I need a snooze button for Mondays

Ugh. I'm not here right now. At least, my mind isn't. It's still in bed, with a pillow covering its ears and a hand reaching out to slap that snooze button into oblivion. In other words, Ms. Cheerful is not in the office. Sadly, the need to exercise does not have a snooze button. I'm going to compromise by just doing a basic routine.

• AM:15 minutes elliptical Done! Got my heart rate, which considering how unmotivated I was when I started, is surprising. But I'll take it.
• Noon:30 minutes elliptical Done. Eventually. If you consider 'noon' to be 3 pm.
• PM:60 minutes elliptical Done. Late, but done.

I do love Fridays

Even on a three-day week. I did put in a solid hour going through stuff yesterday. Still more stuff to go through. I think I should be able to clear enough space by the end of today so that I'll have some room to do different exercises besides ellipticalling.

• AM:15 minutes ellipticalDone!
• Noon:30 minutes ellipticalDone. Granted, I was rather flexible in my definition of 'noon' -- does 3 pm count? I'm calling it done
• PM:60 minutes STIHTGTDone. Actually starting to see progress!

Monday, and only three days left in the week

This is what a Monday should be. Tomorrow's hump day, and then I've made it to Friday! On the down side, taking a 5-day weekend has left me mentally unprepared to face my inbox. They expect me to work? How unfair is that!
Okay, whining done for now. Pretty much. I'm going to concentrate on getting more of the STIHTGT today, with exercise breaks to keep my energy up.

• AM: 15 minutes elliptical - done
• Noon: 30 minutes elliptical sorta done, 30 minutes STIHTGT mighty fail
• PM: 15 minutes elliptical,overdone 1 hour STIHTGT over fail

I'm sensing a pattern here. I can see making time for exercise, especially when work is irksome or stressful, but cleaning? Naaaah. Yet I need to do both. On the exercise side, I did put in a 45 minute walk this evening as well.

Progress Report & Goals for September

Oddly enough, my subconscious seems to have decided that since I'm taking a couple days off, that meant I didn't have to schedule in exercise. Sorry, no. Doesn't work like that.

Looking back on this re-boot of my exercise program, I can see progress. Mostly because I started from a state of complete slug, but I'm still calling in a win. When I first went back to the elliptical, I felt it, actually felt the level of effort in my muscles. Now, I can go for an hour again. The muscles aren't sore the next day, but my legs feel as if they got a workout.

I want to start becoming systematic about the goals I need to achieve. Set up a way to push myself. The problem is, there isn't really room to go back to the dance videos I used to follow. I've got room in the exercise room for the elliptical and a whole bunch of Stuff That I Have To Go Through. All right then. That'll be part of this month's challenge. If it's between me and my exercise goals, I'll have to tackle it.

This is going to be a challenge.

• AM: 15 minutes elliptical - done
• Noon: One whole friggin' hour tackling the STIHTGT.- done
• PM: 15 minutes elliptical

Rainy Days and Wednesdays

Singing in the Rain, non-Hollywood style

It's raining! It's lovely and cool. I moved back from my outdoor office (the patio where I work when it's too hot indoors) to my regular office inside. It feels like fall.
In other words, it's great weather for exercise!

• AM: 30 minutes elliptical - done!
• Noon: 30 minutes elliptical - done!
• PM: 60 minutes elliptical - done. barely

Exercise? Didn't I just do that last week?

I hate housework! You make the beds, you do the dishes and six months later you have to start all over again. -Joan Rivers Phyllis Diller

• AM: 15 minutes yardwork. It's not too hot, for once. done
• Noon: 30 minutes yardwork. And the yard is a mess. done
• PM: 1 hour elliptical. done!

One of the great things about an exercise blog

I really don't feel like exercising today. It's 10 in the morning and it's already starting to feel hot. HOWEVER Since if I don't exercise today, I'd have to post that, I decided to find some kind of exercise I can get in today that qualifies.

