There are many possible morals to this story...

I imagine what a prospective adoption parent must go through and feel. When you finally get your baby it just has to seem absolutely perfect to you. Then after a couple of weeks you notice it's imperfections but you deal with them. I have been through this sort of thing with my bike the last two weeks.

All little boys love their bikes. When I got this shiny red bike it was love at first sight. It was awkward pedaling at first but I attributed that to my declining motor skills and physical conditioning. And I did get better at riding it. But this bike did present ongoing challenges. It was hard to control, especially at start up and lower speeds. It also seemed harder to pedal than I felt it should have been. I felt from day one that the front wheel was too close to me and even commented on that to Karen. I noticed on our rides together that there were times she was coasting but I had to keep pedaling to keep up with her. A boy having to ride harder to keep up with a girl? I would not have survived childhood if that had been the way it was back then. I was starting to think of ways I could modify the bike. Maybe adding a banana seat or new handle bars, something to make this ride right. It never occurred to me that maybe it something was not assembled correctly...until yesterday.

I have shared how we got our bikes. We bought them, at a good price, fully assembled from a guy who buys them at auctions. He is a nice guy but not a bike shop owner. If you scroll down to the bottom of this page you can see our bikes. Notice the fork that holds the front tire. It has slight crook in it that extends away from the pedals. My bike was assembled with the fork backwards! This shortened my wheel base and caused all the problems I listed above. All I had to do was loosen a nut and turn the fork and handlebars in the correct direction. I did this and a light shone from above and a dove flew down to my shoulder and a voice from heaven said " It's about time you figured that out Einstein!"

So of all the possible morals to this story I choose to go with "All's well that ends well".

I'm back Wednesday with the weigh in... off and pedaling for now.

What is the ideal body weight?

What is an ideal body weight for me? What is your ideal body weight? Well as always I turn to my good friend Google and ask the question. There are several answers of course. What drives me nuts is the opinion of the medical profession. They say a man 69.5" tall at my age and big boned should be 131-171 lbs. In my junior year of high school, in the best physical condition I was ever in and at this height, I weighed 167 lbs. I do not find their number to be realistic. In my search of sites I found the one that has what I believe the most realistic number. The site is http://www.halls.md/ideal-weight/body.htm . The number is the average weight for people my height, age, and gender and they say my goal weight should be 214-218 lbs. Given where I am now that number would be great. I initially set my goal at 210 lbs and I do plan to get somewhere in that range. But what then?

I have set weight goals before and I met them. I then celebrated over the next year or two by putting all the weight back on. Tracking pounds is important. It is how we can measure our success. But this ultimately isn't about hitting a weight. It's about eating a diet and exercising enough to keep my weight where it should be for the rest of my life once I get there. I guess my goal this time is to get there and then keep on pedaling and eating right.

This will be my last post of the week. I'll return on Monday.

I'm off and pedaling for now.

Wednesday is weigh in day

Tip of the day: Lean Cuisine Panini sandwiches. Healthy food never tasted better and at only 3 minutes in the microwave has never been easier to fix.

When you are trying to lose weight every pound lost is good but the pound that takes you from one set of 10 to the next lowest set of 10 is always special.I am now under 270! I hit the scales this morning at 269.8 lbs. I love digital scales by the way. Any loss, even 2/10 of a pound, is reflected and just lifts my spirits.

I have lost over 8 lbs in two weeks. The weight loss is always quicker early on and I don't know if I can keep that kind of pace up or not. I guess we'll see what happens.

I'm off and pedaling for now.

The sins of the children visiting the parents?

My mom gave a good reminder tip today. It's something we all know but don't practice. The funny thing is I recall when I was six years old and we would eat at the dinner table my mom would tell me to do this very thing and yet to this day she still has to remind herself to follow her own advice. Mom, this is actually quite a relief. I thought it only me.

To quote my Mom... " slow down, chew longer, maybe take smaller bites. If I want to eat half as much, try to make it last twice as long. They say it takes 20 minutes for your stomach to "feel the full" from what you're eating. "

Okay I'm back Wednesday with the weigh in.

I'm off and pedaling for now.

Keep those tips coming in...PLEASE!

