Losing a part of me

Category: Restaurants

  • Day 1125

    I took Leslie for breakfast yesterday as planned. I ordered the French Toast with strawberries and bananas and drizzled it with maple syrup. It was delicious! Before driving her to the airport we then went to the pub, and I enjoyed a plate of fish and chips. I was tempted to change that up but decided that many of the other options were somewhat less healthy for me. We drove to the airport and were so early that we decided to stop off at another restaurant to share a dessert. I dropped her off at the exact time we had planned for our tearful goodbye, and I drove back to Burlington.

    I was already back in Burlington when my phone rang. Leslie told me that the airport was shut down, and that she needed for me to come back to pick her up. I had already completed my (safe and calculated) U-turn before I asked her what had happened, and was back there in precisely the least amount of time one can safely drive from Burlington to Pearson International Airport. A plane crash on an active runway (which you have probably already heard about by now) had the entire airport shut down until… nobody knew. My wife, ever the smart one, had already rebooked her return flight for Wednesday morning when she called me. The reasons may be terrible, but I have another full day with her, and I am not complaining about that.

    My original plans for dinner last night were complicated by this, and I left the leftover shawarma for my wife to eat. After all, it was her leftovers! I prepared a couple of meatless cheeseburgers for myself – one with a bun, the second without. I had some mini crisps on the side. I had to be finished with my meal by 6:15pm so that I could be online to teach my class, and so I had plenty of time to digest before bed. While I do not think my food intake was the healthiest yesterday, it could have been much worse.

    My weight dropped this morning by over a pound. I actually weigh less than I have since the beginning of February – I have vacillated between this morning’s 305.6 lbs. and Friday’s high of 311.2 lbs., which tells me that while I have not made any progress, I have also not lost ground. In truth, expanding that date range back to December 20 and I have been as low as 299.8 lbs. twice (December 22 and January 19), which means that I have not changed a lot since before Chanukah. With all of the stress and anxiety and problems I have endured in that time it is no small success that I have not done worse.

    My food plans for the day today are currently up in the air. I decided to wait until Leslie is awake to discuss breakfast, as I would normally just make myself an omelette and she would make whatever she had planned (usually instant oatmeal), but I know she had planned her oatmeal down to the packet for her original Monday departure, so she has none left. She is not a fan of my omelettes. I will give her the option of taking her out for breakfast again, and if she agrees then we will probably do something similar to yesterday. I will skip the desserts, as I will also take her out for a nice dinner. I had planned to do so Saturday evening, but those plans were thwarted by the inclement weather. Where we will eat is up in the air, but it will most likely be either sushi or steaks. I have not discussed this with her yet, and she might not want to eat out because of her very early flight tomorrow morning. We will see.

    I usually only discuss my sleep score when it is really good or really bad, and even then, I often forget. Last night it was down to a 77, which is still on the high end of fair. The fact that it was down from two nights in the 80s (88 Saturday night and 82 Sunday night) means that I have actually been sleeping pretty well. I am quite pleased by this, because good sleep is so important to good health.

    Leslie is now awake, and she has told me that she does not want to go out for breakfast. That is good for my eating, and I will shortly make my omelette. Lunch and dinner are still unknowns – I will discuss them with her once she has had her caffeine and some food.

    Have a great day folks!

  • Day 901

    My weight dropped almost half a pound this morning. This despite not having any success on the throne this morning, and after Leslie and I ate a delicious but very large piece of fish with a couple of egg rolls for dinner… at 9:10pm. I have hope that within a day or two I might drop to my pre-Canada Day Fireworks Trauma weight, and a few days later I will get down below 280 lbs. again.

    Today is Leslie’s last full day here, and that makes me sad. I know I have to appreciate what time we do have (and I do), but we really do not have enough of it. One week every couple of months is no way to maintain a healthy relationship. I try to show a brave and strong face for her, but it kills me inside when I have to drop her off at the airport.

