Buckfever's General Progress Log

Hi Buck!

I’ve noticed that for the past few days, you’ve increased both the pressure and the repetitions of the VED protocol. Is there a specific reason for this change? As always, I want to give you my compliments and offer my support for your impeccable work!

I acquired tapered cylinders which is allowing more packing of the shaft and minimizing the darkening, so going back to 3 X 5 minute protocol at 1 notch below 5 in/hg that I had previously found led to a progression of expansion. I’m thinking to follow this until the progress plateaus and then drop to 2X5 minutes and explore increasing the pressure in increments. I definitely had found that the 3rd session at low pressure saw greater expansion. And still finding that presently.

12/25/2024

1.75"X9" tapered tube

5 minutes @ 4.375hg
2 minute rest
5 minutes @ 4.375 hg
2 minute rest
5 minutes @ 4.375 hg

4.375 = 7 notches

Tube down length position: 18.1 cm
Pack: 10.5 cm

A little more packing than yesterday and the length came right at the end.

I am feeling off, yesterdays function went late didn’t eat dinner till 8 p.m., feeling bloated and dehydrated if that makes any sense.

Yesterdays activity level:

30 minutes on the Elliptical with the 40lb vest, highest incline. highest resistance. This is close to maxed out now probably need to move to the treadmill and max out the incline and then increase the speed to make it hard enough

Weighted Pullups +10lbs X 2 X 8sets
Overhead Press 70lbs X10, 8 X 6sets
Upright rows 60X8,7,6,6,7,7,7
Dumbbell External rotation 1lb 20X 7 sets Just a rehab movement.

We got some good work in yesterday. I’m thinking about this being a 100 day commitment to progress safely, with the primary objective being not getting hurt. After which understanding that what ever strength and size is acquired has to be maintained for a time so that it sticks and doesn’t fall right off. That’s the long run journey.

We will get some good work in this morning but 2 more drawn out functions today and a good bit of travelling.

Weight: 183.8 @ 19.3%

Not happy about the weight. After the workout I was feeling depleted so broke the fast and had a sandwich. Was on point otherwise. Today is going to be key, it’s a luncheon and a dinner, very easy to blow it. My strategy is protein and salad.

And three more functions next week. And then it tapers off with one in January and one in February. I’ve declined 2 more already and plan on declining everything henceforth. This is just too much. And I need to make getting fit a priority, to say nothing of needing to carve out more time for intimacy. Oh and leisure, what’s that?

12/26/2024

1.75"X9" tapered tube

5 minutes @ 4.375hg
2 minute rest
5 minutes @ 4.375 hg
2 minute rest
5 minutes @ 4.375 hg

4.375 = 7 notches

Tube down length position: 18.1 cm
Pack: 10.2 cm

Less expansion with todays session.

Weight: 183 @ 19.2%

Stuck to the plan fairly well during the functions yesterday. Pushed water all day. Even just tasting the sweets I noticed my blood sugar would spike which has me thinking I need to pull back the sugar further.

Yesterday activity level: Nothing. Was planning on a robust morning of lifting but when I got down there was not feeling well and decided a day of rest would serve me better. Will get back on it today.

Saw the guy that I do the hill with and he’s on board for Sunday mornings after the winter, so will migrate to deadlifts on Wednesdays and the sledding hill with the weighted vest on Sundays. And Sunday, Wednesday and Fridays will alternate upper body workout A and B. And will incorporate the morning and evening walks on the off days. So next years plan for the summer cut is forming.

Right now 100 days of strength.

Need to work on the intimacy.

How often are you checking your blood sugar?

It’s supposed to spike after eating sugar. Then it should come back down fairly linearly over the next couple of hours and return to normal.

Not all carbs are metabolized at the same speed, and that varies a lot between individuals, too.

Current thinking is that spikes aren’t a problem (unless you’re seriously diabetic) as long as they return to normal in a reasonable time.

Haven’t checked recently. A1c has generally been around 5.6.

12/26/2024

Todays Work:

Deadlifts: 145 X 10 X 10 sets

rest

Weighted Pushups, 40lb vest: 5 X 7 sets

T-bar rows: 95lbs X12 X 4sets,10,10,12,12

Curls 65lbs X 5,5,6,5,5,6,6

Rest

Cardio:

Elliptical - 25 minutes

Stretching.

Pushing water, chill day, trying not to blow it on the consumption. Upper body strength seems like it’s rebounding. Sandbagging a little, it’s coming up I don’t want to push it.

You can get a box of test strips for under $5. The usual test interval is 20 minutes or 30 minutes, depending on the doc.

