Tag: exercise ring

Another Long Day

Another long day filled with a gaggle of long, frustrating meetings and problems. 18 minutes until the weekend. I think we’re in a position right now where we will be able to call it a day at quittin’ time, but I’m not going to count my chickens until they hatch.

What’s in the queue for the weekend? Not sunrise at the ocean pictures because the weather forecast is crappy. Tonight we’ll have our third Hello Fresh meal. The first two were excellent and I expect good things from the turkey meal we have lined up for tonight.

I have to mix a song. It’s the last day of the month so I need to finish off the second of two songs I worked on this month before midnight so that I can complete my personal write and record a single challenge. The first song was done a couple of nights ago. The second song isn’t as good, and the performance is worse, but it’s still worth finishing. Tomorrow is April 1st so the Record Every Month challenge resets and I can start working on something new. I’m thinking about using the tremolo built into my amplifier this time. I never use it… so maybe I should.

Jen has a project in her office that we’re going to work on. She wants to change a bunch of things on her desk. We haven’t done that in a while so it will be fun to mix it up. I am thinking of changing things up on my desk too, but I think I want to wait a month until the window replacement project is complete. I don’t know why but that’s my story and I’m sticking to it.

My exercise and calorie (move) goals are done for today. My liquid intake goal is also done. I have a few more hours before my stand goal is done, and almost half of my protein goal is still outstanding. I’m behind on that one, by quite a bit. I’ll hit it though.

Okay, time to sign off. I still have nine minutes left in the work week. The weekend is so close… so very, very close. I’m ready for it.

Week 29 Weigh In

Hello my friends and loyal readers! Welcome to the official Week 29 Weigh In post!

It’s amazing how gun shy one less than impressive week has made me. It’s also amazing how stupidly unpredictable weight loss can be. Yesterday I stepped on the scale as soon as I got out of bed. I was down about two pounds since last Wednesday. I did not record my weight, I was just paranoid about having a bad weigh in this week so I snuck a peek early to get a glimpse into the future. The number was good, but not spectacular.

I did it again today, but this time it’s official. I got out of bed and stepped on the scale and I am down 4.2 pounds for the week. Wow! That means I lost about two pounds yesterday. How ridiculous is that? Don’t get me wrong, I am not complaining at all. It’s just that losing two pounds yesterday implies that I could gain two pounds today. I need to stop stressing about this and just go back to one scale moment each week.

We’re in a state these days where three pounds a week feels epic. Now we hit four pounds and it’s like, Wow! I now weigh 263.6 pounds which seven months ago was absolutely unimaginable. I have lost 167.8 pounds since the surgery on May 4, 2022. I have lost 188.4 pounds since the first visit to the clinic on January 19, 2022. My BMI is down 0.5 points this week to 32.1. Like I said, ridiculous.

I was thinking of a sort of mini goal of seeing if I could hit 200 pounds overall by the time we go to Disney World on January 4, 2023. That’s only 11.6 more pounds. That’s an average of less than two pounds per week for six more weeks. That’s doable, but the real goal should be hitting 200 pounds by the anniversary of the first weigh in. That date is eight weeks from tomorrow. If I somehow manage to average 4.025 pounds per week for those eight weeks then I could hit 200 pounds since the surgery by that date. I’m not holding my breath on that though. Four pounds per week is not happening, despite hitting four pounds this week. We’ll see how close I can get.

My exercise routine got weird yesterday and it continued to today. I stopped at 30 minutes because my pace was all screwed up. The first mile was faster than eight minutes. I kept the pace consistent and the second mile pace was almost 20 minutes. It wasn’t that extreme today but it was just as dumb. I stopped at 30 minutes again, then watched the second half of Andor while eating breakfast and then ran for another 30 minutes. Same thing happened, but the two trots-in-place were enough to close my Move ring (calorie count) so I’ll take it.

Tomorrow is Thanksgiving. Back in the pre-surgery diet days that would make tomorrow a massive cheat day. Not this time. Those days are over. I am going to have about four ounces of food and that’s it. Last night I had more than that for dinner because I was WAY behind on my protein goal and it made me sick. It wasn’t due to a mistake like eating too fast or not chewing enough (which are my two common mistakes), it was just because I was completely full and my new little stomach didn’t like that. So I am cutting myself off despite the holiday. Four ounces is all you get, Robert.

That doesn’t change the fact that Thanksgiving is probably my favorite holiday of the year though. I just love it. Food or no food. It’s almost time to punch into work, and the day before Thanksgiving is traditionally the slowest, most agonizing day of the year… so duck and cover, kids. Good luck to you all, and may you all have a happy Wednesday is Weigh In Day today.

