Week 4 & 5

Weeks 4 & 5: Dec. 17 - 31
Miles Walked: 43.8
Weight / Waist: 252 lb / 43.75"
(note: waist is measured at the point of largest girth; in my case, that's around me at the belly button)

SUMMARY AT 5 WEEKS
Miles Walked: 99.8
Weight Change: +6 lb
Waist Change: -0.75 inches

I'm at the end of a 5 week stretch, and I've walked nearly 100 miles. I haven't lost any weight, in fact, I've gained some. But my weighing-in this morning comes at the end of a long holiday week (i.e. I've had my fill of cookies, beer, pie, etc.). I'm looking pretty bloated right now :-) but at least my waist is smaller. I think that's a good indicator. And, judging from my legs, I've gained a bit of muscle.

My new goal is this: Walk 1000 Miles in One Year's Time That's averaging about 20 miles per week. I think I can do it. We'll see...

Week 3

Week 3: Dec. 10 - 16
Miles Walked: 17
Weight / Waist: 246 lb / 44"
(note: waist is measured at the point of largest girth; in my case, that's around me at the belly button)

SUMMARY AT 3 WEEKS
Miles Walked: 56
Weight Lost: 0 lb
Waist Lost: -0.5 inches

Well, I think I have some progress to report. It appears 0.5 inches have shrunk off my waist. This measurement is most likely correct since my pants are fitting a bit looser now :-) The weight may come down later. Sometimes weight "hangs" at a certain point, and then drops after a few weeks. Also, I may be building a little bit of muscle with all this walking.

The big accompishment of the week is that I walked 13.2 miles in 3 hours and 5 minutes yesterday (that's 14-minute miles!). I'm planning on walking/running (mostly walking) a 25K race in Big Bend National Park next month, so I wanted to see if I could handle going a long distance. The 25K is 15.5 miles, so I'm getting close. I'll have a month between now and the race, and I need to keep walking hard. I think I should be walking 20 to 25 miles per week.

Week 2

Week 2: Dec. 3 - 9
Miles Walked: 21
Weight / Waist: 246 lb / 44.5 inches

SUMMARY AT 2 WEEKS
Miles Walked: 39
Weight Lost: 0 lb
Waist Lost: 0 inches

Eeeeecccchhhhh.... I've gone nowhere in two weeks. No weight lost, no inches lost. Of course we had the company holiday party this past weekend, so naturally I drank and stuffed myself silly :-) At least I walked a few more miles this past week!

Nectar of the Gods

Okay, it's another non-beer post in the Beer category, but it's worthy, I promise.

The Perfect Margarita (Nectar of the Gods):

• 1 cup Gold Tequila (a)
• 1/3 cup Triple Sec (b)
• 1/2 cup fresh sqeezed key lime juice (with pulp and seeds removed) (c)
• 1/2 cup Agave Nectar (d)
• small pinch of salt

Throw it all in a blender and fill with ice. Blast it until creamy smooth (1 - 2 minutes). If it gets too thick and won't blend, then pour a little water in to get the mix flowing. You can skip the blender and just mix this stuff right over ice for an "on the rocks" drinky-drink.

Notes on this recipe:

a. You don't have to get fancy here. Just use a decent brand (e.g. Sauza or Jose Cuervo). If it comes in a glass bottle, then it might be okay. If it comes in a plastic bottle, then it's probably fit to use as an engine de-greaser.

b. Get fancy! Ordinary Triple Sec is okay and produces good results. For a better tasting 'rita, use Grand Mariner or a cheaper equivalent (e.g. Bauchant) - basically any orange liqueur and brandy/conac blend.

c. Key limes are sweeter and more tart than typical limes. I definitely prefer key limes.

d. THE SECRET INGREDIENT. Look for agave nectar next to the honey at your local grocery store. If you can't find it, then try one of those fancier grocery stores (e.g. Whole Foods, Central Market).

For you metric-system types:

- 1 cup = 237 mL
- 1/2 cup = 118 mL
- 1/3 cup = 79 mL

Also, one shot from a typical shot-glass is roughly 1/6 of a cup in volume. So, you can measure in 1/3 cup increments by using two shot-glass volumes.

The Story

This recipe represents about 12 years of experimenting. My first margarita was some cheap rot-gut tequila mixed with some neon green crap in a bottle. You know, the giant jug of unnatural green liquid just beckoning at you in the liquor store. It tasted like ass and I knew I had to come up with something better.

After some experiements and a few years of experience (i.e. late nights, bad hangovers), I settled on a decent recipe using frozen limeaid concentrate, tequila, and triple sec. This does make a pretty good drink, but it's not quite there.

Just recently, I was introduced to a fantastic substance called agave nectar. Holy shit, I found perfection!!! Okay, maybe it's not perfection, but it's pretty close. The above recipe represents a new plateau in my evolution of the perfect margarita.

You can thank me later, when the room stops spinning...

