To Fast or Not Too Fast

Medium difficulty post hole digging for shed

Yesterday I mentioned the plateau I had reached in weight loss and mentioned my plateau busting method of fasting from dinner Thursday to dinner Friday or about 24 hours. I find myself torn about whether to continue this because so many recent studies seem to show that fasting is not effective for weight loss due to the tendency to over consume upon conclusion of the fast. My personal experience is that, yes, I do eat a bit more after a fast, but it still results with a daily calorie consumption at least 30% below normal daily calorie intake. My only quibble or problem with that is that the method I use results in finishing the fast on a Dinner meal which means I've thrown a lump of consumables in my gut that may not have time to be fully processed by my normal 10 p.m. bedtime and thus may contribute to nighttime gut junk.

I didn't fast today because, at least for today, I broke through the plateau with a 2 lb drop (187.5). Fasting is hard so I'm not too fast to fast. I have a pet theory, probably perused on one site or another, that fasting could be beneficial because we continually consume food that contains all kind of stuff, some of which may not be the greatest for our bodies to process. Thus I look at a fast as a way to give my body a break from intake of those potentially less than healthy materials. I don't know that 24 hours is long enough to purge much of anything, but I am the master of my own beliefs and I'll cling to this belief that fasting provides a potential cleansing effect until something scientifically based convinces me to change my outlook.

Another 25 minute walk today with the 16 session KB strength exercises. I completed the workout but was a bit sweaty and drained afterwards.

About the photo - I've had the occasion to dig some 40+ post holes on The Gruene Weide of which there were three ways to dig post holes. The easiest was when a neighbor brought in his tractor with a post hole auger that knocked out holes with no more effort than my placing the auger bit at the hole location and stepping back. For most of the holes for fence building and shed building I rented a power auger which does take a bit of effort to operate as it takes application of physical weight to facilitate faster digging and there's a lot of muscle power required to resist the torque of the bit wanting to spin instead of penetrate soil. There's quite a bit of strength conditioning involved with hand operated motorized augers. Finally, there's been a good half-dozen holes which were dug with post-hole diggers. That's the heavy duty hole digging method and darn good cardio exercise.