Nat Arem's Blog

I don’t normally blog about music, but I feel like stating that Our Lady Peace is my favorite group of all time.

Guster is up there.

CCC is great too, but probably not the one you’re thinking of.

http://archives1.twoplustwo.com/showflat.php?Cat=0&Number=9224134.

Enjoy.

I normally don’t do this stuff, but I want to make everyone aware of my friend Eric Strauss’s blog, http://www.eestrauss.com. It’s a solid blog and it’s a nice break from the poker blogs that I’m usually reading.

I grew up next door to Eric and we went to the same schools from around age 2 until 18, at which point we parted ways to go to college. At some point in college, we both started learning about poker. The funny thing is, Eric jumped into it much faster than I did. I insisted on actually learning the game before really putting money on the line. Eric was making $50 deposit after $50 deposit onto Party Poker and goofing around in various low limit cash games and SNGs. I got made fun of a few times for not being willing to put money on until I learned the game (we couldn’t tell you what a value bet was … I didn’t know about the value of position at all — this was a very early stage). It’s kind of funny to look back on that. At this point, Eric is trying to get back into poker after a few years off. I was helping him with some low limit SNGs on FTP when I was back in Philadelphia for the holidays. I’m not sure how it’s going to go, but I hope he gets into it and does well.

When I upgraded my blog software to the latest version, I apparently lost all of my links. I’m going to see if I can figure out where they went.

Worst comes to worst, I’ll just rebuild them in the next few days as well as I can remember.

I just got this comment…

Why do I come to this page when I go to Action Jeff’s blog.

Matt
#6 matt_ssl4 on 2007-02-15 01:10 (Delete) (Reply)

I guess I should explain. Jeff asked me to take down his blog for a reason that he would like to keep private. Therefore, since I’ve been hosting it for free for him for awhile, I decided to steal his traffic for the time being (and they’re on the same server so it was easy to point his domain to my pages).

I made a post around a year ago about a weight loss bet, etc, etc. The general bet was 30 lbs in 6 months and I had a few K in action on it (including 500 with GambleAB), mainly with non-poker friends of mine. I was at 239 when I made the bet and I needed to get to 210 by the start of the WSOP. When I flew into Vegas last summer, I was 217. So I lost. You can see the original post here.

Anyway, I was okay with being in the 217 range and I held it okay during the rest of the summer, but I became ridiculously lazy during law school last fall and I put it all back on and more. This is really embarrassing to even type, but I was 249 around Christmas. I felt sick to my stomach looking at the scale. I’ve done a few things in my life that were really really stupid and I’ve honestly never felt so disappointed with myself as I did in the hours and days after weighing in that high. I’m only 6 feet tall. I do have an above-average muscle build, but I should NEVER be that heavy or anywhere close to it. Furthermore, I got a bunch of comments from people in Philadelphia who hadn’t seen me in years about how I’d put on weight, etc. It just added to the pain.

I left Philadelphia on Jan 4th for the PCA. I knew I wasn’t going to make much progress in the Bahamas, so I didn’t even really think about health issues there. I just kept telling myself that when I stepped back onto US soil in Atlanta on Jan 12th, I was going to be healthy. I don’t know what my weight was when I got home, but it was probably similar to my Christmas weight of a few weeks before.

Since I’ve been home in Atlanta, I’ve been doing very well. I’ve cut TONS of calories out of my drinks. The only drink calories I’ve had are from going to bars and I’ve only done that a few times in the last 30 days. I’ve switched to drinking water and calorie-free sweetened drinks (like various diet sodas or crystal light mixes). On the food side, I’ve also been relatively good. I’ve been eating smaller portions and I’ve been trying to snack a lot on healthy food. One bad habit of mine was taking food in front of the TV or computer and just munching away for an hour without even realizing how much I’m eating. Now I just carry a bag of mini carrots in front of the computer and I find I still do the same thing, but this time at least I’m eating something healthy. There have been a few occasions where I’ve eaten an entire bag of carrots (one of those big bags) without even really realizing it. I don’t mind though. As long as I’m eating healthy, I’ll allow myself to eat as much or whatever I want.

With regards to unhealthy food, I have had SOME. I don’t eat great when I go into the Bluff Magazine offices. But I try to be reasonable. For instance, one evening we went out to get pizza. I decided to get water (obv) and get a salad beforehand, on which I didn’t put any dressing. After that, I was still hungry and I had two slices of pizza. I have had some other unhealthy meals here and there, but for the most part it’s been extremely healthy and when it’s unhealthy, I cut down on the portion size of the unhealthy part.

To wrap this up, I just bought a scale earlier today and I weighed myself a few hours ago. I’m down to 231, which is 18 pounds lighter than I was at Christmas. I think some of my efforts are paying off, but I’d really like to be 200 by the summer. I know that pounds will get harder and harder to drop, but I’m prepared for it. This time, I’m really committed to making this happen and making it stick. I’ve got another pretty big bet (actually much bigger), but I don’t want to reveal the details of it. Suffice it to say that I’m well ahead of schedule even considering the inevitable weight-loss slowdown once I get into the high teens and low twenties area. I just need to keep it going. Hopefully my knee, which has been feeling great, will allow me to continue to run on it. I’ll post periodic updates on this goal of mine.