    Last week we were at Costco and I saw that they have on sale a Ninja appliance that includes the functionality of my old Ninja blender, plus a food processor and a pitcher, with all of the different blades to make all sorts of goodies… including healthy ones. As I was waiting for a cheque to come in, I decided to hold off. That cheque arrived over the weekend, and so yesterday we went back to Costco to pick it up. We then went to the supermarket to get the necessary ingredients to make our first masterpiece, and when we got home, we did it. Yes, I am now one of those people who buys a fancy kitchen appliance, and the first thing I did with it was make dog-friendly ice cream treats for Princess Sophie. While they are perfectly human-friendly (peanut butter, yogurt, and bananas), I froze them and let Her Floofness know that they are special treats just for her. (I did lick my fingers… yum!)

    I will make lunch for us today, and then for dinner we will go for sushi. That has been the plan since before Leslie even arrived. I was hoping that we could enjoy another bottle of ice wine with our post-dinner cigar, but the Liquor Control Board of Ontario is on strike, so the best we can do is to pick something up from the wine section of the supermarket.

    Have a great day folks!

  • Day 891

    It was a relief to see my weight drop by 1.4 lbs. this morning. I have not been doing very well with my eating, but I did a little bit better yesterday than I have been.

    I was supposed to take my son (the younger) for lunch today, but his mother asked me to change that to tomorrow, which means that tomorrow I will be eating two meals out, as there is a meeting on men’s mental health for a group that one of my Lodge brothers runs, so I promised to be there. I will do my best to stay on track with my eating at both meals. I recall that my last lunch with my sons was doable because of how I ordered, so if he insists on returning to the same restaurant, then I will order the same meal.

    I have had two good trips to the toilet thus far today. I expect that my body is getting back to whatever it feels normal is. I did have a meal replacement shake last night, to which I added a teaspoon of fibre powder. I was quite worried about that, but so far so good.

    Have a great day folks!

  • Day 878

    I don’t know how I wrote this but did not press publish. Sorry about that… Here is yesterday’s article! -MDG

    It is funny how certain things can bring back memories from however long ago; when I was a child my father’s phone number at the office was 878-3371. Typing in the title of today’s article that came flooding to the fore. When I write ‘when I was a child,’ I truly mean it… he left that firm when I was not yet eight years old… nearly 44 years ago. Because of that, I second-guessed myself, so I typed the number (with the area code) into Google and sure enough, the website of the firm that he was with when I was a child came up. I miss him so much.

    I gained another .6 lb. this morning, bringing me up 2.4 lbs. in the last two days. Fortunately, I think that my brain is back to normal, so I should not have to worry about eating for that. I will, however, need to worry about eating when I go for lunch with my son (or sons – that is not yet clear). My son the younger wants Lone Star Texas Grill, and I am more than happy to accommodate him… even if today was not Father’s Day, which it is. I am thrilled to be seeing him (or hopefully them).

    A couple of notes on this morning’s weight gain:

    1. Yesterday I ate more than I had planned to; I had bought a carton of eggs for breakfast, and had quite a few left. I ended up making a large omelette for dinner with the remainder of the onion, and sliced up the remainder of the cucumber which I had on the side. There is now no food left in the house to tempt me this morning;
    2. It was only after I returned from taking Princess Sophie for her walk and then drinking my morning shake that I was able to successfully move my bowels, and there might not really have been so much weight gain had it come prior to my weighing myself.

    With all of that said, I am still pleased that I did not gain more weight than I did. As I prepared to step onto the scale, I said to myself that if my weight was 283 lbs. or less then I would be satisfied. It came in at 282.4 lbs. … I was relieved that I did not gain more than I did over the two days.

    And so, today I restart the program… with a possible necessary exception of lunch with my sons, but I will order very intelligently, and will eschew the proffered chips and salsa. I enjoyed my first meal replacement shake of the day at 10:30am, which means that I should not be too hungry when I get to the restaurant. I will order the same dish that I did the last time I was there… although I confess, I do not recall what that was. If I do not recognize it on the menu then I will look up the nutritional values on their website. The afternoon and evening will be meal replacements only.

    It is possible that a friend may be coming over to join me on the balcony for a cigar this afternoon, but that is still a very tentative thing that we discussed in passing. We will see, and if he does not then I will still enjoy the afternoon. I plan to retrieve the dresser from my locker so that I can use it as the chest of drawers in my office area… replacing the plastic monstrosity that I have been using for nearly three years (and which sat in my storage locker for four years prior to that… and which was probably in my office in my previous apartment in Burlington, although I confess I do not remember that far back.

