2011 NFL Season, Week 5 results

There were only 13 games on the schedule during this first bye week of the 2011 season.  6 times were idle.  My record was a paltry 9-4.  I got my ass handed to me in a few games.

Most shocking of them all was the 49ers 48-3 route over the Bucs.  I never, never, never saw that coming.  I truly believed the Bucs were the superior team.  The 49ers may just have the best young coach in the league, and Jim Harbaugh just might be the NFL Coach of the Year 2011.

The 49ers are the biggest surprise team in the NFL.  They are more surprising than even the Buffalo Bills, who are also a huge surprise.  The Lions are not really a surprise.  We all knew they were loaded.  It was strictly a question of whether the chemistry would come together and if they would gell well.  Only the Redskins can challenge the 49ers for the surprise-team title.  However, the Redskins showed signs of life in Pre-Season.  Not so with the 49ers.

I was also quite surprised by the Vikings' dismemberment of the Cardinals.  It's clear that the Cardinals are a lot worse than we suspected... and every dog has his day, even if it is snake-bit dog.

It's time for the Giants to hang their heads.  I've lost my faith in those guys.  I believed they were a big physical team, but they just aren't a good or consistent pro club.  They are the little girl with the curl.  They had no business losing to the Seahawks.  That was a disgraceful loss.  The Giants dropped a sure-fire gimme.

The moment I gave the Titans a vote of confidence, they let me down, allowing Ben Roethlisberger to throw 5 TDs during a game in which he was hobbled.  The Titans and suspect again.

The end of the gastric bypass trail

Without a doubt, the end of the gastric bypass trail is approaching.  It might have already arrived, and I might not have accepted it just yet.

Those who read this blog know that I went through damn near a year of preparation for Gastric Bypass surgery.  This included 6 months of "education" and "training" course.  The nurse/dietitian who ran this program drilled one point into our heads repeatedly.

We would have a relatively short window to loose all our weight.  That window would most likely be 9 to 12 months.  After that, we would "return to normal".  What does that mean?  It means we would feel hunger again.  It means we would be able to eat pretty much anything again.  It means we would be able to consume relatively normal portions of food.  It means that we would be able to face the idea of eating more than one solid meal per day without cold sweats and fear.

When the day came that we could feel hunger again, eat anything, consume relatively normal portions, not throw up, and eat more than one solid meal a day, this day would signify the end of the gastric bypass trail.  After this day, all weight loss would come at a costly premium again.  It would come slower and be more difficult to obtain.  We would have to fight through hunger to get it.

For some of the more severely challenged members of the class--the people over 400 pounds--that was a scary thought.  These folks needed to loose damn near 200 pounds in less than a year to get the job done.  I didn't feel particularly threatened at any point by this talk.  I felt a round figure of 100 lost pounds would be sufficient for me.  If I reached 231, Dr. Bachner said I would avoid the wheelchair.

I went considerably further than that.  I've lost 135 or 136 pounds in just about 8 months.  I am probably around 21-22% body fat right now, so I am within striking range of my final goals:  17-18% body fat.  I haven't got a lot to fear if I am reaching the end of the gastric bypass trail.

Still, it is with a feeling of impending doom that I tell you I haven't thrown up in the past 7 weeks.   I do feel hunger again.  I have felt it several times in the past 5 to 8 days.   I can eat anything.  I ate most of a Wendy's cheese burger at lunch, and most an In-N-Out Burger for dinner.  {I was particularly bad today because I went down to Hollywood to see an old friend play at the Viper Room.}

As you know, I have been drinking some chocolate milk lately.

At length, you know well that the weight loss has not only slowed down, it has gone in reverse.  I am around 194 now, after reaching a low point around 190.7.  This isn't necessarily a bad thing.  People were beginning to inquire about my health.  They were wondering if I had cancer.  Several have told me that I have gone too far.  Many have told to slow down or quit entirely.  They feel I hit the goal a month ago or more.  Of course, they don't know about (or understand) the results of the body composition tests.

I didn't really want to go under 190 pounds.  I was hoping that I could add lean and reduce fat at the same time to get all the numbers to settle up at... say... 15% body fat around or about 195 pounds.  To achieve this objective, I would have to raise by body lean to 165.75 pounds.  I still believe this goal is achievable.  I hope I am blazing the trail to this goal as I write.

We'll have to see.  Phase II of the program may be beginning very soon.  This will be the honing phase, where scale weight doesn't change much, but my physique hardens.

The CrossFit recover with chocolate milk

So, last night I walk up to the counter at 24 Hour Fitness in Thousand Oaks, and I ask the man at the counter what recovery drinks he has on sale today.  He points out an indistinct product that I don't particularly like.  I frown.  The drink is expensive, and it contains only 35 grams of protein per serving.  I am not going to buy this one.

