...and it begins

A weekend of food, bread, and beer and I'm ready to get things back into right again. I didn't eat all that much more than I usually do, but it was more of the stuff that I don't usually eat.

On Friday, I was 183lbs and today I'm 185.5. Not bad for a holiday weekend of bread and beer. I'm not a low carber, but I'm sure I'm on the low end of normal, since I do eat fruit and yogurt daily, corn tortillas and pozole every couple of weeks, and have a beer here and there.

Last night's Guinness was my "cheers" to top off and end my wonderful weekend with the family. Today begins a week of asceticism.

asceticism; the way I see it

• No grains – easy, since I don't eat them much anyway. I typically reserve what few grains I do have for beer or tacos, but these are low level foods
• Limited dairy – half and half in my joe, and one meal with cheese per day
• No fruit – it's a gateway food
• No yogurt – It's not filling, and just makes me want more yogurt, fruit, or sweets
• Veggies – yes
• There will be meat – oh my yes
• Avocados – Thanks to my sister's tree, there are plenty to eat right now
• Coffee – black and/or with half and half
• No alcohol – No beer, of course, but also no booze or wine for the week
• Sleep – I will try to go to be earlier than usual, which isn't really much of a commitment
• Intermittent Fasting – I almost never eat breakfast, so that part is normal. On some non-training days, I will go longer, but I'm not the 24 hour fasting type. My only issue I have with IF is forgetting to eat enough in the hours prior to training. I can train empty first thing, but training empty after a full day leads to bad training.
• Training – Gal and I appear to be going back to the gym this week, so two days of that and two days of kettlebells and ab rollouts in the little apt gym
• Mobility – It continues
• Walking – Yes, please
• Running – Gal suggested it. I plan to string her along...

By the way, I don't think I've ever used the term "ascetism" before yesterday, when I tried and failed to pronounce it after Gal said it over beers. I said "aesthetic" and got an eye roll for it.

Coincidently, and speaking of asceticism, this morning, my RSS reader found yesterday's blog post by fellow blogger John Durant, regarding his recent monk/monastery/fasting/adventure – Fasting with the Trappists: An adventure in asceticism. It's a good read AND also works well with my philosophy on dieting hard, which is to imagine myself in the place of some sort of monk; feel the hunger.