A diabetic running gel, is this possible?

 Friday I was shopping at my local Walmart (yes I am white trash and I enjoy Walmart) and was picking up a few items for the weekend that I was out of.  The list consisted of camping snacks such as granola bars, gummy worms, and Quick Sticks.  Saturday was one of my busiest days every because I am not smart and over booked myself.  The day was to start with an 8:00am run with my www.insulindependence group, then at 9:00am a  yoga-dog obedience-cross training class , then a run home to change clothes pack up for camping and head out to do an orienteering event from 1:00pm till 4:30pm.  When I shop for diabetes crap at the store I always look around and see if there is any new product on the market I am not aware of, this usually takes a solid one minute because nothing changes in the world of diabetes, but this time I saw these fast acting glucose gel's next to the Quick Sticks.

 I picked up a box and this did not look like some sort of faux-diabetes wanna be product like the "sugar-free" candy in the diabetes section that has 41g of "sugar alcohol" in them.  This looked to be a real deal running gel for diabetics so I grabbed a box along with my Quick Sticks and headed home.

Once I got home and was planning my run details which usually include three honey stingers and a couple of Quick Sticks, I replaced the stingers with these "level life" things, willing to risk my life for diabetes experiments with myself for myself.   On the run at like mile two-ish I had one of these gels and let me tell all you runners this, these things are freakin good.  I mean not just another hammer gel, GU, or honey stinger where they are all thick and weird and stuff but this thing was the consistency of a think watery fluid and the flavor was way freakin good.  The runners out there reading this know what I mean when you get "gel burnout" and just the thought of certain flavors and brand almost make you throw up from just thinking about them, for me it is GU vanilla flavor.  I have had about a gazillion of those things back when they used to be the only game in town for gels and now I cringe when I see them at the store.  These things list dextro something another as its main ingredient and I have not heard of these things but looks like a little research is in order to find out why I am just now trying these diabetes running gels.  If you have not tried them I would 100% give them a try.  They are not as carb filled as your typical gel but the flavor and consistency is worth the price of having to Carry twice the gels.

Good Customer Service

 So three days into owning my new CDM (continuous Dave monitor) the zipper broke on the holster thing, and the clip started to act funny.  No worries, I just called up old Dexcom where they were completely OK with shipping me what they had in stock.  I was worried when I started my CDM (continuous Dave monitor) because the accessories for the unit were slim to none, and slim just left town.

 I guess last weeks announcement of the new and improved Dexcom thing is the reason there are no accessories.  I asked the person on the other end of the phone how long they would be servicing the unit I had and she let me know for a few years but not for long.  Back to my holster case issue, the one they sent me was a neoprene "sport" model which meant that I guess you can sport it up with this case instead of the other case.  After using on a run a couple of times now I must say the non-sport model was much more sport prone than the neoprene sport model.  The top picture you can see the clip, which I love crap on my belt, maybe I want to be diabatman or something but if I have to have it on me I want it on my belt and I now wear a running money belt type thing that I found is use full to clip the CDM (continuous Dave monitor) to and this new unit has a clip and also a loop that keeps it from falling off.  Now the new cover is more snug and looks alot less 80's but the old leather case I am finding out is probably the better of the two but not by much.

 Here is the old unit which had a smaller window to see the CDM (continuous Dave monitor) through and you can see even in this picture how the zipper looks a bit off.

 The back of the leather case had this cool two part system that I could clip the CDM (continuous Dave monitor) to then the flap part would fold over the belt the other way and snap shut so to not allow the CDM (continuous Dave monitor) to fall off.  There is one huge thing I am going to have to fix on the new "sport" model that was also an issue with the leather one but not as bad and that is the stupid freakin zipper on it.  The zipper on the thing rattles around as you walk and sounds kind of like a muffled bells on a cats collar.  The first time I had the "sport" model on I thought our air conditioner was broke and walked around the house for half an hour trying to figure out what this metal clinging noise was till I discovered it was my CDM (continuous Dave monitor).  I am thinking of cutting off the metal pull and just replacing it with a string.

 At work we have this Halloween tradition of "booing" someone.  This is where you go to someones cube and decorate it for Halloween and leave them some gifts.  Thursday I was "booed" and I got this lovely argyle sock/skull and cross bone bag on my desk.

I opened the bag and it was full of all sorts of candy and treats.  Now don't get me wrong I have been chowing down on these things and enjoying every last fun size but, this is why I call Halloween the start of the diabetes depression season.  It starts with Halloween candy on the first of October and ends the weekend after the first of January.  The middle is filled with Thanksgiving glutton eating, then your Christmas eating out all the time and getting pies and cookies, then on New Years eve you finish it off with parties of random finger foods you couldn't possibly figure out the carb count if you had a degree in finger food carb counting and wild egg nog and frothy sweet drinks.  Then people tell me I am a "Grinch" during the holidays, which I am not.  The fact is having had several good years in this season and alot of bad years I have to be self aware, focused on the A1C prize in January, and dedicated to keeping ten fingers and ten toes by my 50th birthday or more.  More birthday's with 10 fingers and 10 toes, not more fingers and toes on my 50th birthday, like some sort of nuclear waste accident or something.  So happy holidays diabetics and may each and everyone of you have an A1C below eleven-teen or something come January.

