Halloween

I have to be honest. When I see the picture above, all I see are my flaws. I have my problem areas but you cannot spot train meaning do exercises to target one specific area. I read your body loses fat where it wants to. This also bring up another question. Will I always not like what I see in my pictures? I mean, when I get down to my goal will I still look at myself with non-approving eyes? And also, is this normal behavior to see yourself in this light? Anyways, back to the subject at hand. These past few months, I told myself that I will turn things around and really focus to finish what I started. But alas, I have gained some weight back. I admit that I am a stress eater and seem to reward myself with fatty foods. I weighed in at 198.7 lbs yesterday. This is really disappointing. But what can I do but to dust myself off and try again. So here is another blog about turning things around. We shall see. :P I just cannot wait for the day when I post a picture of myself and am truly proud of what I see. I plan to state my goal for the week on Monday and results on Friday. So my plan is no more pastries in the morning with my coffee and candy and tortilla chips and fast food. That's a start. For this week, I want to lose at least 2 lbs.

On another note. Have you seen Paranormal Activity? I do not like scary movies and it freaked me out. I keep waking up around 3 am thinking someone is going to drag me away or I'm going to sleep walk somewhere. Haha. I haven't had a good night's rest since then. Thanks ERIC! Plus I live alone and it's really quiet where I live. Every little noise freaks me out and I'm just waiting for my door to slam shut or to hear footsteps in my livingroom.

But one thing I am excite about is that I was appointed the coordinator of the family Thanksgiving Party this year and I want to do a good job. So I'm going to get a party list together and maybe even make my own invitations. Something simple and traditional. I luv Thanksgiving and Christmas.

THE VOICE!

Today is a glorious day! Whitney Houston, "The Voice", released her 6th studio album and it is awesome! I downloaded it from iTunes after my Monday morning meeting and have been listening to it ever since. "Call You Tonight," is my favorite track off the album. But why oh why did I not make sure that I pre-ordered the album a couple of weeks ago? I missed out on a bonus track of the remix of "I Didn't Know My Own Strength." Oh well, I'm sure they will release the track soon. But after work, I am heading straight to Target to get a CD copy as well.

My obsession of this gorgeous diva began in 1999, when I purchased an album entitled "My Love Is Your Love". After listening to "It's Not Right But It's Okay," I was hooked and bought her entire discography. Although she may have had some ups and downs since then, I really like her music and this album is no exception.


Today I ran across a fan's site and it is totally awesome. Check it out at http://www.welooktoyou.com/ Her time is here and I can't wait to see more of her on Good Morning America on Wednesday and Oprah on the 14th! If she tours, I am gonna go to at least two of her concerts.

The Wedding Date

On Saturday, I attended a wedding reception with my friend. We cut a rug on the dance floor thanks to our three lessons learning the Country two step, waltz, and swing dances. At midnight, the reception was over and we took the above picture together. I am still in the 190's and can't seem to get into the 180's. When my friend first sent me that picture, I was really disappointed in myself. I really began to wonder if I would ever be truly satisfied with how I look. But as I looked through my past photos in my previous blogs, I began to truly appreciate my progress and reminded myself that I am not done yet. But one thing positive about the above picture is that I fit into a medium. Yes. A medium. But it also shows that I need to lose more fat in my upper body. When I went home to the reservation, I noticed Navajo men tend to keep all of their excess fat in their upper bodies. More specifically, the belly and chest area. I'll tell you one thing though, I did not come all this way to stop now. I really do want to finish and look into my reflection after I shower with pride. ;)

Also, last week I met with a personal trainer and I weighed in on her scale at 194 lbs. During this initial consultation, she determined my fat content with calipers and did her assessment of my situation. But it did not come as no surprise that I am still overweight but I believe she can help me to reach my goal. She showed me a picture of fat and muscle which both weighed the same. The muscle of course took up less volume. So the plan is to burn fat and replace it with lean muscle. Sounds easy right? But overall, she said it seems that I am on the right track. The only obstacle in my way right now is finances. I spent all my spending money fixing my truckon Friday. So my plan of attack is to save up for a couple of sessions next paycheck and in the meantime, work out and continue keeping tabs on my calorie intake. This marks the 5th week of sobriety and being smoke free. ;)

Like my friend said, "We are our own worst critic."

After A Week Of Camping

Camping was fun. I spent time with my family and saw some people who I haven't seen in a long time. We all sat around the campfire and talked to each other. I haven't laughed as hard as I did the night my little nephew was telling us a story. He is only 5 years old. Haha. But I remember how much I enjoyed camping out in the mountains when I was a little kid playing in the dirt and fishing. Although, I was only able to spend a couple of nights there, it was all worth it. I'm fully rejuvenated and ready to get back to work. My weight loss program all went down the drain but I'm ready to get back to where I left off last Friday. Oh yeah, above is a picture my sister took of me this weekend. Man, 17 more lbs to go! But I think after this weekend, I probably need 20 more to go.

