The Mathematics of Weight Loss

Yesterday Louise and I celebrated our first year of our weight loss program.  We celebrated, of course, by going out to eat.  By the way, we went to the Polo Grille in Tulsa at Utica Square and the service and food were impeccable!  Louise had a lobster tail and I had a small filet.

During the past year, I've lost 94 pounds and she has lost 60.  Together, we've lost the equivalent of a medium size person!  The term "lost" is really a misnomer; most people don't lose weight, they get rid of it!  During the last year, we've had several splurges including dinner last night.  The key is to "get back on the horse" the next day and continue your program.

I have spent a considerable amount of time during the last year thinking about weight loss and have come to the realization that it is simply a matter of mathematics.  I thought that since we both are deeply involved in this program, I would put down some of the numbers.

One of the must important numbers is know is what the experts call the basal metabolic rate, or BMR.  This is simply the amount of calories a typical person will burn in a day without doing any serious exercise (a couch potato, in other words).  The formula for BMR is as follows:

     For Men:  BMR = 66 + (6.23 x weight in pounds) + (12.7 x height in inches) - (6.8 x age in years)

     For Women: BMR = 655 + (4.35 x weight in pounds) + (4.7 x height in inches) - (4.7 x age in years)

In my case, my weight is currently 183 pounds, my height is 67 inches and my age is 70.  If you plug these numbers into the formula, it reveals that under "normal" conditions, I will burn 1581 calories per day.  If I were a woman, my BMR would indicate a total burn of 1437 calories per day.  Don't ask me how these formulas were derived, the "experts" did it.  By the way, you can find several BMR calculators on the internet.

The formulas above show several interesting facts:

     a) People who weigh more have a higher BMR.  This makes sense since larger people require more calories to move around, to keep their bodies at 98.6°, etc.

     b) Taller people also require more calories to sustain their bodies, I suppose for the same reasons listed above.

     c) As we get older, we require less calories, probably because we become more sedentary.  Notice in the formula that age related calories get subtracted, not added.

I should stop for a minute and answer the question, "What is a calorie?".  It is simply a measure of energy, just like BTU's.  In fact, one BTU equals 252 calories.  Thus, a calorie isn't some physical thing we find in food and drink but a measure of energy.

OK, now I know my BMR if I'm a couch potato - 1581 calories per day.  If I do nothing but get up in the morning, eat, watch television, and go to bed at night I'm going to need to consume 1581 calories every day to maintain my current weight.  But what to do if I want to get rid of some of my weight?

Again, the "experts" tell us that a pound of body mass has a calorie content of 3500 calories.  If you want to get rid of one pound of body weight, you need to consume 3500 fewer calories than you burn. In my case, I burn (or use) 1581 calories per day or 11,067 calories during a one week period.  If I want to lose (oops, I used the "lose" word) one pound in a week, I have to either exercise to burn calories or consume 3500 calories less than my body needs.

The math tells me that 11,067 calories minus 3500 calories equals 7567 or 1081 calories per day.  In other words, if I consume 1081 calories per day, I should get rid of one pound of body weight in a week.  I've got to tell you, 1081 calories per day is a pretty harsh diet.  What to do?  Exercise!  Exercise has two important benefits here.  First and most important is that it keeps you moving!  By now everyone knows that you need to get up off the couch and do something.

The other benefit of activity is that you get to eat more!  That's what I'm talking about!  In my case, walking for one hour per day burns an additional 350 calories of weight loss.  There are numerous charts on the internet telling you how many calories you burn doing various activities.  In Louise's and my case, we both wear Fitbit bracelets which calculate how much exercise we get and how many calories we burn.

So, the math is clear!  Weight loss (or gain) is equal to calories eaten minus calories burned (or not eaten).  The other day I did a little math to confirm this.  In the past nine months my Fitbit says that I have burned about 1,000,000 calories (yes, that's one million).  My eating diary says that, for that same period, I have eaten about 750,000 calories, or 250,000 less than I have burned.  Using our 3500 calories per pound of body mass, that says I should have lost 71.4 pounds.  My actual weight loss during that period?  67 pounds!

The math is correct - if you eat less than you use, you are going to lose weight!  So get out there and do something!

The Evolution of Our Camping

Having just spent three months in South Texas in our motor home, I began to think back on our camping and RV experiences.

