Or I should say, the idleness that was February. February has been a battle of laziness and sickness, and that’s all the excuse I have. Tried despite the slack to make an effort to eat smarter, which is hopefully working itself into a routine. Trying three supplements in this “eat smarter” routine, which I’ll go into later.

Meanwhile, I am enjoying a new mile a day walk video with the same mellow Leslie Sansone. Doing the same mile video over and over — Morning Mile, is what I had — gets old so fast, so this is one video with 5- 1 mile workouts, each with a little variation, and so far so good. The total of 6 1-miles, even at just 15 minutes a pop, has been a nice thing to work in on my morning “Get Up! alarm”. I have room right in the office, and it’s an easy way to make the most of a break from desk-time.

Still haven’t really managed to work in any real extended workout back into the routine, but I have been digging up new options. Kit has all the Beachbody-p90x dvds at her house for when we manage to meet up there, and I’ve now gotten all the Beachbody-Insanity on the video share here. I guess we’re both crazy! Loaded up some of the higher-rated free Netflix videos to stream at home, too.

Lastly, picked up some toe-socks (that fit!) which have made the VFFs a whole lot more comfortable to workout in. Those and the updated Nike+ software and Nike band should prompt me to hit the treadmill ASAP — I’m thinking today!

Okay, now nothing left but that boring supplements info:

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Alice in Chains - 2010

After a long hiatus the members of ALICE IN CHAINS have decided to honor their musical legacy by taking their beloved songs to the road this spring/summer. JERRY CANTRELL, MIKE INEZ and SEAN KINNEY will be joined by WILLIAM DUVALL, who will handle lead vocals for the group’s five U.S. club shows and overseas festival performances in Europe and Southeast Asia.

KINNEY told Reuters, “We’re not trying to replace Layne…We want to play these songs one more time, and if it seems like the right thing to do, it’ll happen. I don’t know how long it will go or where it will take us. It’s kind of a tribute to Layne and our fans, the people who love these songs.”

Alice in Chains - 1992

After the 2002 death of LAYNE STALEY, the members of ALICE IN CHAINS continued on with their projects until a 2005 benefit in Seattle. Overwhelmed by the Tsunami, they were moved to put together a charity show for CARE. It was the first time the band performed together in eight years. Five months later, KINNEY posed the question, “Should we go round the world and play these songs one more time.” Their March 2006 performance on the “VH1 Decades Rock Live” tribute to Heart in Atlantic City confirmed that their fans still wanted to hear them live. This year, JERRY CANTRELL, SEAN KINNEY and MIKE INEZ are thrilled to be reunited and returning to the music they created and the legacy that is ALICE IN CHAINS.

Obviously the original notion of “one more time” and “we’re not replacing Layne” has turned into “these songs are a part of us, so we will play them even though we have a new album”. I guess this was still the concert for me, as they played everything I loved. I understand, though, that in 2007 they did a tour opening for Nine Inch Nails in Australia… now that would have been my concert. Just kill me afterwards, since I couldn’t top it.

I’d been actively avoiding information about AiC 2.0 for a long time, and only really started listening to their new release lately. As James put it “it sounds like all the AiC I don’t care for” — which is, of course, all the AiC I play over and over singing, and apparently that much is true for at least Bruce, too. I like the new stuff because it sounds like the old stuff — which just adds to the jive punk doing his Layne Staley impression vibe to me. I keep calling him “jive” because that massive fro — though cool as hell — does not the lead singer of a “grunge” band make, and “punk” because the dude had so much energy he made the rest of the band look like they needed wheelchairs. The Atlanta born Duval, I discovered, is 42, a whole year younger than Jerry Cantrell. So, obviously the “vibe” being  off is just visually to me. Close your eyes and for the most part, those old songs sound like those old songs — hell probably better than the latter years drug-attled Staley would have sounded on tour — or so I continue to tell myself.

I guess bottom line, these guys have the Alice in Chains sound that I loved, Duvall has the voice, I’m enjoying the new stuff and happy to hear the old stuff, so Layne or no, I’m a fan. Wish I had tickets for tonight, too.

I’ve mentioned briefly how happy Mom has seemed lately, and how that’s led to repeated “good talks” on the phone. J&P actually had a (couple) great visit recently where apparently they thought she might be “back on the meds” for social anxiety — but she says she isn’t. She’s just happy.

