I fasted all day yesterday but lost less than three pounds. Typically, I’ll lose at least three and sometimes four pounds on a fasting day, so I’m not sure what happened. I can’t blame that low number on drinking too much water, either, as I drank less water than I normally do on a fasting day (not on purpose; it just worked out that way). I did go to the gym and got a good workout in, so that’s a consolation. And I can still make the five-pounds-per-week goal since it’s just the beginning of the week.

I stopped at the grocery store last night after work to get some water and blueberries. Unfortunately, I also picked up some chocolate-covered almonds. I haven’t eaten any of them yet, but that’ll eventually happen, and I calculated just this morning that each bag contains 1,500 calories (I bought two bags). It made me realize that I”ve got to forecast my caloric intake rather than just monitoring it as I go. If I buy food of any sort, I’m going to eat it because it’s there—although there have been several occasions in the past when I’ve failed to consume the ingredients for salads in time (because lettuce isn’t exactly enticing). So I have to watch not only what I eat, but what I buy.

I”ve never been good about buying groceries ahead of time. I tend to buy them as needed, and doing that sometimes results in straying from my lists and making impulse buys just because I’m really hungry. There’s that old adage: never go grocery shopping when you’re hungry. I violate that principle all the time and should work on adhering to it more strictly. So, in addition to watching what I eat and what I buy, I need to watch when I buy it.

I don’t really have anything else to say today. I slept poorly, and that’s an interesting topic to dive further into later since both poor sleep quality and quantity have been linked with weight gain. And that effect is especially pronounced in people with sleep apnea, which I have. It’s kind of a circuitous thing: being overweight can cause sleep apnea, and sleep apnea can cause weight gain. It’s tough, but such is life.