04/28/2011 Yeah, when life catches up to you, just keep pushing…
This morning I wasn’t able to get my morning cardio session in as I had to escort my mother to a pre-operative surgical appointment. She’s having a partial knee replacement in a couple of weeks, and I assist her in her health care.
It was actually nice not to work out in the morning. My legs needed an extra bit of time resting, as the leg workout that was done yesterday left my legs even sorer than the day before.
The visit to the hospital went much faster than anticipated, last year when she had the same procedure done, we spent the entire day at the hospital. Today we were out of there after a few short hours. The hospital had undergone some renovations, which streamlined the pre-operative screening process, and the volunteer who acted as the appointment coordinator was an ex-military guy just kept things moving.
During our lunch break, we went to a Chinese buffet. My mother is a picky eater, whenever we travel as a family she often complains at meal time that there’s no Kimchi (Korean staple of pickled cabbage), so eating out with her can be an arduous feat to say the least. I’ve found that most Chinese style buffets have enough items to make her happy. Whereas for myself, the Chinese buffet’s are no longer an enjoyable place.
There were 6-7 food stations, each station with at least 5-12 food options per station. This place also had a hibachi grill where they cooked items made to order and a small sushi station made up primarily of rolls. With all this variety I found myself choosing food from 1 station, and an area made up of less than a quarter of that station. My lunch was mostly salad, with 8 pieces of shrimp, about a tablespoon of Italian dressing, some Chinese version of Kimchi, and two tiny pieces of marinated beef. I think my meal was less than 600 calories but I logged it as 600 because who knows what the caloric count is in the beef, the two pieces I ate were single bite size.
I couldn’t fathom how a few weeks ago I would have made 3 trips to the buffet, filling my plate each time, completely avoiding all the fruits and veggies, and going straight for the worst of the worst, because it would taste so good. I always felt like shit afterwards, but it was great going down. My life has completely been flipped upside down, now I don’t enjoy the food going down as much, but I don’t feel like a great big fat ass afterwards which makes want to stick my hand in a blender for relief. I guess until I figure out how to cook healthy tasty meals I’m almost in a perpetual food purgatory…C'est la Vie.
After the appointment I went back to one of my car wash sites that had opened after the heavy morning rains, but was grossly under staffed. When I arrived there was a line of cars, and only my two supervisors cleaning the cars. I immediately jumped in to help, but didn’t panic. Normally this is where I would have gotten angry, and used my shear hostility to fight through a situation.
I didn’t panic, we made some phone calls, called some people in, and a couple hours’ later things leveled off, and became manageable. The next thing that I did was the most surprising thing to me, rather than cancel my personal training session, and stay onsite to manage what was going on, I said fuck it, and went to go workout.
It’s the first time I’ve chosen myself over the business. The business gives me what I need to enjoy my life, but I haven’t been enjoying my life, so what the hell is the point of being involved in the business?
My small emotional victory would have been perfect except that I messed up the time of my personal training session, when I arrived I was already late for the start time, but I thought I had arrived 45 minutes early to get some cardio in, when I showed up Ali looked at me like I had forgotten something. I of course gave him a strange look of, “What?”
As a result of being late we got right into the session. I told him let’s just workout for the 45 minutes, and make up the time another day. He agreed, and we got started.
Today we spent a big portion of the time boxing. Because I was late I didn’t get a good warm up so Ali warmed me up through boxing. After 10 minutes of boxing we moved right into resistance work focusing on the chest.
He had me first lie on a resistance ball, and press upward using the free motion cable machine. After 20 reps, I sat on the resistance ball and pressed forward using the rubber resistance bands for 1 minute. We then transitioned into a lunge and press, while lunging forward I pressed forward using one side of my chest, 20 reps per side. I was told then to get into a plank position while using the Reebok Core trainer as my base. For a minute I twisted the core trainer while holding the plank position. This exercise makes your abs tighten up, while making your chest burn.
I then put the gloves back on, and we worked on some more boxing, essentially trying to burnout on punching. He had me do three or four sets of combinations, and then in a stationary position we did 100 total crosses, 100 total hooks, and finished with 100 total uppercuts.
Again making a quick transition we went back into the gym do some weights. With a shortened session this was our last go around of exercises. While lying on a resistance ball I did chest presses with 1 arm first using a 30lb dumbbell, and then using a 35 lb dumbbell. I did 25 reps on each side. From the ball I was put into a push-up position plank which I held for 1 minute. The third leg of the mini circuit involved using me thrusting a medicine ball forward while on my knees, I would then fall forward into an assisted push up, as I came up from the push-up the ball would be rolled back to me by Ali, I would then pick it up and repeat the motion, I did 10 reps. Ali had me do this mini circuit twice. The final exercise of the day was 1 minute using the same medicine ball, and doing trunk twists from a seated position.
For the amount of time we had and the late start I felt I got a good work out.
Following my personal training session and because I missed my morning Cardio session I got on the Arc Trainer and did another rendition of Cardio Intervals. I ended up doing 4 complete cycles of the intervals. Eight :30 seconds intervals upward, with a hold of varying time at the top, and seven :30 intervals downward. With each cycle of intervals I varied the resistance and incline on the Arc Trainer.
With the first progression upward I left the incline on 6, and only increased the resistance by 10 moving from 30 to 100. At the top I held it for 2 minutes. On the second progression upward I increased the incline to 10, and then increased the resistance by 10 again reaching 100. At the top I held it for three minutes. The third set of cardio intervals involved a higher incline set to 20, and I again increased the resistance by 10 reaching 100. At the top this time I held it for 4 minutes. On the last set of cardio intervals I increased the incline to 20 again, but I increased the resistance by 5 starting at 65 and working back up to 100. At the top I held it for 5 minutes. During each of these cycles after the hold I would work back down at the same pace, and I did 2 speed sprints in-between each set.
For the type of day I had today, I’m happy with my ability to stick it out, and still get in my workouts. I am also thrilled at my discipline at the Chinese buffet, they even had ice cream which I did not partake in, and I’m a sucker for soft serve ice cream. I have often dreamed of purchasing a soft serve ice cream machine, the little devil Lou telling me buy it fat boy it will make you happy, and the little angel Lou saying no you will kill yourself with that machine. Alas, I won’t be buying one any time soon, in fact I don’t know when the next time I will even want to sniff any type of ice cream. I’m just working too damn hard to sacrifice all this work for 10 minutes of sweet bliss.