I’m still stuck with the rest of my posts about my trip to Taiwan last June.
It’s all in my drafts as of the moment. Three posts of varying lengths and completion rates. I’m very finicky with these travelogues and they can be long, and I’m on editorial mode, chopping and adding things. I’ll only post them when I’m as close to 100% happy with them.
I’m my harshest critic sometimes.
I just completed the last of my podiatrist appointments this past Saturday.
I’d say it was money well spent, for tangible and intangible reasons. For one, it did cure what ailed me. No more foot pain in the morning. Second, it greatly helped me realize I wasn’t taking care of my feet as well as my weight. I got semi-serious with my fitness level, so I made some changes over the course of several months to aid my foot treatment.
I changed my breakfast months ago to fit under 400 calories a bowl. Just chocolate-y unsweetened oats with 100ml of low-fat milk, a tablespoon of trail mix, and 23g of protein powder – I do use Dymatize powder for a while now, but I use the same measuring scooper I got from my old Orgain powder. Unchanged since late May. I find that scoop and its amount the sweet spot for my morning oats. Just enough to give body and goopy texture to the oats. Not too sweet, not too overpowering. I tried the full amount from Dymatize’s scoop previously, and I found it not to my liking.
I changed my treadmill routine from running to inclined power walks. It’s a work in progress, but I did find that I sweat a lot more with inclined, so I stuck with it for a month now. I went from 6%, then 8%, and now to 10%. I plan on increasing once I get more comfortable with 10%. I also prioritized my leg exercises more, so I use the machines at the gym that prioritize the legs and thighs more, like seated leg curls. I still do weights and some chest press as well.
I’ve stuck with the YAZIO app and tracking my meals since early May, as the podiatrist recommended me staying below 2500 calories a day. Problem was, the search functionality was a bit lacking in some non-Western foods, so I had to rely on Google to help me calculate the correct estimate. That manual googling also helped me avoid certain “healthy” foods that weren’t so healthy as I thought. Never had a day since without logging my meals. It also helped that the podiatrist has a nutrition background, so I fished for advice every few appointments. But I never try to self-flaggelate my tongue, I just made wiser choices. And sometimes every two weeks or so, an indulgent brunch wasn’t too bad (as long as it was on an exercise day). And also, logging also helped with me avoiding bigger meals. For example, if I already had 1200 cals logged for the day, I look for snacks and dinner that won’t break 800 cals total next. So sometimes I just get fancy soy pudding for dinner, under 400 cals.
So far? From 245+lbs last April, I was 217lbs last Monday. Not that high of a loss given that I had to do a brief pigout when I went home in PH last June (I went home at 222lbs, I went back to Singapore at 229lbs), but anything’s better than zero for me. Progress is still progress. I did put my weight goal in YAZIO before, and it’s 190lbs. I really hope I hit that by December. I have been @ 181lbs before in 2016.
My custom orthotics has also been helpful. No more flat feet for me. So far, I only feel the orthotics when I switch shoes. A week or two after, not so much. Also, the orthotics kind of helped me during the Taiwan trip, to walk way less and take more walking breaks.
Also, shoes. I had to ditch my Nikes as I found it to be my only pair of shoes that made walking painful with the orthotics. Two days on it was enough data for me. So now, I rotate between my Adidas Ultraboost and two of Asics Gel-Pulse shoes, 13 and 14 version. Those shoes felt great with the custom orthotics.
Next hurdle is the “feet exercises” thing. My podiatrist made it a point to drill down the basic feet exercises I could do at home so I can maximize the post-treatment benefits, and recommended that I do some of them as much as I could afford to give time to. So I usually did them at night before sleeping. Front heel walks, side foot walks. Wall standing exercises, stretch tape curls. Tried to do them as much as I could, even marking them at the calendar as “done”. Now with no more appointments to look forward to, I have to try doing it more without the prospect of a clinic appointment as an incentive.
