And You Thought I Was Done With Goals

Now as you are all aware of I’m sure, Mr. Lemonhead has set himself on an amazing journey towards a physically fit body and a figure that has been hibernating ever since I failed to see my name on the list for the 2000-2001 Morton High School Varsity Boys Basketball Team. Those 35-45 pounds I put on this figure over that winter (I don’t know why, I only ate a hot pocket after school every day?) have melted off, though never completely, and then somehow managed to find their way back to my waist. This mission that I am currently on with the ultimate goal of seeing a scale that the first digit starts with a “1” instead of a “2” (or a “3” which was my trajectory at 12/31/10) also comes with other minor goals that I, Mr. Lemonhead, hope to accomplish in 2011. As has been my philosophy since creating these Diaries what better way to hold yourself more accountable, than to let everyone know what your intentions are (I know, I know, you don’t care but I don’t know if you don’t tell me). With that being said, I give to you The 2011 Goals of Mr. Lemonhead:

Previously Stated Goals

1. To run 20/miles a week

- - I know that I have already fallen short of this goal but that is still my goal for the year. By the end of the year if I fail to achieve this goal for the remaining weeks I hope to make up for with a weekly average > = 20 miles a week (I can’ t believe I bombed the greater than or less than  test in 1st grade - it still haunts me)

2. To run 1,000 miles in 2011

- - This one kind of piggy-backs off of my previous goal, but one that should be stated, none-the-less. This has been a goal of mine ever since I started my running career (4+ years and counting). I came tantalizingly close in 2010 but succumbed to the pressures of fountain soda and eating whatever I could. The horse that I was riding on to my elusive goal bucked me off and there was no recovery. I ended the year with somewhere around 920 miles.

3. To weigh less than 200 lbs at 12/31/11

- - THE ULTIMATE GOAL and the reason these diaries exist. My weight loss history is well documented but what isn’t so pretty is my ability to keep those lbs off after my “diet” ends. Achieving this goal and maintaining same pants size for a year would hopefully lead to a life of good habits and the need to confess to you all the damage that I do to my body.

Newly Stated Goals

1. To run a sub-4 hour marathon in the Spring and a marathon in the Fall (3:30 - 3:35 finish)

- - This goal depends heavily on numbers 1 and 2 above. While I am known as the King of the Taper, my last two training programs were derailed by two injuries (strained calf and pulled hamstring) that forced me to stop training for a month each. Oddly enough these two injuries occurred 1 year apart and on the same training run that I was trying to complete. I am sure these injuries were a result of my lack of a base so if I can keep the weekly mileage where I want it to be, hopefully the injury bug won’t rear its ugly head. I have decided to run the Illinois Marathon on April 30 as my Spring Marathon and the Fall marathon is TBD. My plan is to ease into the training for the Illinois Marathon while building my base and to use that base for my Fall marathon (hence the better expected finish time).

2. To run a sub 20-minute 5k

- - Yet another bold goal that is achievable with some consistent running. This goal materialized after seeing that my old grade school classmate Kris Rampelberg (who I may have gotten into a tussle or two with while on the Jefferson School playground) had a 5k time that was superior to my own. This averages out to be about a 6:26 pace which may kill this fat kid, but there is nothing wrong with setting this bar high.

3. To rid myself of the overwhelming desire to eat anything and everything that I feel is edible

- - If I was able to achieve this goal there would be no need for Mr. Lemonhead and his never-ending thoughts. We could move on to more important things, like what the Cardinals need to do to shore up their left side of the infield or what the if Ron Zook is cut out to be the guy who leads The Fighting Illini back to bowl glory and consistent winning seasons. And in ten years, I may be able to talk about the excitement of having a kid on the way (I may be being a little aggressive on that front). Until I achieve this said goal all you will get to hear about is my eating exploits and the lack of will power that was undoubtedly given to my upon birth and I have no control over (no need for excuses here).

I understand that these goals are primarily related to running and may have you asking yourself, why do I care? I wish I had a good answer for that but I don’t. If you don’t care, then I apologize for the 3 minutes of your life that you will never get back. Last week I tipped the scales at a beefy 231.0 lbs and this week I had a modest gain of .4 lbs. After losing 7+ lbs the previous week, it is to be expected to come down to earth a little bit so I am not concerned. So if you are keeping track at home my weight loss for the year has been 10.6 lbs, or 4.38% of my body weight as of 12/31/10. Not a bad start but this engine needs to keep on moving. Here is how my grades went for the week.

