Get Strong Get Lean E-Book

Chad V. Holtkamp

• Herausgeber: Briefcase Media Group
• Kategorie: Ratgeber
• Serie: Home Gym Strong
• Sprache: Englisch

Seitenzahl: 280

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2017

Beschreibung

Squat. Bench. Deadlift. 16:8 Fasting.

Author Chad V. Holtkamp is back, this time spending a year working with a famous online personal trainer.

Through a unique fitness memoir style, he details his workout highs and lows throughout the year.

If you like:

-actionable advice

-honest portrayals of fitness struggles

-resources that don’t skimp on the food

then you’ll love this fit and funny guidebook, the standalone finale of the Home Gym Strong series.

Buy Get Strong Get Lean today to take your first steps to a better body!

Leseprobe

Also by Chad V. Holtkamp

HOME GYM STRONG FITNESS SERIES

Work Out Pig Out

Sink or Swing

Get Strong Get Lean

40 Days + 10,000 Swings: A Journal

Sink or Swing: The Complete Experience

Home Gym Strong: The Complete Collection

FROM THE VAULT MUSIC SERIES

Quad Cities Underground

1994

Lyrics, Poems, & Other Odd Bits

THE SPOOK & GOON SPACE ADVENTURES SERIES

Invasion of the Frorees

Escape of the Glitter Princess

Attack of the Mutant Miners

Return of the Father

Rescue of the Intrepid

Domination of the SPOOKS

The SPOOK & GOON Space Adventures Series: Books 1-3

Raptor Team

DAYDREAMS OF OTHER WORLDS SAMPLER SERIES

Outer Thoughts

Distant Thoughts

OTHER WORLDS SHORT STORIES

Practice Makes Perfect

Father of Waters

Running From Mars

The Cleanup Crew

Sweet Escape

Mystified

The Glitch

MUSIC ALBUMS

Someday

On the Edge…

Visit chadvholtkamp.com for more info.

Get Strong Get Lean

A Year of Barbell Training, Intermittent Fasting, and Eating Lots of Protein

Chad V. Holtkamp

Get Strong Get Lean is the finale of the Home Gym Strong series. While I’m busy cranking out my next series, you can find out right away when they’re set for release.

Visit chadvholtkamp.com to join my reader’s group to stay in the know.

You can also visit HomeGymStrong.com and follow my workout adventures on a more frequent basis.

Book publishing is all about reviews. If you enjoy this book or get anything out of it in any way and think it might help others as well, I have a teeny, tiny favor to ask of you.

Would you please leave a quick review at your favorite online store? They’re hugely beneficial for others seeking that same guidance, and much appreciated by everyone!

Click here to leave a review

My wife suggested I dedicate this book to all the other loud typists in the world. This book (and all my earlier works) were pounded out on a 2012 13" MacBook Pro.

Contents

Introduction

Chapter One: January 2016

Chapter Two: February 2016

Chapter Three: March 2016

Chapter Four: April 2016

Chapter Five: May 2016

Chapter Six: June 2016

Chapter Seven: July 2016

Chapter Eight: August 2016

Chapter Nine: September 2016

Chapter Ten: October 2016

Chapter Eleven: November 2016

Chapter Twelve: December 2016

Epilogue

Did You Like Get Strong Get Lean?

Join the Crew!

And Still More Bonus Content!

Acknowledgments

Recommended Reading and More

Fitness Books by Chad V. Holtkamp

Also by Chad V. Holtkamp

About the Author

Introduction

Over the course of three books in the Home Gym Strong series, Work Out Pig Out, Sink or Swing, and 40 Days + 10,000 Swings, I’ve tried to show the reality of what happens in the daily struggle for fitness. I’ve worked through many different programs from many great fitness experts. I’ve given you a taste of what they have to offer. Work Out, Pig Out showed how jumping from program to program led nowhere until I focused on one plan. Sink or Swing and 40 Days + 10,000 Swings showed how that focus could pave the way for eventual success, only to have life throw roadblocks in my path.

