Fair. 
Ha!
But when you think about it, muscle gives us a lot of leeway. You can get away with so much when carbs are preferentially stored as glycogen rather than fat.
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I like this approach. Once you have the basics covered, there’s no need to count calories and get obsessive, especially if you’ve already had that experience and learned what you needed from it.
I have a body fat range too, and it’s just an eyeball test. If what I see in the mirror is getting near the top of that range, it’s pretty easy to make minor adjustments and tighten back up to a comfortable level.
Funny, Dani and I have this conversation often. We don’t really “diet,” but to the average person we’re “on a diet” just because we avoid obvious junk food and have some basic healthy-eating principles in place. Like recently, someone brought a homemade pie to the office and offered me some. I said no thanks and got kind of a funny look, so I told her that I don’t eat things with added sugar.
To many people, that’s an extreme “diet.” To me, it’s just normal. A “diet” to me is not buying almond butter!
BTW, Dani, we’re out of almond butter. I guess I’m not on a diet right now.
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I like Dr. Ken Berry’s answer to this.
“Oh, if I eat that I experience swelling”
Sure, its swelling of the gut and butt, but they don’t need to know that
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Not sure if youre joking here or not, but you have no idea how dangerously close to home that is haha
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@Chris_Shugart you look better now, man; very impressive.
@Matthew_Weeldreyer I do the exact same thing with my kids’ food! Weird that I had to adjust my lifting belt…
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Did ya fly on Sunday too?
Ugh, there’s nothing in the world as deceivingly exhausting as flying. You sit. You stand. You wait. You sit. You stand. You wait. Sometimes you have to run past 44 gates in 5 minutes because your boarding pass said B48 but your brain said B4 and you waited at the wrong gate for an hour and a half for no reason. Then you stand and wait again.
So much fun.
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I fly a lot for work, but not as much as I used to - I hear ya! It’s a pain. I’ve missed at least 3 or 4 flights this year, off the top of my head, where I was stuck overnight somewhere - super annoying!
And then somehow you can still talk to people… insanity!
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Home Again
So in a post above I wrote something about being chatty on planes and decided to amend that statement. It’s not that I force people to chat or even expect them to, but I do try to be warm. So if they feel like talking, I’m down. If they don’t, I’m down.
My last flight was silent because of exhaustion. So we said hello, then fell asleep. This is pretty weird when you think about it. Flying and kindergarten are the only contexts in which you take a nap with a stranger, and nobody thinks a thing of it.
Also, hot take here, but adults who need a snack and a juice box during a two hour flight are pretty funny.
Monday’s Workout
Superset
• T-Bar Row
• Lateral Raise
• Hammer Strength Chest Press
Compound Set
• Cable Row
• Arnold Press
• Bent Over DB Flye
• Dip
Great workout. Everything felt challenging and productive.
My friend Debbie came over during the lateral raises and asked if I could dog sit her 3-pound teacup yorkie next weekend. And honestly guys, this is going to sound crazy, but that house is too scary. It’s an estate. And I’m in the middle of a creepy book. There’s no freaking way I’d stay there alone. Chris and I can’t do it together because we have our own fur-faces to take care of, and one of us has to stay with them.
So I volunteered Chris to do it! And that means he’ll be changing doggy diapers next weekend. Hopefully I can get some pictures of that. I’ll drop them here if Chris lets me!
Solving the Blackout Mystery
Remember how I said that I’d black out between sets at the gym, and that it’d get worse the further the workout went? Well the problem was so easily fixable that I’m almost embarrassed to even write this.
Turns out – and this is still somewhat speculative – I had a low blood volume, and even when I drank a ton of water, it’d still pool in my lower legs and feet. The solution? Electrolytes. I needed salt!
So I started taking LMNT about a month ago, and the blackouts stopped around the same time. Easy peasy.
And this checks out, appetite-wise. Chris has always been astonished about how much salt I’d add to his cooking. It’s not that his food was bland, it’s that my body was telling me what nutrient it needed. Cravings are often functional.
What’s crazy is all the outdated nutrition advice that tells us to limit our salt intake. Rubbish. If you’re a lifter who avoids a lot of processed food, more salt may be exactly what you need.
I also suspect that people will keep eating food they crave, but don’t need, when their bodies are telling them to get more of a specific nutrient. How many times did I eat a handful of Siete Hint of Lime Chips, when I could’ve just drank some calorie-free electrolytes? (Best chips ever, no regrets.)
So that’s what happened. Don’t black out.
EDIT: Editing this to say that there may or may not be an electrolyte product in the works here, and if my boss makes it, you know it’ll be better than anything out there.
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Flying takes a level of fitness, physical and mental, that most people never consider. So I’m impressed by the fact that you travel so much and stay so fit. That’s amazing. Seriously, bravo!
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I was just joking!
That’s funny and true.
Exactly what my wife would do!
Awesome! Glad you worked it out!
This is a great point. Sometimes the answers are screaming at us and we just have to listen!
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I certainly appreciate it, but everyone has their burdens you know? When I’m on the road, I don’t also have to take care of a house, kids, etc. so there’s at least a little giveback there.
I’d also say maybe I periodize a bit… where I’m not exactly as fit when in really busy traveling seasons!
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Oh gosh! I wasn’t referring to your comment haha! I listened to a podcast this morning called, “Were You Raised by Wolves” and one of the topics was about how rude it is to be chatty on planes.
I love that show. It’s all about etiquette, and I could use some training in that area!
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I like her already!
Right? And I was silencing those screams with chips. LOL
So true!
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now I just need to work out what my body is missing that it makes me crave dark chocolate and cheese so much 
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Oh! Oh! I know! raises hand
Dark chocolate is dopaminergic! Dopamine isn’t the “love hormone” as people used to say. It’s actually the motivation hormone. It gives you drive. I’m just quoting Dr. Teta here, this is not my own knowledge lol.
He used to recommend adding a pinch of unsweetened cocoa to your coffee in the morning if you wanted the dopamine hit without the calories.
But super dark chocolate is now just a part of my diet. Calories shmallories.
Fun fact: Cocoa powder contains a tiny amount of copper, and if you accumulate too much of this element that’s supposed to be in the body in trace amounts, it can cause a seriously upset stomach. (been there!)
But that usually only happens if you’re OD-ing on tablespoons of pure cocoa powder.
Cheese is legitimately addictive. And if you’re gonna eat the cheese, you’ve gotta pay the tax.
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Well that makes me feel good about my occasional 2 squares of dark chocolate, thanks for that.
That video made me laugh hard. We fostered a Labrador puppy for Australian Border Force for 18 months during covid and he LOVED cheese.
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What a cutie pie! 
Got a favorite brand of chocolate? We’ve been buying these lately.
The 92% cocoa doesn’t taste sweet when you eat it by itself, but if you have it with black coffee (or unsweetened coffee with cream) it suddenly tastes sweet.
It’s also super good with a tsp of natural almond butter spread on top.
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Oh yes! That’s a great one too!
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Now I am sitting at work dreaming about chocolate. Thanks Dani. 
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