Shallow Thinker

I have this “unidentified friend” who has been working on his weight for a while. On occasion, he’ll post about his progress and from what I can see, he’s trimming down. (And from what Chuck can see, he’s shaping up!)

I’ve been working on getting in shape a bit myself. I haven’t really been trying to control my weight, but I have been keeping an eye on it just out of curiosity. The results?

In the past year, I’ve put on 5 pounds. In the past three years I’ve managed to gain 10 pounds.  When Butterfly was born, I was in the mid 170’s, but now I’m sitting around 185-187.

So where is this weight going? Have I been working out so much that I’m getting really muscular? Maybe I’ve eaten so much that I’m getting fat. Maybe I’ve taken in too much iron and my bones are getting heavier. Oh, I know, I have a goatee and I need a haircut…maybe that’s most of it.

Better yet, I’ll ask you, the random people of the internet. Where is the weight going? Even if you don’t know me, you can feel free to answer.  Here are your choices:

• A) Wow, you’re getting muscular! Is it legal to carry those guns?
• B) Dude, you’re getting fat. Three chili dogs at one meal is enough.
• C) It’s probably all added mass in your brain. You seem smarter every time I talk to you.
• D) I don’t know you, but judging by your blog, you’re a handsome fella.
• E) Maybe you should try brushing some of that plaque off your teeth.
• F) While A and C are very true, I think you’re just getting old…like Lance.
• G) This post was very boring and I didn’t even make it this far down.

My wife constantly tells me that eating breakfast is good as long as it’s the right kind of breakfast.  I think that one of the things shem mentioned was eggs.  That’s good because I like eggs.  Here’s this morning’s day-starter…

My wife and I cook supper on occasion. And, when we have left-overs, she sweetly puts some into a container for me so that I’ll have lunch for work the next day. Last night was such an occasion and this morning Kelley informed me that my entire lunch was in a bag in the fridge ready to go. So after hugging Butterfly and getting an extra hug from Ladybug, I grabbed my lunch and headed out the door.

When I got to the cafeteria, I opened one of the containers and found this odd substance inside…I wasn’t sure what to do with it. I don’t know that I’ve ever eaten anything like this. Luckily, I work with some people who have eaten this kind of thing. One of the guys told me it is “salad.” So, like any other man who has been given something healthy to eat, I traded it for a Snickers…now that satisfies!

About a year ago, my employer held a health & benefits fair. I was excited because I love going to the fair. I wasn’t sure how they’d incorporate health into it, but I was really excited about the benefits part - seeing the people juggle, getting a smoked turkey leg…maybe even some rides!

Apparently my employer has a different view of what a “fair” is. (I’d hate to see the ones that they went to growing up.) This one involved walking around and talking to people about retirement and exercise and blah, blah blah. Apparently I’m not saving enough money for retirement. Also, I’m overweight (see below). But, being the smart person that I am, I think that this is a brilliant combination! If I’m overweight, then I’m much more likely to die early. And, if I die early, I don’t need too much retirement money….right? So, I get to eat what I want now and spend the money to buy stuff that I want and I’ll die right on time. I really feel sorry for the people who are eating healthy and saving. They don’t get to have anything, and they have to live much longer without it, too! Losers!

At any rate, the point of this post was to discuss what “overweight” really means. The most common tool for determining this is the Body Mass Index (BMI). This is a formula that compares your weight and your height. If you’d like to see where you are, just click the picture to the left and it will link you to the place on the CDC’s website where you can figure it out. (If you’re a teen or a child then you’ll need to use a different link - click here. Also, if you’re a child, why are you calculating your BMI? And can you read this? Wow…impressive!)

So here’s my deal. I’m 5′11″ and last night I weighed in at 186 lb. So, you put those numbers in and…..overweight. But let’s tweak it a little bit. I’m actually 6′ when I wear my shoes and I need to take off a pound or two to account for clothing. NOW, let’s try it again and…..overweight. Guess there’s no getting around this one….I’m a big boy…

On occasion, my knees feel good enough to let me run…so I try to take advantage of that and punish them by running. It’s a vicious cycle that I enjoy thoroughly. At any rate, I got a chance to run this evening. My time wasn’t anything to blog about….but yet here I am, blogging away. But why run…what’s the goal?

