Big Springs

On Saturday Robyn and I took a walk into some happy memories and some beautiful nature.

Just over five years ago, we were engaged in a meadow about a half mile above Big Springs Park in Provo canyon.  It had been a few years since we had been there so we decided to hike up to our meadow and then head up even higher.

I remembered it being a very difficult hike to get to our meadow.  This time around we walked right past it and I asked Robyn if we had taken a wrong turn because the trail didn't look familiar.  She explained that was because we had already hiked further than we had ever been.  I was confused because we hadn't got to the hard part yet.  Apparently losing 60 pounds and walking every day makes you unable to detect the hard part.

Here are a few fun pictures from our adventure while hiking Big Springs.

Robyn looks phenomenally cute in the wilderness

My hair is in that awkward stage where it's too short to comb but too long to not comb.  I call this one, "Robyn takes a selfie with a crazy clown."

Entering the meadow where we were engaged.

Robyn standing in the spot where we were engaged.  (Or, at least withing a few feet of it.  It's hard to tell among the grass.)

It's important to kiss in the meadow where we were engaged.

The river was pretty, Robyn was pretty.  I call this one, "overload of pretty."

I love the fall colors, and the trail among the falling leaves.

Sometimes Robyn rocks out in the wilderness and love spews forth from her hands.

She's getting so skinny!  Little known fact:  I have lost more pounds than Robyn, but she has lost a larger percentage of her body weight.

As you can see, it was a super fantabulous hike.  I have to do lots more hiking if I'm going to be ready to climb to the top of Timp next year.

How To Eat a Brownie Without Eating a Brownie

The following is not good advice.  My wife claims that this kind of thinking is how I originally got to be 300 pounds.  I think this kind of thinking leads you down the path that rocks.

Have you ever had that experience where your wife makes a bunch of delicious unhealthy food for a friend or family member?  You know that feeling where you really need to eat some?

I had that feeling.  Robyn had made some brownies.  She put most of them on a plate to be taken and consumed by people that were not me.  Probably these people also hadn't set a goal to lose one third of their body weight.  Ah well, touché.

After she was done plating the brownies, there was a pan that looked like this:

It should be noted, there are 4 brownies in that pan.  

When I was done with it, it looked like this:

As you can see, there are still 4 brownies in the pan.

 
If there were 4 brownies when I started, and 4 when I was done, that means I ate zero brownies, amIright?

If I ate zero brownies, at approximately 200 calories per brownie, I ate zero calories.

Voila!  That's how you eat a brownie without eating a brownie.  You can thank me later.

When I explained this logic to Robyn, she wasn't impressed.  She told me that's how I got to be 300 pounds.  She was wrong, the old me would have made the pan look like this:

Or, more accurately, the old me would have demanded that she make a second pan just for me.  I'm just sayin'.

Get The Bugs!

The other night I was sleeping.  That shouldn't surprise you.  That's what I do at night.  I kind of like it.

Sometimes Robyn doesn't want me to sleep.  At least that's what I have to conclude.

Anyway, like I said, I was sleeping.  It was awesome.  Then the awesomeness stopped when I was woken abruptly.

Robyn (with urgency and conviction): "Jeff!  JEFF!  JEFF!"

I was tired and groggy.  Not sure what was going on.

Me:  "What do you need?"

Robyn:  "Get the bugs!  Get them!"

You're reading this right now, thinking, "Oh, she's talking in her sleep again."  You have the advantage of reading this from a perspective where you've been awake for more than 2 seconds and your brain is fully functional.  I, on the other hand, looked around in the darkness desperately trying to comprehend what was going on.

Me:  "What bugs?"

Robyn:  "I don't know.  I'm trying to sleep."

Crisis averted, I guess? That must have been one awesome dream.

On Drugs

I'm totally on drugs.  But I have a goal to be drug free, just like I learned in elementary school.

It all started about 6 months ago.  I hate going to the pharmacy. As such, I asked my doctor if there were a way for me to get my diabetes medication in large quantities, so that I could pick it up less often. My doctor, being the kind soul that he is, made sure to oblige. He gave me a prescription for a 3 month supply, which is 2 ginormous bottles of Metformin.

Then, a few months later, after I lost a bajillion pounds (bajillion is totally a number, in this case bajillion means 50)  and significantly lowered my blood sugar, he told me to cut the amount of medication I'm taking in half.

I continued on, taking my lower dosage, until the bottle I was using ran out.  I naturally called the pharmacy to refill my prescription and came home with 2 more ginormous bottles.

That's when Robyn informed me I still had a ginormous bottle that I hadn't used yet.

So my current "ginormous bottle of Metformin" count is up to 3.

I'm not sure why the newer bottles are taller, but they're all ginormous.

Before you decide that you should rush over to my house and steal my large drug stockpile, there are some things you should know.

1.  Stealing from me is not awesome.  We already went over that.
2.  Metformin isn't the type of drug you get high on.  You wouldn't enjoy it.  All it does is help lower your blood sugar.  I suppose if you took enough you might get some really cool shakes and perhaps a coma, but that's the most fun you'll be able to have.

I looked at all those pills and thought about how my kidney would probably appreciate it if I wasn't on drugs.  So I set a goal.

My goal is to never fill that prescription again.   Those 3 bottles should last me a good 9 months at my current dosage.  By then I should be under 200 pounds.  Hopefully, at that point I won't need diabetes medication.

Don't worry, I'll do what my doctor says.  If he says I still need it, I'll keep taking it.

But, I just want to be drug free.   I want to say no to drugs.  It's what the D.A.R.E. officer that visited my fifth grade class would have wanted.

Sometimes I Get Robbed

Friday night, I mowed the lawn.  That was my first mistake.