Exercise is one the of the most popular book categories on Amazon. We are a nation — a world — obsessed with getting in shape. Facebook, Instagram and Twitter are littered with images of and boasts about doing one fantastic feat or another, garnering millions of likes and followers and retweets in the process. Gorgeously toned bodies glistening in the light, teasing what you, too, could have if you just worked hard enough: the Protestant work ethic’s holy grail.

What those immensely popular accounts don’t show are the emotional and physical tolls and the real struggle that goes into getting into that kind of shape. Millions of people battle in vain, never quite reaching the goal, always missing out for some reason or another, berating themselves for not being strong enough, lean enough, hot enough. Then they work doubly hard, thrice as hard, still never quite achieving the fabulous bodies featured in perfect lighting through professional lenses.

Most people don’t flash their half-naked bodies on the web for the world to see. They quietly go about their lives, fitting in fitness as time allows. They work their jobs, trade stories and secrets and diet and exercise tips with their co-workers, share what they’ve seen on T.V. and read on the Internet, spouting secondhand, watered-down ideas from so-called experts. Sometimes these co-workers and experts get it right; often they get it wrong. But they keep trying, day after day, to live healthier, happier lives. Anonymously. Their numbers are legion; much more than the infamous Instagram stars.

I’m not an expert. I’m not a famous fitness guru. I’m a 6’4" forty-something guy with a job and a wife and an obsession with fitness, partly from vanity and partly from wanting to live to be a hundred years old. With this series, I’ve listed my struggles and accomplishments, highs and lows, successes and failures. All while living life and dealing with those things on a daily basis.

My wife and I don’t have kids, and I work from home a lot and use that extra time to work out. Most people don’t have that luxury. Working out and getting in shape is still a struggle for me. I don’t have all the answers and never said I did. But what I’ve wanted to show with these books is what happens on a daily and yearly basis, warts and all; the embarrassing and the happy things that happen to an average person, working a full-time job, living a life that includes fitness, sometimes to the point of obsession. I hope that sharing my experience helps you, if nothing else, at least to know what to avoid.

Chapter One: January 2016

6’4”

259.2 pounds

46” chest

40” waist

Week 1 — January 1–2

2015 sucked. We had no love lost for it being over. Good riddance.

As a new year dawned, full of the promise of better times, my wife and I were both in rehab mode. For me, it was a mental and spiritual recovery. For my wife, it was mental, spiritual, and physical. Still healing from the foot surgery two days earlier, she was feeling little pain thanks to the drugs. Her doctor prescribed codeine, but they knocked her out and she fell. I had to carry her up the stairs — and we had a lot of stairs — so she quickly changed to ibuprofen. After a mellow New Year’s Eve watching Nick and Nora on A&E, we greeted the day and the dawning year with pizza, just like every other year.

Bored from sitting on the couch watching T.V. all afternoon, I faced my fear that evening and took my blood pressure for the first time in ages. It was high, way higher than it should have been. While this might not be advisable for everybody, I’d found over the years that working out helped me when my BP was high.

Even though it was already 6:00 P.M., I went upstairs and changed into my workout clothes. Then I dragged my butt to our basement gym. A commercial gym would have been filled to the rafters with New Year’s wannabes, which was why I’d converted our utility room to a home gym in the first place back in 2012. I filled it with all the tools we needed to get in shape: a squat rack, bench, barbells, plates, kettlebells, and treadmill. I only needed the motivation to show up and get it done. And a few layers of long-sleeved shirts to stay warm. A basement in January in Chicago was cold!

I continued with the Power to the People plan of deadlifts and bench press. After spending the prior month doing that workout, it was brainless. At that point, the less I had to think about, the better. I’d do sets of 5 reps, 3 reps, and 2 reps with 235 pounds for deadlifts. After a short rest to reset the weights, I kept it light with 135 pounds for 5, 3, 2 on bench press. I ended with a set of three dead-hang chin-ups. It was an easy workout for me, but I hadn’t lifted since before Christmas so I wanted to back off from anything heavy.

