Back On The Farm...

I'm standing at the edge of the farm looking around and deciding what to do. Naturally I can't make up my mind, all I know is my routine is so busted that I'm starting to wonder if I can ever get it back or if I even want to.

Bill needs routine though but what does that mean? With exercise there's a required regimentation, a discipline that must be adhered to or the whole thing goes spinning wildly out of control. Cracks are showing all over the place, tiny little cracks but like Egg Shen says, "See? That was nothing. But that's how it always begins. Very small."

I'm not sure what I'm trying to tell you. Maybe, this ain't easy? That you're gonna hit rough patches where you just want to shut down, give up and return to the easier path. I'm starting to get a taste of that, and I've been at this, what? ::counts fingers:: nine months or so, not even a year.

I don't know what to do, I'm in uncharted territory. Well unless I head down the well worn path of giving up. But there's nothing you can do to help, this is a personal battle, as in very personal.

So I'm trying crap and very obviously whining about my lack of finding a panacea. Sorry about that, call it a coping mechanism.

I'm not ready to give up... yet. The cost/benefit is waayyyyy on the benefit side but honestly, after awhile, this workout stuff is a pain in the ass. So whatcha gonna do bobalou?

• I keep thinking about my wife screaming her fool head off at the kid's soccer games, "JUST ONE MORE!" So I'm getting up and making myself go into the gym just one more day.
• I think about how desperate she is to buy me new clothes because I'll look better in them and how proud she and my family are of me.
• I think about how in general I feel better, and feel better about myself.
• I'm using this Lose It! iPhone app again and being ruthlessly honest with what I'm eating. I'm weighing daily (currently at 203) and not really trying to get to 190 at the moment. Just keeping an eye on things, a holding pattern.
• I'm trying (halfheartedly) to play Bubbles BINGO game and I'll describe that maybe tomorrow.

And at the moment, that's about it.

So I'm pretty much off the farm.

I stroll into the gym around 5:30am and hop on an upright bike figuring I'll do a twenty minute 'tempo' workout. I modified it though and decided after around five minutes of warm up to set the level at 7 and hammer a cadence over 100 for fifteen minutes. Some music helped (a lot) and other slower ones didn't.

IronMan is sitting next to me on a recumbent eating his biscuits and gravy, lounging around yakking to anyone who'll listen about whatever is floating through that pretty head of his at the moment. He reminded me so much of me that I figured this was his way of payback when I'm in a similar loquacious mood. Plus it's Wednesday his normal day off so anything he does is extra benefit.

I wrap up, hop off the bike, wipe it down and end up heading down the hallway towards the basketball court with IronMan and awesomeGirl to do some of those bear crawls/lung walks. awesomeGirl asks how many we normally do?

"Seventeen"

She stares at me with distrusting owl eyes, "Oh you do NOT!"

Well OK we do two but in binary that's expressed as 10. I think I'm going to start expressing all my repetitions in binary, so my fifteen 'situps/getups' would be 1111, impressive!

Anyway IronMan and awesomeGirl kick my butt getting down and back way ahead of me.

sigh

After I'm done vomiting and wishing I was dead I head back into the gym and do part of Bubbles' ABS routine. Not all of it, though.

I'm a bad, bad boy.

I'm off the farm.

but what will you do when

you run it through and

you can't get me back on the farm?

- Aimee Mann

98.6

All was quiet in the gym today. I got there and it was just AT Everest and me for awhile until awesomeGirl and IronMan strolled in. I suffered on the BOSU trying to do these one leg things. I blow at them and end up looking like a drunk on the silly thing.

I'm not sure what I need here, motivation? Work continues to wear and this is a real struggle for yours truly. I'm tired today, perhaps I caught the trendy swine flu that seems to be gripping the nation. My daughter came back from CCD yesterday looking grim and sad while she trudged upstairs to take her temperature, convinced she was next to wear the surgeon's mask since she didn't feel 'good.'

A bit later she miserably calls down, "98.6" her voice filled with the knowledge of upcoming weeks laying on her deathbed watching SpongeBob Squarepants.

"Um, yeah, that's a normal temp."

"It is?"

"Mmmhmm."

Crises averted we resumed our normal family life.

And that's what I pine for, a return to normality across the board. Now don't get me wrong my family life is awesome so if the great Gog is gonna say it's one or the other then I'm picking the current status-quo.

I did Bubbles' Tuesday routine and as I type this I realize I have yet to enter those routines here - sigh. Had a nice walk with my wife last night and when I weighed in this morning saw that I managed to put on two pounds overnight.

Am I PMSing? What gives with this funky fatigue? Oh well, life bangs on and so must I. First thing I'm gonna do is start counting calories again and then see if I can find out why I'm so tired, swine flu? I'm eating well and taking my vitamins, upcoming birthday? Whatever it is it is mine to deal with but at the moment I just want some downtime from work and that wont happen anytime soon (soon meaning, um, now).

