February 10:

Slept late this morning (7am) and woke up on my own, no alarm, no dog. Felt wonderfully rested. I then had to really convince myself to do my cardio. I had just about talked myself out of doing it, saying that I would make today my rest day instead of tomorrow, but then I got online and looked at the sites of the other darers for motivation, then went ahead and put on shorts and t-shirt and did 30 minutes on the bike. My mom asked me today if I still had the treadmill--I do, but the advantage of the bike is that I don't have to dress specially, i.e. put 17 layers of sports bra on to keep the Twins in place. Less preparation means less time and reason to talk myself out of it. Know your limitations. :-) I tend to have faltering willpower to maintain training intensity, which is why this dare--and the ongoing support of the other darers--has been great. How can I quit when they're still going strong?!

Food:

Fake eggs w/chicken, then 1 tbsp of peanut butter--just licked it right off of the spoon! Went to lunch with Mom at the China Buffet. Stayed pretty good--tried to stick with the various veggie-meat combos that they had instead of the fried stuff. Did have to indulge in a yummy macaroon-type confection though. But just had one! Left pleasantly full, but not bloated. Later in the afternoon had a protein shake (finally learned the trick of blending it several hours ahead of time so that it has a chance to dissolve more thoroughly and settle a bit) and an orange. In the evening had a ham sandwich.

February 9:

Shoulders and triceps today. At one point we were doing tricep pressdowns, and after the fourth set I asked Mike how many sets we were doing. He grinned evilly and said, "Until I tell you to stop." He enjoys this way too much! Cardio was 30 minutes on the bike at the gym.

Food:

I figured I'd do a breakdown of what I'm eating again. I won't do this more than once every other week or so, since it's kind of a pain, but it does give me a good idea of what's going into my body and whether I need to adjust my diet anywhere. Unfortunately, I was a bit bad this afternoon--had the screaming munchies--but at least I only munched on fruit, veggies, and peanut butter. Still, I'll be honest and list it all.

Food	Protein	Fat	Carbs	Sugar	Calories
Soy Bar	15g	5g	23g	11g	170
Oatmeal	5g	3g	27g	1g	150
Milk(2/3 cup)	6g	0g	8g	8g	54
Orange					60
MetRx	23g	0g	1g	1g	105
Milk(1 cup)	9g	0g	12g	12g	80
Raspberries	2g	0g	10g	5g	40
Chicken breast	17g	5g	3g	3g	130
Spinach	3g	0g	6g	0g	45
Fruit cup	0g	0g	13g	12g	50
carrots	1g	0g	9g	5g	44
Fat-free dressing	0g	0g	5g	3g	20
Bread (1 slice)	3g	1.5g	12g	1g	70
Peanut butter (1tbsp)	4g	8g	3.5g	1.5g	95
Totals:	88g	22.5g	132.5g	63.5	1113

Looks like I kinda went nuts on the carbs today, and my sugar intake is rather higher than I'd like. I think that, regretfully, I am going to have to give up the soy bars and find a lower-sugar/higher-protein replacement. I have about six left, so when those are gone, I'll find an alternative. Later, I had some angel-hair pasta with parmesan cheese sprinked on. What the hell, I'll just go carb-crazy today.

February 8:

Worked traps and back with Mike and Rene. Both these guys are big and going for that no-neck look. I rather like my neck, so I still worked traps, but concentrated more on just going for building depth in my upper back. No cardio today.

Food:

Was absolutely starving to death when I got home at 0600. Shame on me--I shouldn't let myself get so hungry, but it was a crazy-busy night dealing with my arrestee. Between taking the stupid [expletive deleted] to the hospital twice (first to get his hand stitched up where he cut it during the commission of his offense, and second to get it RE-stitched after he pulled the bandages off, ripped the stitches out and bled aaaalllll over the back seat of my car) and taking him up to the jail, there was no chance to even grab a protein bar. So, finally had a shake when I got home. No energy for anything more complicated. Woke around noon, had a roast beef sandwich before heading to the gym, then another shake when I got home. Large chicken breast and half a can of carrots before heading to work, then a banana around 1900 and my usual container of sliced chicken breast around 2200.

February 7:

30 minutes on the bike after waking. Does the foot pursuit I had during the night count as cardio? (It wasn't a very long pursuit--I lost him about 20 feet into the woods. AAAARGGHHH! Luckily we snatched him up later in the evening.)

