Tuesday, September 28, 2010

Longer the Day, Less Focus

I had a very long day.

It makes me empathize for those that have an hour commute to work.

It also made me less than enthusiastic for cardio tonight.

So Kamiah gave me a Rosie the Riveter speech and I went home was underwhelmed with the Glee episode and hopped on the treadmill.

Grave mistake #1: Do not get on a treadmill when you would rather take a walk outside.

Grave mistake #2: Do not tweet while doing your cardio because you will, with every step, lessen your grade level of writing.


Weight: 207.8
Miles: 6.905
Circuit: Beginner - 3

Ceasing Ramble

Monday, September 27, 2010

Another Week

Today is my Mom's birthday.

Last year I forgot her birthday for the first time in the 'you're supposed to remember on your own' age. While my brother not only remembered, but got my Mom flowers. I heard about it for a month.

Today I was 99.9% sure it was my Mother's birthday.

I double checked by doing what anyone would do, bringing up her university records. It's the nice thing about working at the university that your parents went to, access to verifying birthdays.

I gave a birthday call on the way to the nearby community college. Saved.

Work was interesting as it always is at the community college. I enjoy the atmosphere and the changing up of viewpoints in the students.

On the drive home I called again to chat with my folks. When I tried to get out of my Mom if my brother had called yet.

He hadn't.

So I called him and told him to call my Mom.

Sure wish Brian did that for me last year.

On the workout side of things:

Friday - I did not have time to do the circuit workout, Beth invited me to go to the Season Ticket holder party at the K. I got to see the clubhouse, sit in the dugout and walk around the field. It was awesome.

Saturday it rained on and off and Dany and I went to a little tailgate with Hawk the Ewok.

Sunday... I diligently watched television.

Today I got back into the circuit workout and I think next week I will fully be able to add in another set to the beginner workout.

Miles Walked: 5.575
Circuit: Beginner - 3

Ceasing Ramble

Thursday, September 23, 2010

A Love Letter

Dear Cardio,

I hate you today.

Love,

B

Miles: 5.575
Circuit: Beginner - 2

Wednesday, September 22, 2010

You Can't Stop the Beat

I was whiny today.

Way past whiny. My thighs still hurt going down stairs and getting out of chairs making me feel like I was possibly going to have a hot flash soon.

I had convinced myself that I only needed to do cardio today and stay away from the circuit workout even though I had scheduled them to be MWFs.

Then I consulted my exercise Yoda, Mia who told me that I needed to power through and do the circuit workout.

We talked about switching up some of the arm exercises with the lower body workout, but I figured if I was going to do it I should keep it in the same order of focusing on the zones.

Then Krisana and I walked to the union for a farewell reception. I whined more.

I left work, whining.

I returned to a cat... that whined at me.

Then I changed my clothes and pulled out the dumbbells, turned on the box fan, and got to work. (Yes, I put a comma before the "and" I'm still of the old school that does it that way. MLA will accept either as will APA.)

Interestingly my arms started to burn in the warmup of simple arm lifts. I felt dread try to wiggle its way into my heart, but focused on the playlist and making funny faces at myself in the mirror to try and get myself to not pay attention to the aches and pains.

The next pain was in the core workout, but again I powered through it and figured out that I had been doing Plank incorrectly with how I balance my weight. I changed it and I still can't hold it well.

Kamiah you will win in a "Plank off" Every. Single. Time. I just want to be able to hold it for 60 seconds without whimpering to myself.

Then came the lower workout and I started out slow it was going okay. There was pain, but I could work through it. There were moments that I was sure I was going to lose function of my legs and plummet to the ground.

Instead I made it to the cool down and "You Can't Stop the Beat" came on... so I decided to do some cardio, just a half of a mile, which turned into maybe three quarters and when I hit that I thought, well might as well just do the full mile.

Hmm.

Didn't think that was going to be today's outcome.

So yay!

Miles: 4.075
Circuit: Beginner - 2

Ceasing Ramble.

Tuesday, September 21, 2010

Holy Crap

That's all I can think about as I sat down after the simple walk that I just did.

Because of the circuit workout from yesterday my thighs have been screaming like a six-year old who has had their Nintendo DS taken away. It didn't hurt as much when I was walking or going up stairs, but going down stairs made me feel like I was going to have my legs fly away.

So as I walked across the parking lot to my car after work I contemplated waiting until seven to do my walking tonight.

I had nearly convinced myself until I walked up the stairs to my apartment and felt my thighs screaming protest again. I had to walk or I was going to be stuck in my chair until possibly Friday.

Unable to move.

So I did 1.575 miles in 30 minutes and my thighs still hurt, but I am proud that I powered through the pain.

Now here's hoping I don't cry tomorrow when I try to attempt the circuit workout again.


Miles: 3.075
Circuit: Beginner - 1

Ceasing Ramble

Monday, September 20, 2010

Deceiving Circuit Workout

Each day another little change.

Today I tried to get up when my alarm first turned off, but failed. So I knew that my circuit workout would be destined for evening instead of morning.

I'm honestly glad I forgot how deceiving the circuit workout is. Tiny little exercises built on top of each other to work different muscle groups and leave you thoroughly worked out.

After a brief check-in with Kamiah this morning I told her about easing into exercise and decided to do the lesser of the circuit workout that I used to do, which is just doing one set instead of two.