Oh, she hates the winter, all the snow they’ve had, the cold, the insane electric bill from when her heat pump freaked out, and now all the worrying about having enough wood for the fireplace. However, she took action and traded her — my old car, actually — in on something newish, and it was her first time picking out a car on her own. Sure, she stuck with Chevy — channeling the spirit of Dad — and she got a 4-door silver suv when she traded in her 4-door silver suv, but she did it herself.

At first I thought she was just happy with the purchase of a more reliable vehicle with a working radio and the confidence she could leave that boring winter whiteness if she really wanted, but I’m starting to suspect she’s feeling a bit empowered at her own ability to make decisions. This coming after her taking the reins in December to set up her own cable/phone/internet and consciously keep me out of the loop so I couldn’t arrange payment for her. She was so happy to call and tell me to be sure to stop paying the bill on her old service because she was canceling it.

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We were supposed to have a meeting today, which means a long drive and a day away from home, but it was canceled. I knew this, yet somehow I didn’t remember that I hadn’t set any “get up” reminders for today, since I thought I would be gone.

You can guess the rest. It was a long day of sitting on my butt in the regular computer chair, but it was a very productive work day. Coffee + fiber & cereal 10ish, kashi frozen meal 2ish, and maybe a slightly smaller than normal portion for me dinner 6ish. No snacking, no hunger pangs, so great diet day for me. Her it is midnight and I’m still not even snacky… unless I start to think about what there is to snack on… but that’s another problem altogether.

Anywho, so fell back into a rut of sitting too still in front of the computer and not remembering to get up, but at least didn’t overeat. Had planned to walk on the treadmill some more tonight as we watched more Olympics, but somehow JamesT and I both seemed to forget the Olympics and get caught up in other things. I sat back down and ended up sitting/working another four hours instead of doing anything productive… well, productive for my health at least.

Tomorrow should be a good day, though. Any work for work will be at my own pace — fingers crossed — since I’m off the clock. Also have plenty of household chores to accomplish for the week — which is movement, and I am looking forward to some treadmill/Olympics viewing! Still can’t believe I completely spaced tonight.

Great Monday so far! Maybe I’m just feeling energized by all the good feelings of love for Valentine’s Day — can’t say JamesT isn’t a motivator for me to get healthy! Not sure what happened with the allergy attack yesterday, though – probably stress related, but today has been tip top healthwise. Perhaps still an occasional sneeze, but in general I’ve felt exceptionally clear-headed today — as in happily able to focus and concentrate. Work has benefited.

 After reading more reminders about keeping up with daily steps, I decided to pull the old elliptical out of storage and put it upstairs. Hopefully it can make my scheduled work breaks more productive — so when my alarm says “Get up!” then I can get up and go!

Have also had better luck today in the VFFs by applying a little Body Glide anti-chafing balm to my troublesome left-foot — the flat one!  More toe raises and stretching today. Looking forward to stronger ankles and finding out if it’s possible to actually fix a flat foot.

Two dietary revisions over the past 24-hours. First, a little cup of dry Special K Chocolatey delight, with just a sprinkle of coconut mixed in seems to make a satisfactory substitute for a girl scout cookie craving. Yay!

Second, I added back coffee, with sugar-free creamer and benefiber to the daily routine. May switch back to some teas with the creamer and fiber, but today I was just craving the coffee. Forgot how filling the combination could be. I credit my tiny cereal breakfast and string cheese with slice of ham lunch without hunger pangs today entirely to the extra fiber and coffee richness.

More Olympics tonight, so hopefully that will mean some time on the treadmill after dinner! May this good day be the start to a great week on the project!

Woke up massively congested, sniffling sneezing — and burning eyes, which to me indicates an allergy reaction. Haven’t managed to shake it all day, and just have been miserable. Took a second dose of allergy meds, without any benefit I noticed. Starting taking my vitamin and allergy meds before bed for a couple weeks now, and it’s been working fairly well — at least allergywise — until today. Not sure what happened in the night… perhaps I had a cat crawling on me more than I realized.

I was down a pound this morning for this week, though I can’t say it’s for much effort. At least after today — I have snotted and sneezed and slacked on exercise. Did knock out quite a chunk of work today, though, so at least I am not feeling so overwhelmed to start this upcoming week.

Didn’t even put on the VFFs today. The cold meds I’ve popped today managed to knock me out twice for a little while in front of the tv, so I’ve just let them. Slack slack slack. Snot snot snot. Body woke up in revolt to doing much of anything today, so I’ve given in and not pushed it.

