Shortly after I got back from the gym yesterday, about the time I would have posted here, I was informed that we would be hosting a small BBQ for some of my wife's relatives and they would be here in about two hours. That gave me a lot of time [/sarcasm] to plan a menu, shop for it, prepare the appys before our guests arrived, and take a shower. All was accomplished and we had a fine time.

We were at the gym this AM for some more fun. Unlike yesterday we have no plans for the balance of the day and are hoping it will be low key with probably a few mile dog walk this afternoon.




Dinner tonight is going to be a spring mix salad with a number of the small leftover portions of protein (shell steak and salmon) we have in the refrigerator incorporated.

I'm more than a bit impressed, GC.:c011:

If anyone is up to the task, though, you are!!!!!

Glad it went well.

Hi SL! I hope all is well with you.

Update

After the gym yesterday we were fairly sedentary except for some dog walks.

I was at the gym this AM for a very mediocre workout. Despite doing nothing detrimental of late I had no gas in the tank. I think I may introduce oatmeal into my breakfast as a healthy source of carbs. I have a blood test tomorrow which hopefully will shed some light.

Exercise for the day was pushups.

Dinner plans are still up in the air; I'm leaning toward a salad with beans thrown in for protein.

Exercise for the day so far has been 40 pushups and 2 mile walk to do an errand. My plan is to go to the gym this afternoon for a light weight lifting session.

Dinner tonight is going to be an experiment. Stir fry shrimp and veggies with sweet Italian sausage served over kale. What could go wrong? :rolleyes2

I'll be at the gym later today after going to the doctor to follow up on my feet, which are now fine, and how I'm reacting to the new medication I was put on.

Dinner tonight is going to be roasted pork tenderloin with a side of eggplant.

Sounds like a good plan, GC.

My husband has oatmeal almost every morning!

I missed that something was wrong to your feet!!!!!!

Hope all continues to be well!

I'm going to start my oatmeal regimen tomorrow.

My feet....right before we went on vacation they started swelling and stayed that way for our time away. Something like this happened about 4 years ago and after going to a number of specialists no determination of a reason was ever found, but the situation subsided. This time my GP changed my BP medication and told me not to run until things are resolved. By the looks of things they are, but she wants to see me to evaluate and also go over some bloodwork from a recent test.

Glad that you and she are investigating it, GC.

I never made it to the gym yesterday because the short doctor's appointment turned out very differently than I anticipated. I really thought it was going to be an extremely routine visit and that once she examined my legs and told me my blood work was fine I'd be on my merry way to move some iron. Not the case.

My feet were fine, but some of my kidney readings were very out a whack. All associated secondary and tertiary numbers came back okay so she was very perplexed to the point of suggesting that the lab may have made a mistake. Our strategy going forward is for me to be retested while having an appointment with a kidney specialist just in case the lab results are correct. Crazy stuff. If this was a show/movie about a medical mystery I might be mildly interested, but since it's me I'm all in. :(

I haven't exercised yet today, but need to do something for my mental and physical well being.

An acquaintance that I haven't seen in years is going to be here around dinner time; she's coming from very far way so she can't predict when that will actually be so I've chosen a menu that can be cooked quickly. I'll be serving:

Marinated grilled flank steak
Tri color couscous with butter and basil
Roasted asparagus

Dessert is to be decided. We have ice cream, cake, and fresh fruit.

Depending upon on how our guest is feeling after her drive we may be doing our usual last night of the month event and going to watch a home town band at a nearby tavern.

Prayers your way, GC, my friend.

I will bet on a faulty lab reading!!!!!

Dinner sounds great!

Weird stuff indeed SL! My next blood test is on Monday so hopefully there will be a happy resolution that will not entail me having to go to a bunch of specialists.

Thanks about dinner!

A nice weekend. On Friday a long time acquaintance came for dinner and slept over and yesterday we hosed a luncheon for some of my relatives.

I was at the gym both weekend days and will be there in about 60 minutes for my usual Monday morning session with my trainer.

Lastly, I'm taking another blood test this afternoon to see if indeed something is wrong with my kidneys or the previous test was inaccurate. Obviously I'm hoping for the latter.

I neglected to post yesterday's luncheon menu. Here it is:

Appys

Citrus marinated olives (I'm not entirely confident this will come out as I envision)
Butter bean hummus and crudité
Rosemary focaccia bread and basil infused EVOO for dipping

Main Course

Shrimp burgers with pesto
Smoked turkey breast BLTs with arugula
Spring mix salad with herb vinaigrette
Black bean and corn salad

Desserts

Fresh fruit supplied by us
Whatever my guests bring

As planned I was at the gym and after warm ups did 3 rounds of:

Trap bar deadlifts
Bb flat bench presses
Weighted step ups
Bag cleans
TRX mid rows
Push ups

Dinner tonight is going to be leftovers from the last few days.

Obviously my posting of yesterday's menu was a cut and paste because I now know how the olives turned out. For those that liked olives they turned out great and they were consumed in mass quantities; for those that didn't care for olives they didn't touch them. Who knew olives were so divisive?

I walked about 1.5 miles round trip to meet a friend for breakfast. I had planned to go on a multi mile hike with my kids and dog this afternoon, but it's looking as if we're going to be hit with rain any minute so those plans have been scrapped. I'm not sure what I'll do to replace that activity, but regardless I plan on doing 50 pushups.

Dinner tonight is going to be a roasted pork and eggplant tomato based sauce served over cauliflower rice with a salad as the side.

I walked 5 miles today; it's exercise, but nothing impactful on my cardio system. :-(

I'm a little gun shy about posting about tonight's dinner since the last two days weren't close to what I thought they would be. On Tuesday instead of what I wrote in my previous post we had haddock that I marinated in the citrus marinade I used for the olives this past Sunday and served a salad on the side. Yesterday I took the roasted pork that was supposed to be eaten on Tuesday, ground it up, spiced it, and turned the result into patties that I pan seared and served a salad on the side.

If all goes according to plan tonight I'm going to make BBQ chicken thighs and serve a corn casserole as the side dish.

Just like last week's visit with my GP, what I heard from the kidney specialist was not what I was hoping for. It's my first time seeing him so it was a little hard to fully determine how he chooses his words, but my take away was that he's more concerned about the lab work than my GP was and his physical examination only exacerbated it. Like my GP he said that some of the readings were inconsistent with each. He wants me to have a CAT scan of my abdomen as well as additional blood and urine tests and we talked far too long, which means in my book anything longer than zero, about chronic kidney disease. WTF??! At this point he doesn't want me to make any dietary changes so I'll continue on my merry way.

To say I'm a bit shaken would be correct, but what's most important is how I'm going to deal with it. Firstly, I'm going to do all that was recommended and secondly I'm going to the gym this afternoon to punish some iron.

It's just me and my wife for dinner tonight; what I'll be cooking still needs to be decided.

Since my last post:

Yesterday we were at the gym in the morning and considering how I was feeling had a much better workout than anticipated. In the afternoon we took our dog on a walk of a few miles.

Dinner last night was St. Louis ribs. The side was a rice and spinach mixture.

This morning I had a solid workout. Five rounds of:

Standing Kb rows
Kb reverse lunges
Kb snatches with a squat
Pushups
Mountain climbers
Planks with alternating hip touches.

Our plans for the day are still undecided, in part because we're waiting to see what happens with the rain. If we're home I'm going to make beef with garlic and sherry with a side salad as well as textured vegetable protein (TVP).