<p>missypie: Wonderful vacation. Did you ask for one or more delicious “French-style beignets?”</p>
<p>I have those with hot chocolate…ummm, ummm!</p>
<p>mp…wow, that sounds totally worth it. I would probably up 10 lbs though given that I go up 5 pounds after one night off the wagon. Hey but that might be worth it too! Sounds like a blast…have never been to NOLA.</p>
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<p>Yeah, at the three visits to Cafe du Monde. The kids couldn’t believe how good they are. I had described them sort of like a sopapilla. They thought they were much better than that.</p>
<p>How thing are after Katrina in downtown? It is fine to visit…</p>
<p>I’m so glad you enjoyed your trip to NOLA. I used to have business trips there and always took myself to the finest restaurants. Then I became SM to 3 Tulane students and the fine eating continued.</p>
<p>Greenery - Things are fine in downtown NOLA. You would never know about Katrina if that was all you saw. Many other areas fully or mostly recoverd, others not so much or even hardly at all.</p>
<p>A friend told me to take one of the Katrina Destruction tours because it is supposed to be very interesting. However, I didn’t know if the groups doing the tours are for profit or not for profit and I don’t like the idea of tour companies profiting off the misfortunes of others.</p>
<p>What I saw of NOLA (typical tourist areas - Quarter, Garden District, Zoo) - all looked great.</p>
<p>Arghhh. Major computer problems. </p>
<p>I didn’t get a brow or a bikini wax, but I did get my new exercise bike yesterday. I wasn’t sure I was fit enough to carry into the house and get it put together!</p>
<p>I skipped my ipod nazi yesterday and did a session of intervals after I got the bike put together. Wow, am I sore! This thing works arms and legs. Pedal slow and it’s easy, pedal fast and the resistance goes way up. Perfect for working as hard as you want to work, especially for mixing in really hard with easier recovery periods. Really smooth.</p>
<p>I can see why momofwildchild said it was so hard. It’s easy enough at low speed, but if you are trying to crank out some miles at high speed (like in a race), it’ll wear you out – like a combination bike/rower. I’m sore in places that I didn’t even know had muscles.</p>
<p>idad, just checking in to see how you’re feeling today. Has Schwinn called you yet to seek your endorsement?</p>
<p>Are any of you using a meal planner from the internet? I mean a meal planner that already has the meals planned out for you. I really like Eating Well’s meal planner ([Weight</a> Loss Diet Meal Plan | Eating Well](<a href=“1,800-Calorie Meal Plan for Weight Loss”>1,800-Calorie Meal Plan for Weight Loss)) but my god, I’d spend ALL day fixing food (some of the recipes take hours). I am not overly busy and don’t need a time-restricted plan, but I also can’t spend 2 hours making burgers for lunch. What website do you suggest?</p>
<p>I use the livestrong website to track what I’m eating. I don’t feel I need help with planning recipes or meals. But it’s good discipline for me to see what I’m eating and where I am going over what the recommend. I seem to eat more protein (despite sticking to 3-4 oz servings) than they think I need, so I’m trying to eat more beans.</p>
<p>I also am using the Daily Plate from the livestrong website. I too am interested in some new recipes that don’t require hours of preparation. My biggest enemy is becoming boredom with meals.</p>
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<p>Just like a real bike. You might think that if you were riding at 8 mph, and wanted to go twice as fast, you’d pedal twice as hard. But noooo. Air resistance kicks in. You have to pedal a lot more than twice as hard to get to 16 mph.</p>
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<p>Good. I did another 25 minute interval session on the bike yesterday. I’m really feeling the arms, shoulders, and back - which the old bike didn’t work. iPod nazi again today. </p>
<p>I may have to improvise for a bit. I’ve got the dreaded “blue screen of death” on the computer with iTunes (and all my iPod nazi workouts). I’m on the second time around of the week on my iPod and no way to get to the others until I solve my computer problem. I have the book with each workout; I’ll manage. A few more days of bike wouldn’t be the end of the world.</p>
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<p>They don’t need me. They’ve been selling these AirDyne bikes for 33 years – since 1977. They can’t kill it off, even with “new, improved” versions.</p>
