Seven Sandwiches in Seven Days

February 02, 2011

Seven Sandwiches in Seven Days

I started off the new year with the so-called "Slow Carb" diet advocated by 4-Hour Body's Tim Ferriss. I was fairly compliant and most of my meals were composed of a cup of beans (canned black or kidney), four servings of vegetables (e.g. a family pack of mixed vegetables), and some sort of "complete" protein source (e.g. a chicken breast, a couple eggs, steak, etc). You have to make sure you're getting enough fat to feel full, so I'd either add half an avocado, a mound of guacamole, a solid glug of fish oil, or whatever else seemed like a good idea.

This is me cheating. We added rice to the green chili because I'd made it too runny.

By the last week in January, I was getting cranky. My weight had drifted down about two pounds in three weeks and I was tired of beans. I'd also become absolutely obsessed with what I ate. I suspect part of the problem was that my post-marathon weight training wasn't burning anywhere near the calories of the pre-marathon running training and ...meh. Never mind, I don't care why. What matters is I wasn't much fun to be around. I was also almost constantly sick (as in, "You've got another cold this week?!").

Julie convinced me that I wasn't doing anything healthy and I decided that I needed to snap out of it. Decision made. Done? The trouble is, it's hard to just "snap out of it." I'd been eating weird and drinking the proverbial kool-aid since mid-December and I wasn't mentally ready to just stop. I needed a habit buster. I needed a goal...

SEVEN SANDWICHES IN SEVEN DAYS!!!

Ah, my old friend the sandwich. Mid-January, I was doing some serious groundwork for a fictional universe involving the adventures and brotherhood of different kinds of sandwiches. I missed them and they were just the thing to snap me back.

Day 1: Barely a sandwich.

Yeah, it was a taco between two slices of bread. As I recall, my lunch plans somehow got disrupted and this was plan B.

Day 2: More like it, but not quite "there" yet.

I think Julie reminded me that some stores trade money for sandwiches and Subway was the best I could do on short notice.

Day 3: Now that sir, is a sandwich.

Hummus, a fine proud sandwich and German potato salad. Rather than try to sneak my sandwich in for lunch, I took Julie out on a date to a proper sandwich production facility.

Day 4: Whahht? Is that bread pink!? Fear not, it's tomato basil.

On Saturday, we needed a place that had a Julie-certified cup of coffee and could also provide me with a sandwich of sufficient grandeur to be a "seven days" sandwich. Panera got it done.

Day 5: Seriously? A shoe and a half-eaten sandwich.

I dunno what to say. I don't remember anything about Sunday. There's a good chance I wasn't wearing pants 'till sometime after noon... I think this was probably a prime rib and blue cheese from Quiznos.

Day 6: Snowed In

Monday was a neat one. The edge of the mighty blizzard of 2011 caught up with Manhattan and I wasn't going anywhere for lunch. The university was closed if that's any measure. Fortunately, a place across the street from my office was open and I grabbed lunch with, ahem, The Company President. He watched me photograph my sandwich and listened to me rattle on about my new weight-lifting equipment.

Day 7: Not a sandwich.

On Tuesday, the weather wasn't funny anymore. Most of the stores in town were shut down and Monday's across-from-work sandwich place was closed up. I wandered around until I found a new place, but ended up getting a frittata. Which, by my reckoning, is not a sandwich. (It's also not in the spell-checker's dictionary.)

Day 7: An actual sandwich.

Fortunately, there's more than one meal in a day and our local Mr. Goodcents hooked me up. It was impressive finding a place. On Tuesday seeing a store with the "open" sign lit up meant something. After 3 minutes inside I had to completely re-scrape my car. I also grabbed one for Julie and one of the sections is still in the fridge...

So that's it. Seven sandwiches in seven days. I am officially readjusted and returned to "normal". For anyone who made it this far, here are some puppy snow pictures!