    Have a great day folks!

  • Day 847

    I did something yesterday evening that I do not remember doing in a very long time: I ate half of an apple. It was a very large apple, and while I could easily have finished it I thought that would be ill-advised. I accomplished this by cutting it in half before biting into it, and I immediately put the other half into the fridge. I was not sure that I would have the willpower to not go back to it later in the evening, but I made it.Woohoo! I also did not eat all of the French fries, opting to prepare a reasonably sized portion, and then putting the rest of them back in the freezer.

    I reached out to my diet buddy, as I promised I would. She is going to be unavailable this weekend, but we are planning to connect the following weekend. I hope she has been doing well, and look forward to catching up with her.

    Yesterday was my last 12-hour teaching day of the week. Today I am teaching from 10am to 5:30pm, and Friday I am teaching from 5:30pm to 9:00pm. It is a relief to get back to a more reasonable schedule, and I hope that I can use that to get some exercise in. These last couple of days I have looked out the window during the day and wished I could change into my running kit and go out for a walk or a jog or some combination of the two. Tomorrow I know I have to take Her Royal Floofness for an appointment, but that is the only daytime commitment that I have. If it is a nice day then I am going to try to push myself to get out for a walk.

    Despite eating pretty well yesterday I was shocked with a two pound gain on the bathroom scale, and I was not pleased about it. If a couple of yogurts and half an apple are going to kill me like that then I should probably just give up. No, I am not giving up… but I will try to eat better today than I might.

    I got very busy after writing the previous paragraphs, and did not get around to finishing… or publishing the article until the following day. Oops.

  • Day 797

    What a shock… the Internet is not working today. Why not? Cuba. I am only very slight pit off by the inconvenience, and will not lose one minute’s enjoyment for that. I will have e to try to tether at some point to speak to someone, but other than that I have no real need to be connected while I’m here.

    Yesterday was a typical day for me insofar as a lot of things did not happen as planned, and I had a lovely day nonetheless. The only issue that I had was the disrespect shown to me by two groups of people… sometimes it happens from Cubans, but tourists seem to take the concept of Cuban Standard Time a little too quickly. A couple that I met on the airplane were supposed to meet me in the morning but they did not show up. I was not bothered one bit by that because the plans were very fluid… I knew when we discussed it that either we would connect or we would not. They reached me by phone at 2:30pm and asked to meet for lunch – they would meet me in 30 minutes. They showed up 75 minutes later, which only slightly irked me in that I was not hungry, but I did not want to eat lunch at 4:30pm knowing that I had dinner plans (which fell through because of someone else disrespecting my time).

    I want to be clear that the couple did not intentionally disrespect me. They were in Cuba for their first visit, and thinking that their credit cards would work, they brought almost no cash. This was a huge and disastrous mistake for an American tourist to make when coming to Cuba. Fortunately I was able to bail them out before they went hungry – they transferred money to my US account and I got Cuban cash here. Again, I am only happy to help. What inconvenienced me was that they told me we were probably going to have dinner (my other plans fell through). At 9:15 they promised they would confirm or cancel within 15 minutes. They decided to eat in their hotel which was not a problem for me; the problem was that they did not call to tell me, so I waited over an hour before cutting bait and going to eat. I do not ever like to eat at 11:00pm.

    With the exception of the times I ate reasonably yesterday. I hate that I ate late at night, but other than that I did fine. I also walked a lot – I believe I did over 15,000 steps before midnight, and I know I walked 5,000 steps before calling it a night. I am not worried about my weight but I know I am not gaining this week (so far).

    I could write more but I’m just trying to enjoy my day. It is sunny and hot and I am loving it.

    Have a great day!

  • Day 796

    Yesterday was a wonderful day from beginning to end. IY”H every day should be as good.