Exercise - B-
I managed to get my 20 mile minimum in for the week but it took a day in honor of Martin Luther King, Jr. to accomplish it. If I wasn’t able to sleep in on Monday and then go for my run, I am not so sure I would have been able to get in the 5.38 miles I ran that day. I will take them anyway I can get them though. I also ran 3.06 miles on Wednesday, 6.27 miles on Saturday and 6.11 miles on Sunday for a weekly total of 20.82 miles (that makes me 2 for 3). I can also tell you another certainty: this large body of mine was not meant to do sit ups and push ups. I am now up to close to 40 situps after my runs and I think the effects are paying off. I’ll give you a sneak preview of next week’s picture of my progress (I also included Jamie in the picture because she has been working on them as well). Push ups are just an awful idea and I am up to close to 20 and you would think that it was 200. Those dogs are not easy and my body hates me every time I put it through a measly 20 of them. Overall, it was nice to get the minimum in but I also missed out on 2 runs that were in my marathon training schedule. There is always next week I guess.

Eating - B-
Monday through Thursday night went according to my new eating guidelines and everything was great and then Friday hit. I started off my Friday morning with 4 eggs (scrambled of course) with cheese and salsa. It is part of my effort to change up my eating habits in the morning and stray from the standard bowl of cereal and glass of orange juice. 4 eggs was probably a little too much but there were only 4 left in the container so why leave just one egg left (that’s fat-kid speak for I have a way to justify when I eat more than I should). At work somebody made a delicious French toast casserole and I had a small plate with real maple syrup and a couple bagel bites with cinnamon. Overall, a success if I had stopped there. Unfortunately I then helped myself to more of the casserole and bites and threw in some pieces of chocolate. For lunch I then had Orange Chicken from Panda Express with chow mein and then I overdid at dinner. Compared to last year it wasn’t nearly as bad as Friday’s have been, but it was a return to the 2010 Mr. Lemonhead (at least partially) for a day. On Saturday I enjoyed some Quatro’s pizza in Carbondale along with chocolate chip cookies and a Diet Pepsi while Jamie and I visited the other Larson’s and Poppy. Sunday brought the NFC Championships and some boneless wings, rotel cheese and chips. I was damaged by three days worth of eating but for 4 days of the week things went well.

Overall - B-
I have made significant progress in my campaign towards a slimmer body and the results are starting to show as I don’t put on my dress shirts and instantly feel like the air into my lungs is reduced by 75% due to the tightness of the collar. I am no longer on the verge of moving up to the last hole on the belt loop and my dress pants couldn’t double as khaki running spandex anymore, so things are really on the up and up for Mr. Lemonhead.

I hope I made up for the brevity of last week’s entry. I thought it necessary for me to get my goals out there for you to hold me accountable to since I obviously am incapable of doing it myself.

Thanks for reading and please feel free to leave any comments or suggestions as I peregrinate (thank you Webster’s!) the path towards my pre-2001 figure.

Thanks.

Mr. Lemonhead

Look At Me Now

At least for two weeks I was able to get this out on time. Here we are two days into the week and I am only now getting out my summary of last week in the life of Mr. Lemonhead. In order to keep material fresh, there may be some weeks where I keep things short (my intent for this week). In other news, the Larson family has grown by one more with the addition of Poppy Clementine to the clan and now that makes 8 nieces and nephews (good thing there is plenty of me to go around). Congratulations to the Larson Party of 5 and I can’t wait until #6 is on the way.

Last week was a mixed bag for yours truly. I somehow managed to limit my caloric intake which had the inverse effect of what I was hoping for. The count for the week was Couch-5 Axel-2. I guess when your body is used to running on 5,000+ calories a day and you limit it to what a “normal” individual might ingest during a typical day your body might be a little sluggish until it can get used to scraping by on such few units of energy (that excuse sounds good…let’s go with that one for this week). So exactly how much did my weight fluctuate this week? Well, last week I weighed in at a mammoth 238.4 which didn’t break the scale but if my weight were to stay at that level over time it might. This week after some hard work and determination I weighed in at a beefy 231.0 (amazing what a little will power can do, I know). That brings my total weight loss YTD at 11 lbs or 4.55% of my original weight. Still a long 31.0 lbs to go, but at least I am making progress.

