#1399, Monday, April 6: Celebrity message

Post 1399, Day 96 of 2015
- 1,557 days since I started this blog -

Daily Comment

I hadn't written anything on my blog today (usually, I write the commentary during the day). Today, I didn't, and I went to sleep without having accomplished that particular task.

I woke up in the middle of the night to pee. Before going back to bed, I checked my phone. Something I never do in the middle of the night (and lots of times, I forget to do it during the day).

There was a text message from Alex.

We'd talked during the day - he was excited - he'd met Mick Fleetwood of Fleetwood Mac and they'd hit it off. Mick had invited him to dinner, given him VIP tickets to the night's show in Bakersfield, backstage passes and an invitation to the after-party. He'd asked what my favorite song of theirs was (Rhiannon, by the way. I very much admire and appreciate the Fleetwood-McVie rhythm section - and they were the only band I knew named for the rhythm section).

So, it's a quarter to four, I'm up, and I've peed and I see a two-hour-old message from Alex.

It's a 40 second video to me from Alex... and Mick Fleetwood. <--Click to see it.

Now I'm wide awake. No sleep for me. And that's today's Daily Comment.

Food and Diet Section

Today's Weight:                   210.0 lbs

Previous Weight (4/3):            209.6 lbs

Day Net Loss/Gain:                + 0.4 lbs

Diet Comment

I misbehaved - diet-wise - over the weekend, but I'm going to be good now, I will, I will...
 

Food Log

Breakfast
Quest bars.

Lunch

Roasted turkey breast chopped salad: baby kale, baby spinach, chard, cole slaw mix and balsamic vinaigrette.

Dinner
Pepperoni and broccoli with Dal Tadka.

Snack
Celery and home-made spicy mayonnaise.

Liquid Intake
   Coffee:  24 oz.   Water: 80+ oz. and a pour of Jameson's Irish whiskey.

Please leave a comment if you visit my blog. Thank you!

 

#1398, Friday, April 3: See the man with the stage fright...

Post 1398, Day 93 of 2015
- 1,554 days since I started this blog -

Daily Comment

The pic above was taken right before I started my set - my first ever appearance at an open mic as a singer/guitarist.

If there were ever any question of my impulse control, this should answer it: I have little-to-none. 

A friend of mine was starting a new open mic, about twelve minutes from my apartment, in a club I knew with new ownership. In support, I went there with bass guitar in hand, looking to see if anybody would have a need for me, or, at worst, accommodate me on their set.

About halfway there, I decided that if I could borrow a guitar, I'd play a few songs. I came up with a short list that I could sing and remember the chords to (which meant the entire repertoire was limited to tunes from the mid-to-late sixties).

My friend and host was delighted to loan me his guitar.

I was a little nervous. Playing guitar and singing is nothing new to me, but has been a very rare part of my musical experience for the last thirty-five years or so.

Then the performers started. A very impressive group. All excellent guitarists and singers. Some performed all original material. I began feeling something I hadn't felt in a musical environment in a very long time: Performance jitters.

As accomplished performer followed accomplished performer, my nervousness increased, until I had full-blown stagefright.

Then something kind of cool happened. I thought about how I was feeling, and where it was coming from; I realized I was doing things I don't usually do: Compare myself to other performers, worry about other people's opinions of me, and, most of all, fear of a truly unknown near-term future, that might just hold shame and embarassment.

I got on the stage and told the story of why Roy Orbison wore sunglasses when he performed, as though I had suggested the idea to him, and put on some shades (you can see them in my shirt pocket above). Nobody gave me much of a response. Then I tuned up. And by the time I had finished, I was in that music-performance zone I am so addicted to.

My set list consisted of Don't Let Me Be Misunderstood (Nina Simone; the Animals), Travellin' Light (Herman's Hermits), Reason to Believe (Tim Hardin). It seemed to be going well, because I was asked for an encore (!). I played No Expectations (the Rolling Stones) and We Gotta Get Outa This Place (the Animals - again).

I knew being afraid of it had made it the right thing to do.

Food and Diet Section

Today's Weight:                   209.6 lbs

Previous Weight (4/2):            210.6 lbs

Day Net Loss/Gain:                - 1.0 lbs

Diet Comment

My weight loss continues apace. I'm going to try to be very good this weekend, and come back a pound or two lighter on Monday.
 

Food Log

Breakfast
Skipped.

