Day 44--Holiday Hangover

Today should be a National Holiday. We should just move Presidents' Day to the first Monday after the first Sunday of February. That would be the day after the Super Bowl so we can all eat & drink all we want, stay at our friends' houses after the game is over, have time to clean up and then not have to worry about getting up early the next morning to get to work. One million people watched the game last night and I'm sure they'd all agree with me on this. Especially since most of us don't really celebrate Presidents' Day anyway.

Other than that, today is a day to celebrate only gaining .2 pounds from the gluttony that is Super Bowl Sunday. I probably could be celebrating no change in my weight, but I didn't feel like making the effort of peeing before my weigh in. My cat, on the other hand, could do with a kitty treadmill. I used the Wii to weigh her in, and she's pushing 20 pounds. For now, I'm rationalizing it as that she's part Maine Coon. (It's sort of the cat equivalent of being big boned."

Day 43---Super Bowl

The head count for our party today is hovering around a dozen, so this weekend has involved a lot of prep work. (Kept typing prep as perp. That's not what I was doing today.) Even with all the prep work of cleaning, cooking, rearranging furniture to fit everyone with a decent view of the TV and fending off the puppies, I still managed to get my EA Active work-out in today. My weight is still right at 132 pounds, where it feels like it's stuck. I'm waiting for the point in this 30 day challenge when the upper body exercises with the 5 pound weights don't make me want to cry. I'm not anywhere near that point yet. I am weirdly at a point where I look forward to the running, though. I need to take that unexpected enjoyment of running and try the Wii Fit running, which I've never done. All of that exercise, plus the exercise of scrubbing the kitchen floors should give me enough of a calorie burn to off-set all the crap I'm prepared to eat and drink the rest of the day. Now, on to the game. Go Saints!!!

Day 42--Weight

I didn't work out yesterday because of bowling. I really didn't feel like 30 minutes of really hard exercise at 10 when I got home. I did weigh in last night and found that I had gained .4 pounds because of the pizza. I even had leftover pizza for lunch on Friday, so I thought that I'd see the results of this diet transgression on the scale, but I didn't. I weigh less today than I did on Thursday before the pizza. This gives me hope for tomorrow. In case you're not a football fan, tomorrow is the Super Bowl. It's the biggest party day of the year, even for people who don't like football. Close to 100 million people watch the game every year. Most of us eat chips, dip, fried foods and other unhealthy things during the 4+ hours of activity. I don't plan on being saintly tomorrow, but now I know I can eat more than is ideal without needing to feel any guilt. I'm glad for that, because my brother is recreating the food stadium in the photo. He will be making some changes, and I will post a photo or two of his version Monday.

Day 41--Domino's

I had Domino's for dinner. Turns out that the new improved taste is improved. Before I ate bad food, I weighed in at a little bit under 132 pounds. I know my weight fluctuates about 1/2 pound a day and it's good to know that the mid point in that fluctuation is 132 pounds now, and not the 134-135 that it was at the beginning of the year. Today's workout wasn't too difficult, which I appreciated. I wasn't really feeling up to a hard work out. I did do a lot of bicep curls though. Now I just need to convince everyone that they should admire by big, bulging biceps. No, they're no as big as this guy's. This guy was a huge steroid user who had the largest biceps in the world at one time. I watched an entire show about this guy on The Discovery Channel one Saturday.

Day 40--Rest

I was really hoping for some weight loss today, but no such luck. I didn't gain much, but I can barely wait until my weight gets below 130. I understand when the Biggest Loser people are so excited to cross a plateau. I guess I should consider myself lucky that my plateau is already in a healthy range and not 300 or 400 pounds. This isn't the first time in my adult life that my weight has gotten too high for my comfort level. This is probably the fourth time that I've gone over 140, and some of those times it's gone over 150. I'm really hoping that this is the last time that I ever have to work to get it back below 130. As I've gotten older, the work needed to get below that mark has increased at a level that seems to be exponentially related to my age. The first time it happened, I was 21 years old and all it took was a slight tweak to my eating habits. It wasn't anything that could be called a diet, because it wasn't that big of a change. This time around it's been a year of changes to my eating habits and a ton more exercise and I'm still not there. This should be my motivation to keep it low once I finally get it down where it belongs.

Day 39--New goals

I wasn't sore today at all. I was surprised about that after the pain that I was in yesterday while doing the first workout on high intensity. Working out is now getting to be a part of my daily routine and I'm actually enjoying the workout itself, and not just the results. Not that the results aren't great. I keep noticing the tightness/firmness of my muscles throughout the day, even when I'm not flexing. Today, I was taken aback by the way my arm feels, which I notcied while pushing up my shirt sleeves. I can also feel my legs getting firmer overall, even when I'm not flexing.

Now that I'm seeing the first steps in my quest to achieve a perfect body, I've set some more specific goals. I was inspired by watching NBC tonight. They had a commercial for the Olympics, and skier Lindsey Von was featured in it. There was quick shot of her in a skier's squat, but balancing on top of a yoga ball. I found an entire video of her working out, which blew my mind. That, and a story of golfer Anika Sorenstam practicing her drives from the top of a yoga ball have motivated me to be able to match their ability to balance.

Day 38--Starting Over

Today, I began a new 30 Day Challenge. This time, I'm doing it on high intensity, rather than the low intensity of the challenge I just finished. I've been under the assumption that the levels were called low, medium and hard, but turns out that wasn't correct. It's really low, medium and high intensity. Today's workout was just about 30 minutes, instead of the14 minute workouts of the low intensity. I definitely broke a sweat and was winded several times during the workout. Three minutes of full-speed running with high kicks will do that to you. I also moved from 3-pound weights to 5-pound weights. I can already tell that I'm going to feel that difference in my triceps and my anterior deltoids. Those front shoulder raises made me want to cry. On a good note, my weight before working out was under 132 pounds. I didn't weigh in after working out, because I ran out of time and was exhausted. I'm really hoping that one week of working out on high intensity will help me cross the 130 mark once and for all.