Food:

Had a soy bar around 0300 during my detail, then had a couple of slices of the deli-thin-sliced roast beef before going to bed at 0630. (Didn't want to have anything containing carbs since I was going to sleep, but I was Hungry!) Had oatmeal at 1100 after my cycling, sweetened with just a teaspoon of Splenda. I think maybe this stuff is too good to be true. I usually detest artificial sweeteners--god knows I can barely tolerate nutrasweet. But this tastes a whole lot more like sugar than anything else, doesn't have that nasty aftertaste, and--according to their website--does not affect blood glucose or insulin levels. We'll have to see how well it works. Had three low-fat tacos at about 1400. Those filled me up so well that I didn't eat anything before going to work. Between 1900 and 2100 had a large chicken breast. Then work got pretty darn crazy and I had no chance to eat anything else until I got home at 0600.

February 6:

Leg day today with Mike. No lunges this week, but we made up for it by going heavy on deadlifts and leg curls--really hitting the glutes and hamstrings hard. So goes the Quest for a Perfect Butt. Today was also Mike's birthday, so I stuck 31 candles on a protein bar. He thinks I have way too much time on my hands.

Food:

0700 Oatmeal with milk and just a teensy bit of honey to make it edible, and an orange. 0930 Beef & vegetable soup. 1200 Protein shake before going to the gym. 1500 Another protein shake after returning from the gym and after washing the Dog. 1530 I was still pretty hungry, so I made tacos with extra-lean ground beef, which I then rinsed after browning--my bodybuilder friend told me that rinsing removes a pretty decent amount of the fat remaining. The tacos were sinfully good, probably because they resembled Real Food and were not chicken. I had four. Slept from 1800-2200 since I have a detail at midnight, then had a banana and a roast-beef sandwich.

February 5:

Made up for being a slack-ass yesterday. Did my 30 minutes on the bike when I woke up. (Then spent the entire morning in court sitting on my ass until I could finally sweet-talk the DA into letting me go since he wasn't going to put me on the stand anyway.) But since I had court in the morning and Mike had a detail in the afternoon, I did my weight training on my own in the afternoon--worked chest and biceps. Then went out to the academy and ran slightly over 3.5 miles with the class. Absolutely gorgeous weather for running--felt great.

Food:

0700 Fake eggs with a whole chicken breast diced in. I usually just use half a breast, but I wasn't sure how long I was going to be stuck in court so I kinda wanted to "load up." It ended up being a bit too much for me though, and I couldn't finish it all. So the dog did. Had a can of beef & vegetable soup when I got home at around 1130, then a protein shake before going to the gym at 1430. And another shake after getting home from the gym at 1530 and before heading out to the academy. 1900 Sandwich made with potato bread, very thin smears of light mayo (I don't like the taste of fat-free mayo) and very low-fat roast beef. Hah... not chicken!!

February 4:

Gonna make today another Day of Rest, because I just ache all over and could not drag my ass out of bed at 0300 to do the bike. Still wiped from yesterday (and the whole week!) I guess--and I even went to bed at 1930! (And I have court tomorrow at 0830 which means no sleeping late tomorrow either.) However, I did my weekly weigh and measure, and was well pleased to see that I continue slow and steady progress. I guess that the damn morning cycling is paying off. Anyway, I rewarded myself with some real hot chocolate this morning. Today's probably going to be as hectic (or more so) as yesterday--not helped by the fact that it's [expletive deleted] Mardi Gras and there's a parade today, which makes getting from one side of town to another a nightmare.

Food:

As stated above, I felt like warmed-over shit when I finally got up this morning. Didn't have much appetite, and ended up just having the hot chocolate and a handful of Cracklin Oat Bran cereal. Got to roll-call and the small headache I'd had upon waking was now a splitting headache so I ate a soy bar and some ibuprofen and that helped the headache some. Was planning on going back to the house to try and do a shake or my Usual Breakfast, but Mike came up with the glorious suggestion of going to Denny's. I ordered the "Slim Slam" which is Egg Beaters with a slice of ham and two pancakes with fruit topping--I didn't eat much of the eggs but after I devoured the ham and pancakes I felt 3000% better and felt like I might survive the day. Breakfast held me for quite a while, so I didn't eat again until about noon when I went home and had a large chicken breast and carrots. When I got home after my shift I had a can of chicken noodle soup. I plan on having a shake sometime later this evening.

February 3:

Did 30 minutes on the bike at 0300 when I woke up. Good thing I did it in the morning, because I was way too tired after work to do much but curl up under the quilt on the couch. Busy day--seemed like I was making an arrest every time I turned around.

Food:

0430 Had a peach/vanilla protein shake and two pieces of toast w/ peanut butter. 0930 had another shake--no time for much else. 1130 to 1300 had a large chicken breast. Somewhere around 1400 had a soy bar--then got busy again. 1800 had the other half of the black beans and corn from the previous night. Was too busy to be hungry today. Can't wait until daywatch is over.