Lunch
A cocoa-hemp-berries-and-kale protein shake (almond-coconut milk, kefir, kale, frozen mixed strawberries, blueberries and raspberries, large organic egg, whey powder (36g protein), hemp seeds, hemp protein (7g protein), celery, raw organic cacao powder, fermented coconut water, chia gel, moringa leaf powder, cinnamon and stevia-inulin blend.

Dinner
Pepperoni, cole slaw and cheese.

Snack
Cheese, celery and home-made spicy mayonnaise.

Liquid Intake
   Coffee:  24 oz.   Water: 76+ oz. 

Please leave a comment if you visit my blog. Thank you!

 

#1397, Thursday, April 2: Marvin Gaye day

Post 1397, Day 92 of 2015
- 1,553 days since I started this blog -

Daily Comment

One of my all-time favorite musicians was born on this date.

Marvin Gaye started as a session drummer at Motown. It may have been Berry Gordy's single greatest achievement (among many) to recognize how much more he could do, and to be convinced (by Marvin, of course) to give him the opportunity to do so much more.

The rest, as they say, is history. A lot of it is triumphant, but much of it is sad, not the least his untimely, filicidal murder.

As well as being a great, emotional, versatile singer, he was a trend-setting songwriter.

And, at Motown, a ground-breaker. He went on strike at Motown when they refused to release 'What's Going On' because it was too political, and raised the stakes to release Motown's first autonomous album. That album was the first to give credit to the musicians who backed the Motown artists.

He was the first singer I associated with Motown. I had the great fortune to see him in performance twice. His humanity showed through the formal settings of his concerts (he performed in a tuxedo both times.

When I saw him at Radio City Music Hall, he stopped the show to make certain a musician who had fallen off the bandstand riser was not injured. Although the musician didn't return, he assured the audience he was all right, and re-started the show to a standing ovation.

To me, he was the epitome of the complete musician - someone who could move the listener by putting his soul on display, even between the lines of the lyric. That he was a great wordsmith was almost irrelevant - you could hear it in his voice, no matter what the lyric.

Food and Diet Section

Today's Weight:                   210.6 lbs

Previous Weight (4/1):            211.6 lbs

Day Net Loss/Gain:                - 1.0 lbs

Diet Comment

I am happy that what I ate and drank after midnight last night didn't put weight on. A little confused that I still lost weight. But mostly, relieved. It was a good time, I was prepared to see the consequences at weigh in, but no! OK, mostly happy.
 

Food Log

Breakfast
A capicolo/cheese/greens/onions/peppers omelet.

Lunch

Roasted turkey breast chopped salad: baby kale, baby spinach, chard, cole slaw mix and balsamic vinaigrette. And a Quest bar for dessert.

Dinner
Pepperoni, cole slaw and cheese.

Liquid Intake
   Coffee:  28 oz.   Water: 104+ oz. 

Please leave a comment if you visit my blog. Thank you!

 

#1396, Wednesday, April 1: The sin of pride and ignorance

Post 1396, Day 91 of 2015
- 1,552 days since I started this blog -

Daily Comment

A friend posted that he was proud of never having watched 'xxxxxx' and didn't intend to change that.

I was taken back by this. I actually don't care what he does or doesn't watch on TV. For the record, I think 'xxxxxx' is great, but I have known other people who avoided it, since it seems 'political'.

But, really, proud of being ignorant? Intentionally being ignorant? I take issue with these ideas, but it does lead me to look at myself. Where are my statements of pride? What 'shelter' do I take in avoiding knowledge?

I am ignorant of a lot of things, but I can't say I take pride in any of that ignorance. I have never believed that ignorance is bliss.

I am, however, skeptical of knowledge. Maybe I'm proud of that, feeling that I am not fooled into believing I know the truth about anything. Of course, any pride is ridiculous, and I have been fooled into believing lots of false stuff. And I would have to be crazier than I even am to believe that I know the truth about anything, or that I have some talent that allows me to discriminate between truth and lies.

Too often, we accept as fact what is belief. Too often we learn a 'truth' only to find later that it is not true. Also, there's a Zen proverb I paraphrase as, "Whatever you believe, the opposite is also true."

Truth is paradoxical. We are wired to accept as true anything that confirms our beliefs, and reject what does not. Information presented authoritatively, and repeated, is believed to be true. There are lots of ways to overwhelm our bullshit detectors.

So: Pride in ignorance - crazy, right? But pride in a belief system? Equally absurd.

I'm having none of it.

Food and Diet Section

Today's Weight:                   211.6 lbs

Previous Weight (3/31):           213.4 lbs

Day Net Loss/Gain:                - 1.8 lbs

Diet Comment

A good start toward my goal to lose 10 pounds in April, undone by late-night drunkenness binge eating after a gig. Sigh.
 

