22 sept. best burger

i realized today that best burger does one thing right that i never noticed...they put the lettuce, onions, ect. below the meat patty. you see, heat rises and cold sinks. therefore, the vegetables remain crispy and fresh resulting in a masterpiece of taste from the first bite to the last. http://www.flickr.com/photos/32233400@N00/2302172701/ there is another joint that does it the same way and their burgers are also fantastic: In and Out. all those restaurant hamburgers be shamed, they have no idea how to do it right; chili's, red robin, tgi friday's, and so on. even though Best Burger has bigger hamburgers, In and Out is right up there as far as taste and quality. i know this is an outlandish statement, but i'm making it and if you have any doubt...you need to try it. in any case, the double-double is to die for. the fries are most likely better for you at in and out. seeing how they are fresh-cut right behind the counter.
the whole point of this entry is to illustrate my lack effort on working out and eating right. but hey, if you can't enjoy your vacation...?

utah - 19 september

after i let andy know that ogden is one of the top 50 cities in america for adventure (you can see for yourself in National Geographic Adventure Magazine September 2008 issue p. 79) i jumped on a plane and headed out. however if you are trying to regain a workout schedule...it can be bad. well, not all that bad, but less disciplined. i did have a bbq pork sandwich at the grill in the Honolulu airport; really amazing! the flight wasn't bad, the lady next to me must have been really tired cause she just layed right out. the in-flight movie was something with a miss pettegrew in the title; not worth seeing. however, i am currently breathing the cool fall air of one of america's most adventerous cities. wish you were here.
my work out for the last day or two has consisted of sitting on airplanes and forgetting to sign out on leave...oh well, what are they going to do, bar me from re-enlistment?

weights - 18 sept. 08

yesterday i hit the track and the weights. i ran for 30 min. and lifted weights for about 45. running was pretty basic, ran until i got somewhere then turned around to come back. my weightlifting consists primarily of free weights (cause that's all we have in the barracks). i started on the bench with the bar only and worked my way up slowly to pushing up 2 plates (135 lbs.). i do sets of 10 reps at each different weight and then sets of 7 reps. then i move to curls and tri's. it's pretty awesome, the first couple times my arms were pretty sore the next day, but it goes away after a schedule is established. i'm not trying for body mass, just tone to help me with my running and overall ability. as far as my diet goes, there isn't a lot to say. i eat boston market tv dinners, yogurt and cheese for breakfast and a pb&j for lunch. pretty simple...every day.

one more for the pile - Mike

i found this guy's flickr page when i was looking for pictures of the hawaii ironman. pretty impressive.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/54973866@N00/

24/5 day 5 - Mike 7 March

for the last day of 24/5 weapons immersion for the week, i am glad to be free of my weapon. i keep checking over my shoulder because i'm still not sure if i should have it or not, so i keep looking for it. we started the day at 6am, like usual, and went out to the mount site. we practiced mount drills all morning in our gear. it was really cold at first, but as the sun came out we warmed up a bit. the good news is that i have less than 2 weeks at goodfellow. so i less than an month i'll be in hawaii working for the man. in essence, i did no organized pt again today. tomorrow i'm planning on going to the gym and biking for a while after i run a few miles. the last real pt i did was the 10k ruck march, so i'm looking forward to stretching my legs out.

Breakfast: 2 hard boiled eggs, bowl of peaches and honeydew, 2 strips of bacon, english muffin with margarine and jelly, 4 oz of OJ.
Lunch: PBJ on wheat bread, bowl of cottage cheese with cantalope, glass of milk, small bowl of multi-colored pasta with the white sauce.
Dinner: no dinner but i had 2 pieces of pizza after training around 5pm and i'm getting hungry.
Indulgences: a handful of reese's pieces. i've been drinking a ton of water lately. i was concerned i wasn't drinking enough so i went to the commesary and got a case of it.

Congrats to Chang on his DLPT score.

24/5 day 4 - Mike 6 March

Idle hands are the Devil's workshop. it's the truth i tell you. expecially if you get let out of training early and you can't do anything but go to the barracks cause you are on weapons restriction. i'll just break it down for you.
Breakfast: pancakes, two eggs, and two strips bacon.
Lunch: PBJ, corn pops, skim milk.
Dinner: 7 pieces Papa John's pizza, 1 IBC root beer, and i was stuffed.
Indulgences: pretty much everything i ate today.
so there you have it. we couldn't do too much for training today cause there was rain, thunder and lightening. which is pretty cool, but it makes for a pretty useless day cause there is only so much you can do in the classroom when you are supposed to be doing hands-on training. bad day for healthy eating, but i'll tell you this, the pizza was good. i'll just have to be good this weekend and count today as my splurge day for the week.