12/27/2024

1.75"X9" tapered tube

5 minutes @ 4.375hg
2 minute rest
5 minutes @ 4.375 hg
2 minute rest
5 minutes @ 4.375 hg

4.375 = 7 notches

Tube down length position: 18 cm
Pack: 10.4 cm

A little less length a little more packing than the day before.

Weight: 182.6 @ 19.2%

As long as we’re drifting down.

Slept well after the robust activity level. Thinking I don’t get enough physical activity. The three days that I do not go into the office, those mornings I’m going to set aside for exercise. That’s 2 hours of work but I need to spread it out so I’ll start at 6:30 and get it done by 11. It would be good to get in more days and on the weeks that I get more days off I will, but this 2 hours 3 days a week is something I can carve out for sure. So will go with that.

Noticed also that I am pushing food a little bit. That is eating slightly larger quantities than I need to out of habit, so I am using the food scale to pull things back a little. Nothing major, but for instance 7 ounce turkey burgers were too much and yesterday I did 6 ounce and that seemed to be a better amount.

Satisfied but not full is what I’m going for.

EQ is pretty good still not enough intimacy though.

I have a tester somewhere I have to dig it up.

I buy Mrs. Andy’s test strips at the local Kroger pharmacy. They have packages with a meter and strips for $15.

She has a collection of meters, some of which she got "for free." I think one of them was through her health insurance, and the others were some strip manufacturer deal with the pharmacy; like the days when Gillette used to give razor handles away to generate a market to sell their blades.

Okay 106, 1 hour after dinner. I don’t think I have a problem, I just felt the spike after the sweets, I’ll test some more though.

I suspect your pancreas is just fine.

12/28/2024

1.75"X9" tapered tube

5 minutes @ 4.375hg
2 minute rest
5 minutes @ 4.375 hg
2 minute rest
5 minutes @ 4.375 hg

4.375 = 7 notches

Tube down length position: 18.3 cm
Pack: 10.3 cm

A little less packing a little more length. One of the things that I am observing is that with the tapered tube the expansion seems to be getting there right at the end. So the greater constriction is impeding the rate of expansion. I imagine that things will go better with the 2" tapered tube but no hurry I want to fully pack this one.

Working half a day today and then a function this evening. Tomorrow is a free day we will get the full morning to work out. Tuesday New Years Eve there’s a function but the morning will be free and then New Years day there’s several functions and realistically even though the morning will be free, I imagine I will be wiped. I view this time period as simply hanging on trying to minimize the damage before we get to it on the flip side. There’s another function mid January and another in February and I’ve let it be known, that I will not commit to anything additional for the next 100 days while I prioritize my health.

Worked on priorities this morning which I periodically do and clearly defined the physical goals. And there is a definitive shift. Last year I was so busy and had such limited time that I decided to forgo the strength training and focus on cardio as I felt the long haul Covid had done a lot of damage there. But now what I really want is to try and rebuild the powerful lean physique that I used to have to whatever extent is possible at this age. That is my No.1 priority.

At no.2 is my sex life. There is no doubt that I have let that slide way down the roster, so today I started to think about who I was and who I want to be when it comes to sex. Getting as granular as I can as far as the kind of sex I want to have and the kind of attitude I want to bring to it. It’s almost unbelievable to me that I let it fall off, bit I did.

As far backing off on work that seems to be solved, through no fault of my own. The scheduler wants time off to travel to see her granddaughter and has agreed to block my schedule when she’s out of the office and surprisingly no push back from anyone on that arrangement. Human beings are very interesting. This authority was embraced as it was perceived as imparting a higher status within the team. Beautiful, as long as I get the time off.

Yesterday I was largely on point with the meal plan, BUT it felt like I was pushing food out of habit. So I’ll continue the process of gradually pulling it back.

Added 25 minutes on the Elliptical this morning. Was reading that 150 minutes of aerobics per week is recommended, so that’s 6 X 25 minutes so we should do that as well.

Saw a friend/client this morning and she revealed to me that she married 2 years ago, third marriage and says it’s not going so well and she’s starting to wonder if she’s well suited for it. Thinks that maybe she’s been operating based on some kind of adherence to convention.

Intelligent woman finishing up her PhD. Says it troubles her that she seems to always be late in her revelations. Told her we all do that, hopefully we learn from it but yeah somethings are unbelievable about ourselves. I told her that in my experience relationships based on compromise always fail even if people stay in them. She agreed saying that 50-50 is not something she can do anymore.

I wonder what she’ll do.