Thank heavens I did that for myself.

Below is the Circuit Workout that I Use:

Warm-up:
Step Touches
Arm Raises
Simulated Jump Rope
Shoulder Rolls
Neck Rolls
Marching in Place

Upper Body:
Bicep Curls
Tricep Kickbacks
Dead Lifts
Chest Flies
Shoulder Presses
Overhead Pullovers

Core:
Crunches
Oblique Crunches
Captain's Chair
Plank (I hate this so much, but keep it in there)
Back Extensions

Lower Body:
Lunges
Plie Squats
Step-ups
Reverse Lunges with Leg Lifts (wherein I start sucking wind)
Calf Raises (wherein I hate all movement)

The Cooldown:
Calf Stretch
Hamstring Stretch
One-Arm Reach
Hip Flexor Stretch
Tricep Stretch
Quad Stretch
Child's Pose (wherein I think Yoga might be awesome)
Low Back and Glute Stretch

A set is usually 10 to 12, but I make a set 12 to 15.
Some exercises are time based, such as step-ups, the plank of evil incarnate, marching in place.

Generally it kicks my ass, and when it stops kicking your ass you add another set by first finishing through all the exercises in the area and then going through again. Circuit workouts are awesome. And painful. And awesome. And sweat inducing. And Awesome.

Another tidbit that Mia and I talked about was a thought I had while walking yesterday. I am addicted to achievements on Xbox as are many individuals that I know. So why not make Exercise Achievements to give me something to strive towards...

The first couple that I could come up with were:

Walk Five Hundred Miles - 20 EXP
Walk Five Hundred More - 40 EXP

I'm sure that there are things that I should really look into that are difficult, but also easy to achieve so I have little successes. I'm not sure what all of them will be, but I'll post the achievement when I get it on my blog. Much like the image below:



If you have suggestions please let me know. I know that one should be holding the Plank position for the actual amount of time instead of always wussing out. I hate the Plank. Maybe something like "ARRRRRRRRRRRR - 10 EXP"

Be creative I'd love to have goals set by others to strive for as well.

Start Weight: 208.6 lbs.
Miles Walked: 1.5 miles
Circuit Workouts: Beginner - 1

Sunday, September 19, 2010

Not Quite Sucking Wind

The re-dedication to exercise started off better than I thought it would. I didn't want to push myself back into what I used to be able to do in my height of fitness.

Because that inevitably leads to hurting the next day and putting off the exercise (I should know I've fallen into that before).

You will notice that I do not have my initial weigh-in, because perhaps I stayed up late last night playing Deathspank on Xbox and perhaps... I got up at noon. I'll put that in tomorrow.

I'd like to do measurements too, but I'll need someone to help me with that later.

Before doing my 30 minutes of cardio on the treadmill tonight I checked in with my friend Kamiah to see if she would be interested in helping me stay true to the promise I made to myself.

To exercise daily.

I told her that I would like her to guilt me everyday and she asked if she could instead be very peppy.

We also talked about what motivates us, what we do during exercise and writing.

I'm glad to have her on this ride with me, because I do admire Kamiah's commitment to many things. I'm happy to have her remind me have to be committed to myself.

The actual workout had a simple goal: 30 minutes on the treadmill or 1 1/2 miles whichever took longer. It turned out to be the 30 minutes took longer, which made me happy with the first dip back into exercise waters in a while.

A Mr. Bandito note: He was fascinated with the treadmill the entire time.

Ceasing Ramble.

Saturday, September 18, 2010

Wherein I Spew Words and Such

Yes, I do realize it has been over a year since I blogged, thank you for noticing. If you did at all.

With the addition of twitter into my life I couldn't really find things to blog about without my blog turning into pictures of my cat (Who is doing fabulous, thank you for asking).

So instead I've decided I'm going to take you on a ride with me. Possibly a very, very, boring ride, but a ride nonetheless.

Yesterday I took off the afternoon at work to come home, pack and set myself towards St. Joseph to pick up Dany and see Brandi Carlile in Council Bluffs, IA. I took a quick shower because I felt like a slob and decided to change into something that was not a t-shirt of the university I work at so I would not be carded every two minutes during the concert.

So I opened up my closet.

Many of you know where this is going... the dreaded change of seasons when you pull out clothes that you wore in the past, but which are strangely tighter in the arms, or just don't look quite good around your waist/hips/chest.

I saw the lady cut graphic t-shirt of Superman stretching in areas that I hadn't seen before and Ole Blue was feeling strained and I flew into a full-on thirteen year old girl tantrum that resulted in my bed full of rejected outfits.

On the drive to St. Joseph I lamented to myself, while listening to country music, that I had finally reached the tipping point of 'when you finally realize you are out of shape'.

I knew that I had been struggling on stairs more than I should, but I didn't really care.

But it wasn't until Friday afternoon when I did the meltdown of maturity to see that I need to get back on the exercise horse.

So, I'm going to instead drift my blog into daily updates on my weight, exercise, and hopefully other entertaining things of the day.

Yes, I said daily.

Bold statement.

I'm sure I'll miss a day here and there due to lack of internet, but I'll still put it in the following days post.

I'm hoping to have a bit of an announcement tomorrow, but we'll wait on that one.

Tomorrow the weigh-in and initial "when she sucks wind" exercise re-start.

Ceasing Ramble.