For the home cooking, I really have to get back on the horse with that thing. After I got back from the Philippines in June, I kind of went back to evenings as usual due to workload, and I preferred eating out instead of cooking a dish myself during weekday nights. On weekends I’d do a spot of cooking to make myself happy, like a simple 10-minute rice dish (excluding prep) with chicken breast meat. Hopefully I get back on it. But since workload got a bit tight, I get home a bit late again.
Still a work in progress, and lots more to do. My foot got better, now I got to be better.
Two weeks ago, the LED ceiling light at my room finally went bust and unresponsive after weeks of threatening to do so with occassional flickers and sudden turning-off timings. We did ask the house agent to get us a new light to install (he did), but we had to install it ourselves. My housemate had an electrical studies background, so he installed it for me.
But I also noticed I was way too reliant on that ceiling light. I had to borrow my housemate’s room lamp the day before we installed that new ceiling light as well, and that made me think of looking into plunking a few for a room lamp.
So when I got into IKEA Alexandra on Sunday for a spot of lunch, I decided to buy a few more comforts for my room, including a lamp. Thankfully, the full lunch I got (of course it’s Swedish meatballs) gave me a SGD20 discount coupon, valid for that day only with a minimum purchase of SGD100. Sweet.
I kind of treated it as extra exercise as well, walking through IKEA’s big-ass shop floor. Took my time walking as I looked through each section, kind of like window-shopping. Lots of temptations as well. But I stuck with the ones I definitely want and definitely need.
First off, a bolster pillow. I bought the cheapest one that was tightly vacuum-sealed and compressed. Gave me the impression that it was newly-shipped, as the others were in an uncompressed state and in full size. Made it easy to fit in the IKEA bag too. There was another that I fancied, about SGD15 more expensive with a much more velvety cover and supposed hypoallergenic benefits, but it also seemed more of a hassle to wash. So I stuck with cheap.
Second, a new mattress protector/cover with a cooling layer. I really liked the duvet I bought last time with a “cool” fabric layer that helped retained some of the aircon chill, made my nights super easy to fall asleep with. So I thought to experiment with a fucking SGD60+ mattress cover. If my blanket’s cool, why not my mattress too?
And lastly, a SGD30+ desk lamp. I opted for their Brunbage model, one with a ring-style LED setup, lots of lighting options – can be white, yellowish, dim, bright, super-bright at certain button settings – and a long USB-C cable. It also helped that it was made in such a way that it had a hook for headphones and a sturdy base with compartments for pens and sticks, as well as a front section that can comfortably hold a phone in landscape. Also, an extra USB-C two-port charger.
Total came to around SGD130, and with the coupon, I got it for a bit less. So when I got home, I immediately got to testing out my purchases.
Bolster pillow was super nice. It springed to full size when I cut off the thick plastic wrap. Smelled nice too. Felt soft and comfortable. Very good puchase. Now I have to decide what to do with my old bolster pillow. I’ll wash it later this week though. We’ll see if I can wash off some of the old smells.
The mattress cover gamble paid off too. I installed it over my mattress then covered it with the one I already had on it. I turned on the AC for a few minutes, turned it off, then after a few more minutes I laid down on the bed. Man, shit’s cool. The cover did really keep the chill. The bed felt cool to the touch. Like those hotel beds I’ve been to where the bed felt comfortably cold even if the AC was set to a lower setting. Later that night, I had a wonderful sleep on it. Dozed off quick. Great purchase.
The lamp, well, it’s enough for my needs. I tried it on by around 8pm. I turned off the ceiling light and had the lamp on at normal light setting (white and normal bright) while I browse the net on my laptop on the desk. After a while, I found I didn’t really need the ceiling light anymore that night, the lamp did its job. Maybe it’ll help with the monthly bills as well. So I left it on until I went to bed for the night.
All in all, nice purchases. I bought the things I needed for comfort. No bad purchases.
Briathrail // Albert 2MNG 
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