D.Alan’s BodyBlog

A collection of random comments and musings this time.

Saw my sig line in full force again.  Last week I was descended upon by a couple of aunts, a cousin and her kids and the kids from two other cousins.  They live out of town and came up for a day trip to the local zoo.  I have no kids but was elected as "tour guide" so off we went.  Man, did I see a lot of out-of-shape dads at the zoo!  I am thinking, geez, a lot of these guys are younger than me and look at that BF%.  I think I saw two guys that stick out in my mind as being more or less in shape, but I think they were just more lean than actually being lifters or in shape.  The one father/son combo that really sticks with me is the pair of them that each looked like a beach ball, proudly wearing T-shirts having something to do with football.  I don’t get the football and fitness thing.  To me, most professional (and high school) football players are fat and out of shape, except for maybe the kickers and quarterbacks.  I just have to chuckle to myself when I see the ads on TV about how the NFL is promoting fitness in kids.  Yeah, right.  There was an ad on TV a season or two ago with a famous NFL quarterback telling adults that it is OK to be a couch potato.  Sheesh.

Thought I really screwed up my left shoulder this weekend.  I decided to add body dips to the routine; my delts are really lacking.  I don’t have a dip station so I put two dining room chairs near each other and started into the dips.  First one I went down too far and ended up on my butt on the floor.  Nothing hurt except my pride at that point and I got back up and did three sets of 10.  By bedtime my left shoulder was yelling at me and by morning it was almost screaming at me.  I am thinking, oh great, the right shoulder’s been iffy since spring now I’ve screwed up the left one.  I didn’t take anything for it, I hate taking NSAIDs… they work great, but I retain water like there’s no tomorrow when I take them.  Anyway, by evening my shoulder was feeling a lot better and by the next morning it seemed to be completely normal again.  Weird.  I was worried because I had planned shoulders/chest/tris for that evening and figured I’d have to modify that or scratch it completely, but by liftin’ time I was good to go.  I proceeded cautiously but I managed to do the full routine w/o incident.

Posted a pic last night of me in a new T-shirt I bought.  Stumbled across it on a seasonal clearance for less than two bucks (!) and it looked like it had shorter, arm-flattering sleeves.  Why not.  Got it home and on me and wow.  Made me feel great.  The pix didn’t pick up every detail but my tris esp. really show up in a relaxed pose in this shirt.  It was a good pick-me-up because I have been really down on myself this summer because the weight has come up a few pounds and I don’t think it’s muscle weight since the workouts have been really lacking this summer.  Also my waist is up a bit, so I have been really kicking myself for the slide backwards.  The new shirt helped to mitigate that a bit.  The belly may be a smidge bigger, but the chest and arms are looking great.

Meanwhile summer is screaming towards its end, darnitall.  In one way, it will be good because I will be back to work and back to a stricter diet and eating routine, plus I’ll be home to actually work out.  In another way I always hate to see the end of summer.  Got one more cottage trip coming up this week to enjoy the last gasp of summer.

Then it’ll be back to full time liftin’.

Blasted my bis tonight.  I had hoped to do bis earlier in the afternoon today and then do shoulders, chest & tris this evening, but it was just too bl**dy hot and I was doing all sorts of other things like lawn mowing and futzing with the car and so on that I just didn’t have the oomph to do two workouts.  We’re headed to the cottage again tomorrow hence wanting to get in all the workouts that I can.

I did, though, do some of my yard work today shirtless for the first time ever.  When I did the trimming and blowing later in the day well after I had mowed it was just too hot for many clothes so the shirt came off and I did it, I did yard work shirtless.  No wolf whistles from the neighbors, but no one was covering their kids’ eyes and shooing them into their houses, either… lol.  That felt kind of good as that was goal of sorts for me through the winter, to not be ashamed of my body to do yard work this summer shirtless.

Looked at my log tonight and I have worked out all of four days in the last 14… sheesh.  I haven’t been home much, which is the reason.  Been to the cottage and then off for a long weekend visiting an aunt and cousins and their families… and ate my way through the visit, sigh.  Weight is still up a bit but it holding and I keep hoping it’s a little more muscle added… yeah, right after the way I have been eating this summer.

Gotta love the fitness support I am getting from my parents.  They’re both 75 and live with me.  My mom was on the trip to the aunt’s (it is her sister) and on our return she’s telling my dad about my cousin’s husband who has dropped a lot of weight.  Cousin-in-law is a state police officer and they get a pay bonus if they do well on a fitness test, so he’s bucking for that.  Good for him, but my mom is going on about how good this guy looks with the weight off… I never get that kind of comment.  Yeah, the cousin-in-law looks good, but it isn’t a muscular look by any means, he’s just dropped a lot of body fat.  I understand he’s been doing a lot of cardio, though last I knew he had a top-of-the-line Bowflex machine in his basement.  He’s not real tall and with the weight off he now (I think) looks small.  Anyway, interesting that this guy gets these compliments from my mom but I don’t rate any.

Then the other day my mom had the soaps on the TV and my dad was puttering about and one of the TV hunks shows up on the screen with his shirt off and my dad makes a comment in a real mocking tone, "Oh, look at the abs."  I am thinking, "Yeah!! Look at those abs!  What’s his routine, I wonder what his BF% is?" etc. but obviously my dad doesn’t think ripped abs are anything to be proud of.  It’s not the first time he’s made comments like that, esp. concerning abs.  What a support system I have…  which is why I gripe on my blog here on bb.com.

And I also keep liftin’ despite the crazy travel schedule and lack of local support…