i've increased calories by 250 to reach 2750-3000 calories a day. i think 2750 is my new maintenance calorie level; 2250 + 500 for working out. it used to be 2500 + 500 when i was heavier. i've been keeping sugars between 5 and 10%, fat at 20%, protein just over 250 grams, and carbs over 300 grams. even though i'm just now reaching a surplus, i've re-gained about 5 lbs this last month to reach 203 lbs bodyweight. so i'm not sure what is going on? maybe my caloric requirements are even lower than i'm estimating, or i'm counting calories incorrectly, or my body is just storing water weight and glycogen (from the extra carbs). i guess i could be gaining muscle and/or fat already too. at least my bodyfat measurements have stayed about the same, so that is good. the problem is both my bodyweight and fat percentage measurements have become less consistent (happened the last time i tried bulking too). my measurements are much more consistent when cutting. as far as muscle, which is the goal; my upper body (chest, shoulders, traps) look visibly larger. there are moments when my strength returns too. i.e. i managed the 130 lb dumbbells on bench, although i'm still just under 315 lbs on straight bar bench for 5 reps (previous norm). for measurements, my chest and belly increased, and calves decreased. damn you calves. been lifting them regularly, and they just wont grow. they are showing a decent amount of definition, which is kind of cool, but i wish they would start growing.

for nutrition, i keep making changes. been using a food scale, to re-learn portion sizes ... because the portion sizes that restaurants use are ridiculous. Target just started carrying stevia, so i've been trying that in tea. also started making no-bake protein bars (oats, protein powder, natural peanut butter, fat free sugar free jello packet, water). when cutting, i like the 'pure protein' bars you can get at retail. they have a good mix of fat/protein/carbs, are low sugar, low GI, taste decent, and come in smaller 50 gram bars. but i want more carbs for bulking, and most everything else has too much sugar. by making my own, i can make the nutrition profile to suit exactly what i need. finally, i just started messing with my cheat food ... chocolate. honestly, i didnt realize that most everything was chocolate-flavored sugar. so far, i've only made chocolate almonds (100% bakers cocoa with chopped almonds). that is high fat with no sugar, and gives me another option to get some good fats when i'm under the 20% mark. hopefully that will appease the choco cravings, and the bitterness will keep me from going crazy and eating it all at once.

ignored the ConvertGram() method from SAPI 5.2. it looks like that method just converts the CFG format into a byte stream format that Speech Server can load quicker. maybe CFG+? ... just uneducated guessing. regardless, that method call is not necessary, so i went back to changing the dependencies to SAPI 5.3. one method call was giving me problems, because the old code was passing String.Empty, but the new method was failing until i passed in null instead. that was found through trial and error. mostly error. it looks like its now processing the n-gram correctly. but now its failing on save ...

eva uses large n-grams for music searches. these n-grams are pre-generated from a music library because they take a long time to build. the problem is MS does not programmatic APIs to build these grammars. they only provide APIs for GRXML. so i have to manually use graphical tools to build them. or i have to deploy dev tools to eva's server, and then i could automate the build process. but i really just want an API. the other option is to use the System.Speech.GrammarBuilder to programmatically create a grammar at runtime that behaves like an n-gram. i do this for audio books. the problem is its slow. it takes over a minute to build the audio book grammar, and that grammar is much smallar than my music grammars.

using Reflector, I've found the class Microsoft.SpeechServer.GrammarTools.GrammarBuilder. it takes a TrainingSet and outputs a byte []. the TrainingSet is just an object representation of what the conversational grammar builder uses. so i can programmatically create a TrainingSet object, populate it with text samples, and call BuildCFG. save the byte stream to a .cfg file and it loads in System.Speech.SpeechRecognitionEngine and works! ... it's an n-gram. so that gives me an API on my dev machine. the problem is it uses Interop.SdkSpeechLib, which i can grab from \windows\assembly. but it depends on a COM lib from SpeechServer ... which would entail deploying Speech Server to eva's server. which i really dont want to do because eva uses System.Speech. so i decompiled Microsoft.SpeechServer.GrammarTools and tried building it against an Interop.SpeechLib COM wrapper which depends on SAPI 5.3 (Vista). that took a while, and i can almost get it to work, except for this version of SAPI is missing the command ConvertGrammar ... which sounds important. anyway, i have to try skipping that call and seeing if it really is important. the other option is to try installing UCMA 2.0 SDK to eva's server, which installs a server version of SAPI, and see if Interop.SdkSpeechLib will reference that. serious pain ...