I also vowed to write for an hour each day. I had no idea what I’d write, but if I wanted to continue to call myself a writer, I had to write. Once my workout was over, I grabbed a glass of cherry Crystal Light. Then I sat my butt in my office chair to spew forth words on the virtual page.

I kept to the routine on Saturday: a quick workout in the morning followed by an hour in the writing chair that afternoon. I’d always heard it took 21 days to make a habit. I had two down and 19 to go. We still had pizza left from the massive pie on New Year’s Day as well as my favorite chocolate chip oatmeal cookies and gooey chocolate caramel almond ice cream. Unlike 2015, I wouldn’t go a month without either.

Week 2 — January 3–9

At this point, I was fat, or fluffy, or full-bodied or whatever kinder, gentler language people use to soften the reality of being fat. Whatever the sugar-coated term, I was fat. After four years of marriage, my wedding ring also didn’t fit, much to my wife’s chagrin. I hadn’t worn it in nearly a year since almost breaking my finger with too many kettlebell swings. The extra layer of blubber made my finger that much bigger. My wife dealt with it, but silently let me know her disappointment whenever we left the house and I didn't have it on.

Wanting to get un-fat, I went back to my usual January routine of Lyle McDonald’s Rapid Fat Loss program. Like every other year, I’d force myself to lose all the excess weight I’d packed on during the previous five hellish months. After so many years of starting the new year that way, it was routine. This time, though, the chicken was unbearable, no matter how much I tried to mask the taste with salt.

The next day I quit the Rapid Fat Loss plan. I slept like crap Sunday night, and my blood pressure was sky high on Monday morning. Plus, I couldn’t face another day, much less another few weeks, of chicken. Pavel Tsatsouline is said to have once called it a “weak bird,” and that was good enough for me. I never wanted to eat it again. Instead of straight black coffee, I added in my beloved heavy whipping cream and got on with a workout of deadlifts, bench, and chin-ups.

It felt good to work out. Compared to the extreme kettlebell workouts I’d forced myself into the year before, they were enjoyable. They didn’t kill my hands or break my bones. It’s said that the best workout program is one you can do for days, weeks, months, and years. Power to the People was that one for me.

I grabbed some potatoes from the store on the way home from work and threw them in the oven for an hour. Slathered with yummy grass-fed butter, I happily abandoned the no-carb plan. Too bad I still had a week’s worth of chicken to choke down. I never wanted to eat it again. I couldn’t just throw it out and waste it, though. I tried to make it bearable by having a juicy slab of red meat to go with it.

I slept much better that night after yet another hour of butt-in-chair writing time. In addition to freewriting to get my thoughts flowing, I was plotting my next book about what had happened the year before. It proved to be good therapy for me, going through it in my head, trying to remember all the sad details of how our lives had crashed down around us.

Knowing we were going to be traveling at some point in the year, I checked my passport. Oops, it expired soon, so I needed to get it renewed. They aren’t valid for international travel within six months of the expiration date. After some web searches, I found out that it was a painless process, only taking a few weeks. I could even get one within a day if it came down to it. With my wife literally getting back on her feet while also looking for a job, we didn’t have any Caribbean trips booked yet. The only vacation ideas at that point were trips to Sanibel with her family in June and then another back to Florida for Labor Day. I filed my passport renewal away, thinking I’d get to it sometime. I wasn’t in shape for either trip but I still had time.

After another great night of sleep, aided by the fact that it was a Wednesday and neither of us had to wake up to an alarm, I awoke refreshed and ready for the day. It showed in my blood pressure, a welcome 124/80, the best reading I’d had in months. Sleep could cure many things, and I was growing accustomed to getting the extra shuteye. My wife was enjoying the rest as well. Four years of long hours and erratic deadlines made this a more enjoyable way to live.

