First off, a link to a FUNNY story, I was literally gaping in disbelief while reading this:
http://www.shtick.org/Misc/ryans.htm
The weather has been extremely confusing lately. So far this month, I have worn shorts 3 times...in January! Something is fundamentally wrong with this concept, the weather should at least have the common courtesy to at least act like it's winter.
So I have finally made the first step toward doing something I've been talking about for about 5 years now...learning to play piano. Christie and I ordered a cheapo yamaha portable keyboard a few days ago, so we will see how this goes. Thanks to Bobbiestan, I have a bit of knowledge about playing after receiving a lesson from him. I've always been able to sit at a piano and play chords and such, just from having played guitar for almost 10 years now, but I can hardly do anything resembing PLAYING the instrument, having no formal training regarding the *physical* aspect of playing the piano (and nobody is interested in hearing me explain why it takes so many fingers to play an Esus2(9)#11 chord). So far, I can play a mean rendition of Mary Had a Little Lamb.
The fat cutting "diet" still goes well, yesterday was the 5 week mark. I never would have imagined it going this well. I'm a bit sore this morning from the new weightlifting workout I did last night. I finally came to the conclusion that the whole split muscle group(s) workout wasn't working for me anymore because: 1) I really don't have the extra time for it and 2) I don't have the resources available to me anymore after moving away from an apartment complex that had a free gym. Now it's just me, my bench, and my trusty set of bowflex dumbbells, so I have restructured my workout to more match my available resources.
I drew up a "test" workout one day early last week, then tweaked it throughout the week, getting it ready for yesterday. My goal was fairly intense full body weight workout, 3 days a week, between 45 and 55 minutes to a workout session. My workout last night came in at around 49 minutes, so I guess I did good for a first stab at it.
Having been doing the split muscle group workout for about 6 months prior to this, last nights workout was VERY intense. It's a different feeling altogether; 3 sets of 12 with moderately heavy weights and about 1 minute of rest between sets on my new workout, as opposed to 5 sets of 8 with very heavy weights and 2 minute rests that I was doing on my old workout). I feel very pumped this morning (a good thing). I will like to see how I feel as I continue to do this workout.
Tuesday, January 24, 2006
Monday, January 16, 2006
Nothing Much to Say
Not a whole lot happening lately. Today is Monday, and it was a casual dress day for us, but I forgot...go figure. I'm in such auto-pilot mode in the morning that it probably wouldn't have mattered if I would have had a 50 foot marquee in my kitchen saying "WEAR JEANS TODAY".
Saw the movie Red Eye last night. For a Wes Craven movie, it was different, but not much else to say about it. It's not going to win any awards for originality or anything like that. In fact, it's actually quite normal compared to most of his movies, and the first of his I've seen in a while that didn't have a monster in it.
Watched 40 Year Old Virgin Saturday night for the 3rd time, and it's not any less funny, I still laugh hysterically at some of the parts. If you are easily embarrassed, you might not want to see this movie, they take every uncomfortable thing about sex and literally THROW it out into the open. Good stuff though.
My diet has been going on for 4 weeks today, and I must say that I've been satisfied with the results. I must be doing something right, because I'm not hungry all the time. One thing about this diet, I don't like to eat out much, simply because most restaurants don't make their nutritional information available enough so that I can research before I go there. It's probably for the best though...
Well, off to work.
Saw the movie Red Eye last night. For a Wes Craven movie, it was different, but not much else to say about it. It's not going to win any awards for originality or anything like that. In fact, it's actually quite normal compared to most of his movies, and the first of his I've seen in a while that didn't have a monster in it.
Watched 40 Year Old Virgin Saturday night for the 3rd time, and it's not any less funny, I still laugh hysterically at some of the parts. If you are easily embarrassed, you might not want to see this movie, they take every uncomfortable thing about sex and literally THROW it out into the open. Good stuff though.
My diet has been going on for 4 weeks today, and I must say that I've been satisfied with the results. I must be doing something right, because I'm not hungry all the time. One thing about this diet, I don't like to eat out much, simply because most restaurants don't make their nutritional information available enough so that I can research before I go there. It's probably for the best though...
Well, off to work.
Tuesday, January 10, 2006
And Now, A Word from Our Sponsors
That last post was brought to you by Bobbiestan and the numbers 0 and 1.
Tuesday Morning Buzz
Am I energetic because it's not Monday anymore, or is it that I'm loaded with Red Bull? The answer has yet to be seen...but soon.
Feels like our schedules are about to tighten up around here, I was checking out my work assignments yesterday and realized that it's going to be a busy next few months. Plus, I can sort of feel it in the air. Once you work with a group of people long enough, you become more in tune with the subtle nuances of group dynamics, to the point where you can almost "feel" that something is going on. So right now I'm "feeling" like chains of events are going to be set into motion that will result in a big deadline crunch again...hopefully I am wrong.