As a child, I don't remember our family ever "going camping".  We went on quite a few vacations but we always stayed in a motel or rented a cabin.  After I grew up and left home, Dad and Mom did get a travel trailer and spent a great deal of time traveling.

When I married Louise, our first vacation together was a camping trip.  We had moved to the Detroit area because of my job and decided to go camping in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan.  We rented a tent, bought a lantern and portable cook stove, and took off.  It was one of the most memorable trips of our life!

Later, after we had returned to the Tulsa area and started having children, we did quite a bit of camping, starting with tents and camping with our friends, Richie and Leann and Grover and Barbara.  We soon graduated to an old Ford van which we used for a while, then an overhead camper in the pickup truck.

Eventually, we acquired an old 22' bumper pull travel trailer and pulled it all over the United States, including a trip to Virginia to see our old friends, Jerry and Marlene.  In 1986, we were part of the group which purchased Tulsa Winch and sold the travel trailer for two reasons: first, we needed the money, and second, we weren't going to have any time to go camping.

At this point, I was reasonably sure that our camping or RVing days were over.  In fact, my standard comment on camping and RV's was that I would do all my future camping at a Holiday Inn.  After my retirement in 1998, however, that changed.

Some friends who were RV'ers said something about us going on some trips with them.  I thought it might be wise to rent an RV to see what it was all about.  After I checked some prices for rentals, however, I decided I didn't want to do that.  We wound up buying a used Sprinter fifth wheel trailer from a couple who were giving it up.

The Sprinter was a good trailer but you couldn't stand up in the bedroom.  To exit the bed, the person closest to the front of the trailer had to crawl over the other person.  We also decided that we needed more room.  This was about the time we started going to South Texas in the winter and, when you spend three months in an RV, you appreciated all the space you can get.  We traded the Sprinter for a brand new Everest fifth wheel.

We pulled the Everest all over the U.S. for several years and had a great time in it.  I was towing it with a 1999 International and it was a good looking combination.  Eventually, the International grew tired and I was faced with the prospect of replacing it.

In about 2010, Louise and I decided to try a motorhome instead of a trailer.  We traded the fifth wheel off on a used Holiday Rambler bus and used it for about five years.  Last year, we traded the Holiday Rambler off on a Tiffin Open Road with four slides.  It has more room than any RV we've ever had and we are really enjoying it.  In fact, we just returned from Roaring River in Missouri where we spend a week.

I don't know how long we'll be able to continue to RV but, for now, we are gonna go every chance we get!

Our Bermuda Vacation

Louise and I just returned from a week-long vacation to Bermuda.  I had thought about a trip there for several years and I guess you could say that I had it on my bucket list.

We flew from Tulsa to Hamilton, Bermuda via Chicago and New York.  We had to spend a night in New York because all the flights to Hamilton leave in the morning and arrive about noon.  Naturally, all the flights were delayed and otherwise messed up but we got to Hamilton about when we thought we would.

The island of Bermuda was discovered by the either the Portuguese or the Spanish (I think they are still arguing about this) in the 16th century but no people were left on the island to stake a claim.  In 1609, an English ship headed for Jamestown got off course and was forced to land in Bermuda.  The island became a British colony and remains part of the British Commonwealth today.

We really enjoyed our vacation.  The island is full of neat beachs and quaint, small cottages.  We used the bus system all week to get around and it worked well.  Plus, we didn't have to drive on their narrow, winding streets.  Most people who live in Bermuda get around by riding scooters.  It's not unusual to see a well dressed businesswoman in a skirt and high heels tooling down the street on a scooter.

Bermuda shorts really were created in Bermuda.  The typical businessman there wears a jacket and tie, Bermuda shorts and knee high socks.  Most of the shorts are of pastel colors, coral, yellow, pink, and green as are the houses.

One thing we were warned about but still surprised at anyway was the cost of goods in Bermuda.  Louise and I typically spent $60-$70 together for breakfast and about the same for lunch.  Dinner was upwards of $110 for a couple.  There are no fast food chains in Bermuda; the government has banned them.

Although Louise and I flew to the island, there are several cruise lines which have Bermuda as their destination.  There are three cruise line ports in Bermuda and we saw cruise ships at all of them.  We decided that, if we were to return, we would take a cruise there where we could go back to the ship for our meals.

The trip home was similar to the trip out except that we went from Bermuda to Washington Reagan to Charlotte to Tulsa.  And, like the trip out, all the schedules were messed up.  We got home the other morning at 3:30 a.m.  Needless to say, we slept very well when we got home.

