Years have passed...

 I'm still here.  This has sat, long forgotten.

My diabetes got worse, much worse.  I started taking insulin just because it seemed so hopeless.  I started at 10 units per day, and I saw a huge improvement.  A little more than a year later I was taking close to 300 units a day and spiraling out of control in terms of my health.  I've seen it happen to other people.  They crash hard and nothing can save them.  I had my recent scare where I almost lost a foot to botulism and staph, my blood pressure was at a place I called unsurvivable,    So I stopped taking insulin, and the six other pills I took for diabetes as well.

I also buckled down and really changed how I eat.  I had been up at almost 300 pounds, with a BMI that was just barely shy of 40, the magic BMI number that changes from obese to the unofficial morbidly obese.  My A1C hadn't returned to the days of being in the high teens, but it was on a steady and strong upward trend.

Today I weighed 222 pounds.  I estimate my A1C to be about 7, and estimate that it has been falling steadily since May.  My blood pressure was high when I went to the ER last week for a scratched eyeball and puss-oozing eye infection, but I had reasons for it to be high.  I'll get an A1C test within a month or so, but over the past year I've gotten good enough at calculating my A1C that I usually match the numbers the doctor gives me from a blood test.

I hiked close to Chupadera peak a couple of weeks ago, but there was lightning and thunder, so I didn't go up it.  I meant to go hiking in the mountains over the weekend, but my back injury was making itself known again, so I didn't do anything in the hopes of avoiding another spasm in it.  After watching Miranda In the Wild, an REI employee who made a series of terrible videos for REI that eventually turned into a show of her own where she was allowed to have a personality, I really want to hike 30 miles.  She hiked 30 miles on her 30th birthday.  I'm about to be 51, and I'm not going to try and hike 51 miles.  But half of 51 would be doable, and is close to 30.  So I need to get out more.  I still want to be at Turkey Creek for my birthday, so it would be a hike in the Gila, which from Turkey Creek, means uphill a lot, but an easy downhill back to the springs.  I'm not sure I'll achieve it though.  But the goal of a thirty mile hike this calendar year, even if not on my birthday, is something I suspect I could pull off if I try hard.

Posting Again!

My current steps are 9,008,351 over 1542.97 days, an average of 5662.86.  My last recorded odometer on my new bicycle is 1340 km, but I've probably ridden ten or twenty km more than that by now.  I do love driving my new Subaru a lot.  Which is bad.  I'm about to buy new tires for it, relevant to mention here because the tires are for driving to Springtime Canyon in a few weeks.  Mostly car camping, but outdoors at least.

I didn't go to Turkey Creek this year because I was afraid of the fire season.  When my birthday came around the forest was open and not on fire (there) so I could have gone, but I hadn't planned it so it wasn'y really feasible.  I might go later this year, maybe in October.

I'm once again on yet another push to eat better and exercise more.  I'm even thinking of hitting Wheeler Peak, a mountain I've never been on in New Mexico.  One of the alternate routes passes by two lakes, which seems nice.

Long Time Without A Post

I haven't posted in forever.

My new bicycle, which I bought just over two years, managed to accumulate roughly 1000km in those two years.   They were evenly divided as well, with about 500km the first year, and 500km the second year.

I recently fixed it up, and I'm trying to get back to riding a lot.  I've gone 81km in the last past two weeks, which is a huge improvement over the average 10km per week for the past two years.  Now, over the past two years, I'm averaging 11km per day!

My lifetime average for steps is up to 5598.69 per day, over 1345 days.  Over the past weekish (8 days) it has been an average of about 8800.

I don't have much else to say.  I'm still fat.  I'm still ugly.  I'm still stupid.  I'm getting old as well.

Belated Title (Added August 2018)

I wish I could delete comments.  I also wish I could add a post title.  Something is going seriously wrong with this so-called "blogger" platform today.  I have a ton of spam comments that can't be removed, and I can't add a title to this post.   The "Send Feedback" button doesn't work either, so I can't send feedback.