My wife might disagree.  She may say that leaving the garage door open was the mistake. She's entitled to her opinion.  I say, it wouldn't have happened if I hadn't mowed the lawn.

Like I said, I mowed the lawn.  As you may have inferred, after I mowed the lawn, I failed to close the garage.

Another fun fact is that I also didn't lock my car.

The next morning Robyn and I got into the car and noticed a few strange things.

1.  Both the driver's side and passenger side doors were not shut tightly.
2.  Our glove compartment, and all other compartments were open.
3.  Random items that had no value but had been in compartments, such as Lifesavers and a water bottle were sitting on the seat.

When we first got in the car, Robyn asked, "Why did you put all this stuff on my seat?"

My response was, "I didn't.  Why did you open all the compartments?"

It turns out, she didn't do that either.

As we looked closer, we realized there were some things missing from the compartments.  Most notably, we had an old GPS device that hadn't been used since the purchase of our iPhones.  We also noticed that our car registration was missing from the glove compartment.

We then checked the trunk and noticed that our 72-hour-kit was missing.  It was just in a backpack, so they probably grabbed it without even looking inside.

So there you have it, someone wandered into our open garage, opened up our car and stole an outdated GPS, a piece of paper and some expired food.

When we talked to the cops, the biggest thing I was worried about was some form of identity theft with our car registration.  They assured us that our registration doesn't give them any information that they could use against us.  They hypothesized that the registration is some sort of trophy that they grab whenever they rob stuff from a car.

I can just picture the cute little teenagers perusing their "trophies".  They look at ours and reminisce.  "Jeff and Robyn, these people were great.  They had that GPS that I sold for 25 dollars on ebay.  They also had that great backpack.  Too bad it was full of food that was so old that it made me sick.  I sure loved that roll of toilet paper.  It was definitely worth risking getting arrested for that."

This is what I imagine the precious teenager will look like in a few years.

So, to that special teenager (I only assume it was a teenager because that was the cop's belief) I have one little message:

Dude, really?  Was it really worth it?  If you needed food, you could have knocked on my door.  I would have given you non-expired stuff.  If you needed toilet paper, we have plenty of that.  If you needed outdated electronics, I've got boxes full of junk my wife would love to get rid of.   If you wanted a piece of paper with my name, I'll give you an autograph free of charge.  I'm even willing to give you an autographed picture.  (I'm always good to my fans.)

But, hey, thanks for reminding me that we need fresher food in our 72 hour kit.  You may have made us feel icky and creeped out, but at least you helped us out there.   You can have the expired stuff.  When we're in an emergency, I'll have you to thank that the food bars are not made of iron.

The Eye Doctor

I went to the eye doctor.

It was a new experience for me.  I've always had super good eye sight, so an optometriest has never been a necessary person for me to visit.

Don't get me wrong.  I'm sure they're all very nice people.  I don't have anything against them.  I'm not some sort of Anti-optite.  I've just never had a reason to visit before now.

However, there were two main reasons that caused me to make this visit at this time.

First, my primary care doctor has been bugging me to go.  It turns out there is something called "diabetic retinopathy."  It turns out that it's something you don't want to have.  It turns out that going blind is not awesome.  He wanted me to get checked out, to make sure I am avoiding all the not awesome things like going blind.

The second reason is that I've recently noticed that my right eye doesn't see as well as my left eye.

So, with those 2 reasons, I headed on over to the doctor.

The most important part of the story is that I got to wear these awesome shades.  If you understand nothing else from this post, understand that I looked awesome after my eyes were dilated, and I feared the light.  (Much like a gremlin.)

The good news is that, according to Back to the Future 2, everyone will be looking this awesome in 2 years.

After seeing how good I looked, feel free to continue.  If seeing my awesome shades is sufficient for you, I understand, you are not required to read on.

Before going to the eye doctor, I got to fill out all sorts of forms explaining my life to the finest detail.  It turns out that, in order to be able to tell if I see well, you need to know everything about my life.  Who knew?

After divulging all of my deepest, darkest secrets they took me into a little room and let me wear some head gear.

It's debatable whether I look more awesome with the head gear or with the shades.

Also, for those of you savvy enough to notice, I do in fact have different amounts of facial hair in those 2 pictures.  That is because I didn't actually take a selfie of myself in the headgear.  I took a picture of the headgear and photoshopped it onto a selfie of me from a few months ago.

I just feel so much better, now that I was honest with you.

The result of the headgear test was that I am 20/30 in my right eye due to astigmatism.  They claim I've probably had it my entire life and never noticed.  I don't think that explains why my vision has deteriorated recently, but whatevs.

After the head gear test, they had to dilate my eyes.  This allows them to peer deep into my soul and discern if I have diabetic retinopathy.  They first had to put a strange numbing agent on my eye.  It made my eye feel weird and puffy.  After that, they put the magic dilating solution in and left me alone for about 10 minutes.

It was the wierdest thing in the world.  I sat there, playing with my phone, and watching my vision get super blurry.

After I was sufficiently dilated, the doctor came back and peered into my soul as planned.  The verdict:  No diabetic retinopathy.  I'm not going blind.  Woot!

However, they did give me a prescription for glasses, to help with my 20/30 vision.  They said I don't need them if I don't want them.  But now I'm torn.  I miss my old perfect vision and I'd like to have it back, but I'm not sure if I'm ready to wear glasses.

I talked to Robyn about it.  It turns out she has 20/30 vision in one eye after her Lasik a few years ago.  For her that's fantastic, because she had something like 20/1,000,000 before.  For me, it's not so great.

What do you think?  Will I look distinguished with glasses?  I mean, I'm definitely getting Google Glass later on.  I may as well just add some lenses to that so I can have 20/20 vision while simultaneously tweeting and facebooking using only head gestures.