I mentioned the 50 gram product that I liked so much.  The fellow responded in a predictable manner.

"You know you're body can't absorb 50 grams of protein in one shot.  30 grams is about the limit."

"Yep, I am aware of that, but I am a special case.  I had gastric bypass 8 months ago, and I have to consume 50 to get 30.  This is the newly installed inefficiency of the system.  The code term is malabsorbtion."

He accepted that graciously, something others have not done, and said something that surprised me.

"If you ask me, all these post-workout drinks are a rip-off.  Everybody in the CrossFit movement drinks chocolate milk to recover after a workout, and that's the best you can possibly do."

"Chocolate Milk, you say?"  This was the second time that somebody had mentioned chocolate and exercise recovery in the past week. "Incidentally, what the hell is the CrossFit movement anyhow?"

The fellow looked stunned and hurt that I didn't know about the CrossFit movement.  Evidently, CrossFit grew out of the same roots as the P90X exercise program.  Doing a wide variety of exercise, aerobic, anaerobic, weight resistance, weigh augmented calisthenics, gymnastics, and yoga, these guys and gals try to reach the highest levels of fitness.  They have taken all of these training techniques and tried to turn it into an underground sport.  Evidently, they have gotten some attention from the ESPN.

Strangely enough, these chaps have embraced Chocolate Milk as the food of choice in their extreme subculture.  Apparently, they favor 16 ounces of 2% fat chocolate milk after a workout.  They don't like the full-fat 4% milk because they feel it suppresses the beneficial insulin reaction that aids in anabolism & recovery.  A 16 ounce serving of chocolate milk contains approximately 340 kcal and 26 grams of protein.  This is not far from the balance of other recovery drinks.  It is less protein to be sure.

As I mentioned before, this was the second reference to chocolate I had heard in the past week.  Consider the following URL which teach us about the glories of dark chocolate and a strange chemical compound called epicatechin.  Rumor has it that this chemical is actually a vitamin, and stimulates muscle development as much as exercise (in mice).

I decided to give it a whirl and dropped in at the Target next to my 24 Hour Fitness gym in West Hills at lunch.  There I acquired a 56 ounce bottle of Nestle's Quick Chocolate milk for something like $3.50.  I was quite surprised.  A single bottle of recovery drink (perhapse 16-20 ounces) costs $4.00 in this neck of the woods.  A single bottle of this stuff should provide 3.5 recovery drinks.  This means that chocolate milk is a 400% increase in value.  That is supposing they are equal in effect.  My new friend assures me they are not equal in effect.  Chocolate milk is better, he says.

I will let you know how this goes.  So far, the chocolate milk is inducing drowsiness.  Also, milk contains a paltry 13 grams of protein per 8 ounce serving.  This means the recommended 16 ounce dose provides a meager 26 grams of protein.  This means I need additional protein from other sources to supplement it.  I may mix in some powder.

194.4?

No time for a real blog entry, but the bathroom scale said 194.4 this morning... wtf?  The metabolic hi-jinx continue to rage around here.  The final results of Bod Pod XII are anybody's guess now.

Moneyball (2011)

So, unless you have been buried under a rock for sometime, you know that Moneyball is the latest and greatest thing at the box office.  The movie features Brad Pitt, Phillip Seymour Hoffman and Jonah Hill in a purportedly true story about how Billy Beane and the Oakland A's revolutionized the game of Major League baseball.

If the story is accurate, they reinvented the way general managers staff their ball-club, using techniques not unlike those found in the fantasy leagues.  I say "if the story is accurate" because I honestly don't know.  I wasn't watching a lot of baseball back in those days, and I still don't watch that much now.  As you well know, football is my sport, and this is my one area of expertise in the realm of sports.

Moneyball is a pretty good movie, but it isn't everything it is cracked up to be.  Based on the Rottentomatoes.com scores, you would expect this to be a major-league Oscar contender.  I seriously doubt it.  This may well be one of the best films of 2011, but that is damning with extremely faint praise.  This movie is over-rated because it stands out sharply in the cesspool of 2011 movies.

Am I alone here when I say 2011 has been the most disastrous and wretched year for movies ever?  I am not joking around either, folks.  This is the worst year for movies I have ever seen, and I have been walking this Earth for something close to 45 years now.  I crawled around before that.  I have seen a few bad years during my time, but nothing quite as bad as this.  Frankly, no other year I have experienced ever came close to this.

So why isn't Moneyball the best picture of 2011?  Primarily because the director wasted tremendous amounts of time setting up and lingering upon big, huge, heavy-handed, somber moments of emotional drama.  I would have greatly preferred more of the science of moneyball in my Moneyball (2011) movie.  There was some of that, but not nearly enough.