Exercise - D+
As stated previously, this week was a tough one for me to get out of bed in the morning and put on all my winter running gear and head out for a morning run. I was able to successfully do so on Tuesday morning through a couple of inches of snow for 4.44 miles and for 1.75 miles on Saturday (was supposed to be a 10-mile run) for a total of 6.19 miles for the week (just shy of my previously stated 20 mile/week goal). After two weeks I can tell you one thing for sure. I did a lot of damage to my body during ChrisGiving and am slower than I have ever been. Maybe it is the 95 mph winds or the layers of clothing or the 10 degree weather, but these legs aren’t moving as fast as they were about 2 months ago. If an onlooker were to view me running during this summer this is what it might have looked like but now this is more what I look like. The good days are coming as we are almost out of January and into February and that magic word everyone loves to think about, Spring. Until then I will continue my daily battles with the whispers from the couch and hopefully get back on track to my weekly goal (51 out of 52 sounds better than 1 out of 52).

Eating - A
This my friends is what caused Mr. Lemonhead to lose a few of those unwanted lbs. For the first time in a very long time I didn’t overindulge in everything that tastes good and ate things in moderation. I went out to eat once for lunch and actually contemplated a salad before deciding on 8 boneless wings and fries with a water to wash it down (come on now, you have to crawl before you can walk). Other than that the section that used to be the longest has now become the shortest (at least for this week). Jamie has declared the Winter of 2010/2011 to be the “The Winter of the Soups”. We are on what seems like soup #25 for the winter and that number grows weekly. We have tried such delicacies as Turkey Bean Soup (not good), Chili (better but not good), Vegetable Soup (still not good) and this week brings us Chicken Noodle Soup (finally something these taste buds can enjoy). Now I understand why people who ate from the Soup Lines were so skinny.

Overall - B-
Imagine the damage that can be done when I combine healthy eating plus a good week of exercise. It comes so naturally to me to combine unhealthy eating and the ability to find a comfortable spot on the couch, I am not sure why the other is so hard. I guess I better not get greedy because at least the top band on my undies isn’t basically folded in half when I change my clothes. Getting large and in charge is not a pretty sight folks, but I guess you had to witness it firsthand with my photo gallery two weeks ago (sorry to bring up such a painful memory). Baby steps, though, as there is still a long ways to go before I can rid myself of all folding of the undies waistband under the pressure of this large belly.

As always thanks for reading and please feel free to write any comments or suggestions as you follow my epic battle towards eliminating the need for a manssiere.

Love.

Mr. Lemonhead

I Thought This Was Supposed To Be Easy

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Programming Note: If you haven’t done so already, either due to the lack of interest in what is happening in the life of Mr. Lemonhead or due to the fact that you are infected with the same laziness as me, would you please take the time to join my blog as a follower? I am not really sure what that will do for you besides make me feel like I have a captive audience (for a short period of time). Who knows, by joining you may provide that extra incentive for me to put down that tasty treat that I would otherwise be ingesting if it weren’t for your loyalty to the cause. I need all I can get for we all know that up to this point I haven’t been able to do it myself. I want to give a shout out to the four loyal followers of the life and times of Mr. Lemonhead in Beth Harbaugh-Wittenbach (the unofficial 5th child of the Larson clan), Micah, Mom, and the Mrs. Lemonhead (or Jamie as you may know her). I am not exactly sure how you become a follower but if Micah can do it I’m sure it can’t be that hard. Now that I have gotten that out of the way, let’s move on to the show.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------


Here we are already, into Week 2 of a brand new start to 2011 and the beginning of great things to come for Mr. Lemonhead. Through this past week I have been able to determine one certain thing: eating healthy and exercising sure is no fun. If broccoli tasted like Snickers Ice Cream Bars then I can tell you with 100% certainty that I would be tipping the scales at sub-200 and you wouldn’t be reading this message right now. If exercising were as much fun as watching an episode of Bones then I would have run a Boston Qualifier already (sub 3:10 marathon) and I would competing with the runners in the regular divisions rather than throwing my weight around (literally) in the Clydesdale Division (for those that don’t know it is a division they made up so us fat ones have some incentive to run hard). But my good friends, we have to deal with the hand we have been dealt and mine is a hunger that never seems to be quenched and a body that prefers stillness rather than movement. Thankfully with the will power that you provided me with your reading of my entry last week I was able to slay those two nasty beasts on my way to a decent Week 1.