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<p>Yep. The aero drag or air resistance increases with speed squared. So to go twice as fast requires 4 times the energy. This thing will show speed or power on the display. 10 mph is about 50 watts of energy. 20 mph is about 200 watts – right at the all out limit of what I’ve been able to do in a 15 second sprint during my intervals.</p>
<p>It’s nice though. The old yardsale bike only had friction from brakeshoes. If I set the resistance high enough for fast pedalling, I can’t move the pedals at a warm-up pace. Bring the resistance down and my feet are flying off the pedals during a sprint interval. This new bike solves that. No adjustments necessary. The faster you pedal, the harder it gets. It gets the heartrate up when you push it – working both legs and both arms. Those are big muscle groups.</p>
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<p>Imagine how many batteries you can charge, idad! :)</p>
<p>I would have charged some batteries today. A mongrel workout. I started with a couple of stress test type things to estimate max heart rate. One was step up on a step and then back down 90 times in 3 minutes. That got my legs burning. Then sit down in a chair and back up 30 times in a minute. All that and my max heartrate was the same as the age charts said. Coulda saved the effort…</p>
<p>Figuring I could skip the warmup after that, I did two exercise circuits with the iPod nazi, including more stair steps, but with dumbell presses at the same time. No wonder these exercise circuits have been kicking my butt. My heartrate hit 83% of max, which is pretty strenuous. I skipped the third circuit figuring the stress test was equivalent.</p>
<p>Then I turned the intervals into a little longer session on the bike. Five minutes warmup, then 6 minutes hard intervals (20 seconds hard, 40 seconds easy). Then five minutes cooldown. My heart was hitting 89% on the hard intervals.</p>
<p>This completes my first 4 weeks of exercising. I’ve done three workouts plus another 2 days of 25 minute cardio each week. I’m pretty stunned at how much my breathing and stamina have improved already. And, as of this morning, I’ve dropped 10.5 pounds, without really dieting. Just cutting out the junk food, trimming the olive oil and blue cheese or parmegianno in my homemade salad dressings, etc. I figure if I can cut a third of the calories in my salads, that’s a third fewer calories. We’ll see how it goes. If I can lose slowly but surely without “dieting”, then I have a better shot of making it a permanent change. So far, so good.</p>
<p>Really impressive, idad. That’s fantastic. </p>
<p>I think in reviewing the posts here most have been successful with weight loss when they haven’t pursued a radically different diet - simply eliminating the excess in their current diet. For instance there don’t seem to be any among us following the cabbage soup or grapefruit diet. I’ve seen South Beach mentioned a few times- is anyone following that exclusively or simply using recipes as part of their diet? </p>
<p>Today is a beautiful day here and time to put on the running shoes.</p>
<p>I’ve preached to many people over a long time that it’s not a matter of being “on a diet” or “off a diet”; it’s a matter of eating healthy, eating only what you need to satisfy your hunger, and keeping active. It’s got to be a lifestyle, not a temporary thing.</p>
<p>interesteddad, these workouts sound pretty intense; congratulations on surviving them!!</p>
<p>Back on the straight and narrow today. I had a nice workout yesterday but it was my birthday and my husband ordered a cake with buttercream frosting from our favorite French bakery. Here’s the funny thing: After seeing everyone leave behind so much restaurant food in NOLA, he said he didn’t want CAKE leftovers, so he ordered this tiny cake. We could have polished it off last night but saved a bit. Does he not get that no, no one wants to eat cold oyster leftovers, but everyone wants cake leftovers? Don’t know if he did it for spite, or was sincere, but at least it keeps me from eating cake all next week!</p>
<p>Missypie, I often find myself asking, does Fang Jr not get it that X? And the answer is usually, no, he doesn’t get it. It’s probably the same for Misterpie. No, he doesn’t get it that cake “leftovers” are just cake, which is just as delicious or even more delicious the next day, whereas a soggy unrefrigerated po’ boy is a handful of food poisoning.</p>