Fishing Vacation

Tomorrow is when I go on my camping trip to the lake shown above. It is called Wheatfields Lake which is located on the Navajo Reservation within the beautiful Chuska Mountains. It's a small lake full of rainbow trout. I've been going there since I was a kid. I just can't wait to enjoy the great outdoors, get in some reading and maybe even catch a fish. Honestly, I haven't caught one of those in a long, long time. Too long if you ask me.

So in preparation of this event, I weighed in today at 187 lbs. I lost 1 lbs and am 17 lbs away from my goal of 170 lbs. I think this is a reasonable goal weight. I'm doing a lot more cardio, but I'm really thinking of training for a half marathon. There is a race here in the city I live in which takes place in November. And I think it would be an awesome experience. What do you think?

I haven't had any thoughts about drinking or smoking since July 13th when I decided to quit that nonsense. Sixteen days, which is about 2 weeks and some change. I'm glad I made this choice because I feel so much better. The sight of people smoking in the morning kind of makes me shutter because that is what I used to do sometimes. I also kissed somebody who was smoking cigarettes and let me tell ya. It ain't a pleasant experience. Haha. All the more reason to quit. But as for drinking, I gotta admit that I do want to have a glass of wine with a meal every once in a while. But we'll see about that.

So I probably say this often, but life is good! Can't wait to see the Milky Way in all it's glory during the night time. Make s'mores with my neices. Play games and just enjoy cooking out and laughing. It's gonna be an awesome, rewarding experience. I'm glad Navajos are very a family oriented people. ;)

Friday Progress - 7/24/09

I ran my 5K this morning on a trail next to my apartment. Part of my weight loss plan is to jog at least every weekday of the week in the early morning. I can proudly say I accomplished this goal for the week. I must say, it feels good to witness the morning sun peeking out from behind the beautiful Sandia Mountains, shown in the above picture. Something inside me feels a sense of connection to nature. In traditional Navajo culture, they say you're supposed to run towards the east every morning before the sun rises to start off the day right. I can surely see why. Its medicinal and you begin the day knowing you accomplished something. Sweating out those toxins and giving your body a jump start makes you smile and enjoy life that much more.

I lost 3 lbs this week. I weighed in at 188.8 lbs on the scale at this gym I joined a week ago. My sister recommends this personal trainer she has been seeing named Lara and I really want to schedule an initial consultation within the next two weeks. I want to be pushed to my limits and see if I can truly handle the workload.

I'm proud of my progress so far. Life is turning out for the better and I feel 200% better than I did last week.


Last night, I attended a screening for Julie & Julia which comes out during the first part of August. It's a movie about Julia Childs and another woman Julie who is a cook at heart and fan of Julia's cookbook. I don't want to spoil anything, but all I can say is to go watch this movie. I really enjoyed it because I enjoy cooking myself. It comes as no surprise that Meryl Streep did an awesome job portraying Julia Childs. After watching this movie, I want to buy Julia's cookbook and cook some of her recipes myself. Maybe I can cook a delicious meal for my next date. ;) Anybody want to be my guinnea pig? Haha.

My Fitness Pal

Created by MyFitnessPal - Online Calorie Counter

So yesterday my friend, Will, from the Men's Health Belly Off Club suggested I check out this website called Fitness Pal. And it is pretty awesome and free. You can enter in your food information as well as workout routine and it'll give you an idea of how much you can lose based on your intake vs. how much you burn while working out. But anyways, I looked into the blogs and forums and they too are awesome. People helping other people out who are in the same situation. One thing I really got out of it is that this lady wrote about how she was feeling depressed. She said she was depressed because she was mourning for her old self. That is exactly what I'm feeling right now. I am mourning for the loss of "Big Will." Yes, my old self has a name. :P But I find myself getting attention and I just miss being invisible when nobody payed any attention to me. And also, I miss using food to cope with my emotions like going to get some pizza or some takeout. But currently, I am dealing with some problems and I tried to deal with these issues through food and it did not give me the same comfort as it did once before. So now, I'm finding that I have to deal with my problems directly through writing in a journal or talking a walk. Wow. She really hit my current situation right on the mark. But anyways, I'm back on the wagon. I feel like I am overeating in the evenings but my calories are actually a little bit below my goal so I have to eat more I guess. Great! I will update my picture in two weeks after my camping trip. I can't wait to spend some time with family and go up the mountains to fish, roast marshmallows and just hang out all day.