    After the ridiculously long, stressful, and expensive two-day span that was Saturday into Sunday, I landed in Cuba only one hour later than I had originally planned for, and was at my apartment by 4:30pm. I did not unpack, but I did go into my suitcase to find a pair of shorts and my sandals (I had changed into a short-sleeve shirt on the plane from Toronto to Houston) and I went out to meet my buddy only a few minutes later than expected. He and I spent the evening together, enjoying a coffee and then dinner… followed by another snack a little later. I was back in my apartment by 11:00pm, and while I was quickly running out of juice, I had to unpack and organize my kit before turning in. I turned on the water heater so that I would be able to shower before getting into bed, which I was finally able to do by 12:30am. I slept like the dead.

    I seldom eat well on travel days, and what with all of the stress and anxiety of the entire ordeal Sunday was no exception. After everything, I should have turned it off… but as we sat in the cafe-bar toward the end of the evening, as Johnny devoured his desert I compounded it by indulging in a plate of French fries. I knew it was wrong… and I did not and do not and will not feel bad or apologize for it. My step count for the day was 14,000, and my stress count was through the roof. I deserved every morsel and every calorie that I ate Sunday.

    Yesterday would have to be better… and it was. I did not eat breakfast, partially because the restaurant I had planned to eat at was not open yet, but also because I met a few guys from Kentucky at my buddy’s cafe and nibbled on a piece of their toast. For lunch I had a plate of pasta (which in Cuba is a reasonable size, and not what one might get in a restaurant in North America). Dinner was a plate of fried plantains and a chicken dish that likely had the nutritional value (or lack thereof) of an order of General Tao’s chicken… but again it was a reasonable size. I walked 17,000 steps throughout the day, enjoyed many cigars and cups of coffee, and the company of a few friends I always see when I’m here. In the balance, yesterday was a weight-plan success.

    After dinner I went back to Johnny’s bistro for another cigar and a video call, and I ran into the guys from Kentucky who joined me for a cigar… and pulled out a bottle of very fine bourbon. I relaxed until closing and then walked with Johnny as far as my apartment, where I picked up another cigar and then went to see my friend Gloria at her work. She and I chatted until nearly 3:00am, at which point I headed back to my place and had a very good (if short) sleep.

    This morning I ordered a plate of fried eggs and toast, and a couple of cups of coffee. Depending on whether or not people I met show up or not, I will either be leading a tour today, or I will just do my own thing in Habana Viella. While it would be great if they do show up, my day will likely be no better or worse if they do or not… it will just be different.

    My goal is to register 15,000 steps or more every day in Havana. That should not be a difficult goal to achieve, and will likely do much more than that some days. The only thing I need to be aware of is the state of my feet, remembering the problems I had with them on my last trip. Those problems started with a lot of steps in a pair of sandals that were probably well past their expected lifespan (measured in steps, not in age). I gave that pair away, and am wearing another pair that I had… which are older, but not nearly as well worn. After a day and a half in them (and over 30,000 steps) my feet seem fine, so I am optimistic. I brought running shoes just in case, but so far so good. If I need to then I will switch out for runners, but if I can manage it then my other goal is to return to Canada without having worn a single pair of socks the whole trip. We’ll see…

    If the group does not show up then I am planning to have a pizza for either lunch or dinner. The other meal will likely be fish or pasta. We’ll see. I did not feel the need to snack yesterday and while I was peckish by about 12:30am, I did nothing about it and went to bed a little hungry. I would have had to be much hungrier to decide to eat after 11pm. If I can make it through today without snacking then it will absolutely be another good food day.

    It has been some time since I wrote about my bowel movements, but this morning was so good that I feel I should mention that my system is working well, and I suspect that it was ridding my body of all the garbage I ate Sunday. As I walked toward my buddy’s bistro for breakfast I felt five pounds lighter.

    On the negative side, I was extremely disappointed with myself yesterday morning when I put on one of my new shirts and it was tight. I could have gotten away with it, but decided against it and changed into something looser. Hopefully within a few days I will try it on again with better results. While I am well aware that hope is not a strategy, I am truly hoping I can make that happen.

    It is now approaching 10:00am and my group is not here. As I said, either they will show up… or they will not. Either way…

    …have a great day!

