I’m feeling so good! I have a four-day weekend starting tomorrow, got some stuff done at work today, and I managed to do tonight’s Crossfit Workout of the Day (WOD)!
Okay, so I didn’t quite do the workout. My pull-ups are basically hanging on the pull-up bar and jumping up to get my head somewhere below the bar — hey, but I felt it in my back and arms! Um, and my lunging walk was not a thing of beauty, but I did it!
The weather should also stay nice this weekend. So, things are just feeling “cooler-n-hell.” In honor of this feeling here’s a video of Ray Wylie Hubbard singing “Cooler-n Hell.” And yes, it’s one of those “let’s show as many hot babes in skimpy outfits” kind of video, but the song is one of my faves.
The crossfit bootcamp class tonight was an ass kicker. The lower half of my body will feel it tomorrow, and I don’t even want to think what it’s going to feel like on Friday morning when I wake up. Not that I normally jump right out of bed, but on Friday morning I expect that I will slooooowly roll out of bed and hopefully stand up.
Monday night we focused on our core. I didn’t really feel it until last night, and then it wasn’t until today that I felt that DOMS (delayed onset of muscle soreness). So tonight was three sets (30, 20, then 10 repetitions) of four lower body exercise. It’s the burpees that get me every time. I’m feeling it now. I got home and looked up my flight of stairs and winced. Shoot, even stretching was a slow and awkward activity.
Yep, I’m going to be moving slow tomorrow. Real slow.
Well this review is a bit late. I wrote it prior to the Academy Awards. My remarks about its chances at the awards still work, ’cause the movie did darn good at the awards (Best Screenplay, Director, and Picture were the main awards it won).
Tom Naughton put together a documentary that I do want to see: Fat Head. He looks at our fear of fat in our diets. As one of the many people who read Gary Taubes’ Good Calories; Bad Calories, I’ve become one of those low-carb eaters. I really cut back on eating refined carbohydrates and sugar. I didn’t give them up, but did cut back dramatically. I do eat fat — give me butter, please! What a difference this has all made in my life.
My energy is high, I’ve felt stronger, and my mood is so much more balanced. Yeah, yeah, but have I lost weight? No one wants to hear how healthy and strong I feel — they want to know about losing weight. That seems to be the scorecard on eating patterns. So, yes, I have lost weight. I started last June eating this way and I’ve dropped about 55 pounds. It seems so strange to have dropped all of that. And though I think everyone’s fascination with losing weight is missing the point, I do love the ability to shop for clothes in Misses sizes. Women’s (plus) sizes never seemed as attractive to me.
My goal is to get to about 22% body fat, which means I need to lose another 30 or so pounds. I really want to get muscles too. It seems to be easier when I eat like this. My body composition just feels different. I have a more defined waist, wider shoulders, and muscles at this weight than I did when I weighed the same amount several years ago.
I just have to thank Gary Taubes for his book. I love blogs that cover paleo and low-carb eating. I’ve learned more about body chemistry and what’s going on inside of me. I’ll start pointing to some of them as they discuss topics about food and exercise. You can start exploring the links on my blogroll. Look under Food and Fitness.
Here’s a few fun video clips from Fat Head. It was reading about how blood sugar affects insulin, and the damage that can result, that got me re-thinking what I eat. Fat Head explains things with humor and intelligence.
Whew. I made it through tonight’s workout. My fear that I was going to be weak as all get up after missing any other workouts since last Monday did not come to pass. I had a bit of a bug for a chunk of last week, but it didn’t mess me up too bad for tonight’s class.
After warming up with some squats and other stretches the instructor had us doing this strange version of pushups. We had our hands on some plastic plates that we slid back and forth under our body. That was topped with these situps that had us twisting side to side holding a weight. I made it through a grand total of 150 each.
The funny thing is that the pushup variation seemed easy. Working on my core was great, but I think I didn’t try hard enough — I should have done more of the pushups without resting on my knees. I think I could have done it, but I wimped out. Next time I’ll go full throttle and not go the wimpy route.
As one of the few folks in this country without any kind of TV signal, I’m sitting here catching up on the Oscars by refreshing the IMDB site. I gather that Slumdog Millionaire is going to take it all.
