I’m just sayin…

Well, I haven’t embarassed myself lately, so its about time for me to fall down the stairs or drop my pants in a public park again.

Here’s my story…

Almost everytime I have a cardio session, I like to wear a neoprene belt around my waist. It helps me get a good sweat and pull water from my trouble spots. Well, this morning I wore it during my leg workout. When I was done, i decided to go in a corner and get abs out of the way so when I finished running, I could just leave the gym.

I began my ab warmup with regular crunches. After the first set, I raised my legs for reverse crunches when I felt the air between my belt and my back disperse…Oh, my goodness!! The sound….its as if i had sat on a whoopi cushion or had one of those ‘fart’ machines on a hidden camera show. It was loud and long!!!

Personally, I would have brushed it off and kept going because I knew it was just the damp belt around my waist…unfortunately, I did not have a chance to explain it to the surrounding machines that were now occupied by the disgusted gym-goers. I looked around and saw the cross-eyed glares and wrinkled noses. If I could have turned red, I would have…luckily, they all scurried away from the imaginary smell so I could finish my ab workout in peace.

Moral of this story….Don’t wear waist trimmers while trying to slim yours.

I hope the title doesn’t get me into trouble.

~It is the constant and determined effort that breaks down all resistance and sweeps away all obstacles.~

Since I started training to be a competitor I have been faced with so many obstacles. Another one surfaced on Friday and I had another pity party for myself and was ready to throw in the towel. But then, fate stepped in - I met Lee Haney at GNC on Saturday and he reminded me that Most of the important things in the world have been accomplished by people who have kept on trying when there seemed to be no hope at all.

This man is amazing. We talked for a long while and he gave me his full attention even though other people were waiting to meet him. We discussed my workout schedule, my diet…he gave me tips for the next time, and told me how I can make it through the next 4-5 weeks. He was asking me to flex my arms as he poked and prodded me to check for body fat and water retention…’turn around’ (poke poke); let me see your calves (poke poke)? Lift your shirt, lets see your abs (poke poke)…yeah, I’m in the middle of GNC and people are looking at us all twisted. I know he’s checking my progress and I’m used to it so its not a big deal…but I have to feed into people’s inquisitive nature!

As I was leaving I walked past this chick who had been staring at us with big eyes…I pretended to giggle like a school girl and as I walked passed her I said ‘I just got felt up by Lee Haney’.

The world ain’t all sunshine and rainbows. It is a very mean and nasty place and it will beat you to your knees and keep you there permanently if you let it. You, me, or nobody is gonna hit as hard as life. But it ain’t how hard you hit; it’s about how hard you can get hit, and keep moving forward. How much you can take, and keep moving forward. That’s how winning is done. Now, if you know what you’re worth, then go out and get what you’re worth. But you gotta be willing to take the hit, and not pointing fingers saying you ain’t where you are because of him, or her, or anybody. Cowards do that and that ain’t you. You’re better than that!

This quote was sent to me as inspiration to push while going through a tough spot! Its from the lastest Rocky Movie…I haven’t seen it yet but I really really like this quote.

How dare you judge me and tell me that I’m living ‘unhealthy’ and that I’m not happy (I don’t remember you being in my head).

How dare you tell me that I’m not enjoying life.

How dare you say to me, as you drink your third coke in 2 hours, that drinking a gallon of water is not good for me.

How dare you sit there and pretend to care about my business as you inform me that I’m overworking my body because I’m doing too much. Spending all my life in the gym is bad for the social life and that I won’t get a man because I focus too much on myself. I should quit this idea of a competition because its made me too cranky….

Hmm, uh no chica…you made too cranky. At first I was pissed off about this…that my boss and co-workers are educating me on fitness as they gather around boxes of krispie creme donuts and diet coke. You…who are obese and five seconds away from diabetes and a stroke…you are informing me that my habits aren’t healthy?

