Friday night dinner. Nothing fancy; I am definitely not proclaiming that I made something awesome. However, I did just get my toaster oven, and this is my first non-toast-oriented dish.

It’s just chicken breast + mushroom soup + mushrooms.

In all, it is about 680 calories, and for dinner, I had about half of it with a simple side salad and some mixed veggies. In all, about a 425-calorie dinner followed up by a bowl of Fiber One cereal and some Lactaid milk.

BTW, do I sound like an old man or what?

Oooh, side note: In my current obsession with all-things Jillian Michaels, I saw in a chat she did with the Washington Post that she advises against men consuming soy, presumably soy milk and soy protein powder. I had to check my milk; I drink Lactaid. Also, my protein powder is whey. I think I’m good.

I also calculated my BMR tonight, and it came out to 1997.53 for my starting weight of 211. BTW, 211 isn’t my highest weight. I’d say I have probably inched close to 220 at some point over the past 10 years. However, my recent low was about 198.

The problems there were numerous. I suspect I was working from an “energy deficit” as Jillian might have said. See, you take that 1997.53 BMR and multiply it by 1.375 (for a guy who exercises 1 to 3 times a week, which historically I have) to get my daily caloric intake.

That number is over 2740 calories a day. Working at a deficit of 500-cals a day, I can do up to 2240 theoretically. Last year when I dropped 11 pounds or so, I was eating 1500 to 1700 cals a day. Probably a bit too much of a calorie deficit. See, I dropped the pounds but didn’t have the energy day-to-day to workout.

Tangent city. I feel like I ate a ton today and only took in 2,005 calories.

The downside to this is sodium. Canned soups are terribly high in sodium, which gets stored in the body making one look all puffy. Going to start looking for the reduced sodium labels to see just how much lower they are.

Video I shot (a whopping :42 worth) on Feb. 27 at Roll-A-Way Rink in NW Oklahoma City as the Oklahoma City Victory Dolls roller derby team opened its season with a win over the unconfortably named Assassination City (Dallas).

I say “uncomfortably named” when the Oklahoma City’s team initials are “VD.” Ha!

Here’s the truth: I am a sports fan, and I enjoyed the heck out of this. Took a little pre-bout research to figure out the scoring, but once I understood, I totally understood. Don’t have time to get out to NW Oklahoma City too often — but if something pops up like this in Norman, I’m liable to check it out.

I don’t touch on the sub-culture aspect of roller derby much, but it’s definitely punk. I’ll let this documentary speak to that. Put together by backup Oklahoma Sooners QB Hays MacEachern and Andy Gibson, this mini-doc sort of introduces you to the Victory Dolls through the eyes of a woman who, um, doesn’t quite have her health insurance yet.

Here’s what I took away from the work the OU students did: I’m sorry it was only five minutes. It was very well done and interesting. Enjoy.

That’s How I Roll

andygib | MySpace Video

adamiss:

“Talent is God given; be humble. Fame is man-given: be grateful. Conceit is self-given; be careful.”

 - John Wooden (1910-2010)

Surprisingly good: Brown rice, canned peas, tuna, tbsp. of Miracle Whip.

Now, the problem: It was 735 calories, of which I ate probably 80 percent. However, if I can not “eat the whole thing,” which is always a goal — as in “Ryan, don’t eat the entire bucket of chicken” or “Ryan, they make ice cream in containers smaller than a gallon” — then we have something here.

The takeaway is thus: Only brown rice and whole wheat pasta for awhile. This will require creativity.

Like an dingbat, I hadn’t charged my Cybershot’s Lithium battery in awhile, so no snapshot of the bachelor-food masterpiece. Tried doing it with the Blackberry, but those things just aren’t made for anything but e-mail and light browsing.

This looks very funny. Roger Ebert gave this three stars (ergo, a good review). “Get Him To The Greek” is a Judd Apatow movie, and Apatow has gradually turned himself into the John Hughes of this generation.

Apatow + good Ebert review = will go see.

My workout strategy was to have audio of Jillian Michaels yelling at me constantly. However, all I have been able to find on YouTube are videos of her making a ton of sense.

Video below.

In all seriousness, I am about as ADD as one can possibly be at 40. Well, almost 40. While it’s hard to get out of bed super early to do anything, it’s doubly tough when the workout routine is a bore.

That’s why I’m going in with my little cheat sheet of speeds and inclines and changing it up often. The trick long-term is being able to do this every day, and the key to that is variety in concert with striking while the weather is hot.

I despise winter. I don’t start projects during the winter, but I suspect I could carry on good habits as the weather cools. We’ll see.

Meanwhile, I’m still looking for good videos of Jillian yelling or kickin’ ass. This quick video of her talking about how to lose ab fat will have to do for now.

Woman Unusual (Smooth Jazz / R and B Demo)

WOMAN UNUSUAL
c. 2009 Ryan Welton

Alone but alive
My pen speaks
Words but not wise
To what you seek
If I knew, I could solve this mystery

CHORUS:
Here’s to woman unusual
Here’s to ordinary man
Here’s to curious, crazy love
We should take it if we can

A fool and his pride
The lady speaks
A pain she confides
To me, she seeks
A steady shoulder to rest her weary head

CHORUS

Found a cool spreadsheet somebody put together with interval and incline treadmill workouts. You can download the XLS file and take them to the gym.

That’s what I plan to do tomorrow. Thinking I’ll try one of the interval workouts.

For the spreadsheets, go here: http://bit.ly/dhCTOm

Sometimes in art, we are challenged or forced to do things outside of our comfort zones. However, most of the time, it is preferred that the artist stay true to himself.

That’s my opinion of course. For the sake of growth, others would disagree. And I wouldn’t take major issue with it except to say that Marky Mark is not a big band crooner. Get my drift? At the end of the day, we are who we are.

And I posted a video to an original composition tonight that, I think, is kind of outside my wheelhouse. Kind of a slow jazz vocal, it borders on R and B (my ampersand key doesn’t work) — and while I like the composition, I don’t love it. Sitting back waiting for it to post to YouTube and eventually to here, I kept thinking, “That’s not the type of song I should be doing.”

The question is: Good to stretch creatively? Or a waste of time?