Trending healthy

Finding Time to Work Out

Getting out hiking is just one way to improve health and life.

I consider myself a gym rat. That is, if I had the time and fewer responsibilities, I would be spending maybe a couple of hours a day working out. That would include a good 35-45 minutes of aerobic work and then some strength training exercises. As it is, I manage to get to the gym 3-5 times a week for roughly an hour.
Things get complicated though when work decides to change starting times. Prior to last week, I was working out after work. This was affected by things such as having to work overtime. I could work up to a half hour of overtime and still do much of my workout. However, they changed our work schedule and now I go in an hour later. No working out after work. Now I have to get up at 5:00 and basically head straight to the gym. I'm not used to getting my body awake and moving at that time of day.
Ultimately it's a better fit if I can do it, because it tends to regiment me. They have been talking though about changing time again to coming in a half hour earlier. This would make it tough to get to the gym either before work or after.
The thing is, making time or finding time is the key to any ultimate success, and no matter what happens, I will get to the gym somehow.

Diet and Longevity

I recently had a conversation with a friend about the relative healthiness of white bread as opposed to whole grain breads. Her thought was that it that there wasn't much difference to the relative nutritional content of both breads. After researching that, I found that most "experts" agree. It appears that with the fortified flours that are used in white bread these days, there isn't much nutritional difference. The main difference appears to be in fiber content, and of course, you can get enough fiber elsewhere, and maybe we shouldn't be eating all that much bread in the first place. But what if we do? What kind of bread is best?

I like to look at real world examples for my healthy choices and one of the best examples of a healthy lifestyle was Jack Lalanne. Lalanne was prominent health guru of the 20th century. He is known for his feats of strength and vigor well into his old age. One of his favorite sayings was "if man made it, don't eat it", emphasizing eating food that were as close to nature as you could get them.

If we apply this to bread, then whole grain breads are healthier, and grains themselves, even better.

That kind of thing is emphasized over and over again in studies of the longest-lived peoples on earth. Simple foods, no preservatives or additives, lots of veggies and fruits. It's that simple.

Exercise as a Longevity Factor

Most people are aware that exercise prolongs life, or at least, prolongs how long you will live in good health. It doesn't need to be going to the gym. I recently read about a 105 year old man who spent much of his time dancing. Hiking, walking, jumping around in your yard, chasing your spouse around the room--all of these things add up to a long and healthy life, provided you don't catch some dreadful illness. However, eating right and exercise help even in the case of cancers and some other diseases. They give your body a chance to fight back. We know that not all illnesses can be helped by good nutrition and exercise, but in many cases, they can.

One Final Thought

Good relationships such as friendships and marriage are also key to longevity. Try to find good associations and get together frequently. Not only will you increase your likelihood of living longer, it will be a blessing in your life.

Fitness goals: What are they and how do I reach them?

I used to have a lot of goals regarding fitness. Now, my only goal is to keep going. I do have a goal of a minimum of three days per week exercising, and a goal to eat nutritiously. All of this in order to maintain my health for as long as possible, or rather to do everything in my power to live a long, healthy life.
Every once in a while, I calculate how all of that is going. I decided to do that for the month of May. Examining my eating habits was rather easy. I asked myself how often I eat healthy versus unhealthy. Most days of may, I had a very nutritious smoothie for breakfast. My smoothie includes the following: plain whole milk yogurt, goat milk, spinach, carrots, blueberries, eggs, banana, turmeric, and now nearly daily--chia seeds. Often I include, kale, broccoli, cauliflower, or some other veggies. That's a very healthy smoothie and I have it for breakfast nearly every day. I would say I skip it once a week and on those days I have something else healthy, like oatmeal with blueberries, yogurt, turmeric, and real maple syrup for sweetening.
I take a few supplements as well, mostly to help with blood pressure control. L-Argenine, CoQ10, some super Resveratrol combination thing, and a multi-vitamin. I drink a cup of green tea at least five days per week.
For in between meals, I have Clif Bars, which are packed with nutrition. Sometimes I break down and get some street tacos or other fun stuff for meals. Sometimes even cheesecake or pie. I don't believe that anyone should forego everything tasty and wonderful.
So I think I'm doing far better than the average person on eating well. I am meeting my goals there.

As far as exercise goes, I do a variety of things to try and maintain a healthy body weight and good fitness levels. I make it to the gym, usually around four times per week. I take a walk on Sundays. I go hiking when I can.