Recent Photos from the High Lonesome

I've finally enjoyed a bit of free time and processed a few recent photos. Here are some sights from the High Lonesome (the ranch where I hunt):

Finally, after weeks of waiting, here are clear skies and the Comet 17P/Holmes:

Well, the second shot is the moon :-) but I was so happy to finally have some clear skies over my camera. I live in Houston with frequent clouds and pollution, and I've not been able to see the comet yet. The High Lonesome is way out in the Texas Hill Country, so when the skies are clear, the star viewing is awesome.

First Post - 50 lbs to go!

Seems like I've always been in a weight loss mode. I've been overweight for as long as I can remember.

As an adult, I've fluctuated between 205 and 275 pounds (the peak was during the beer-drinkin' pizza-eatin' college days). However, for the past two years or so, I've stayed mostly constant in the 240 - 250 range. I guess that's a good thing, as going up-n-down in weight isn't healthy.

I've decided to log my weight and exercise progress here on my blog. I've created a Weight Loss category just for these posts. This is the first one. Below is a quick summary of my progress in the previous week.

Week 1: Nov. 26 - Dec. 3
Miles Walked: 18
Weight / Waist: 246 lb / 44.5"

My goal is to make one post per week reporting some sort of progress: either losing weight, reducing my girth, and/or walking many miles (my primary form of exercise).

To date (for 2007), I've probably walked 250 miles. This includes the 60+ miles I've hiked in Big Bend :-) and most of that was with a heavy pack. When I walk during the week in my neighborhood, it's usually 4 to 6 miles at a time, averaging 14 minutes per mile. Yep, that's right - I hual ass! :-) my big fat ass, to be exact. I can't run or jog worth a fart but I can walk until my legs fall off.

My plan is simple. Since my diet is fairly good and healthy (except for the too frequent over-indulgence in beer :-) I'll focus on eating less. The major component of this "diet" is just to exercise a lot. This has many benefits aside from weight loss: I feel better, exercise burns off stress, I can do more because my endurance is higher, I sleep better, and I enjoy my hiking/camping outings much more because I'm in better shape. It's a complete reversal of the vicious cycle.

Does my plan work, you ask? You might be wondering why I'm still overweight if I've already put so much effort into exercise this year alone. Well, it works when I keep doing it. I've gone through alternating periods of activity and inactivity. I'll walk a lot and eat less for several weeks (and dump several pounds) and then follow that with several weeks of inactivity and eating a lot (and gain back the pounds).

When I started 2007, my goal was to loose 50 pounds by the end of the year. Well, here I am with less than a month to go before 2007 is gone, and I'm almost the same weight in which I started this year. Pppfffttt.....

I won't reach my 50-pound goal before 2008 is here, obviously, but I can pick up the plan again. That's always been my problem in the past. I'll get serious about it, stick with the eating less & exercising more program for a couple of weeks, and then fall off the wagon for a time while I eat myself silly.

I've got to stick with it - FOR GOOD. This isn't a diet, it's a lifestyle change. So follow my progress here. Taunt me, challenge me, tell me my ass is too fat or my spare tire is too large or something. I've got to lose it!

She's Gone!

The 1D mark 2 is gone. I done sold it.





sniff I will miss her, no doubt. She'll ship off on Friday as soon as the post office opens. It was good while it lasted...

Killing for Pleasure

I just got back from a hunting trip in the Texas Hill Country. I'm on a hunting lease and go several times a year during deer hunting season. We hunt deer, mostly. Sometimes there are other animals killed.

This is a bobcat taken by one of the other members of the hunting lease. I have to stop and ask, "why?".

I was taught as a boy that if you kill an animal, you do so for a purpose. The animal is to be used as best you can, i.e. eat the damn thing. It is a basic "game management" rule that is very effective. This poor cat was wasted for naught.

Now, you can justify this killing by reasoning that bobcats are dangerous for the local livestock. They may also take small, immature deer that would one day be fit for hunting. I say, so what?

We must remind ourselves that there is a natural cycle of things. There is a food chain and a normal balance to life in the wild. Humans are not the only predators. Killing one bobcat is a small act but will affect the "balance". What if the bobcat's primary food is mice? Since the cat is gone, what will eat the mice? More snakes? Think about it...

In the past years, I've taken to mostly photographing the animals instead of killing them. It seems much more impressive to hang a nice photo on your wall instead of a stuffed head:

The few deer I do shoot end up being eaten. Our deer kills are managed carefully. The management rules stem from the advice from biologists who have studied the area as well as laws imposed by the state.

We don't really need to hunt at all. But those of us who do have a responsibility to hunt carefully and for a purpose.

Workin' in the Swamps

In the past two weeks, I've made 3 trips to the fab yard in Louisiana. It's been exhausting. To date (for this year), I've spent 80 days away from home in 14 separate trips to Louisiana (4 of those were offshore).