She relaxed on the couch with a Top Chef T.V. marathon and cracked open a bottle of Bordeaux that afternoon. In my best Poe impression, I used a glass of it as a writing aid that night. An hour was a long time to sit with my thoughts, the more mental stimulation, the better. I kept to it, cranking out the words as fast as I could think them. Whether it was any good was immaterial, just the practice of sitting down and writing was a step in the right direction.

Christmas candy was still floating around the office the next day. It was all too easy for me to give in to the temptations of Hershey’s Kisses. I made my penance by force-feeding myself a chicken breast. That was the drawback of planning a week’s worth of meals, gung ho from willpower I no longer had. It was gross. I scavenged some leftover potato wedges from a meeting, along with a few small desserts. Once home from work, dinner was more chicken. Really??? Even with the obligatory eye of round, the chicken was ugh-inducing.

I weighed in on Friday, down a few pounds and slight measures on my waist. The workouts and attempted healthier eating, aided by a lot of extra sleep, worked. Another day of deadlifts and bench called — 265 pounds on the former and 155 on the latter.

My wife’s candy bowl from her last job suddenly tempted me while I was writing that night. I hated hard candy. Yet there I was, sitting at my desk, sucking on Now & Laters for the first time since warming the bench with Jimmy Martin in 9th grade basketball. Neither of us was serious enough, or good enough, to play the actual games. Watching from the sidelines, we’d store them in our socks, suspicious bulges above our basketball shoes. Now, in our house, someone was bound to eat them. So I did.

We got word that Saturday morning that David Bowie had died the night before on his birthday, after a surprise album release. It would be the first of many celebrity deaths in 2016. With Let’s Dance being one of my signature songs from my music days, along with Bowie being a huge influence on many of my favorite bands, it was a major shock. With nothing else to do but watch T.V., we stayed in and cooked up a giant batch of chili and imbibed several bottles of wine, mourning the loss of an icon.

It was also the night of the GIGANTIC Powerball drawing of $1 BILLION. That was enough to even get my wife’s attention. Despite the snow, I drove to both the gas station and the grocery store to buy tickets. Dreaming of the riches that awaited us, we decided we’d buy Club Med Turkoise and retire to paradise.

We won $28.

It was better than nothing. Like most lottery drawings it was still a losing proposition considering what we paid for tickets. Oh well, it was fun to dream for a while.

Week 3 — January 10–16

We had more chili the next day and thawed out a batch of mostaccioli left over from before the holidays. It was a relaxing Sunday, and my wife was finally feeling better.

We slept in again on Monday morning. It was becoming too much of a habit, steadily sleeping later and later. By the time we woke, I had to get right to work. It was a good thing I only had to walk 20 feet to my office down the hall. As usual, I was able to break away during lunch for my workout, slowly bumping up to 285 pounds on deadlifts and 165 pounds on bench. I ate a light dinner around 4:30 P.M., with some pork chops to tide me over for my writing session. Then I planted my butt in my chair promptly at 5:00 P.M., a quart jar of Crystal Light at the ready.

Whether it was the extreme cold of January or the fact that I was the only one in the office the next day, I was in a bad mood on Tuesday. Even cookies and Hershey’s Kisses couldn’t brighten my mood. I struggled through the day, trudging home in the darkness. I got a late start on my nightly writing, barely finishing in time to grab some dinner and call it a night before bed.

Something with my morning coffee on Wednesday didn’t make my stomach happy, but I made it through my workouts, adding 10 pounds to deadlifts and 5 pounds to my bench press, steady, easy progress. Heirloom oranges were back in stock at the store, too. It was stunning how much better they tasted than regular navel oranges, so juicy and sweet.

I slept all night again, and woke to the news of another celebrity death, this time Alan Rickman. He was 69, just like Bowie. I saw Die Hard with my friends on my 16th birthday, and it was still one of my favorite movies. 2016 was off to an ominous start.