Oh, I can't publish this post either.  That button has broken as well.

Ice Chests

I gave my Coleman Xtreme a little bit of a cleaning.  Despite having been kept indoors and out of the sunlight, the outside is cracking right where a handle attaches.  It's only been used a dozen or so times over maybe ten years at most.  Kind of disappointing.  Maybe I will be picking up a Yeti sooner than later.

Camping!

Going to go camping on Friday at Water Canyon in the San Mateo mountains.  I cobbled together some quick directions:  from Socorro go west on highway 60, then turn left at 13S 0292274 3777050  on 107, then right at 13S 0283810 3753148 on forest road 52, then left at 13S 0279156 3754953 onto 56, then stop at 13S 0276343 3748827.

I currently own at 36 quart Coleman Xtreme cooler, and that I think is a Coleman 52 quart steel belted cooler.  The 36 quart is definitely too small.  The 52 is a good size, but doesn't keep things cold very well.  It seems like I really need a 45 quart Yeti.  But Yeti's are expensive!

But the Yeti is bear proof, should keep ice as ice for maybe as long as a week if I never open it, and it looks quite nice.  The internet is filled with people who love the cooler, and a few who hate it, and the consensus seems to be that those who hate it don't know how to use a cooler.  Just reading about the Yeti has probably improved my cooler-using abilities by a lot.  I'll be pre-cooling my existing cooler for the camping trip.

For my food I'm probably going to take steak for the evening, and bacon and eggs for the morning.  I'm debating if pancakes are a good idea.  Or possibly hash browns.  Probably hash browns.  My hash browns will be tiny cubed pieces that are pan fried.  I'm planning to have my green Coleman camp stove with me, as well as an MSR whisperlight for any boiling.  I think the whisperlight will easily defeat the Coleman when it comes to boiling.

I'll need to pack: steak, eggs, bacon, potatoes, oil, black pepper, a cast iron comal or skillet, tongs, a spatula, a cutting board, a knife, and an onion.  The onion was an afterthought, it goes with the potatoes.  And maybe butter.  Butter is nice with hash browns.

I kind of wonder if popcorn would be good too.  I'd need a pan to cook it in, and popcorn if I do that.

I have six blue cold packs for my cooler.  With my small need for food, I can probably use the 36 quart Xtreme.  I need to freeze some water to pre-chill it Thursday night.  I should be able to pack it Friday morning, and leave it in my car all day at work without it going warm on me.  I'll add a couple of straps to it to seal it shut.

There is no rain forecast, so hammocking should be a breeze.  But I'll have my tarp with me, and set up, just in case.

On Monday I drove out to the campsite after work to make sure I remembered how to get there and that my car would make it.  The road was a little rough, but doable.  Friday should be no trouble.

Pictures at http://schlake.us/daily/2016-05-16.html

REI and others...

I spent a lot of money at REI today, but I stayed on my list, and pruned the list while I was there, so I did good.  They didn't have the TNF jacket I wanted, but I tried on a very similar jacket.  But since I like the Marmot, I probably won't order the TNF.

I now have a metal bowl and a metal plate and some metal utensils.  No more plastic!

I bought some food to try eating.  I plan to go camping for two nights starting May 20, so I can eat it then.

I bought the table I wanted after setting it up in the store and poking it.

I have a bug net for my hammock now.

I have a much wider collection of maps for New Mexico now.

I bought a few other sundry things as well.

And I went to Whole Foods after that and also stayed amazingly on list.  They had the jarred sauce that Supermart stopped carrying, so I bought some of that off my list, and hey had buffalo tenderloin, so I bought that off the list.  I suppose the chocolate covered cake bites were sort off list, since they weren't the desert I traditionally buy, but not much off list.  They were sitting right next to the thing I meant to buy!

At the Salinas Pueblo Missions Visitor Center I  bought a book on scenic drives in NM.  It has a lot of good drives in it.