321.2 lbs.

Big News: 321.2 lbs. That's a net loss of almost 13 lbs., and I'm right on target since I established new goals about a month ago--1.5 to 2.5 lbs. a week. The best part of this week is not the weight loss; it's that I made ice cream on Monday and have eaten only one small scoop a day since the initial binge. This fits my original goal of raising the quality of food I eat while reducing the quantity. There's nothing better than home-made ice cream--right out of the canister after the motor stops churning.

About a month ago, I started using MyFitnessPal to record the nutritional values of the food I eat, track things like sodium and potassium, and keep a diary of my exercise. The name is silly, but it sounds better if you try to pronounce it like John Wayne might have (my ... FITness ... pal) with an inflection that rhymes pal and pilgrim. I don't have too much trouble staying at my goal of 2050 calories per day, especially when I carefully track what I eat after 3:00 PM, but I love salty food.

Standing at the deli counter a couple of weeks ago, I thought, turkey has to be better for me than salami, so I bought Cajun-spiced turkey. One slice of Sara Lee Cajun Spice Turkey has enough salt to raise the blood pressure of North America, and so does a MacDonald's Sausage Biscuit. I love both of them, but I also love low-sodium roast beef with horseradish--a more-than-satisfactory lunchmeat replacement that also gives me an excuse to eat a big slice of onion, and I bet onions have potassium.

About the time I learned the salt content of Cajun-spiced turkey, I read something about the effect potassium has on helping the system manage sodium, so I started watching my potassium using MyFitnessPal's database. It's hard to eat enough potassium. Bananas have it, but it's hard for the system to get shed of a banana. Cantaloupe has it and doesn't have a banana's unfortunate side effect, so cantaloupe it is and a few other leafy and fruity things. What if horseradish was a good source of potassium! I better go check.