So for the last 6 months I’ve had this strange mental itch, and like a slow sunrise I am gradually becoming aware of what I am feeling. About a year ago I thinned out my closet; at some point afterwords I combed thru some stuff I had packed away in some boxes and responsibly did away with what was not necessary; finally, about last November my wife and I decided to try the Just-in-time principle to our food shopping and preparation.

From Wikipedia:

Just-in-time (JIT) is an inventory strategy that strives to improve a business’s return on investment by reducing in-process inventory and associated carrying costs

So how does this fit within the context of the household? ROI has increased as less food is wasted; purchasing less food has also reduced unhealthy snacking – we eliminated unhealthy food as it was not essential. The associated carrying costs can be seen in a cleaner kitchen, less garbage and overall less stress¹. As we move towards planning most food consumption, food preparation stress is way down. The raw numbers were eye opening; our budget of 500 Euros a month on food began to come in at around 250 Euros when we stuck strictly to JIT food purchasing and preparation.

Overall I have found that the idea to go JIT in areas of our household has been a reflection of my subconscious desire to live a more minimalist lifestyle. It is made largely possible because we live in an urban area with the support to buy things just-in-time: we have a bakery just outside our front door and a grocer one block away. And on Saturday mornings the local farmer’s market is three blocks up the street. Buy, prepare, store what we need for the week and do no more until it is needed.

It will be interesting to see where else we can apply this; as we live in an apartment with little storage space we tend not to hoard non-food goods that much. Except books! And that is where the Kindle makes for a great JIT book reading solution: finished your last great read? Poof! you have just downloaded the next one.

You can declutter; you can own less then 100 things; you can do less during your day.

All of this can contribute to a minimalist lifestyle, but it does not necessarily reflect a minimalistic worldview.

I think that many of the minimalism micro-movements that can be read about on various blogs and magazines are stopping short; it needs to go beyond lifestyle because indeed mother nature herself is a minimalist!

The message I read is that a minimalist lifestyle is for us, the souls that have been lost to the factory era and its super-consumerism long tail, when indeed it is ultimately the world that needs minimalism.

This is relevant and important, for me-focused minimalism shares that same quality with me-focused consumerism. I think minimalism is a great idea, will be a great lifestyle and needs to be an important worldview.

Update: in the minimalism of veganism, Leo Babauta does a good job of outlining how it fits in his world-view, not just his lifestyle.

January turned out to be a great month and February seems to have really taken off. It’s already the 2nd?

This will be a rather hasty post as the month is underway and I need to throw down some goals for the month here. In no particular order of importance…

1. I ran 14.5 hours in January and want to better that in February. Easily done with long runs but consistency was a real winner in January; so while I want to do some long runs I need to keep the consistency up. Max 5 rest days on the month will be the goal.
2. I have managed to keep the coffee machine away for all of 2010 and need to keep it that way. I also need to be sure and nap rather then use caffeine to get over tiredness.
3. I am going to strive to limit distractions. This is rather vague but the idea is something many at-home workers will be familiar with; I need to be sure that I am 98% focused to the task at hand. I have implemented some changes and I will write about this sometime closer to the end of the month.
4. This is a biggie: I want to strive to eat in the top-left hand of the graph on this page at least 70% of the time this month. This is a big ask and I’m not quite set up to track that yet, but we (my wife and I) have some ideas of how to do this.

I’m sure I have some other things that I am working on but for now I want to get this post up before the month rolls on too long; I’ll add anything else in to the month end wrap!

This little tool or tip has helped me to stay centered and focused at work and increased my productivity and satisfaction at the end of the day. I use it in front of the computer but with a few changes it can be used anywhere.

I found that while working in front of the computer I could be easily distracted from the task at hand, sometimes leading to a lack of focus and deadly procrastination.

There are ways to avoid those ends and the best manner to be aware of the problem and find solutions it to be, umm… aware of the problem. This of course requires focus, so I set about something that could work in a similar manner to how one uses their breath as a center when meditating.

The solution! A simple countdown timer

Okay, bear with me if this sounds lame; it works (boy I can really sell an idea, no?)

I installed an extension for Firefox called easyEggTimer. At the start of the day I open it with Alt-e and then Alt-e, set a time, say 15 minutes, and the timer pops up 15 minutes later.

Big deal?

I know it sounds simple, but the idea is that when the timer goes off, you can evaluate where you are, what you are doing and if you are lost in the unconscious wave of the stuff that a day in the office can bring along.

It is a simple pop up that forces you to stop, look around and get back on track if you find you are somewhere else.

