day 90: the end of the beginning

Day 90 was a day of looking back and looking forward.

First, I looked back before PCP. I distinctly remember telling myself and others that there is no way I could lose 10 kilos without cutting off a leg. I remember thinking how much I love pasta and carbs in general. I remember thinking I was in pretty good shape, for a guy who sits at a desk all day at least.
How wrong I was.

Then I looked at the early days of PCP, when 700 jumps seemed like too many and took forever, none of the exercises were more than 3 sets, and none of the reps were over 25. And it still killed me. When the food requirements were exotic and strange, the prep a chore, shopping a mystery, recipes non-existent, and results often borderline inedible.

Next I looked at where I am: went to Bairan with Patrick and Kazue for lunch, a Chinese restaurant I used to go to often. Ordered my favoriate yakisoba, sweet-and-sour pork, and shrimp fried rice.
The first bites were utter heaven; an explosion of flavors setting off massive chemical releases in my brain.

And then I started to taste, to REALLY taste, the salt, the oil, the corn starch and artificial colors and sweeteners...and started feeling kinda nasty, and very, VERY full, so I stopped. Not exactly satisfied, no.

By now I was starting in on a nice food coma, the dull and lethargic feeling I used to have after ever over-eaten meal. So we walked down to Starbucks to get some dessert and check out the final photos.
Again I had an old pre-PCP favorite: soy chai latte, chocolate chunk scone. For kicks Patrick and I split a chocolate muffin and white chocolate macadamia nut cookie too.
Again, the first bite was utter heaven; sugar and endorphins dancing in eternal splender from my tongue to the base of my skull. I felt adrenaline rush into the tips of my toes and fingers it tasted so good.

And then I got a massive sugar rush; could not stop tapping my feet, felt like I was going to bounce off the walls, caffeine and sugar blowing out the cell walls in my brain. Massive buzz which quickly turned into a deep, throbbing headache behind my eyes.
Said good-bye to Patrick and Kazue and got on the train to go home. Was going to go shopping but did not feel up to it, so emailed wife and told her I was on my way come.
Caught up with her and the kids just outside the apartment, so we all went upstairs and made dinner.
It was a lovely feast at which I ate way, way too much. And as the blog a few posts below can attest, it was not a pleasant evening.
After getting some decent sleep and eating a proper, PCP breakfast after a proper if less-challenging workout, it was time for shopping!
Please note that I live in Tokyo, land of skinny Japanese boys and girls, so even at a place like The Gap, clothes are tight, low-rise, and small.
First stop was my tailor, at which I ordered a new double-breasted black suit and had my pants taken in. SIX CENTIMETERS. Which is an utterly ridiculous amount and borderline impossible -- another centimeter and I would have to simply order new pants!
Then we went to The Gap so I could get some weekend pants. I wear suits all week, so I only actually own one pair of jeans that I got about 20 years ago at The Gap. Needless to say they are huge.
I tried on a pair of 79 (30") regular straight leg jeans; waist was a bit loose but could not fit my legs into them, and they were so low-rise as to be scandalous.
Next a pair of 70 easy fit jeans; again the waist was big but at least the legs fit. However they were 12,000 yen! Figured for that much money I could have alot more fun than buy a pair of jeans I might were at most twice a week.
So gave up and went to the sale rack in the back. Found a decent pair of khakis and a pair of shorts, which were kind of baggy but had adjusters on the waist so I figured they'd be ok. Turns out the shorts were size S. Japanese S. JAPANESE SMALL.
Immediately anti-matter and matter reversed energy states and the universe as we know it collapsed in on itself when faced with the impossible reality of me wearing anything sized Japanese S.
So here we are, now (see a slideshow of all the results photos).
Triceps and shoulder:


Biceps and back:


The whole package:


The Dream Team:


And again just so there are no mistakes, the Before and After:


Also, lets look at some numbers. No, not weight and percentage of body fat, but numbers that matter: money.
Here is my household spending on groceries and eating out.
PCP started in March and though I spent more on groceries I spend much less on eating out, such that my total spend per month was down:


Finally, the look ahead: rather than get used to eating modern crap food in a box again, I much prefer to do some decent exercise on a fairly regular basis, eat lots and lots and lots of real, actual vegetables, snack heedlessly on fruit throughout the day, and spice it up with the occasional fried thing.
I like waking up hungry and having a big breakfast, not going into food coma after every meal, feeling light, strong, lean, and fit.

