Day 17 and I’m back in London hunting for good food. I was expecting to do much better than my last attempt and ultimately did succeed.

Day: 17
Date: 28/05/2013
Workout Day: Rest
Weight (lb): 165.0 (6.8 lb loss)
Body Fat %: 15.2 (1.4% loss)
Health: Very tired

On the long commute into London I like to observe human behaviour which these days seems to centre around coffee and in the case of the London Underground everyone looking miserable and trying to read. This baffles me. Imagine standing in an ultra cramped carriage being rocked around, with people squeezing past you to get to the upcoming musical chair seat and for an average journey length of only 20 minutes. And what do most Londoners feel the compulsion to do? Read. Increasingly it’s a Kindle, but otherwise it’s a book or newspaper. You see them bumping into people as they don’t predict the sway of the carriage and barely hold on to the rails as one hand is so focused on holding the book and turning pages. Their books bump into other passengers’ backs and the readers somehow get annoyed. Surely people can wait to read their precious novel? I just don’t get it. And then as soon as they’re off the tube, it’s into Starbucks so they can walk into work with a “proper” coffee, and commence the expenditure of their average £10 per day habit.

A not uncommon sight is the order of a skinny latte with a load of sugar added and accompanied by a muffin of some sort. Otherwise the cappuccinos are still hugely popular, as with any calorie ladened drink. People just don’t realise the calories they consume from drinks. It’s like anything in a liquid form isn’t food and therefore isn’t bad for you. Unless it’s a protein shake of course, and that’s weird and unnatural. In the corporate environment you pretty much are considered a freak if you drink a protein shake.

The same goes for anything healthy. And by healthy I mean actually healthy and not 70’s or 80’s healthy with a pasta salad or soya protein and rice. I mean paleo, proper food, meat and veg and fat. But the ultimate freak is one that doesn’t eat carbs. Not eating bread for lunch is bad enough, but no pasta or salad and you are starting to get some very odd stares. And when they realise you haven’t a bowl of soup either, then they can’t understand what else it could be. So they ask, in a kind of ridiculing manner, “So what have you got today then [you freak]?” I reply, “Chicken breast, peppers, mushrooms and chilli sauce.”  “For lunch??!!” they reply, and this encounter continues for a few seconds until the exact same thing happens every time. They realise that it actually looks nicer than their lunch and ask where they can buy it from.

One thing that doesn’t do me any favours is my lack of sporting competition or bodybuilder size. If I was known as some competing athlete then people would respect my different diet and know it to be essential for my goal. In my case they think it’s just me being stupid, excessive and faddish whilst I’m on this “current” diet [“especially as he doesn’t look fat as he is”]. But I really don’t care. I’m proud of what I’m doing, of how I look and how I eat. You stick to your sandwich and we’ll see whose body looks best in 8 week’s time.

My food today was good and very heavy on the protein.  I had an awkward moment where I was with with a few colleagues who wanted to go to a pizza restaurant, whose menu only had one salad that would have been suitable for me. So I asked them to go somewhere else (despite them already starting to sit down at a table) and I ended up having a steak at a fish restaurant. I did well ordering some broccoli instead of the delicious looking triple cooked chips and the steak was great, so another restaurant victory for me.

On the progress side of things, my stats jumped up this morning at the weigh-in and I’m feeling very tired. Completely drained in fact, and wondering what the hell is going on. I’m putting it down to a lack of sleep but will be monitoring my diet and training closely to see if something is going on.