One thing I have quickly learned about writing a blog is that there is only so much you can say. I can only say " I ate well and rode my bike last night" so many times before it gets old. Fortunately the great encouragement I have received along with what you all have shared with me has provided most of the content here so far. Be sure and let me know of any cool websites and/or programs you know about so I can share them with everyone.

Today's tip comes from my daughter Kimberly. She, and anyone else who knows me, knows how much I love french fries. I have always loved them deep fried too. They are obviously much healthier baked but you lose so much in the flavor and texture areas. Well Kim told us about a way to bake the fries and get deep fried texture and taste and it is so simple! First you Spray the sheet with Canola oil non stick spray. Then spread the fries in a single layer and spray the fries with the same canola non stick spray. They are wonderful prepared this way. The crispiness and deep brown look and most importantly the taste that you get with deep frying is all there. Tip number two is my own. You should cook only the recommended serving size portion and when it's gone it is gone. Now this is simple and most of you have probably done this all your life but just understand this is a new practice to me.

I'll have my next post Wednesday and every Wednesday is weigh in day. See you then.

I'm off and pedaling for now...FLAME ON!!!

So what's on the menu these days?

I believe that should be allowed to eat good food that I enjoy. I believe can have a couple of wickedly delicious fat gram loaded meals each week too. It's how we balance it out that makes the difference. Unfortunately I forget to balance these things out. I also forget to get in my exercise. There are many forms of exercise available to us. I once was hooked on the jogging trampoline and still believe that for the price it is the best piece of exercise equipment on the market. I have one now and in the cold if the winter I plan on removing the dust and using it too. What I have to do is make the once and for all lifetime commitment to eat smart and always exercise. The trick for me is that I work all day every day sitting at a desk as a finance manager at a car dealership. Most of my food is microwaved meals or re heated leftovers (not that there's anything wrong with that). So with that in mind we search for a healthy eating plan.


My Mom put me on to a cool website and that is http://www.livestrong.com/. If you click the link to "diet & fitness" and then click "daily plate" there is a form you can fill out with your age, height, current weight, weight loss goals, and level of exercise you will be doing. It then tells you how many calories a day you can eat and still hit your weight loss goal. According to their chart, at a moderate exercise level, I can consume 2400 calories a day and obtain my goal of losing 2 lbs per week. I took it one additional step and registered (for free) at livestrong.com. I can tell them what I ate each day and they tell me how many calories and fat grams I have consumed.I am honestly surprised that I can eat 2400 calories and still lose weight. It doesn't mean that I will eat that much either. In fact I am going to try and stay below that each day. On the days I go over I will try to make up for it the next day. I LOVE THIS WEBSITE AND RECOMMEND IT HIGHLY. Thanks for the tip Mom!

This is what I ate Wednesday:
Breakfast- Jimmy dean frozen low cal breakfast sandwich. You can buy these at Sam's. Delicious and filling. I ate it at 8:15 on the drive in to work. I also had a banana. It kept me full until lunch time.
7 fat grams, 260 calories

Lunch at 1:00 pm- One Totinos Supreme pizza. This is the small one that Kroger runs on sale all the time for $1.00 each. I also had a one ounce serving of Frito's.
Pizza- 40 fat grams, 740 calories Frito's- 10 fat grams, 160 calories

Supper-Good size portion of Karen's world class spaghetti. The only thing I like more than the sight of Karen's leftovers is the sight of Karen herself.
Spaghetti- 40 grams fat and 640 calories.

For the day I was at about 100 fat grams and 1800 calories. I ate well and was never hungry. I rode that night and lost .8 lb from the previous day. These are the types of eating days I am having now. We'll see if it gets me where I need to be.This will be the final post for the week. I'll be back Monday.

I'm off and pedaling for now.

Mapping out the route

Where you ride your bike is so important these days. There is an article in the paper right now about a rider who was killed this past weekend. He was hit head on, went through the drivers windshield, and was lodged in the back seat. Karen and I seriously discussed this when we got the bikes. There is a great bike trail in Towne Lake with a beautiful mini lake, a water fountain, and a great winding trail. The problem is it requires riding down Conflans and crossing Belt Line. We really did not want any heavily traveled streets on our paths. We decided on a planned route through residential streets only. If one of us goes on a solo ride and is late returning we know exactly where to look for the other.

