My Day Ahead – Oct 06, 2019

Today

(intensity minutes)
A busier day than yesterday scheduled, but also hopefully less or no unexpected blip in my gastro area 😊

I’ve had a little time to research & think about what happened to me yesterday (see Yesterday below, gastro problems). “Most” of the research seems to indicate there’s little to no difference re weight loss via eating 3 large meals vs 6 smaller meals. “Some” say smaller meals actually lose less weight. But I’m not interested in losing more weight. I already lost 20+ lbs since late May, lol! Several, but not all, also say blood sugar is more easily controlled via smaller meals and (healthy) snacking. My glucose is in the high normal, so I have to be “aware” of it at least. What I didn’t see referenced, and is important to me, is having healthy snacks within 30 minutes of exertion, esp protein, so my body can rebuild w/out “aching” later in the night or next day.

And, as I referenced in my Yesterday section below, I feel I have an advantage over my younger self in that it takes a “lot” less exertion to pump my heart rate up into moderate or higher intensity to exercise my heart. Which I didn’t feel safe to do until I had a ”very” thorough cardio stress test w/monitors and doctors present and took my heart rate safely up to 189 beats per minute. And boy was I hungry after that! They gave lots of juices and snacks, lol! 😂

How can I refrain from snacking if my Garmin tracker and my breath are telling me I‘m easily working in moderate or higher intensity – for me….

Anyway, one of the articles in my Google search said one thing I totally agreed with:

• When hungry, eat.
• When full, stop.
• Repeat indefinitely.

Yeah, I like that a lot! 😊

(art)
Picking up my painting from Art for the People, then heading to Sprouts for a few things. I’ll try again w/a whole different style of painting at the gallery. It’s much more avant-garde than say the Old Bakery, and I have a piece in mind the curator’d seen that I think would fit the folks that like Art for the People better. I don’t have it posted on Fine Art America (FAA)yet, but plan to soon. It’s a very loose more wire-y colorful interpretation of Playtime. Very fun piece I think 😊

The rest of the day’s an open book, but we know how those “books” can go, lol!

(plans, being happy, Future Shock & Alvin Toffler)
Maybe I can capture the digital shots I need to upload my playtime painting image & post a link. Plus, finish the blog post for my next image on FAA (working backwards from the 1st images I posted starting early 2016. Here’s the link to the 1st post which went up yesterday – let me know what ya’ll think of the idea! If it works out for me, should keep me busy for several years just on that!

Planning on things I can do when I can’t do what I still manage now, is partly how I’ve managed to get to this point, hitting 69 soon, and still doing things I like.

Sitting in a cultural anthropology class in ‘69 in the jr college that eventually morphed into the University of Houston Downtown campus, I’ve always distinctly remembered hearing the instructor tell us about Future Shock & Alvin Toffler, and the main takeaway, my main takeaway, was – if I wanted to be happy into old age, I had to start thinking about the things I liked doing, and do them.

Not that we, he said, to those of us in the class, couldn’t find ways to be happy if we waited till later to find what we enjoyed doing, it was just that this way..would be easier.

My 18 year old heart and mind totally agreed. Instantly ❤️ 😊

Yesterday

(surgery recovery, walking)
The day ran really nicely till mid afternoon.

Nothing terrible, just another lesson learned re my surgery recovery.

Sheila & I’d started the morning (after coffee of course!) with a nice extended walk in what felt like a true hint of the cool down projected for us by Monday morning! It’s was a mildly jubilant walk for both of us, the sky was clear light blue and the sun, when it shone directly on us, was warm vs already blow dryer hot 😊

Flowers were literally springing up in what’s considered Austin’s 2nd spring (vs a fall weather season). A few clouds reached around trees, and I made a point to remember to start a new gallery on Fine Art America for pics I take on my walks (I have two pics so far & have more I want to put up).

I made cereal breakfast w/lots of fruit I’d cut into small chunks, but overall, both our servings were smaller than what I used to put together, and it felt good, having a reasonable portion.

Then typically, I’d snack fruit or veggies or fig bars and such til lunch.

This time I didn’t. I wanted to see if I could cut down on the between meal snacks and have more a reg size lunch and not end up w/leftovers ‘cause I couldn’t fit it all in.

(Notan, art room)
I spent the rest of the morning and early afternoon rummaging in my art room, going into boxes I hadn’t been able to touch since late June. Found a sketch book I’d had since the early 80s, scattered with early drawings and what looked like early Notan sketches, though back then I had no idea about Notan. Several pages were descriptions of some of my paintings, much like I do in my blog now, but these were only for me. If there were blogs back then, I wasn’t even vaguely aware of them, lol! Before I knew it it was time for lunch.

Lunch was grilled veggies w/salmon. Delicious! 😊

And I had a healthy portion.

Or was that hefty?

(gastro problems, surgery recovery)
Too hefty it turned out. First I felt uncomfortable. Then I started aching on one side of my stomach. And then I really started feeling bad, bloated. I took one of my few remaining anti-bloat pills I’d had since back before the gallbladder emergency.

It helped fairly quickly.

I walked to check the mail and wanted to walk more, but by 3pm the sun was full strength and I couldn’t. Went back to the apt and tried to rest, then work on my next image blog post. Extremely trying. Gave up. Had a shower, letting warm water soothe my muscles. I’d done a lot of walking lately, and remembered I hadn’t snacked between breakfast and lunch as I almost always do, not even a small piece of fruit.

I think the lunch, the too-big-of-a-portion lunch I served myself, landed on a too empty of a stomach. Like Sheila told me, if smaller meals is the the way I need to eat, then that’s the way it works for me. Smaller big meal portions w/small healthy snacks in between (including occasional whole grain crackers w/cheese, etc).

(intensity minutes)
Putting my Garmin tracker back on as I got dressed from the shower, noticed an odd number on my display. That morning I’d shown Sheila that I was nearly double the minimum 150 recommended number of moderate to higher intensity minutes for a week‘S time, at close to 300. Something I’d been used to doing pretty regularly (300) before my surgeries, and I’d felt I was recently working my way back to my old “normal.”

Somewhere between morning and late afternoon after lunch & my shower, I’d spiked my intensity minutes to almost 3x 150!

Maybe working in the art room moving boxes. Maybe the stress of the bloating I’d experienced from lunch. Maybe the heat walking to & back from the mail. Maybe all of that. But some combination of things had “exercised” my heart rate into the moderate & high range similar to a fitness class.

I took it easy the rest of the day into the evening.

When it’s time to rest, it’s time to rest ❤️

Plus I had myself a fig bar 😊

Related Amazon Search & Products

I do like to point out I pick my selections to showcase from my Amazon searches. May not always be the case, or wholly always the case, but for now, I prefer picking titles and book covers and gift items that just really appeal to me. There’s lots more to choose from, but only have so much room, lol! I hope you enjoy —

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My Related Blog Posts

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Thanks so much everyone! 😊

Adan

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Fine Art America (FAA) – https://fineartamerica.com/profiles/felipeadan-lerma.html