upclose and personal
I have a site on Apple’s me.com that was my first pass at a blog/recipe site. I wasn’t really crazy about it. I have since started this one using wordpress and I got my own domain name. This post and several that will follow are from that “me.com” site, written back in May and adapted a little because of time. They are meant to tell you who I am and how I got to where I am, including where I went astray.
who the heck is tim?
I am one of thirteen children born to Ed and Jane. I was born in Baltimore in 1953 which makes me “Young enough to still remember; too old to do anything about it.” I grew up in Fallston, MD and went to Bel Air High School. (Jane has been a Weight Watcher since 1969.)
I joined the Air Force in 1972 and after basic at Lackland AFB, San Antonio, TX and tech school at Keesler AFB, Biloxi, MS, I was stationed at Pope AFB in Fayetteville, NC for three and a half year. Then I spent a year each at Tatalina AFS, Alaska (near Takotna and McGrath AK), and Montauk Point AFS, Montauk LI, NY. I got out in 1978. I graduated from University of Maryland College Park with a BSEE in 1984. I worked in that industry until 1992 usually for contractors connected to “DoD at Ft. Meade” (aka NSA).
Herself and I married in 1973 and we have four children: one daughter who is now a doctor in Savannah GA, a son in law school in Baltimore, and two teenage sons at home. I became a stay at home dad in 1992 when we adopted Patrick. I homeschooled Patrick and Michael into middle school.
Over the years, I have slipped into some very bad eating habits. Clearly some go back to childhood: being one of thirteen, I learned to clean my plate. That wouldn’t be so bad, except I developed the habit of filling my plate up. And I would fill it with too much red meat, too much fatty food, not enough vegetables and fruit. Exercise for me was to take a walk after dinner – to the Candy Box for ice cream. My philosophy became “No pain, no pain.”
My weight had grown to over 240 pounds. I am only five foot six inches tall.
I joined Weight Watchers on 19 April 2008. I eat better and I exercise. I am also a much better cook now. It is what they say on their commercials: a lifestyle change. The plans that would have you believe that you can lose weight and not change the way you are living just don’t make sense.
I love to cook and always have. I thought that the only way to cook was to use lots of oil, butter and salt. I would look at those book that promised to lower your cholesterol and thought that they would be full of fat-free and taste-free vegetarian meals. I never realized that cooking healthy would be so much fun.
I do other things besides hang out in my kitchen. I play hammered dulcimer. If you don’t know what that is, Google it. I like going camping with the boys. I love shrimp, baseball, especially the Orioles (they’re breaking my heart again), Moab UT for vacation, and Alaska (I left a little bit of me there but I brought back an extra 15 pounds). We had planned a bike trip the entire length of the C&O Canal from Cumberland to Georgetown but because of this and that it didn’t happen … this year.
before (r) & after (l)
What follows is four entries that I have put together so I can tell the story of how I got to where I am today.
The fact is, I didn’t think that Weight Watchers would do me any good and that I would just move on after about six weeks. I didn’t start a diary or take measurements or even do photos of myself along the way.
Now that I have come so far I wish I had.
No diary, but this is the backstory.
