Day 2 of my fast

9 am--Disappointment. After 33 hours of fasting, my weight this morning is 151, a loss of one pound. My hunger continues after a restless night, sleep for an hour or two, awake for an hour or two. Feeling limber, slightly light headed. A cold is complicating my condition...sneezing, sniffling. Maybe this is poor timing for a fast. Also I am 77, Hendricks' account of his 19-day fast dodged the problem of people of my age (77) undergoing this, although there is some evidence in rat studies that fasting in old age has minor benefits at best.
As I awakened this morning, images from Steve McQueen's film Hunger (2008) emerged in my reverie. Michael Fassbinder played Irish republican Bobby Sands in a hunger strike in Northern Irish prison. Details of hiss physical deterioration are riveting. Fassbinder starved himself during the making of the film.
A friend of LaVona's said fasting is dangerous after hearing about my plan, which reminded me of my parents' belief that one would die after 10 days without nourishment.
BP 136/74

Day I of my fast

Friday, Feb. 17

Starving Your Way to Vigor: The benefits of an empty stomach
by Steve Hendricks

3 p.m.--“Two weeks after the Fourth of July at the end of reconstruction, a doctor in Minneapolis named Henry S. Tanner resolved to end his life.” With that opening sentence, Hendricks begins an account of his fasting experiment published in the March issue of “Harpers.” Now a third of my way through the 10-page piece, I have decided to fast for several days in a row, not sure how long, but probably not as as long as Hendricks’ 19 days.

At day one, 16 hours after my last food:
152 lbs @ 5’ 6” height
Blood pressure
152/82 63 pulse
145/82 60
138/24 59

Walked 5 miles @ 4 mph at midmorning.

18 hours--LaVona just fixed herself a fried egg on toast while I described to her how I was feeling...hungry but clear-headed and not prepared to back out of the fast. Reminded of quitting smoking some 25 years ago: The physical sensations of both were not painful, but the need to be control of my desire for a cigarette (now food) was annoying, knowing that the frustration of keeping in control would go away if I merely lit up.

Today marks a decade since "one of the blackest moments of the war on terror: The opening of Guantanamo Bay detention camp," writes Elizabeth O'Shea in the Sydney Morning Herald. Gitmo still holds 171 of the 779 prisoners who have been detained there — without "a fair trial and the presumption of innocence." Eighty-nine of today's detainees have been cleared for release, but are stuck in limbo after Congress blocked their transfer. Gitmo "represents an affront to the bedrock principles that underpin Western legal systems," O'Shea argues, and "as a society, we have paid a hefty price" for this miscarriage of justice.

Dec. 30

Salad

Dec. 30

Main course

The Art of Fielding: A Novel by Chad Harbach

"He already knew he could coach. All you had to do was look at each of your players and ask yourself: What story does this guy wish someone would tell him about himself? And then you told the guy that story. You told it with a hint of doom. You included his flaws. You emphasized the obstacles that could prevent him from succeeding. That was what made the story epic: the player, the hero, had to suffer mightily en route to his final triumph. Schwartz knew that people loved to suffer, as long as the suffering made sense. Everybody suffered. The key was ti choose the form of your suffering. Most people couldn't do this along; they needed a coach. A good coach made you suffer in a way that suited you. A bad coach made everyone suffer in the same way, and so was more like a torturer."

History of the West by Larry Spears

Tom Mix was a v. big cowboy star in the 1930s. He was a real cowboy. I saw him in one movie that must have been a rerun. He wore a hat that was more pointed than Gene Autry's. He was a friend of Wyatt Earp until Earp died. Mix cried. In my time, little girls skipped rope to "Who you gonna marry?...Tom Mix; what you gonna feed him....hot bricks." Tom Mix was killed in an automobile accident when a heavy object in the back seat flew up and broke his neck or maybe crushed his skull. Don't recall. But I still remember that when packing the car. Put the heavy stuff in the trunk. Everybody know to do this, but I remember Tom Mix when I do it. Tom Mix died so that Sharon might live.