My gym routine includes exercises for cardiovascular fitness, that is, aerobic exercise, and also strength training. My main aerobic exercise right now is stair climbing, but sometimes I am too exhausted and finish up with treadmill walking. Every so often, I start on the stair climbing machine and within 1-2 minutes realize that it's just not my day and head over to the treadmill to complete the allotted time. I generally exercise from 30 to 45 minutes on the stairclimber/treadmill, depending on the day. Each piece of equipment has the capability to estimate how many calories are burned depending upon a person's age and body weight.
When I finish the aerobics I will go and do about 15-20 minutes of strength-training on a particular part of the body--chest and shoulders, legs, arms and back, abdominal/core. I rotate through one of these strength areas each time I go to the gym. Except when I don't. Sometimes it's all I can do to get through the aerobic workout. It is exhausting. I find though, that if I go more than a week without tackling a particular body area, the next time I do it, I am hurting much worse the next day. It never used to be like that in my youth. Sometimes I skip the strength-training part because I have worked late and I need to get home, either to make dinner, or to pick it up along the way.
That being said, I manage to kill it at the gym

Here's what I found out about my exercise results in May.

On the stair climber when I averaged both the days when I go to the gym and my days off, I do 67 floors per day, or 1139 steps. When I add in the calories spent on the stair climbing, the days of walking both on the treadmill and outside, and hiking (the one 6.8 mile hike I went on in May consumed 2750 calories alone) I burned off 13,722 calories during the month, an average of 443 per day, not counting the calories burned in the strength training.

I think I'm doing about as well as I can. And if I can do it, you can too. It takes very little time to eat better. You can improve your fitness by walking a little each day, but if you have access to an apparatus, like a stair climber, you can burn more calories in a shorter period of time. You can even do some great workouts in under five minutes with no equipment. Check this out:  I've tried it and it's killer!

So, no excuses! You'll feel better by doing something about your health. Go for it!

Thoughts on healthy lifestyles

As a self-described health nut, I'm always looking at ways to live healthier and happier--even into advanced age. Fitness has always been a big issue with me, and in fact I find myself frustrated about it way too often when the demands of my job and life as a caregiver affect my fitness plans, which they do frequently. Often also, in those fast-paced demanding days,  I find myself reaching for the easy thing to eat, instead of carefully planned and cooked meals. My lunches often end up as General Tso's Chicken along with some kind of pasta (though spinach pasta is part of the mix--or at least green pasta) with bits of broccoli in it.
That being said, I do put an immense amount of thought into doing what I can do easily to eat more healthy, and I investigate thoroughly the evidence for longevity and lifelong health that is evident in certain societies.
Which brings up something I just ran across today. I have done cursory investigation of the Paleo dieting regimen in the past and fairly recently discussed it with a fellow health enthusiast and was reminded that the Paleo diet ousts dairy products. The reason given for that is that humans eating dairy products is a relatively recent event in their eating lives. Recent meaning, only in the last 10,000 or so years have domesticated animals existed and prior to that, folks would have had to milk wild wildebeests and musk oxen--not a very pleasant sounding task.
My prior research into longevity though suggests that in one area of the world, goat's milk is a key contributor to that society's tendency toward long life. Dan Buettner's classic treatise on the subject, The Blue Zones: Lessons for Living Longer from the People Who've Lived the Longest identifies goat's milk as one of the factors. This according to longevity studies of the Ikarians of Greece. Goat's milk apparently promotes healthy intestinal flora and is high in tryptophan, which is a stress-relieving hormone. See the book review here: Clickety-click
I concur with much of the Paleo dietary guidelines though. I'd add that the late exercise and diet guru Jack LaLanne believed in eating things that were as close to their natural state as possible. I firmly believe that eating that way plus having a killer exercise regimen let LaLanne live until he was over 96 and much of that very healthy--at the age of 70 he pulled seventy boats, some with people aboard, for a one mile swim.
Though I haven't yet reached LaLanne's proficiency at either fitness or dieting, I'm working hard at perfecting both. For breakfast most days of the week I make a smoothie filled with all kinds of good stuff. The mainstays include spinach, blueberries, carrots, raw eggs, bananas, and turmeric, though I occasionally throw in other greens like kale and am planning on trying beets soon. When I don't feel like making the smoothie, I have some oatmeal with blueberries, real maple syrup, and plain whole milk yogurt. When I really go off the road of my diet I will eat whole wheat toast with Crazy Richard's peanut butter (made with only peanuts) and a glass of whole milk. Whenever I miss my smoothie, I try to make it up later in the day. That doesn't mean I don't go AWOL every once in a while on my good eating habits. I do. But then I try to get back to what's good and healthy within a day or two of messing up.
That being said the second component of maximum health is a good exercise plan. I am convinced that exercise is just as key as a good diet is at helping someone maximize their potential for a long and healthy life. Right now I'm doing a variety of strength training exercises along with stair climbing for cardio. Often on my days off, I am hiking, skiing, or just getting outside and working for those stress relieving, emotional healing, life invigorating excursions that renew both body, mind, and soul. I won't be towing any boats across the bay any time soon, but I hope to lead a vigorous life well into my nineties, if not beyond.
Lastly, the keys to good healthy lifestyles include having good interpersonal relationships with family and friends, laughing a lot, and lots of hugs. That kind of thing I can get behind any day of the week.

