UH60guy

That's a good idea This was the thin powdery stuff, but it was a foot deep. I ended up doing more of a combination of squatting/sweeping motions, some shovelling, and some slapshot-style stuff to mainly just fling it to the side. I'm pretty sore though! Still, not looking good for my run schedule with all this snow and ice

Ok, shoveling the whole driveway out of a foot of snow with a garden shovel (don't have a snow shovel) counts as a workout, right? I'm beat. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk, sorry for short choppy sentences!

Yikes, more time away from the house, more time away from the routine. We had a 4-day trip up to Washington DC Thursday through Sunday. My wife had an interview for one of her doctoral internship sites, and we combined the trip with a full day of house hunting over the area. The real estate agent took us to 14 houses! It was a long day. However, what this 4-day journey meant was two days away from work (and my usual workout over lunch), so no gym time was accomplished. We're still in the freezing cold snap, so I ain't gonna run in that. I better start running somewhere soon0- I have a 5 miler in 44 days and a half marathon in 45. Now that I'm back at work, I did make it back to the gym! So at least I know when I'm in my comfort zone, I can achieve things. It's just a lot of change and time away from the routine that is killing me. Trying to calculate my eating and goal progress- I had a minor snafu with my challenge tracker sheet where it's not calculating properly on Google Drive (I keep it there so I can update via iPhone), so I'll have to look at it again. It looks like after the first 3 weeks, I've only run once and gone to the gym three times (not counting today). Eating was meh- 42 points, meaning I'm on track for a B or C on the challenge. At least that's something. And on the savings front, that's going surprisingly well. The next payday is Thursday, and I anticipate we'll have around $700-800 in the account, depending on the electric bill at the end of the month. We did that even with travelling and putting the dog in boarding too. That means we will have made up for the lackluster savings from the first paycheck, and might hit our goal of $400 per paycheck (averaged in this case). Definitely a big achievement, as we needs the dough for closing costs and the move!

If you have an Amazon Prime account, they can be good for unique foods delivered in 2 days with free shipping. for example, they have red jalapenos there: http://www.amazon.com/Bell-View-Roasted-Whole-Jalapeno-Peppers/dp/B00DFM4D0I/ref=sr_1_2?s=grocery&ie=UTF8&qid=1389901481&sr=1-2&keywords=red+jalapeno

Thanks for the tips- that sounds a little easier to say than the "I don't eat that" type of response, which is a lie. I do eat cookies. I eat them, I eat some more, and some more, and I love every minute of it. The "not today" option you mention sounds great- it turns it down, but keeps it from being this forbidden fruit (from now on I will consider cookies fruit) and therefore more binge-worthy when I do have them. the run went... well, it went. I left my GPS at home and brought my iPhone just on Zombies, Run! which tells me of the time only after each mile. Not sure of my distance, but it probably was close to 3 miles. I was hurting, and I didn't attempt the workout inserted in the middle. I think I was back up to 9-minute miles, but enough stuff went wrong I could't really tell. In the first mile, a car backed out into the street and onto the shoulder, forcing me to stop. I stood there, but he turned into me. Apparently his driveway wasn't good, so he wanted to park on the street where he forced me to stop. I had to hop in the mud before going again. At mile 1, I was at 9:27. During the second mile, the app unexpectedly quit. I could get the music playing again- and the timer was still counting, but the distance tracking and story from the app stopped. I had no idea how far I would go from that point on. Worse, when I put it back in my waist pouch (I hate having it on the arm band, it makes it heavy and sweaty), the zipper came off when it was closed. I mean, it sealed the iPhone in the pouch, tracks completely closed, and the entire zipper came off, leaving my iPhone trapped inside. Now I had no distance and no timer. It was uneventful after that, but when I got home and pried the tracks apart, it was around 28 minutes. I can only assume with the stops in there that it was around 3 miles. But boy did it hurt. I was really doing well with running before- I could run 5 or 6 miles without much effort. Now I'm struggling with this 2-3. It really shows how much a few weeks off can set you back. I really have to get after it as I have an 8k on March 15 and a half marathon the next day. Hopefully I can build back up to it.

Sorry I haven't posted in a while, but dear God, you are like some parallel universe version of me. The latest coincidence was you posted the Sherlock pictures yesterday, the same day that I finally got around to watching the end of the first season. Then you start talking about the Penguins... Now I've narrowed it fown to exactly which parallel universeI In this case, I have a feeling that it's a mirror evil/opposite universe a la Star Trek... as in that I find the Penguins and Sid generally evil. I probably should go grow a goatee to show that I'm on the other side here. Lets go Caps!