Has Eddie Bower changed?

 The other day our mail person delivered the new Eddie Bower winter catalog and I have always considered Eddie Bower as a kind of north of Mason Dixon meets Connecticut kind of magazine that appeals to your 40 plus crowd and has some "adventuresome" clothes with the handy gadgets for all of us that need another gadget.  Then I noticed my son had not only read through the magazine once he was going through it for a second time and not just quickly thumbing through the pages but actually reading about the products and then he says to me: "Is Eddie Bower a good company, because they have some cool stuff in this catalog" and I had to look through it for myself to see what 40 plus year old people were wearing that would have a high school kid thinking "neat."

 The minute I open the magazine the feeling of "Columbia" brand came to my mind with new fancy words about techno-clothes and ways to make a ducks feather keep you warmer with NASA technology.  Like the "Accelerant Jacket" that is like goretex, down, and something else that will keep you safe on top of a mountain during a hail storm.  I was expecting the usual pictures of dudes raking leaves with his kids in a 100 dollar flannel or a mom and kids throwing snow balls at each other in ski pants and barn jackets but none of this was in the magazine so far.

 Deeper I go and come across "synthesis" and how the new Eddie Bower jackets work better to do more for you.  Then I started to notice the prices on these things and let me tell you if you are gearing up to go camping with all Eddies clothes you had better be bringing in some solid change because Eddie used to just be proud of his stuff and now he thinks you should consider him one of the prime providers of arctic wear.

 I like how they did the picture above, which is what a normal person does.  They buy one brand of jacket but get a certain brand of rope, boots, and snow skis.  This kind of helps you match your Eddie gear with other brands.  I still wonder when we moved from raking leaves and throwing snow balls at kids to traversing a mountain with your skis on your back?  Did I miss a few catalogs or something?  Where are the flannel lined denim jeans and fancy water bottles?

 Look here they got an award from my favorite magazine (yes that was a joke) Backpacker for their new rain jacket that is light, filled with down, and does something 2.0.  This now looks more like a winter Dallas jacket that I could wear (if money was no option).  With all the new diabetes gear we carry, zippers and pockets are my new obsession and having them in the right place at the right size matters.  have you seen the snow jackets that have a sun glasses pocket under your arm, I have one of these jackets and let me tell you the only thing that goes in the sun glasses pocket is my glucagon injection because anything else would be destroyed.

Now we are getting some cool things I that I truly have to agree with my son that are cool.  Those gloves are definitely on my gotta get list.  Then I saw the boots and those were on my must try on list then I noticed the pants and I just bought last spring a similar style and cut pair of nylon pants that look just like those and they are great outdoors jeans and fit like you were made to camp forever in them with all my diabetes pockets in the right places.

Don't ask me how I put the same picture on here twice but I did and I am a moron and don't know how to remove it so enjoy this one more time.  Why is the WD-40 can in the picture, like anyone that is buying this stuff needs to know about WD-40.  We do get our first glimpse of flannel and a snow shovel so there is a tie in to the old magazines.

This is the bold claim of the year: Gear of the year, I don't think so.  Not saying this is not good stuff or is not worthy of gear of the year award but give us some time to adjust to your new ways Eddie before telling us you now have moved your tents and backpacks from the camping isle of Target to above and beyond everyone else.  Maybe two or three years and we will give you this award but let it sink in first.  The tent also has me as not being gear of the year because any tent that is dogie door enter and leave is not engineered right.  The new best in tents always have a side door so you can roll out of the tent instead of crawling on your hands and knees like a dog (get it that is why I call them dogie door tents with a head or foot entrance).

The back of the magazine finally is pure Eddie that we all know and love, flannel, flannel, and more flannel.  I just wonder where are the blue jeans and barn jackets?  Eddie does make the best flannel on the planet.

Back to those boots I saw earlier and I read how they have all sorts of this and that in them but most important is they are a three season boot which is what we know and love in the great state of Texas.  A four season boot would cause you to get blisters in the summer from all the insulation.  The bad thing though is they have my kryptonite of a soul the Vibram soles.  I am working on getting over my issues I have with them from 14 years ago but it is hard and these boots look sweet, don't they have diabetes written all over them.

In the end Eddie is not the same Eddie I used to know just a short time ago with a wife and kids, a house and pets, but is now younger and more adventuresome.  I don't know if the new Eddie will be touching my skin any time soon but I do have some items on my want list, do he does have my attention.