We ride from our corner of McDermott to the other corner and then head to LB Barton Elementary School. My Buffalo pride swells each time I ride by that school. We have our only potentially busy intersection at Conflans @ King Richard. We usually ride around 9:30 to 10 pm so it not busy at that time. We cross Conflans and ride King Richard south until it dead ends in to Alan-A-Dale. We hang a left until that dead ends in to Huntington. We go around the block, then take Yorkshire back to the west. We ride by my cousins' Kenneth and Jannell's house every night. Some day this fall when we can take a Sunday afternoon ride I am going to pop in on them. We ride down Yorkshire back to King Richard and return home from there. It is a slight downhill ride out and slight uphill ride back. Let me tell you these 52 yr old legs can really feel the incline on the way back. The ride takes 15 minutes and at this time of the year, when its still in the 90's at 10 pm and so humid it is a good workout for us. We will add additional time as we improve our conditioning but for now it is just right.

I plan on giving weekly weight updates but for what it's worth I had good news at the scales this morning.

I'm off and pedaling for now.

First Post

Staying in shape and controlling your weight...why is this so hard for me? That is really what this blog is all about but before I get into that too much, let's talk about my first love...the Bicycle.

My bikes of recollection start with the little one with training wheels that we all had. It was red and I got it for Christmas when I was 4 or 5. We still have the home movie of that Christmas and there is a brief shot of me pedaling away on that bike. My first two wheeler was a used bike my Mom bought me at Firestone or Western Auto or Whites...the memory is real but distant. It was a 26 inch adult bike that I could barely ride and I got it when I was in the first grade. Actually My Mom, older brother Dave, and I went there to get Dave a new bike. He got a brand new shiny bike which he could easily ride. I wasn't expecting to get a bike but got lucky. There was a used trade in there and my Mom offered them 5 bucks for it and they took it! I could barely reach the pedals but I remember riding that bike home down the Irving Boulevard service road and being so happy. In retrospect it was a tank but it was my tank. Then Dave and I got our first 20 inch banana seat bikes Christmas of my second or third grade year. We had matching gold stingrays. We rode those bikes everywhere for the next few years and they were our best inanimate friends ever. When I was in the 6th grade and had a paper route I got another 20 inch banana seat but this was a souped up purple monster. It was quite simply the most awesome bike ever. It lasted me through Jr. High and then got put to pasture. In early high school I do recall having a 26" 10 speed bicycle. It was Dallas Cowboy silver blue and I bought it at Kmart. They were all the rage back then and you had to have one. I never bonded with that bike though. I like foot brakes, not hand brakes. My sophomore year in High School I got my drivers license and I was done with bikes for a long time.

My first two daughters, Melanie and Kimberly, left their training wheels behind forever around 1987 or 1988. Daddy needed a bike to ride with them so I got a 26 inch cruiser. It was the Black Beauty and I really enjoyed riding that bike with my girls. I kept it several years but eventually it was sold in a garage sale . So I have been bike less for the last 17 years or so...until now.

I have always fought the fight with weight. I have had good years and bad years with weight control but unfortunately considerably more bad ones than good. I am at that point, at 52 years of age, where I either need to get healthy or I am putting myself in danger. It is time to act. The good weight years share two main constants and they are eating sensibly and exercising. I am not going on a diet. I am however making better choices on what I eat. I am a big believer in counting fat grams and keeping those counts low. Some people focus on carbs, some on calories, but I do fat grams. When I reduce fat grams and I exercise, I lose weight. It is pretty simple actually in theory but harder in practice for me but I have done it before and am doing it again. Low fat grams takes care of main constant number one. Exercise is main constant number two. For that I have returned to my first love, my bicycle. I found, on Craig's List, a guy who sells new bikes at 50 percent of retail. He buys department store overstocks at auction and sells them out of a storage building near Valley Ranch. HOW COOL IS THAT AND WHY AREN'T I DOING THAT? I got two bikes, one for me and one for my best friend and wife of 33 years (as of last Friday) Karen. We are off and pedaling! This will be my blog. As I am known to do I will probably make this all about me but I have to say that doing this with Karen pedaling right beside me means everything to me.

Okay, here is the bottom line. When I started this program I weighed in excess off 280 pounds. This morning I weighed 274.2 lbs. My goal is to lose 2 lbs. per week and be at 240 by thanksgiving, 210 by next spring. I may have to find another mode of exercise through the winter but we'll cross that bridge when we get to it.