Sweaty

You know something? Running in place for 45 minutes is a whole shit load more difficult than walking in place for 45 minutes.

I upped my workout settings from 40 minute indoor run to 45 minutes yesterday. The reason being that I wanted to guarantee I close my move ring, which counts calories, at the same time I close the exercise ring. The exercise goal is 30 minutes. I think we’re getting to the point where that needs to be increased to 60 minutes. I actually hit 60 minutes the last two days. Maybe December 1st. Maybe January 1st. We’ll see. My move/calorie goal is set to 1000 calories. I haven’t missed that goal in over 150 days. I think the time is coming to raise that goal too. Maybe raise it to 1500. I had it set to 1250 for a while last year. 2000 seems too high. 1500 might be a better challenge. January 1st. Maybe. Anyway, jogging in place for 40 minutes wasn’t getting me up to 1000 but it was getting me close. 45 minutes today gave me 1020. Perfect. We’ll stick with this setup for a while.

What else is going on? I still haven’t played the guitar since the end of September. I do have a couple of song ideas going for national solo album month though. I haven’t given up yet. I just need to find the time to play. The calluses on my left hand are gone, and there is something wrong with my left arm that is causing me a lot of pain. I don’t know what it is. I don’t remember doing anything to cause it. Is it tendonitis again? Last time that was in my left thumb. I don’t know. I haven’t been lifting the dumbbells since it started. Maybe I should? I don’t know. I don’t think it will stop me from playing, but we’ll find out at some point.

I started a time lapse video of a candle next to my desk today. I figured you all missed that stuff. You do, right? Wait… don’t answer that. I don’t want to know. Let me remain deluded.

Okay. Time to go make breakfast. Assuming my post-running legs can still move.

Week 23 Weigh In

Happy Wednesday Weigh In, once again. 23 weeks post surgery and nothing but a lifetime left to go. My 10’s column changed again so let’s celebrate.

I am down 3.6 pounds. That brings me down to 287.2. 300 pounds seems very far away now. Happiness. Granted, 300 would feel more comfortably far away if I was down to 187.2, but we’ll jump off that bridge should we ever come to it, m’kay?

I just earned myself an Apple Watch activity app award. Most calories burned in a single workout. I was doing my walkies while watching the new episode of Andor and I hit that 3.2 mile (simulated) goal without realizing it. I didn’t notice that I could allow myself to stop until I was almost at four miles (simulated), so I just kept going. 4.02 miles in 45:21 for 758 calories. My exercise goal for today has been obliterated, and my calorie goal is over 75% done. I think I am in good shape for closing that ring today. Hurrah, babie.

Speaking of goals, I didn’t hit my protein goal of 60 grams yesterday. I was super close, 58.38, but I didn’t get there. I had some trouble with my lunch and I didn’t want to push things at dinner so I kept it a lot smaller than usual. I will do better today, guaranteed.

My next check in at the clinic is on Tuesday. Everything is going well so I expect that appointment to feel like a formality. Here’s hoping it all stays on track.

Working from Home

I’m working from home today. Back where I belong. After a day and a half in the office it feels good to be back at my desk in the cellar.

Not that a day and a half in the office is so awful, it’s just that after two and a half years of working at home I am really settled and used to it now and just don’t want to stop.

I had two nights in a row of really shitty sleep. Tuesday and Wednesday nights were just plain bad. I don’t know why. Well… Tuesday I just couldn’t sleep and was awake until almost 2:00am. Wednesday I don’t know what the problem was, it was just bad. Last night I was out like a light before 10:00pm and ended up with almost nine hours of sleep. I feel a little better today, but damn was I sleepy last night.

The last three days, including today, I have been pushing myself a little extra during my morning walkies. I’ve been trying to pick up the pace of the pacing, and also keeping it going for longer. My exercise goal is 30 minutes and I’ve gone for closer to 45. I’m doing the faux 5k thing again. I am trying to keep up the faster pace for 3.2 miles, which usually comes out to 44-45 minutes. The main goal here is to burn more calories early in the day so that I can close my move ring earlier. My goal there is 1000 calories. I’ve had a few days recently where bed time came around and I still had about 100 calories left to go. An extra 15 minutes of exercise each day should take care of that. I might change my goals one of these days, but I want to see if my ankles start hurting from the extra walkies first. We’ll see.

I watched yesterday’s episode of She-Hulk during today’s walk. On two occasions, my walkie pace synced up with a song playing in the background perfectly. My steps were eighth notes. It made me wonder if the audio folks working on the show try to match up the beats per minute of the songs they use for an episode. That’s something that really no one would ever really notice, but if that were true I think it would be incredibly cool. That’s just me.