Thanks to Patrick and Chen for making it possible to start this, and thanks to my wife, daughter, son, and friends for making it possible to finish.
Now it is up to me to continue.

new clothes

Khakis are 79cm (30") waist, shorts are S. Japanese S!

getting suit pants taken in

six cm!

Before - After

RenfieldBeforeAfter
Originally uploaded by Peak Condition Ren

I got me some Peak!

Final Results

IMG_3985
Originally uploaded by Peak Condition Ren

it's all about lighting

Another key lesson from PCP: harsh, direct overhead lighting makes strong under-shadows - perfect for making abs look good!

final breakfast

TWO eggs with lettuce, zucchini, bell-pepper, garlic, bagel, banana and kiwi fruit and fig blend with soymilk.

consequences

This will easily be my worst blog-post ever.
It is several hours after dinner, evening bath, and bed.
Awoke to an unfamiliar grumbling in my stomach. Headed to the toilet.
Now, in my pre-PCP days I used to have stomach problems all the time. But the past three months have been the most uneventful and regular in my life.
Until now.
With no exaggeration, I can honestly say I now understand why diarrhea is a leading cause of childhood mortality in developing countries.
Seriously.
I cannot exaggerate how utterly miserable this is: dry-mouth, cold sweats, light-headed, weak and shaky...only now twenty minutes later can I even focus and steady myself enough to type this.
Actually blogging is helping me deal with the physical pain and mental stress. In a strange way, analyzing what is happening, trying to break it down and describe it, is a pretty good mechanism for just dealing with the reality which I am in right now and from which I cannot possibly escape.
And it does not end. Surely I did not actually eat enough food to produce such a volume of gut-busting misery?
Again apologies for the graphic detail, but in the interest of full disclosure, to be consistent with my total honesty and transparency, and for posthumous/historical purposes, I must say: I am shitting a stream of filth and suffering for it.
Suffering and learning a valuable lesson, perhaps the most important lesson of the whole PCP: it is neither ideal nor impressive to eat unhealthful foods.
I ate today "normal" meals, the kind of salty, greasy, sugary, buttery junk I used to eat all the time, and I stuffed myself to gut-busting, over-eating just like I used to.
Only now, after 89 days of eating well, I have lost my completely unnatural ability to cope, both mentally and physically.

I think some will read this blog and conclude that the PCP is a failure: it has weakened me and my ability to cope with modern reality. I can't even enjoy a decent outing with friends, a meal of Chinese food and dessert at Starbucks, without ending up groaning in the toilet late into the night! PCP has turned me into a raw-vegetable eating, proselytizing foodie; a bore to be with and an impossible date!

Others, myself included, see this as an affirmation: there is nothing "normal" about what we call food in these modern times. The 293 calories in a chocolate chunk scone is not normal; it is a gross concentration of fats, carbohydrates, sugars, of butter and additives and preservatives chemically designed to stay fresh-looking on the shelf all day without refrigeration, to make my mouth water, to make my stomach grumble. But is is not food, at the very least not to be consumed in the concentrations and volumes with which modern society so easily provides.

Brian said PCP is great for people who love food. I agree: it has unlocked my taste-buds to a point that I cannot describe to anyone these days who eats "normally". I do not exaggerate when I say an onion is sweet, a carrot has a deep and rich tangy after-taste, the juxtaposition between the almost-sour bite of a ripe banana and a perfectly sweetened strawberry is perfectly accented with the addition of a hint of cinnamon. This is what food taste likes. Not oil, nor salt, butter, cream, sugar, not salad dressing nor ketchup, not soy sauce, not Tabasco...just food.

