Score: 0
Total: 20
Work hours today: 8
Work hours for the week: 53.5/60
Sugar Liberation Strategy: Strategy A lasted 10 days; Strategy B lasted 0 days
Strategy C: cold turkey with holidays.
Sleep time: 8.5 hours, will attempt next week.

Comment: It didn't work moderating myself today. I'll comment more later

Score: +1
Total: 20
Work hours today: 11.5
Work hours for the week: 45.5/60
Sugar Liberation Strategy: Strategy A lasted 10 days
Strategy B: ween myself off gradually and then not taking holidays once complete: 0 days
Sleep time: 8.5 hours, will attempt tonight.

Comments: That was a prophetic comment you made yesterday Dan--in the end I couldn't resist the sugar. First it was actually a bag of chips on the way home from the parties. Eva wanted a milkshake, and I wanted one as well, but I didn't want to violate my policy, so I decided to get something equally appetizing but without the sugar, so I chose chips. Once I finished them, I felt like I was in a junk food state of mind, or rather, it was probably like a crack head who started out with weed, and tried to quit all drugs, but then decides to smoke weed again, and in smoking the weed, felt drawn toward the crack. It didn't help that my crack was right in front of me in the form of mind blowing chocolate and espresso powder cookies that Eva made. Anyway, I ate a bunch, ate more for breakfast, and then at work the candy dishes were overflowing and there were donuts in the break room. That was the end of strategy A
I'm going to score strategy B in the following way: since I'm looking for the lowest net intake of sugar, I won't count each day as "a day" for strategy B, because each day won't be a full sugar free day. Rather, I'm going to ween myself off in three stages. The first stage, starting tomorrow, will be close to full indulgence. I'll only hold back a little. This might mean 2 sodas, 2 candy bars, some gummies, and a cookie, for example. Stage two will be leveling off to a bit more than my ideal state, maybe 1 soda, 1 candy bar, and some gummies. Then stage three will be where I began strategy A--only 1 home made / quality dessert in moderation per day, maximum. For now I'll count stage one days as 1/3rds, stage 2 days as 2/3rds, etc. I'll try a week on each.
It was scary to see how much the sugar affected me. For a while, when I was first studying the GREs, and I was abusing sugar like crack, I made a great many careless errors, or "concentration" errors as they're called in football. Once I started strategy A they almost disappeared completely, except that I felt irritable instead, probably from sugar withdrawal. Today I made several incredibly stupid mistakes, making for a very frustrating sessions. I mean shit, I wrote out 6! as 6x5x3x2x1--what the fuck?! And it was funny because the book even had an answer that corresponded to the answer I got using that shitty expression. Anyway, sugar is a beeotch.
One thing I was considering--being on strategy A really changed my sharpness for the better. Should I retry strategy A, and continue to try it until I take the GREs, which will be in about 2-3 weeks? I say this because if I do strategy B now, I will still be relatively sugared up come test time, which concerns me. If I do A, then I might be mentally strong on test day, but it might inhibit my long term efforts to break my habit (since I'd be delaying the experiment). Maybe I could do A until the test and start again? Except if I do B, I'll be at the tail end of phase 2 or even into phase 3 by the time I take the test, so it might not be any different, or it might even be better, because I will have gradually come down from my addiction, so I won't be as irritable as when I insist on doing it all at once and being perfect without easing into it. Anyway, that was a jumble of shit, but comments would be appreciated.

Score: +2
Total: 19
Work hours today: 11
Work hours for the week: 34/60
Sugar Liberation Strategy: Strategy A, cold turkey with no holidays--day 10.
Sleep time: 8.5 hours, will attempt Thursday night.

Summary: Admin, Grad school, pushups, GRE, dinner, and soon off to Halloween parties with Eva. I'm going as Raskalnikov. I'm trying to switch to herbal tea in the morning instead of coffee. I'm not noticing any symptoms of withdrawal. Nothing much has happened really. Last night I got 8.15 hours of sleep, and it wasn't enough. Tonight is going to be a late night because of the party, so I'm voluntarily breaking my experiment sequence tonight. This will probably throw off the results for Thursday night into Friday, so I'll try 8.5 on Thursday and on Sunday/Monday.

Score: +2
Total: 17
Work hours today: 11.5
Work hours for the week: 23/60
Sugar Liberation Strategy: Strategy A, cold turkey with no holidays--day 9.
Sleep time: 8.25 hours, will attempt tonight.