• AM: 15 minutes on the elliptical. - done!
• Noon: 15 minutes yardwork. More, if there's a breeze. - done
• PM: I am going to go to the nice air conditioned library and climb stairs.- Fail

Have you seen my motivation anywhere? I could've sworn it was right here...

Tired. No energy. Just want to go back to sleep. So I post my day's exercise schedule here in the hope that it will motivate me to move.

• AM: 15 minutes on the elliptical- done
• Noon: 30 minutes yardwork - switched this for a 30 minute walk instead. Needed to run errands. Combining drudgery with exercise. Win!
• PM: 45 minutes on the elliptical. I want to ramp up the duration, push myself a little. Hopefully, I'll be awake by then. - done!

Running away from home was a good idea

Sometimes, running away from home is the mature, adult thing to do. I spent the night in a hotel overlooking the beach. It was blessedly cool, with touches of fog, and I fell asleep listening to the sound of the surf.
Of course, when I came home it was 85 degrees in my house at 9 pm, but I still felt better.

Exercise du jour:
• AM: 30 minutes elliptical - done. Well, 20 minutes. Need to squeeze in another 10 minutes at noon.
• Noon: 30 minutes elliptical - done. Got in 40 minutes, she said smugly.
• PM: 15 minutes elliptical - done

Walk

Exercise du jour: Walking. Just walking. One hour. That is my goal.Done! I imitated the bird in the picture and went to the beach, which was blessedly cool. Perfect walking weather.

There's more than one way to be flexible

We're looking at a mini heat wave. Well, not be the standards of anyone who's been sweltering east of the Rockies, but for the Pacific Northwest it's going to be way too hot. So I'm changing the exercise schedule to reflect the life of the AC-deprived.

• Morning: 1 hour ellipticalling crack o' dawn. Managed 45 minutes.
• Noon: 30 minutes yardwork (in the shade), 15 minutes elliptical. Done
• Going to the library or Starbucks or some other place blessed with ACOh, baby, Done!

Achievable goals, I haz them. I hopes.

Stretch or Kvetch

I've been doing pretty good with the steady exercising on the elliptical. (Well, apart from Friday, which, as I've already explained, never happened.) But I have been falling down in an epic fail when it comes to stretching. My subconscious apparently thinks it's not Real exercise and that I shouldn't have to do it.
It's going to be very hot this week, so I'm going to change up my schedule:

• Morning: 15 minutes elliptical done
• Noon: 30 minutes yardwork done
• Afternoon: 30 minutes yard work and 15 minutes stretching. And maybe kvetching as well. done

For now, I'll skip the evening exercise and concentrate on doing things before it gets too hot.

The illusionary Friday

Look, yesterday never happened, all right? You imagined it. In reality, we skipped straight from Thursday to Saturday. Otherwise, there would have been a blog post about how much exercise I got in on Friday, even though it was way too hot to do anything but sit in the shade and keep hydrated.
Monday, however, will occur. Sorry 'bout that.

I can do anything for fifteen minutes

Well, except hold my breath. Or stand on my head. Or listen to the NBC commentary on the Olympic Games. Or... Well, all right, there are several things I can't do for fifteen minutes. But exercise is not one of them. I'm going to try breaking up some of the exercise sessions into smaller portions today, just to see how it feels.

Exercise du jour:
Morning: 15 minutes elliptical. Done!
Noon: 15 minutes elliptical, 15 minutes yard work. Done done
Afternoon:60 minutes elliptical. That'll be my endurance portion of the day.Done! Almost gave up, but I thought "just a few minutes more" and after several "few minutes" I made it.
Evening: 15 minutes stretching.

Let's try this again

If you set goals for yourself, and you're like a lot of other people, you probably realize it's not that your goals are physically impossible that's keeping you from achieving them; it's that you lack the self-discipline to stick to them. It's physically possible to lose weight. It's physically possible to exercise more. - Daniel Goldstein

New week, blank slate. I'm going to start off with the assumption that I am going to either find or take the time out of my work day to exercise.