I set it for 15 minute intervals and go with that unless I notice that I’m having a particularly un-centered day in which case I drop the reminders down to as little as 5 minutes until I get back on track. Other then turning off my bookmarks toolbar in Firefox, this has been the most productive change I have made on my computer in the last 6 months.

The food game seems so complicated at times; I get told by the trainers in the gym to eat more protein, by the mirror to eat less bread, and by books that animal protein causes cancer and that if I do eat protein, don’t mix it with carbohydrates (and by all means don’t eat refined flour based carbs). Wow, can someone just bring me a pizza?

Seriously though, after dealing with some health issues and reading the China Study (and taking a flexitarian approach to eating¹) I realized that the burden falls on our own shoulders to sort out what works for us when it comes to food and I decided to develop a framework of what works for me. The framework has but a few rules and it seems to me that by keeping it simple I save money and feel, look and perform healthier then ever².

First, the over simplified diagram of what I learned after spending 15 days on a fast, which was to eat most if not all of my food from the upper left part of the following image:

A non-scientific graph outlining our food choices from natural on the left to processed on the right and where these choices typically plot in terms of being healthy or unhealthy.

And so the simple rules:

• Eat most if not all of my food from the upper left part of the image above
• Avoid meat
• No refined sugar or flour
• No milk (I was never a big milk drinker)
• Avoid coffee unless it is necessary to use it as a stimulant
• Avoid alcohol

And that is it. There really isn’t much more to it. Eat as much un-to-low-processed food as you can, easy on the meat and by all means drop the refined flour and sugar. A simple, and actually rather inexpensive framework for eating that has worked for me. I will say that having a minor health issue and doing a 15 day fast is a great educator and motivator to get on a plan like this and in that sense it isn’t for everyone. Once on it, though, the results make it hard to stray back to poor eating.

Anyways, I’ll just repeat what the footnotes say: I’m not a doctor, always consult your doctor before doing anything like this. I certainly did!

This, the first month of 2010 marked the end of a loooong lasting relationship that I have had the pleasure of enjoying since sometime shortly after high-school.

It was a sad good-bye yet at the same time released a lot of stress. I had known for a long time that it was the right thing to do but was hooked. It was addictive and had become a habit in my life.

On the 30th of December, 2009, I unplugged, dismantled and washed my espresso machine. This was to be the last day that I would have wonderful shots of dark roasted coffee at my disposal.

I had dropped coffee on other occasions but slowly, as I would get worn out or whatnot, I would let it back into my life until it was sitting there on my desk working away the days by my side.

The thing that made the decision easy was not the bad health issues that coffee has – there are just as many good side effects reported about coffee.

What did it for me were three things:

1. The munchies: Most often associated with another habit/addiction, I have confirmed this problem with other coffee drinkers. You have a coffee on your desk, and beside it a pastry or some other food as an accompaniment. For me this was the norm.
2. Bonking: The word refers to the event when your blood sugar runs dangerously low and you get lethargic, shaky and pretty cranky. I found this was an issue while on coffee, a non issue off of coffee.
3. My son: At the end there my 2 year old son would climb up his step-ladder in the kitchen, turn to me a say “cafe?” He loved to work the buttons on the machine and also to have a sniff when it was done. A several-espresso-per-day father is not the type of leadership I want to provide my son.

Interestingly enough I stuck by coffee not only because I love the flavor but as an endurance junkie it is supposed to help the body tend towards burning fat rather then blood glucose. Great for putting in long miles. Unfortunately I found myself eating more crap with my coffee and unintentionally ensuring that I had fat to burn off.

I have had a couple of coffees this month; bought from bakeries or whatnot, this was me using it as a tool when needed. It is a stimulant and funny enough I find that it works better in this regard if you don’t drink it 24/7. Ironically one of the reason’s I was drinking it was to get me thru a long working and family day and in the end it really wasn’t that effective. Now when I am tired I nap¹ and when I really need it I get an espresso after lunch but am careful not to dig myself too much sleep-debt from using this crutch too often.

And so the end of January 2010 marks the breaking of the habit and a bittersweet goodbye. I do miss a nice dark roasted coffee, but the health and leadership benefits greatly outweigh the enjoyment of a shot ².

Okay, so this was more surprising to me then to anyone else as I didn’t share any resolutions with folks this year.

Anyways, it just so happens that Gordo Byrn¹ was running a mini run camp for the month of January and I decided to give it a go. It was open to the public and was sort of a mini competition in the same vain, I think, as his Epic camps (though far, far less Epic). You received a point for every run you did over 30 minutes. You could do a max of 2 runs per day. There were also bonus points for consecutive runs, and the only one I really cared about was the 30 bonus points for running 30 days straight.