Forty minutes of pain

My newest workout at the gym is what I call "Forty minutes of pain". It's really refreshing. What that involves is forty minutes on the stair climber. I have recently bumped this up to forty. It used to be thirty-eight, and I will still do shorter time periods when I don't feel up to the forty, or when my time doesn't allow me to complete forty minutes. But today, I did the forty and it was forty minutes of pain. I began the routine doing 71 steps per minute, then increased by 1 step every four minutes, until I got to 28 minutes, after which I increased by one step every three minutes. My goal was to burn off 700 calories. I didn't quite make the 700 by the end of the forty minutes, but after about 44 minutes (the last four part of the cool down) the calorie counter registered 700 calories burned. I also burned a few after the stairclimbers as I did my abdominal workout today. Here are the vital statistics:

Minutes: a little over 44
Floors: 191 (at about 17 steps per floor)
Steps: 3247
Calories burned: 700 (maybe 75 more doing the ab workout)

There's one more statistic that's worth noting:

Pieces of pie burned off: two

So there you have it, I have burned off several pieces of pie since Thanksgiving, but still haven't burned off all of the pie and other things I've eaten. Thus go the holidays. I also have a much harder time making it to the gym to do said workout from about mid-November through the end of the year, simply because my job as a mailman gets pretty crazy during that time period.

The bottom line is that forty minutes of pain is worth it to me so that I can do the things I love, which includes eating.

Short hike: Grandeur Peak

Yesterday I got a chance for a break from my care giving duties and decided to take a hike. My choice of destination was Grandeur Peak--or as far up the trail as I could go before my time limit expired. I chose that because I didn't want to find my spikes for snow hiking. I had a pair of micro spikes that I had found abandoned and slightly rusty at Lake Blanche a few years ago. I had never even looked at them since then and when I did, I found that they were extra large. I'm pretty sure I wear medium. Still, I threw them in the pack just in case. If any of you reading this are missing some,  and lost them at Blanche, if you can identify them, they are yours. Otherwise, I'd be willing to trade them with someone who bought mediums or large by mistake and need extra large.
This trail begins at the Church Fork Picnic area up in Millcreek Canyon. I started at about 8:30 from the main road that goes up the canyon, as this time of year, you can't drive into the actual picnic site where the trailhead parking is located.
The stream through the picnic area was rather pretty, so I took some shots of it as I leisurely followed it up the Church Fork drainage.

The trees didn't have their leaves yet ,but there was some green along the stream. I saw a lot of horse tail, what we used to call "snake grass". We used to make whistles out of it, and for the life of me, I can no longer figure out how we did it. If any of you know, I'd appreciate a head's up.

We used to call this "snake grass". Its real name is "horse tail"
If you know how to make whistles with the segments
I really want to know too.

I did a lot of stopping to take pics and that might have cost me my chance at summiting the peak itself, which rises just above 8200 feet. I needed to be home by noon though, and that's clear across the Salt Lake Valley, so I figured getting back to the 4runner at 11:30 was the plan. At around 9:55, I hit the final saddle before the final approach to the peak and there I reached a milestone. I actually caught an old guy in his seventies. I had no idea how far ahead of me he'd been on the trail from the time I began the hike, but it's pretty rare that I can catch one of these old mountain goats and pass them.
The way I figured it, I had been making great strides at the gym on the Stair Climber machine, having been doing around 36 minutes on the thing twice a week. I really think that helped my ascent on this trail. I don't have the exact figures, but it's around 1700-1800 feet in elevation gain to the saddle in around two miles. Usually that would be kicking my rear end, but this time I felt pretty strong the whole way--well except for the first part and I always struggle at first, until I get warmed up.
I looked around from the saddle. The cloudiness and general grayness of the overcast sky had not been relieved from the time I began until I reached the saddle, and I never saw the sun except through the clouds until I was most of the way back down. There's a nice view of the city and some great views of the surrounding peaks.