Okay, 8.5 hours left in the work day. We have a pre-fab furniture item coming tonight and we’re donating a couple of furniture items tomorrow. I have to have all of that ready to go. There’s a chance we might see the kids very briefly tomorrow but that’s still very much up in the air. Outside of all of that the questions remain: Will I be able to do some music this weekend, and where do I go for my just-after-sunrise pics tomorrow and Sunday? Very important questions.

Right, back to work with you!

I Am Toast

Methuen, MA to Burlington, VT to Methuen, MA to Burlington, VT to Methuen, MA in a period of about a day and a half. Sweet Christmas, am I exhausted.

Everything went fine on the second trip to school yesterday. No issues at all. I helped bring a few things up to Harry’s room and helped bring a few things back to the car. I stopped at a few random places in order to stretch my legs and all was well. I left the house at about 3:45 and got back at about 10:45. Pretty much exactly on schedule.

About 10 minutes after I got home I zombified completely. I had a few things I needed to do before bed and I did them all, but once that was through I was mentally and physically done. I put out the Poland Springs empties so that they could be picked up today. I brought the trash out to the street so it could be picked up today. I finished my exercise and move rings so that I could keep my perfect month intact.

Note, I said I closed the rings. I did not say I did a full 30 minutes of walkies. Nope, I was too tired. I broke my streak of days with a single 30 minute work out. I did 18 minutes last night and that was enough for me to have all three of my Activity App rings closed and that was all I had in me. The streak ran from June 1, 2022 to August 28, 2022. I started a new streak this morning. Bring it on.

Okay. I have to go to work. I have a busy morning. My goal is to get through the work day, cook some dinner for the love of my life, and then fall asleep in front of the TV until bed time. Bring it on.

200%

While I was waiting for people to show up at my parents house in Tewksbury this morning, after taking all the pictures, I had nothing to do so I started doing my morning walkies. I had two minutes left to go in the 30 minute walk when the first person arrived. That put me in a bit of a pickle. My exercise ring was closed (I had a couple of minutes logged from walking up and down stairs) but I did not make the full 30 minutes. I’ve mentioned before that I have a bit of a streak of 30 minute workouts going.

Would today be the day that I break the streak?

Nope.

I started another 30 minutes in the 34 minutes before the start of my work shift. It wasn’t even 9:00am yet and my exercise ring was already over 200%. Now that is dedication for you. It’s also stupidity because now my legs feel like dead weight. Oh good!

Happy Friday, everyone!

Workout Streak

I think it was June 1st. That was the day I went nuts on my walking in place exercise and did the full 30 minutes in one shot. Every day since then I did the same. On 3-4 days I even pushed it to 45 minutes, but prior to today I was on a streak of 59 days doing a single workout of at least 30 minutes.

Today the streak was in jeopardy. I closed my 30 minute exercise ring without doing any specific workout at all. Most of it came from walking around Boston, but there were a few minutes from walking up and down the cellar stairs and from following my mother around the nursing home while wearing a mask.

The exercise ring was closed. I didn’t need to do any more. I could call it a day and consider it a win, right?

Wrong. Jen fell asleep around 10:00pm tonight. Harry got home from work at about the same time and camped himself in front of the tele to come down after a stressed out shift. I took the opportunity to go down to the cellar, pop on this week’s episode of That Pedal Show, and do my 30 minutes of walking in place.

Sure my 30 minute exercise ring is at 60 minutes. That’s cool and all, but the important thing is that the single 30 minute workout streak continues. 60 days down, effectively infinity to go! WOOHOO!

43 Days

Earlier I mentioned that I was in the middle of a streak of doing a 30 minute walk-in-place thing a day, but I didn’t know how many days the streak had been running.

I went back and looked it up. June 1, 2022 was the first day. That was 43 days ago.

I also looked up what the longest single walk-in-place thing I’d done was. It was Thanksgiving 2020 and I did a make-pretend 5k walk. My exercise app has it on file as a 3.2 mile indoor walk. 5k is more like 3.10686 miles, but I think I rounded up to make sure I hit the goal.

I wonder… instead of doing a 30 minute walk each morning… should I do an approximate 5k? I would have to get started earlier in the morning than I do now. I bet I could do it. Thanksgiving 2020, I was pretty sure I was going to die. Today? I bet I could do it.

Maybe tomorrow.

The goal with all the walking of course is our planned trip to Disney World in January. I want to be able to walk from one end of Orlando to the other without getting too desperately tired. The more walking I do in preparation, the easier that trip will be.