MarkusWolf’s BodyBlog

There’s this 60-something guy at my gym.  In pretty good shape he is.  Shows up consistently. Good for him.  But EVERY TIME, I see him he’s wearing these obscene tight cotton shorts.  To quote from the movie Spinal Tap, it looks like he’s got an armadillo in his trousers.  And he’s scaring the children.

How can I tactfully tell him that tight cotton shorts on an old guy, or anyone for than matter, are just an unfortunate fashion choice?

OK, this is weird.  Apparently that ladder fall a couple days ago made some scar tissue in my right arm triceps where I fell across a ladder step. Doing some dips and I get this creaking, cracking noise from right above the elbow. It hurts a little, but not bad.  I banged out 35 dips no problem.  Each one made that crack/pop noise though.  Tin Man is getting rusty.

It’s been about three weeks of eating 30 percent fewer calories than I used to.  I’ve cut way back on the fat in my diet. ( to 22 grams a day) And I feel pretty good! I don’t look much different, so I’m not taking more progress pics yet, but I can feel a difference.  My stomach feels tighter and flatter.  And maybe there’s  a little less blubber to pinch around the middle, but hard to tell.  Probably the biggest difference is that my digestive tract is feeling better and less burdened. It is encouraging.  Has anyone else noticed this in losing weight?  Do you feel different?  Thinner? Better?

A good friend just called to say she signed her divorce papers. She wants to celebrate by porking out on nachos and beer.  I think bar nachos might possibly be the worst foodstuff a human could possibly eat.  Start with greasy chips, put some greasy cheese and greasy burger on top of them. Maybe a few jalapeno peppers to add gas to the fat bloating. Shovel into drunken face. Bleh!  Maybe I’ll see if they have any salad at the bar. Maybe I’ll have just one nacho. But they say no one can eat just one…

This morning while doing hill sprints through the woods, lungs on fire, legs wobbly, another realization about myself. It’s why I like to visit this bodybuilding web site. And why I go to a public gym instead of toiling with weights in the spidery darkness of my basement. It’s why my backyard is a wildlife sanctuary that reveals new wonders of nature every day. And why my vacations are sailing on the ocean. It’s something to do with what I’ve come to call the "Zhivago moments" of life.  In the 1965 classic movie, Dr. Zhivago finds beauty everywhere he goes.  In the light. In the falling snow. In noble suffering. And,  in a beautiful and ultimately unattainable woman. But every moment for him is pure rapture in appreciating beauty and life.  

Sometimes, I have Zhivago moments. On this website, I see not just beautiful bodies, I see people who represent the best aspirations of humanity as they strive to make themselves better and stronger. Rarely or never blaming others for their problems. You are all a beautiful sunrise, the light shining though the window and reflecting off my writing desk. Thank you for sharing.

We’re getting a new deck put on our "American dream" house.  That meant tearing the old deck off.  I could either pay the builder $500 to do the demolition or do it myself and save the money for a new grill.  (I love grilled fish, and cooking it outside prevents stinky fish smell in the house.)  Since I was a little boy, I always seemed good at destroying things, so I took a wrecking bar and my mighty splitting maul to the task yesterday.  But first I had to get up on a stepladder and pull some pesky nails and screws that were holding everything together.  It was one of those old, wobbly aluminum ladders rated, inexplicably, to support 150 lbs.  max. I’ve gingerly used this deathtrap for years without mishap, but yesterday, one of the legs sunk into the soft earth under the deck, twisted and collapsed under my 200 lb. mass.  Down I went, hard! It was on my side, since my legs were kicked out with the ladder.  I’ve trained for years to fall properly in martial arts classes, so that probably is the only thing that saved me from a broken bone.  Still, I fell on top of the ladder, leaving some pretty nasty scrapes and bruises from the six-foot drop.  So off I limped to the Home Depot to get a new, 375 lb rated fiberglass ladder. $160 bucks later, I had the new ladder, two hours later, the deck was down.  Not the savings I’d originally hoped for, but a least I’ll have  better ladder for the next task.  And, I’m lucky the fall was not worse.

Last night I was watching the NHL playoffs and fell asleep in front of the TV. Not something I want to make a habit of because now I’ll probably be tired all day. Poor sleep is not conducive to a healthy body, and that’s especially true for a person with MS.  Anyway, I woke up at 3 am and an infomercial was on about a supplement called Extenze that’s supposed to make a man’s penis bigger. I couldn’t believe it.  I thought maybe I was still asleep and having a bizarre dream, like that time years ago when I woke up to an infomercial with a hilarious Asian man talking about his Sobokowa buckwheat pillow. But no, this too was a real infomercial with guys doing testimonials about how consuming this pill chock full of hormone mimicking chemicals made their winkies bigger so they could satisfy their girlfriends.  OMFG!  First, it seems to me that this thing just wouldn’t work. But if it did, what must it be doing to the rest of the man’s body? My guess is a grapefruit-sized prostate and ass cancer would be likely outcomes. Maybe some man-boob action? I just don’t see how this would be a worthwhile trade-off. Since it’s a supplement, it’s not FDA tested, so there’s really no telling what the negative outcomes might be. What’s even more absurd is that the same people who gulp this shit down without a second thought often insist on buying  organic fruit and vegetables because they are afraid of the chemicals. Once again, an example of men thinking with the wrong head.

A two mile run. 100 Hindu Squats.  And swung an 8 lb splitting maul for 30 minutes, splitting some really gnarly burr oak firewood.  I got a month’s worth of wood for the fireplace too!  Some martial arts guys swing a sledge hammer against a tire to strengthen their forearms and abs for the stresses of hitting something/someone really hard.  I can definitely feel it. It really is a good "toughguy" workout.  Funny thing is, my dad who is pushing 70 can still split more wood than me.  He’s been doing it for many years and is tough tough tough.

So last night I was at martial arts practice. Feeling strong, showing the youngsters half my age how an old man like me could still teach them a thing or two.  But after an hour and a half, my right eye started to go. Everything got pixelated and I got the stabbing pain in my temple that tells me the optic nerve is shorting out.  This has happened before. It will happen again.  So I had to stop and sit down. After I cooled off a bit, the vision came back.  From superman to something less.  Ah the human condition.

Yes, its ****ing depressing to find out I’ve got a chronic disease that will limit me for the rest of my life.  Makes me question everything.  Worse is that my neurologist says the physical damage of the brain synapses actually causes depression in 85% of MS cases.  Which probably explains my battle with long, extended bouts of oppressive gloom.  The Doc prescribed the SSRI drug Lexapro for me.  A month on it and it seems to help a bit. My weight room workouts even seem to go better, as I can bang out more reps before muscular failure sets in.  Apparently the extra seratonin helps my shot-to-hell nerves fire the muscles better?  Anyway, it’s an unexpected side benefit. I’m guessing this would not occur for someone who does not have MS.  So before you rush out to find some Lexapro on the black market, also remember there are downside side effects.  Antidepressants tend to kill the sex drive.  So I also take Viagra now to attain what Robin Williams calls the Frankencock. Hooray! Works better than when I was a teenager. Just give me a half hour for the drug to kick in, darling.  Quickies are a thing of the past. I guess I can live with it.