As witnessed first hand by those horrific pictures of me with my shirt off last week (I don’t think I can apologize enough) I weighed a blimping (maybe I made the noun blimp a adjective, maybe not) 242.0 lbs (in the buff). While I would love not to have to refer to my weight with an adjective such as voluminous, I have no choice as this week I weighed in at a voluminous 238.4 lbs, for a net loss of 3.6 lbs. Yes, loyal readers, we did it. Admittedly, with the week that I had I anticipated a larger loss than the one experienced, but muscle weighs more than fat right?!?!?! But what events could lead to me being 98.5% of the man I was last week?


Exercise - B
This week I was able to get my spandex wearing body (only temporary thankfully until my loose fitting clothes fit like they did 4 months ago) out on the road 5 out of the 7 days for a grand total of 21.44 miles. I may be exceeding the rule of thumb that one week’s mileage shouldn’t exceed the previous week’s by 10%, but for you math people out there what is 10% of 0 (get my point?). Unfortunately, this was the rule of thumb that I was following from December 5 until January 1. No longer will I adhere to the rules placed before me (except for the tapering one of course) and I will test the outer limits of my body (21.44 miles was about it) even if it means I end up looking like this. I am not a meteorologist, nor did I play one of tv, so I wish that someone could explain to me why winters have to be so windy. Now when I get up in the morning for my daily debate on whether to hit the road or not I have to factor in 1) How comfortable the couch would be, 2) What the temperature outside is, 3) What route that I am going to take for my run, and now 4) How big of a wind am I going to be running into. Regardless which direction I am running in, the wind is always at my face making my eyes water from the blistering cold. This week I had to participate in some night runs as those questions above were to overwhelming to get me outside. Why can’t we mix the summer with the 98% humidity and absolutely no air movement at all with the winter and its 1097 mph winds to create a happy medium? I really don’t think that is too much to ask. I graded myself out as a B this week not only due to the fact that I met 1/52 of my 2011 goal of 20 miles a week, but I also accompanied those runs with 1 push up for every mile and 5 sit ups for every mile ran. If I can continue this up for 52 weeks then the weight will just start melting off (positive self talk).


Eating - A-
When you are coming off the past ChrisGiving holiday season that I did it is pretty hard not to give myself an A for the week. Even a 25% reduction in my daily consumption of food would result in the cutting out of 1,500 calories. Thankfully I was able to get the train back on the tracks and show a little self control. I was able to avoid the food at work except for one day where I enjoyed a few mixed nuts along with some chocolate covered raisins. Even on Friday I limited myself to one Asiago cheese bagel for breakfast. As you can imagine without my typical consumption there were leftover bagels that went to waste. I only ate out one day when I ate at Buffalo Wild Wings for lunch. I was successful in limiting my portions for dinner (so I think, I guess the Mrs. could tell you the truth) and I think the insatiated hunger (so it seems) was able to be satiated with fewer foods. On Friday I enjoyed Rizzi’s Stromboli with a Caesar Salad and a small Butterfinger/Snickers Blizzard prior to enjoying the Blue Man Group. Moderation is key and even in enjoying the delectable treats listed above I was able to do so in moderation (God does work miracles!).


Overall - B+
As stated in my last entry, I am taking Robert Frost’s road less traveled, and after one week I now realize why there hasn’t been much traffic. Thankfully the work that I put into it resulted in a loss for the week and it has my confidence growing (unlike my waistband during the previous 5 weeks). It was a good week but I know that I can do much better. I don’t want to eliminate eating unhealthy crappy foods for when I get below my goal I will indulge myself in all things unhealthy that I had deprived myself during that time and the resulting damage to my body won't be pretty. For a week, at least, things are moving in a positive direction.

While progress has been made in the past 7 days there is a lot of work yet to be done. I am still 38.4 big lbs away from my goal. This is going to be quite the adventure that you are going to get to enjoy and I am the one paying the price of admission.

