Maintainers moving in September
 

Do join us, however relaxed or hard-core your movement style. You are all welcome.

I'll start as it's well into September over here.

Gymn today. Walking on the treadmill with a bit of running. Physio exercises (basic + 2).

I'm trying to work up to doing the bridge with one leg off the ground, pointing up in the air to a faraway planet. Can any of you do that? There was a man on the mats today doing something like that and pressing a dumbbell. I'll work up to that little by little, I think.

The weather is so glorious here that I should be out, running through woodland really but my focus has to be on the physio exercises in order to make sure I've re-educated my core, back, leg etc etc muscles.

Thanks for starting the new thread Silver!

Sept 1:
- 29:50 bike ride, 6.75 miles, 13.57mph

I got safety gear for my bike so I could go out riding before sunrise so this was my first go. I was a little slow because of time to adjust my mirror and headlight, but hopefully they will be all set for next time. Still need a reflective vest, but I now have a headlight, taillight, and mirror at least.

Thanks for starting the thread. I had a good August exercise wise. I only missed two days. We'll see how September goes.

September 1: 45 minutes elliptical (also walked Dewey but not going to count it as exercise as he does a lot of stopping and sniffing!)

Totals:
1 day
45 minutes

Addendum to 9/1: 15 min dog walk

9/2:
25 min dog powerwalk
30 mins pilates: super butt workout, crazy core workout, amazing leg and upper back stretches

Kettlebells: 30 minutes
Core work: 15 minutes
Total: 45 minutes

Have revamped my exercise routine to accommodate my new schedule once school starts. Only doing five days (weekdays) instead of six, weekends off b/c they get busy with the kids once they are back in school. Working out in A.M. only except for Pilates twice a week at noon. Cut down cardio from four times to two times weekly and upped kettlebells from twice to three times weekly. Aim to also streamline my routine to be 30-45 minutes, down from 1 hour plus I was previously doing. I'm hopeful that this can help me keep up with it during the somewhat hectic and sometime stressful school year with my two boys - 4th grade and kindergarten. :love:

September 2: 31 minutes elliptical plus 30 minute walk in 100 degree weather.

Totals:
2 days
106 minutes

No gym, which saddens me. I used the gym once for a shower, on the first day of salvaging, to get all the mud off, and felt sad that spin class was going on down the hall without me -- the music, the yippees, the instructor yelling -- as if I'd been barred from my former life for having done something wrong.

But I am not taking it easy, so it's easy to get over. I walk back & forth all day and lift heavy things. I can lift much heavier trash & stuff than I would have this time last year. One goal I have: To swing plastic trash bags like kettlebells & throw them over the side of the dumpster. Which is very tall. Taller than me. So I have been doing really awkward jumps and passes, barely boosting the bags over with both hands.

Still, as I've said before, all this would have been impossible for me at 247 pounds. I would have been exhausted & out of breath. I would have collapsed within a few hours instead of working all day, as I need to do, to get this done before the mold & mildew & etc. becomes overpowering. I am thankful to be in better shape. This is how my workouts have paid off. It isn't just aesthetic, or for sexual attractiveness. Or for vanity of athletic prowess. It is helping me get through the days.

Saef - :hug: I'm sure you are getting a lot of exercise with all the cleaning up.

9/3:
- 27 minute powerwalk with doggies
- 1:06:45 bike ride to the apple orchard and back (break in the middle to pick apples). 15.13 miles, 13.6mph

Funny that last week I did the same route except a bit further past the orchard, and I was 14.1mph. I think the wind is the difference. Last time I had a headwind on the uphill direction and a tailwind downhill, and this time it was reversed. I was faster going up, but slower coming down. Oh well.

September 3: 60 minutes spin, 15 minutes run, 60 minutes walk with dh.

Totals:
3 days
241 minutes

Didn't count it, but I danced for 2 hours with dh last night-- that had to be some extra calories burned!!

September 4: 90 minutes Bikram Yoga

Totals:
4 days
331 minutes

9/4:
- short dog walk
- swim! About 30 mins total, 20 laps, including kicking, ladders, and a lap of underwater dolphin kicking.

9/5:
- 30 min doggie powerwalk
- 15 min swiss ball core exercises

Monday - saw the physio who said she wasn't surprised I'd had a little flare-up, considering the summer I've had. She says I'll be better in two weeks and there's no need to see her again. Sounds like I'm back on track for London 2012* then!

(* Olympics. I am in [my] dream team. Today's it's possibly sprint and/or high jump, probably because they seem very far from my real life at present.)

