TraveyBoy

I just made this smoothie this morning. Only minor change was I used 2 scoops instead of 1.5 (of a different brand), and mixed berries instead of strawberries. Mine came out to 888 calories! That's probably the most I've ever had for breakfast. It was tasty, though! I am new to bulking, I'm shooting for 3,300 calories and I'm up to 1,820 so far today. This is not easy! I feel like a pig. But they are pretty "clean" calories. I'm hoping it will have the desired effect.

I've heard that over-ripe bananas are worse for you because they've started to turn in to sugar. Do you guys know if there's any truth to this?

I'm relatively new to squats, and I'm just starting to actually put some weight on them (I'm up to 185lbs). Last time I noticed my knees would start trying to come closer together as I pressed up out of the hole, and this surprised me. I just learned today about "knees out" and I am so glad! I was probably going to continue doing them wrong and hurt myself. I can't wait to try "knees out" tomorrow morning.

I don't think the jumping jacks are completely necessary, I can see how they would be embarrassing. Like Bean said, you just need to get the blood flowing. I will usually stretch every muscle I can, and then I do all the warm up sets suggested in Starting Strength. You should do enough warm up so that it's not a shock when you get to your work sets, but not so much that it makes you too tired to complete your work sets.

Back in 2003, I had just started to go to the university gym with a friend of mine. A guy (much bigger than myself) asked me to roll up his sleeve for him. I thought maybe that was normal for a gym, and since I was a n00b, I did it for him. Then my friend says "Yeah...that NEVER happens." But the "overheard" portion is this: Later on I saw that same guy staring at himself in the mirror and muttering "I AM A MACHINE!" over and over. Friggin' weirdo.