This Week

Here are all my excuses for why I don't want to work out this week (let alone today):

• It's rainy and 49 degrees out.  Hi May, I'm pretty sure you're an honorary summer month so let's get with the program, huh? 
• It's supposed to top out at 61 this week, and rain every. single. day. 
• I'm starting hospital volunteer hours this week, Monday and Wednesday after work...that's when they had available. Figures those are my two key workout days.
• Wednesday and Friday mornings are taken up with trips to the hospital to prove I don't have TB...don't worry, they require that to volunteer.  I don't have TB. I hope. 
• It's really just gross out. 
• With Monday and Wednesday night out of the question, Thursday is the only spin class I can definitely make it to this week (and for the next few weeks). Tuesday I might be able to make it to if I don't need to go to another strength class for an observational beatdown. 

Ok, mostly it's just the weather that's making me want to curl up with a blanket and a book and junk food. And the warped schedule. So to combat those excuses, here's the plan of attack: 

Monday	Tuesday	Wednesday	Thursday	Friday	Saturday	Sunday
Pushups, Dips, Situps, Squats PM: DVD of some kind after hospital	8:15 AM: FIT (training) 5:30 PM: Spin/Strength 6:30 PM: Pilates 8:00 PM: Biggest Loser treadmill run/walk	AM: Maybe a workout? DVD? Pushups, Dips, Situps, Squats PM: DVD of some kind after hospital	5:30 PM: Spin	AM: Workout DVD? Pushups, Dips, Situps, Squats Cleaning the house for guests!	Pirates 4	TBD - maybe a solo spin or something

I have an old friend coming into town this weekend to see POTC 4 (yes, that's a legit reason to drive 4 hours), so workouts from Friday to Sunday may be suspended or modified. I think screaming at the top of my lungs and jumping up and down when Jack Sparrow makes his screen debut should count as a workout, but that's just me.

Next week should be a little better, though next weekEND is Memorial Day and who knows what that'll bring. At the very least,

In other news, I did my dips and squats, and I have proof.

 Holy bajezus this is an unflattering picture. I've never thought my feet looked like clown feet and my elbows were ugly before, but this picture proved I should.

 Geesh.  This shirt is supposed to be my "sexy work" shirt.  I swear it looks better from the front!

 Proof?

 The camera was still on time delay, taking 5 pictures, so I modeled it out. The other 3 were worse than this, if you can believe it. Not a good picture day.

 Squats! Not sure what I'm looking at.

Look, ma! No head!


Ummm so yeah. Not going to take more work pictures until I don't look so...muffin-toppy. Sheesh. Maybe tomorrow I'll check the mirror on the way out the door.

Profile: Power Hills, the 60 minute edition

I finally got to teach again on Sunday, hooray!  Now the next time I'm scheduled to teach is...July.  Sigh. I'm hoping folks will start needing/wanting subs soon, since school's about to be out. We'll see.

In any case, I used a tried and true favorite profile with a new playlist (which I whipped up at 6:30 AM Sunday...class was at 8:30).  It got rave reviews, in spite of Judas being on there...I was a little nervous about playing that one, even though it's in the top 40, because it could be controversial.  But then I figured hey...it's 8:30 AM on a Sunday. If folks are here, they're not at church, so it probably won't matter. I got half a dozen people coming up to me afterward, beaming that they LOVED the class.  Folks, I can't tell you how much this means.  If you like a class, tell the instructor.  At the very least, it'll help you get more of what you like.  For me, it's like the universe knows when I'm feeling iffy about a class, and that's when the most people come up and compliment it.  Go figure.


In any case, here's the profile, with playlist:

The first song is from the ending credits of Thor.  It's a pretty sweet song...quiet at first, then it builds. It would be a good song for a "redemption" themed ride, I think.

Danza Kuduro was from the Fast Five soundtrack. Horrible horrible movie, but it was in Rio, so the soundtrack was fun.

I'm still embarrassingly hooked on Ke$ha (which I ALWAYS type "Ke$sha" first and read as "Ke dollar sign ha" courtesy of Glee) and Hey Baby, so those showed up as well.

The great part of teaching Sundays is that, since I've never actually been to the class before, I'd never seen anyone in there (except the friend who came just because I was teaching...thanks Liz! :-D).

In any case, it was a good ride. Everyone worked hard but was still smiling at the end.  Success.

I did my pushups this morning.  I'm repeating week 2 because last week I couldn't do normal pushups...I'd done them all girly style, so this week I'm doing them like a man.  Or something like that.



Pushups:

Set 1	9
Set 2	11
Set 3	8
Set 4	8
Set le max	11

I'm also restarting the dips and situps challenge, since last week was kind of a waste for both. I think I'll add the squats challenge in as well, so look for pictures later today.