I think we will try a destination a bit less expensive next trip.  We've talked about Belize or Costa Rica.  I'll let you know.

An Epic Battle

As everyone who knows me can attest, I have always had a problem with my weight.  And, of course, that problem has magnified itself as I've grown older.

When I graduated from high school, I weighed 187 pounds (Its funny that I can remember something like that!).  For my height, that was considered overweight.  I stayed around that weight during my college days and when I first got married.

Marriage does a lot of strange things to you, including making you gain weight.  After a year and a half of marriage and a good "desk" job, I weighed 225 pounds.  In October, 1971, while Louise and I were living in Detroit, I went on a diet.  I lost 50 pounds in 90 days and, by the time we got back to Oklahoma for Christmas, weighed 175 pounds!  This was the lightest I had been in years.

Eventually, though, the weight all came back, plus a whole lot more!  At one point in the late 1980's, I got on the shipping scales at work and they topped 300 pounds.  Once again, I lost some weight but didn't really change my lifestyle like we are told we have to do.

In fact, over the years, I figure I have gained and lost over 400 pounds going on diets and then gaining the weight back.

Last year, we had a couple of friends who really enjoyed some weight loss with bariatric surgery and Louise decided that she wanted to do that.  Her doctor gave her a reference to a bariatric clinic in Owasso and, on September 21, we attended a seminar there.

That seminar acted as a motivator for us and we decided to change our eating habits and get more exercise.  In the meantime, Louise started seeing the doctors there and preparing for her surgery.  I even talked to the doctors about the surgery for myself but decided that I might be able to lose enough weight on my own.

It was decided that she would have her surgery after we returned from south Texas this spring.  Over the winter, we were very diligent about our diet and exercise and got a big surprise when we returned home.  Louise had lost so much weight that our insurance would no longer cover the surgery!  The doctors at the bariatric hospital did tell us that they would be happy to go ahead and do it for cash.  It would only cost $17,000!  By now, we had decided that we could do it on our own.

As of today, I've lost 73 pounds and weigh 203.  My goal is in the 160-170 pound range so I still have a ways to go.  I'll let you know when I've reached my goal.

One of the nice things about losing weight, other than the health aspect, is having people notice and comment.  In fact, one friend saw me the other day and raved about my weight loss.  She wanted to know how I had done it.  I told her that I had discovered the real secret to weight loss and she really pressured me to tell her what it was.  When I told her that it was diet and exercise, she was really let down.

Louise and I are now beginning to think about maintenance.  We are going to be at our goals in a few months and don't want to ever have to go through the weight loss deal again so maintenance will be very important to us.  This is something we've never done before so it should prove challenging.  Wish us luck!

The Rio Grande Valley

Louise and I have just wrapped up our 10th winter in the Rio Grande Valley (simply called "The Valley" by most of the people here).

The Valley starts at Rio Grande City in the West and runs to Brownsville in the East.  Total population of the area is about 1.3 million people.  The population swells by about 710,000 people in the winter as "Winter Texans" descend on the area to avoid winter in their home state.

If you drive through a shopping center parking lot, you will see more out of state and out of country license plates than Texas plates.  Ontario and Quebec plates are very common, along with those from the Mexican state of Tamaulipas.  Winter Texans from Wisconsin, Iowa and Minnesota are everywhere during the winter.

The Rio Grande Valley is roughly divided into three areas with the upper Valley starting at Rio Grande City and including Mission, McAllen, Edinburg, and Pharr.  The mid Valley runs from Alamo in the west to Harlingen in the east and includes Weslaco, Mercedes and La Feria.  The lower Valley is dominated by Brownsville and includes Port Isabel and South Padre Island.

The Hispanic influence is everywhere and the Spanish language is as common as English.  The Valley is separated from sister cities in Mexico by the Rio Grande River.  Reynosa is just across the river from McAllen, Nuevo Progreso is a sister city to Weslaco, and Matamoros lies just across the river from Brownsville.

Winter Texans have traditionally crossed the border in droves to shop in Mexican towns.  Their spending has focused primarily on pharmaceuticals, liquor, dental services, and of course, souvenirs.  Because of the drug wars which have become common in Mexico, many Winter Texans today are hesitant to cross the border.  Louise and I used to regularly cross the border but quit doing that about five years ago.