Now, I normally do not like writing about my workouts. I once had a “blog about multisports” and never once wrote there about my training. This however, is a little different. The mini run camp was an intense experiment for me; I hadn’t run more then 5 days a month in the last 6 months prior to January.  I was lucky that in December I had run about 6 times and also had some great leg workouts in the gym and so this is for me, given my prep for it, was a mini Epic run camp. Blogging about it should be good fodder for comparison down the road if he does it again (please do!).

January 1-10th

So I got sick just at the end of 2009, for the first time in about a year and a half. A cold really put a damper on my energy levels but the good news is that my wife kicked me out of bed because my congested self began to snore and wake her and my son up (he tends to sleep with us). I actually slept better on our couch knowing that I was not going to wake them up so this seemed to help for recovery.

Things went well and I ran only once a day and just over the 30 minute limit. I saw little improvement in this time and gradually developed soreness in my quads.

January 11th-20th

During the beginning of this period I was really starting to get tired in my legs and running lethargically. Contrary to what my body was saying something else inside me really wanted to get in a double (two runs on the same day) so that I could pop a little distance in between myself and the others that were singling every day. So on the 12th and the 15th I managed to get in some doubles, bracketing a workout at the gym each time. I find that running on either side of a gym workout is the most efficient time solution as it reduces the shower cost of doubling as well as leverages the trip to the gym as a run.

Due to tiredness in my legs and some tinges of tendinitis in my left knee/quad, I did a few runs exclusively in the park next to our place, the dirt trails being more forgiving on the limbs then asphalt.

I developed a real thirst for fresh squeezed orange juice early in this phase and it continued right thru. Hydration is not an issue for me as I drink a good 4-5 liters of water a day, however my nutrition, or better, food intake may have been a bit low. I eat well – mostly raw and vegetarian – but likely needed to increase intake as I had a day, the 17th I believe, where I ran, ate lots of food, napped and then ate again.

Near the end of this phase, having taken a few midday naps to try and increase recovery and reduce fatigue, I noticed that I was running stronger ². I had also begun to stretch my hips a bit more and after a day or two the slightly increased fitness and looser hips seem to have a nice effect on lengthening my stride. I doubled on the 19th.

I also started to train with food in my stomach during this phase, varying from a half to a whole banana plus water.

January 21st- end of the month

This is where the wheels fell of the cart. Just at the end of the last bit (18th and 19th) I put in two doubles which allowed me to be sitting with a comfortable shot at finishing 3rd overall in points³.

On the evening of the 22nd it was getting late and I was feeling out of sorts, kinda tired. I decided to have a nap (at 10pm!) hoping that would give me the juice to head out and run for 30 minutes. When I woke up I knew I was sick. It turns out that I contracted a virus that had been going around. I skipped the run, had a violent sleep and did not manage to get a run in again until the 26th. This of course ruined any chance of the 30 day bonus and consigned me to finishing somewhere in the low 20’s.

Take stock and adjust

As with any endurance event you have to be able to take stock and adjust when things go south, and this is what I did. It was clear that I was slowly running the tank dry and so after the violent virus I took it easy and coasted in to the end of the month. I missed the goal of 30 consecutive days but happily managed to get in the most volume I have had running in a 30 day period for a very long time ⁴.

The road ahead will be interesting. For those who speak the lingo I’ll be spending much of the year in a prep period as I get myself back in shape to train. The trick now will be to increase my volume and keep an eye on fatigue as I look to be able to hold 20-25 hours of running per month. We’ll see how it goes.

There once was a boy a lot like other boys.

He played sports, games, played with his friends, watched TV and surfed the interwebs.

He finished high-school, and went to University.

There he studied, played sports, partied and had a great time. He would cram for exams with friends, eat bad food and drink lots of coffee.

He lived with friends, got a job, worked, came home, dated girls and hung out at home with his buddies.

They watched hockey (we’re talking about Canadians, eh?) and drank beer and ate chips and other crappy food. They would eat out a lot.

He liked to swim and run and bike, and so he did an IronMan race, which had the added benefit that he could eat a lot more food. (Pastries included!)

Then he met the girl. They moved in together and sure, although he had developed some poor eating habits over the years, he ate healthy.

I mean, he would eat vegetables and fruits that have antioxidants!

Then one day he had a pain in his big toe. It really hurt at 1 in the morning and only felt better if he cut it off held it high in the air over his head.