Food Log

Breakfast
A Quest bar.

Lunch
At Ling-Ling's Chinese Buffet and Grill:

Brussels sprouts, kimchee, and, from the "Mongolian Grill", my go-to dish: pork and chicken with cabbage, onions, mushrooms, green peppers and broccoli. Not shown: Dessert Quest bar.

Dinner
A cocoa-hemp-kale protein shake (almond-coconut milk, kefir, kale, large organic egg, whey powder (36g protein), hemp seeds, hemp protein (7g protein), celery, raw organic cacao powder, fermented coconut water, chia gel, moringa leaf powder, cinnamon and stevia-inulin blend.

Snack
Pepperoni and cheese.

Liquid Intake
   Coffee:  28 oz.   Water: 76+ oz. and a shot of Jamerson's and a beer.

Please leave a comment if you visit my blog. Thank you!

 

#1395, Tuesday, March 31: While I was away...

Post 1395, Day 90 of 2015
- 1,551 days since I started this blog -

Daily Comment

The best part of going on vacation is the contrast with the usual day-to-day. I disconnected from life in Syracuse. I did things that were almost exclusively non-Syracuse-life-ordinary things. And I didn't do what I usually do at home.

I did a lot of walking, for one. I walked on the beach, to stores (once - that's a long walk), took late night walks with Reggae, Marco's Irish Wolfhound. I did no driving at all.

I did a lot of fishing, too. I surf-casted almost every day, and went out in Ponce Inlet by boat a couple of times. Discovered a real talent for not catching fish. In fact, nobody around me caught a fish, until the next-to-last day, when a few fish were caught, including one I reeled in. That's the pic I'm posting. 

I heard some of my fishing friends celebrated my departure by catching oodles of fish the day I left.

I ate unusual (for me) things. Lots of off-plan food, including a lot of home-made pizza. Bread. Pretzels. On the other hand, almost every day, I got to eat fresh-caught fish. Still, I lived in a bread and flour environment, and far fewer vegetables. I also drank a lot, including more beer than I've had in the last two years. So... I gained weight, despite the sharp uptick in exercise.

And came home to some news. Terrible news, excellent news.

The bad news is that the leader of i am Fool, J., had a couple of heart attacks while I was away. He had two surgeries. He's stable, in recovery. I found out on my flight home. I'm glad he's still with us, and will recover.

The excellent news is that Alex got an Assistant Writer position on the second season of HBO's show called The Brink. The first season hasn't aired yet, but has finished shooting and is in post-production. He starts in two weeks. He will be leaving Apple to do it. We hope it is the start of the professional writing career he moved to California to have. I am very, very proud of him. It's quite an achievement, almost nine years in the making.

Other than that, I was playing bass within two hours of my arrival home, had picked up a little sub-gig and have a gig this week. That felt good, and normal.

I'm not on vacation anymore. I was very happy while I was in Florida, and I'm very happy in Syracuse.

I'm just a happy guy!

Food and Diet Section

Today's Weight:                   213.4 lbs

Previous Weight (3/20):           208.4 lbs

Day Net Loss/Gain:                + 5.0 lbs

Diet Comment

My vacation, while full of healthy food - most usually, fresh-caught fish - was also an experiment in high-carb eating and drinking. So it goes. Now I have a goal to lose 10 pounds in April.
 

Food Log

Breakfast
A cocoa-hemp-kale protein shake (almond-coconut milk, kefir, kale, large organic egg, whey powder (36g protein), hemp seeds, hemp protein (7g protein), celery, raw organic cacao powder, fermented coconut water, chia gel, moringa leaf powder, cinnamon and stevia-inulin blend.

Lunch

Roasted turkey breast chopped salad: baby kale, baby spinach, chard, cole slaw mix and balsamic vinaigrette. And a Quest bar for dessert.

Dinner
Cheese, capicola, pepper and onion omelet and Ezekiel 4:9 Flax bread.

Snack
Pepperoni.

Liquid Intake
   Coffee:  28 oz.   Water: 88+ oz.

Please leave a comment if you visit my blog. Thank you!

 

#1394, Friday, March 20: On vacation... almost

Post 1394, Day 79 of 2015
- 1,540 days since I started this blog -

Daily Comment

I am going on vacation Monday, so there won't be any updates until April 1st. No joke.