September 5: 60 minutes spin class and 15 min warm up/cool down

Totals:
5 days
406 minutes

Glad you're better! Could you please explain Olympics - dream team?

Dagmar :dizzy:

Tuesday, Sept. 6:

4 mile run on Smokey Hollow Road, Route 48 and Hencle Road

Must sign up for a one-year membership at the gym in my mother's town tonight, even though it's rather beat up.

I need to construct a new routine. I'm in transition and quite shaken psychologically & am in danger of sitting around staring at my hands and brooding over what's happened, what I should have done, what the future holds. Which would then lead to eating, because historically, that's what I do to comfort myself, to zone out in sensory bliss. Neither of these past-times makes me feel better or helps my health. Getting moving actually does both of those things -- as long as I don't use it to replace other aspects of my life, particularly connecting with people.

I can make this transition if I do it carefully. My four steps for exercise today will be: 1) This morning run; 2) Signing up at the gym; 3) Locating my new strength training routines (written down & stuffed someplace); 4) Finding yoga or Pilates within reasonable driving distance (important during our fierce Upstate winters).

Saef, does this mean you are moving in with your mom for the time being?

9/6: 31:15 6.75 mile bike ride

Nil, so far, but I hope to manage some physio exercises later, floor space permitting.

Saef, it sounds as though you've decamped Upstate for a bit. That sounds like a sound move. I do hope you continue to find harvest time and the fall beautiful and uplifting. Are you taking some R&R time? Yes, surely. :hug:

September 6: 60 minutes elliptical

Totals:
6 days
466 minutes

Jessica, yes indeed, I'm back in my old bedroom at my mother's house, though with my clothes stuffed into the chest of drawers in yet another room, the guest bedroom, because a lot of my mother's clothes seem to have migrated into my old bedroom closet, dresser and chest of drawers. It's an awkward solution to my homelessness, as I found while working from home yesterday, as my mother tried to "coach me" while I had my weekly one-on-one call with my manager. ("Tell her your car broke down on the way here. Tell her you're getting a wireless setup this afternoon.") Anyway ...

Wednesday, Sept. 7:

I joined the gym yesterday (just $15 a month) and so went there in the morning.

15 minutes warmup on Nautilus elliptical, intervals, resistance at eight and three
60 minutes back and biceps routine with weights
45 minutes Nautilus elliptical, intervals, resistance at nine and three

This gym doesn't provide towels. So I brought my own, or rather, one of my mother's, as all my towels are gone, turned to black slime in the flood. Now, a few years ago, at an antique show, my mother got a deal on a bolt of old machine-made lace, and she sewed lace on the border of her towels. So there I was, in the free weight section, which is huge at this gym, full of big meaty guys, many of them military or ex-military. I had my lace-edged towel spread over the bench as I went through the P90X back and biceps routine. No guy went near it. Perhaps they were afraid that picking up a lace-edged towel might immediately emasculate them -- like holding a woman's purse is said to do. (I've seen men hold purses for women, keeping them slightly away from their bodies, as if they were small dead animals, with a look on their faces clearly meant to dissociate themselves from the purse: "Look, this isn't mine, but the girlfriend/wife asked me to hold it, so whaddya gonna do?"

Sounds like you are working out a plan Saef, albeit not perfect, but doable. My dh is one of those men that CANNOT hold a purse. He might catch something I guess. My dh's dad holds his wife's all the time. Perhaps the fact that we make fun of him makes my dh less likely to hold mine for a minute!

LOL about the lace towel Saef. Perhaps you could mark off one room of the house as the "office" and tell your mom to never disturb you when you are in the office with the door shut, because you are working?

9/7: 2 mile powerwalk, 27:41; 10 rollups, 10 rollovers

September 7: 50 minutes boot camp (tried a new class and the instructor was 10 minutes late:mad:). The class was very good though. I usually do Bikram Yoga on Wednesday but we had Back to School Night so it wouldn't work in my schedule. I went to my last back to school night ever. Hard to imagine....:(

Totals:
7 days
516 minutes

Saef, I'm starting to suspect our moms were separated at birth. I had this same issue when I had to spend several months at home between jobs. I was trying to keep up on my publications, and my mom does not regard reading or "sitting at the computer" as actual productive work, leading to lots of interruptions. You will probably need to think about establishing a space, perhaps if it is hard to set boundaries, not in the house? I spent a lot of time at the local public library (which also had study rooms you could use).

Sept 8:
20 minutes elliptical (first in two months! Yay!)
15 minutes walking on treadmill
physio exercises

It is ridiculous how I am looking forward to my grilled vegetables today.

