With apologies to Matchbox 20, today’s post is about a level of redemption after yesterday’s failures. I finished yesterday’s post saying, “Tomorrow is a new day.” My plan was to get “back to good” on the #DrinkAndDropChallenge. Mission, mostly, accomplished.

I’ll take today as a step in the right direction. It wasn’t a day of perfect choices, but at least it was a step in the right direction. We press onward, eyes on the prize of a smaller version of me on the horizon somewhere.

Today’s Food

  • Breakfast. You guessed it.
  • Lunch. I got a frozen meal. It was small. I mean, kid’s menu small. It was good, actually. Quite tasty, but it was barely enough food for a 4-year old. It’s the SmartMade Chicken Fried Cauliflower Rice Bowl. Bonus points for sitting at just 150 calories
  • Snack. About 11 minutes later, I was hungry again, so I opted for a banana and some trail mix.
  • About 2 hours later, I was hungry again. Ugh. A second banana got me through until later in the evening.
  • Dinner. This didn’t come until after tennis. And yeah … we got housed in tennis once again. There was plenty of beer. I wasn’t altogether happy. And this is why my mission for the day was mostly accomplished. I basically had Fritos and Cheez-Its for dinner. So, I wasn’t over-the-top on calories. But nutritional value …. nope. Not even close.

And Now, Beer

We had our final tennis match of the season (make-up from the washout yesterday.) So I got in a nice workout. Having almost no calories all day followed by a bunch of cardio … yeah. We deserve some beer tonight. Tonight was a simple “empty the fridge of the random leftover singles that have been collecting.” It’s like I made my own mix-a-six for the match. In tonight’s grab bag:

  • Boulder Brewing Pulp Fusion. Not gonna lie. I wasn’t looking forward to this one. But it was actually quite tasty. It’s a citrusy-IPA that gets it bright flavors from blood orange juice, rather than just from the hops themselves.
  • Sweetwater Black Lager. The magic of a black lager. Crazy dark in color, super light in flavor. One of my favorites from Sweetwater.
  • Red Hare SPF 50/50 Tangerine. Pretty sure Red Hare created a style for this one. They call it an India Pale Radler. So, they take an IPA (their Gangway) and mix it 50-50 with tangerine juice/flavor. (Hint – that’s what a radler is: half fruit, half beer.)
THIS. This is what I meant yesterday by recovering from a bad day. I’m not going to let yesterday’s failures become today’s repeat of the same. Each new day is a chance to chart a new course. Yeah, this is more like it!
Mike Pennington by Mike Pennington