i eat all day. as soon as i wake up and right before bed. many small meals keep your metabolism going and help avoid an insulin spike. my 3 types of meals are : protein shake, snack, and more traditional meals. meals range from 250-400 calories, snacks are 150-250, and protein shakes are about 100. so i'll get calories every 2 hours. but the real goal is to not go more than 3 hours without eating. also, meals are scheduled around working out, so i have a morning and afternoon workout schedule. these schedules are the same for cutting and bulking, i just eat less calories when cutting.

8am protein shake
9am meal
10am pre-workout drink
-morning workout
12pm post-workout drink and protein shake
1pm meal
3pm snack or protien shake
5pm meal
6:30pm protein shake
8pm meal
10pm snack
12am protein shake
-sleep

8am protein shake
9am meal
12pm meal
2pm protein shake
4pm meal
5pm pre-workout drink
-afternoon workout
7pm post-workout drink and protein shake
8pm meal
10pm snack
12am protein shake
-sleep

wanted to test eva's reliability, so i've been running the same version uninterrupted for the last month ... and it worked. the alarm woke me up each day, appointments have been announced, and it never crashed. the only problem is i've got some small memory leaks from all the DirectShow usage. it's a serious pain to find these leaks.

over the last month of testing, i've mainly just been making small tweaks on my dev instance of eva. most of the changes have been to provide more verbal feedback, to tip me off when a false positive has occurred. and the URL changed for streaming C89.5, so now i have feedback for when a stream fails to play ... instead of just sitting there thinking its taking a really long time to buffer ... sitting in silence ... like an idiot. one of the new features i'm working on is unit conversions (e.g. pounds to kilograms). there have been a number of times when i've needed to perform a unit conversion in the kitchen.

used to just browse the aisles and look for keywords like 'low fat', 'high fiber', 'healthy', etc... except those products are typically good in one aspect, but then poor in another. e.g. low fat foods typically have alot of sugar. now i ignore the marketing and go straight to the nutrition label. first, i steer towards unprocessed foods. next, i check to make sure the serving size is not deceptive. then i check to make sure sugars and sodium are low. sugar should be around 3 grams or less, 5 grams max. i'll also look at the ingredient list to limit sugar substitues : splenda, sucralose, aspartame, high fructose corn syrup. sodium should be less than 100 milligrams. although some of my protein and workout drinks are closer to 200, and my cottage cheese has about 400. supposedly there is low sodium cottage cheese, but its not available where i shop. those 2 reguirements (sugar and sodium) quickly rule out most products. then i'll look at carbs, protein, and fat. the percentage of each depends on when i'll be eating the food. i want more carbs early in the day, and steer towards more protein later in the day. the amount of fat depends on if its a good or bad fat. e.g. any trans fat is out. but i have some wiggle room here because i generally have to supplement good fats to get over 20% per day, which is needed to avoid going cataolic. for now, i ignore fiber, potassium, and cholesterol values. one value i need to look into is sugar alcohols ... not entirely sure what that is? finally, i might look at the ingredient list again. if the ingredient list is long, with names i cannot pronounce, then i'll put it back.