Slumdog was a fun movie and deserving of attention. Does it deserve all the awards? Who knows? I haven’t seen any of the other best pictures. It’s the hazard of living in a town with only 11 screens. We never get any of the Oscar contenders unless they are also big box-office hits. So far, we had Benjamin Button and Slumdog Millionaire show up. Doubt, Frost/Nixon, Milk, and many of the other films nominated for awards never made it here.
Hey, but we do have clean air, pine trees, and great people. So who cares about movies? (Dilettanteville shyly raises her hand) — okay, okay, but can’t I have clean air and good movies too?
Saturday evening and I’m in for the night. I’ve got a stack of DVDs to watch and am thinking about what to fix for dinner.
My current DVD is episode seven and eight of “Band of Brothers.” After that I’m sticking with the TV theme and putting in some “House” episodes. For dinner? Maybe some homemade hot wings or some leftover pulled pork (easy, easy recipe thanks to Son of Grok).
I have to see Confessions of a Shopaholic, write a review, and clean house sometime tomorrow. As someone who doesn’t have any TV signal, I will not be watching the Oscars, but will check in with IMDB during the evening.
And that is my amazingly exciting weekend. Just one day I’d like to write that I’m jetting off to Paris for the weekend.
I finally created a Facebook account. It’s all my old friend, Wendy’s, fault. She was talking it up. I decided to just go ahead and do it, even though I grumble about the whole concept.
So I joined. I’ve already touched base with some old friends. Dawn, who headed off to earn her doctorate in Minnesota and my old drinking/theater buddy, Jan. Okay, I think I could learn to like Facebook.
What can I say? I, like many people in this country, enjoyed Kevin James’ Paul Blart: Mall Cop movie. It’s not great by any means, but there are some silly laughs.
Oh, I wrote this when the Arizona Cardinals won the championship, so had to use that in my review. Here’s the review.
My old roommate, Wendy, was up in Flagstaff over the weekend. I joined her and her husband, Eric, for breakfast. Can I say that she has the cutest kids? Sammy (soon to be 6) and Molly (3) are adorable.
Sammy had to show me his Bakugan cards and toys. Has anyone heard of these? I gather it is the in thing for kindergarteners nowadays. Though if you ask me, they seem designed for older kids. They certainly aren’t designed for 50-year olds — I was totally lost trying to figure out how the game is played. They were cool, no doubt about it, but my brain still struggles with a game of solitaire. I don’t think I could handle game cards that list powers and abilities, and using the “balls” to get those points.
Wendy and Eric are good people and it was great to see them and the kids. I just don’t see them often enough and there’s no reason not to. I’ll plan on meeting up with them next time I’m down in the valley for a long weekend whether they like it or not. Hey, that’s the fun of being old friends.
I stayed down at my Mom’s place for the last few nights. Mom is finally feeling good enough after her heart surgery to be at home. She’d been staying at my sister’s house and she was feeling bored (I imagine my sister was feeling something a bit different than boredom — the guest bed was put away soon after Mom left).
It’s good to have Mom at home. The whole heart attack, heart surgery, and dips and valleys in getting better were not fun for any of us. Now she can take care of herself and hopefully stay better. I made her some chicken soup, cleaned a chunk of her house, and washed most of the laundry. She should be in decent shape.
Anyway, it’s good to be back home. I’m ready for a lazy day tomorrow, a scheduled day off. Okay, so I have a dentist appointment, still, it can be a relaxing day. Please?
I had my first kettlebell workout tonight. The class I attended had a substitute instructor who brought his collection of kettlebells. He taught us to pick one up and then how to do a kettlebell swing. It’s a fun and strong workout.
I started with a small kettlebell and got to do about a total of 40 swings . Then after watching the next round of students do theirs I had the opportunity to do some more with a heavier kettlebell. It felt easy to do, but certainly got my blood pumping.
For someone who hated doing much in the way of exercising I’m really enjoying learning this new stuff. I think my body is liking it too.
My life is changing. How do I know? I made homemade chicken soup. Not only did I make homemade chicken soup, I used homemade chicken stock. I have become a Martha Stewart pod person.
Really, who am I? A year ago, cooking was a nuisance, a chore, and a pain in the backside. Take-out and easy-to-fix prepared food made up a good chunk of my diet. Now? I make homemade chicken soup.
Yep, I had to go see a slasher flick. I can’t tell you how much I hate these kinds of movies. I really had no idea how to rate it. I wanted to give it an “F” but maybe it was good… if you like slasher movies. I settled for a “D+” just because I did find some of the characters entertaining. Here’s the review.