  • Day 751

    I am having a good day so far… after a wonderful but very late night last night. No details; I was out and had a nice time. Unfortunately, that gave me precious little sleep. I was relieved that of the 3.2 lbs. that I gained yesterday morning, I dropped 2.8 lbs. this morning… putting me once again below that terrible 270 lbs. mark that I was so angry with myself for exceeding… even if it was only for a day.

    I am packed for my trip… although when I am back from dinner with my son, I will pack my carry-on bag. I tried to check in this morning, but apparently you cannot check in online for flights to Cuba that go through the USA. Okay, I will have to check in at the airport. No big deal.

    I had a late breakfast this morning, followed by lunch with my friends and godchildren. I ordered the salmon power bowl, which was probably a bit high in calories, but healthy. I am soon taking my son the younger for dinner, and wherever we go I will make sure to eat smart.

    Almost as soon as I am home from dinner I will be going to bed. Aside from the fact that I only slept about four hours last night, I am setting my alarm for 2:00am so that I can get to the airport for a very early flight. Once I am through the US Immigrations checkpoint, I will officially be on vacation. Yay!

    I’ll see you all tomorrow… either from the airport, from Miami International Airport, or from Havana!

  • Day 547

    Yesterday went about according to plan. The only aberration was the cupcake that I shared with Leslie. She had bought four the previous day and there was one left. Other than that, we had our salad for lunch, and in the evening, we went to the Davidoff dinner at The Cigar Lounge at Chamberlain’s. The food was magnificent, although we did have to tread carefully to avoid eating treyf.

    Treyf is the Yiddish word used for something that is not kosher. While Leslie and I do not observe the laws of kashruth (kosher) as strictly as some, we nonetheless do not eat pork or seafood, and we will not mix dairy with meat.

    Of the three appetizers that were provided for us, two had pork in them. They did agree to bring us the deviled eggs without the bacon toppings, and they eventually confirmed that the bison meat balls did not contain any pork. We then had to contend with the salad (which they originally brought with cheese), and the potatoes (all of their usual options contain dairy; they did offer us a baked potato, which was delicious). Of the main course options, three of them were fine, and we both opted for the filet mignon. It was out of this world! I paired these with a Diet Coke with a wedge of lemon. Eventually one of the attendees ordered a glass of bourbon for everyone, and I drank mine and part of Leslie’s (she does not like bourbon at all). When all is said and done, this was a cheat meal… but not a particularly bad cheat.

    This morning I started out with an omelette, and then I went to Starbucks to get coffee for us to enjoy on the balcony with a cigar. Leslie’s morning schedule was light, and she had her phone with her in case there were any urgent calls or e-mails. Our lunch was our usual salad from our favourite place. I find it interesting that I actually prefer my salads from there with tofu over the chicken. It is not only because I can have the creamy dressings when I choose to, but also because their chicken is not the best. I still love chicken… just not theirs. At the same time, I do not mind their tofu… but I am not rushing to start preparing tofu steaks at home.

    We have not decided what we will do about dinner this evening, but we will figure that out soon enough. I am teaching until 8:00pm, and then we will light the Sabbath candles and enjoy our Sabbath meal together. I thought for a minute about picking up a challah but decided against it. Between the bread that I ate before the meal last night, and the hamburger buns I had for lunch a couple of days ago, I feel I have had enough bread for the week. We will enjoy a bottle of wine though… which we will pair with a lovely cigar after the meal.

    Have a great day folks!

  • Restaurant Delivery: Begone, evil temptress!

    imageAt no point in my life do I remember not being able to order pizza in for delivery. In fact, as a child living in the suburbs of Montreal, I remember there were always two types of food that would always deliver: pizza and Chinese food. I remember Pendelli’s Pizza on Cote St. Luc Road was our first go-to pizza delivery joint (which happened to be three doors down from my elementary school); I cannot remember if it was House of Wong or Hong Kong House (they were owned by the same people and had the same menu) that was on Queen Mary Road above Decarie Boulevard that was our original Chinese food source, but it was one of the two.