As always, thanks for reading (or skimming/skipping/ignoring) and please feel free to leave any comments or suggestions (even below the posting) as I continue the battle with obesity.

Love.

Mr. Lemonhead

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Programming Note Part II: I am relatively new to the blogosphere and am not quite sure of how everything works completely. My hope is to be able to post my spreadsheet with the status of my weight loss and everything else that I deem important. Ideally I would also be able to post any new entries and have you alerted to that fact (even though you would have to resist the urge to ignore them) that there is new material from my brain to your computer screen. I think this information medium is best but please hang with me while I iron out all the kinks. Thanks for understanding.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

My 2011 Resolution

Here we are again, loyal readers, after taking a sabbatical towards the end of 2010 I find myself in a not-so-enviable position of being largely overweight teetering on the edge of morbidly obese. As I am sure that I told some of you over the holidays, I find myself at a crossroads at the beginning of 2011. Going down one path that for some reason seems to be more traveled is that towards 300 lbs and a head that is so bloated it connects directly to my shoulders. The other path (less traveled) is that towards 200 lbs and the ability to wear my full collection of t-shirts and not having to worry about people not being able to read the letters or logo because it got caught in one of my many rolls or is so stretched out that what was once a legible letter or word is now just a collection of random dots that nobody can comprehend. On New Year’s Eve I was visited by the ghost of Mr. Lemonhead Past, the ghost of Mr. Lemonhead Present, and the ghost of Mr. Lemonhead Future. With the glimpses into where I have been and where I am going, it has scared me into changing things around in 2011. So, just like Robert Frost, I am choosing to take the road less traveled.

Ghost of Mr. Lemonhead Past

Ghost of Mr. Lemonhead Present

Ghost of Mr. Lemonhead Present

Ghost of Mr. Lemonhead Future

Now you may have heard this kind of crazy talk from me before, dating back to my first edition of the Diaries of Mr. Lemonhead in October of 2010, but this time things are a little different (please stop laughing I am being serious). Previously, I thought that if I were to just pen the details of my week in terms of eating and exercising, that that would be enough to stop the monster that is my appetite and would keep my from overindulging in all things delicious and more often that not un-nutritious. By the fact that when my quest started in October my weight was around 237 and I was able to get it down to 227 before Thanksgiving and since that lovely Monday morning of November 22, my true colors have revealed themselves and I now weigh an unhealthy 222.0, oops, sorry for the typo, I meant 242.0 (at this point you should pick up your jaw from the table from your astonishment…it can get uncomfortable). I have now realized that I need more of a plan and am working on developing a plan with goals, hence the purpose of this email. The parts to my plan will be laid out before you:

1. Rather than send out a weekly email and saving them along with the responses as some sort of keepsake, I have decided to set up a blog (available at www.diariesofmrlemonhead.blogspot.com) so all of my entries can be seen in one spot and I can make sure that the promises I make do not turn up empty. I am still planning on creating one weekly entry on Monday’s but that is going to be flexible as some days allow for more time spent on penning these entries than others. Who knows maybe I may get crazy and throw two in one week? Now I know some of you may be thinking that you finally have your reprieve from my diary entries, but I may be sending my weekly thoughts via email as well, it is still up in the air.

2. Most of my diets… I’m sorry…lifestyle changes have had a beginning date and an end date. During this predetermined time I would do a fantastic job of limiting my intake of caloric-laced food and as a result my once-high weight would begin to approach the not-so-overweight levels. Once the day of reckoning came and I either won the bet that was associated with this lifestyle change or lost by the size of one bowel movement, I went back to my old ways of attacking and eating food with a passion that I wish would carry over to other facets of my life…say exercise. The game plan that I came up with for 2011 has no timeline for an end date, but rather will end with me being able to step on a scale and the three numbers on that scale prior to the decimal point must be a 2 accompanied with 2 zeros or the first digit must be a 1. This is much more of a long-term plan than most lifestyle changes I undertake, so I am sure there will be some ups and downs, but the more there are, the more enjoyable it is for you.