My vacations take the form of visits to friends and family, and this one is no exception. My good and old friend Marco lives in an idyllic setting South of Daytona Beach. He is as close to being on the water as you can get in his location, and we'll be surf-casting for dinner every day I'm there. 

It's what he does every day. He teaches surf-casting, too. He is an excellent chef, as well. Last year's vacation he was sick almost the entire time, and we still spent hours on the beach catching fish.

This is this year's beach vacation, as it was last year's. I'm excitedly looking forward to relief from the noxious weather (today's the first day of Spring, and it's twenty-three degrees out and snowing here in Syracuse), and spending a lot of time outdoors - something very different than what I do at home.

I take two week-long vacations every year, and fill in the year with long weekends. These long weekends are, in many ways, the most important vacations: They're the sanity-keeping ones. The ones that bring me back home to New York City, and to Sharon, MA, and Brattleboro, VT, and Woodstock and Westchester New York.

My other long vacation is to LA to visit Alex and friends. 

That's the plan. Not planned, but happening, will be visits to other parts of New York (I'm officiating at a renewal of vows in Westchester, and just waiting for better weather to get back to Woodstock), and more visits to NYC.

That's how I like to use my vacation.

It just occurred to me that going forward, vacations will be different. They won't be vacations from work, they'll be vacations from my day-to-day life, and not limited by work.

I'm looking forward to that.

Food and Diet Section

Today's Weight:                   208.4 lbs

Previous Weight (3/19):           207.4 lbs

Day Net Loss/Gain:                + 1.0 lbs

Diet Comment

Was it the almonds? Was it eating the majority of my calories after 10pm? I don't know. And, since I ate pretty well, I don't really understand why the weight gain.
 

Food Log

Breakfast
Quest bars.

Lunch

Tuna salad and baby kale, baby spinach, chard and cole slaw mix. Not shown: A Quest bar for dessert.

Snack 

Baby carrots and home-made mayonnaise.

Dinner
Capicola and melted Swiss cheese on Ezekiel 4:9 Flax bread.

Liquid Intake
   Coffee:  28 oz.   Water: 80+ oz.

Please leave a comment if you visit my blog. Thank you!

 

#1392, Thursday, March 19: Old dog, new dog house

Post 1392, Day 78 of 2015
- 1,539 days since I started this blog -

Daily Comment

I now possess an upright bass. Because I need to be more humble.

The few people who know that I was getting it have big expectations. I know better. I am starting from zero with ith it and it will be a long time, if ever, before I can express myself on this bass the way I do on electric bass.

The two instruments are derived from two different instrumental families and have exactly one thing in common: Tuning and frequency range. Other than that, they are different in every dimension, including sound and smell.

My plan of attack is to go slowly, use written music (getting back my music-reading skills will benefit all my playing, I think), and pay a lot of attention to proper form and intonation. The doghouse is very physically challenging, and I know at least one player who has hurt himself to the point of having to give up playing because of his devotion to the upright.

And, I may not ever get to the point where I'm as comfortable with this as I am on bass guitar. So be it. The idea here is my own pleasure/satisfaction/fulfillment. I'm not trying to make anything more out of it than some good sounds, and generate a little self-gratification.

The upright bass was the first musical instrument I was really attracted to, from when I saw Stubby Kaye playing one with a moustache painted on it as a toddler; but its intimidating size, as well as the fact that nobody I personally knew played one kept me from it. By the time I grew into considering it, I was pretty much hooked on bass guitar.

So, once again, something new for this old dog.

Food and Diet Section

Today's Weight:                   207.4 lbs

Previous Weight (3/18):           208.6 lbs

Day Net Loss/Gain:                - 1.2 lbs

Diet Comment

A little recovery from what has been days of indulgence. Today should continue that trend.
 

Food Log

Breakfast
A cocoa-hemp-kale protein shake (almond-coconut milk, kefir, kale, large organic egg, whey powder (36g protein), hemp seeds, hemp protein (7g protein), celery, raw organic cacao powder, fermented coconut water, chia gel, moringa leaf powder, cinnamon and stevia-inulin blend.

Lunch

Roasted turkey breast chopped salad: baby kale, baby spinach, chard, cole slaw mix, black beans and balsamic vinaigrette.

Snack 

A Quest bar.

Dinner
Pepperoni and cole slaw. A few ounces of almonds.

Snack 

Quest bars.

Liquid Intake
   Coffee:  28 oz.   Water: 100+ oz.

Please leave a comment if you visit my blog. Thank you!