Summary: Missed my bedtime, but only by 15 minutes (but that's the point, making sure to be precise for my experiment). Tonight I will do it! Worked, pushups, admin, halloween costume (19th century Russian student), burrito with Josh, Grad school applications, and GRE.

Score: +2
Total: 15
Work hours today: 11.5
Work hours for the week: 11.5/60
Sugar Liberation Strategy: Strategy A, cold turkey with no holidays--day 8.
Sleep time: 8.25 hours, will attempt tonight.

Summary: Went to bed late last night, shame. Tonight will go to bed at 10. Used Philly Car share to get house plants. Graduate school stuff. Meal planning. GRE vocab. Pushups. Was ok at being calm today. Stressed out driving.

Score: +1
Total: 13
Work hours today: 0
Work hours for the week: 60/60
Sugar Liberation Strategy: Strategy A, cold turkey with no holidays--day 7.
Sleep time: 8.25 hours, will attempt Sunday night.

Summary: breakfast, walk, 4th street deli, lorenzo's, calls, and reading after this. I gave myself a 1 because I didn't relax as much as I should have--I thought too much about work. And then when I was trying to do things, like shop for a costume for next week's party, I was indecisive and ended up with nothing. I haven't read yet. The walk was nice, and I stuck to my principles, so it wasn't bad.

Score: +2
Total: 12
Work hours today: 6.4
Work hours for the week: 60/60
Sugar Liberation Strategy: Strategy A, cold turkey with no holidays--day 6.
Sleep time: 8.25 hours, will attempt Sunday night.

Summary: I spend too much time writing on the blog, so posts will be quicker. Breakfast, coffee at La Colombe, Philly Mag, cleaning house, domains, cleaning bathroom, grocery shopping, laundry, dinner, GRE, after this grad school research until Eva comes home. Listened to Radiohead's new album while cleaning. I want to increase my knowledge of contemporary music. Even though tomorrow is a day off, will skip Eagles game to spend time doing something more valuable, like reading. Need to be less tense next week.

Score: +2
Total: 10
Work hours today: 10
Work hours for the week: 53.6/60
Sugar Liberation Strategy: Strategy A, cold turkey with no holidays--day 5.
Sleep time: 8.25 hours, will attempt Sunday night.

Comments: I stayed very calm today, which has been key. I've been trying to mentally embrace each activity as it is taking place, without worrying about what comes after, or what might go wrong after, as if I were doing whatever I am doing at that moment for eternity. That worked well today. I tried a hoagie from Tony Luke's in Center City, and all I can say is that they should stick with cheesesteaks. When I got home I did push-ups and unpacked and then watched The Devil Wears Prada with Eva, which was much better than I would have thought. I found it entertaining and thought provoking, although I wonder about it's correspondence to reality (like, where it would score on the realness scale, if you take the Godfather saying you can never be a real man without spending time with your family as a 10 and Redneck Zombies as a 1). After that I studied French for 20 minutes, with vigor, and then I worked on GRE for a little over an hour. I'm making less stupid arithmetic mistakes, which is comforting, and I annihilated this purportedly difficult problem involving standard deviation. Shabbat dinner was glorious (Eva cooked everything--matzo ball soup, garlic tomato kale, and challa with wine). Afterward we went over color schemes for painting the apartment, and if I have the energy, I'm going to clean up before going to bed. I might just go to bed.

Score: +2
Total: 8
Work hours today: 12.1
Work hours for the week: 43.6/60
Sugar Liberation Strategy: Strategy A, cold turkey with no holidays--day 4.
Sleep time: 8 hours