24/5 day 3 - Mike - 5 march

awesome day today. started it all off with 10k ruck march and averaged a little less than 15 minutes a mile. not bad, but i hear that's airborne pace. and also, no blisters. after the ruck our DS gave us a little time to go back and fix ourselves before the day of training, so i missed breakfast at the dfac. but we trained in the sun until about 1700 and i was pretty tired and dripping with sweat for the second time today. it felt good to be outside all day instead of being inside. speaking of outside, texas is getting warm. which means the barracks are also pretty warm, and the CO wants us to all sleep in pt's. probably not going to. anyway:
Breakfast: missed breakfast so i ate some lucky charms i ganked from the dfac.
Lunch: 2 egg rolls, glass of milk, bowl of multi-colored pasta with marinara sauce, glass of apple juice.
Dinner: plate of spaghetti, green beans, and i was still hungry so i got some corn pops with skim milk.
Indulgences: 2 cookies at dinner, a few lemon heads from my wife, and 2 32 oz. bottles of gatorade.
Side note: i was sharing stories from basic today with some others and when i said i went to knox all eyes turned towards me. one soldier was in bravo when we all got there and the only thing he could remember about the knox boys was nye leaving his pt top in his fridge. we had a good laugh. but there still isn't anyone with better basic stories than us. i guess the low crawl pit at leonardwood is a grassy field or something. so i mentioned the saw dusty, football field sized low crawl pit with berms like waves of the sea we got to crawl through. remember? it's where we all saw williams cry the first time.

24/5 day 2 - Mike

i came to a realization today; a revelation if you will. i think that i may be crazy. i realized today that i think everyone around me is retarded. so the way i see it is that either i am crazy, or everyone else is and i'm the only sane one. i've posed this question to shane before, and i know his response.
class graduation was today. it was pretty cool. i found out that i'm going to miss STRAC by 1%, but don't worry, "94% is still a pretty good accomplishment." so anyway, crappy day.
Breakfast: none, we had class graduation all morning from 0645.
Lunch: bowl of pasta, PBJ, glass of milk with two chocolate chip cookies,
Dinner: cheeseburger, fries, corn dog, bowl of cantalope, and two glasses of water.
Snacks: pomegranate juice, gatorade, cashews and chex mix.
training is going great, no pt today because of graduation, but doing a 6 mile ruck march first thing in the morning.

24/5 day 1 - Mike

today is the beginning of the final phase of AIT for this kid. i must admit that i am very excited to get going. tomorrow is air force class graduation which should be a lot of fun. there is only 7 army and the rest are AF of a class with 30+ students. awesome! anyway, today was a good day for eating and working out. i started the day with ability group runs. i got set up and stuck in the alpha group with the 1st sgt. but so did a lot of kids that weren't used to running with him. he basicall took all the 15:30 and below runners, which i don't think he was really excited about. but we ran a little over 3 miles and he released us half way through and then ran up ahead of us and lost us. i guess he got bored of us. anyway, here's how the food broke down:
Breakfast: two strips of bacon, two hard boiled eggs, fruit loops with skim milk and water.
Lunch: two italian sausages (i really like these, it's like having brats for lunch) with a glass of milk and a small bowl of cottage cheese.
Dinner: Mashed potatos, probably a 10 oz ribeye steak (in the dfac), glass of OJ and corn pops with skim milk.
Other foods through out the day: pomegranate juice (my latest fixation), cashews, gatorade, and a small handful of skittles at graduation practice. oh, and lots of water today.
ps. the graduation coordinator (air force tech sgt) is a complete idiot, and we aparantly got a new instructor...today. i think she is supposed to piggy back my current instructors, but she is...do you remember the movie "Cone Heads?" now do you remember david spade's character? well, she acts like that. irritating. but we are graduating soon, and that makes it all worth it, so i can say with a smile on my face that today was a decent day.

it's a beautiful morning, 1 march 2008 - Mike

well, at the end of the week, i can look back with joy. class is over! it makes me so excited to think about that i just blush. anyway, with the end of class also comes weapons training. which, as i'm sure you both are aware, means i get to walk around all day with a ruck, weapon and TA-50. which is acutally proving to be quite the workout. i was having a conversation with my room mate the other day about how much of a difference we have noticed in our health. carrying all that junk around is like working out all day long. So i am still hitting 8~12 miles a week during pt, as well as carrying around my TA-50. so i feel like my workouts are doing pretty good. However, i haven't had any time in the pool. mostly because i don't think the people here know what water is, so i haven't bothered to ask anyone where to go. anyway, here's how my diet is breaking down over the last week:
Breakfast: two hard boiled eggs, water, 2 strips of bacon, an english muffin with grape jelly, and either corn pops or cheerios. i gave up on the total, it started to get bland; only took 2 1/2 years.
Lunch: approx. 1 cup of cottage cheese with a cherry tomato or 2, sometimes a PBJ, and sometimes another bowl of cereal, but not both. also, another glass of water, and often times a glass of milk.
Dinner: a meat, a starch, and a vegetable. whatever is served at the DFAC that day. sometimes it's chicken, and sometimes it's roast beef. but it's always not that good. unless they have spaghetti. i eat the spaghetti for the morning runs.
Snacks: cashews, peanut snack bars, and a crap ton of gatorade (2 32 oz. bottles at the px for a dollar, i stocked up)
Indulgences for the week: Buffalo Wild Wings on tuesday night, i ate 8 wings (4 honey bbq and 4 parmesian garlic) and drank 3 root beers. Last night i went to San Angelo's only sushi bar. it was okay, but i think they tried to hide their lack of fresh product with lots of cream cheese, avacado, and fruit; plus the wait was over an hour after we ordered our rolls. and then "marble slab" ice cream after. (i thought to myself, marble slab? must be a Cold Stone knock-off, but my room mate, who is from texas, says it's the other way around. who knows?
the good news is that i got my computer back so now i'll be able to blog every day!

