Missed my workout today, bummer. My son woke up little after three am. So I spent the rest of the night trying to put him back down before I had to head to work. Anyway running low on sleep and frustrated so will likely skip tomorrows workout too in favor of walking the two miles to work and then it looks like I'll have plenty of snow to scoop when I get off work.

Today's workout was five thirty second sprints on the bike with a 90 second active rest period between each, so 10 minutes on the bike. Then 20 min on the elliptical trainer. About ten minutes into the elliptical I was feeling a little awkward like I was just kind of flailing at it so I bumped up the resistance witch allowed my stride to feel more purposeful. I was at about six clicks of resistance so I'll try to start out around there tomorow.

I'm scheduling my weeks workouts for four AM so that I can be done and cleaned up and on my walk to work by five thirty. To pull this off I have to have every thing lined up the night before. So I'm going to set alarms to remind me to set out my clothes and lunch for the next day the night before. And have alarms to keep me on track for what I need to be doing. The times may have to be adjusted but at least I have a plan.

I also need to get batteries for the elliptical display and would like to get a computer hooked up to the spinner so that I have some idea or intensity or speed.

Today is a Saturday and I got up early anyway to get a workout in. I snuck out of bed where my two boys and wife were still sleeping and headed for the basement and the elliptical machine. I just want to get back into the habit of setting aside some time every day so I did away with the intervals so that I could log a solid 30 min or so. I made it to 30 min without any big deal but I'll tell I had to laugh when around 20 min I was feeling a little spent and wanted to dial down the resistance but it was already as low as it would go for my hole whole workout. I've felt pretty hungry and have been grazing and snacking all day.

So I actually had my first workout in a long time just before the new year. I programed some intervals on my phone and headed to my spinning bike to try it out. I made thirteen minutes ding aak all out sprint for 30 seconds every 2 minutes. So i got like 5 good sprints in before I was too winded to continue.

Fitness blog

Well it's a new year and I'm sliding into my 37th year late this summer so my perceived need to be in good health and shape is unusually acute. And I'd like to document my journey back into fitness in this blog. The point of blogging it is mostly to hold myself accountable, but also to document the challenges and successes of how a not grossly obese ( although the gov. calls my bMI obese) mid thirties working class dad of two young boys gets his mojo back.

So here we go : first of the new year I'm 6'1" tall that won't change and tipping the scales at 252 lbs. My xl t-shirts are getting snug and seem shorter and I've grown out of all my size 36 jeans. My 38's are snug and I have stooped as low as to buy some 40 for work.

Where I want to be: Ten years ago I was a regular jogger and had worked my way down under 220 lbs. I felt pretty fit then I'd like to at least return to that point and likely surpass that. Also I just really want break into that box of smaller clothes that I have packed away and feel good wearing them again.

I plan to do this mainly by upping my activity level. And being more structured with my diet and time management

Laborday weekend

So I had a big list of things I wanted to do this weekend and I took Friday off to take my wife to DES Moines for her orthodontist appt. But I didn't get a lot of the other stuff done. I did get the large picnic table painted, which looks very nice. And I'll probably get the other one painted too. We found new shoes for Dex and Rach and I. I got some nice addidas trail runners, need to start running next. I did get one sort of work out in about 20 min in the spinning bike and a few yoga stretches. Now I just need to get to where it about a 4 or 5 day a week habit. I also got the blades off of the chipper shredder to be sharpened, that will be nice for our garden composting efforts. For now the walk that I just took with my family and now the relaxation of laying in the hammock with Eli watching the clouds roll over are more fullfilling.

Changes

So I have some changes on a couple of fronts in my life. First my wife has been reading about how all the fake stuff we eat is having adverse effects on our lives so we are slowly shifting our diet over to a more natural, organic, whole food diet. Not that we were eating total crap before but we are making more of an effort now and putting out money more into organic stuff. As well as enlarging our own garden and trying to get better at growing and storing our own goodies. Second I'm getting some help for my depression issues, it seems to be helping I'm a bit more able to focus and more motivated to just do the things that i need to do. Enough of the constant irrational battle in my mind over my self worth and ability to do things right. Thirdly, with the oil spill in the gulf and BP's lack of a serious response to protect the environment, and the total corruption in the middle east with oil money being used to buy weapons and terrorize their own people and try to kill us. I think it's silly not to reexamine our relationship with the internal combustion engine. I have decided to Leave my van in the garage as much as possible. I'm walking to work form now on and will only be driving it for trips that require us too haul everyone or lots of stuff.