Adventures in shopping: Manuel gets a girlfriend

I've been draggin', my energy level saggin', my conscience naggin'.
Only one thing to do in a situation like that.

Yes, I went shopping.

It wasn't quite as bad as when I went to buy Orlando Manuel, my manual treadmill. But it still had moments of oddity.

Picture the scene: me in a crowded store, trying out the elliptical. Little kids tugging on their mother's sleeve as they pass by "Mommy, what is that lady doing?" (Honestly, does No One in this world ever try out exercise equipment before they slap down the credit card? Am I the only one?)

And the result is Manuel's new girlfriend: Ellie.

Ellie the elliptical machine. Bear sold separately.

She's a bit clanky, but I can get my heart rate up quickly and keep it up in the workout range without too much stress. I know it's exercise, but it doesn't feel like I'm working as hard as I am. I often don't realize how hard my heart is going until I check my pulse. It doesn't feel like as much work to get a workout using the elliptical machine. (Well, it doesn't feel like it until I get off. Then the muscles make themselves felt.)

Plus, she was 70% off, which appealed to my cheapskate frugal side.

Wimp out day

I can't do it.

The bicycle stays in the garage today.
The running shoes are in the closet.
I'm driving the evilSUV to work.

No star.

Photo courtesy of :

http://www.flickr.com/photos/your_wht_knight/ / CC BY-NC 2.0

Another damn good reason to exercise

Study du jour: A study published in the Journals of Gerontology describes how your brain starts to go once you hit 30. Researchers wanted to find out what happens when older people exercise. (More detail at the bottom of the post.)

The conclusion:"Significant increases in brain volume, in both gray and white matter regions, were found as a function of fitness training for the older adults who participated in the aerobic fitness training but not for the older adults who participated in the stretching and toning (nonaerobic) control group."

Exercise du jour: Well hell, I'm walking! I'll try to fit in yoga in the evening, but today I'm inspired to be aerobic.

Done! Not as long a walk as I would've liked, but even 30 minutes counts. Plus, on a day like today it was really good to get out of the office and walk in the soggy forest. A place where no one wanted me to document anything at all, merely to be there.



More about this study: BEGINNING in the third decade of life the human brain shows structural decline, which is disproportionately large in the frontal, parietal, and temporal lobes of the brain .... Cardiovascular exercise has been associated with improved cognitive functioning in aging humans (3,4). These effects have been shown to be the greatest in higher order cognitive processes, such as working memory, switching between tasks, and inhibiting irrelevant information, all of which are thought to be subserved, in part, by the frontal lobes of the brain. For more information about this study, click here.

Oh no! She said ... IT!

So this woman says to me... she says... brace yourself...

"But you have such a wonderful personality!"


Ack! Argh! Noooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo!

If that's not the kiss of death, I don't know what is.

Exercise du jour:
90 minutes quite brisk walking



Photo credit: Oddsock

One step at a time ... but which way?

Quote du jour: I child-proofed my house, but they still get in.

Exercise du jour: I can't plan exercise for today. I don't know if family is coming to visit or not, and if they are then I don't know when they might come by. I just know it's probably a good idea to hide the breakables.

Having just done a road trip myself, I can understand the whys and wherefores and whoknows, but it's still frustrating. If nothing else, I'll do a lot of housework. And mowing the lawn, that's exercise.


Blues Crossroads courtesy of hankword.

Easter Friday

Okay, I suppose including this photo is a stretch. Easter island isn't really relevant to Easter. Besides, what is that woman doing? Trying to look like she's smooching a giant carved rock? Or hoping it's going to fall on her any minute?

Quote du jour: Life is too important to be taken seriously. - Oscar Wilde

Exercise du jour: More walking, and for that matter, more jogging.

Easter Island photo courtesy of Goron.

Easter Thursday

Quote du jour: When in doubt, make a fool of yourself. There is a microscopically thin line between being brilliantly creative and acting like the most gigantic idiot on earth. So what the hell, leap. -Cynthia Heimel

Exercise du jour: Weight lifting with a Kettleball.

Easter bunster courtesy of annia316.

