Sunday, November 1, 2009

Jiggling & Shaking To The End of Week Two

It's been a mad, MAD weekend, with the beau involved in a four-night improvisation festival for Halloween, and an inter-state improviser staying with us for the duration. As a result, I barely noticed the last two days of the Shake Weeks slip by, except when I hopped on the scales each morning - the downward trend continued all week, with this morning's weigh-in putting me a full 1.7kg lower than I weighed this time last week! I suspect a little may be lean mass loss since I suffered leg cramps for two night mid-week, but other than that it's been a progressive loosening of flab, and then tautening of skin!

Day 13: I was awake and enjoying my first shake of the day well before the beau and the guest rose, thereby dodging potential awkwardness. When they did appear, I whipped up some almond pancakes with blueberries and cream, fried eggs and bacon for the two of them. I never mentioned being Primal to the guest, but he accepted what I served graciously and soon thereafter gushed about how nice it was. I noticed him trim the fat off the middle bacon, but at least he put a bit of cream on the pancake.

Since breakfast was served at noon, we decided to combine lunch and dinner. I enjoyed my lunch shake with lots of ice since the weather screeched up to a mind-numbing 30 degrees Celsius, our first proper summer day!

Snacked on an ounce of macadamia nuts once again - it's good to know that I'm in control of those cravings! Fat loss will do that to one's self-control, I guess :)

Dinner was a topside beef roast, rubbed in fresh garlic and rosemary, and tasted delicious! Our visitor couldn't stop commenting on how tasty it was! I'll definitely be preparing meat that way again.


For the boys I also prepared a green salad, but I decided not to partake since my experimentation with adding vegetables hasn't been worth it - I like the taste, but I don't like the, er, evidence of fermentation occurring in my colon...
A very early dinner - 4:30pm - and then a long night of ushering the evening's impro performances, but the roast saw me through! Meanwhile, part of my job for the evening was to offer free lollies to the audience as the entered the theatre - I felt so dirty!

Today, the final day of dairy shakes, ran according to the usual plan - a shake for breakfast and for lunch, and then I snacked on the last of the macadamia nuts, before serving myself a tasty plateful of grilled lamb chops (with a side of bacon, but the bacon finished cooking first so it didn't last long enough to make it into the picture...)!


So that's it for Weeks 1 & 2, with some unpleasant stomach sensations but some positives (mainly attributed to caloric restriction, but good to know I can still lose whilst consuming dairy) to make the experiment worthwhile thus far. Tomorrow heralds the beginning of the Meat Weeks - somehow I don't think they will pose a problem! I'm a bit concerned as to whether I can continue to supplement my diet with additional leucine, but perhaps when my new egg protein powder arrives, I'll mix up some shakes to take to work (with the weather warming up, a chilled lunch sounds perfect!) and add the leucine there. I haven't been eating lunch for the past couple of months, but I will for the duration of this experiment since Mum is bound to do the same.

In preparation for eating yet more meat, particularly red meat, in the face of the media frenzy of "red meat is unsustainable & ruining the environment" BS, here's a quote from Joel Salatin via Local Nourishment that, if the theory is true, neatly sums up my ideals and hopes for today's and tomorrow's eaters:

“Every bit of the alleged science linking methane and cows to global warming is based on annual cropping, feedlots and herbivore abuse. It all crumbles if the production model becomes like our mob-stocking-herbivorous-solar-conversion-lignified-carbon-sequestration fertilization. America has traded 73 million bison requiring no petroleum, machinery or fertilizer for 45 million beef cattle, and we think we’re efficient. At Polyface, we practice biomimicry and have returned to those lush, high organic matter production models of the native herbivores. If every cow producer in the country would use this model, in less than 10 years we would sequester all the carbon that’s been emitted since the beginning of the industrial age.”

Just two days ago, an article written by a small-time rancher appeared in the New York Times, explaining the very same idea, with an accessibly personal (yet therefore appearing biased) spin on the blame placed on animal farmers, intelligently coaxing the readers to make smarter meat choices - read The Carnivore's Dilemma.

Lastly, Dr. T at Nephropal published a fantastic paleo primer which very clearly details the health problems caused by the current Western diet and how adopting an evolutionary way of eating resolves all of those issues. Dr. T isn't the most eloquent writer on the 'Net, but they certainly know how to spin an allegory and make the facts hit home, in a colourful and non-threatening way. I'll be sharing this one with my friends!

I hope everyone had a safe and candy-free Halloween!

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