Also, there will be pictures of office workouts that YOU can do, no matter what kind of privacy concerns your office presents, coming soon. Promise.  :-D

Quick Rehash

Overall, a good night. I completed everything I set out to do, and then some.

Strength class: check
Pilates: check
Watch Biggest Loser on the treadmill: check - ran/walked 5.1 miles in about 57 minutes. Boom.
Situps max out: check...but after pilates/strength/running, so I ended up at about 25 and just felt miserable so I stopped.
Dips max out: check. While waiting for something to get done at work, I did 32. Not great, but you have no idea how much my arms hate me right now.
Squats max out: not check. Oh sweet baby jeebus not check. I can barely walk right now. I think I've done about 400 squats in the past 24 hours...does that count? I think I'll start the squats thing next week.  Oy.

Funny thing is, I'm not really tired...just sore beyond all reason. I drove home thinking "maybe I'll pop in one of the new BL DVDs I just got.

Did I not mention that I'm a BL junkie?  Guess what. I am.

Then I got home and went to get out of the car and nearly decided to sleep in the driveway, to avoid the walk to the house (10 feet and 2 stairs). Tomorrow may be an easy day.

Also, I won't lie...those A&P flashcards have me a little spooked about the class...but it doesn't start until June, so I've got a little time to make my preemptive strike.

In any case, bed time. Tomorrow morning is another pushups day (whimper) and the first day of dips, situps, and maybe squats. We'll see.

What'd you do today?

Post-FIT Hangover

I think FIT must stand for Frickin' Insane Training. The woman who teaches Monday nights is a nut.  She just keeps going like it's nothing (seriously I'm not sure she even sweats!) while the rest of us are flopped on the ground convulsing from jumprope allergies. And I'm supposed to be training to teaching this class.  Oy.  All I can think right now is that I want to get on a bike and spin this yuck out before class tonight.  Not sure if I'll do spin or strength (*whimper*) tonight, but pilates is definitely on the menu.

Because FIT was so nasty last night, I never did my max out tests for squats.  I have no real excuse for not doing the dips or situps tests though. Guess I'll be doing those tonight so I can start training for those tomorrow.

Also, I'm going to put this out there now...I'm not working out on Saturday. I'm not wimping out, I just want to make sure I survive Tough Mudder, and I'll need time to get my outfit ready anyway. Mom, don't worry...you'll be able to see me in the pictures.  :-D

So the plan for tonight (I like clean summaries, and I'm a little blurry today, so this is more for me than for you):

Spin or Strength, depending on how early I can get there
Pilates
Max out test for dips, squats, situps.

Rose over at Eat, Drink and Be Meiri said she'd join in on the challenge yesterday, and Heather over at View From the Shoe said she'd join today, so we're practically a mob here.


How about you? Are you in? 


Bonus points if you send pics!

Well that was fast

So a few different blogs I follow (of course I can only find one right now...) have decided to do the hundred pushup challenge. One girl (whose post I can't find for the life of me) posted pics of her newly-chiseled arms, and I decided that was enough to convince me to join in on the game.

Turns out, the guy also developed training directions for doing 200 squats, 150 dips, and 200 situps. So, naturally, I'm adding those to the list as well. Monday, Wednesday, Friday are now going to be my strength training mornings, since I'm not quite convinced I'll be able to get up early enough to motivate myself to run.

Last night I did the initial test and managed to eek out 13 pushups (which in retrospect may have been with crap form). This morning, Nick and I did Day 1, and he did MUCH better than I did...but he's also a boy, so I'm not too warped about it.  :-P  My sets:

Set 1: 12
Set 2: 7 (supposed to be 10, couldn't do it)
Set 3: 7
Set 4: 7
Max Set: 11

The last 3 sets were knee pushups.  I may have to repeat this week, I dunno. We'll see how Wednesday goes.

Tonight (or sometime today) I'll do the initial tests for other stuff and report back.

In other news, this is the preliminary workout schedule.  I know what you're thinking, there aren't any rest days built in...but the fact is, I don't take consistent rest days...I take them, but not on the same day each week.  Usually I take 2 or 3 actually, throughout the week.  So I'm going to have a plan for every day of the week, so I have some idea for what to do if I switch around my rest days. The unmovable (read: days I'm usually good about working out) days are M, T, W. The other 4 tend to depend a lot more on my mood and whether I'm teaching or not. Also this is my "shoot for the moon and you'll land among the stars" plan...I've never run a full hour and a half in my life, and probably won't start today. But if I aim for that, maybe I'll run 45 minutes, you know?

As many of you know, I'm a Biggest Loser junkie.  I know I know, there are infinite contraindications on there, and a billion moves made for TV that shouldn't actually ever be done...but what can I say? It's inspiring and motivating.  To that end, I'm also tacking on the Biggest Loser 11 Finale Challenge, to add to the number of successes (or failures, who knows) for this month. Here's hoping I look half as good as the contestants, come finale night!