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John West's Journal  Yeah sorta like that EPMD album. Not really gonna post here anymore cause everyone that I regularly communicate with anymore is on myspace and I can blog there. So yeah, if you want to see my continued retarded musings poke me Here Is the day it starts. The competition at my gym that is.. I've got all my tools. I bought a pocketPC and some software to accompany that will allow me to track everything I eat, every workout I do, how I feel, and basically provide an intimate level of detail of the 12 weeks. I know I have probably said "I'm throwing the gauntlet down" but for god's sake I am dead serious this time... My weight has been slowly declining over the last 30 days... At the end of the year thanks to holiday poor choices I bloomed up to 210 again (ack)... Now I'm down to 198-200. Still a cry from the 180 I want to weigh. I think I will spend the first 4 weeks doing a combination of weight lifting and aerobics. The contest considers body fat %, strength, etc. So even if you pack on a ton of muscle but still carry 20% body fat no win for you.. So I will train hard in both areas (weights and aerobics) and see how that affects the weight. If I don't see enough progress in the fat trimming category then I will drop weights and focus on harder longer aerobics. then if that works after 4 weeks I have the last month to tone up.. People can make amazing strides in physique if they dedicate themselves to it. School is first of course but all the other stuff can fall off to the way side.. I could be real hardcore and packup my videogames or something but I don't think thats necessary.. I really have all the tools, I just have to do it which seems like a simple thing heh. You want it so bad you can taste it, but whatever that intangible is that prevents you from taking it, creating it, etc. I want it so bad.... It's the one area of my life I feel most dissapointed in that I ultimately have no one else to blame but myself for... The biggest thing is going to be getting up of all things ;-) In order to fit this into my regular schedule I have to getup a little earlier then usual and just stay organized... My life, schedule wise at least has been rather chaotic and lacking heh.... Been doing good in school.. I hate my english class... I can appreciate my teachers love for poems and art, but just as I started at my shop teacher I questioned the necessity of knowing how to run wood across a planer (sp?). I have taken many english classes... Research paper writing, business writing, technical manual writing, etc. Yet because EWU has a very specific "American (north and south)Literature Humanities" requirement I sit here among freshman who are unsure of what they want to major instead of taking my next accounting series.. bleargh! I love poems to... but I'm midway through my junior year and the imagery of Robert Frost as he walks along the snowy path is not where my mind is right now :-) Back to my initial thing.. the program Ive been using "MySportFitness" by VidaOne is actually really comprehensive. With the plugins I can track everything I eat by either entering the foods manually or by finding the food/ingredients in the FDA database of over 6,000 items. You can build meals and then save them for repeat usage etc... So since I eat one of 3 or 4 things for breakfast everyday, tracking that meal is a matter of seconds. You can then compile graphs and data that compare daily caloric consumption, what those calories are made up of, etc etc. Then you can input any and all exercise. Be it aerobic, weight lifting, or any number of many activities such as rafting or horse back riding. For something like weight lifting it contains something like 200 exercises and you can add your own if it's not already in there. Track every rep, at what weight, etc. Again it tracks caloric burn. So you can easily compare across a week your weight loss, caloric consumption, caloric burn, and general well being. It's like stats in world of warcraft :-) Neat graphs and stuff to... Basically it does what I was trying to do on paper automatically and about a million times quicker and it's small enough to carry around the gym. I bought the rx1950, it's HP's intro model. It's no the best value at $299.99 but being that Im affiliated with HP through market source as a Rep for HP I got a $200 rebate for buying it. Then I got my old manager at CompUSA to sell me an open box one for $250 with tax, it had been returned for no reason really (it still had the plastic on it). I had a $50 gift card to comp from something else. So I paid $200 for it and have a $200 rebate coming in a couple of weeks... so net cost to me was nada. I would have bought one anyways cause the program came highly reccomended but it worked out super great... It's a weak little machine compared to what else is out there but I bought it for what I needed not what I wanted :-) As easy as I lost the first 50-70 pounds of fat (through eating greasy fatty foods per Atkins) it's sure hard to shed these last 15-20... It's like we have seperation anxiety! But I can say to all the nay sayers that you don't baloon back up after you quit the atkins diet... My weight has remained steady for nearly a year. Yeah I'm more active then I was before losing the weight but if you maintain the same lifestyle before your diet as you did before your always going to gain the weight back.. its why you got fat in the first place! The atkins "trend" seems to have trailed off... sad really. South beach seems to be the "it" now but last time I looked at that diet they had changed it 30 times in the last week alone.. maybe it has settled a bit.. It's the same core concept just alot easier to follow for more people. I've given up on a magic bullet for the last bit of weight though (tried doing atkins ag ain and it