Easter Wednesday

Quote du jour: Keep away from people who try to belittle your ambitions. Small people always do that, but the really great make you feel that you, too, can become great. - Mark Twain


Exercise du jour: Walking, again, and okay when nobody's looking a little jogging. I'm trying the stealth exercise approach here, trying to get my body used to regular jogging without actually making it think Life Is Hard or Why is she being so cruel to me or any other thoughts that sow the seeds of self-doubt in the back of my mind.



Easter bunny joke courtesy of isazappy.

I call this Thin Tuesday

I'm too lazy to go consult my French-English dictionary to find the proper French term for "Thin Tuesday." Not that it's a term any self-respecting francophile would use. Svelte, maybe. Time to get back into a regular exercise-and-post-about-it routine.

Exercise du jour: After I unpack, and find room for all the Really Necessary Stuff my mother decided to stuff into the car, I'm going to take a walk. If a little jogging creeps in, well, so be it.


Gorgeous "little liquid Easter eggs" courtesy of Steve took it.

Hi Atus!

All right, so that's a lame title. Whaddya want. I'm on the road, visiting family for Easter.

I've been gone. Oddly enough, people noticed. You guys kept looking at my blog; the guilt was becoming enormous.

My claim is that this hiatus was all part of my cunning plan. When work became so ovewhelming that all I did was work or sleep, posting exercise schedules or excuses fell by the wayside, as did a lot of other good things. I kept up -- pretty much -- with the eating mostly vegetables, though there were a few days where I followed the Fried Chicken diet, I have to confess. (But only chickens who were "raised in a human environment," as the sign in the store said. Poor chickens. Presumably that meant they had to sit in a cubicle for 12 hours a day and fight traffic to get home.)

Anyway, where was that paragraph going? It had a plan, then it got lost in a maze of dashes, parentheses, and tangents. Poor paragraph.

The point I was aiming toward was that when keeping up my Good schedule became impossible, I decided to make that part of my plan. Inadvertently, my last blog post was on Mardi Gras, the day before Lent started. So even though I went back to exercising regularly a couple weeks ago, I decided it would look more smooth and deliberate if I went back to posting as soon as Lent ended. Easter's a time of rebirth and stuff like that.

Somehow this seemed important from a psychological standpoint: hey, I may be struggling to keep organized, but I've got a plan and I'm kinda following it!

Exercise du jour: 50 minutes on my mother's motorized treadmill, watching cable television. Since I have neither cable TV or a fancy motorized treadmill at home, this is going to feel luxurious. Then it's the drive back to Oregon.

Easter tomb photo courtesy of Doughnut Diva.

Self-pity raised to an art form

I can pout better than a Super Model.

Time to stop feeling sorry for myself. I've caught up a bit on sleep, definitely caught up on food, and somewhat caught up on work.

Exercise du jour: Half an hour of the new yoga DVD.

Merry's Exercise Routine

Methinks time to rethink my exercise strategy.

[Photo credit:Roadsidepictures]

Summary du week and sundry inanities

Exercise? Moi? Maybe.

This week I have completed one whole friggin' 30 minutes run. Indoors, since I've discovered running in freezing temperatures makes my asthma happy, but not me.

Also, I failed the week 4 push up challenge test.

Well, not exactly failed. I think a true FAIL would probably be if both my arms fell off. All that happened was that I didn't qualify with a high enough number of push ups to move on to week 5. I could always try week 5, but based on how I felt during the test, I think not. (It was amazingly difficult to do even 20 push ups. Damn those aliens.)

Mostly I've been testing exercise DVDs for Cranky Fitness reviews. (Don't spend money on the Skinny Bitches Boot Camp DVD. Trust me.)

It looks like I need to have a schedule up here to swear at. Trying to track exercise in emails or in my head is truly annoying. Plus, after-the-fact reporting is not as effective because I'm apt to forget which exercise I'm doing which day. And apparently I need that additional guilt factor of posting the exercise du jour up here.

The other problem is the lack of balance between work and real life.
I need to get up earlier, so I can leave work at a reasonable hour.
Otherwise I get into a hopeless cycle of
- trying to get everything done after I get home late at night
- leading to not getting enough sleep
- resulting in the need for strong coffee to jumpstart the day
- thus necessitating sleeping pills or empty-calorie-laden wine to keep me from being caffeine-wired and bouncing off the walls at midnight
- which leaves me groggy the next day, thus requiring coffee to jumpstart the day ... arrrrrrrrrgh!