The sun was fighting valiantly to break through the cloud cover above the mountains to the southeast.

Looking down into the Salt Lake Valley.

The view from the saddle is excellent though and I would like to go back again, not only to scale the peak, one of the easier ones in the Wasatch Range, but to take in the views on a less gray day.
All in all it's a great little hike and pretty easy for anyone in decent shape. Since I have not done the last part, up to the top, I won't vouch for that, but the rest of it could be done, up and back in three hours, just like I did. The rest of the way up? That's another adventure for another day. I'll be up for it. Will you?

Fitness: It's much easier to get out of shape, than into shape

I have found, through sad personal experience, that it's much harder work to get back into shape, once I lapse and let myself get out of shape. Here's my real life example. I had posted some pics as I reached or nearly reached my fitness goals last fall. I was in very good shape, physically. As a mail carrier, last fall, like every fall in the history of the U.S. Postal Service, business picked up because of Christmas. Beginning about mid-November, I personally became so busy, that I was making it to the gym only 1-2 times per week, when prior to that, I had been going a minimum of three, and more usually four to five times per week. By December, it was down to 0-1 times per week.
As the only bread winner of our family, as the year ended, I found myself needing to get more hours at work to help with some upcoming expenses. So I signed up for the overtime list. I knew going into it that doing so would have an effect on my ability to exercise, but I felt that our needs were more crucial and that I could withstand the three months that I'd be on the list (we are able to sign up each quarter). My trips to the gym followed the same trajectory as they had done during the Christmas season.
Sometime in March, it became unbearable and I removed my name from the list with two weeks to go in the quarter (though we can only sign up on the list at the beginning of the quarter, we are able to remove ourselves from it at any time). I thought that this would create the opportunity for me to get back to the gym on a much more frequent basis. At first, this is exactly what happened. But starting the next quarter, I got back on the list for my own work assignment. There are basically two levels of O.T. that we can sign up for. One is to work only the O.T. on our own routes, and the other is to work O.T. on any route. Since I am a T-6, I do five different routes on their days off, thus, any one of those routes constitutes my own work assignment should there be a sick call, or one of them on vacation etc. Generally, when I have been on my own work assignment, I have gotten far less overtime than when I've been signed up on the other list. That wasn't the case this time.
Our office has had a veritable cornucopia of vacancies over the past few months and this has moved people who would generally have filled in the gap on sick days and vacation days to other routes, and left me (because I am on the "own work assignment" list) to do those routes when needed. The bottom line is, I'm still going to the gym quite a bit less than necessary to get back into shape, let alone reach the fitness level I had achieved back in October.
All these months of not being able to workout like I should be have taken their toll. I'm experiencing physical ailments that I should not be experiencing and wouldn't be if my health regimen was in place. It has not only physically effected me, but mentally, as I have recognized what's happening, but been powerless to change it. I spent several months a few years ago unable to do vigorous exercise because of a shoulder surgery that wouldn't heal properly. So I know all the signs of poor fitness.
I have a solution to that. I have put in a bid on another route, a single route this time. I will get less overtime if I get that route, but I will have much more time to get to the gym and I will take advantage of it. I should find out sometime next week if I get that new route. Likely, I will and I will need to make adjustments on spending and/or retirement withholdings in order to make ends meet. But the peace of mind I feel will be well worth the sacrifices.
Just so you know, my exercise of choice is walking or hiking. I do a lot of running only because of limited time and I can get a lot more calories burned and cardio done in a far less amount of time. Actually, hiking burns a lot of calories fast too, but I don't have mountains close enough to do it frequently enough. I don't like running, and never really have other than when I've been in really good shape, it was fun to run and test myself against other runners. So, I'm doing something I don't especially like, because of the results I get by doing it. It's quick, and it does the job. But if I had the time, I would walk or hike for fitness.
My advice is this. Find an exercise you'll do and do it. Get in shape and stay there, but if you find yourself in a situation like mine, don't lose hope. With determination, you too can get back in shape. I'll be waiting for your pics once you do.