It's weird about the snacks and desserts- usually I avoid them, and I've been good about that lately. The problem is other people offering me crap, and me not turning it down. It's convenient to blame them, but I know I'm the one who has to say no. For example, the person in the office next to me bakes cheesecakes. She offers me a slice, I politely decline and say I've gained 10 pounds, but then she says "just a little slice" and I've already used up my willpower reserve on the first denial. Same at home- the wife bought cookie mix, so each night she bakes 2 for each of us. I should say no, I just don't. On the plus side, I found it very easy to turn off the "Starbucks every day" switch, by buying a variety pack of tea and keeping a cup at my desk. That helped with cutting out the snacking too. On the weight front, the good news is my initial fears of a 15 pound gain were unfounded- I guess the first time back on the scale was one of those fluke days. More self-confirmation of why I like to check every day (mindfulness and to watch the trend). Turns out I'm "only" up ten pounds in the two months since the baby was born. I still haven't run this challenge- and I really need to as I have an 8k and half marathon on St. Patricks day weekend. I'll try again tonight. And today I completely forgot about the gym. It wasn't until the lunch hour ended (where I didn't do anything anyway) that I realized I completely forgot to go. On the plus side, I just noticed the mini challenge workout today with the burpees, jumpting jacks, etc. I will try to make up for the missed workout by including it in my run. I used to be good about running two miles or so, doing bodyweight exercises, and finishing another mile or two. This mini-challenge seems to allow it. I'll have to see how I feel during the run, I don't want to overdo that for the first time back like I did with the gym last week. On the savings side, we had $273 of the planned $400 from my last pay period able to go into savings when yesterday's paycheck came. Not bad, but not great. A few things made it harder, but that shouldn't be an excuse- our water bill comes every two months, (so this was one month it was harder to reach the target), we had to travel to house hunt (2-3 extra tanks of gas), as well as the fact that I'm not the only one in on this goal. The wife's spending it counting against me here, even though it's not like she went on a spree or anything this month. The downside to a joint account I guess. Hopefully we'll be able to bring it up to a total of $800 in two more weeks, but we have car maintenance and a $250 house appraisal that will impact the budget too. We'll see!

My four words: Make exercise a habit Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk, sorry for short choppy sentences!

The benefit to the scale every day is you can weed out the fluctuations and see the trend. Like if one Sunday I see myself as the same weight as last week, I wouldn't know I lost two pounds over the time and the Sunday upturn was just a normal fluctuation. I'd see the downward trend and be ok with it, rather than just two data points and being disappointed in no change. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk, sorry for short choppy sentences!

Wow, I'm still struggling with getting into a routine. At least some of this I can chalk up to overdoing it at the gym Thursday- I was too sore to run or work out through the weekend (could barely get up the stairs!), so I failed on that front. Same goes for the eating, I just keep going for desserts. Well, I feel better again, so I'm off to the gym in 15 minutes, for what I hope will be getting back into my old routine of Mon-Wed-Fri workouts over lunch. The runs are going to be tricky. As much as I hate running while at lunch and coming back to work a little sweaty, it might be more reliable than trying to do it when I get home and have the baby concerns. And wow, I finally had the courage to step on the scale this morning for the first time in like 2 months. I'm up 15 pounds. I'm sure some of that is water weight from pizza and bowling with friends yesterday, but it was a wake up call that I needed. I will endeavor to track the weight daily as a reminder that it's something I have to work at. Denying or hiding from it made it too easy to justify extra helpings, extra desserts, not running, and more. Week 1 status: 0/3 runs complete. 1/3 work outs complete. 13 food points (need to average 16.7 per week to meet goal of 100) Savings- will judge on next payday, the 14th, but it looks like slightly less than $300 will be saved of the $400 goal.

I'm right with you on the legs- just like you my last gym workout was about a month ago and I think I overdid it the first day back. Let us know if you find any tricks to working around the pain!

