Technical Doohickies

This is wholly unrelated to fitness.  I am putting this here in case some poor soul out there has the trouble I did.  If you own an Insignia television and you try to play movies (DVD's) through the XBox 360 in high definition and have no audio, this is how you fix it.  Go to Insignia's website, find a firmware update for your television and follow the instructions.  Voila, you will have sound and hi def at the same time.  It was extremely easy to do.  (Except for the part where I had to get out a magnifying glass to see the model number on my TV.  Haha!)

I have tried to put every keyword I could think of in this explanation.  Hope it helps someone!  :)

Settling in

I'm getting into a routine now and I like it.  I'm still not 100% comfortable in the gym and some people really annoy the shit out of me.  But I know what I need to do now and I've got a method.  The thing I have noticed that's a definite upside to spending this much time in the gym?  I don't want to eat crap because I don't want to take away from the work I have been doing.  I hadn't considered that happening and it's a pleasant surprise.

So, gym pet peeves.  People who hog a machine are number one.  There were two fellows on the lat pulldown machine yesterday doing many sets of 50+ reps and resting extensively between sets.  It was the LAST machine I needed and I had to wait eons for it.  I could have done all three of my sets during one of their rest periods.  People who half-ass shit while on their phone.  This girl today was clearly doing a very light weight on the leg press, very slowly, while texting.  I wanted to pull her hair.  And she wiped down NOTHING.  Then there was the dude the other day who thought he could intimidate me into getting off of the cables.  Sorry bud, I was here first, haven't been here that long and I ain't moving until I'm done no matter how much you cuddlehump me.

RAHR!!!

Two days in, and I am feeling it.  In my muscles, that is...  phew!  I've gone to the gym yesterday and today, lifted all the weights, OOF! and then followed it up with 30 minutes on the elliptical.  I woke up much less sore than expected but I feel just worn out.  My routine is 4 days; chest, shoulders, back on days 1 and 3, arms and legs on days 2 and 4.  Having done each day now, I've tweaked things a wee bit.  Some machines have changed in 20 years, haha!  There was no seated rope pulley machine but there is some other "fancy" seated row thing.  My son laughed when I asked him where the lying down leg curl machine was, you can sit and do leg curls now!  Wow, I'm old.  So, yeah, some little things.  I wanted to do each body part in its entirety before moving on to the next but I just go to the local rec center where real estate is hard to get.  When I can get on the cables I just go ahead and do all the cable exercises.  When I get a bench, I keep it and do all my bench work.  So I do have to skip around a little, I don't think it really matters.  I'm more focused on burning fat than on fine-tuning body parts.

Wow!

So tonight I sat down with my Hard Bodies book and read the beginning and then I downloaded an app so that I could build my routine and take it to the gym with me.  I put in all the exercises and was blown away by how many there were.  I mean, my brain read "five per body part" but once I had the whole routine input I couldn't help but think "Damn, I used to work my ass off, no wonder I looked good!"  Seriously, I think my brain just blocked out how much work I must have done to get that body I had in my mid-20's. 

I am getting excited about getting back in there.  Sure, there will probably be some folks giving the old, fat lady the hairy eyeball.  Screw 'em.

I think the first day I will get my teenage son to go in with me and help me find all of the equipment I need.  I think he's going to love the app I found.  I am always finding scraps of paper with his exercises written on them.  Now he can just put them into his phone.  It's very cool!

Yay!

