The Quarantine 15

When I arrived at Abbott Hall in Carbondale, IL in August 1998, I was just starting my freshman year. I was living with Vinnie and it's where I met Adam, Ed, and other close buds. A common refrain about freshman year is what they call "the freshman 15" This is the normal 15 pound gain most 18 year olds add to their frames. This comes from adjusting to a new lifestyle of unlimited seconds and third helpings at the buffet for breakfast, lunch, and dinner. This also includes the beer, late night pizza, and more beer. Eventually as sophomores we all rediscovered a healthy diet and went to the rec center, but it's sort of a rite of passage.

The quarantine 15 is almost the same thing. Everyone is required to be sheltered in place, you're kind of stuck at home, it's more snacking, tv, laptops, and eating at home. The trips to Costco are about every 10 days, sometimes using instacart delivery, due to long lines like this

It was even worse because it gets hot in Oahu and we're all wearing masks.

It's easier to eat healthy though when we go to Costco, and we've developed a nice routine of grilling twice per week, going through big bags of frozen broccoli, chicken, sausages, cauliflower rice, and more... Although, after a while, it's boring eating the same stuff, so we started to add oreos, ice cream, goldfish crackers, and other junk to our diets. We also started eating prime rib takeout on Thursday and alternating who get's to pickout the takeout on Saturday night. One of our favorites is Mad Bene in Kapolei. Just like a freshman, the weight starts creeping up.

We're now 6+ months into the quarantine and more like sophomores now. We know what to expect, we are trying to find healthier alternatives, cooking at home more often, like this healthy loco moco option I made below, with cauliflower rice and no gravy.

We're also getting in our workouts. Christie loves yoga and daily burn. For me, it's a lot of swimming, running, and kettlebells. Occasionally we do jump roping too.

This is actually a pretty heavy kettlebell. I also ordered a 35lber. In 2018, when I had first got it, 15 swings was about all I could handle in a day. Now I do sets of 50 and as many as 200 in a session. It's a great fat burner and provides some metabolic mayhem.