 

#1391, Wednesday, March 18: Let go of the small shit

Post 1391, Day 77 of 2015
- 1,538 days since I started this blog -

Daily Comment

I am not sure where the feeling of 'discontent' comes from. Certainly, it is an ego thing: the feeling that what is happening, where I am, is not what should be or where I'm supposed to be.

There are lots of cliches, many sourced from Eastern philosophy, about the 'rightness' of being where you are. Mostly, the idea is that where you are is the only place you can be - an obvious truth.

But if it is true that wherever you are is the only place you can be, then in my philosophy, the opposite must also be true. In this case, that means that you can be everywhere at once - being in one place at a time, well, that expression has the sense-temporal illusion built right into it. What if there is only one time - and it has no past, no future, just now - with timelessness comes the idea that everywhere you have ever been, will ever go, is simultaneous. There is only now. The idea that you are in the only place you can be is only true in the temporal sense. And that is, as they say, the rub.

We can't perceive now-ness - there is a sensory delay in realizing anything from when it occurred. The situation you are in is the situation you were in by the time you acknowledge it. You can't change the (perceived) past. Once it is history, there isn't anything you can do to change it.

I am a little discontent as I write this. But as I list the things that are driving my uneasiness, I realize they are whiny, self-indulgent things. I didn't get my way, and it looks like I'm not getting my way now and won't in the future. Boo-freaking-hoo. Crying over spilt milk, or worse, crying because of fear of the future. It is embarrassing.

Apparently, things are going so well, that when something seems less-than perfect, I want to vent. Things are too good! What the hell happened?

I have a little mental letting-go exercise I do.

Now's the time.

Food and Diet Section

Today's Weight:                   208.6 lbs

Previous Weight (3/17):           208.4 lbs

Day Net Loss/Gain:                + 0.2 lbs

Diet Comment

With a negligible weight gain today, I feel as if I've gotten away with something. I ate two full dinners and a late snack on top of celebrating St. Paddy's with a few shots of Irish whiskey. I wish I could say today would be better.
 

Food Log

Breakfast
Skipped.

Lunch
At Ling-Ling's Chinese Buffet and Grill:

Brussels sprouts, kimchee, and, from the "Mongolian Grill", my go-to dish: pork and chicken with cabbage, onions, mushrooms, green peppers and broccoli. Not shown: Dessert Quest bar.

Snack 

Quest bars.

Dinner
Capicola and eggs with Ezekiel 4:9 Flax sprouted grain bread and celery and home-made mayonnaise.

Snack 

Quest bars.

Liquid Intake
   Coffee:  28 oz.   Water: 100+ oz.

Please leave a comment if you visit my blog. Thank you!

 

#1390, Tuesday, March 17: Tomorrow's bass

Post 1390, Day 76 of 2015
- 1,537 days since I started this blog -

Daily Comment

The idea that what you think about, what you visualize, becomes real (manifests) is a very old one (it's the basis of 'The Secret' which used it as a marketing phenomenon for New Age self-help pitchmen). This doesn't mean it isn't true, or that it doesn't make sense.

It seems to me that, since thought and perception are coupled so tightly (one doesn't happen without the other), it is not an impossibility that this is 'real'. I also think that it is a perceptual aberration that sees imagining, visualizing or just thinking about something as the 'cause' in a cause and effect relationship when the thought-about thing happens.

Cause and effect is a time-based relationship. The only time something happens is that elusive 'now' which actually encompasses all 'real' time, and which we human thinkers can't perceive. I believe the thought and the manifestation are, in the big picture, simultaneous things; neither coming before or after the other. Our perception, which only sees a flow time, doesn't recognize this.

So, maybe I shouldn't have been surprised about the chain of events that started at a duo gig Saturday night and will conclude tomorrow (Wednesday) night.

It began with a conversation about my forsaken quest to take up upright bass. Guitarist-singer Chad asked me what happened with that, saying he would really like an all-acoustic format at some point. I told him that, due to not being able to find a locally available and sympatico teacher, I'd given up on the idea. I didn't want to go about it in my usual 'backing into it' way, because I was a little intimidated by the instrument's physicality and didn't want to hurt myself, or waste time and money trying to figure everything out by myself. I wanted a teacher's help with buying one, setting it up, and learning how to play it properly, without injury.

He asked if I couldn't start by renting one, and I insisted I wanted to find a teacher first. But the idea, which I hadn't thought much about since last year, was now back in my head.

At one of the three open mic/jam sessions I went to Sunday, the house band had an upright bass player I knew only slightly, and had never really talked with. Chatting him up, I found out he was from Utica, and didn't know any local upright bass teachers. But he said he'd be happy to give me some help/lessons before the open mic started, if I wanted.