23 Feb - Mike

toady is saturday, and thank goodness.
yesterday:
workout: 5 mile run with the company around the parimeter. then walking in a circle for 30 minutes waiting for everyone else. Lt. Li is not as fast as he thinks he is.
Breakfast: i ate breakfast really fast. mainly because i don't have any time with all this weapons immersion nonsense. so i end up rucking most of the day as well. you guys know, you did it. anyway, water, cantalope bits, bran cereal, and skim milk.
Lunch: the usual, peanut butter and jelly sandwich with milk.
Dinner: Texas roadhouse. 8 oz. serloin with baked potato(e) and (obviously boiled) vegetables.
Indulgences: the carnival. had a funnel cake with a lemonade. then went and rode some rides and watched the end of the rodeo. the funnel cake had me tossing in bed until about 3 am, when i got rid of it. going to be avoiding the funnel cakes for a while. which brings me to today...
23 Feb
woke up finally at 8am after the funnel cake incident and forced myself into my shoes and out onto the track. 45 minutes 100 and 400 meter sprints, with one mile warm up and cool down.
two granola/peanut bars, gatorade and water is all i've had today, not much of an appetite.

21 Feb

my posts are sporadic at best, but i don't have a computer anymore. it's in the shop in utah and it should be done by the end of the week. they will mail it back to me, but it'll take a little time cause they ship ground. oh well, i'll continue using the event center and associating with all the young zoomies while they check their myspace accounts. not bad kids, but the age/maturity gap is a little problematic. Haug sends his best, by the way.
Breakfast: 1 cup rasin(spelled wrong) bran cereal with half pint of skim milk, half cup of cottage cheese, two hard boiled eggs (i bite off half with the yoke, then squeeze the rest of the yoke out of the other half), two strips bacon.
Lunch: more cottage cheese, glass milk, glass water, peanut butter and jelly sandwich.
Dinner: cup of pasta, baked chicken breast, fried ocra (whatever that is. kind of like zukini tampura, not good), and a few bites of a chocolate/peanut butter cake from Companio's that my wife sent me for valentine's day. i've been eating small portins of it each day so i don't get sick all at once.
Now: i'm drinking a gatorade rain berry flavored. it's not that good, and it tastes like syrup. but i always remember to shake the electrolytes up before i drink it.

inspiration

as promised, here are the links of team hoyt:
http://www.teamhoyt.com/
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=flRvsO8m_KI
so there you have it. you can.
as for my diet, i had a really good day. but not as far as the diet. i'm with my family in utah. i had a bowl of tricks this morning and a plate of cookies for lunch. but i did have a coca-cola zero as well. that's got to count for something. it's okay, i'll be on my own tomorrow and back in texas. nothing else to do but take care of myself. until next time. oh, and my computer is in the shop, and i dont' know when i'll get it back. so my posts for the next week or two will be sporadic. hopefully i'll get a little extra time from here on out, i just got out of the most difficult section in my course. Isiah 6:8

first blog

it's mike, and i'm signing in for the first time. i'm the only white guy in the picture, but i speak chinese if that helps. i'm the only married one in the group, and i have a new baby boy. the ironman is the ultimate test of the human body, i have always wanted to do this event, and over christmas break when i was flying i saw a guy in the airport with a t-shirt that simply said in small black print, "ironman finisher." i knew i wanted one of those shirts; i had to have one. but it's not the shirt that is the quest, it's to stand on the top of the mountain, to see the sunset from where the eagles do and to breathe the cold, crisp and thin air on top of the world. for me, the ironman is the top of the mountain. couldn't be in better company either. anyway, enouth of that.
my normal breakfast consists of water(no kidding), three hard-boiled eggs, total bran cereal with 1/2 pint of skim milk, whatever fruit is at the salad bar, and marching.
lunch is sporatic at best with a salad, some kind of meat, and some kind of starch, usually bread. the peanut butter and jelly kind. during dinner, i eat casually, if i'm going to be running the next morning, then it's pasta, if not, it's grilled chicken somekind of non fried meat. running is awesome.
that's it for now, my wife is waiting for me.
oh, and my inspirstion is dick and rick hoyt. i'll add link later.