Well, that's a long story for another day... Yeah, I'm a UH-60 pilot in the Army, though I'm currently in a job flying a desk. OK, now that I'm back at work, holidays are over, and the trip to the DC area is behind me, I got back into things. I went to the gym over lunch today for probably the first time since the baby was born. Unfortunately I tried to hop back in where I was, not where I am now, and probably overdid it. I'm quite sore from the squats, and wondering if and how I'll be able to run tonight. I think I pulled my hamstrings, but thankfully no sharp pain, so it'll likely just be really sore for a few days. The pull ups went fine, though I could only get 4-5 at a time for 3 sets, and the fourth set I only got 3. I used to be at 5-6 for four sets regularly, so we'll see if I can get back there. At least no soreness on the arms. I wasn't able to get a spare bench, so no bench presses today, but I did dips. Two sets of 8, two sets of 5. Not great, but again, not sore at least. Finally, I went on to planks. I did two at a minute each, and two at 45 seconds. I used to be up to all four at a minute, and sometimes the first one for a minute and a half. Not a huge loss there, but definitely a step backwards. It's going to be critical to not think of this as a loss of former capability, but a gain in being regular at the gym and running again. I have to take the emphasis out of the results and focus on making the routine a routine. We'll see if I can get a run in tonight. If I do, I'm not even going to take a watch with me- I don't want to focus on a loss in pace, but need to just put the miles behind me. The food front's been a little rough. Monday, all three meals were fine, but had a snack and a dessert (2 pts). Tuesday was 2/3 on meals, and minus a half point for a snack (1.5 pts). Wednesday was 3 good meals, but again both a snack and dessert to lose 1 point. So, for the first three days, I'm at 5.5 out of a possible 9. Not good. I need to resist those urges and get my eating back under control and routine. Of course I say this as I am finishing off a tall Starbucks latte (-0.5 pts).

Oh of course! Today I'm home alone with her at the mother in laws house. No gym to get back into things until thursday, but no one at the moment to derail my eating plans And regardless of location, I ain't running in this cold- would probably do more harm than good. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk, sorry for short choppy sentences!

Awesome job! Glad to hear you did well. I kinda fell off the face of the Earth for a while there, but it's great to see that you rose to the challenge and made it through! Five pounds for the holidays isn't that bad at all. I'm jealous, I still haven't faced the scale myself.

Well, it's Groundhog Day... again... and that must mean that we're up here at Gobbler's Knob waiting for the forecast from the world's most famous groundhog weatherman, Punxsutawney Phil, who's just about to tell us how much more winter we can expect. I'll give you a winter prediction: It's gonna be cold, it's gonna be grey, and it's gonna last you for the rest of your life. I need to do something I can maintain the rest of my life. The last challenge, I tried to exercise outside of my routine. I thought I was getting bored with my workouts as well. We just had a baby, and everything was thrown out of whack, so I tried to roll with it and be adaptable. Time off from work, travelling, the holidays- you name it- nothing spoke routine. I lasted about 5 days and failed utterly and completely. After a 10-miler the first weekend of December, I haven’t run once. I think I’ve been to the gym twice in eight weeks. Turns out I need the routine. I need to wake up every day the same mindless way, turn on the autopilot, and make it to my goals. What would you do if you were stuck in one place and every day was exactly the same, and nothing that you did mattered? I would master a few talents. For this challenge though, I need to relearn and master the art of routine. I’ll set the goals independent of accomplishment, instead the act of just getting out there will be the goal, with the resulting strength a benefit: Goal: 3 gym workouts per week (STR+4) Goal: 3 runs per week. (STA+2, DEX+2) “Yeah, three cheeseburgers, two large fries, two chocolate shakes and one large coke.†I haven’t been eating that well lately. Even my eating habits I need to get back into a routine. Cut out the restaurants, cut out the snacks and desserts. Goal: Eat “real food†each meal (CON+2, CHA+2). Get a point for each healthy meal made of recognizable ingredients not from a package in a reasonable portion size. Lose half a point for each dessert or snack. The goal is 100 points. I'm a god. I'm not the God I don't think. … Meaning I need to at least have some long term plan. Well, we’re moving, selling a house, and buying a new one in April. This is also my long-term goal (getting set up in the new city). So, saving some money would be really nice. We’ve been hit hard with new baby expenses and some car maintenance, so we’re low in savings and the last few months we have been living paycheck to paycheck. Big ticket items are hopefully out of the way so this is a prime chance to save up for closing and moving costs. Goal: Put $400 per paycheck into the savings account (WIS+3). Okay, campers, rise and shine, and don't forget your booties because it's COOOLD out there. That's right, woodchuck-chuckers - it’s… GROUNDHOG DAY! Let’s get started! Summary: Long term: Move and start new job, be physically fit when I arrive. 3 gym visits. 3 runs. Eat well. Save money. My motivation: I have a two month old baby- she’s both my motivation and my adversary here. On one hand, my wanting to help out and be around her is hurting my exercise regimen. On the other hand, I want to be healthy and around for a long time, so I need to get back into things.