Injured, but chipper

Apparently, on a recent hike, I re-injured a part of my body that I had initially injured while skiing in January or February. The pain of the ski crash had never fully gone away and I had already been thinking I would see a doctor about it. Today, I called in sick because it hurt to move my legs.  Lifting my right leg up, such as in putting on a pair of pants, or rolling around in bed, hurts like crazy. It was hurting yesterday and got increasingly worse. I couldn't imagine getting in and out of my mail truck as much as I would be doing today.
I'll try to schedule an appointment with my usual guru for injuries, Jim McIntyre, hopefully for today if possible. If not, I have a day off tomorrow, so maybe then. I'm thinking that if I can get in today, and it checks out as just something that needs time to heal, rather than surgery, I'll still go to the gym tomorrow, but not do any exercises that hurt the area affected.
I'm upbeat about it. I'm not dead or dying. I'm actually feeling great other than this particular wound, so I'm anxious to get back into the gym and continue my workouts, which have by the amount of overtime I've gotten over the past six months, been severely curtailed. This isn't really a setback and I'm thinking it's kind of minor, but the fact that it hadn't healed in several months tells me that it may have been a bit more egregious than I originally thought. I'm fairly certain though, that if I had the inclination, I could still do plenty of stuff today that requires upper body strength--you know, like canoeing or kayaking. Well, I could, but I never call in sick to go play.

Staying fit when you're busy

This month is December, and being the typical mailman, I'm getting a lot of overtime. We have over the past months been doing 30 percent of Amazon's volume, but recently that has climbed to 70 percent. The overtime is great on the wallet, but with time, it gets to the point where it wears one out. Then add to that my personal circumstances of working out after work are now trashed, due to family responsibilities at home, and you can see that my regimen has been trashed.
I've given a lot of thought as to what I might do to counteract this annual trashing of the routine. My first thought is, to not worry about it. The body needs some time to recover from hard workouts and maybe I just need to decide that December is that time. I can begin again with renewed vigor in January.
Then again the gym rat in me says "no". There's got to be another way. I thought about basketball players in the NBA. In the off-season, the dedicated ones do a lot of strength training to build themselves up for the season. Then, during the season, they can't work out as much as they'd like, but they are doing other things to keep in shape. In their case it's playing basketball. So, I ask, how can I emulate that while delivering mail, mostly from a truck?
One way is to decide that the trips up to people's houses with packages is my workout for the day. I can run, to increase the intensity of my workout, or I can walk, to keep from tripping or for an easier workout. With hundreds of packages each day, this kind of working out can add up. I may not get the intense focus on various areas of the body to strengthen, but my general fitness can remain high. And I can tone it down in a limited way by walking instead of running.
So, think of your own personal circumstances and do the best with what you have.
Another to consider is diet. This time of year it's easy to grab treats that your loving friends and neighbors have dropped by. It's much easier to grab a cookie than to make a sandwich, for example. But this is the time to keep on top of your eating habits and limit yourself. I like to choose certain days to overindulge--my family's Christmas party is one of them--and then limit myself the rest of the time. Don't keep totally away from Aunt Mildred's fudge, but limit yourself to one small piece. That way, you keep a certain amount of control. Eating habits are even more important than exercise in the way we feel and in maintaining a healthy weight.
And then, when you set your goals for the New Year, you will have already created within yourself the discipline you need to advance those goals past the first month and throughout the rest of the year.

Starting to get too cold to be shirtless. Final fitness update.

I began my fitness journey months ago. If you've been following, you know I've had some major setbacks including Ann's hospital stay, my own bouts with diverticulitis, etc. My original goal had been to make it down to 185. I had promised a shirtless photo if I made it. Frankly, I've been hovering between 186 and 189 for the past month. I'm in great shape for a 56 year old. I'm not bragging, but I'm telling you what's possible. I exercise between 3-5 times per week and usually for an hour to an hour and fifteen minutes max. I'd say I average four hours of exercise per week. It's generally 30-45 minutes of cardio, followed by 15-20 minutes of strength training. My own goal with this isn't to actually lose weight, but to keep fit enough to do the things I love to do, like hiking, fishing, and going on picnics (ha ha!). My eating regimen is a balanced diet, never eating too much junk, but not avoiding it entirely--just trying to be sensible. I post this picture to show those who think exercise requires large amounts of time to produce results, that it really doesn't. All it really takes is consistency, frequency, and trying to use common sense with the foods you eat. I will post this pic and then you'll never have to look at me shirtless again.