Have a great day. On the plus side I'm gonna toss a hardball with my daughter after work, I'm looking forward to that.

The Tao of IronMan

First things first:

A HAPPY BELATED BIRTHDAY to AWESOMEGIRL!!! 

(Her birthday was on Saturday)

One woe doth tread upon another's heel, so fast they follow...

Friday: Well it's the return of the threads, and so what? I'm beyond exasperated at this point and learned helplessness has set in. That was the attitude I woke up with this morning and foolishly glanced at my email. More fun was had last night as the threads cavort and pursue their evil mischief.

So I was going to go into the gym, change and go to work all mopey and crap, full of woe is me. However I happen to glance in and see IronMan huffing away on a recumbent so I put my stuff in my locker and go over and tell IronMan my sad, sad tale.

He hops off the bike and say, "Come with me."

The next thing I know I'm doing bear-crawls across the length of the basketball court and lunge steps on the way back. On the second trip with the bear crawls my legs give out at midcourt. I manage to resume and end up losing total body function and go slamming into the wall a heaving, gasping wreck.

And they say exercise isn't fun.

I manage to lunge walk back and I am done with that! I had the illusion I was in fair shape until I did that nightmare. I wistfully eye the defibrillator and oxygen tank as I head back down the hallway. The rest was IronMan's ABS class which tore me up pretty well.

And when it was all said and done I felt better and was glad I did it.

Thanks IronMan.

It's Sunday now and I'm wondering how to do a work out. My daughter wants to toss the baseball and my son wants to play frisbee golf. I want to encourage both activities, number one because I enjoy them and number two because it gets them away from computer monitors. Will I get to the gym? Not sure but I hope so.

The gym and baseball never happened but seven or so holes of frisbee golf did! We all enjoy it, well except my wife who's struggling with her throw. Did you know there are frisbee discs specifically for golf? When you think about it, of course there are but I had no idea. We got some but alas they didn't help much, but my son followed by my daughter tend to dominate the game. This is what it looks like when Bill plays:

It's fun. I plan to get my wife out in the back yard and work with her on her toss (not that mine is any great shakes but currently it's better than hers).

Then Monday rolled around and it's back on the gerbil wheel. I decided to do a 35 minute tempo burn and then see how I felt after that which was tired. I have to go into work and write somethings up so I'm feeling a little time crunched so I did the bear-crawl/lunges across the basketball court thing.

Well one of them anyway, it jacked my HR up to 144 and destroyed my thighs so I waddled back into the gym where I was put to harsh interrogation by IronMan.

"How many did you do?"

"One."

"Awww come on you can do more than that! Come with me."

So, at gunpoint, I was taken back into the basketball court by IronMan and made to do another. I barely beat him in the bear-crawl but had my butt handed to me on the lunges back. HR got up to 155 on that one.

Then, we headed back into the gym where we sang (in beauteous harmony) Happy Birthday to awesomeGirl. This irritated goodMood since we hit such beautiful notes it shorted out the stair climber he was on and he had to reprogram it.

The Tao of IronMan can best be summed up like this, "Do one more than you think you can and do all of them to the best of your ability."

The Tao of Bill for today: It's Monday - deal with it!

In the Grip of the Threads

Well last night was fun... The issues with the system continue and it stresses me out like no tomorrow when I'm in the grip of the threads.

I staggered into the gym today and did the Thursday routine but... anyway I went through the motions and I'm not sure how to keep any motivation going at this point. I know exercise is suppose to help when one is in the grip of the threads but after awhile confusion sets in and I lose sight of importance.

Is it more important to try and sleep and show up at work early to attack an ephemeral issue that some very big brains can't identify?

Is it more important to try and sleep and exercise with increasing feelings of fatigue because you were thrown off schedule the previous evening dealing with the threads?

Kind of a judgment call huh? I opted for the gym and spent a distracted hour kinda working out - sigh.

Not sure how to deal with this, maybe experience will better guide me in the future. Not that I EVER want to experience this again.

Have a great day!

Well THAT Figures

Last night was spent monitoring the system, seeing all was well and waking up to an outage. Good times. Needless to say I overslept and only did a minimal ABS workout while yakking with ponyTail and goodMood. That was fun!

I need to get "The Troubles" behind me. Keep thinking I have and then they come back - sigh.

Yesterday awesomeGirl approached me about starting a blog. I'm going to give her a hand with it and point to it off this one once it's up.

Work beckons...

Soon to be Epic

TomS sent the following email in response to my reaction to his new trainer:

Should we, at our advanced age, be throwing down the gauntlet like this? Even in our best physical condition, the most we can hope for is to not be incapacitated by cramping or other maladies following our ride.

This competition will hold as much interest as the epic matchup between the Browns and the Bills this past Sunday. A 6-3 exhibition of football excellence.