The exotic abdominal exercising routines, the cleverly measured rope-jumping, the scientific calculations of dips and pulls and raises and pushes...this is all well and good, but utterly and completely irrelevant without getting free from the vicious circle of modern eating.
If this blog serves any purpose, let it be for those who are considering PCP for themselves, or just those who wonder about healthful eating habits. Let this be both a warning and an invitation. Perhaps I am just a weak-stomached whiner who needs some familiarity with modern medicine to ease my so-called eating troubles. Or perhaps I am a closet vegan hippie proselytizing some good-intentioned but utterly impossible utopia of convenient and affordable healthful foods, locally and organically grown.
Most likely, though, I am just another guy whose eyes have been opened, through his stomach, to the reality: a food-culture based on chemical nutrition, dominated by convenience food, plagued by deadly and utterly avoidable obesity, diabetes, and cancers, controlled by huge processing entities focused on efficiency, regulated by a meek and subservient government aligned perfectly with said entities, and a silent, ignorant base of consumers who have been advertise brain-washed into thinking that cooking is hard and time-consuming, food comes in a box, chemicals can solve the problems that chemicals produce, and that all of this is perfectly, utterly, normal.
As a society, we suffer the consequences of our actions.
As an individual, I suffer the consequences of my actions.
I do not seek to foment revolution, and I do not think anyone reading this, or in fact my entire blog, will somehow be inspired to throw off the shackles of modern eating. I am only trying to help myself settle my own thoughts and feelings, as I sit here dealing with the very real consequences of my own actions; to trace the cause and effect, so that I can at least learn something and be a better person for it.

Recently I have been trying to "deepen" my zazen practice, and one of the ways I have been doing this is by reciting the Gokan-no-ge, a zen Buddhist chant called "Five Reflections".
This goes quite harmoniously with a PCP-enabled understanding of food and eating.
The English translation is something like:

1. We reflect on the effort that brought us this food and consider how it comes to us
2. We reflect on our virtue and practice and whether we are worthy of this offering
3. We regard greed as the obstacle to freedom of mind
4. We regard this meal as medicine to sustain our life
5. For the sake of attaining the Truth we now receive this food

(There are innumerable English and other translations of this on teh internets, but being as how I actually understand the Japanese in which I was originally taught this chant, and since I prefer the lyrical rhythm of the Japanese, I do not recite this in English.)

family dinner

saikyo yaki grilled snapper, rice, steamed veggie, pork with cabbage, boiled dumplings, slimy potato and squid...

dessert

chocolate chunk scone, chocolate macadamia cookie, fudge muffin

lunch part 2

sweet sour pork and shrimp chahan.

LUNCH!

bairan yakisoba!

open omelet

Eggs with peapods, onion, tomato, spinach, grilled pumpkin.

inspired, experimented

Inspired by Todd, I blended together my final fruit snack with my post-workout banana and cocoa protein powder: apple, fig, banana, protein powder, hard-boiled egg white, a dash of soy milk to make sure it blended, and three strawberries just for fun.
Was not bad, but not as thick and sweet as basic banana mush. Will need to work on various recipes; I think the soy milk and egg white killed off some of the fruity sweetness...

invited to a veggie party dinner

Grilled eggplant and pumpkin, steamed carrots, onion, zucchini, bell-pepper, chikuwa.

thoughts on supersets

Got up at 5am and for once no one else got up, so I did nearly my entire workout in the morning in blissful solitariness.
Which didn't mean it hurt any less.
Legs still sore from the previous leg workout AND the kick-style fighting class I went to on Tuesday.
Stomach hurts from when my resistance band tore lose and smacked me upside the upper abdominal area leaving a lovely red welted line straight across my midriff that isn't going away anytime soon.

Did my jumps watching boring NHK news, then did 8MA+ at half speed, which burned twice as much.

