Day seventysix

I am trying to post every few days at this point. I will probably not post daily as I have in the past.

I am back from the trip to Cork, Ireland. I gained some weight on this trip. This morning I weighed 240.1. That's 2.3 pounds heavier than prior to the trip. The factors in that are probably:

1. I ate bread. They have marvelous bread in Ireland. Completely whole grain, but still. Not gluten free and very high in calories.
2. I was not completely strict on refined carbs. I ate a few desserts, which were not sugar free.
3. I may have gained some muscle. I have been doing a lot of yoga. More on this later.

On point 3, my clothes still fit the same, if not a bit looser. So it is true that I may have packed on some muscle. I have certainly been working hard. I have done Bikram yoga almost every day. I bought the book, and used an interesting technique to fit this in. Given that there are no Bikram studios in Cork, I had to do this in my hotel room. I proceeded to strip down, lock myself in the bathroom and stop up the gap at the bottom of the door with a towel. I then ran the shower on full hot until the tub was full. At this point the bathroom was very warm and steamy. I did the first 2 poses with the water running, and then shut it off. I finished the remaining poses with a full tub of extremely hot water in the room with me, with the door plugged up as I said. The result was that I sweated buckets, and got a killer workout every time I did this. And I never had to leave my hotel room to do so. Plus, since I did the whole thing in the buff, I did not generate any sweaty workout clothes. And for my final savasana, I simply got into the tub and soaked. Pretty cool, huh?

I do have some symptoms, though. I think the gluten is the main issue. My inflammation has kicked up, and I have a few IBS symptoms. I definitely need to tighten the diet back up.

I will be in California next week where eating strictly vegan is easier. I will let you know how this goes.

One interesting place I ate at in Cork was Cafe Paradiso, owned by Dennis Cotter. This is one of the finest vegetarian restaurants at which I have ever eaten. Outstanding! I ate there Thursday night, and I can still remember the details of this meal. For a starter I had a sample of vegetarian sushi. For my main course, I had pan fried tofu over a bed of braised bokchoy with a coconut milk-based Thai curry sauce. This came with a fried vegetarian wonton and udon noodles. For dessert (this is where the refined carbs came in), I had rhubarb crumble with gooseberry and soy ice cream. This was accompanied by a decaffeinated cappuccino with soy milk.


The EMC Cork folks who went out to dinner with me were kind enough to purchase for me Dennis Cotter's book, Paradiso Seasons, which I have begun to read. This is a very interesting book. I highly recommend it. It won the award for the best vegetarian book in the world in 2003, the year that it was first published. The following is a photo of me with the book while in the restaurant:



I will probably kick off a four day fast the week after I get back from this trip to recover the ground I lost in Cork. While I maintained the vegan nature of the diet (at least so far as I know, given the level of control I had), I did vary from the strict ETL guidelines, and that has caused me to lose some ground which I need to recover. I will let you know on that.

More later.

Day seventythree

OK, so I have not blogged for 12 days. Sorry about that.

I am still doing remarkably well, though.

Admittedly, I have been traveling. Last week I was in the Western suburbs of Boston. This is a desert for vegan style food. There are very few vegan options in Whole Foods, believe it or not. I have one war story on this. I hooked up with a local yoga studio called Mystic Fitness. This is a really great studio for those desiring Bikram style, hot yoga. I had a conversation with the owner of this studio that went something like this:

I was in California last week and ate very well as a vegan eater. My hotel even got it. Here, I ask for soy milk in my hotel restaurant at breakfast and they look at me like I am insane. There are very few vegan options in restaurants. What gives with that?

He laughed at me. Said he was thinking about moving to California himself. The issue, according to this gentlemen, is that California is a health-conscious, outdoors oriented culture. Also, lots of locally-produced fresh fruits and vegetables. In Boston, they have winter six to eight months. Folks are depressed most of the time. They need comfort food. Fried pork chops with cream gravy. Ice cream. 36 ounce porterhouse steaks. You get the idea.

I did manage to eat vegan in Boston with difficulty. The EMC cafeteria was pretty good. I could always get a salad, and maybe a vegan soup option. The Naked Fish in Framingham was also not too bad. My last night there I ate at Chef Orient in Framingham which I would have to say was also not bad.

This week I am in Cork, Ireland. I am staying at the Oriel House in Cork. This is a health oriented spa hotel. Still does not get it with respect to vegan dieting, though. I ordered a grilled vegetables sandwich for lunch on Monday. Asked for no cheese and salad instead of french fries. I got the sandwich with the cheese on white bread with the fries.

