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Hey, guys! Hope everyone is having a badass day full of badassery and righteous villainy! So, I've started doing the Paleo diet. I've been doing it for four days now. I have a few questions that would put my mind at ease if they were answered (or maybe I'll freak. We'll see). It's basically a list of "how bad is it"s. 1. How bad is it to have meat that isn't exclusively grass fed? I just got a job recently, but it really doesn't pay well enough for me to comfortably buy all organic foods. It really is pretty expensive on my current pay. I've told my family that I'm on the Paleo diet, so they try to be understanding and cook things that I can eat too. At the same time, I don't want to force them to change what they eat for my convenience. How bad is it if I have a small portion of rice (like 1 cup after cooked) and the food has been seasoned with about a tablespoon of granulated sugar? Will that throw off the ketosis? I've done pretty well with eating the right things, in spite of the above mentioned. How bad is it if I occasionally eat something high in carbs? For example, went 3 days eating the right things, then this morning had a bagel for breakfast because was late and had to have something.Okay, so that was two things. I thought I had more. I'm not trying to make excuses, these are just realities I have to deal with. It's a little bit of an issue because, as I mentioned, I'm not quite able to afford buying the organic stuff. I really have to keep a tight hand on my wallet because of debt, etc. So, it's financially convenient for me to eat with my family. I don't know if this helps at all, but I've also reduced my portions significantly, and when I do have carbs the amount is quite small compared to what I was doing last week. I want this to work, but I feel like I'm a little stuck as to how strictly I can follow the diet. As I said, I'm not trying to make excuses here. I have no problem going low/no carb. TONS of tasty food I can make, but I simply can't afford it most of the time.

What do you guys do for quick, affordable, healthy, tasty meals? My dad went carb-free for a while and lost maybe 30 lbs in what seemed like very little time. He was eating at good restaurants every meal, getting filet mignon and grilled shrimp, telling me all the while about how easy it is, and how it doesn't taste that bad. But my budget is maybe $3 a meal... What can I do? So far, I've been buying a family pack of chicken breast in the beginning of the week and cooking it up with some spices, setting aside small portions for each meal. But it's getting old quick. I love fish, but it's expensive and doesn't taste so great when kept in the fridge for a few days. Prepackaged meals? Frozen meals? A nibblet of a meal from a common restaurant? Or something that will keep all week in the fridge for me to mass produce on Monday nights? Thanks!

The last challenge I had was so so on the successful side. I didn't lift as much as I wanted but I did lift, didn't make many gains though mostly because of my lack of recovery. Work has been and still is a bit crazy so I'm having to make sacrifices in order to keep up. Unfortunately these sacrifices will have to be maintained for a little while but one unintended side effect has been my diet, which I started eating things that were convenient. I stopped cooking and started microwaving and/or eating out. This leads to my main quest. Main Quest Become a better man, husband and housekeeper, while maintaining a busy work schedule. I've slacked off on many parts of my life with the excuse that work is super busy. Just because I'm busy at work doesn't mean I get to slack off on my home life. Goal # 1 Develop a weekly food schedule and a daily cooking habit that is affordable and mostly paleo. The food budget should be around 100-120 dollars a week. This includes planning all my meals on Sunday, cooking what I can ahead of time to minimize time spent every day and it must be healthy. (1 point per day for a max of 42) Goal # 2 I've fallen back to an old habit; drinking too much, too often and blaming it on stress. I need to run damage control on this, pronto. Drinking 4-5 times a week is not acceptable, so for now, no alcohol until I can get this under control again. (pass/fail) Goal # 3 Spend more time with my wife. We don't do much together these days, home meals every night will help but I need to put some extra effort into things like movie nights, weekend dates, theater, etc... (3-4 date nights with the wife this challenge) Side Quest(s) Side Quest #1 Take down the pool. I have an above ground pool that I started taking down to get room for a garden in my back yard, finish taking it down you lazy bum.(Pass / Fail) Side Quest # 2 Get back to the weights. I haven't lifted in a few weeks. Replace drinking with lifting, get stronger, save money, profit...? (Let's do a round of 5/3/1 on a 4 day split, 1 point for every week I do a full split for a max of 6) So yeah, here we go again.