Powered through the supersets, going REALLY low on the chest dips and really feeling it burn like heartburn. Man when the pectoral muscles burn and fail, they really, really hurt!
Shoulders was shoulders: near constant burning but I am used to them.
Final triceps dips where just torture; my right elbow was quivering and I could not push my self up on the last rep; I just collapsed onto the carpet.

And then it was time for abs: v-sits and planks, superset, to failure.
HFSWTFSATANSATANSATAN.
+5 Sword of Hurting; 20d save role at -10...FAIL.

At this point my family was in the living room, on the couch, watched bemusedly and with detached grins as I berated myself attempting to achieve at least double-digit v-sits and 60+ seconds planks through all the requisite sets.
Which I somehow managed to do.
And then I lay on the carpet, sort of curled up fetal, whimpering a bit, for a good 3 minutes.
And then it was over.

final PCP lunch bento!

Going out in style: scallop fried rice, grilled pumpkin and eggplant.

eggrything breakfast

Snap peas, garlic, carrots, bell-pepper, onion, spinach, mushrooms, tomato, zucchini, bran with banana cinnamush and blueberries.

this dinner bento never gets old

Scallops fried rice with grilled pumpkin, bell-peppers.

how to snack: by me

I love the concept of quick, convenient, and home-cooked. But I do not think that a near-1000 calorie chocolate-cake-in-a-coffee-mug-in-five-minutes is a particularly good idea.

Luckily, when I have a sweet craving and only have five minutes, I have myriad choices:

• banana cinnamush with blueberries
• apple slices + chunks of yellow kiwi fruit = crazy delicious
• grapes and strawberries

I have discovered that the key is to combine fruits; a fleshy/meaty fruit juxtaposed with a more acidic or tangy fruit. Thus apple + kiwi fruit has more kick than apple + grape.
Also, when bananas get over-ripe/brown and soggy they are already halfway to cinnamush goodness. If they are too ripe and tangy (i.e. not sweet enough), a wee dollop of honey does wonders.
Also brilliant spread on any carb (bagel, tortilla, whatever).

Other genius snacks in my arsenal:

• steamed (or microwaved) corn on the cob
• grilled (or microwaved) sweet potato / yam -- crunchy skin is the best part!
• figs (not dried figs, or Fig Newton cookies, but the actual fruit itself; the whole damn thing, skin and all)

Other, slightly less PCP but nonetheless acceptable snacks:

• peanut butter and celery (or apple, or cabbage, or banana)
• soft-boiled egg (eat the slimy yoke! live LARGE!)
• umeboshi onigiri
• kimchee and/or namuru (get your spice on)

Then again, the occasional Starbucks chocolate scone won't kill you. Just depends on your definition of occasional.

i was compelled by forces beyond nature to make more fried rice!

Scallops and mountain veggies fried rice, grilled pumpkin, bell-peppers, warm salad.

PAIN

Good timing that Patrick's message today was about thinking about pain when working out.
I had plenty of that this morning!
Woke up at 5am like always, sat some zazen in the spare room, in front of the balcony window, as the morning ski turned lighter shades of gray, then discovered that wife was feeding/sleeping with son on the couch in the living room. So instead of doing the jumps, 8MA+, and workout in the living room, I gathered my stuff and headed down to the garage, aka The Prison Yard.
Did the jumps OK, then started Day #2 of Supersets.
Three comments:

1. Creeps AND Floor Jumps?! Satan.
2. Forward Shoulder Lifts and DaVincis as a superset: not. even. funny.
3. See the safety tip below: when doing shoulder flies, be sure the velcro strap is SECURELY fastened to the drain pipe, or else serious redness and welting will result.

I headed back upstairs to finish the flies in the spare room, and by then everyone was up so I started in on the abs. V-Sits to failure is really hard the first two sets, and really, really easy the last three.
Side crunches to failure was not happening, so I just did 100 on each side until I was on fire, and THEN did 8MA+. By then 7th minute I was utterly whimpering, so mission accomplished methinks.

