What will the roadmap be for 2021? Is yesterday's workout catastrophe the shape of things to come? I still want the things I want for this year, even if I cannot work on them directly for this month. In context to these years since 2018, a strong showing from my diet regimen in the first four months of a year already puts me into positive territory and I can definitely pivot success from it...

Of course, all of these are simple thoughts that roll around my head that don't have much application a couple of mm's beyond my cranium.

I'm about to hit 75 days as a Carnivore, which sounds like a lot until you realize I went for 136 days straight on keto until I was hoodwinked by Sonic. The great thing about where I'm at with Carnivore is I feel like I'm just getting started. And truthfully, I AM, especially when you consider other Carnivores like Kelly Hogan's 11+ YEARS. I find what I'm doing now, is SO different from that low-calorie, starvation diet, where just the force of the will brings some sort of stand-in for victory.

On other fronts, I want to pour nutrition into my headspace. My New York Times subscription runs out tomorrow and with it, my desire to know what's going on the world. What I did in 2020 makes sense: ignore the noise. It's one big ship of fools sailing out there, all pawing after the helm. Ah, my friends, they don't know "what has been is what will be, and what has been done is what will be done; there is nothing new under the sun."

All day yesterday, I looked forward to this morning. I set my FitBit alarm to smart wake by 3:45 AM. I could choose among the dregs of my UFC subscription, the waning efforts of my YouTube TV trial or the chrono-tapestries of Spotify for some inspirational Coldplay.

After a couple of weeks away to nurse my injuries, I was ready to hit the treadmill. Wasn't I?

If I told you that the first song I listened to was Kenny G's off-chance cover of You're Beautiful...

...how did you think my morning went?

It was a DISASTER.

The first 5 minutes were great. I was priming the pumps of digital content when I received my first omen: my recently updated iPad REFUSED to talk with my bluetooth-enabled stereo. Sure, my android phone could, but...well, NO problem, I'll call an audible. We've all got our inner Bill O'Reilly, right?

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The iPad's speakers can hang with the machinations of a treadmill, something that cannot be said of my right knee some five minutes into a workout. It began with a tightness behind the joint. "No problem, lemme drop the incline down to 0%." Then it felt...well, I can only describe it as the teenage angst of my patella as it glided along asphalt atop a skateboard while listening to the Smashing Pumpkins. 1979 all the way.

So, I stopped, hobbled around my gym for a bit and pulled on my hand wraps and gloves. There's nothing like a heavy bag routine to get the heart pumping! In just the first few strikes, my inner left elbow got a feeling—and NOT in a good Hooked on a Feeling kind of way!

It's the same feeling that something isn't quite right while something isn't quite wrong, either. Just a feeling. A spidey sense of an injury.

So, bagwork is out. And there I stood: me and Kenny G.

Spring is coming. And I can't put in the time for cardio to be ready for it. But, who needs conditioning when you got THIS!

January was World Carnivore Month. And while I wish I could claim this as my own, it's now Fiber Free February! I intend to create more of these to fill out the rest of the year because...well, this sort of thing comes somewhat easily to me—you gotta be somewhat deft to pull off wordplay like this earlier post Char Scores: the Rack of the Bones in referencing the Star Wars title!

Bacon is back. For a little over a week, I had no bacon or bacon fat in my diet. I guess I wanted that sub-200 lb mark on the scale so badly that I fell back in that broken paradigm that calories mattered. But, with the fat loss from my diet, I just haven't been as satisfied or energized. We can't make lasting weightloss happen—directly anyway. Instead, our body responds to our lifestyle; our hormones determine our body composition. It just happens. I'll get to where I want in time, though admittedly it comes off a bit like being a kid longing for Christmas again!

Enough with the why's for BACON IS BACK! I dunno if that can be understated. It's bacon, people! Gaffigan is completely on point:

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This morning, I used my new Instant Pot Duo 6-Quart to cook my breakfast lb of ground beef. All it needed was a cup of water and its trivet. After the pressurization, there was the 20 minute cook time and the depressurization. I then had a tasty plate of beef ready to go! In the future, I might add another 3-5 minutes as I half-defrosted the meat instead of going straight frozen into the pot—life is an experiment! Of course, this isn't the sort of browning application that I do on a hot skillet, but I suspect one that does a better job at retaining fat.