Each year, I do the Run4Missions 5. The first time I ran it, I didn’t know what to expect because I hadn’t run in a while. I finished in 25:43. Last year, I trained a little leading up to the race and finished in 24:22. So, I’ve set a personal goal of 22 minutes flat. I don’t know that I can achieve it this year, but I do think that this year’s run will be a great indicator of if it’s actually reachable or not.

Tonight I ran 4 miles in 36 minutes. That works out to a pace of 9 minutes per mile. If I want to complete the 5K in 22 minutes, that works out to a pace of just over 7 minutes per mile. WOW….I need to trim 2 minutes per mile….2 whole minutes!! In the words of the song from Smokey and the Bandit:

He’s got a long way to go and a short time to get there. He’s gone’ do what they say can’t be done

Well, I don’t know about that second sentence, but the first one definitely applies. Have I set my goals too high?

I took yesterday off work so that I could visit various doctors for various reasons. One of these happened to be a dermatologist. I went to him because I’ve been getting some really bad headaches. My theory was that I have been working out so hard that my muscles are expanding too fast. As a result, the skin is pulling too tight and causing headaches around the head area. (Because headaches around the arm area are untreatable.) At any rate, I wanted to see if he could cut some slits in the skin so that it would stretch out and relieve the pressure.

While I was there, I figured I’d get him to check over all these spots on my skin. See, some people have this amazing ability to cope with sunlight. Their skin turns dark as a defensive mechanism so that they absorb less of the light….but not me. No sir, my skin turns from pasty-white to blood-red….then it dies and falls off, allowing a new wonderful layer of pasty white to appear. On occasion, I get lucky enough to have freckles. So if I’m really far away from you and you squint so that I look blurry, it might look like I have a tan….but I don’t. But, if I ever get really bored, I could play connect-the-dots…for a long time.

At any rate, the doctor told me lots of things to do to keep from turning into leather. Here are some of the things that he did not advise me to do.

• get burned at least once or twice a year…it keeps up your pain threshold
• for rough spots on your skin, try sandpaper
• if you have a spot that you think needs to be removed, try using a sharp knife and do it yourself - it saves insurance money
• a soldering iron will work well, too
• honey makes a great moisturizer
• if you can’t tell the different between your skin and beef jerky, then you’re doing it right

It’s no secret. My wive loves chocolate. Our years of marriage have given me a keen insight into her personality. So when I come home from work, I can tell instantly if there’s no more chocolate in the house. (The bite marks on the door are a dead give-away.) Each night she recounts to me the woes of her battle against this sugar-sweetened beast. Sometimes she wins the battle and other times the chocolate wins…which I guess is still a win for her. (Odd….that’s how our arguments turn out, too.)

The smooth lather of cocoa wields no power over me. But there are a handful of items that may cause me to stumble on occasion (meat and cheese…preferably with a smoked flavor), but I generally do pretty well. So what is the secret of my success? What keen insight do I have that allows me to maintain this finely-tune physique?

Laziness - yeah, you heard me. I’m lazy and that’s what keeps me fit. If I’m sitting on the couch thinking, “boy, it sure would be nice to have a bowl of ice cream” then my laziness kicks in and replies “yeah, but it sure would be nice to not get up right now”.

So what if I start working-out on a regular basis again? Exercise is supposed to give you more energy. And if I have more energy, I won’t be as lazy. And if I’m not as lazy, then I’ll probably get up and actually get that bowl of ice cream…which would make me out of shape…and in turn…lazy. So why go through all that trouble to be lazy if I could just be lazy to be lazy? See, it all makes perfect sense!

The only flaw in my plan is when the wife gives me something for my office…like this bag of hickory-smoked beef jerky. But I don’t have to worry about absorbing all of these preservatives and fats. When I’ve finished it off in one sitting and chased it with a couple of Mountain Dews, I’ll applaud myself because self-control and laziness will work together to keep me from going out and buying another bag.