And now my thighs and shoulders are just kind of smoldering all day, so I am walking slow and not making any big, sudden arm movements. Sore is good!

prison scramble breakfast

Sweet potato, carrots, komatsu, scallops fried rice, eggs, garlic...banana cinnamush with blueberries.

safety tip

Be sure the resistance band is SECURELY fastened, otherwise snap-back may result in painful injury!

last-of-the-fried-rice bento dinner

The end of an era! Buried under carrots, pumpkin, and sweet potato.

hot rice, cold veggies lunch

Shrimp and scallops brown fried rice, cucumber and bell-pepper.

supersets

Honestly, I did not think it was that bad. I like doing different exercises in rapid succession, instead of a gazillion reps in a million sets of the same thing. Then again mixing up the different muscle groups certainly means it hurts more, in different places.
The final five sets of v-sits AND planks to failure was just. utterly. miserable.
I think my problem is I always think I can do just one more...and then I have four more sets to do. So by the last set I was utterly crushed and could barely sit up. I think I ended up doing over 100 v-sits total, and nearly 10 minutes of planks. And that was after I did 8MA+. Methinks it was a bit much...but only a few more days to go, so no time to complain now!

superset tuesday breakfast

Eggs with cucumber, bell-pepper, garlic, komatsu, lettuce, bran cereal with blueberries and banana cinnamush.

week 12 results

Rainy and humid - perfect weather for a sweaty PCP workout. Today was the last normal workout before the beginning of the end: Supersets. Did all the fun stuff today with Patrick: pistol squats and floor jumps, forward shoulder lifts and chicken wings and shoulder flies, v-sits from hell and some side crunches to top it off.
As Patrick predicted,spent the first few weeks tearing down, the next few weeks building up. The almost-normal menu from last week has got me stabilizing at a slightly higher weight and body fat, and the interesting thing is I look better and feel great.
Too many people telling me last week I looked emaciated, too skinny. Now I have some proper bulk, and a decent sheen of fat to accentuate whatever muscle definition I have.
Besides, the numbers are irrelevant: I feel great and ready to whine and suffer and ultimately prevail through this last killer week!
Patrick hooked me up with my very own PerfectPullup bar, too, so no more excuses.
GO TEAM GO!

dinner bento

same as lunch.

last week, first lunch, familiar bento

Brown fried rice with scallops, lettuce, onion, garlic, steamed pumpkin, sweet potato, carrots.

last week first breakfast

Eggs with chingensai, bell-pepper, onion, garlic, cucumber, mushrooms, bran cereal with blueberries and banana cinnamush.

totally random dinner

Salad with cucumber, apple, bell-pepper, balsamico, grilled leeks, kamaboko with egg-whites, toast with banana cinnamush.

what not to drink

Comparison of sugary drinks and their junk food equivalent.
Now how about a lovely cup of tea?

final weekend

This is it: my last PCP weekend. Tomorrow I head to YG to do a Week 12 Results check, and then it's just five days of Getting It Done.
Yesterday spent the day outside in the perfect weather with my wife and kids; veggie-filled brunch with friends, couple of trips to the park, and finished off with a delicious salad and sashimi dinner at the local fish joint.
Today complete opposite: rainy and crappy all day, so spending the day indoors, most of the time in the kitchen prepping for next week. Lots of steaming, sauteing, grilling, boiling, weighing, and bagging.
Them for next is: no salt.

Friday I am taking the day off from work. Will head to YG in the morning, do a two-hour yoga stretch class, then do my Final Workout with Patrick, take some last photos, and get some LUNCH!

Also been working on our latest homework: find some ab-work alternatives. I have already turned Eight Minutes Abs in 8MA+, by adding the twist "keep feet off ground the whole time" which really turns it into a different kind of torture.
And then I found "Six Minutes Abs: Couch"! An interesting version for those days when I don't have that extra two minutes.

thai delivery lunch

Stir-fry veggies, shrimp spring rolls, veggie omelet, yellow veggie curry

rainy sunday breakfast

Bagel with banana cinnamush, eggs with lettuce, garlic stems, tomato, brocolli.

salads at uokatsu fish place

Little fishes and tomato, asparagus and crab.

lunch buffet @ r cafe

Lettuce, cucumber, tomato, carrot, corn, grilled veggies...

messy omelet breakfast

Eggs with garlic stems, mushrooms, spinach, bagel with banana cinnamush.

