Thoughts: Now that I’m committed to doing a 4 week leading up to the Orlando Megacon, I scheduled a body fat assessment at Gold’s for tomorrow morning because I just don’t trust my own measurements. (I’m going to take pen and paper with me so I can get my measurements from June 6, 2004, and the last official measurements in October as well. I’m pretty sure the June figures were sky high.) I don’t think I’m measuring in the right locations, hehe. Even grabbing huge hunks of suprailiac flab to go with my thigh and tricep skinfolds with my Slim Guide calipers results in an outrageously low body fat calculation in the mid 14% range, which just can’t be right. Mybodycomp.com has me at 22.7% (up from 20.17% at the end of my second fat loss-focused challenge). The Tanita scale pegged me at 21.4% and 135.8 lbs this morning in my dehydrated “just woke up” state. I’ll check again tonight after I’ve chugged down my usual gallon of water. I think my true bf% is somewhere between the two extremes of caliper and Mybodycomp (~19%?), which consistently overestimates my body frat by 3-4% for some reason.

Here are my measurements as of this morning. If all goes well, every measurement except my shoulders and arms will be back at my pre-bulk figures. I must say that there are good points to both cutting and bulking. Bulking’s primary good point is the food–I get to eat a LOT of it. I can afford to be a little more lax about adding extras like sauces and dressings as well. However, there’s definitely a feeling of sluggishness in my runs that is missing when I am a few pounds lighter, and a sense of uncertainty about when to call it quits and start working on some fat blasting again. With cutting, well, you have a goal and can see both your clothing size and scale weight drop, which is very motivating, but your muscles pretty much stay the same the whole time, which is not very entertaining at all…

========
Nutrition (1600-1800 calorie cutting menu)
1: Chocolate peanut butter banana shake with flax oil and GNC Creastack
2: 3×1 veggie omelette with 1 c. spinach, salsa, and 1/3 c. (dry) oatmeal
3: Kashi crispy bar
4: 3/4 c. cottage cheese and 3/4 c. strawberries
5: Healthy options from catered dinner at work, or 1 can tuna, 2 c.
raw spinach, 2 small oranges
6: 3×1 spinach and tomato omelette with medium apple

Supplements:
Multivitamin with iron
Calcium 500 + D
1 T. flax seed oil
3/4 t. GNC Creastack

Calories eaten / deficit for yesterday = 1866 / +1 (target -538)
Water: 14 cups
Ratios: 45% carb / 41% protein / 18% fat (rounding error?)

========
Workout:
8:30 am Max-OT chest/shoulders/triceps
10:00 pm 50 minutes stationary bike or 50 minutes Yoga Conditioning for Athletes DVD

========
The Awful Truth:
1. Had some unplanned Kashi GoLean last night that brought my total close to 1900 as I was raging at my failed Palm/Dell Hotsync. I am apparently able to mindlessly toss back cereal in a variety of moods: when calm, PMS’ing, not PMS’ing, or when completely pissed off. Lucky, versatile me.

========
Brownie Points:
1. Scheduled body fat measurement at the gym for tomorrow morning.
2. Did all of the dishes.
3. Did some dips with just 40 lbs of assisted weight, and will likely drop that even more next time. I don’t think I even need any assistance, to be honest.

========
Short-term Goals:
1. Get to Costco this week to have my eyes examined. Judging by the blurriness I experienced this morning when I tore open a new set of disposable contact lenses, my prescriptions are now officially invalid.