Homer's Travels: I Guess I'll Have To Keep Going

Tuesday, February 17, 2015

I Guess I'll Have To Keep Going

In my last post I mentioned in passing that I'd had my blood test on Friday.  Yesterday I got my results.

As usual I was all nervous.  I figured that I was going to have bad numbers because I hadn't been careful enough the last few months.  While I was exercising more I was eating more ice cream and banana nut muffins (Guess which one has more calories ... the muffin!).  Turns out a didn't have anything to worry about.

All my numbers, except LDL ("bad" cholesterol), were in the normal range.  My LDL was only one point  above desired but was still thirty points below the "warning-heart-disease-eminent" level.  I was a bit disappointed with this number as my LDL had been in the good range last year.  My disappointment was balanced by the surprise that was my HDL ("good" cholesterol) level.  For the first time since I started to keep track (April 2004) my HDL was in the normal range.

So what caused this increase in my HDL?  The doctor thought it was probably all the exercise (i.e. bike riding) I have been doing in preparation for RAGBRAI.  He's probably right since my diet hasn't changed much (except for the increased frequency of ice cream and muffins).  I also think the fact I've lost a few pounds since last year may also be keeping my numbers in the good range

So what does this mean?  It means I need to keep riding my bike.  This kind of sucks.  You see, I really don't care for bike riding.  I want to do RAGBRAI so that I can say that I did it, but I'd been planning to stop riding as soon as I finished the ride across Iowa.  I guess I'll have to rethink that plan and just keep going.

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