Yet another fried rice dinner

I never get tired of scallop fried rice, onion, pumpkin.

same rice lunch

Fried rice with brocolli and zucchini.

thoughts on the gym

Our homework this week was to check out a gym. Now, given the convenient location and company membership, I have actually been a frequent user of the gym throughout PCP. The second month I worked out at the gym regularly at night,and once I switched consistently to working every morning before breakfast, I continue to use the gym during lunch and at night to supplement my workouts and do the occasional just-for-fun session.
The facility itself is quite typical for Tokyo: a large quantity of equipment and myriad services packed into a small space. The staff are friendly and helpful and are generally young and healthy.
I quite appreciate the two weight stations with pull-up bars, the selection of four different resistance bands, two padded stretch areas with mirrors, and an aerobics studio that I can often use for jumping.
It gets a bit crowded during lunch and evenings, but if I go early or late, I sometimes find myself the only patron.
So in all it is a convenient place to do my thing, shower, and get on with it.
Regarding the people working out there...perhaps it best just to describe a few typical users:
ForeverMan - this guy works out ALL the time. He is sweaty and working hard when I arrive and appears no closer to being done when I leave. He has music in his ears, watches the TVs for minutes at a time between sets, drinks chemical concoctions frequently, and utilizes every toy and training regimen available.
And in the three months I have been on PCP, he appears to be maintaining his slightly paunchy physique perfectly.
LeisureLady - Her workout apparel is perfectly coordinated, down to her jewelry.She is skinny in that emaciated-bulimic-model kind of way, and she never, ever sweats.
Spends most of her time on the stretch mats doing light Pilate's moves; she is incredibly limber. Alternatively she can found on the recumbent bike machine - sitting - watching TV and chatting or texting on her cell whilst leisurely moving the pedals.
One-On-One - Accompanied and guided by a personal trainer, bonus points if said trainer does not even work at the gym and extra-bonus points if said trainer speaks a different language, forcing communication to a series of demonstratory moves, random single shared words, and head-nodding or shaking. Always has a stopwatch and some other handheld equipment like rubber bands, colored tape, small towel, etc. Jackpot if includes a relaxing massage after rotating through every area of the gym.
Quantifier - This guy records EVERYTHING in a detailed workout log. Which he undoubtedly needs just to remember what to do, because his routine is complex. Speed push-ups for ten seconds followed by 20 weighted squats followed by wrist curls with a rubber band and a towel whilst observing tantric nasal breathing. Repeat a prime number of times as a function of the day of the week.
Record, repeat.
His calves and forearms look excellent, his gut is unchanging, his back is flexible though his legs are not, and he is sincerely doing his best to collect as many pieces of equipment as he can, scattering them about his general area of commandeered floor space.

There are others of course, even a few folks who seem to know what they are doing and are in fine health, but the majority...let me just say that I saw a cow-worker on the exercycle, utterly bathed in sweat, blue in the face and gasping for air.
I thought it amusing that the email I got from him this morning was titled "Breakfast is served" and stated: "100 krispy kreme donuts outside my office. Let's eat!"
Keep peddling, man, keep peddling...

breakfast of champions

Bagel with banana and strawberry cinnamush, eggs with bell-peppers, zucchini, garlic, spinach.

no great wisdom

So today was an appropriately rainy and miserable day. Wife and I headed out to Chiba, east of Tokyo, where we first met and lived when I came to Japan in 1994.
To attend the funeral of Master, the awesome guy who ran the local yakitori (chicken sticks) place that was the neighborhood since well before I ever arrived.
He was 51, survived by his wife, junior-high school aged daughter and high school aged son.
Pancreatic cancer.

So what deep and wise lessons did I learn from this experience? The second death this week, btw. My friend's father also died of cancer, though he was much older. And she is pregnant, so there is some consolation in knowing that the circle of life continues on there...