When I mentioned that I didn't even have an upright to practice on, he gave a little laugh. It turns out, he was thinking about selling his 'beginner' bass. He'd think about it, and call me (I gave him my card) if he decided to do it.

Yesterday he sent me a text with details about the instrument, and I texted him back I was good to go.

I'm going to the bank today, and will drive out to Utica after work tomorrow to complete the deal (and get my first lesson, while I'm there).

Funny how some things work out. Of course, that's just a perception which means its just an illusion.

Still, funny. And nice.

Food and Diet Section

Today's Weight:                   208.4 lbs

Previous Weight (3/16):           208.8 lbs

Day Net Loss/Gain:                - 0.4 lbs

Diet Comment

This small step in the right direction was erased in St. Patrick's day indulgences.
 

Food Log

Breakfast
Two Quest bars.

Lunch

Salmon salad (Wild Alaska pink salmon, celery, mayonnaise) on baby kale, baby spinach, chardand cole slaw mix.

Dinner 1
Pepperoni and eggs with cole slaw.

Dinner 2
At Funk'n'Waffles:

Reuben waffle (pumpernickel rye waffle with corned beef, swiss cheese, sauerkraut and Russian dressing).

Snack 
Two Quest bars.

Liquid Intake
   Coffee:  28 oz.   Water: 116+ oz. Irish whiskey - multi-shots 

Please leave a comment if you visit my blog. Thank you!

 

#1389, Monday, March 16: Enduring work

Post 1389, Day 75 of 2015
- 1,536 days since I started this blog -

Daily Comment

About work. I keep a two-column list in my head called "Work or Retire". I consult it every weekday, and make a decision whether or not to keep going to work (which is the default) or begin my retirement.

The Go to Work column has these things in it: Pension after December 6, 2015 (my five-year anniversary); and Retire January 29, 2016. That's also the list's use-by date.

Lately, little things have been accumulating in the Retire (AKA the "I-don't-want-to-do-this-anymore") column. Little and big things. Today (and the reason I am writing on this topic), my work-from-home connection wouldn't connect, and I ended up having to go in to work when I had not planned to work in the office. Also, things on the network aren't good. The system is frequently dial-up slow - a hassle when all your work is network-dependent (dumb workstation).

Other items in the bag it and sleep in column are an ongoing reorganization plan so stupid and inefficient that it has taken longer than I have been at the VA (more than four years now) for it to get to the point where partial implementation has created more inefficiency and my participation is probably moot. I also have a couple of assignments I find unpleasant.

Balancing and canceling some of these things out, there usually isn't much work and the office is only a mile away from home.

I am incredibly lucky and grateful to have a job which doesn't require overtime, doesn't make me compete with co-workers for advancement (or require that I want advancement), offers benefits, including good healthcare and an actual pension. This is the perfect end-of-career job for someone like me, who is seeking low stress over wealth.

The disadvantages are few: Lower pay than private-sector work, the bureaucracy, and attendant nonsensical rules and processes. Working completely unsupervised is a plus, but it is offset by a complete lack of a typical office social network, which I have (usually) enjoyed in all my other jobs.

True, sometimes the balance seems to tip negatively - that bureaucracy and long-way-around way of doing things can grind a person down. But I have only nine months left to qualify for that pension benefit, and only around ten months to full Social Security retirement.

I will probably persevere at the job until at least the end of this year, when I might bridge the final month on leave rather than cash out my vacation. I'll let that decision go until then.
Having this choice is one of the things that makes me the luckiest person I know, and fills me with gratitude.

Food and Diet Section

Today's Weight:                   208.8 lbs

Previous Weight (3/13):           208.6 lbs

Day Net Loss/Gain:                + 0.2 lbs

Diet Comment

I ate badly over the weekend. Starting this week with a twelve-hour fast, and eating lightly after that.
 

Food Log

Breakfast
Skipped.

Lunch
A cocoa-hemp-kale protein shake (almond-coconut milk, kefir, kale, large organic egg, whey powder (36g protein), hemp seeds, hemp protein (7g protein), celery, raw organic cacao powder, fermented coconut water, chia gel, moringa leaf powder, cinnamon and stevia-inulin blend.

Snack 
Pepperoni and celery with home-made mayonnaise.

Dinner 

Cauliflower with Dal Tadka (lentil curry). Not shown: A Quest bar.

Liquid Intake
   Coffee:  28 oz.   Water: 86+ oz.  

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