After spending so much time lately with my wife, going into the office was a struggle. And yes, there were still more cookies for the taking when I got there. They held me over until mid-afternoon when I had my pork chop with Tabasco. The difference between pork and chicken was night and day. Pork easily won the flavor contest, no matter how lean it was bred to be now.

Despite all the extra cookies, my weights and measures were heading in the right direction, albeit slowly. I was down about a pound and a 1/4" on my waist. As long as I was making progress, I was okay with it.

The next day was our friend’s birthday party. He had a big house in Rogers Park, and the basement was perfect for a wine cellar. Another friend brought a bottle of The Prisoner cabernet sauvignon. It was easily one of the best wines we’d had in a long time. Being a party, the bottle didn’t last very long, and we wished for more. Sure enough, our friend happened to have a bottle stashed in the basement. It was dusty from storage, but tasted even better after being cellared for a few years. Paired with my wife’s cinnamon/anise cake and some chili and stew, it was the perfect combo.

Week 4 — January 17–23

Despite the frigid temps of January in Chicago, I did my weekly grilling the next afternoon. We feasted on cheeseburgers with mayo and mustard — no buns — and enjoyed the smoky goodness of grilled meat on a cold winter’s day. We were lazy and bored, so we watched the figure skating championships and napped away the afternoon. Hungry from hibernation, we woke up long enough to bake up stuffed pork chops and potatoes for dinner.

After such a relaxing Sunday, I was stressed about going back to work. I didn’t sleep very well, tossing and turning all night. There were a couple of jobs I was trying to fill that were proving tougher than normal, and more pressure from senior management to get them closed out. Sure enough, my blood pressure was high the next morning.

I subbed in pork for the chicken to go along with the red meat. It was way easier to eat pork for sustained periods. I waved the loads on the deadlifts and bench press, too. After hitting 300 and 200 pounds respectively, I backed off to 255 and 155 and planned to work my way back up.

The cookie elves graced our office yet again the next day. I wasn’t sure where the endless supply was coming from, but my willpower held me to just one for the day. I made up for it by skipping the Crystal Light during my evening writing session. I was quickly closing in on 21 days, so it was almost a habit.

I was back in the office again on Wednesday for a meeting, and it forced me to move my lunch workout to 6:00 P.M. when I got home. That pushed my writing back to even later, but I still managed to get an hour done. I was brainstorming ideas for all the books I was going to publish throughout the year. I added in some thoughts about a new website I was going to launch, too, combining all the creative things in my life. Rather than just one site dedicated to my fitness routines, I was going to add in pages for my music, DJing, and even photography.

We had another work meeting the next day, so I was in the office for the third day in a row. Lunch was provided in the form of a small Freshii baja steak burrito. It might have filled up someone a third of my size, but it left me starving. There wasn’t much I could do. It had to hold me over until I could indulge all my food at dinner — eye of round, a pound of pork, sweet potatoes, regular potato, butter, sour cream — a real man’s meal! Sufficiently stuffed, I marked 21 days of writing with a flurry of words and went peacefully to sleep.

I wanted to amp up my cardio plan to try to strip off some of the flab I’d been carrying the last six months. After my deadlift and bench session, I added in double-kettlebell swings with 24 kg bells. Too bad any extra conditioning stimulus was erased by the gooey cinnamon rolls my wife made later that afternoon. It was winter, and she wasn’t working. Who was I to argue?

I had a giant pork loin to finish off for dinner while we watched gymnastics on ESPN. Winter was a time for oddball T.V. habits. Somehow, we’d seen the same meet the same weekend the year before. We split a bottle of bad Spanish wine and sat on the couch the rest of the night, continuing the weird tradition.

Those cinnamon rolls proved delicious with my morning coffee and made a great pre-workout meal. I was back up to a decent weight of 285 pounds on deadlifts before we headed off to the movies downtown for the afternoon.