Anyway, no liberating enlightenment for me. Some fond memories of fun times now 10 years in the past, and the knowledge that I am doing the PCP not just to look good naked, but to try and be alive as long as I can to provide for my own wife, son, and daughter.

After the funeral, on the train back to Tokyo, my wife somberly eye-balled me and deadpanned: "Don't you DARE die on me: live long."

Abso-fucking-lutely right I will do my damnedest to ensure I live as long and well as possible.

After the funeral we headed to the lunch buffet at the French Kitchen in the Grand Hyatt; we deserved a little something to lift our spirits and spend some quality no-kids time together. And the vegetable buffet was amazing.

The whole day has renewed my vigor and confirmed my priorities. I may yet die of cancer, but at least I am not actively inviting it, or any of the other myriad avoidable/preventable diseases that are ensured by a life of sloth and gluttony.

And now I am heading to fighting, to burn off the remnants of this icky day and put me one step closer to peakfection.

minimal salt dinner

Brown rice with shrimp, scallops, peas, carrots, corn, chingensai, garlic, onion.

for Abby

Chocolate FOUNTAIN, with piles of marshmallows, banana, cookies, bread pudding, etc to dip into the chocolate!
This is so not-PCP.

post-funeral lunch buffet @ Grand Hyatt French Kitchen

Grilled onion, cucumber, bell-peppers, asparagus, mini-tomato salad, carrot salad, veggie sticks, tuna tartar...

the standard breakfast

Bran cereal with banana cinnamon,blueberries, eggs with bell-peppers, mushrooms, garlic, spinach, leek.

forewarned

Raining all day today. Alarm went off three times before I finally noticed and woke up. So I was up 15 minutes late; not a good start.
Headed down to the underground garage to get my jumps on. Took a while to get into a rhythm, but I started counting sets of 500 and was done before I knew it.
Came back upstairs, knocked out 8MA+, doing the side crunches really slooooooowly and fully feeling it.
Then the workout: legs, shoulders, abs.
Patrick warned us that the last ten days are brutal. He wasn't kidding. I absolutely have not worked out this hard yet on PCP. Finishing every rep of every set is an absolute struggle of mind and muscle: it hurts. All the sets have a range of number of reps. Up until now I have been maxing out every set, sometimes going over.
Not today -- last few sets I had to go down in reps, until on a few exercises I was barely quivering and struggling through the last set, minimum reps.
Ah, the joyous burn of muscle failure. It is good though, because these last few weeks I have been bobbling around 36% muscle mass and if I can just push it a bit more I can build a tad more muscle and really lock in some great results.
So: I have been forewarned. To the burn!

more cheats

Beautiful weather in the morning so I did jumps outside in front of my building. Being on a hill I find it a tad easier to jump facing downhill...maybe it's all psychosomatic?
Came back up to the apartment and cranked through 8MA+; yes it still hurts, and I was REALLY concentrating on the side crunches keeping burning tension the whole time. Don't have a pull-up bar so did the pull-ups under my dining room table, which was probably MORE of a workout than real pull-ups because I did full sets and was quivering with failure at the very last rep of each set.
Also did not do the Kung-Fu sits again because no pull-up bar, but I did the full bicycles, alternating forwards and backwards pedaling each set, and only used my hands a little to support my quivering-in-the-fringes-of-failure thighs.
Figured I would hit the gym at lunch or in the evening and use the pull-up bar, but it didn't happen; ended up working hard straight through until 7:30, heading down to a co-worker's leaving drinks (ice tea and  veggies sticks, pass on the mayo dip thanks), then back to the office before coming home around 10pm to prep a bunch of food (Wednesday is the day groceries are delivered so lots to prep and chop and steam) -- cooked up a big batch of brown rice, mixed a bunch of veggies, grilled up some shrimp and scallops and garlic, steamed some veggies, weighed and packed some fruit...