Summary: Got everything done exactly as planned. It was glorious. work, pushups, 45 minutes of French, 1 hour of GRE, wrote a letter to my grandparents, cleaned up a bit in the kitchen, and researched grad schools for 1/2 hour.
I had an amazing moment earlier when I was studying French. It was 4:45 in the afternoon, and I was dead tired. I was having a hard time concentrating, and I was tempted to go to sleep. I thought about drinking coffee, but I've already had my 1 cup for the day. I was trying to rationalize taking a nap. But then my reason told me that the only good choice was to power through, so I strained to stay awake and focus, and within about an hour (after moving onto GRE), my sleepiness was replaced by exhilaration at how much I was getting done. It was like opposite physical states traded within an hour of me not doing anything physical.
I'll finally get to read Anna K tonight. Hell yeah. I'll have at least an hour, and probably an hour and 15. I should also go to bed on time tonight (10:15), so I can have the first round in my experiment. If, a) I actually lie down at 10:15 to sleep, and b) I don't wake up naturally before the alarm, I'll try going to be at 10, probably Sunday night or next Monday night (weekend nights are relaxed). If I can't get up without the alarm after going to bed at 10, I'll move to 9:45 and so on. I don't give a shit if I have to go to bed at 6:30 pm, I'm going to get to the point where my body gets all the sleep it needs and wakes up comfortably without the need for an alarm.
Also, another significant thing that's going on is that I'm breaking my sugar addiction. This has God knows what kind of affect on my state of being. I have four different strategies for it. Plan A: go cold turkey and never eat pure shit (candy, soda) again. Actual pastries or desserts that are made with artistry are ok (so a Le Bus croissant is ok, but not a Tastykake, and only 1 Le Bus croissant per day, max) This principle goes for all 4 plans. Plan B: ween myself off in graduated steps, and once I'm completely free, never again. C: go cold turkey but allow myself a few holidays throughout the year where I can eat all the shit that I want to D: ween myself off and allow myself holidays. I'm going to try each strategy, write down how many days it lasts, and then whichever lasts the longest, I'm going to keep trying that one until it works or until another strategy presents itself to me. Actually, while I'm writing this I think I should record which one I'm on and how long it's lasting at the top of my blog. And I'll put the sleep thing up there for good measure.

Schedule for tomorrow:

French 15
GRE 1
Bike lock bracket and registration, up to an hour
Remainder on grad school research.

Score: +2
Total: 6
Work hours today: 10
Work hours for the week: 31.5/60

Summary: Did all the stuff on my schedule except get plants and pick up the card. I did more work on GRE than I expected--about 50 minutes. One major difference today was that I took it easy during lunch. I ate slowly, and read an article on the Inquirer, leisurely. It was great. It aided me to be relaxed for the rest of the day and conserve my energy. To try to cram work into my short lunch break, right after 4 straight hours of work, and just prior to 4 straight hours of work, is too hectic.
Unfortunately I won't hit the pillow until about 10:25, which is ten minutes later than I wanted to. Until I actually lie down at 10:15, I won't be able to judge if it's enough time. My plan is to scale back 15 minutes a night (8 hours, 8.25 hours, 8.5 hours, etc.) until I get to the point where I wake up without the alarm. Other things factor in to this, as I've come to realize. I'll blog about it later

Schedule for tomorrow:

I'm leaving the details up in the air, but because Eva is working again, my goal is 12 working hours tomorrow. At least 45 minutes will be French, and 1 hour will be GRE. I'll probably do admin for an hour or more, and grad school for at least 1/2 hour. HOPEFULLY I'll get to read some Anna K tomorrow night.

Score: +2
Total: 4
Work hours today: 10.75
Work hours for the week: 21.5/60

Summary: woke up late, still did my lunch stuff, went to local office supply about shredder, looked up stuff about it online, spent a lot of time researching health insurance, took a walk to get food, jogged, push-ups, and GRE vocab studying. I need to calm down and be relaxed. Breathe deeply. I'm wasting energy by being tense. I probably would have gotten up on time today if I had relaxed more yesterday, and I'm worried about the same thing tonight.

Schedule for tomorrow:

At lunch: reserve car, if needed
Right after work: haircut
Plants, bike store, card, figure out food.
1/2 hour GRE
Initiate contact with Aetna about chiropractic benefits

