After 42 days, The 29th Expedition: Erebor has docked into port. Its results:

13 lbs / -5%

(Overall Graph)

That now adds to a total loss of 43.5 lbs in 12 weeks, outpacing the magnificent keto initiative of Expeditions 13 and 14 of 36.25 lbs. That said, The 14th lost 12 lbs—basically the SAME as The 29th.

Back then, I stumbled into the answer without knowing it! I was averaging 212 grams of fat back then in a keto context. Unfortunately, I still believed in having my protein jacked-up high, so it averaged 128 grams as opposed to today's 75. That higher amount would prove to come back and bite me.

Waving that all aside, how did I lose this 5%? This was the total served in the ship's galley for the voyage of cooked totals:

• Ground Beef: 12.2 lbs
• Bacon: 9.5 lbs
• Bacon fat: 4.5 cups
• Butter: 10.1 lbs
• Ghee: 3.7 lbs - homemade from 5.4 lbs of butter
• Coffee: 10.4 gallons
• Lamb: 1.5 lbs

What did that look like? While averaging 1.7 sticks of butter, it evolved into adding hitting 4.3 oz of ghee in my 3-cup coffee at 3-something in the morning.

For lunch-ish? A half-package of bacon and 1-2 tablespoons bacon oil poured atop a 1/2 lb burger that cooked down to 5+ oz—sometimes I skipped the bacon fat (hey, sometimes I share). After 10:30 AM, I'm good for the rest of that calendar date. Sometimes, I'll make another cup of coffee to pick up any ghee stragglers (0.3 oz at most) around 2-3 PM, but mainly, it is just water.

Pretty simple, right? I feel like I'm overeating because I've forgotten what those diet hunger pangs felt like. This approach runs around 2000-2100 calories (if that EVER mattered).

When I look back and remember how ravenous I was to eat my next morning "meal" of crackers—dehydrated spinach, broccoli and flaxseed—I just shake my head. That 1240 kcal ceiling was just dumb. "Look at me, I'm semi-starving. My body will NEVER react adversely to this with a wild roller coaster ride back up! Weee—who needs sustainability?!"

...hey, I had to learn that I had to eat BACON to lose weight!

Gaffigan got it (mostly) right.

No, forever shall it be said that SUGAR is the killer in the room. And it's added to virtually every product—AHA approved! Yep, the American Heart Association recommends 60% of your diet to be sugar. Do we even need 1% of THAT?

...but...need vs. want...it is an entirely different beast. You just don't get to 336 lbs by not WANTING 4 or 5 donuts, a buffet table of Taco Bell, a 1/4 gallon of Blue Bell Ice Cream and to wash it all down with 2 liters of Coca-Cola for the night. I'm not exaggerating there.

Perhaps, my eating foods sourced from, or pretty darn close to, animals isn't a bad thing...

And hey, I have my vice! I'm pretty sure there's not a coffee cougar lurking in the jungles of Central America. Actually, I TOTALLY get that caffeine is a natural pesticide AND a psychoactive drug! That said, look, I have NO problem of being the Billy at the head of the mind flayer army comprised of Hawkins residents gutturally choking down chlorine and rat poison to take over the world a small, Indiana town.

But, SUGAR...I'm totally convinced THIS is Sugar's theme song.

The Next Day: 5:37 AM & Me

Yesterday was decidedly NOT a red-letter day for me. I woke up with sharp & shocking inflammation in my right knee from something I re-tweaked while moving boxes the other day; at one point, I had to use a crutch to back off the tension. Later, my right ring finger was slammed in a drawer full of clothes. I then canceled $800 worth of tools because Amazon was playing whack-a-mole in its logistics network—I knew NEVER to go with Amazon for I chose to go with specific vendors YEARS ago while out in the country. I discovered our house seller thinks contract language is just a mild suggestion. Finally, I drove by a potential house alternate in Bartlett of what was once a nice neighborhood that hence has fallen, proving once again that my beloved, entropic hometown is deteriorating. And, this all comes on the 19th anniversary of my father's passing.