My wife wanted to see The Fifth Wave. Me, not so much. I was really tired of all these “high school kids save the world” movies. That one was really terrible with a few chuckles from the audience. Even my wife wasn’t a fan.

We made our way through the chilly night air amongst the throngs of tourists on Michigan Avenue. After catching the bus to Lincoln Park, we got our name on the waiting list for RJ Grunts. Once we finally got a table, we had a batch of BBQ wings and burgers. We even saved room for a giant cookie and ice cream for dessert, washed down with a couple of Porters.

The food was terrific, but the vibe sucked. My ears were assaulted by bad ’70s shlock rock. I could tolerate most music, but any songs from the ’70s not by The Ramones or Barry White should stay locked in the vault.

Week 5 — January 24–31

Somehow the batch of cinnamon rolls lasted until Sunday when we finally finished them off. There was even some leftover chili from a few weeks back. We doused it with sour cream and cheese, scooping it up with plenty of chips.

Another Sunday, another bad night of sleep. After tossing and turning all night, I dragged myself out of bed around 7:30 A.M. At least I could get some extra sleep to make up for what I hadn’t gotten during the night.

To add insult to injury, our Comcast connection went down just before lunch. I took it as a sign to get my butt downstairs to work out. I worked through a heavy set of deadlifts and bench while I waited for the connection to come back up. I added 10 sets of 10 double-kettlebell swings with 24 kg bells in as well, slowly working my rest periods shorter and shorter. Comcast finally came back up around 2:00 P.M. so I was able to get the rest of my work done for the day.

In addition to my daily coffee with cream fix, I dug out a box of matcha green tea over lunch and brewed up a jar of that. Despite being a year old, it seemed okay. Not being a tea connoisseur, my palate didn't notice a difference.

With a few days left in my workout cycle, I was back above 300 pounds on deadlifts and closing in on 200 pounds on bench. My wife even had some leads on a couple of cool jobs. Before she started slaving away again, we’d need to get to the beach. The day she got laid off in December, we’d booked a trip to Mexico and promptly cancelled it. That was quickly back on the horizon. The only catch was when?

The meeting fairies blessed me with tasty salad fixings for an impromptu lunch the next day. Too bad the cookie elves got held up in traffic. Oh well, I munched on delicious strawberries instead.

I’d lost a tiny bit the next morning, but it was so little that it was barely worth celebrating. I blamed the cinnamon rolls. They couldn’t argue with me, so I was okay.

For my workout, I’d worked my way up to the end of the cycle and went for 325 pounds on deadlifts and 195 pounds on bench. With all the food and the extra rest, the workouts were becoming routine, almost easy. I was back on track, looking forward to backing off and ramping up again the next week. I was short on time afterward so I skipped making coffee and made a quick trip to Dunkin Donuts. Of course, I came away with a couple of donuts as well.

We headed back to Iowa yet again that morning for a graduation party for my nephew. After all the trips the past six months, I was done with heading back home. The drive through the corn and soybean fields of western Illinois was boring, even on the best days of summer. In winter, the bleak, dreary landscape made it that much worse. Snacking on organic Oreos, we made the best of the long drive. I was happy to have my wife with me for once, rather than driving solo as I’d done so often. With chips and cheese and chili and cake at the party, it wasn’t the best eating day.

I wasn’t feeling 100% the next day, but it was a rest day so I snuck a few more donuts and some ice cream to close out the month. I also had a few rice stuffed pork chops for protein. After all the heavy deadlifting sessions, I should have eaten a lot more to make up for them, but the junk food filled me up so much that I didn’t notice.

Measurements: Waist measurement is a better guide than scale weight. Despite losing weight, I was still going in the wrong direction on fat loss.

Aha moments: After a stressful period in life, small steps in the right direction can be major victories.

Recommendations: Going gung ho into a workout plan to start the new year seems like a great idea. Don’t beat yourself up if you don’t always stick to it.