finished a 2nd week of bulking. calories have been around 2750, which should be at maintenance level. bodyweight got up to 201, but is back to 200, and bodyfat percentage is still 10%. visibly, i think my muscles look slightly fuller, from the extra calories/carbs; and i have more energy for lifting, so strength is slowly increasing. the bad news is my appetite is also increasing. i feel hungrier than when i was cutting, so i'm having to restrain myself from really packing away the calories and bulking too fast. going to wait a couple days before adding 250 calories ... or hold off til next weekend.

i can generally find something healthy (or at least decent) when eating out, IF the restaurant provides nutrition info. i'll check online first. if they dont have any, then i contact them through email. others provide partial nutrition info, for the stuff they think is healthy ... so i want these to provide the entire menu. the other pain is the ones that provide the individual ingredients (e.g. for a burrito), but dont provide a web app to help you calculate the total. i'll write and complain to these sites as well. sometimes you can find a 3rd party nutrition site that has calculated the nutrition info for popular items. if i still go to one of those restaurants, and i know their website was lacking, then i'll ask them for nutrition info when i get to the restaurant. sometimes that'll bring the manager out so i can ask them directly, to put it on their radar. anyway, it shouldn't be this difficult. i think New York recently voted to require calorie info on menus ... that needs to catch on.

bulking is my element. to gain muscle, you need to perform the core lifts : bench, squat, deadlift. these core lifts are what release testosterone. i'll bench and squat year round, but i despise deadlift, so it gets saved for when i feel like some masochism. today was heavy leg day, so i busted it out, and it tore me down. its one of those workout sessions where you have to use both handrails to get down the stairs, and you have to contemplate if you're legs will hold out for the drive home. then its time for recovery. although the 'bodybuilding for endomorphs' says to avoid dextrose and high carbs such as waximaize, i'm going to ignore that on heavy days. so i took a full scoop of waximaize post workout ... 40 grams of quick carbs ... AWESOME! after 11 months of a carb deficit, i can basically feel my muscles healing. serious endorphin high ... this is why i'm addicted to workout out. next time though, i should probably split the waximaize dose up for pre and post workout (20 grams each). i also have to avoid overtraining, because i'll crave this feeling, so its easy for me to start working out too much, instead of giving myself time to heal.

finished my first week of bulking. weight started at 218, then it steadily increased to 220, so i was going to leave calories between 2250 and 2500. this was confusing to me, because 2500 calories should still be a deficit, or at least maintenance. my only guess is that my body is storing away extra water and glycogen from the increased carbs, because my bodyfat percentage was staying just at 10%. well, i woke up today back at 218, so i'll increase calories by 250 for 2500 to 2750 a day. i'll probably shoot for 2750 on heavy days, and 2500 on light days. maybe 2250 on my day off.

what i eat throughout a day has slowly been changing over the last year. i'm getting to the point where i eat mostly like a bodybuilder. its radically different than how i ate over a year ago.

waking up - Syntha 6 protein shake. this supplement has protein, carbs, and fat; since my body is starving after 8 hrs of sleep. the only thing i dont like about it is that it has Splenda, but its about the only protein drink i want in the morning.
breakfast - grits with egg whites / egg beaters OR oatmeal with whey protein. for fats i either eat some almonds or add some almond / peanut butter to the oatmeal.
pre workout drink - no-xplode or gaspari superpump 250. sometimes i'll take Animal Cuts as a thermogenic.
post workout drinks - Cell Mass mixed with berries. 15 minutes later i'll have a protein drink.
lunch - usually grilled chicken from Subway, roast beef or turkey from Firehouse, or tuna from Potbelly. wheat bread, without cheese, without sauce, and with all the veggies. these sandwiches have alot of sodium, so i could improve here by eating at home. e.g. some lean meat with a complex carb like sweet potatoes or brown rice.
mid day snack - this changes based on what i'm doing. if i'm cutting, it will just be a protein drink. if i'm bulking, i can mix in oats or fruit. add some almonds for fat. sometimes i have a protein bar.
afternoon meal - lean meat and mixed veggies. almonds for fat. lean meats include chicken, turkey, beef, fish, shrimp.
dinner - lean meat and mixed veggies. almonds for fat.
night time snack - low fat cottage cheese or low fat yogurt.
before bed - casein protein drink. need this to get me through 8 hrs of sleep.
liquids - throughout the day i drink water, decaf coffee, decaf tea, BCAAs drink, greens drink. every once in a while i'll have an 8 oz decaf and diet soda. all of which are 0 or low calories.