I need to keep people out my space…they are jealous because I have the body that they want (not to sound vain but if you saw these people the only thing you would be able to say is…damn!). Per some survey that I saw on the news a while ago, I live in one of the ‘fattest’ towns in America (no, not the state of GA but America) …but they don’t care. I can’t be mad at them, I feel sorry for them.

These are the people who want that magic pill to dissolve all the fat out of their body as they sleep and they can wake up and piss out 80 pounds before work; this is the group who will get sucked and tucked and get upset because they have to go back in 3 months to do it again; this is the crowd who will buy every dream machine on TV because of the assinine promises made; this is the crew that is all talk and no action.

Well, if it was easy then it wouldn’t be worth it. You can’t be afraid of hard work in this business and I won’t let you drag me down. Okay, I feel better after venting.

But maybe I should. Today really is Friday the 13th and its hit me hard all before 7am. I get up this morning and I notice a wet spot on my ceiling - I’ll worry about it when I get back from the gym. Uh…if I can get there. My tire is low…extrememly low. *sigh* Well, there’s a gas station with an air pump next to the gym so I’ll take care of it and then workout. Its a good thing that my workout was off the chain, otherwise, it would not have been worth getting out of bed today.

Leaving the gym, I notice that my car is now leaning…literally. My tire is completely flat. Oh, I don’t have time for this. I limp back to the gas station to fill it up. Its only 6:45 so nothing is open. I drive, carefully, back home…I shower, pack my meals, call my boss, and head to the Tire shop. I got there at 7:20 (that was the quickest that I’ve ever gotten ready) and sat outside and just felt my tire go flat.

I have a nail in both of my front tires and both need to be replaced. While I’m here, lets get it all done; so I include an oil change, alignment, and tune up…$250 gone all before noon! Not to mention I have this ghostly leak coming from upstairs. I think its pipes or something becuse I checked the and nothing is wet or leaking.

I want to go back to bed…its not even noon and I’ve spilled my coffee too.

This morning I trained legs…usually this is something that I do in the afternoon because I have trouble walking after my workout. But, I figured I would get all of my heavy lifting done in the morning as well as butt-blasters and abs. Then I could just spend this evening doing cardio.

Now, I’m not selfish with the machines because I know I’ll be on them for a hot minute so if you need to work in with me that is fine. What I can’t stand is when people pretend to have the intention of ‘working in’ but don’t really understand waht that means. They think, ‘oh I can sit on the machine and recover for 10 minutes as you stand by and watch me’. Excuse me, but I was here first and I allowed you to work in with me - apparently, you don’t understand what that means…go recover over there so I don’t get cold.

I try not to say anything because I know it will come across as really really rude and since I work at the gym I have to have a smile plastered onto my face at all times. I ask him how many sets he has left and he starts lifting again really fast…does 3 reps and then stops to just look around. I’m about to rip him off the hinges so I just go to another exercise and decide to come back. This kept happening for the first 20 minutes of my workout…people jumping and chilling on the machines that I need.

 Okay, I’m done venting. The rest of my workout was great, just had an irritating start. I need to make a shirt that say ‘Carb deprived, don’t @#$@^ with me’

I had just finished my second session of training for the day and was sitting on a mat, drenched in sweat-I was so exhausted I couldn’t move. Then this woman stops in front of me and says ‘why do you look so tired?’ I was too irritated to answer. I had seen her and all she had done was walk slowly on the treadmill, flirt, adjust her bra, and get in my way. I had hoped she would keep going but instead she stopped and sat down next to me ‘I am so tired, it was hard for me to come in here today but you got to get it done.’

I wanted to bounce a medicine ball off of her head. Leave me alone! I’m carb deprived, exhausted, and don’t like people right now. No, I didn’t say but I was close.

I hate it when people sit in the gym and pretend this is a social club while walking around in their short shorts trying to get attention. I can’t believe that I used to be one of those people who would come to the gym and half a$% my workout as I talked and chatted with all my ‘gym friends’. I would stay at the gym for over 2 hours but only actually work for 30 minutes. No wonder my body never really changed.