Cuisine Routine

Much has been made lately of Olympic champion Michael Phelps' 12,000 calorie per day diets. it's quite a scene, man. It's more like a weightlifter's diet than that of a swimmer. Phelps says he swims 5 hours a day, six days a week, so he's built up the metabolism of a long-time meth addict (Ever see a fat meth addict? Me either) and can get away with eating a whole pizza every day. I've never done this before, but I want to see how my typical diet rivals that of a record-setting Olympian. Here goes:

5:30am- My first meal of the deal is a cup of instant oatmeal. Today's flavor? Maple and Brown Sugar, which actually sounds better than it was. I didn't use enough water, so it was like ingesting wallpaper paste. Low sugar wallpaper paste, at that. 110 calories. I also had a half a cup of coffee, which I call my energy drink. 0 calories.

7am- I hit the red light at Summerlin Parkway and 215, which makes it a perfect time to wolf down a Trader Joe's strawberry breakfast bar. It's got a delightfully fruity flavor, and it's sturdy enough not to break apart upon first bite. I finish it before the light turns green. The red light is unreasonably long at Summerlin Parkway and 215. 140 calories.

8:30am- I dig into some fresh cut cantaloupe after getting back from walking the dog. I don't know what the calorie count is for fresh melon. I think fresh fruit is the last thing you can buy that doesn't have a nutrition label on it, which is a good thing. I'm drinking a bottle of water right now, and it has a nutrition label on it. This makes no sense to me. Zeroes across the board. It's not a significant source of anything, yet it's called the "stuff of life". Go figure. Anyway, I'll say 150 calories for the melon

8:40am- More fruity stuff. I have a cup of Yoplait Digestive health yogurt. Pomegranate Blueberry. On the product box, it says if I don't see results in ten days, I can get a full refund. Considering I go through a roll of Cottonelle toilet paper per day, I think it's working just fine. 110 calories

Total breakfast intake: 510 calories

11:30am: Lunch time! After a not so successful nap, I decide to create a nice little lunch for me. I want something more than my usual microwavable meal (even though those have markedly improved), so I make a turkey pita with caesar dressing, and have some sour cream and onion Baked Lays chips with it. With the turkey and the chips, I'm estimating what their "serving sizes" means. Serving sizes are almost always unreasonably low, so I'll go like this: Pita: 160 calories, turkey 100 calories. Caesar dressing, 15 calories (it's one of those spritzers, not from a big bottle). Chips, 150 calories. Topped it off with a sugar free pudding for dessert. 60 calories.

Total lunch intake: 485 calories
Total breakfast /lunch intake: 995 calories

If Michael Phelps takes in 12,000 calories a day and can swim for five hours, if figure I'd be good for about 20 minutes in the pool before requiring medical attention. I'm still hungry, but I don't know what to eat. I know what I want....this is the part of the day that I want that whole pizza, but we don't have one, and I don't feel like getting one. My admiration for Phelps grows by the meal. Eating a lot may sound easy, but it's not.

1:45pm: Having a little snack, as I need to be back at work in two hours. Today's snack is Pop Secret 100 calorie Kettle Corn (100 calories. Duh), chased with a glass of caffeine free Diet Coke. This should tide me over until dinner. Looking at how many kernels didn't pop, I'm guessing my intake is closer to 80 calories, but I'll keep it at 100.
_______________________________________________________________ Watching Olympic baseball. Remarkable how boring baseball really is when you don't have a rooting interest. Quick note on Michael Phelps. No, he's not the greatest Olympian ever. I don't even think he's the greatest swimmer. He barely won gold in two of his races, and no one is talking about how his greatest advantage is his height. He's 6'4". If Michael Phelps maxed out at 6'3", he's would've finished 2nd in two of his races. Without the anchor leg that his teammate swam in one of the relay races, that would've been another silver. Spare me the "greatest ever" nonsense, especially if you're just using it (NBC) to sell dvds.

Eating makes me spunky. I need to do it more often _____________________________________________________________

5pm: A Quaker Chewy Granola bar. Peanut butter and chocolate chip. It's just enough to take the edge off as I'm 90 minutes away from dinner. I successfully manage not to get any chocolate on my shorts. It's been a good day. 100 calories

6:30: Dinner time, or as they call it in the Midwest: Supper. Tonight, Pumpkin and I enjoyed linguine with browned butter and mizithra cheese, ripped off from the dear departed Spaghetti Factory. I can only estimate the calories for the cheese and the butter, and I figured that I had two servings of pasta, so I'm going to put the total for the plate at 700 calories, give or take. oh, and a small slice of french bread. 100 calories more? Desert consisted of two fudge bars, 120 calories total. I'm not hungry right now, but i feel a snack coming later.

Total Dinner Intake: 920 calories

I've gotta hand it to that Phelps guy. 12,000 is hard enough to do for just one day, but when you're bringin' it day after day after day, that's something special. I'm something like 10,500 calories behind his pace and, not surprisingly, I don't have any energy. A planned trip to the store was cancelled because Pumpkin and I are having a hard time lifting ourselves off the couch.

7:35pm- One last little snack, a root beer popsicle. 35 calories. I have a small sore throat so it's the perfect balm. I want another, but pass. Why pass? I really don't know. It's not like I'm having a second piece of pie.

Total calories consumed today: 2150. It seems like I've had less than that. Still, I trail Phelps by 10,000 or so. Looks like I'll never be a world-class athlete. Then again, McDonald's is an Olympic sponsor and supplier, so maybe I should include more of their cuisine into my daily routine.