Hey, Bronzeager! I have to admit that I've read your name two ways in the past: As someone from the Age of Bronze, or as someone who is both Bronzed and Eager (which sounds kind of like a porno starring a Beyonce lookalike, and hey, she's not a bad person to look like).

I've also thought about using the library, but the thing is, I have meetings on the phone all day, or one-on-one discussions regarding the writing I'm working on, and I'd be yakking into the phone, which would be very annoying to other library patrons. In particular, I have a bad memory of having to deal with a password change while I was on vacation, and going to a public library to use a computer to change it remotely, and having to call tech support in Bangalore, and shortly afterward getting kicked out of the library for talking loudly. (The connection to India was bad & I had to keep repeating myself and what the tech support said, as the person's accent wasn't good.) I feel awful about this in retrospect. I am not normally a person who is disruptive in libraries. In fact, I am very respectful of books, reading, study time, etc.

Anyway ....

4 mile run on the same route as Tuesday, except I ran it backward, going counter clockwise, and found it's tougher that way because of a gradual but pronounced elevation.

:lol3: When was the last time you lived with one of your parents jessica? Most parents never, ever totally respect your borders, no matter how adult you are. I finally locked the room's door and wore earplugs. My dad broke the door down with a crowbar (admittedly he is a nutjob and saef's mom is not) because he "thought I might be in trouble". :crazy:

I hope you can work out a better solution with your parent saef.

Dagmar :cool:

I disagree. Neither of my parents ever disturbed me if I had my door closed, even when I was young. But perhaps this isn't typical.

Yeah, I'd say your father is more than a nutjob, Mudpie.

Jay

Hi! Saef, I wish I handled adversity like you have been doing.

I started 30 day shred and today was day 8 of level 1. Then as time allows I do an extra 10 to 20'minutes in the treadmill. I can definitely tell the difference in muscle tone. I continue to lose weight thus I am now maintaining a loss of 63 pounds and I am 2 pounds away from healthy bmi.

I'm feeling anxious since I am now getting into uncharted waters meaning I have not being under 135 in my adult life, maybe in 8th grade... Not sure what to expect... Did any of you feel like that?

September 8:
50 minutes elliptical

Totals:
8 days
566 minutes

Charin, you weren't here at my mother's house yesterday, hearing me be nasty and sarcastic with her out of stress because she'd called the FiOS guy from Verizon to take down our DSL & install our new high-speed Internet connection just as I dealt with an as-soon-as-possible project at work, a contentious new assignment and two corrections of previously published work, all hitting me consecutively within 10 minutes of each other. I thought I would scream, and then the insurance adjuster informed me the damage on my apartment is considered flood damage, not hurricane damage, and therefore I am not covered. Shortly after that, I went for my noon-hour run.

And for today, Friday, Sept. 9:

15 minutes Nautilus elliptical, backward, warmup
60 minutes arms and shoulders weight routine
45 minutes Nautilus elliptical, intervals, resistance at 9 and 3, with my feet going a little numb. I have to figure out how to work the pedals on this thing, as it's not like the elliptical I'd been using at my other gym.

Ha. The Bronze Age is part of what I study, and also because I don't yet qualify for "Silver" or "Golden Age". I did indeed used to get rather bronzed doing fieldwork in my feckless youth, so I would love to have Beyonce's nice smooth skin, at the very least. There would have to be a lot of airbrushing in the porno.

Sept 9
15 minutes walking on the treadmill
8 minutes on the bike OMG why is it so hard
15 minutes on the elliptical
kicked my legs in the pool a little to cool off
{Ooops gotta do my physio still... } Did it, yay

My knees are very creaky and poppy from lack of exercise. For one of my physio things I have to go backwards up stairs, and it's so embarrassing I did it on my apartment building stairs instead of the bleachers at my sport club.

[QUOTE=saef;4026129]Charin, you weren't here at my mother's house yesterday, hearing me be nasty and sarcastic with her out of stress because she'd called the FiOS guy from Verizon to take down our DSL & install our new high-speed Internet connection just as I dealt with an as-soon-as-possible project at work, a contentious new assignment and two corrections of previously published work, all hitting me consecutively within 10 minutes of each other. I thought I would scream, and then the insurance adjuster informed me the damage on my apartment is considered flood damage, not hurricane damage, and therefore I am not covered. Shortly after that, I went for my noon-hour run.QUOTE]

well, you still went on your run :) I would have seriously considered hiding under the covers and not coming out for a while.