Exercise du jour:


No! No! I'm not going to try out another exercise DVD tonight! I'm going on strike! Let my 3 miles of virtuous walking count as my exercise du jour and give me the damn star before somebody gets hurt.





Thank you.

Hmmmn.... maybe those "100% Natural" Sleep Aid pills were a mistake. I did wonder when the package promised it was the "non-drowsy formula." (Non-drowsy sleep?) I wonder if the pills are starting to get to me, mwa ha ha ha ha haaaaaaaaaaa............

12th night, but no epiphany

Today was the 12th day of Christmas, the Feast of Epiphany. Seems an ironic holiday to report failure. Got off to a bad start this week, my first week back to work after a couple weeks off. Due to a severe lack of organizational time skills, I now have to choose one of the following: sleep, food, or exercise.

Not much of a choice. I was up until 2 a.m. last night. See ya in the morning.


Adoration of the Magi courtesy of Flickr.

Looking ahead

Horsie courtesy of Flickr.

Not sure what to do after the couch to 5K.
The community hospital is hosted a series of Yoga classes. Hafta say, one of the main attractions is the fact that it's a ten minute walk from my house. Could easily fit it in on my way home from work. Except I should probably be looking for something more aerobic if I want the scale to budge.

Total fantasy... there are stables around... only a forty minute drive and I could take riding lessons... which are pricy :(

Okay then, how about Aikido? Looks like a good place about a ten minute drive away. Except that I keep visualizing a classes filled with very short, flexible midget children, and myself towering above them.

I could always keep running... increasing the pace or working on running up hills. I like the structure of the program, the way the voice told me when to run and when to walk. It was great not to have to worry about it.

Giveaway du jour: Hell, haven't I give everything away already? Who knew I had so much stuff. Okay, fine. Another book gets the toss.
Two books -- I'm getting better at this!

Exercise du jour: Raking, weeding, gardening. It's not exciting, but it's necessary. Plus, it really is a workout if you do it enough -- and Lord knows I need to do it a lot.
Oh, Frapp! You'd think after exercising for 29 days straight it would have become automatic. But noooOOOOoooo. It wasn't until 8 pm that I remembered that I was supposed to move my body today. Pushups and kettlebell arm exercises. Sadly, the leaves will still be there tomorrow.

Definitely a sore loser

Shouldn't running in a beautiful spot be a cheerful experience?

Fact du jour: My body is not pleased with me. The muscles aren't sore, but I'm feeling tired. Worn out. The body is starting to complain. A twenty minute run today, and it's outdoors. For some reason, I hate running outdoors during daylight. I have no idea why.

Last time, I went running by the library, where there's an extensive series of walking trails surrounded by beautiful lakes and grounds. It was early in the day, so there wasn't anyone around to see me huffing and puffing and glowing red. (I don't count that flock of Canadian Geese, who were extremely impolite and Not the sort of bird I would consider a civilized acquaintance.) And I was miserable the whole time.

Oh, Merry... come here for a minute...

I've lost at least six pounds this month. Right now it doesn't feel worth it. Damn I hope this is a transitory mood swing. I blame the planets being out of alignment. Where's a cosmic chiropractor when you need one?

Giveaway du jour: I'm heading in to the garage again. I'm starting to see a patch of floor. And I'm sure there are more things lurking there that I could give on to someone who'll appreciate them. I refuse to let that garage beat me!
On the other hand, maybe I'll attack it another day. The sun is out, the sky is blue. I'm getting rid of another book and taking up the rake to do Good Things outside while I can.

Exercise du jour: Week 5 of the couch to 5k. 20 minutes solid running. Yeah. I'm enthused. I'm really enthused. Yeah. That's me. Watch this space for a gold star.

Update: Well, Dr. T suggested postponing the run, and one should always listen to a doctor. (Yes, I know the degree is a Ph.D rather than an M.D., but that's not important right now.)

Plus, the roads are icy; there have been several accidents this morning. (A couple hours ago, before the temp went above freezing, but let's not get distracted by side issues like that.)

Plus, I just stepped on a piece of glass and cut my foot. (Hey, it needed a band-aid. Don't want gangrene to set it.)