Courtesy of Bobbiestan, I got to watch the first half of Dream Theater's Live in Bodukan DVD last night. It's a REALLY good DVD if you are a fan of the music. I came to 2 conclusions while watching this DVD; 1) these guys are definitely in the upper eschelon of musicians in the world today, and 2) they are absolutely insane. It's amazing that they can even make it through the first song without exploding into nothing but numbers and musical notes. In other words, good stuff...
Feels like our schedules are about to tighten up around here, I was checking out my work assignments yesterday and realized that it's going to be a busy next few months. Plus, I can sort of feel it in the air. Once you work with a group of people long enough, you become more in tune with the subtle nuances of group dynamics, to the point where you can almost "feel" that something is going on. So right now I'm "feeling" like chains of events are going to be set into motion that will result in a big deadline crunch again...hopefully I am wrong.
Courtesy of Bobbiestan, I got to watch the first half of Dream Theater's Live in Bodukan DVD last night. It's a REALLY good DVD if you are a fan of the music. I came to 2 conclusions while watching this DVD; 1) these guys are definitely in the upper eschelon of musicians in the world today, and 2) they are absolutely insane. It's amazing that they can even make it through the first song without exploding into nothing but numbers and musical notes. In other words, good stuff...
Monday, January 09, 2006
Monday Mourning
Well, first day without Mike, we shall see how it goes. I figure it will be a little less interesting around here, and a bit less inappropriate :)
Weekend was good, saw The Producers saturday night, and it rocked. If I had to describe the movie in ONE word, I guess the word would have to be "gay", and I mean every conceivable definition of the word. I mean, it's a movie musical about a broadway musical called Springtime for Hitler...yes, it's as strange as it sounds.
During the previews I saw the preview to a new M. Night Shamaylan movie called Lady in the Water that looks pretty interesting...actually they preview it as "A bedtime story, by M. Night Shamaylan". Maybe this bedtime story won't keep people up at night like that kid from The Sixth Sense. Hopefully he will skip his obligitory plot twist this time and focus on the story-telling...his last movie was a bit too transparent.
I spent the rest of my free time this weekend playing Final Fantasy IV Advance. It is precisely 153% as good as I remember it, that is to say, stunning, even after 10 years or more. If Square really wanted to torture me, they'd release FFVI. It just doesn't get much better than FF4 and 6...to me anyways...but I am old school like that.
Weekend was good, saw The Producers saturday night, and it rocked. If I had to describe the movie in ONE word, I guess the word would have to be "gay", and I mean every conceivable definition of the word. I mean, it's a movie musical about a broadway musical called Springtime for Hitler...yes, it's as strange as it sounds.
During the previews I saw the preview to a new M. Night Shamaylan movie called Lady in the Water that looks pretty interesting...actually they preview it as "A bedtime story, by M. Night Shamaylan". Maybe this bedtime story won't keep people up at night like that kid from The Sixth Sense. Hopefully he will skip his obligitory plot twist this time and focus on the story-telling...his last movie was a bit too transparent.
I spent the rest of my free time this weekend playing Final Fantasy IV Advance. It is precisely 153% as good as I remember it, that is to say, stunning, even after 10 years or more. If Square really wanted to torture me, they'd release FFVI. It just doesn't get much better than FF4 and 6...to me anyways...but I am old school like that.
Wednesday, January 04, 2006
Elliptical Trainers Rock
Ellipticals rock...no impact, no back pain, quiet, and judging by the feeling in my legs, they are a hell of a workout too. I haven't used one for the better part of 6 weeks, so this feeling is altogether new to me...again.
Diet goes well, I'm doing much better at it (albeit a bit obsessive) than I figured one could do on a diet started the week before Christmas. People called me crazy, and maybe they were a bit right, but the day before I started this diet, something clicked. I suddenly became tired of talking about doing this and decided that the time for talk was over and it was time to take action. People ask what diet I am doing, but it's not really one of these gimmick diets that have a name, so I guess it would be called My Diet. My Diet is a culmination of about 6 months of research on many health and fitness websites, in addition to several body building websites. My goal is an overall reduction in body fat % (or a more "cut" look for those of you familiar with body building lingo). I'm not so much shooting for a weight reduction, but I'm sure that will happen (it already has). So 2 weeks and 2 days into it, the scale hasn't really budged much (3-5 lbs), but something has. I can tell a difference when I put clothes on now; the pants have a little more room around the waist.
For anyone interested, here's how My Diet goes (after a little background):
First, I found a good BMR Calculator (Basal Metabolic Rate, the number of calories to intake for your body to break even, i.e. maintain your weight, every day) and found this number to be around 2,500 for me (it's a little high because I've been weightlifting and doing cardio regularly for quite some time now).
