It Seemed Like a Good Idea
Thanksgiving’s over and after five days spent on the road with family celebrating the holiday and my son’s birthday I can say that I’m stuffed. Tired too, it was a lot of miles and a lot of activity. And a lot of food. Loads and loads of food. Good food, but it’s still calories.
And that brings me to the next part of this post. All those calories don’t just go away. Sure, I’m an active guy that hits the weights pretty hard. Truth be told, if I work out regularly I have to focus hard to eat enough to avoid losing weight. Now now, don’t get mad at me – my regular workouts involve moving barbells with 300+ pounds on them multiple times. Doesn’t sound quite as easy / fun now, does it? It is, but you have to have something wrong with your brain (like I do) in order to enjoy that kind of work.
But there’s more holidays looming around the corner! And that means more holiday food. People will be bringing in the goodies to work too – and it’s not like I can just have that sweet tooth removed. And after that my wife and I have a trip to the Arnold Classic planned in early March. No, we’re not competing in anything but we’re both in great shape so shouldn’t we look like it if we’re going there? So what’s the answer? More exercise!
It’s more than just trimming the fat though. I had the realization that, almost a decade ago, I felt great about myself when I would go for a jog to start the morning off. I did it for a year or so, maybe more, and I was in great cardiovascular shape and on my way to building up some muscle mass. So why not try to get that runner’s high again and soar through my work days by starting it off with a morning jog? Turns out I only had one thing that I’d overlooked… Cardio sucks.
The after effects not so much, I suppose, but actually doing it is horrible. If you reach the point where you’re vision isn’t blurry and you don’t feel like you might spontaneously expel a lung then you just got horrible bored at the mindless task of running. I’d forgotten most of these things, but this morning I reminded myself. I have a plan though, and it’s a simple one. I’m going to minimize my cardio. 10 minutes or less in the morning, that’s it. Too much cardio burns muscle mass and I want my muscles to stay where they are (or get bigger).
Even so, half a mile at 6mph nearly killed me this morning. Laugh if you need to, I’ll take it like a man. I’ve always been built for speed, not endurance. Think cheetah, but please refrain from any visions of me chasing down an antelope wearing leopard print underwear. Nobody wants to see that.
But in the meantime while visiting family and stuffing my face full of tasty treats I also managed to crank out over 11,000 words on Victim of Fate! I’m still a long ways from finishing but I’d wager I’m somewhere between 1/3 and 1/2 of the way through the rough draft. Bounty, book 3 in my Wanted trilogy, is in the hands of my copy editor now. It’s getting close and this one is going to be great!
To learn more about Jason Halstead, visit his website to read about him, sign up for his newsletter, or check out some free samples of his books at http://www.booksbyjason.com.