Even an old guy like me can stay in reasonable shape.

The mysterious ways of weight loss

This past week I fluctuated between 187 and 186.5. It's the first time in years that I've been below 187 at all, so I was pumped. The funny thing is, now I'm very conscious of the things I'm putting in my body. I'm wanting to reach my goal of 185, but it seems that I may be able to do even better. That being said, we who have weight-loss goals would do well to keep a couple of things in mind. The first is that there are nearly always daily fluctuations in weight. Most of those are due to water intake (or lack thereof). I have found myself in this process doing the two step forward, one step back kind of thing. It's to be expected. What needs to be considered is the overall trend, not the day to day weight.
The second thing to consider is that we should be focusing more on fat loss instead of weight loss. I think this is where one of my pet peeves comes into play, and that's the height to weight ratio tables that are used to compute your overall health. Body Mass Index measurements are really a false way of figuring out overall health. The reason being that someone who is heavily muscled will have a higher weight to height ratio than someone who does no strength training. I personally do a bit of strength training and have larger muscle mass than say, a skinny guy who never does body weight exercises, but who may be way out of shape because of no exercise to speak of. A far better way to indicate health is through body fat percentage, coupled with resting heart rate, blood pressure, and a few other indicators.
That being said, the most important thing is that we are out there doing something to improve our health. Whether it's giving up soft drinks, or stopping by the gym, we can all do something. Make it a goal and start today.

My personal fitness challenge

I'm still on my way to get down to 185. Originally I had the goal of doing so by July 4th, but my wife's hospitalization, my own bouts with diverticulitis, and a few other roadblocks delayed my attempt. However, the past two days that I've weighed myself, I've been at 187.5, and 188. That would be on Thursday and today--Saturday. It's the first time that's happened in this attempt. Of course, that could possibly have something to do with getting my haircut. Even though I just got it trimmed a bit, I've been known to lose a pound or two after a haircut in the past. Maybe that's why I gained a pound between Thursday and Saturday. Or, it could have been the buffet we went to last night.

My personal fitness challenge

Remember a few weeks ago when I started my personal fitness challenge of being down to 185 pounds by July 1st? You probably also remember all the setbacks I've had during that time. Still, I think I started at 192 and I'm now down to 188. That's a loss of four pounds in two months...not great, but considering all the illnesses for both Ann and I, it's definitely progress. Now, I'll be shooting for mid-August to lose the rest. Wish me luck!

Fitness? I'm still trying

I just ran a trial 5k on a treadmill and my time was 27:42. That's my fastest time in over a year. I've been sick with diverticulitis and the antibiotics that I'm taking to fight it, so that's saying a lot about my overall fitness level. My actual race is on the Fourth of July and I will have been off the drugs for five days--my last ones are tomorrow.
As I neared the end of my run today I remembered something about one of the drug's side effects. Cipro is one of the drugs and I remembered that one of the side effects is to more easily pull a muscle. I could feel one going in my right calf, but wanted to complete the trial run, so I pushed on. It's a bit sore, but it will mend, and since I'm going to be tapering off in preparation for the race, I don't anticipate any problems by race day.
I guess the bottom line is that if you're trying to stay fit, push on through temporary pain with lighter workouts and you can pretty much maintain a base line level of fitness. Then, when the opportunities arise--like today for me--see what you can do. You may surprise yourself.

Diet and holidays

One thing that's fairly obvious is that it's much more difficult to maintain a diet on a holiday than it is on a regular old day or week. Easter is no exception. But this isn't something to stew over (pun intended). In addition to their literal meaning of "holy days", holidays are meant to be times to have good food and good times with friends and family.

The question is, how do we deal with staying on top of our eating habits when we have holidays in our lives? I saw a sign the other day that said something like, "no amount of hard work can make up for bad eating habits." And that's the key. Eating habits. The most important thing is that your habits of eating well are entrenched and that you get right back to them after your holiday splurges.

The occasional piece of carrot cake isn't going to hurt you. It's the daily eating of fast food, junk foods, candy and desserts, and soft drinks that will take its toll on your health.

So don't be afraid to eat that piece of pie today. Just don't make it two pieces. And get back to eating healthy tomorrow.