didn't work) it's just gonna take hard work, determination, and no more of that damn delicious ice cream :-0 I haven't cried in over a year... it feels good. Thats what they smelled like, over a decade ago. Spun and dipped on strings in a classroom more then a decade ago In young infantile hands they were hung Brought home with pride I couldn't hope to hide These candles that I had made were all mine Despite the lumps and the clumps my mother couldn't deny For years they stayed dangling When the family fell apart these candles did not part Held together by more then proverbial string Now in these years of my new life they still hang On the cabinet all the same The one thing that has changed My mothers life did not end in veign Now my days knows great pain These candles no longer have any stain No matter how much I lose or gain The locations will always change but these candles remain Though these candles do not speak They may appear quit meek These candles can make me quite weak It's easy to forget how much our parents love us. sometimes its easier for us as children and young adults to write them off. Are these mistakes we make some unspoken right of passage? Do my contemporaries get the chance to apologize. To say thank you, even though it can never be enough. To say I understand why things where the way they were and I understand now. Do parents carry such guilt? Do they need to hear those words? I will never know, for when I had these words in me, they were gone. It's not saying goodbye that hurts me the most..... I don't believe in goodbye in that respect... I want that "time".... The time when you can hug them, look back, and just be thankful for all that you had. Why when I am finally able to see, feel, and express that which I always assumed and saw as an institution it goes away? I am cold, I am callous, I am calculated, grounded. To those who I have touched, and those that have touched me. I am all these things and I am none of them. For the foundation is only as strong as it's weakest point, and I am these things so I do not crumble, to make sure that no matter what happens, my spirit for life never lets go. For everyone else I must glow, for everyone else I must not bow. Maybe the cruel irony is we that my compassion for my parents comes only from their departure.. I could only be ready for them after they had to leave this life. I need my strength, my independance, and fire. For without them I am nothing. I love you mom and dad, whever in this metaverse you may be, I carry you inside of me with every step of every day and in every decision about which way. For my life would have ended on that day, if I didn't have the strength that you gave me and I took away. but words... no language... expression itself would fail in every means to communicate. The palette of human vernacular could carry meaning no more then wild gesturing could delivery shakespear or poe. Unfortunately the way I feel only I can know. p.s. rather ironically I originally typed "I would right something" in the subject. a slip? my sub concious crying out at which it cannot control? funny the way our minds sometimes go. Perhaps to communicate to the heart what it can't possibly understand or know. So I have owned an xbox 360 now for 3 weeks. It's been an interesting time. I have been blown away (Project Gotham Racing 3), scared shitless so bad I wouldn't play alone or in the dark (condemend), barely entertained (perfect dark zero), and wanting more (kameo). Primarily though it left me feeling like I was playing a product that really shouldn't have been released till at least Febuary. So many of the games feel like just another month or two would have made a world of difference. Project Gotham 3 despite all it's amazing features is missing some amazingly simple things (relating to matchmaking and online play on xbox live). It feels like the developers aren't stupid they just overlooked features that had basically become standardized in the last generation that more play testing and feedback would have revealed to them. Kameo, started out as a xbox1 title (if not even gamecube). 80% of the game reeks of last generation dressed up in a next generation dress. Not horrible but really not great either... But theres 20% of the game that makes you go "Oh wow, I get to play this? I'm not watching something thats noninteractive????" then when the game ends you go WTF, I saw what they were capable of, I TASTED that appetizer now give me the entree! You spend your whole game collecting ""characters" and then when you finally learn to use them all and their unique and different interactions/combinations (never mind the many possible but unneccesary upgrades) the game ENDS. Another product that given a few more months could have gone from good to great. Perfect Dark Zero... well the best thing I can say about PD0 is that it boots up reliably.... maybe I need to give it more time (and I will) but so far it just feels slow, generic, and two generations ago. Condemned is the only game that felt finished though it was quiet short (but in design choice not as a flaw). Still a pretty good launch lineup and one I was satisified with. I would hope that some of the original titles see sequels (especially condemened and Kameo) because they really show promise. So why am I upset? Well whats out will carry me a month or two sure. And I was looking forward to a slew of games in coming months. Bethesda's Elderscrolls Oblivion could consume a man whole if he allowed. Top Spin 3, one of my favorite sports series ever, now on live and 360, Full Auto, Frame City Killer, and damn never every game initially announced for January/Febuary has been pushed back either a month or two and in some cases "when it's done". This "lull" if not corrected will KILL microsofts early jump on PS3. The hardcore have purchased, and would regardless. But to