sylph

So, week away was work-filled, people-filled, and didn't leave much downtime for anything not work-related. Plus sleeping in a hotel instead of my own bed. I did get one mediocre hotel workout in on Thursday afternoon last week, and there was quite a lot of walking and standing throughout the week so I was definitely expending effort, just not in the way I had planned. I kept to my 'no alcohol on weeknights' rule aside from one social beer at one dinner, which was good. Food was all over the map as much of it was provided to us. AND I was expending a lot of mental/social effort all week so I didn't have much to spare for making good choices 🤷‍♀️ I am still feeling a bit over-peopled and under-rested, but hopefully that will dissipate soonish. Today I have had zero snacks and it's gorgeous outside so I will likely go for a quick walk around the neighborhood just to get off my behind. I need to grocery shop and meal plan in the next few days, If the weather holds I'm going to aim for a run tomorrow and Sunday or Monday with lifting Thursday and Saturday. Or some combination thereof. Unfortunately, I can no longer run with my morning post office treks. The dude who in the past has left threatening notes on my neighbors' doors has been seen skulking again. I'll be driving to the post office and keeping my runs to (slightly boring)repeated laps around the half mile loop that is my neighborhood for the near future.

Hey, Hi! Thanks for checking in all. Sorry for falling off the face of the earth. I was out of town for a week for a work thing and didn't broadcast that widely or at all, really. But I am back now. Mostly caught back up (unpacked, laundry is done, etc.). Hopefully some kind of planned movement will resume tomorrow.

Ugh. But WHY tho?

From someone who grew up in a very casual Pentacostal-adjacent but independent Bible church... low church vs high church is to do with the degree of formality/ritualization involved in the structure/practice of the church?

I'm used to it by this point. I had it scoped when I was 14 after an injury. Technically I don't have an intact ACL in that knee so the crankiness is not surprising. You'd think after dealing with it for almost 30 years I'd be better able to remember how much is too much, but apparently such is not the case...

Sorry to hear you're feeling poorly. Hopefully you'll be on the upswing soon. Don't push too much too fast and just prolong the agony (not that I'd know that from experience or anything).

Lift weights 2x/week. SBS 2x/week hypertrophy template Run 2x/week. Do in conjunction with post office trips as much as possible. No alcohol on weeknights. Snack less. --------- Thursday Lift. Not a lift day. Run. Yes! It was a relatively easy early first half with lots of walking intervals. At the end, was a 15 minute 'free run' where you're supposed to walk or run as you feel able and listen to your body, slow down and walk if you need to blah blah blah. Well, friends, About 6 or 7 minutes into that run I thought "I wonder if I can run this entire 15 minutes" ... I have made smarter choices. In the moment, it was totally fine! I was not speedy, but my cardio was not a problem, gait seemed fine, all that jazz. I made it the entire 15 minutes without slowing to a walk, except for pauses to check for traffic as I crossed roads, etc. About an hour after the run, however, my knee began to complain. Said complaints aren't really in the pain category (thank goodness). Instead, I get a feeling of instability as well as an increase in joint space pressure and size. In short, my knee swelled up quite a bit and my range of motion became fairly limited for the rest of the evening. It's better-ish this morning, but I'll have to take Saturday's workout and Sunday's run on a 'see how it goes in the moment' basis. Alcohol. None Snacks. Just choc chips, as per usual.

It was funny--I was so puzzled by the fact that the pull was so urgent that it made the not drinking part easier. So weird. Hmm, this is true. I did. Though I wasn't terribly smart about it (what was that you said about accumulated wisdom?) and it's swelled up rather significantly afterward...

I'd say grief is pretty normal for something like this. So glad you have a strong support system IRL to help bolster you. Here's to more excellent sleep, more laughter, and the boundless possibility of a life newly reset

Lift weights 2x/week. SBS 2x/week hypertrophy template Run 2x/week. Buy 6 mo sub to ZombiesRun! to facilitate this Do in conjunction with post office trips as much as possible. No alcohol on weeknights. Snack less. ------ Wednesday Lift. Not a lift day Run. Didn't manage to get a run in yesterday. Work was BUSY and full of meetings. Today looks better, plus I need to get up to the post office, so I'm optimistic. I'll need to keep an eye on my knee, though. It's gently niggling at me this morning. Alcohol. None. This was the first time this challenge that I really wanted a drink and had to resist the urge. Not sure what the pull was, but I got through it. Snacks. Lunch felt smaller than usual, so I had a granola bar about an hour afterward. Evening snack was my now-habitual chocolate chips.

Big changes in the works for you. Amazing job recognizing what you needed and having the bravery to make the change.

Lift weights 2x/week. SBS 2x/week hypertrophy template Run 2x/week. Buy 6 mo sub to ZombiesRun! to facilitate this Do in conjunction with post office trips as much as possible. No alcohol on weeknights. Snack less. ------- Tuesday Summary Lift - yes Run - no Alcohol - no Snacks - post-workout cottage cheese (which almost doesn't count) and a handful of post-dinner chocolate chips. I'm comfortable with this. Second workout of the week yesterday afternoon, which was: (all weights in lbs.) Deadlifts 45 x 8 65 x 6 95 x 6 95 x 6 95 x 6 95 x 6 Very sadly light. Not difficult at this weight so will go up next time. Easing into this to ensure my SI joint stays happy. BB OHP 45 x 8 45 x 8 45 x 8 45 x 10 If my barbell was lighter, I would've gone lighter. Reasonable as they were, but my shoulder would've appreciated a slightly easier time of it Reverse DB Lunges 15 x 12 15 x 12 15 x 12 15 x 12 High rep, unilateral exercises are the worst. Why did I think these were a good idea? DB Rows 10 x 12 10 x 12 10 x 12 10 x 20 Easy does it here as well. Keep the elbow tendons happy. Gotta love that I'm at an age where every exercise is done with caution to ensure some old injury or grumpy joint doesn't get tweaked. sigh. Busy morning this morning, full of work-y things. Maybe I can sneak a run in this afternoon. If not, tomorrow should be workable, with the second run getting shoe-horned in on Sunday morning.