Its hard to live like that and so the boy went to the doctor who told him he had a gout attack! You know, that thing old people complain about? ¹

Say what?

It was hard to run. That big toe was not quite the same afterwords.

So the boy, worried that this would get worse or be a problem again – I mean he ate healthy and was struck down by an ‘old persons’ problem and he was young!

Anyways, the boy, he took matters into his own hands. He decided not to eat.

You see not eating allowed his body to flush out his blood, to clean out the gout.

Not eating was great! After a few days hunger was no longer an issue (though it sure was cold.)

Not only that, but sleep was more restful and he needed less!

And a funny thing happened. The boy noticed just how much food had transformed from something that gave him energy into a habit.

He noticed how often a cracker here, a cookie there and “a glass of orange juice ’cause I’m procrastinating” happened. (What, oj is healthy food!)

Food had become a habit. He was amazed at how big that habit had become and that the habit… was holding him back.

But back to the fast. After 15 days without a bite of food, his body kindly asked for something to eat.

And so the boy gave it food. And he found that while eating much less food then before he was able to sustain himself for the day.

Strange. He was more or less the same person. Minus 10 or 12 pounds.

So he ate and slept less yet felt more rested and was less tired during the day.

And this is the story of how a boy transformed his relationship with food.

The End.

The man knows how to take the thoughts that are in my head and crystallize them into engaging prose.

In Why write a book? this magician, Seth Godin, managed to explain some of the misgivings that I have about writing this blog ¹ and at the same time re-enforce to me the reasons why it is 1. good to write and 2. good to write and publish your work.

Granted, he is talking about a book but on the face of it he is talking about writing. Writing organizes your thoughts, which is a great thing. But anybody can write in a diary so why blog? Myself I prefer to write in electronic form to have something that is both searchable and up-datable. So why not write a private blog?

Lets go back a minute

I have another blog that I began writing back in 2004. I really enjoyed that experience as it allowed me to participate in an early, budding “web developer blogging community” of sorts and it allowed me to “meet” a lot of people in our industry as we commented on each others blogs and shared ideas.

Back then there were not that many blogs and there were certainly not that many people reading them. This helped ease my nervousness about publishing my thoughts and ideas in public but nonetheless I was always a little scared each time I published a post. And here is where Seth’s post comes in again, where he states:

I published a book today. My biggest and most important and most personal and most challenging book. A book that scared me.

I’ll admit that it was easier to write on my web dev blog because that niche was not very big. Here on my personal blog, my writing may not be so niche; the thoughts and ideas I share may be applicable and open to scrutiny to a wider audience. That scares me. This is a good thing. And so is the possibility of finding like minded and un-like minded people to build a community of peers. So today Seth Godin, and writing this post, helped me to define why I blog.

Now it’s time to start hitting the Publish button instead of Save Draft.

Merry Christmas! Here I am up before the rest of the crew looking to work out something that has been lurking in my life for a long time.

While Christmas shopping the last few days, I have been haunted by the thought of stuff. For years I have felt bothered by the amount of stuff available to us. For whatever reason this bother I have felt has been growing of late and, somewhat fittingly, I have decided this Christmas morning to commit to a great purge of my own personal collection of stuff.

The week that follows Christmas is known by some as ketchup week, and I will be using the ketchup week of 2009 to take the big box from my son’s largest present to collect all of my kipple and other belongings and begin a serious shedding of materialistic weight.

I have a bit of a head start in that when I moved to Spain in 2002 I came over with my road bike and a big duffel bag and that was it. I left some belongings back in storage in Canada but the bulk of that is taken up by a dinner table and futon plus gear for a small apartment (kitchen stuff and a few other essentials). Since I have come here I haven’t bought up too many things other then clothes and books. Unfortunately kipple – by definition – just seems to happen.

Some ideas as I get started:

• Only two large towels and two hand towels for me.
• Shoes is a tough category, I have a business pair, then casual, a pair for running, cycling and then hiking boots. This seems like a good limit I guess.
• Books: I have a large collection of unread books in my house and recently bought a Kindle. I will not buy another paper book unless its a must read and not available on the Kindle. I have a large enough backlog as it is, if its not yet digital and I don’t have to read it now I can wait until it becomes available in digital format.

Okay, time to get to work. I think I will update this post as the process unfolds during the week.

Update (16/01/2010): I’m still sorting out my stuff. I have been acutely impaired by the fact that little of it consists of personal items, but rather more household items. A bit harder to deal with as it involves not just myself but my wife and son. I think I will post a summary once this process is completed.