The Fifteen Pound Cycle

Maybe I'm unique.  Maybe I'm not.  Maybe I am just like all of the other folks out there.  I think about food, I like talking about food, I like talking about others who like food and I'm fascinated by those who eat too  much food.  I spent the better part of last weekend researching (if you could call it that) the heaviest people on record.  Did you know that multiple individuals have passed the 1,000 pound mark? A thousand pounds?  You know it's pretty bad when instead of putting on 5 pounds over the holidays you put on 5 hundred pounds.  As a studier of medicine I am a little more fascinated by the human body each day.  A core piece of our first year medical school curriculum is human dissection.  Two of my buddies and I spend a couple hours a week dissecting a human.  It is fascinating. Most people out there believe that you have a heart and lungs inside of you, but not too many people have held one in their hands.  Perusing with all of the intestines (and they are about 20 feet long) is a real treat.  But what baffles me more than it should, and getting back to the point, is fat.  It's slippery between your fingers, a little bit shiny with varying shades of yellow.  When the hamburger and fries get consumed your body deposits these little globules of fat throughout your body in adipocytes.  I was particularly surprised at the amount of fat behind the knees and in the armpits.  Not the usual place I think of when I think about those 5 extra pounds.  And when you forget to eat because you've been studying all day or you just happen to be riding your bike across Canada then the fat is sent off to the liver to be metabolized eventually turning into electrons carried on NADH to the electron transport chain to generate ATP to allow for actin and myosin cross bridge cycling of muscle contraction.  It really is a miracle that 1) all of this actually happens and 2) that someone figured it out.

But back to the fat.  It fascinates me when I hold it in my hands in the anatomy lab and I love that it has seemed to seep into so many aspects of daily life: The Biggest Loser, Skim Milk, the countless Infomercials and my goal for February and March - Insanity with Shaun T.  My research this weekend was very exciting.  The highlight was the following tidbit of information.  The fifth heaviest person on record, Walter Hudson, states the following was a typical diet for a day: "two boxes of sausages, 1 pound (0.45 kg) of bacon, 12 eggs, a loaf of bread, four hamburgers and four double cheeseburgers, eight large portions of fries, three ham steaks or two chickens, four baked potatoes, four sweet potatoes, four heads of broccoli, most of a large cake, and additional snacks. He also drank an average of 18 US quarts (17 liters) of soda every day." Sweet Mylanta! Most of a large cake? Four heads of broccoli? Who was this guy kidding?

Now about myself.  Every year something interesting happens.  I roller-coaster about 15 pounds.  Basically from January to September I am in weight loss exercise mode and from October to New Years I am in get ready to hibernate, eat everything in sight mode.  So I run between 165 and 180 pounds.  180 is the cutoff.  I don't let myself go over, that's a rule.  So I am currently in health mode.  And that doesn't just mean smaller portions, it means revamp the whole diet.  Currently I'm on a smoothie kick - a banana, some yogurt, some kale, a handful of berries and a couple almonds.  Blend that up and voila.  I'm pretty good at staying on top of my game until my wife invites me over to Google for lunch. Then smack.  Flood gates rush open and I'm back to eating everything in sight.  It sure is delicious over there at Google.  Chef Tom sure knows how to cook up the good stuff.  Today was no exception.  Tomorrow will be another smoothie in the morning, and likely overeating at Zingerman's Deli for dinner.  And my love affair with food will continue.  But all in all, these 15 pounds of adipocytes that is mysteriously stuck behind my knees and in my armpits will metabolize and the cycle will continue.

Banana, Kale, Yogurt, Berries, Almonds

Breakfast

Google Lunch