On the road again

When my family moved to Maryland when I was a kid, I remember walking into our otherwise empty new house and seeing cans of dog food in the pantry with a note that they were for "Cougar". The mystery of "Cougar" was soon revealed as a beautiful Golden Retriever appeared at our back door with the omnipresent "feed me" look so common in dogs. So, like the owners before us, we picked up the tradition of feeding Cougar.

The thing about Cougar is that he didn't stick around for long after he ate. He was likely off to the next sucker's house for yet another meal, and then to the next and to the next before returning home in time for dinner. I have no idea where Cougar actually lived, and somehow he managed not to become enormous and fat, likely from all the running he did to scrounge for his multiple daily meals.

I have driven from Austin to Houston easily 100 times since I moved down here 6 years ago, the most recent being this morning. During that time, like Cougar, I discovered every doughnut and kolache shop on 290, 71, and I-10, and optimized my route around where I wanted to forage. It made the trip pleasurable, knowing Chappell Hill, Hruska's, or Buck-ees was right around the corner with a tasty treat waiting for me. However, unlike Cougar, my snacking and foraging did not have a seemingly neutral impact on my fatness.

On that note, today my mission was to unlearn all my unhealthy places, and try to find healthier places to eat. This was no small task, because road fare is by definition cheap and high calorie, and the closest thing you get to a city along the journey is Giddings, population 5,105. As an aside, Giddings' motto is "experience hometown hospitality," in case you were curious.

Luckily, one of the tenets of my diet is that there is no bad food. So it was past the Krispy Kreme display at the Chevron to the breakfast tacos, where I could get a good balanced breakfast I could eat with one hand. It was a huge score to see the ladies making them right there in front of me, meaning they were as fresh as delicious. Grab a couple of Nutri-Grain and Special K bars, and I've got my snacks for the morning to go with my breakfast (limit one taco please, as there are approx 400 calories in a breakfast taco).

Lunch is a different problem, because it is hard to find something on the highway that isn't "white gravy" fare. "White gravy" fare is anything chicken fried and usually coated in white gravy, with a side of poached-to-death-and-drowned-in-butter vegetables. Now don't get me wrong, there is nothing undelicious about chicken fried critter in white gravy, in fact it is all too delicious. But there is no way you get out of there for under 1000 calories, or much much worse.

I went with the breaded chicken tenders when I stopped. Not my ideal choice, but there is a lot of protein in them, and a balance of carbs as well to keep me going. I figured two of them had about 400 calories in them (a fair estimate) and although higher in fat, the almost 20g of protein is a good fix.

By the way, it is incredibly difficult to work up the energy to work out after six hours in the car (3 hours each way), especially when I get up at 4:30 to make the trip. But I can't make excuses, so I got in the pool and swam for an hour. Three 10 minute sessions of crawl and breaststroke to mix it up and work different muscle groups. It actually energized me to swim a bit.

On, and it looks like the 230.8 weight was an anomaly, as it seemed to be at the time. The next day I weighed in at a more reasonable 232, and today it was 231.4. Who knows what caused the low reading, but I'm still making progress toward my goals, so I'm happy. I hope to be under 230 a week from tomorrow, which will mark the first time I've been under that mark in 10 years or more.