Interestingly, the number of Winter Texans is declining rapidly.  Five years ago, it was estimated that about 800,000 people came to the Valley for the winter.  That number today, as stated earlier, is around 710,000.  It seems that many of our generation and the one following are not attracted to the RV lifestyle and to spending their winters in warmer climes.

Louise and I do really enjoy our winters here.  It seems that every year, about October, we begin to really look forward to going south.  The park where we stay, VIP La Feria, is in La Feria, about seven miles west of Harlingen.  We've been there long enough that we have a lot of friends in the park and spend a lot of time visiting back and forth in each others' sites.  We see these friends on a daily basis, unlike at home so we really are closer to them than to our friends at home.

I think we will continue to come to the Valley as long as we can.  We sure don't miss the Oklahoma winters!

Thomas Perry Porter Sr.

Tom Porter was born October 6, 1888, in Austin, Travis County, Texas.  Austin is the capital of the State of Texas and Travis County is slightly more than 1000 square miles in size.  His parents were William Eugene Porter and Laura Emaline Dunham Porter.

William was born in Minnesota but had moved to Missouri and then to Texas as a youth.  Laura was born in Missouri and had married L.A. Wyatt when she was 16 years old in Palo Pinto County, Texas.  Palo Pinto County is located about 65 miles west of Ft. Worth.  L.A. Wyatt’s fate is unknown but Laura had a son by him, Albert, who was born in 1879 in Palo Pinto County. Of interest to residents of Mannford, Albert later married a woman named Callie and they had a son, Raymond. Raymond was known to local residents as "Slip". He was sort of the town "ne'er do well".

In 1886, Laura married William Eugene Porter in Fannin County, Texas.  Fannin County is located about 60 miles northeast of Dallas, a good distance from Palo Pinto County.  Laura and William had five children as follows:

Ethel Dorothy 1887 Whitesboro, Grayson County, Texas

Thomas Perry 1888 Travis County, Texas

Hermina (girl) 1893 Indian Territory, Oklahoma

Doss 1898 Indian Territory, Oklahoma

Arbell Abt. 1899 Indian Territory, Oklahoma

There are, of course, no records of the 1890 Census.  During the 1900 Census, William Porter was listed in Township Two of the Chickasaw Nation in Indian Territory.  All five of his children, as well as Albert Wyatt, his stepson were listed as living with him.  Interestingly, William’s marital status was listed as widowed.  It is presumed that Laura died during the birth of their youngest child, Arbell.

William Porter supposedly died in Antlers in Pushmataha County, Oklahoma in 1904.  No documentation for his death exists however.  At any rate, Tom would have been 16 years old at this time.

By the time of the 1910 Census, Ethel Dorothy had married William Renner and they were living in Roger Mills County, Oklahoma, just northwest of Elk City.  The Census listed them as having two living children at home as well as her brother, Doss.  The rest of the children, Tom Hermina, and Arbell, have not been found in the 1910 Census, neither has Albert Lee Wyatt, their half brother.  Albert Lee did, however, register for the draft in 1917 (during World War I) while living in Mannford, Creek County, Oklahoma.

Sometime before 1910, Tom Porter also came to Mannford.  He worked as a cowboy on the Wilson Ranch whose foreman was M.W. “Cap” Alexander.  DNA testing indicates that Cap Alexander’s wife, May, had a son, Tommy Herman, by Tom Porter while she was married to Alexander.  Since Tommy was born in February, 1911, it is presumed that Tom Porter was working on the Wilson Ranch in 1910.

By 1917, when Tom Porter registered for the draft, he was living in Dundee in the northwest corner of Archer County, Texas, just south of Wichita Falls.  He was still listed as a cowboy, now working for W.T. Waggoner on his ranch.  The Waggoner Ranch was then and is today the largest ranch in the United States with a single fence line.  The Ranch encompasses more than 510,000 acres in six counties.  In the draft registration, he was listed as tall and slender and with a stiff arm.  Family lore indicates that he was injured in a fall from a horse, the arm was never set properly and resulted in it being somewhat immobile.

Tom married Margaret Ann Cox on October 30, 1919, and they had two children: Thomas Perry Jr., who was born in 1920, and Minna Lo, born in 1922.  Both were born in Menard, Texas, in Menard County.  Menard is 235 miles from Dundee so it is presumed that he no longer worked for the Waggoners in 1920.  In fact, the 1920 Census listed his occupation as a truck driver for an oil company.  The 1930 Census listed his occupation as a tool dresser for an oil company.