i've been doing some more reading and have decided to follow this plan : bulking for endomorphs. this plan should help me minimize fat gain, and there are only small changes to my current plan. first, i'll limit complex carbs to breakfast, pre and post workout, and also lunch. i'll have to switch to getting more fibrous carbs from veggies. another change will be to get some good fats every meal to help with insulin levels. i've generally been doing this already, but this provides some reasoning behind it. i was also going to try a waximaize supplement post workout, as a carb boost, but this article says it might not be necessary for my body type. i've already been avoiding high dextrose post workout drinks, just to keep sugar intake low. on off days, i will reduce calories. finally, i will only add more calories when weight gain stalls. hopefully that will maximize lean muscle gain. if not, its easy to add more carbs.

started too fat - started at about 15 or 16% last time. above 12 or 14%, you'll likely gain more fat than muscle. starting at lower bodyfat percentages, i have a better chance of gaining more muscle vs fat. at that time, i should have done a maintenance month instead.

did not slowly add calories - by going from a 500 caloric reduction to a 500 surplus, my body could not keep up, so it switched to storing fat.

too much protein - at that time, my percentages were 20% fat, 40% protein, 40% carbs. so i would get more than 1.5x of protein grams per bodyweight in lbs. thats more protein than i needed.

not enough carbs - needed the extra carbs for energy and recovery.

too much sugar - from fruits, dairy, and a sugary post workout drink. going to cut out the sugar substitute products too.

didnt train heavy enough - tried lifting 10-12 reps when i had more calories. instead i should have been lifting 5-8 reps, and saved the higher reps when on a caloric deficit.

way too much sodium - was probably getting about 7.5 grams, or 3x what i need.

not enough water - was getting too much caffeine at the time, and that was dehydrating me.

my body type is a mix of meso- and endo-morph, so i can gain weight (either muscle or fat) easy. the problem is most bulking articles are written for ectomorhps (hardgainers), so i have to be careful. for nutrition, i'll have to keep eating clean. i wont have any cheat days and alcohol stays off the menu. if i dont eat clean, and just eat regular, then i'd probably gain too much fat. i've been at a 500-750 calorie deficit, so i'm increasing to maintenance by adding 250 calories each week. it'll take 3 weeks to reach maintenance, then i move to surplus calories. with a surplus, i'll add 250 calories every 2 weeks. chances are that i can only go 500 to 750 calories over maintenance. so i'll weigh and measure bodyfat percentage everyday to make sure that my bodyfat percentage isnt increasing too fast. for bodyweight, i only want to gain 1 (max 2) lbs a week. if i start gaining too quickly, then i'll reduce calories. and if my bodyfat percentage were to get to 12%, then i'd start transitioning back to a caloric reduction for another cutting phase. the additional calories will come mostly from carbs for energy and recovery. fat will be kept at 20% throughout, while protein will only be slightly over my bodyweight in grams. carbs will start about 40% and might increase to 50% when at a surplus. so i'll always get more carbs than protein. supplements stay the same, the only difference is i might switch to some protein drinks that include more carbs. lifting will be heavy weight at 5 to 8 reps. tempo will be quicker contraction and slower return. the schedule is 5 days on, 1 day off, to allow for more time to heal major muscle groups. cardio will be reduced to every other day. time will be limited to under 30 minutes, and primarily lower intensity. but i'll still probably do 1 high intensity cardio workout (jogging or stairs) each week. on off days, i wont lift or do any cardio at all. could potentially lower calories slightly on off days too.