You can’t buy this kind of wisdom, folks…I’m giving it away for free.

One of my favorite singers, Justin McRoberts, has a song that starts “I feel the wear in my knees from the weight of time…” And then the song goes on to say other things, which I’m sure are very important, but my brain has been stuck on that line for about the past 4 years. That’s because about that time ago I started really having some trouble with my knees. After ignoring my wife’s advice for 6 months, I went to the doctor and was told that I have arthritis in my knees. (I’m 28 now, so that means I must have been about 26 then…right?). I was pretty sure that my doctor was mistaken. I am a young buck in the prime of my life….but sure enough, the signs were all there.

I, being inquisitive and all, decided to find out what was actually going on in my knees, how it could have happened, and all that stuff. Basically, I’ve worn out some of the cartilage between a few bones. But I’m so young, how could this have happened? And then it hit me…My high school coaches are to blame. I was fortunate(?) enough to go to a small school where I played football and ran track. And every day I was told to run, run, run, and then run some more. And of course, I always had to run a little extra for disciplinary purposes, but those were always well worth it. But basically, I was such an athlete in high school that I wore out my knees. (See, that’s why I didn’t go on to play football in college or the pros…I was just too good too early.)

At any rate, there is a moral for this story that I think each of you should know. Exercise is nothing but trouble. That’s right. Professional athletes are all the time breaking bones, tearing ligaments, or fracturing pinky toes. I’ve never heard of a librarian spraining an eyeball from reading too hard. How many times have you torn your ACL by sitting in a Lay-Z-Boy watching American Gladiators? Me either. So statistically speaking, you’re much safer being lazy and doing nothing.

So pass me some of those chips and a frosty beverage while I sit here and try not to get arthritis in any of my other joints. In fact, it might help my elbows out if you could just put those chips directly into my mouth for me.

Special Nerd Link Information - Clicking on Justin’s picture will open a demo player where you can listen to samples of his songs. The song referenced above is titled “Ready When You Are” and is track 3 on the “Father” CD.  I recommend the album “Intersections” and “Untitled EP” with a warm cup of coffee, a nice fire in the fireplace, and a plate of nachos. It’s very cozy.

If you have children, then you’re always proud of them and telling hilarious stories about the silly things they do. If you don’t have children, then you’re always sitting through some boring story that a parent is telling you about their kid pulling the cat’s tail over and over. They’ll laugh so hard telling it that they’ll start to cry. The tears streaming down your cheeks are from fighting off the urge to yell “THIS STORY IS BORING AND I DON’T CARE!” So with that in mind, I want to regale you with a tale of watching my child mature.

It was about 6 months after I’d started a new job (which I haven’t been fired from yet) that I looked around and realized that I was just an insignificant spec in the world of engineering. This is not what I wanted. I didn’t sleep through four years of college just to become a random person woven into the fabric of society. I wanted to be somebody….somebody who makes a difference. History is littered with engineers who have worked tirelessly and made amazing innovations, but we never remember their names. For instance, the first guy to make a bridge….he wasn’t even named Mr. Bridge. Nope, Mr. Bridge was his manager. I didn’t want that to happen to me. I needed something to define my legacy. And then, my first brain-child was born:

SODD (Society of Dunkin Donuts)

With keen intellect, a winning personality and a knack for making lists, I managed to find about a dozen willing participants. Each participant was responsible for bringing two dozen donuts for his/her assigned Thursday. And on Thursday morning, when the donuts arrived, all participants would gather around the box and break deep-fried bread together. I looked around at the society, and it was good. A bit wobbly on its feet at times, but a beautiful idea born unto my workforce.

It is with great pride that I write you today to tell you about watching this legacy take its first steps to independence. this morning, after sprinting from my car into the break room, I opened the box and almost wept with joy. One of the participants, all on his own, found a way to combine the concept of “fried dough” with that of “chocolate in a candy shell”. I had to snap a picture of this beautiful creation before I devoured it.

That’s what being a father is all about.