The city I once knew as home is
Teetering on the edge of radioactive oblivion
A three-hundred thousand-degree baptism by nuclear fire
I'm not sorry, we had it coming

GUNSHIP - Tech Noir

So, it wasn't the best of days. What will TODAY look like? Although my ring finger HATES me for the above paragraph and the zone it has to cover on this keyboard, it's going to be a day full of win. I've got a big ol' list of things to figure out and that's where I really shine.

Arriving at Port

I had that dream again last night. That dream where I am running. But this time, I was running among an AI-generated crowd of friends that encourage me. In my dream, I felt I was slow, though they seemed mindlessly happy with my effort. Bewildering.

This is the last day of The 29th Expedition. It started with my second day back on Facebook and ends with me being alone. Revisiting my past, trying to recapture those old moments...well, we can't do that sans a DeLorean and 1.21 "jigawatts." The pieces no longer snap together. I have bits of fabric but not enough to form the tapestry.

I was curious of what Kelly said in the video I referenced yesterday about her joining a Crossfit gym for a 40+ class. That idea really intrigues me. Instead of the grasping of the wind of past efforts, I'm curious to be a part of a community, a tribe, with a drive within that lines up to my own desires—a push through our own inner strength toward winning. I'm sure there are all sorts of interpretations of Crossfit beyond my characterization of it beyond screaming and a "Bruh, how much can you lift" from a raspy-voiced woman.

Song of the Day

Because when it gets tough, you gotta dig deep:

Joe Esposito - You're the Best

Album of the Day

Howard Shore - The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies (Original Motion Picture Soundtrack)

Virtual Idiosyncrasy

Later today, I'll be migrating my Tutanota email address back to Google, swinging by sites and updating as needed. Not moving old emails—that's for sure! Before leaving Facebook for the last time, I handed out my updated email to those who I've been doing PM exchanges (well, I forgot one). I have not received a single email. Not one! I mean, I had multiple threads ongoing—active dialog on Facebook! Pull it from that FB notification ding...folks don't engage. Are they all merely cleverly crafted pieces of code by ol' Zuckerberg?

If we just smacked the tennis ball to one another a couple of times, I totally would get that. That said, my leap off Facebook is just switching a phone number...though, I guess folks don't do that anymore, either.

I find it a delightful curiosity of the system. The platform is too cluttered, too generated these days. I find peace leaving it, though...it's bittersweet. It's never easy when I leave this or that individual behind. Collectively, sure—"See ya, cloud crowd!" But walking away from a person who is a unique, complex spirit...yeah, it's a hard one. And multiply that sensation by N number of times! And then there's the recognition that maybe they are just...indifferent. Worst yet, perhaps Facebook relegates our soul to this?

I'm reminded of these lyrics:

I changed by not changing at all
Small town predicts my fate
Perhaps that's what no one wants to see
I just want to scream hello

-Pearl Jam, Elderly Woman Behind the Counter in a Small Town

I suppose time is not the same for me as my Cylon brethren. Beyond the stories and toe stubs along the way, I'm no different today as I approach 45 than when I was coming upon 25...

...I don't know...I'll continue to champion the value of NOT keeping up with the news; it's all a bunch of marketing anyway: "Join our Party today and gnash teeth together!" Worse still..."Be like us teens! Say our words! Wear our clothes! Listen to our music! Because we matter! You DON'T." Naw, I rather pull up a chair and listen to the old fellas drinking their morning coffee

Stay away from the rhetoric of the cool kids' table. Cuddle up with a good history book. Or when you get that need to pop open that news feed, just read about the Ardennes offensive...or Uncommon Grounds: The History of Coffee and How It Transformed Our World.

Fitness

I watched the following video last night of a man in his 50s talking to a 44-year-old. While not a carnivore-centric video, I loved its approach to fitness, that if we know something is superior, why rely on a metric for validation? Just trust the process, right? And it also compelled me to leave 2022 in the past and work out! Yes, I can lose weight and not lift a single dumbbell on carnivore, but that just resets me. What if I want to be more? What if I want to win?

The video highlights this article, The Health Benefits of Resistance Exercise: Beyond Hypertrophy and Big Weights.

YouTube Link