Exerbabble for 2-25-6

I was up late last night. Yeah. I was. It’s strange how it’s almost pleasurable to stay up late. It was nice feeling tired. I woke up at a decent hour. *nods* I think I’ll skip to today’s workout.

I felt somehow stronger doing the pull-ups. Maybe I’ve been scrambling to get myself up over the bar for so long that I never got form down. Yes, there is such a thing. I want to widen my grip slightly to emphasis my lats more, but I don’t have the strength for it yet. Yet. In time. If I had a closer underhand grip, I could pump out more. But doing it overhand hits your forearms more. I like that.

..I was flexing today, because I believe we should all admire our bodies. I noticed my right forearm is larger than my left. It’s a slight difference when I flex, but I notice. It’s strange because functionally, I don’t notice a difference between my left and my right arm. However, I am right-handed.

You know, we forget how strong our fingers are. I’m deadlifting 95 lbs, but what is holding up the weight? My fingers. Ten fingers are holding up 95 lbs. Isn’t that amazing? I think it’s amazing. If we had only 8 fingers, we’d have slightly less gripping capacity. If we had 12 fingers, shit, we’d have large hands. *nods*

Yeah, I dropped the weight on my deadlift to focus on form. It felt.. nice. 95 pounds felt.. light. How the hell can 95 pounds feel light? I watched my knees in the mirror, and I felt more in control of the weight. I think I’ll go back to 105 next week and judge then when to go back to 115. I won’t do 115 until I feel like I’m in control of the weight, as opposed to all my concentration being on moving the weight. Ya know?

:: squeezes his gluteus maximus ::

You know you want some of that.

I was going to do cuban rotations, but then it hit me. My support muscles aren’t what need work. It’s my big muscles that need work! I’m hardly handling weights (with my arms) where it’s so heavy that the support muscles can be compromised. Having strong rotator cuff muscles is important, but they get worked simply by using freeweights. There’s no advantage to doing an isolation exercise like that right now. I’m better off putting my energy elsewhere. I should be so lucky as to reach a point where I have to specifically work my support muscles!

Oh. I should mention. After I do deadlifts, I tend to get out of breath. I do focus on my breathing, mind you. Exhale on the concentric, inhale on the eccentric, never hold your breath. Even pace, keep breathing, stay in control of the weight. For something like a deadlift, I take rest periods seriously. (As opposed to bench-pressing, where it just doesn’t seem to effect my heartrate that much.) Anyway, after my second set, I noticed a delayed effect of becoming a little lightheaded. I paced a little bit, breathing, and letting my heartrate come down a little. I think I know the difference now between a workout heartrate and a “Uh, that has to come down” heartrate. I rested sufficiently and did my third set without incident.

My point of mentioning this is simply to emphasis that I need to work on my cardiovascular system. Your heart is the most important muscle you have. I’d love to just keep doing only weight training, but instances like that show how I’m going to run up against a limit eventually. So I’m thinking I’ll plateau my weights (as in, not expecting gains), and emphasis more on bringing my resting heartrate down. That’s a far more useful goal than simply being able to move inanimate objects.

..Though I still want to move inanimate objects. ; )

I’ll try this after my weight training class ends. I’ll try a pattern where I do cardio three days, then on the fourth day lift weights. A simple one-day where I have eight or nine basic exercises (depends on whether I do shrugs or not). Being ambitious, I’ll think of it as a six or weight week ass-kicking. My goal isn’t to lose weight or fat. My goal is to get my heart stronger. I’ll continue trying to eat more (not crap food). I’ll start at twenty-minutes and work my way up to an hour. Right now twenty-minutes kicks my ass. I can do it, just not at as high an intensity as I should be able to. For simplicity’s sake, I could just add one minute a day. A thought. Supposedly with cardio, you don’t need rest days in between. All I’ll need to ensure is that I get enough sleep.

Just ideas. Typically what I end up doing will be slightly different.

Not sure what else to share. Typical inner monologue where I close my eyes while my dad is driving, out of fear. He speeds through parking lots, he doesn’t use turn signals. Oh, but if he does, it’s right in the MIDDLE of the turn. He ones of those people who race towards stop signs or red lights. I cock my head, as not only does it waste gas, but it’s not good for your brakes. He has Perfect Parking Spot Syndrome, whereas I just get the first damn spot, regardless of how far away it is.

He is a shopping cart abandoner. He’ll leave it in the middle of the aisle and wander off. I cock my head. Being in charge of the shopping cart is a big responsibility. You don’t just LEAVE it somewhere. It doesn’t matter if one of your shopping comrades is nearby. If you’re in charge of the shopping cart, it’s your responsibility not only to keep it nearby, but also to keep it OUT OF THE MIDDLE OF THE AISLE.

I already know how critical my brain is of him. Ahem.

I was looking for cottage cheese when I noticed that cottage cheese has Shoe Syndrome. Or maybe I just haven’t bought cottage cheese in ages. Shoe Syndrome, in how you used to just be able to buy shoes, but now there’s a million types of shoes which confuse me greatly. I see SKIM COTTAGE CHEESE. No. I see TWO PERCENT COTTAGE CHEESE. No. Where’s the REGULAR COTTAGE CHEESE? Noticing that there seems to be a baseline percentage of fat, I got the highest available, which was apparently 4%. This is how a Timmy shops. I checked the nutrition facts: Cottage cheese does indeed have a good deal of protein. *smiles*

I’m home and tuggified. I’m going to try something. I’m not going to post this entry right now. I’m going to save it in notepad. I said to someone recently, on how to clean her room, that she should “find her floor”, toss everything on her bed, vacuum, then toss everything you don’t want in a garbage bag and organize the rest. Having it on your bed FORCES you to deal with everything. ..I think that’s why I haven’t started. Oops. I know if I do this I’ll feel better. See? Positive thoughts! Like hard nipples. ..Okay, that only made sense to me.

This didn’t work out at all. I’ll have to try something else. Have to keep trying. I’ll leave it at that.

The mods aren’t around for ditl, but I’m going to still take pictures on Sunday.