So, various cheats of the day:

• Used my hands a bit to help my legs on the bicycles
• Did inclined pull-ups instead of proper
• Jumped facing downhill
• Skipped the Kung-Fu sits
• Put blueberries in my organic whole bran sticks cereal (zero salt!)
• Put too much soy milk in my organic whole bran sticks cereal
• Mixed some strawberries into my protein powder bananamush this evening

Then again, none other than The Kazu himself said eating fruit is totally OK, so I am reasonably guiltless about the blueberries and strawberries.

And seriously I do have to say one of my absolute greatest discoveries on PCP is bananamush. Whenever I get the urge to have something sweet and thick and filling, instead of grabbing a bar of chocolate and nougat, or some other tasty chewy evil snack, instead I can mush up a banana with a teaspoon of cinnamon (maybe powdered carob or cocoa would work too?), toss in some berries, maybe the occasional nut or coconut slice or something, and indulge effectively.

Skipping the pull-ups and Kung-Fu sits sucks; doing inclined pull-ups and 8MA+ anyway is a feeble excuse.

I am weak. Day 80 behavior this is not. Must. Man. Up.

Bran sticks and soy milk I can fix -- just gotta use less bran sticks cereal, requiring less soy milk, to keep at the carbs allotment. Will probably consciously continue to add unnecessary fruit though, because it's damn good, and it is just fruit. So unless Patrick explicitly tells me to put that extra fruit onto the forbidden list (with the raisins and mayo), I will finish off all the blueberries and strawberries in the fridge.

And tomorrow I am attending a funeral in the AM. Actually two deaths this week: friend's elderly father passed away last night after a long and valiant struggle with cancer, and an old acquaintance from when I first came to Japan (16 years ago!) died this weekend at a relatively young age (early 40s) apparently from some seriously fast and lethal cancer.

More on that tomorrow, after I actually attend the funeral and the reality sinks in appropriately.

Needless to say it gives pause for thought: one the one hand, being generally healthy and eating wholesome, healthful foods will surely reduce the cancer risk...but on the other hand, nothing to be done about getting hit by a bus tomorrow.

Like I told my friend whose father passed: I could say something  deep-sounding and zen about and living in the moment etc. etc. but that is just way too trite and feeble. The reality is, well, reality. Here we are, doing what we do. Net-net, I'd rather be eating well and feeling good. And if I STILL get cancer, or hit by a bus, there's nothing to be done about it but leave a fit-looking corpse and hope my life insurance policy makes things a bit easier for my family.

this-looks-familiar dinner

Last of the fried rice with bell-peppers and broccoli, little bab-leaf salad with carrots, ito-konnyaku, and zenmai.

square lunch

Fried rice with onion and eggplant, mountain veggies in spicy sauce.

eggsrything and bran breakfast

Whole bran with soymilk, blueberries, banana and cinnamon, eggs with carrots, bell-peppers, garlic, mushrooms, onion, cucumber, tuna.

RESULTS!

As Patrick is in the USA this week, he kindly arranged for the legendary Kazu to run me through the workout, take my photos, and record my stats. It has been two years since he finished his own PCP, and if I can look half as good at his age I will be a star.
He counted off all the reps and sets and paced me the whole workout, from the never-ending chest dips, through the inclined push-ups, ovations, and hundreds of curls before humbling me on the final 450 seconds of utterly brutal planks.
So the result: I have dropped a kilo in weight, and half a percent of visceral gut fat! Muscle mass went down slightly bit that is close enough to be a rounding error on the scale - basically stabilizing at around 36% which is a fine place to be. Body fat is consistently low teens, too.
Honestly on the one hand I am damn impressed with myself, but on the other hand I am not so impressed because I have been busting ass for nearly three months and if there is one thing I have learned it is: hard work on PCP gets results. It does not get much simpler.
I just have to keep pounding away for 11 more days to really lock in the results and then it gets REALLY interesting! Post-pcp I am looking forward to eating...pork. Sasauge, bacon, yakiniku, whatever. Healthy proteins like chicken and seafood are lovely, but sometimes a man needs his swine!