took her.

Me, Claudia, Orly (el Capitán) after yet another great meal. Yes, everybody's all smiles.

The 'traditional' post-meal serenade. I've done this after every single meal I've eaten at Capitán, from the first time four years ago.

A few nights later, we went to the open mic at Bistro Yaku. Earlier that day, I'd met Peter Nolan on the street and asked him to come to the open mic, because I hadn't heard him play since meeting him in Cuenca before the pandemic. To my great pleasure, he did show up and play. He even invited Claudia to play some harp with him. 

Claudia did a set with Josep, an extraordinary bass player who manages to accompany a variety of singers on bass, and make it sound beneficially arranged, on bass alone.

The wonderful Peter Nolan. Peter travels the world like me, but more. He travels with his wife Sharon, and has a one-man blues show that enables him to play literally anywhere he can stand. We have performed in a few of the same places, once, when we first met a few years ago, at the same time. After his set, a woman came up and gave one of the best vocal performances I've ever heard, anywhere. It even included her imitating a trumpet, and singing a great trumpet solo. When it was over, Peter came over to me and said, "We're never going to forget what we just heard." Confirmation that I didn't imagine what had just happened. I heard a lot of phenomenally good music while I was in Ecuador. But really, that's par for the course.

Next, and 'final' event, Saturday night, Claudia's  band, Blues Enigma, had a gig at a new venue, and I'd been invited to sit in.

So, me 'sitting in.' I am aware that I am standing. Thank you. It was a lot of fun, and the most playing I got to do since Chiang Mai!

This is the Blues Enigma Band. While I played bass, their bass player switched to lap steel guitar. I'm sorry I don't have any pictures of that. These pics are from my friend Anthony.

That's really the highlights of my last week. 

Here are some walking around pics:

Anthony and me discussing some... things. We're opinionated.

The day I left Cuenca, Claudia, Felipe, Anthony, Diego the taxista and I went to Sinfonía and had pastrami and cheese on sourdough, with dijon mustard I had donated to the shop. 

And then I got on my minibus to Guayaquil, and it was over. 

Food Comment

Pedregal Azteca is the best Mexican restaurant I've eaten at outside of Oaxaca, and that's the highest compliment I can give a Mexican restaurant. Everything, from the tortilla chips and dip to dessert was excellent. This mole poblano con pollo was seriously good, even compared to the last mole I'd had, which was in Oaxaca. 

From Paccari, at Casa de Coco, we have a cheesecake with a chocolate crust. Again, seriously good. Due to my late-in-the-trip discovery (it opened two weeks before I left, but I didn't go there until my last week, it was the only thing I ate in the café, although I had Pacari chocolate (I don't know why the café's two 'c's and the chocolate's one 'c') every day once I'd found it. 

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