I swear to Bob, those damn planets are plotting against me.


I did the Pilates Beginning Mat Workout instead.

Life's a beach, or so I'm told

Cannon Beach, Haystack rock

Poem du jour:

maggie and millie and molly and may
went down to the beach (to play one day)

and maggie discovered a shell that sang
so sweetly she couldn't remember her troubles,and

millie befriended a stranded star
whose rays five languid fingers were;

and molly was chased by a horrible thing
which raced sideways while blowing bubbles:and

may came home with a smooth round stone
as small as a world and as large as alone.

For whatever we lose (like a you or a me)
it's always ourselves we find in the sea.

- ee cummings


Giveaway du jour: Time for another challenge. I'm going to find a book that I can give away. I can do this.
I'm being flexible with this giveaway stuff. Gave away a vase. Wasn't using it, didn't have a place for it any longer, let it find a home where it will be loved and appreciated. Or at least used.

Exercise du jour: Rania's Personal Trainer DVD, arms and abs.
It's almost 11 pm and I've just finished writing up a post for Cranky Fitness. In other words, short kettlebell arm exercises sounded really good tonight.
Next day update: good idea to use the heavier kettlebell, Dickens, for the arm exercises. Definitely felt slightly sore the next day, so at least the quickie had some effect.

Walking the cheap motivational slogan

Poem du jour:
Easy to sense the trend in the drift of life,
Hard to compel one creature out of its course...
- Tu Fu

Gotta tell you, my motivation went for a walk and hasn't come back. So I'm going to make this short and sweet, just like me. Or short and sour. Something like that. Some days you gotta just fake it.

Giveaway du jour: I'm tired of giving away things. It's a pain to search through storage boxes, and it feels like I'm not giving. I'm going to try for the more imaginative. Okay, no I'm not. I can't think of anything imaginative. I'll go through my pantry and see if I can give something to a Food Bank.

Does canned food go bad? I have a couple cans that have been in the back of the highest shelf for... well, I think a couple of them survived the last Ice Age. Are they still good? Didn't want to risk it, so I donated some bags of pasta. It's not a lot to give. Why do I feel guilty? It's a lot better than not giving anything, isn't it? Sure hope so.

Exercise du jour: I've calculated that it's 2.5 miles to walk from my house to the Max station and then to work. If I commute to work rather than taking the evilSUV, I'll only have to do some arm exercises in the evening and I'm set.

The trouble with this clever scheme is that it is dependent upon my actually Getting UP in the morning. Good idea aside from that.
10 minutes hitting myself with a kettlebell, then 15 more minutes of a mish-mash of arms, legs, abs, and heavy breathing. Technically I suppose you'd call it dancing, or at least moving aerobically while music is playing. Thank God for drapes. Wouldn't want the neighbors to hurt themselves from laughing too hard.
Good enough to get me my star.

Friday! Finally!

photo: brkymantra

Quote du jour: Those who think they have not time for bodily exercise will sooner or later have to find time for illness. ~Edward Stanley

Giveaway du jour: Today I'm going to give up another child book. I can do it.
Okay, not sure where all the giveaway books are hiding. Braved another storage box to find a pair of pants that I'll never wear again. Does it still count if it doesn't feel like I'm giving something up?

Exercise du jour: Rania's Personal Trainer DVD, arms and abs.
Nothing else feels quite like the smug feeling you get exercising first thing in the morning.

Halfway through another week

Photo: ny156uk

Quote du jour:
Better to hunt in fields, for health unbought,
Than fee the doctor for a nauseous draught,
The wise, for cure, on exercise depend;
God never made his work for man to mend.
~John Dryden

Giveaway du jour: Today I'm going to give up another child book. I can do it.
Methinks BCB cursed me -- this was hard to do. Finally found that I had two reference books on the same application, so one of them is now toast.

Exercise du jour: Rania's Personal Trainer DVD, arms and abs.
Four hours of sleep, twelve hours of work. There is no way I'm going to do a full workout. I'd like to find a way to blame BCB for this, but I'm too tired to work up a good rationalization.

Anyway, I did ten minutes' worth of kettlebell arms stuff. Thingies. Exercises. Yeah, that's the word. Knew it would come back to me.