Still passed a pleasant enough Valentine’s Day with JamesT. Did not allow feeling crappy convince me to not cook as planned today, which I’m happy about. Potential snow overnight again might make travel early tomorrow bad, but I’d already not planned to bootcamp in the morning after today.

Once again, tomorrow is another day, and also the start to week three. Let’s just hope tonight I’m not allergic to sleeping anymore.

Managed two short walks on the treadmill in the VFFs today. Definitely going to take time to actually break them in, but I do like them. Mostly been just sitting in front of the Olympics today, but did finally wrap my head around one work issue and sit down to fix a couple things earlier today.

Ran across a recent article on CNN Health about barefoot running, it’s here.  It’s already been interesting to me that with a couple days of toe raises my ankles and arches aren’t having much pain using the VFFs — if it could be true it’s been my shoes allowing certain muscles to atrophy to cause the arch pain, then I may have a tennis shoe bonfire in a couple months.

Just as to status, no really intense cardio workouts lately, just strength, but my stomach has been iffy to say the least. Stopped a more brisk walk short when I thought I was going to puke. Started taking some digestion supplements yesterday, but they say a week for full benefit.

Plan to get up early-ish for a strength video workout tomorrow, then continue to try short turns at the treadmill in the VFFs.

This brief daily update brought to you by 5 hours on a couch watching Olympics opening ceremony stuff — since coverage started at 7:30 even though the ceremony didn’t really start until 9.

Oh well!

Wore my VFFs all day, which are truly getting to be comfy the longer I wear them. Did a workout video in them today, no worries. Didn’t get in any treadmill time, but did at least have a good handle on the two meals we ate today — so never really felt stuffed. Even managed a frozen banana instead of the girl scout cookie temptation tonight.

Staying up watching Olympics left plenty of time to get HUNGRY though, and boy am I still — my head is pounding, also, probably just for want of a snack.

If the 3 or so inches of snow we got are still on the ground tomorrow, we’ll probably be staying in and getting into watching the Olympics more! In essence, the next 16 days are going to be me babbling about cool athletes while I wish I was one — but isn’t that true for most of us. I’ve always found the games to be inspiring to watch, even though this one is starting off on such a dark note. Almost couldn’t believe NBC showed that footage of the luge athlete’s fatal wipe-out, again and again, but then I remembered — oh yeah, this is television.

The following is an e-mail from the past, composed on Monday, August 25, 2008, and sent via FutureMe.org
- – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - -

Dear FutureMe,

Tomorrow should start the Winter Olympics. Here’s hoping that the motivation at working out and taking care of yourself that you felt while you watched the summer Olympics in Beijing wasn’t wasted. If it’s February, then it’s time for snowboarding, and it would really suck for the 3rd year in a row to just not be fit enough to do it.

Please, future me. I have faith in you. You don’t need bootcamps. You don’t need classes. You just need to get up and do things yourself.

Sending love,
Me

Interesting words of wisdom today from the me of 2008. Personally, I love FutureMe.org, and will likely use it again. Of course, nothing hits home how stuck you are in a rut until you hear the same spiel you’re still spouting and notice nothing’s really changed in a year and a half.

My Vibram Five Fingers

I may not need classes, but I am exploring Netflix for new workout videos for home — and am open to suggestion! PLUS I’m also wearing my Valentine’s present — VFF sprints. Nothing was so strange as trying to coax my little toes into their own separate toe pocket was today, but now that they’re on, they are really amazingly comfortable just to wear — in the midst of this hectic day at work, I considered just walking my toe-shoes away and never coming back, but I digress….  They do sort of feel like I left the climbing shoes on after leaving AtlantaRocks more than anything.

As I write this, it’s 3pm and I’m in “my-god-I-want-chocolate-now” mode, which means I’m probably just thirsty. I haven’t worked out, haven’t gotten up when my “get up” reminders went off. I’m generally stumbling around in pile of work crap trying to dig my way out, and thinking that if I can just get a handle on this, then I can relax… then I can run my errands… then we can go to Alabama for the weekend… then I can try out these VFFs on the treadmill or doing a step aerobics video. But I’m so caught up in feeling overwhelmed, I’m barely making progress. Sounds like most other aspects of my life these days, but now… with a post/vent about it all, perhaps it is purged and I can move forward today while there is still daylight to burn.

The postman rang this morning with an evil evil package from a certain great-niece in San Diego who happens to be a girl scout — and it’s all our favorites. Nom. Nom. Nom. Evilness. James opened a box mid-afternoon, but I held out until after dinner — one serving, two cookies, 150 calories of evil. Read More »