Health and fitness goals

This week, I began my outdoor running for the year. I'm kind of a wuss now, and I don't really like running outside in the winter anymore. Too much opportunity to slip on unseen ice and face injury, and for pete's sake, it can get just too darn cold.


My work schedule actually precipitated a complete change in my workout schedule. I now have to split my workout into running in the morning and strength training after work. It's either that, or give up writing in the mornings, which I'm loathe to do.


All of this is part of my goal to get to 184 by July 1^st. Right now, I weigh in at 193. It fluctuates though, because at the beginning of the week, I weighed 191, but yesterday, 193, and I haven't eaten a lot of food. The body normally fluctuates because of wather intake and other factors, so that doesn't worry me. For the past few weeks I'd been at 193-194, so the 191 kind of was an anomaly anyway.


My goal of 184 is one I chose because that's the lowest I've weighed in the past ten years or so and it was the weight I was at when I did the tremendous Half Dome hike in Yosemite National Park. It was the weight I was at when I felt the most in shape that I have been in in quite some time. I will shoot for that, even though I realize that weight actually is a bad way of figuring out general health. It is one way, one factor, and that is all. It's possible that since I'm concurrently doing strength training that I will build muscle which will add weight and my general fitness won't be expressed by a loss in weight. I'm allowing for the possibility and I will know if I'm in great shape or not regardless of my actual weight. I also expect to get my body fat percentage down below 15 percent. I'm really not a fanatic about getting my body fat percentage down to zero or close to it, especially after reading about this study a few years ago: Extra Weight Leads to Longevity, but a healthy lifestyle leads to greater happiness and greater resistance to injury and many kinds of diseases.


I'm a firm believer though that what we eat is more important than exercise in maintaining a healthy life, and in weight loss. I've already begun the diet transformation that will be a part of meeting my goal. I'm not going to totally cut out things that are bad for me, but they will be the exception and not the rule. For snacks, I will more often grab an apple or some other kind of fruit or vegetable, instead of grabbing a cookie or brownie. I'm beginning to train myself in doing so, and wise food choices are the real key to fat loss.


I will post my progress here from time to time.

Running...now we start.

I just started my outside running this year by running a measly 15 minutes in the dark. It was difficult. Number one, it's difficult running in the dark, but my new work schedule makes it impractical to run in the afternoons--especially since within just a couple of months it will be the hottest time of the year. Number two, it's different running on pavement/concrete, than it is running on a treadmill. Instead of pacing yourself by the steady rolling of a belt, you need to pace yourself by feeling your breathing and your heart rate. If you're not used to it, it takes time.
So, it was hard, but not that hard, and if I'd have allowed myself more time after writing to run, I could've gone longer. I'm not sure what pace I was running--likely ten minute miles.
My advice is this: if you are beginning an exercise program, or changing one up, take it slow at first. Work your way into it for a few days. Adjust.
It's important to exercise, but not at the expense of injury due to too much enthusiasm and biting off more than you can chew.
Now tomorrow, I will go longer, and stick to streets where the streetlamps are working, but I will begin slowly and build up speed as my body feels like moving. That's how it's done.

A time dilemma

I'm not good with adjusting to schedule changes. Saturday, my work schedule changed from starting at 7:30, to starting at 7:00. This may not seem like much, and over all, I like the idea of getting off work a half an hour earlier, but it puts me in a dilemma. The dilemma is when to write and when to get my exercise in. About a year ago, we changed from an 8:00 starting time to a 7:30 starting time, and I still haven't fully adjusted, and now, I have to adjust again. I do my best writing in the morning, mainly because there are too many distractions for me when it comes to writing in the evening. On the other hand, going to the gym after work is harder, because sometimes I work overtime and the need to get home outweighs staying until 6:00 at the gym to complete a workout.


My workout is generally completed in an hour, but there is drive time, and doing it after work puts me in the middle of rush hour traffic trying to get home. I'm thinking that I'm going to end up splitting my workout and running in the morning (I will have to anyway once it gets hot), and then doing my strength training after work. Running in the morning will still allow me to write for a while, so I think that may be the best possible solution. I'll need to be disciplined to do it, especially since I will need to get up at a consistent time, but that will be possible. The only thing I worry about is running in the dark. I haven't done that for years, and don't have the reflective gear for it. Of course, that can be easily purchased.


