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Daniel of Doulogos Name:Daniel
Home: Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada
About Me: I used to believe that evolution was reasonable, that homosexuality was genetic, and that people became Christians because they couldn't deal with the 'reality' that this life was all there was. I used to believe, that if there was a heaven - I could get there by being good - and I used to think I was more or less a good person. I was wrong on all counts. One day I finally had my eyes opened and I saw that I was not going to go to heaven, but that I was certainly going to suffer the wrath of God for all my sin. I saw myself as a treasonous rebel at heart - I hated God for creating me just to send me to Hell - and I was wretched beyond my own comprehension. Into this spiritual vacuum Jesus Christ came and he opened my understanding - delivering me from God's wrath into God's grace. I was "saved" as an adult, and now my life is hid in Christ. I am by no means sinless, but by God's grace I am a repenting believer - a born again Christian.
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Daniel's posts are almost always pastoral and God centered. I appreciate and am challenged by them frequently. He has a great sense of humor as well.
- Marc Heinrich

His posts are either funny or challenging. He is very friendly and nice.
- Rose Cole

[He has] good posts, both the serious like this one, and the humorous like yesterday. [He is] the reason that I have restrained myself from making Canadian jokes in my posts.
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This post contains nothing that is of any use to me. What were you thinking? Anyway, it's probably the best I've read all day.
- David Kjos

Daniel, nicely done and much more original than Frank the Turk.
- Jonathan Moorhead

There are some people who are smart, deep, or funny. There are not very many people that are all 3. Daniel is one of those people. His opinion, insight and humor have kept me coming back to his blog since I first visited earlier this year.
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Friday, April 18, 2008
The Taming of the Few...
As a computer programmer, I sit on my bottom for hours on end pushing little tiny buttons all day. On especially frantic days, I may actually burn an additional 20 or 30 calories through my vigorous typing... but the reality is that my job is very sedentary.

Now on the winter solstice in Winnipeg, where I live, we have 8 hours (and five minutes) of daylight, and 16 hours of darkness (less five minutes), which, if you work, means that most of the time when the sun is shining in the winter - I am squirreled away in some windowless place in a big building - and I don't get to see sunlight except on the morning bus ride.

The temperature falls as low as -49°F (without the "wind chill") in Winnipeg in the winter - which is just another way of saying that, for the working man at least - the only outdoor activity in the winter ends up being "frozen star gazing".

Which is all my way of justifying the fact (I suppose), that on average I put on about twenty pounds each winter.

I know, I know... I bought a big old nautilus gym set, put it together in my basement with the intention to start doing something about my exercise deficit - that is, not so much as a year round pursuit - but something to stave off the winter flab. I have been less than motivated in this department. Not that I don't like pumping iron in my basement... well... okay, that's not true - I find it tiresome and boring, and it feels like I am trying to be vain and not simply healthy... yet, as I say, this never seems to pan out for me. My good intentions haven't met up with productive desire yet...

Notwithstanding, in the summer I tend to lose as much from cycling and starving changing my dietary habits, as I gain in the winter. Were it not for this I expect I would be a very squat, plumb fellow.

So it is that I embark upon another season of weight loss. I have decided to do away with the scale altogether, and concentrate on waist measurement at the navel. For men, the measurement at the navel ought to be less than half one's height - that is, for someone who is six foot (72 inches), their waist at the navel should be 36 inches or less (less is better) - anything higher is heart attack country. For myself (a measly 68 inches), my target is something under 34 inches.

Now here is the hard part - an honest measurement. It is easy to take a tape line, and squeeze it around my plumpness so that the number is more pleasing, but that is not going to be a true measure of where I need to be. So about ten days ago I did a baseline measure. Forty two inches.

I have done this the last few years. Last year I started at forty six, and the year before that at forty eight - so forty two isn't as bad as I have been - but let me tell you, it is still an embarrassingly high number. When I graduated high school my waist at the navel was twenty eight inches. I don't expect to see that again until I begin (Lord willing), the "shrivel of the aged"

So I measured again this morning - and I am at forty inches now. I hope to lose an inch a week - so that by July I am down to 31 or 32. I will try to keep up with blogging it, just in case there are others who have similar struggles - perhaps we can encourage one another.

Labels: , ,

posted by Daniel @ 9:17 AM  
5 Comments:
  • At 4:42 PM, April 21, 2008, Blogger Marcian said…

    I, too, suffer from an increased circumference in the spring. I have been more resolute about the cycling, though. And friend of mine did remind me today that I HAVE been busy studying for my license exams... I could have hugged him for that. Best wishes on your endeavour. I am still behind with getting my new cyclo-computer put on my bike to start tallying my miles.

     
  • At 4:47 PM, April 21, 2008, Blogger Marcian said…

    Another thing: my mom got the Total Gym for Christmas last year and I watched my brother in law show her how to use it. Honestly, it looks like more fun than a work-out. It's on my list of "Things to put in a spare room if I had one."

     
  • At 9:34 AM, April 22, 2008, Blogger Daniel said…

    So far this season I have lost 10 lbs, cycled maybe 250 miles, and walked about 25 miles. That's in the last two and a half weeks or so.

    I plan to keep up the pace - I am presently doing about 150 minutes of exercise each week day, and resting on the weekends - but cutting calories each day.

    So far it is keeping me on target, I plan to lose another twenty pounds, we shall see how it goes.

    Good for you for sticking to it!

     
  • At 1:18 PM, April 22, 2008, Blogger Jonathan Moorhead said…

    Ok, ok, I'm getting up for a walk right now!

     
  • At 1:40 PM, April 22, 2008, Blogger Daniel said…

    Go Jon go! ;^)

    The hardest part is not the exercise, its the calorie cutting.

    How does that old personal trainer saying go,... "six packs are made in the kitchen, not the gym..."

     
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