All posts by meat

WGOM Fitness

On doing things, not great but better than not at all

4 Comments

So, in the interest of living life I've decided to do things. My last fitness? post centered around the new class of drugs and the results I've seen. I was kinda shocked with the response from the community. Many thanks to all of y'all for gentleness and grace which brings me around to the second edition of On Doing Good, Not Great.

A good friend lives in Vegas and last spring we went out for 5 days to get lost in the desert, gamble, see some art, and catch up with old friends. We had a great time doing some of the more tourist stuff you can do in a tourist city. At one point I asked my man how he found living in Vegas.  He just chuckled and said, "I love it, there is always something happening in town that I'm not going to go to". I hadn't summed up living in Nawlins* quite like that but it hit home. We got back form Vegas and we decided to do some more things that were out of our comfort range.

I decided that I don't want to work for the current set of clowns I work for and signed up for the first of 4 semesters of Chemistry. Whoa Nelly. I'm taking names and calculating moles but it's not without great effort. Thermodynamics isn't really my friend but we're on speaking terms. (in truth, math is my main hurdle - I can hack the algebra but any calculus results in much swearing) I'm currently sitting on a 99% for lecture and a 96.75% for lab (GD post lab questions due at midnight when lab ends at 10 pm .... I'm a tired old man....GOML) I'm pleasantly surprised with. my ability to learn new things again - funny sometime I stopped applying myself and .... welp .... here I am.

I went to 2 concerts in 2 weeks - nutty for me now, but I once went to at least a show a month. In my youth I went every weekend to see a punk band lay waste to my future hearing. (BTW, Kurt Vile is in pretty great form right now....)

Today I went way outside my comfort zone and joined an Aikido Dojo and got my ass handed to me. I'm not sure how long I'll practice but the initial course is 6 weeks. I'm going to see it out even though I'm pretty sore (in a great way, minus the hard roll I took on my left knee). Dr. Chop asked me to describe my first experience with Aikido and I think full contact yoga sums it up nicely.

For a long stretch, not helped by the pandemic but definitely there before covid, I felt like life was happening at me. Taking the drug has reduced my mass by nearly 21%. No joking, that's EEEFFFFFFing bananas (though, to be fair to me, I still don't see it...). I would never have thought of practicing a martial art before the jab.

I have no idea where any of this goes. Maybe I get through the chemistry and I lack the will or desire to go further. Maybe I won't be able to walk tomorrow because I'm old and frail. But I do know that I've reconnected to doing things and that feels pretty great.

Anywho, I hope y'all are finding joy in these uncertain times.

 

*no one says this

WGOM Fitness

On being better, not great

32 Comments

I've struggled with weight my entire life. When folks were bing nice they called me husky, when not being nice they called me lots of other things. Later in life I became big man. (Seriously, everyone who wants my attention on the street calls me big man (an aside, there is this bellman who works at a hotel between two of my museum's buildings. I see him all the time. A couple years ago his house burned down. Tragic. Right before thanksgiving. I passed him some cash as I've been there and it's a terrible place to be. We chatted about the kind of crushing loss that comes from losing all your shit and how you're glad to be alive but all your time is consumed with figuring out how to get the basics of life covered. Anyway, months later he asks if I know any furniture restorers - I do. I give him the names of a couple guys. A couple months later he calls the museum and is transferred to my desk because he's forgotten the names I gave him. He say, hey, do you work the a heavy set fella? I say, that would be me. He says oh, not heavy set, healthy guy. big man...................))

I've counted carbs, watched weight, drank less, ate only white foods, had a can of green beans a day, didn't orange Julius but might have if I was a bit older, and lost hope along the way. I've exercised, biked to work, strength trained and beat myself on the cardio machines. I work a pretty active job, but now that I'm management I spend a lot more time at my desk.

Enter a bad trip to the doctor. I generally do not shy away from knowledge, though being diagnosed as diabetic kinda crushed me. Moral failure. (I know, I know, not really but that's the thought process). Enter a deepening depression already deep enough with the state of the world. I fired my PCP for a variety of reasons but high up on the list was the way they delivered the news - phone call and an email telling me to pick up a prescription. No follow up. No information. No referral. Just take these pills for the rest of your life, you're fine.

New PCP is a great doctor. Very communicative and very interested in long term enjoyment of life. Says, hey, let's work on some of this. Try to lose some weight. Take it seriously. I do and I did. Problem is that that I just don't lose the weight. Doc says my A1c is climbing a bit despite my efforts at diet and exercise. Says, look, there are these new classes of drugs on the market. Lots of concern tho, no long term understanding regarding  life time drugs or if lifestyle change means you can taper off them in a year and maintain health gains. We weighed the risks and rewards and I chose to jab myself every week (though I've already been injecting shit to kill the hives* so what's another couple jabs a month)

The crazy part is that almost instantly everything changed. I guess I had no idea how much time I spent dealing with or thinking about food. I love to cook. Cooking is an expression of both love and creativity. That isn't what I'm talking about when I say that I didn't know how much of my life was dominated by food thought. Almost impossible to describe.