It took me some serious effort to resolve that one.

I have found an outstanding place in Cork, though, called Lemongrass. This is an Asian fusion place. Very good options for vegans. My only complaint is that they use white instead of brown rice. Great salad for an asian restaurant, though. Also a very good fresh fruit dessert. I have eaten dinner there the last two nights in a row. If something is working, why change?

I have also done yoga 13 times in the past 15 days. I am basically doing it everyday. I am seeing profound changes in my body as a result of this. As well as huge reductions in stress, and increased clarity of mind. I am getting so much payoff that I am strongly motivated to continue this.

My plan is to continue eating vegan in Cork this week, spend the weekend at home in NC, and then be back out in California next week.

More later.

Day sixtyone

It has been five days since my last blog. OK, must do better on this.

The last week has been amazing. Having said that, I have not lost any more weight. I weighed this morning and was 237.8. Still 21 pounds lighter than 1/1/08. But still. 8 pound more than the low of 229.9 from post-fast.

I took 5 days straight of Bikram yoga last week, on Monday through Friday. I spent the bulk of the days doing meetings with Oracle, VMware and the like. Once those meetings were done, I would knock out a yoga class, and then go have dinner, either by myself or with one of my co-workers or colleagues at Oracle and VMware.

This turned out to be a very good pattern for me to follow.

Not only did I get a lot of exercise, and the very best form of exercise, but Bikram made me tired, which helped me to sleep. Further, Bikram yoga is having an impact on my effectiveness and ability to focus. It is difficult to be stressed out and fractured in your thinking after taking yoga. It centers you and calms you down. As a result, you think clearly. I was able to be amazingly effective in several of the meetings this week, so much so that the folks keep asking for me back.

There is something great going on here. I need to maintain that energy.

I also ate very well. I was in California, which is a place that definitely gets it in the area of vegan diet. I found some excellent places to eat.

For example, La Fiesta in Mountain View, California is one of the finest Mexican food restaurants for low-fat vegan eaters I have found. I highly recommend this place. I had vegan enchiladas with grilled vegetables, verde sauce, and black beans. Amazing.

Another outstanding example was Cafe Soulstice in San Mateo. Wow! That is an incredible place.

Cafe Soulstice is part of a new wave of restaurants I call ethical fast food. This restaurant serves only organic, raw, vegan food. Nothing dairy or meat is served there, period. Everything is absolutely fantastic. I had the following:

Soulstice Salmon Breakfast Sandwich $7.50
Soulstice Salmon on our sprouted sunfl ower-almond bread with tomato, cucumber, and dairy-free cheese spread. Served open-faced, topped with fresh herbs and honey mustard dressing (Add avocado for $1)

I asked for the avocado, but they forgot it, so they gave me two of the following:

Superfood Clusters $2.25 Raw chocolate energy nuggets made with raw cacao, coconut, coconut oil, goji berries, raisins, live nuts, Inca
berries, spirulina, maca powder, agave nectar and raw honey. Try one and you’ll be addicted!

I definitely lucked out here! I got an amazing treat for a measly dollar. On top of that I had the following as well:

Raw Decadence Crème Pies $7.00 Chocolate, Pumpkin, Banana, Mango or Berry Made with organic coconut-avocado filling on a date and nut crust topped with whipped coconut crème

I had the chocolate, which is of course dairy free. This sounds like a lot of food, and it was. However, I felt great after eating this meal. Not too full, lots of energy, no swelling or inflammation. Just right.

This is an amazing restaurant. I highly recommend it to anyone who is in the San Mateo area. It deserves your consideration and support.

I hit a bit of a speed bump on the way home. I came through DFW, and found it to be a desert in terms of diet. Barbeque, fast food Chinese, Taco Bell, McDonalds, Wendy's, you get the idea. There was absolutely nothing edible there.

Contrast this to SFO where there was a wonderful soup and salad place with exceptional vegan split pea soup.

Anyway, I did the best I could in DFW. The best I could do in Terminal C was Au bon pain again. I discussed that on my last blog and ended up in a similar state by the time I got home, i.e. swollen, inflammed and with a splitting headache. I have been working this off ever since.

My plans today are to relax, get caught up on my clothes and packed for my trip tomorrow. I will be heading out tomorrow for Boston at 2 p.m.

More later.