Fat Fat Fatty

The first time I was told I was gaining some weight was probably the summer before last, when I was back home in Vacaville and next door at Anthony's house. His dad said something to the extent of "you've gained some weight there" at the time. I hadn't thought much of it and really, up until then I've had the image cross my mind of myself getting out of shape and fat.

To summarize it, basically it all started probably as soon as I got to college. No more track, no more PE classes - no more "regulated" or "forced" exercise. Not to mention no one else to play DDR with me (and I had lost some interest). Best case scenario I was stagnant due to the walking back and forth on campus up the hills but counter-balanced by all the junk that I was eating at school (and no Mom there to force me to eat the veggies that gets replaced by more junk food otherwise).

But then I think I took a positive step the first 2 summers in which I returned to Vacaville to work at the pool supply store. Especially the 2nd (last summer ever) that I worked there, because I remember working hard, long, 8+ hour days where I would spend my lunch break sleeping in the office or munching on Gordettos to ease my appitite. I'm pretty sure that summer I lost a good 5-10 pounds due to work.

However, once I moved into the Johnson house is where I think things started to take a turn for the worst. First, I turned 21 so the bars now added a good amount of extra alcohol to my diet. I suppose I just continued to eat junk and not balance my diet, coupled with more and more lack of exercise. It continued for about 2 years up to now, where I ate whenever I wanted to and the summe time I worked at a place that bored me to hell and didn't keep me busy (or on my feet). This summer especially, I've just eaten when I wanted to and whatever I wanted, late at night before going to bed as well. I've noticed that I've had trouble squeezing into some pants and my shirts are becoming tighter. Just as importantly, I'm completely out of shape physically and strength wise. I can't keep up at all on DDR, and just looking at myself in the mirror I look like a wreck. I can't lift weight as well as I used to, and I can't even do 20 push-ups without struggling.

I don't know how much I weigh, but I'll know tomorrow after I buy a bathroom scale. The plan is this (and I've started already):

1.) DIET: has be changed completely. I can and will only eat between the hours of 5PM and 12AM. I will try to make my own discretion at what I'm allowed to eat and what I'm not allowed. Water will be the beverage of choice, not sodas or even Gatorade. The main emphasis of this diet is to kill my appetite and cravings to eat/snack - with cutting how much is going into my body only a side note.

2.) TRAINING: the parts of my upper body that I will focus on first will be my chest and arms. Push-ups daily (as long as they're not worn out from the previous day) to build up to a regime of about 40 push-ups without getting too tired. I will also work out my biceps until I am able to lift the dumb-bell set that I have here with all the weights on it at 20 reps per set, 3 sets a day. I really want to phase in my abs into the routine but I don't know what I want to do with that... it's so disgusting to look at myself (and in the past these excercises have never produced quick results) but I need to at least get myself back into shape so that I can do sit-ups with ease and not stress myself.

3.) EXERCISE: I have always hated cardio, and will continue to hate it for the rest of my life, but I will have to do it to help lose weight and to get back into shape. I'm trying to figure out ways around it, mainly DDR (hopefully) and even jumping rope. I wonder how treadmills will feel and what kind of results, but I don't want to drag my ass to the gym.

We'll see how long I am able to keep all this up... my goal will be all the way until I go back home for Thanksgiving at least, and hopefully all the way through to Christmas.

Las Vegas 2006

Wednesday - 8/30/06

So there was something of a water management crisis at work (in fact the whole Cal Poly campus) so I ended up not even having to go to work. At about 5 o'clock the guys called to tell me that we were going to Cliff's before we took off, so I showered and packed, then headed over. We went to Cliff's (close to Pismo Beach) for happy hour which included a free taco bar and we all had a drink. Then we drove the 1/2 hour or so to Santa Maria, parked, and got on the plane. It was weird, they had us walk on the runway area a bit and get on the relatively small charter plane. We got to Vegas at about 9:45, and took a shuttle to the hotel (of which Jeff kept us entertained by his spam e-mails that he received on his phone regarding Viagra). By the time we were fully checked in at Paris and got ready to go gambling, it was about 11 to 11:30. So we walked around for a while and checked out all the tables, before finally settling down at the Pai Gow Poker tables, where a nice lady named Jeanette taught us all the rules. I had an amazing night, and the game itself progresses relatively slowly because of the high probability of pushing with the dealer, but I lost most of the small hands and won my big bet ones. Then the bonus finally hit it pretty big for me, when a new dealer settled down and I jokingly asked for 5 aces. I picked up my hand and saw that there were 3 of them, plus the Joker - 4 aces, the bonus payed 25-1. I had a $5 chip there, thus I yielded a $125 big hand. By the end of the night, Dan was up about $150 and I was up $333 exactly. We ended the night around 4 or 4:30.

