ShawnDo

I finished the Master Cleanse after being on it for 31 days. Exactly the same amount of time as last year. I just starting feeling weak and ache-y and decided it was time to come off. I should have gotten off a week and a half earlier, because all the weight I was going to lose was lost back then. I guess 25 pounds is the maximum I can lose on that thing. It’s been a few days, and I’m still losing weight. We’ll see how long that lasts. I’ve been keeping the food intake pretty light, and I continued exercising. I started with weights today, and I’m going to be really hurting over the next few days. I think my psychology will be a bit different now. I remember when I was trying to quit smoking, I would always say “Next Sunday will be my last day” The addict in me would then “load up” over the last few days of the week. I normally smoked a pack in about 2-3 days, but those “last days” I was smoking a pack a day, justifying it in my mind that they would be my last. A couple rationalizations later, and the Monday got pushed back to “that Friday”, or the Monday after that. Pretty soon I was smoking a pack a day for a whole month! The same thing happened to me this past holiday season with food. “As soon as I get back from Thanksgiving, I’ll start my regiment”, “just after Christmas”, etc. I was eating like a complete idiot during that time! and I gained the 25 pounds that I just lost in only a few months!. So now I’m back where I started a year ago deciding I needed to lose weight and maybe I’ll try this “Master Cleanse” thing. It was an educational year, and I don’t think I’ll be doing that again. I guess I’ll try this crazy “eat less and exercise” thing!
I noticed, during my “culinarily debaucherous” holiday, that most of the food I was eating wasn’t even all that good. Just a rut I fell into because I got lazy and wanted delivery all the time. I had all these plans when I moved to NY to try different things and there are more than enough places around me to do that. I just have to get over my hang-up about eating alone. I went to Mee’s the other day and ate by myself. I had an audiobook running in one ear, and I just lose myself in it. I think that will be my thing for the more casual places. Today though, I wasn’t by myself. Risa and I had been talking about hitting up a quality Ramen place for a while. I checked out eGullet and found some of their recommendations for the best ramen in the city. A name that kept coming up is in the area, so we hit it. Menchanko Tei was totally different than anything I’ve had before. I didn’t really associate the food in there with what I normally think of Japanese food. The noodles were extremely fresh, they had to have been made that day. The broth was excellent. I got the “Hakata Ramen” (A picture is in the link) I am NOT a fan of ginger, but it was rather subtle in my dish, and was actually good. They shaved up the mushrooms and ginger so that they were the same shape as the noodles. Ever time you chopstick’ed a bite of noodles, there was always some mushroom and ginger tangled up in there. Crafty! I definitely want to go back and try some of the other menu items. Maybe hit the other place “Sapporo” that looked like it had more variation of Ramen. Quite a step up from the little Top Ramen packages I grew up with! I only had my iPhone with me, so this was the best picture I could get. I gotta carry around the camera more!