So there will be that, and I'll also try to get some cooperation around here with doing some writing at night. My computer just may have to be off-limits to the grandkids and others unless I'm watching a game or movie, or playing a board game with Ann. Of course, this time of year brings a number of things that take away time that could be used for writing—yard work that must be done, and of course the outdoorsy stuff that I always do and that nearly always takes precedence.


I'm glad my time dilemmas are only between things I want todo and not between things that I have to do.

It's great mailman weather

Spring is  here, and with it comes one of the best times of year for mail delivery. I should know--that's my job. There's nothing like being outside when the weather is nice, but not too hot. As an added bonus, I got to deliver an hour off of a walking route yesterday. Now driving around in a truck all day isn't bad in this kind of weather, but getting to do a walk in it is amazing. Walking all day kind of defeats the purpose of enjoying it, but just doing an hour? That I can handle. I used to walk all day delivering mail, up until five or six years ago. It kept me in great shape. The thing is, when I went to do the things I loved to do after walking all week, I didn't want to do them. Hiking doesn't sound fun after packing around mail for 27 miles in a typical week. I finally took advantage of my seniority and bid on a "mounted" route, which is basically another name for a driving route, and presto, my hikes became much more fun.

I never expected to be still delivering mail after this long. In August, I'll have worked for the USPS for 32 years. That's a long time. I'm not really a big fan of government jobs, in fact, I've supported legislation that would be detrimental to my own job, simply to cut down on governmental waste. I'm not a hypocrite when it comes to my ideals and how they apply to limited government. That being said, the need to put a roof over my family's collective heads, and food on our table kept me doing the job for longer than I'd planned. I'd always thought I could go back and finish my degree at the University of Utah, and never realized that there was some kind of statute of limitations on the courses I took. I actually went back to school for a few months to Salt Lake Community College, but again, the family needed my income more than I needed another job and I stopped attending. I learned a lot of math though, and some computer skills.

When all is said and done though, I have other options. I've got one novel completed (not a very good one), and another one that I've completed 58,000 words on. When I get that done, it may not make me rich, but it may help me to end my postal career a bit earlier than previously planned. I'm not counting on it, but I am going to try and finish it to see what will happen. Right now, it's a pretty awesome story line, with a lot of exciting scenes, although most of those scenes have kinks in them that need to be worked out. I'm estimating that it will be around 80,000 words long when completed.

The thing is, delivering mail has its perks. For one thing, the nice parts of the year and being outside. Another advantage to being outside is to not have to hang out with the managers. There are very few with whom I'd like to hang out--too much watching you--you know, the kind of feeling you get when the boss just walked into the room? I know that feeling from both sides, btw. "GG" was the last manager with whom I actually liked hanging out. So "GG", if somehow you're out there reading this, let it be known that you were a cool person to hang out with.

Okay. It's another spring day today, with temps in the low 70s. I think I'm going to wear my mailman shorts today.

How to keep after your goals even when you get sidetracked

I have taken sort of a sabbatical from the gym since December 23rd. Today was going to be my big day to get back after it. After all, it's my day off, tomorrow's a holiday, and it's the perfect time to get going on those goals even if it's continuing goals. I got dressed in my workout clothes, and headed out to the trusty 4runner to drive to the gym. The battery was dead. I hooked up the charger, but I knew that with all my plans for the day, the workout was going to be discarded, like a block of worthless Velveeta cheese.

The question is, do I let that stop me from getting back after it tomorrow? The answer is a huge, emphatic, "NO"! I will make sure the battery is up and running today. I will purchase a new one if need be, and I will be rarin' to go tomorrow.

You see, sometimes we let little things throw us off our paths to success. If we can catch the vision of how we want to be, if we can keep that vision out there in front of us and focus on it, if we can do these things, we can achieve our goals and dreams. What that means is that a little sidetracking rarely hurts anyone. It's the failure to continue after the sidetracking that derails us from our goals.

If I can leave you with anything this New Year's Eve, it's to get back up after the failures. It's to grab life by the scruff of the neck and make it do what you want it to do. It's to believe that you can accomplish what you set out to do, and then to keep plugging until you make it. You can succeed. You will succeed. Believe.

I want to be like this guy

I just saw this video this morning, Never Leave the Playground. Stephen Jepson, age 72, is a new hero of mine. There's a lot to be said for staying active, and a lot to be said for staying real active. Watch this video to see how fantastic this guy is at what he does. It's amazing.