Chapter Two: February 2016

Week 1 — February 1–6

After nearly two months of looking for work, albeit faux-searching the first month while relaxing and enjoying time off with her foot, my wife continued the interview process with a couple of companies. Meanwhile, I continued my workouts, starting my Power to the People cycle over by dropping back to a lighter 265 pounds on deadlifts and 165 pounds on bench press. I’d also worked in three sets on chin-ups, eeking out reps of 4, 3, and 3, slowly but surely getting stronger as the weeks went by.

Scrounging food from the pantry, I found a jar of greens powder. Ooh, boy. Was I that hungry? My mind raced back to the horrors of July 2014, chronicled in extreme detail in my first book, Work Out, Pig Out. Yes, I was that hungry. I kept it to a small teaspoon, not wanting to puke my guts out again.

A vendor brought in coffee the next day at work. I’d already had one venti blonde from Starbucks, so, after a second one, I was wired for the rest of the day. Buzzing from all the caffeine, I nibbled on some fruit and cupcakes, not the healthiest choices.

My bad habit continued when I got home. I was starving and immediately dug into a carton of ice cream. I made up for it with real food a bit later, the normal eye of round and pork chops. Yes, it was boring, but once I got into a meal routine, I’d beat it to death. It still wasn’t enough to curb my hunger. I also slowly added in more greens powder. I hadn’t had any adverse reactions on Monday, so I decided to tempt fate yet again.

After the extra caffeine earlier in the week, I made a few more mason jars of coffee in the office. My recipe was three packets of espresso from the vending machine, to which I added water for a homemade Americano. It lacked the kick of Starbucks, so I went back for a second batch a few hours later. Still not content, I made up some matcha green tea later over lunch. That finally did the trick. I wasn’t hungry until late afternoon.

Too bad my workouts and eating plan weren’t having any effect on my body composition. I wasn’t too concerned — yet. After all the shit life had thrown at me the last six months, I was still trying to process everything that had happened.

Knowing we would be leaving the country sooner rather than later for a “my wife finally got a new job, let’s celebrate trip,” I ran up to Walgreen’s to get a passport photo. It was one of the most unflattering, washed out, poorly lit pictures of my life. I was not happy about being so out of shape but it wasn’t like the clerk was going to Photoshop 25 pounds off me. My passport would be a gentle reminder of that crappy time in my life for the next 10 years.

At least it was time for our friends’ annual Mardi Gras party the next day. We had a great time, but I didn’t repeat getting the baby from the King Cake, like the year before. I did chow down on a bunch of po’ boys, jambalaya, my mom’s chocolate chip cookie recipe, and lots of red wine. I snapped hundreds of fun pictures too.

Week 2 — February 7–13

The weekend was a non-stop party. The next day was SUPER BOWL 50 — Broncos v. Panthers! To make up for the extra food, I did a quick 30 minutes on the treadmill. I kept it easy, though the 300 calories I burned paled in comparison to the amount of food I was about to eat. We ended up watching the game at home as our friend who usually threw the party came down sick. We ordered pizza and wings and drank up some New Belgium Ben & Jerry’s Salted Caramel Brownie Ale. Yes, it was as good as the name implied.

Since the ads are the best part of any Super Bowl, they should have called that one the Pooper Bowl. My wife and I couldn’t figure out why that one game had so many ads for constipation and irritable bowel syndrome. One ad even had a poopy colon mascot. Really? And who could forget the Puppy Monkey Baby? Or the toenail fungus mascot?

The game itself was as boring as Coldplay, the halftime act. Even Beyoncé and Bruno Mars couldn’t save the day. Peyton Manning managed to retire on a winning note when Denver pulled out the victory.

I felt fat again on Monday. Big surprise. I hated that feeling, so I took it out on some heavy deadlifts. And promptly ate more ice cream for dessert. Two steps forward, one step back.