So, with that number in mind, here's what my "diet" looks like:
Daily Calorie Intake: 2,000, monitored strictly, I have a notebook I write everything I eat in. My Carb/Protein/Fat ratio is about 45/35/20, with no more than 10% coming from saturated fat. This seems to be the "ideal" balance based on my research. What this means is on a daily basis, 900 calories will come from carbs (about 225g), 700 from protein (175g), and 400 from fat(about 45g). I got these numbers from the following: 1g carb = 4 calories, 1g protein = 4g calories, 1 fat = 9 calories.
Lots of water everyday (about a gallon on an average day)
Tuesday/Thursday/Saturday - cardio activity: 30 minutes on the elliptical trainer
Monday/Wednesday/Friday - weightlifting
At the end of the day, I add everything up, calculate the percentages, and adjust accordingly. I don't have any foods explicitly restricted from this diet, but some are off limits just by nature (aka fast foods, and most things from the freezer section at the grocery store are the worst). Some are "discretionary", like 1 or 2 time a week foods, like red meat (tends to have tons of protein, but lots of fat)
So that's my diet, and it feels like it's working so far, only time will tell though. Here are some links I used during my research for those of you interested, your mileage may vary:
Men's Fitness
Men's Health
Bodybuilding.com
ExRx.net
Later!
Diet goes well, I'm doing much better at it (albeit a bit obsessive) than I figured one could do on a diet started the week before Christmas. People called me crazy, and maybe they were a bit right, but the day before I started this diet, something clicked. I suddenly became tired of talking about doing this and decided that the time for talk was over and it was time to take action. People ask what diet I am doing, but it's not really one of these gimmick diets that have a name, so I guess it would be called My Diet. My Diet is a culmination of about 6 months of research on many health and fitness websites, in addition to several body building websites. My goal is an overall reduction in body fat % (or a more "cut" look for those of you familiar with body building lingo). I'm not so much shooting for a weight reduction, but I'm sure that will happen (it already has). So 2 weeks and 2 days into it, the scale hasn't really budged much (3-5 lbs), but something has. I can tell a difference when I put clothes on now; the pants have a little more room around the waist.
For anyone interested, here's how My Diet goes (after a little background):
First, I found a good BMR Calculator (Basal Metabolic Rate, the number of calories to intake for your body to break even, i.e. maintain your weight, every day) and found this number to be around 2,500 for me (it's a little high because I've been weightlifting and doing cardio regularly for quite some time now).
So, with that number in mind, here's what my "diet" looks like:
Daily Calorie Intake: 2,000, monitored strictly, I have a notebook I write everything I eat in. My Carb/Protein/Fat ratio is about 45/35/20, with no more than 10% coming from saturated fat. This seems to be the "ideal" balance based on my research. What this means is on a daily basis, 900 calories will come from carbs (about 225g), 700 from protein (175g), and 400 from fat(about 45g). I got these numbers from the following: 1g carb = 4 calories, 1g protein = 4g calories, 1 fat = 9 calories.
Lots of water everyday (about a gallon on an average day)
Tuesday/Thursday/Saturday - cardio activity: 30 minutes on the elliptical trainer
Monday/Wednesday/Friday - weightlifting
At the end of the day, I add everything up, calculate the percentages, and adjust accordingly. I don't have any foods explicitly restricted from this diet, but some are off limits just by nature (aka fast foods, and most things from the freezer section at the grocery store are the worst). Some are "discretionary", like 1 or 2 time a week foods, like red meat (tends to have tons of protein, but lots of fat)
So that's my diet, and it feels like it's working so far, only time will tell though. Here are some links I used during my research for those of you interested, your mileage may vary:
Men's Fitness
Men's Health
Bodybuilding.com
ExRx.net
Later!
Tuesday, January 03, 2006
Happy New Year
So it's been a while, but I've been enjoying a nice 2 week vacation to unwind and reboot...it worked. Guess I should start by saying HAPPY NEW YEAR and here's to a great 2006.
Home ownership is nice, and enough to more than take up 2 weeks worth of vacation time. I've never made so many trips to Bed Bath and Beyond in my life, but we've just about settled in and called it our own. Elliptical machine is in place, as are my weights, and living room furniture is on the way, due on Jan 21...so it's looking good. Perhaps some pictures would be good, as soon as we take some! :)
Later!
Home ownership is nice, and enough to more than take up 2 weeks worth of vacation time. I've never made so many trips to Bed Bath and Beyond in my life, but we've just about settled in and called it our own. Elliptical machine is in place, as are my weights, and living room furniture is on the way, due on Jan 21...so it's looking good. Perhaps some pictures would be good, as soon as we take some! :)
Later!
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