Exercise du jour:
Morning: 15 minutes elliptical -- done. finally. Kept putting it off, then I thought, "If I miss this, I'll have to write 'fail' on the blog. So I did it. Accountability FTW!
Noon: 30 minutes yard work -- done
Afternoon: 60 minutes elliptical -- done!
Evening: 15 minutes stretching -- argh! No good reason. I got distracted and forgot. I promise to stretch instead Tuesday.

O! What a beautiful morning!

It's been a week of craziness, starting with a low of work stress and ending with a high of personal stress (but happy). I'm going to try to settle back into a routine, rather than snatching moments to exercise in between bouts of stress.

Exercise du jour:
Morning: 15 minutes elliptical - done!
Noon: 30 minutes yard work - done!
Afternoon: 60 minutes elliptical - done!
Evening: 15 minutes stretching - fail. Ate something that made me sick, so skipped exercising and went to bed. Scheduling this for Saturday instead.

Just get the morning exercise in, let the rest of the day take care of itself

As Messymimi says, do exercise first thing in the morning. This week, I'm going to try and take a break in the middle of the morning Every Day. I have a tendency to sit all morning, from six in the morning until noon. Bad Merry.

Exercise du jour:
9:30ish -- get up, elliptical for 15 minutes - done! That screenshot above is the text for the mid-morning alarm that I put on my phone. It's quite helpful. -- done
Noonish -- elliptical 30 minutes - fail. I need to take a break at lunch!
4ish -- elliptical 60 minutesdone!

Winging it Monday

I'm typing up this schedule on Sunday at about 11:40 pm. I've been wrestling with day job issues for the better (or worse, in some opinions) part of the afternoon and evening. I've got to be up and at work in another six hours. I am putting up an exercise schedule in the hopes that I will be able to achieve something exercise-wise. It could happen.
Yes, it is also possible that pigs will fly. They could be winging their way toward you e'en as I type. To quote Douglas Adams, "In an infinite universe... anything is possible."
exercise du jour:
The very light version
Morning: 15 minutes on the elliptical -Fail
Noon: 15 minutes ellipticalling also -Fail
Evening: 15 minutes ellipticalling - Done. 30 minutes ellipticalling to make up for the day. I am so short on sleep I kept closing my eyes while I exercised. But I still am counting this as done
Honestly, that's about all I can handle today. It's still movement. I will call it a win if I can achieve all this.

An ambitious schedule for a hot day

People who sat for more than eight hours and were active for less than five minutes had a 59% increased risk of death compared with a reference group of people who sat for less than four hours and were active for more than 60 minutes.

Yes, you've heard of studies about the dangers of sitting. It's still good to reinforce the lesson. I need the reinforcement, anyway. It's going to be hot today. I'm going to try to schedule exercise early in the day, when I can face the thought of working out. Later on, I'll be working up a sweat just by sitting.

Morning: 60 minutes elliptical - done! I didn't think I'd be able to fit that in, but I got lucky.
Noon: 30 minutes yard work - done. Well, more like 20 minutes but it's too hot. I took a break. That counts as done.
Afternoon: 30 minutes stretching and yogadone I did it! It meant working a 13 hour day, but I got exercise in today.

Crazy times, sane priorities

Quote du jour: Either you run the day or the day runs you. - Jim Rohn

It's going to be difficult to hold to any schedule today. Just sat down to work and already five different people have tried to schedule me to work on projects.
I'm going to pause for a moment. Take a deep breath, let it out, stretch.
Okay then. The schedule.

Morning: 15 minutes elliptical - done
Noon: 30 minutes elliptical- done
3:30 p.m.: 30 minutes yard work - done
6:30 15 minutes elliptical - done

I'm going to TRY. If I even get some of this done, I'll celebrate

Update: I'm celebrating! There was pressure to work more than a ten hour day, but I acquired a sudden case of temporary deafness.