Nothing to say

Not physically, but spiritually.  There was a time, when I lived in Columbus, OH, that I did things differently.  I think back to that time a lot.  I mention that time a lot.  It’s time for me to recreate the essential elements of it in the present, so that I can stop longing for them in the past.

Given all that thinking I’ve been doing, I think I already have a pretty good idea what those essential elements are.  There are ridiculously few, and they are ridiculously basic.  I need simply a consistent schedule and more activity in my day.  I don’t even need to eat better.  I don’t really need to change ANYTHING else.  I just need to be more active and more consistent.

Let’s break it down.  The activity was obvious.  I walked and took the bus to go to work, because I didn’t have a car.  Also as a result of not having a car, all my shopping, travel, etc was done on bike.  I biked to the grocery.  I biked to the park.  I biked to the library.  And I forced myself out of the house for a certain number of hours each week.  Given that the weather here is so idyllic, I doubt that last part will be necessary.  The difficult lies in the traffic.  It’s honestly just too life-threateningly scary to bike around here.  Biking to the library wouldn’t really be that far, but there are so many VERY busy intersections between here and there, each polluted with MIAMI drivers.  Let me confess that I’m not altogether eager to put my life into their hands!  So what are my options, then?  I honestly don’t know.  Let me get back to the action stage after addressing the schedule.

Another significant change that I had made in my life back in those days was a schedule.  It wasn’t really a very religious one, even.  I just basically tried to eat at about the same time every day, and I got up and went to sleep at about the same time.  Even on the weekends.  I would go to bed at midnight and get up at 6am.  On the weekends, I’d allow myself another hour or 3 of sleep, depending on how badly I wanted it, and I could stay up another hour later, maybe.  I tried not to vary that schedule by much, though, and 6 hours was honestly enough 5 or 6 nights out of the week.  Then I’d get 8 solid hours and be great for another week of 6 hours a night.

Meals were pretty simple most of the time.  Breakfast and lunch were both at work on the weekdays.  I’d have a couple packets of instant oatmeal or something similarly small for breakfast every day as well as 4 to 6 cups of coffee.  No, I’m not kidding.  It would last me until lunch.  For lunch, I almost ALWAYS ate out.  Fast food and cafeteria food were the norm.  Sometimes I would have leftovers from the previous night.  Sometimes I’d have a can of soup.  I couldn’t really afford to eat out 2x a day, so I tried to make dinner at home as much as I could.  They were always really simple dinners.  I’m talking things that I would NEVER dream of trying to serve someone else.  Ramen noodles were a staple.  I’d dump in half a bag of frozen veggies for balance.  Spaghetti was pretty common, and everything was from a box or jar.  Premade pasta sauce, even.  And a few sprinkles from the oregano and basil.  One of my favorites was cut up chicken breast sort of stir-fried in barbecue sauce, with cheese melted over the top at the end.  Maybe I’d have it with some mega-salt rice mix or on a tortilla, but oftentimes just a bowl of that.  Nevermind the bread&cereals group.

Of course I’d never dream of eating half those things nowadays.  The chicken mess, sure.  Ramen noodles are just too salty.  I can hardly even stand the taste now that I’m no longer conditioned to all the sodium.  I don’t eat canned soup that often, and when I do, it’s probably organic.  My oatmeal comes in cylinders or from the bulk bin now, and gets mixed with a whole fruit preserve for flavor.  No more pre-sweetened crap.  This is all good, but my eating schedule is just horrendous.  I don’t have one.  I’ll eat breakfast anywhere from 8am (in the car, rarely) to around 11:30, when I realize I haven’t eaten all morning.  Lunch will come between 11 (when I just can’t wait) and 4 (when I need to eat somehting to avoid falling asleep on the drive home).  Dinner happens anywhere between 6 and 11.  THIS, my friends, is NOT healthy.

And so I begin my initiative to eat better.  Hopefully, this will be easier to achieve now that I’ve made a solid commitment to do it.  Most days, my best excuse for putting off breakfast and lunch are that I was too busy goofing around on the computer.  That’s hardly a valid excuse.  For dinner, GF doesn’t come home some nights until 8 or 10, but she would be totally understanding if I ate earlier to maintain a schedule.  It’s time for me to start this and adhere to it.  It begins tomorrow.  Breakfast at 8:30.  Lunch at noon.  Dinner at or as close to 7pm as I can manage.

Now what can I do about the activity thing?  I’m not going to bike to work.  Seriously.  It scares the hell out of me.  I’m going to have to make time after dinner then, I guess.  Or jog in the morning (which I’ll have time for if I start getting up at 6.)  Alright, that’s fair.  Wake at 6.  Jog from 6:15 to 6:30.  Get ready and leave.  After a week or 2 of that, I’ll probably be able to jog for more than 15 mins, and by then, I’ll know how capable I am of doing such a crazy thing.  I’ll know how much time I need to get ready and get to work on time.  Too bad I can’t drive to work at 6:15, jog THERE, shower afterwards (le sigh) and then be at my desk on time.  I’d have way more time, because at that hour, the drive would be SO much faster.  Ah well.  And then I can do an evening jog, or some weights or something.

I’m also going to be jogging a half marathon in January, so there’s no time like the present to start training for that.

I’m going to go write up my schedule and post it somewhere obvious.  It’ll help me remember tomorrow, when I’m ENTIRELY not in the mood.  I haven’t really been good tonight, so I’m NOT getting up at 6 tomorrow.  I’ll start that crap on Friday or better yet, next week.