Fattening Up and Gluten Loading

So Anna and I have decided that our official date to start our Whole 30 Paleo Challenge will be December 16th.  I will get paid on the 15th, so I can start to replenish the cabinets, fridge and freezer with good for me treats.  Also on this day we shall take before pics so you can be enthralled by our transformations.  To plan I am printing up some Paleo food posters for the fridge and only buying paleo (except for Kefir and Yogurt, I need my good bacteria and can't afford the supplements) from now until the end of the challenge.  In preparation I am eating as much glutenous, sugary, processed food and beer as I can fit down my throat and into my bloated belly.
The plan this time is not to finish the whole 30 with a sugar buffet, but this time to stick with it within reason.  I plan on being super strong and fit for the Warrior Dash in March, so that is my goal.  I am hoping too that Crossfit and Paleo will help me get my knee back in shape in time to run the Great Aloha Run.
Yesterday I had the best time ever, being a part of Keysa Hale's Marathon Pit Crew.  She has been training for months to prepare to run the Honolulu Marathon and only asked that we meet her at some point to hand her some coconut water and grapes.  Instead we created an elaborate plan to meet her at mile 17, hand her the goods, and then run with her relay style until the finish.  I took the first 3 miles.  We chatted about her weekend from mile 17 to 20.  It was awesome running in the marathon.  I got to experience all of the cheering and hullabaloo without actually putting in too much effort.  I did my best to stay out of everyone's way and to enhance Keysa's marathon experience.  At mile 20 I bowed out, called the crew driving nearby and hopped into the car at a bus stop.  We kept driving and when we spotted her and her friend again, Anna jumped out and joined her.  Then Joanna, Ananda and I found them at mile 24 and Ananda and Anna finished the last two miles with her before leaving the track near the finish.  Keysa finished on her own and we celebrated with pictures, oatmeal cookies, and the pool at her hotel.  It was so much fun.  It made Anna and Ananda want to train for a marathon.  It solidified my knowledge that I do not ever want to run 26.2 miles.  I still like shorter distances.

Yoga

I'm going to round out this week with a yoga class at the Y.  It's been a while, hopefully I won't embarrass myself too bad.  I am the proud owner of some new t-shirt yoga pants I made last night, though, so it shouldn't be too bad.  I may stop at the Salvation Army afterwards and grab some more XL or XXL t-shirts.  These pants are super comfy and only took me a little while.  I've got to field test them today, then I'll make a few more if they're good for stretching.  I didn't even finish off my edges.  Last night when shopping I picked up a 90% cacao chocolate bar.  I had one square of it and that was perfect.  It's just bitter enough that you don't want to down a whole bar, but it satisfies that craving.  I'm starting to enjoy a lot of my food in much simpler form.  My coffee black, my chocolate more and more cacao and less sugar.  A good rare steak, a burger with a fried egg on top.  Veggies with salt and nothing else.  This year has been an awesome wake up call for me, to pay attention to my food and what exercise I'm doing and WHY.  I've learned to question conventional wisdom in all of it's forms, from what popular doctors say to do or take, to what religious leaders in different religions tell you to do, to what the government tells us to eat, to what exercises are good for you and why.  I've been questioning everything and trying to get to the root of it.  Why is it important?  Do I need all of this excess?  Is there a way I can simplify it and have it be just as awesome/tasty/effective?  Turns out most things in life can be way simpler and just as great.  Okay, on my way to yoga.  Have a great afternoon!

Update: Yoga was cancelled because the instructuor was having a tough day.  She was crying and I can only assume that something happened recently, she thought she could teach the class, but she was crying and couldn't do it.  So, I hiked the pillboxes.  I did the whole thing on my own for the first time, all the way around to the end of the Loop and back to the parking spaces.  The pants were fine except that if you are going to use t-shirt pants for hiking/jogging/running, you will want to add a tie to the waist.  As I got sweatier the pants got a little looser and they started to fall down a little.  Not too much, but enough for me to be hitching them up every once in a while.  The fold of material held my keys well when I rolled them up.  I ended up rolling down the waist band a whole bunch so I could pull them up easy every time they sagged a little.  Good pants, great I'm sure for yoga, some modifications necessary for running/jogging/hiking.

Here's where I got the initial pattern

Feeling Very Primal

Yesterday I watched the Discovery Channel special "I, Caveman, Back to the Stone Age and The Great Hunt."  Two episodes of 10 people that are sent to live like cavemen for 10 days.  It was pretty well done, of course there was a lot of focus on any whining and a lot of what I assume was the good stuff was edited out.  However, after 7 days and everyone is starving, they go off to hunt an elk.  It was extremely moving.  It is the only time I've ever actually felt compelled to watch a killing like that.  I can't watch lions hunt on those wildlife shows, but I had to watch as they speared a huge elk, and then dressed it using stone age rock weapons.  It was really sad, and made me think about where the food I eat comes from.  It gives you a whole other perspective.  For me this was more moving and powerful than those movies where they show the horrible conditions of slaughterhouses and stuff.  It was really dirty and, well, primal.  It made me look with more appreciation on farms that raise and slaughter animals humanely.  It is much easier to block out those scenes of dirty cows all crammed into a small room than to block out the eyes of the elk as it died.  

Anyway, the point of all this is that it gave me a boost to think about the food I'm putting into my body.  It made me feel a little more connected to being a human being whose ancestors had to walk for miles to chase down an animal with sticks.