er, um ... that's definitely the most planning i've ever put into gaining weight, so i hope this works better. one thing i'm ignoring is the articles recommend bulking for 6 to 8 months. i might do that later on, if i were starting at a lower bodyfat percentage. also if summer weren't coming up. this (short) bulking phase is really just prep work for another cutting phase in summer. then i could do an extended bulking phase next winter. if i can do extended bulking phases at all ...

myspace music link. i think they hate the drummer (same name), because i dont wear hats or tight pants. i don't know the drummer, so i dont hate him, but i could learn to.

still have some belly fat, and i lost some muscle while cutting. i could keep dieting for another 2 months to get to 190 lbs, which should put me about 8% bodyfat (that's around six pack territory). the problem is i've been on reduced calories for 11 months, so my progress has slowed, and i really want to regain some of the muscle i lost. so i'm going to switch to bulking for 2 to 3 months. since i still have to figure out how to bulk properly to mostly gain lean muscle, i'm not sure what my goals should be? i can say i'd like to regain the 5 to 10 lbs of muscle i lost, regain strength, to get my bodyweight back up to about 210 to 215, and keep my bodyfat under 12%. its inevitable that i'll regain some fat in the process, but the goal is to gain primarily muscle. last time i tried this (6 months ago), i gained about 40% muscle vs 60% fat and water. i need to improve those percentages. when cutting, i was losing 75% fat and water vs 25% muscle; so for bulking i'd like to gain about 60% muscle vs 40% fat and water. the major change from last time will be nutrition. last attempt i immediately jumped from a 500 caloric reduction to a 500 calorie surplus. when i spoke to a nutritionist, they recommended i add the calories back in slowly. e.g. add 250 calories each week until i get back to maintenance level, and then slow that even more as i hit a surplus (e.g. 250 calories every 2 weeks). that will allow my body to get used to the additional calories and become less efficient. for percentages, on reduced calories, i targeted 20% fat, 37% carbs, 43% protein. the additional calories will be carbs, to target 20% fat, 42% carbs, 38% protein. extra carbs will provide energy and help muscle recovery. other changes are that i've been reducing my sodium intake. lifting will be heavy, and i'll change the workouts to allow for more rest between bodyparts. cardio will continue to alternate between high and low intensity days.

after a couple months of bulking, i should have regained some muscle (along with some fat) and my body will become use to more calories. then i'll be in a good spot to transition back into a cutting phase for summer. the additional muscle will burn more calories, and my metabolism will be less efficient than it is now. if i bulk for 2 months or 3 months will depend upon bodyfat percentage measurements. if i'm gaining too much fat, then i'll return to cutting after 2 months, else i'll continue bulking for a total of 3 months.

alright, i just finished up 11 months on reduced calories (a couple months were increased calories where i tried to gain). for body weight, i lost 45 lbs. started at 245 lbs, and i ended up under 200 lbs. for body fat percentage, i started out around 22+% (estimate), and ended up just under 10%. so out of those 45 lbs, i lost about 35-40 lbs of fat/water and 5-10 lbs of muscle. something like 75% fat/water vs 25% muscle. i did lose some strength, but not too much ... and re-gaining lost strength is easy. for measurements, i lost : 1 inch off arms, 3 inches off chest, 6 inches off belly, 4 1/2 inches off waist, and 2 inches off my thighs. my initial goals were : figure out nutrition, change to bodybuilding workouts (vs powerlifting), and get to 10% bodyfat. so i completed those goals.

now i'm heading to the MVP summit, so i wont be lifting or adhering to any diet. it'll be a good break to eat some varied foods and just let my body heal. only problem is i have become accustomed to meals every 2 to 3 hrs, so i'll need to carry emergency rations with me.

when i get back, i get to start BULKING!!! that 5-10 lbs of muscle i lost ... i want it back. just so happens i can gain weight easy. the problem is : how do i gain mostly lean muscle and only a little fat? that is what i'll be trying to figure out next. still figuring out what the new goals will be.