Day 23

Calories burned at the gym today: 781

I have officially started down from my first plateau! I lost 1 1/2 pounds overnight! Woooooooohooo! Hopefully I can get in a couple more weeks of quality weight loss before I hit my next plateau.

I feel like I need to send a shout out. I want to recognize this person and shout out their amazing charity, but I know they wouldn't want that. But this person is such an inspiration to me that I really want to share one of their actions so that hopefully others will be inspired to do what they can for those around them. Last night there was a knock on my door. A friend that I don't see often enough was there with a small gift and a heartfelt card. They said that they read my blog every day and that they wanted to cheer me up after my rough week. I am seriously so amazingly blessed. I have no idea what I've done to deserve such incredible people in my life, but I am truly grateful. I sincerely hope that one day I can be half as unselfish and charitable as this person. I have to admit, it's never really crossed my mind after seeing a downer blog post to go to the person's house and cheer that person up. I now have something else I can work on doing to improve myself.

I am starting to see some changes in my body. It is becoming increasingly obvious which parts I am working and which parts still think they are on a life-long vacation. I'm worried I am going to be horrifically proportioned, like unto this:

Cue shiver of terror.

And that is, to say the least, not what I'm aiming for. 

I thought I was past my battle with the uncommon cold, but tonight has proven me wrong. I feel like poo and I'm getting dizzy just lying here in bed typing this. Don't worry, I'm not short on nutrients or food. It was a 1,500 calorie day. Half the kids I regularly work with at my job are currently carrying some brand of the cold, or malaria, or polio, or leprosy, or the bubonic plague. I was bound to catch any or all of them eventually. Thus, I will be knocking back a good sized cocktail of Nyquil and vitamins at 8:30 and giving my body 10 hours to fight a heroic battle to at least get this on the run through tomorrow. Because tomorrow is rock star dress up day in my club at work. We will be shooting the younger kids' music videos. Unless I am in the process of losing a limb to one of the aforementioned diseases, or projectile vomiting, I will walk, wheel, or crawl myself to work tomorrow, wearing a mask and gloves, if I must, to save others. Because, dangit, I am a rock star.

The guy whose inspiring video I posted yesterday has a blog called  http://bendoeslife.tumblr.com/ . He can be pretty hilarious. Recently he posted a list on his site that made me laugh super hard. So, obviously, I am going to share it:

10 Superficial Reasons to Lose Weight. Because we can’t always be politically correct.

• You don’t have to pull the seatbelt as far to click it.
• Let’s be honest, chub-rub sucks.
• Far fewer sweat stains.
• Cartwheels are much easier (and graceful).
• No more pulling the shirt out of fat rolls when you sit down. (don’t act like you don’t know what I’m talking about.)
• People don’t eyeball you questioningly when you take the last cookie/slice of pizza.
• You can put your shoes on like a normal person. For those of you that have never been obese, trust us, it’s really really hard to put shoes on.
• No more fat-tax ($2 for XXL and up shirts)
• No more pretending like you’re wearing a T-shirt over your bathing suit to “prevent sunburns.”
• Floors don’t creak as loudly. Sneaking up on people is much easier.

In the spirit of being a fair and balanced blogger, I will now list the reasons to stay fat.

• If you’re riding with friends in a two-door car, you always get shotgun, because everyone knows there’s no way you’re getting into the backseat without tearing some ligaments.

But even still, the lose-weight side wins convincingly 10-1. Let’s keep moving.