Relatable. Have you thought about experiential rewards? Concert tickets, hot air balloon ride, NASCAR driving experience, whatever? Non-stuff, non-food, plus memories.

I've not heard of this one. I'll have to give it a look. Thanks!

We're console people (PS5) so game selection is a bit different. Up until VERY recently, Destiny 2 was our game of choice. Lately, the investment has not been worth the time for me, so I've fallen off. I'd like something to replace it if possible. Some sense of progression, probably mostly shoot-y, 3rd person preferred to 1st. We've done the Borderlandses and had fun with them, but the sense of progression there isn't permanent enough for our current tastes.

This came up in a gif search for 'barbell and fire' Seems legit.

From the bit I've seen, it reminds me a little bit of (very) old school Star Wars Battlefront in the game loop, which would be a nice nostalgia hit. I like co-op games and hubs and I need something to play together. The price point is nice, I just don't know if it's got the longevity to hold my/our interest.

On a change of pace, has anyone jumped (hah) into Helldivers II? I'm debating, but am a little concerned about how intrusive/annoying the MTX aspect is. Is progression/advancement reasonable without spending extra real money?

Got a brainwave about current sewing project yesterday right after I posted and spent the rest of the day working on that. 🤦‍♀️ So, no lifting. Will remedy that today. If I do not, please yell at me. Or at least some gentle chastisement. I have a couple meetings to work around and of course will walk to the post office, but I should be able to get out and get lifting shortly after 3p this afternoon. No alcohol yesterday. Snacks were again limited to a(n even smaller) handful of chocolate chips.

Lift weights 2x/week. SBS 2x/week hypertrophy template Run 2x/week. Buy 6 mo sub to ZombiesRun! to facilitate this. Done Do in conjunction with post office trips as much as possible. No alcohol on weeknights. Snack less. -------------- A bit of summary is due. Friday Friends of hubs were in town so we hung out with them much of the afternoon/evening. While I'm glad that we spent the last week+ in a flurry of cleaning as the house is now in a much better state, they were only at the house for about 20 minutes total. Oh well. Totally worth it. No lifting No running Yes alcohol No snacks (somehow) Saturday Yes lifting (see above). No running No alcohol (even though it was a weekend) No snacks I spent the day doing laundry and playing the open beta for Skull and Bones. It was... not great? I kept playing to try to figure out if there was other stuff to do aside from what was immediately apparent and either it really is as shallow as it feels, or they've hidden the meaty bits so well that I could not find them. Sunday No lifting No running No alcohol Yes snacks, but very minor. Small handful of chocolate chips after dinner. The 'sweet after dinner' urge is strong. A few morsels of chocolate satisfied the urge. Note: the goal is to snack less and with it more mindfully, not to eliminate snacks altogether. I'm good with this. The DOMS began yesterday. *insert ominous music here* I also started a bit of a mock up for a new sewing project and I am super chuffed at how well my initial draft turned out. A few tweaks and finishes on the mock up today and I can move onto the mock up of the next bit. This will (hopefully) make final assembly of the project a lot smoother when I get to that point. And chopping up some cheap fabric to practice with is a lot easier on my brain than trying to get it exactly right on the first try with The Fabric (which does not yet exist). ------ This morning I paid some bills, bought my ZR! 6 mo membership (I'm committed now!), and had one work meeting. I don't usually work on Mondays, but this was a special case. I'll knock off early one day later this week to make up for it. The plan for the rest of the day is to take a walk up to the post office and do my second workout of the week. Also more sewing. Deadlift OHP Reverse Lunges Incline DB Press Though looking at this, I may need to adjust some workout selections because between the two days, BP, DB OHP, BB OHP and DB incline press, that seems like a lot, and I don't know that my shoulders are going to be super happy with it. Somehow I don't have any rows or pulldowns--which is because I totally forgot to select any in that row of the spreadsheet, because I forgot how this whole thing worked apparently. *sigh* I'm going to ditch the incline DB press. Add DB rows for today. Probably ditch DB OHP from the other workout. Add lat pulldowns for the other workout. I've also gone through the entire spreadsheet and dropped the reps on all deadlifts by 2 per set. We'll try that for a bit and see what happens.

Yeeep.... I'd forgotten that the raw Hypertrophy template is so high volume. When I ran it before I modulated everything down to the 6-8 rep range. I may have to do that again. We'll see how it goes.

Here, ofc.

I feel like there's a somewhat snarky joke about the French here, but I can't quite put my finger on it.

Lifting done! Woo! In just under an hour. Barbell Squat 45 x 10 65 x 10 85 x 10 85 x 10 85 x 10 85 x 8 Oof. These were much harder than I expected them to be. Will scale back next week. Barbell Bench Press 45 x 10 45 x 10 45 x 10 45 x 12 On the other hand, these were approximately correct in amount of effort. Perhaps I could've gone a smidge higher, but at least I guessed correctly regarding my complete lack of retention of upper body strength. RDLs 45 x 12 75 x 12 75 x 12 75 x 12 75 x 12 These got a bit heavy at the end. Used straps for the last set which helped quite a bit. Given that, I probably could've gone heavier if I'd used straps for more sets. I'll have to remember this for next time. DB OHP 15 x 12 15 x 12 12.5 x 10 10 x 12 Apparently I burned up all my upper body go-juice on benching, because I had nothing left here. Again I say 'oof'