My book arrived today!  This might be common knowledge, but when I order a used book from Amazon I try to choose a seller in my state so the book doesn't have far to go and gets to me faster.  :)  So yes, now I remember why this book was so amazing.  It taught me everything I need to know about strength training.  All of the basics are in there.  It was so educational the first time around and now it's a fantastic refresher course.  Now, I just have to get over my fear of stepping into the weight room.  Twenty years ago it wasn't that scary because there were literally guys everywhere offering to help and show me how to do things.  Now I am twenty years older and decidedly not hot, LOL, so I just get funny looks.  I have to get over that and go in there anyway.  This time around I will be using the "bulky body" workout instead of the "in-between" or "slim" workouts.  Haha!  Now I just need to find an app that will allow me to make a list of the exercises I want to do and let me record how much weight I use on each.  Then I won't look like a total dork carrying around an index card with my workout on it.  :p

This week, I did really great on eating until Thursday night.  That meal was not good, this morning and lunch were great again, dinner again not good.  OK, so now that I think about it, two bad meals.  Not so bad.  No workout yesterday or today, though.  My husband and older son went out of town yesterday and I decided to skip the workout and clean the house.  Then my younger son had a sleepover last night that turned into the friend staying here all day.  I could have gone tonight but I didn't.  Back on track tomorrow!  That's one thing I definitely need to work on, getting back on course when things go a little bit astray.

Ugh.

Clearly not keeping up with things around here.  I watched a "weight loss motivation" video recently that really hit home.  (You can see it here.)  I either want this or I don't.  Well, that was a much needed slap in the face!  And to commit to this goal I must do it in a way that works for me.  Now, no, I don't mean I should be able to lose weight eating chocolate for three meals a day but there are things that work for me or they don't.  As much as I understand the value of tracking my food, I hate it.  HATE IT.  And I never do it for long, and then, because it's part of my "program," I feel like I am off track and it all falls apart.  So, I've created a meal plan for myself and for now I am going to eat the same things every week.  No tracking, this is what I eat.  And my scale died, which is probably a blessing in disguise.  I can't weigh in and get discouraged for a while.

I have been really struggling with putting together a strength training routine.  I used to know what the hell I was doing.  So, here's what I did, I re-purchased my old bible.

Ah yeah! Back in the day (1994-ish), I used this book to learn what to do.  Why not buy it again?  And I got it for one penny, plus shipping.  Score!  I get rather frustrated with changes in the world of fitness sometimes.  All of a sudden, people will be mocking some "old" way of doing things and claiming it doesn't work.  It worked for 25 years?  Maybe there's now a better way of doing things, perhaps it is more efficient or more effective.  But if I like the old way, if I like the results, does it matter?  I KNOW I did the workout in this book, I KNOW what my body looked like as a result, so what the hell, I am going back to 1994.

OK, so on top of the eating and the moving I have been looking at the Tone It Up program.  If the cost was lower, I'd be 100% on board, but it's $150 so I have to think long and hard about it.  And then even if I want to do it, I've got to wait until I can get some other more pressing things handled, like braces for the younger son.  Bleh.

Why counting calories helps.

As much as I don't enjoy counting calories, I can understand the importance.  Yesterday was Mother's Day.  I tracked my food all day but then we went out to dinner.  We went to my favorite Thai place and I ordered Laad Naa.  I have NO clue how many calories are in that dish.  Then we stopped at the store on the way home and my husband bought me a Reese's Peanut Butter cup.  At this point I was considering the day "shot" as far as calories go.  So, I decided to take a walk and mitigate the damage.  I got home from my walk and sat down at my computer to assess the damage.  I use MyFitnessPal to track my food and I wear a FitBit, the two are synced.  I checked for Laad Naa in the database and I had two choices, one was 1800 calories.  O_o  The other was a little over 300.  I chose the smaller, LOL.  Then I added my candy and surprisingly, I was 200 calories under what I am "allowed" to eat.  So, oh yes, I ate that candy.  And to be fair, my dinner likely included that "extra" 200 calories so I probably ate right at my limit.

BUT!  I was OK.  And when you're not keeping track, it's very easy to assume your day is ruined and overeat because you think it doesn't matter.  And it's probably also quite likely to eat too much and think you're fine.

Today I am trying to figure out a weight training routine to do.  I know it's silly but I don't want to use any contraptions at the gym.  I know how to use the weight machines and the tricep pulldown cable.  But I don't want to try and figure out what the heck a Smith machine is, let alone how to use it.  I just want some basic exercises that use dumbbells.  :p