Long day.  Started with the firewood - good workout tho.  I unloaded at least half of that trailer.  I didn't have to, payment included unloading but I figured I need the exercise.  Then finding recipes, then to Kroger's.  Amazingly busy.  I guess we're close to Thanksgiving?  Not that close tho.  Just a little less than two weeks from now. Never-the-less, the store wasn't only packed with customers, it was packed with employees of all levels including the store manager going around asking everyone if they found everything.

I found 2 ladies and asked them about mushroom powder.  I know, never heard of it, right?  I hadn't either.  There's a lot of ingredients they use to keep carbs low in these recipes that I have never heard of before, or have heard of but never tried. Some of it? I'll never try again, either, lol.  I wanted to make sure I got everything on that list. I was there a while. This keto diet is rather pricey as well as time consuming.  Lots of meat, lots of expensive ingredients.  Tho, in  many cases, once you buy the more pricey ingredients, you have enough to last a while.  But meat isn't particularly cheap. 

Got home from that, unloaded everything, carried it all. I was getting no help from the other adults - they got off the diet and did a binge drinking night. They were stone-faced drunk last night. I mean, falling on the floor, puking in the sink drunk.  And were regretting it today.  I did - no such thing lol.  So anyway, I got all this stuff in here - there's enough to cook for the entire week - but no way I was going to make all of that today.  I had to figure out what to eat for the next 2 days. So, I cooked the whole chicken, that turned out delicious.  It wasn't what was for dinner tonight, but I did, of course, have to try it.  I decided to make 2 lunches and 2 dinners, and have Atkins drinks for breakfast. High fat, low carbs. 

So, baked that, made jalapeno poppers to go with dinner and then got out old stuff that needed to get eaten for lunches.  I'm definitely not into throwing any of this stuff out.  So, 2 days worth of eating is accomplished. If I go into a third day, I'm just going to have to get food somewhere and strip it of the carb stuff - bread usually - and just eat the meat and hopefully some veggies at least.  Taking lots of string cheese tho.  Maybe I should take a bar of cream cheese. That has enough fat to last an entire day's worth. I'll figure it out.  The only way I want detention pay on this trip is if it's at least 10 hours after they take 10 hours off.  It really would be better right now if I didn't get detention on this trip and hopefully get at least a 1 day trip after this one to get on the next paycheck. 

I have money saved for the trip tho.  I'm not paying for hotels, airfare is already paid, I'll be taking a few Uber trips and the rest in mom's pickup.  I'm not worried but there is also Christmas coming up and I don't want to dig into business/land savings for that. 

As for diet, I switched to my old size 34's and now they are starting to get loose. That's no joke. I still have a gut going but apparently it's shrinking.  I just look at myself in the mirror and really don't see it, but the scale and my pant size tell a different story. My face also pulling back in instead of that "fat" look.  That was annoying me. Something I always told myself, if I ever get the fat face going, I'm going to do whatever it takes to get my thin looking face back.  Getting there. 

Tonight's dinner wasn't exactly a keto meal.  Deer steaks. When talking keto, fatter is better. Deer meat is extremely lean. Probably high 90 percent range.  But James cooked it - first put it in apple juice and let it sit overnight and all day.  Then Montreal Steak seasoning. It was oh so wonderful.  The jalapeno poppers filled cream cheese and cheddar cheese made up for the lack of fat in the steaks - hopefully.  I may be eating a fat filled diet, but it's still small on the calories. Never anything over 1,500 and usually more like 1,000.

I just don't have the energy like I do when eating carbs.  I won't be doing this diet forever.  I'll probably be switching back and forth.  Low calorie carb diet shouldn't really make me gain a lot of weight. They key, I think, is irrelevant of what diet or non diet I might be doing, to limit to a bare minimum if not eliminate it forever, eating at truck stops and junk food restaurants.  You know the names of those places, I don't need to put up a list. 

But, I'm going to try and get down to my goal weight before going off of this thing.  A couple more months maybe? Hard to tell really.  I just feel good that I've been moving all day long with some still to go - laundry almost done.  It all burns calories. I'm really hoping it won't be too terribly much longer before I get down to 200 and then....below.  If I ever make it back down to the 180's - a weight I haven't been at in many years now -  I will be elated.  But if I can only make to the 190's I'll still be happy. 

Well, the day is winding down.  I don't have the first load in the morning thank God.  It's the second load, meaning an extra hour and a half of sleep before having to get up versus the 3:30 am rise.  I was lucky that there is another Mapleton run going out and that is always the first run by the plant's request.  I could have taken it but I didn't want to be out 3 days.   This Brownsville run doesn't pay quite as much but it's 85% guaranteed to be a 2 day run 

Okay. The only other thing. Possibly TMI. My butt hurts bad.  They cauterized it after they cut the giant mole off.  I could smell my burning flesh, I knew I'd be paying for it and - yeah. Sitting down is a literal pain in the ass, lmao.