Score: +2
Total: 2
Work hours for the week: 10.75/80

Summary: The goal from this point forward is to persist, not to be perfect. Sheldon Brown once talked about how a cornerback must cultivate a short memory because even the best corners will get burned from time to time and you can't expect your game to be perfect, otherwise you'll get depressed and suck worse. Every snap is a new chance, just like every day is a new chance. In fact, every moment is a "new snap", so even if I'm riding a negative day, I should still strive to turn it around even at the last minute(who knows, a late save may earn points).
Another "procedural issue"--to protect myself from burning out, I'm capping off my hours worked per week at 60. Actually, I'm requiring myself to work 60, but not more. So I'll keep a running count of how I'm doing with that. To precisely define what counts as work would be difficult, but I know it when I see it. If anyone notices a pattern, the following would count as work: being at work, studying for the GRE, reading my French grammar book, walking to and from work, exercising, going grocery shopping, blogging, cleaning the bathroom, doing laundry, writing a letter, and paying bills. The following would not be work: sleeping, showering, eating, cooking, cleaning, reading, watching movies, walking around, messing around on the internet, and skateboarding.
Beyond regular work, I studied for the GRE for a 1/2 hour, did laundry, did 7 dive bomber push-ups, studied French for 15 minutes, read a paper my sister wrote and gave feedback, researched graduate school programs, and did some general planning.
I did well in the sense that I was disciplined. I could do better by being less tense. I think I contained my anxiety by not appearing anxious, which is key, but I was still wound up. I need to proceed smoothly, unhurried yet deliberate. It's a fine line.
Tomorrow Eva is catering at night, so I'm going to do extra work. Here's my schedule in outline form:

At lunch: call Clark Office Supply to see if they have a shredder and research barber shops.
4:15-4:30: deal with mail/pushups
4:30-5:30: pick up shredder or get a hair cut.
French: 15 minutes
GRE: 1 hr
Health care: complete a significant step
Grad School: 1/2 hour

Yeah Dan, we need to get on the ball, this is ridiculous. Oh god...I imagine being 40 and being like, "ok, starting tomorrow, we're going to be on point, and here's the new rating system we're going to use" on the other hand, throughout all of this, I have been doing things and have been progressing, so it's not a total loss, just not ideal.
I haven't been posting because I haven't had the internet. Finally, after over a month of trying to get it set up, it's working right now. On my birthday, Oct. 22, I'm going to start my +/- points system with a cumulative score. To review, each day gets anywhere from a +2 to a -2. +2 = totally solid effort, on point, disciplined, and moving in the right direction; +1 = net effect was positive, but it was rocky; 0 = I'm at the same place at the end of the day as I was at the beginning; -1 = slight decline, and -2 = total fuck up. It's good because my birthday is on a Monday, so I can simultaneously start a new week and a new year, each year being from oct 22-oct 21 of the following year. I'll do running counts and also keep track of other things. For example, I could do "books read this year", or something like that.
Between now and my start date, I want to build momentum. I want to flush out the crap from my body, get on a good schedule, etc. so that I can start running. I'll post again on the 22nd

Score for 9/6: +2
Total: 4

Summary: Most of the day was spent moving, but I also had a chance to study French and engage in enjoyable, philosophical discourse with Will. It's incredible being in Philadelphia finally. We walked out of the apartment this morning, through the park, and had a liesurely coffee at La Colombe. It's like a dream.

Score for 9/5: +1
Total: 2

Summary: I went for my job interview, spent time working on domains, and got a lot of exercise walking around the city. I didn't spend any unnecessary money, sort of. I had a 5 dollar bill, and I needed to get on the El, but they don't give change, so I bought 3 pretzels for $1 at Philly Pretzel Company to get change. The pretzels were delicious, and by using the El I saved $3, since it was about $2, whereas the regional rail would have been $5 (maybe a bit less because I could have bought the ticket at the counter). It would be great if I got the job. I'm just waiting for now.
In 12 hours I should be setting up my new apartment in Rittenhouse Square. I've been waiting a while for this.

Score: +1
Total: 1

Summary: Did a decent amount of work; ate slightly immoderately. Didn't spend any money and worked out extra to balance the overindulgence.

Score: -2
Total: 0

Summary: Back to zero, but the shame ends tonight. The score is due to the fact that I spent money and ate immoderately. I took my sister back to WC tonight, and Thursday I move to Philly, so I should be getting back into a normal schedule.

Outcome: -1
Total: 2

Summary: I was immoderate with my eating.

Score: 0
Total: 3

Summary: The good and bad were pretty balanced. I ate a bunch of junk food and sat around wasting time for a while, but then I went in and worked 3 1/2 hours. I didn't spend any money.

Score: -2
Total: 3

Summary: Although not an excuse, my sister coming home for the weekend encouraged me to slide. When we both hang out, the junk food inevitably gets consumed, and we made a run this morning for chips, ice cream, and tastykakes. It was out of hand. I spent money and diminished my health. I didn't do anything productive either.