I'm tired of traveling, living out of a bag, traffic on I-10, black feet from dirty hotel carpet, and particularly sick-n-freakin' tired of high-calorie artery-clogging deep-fried-and-served-with-butter food. Holy crap. I gave up on ordering salads because they just don't understand the concept. No! Please leave the fried shrimp, pound of shredded cheese, and double shot of ranch dressing out of my rabbit food.

But despite the long days, growing waistline, and leaving my family by themselves far away, I do get to catch awesome sights. Above is a newly built jumper (a piece of pipe that will connect two pipelines subsea) being tested and loaded out on a transport barge. It is 16-inch diameter pipe, 80 feet long, 50 tons, and will be installed in 5000 feet of water.

Ultimate Photo: Inside a Tornado

I've been watching the new Storm Chasers series on the Discovery Channel with much enthusiasm. A group of storm chasers have teamed up with a group of photographers that created the TIV (Tornado Intercept Vehicle). If you haven't seen or heard of this thing yet, just do a Google search for it. I won't go into the details, but it's very exciting (and partly insane).

I've thought for some time now that one of the most interesting and extreme photos ever taken would be from the interior of a tornado. People often have wondered about 'ultimate photos'. Some of them have come to pass. Seeing the Earth rise from behind the moon was an ultimate photo visualized long before it actually happened.

I was fascinated with tornadoes growing up (and I guess I still am). I checked out all the books on tornados from the local and school libraries and read them multiple times. One aspect of the tornado stories that caught the most attention from me was witness accounts of surviving a tornado. In some rare cases, people were exposed and were able to look up into the tornado from the inside - and they lived to tell the story!

This ultimate experience was visualed in the movie Twister some years ago. The final scenes of the movie show the main characters surviving a direct hit from a massive F5 tornado, including a shot up into the twister.

It should be just a matter of time before someone captures video or stills from inside a tornado. I look forward to it!

Canon 40D - Worth Getting?

This year, Canon has announced several new camera bodies, including the 40D. The 40D comes along in the 10D - 20D - 30D - series of DSLR bodies. Dpreview has finally reviewed it (I love and value their reviews). Jump to the conclusion page and you'll see why I'm excited.

So I now find myself pondering this camera and whether or not to ditch my aging 1D mark II. I love the 1D. It's a substantial piece of equipment. Beautifully crafted, nearly bullet-proof, and heavy as a lead brick. It is both a sports car and a tank. If I were to drop it on my toe, I'd surely break it (the toe, not the camera).

I'd stick with the 1Dm2, but since I use a 5D most of the time, the 1Dm2 becomes a lot of weight to lug around as a back-up camera. It uses huge Ni-MH batteries that require a huge battery charger. (These things remind me of the old heavy NiCAD battery-powered RC cars I had back in the late 80's.) Replacing the 1D's batteries (with Canon brand) is expensive - $120 a piece. Replacing the charger is an exercise in highway robbery. $320 for a battery charger? Are you f'n kidding me?

The 40D uses the same batteries as the 5D. The 40D is about the same size as the 5D. The 40D is physically very much like my old 20D, which served as a fine backup camera.

The only problem is that I'll miss the 1D. I'll miss the indestructable, take-me-anywhere exterior. I'll miss the well-built solid feel against my fingers. Handling the thing leaves you with the impression that it's made of solid metal, although you know otherwise. There's a dense packing of hardy electronics that work flawlessly to deliver high quality images. You can count on the 1D to perform.

I guess my hesitations are based more on my romance with the 1D than feasible matters. The 40D is the more practical camera for my needs. We'll see...

My LEGO News - Sorting and Planning

I spent a lot of time at home last week with a nasty cold and sinus infection (a pretty bad one too - the headaches knocked me out of commission). I hit the bricks, once again, in efforts to clear the huge back-log of loose parts, half-built projects, and general clutter laying around my LEGO work area.

It's been years since I've built anything seriously. I miss my bricks and I miss the building process. But I've been apprehensive and loath to clean the slate for a new project. There's nearly a mountain of work to be done.

The desk is looking pretty good now, especially with a load of new bins for parts sorting. I like these large plastic frames that contain multiple clear storage pull-out-type trays. Things are looking neat and tidy now, and I'm finally seeing the faint light at the end of the proverbial dark tunnel in regards to finishing the huge clean-up.

The desk is about eight feet wide and used to be very cluttered with all sorts of stuff - books, computer & printer, cameras, and LEGO parts, of course. I decided to keep it strictly LEGO. I screwed-down a large oval train track so that I can run trains around the desk perimeter for entertainment. This is mainly for somebody else:

It's a thief! Stop! Who's stealing my plates???

Little Henry (my son) just can't help himself. He crawled up on the desk and started digging around :-)

So what am I planning to build next? Stay tuned...

Visions of Big Bend

After making several trips to Big Bend National Park over the past few years, I've realized that my photography from the park is turning into a nice project. I have formalized this work into a project I call: Visions of Big Bend.



This is a long-term endeavor, and I hope to continue to work on this project for a long while (as well as visit the park frequently! :-)