get everyone else to keep buying they cannot afford to lose any of their steam and perceived "coolness". Now if march rolls around and two games have come out since launch and M$ doesn't get some more diversity under the belt in the genres, many 360 hopefuls might become PS3 waiters. New Years fell and unfortunately I was actually 7 pounds heavier then I had been prior to the Winter holiday (take that Oreilly!). But I'm not that upset... It was awesome to cut 12 pounds from my waste line in 15 days. But I also realized I was losing alot more then fat. I had zer0 energy for lifting. After doing a bit of research I found out I had inadvertantly starting "cutting", that is increasing aerobic exercise to an "extreme" amount while cutting calories to a figure far below the amount even a "resting" person would consume... great for weight dropping and often used by body builders before competitions and such but not a good way to lose weight overall... I balooned up to 206 after holiday and now I'm back down to 201.. slower but in a much better manner... I've yet to make my mind up... Cutting isn't necessarily unhealthy but its counter productive to what I have been working on. It seems theres only two silver bullets in the exercise world and they both have nasty side effects... You can cut and lose lots of fat and also muscle, something I don't want. Or you can consume hyper calories (3500+) and "bulk" adding lots of muscle and its ugly cousin fat... Seems the alternative balanced diet, balanced workout, and patience is the best route but it's slower and requires the most discipline. Anyone can run an hour and a half a day for 2-3 weeks and force themselves to eat plain food (well at least I think they could). The extremes are easy for short periods.... It's the plan down the middle, the one that takes constant balance and discpline for longer periods that is harder to master... Yet thats what *I* need to focus on :-( I can hop on that treadmill and push my body to it's perceived limits and further. I can pick the dumbells up just one more time, squeeze out just one more rep, one more situp, one more one more. Only I can't say no to the cookie bar, the ice cream, the pie etc... Moderation is my weakness. To help tackle this though I've taken on a few tips that so far, really seems to have made a big appreciable differance (since Jan 1st mind you). Per some tips on body building.com and appetite control I've increased my fluid intake to what minght seem like an insane amount. I've also converted my "3 square meals a day" into 5-6 time allowing... Breakfast is the same size as always as it's probably the most important meal and should stay a certain size consdiering your coming off of at least a 10+ hour fast from sleeping and such. Then 3 hours later I eat half of what I normally would for lunch, 3 hours later I eat the other half. This usually happens at like 9am, 12, 3. Then I will usually eat a small snack at 5pm if I feel hungry, like a single can of tuna or an apple. My first dinner is at around 6pm then the other half at 8:30-9pm. Now this is the schedule when I'm staying up till at least midnight if not 1am. If I where getting up at 6am again you would just slide things earlier (for those who think eating after 8pm is bad, I agree with you if your going to bed at 10pm). Though it's only been about a week I can definately say that my "snacking" desire has decreased. This doesn't mean I don't look at a candy bar and go "ooh that looks good" or ice cream or whatever... I think the key difference though is I might now take a nibble, or a spoon full just to "taste" the treat. I no longer eat them to combat appetite. If you have the time to do so I can say anyone should try out the meal split thing... its less convenient.. theres no doubt about that but it works great... If you get hungry your next meal is usually not that far away. From what I have read this works well because it controls appetite but also because your body has an easier time digesting the smaller portions and the constant intake spurs your metabolism... To each their own, I just know that these two things seem help me with the two things I have the most trouble with.. some people struggle with working out.. I struggle in the consumption heh... Part of all of this is I enlisted in a competition at my gym... my start date isn't until the 20th of feb (doh) but no better time to get started then now? Each group (the first grou already started) gets 3 months (12 weeks). You are photographed, weighed, fat % tested etc. At the end of each group the leader in overall improvement wins a prize, then the winners are compared from each group and the best wins another prize... its free, its motivating, and hell I might win a prize ;-) Though where I would go or where I would stay I don't know. Maybe I just need it broken so that I can pickup the pieces. I know it was wrong to buy an xbox 360 but Christine told me to.... Despite the fact then when I turn on the TV, the radio, or just walk through a mall and I am assaulted by the industry of mass media and homogenized consumption I know the struggle continues. Artists like Talib Kweli remind me what *music* can be, what it can make me feel, and the places it can take me. There is so much energy, passion, and love for creation I am often stunned and at a loss why the industry can not realize the very predicament they are in. They sue their customers, instill fear, and chase down mothers and daughters like common criminals and petty thieves. But I'm just gonna keep listening, cause "I know we gonna get by". To those that dedicate themselves to their passions and share them with those who will listen I can only be eternally grateful. Current mood:  grateful.Current music: Talib Kweli - For The City.mp3 - The Beautiful mixtape Vol 2. |
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