    Somewhere along the way, the availability of food delivery exploded, and at a certain point, my mother had a drawer full of take-out and delivery menus in the kitchen that we could dig through whenever we were hungry. We had long since abandoned Pendelli’s for something else, and the Chinese food was changed from the Cantonese to Szechuan… but now our options included Cote-St-Luc Barbecue (the best rotisserie chicken), Buffalo Bill’s (the best wings in town), as well as Greek, Lebanese, Indian, Persian, and I’m sure many other regional cuisines, on top of the pedestrian burgers and Montreal smoked meat (deli) sandwiches… and whatever else you might want. The restaurant industry wanted our money, whether it was the mom-and-pop joint or the large American pizza chain that had recently come to Canada… they wanted to make it as easy as possible for us to buy their product.

    Sometime after I moved back to Canada in 1997, I heard about a service that would pick up your food from any restaurant or even multiple restaurants and would deliver them for a fee. For too many years I was used to the free delivery offered by so many restaurants and wondered how they would ever survive. I do not know what happened to them, but they were certainly still around when I moved away from Montreal in 2007… and for my frequent return visits to see my parents and friends.

    An hour ago, I was so pleased with my progress, and that I had done so well resisting every temptation since last Sunday’s nacho chips and salsa incident. I was ensconced in my apartment, not quite ready to prepare my second meal replacement of the day, when an alert popped onto my phone. Enjoy $$20 off tonight! Order and save with Uber Eats! Terms and Conditions apply.

    Are you %*@$ing kidding me?

    It is not bad enough that you can get any sort of food by driving less than a mile in any direction; a lot of these restaurants will bring the food right to your door if you simply pick up a phone… and if you watch television, listen to radio, or ever see a billboard then you are going to be bombarded with mouth-watering advertisements for it all; if you are smart, or strategic, or just lucky enough to avoid all of that temptation, they are now sending it right to your damned phone… with coupons no less!

    I know that I got fat because of me, and that my post-Army constant obesity is nobody’s fault but my own; I have written about that so many times over the last four hundred days or so. Nonetheless, it would be ignorant if not irresponsible to deny that all of the easily accessible and oh-so-tasty food what made my mother’s and then my own life so much more convenient by eliminating the need to go grocery shopping and then actually prepare the meals was a huge contributing factor.

    I am not going to say that these services are evil, because they are not. For someone who is not a food addict struggling with obesity they provide a service that, while by no means necessary, is nevertheless convenient for the rest of the population. I can imagine that when the only three options were pizza, Chinese food, or rotisserie chicken that my parents would have welcomed the variety offered by these services. They were never morbidly obese and struggling to lose hundreds of pounds.

    I cannot remove the Uber app from my phone because I do use it every time I have to go to the airport… which is frequent. I cannot even block the notifications for much the same reason. I can, however, curse them every time one of these ads comes up, and declare victory for deleting them as soon as I see them.

    As for the other delivery services, I have done my best to eliminate them as well. The last time I used one, I was sitting on the patio at my cigar lounge in Glendale, California… and it took a year of deleting their emails before they finally took me off their list. If I was still living in Glendale then it was pre-pandemic, and I have not used one since. If I get a notification from one then I will immediately delete it, and if they persist then I will make sure that I block them in every possible way.

    It is hard enough that when I drive to the grocery store, I pass restaurants that serve Lebanese food, Chinese food, pizza, sushi, and wings. I avoid those by staying in my car. Why do these restaurants feel the need to invade the privacy of my own home, coming into my quiet sanctuary, trying to lure me out into the cold, fat world? Begone!

    Of course, on Valentines Day it was nice that I could order dinner for Leslie from another country. As well, I seem to recall that there might have been one meal that she ordered in for us when I was there last. I cannot recall for sure, but I remember we discussed it. Whether or not it happened, I am not sure. Not only is Leslie not morbidly obese, but she also does a wonderful job of supporting me, letting me know when I have had my fill. She does not tell me this based on her own judgement, rather based on what I tell her I should be eating before we begin. ‘Mitch, you said you were going to have half the portion, and then save the rest for tomorrow.’ That is support. The restaurants deciding that portion sizes should be able to feed a small village is not supportive at all.

    There are those who would try to make these ads illegal, because it should be against the law to advertise any unhealthy option. I am not in that camp. I do not want to ban them… I just want to find a way to avoid them.