I can only HOPE our competition will generate the same interest as the Browns vs. the Bills! Anyway I had to give a mature, reasoned reply:

I DIDN'T BUY THE TRAINER DID I? BUBBLES IS GONNA KICK YOUR ASS!

And she will, if I can talk her into it, and I think I can. If I can do anything well, it's whine.

If I can't talk her into it because she's a new mom or some such nonsense, well then I'll pay intoIt to do it, or goFast. Either one of them could act as my 'second' in this matter. I mean I'm still stunned at TomS's effrontery! A trainer? How much more in your face can you get?

But both intoIt and goFast will pass, somethings are just too easy and I already know my wife wont do it or my worthless kids so that leaves... me.

I figure when TomS and I square off it should be a century, first ride of the season. That way we can get it behind us, the century that is. We wont have that puppy weighing on our conscious, it's done.

Plus, two middle aged men tearing down the road in the full grip of recapturing lost youth and totally unprepared for a century is very, VERY...

blogable :-)

Instead of the Trek I was eying I'm now thinking about this- BEHOLD!

It should give me a slight advantage, if I don't run out of gas.

Finally TomS followed up with his first Trainer Report:

Riding on a trainer is BORING! One better have something interesting on the tube or the time will crawl by. I thought Obamacare or whatever entitlement our President is attempting to implement was being funded by various television networks. I could have sworn the commercial breaks lasted 10 minutes or more while on the trainer.

I've completed 3, half hour sessions on the thing. My average cost is down to $110 per session. I sure hope this average improves.

Overall this thing is going to require some discipline. I hope I am up to it. I plan on adding 5 minutes to the overall riding time as I go with this thing. Right now I can't imagine how these guys go 2 1/2 hours on a trainer.

Bottom Line: I HAVE TO DO THIS.

There is not other way to look at it.

Well overlooking the obvious, that he could just bag the whole thing and give me his trainer how can my readership help? Riding a stationary bike is just as boring except for the people about, but sooner or later it ends up being just you and hellish device you've chosen. I have a wall of high def TVs to gaze at in the gym but in the end TV doesn't help me. So I suggested the iPod, that works best for me.

Your thoughts? Since he's home (mostly) alone, maybe porn?

Let me know what porn works best for you and I'll pass the info onto TomS or blog it for the vast collective.

I got to the gym fairly early again today. AT Everest was there ahead of me. Since it's Tuesday Bubbles has laid out a bunch of routines that don't involve cardio. IronMan strolled in as I was finishing up the dynamic warmup so I just had to gab while he pretended to push pedals on a recumbent. Eventually I bored him enough that he made me, MADE ME finish up the routines Bubbles laid out.

We're both disappointed with The Biggest Loser so far. I keep tuning in hoping to see a preview of some insane stunt IronMan will try the next day but all we're getting is crybaby whining ::rolls eyes::

Whatev.

goodMood and awesomeGirl showed up. awesomeGirl was a bit cranky and called me a bad name when I was trying to help her do an exercise properly. Bubbles was in the full grip of allergies looking all H1N1 while showing AT Everest a new program. Bubbles is now at the halfway mark of her pregnancy and proud of her ever increasing belly. An odd point of view for a trainer but she's probably ravaged with hormones at the moment.

Have a great day!

Warning Signs

I have a very busy day ahead of me. However my blood ran cold when I received the following pic from TomS

The implications weren't lost on my paranoid mind! I was staring at a Kurt Kinetic Pro Trainer!!! TomS was letting fly with the opening salvo of Spring 2010.

He plans to crush me on some casual road ride by training all winter long!

How to counter? HOW TO COUNTER??!!

Well I have plans for a new nonexistent bike but now I'm probably going to need a power meter too but the one I'm interested in doesn't even exist. Should I buy a powertap or just wait?

::grabs a paper sack and starts hyperventilating into it::

Oh I know YOU don't understand gentle reader but that's simply because you don't have The Rest of the Story! You see TomS hasn't run just one marathon, he's run TWO! He's got the will and know how to crush me s-l-o-w-l-y.

Well I've got this book, at least until the library demands it back and I've got Bubbles who will help. So...

BOOK + BUBBLES = VICTORY!

AND I've managed to remove Bill from the equation! Gosh, I'm a genius! No... I'm a SUPER-GENIUS!

So Bubbles and that book will take care of TomS. phew! Her kid in the Burley will probably make it a bit harder on her with drag and all but I know Bubbles can do it!

Thanks Bubbles!

It seemed like business as usual at the gym today, no strange dimensions were intersected, no AT Everest on the recumbent weirdness. The usual crew, all was calm... perhaps too calm. Hard to say at this point in time.

I need to start manning up on the cardio and push it a bit there, go to the next phase of Bubbles routine. I did the regular thirty minute one and the ABS like the good boy I am.

I hope you have a wonderful day!