I am not a water sign chick.  I am not an emotional junkie.  I do not favor intense, big, huge, heavy-handed, somber moments of emotional drama.  This sort of tone is especially out-of-order with a baseball movie, which aught to be lite and fun.  I am an Earth sign guy with a lot of fire in my chart.  I would have greatly preferred much deeper scientific insights into the practical methods of how to make it happen in MLB.  I wanted the expert's manual on how to be a successful GM.

I got much more of an emotional drama about a divorced father's life in baseball.  I found that downright boring, folks.  Sorry ladies, it almost put me to sleep in a couple places.

Now why did director Bennett Miller, a Capricorn brother about 4 months younger than me, do this movie this way?  Because he had a practical issue he had to deal with.  Brad Pitt is a chick-magnet.  The chicks showed up in force at the theater I went to in Fresno California last weekend.  You would never have known you bought a ticket to a baseball movie, if you took a pre-game snapshot of the theater I was in.

You know the average Pitt-loving chick is not going to groove on the mathematical formulas for putting a baseball team together.  That will put her to sleep.  On the other hand, the emotional drama of a divorced Pitt trying to stay alive in baseball, and stay connected to his daughter at the same time, just might have some emotional resonance with these women.

In the final analysis, this movie suffers from target audience confusion, a syndrome afflicting many movies these days.  It is further proof that you just can't do a guys & dolls cross-over movie.  You are going to have to decide who your audience is, and you are going to have to target that audience sharply.

For me, personally, there is one interesting fact about this movie.  It has had a lingering impact on my interest in the sport.  I find myself watching the MLB playoffs right now.  I am interested in the scores suddenly.  I am interested in the analysis I hear on the radio.  Seeing this movie did move the needle.  My interest level has increased because I saw this movie.

192.6...?

Well, well, well... will surprises never end?  I just stood on the scale a little while ago, and the score was 192.6.  The Bod Pod would have me at 192.131. That's about two pounds heavier than a few days ago.

Nothing to get all that excited about, but it is an interesting fact.  Sure, one big visit to the bathroom later and I just might be right back to where I was before.  Sure, a little extra salt in my food might explains this away. Sure, your weight is bound to flux a little bit when you are engaged in a major weight loss program.  Mine sure has over these past 8 months.  We have seen this before.

Still, I find it a curious fact that some 80 hours after starting a Pink Magic program, and after 80 hours of devastating workouts that would kill a normal 45 year old man, my body weight is suddenly up roughly two pounds.  Isn't that an interesting and curious fact?

This is the sort of thing that happens to body builders, power lifters, and footballs players all the time... after beginning a stack of Oxandrolone and Nandrolone.

Bod Pod XII is scheduled for this Friday.  We will have to see.  I am cautiously optimistic.

2011 NFL Season, Week 5 Picks

So I am very late in posting my game predictions this week.  It was a busy week, and quite frankly...  I was losing interest.  This is bye-week for my Rams, and my guys are out of the running already.  It kinda takes the heart out of a guy...  Especially when you were expecting a little bit better.

This week, I find myself in discord with the so-called experts.  I disagree with them on many picks.  I usually make my picks before they do, so I seldom ref what they are saying before making my picks.  When I looked at the ESPN crowd here, I was downright shocked by some of their picks.  "Why would you say that...?"

For instance:

1. Why would you favor the Steelers over the Titans?  Because they are at home?  Because they are a super-elite team?  The Steelers can't protect their QB worth shit.  Big Ben is already ripped to shreds.  The Super Bowl looser's jinx be upon them.  I have lost too many games this year betting against the Titans. The Titans can protect their QB, and I think they are going to run like hell against the Steelers.
2. Why favor the Texans over the Raiders in this game?  Because they are at home?  I don't believe the death of Al Davis will be a factor, but I do believe the loss of Andre Johnson will be a huge factor.  I don't think Matt is a good enough QB to survive the loss of the ultimate beat receiver in football.  Chris Mortensen sees this game coming down to a single field-goal.  If so, I bet on Sea-Bass.
3. Why favor the Colts over the Chiefs?  Because they are at home?  They are win-less right now, and the Chiefs are starting to play better, actually winning one against the Vikings.  I can't bet on Curtis Painter.
4. Why in the name of God would you favor the Vikings over the Cards?  Because they are at home?  Bloody hell... The Vikings are the most snake-bit team in league history, and this is their most snake-bit year.  I know the Cards are disappointing the hell out of their fans, but I firmly believe the Vikings will find a way to loose this football game, even if they get out to a giant lead.
5. Why would you favor the 49ers over the Bucs?  Because they are at home?  The Bucs are a good team that are actually going places.  The 49ers are scheduled to resume life as a pumpkin soon.  I can see no reason to favor the 49ers in this game.

These are a few of the significant disagreements we have this week.