Biking Update - December 20, 2008

Not a great week for biking, as it turned out. Saturday was too cold for me to induce anyone else to bike with me, and all those I asked told me if *I* biked alone that I was crazy. I dithered about it until it was too late. Then a busy Sunday and early sunsets the rest of the week meant that the only bike-riding I did this week was on the stationary bike in the attic. I did work on my new Dahon Matrix a bit, though. The bike has been seriously scratched during storage and shipping, so Dahon shipped me some touch-up paint for free. So, I have put several coats onto the scratched areas. I am not so worried about aesthetics - it is not so bad for a bike intended for off-road to look like it has seen some action - but to ensure that the bike is protected from the elements. I'll probably work at it a bit more this weekend, as there are a few scratches that really need the bike upside down to treat.

Weight-wise, however, the news has been all good. I started the 100 Push-up Challenge this week, and many friends warned me that it might cause me to gain some weight, in muscle mass. If so, it was offset by large losses in weight as I hit a new low this week of 220.8 lbs! (Yes, you can see I did bounce back up by about a lb the next day, such is life with a metastable system.) My new goal is to reach 220 lbs by February (I am sure Christmas dinner will set me back a bit) so this means I may reach the goal a couple of months early. I have lost enough weight that I want to ensure new losses are maintained, and that I am not losing faster than is healthy. But it sure feels good to see the line continue to trend downward on the graph. Thanks also to everyone else who is doing the 100 push-up challenge with me, and reporting in on Twitter. It is a lot easier to keep this kind of thing up with friends to hold you accountable.

Next week will likely be more of the same, plus the aforementioned Christmas dinner. Christmas will be a free day, when I'll let myself eat what I want. Then back to the normal slog. Have not decided how I am handling New Years, yet, but we may be traveling down to see some Delawarian Mod-Bloggers, so that may present new opportunities for exercise and for challenging the plan.