On the second day of the challenge I woke up at 8am. Actually I woke up twice in the middle of the night to empty my bladder and quench my parched throat. It is nearly autumn, nights are cool, fans are not in use, windows are left open, and mosquitos bother me the whole night.
8am: Woke up. Drank 300ml of water. Filled seven bottles (3.5 litres) in order to keep count of how much I had drunk. Nagging feeling that bowels need emptied but a visit to the toilet proved otherwise. My body aches. Due to the constant interruption of sleep? Due to the thirst? Due to lack of energy? No clue. Let's test this out. A good scientist always tests their hypothesis before claiming anything.
1015am: Drank another 300ml of water. Feels much "normal" today than yesterday. Thoughts did not constantly drift over to food nor drink.
11am: Went for the regular walk. Decided not to wait till later in the day when my body is relatively weaker to do the walk. Carried exactly the same things as yesterday: keys and a 500ml water bottle. Refilled the bottle twice on the way. At the end of the first lap around the lake my legs automatically led me towards a second turn instead of towards the outside of the circuit. I actually was more or less on auto-pilot until I realised halfway through that I was on my second lap. Did two laps around the lake, plus walking to and from home, a total of 3 x 2 + 3.5 x 2 = 13km.
130pm: Reached home. Drank 1 litre of water in total during the outing. Downed another 500ml once at home.
3pm: Hunger pang strikes while watching a documentary on youtube. The neighbour's cooking wafted through my house. I believe I can live normally without resorting to weird actions to occupy time that I'd normally spend on cooking eating and cleaning. Weird actions include cleaning my room, dusting furniture and tidying papers. Nothing brain taxing. I am not as restless as yesterday, although the level of concentration is still low on certain brain tasks like reading.
430pm: Hands start to feel cold. Is it due to the weather or due to the body's defensive slow-down-the-metabolism mechanism?
515pm: Decided to test out the metabolism theory. Ate an apple. Half an hour later hands return to normal temperature. Drank another 250ml of water.
730pm: Heated up the leftover onion soup from yesterday and added in a bit of bread. It is more watery than yesterday's because I topped up the pot with water (it was too dry, a reheat might char the bottom) and because I have not yet dipped the bread in. Bread will soak up excess moisture in no time. The apple in the photo is another one, not the one I had eaten earlier in the day. I did not eat the second apple.
8pm: Finally managed to empty the bowel that has been nagging at me since this morning. Not hard, so I'm not dehydrated. Dark, probably due to the fact there is so little intestinal bulk in the form of unsoluble fibre. I have, after all, eaten 1/3 of my normal food intake. The body might need time to adjust. Do people poop less when they eat less? Does the norm of "empty the bowels once a day" need to be revisited?
My experiment seems to be throwing up more questions than answers. That's the way of science, trying to find a reason behind every observable phenomenom and with that, trying to predict what would happen when certain conditions are met. Interesting days ahead.
9pm: The elevated heartbeat after dinner is only beginning to subside almost an hour after the meal. Is my digestive system working harder than usual due to the lack of exercise (digesting once instead of thrice a day) these last two days?
930pm: Bed time. As usual after checking the room for mosquitos, the moment I turn off the bedside lamp I hear them whine in the dark.