The weight fell off of me at first. My best friend in NOLA left in June. We kinda had a nawlins** bender before he left which I'm sure didn't help my overall health picture. I started the course of drugs in July and when I saw my man at the MN state fair on Labor Day I was down ~20 pounds. He was shocked. I was shocked. I am shocked.

In the 4.5 months since I started taking a drug designed to control blood sugar (and taken by lots of folks who want to lose the extra 20 pounds) I've lost a considerable amount of weight, but I've also changed almost every aspect of my life. I still drink too much, if I'm honest, but I've been far more active, I eat considerably more healthy than I did prior, and my a1c is low enough to be considered elevated but not diabetic - though I'll carry that diagnosis for the rest of my life.

Lots of stuff to unpack. I have many mixed feelings about the drug. On one hand it's effing amazing in the ability to control sugar and food noise, on the other have I failed so hard I need to be on a drug to bring me back from the edge????!? (also, I don't engage with fast food or 'ultra' processed foods that often, but I am certain that the food scientists addicted millions to their products and now Lilly is here to provide a cure in the form of another addiction) I get that some folks see these drugs as cheating. I didn't engage with this for vanity. The visible change, tho, is what drives people to ask what/how/are you? and say things like you look great (thanks, but that implies I also looked like shit previously...) All to say that when you're big man people have opinions and do not hesitate to share them.

I'm continuing to shrink a bit. I've been lifting again to maintain muscle. Thinking about going to a strength trainer. My life is largely the same but very different. Colleagues and strangers all treat me differently now that I'm not big man anymore. Strange to wander around as a different human in the same skin.

*thanks covid

**no one says this

The Nation Has An Appetite

Gumbo z’herbes changed my life…..

9 Comments

Okay, not really, but! But! this dish proves that kale isn't a joke being played on us by the hip kids. (As you may may have guessed, I'm a kale skeptic, but this was super delish) I adapted this recipe from here.

You'll need - ->

  • 3tablespoons vegetable oil
  • one link of smoked cajun sausage diced - or some tasso
  • 1yellow onion, diced
  • 2shallots, minced
  • 2garlic cloves, minced
  • 1jalapeño, seeded and finely chopped
  • couple dashes Worcester sauce
  • a dash or two of your favorite cajun seasoning blend -Cajun Two Step, Tony C's are great but dial down additional salt,  Donnies spice mix is also great
  • 8ounces fresh spinach
  • 1bunch fresh curly kale, large stems removed
  • 2cups vegetable stock, fish stock or clam juice
  • 1(14-ounce) can coconut milk - I used light instead
  • 1pound fresh or frozen okra, trimmed and cut into ¼-inch pieces
  • 3medium Yukon Gold or other yellow potatoes, diced
  • 1tablespoon filé powder
  • 1tablespoon chopped fresh thyme leaves
  • 1pound head-on prawns or shrimp, peeled and deveined - I used Louisiana brown gulf shrimp  and I highly recommend that you do as well or at least try to find domestic shrimp to avoid engaging in slave labor practices rife in international shrimping.........
  • ½pound lump crab meat (preferably Dungeness crab) -blue swimming crab meat is a-okay here
  • Salt and freshly ground pepper
  • Cooked white rice, for serving
  • Lemon wedges, for serving
  • Crystal hot sauce for serving

Method - ->

slice and dice the onion, shallot, garlic, and jalapeño (seed and devein if you're worried about heat). Chop up the sausage into tiny bits. Heat a bit of oil in a dutch oven or deep soup pot. Brown the sausage and remove from the pan, add the onion, shallot, jalapeño, garlic, dash of Worcester, pinch of salt, black pepper, and cajun seasoning (The spice level is a dealer's choice thing, you do you). Add a bit more oil and sauté until veg is translucent and soft. Add the kale, spinach, 1 1/2 cup water, 2 cups stock, and one can of light coconut milk (you can use the unleaded type here and the end product will be .... extra) and wilt the greens (5-10 minutes over medium heat). Remove the greens to a blender (or use your immersion blender) and add a cup (or more) of the pot liquor and blend the greens until smooth. I used a vitamix to really, truly ensure that I wouldn't encounter a single, recognizable piece of kale when finally consuming this dish.......Return the puree to the pot, stir to combine, add potato dice and simmer until the potato is tender - about 10 minutes or so. Add the shrimp and continue to simmer until the shrimp are cooked through. Add tiger file and thyme,  and rinse the crab meat, remove the pot from the heat, add the crab meat and ring the dinner bell. Adjust for salt, serve over rice with lemon. Kale, not all bad. I still skipped the okra. Okra is still gross.