3. This next part is a little tough to swallow. Starting on January 1, 2011 I have converted to the unleaded variety of soda. Yes, you heard that correctly, I will no longer be drinking regular Coke/Pepsi/Mountain Dew, but will be making the switch to Diet Pepsi (for all other diet carbonated beverages are not created equal). Coke Zero is also an option but I am still a little worried about the Taste Infringement and any backlash from that. There may be some special occasions (say my birthday or Thanksgiving and Christmas celebrations) where I enjoy the fine taste of a diesel beverage, but for all other times those days are gone. With the heavy consumption of ‘the good stuff” that I enjoyed over the month, I think I am in need of a detox period, so for the next two weeks I am going to attempt to drink water, orange juice, gatorade and milk (with my cereal of course). We all have to make sacrifices for what we want and I guess my hand was forced and this will be mine.

4. I understand that simply switching to Diet will not be enough to get me to my desired goal, so I am going to attempt to limit or eliminate my usual routine of breakfast, brunch, my early lunch, lunner, my midafternoon snack, my pre-dinner and my dinner. The plan is to enjoy a breakfast, healthy snack at 10:00, my lunch at 12:30 and a Fiber One bar at 3:00 to help move things along. This is obviously my eating at work schedule since this is unfortunately where I spend the majority of my time that I am not sleeping. I also plan on cutting out my pre-dinner dinner which consists of anything that I can pull out of the cabinets that doesn’t require preparation. Many times cheese, cookies, chips, salsa find themselves victims to my growling stomach. I also plan to eat less and eat healthier. I have to come to grips with the fact that I can be satisfied without making it difficult to breathe because my airways are being restricted by the loads of food that my stomach is trying to digest.

5. The last part of my plan to get back to my girlish figure (think Axel prior to winter of 2000) is to exercise on a regular basis. You may be asking yourself right now, “what is regular?” and my response to you would be that regular to Mr. Lemonhead is a minimum of 20 miles a week. If I am able to get my speed skater thighs and almost perfectly round torso to pound the pavement for 20 miles then everything else will fall into place. This will most surely lead to me getting out on the road at least 3 times or more a week because if I fail to my mind and body will most definitely pay the price as I try to log two 10-mile runs or the pain of a 20 mile run. Along with the runs, I will attempt to do 1 push up for every mile that I log (5 miles = 5 pushups) for the first week or two and stepping it up to 2 for 1 (5 miles = 10 pushups) and 3 for 1 (5 miles = 15 pushups) and so forth as I build up my strength. I will also attempt to do 5 situps for every mile and increase that as I lose some of the fat that is keeping me from seeing my toes. Step 1 towards a healthier me took place on Saturday morning as I grinded out a 4.35 mile run through the biting cold and wind that returned to Central Illinois just in time for my run after being absent the previous couple of days. As I literally pounded the pavement I could only imagine some of the thoughts that were running through people’s minds as I struggled mightily to put one foot in front of the other:

-  “Awe, good for him, that fat kid has finally decided to do something about his weight.”

- “Is he running, or just picking his legs up higher as he walks?”

- “How did he fit those clothes on while wearing an inner tube around his waist?”

- “Should I follow him in case he passes out so I can call an ambulance?”

- “Those clothes are a little too graphic in their fit for my liking.”

- “ I just vomited in my mouth!”

6. The last part of my plan with most likely be the most painful and most embarrassing. Most of the people are surprised at the large numbers that I produce on the scale when I choose to step on it. This may lead people to believe that I “wear it well”. Unfortunately when the shirt comes off, we have a different story. So starting today and occurring once a month, I will provide you unfortunate readers with a snapshot of me without my shirt on. I will provide ample warning beforehand so you can screen any children from seeing such a horror and so you have time to digest your food before bearing witness to such an unsightly scene. If all goes according to plan hopefully somebody would be able to use stop motion to create a graphic animation (no pun intended) of my shedding of those 40 lbs.

There you have it folks, the ingredients to a recipe for some serious weight loss in 2011. My goal by December 31, 2011 isn’t to be half of the man I used to be but I would at least like to be 82.6% of what I used to be at the beginning of the year. I know 12 months is a lot of time, but I am hopeful that through the game plan that I have established along with the help of my loyal readers, we can all enjoy the success that 2011 is sure to bring.

Thank you for taking the time to read and please feel free to make any comments or suggestions as I start back up the trek towards a reduced waistline.

Love.

Mr. Lemonhead