Thursday - 8/31/06

We got up around 11 or so, and went downstairs to have lunch at a very good restaurant inside Paris. After that we started gambling again, and the Pai Gow tables pulled a 180 on me, and started taking ALL my winnings. I lost $200 in a couple of hours, and had to grab more cash from the hotel room. We then decided to walk the strip a little and find the Blackjack Switch game that was supposed to produce positive results and seemed fun. We finally found it at Casino Royale (I found out yesterday that that's where Andrew stayed when he was there a week ago) and Jeff, Brian, and I threw down money. But within 10 minutes, Brian had lost $50, I had lost $100, and Jeff $200... the table was wack, the dealer never busted once, hit 2 or 3 blackjacks, and there were so many low cards floating around. On one of my hands, I hit until I had SEVEN cards and had a total of: 19. It was amazing, but I still lost the fricking hand. We walked around a bit more after that, and watched Jeff win a huge craps hand. I lost the rest of my winnings at the roulette table, and we decided to walk back. We stopped off at Margaritaville and had some drinks and a snack, before finally going back to Paris again and continued gambling. The same dealers were at Pai Gow, and I should've known that was a bad sign. A couple hours later, and a couple hundred dollars were gone again. I had the last $100 that I came to Vegas with me left, and we started getting ready to go to the VooDoo Lounge, of which we received VIP passes from Som who did all of our reward card things the night before.

We took the shuttle over there, Jeff and Dan had some food, before going up 51 floors to the lounge. The passes saved us $20 each, which should've hinted that the drinks were going to be porportional to that heavy cover charge that we got away with. After a $50+ round of drinks, we were debating leaving the great view from the outside deck. We eventually left, by about 10:30 there still wasn't much people there at all. But at the shuttle area, Brian and Jeff said they were going back up, so D and I headed back to Paris and continued to play Pai Gow.


I took my time, playing the absolute minimum and sitting out like 2/3 of the hands. I did that so I could sit there and order drink after drink after drink. D eventually lost all his money, and I lost my $100 but we got drunk off our ass. Jeanette even came over a couple of times to say hello, and we got the pit-boss Rolan to take the picture for us. We headed back up to the hotel at approximately 4-4:30, and Dan dove into the mini-bar's cashews, managed to break the top off the glass jar, but it was all well before I ran to the bathroom to throw up. Brian and Jeff came back eventually by 5 or so.

Friday - 9/1/06

I felt like shit, and we sat in the room after packing up until 1 o'clock to get our full money's worth of that hotel room. I almost left my passport in that room were it not for Brian asking to see the plane itinerary. We went back to the restaurant that we dined at yesterday (and the same one that Brian and Jeff stopped off at 5 in the morning for food). I was still feeling sickly and didn't eat that much. The boys gambled a bit more, as I watched and eventually went to take out some money to buy souviners and to pay for taxi, etc. But not before I won $30 at the Pai Gow Tiles table with Jeff. We got our bags at about 3:30-4 and headed off to the airport. Jeff's plane to Alaska took off about an hour first, and after seeing him off we went around to various small shops and bought some candy and small things. I sat at the slot machines before we got on the plane, and spent about $30 with nothing spectacular coming out of it. The plane ride home was annoying, the speakers were loud as hell and they announced every fucking thing. Finally back in Santa Maria, where we proceeded to wait 15 minutes at baggage claim before finally getting in the car and coming home.

I spent pretty much what I planned to spend at Vegas, and had a great time. I want to go again...