since I no longer drown my feelings in food, I tend to feel more emotional about the simplest things, or start to withdraw. right now I think i am going through a mid-life crisis (I am 36 and thought that would happen later in life) but I think achieving this weight loss has me now thinking in terms of what is really important in life and am I doing what is really important in life, you know? i have a good well paying job as a director of marketing, lead a team of 8, etc. but all of a sudden my heart is not in it. i spend 55 hours a week either working or commuting and quite frankly would prefer a job closer to home even if it paid less, allowing me to be less stressed and closer to the kids (10 and 7). but i am the primary breadwinner and have to think long and hard about leaving my stable well paying job for a new (thus less stable because i would be new?) and with less pay but closer to home job. my husband has plans to start his own business (he is a chef) in the next couple of years and that may change things (not sure in which way) but in the meantime I feel like i am dying inside a bit. my priorities right now are God (my relationship with him), my family (DH/kids), health (maintaining the 64 pounds loss and lose a few more as I continue to eat healthy and exercise), and work. but it feels the way i spend my time doesnt reflect this. and i know I need to work, i am not shying away from that, it is just not fulfilling anymore... this is the longest I have stayed at a particular job so maybe taht is why. also i just started supervising this team a year ago as a result of a promotion, maybe i just dont like to supervise people... i am not sure what it is but i need to figure this out soon....sorry for the long vent....right now i feel at peace with everything else in my life, just not with my j.o.b. :(

Okay, I got off my butt and went to the gym today.

9/9:
- 23 min interval ride on stationary bike (5 min warmup, 14 mins intervals, 4 min cooldown); easy level 8, hard level 15, 5.3 miles total
- 15 mins pilates leg exercises

:hug: to you Charin.
Not sure what I can add but I know that losing weight is a big mental shift and it takes some time to get used to it. I have found that I've actually changed a great deal-- much more interested in health and fitness, etc-- which seems obvious but it has changed much of what I do each day-- planning meals, exercise, avoidance of certain places or situations, et.

September 9: 90 minutes Bikram Yoga

Totals:
9 days
656 minutes

Saturday, Sept. 10:

This morning, I was badly missing my usual Saturday morning at my gym, with spin class and Pilates back-to-back. Instead:

60 minutes stationary bike, resistance at 10 and then at nine, hill intervals
30 minutes walking with my friend and her two Chow dogs in a wooded game management area
45 minutes lawn-mowing in my mother's yard

Such is life out here, where one drives down roads called Dinglehole Road and East Mud Lake Road and Whiskey Hollow Road, or else named for families who lived on them or the village crossings -- some no longer in existence -- that they led to.

September 10: 60 minutes walk with dh

Totals:
10 days
716 minutes

Sunday, Sept. 11:

15 minutes Stairmaster, resistance at eight
60 minutes arm & shoulders routine
45 minutes Nautilus elliptical, resistance at nine & hill intervals

On the Stairmaster, the digital readout kept telling me how many floors I'd climbed, and so inevitably, on 9/11, I thought of people in the World Trade Center, who had to climb steps & steps & steps -- the firemen going up while the people came down.

When I left the gym, to my surprise, there was a young Peregrine Falcon in the parking lot around the corner from the gym, eating up a pigeon it had probably killed not long before. I eased the car up close & sat watching for about 20 minutes. My view was very clear: It was just a few feet away from me. What a beautiful sight, even though gory -- but not gratuitously. The bird has to eat to live; it was just being a falcon.

A 20 minute trundle up and down the very blowy road turned into 45 minutes of autumnal dawdling. The hips and haws and sloes are in abundance this year. In fact, all members of the plum family are having a gala. ETA that I know hips and haws are not fruit of the plum family.

So glad you saw that peregrine close up, saef. Are there high, rocky cliffs nearby where it lives or could it be a skyscraper bird?

Neither, Birchie, since the small Upstate NY town where I'm staying is on fairly flat land. It rolls only a little, as a result of a glacier shaving over it aeons ago, leaving behind little hills called drumlins. But the town has an old center (what we in America consider "old" anyway) composed mostly of Victorian brick buildings, and a river running through it with a steel girder bridge. The old term for peregrine is a "duck hawk" so they also seem to have an affinity with water. And peregrines have been nesting in tall buildings in nearby Syracuse, with a Webcam following them. I'd like to think the one I saw had been raised in Syracuse and was establishing itself elsewhere.

Always fascinating to see a bird so close that I can tally up the markings from the field guide. The legs were bright yellow. The eyes were enormous and seemed black through. The bird never stopped scanning while eating. At times its head made an odd nodding movement, making it look as though it were shrugging. The "helmet" those birds wear was distinct, particularly the "sideburns." And all the streaks and bars and speckles. (Like Hopkins, I love dappled and speckled things -- and of course he'd love seeing a falcon like that, too.)