By 1935, Tom and his wife, Ann, and their two children had moved back to Vera in Knox County, just southwest of the Waggoner Ranch.  His occupation was listed as foreman and it is possible that he was a foreman on the ranch.  They remained in Vera at least through 1942, where he registered for the draft during World War II.  In the draft registration, he was listed as working for W. R. Ross of Ft. Worth, although his occupation was not listed.

Sometime after 1942, Tom and Ann moved from Vera to Seymour, a distance of only 18 miles.  Tom opened a saddle and leather shop on Main Street in Seymour and ran that business until his death in 1974.  For several years during that period, he shared his store with a watch repairman, V. V. Overton, who had a work bench in the front of the store.

Tom died on June 7, 1974, and is buried in Riverview Cemetery in Seymour.  Four years after his death, his son, Thomas Jr., died in New Orleans, Louisana.  Tom Jr. is buried beside his parents.  Ann lived for in Seymour for 18 years after Tom’s death, dying on February 26, 1992.  She is buried beside her husband.

The Real Truth

In August, 2015, I wrote about DNA testing which had raised some doubts about our family name.  As Paul Harvey used to say on the radio, here is "The Rest of the Story".

My adoptive father, Tommy Alexander, was born on February 7, 1911, ostensibly to Milton Walker Alexander and Mary May Stephens Alexander.

Milton Walker, or “Cap” as he was called, was the foreman of a ranch in Mannford, Oklahoma. He had come there in 1901 or 1902 with a herd of cattle which had been brought from Archer City, Texas. The owner of the ranch was Luke F. Wilson from Kansas City, Missouri. Cap was in charge of the ranch in Mannford and had several cowboys working for him. Tommy was named after two of the cowboys, Herman Weir and Thomas Perry “Tom” Porter, as well as for his father.

(L to R): M.W. "Cap" Alexander, Bob Powell, Tom Porter, Katie Porter

Mary May Stephens was born in Arkansas in 1881 and had spent most of her young life in Missouri before coming to Mannford around 1900. Cap, her husband, had been born in Tennessee in 1857 so he was 24 years older than his wife. Their first child, Beulah, was born in Mannford in 1907. Sometime after her birth but before 1911, the ranch house burned. Cap and May moved to another house on the ranch, near Kellyville, Oklahoma, while a new ranch house was being built in Mannford. Tommy was born in the house near Kellyville.

Cap Alexander died in 1935 in Mannford and is buried there. May, his wife, died in 1967 and she is also buried at Oak Hill Cemetery in Mannford.

Cap and May's marriage was tumultuous to say the least. Eventually they divorced and she remarried, living in several places before her death. In all, May was married four times.

Tommy Alexander, after a first marriage that lasted 13 years, met Annie Sue Nash and married her. Sue had two young boys from a previous marriage, Roy Edward (this writer) and Gary Wade. Tommy adopted these two boys and he and Sue had two children of their own, Mary Sue and Thomas Milton. Tommy died in 2004 at the age of 92 and Sue died in 2012 at 86 years of age.

In 2014, Roy Edward, “Edd”, who had been involved with genealogy for several years, became interested in DNA. He had his own DNA tested, along with those of his wife, Mary Louise “Louise” and Thomas Milton “Milt”. He noticed that, although Milt had a lot of cousins turn up on his paternal grandmother's side, there were no Alexanders who showed up.

Finally, in mid-2015, a match showed up on Ancestry DNA which showed a second cousin relationship between Milt and a person who lived in California. After exchanging several emails, it was discovered that one of this man's great uncles was Thomas Perry Porter, the cowboy who had worked for Cap Alexander on the ranch in Mannford. Since then, several Porter relatives have been discovered through DNA testing.

Apparently May Alexander, who was 24 years younger than her husband, had had a relationship or “dalliance” with Thomas Perry Porter! At the time Tommy was born, Thomas Porter was 23 years old and single. He later married and had two additional children. Interestingly, Tommy Alexander was named after his biological father.

May Alexander probably knew who Tommy Alexander's biological father was, since she named him. What will always remain a mystery is whether Tommy knew who his father was. Although he was much more fond of Cap Alexander than of his mother, May, he did have several pictures of Tom Porter which he kept throughout his life.

Without a doubt, May went to her grave thinking that no one would ever know about her dalliance with Tom Porter. However, 50 years later, through DNA testing, the truth came out!