The Windows Are Open

Finally the heat has let off a few times in the last few days and last night I slept with the windows open and the air conditioning off!  I woke up through the night and had to pull my comforter on me to be warm enough to continue my slumber.  It’s downright chilly in the house, 65°F to be precise!

A note about temperatures – Yes technically Canadians use Celsius degrees, it actually make much more sense than Fahrenheit since using Celsius water freezes at 0° instead of 32°! So in the winter it’s very convenient, and when it gets that cold Fahrenheit looses meaning for me, if you say ‘hey it’s 10°F’ I don’t know how to interpret that.  I have been gauging hotness for long enough though to have anything over say 60°F have the same meaning to me as it’s Celsius counterpart.  Generally I still do the general conversion from a Celsius 28° to the rough Fahrenheit temperature of 28*2+30 = 86° (it’s not exact, but close enough) I know that either one of those is too hot for me!

Anyway, what does this mean?  Well today the high is only supposed to get up to 19°C (68°F)! and that means I am going to try to get the afternoon off work either with overtime hours I have banked or use a part day off just so I can ride my bike and run in these lovely cooler temperatures!

It also means that for the first time since the end of May I am wearing jeans and a sweater to work!  I love days like this and it makes me that much more anxious for Fall to arrive so that I can wear jeans again every day!

Hydration and Zombies

No, not HydroZombies, that would be horrifying!

As I have mentioned, it is absolutely, face-meltingly, hot outside.  For instance when I left for work this morning at 6:50am it was already 25°C!  That is usually a High for the day, not what you start off at! Ick!

So here's a story, a lady that was in at our work has a daughter that is fit, like dancer girl fit, and only 17 or 18 or something.  She went to a boot camp workout thing on Tuesday in the ridiculous heat.  It was a half hour boot camp and they worked pretty hard.  When she got home her muscles were sore, so they did the hot and cold thing on them to try to feel better.  Later in the evening she couldn't even loft her hands up.  Mom thought that was strange and took her to the hospital.  The doctors checked her out and discovered that her kidneys were failing and her muscles were dying!  She has like super-extreme dehydration!!  So she's in the hospital still IVs pumping her full of things and all sorts of stuff.  Hopefully her muscles have not been too badly damaged and she can recover!  The doctors did say that if they had waited till morning to bring her in she might have been dead by then!

Moral of the story.  Drink Water when it's hot! Doesn't matter how fit you are, if you are exerting yourself in this kind of weather drink before you go do whatever it is you are doing, drink during it and drink after it!  Your body needs water to survive!

As for the Zombies, Run For Your Lives is BACK in my area again this year - they sure waited long enough to get the word out!  Problem is it is the same weekend at Tough Mudder!  Is that *really* a problem? hmm sort of because I have to drive a long way for each of those events.  I'm Very VERY tempted to run RFYL on the Saturday and then Tough Mudder on the Sunday after!  I know I could do it, RFYL is just a 5k run that I would probably do on the Saturday morning anyways at home.  I think it will come down to cost, I already have Run or Dye the weekend before and Tough Mudder was not cheap.  The Zombie part of it was so great though.  I think that prizes might determine if I go, like last year I was 2nd over all and got some pretty lame stuff, if I had the chance to win something a little sweeter that might make the final decision for me!

Drawing and Comics and Stuff

It is still over 30°C  here in Ontario and while a workout was had in the garage last night I'm thinking that it might just be to insanely hot to be out and about riding my bike or running after work today, or on Monday, or later this week even.  This heat is ridiculous! I know some of you folk that read this live in Texas or like Arizona or something and are thinking I'm a total wuss like "Heck son, when it's 95°F I wear three sweaters and knit mittens, when it gets to 374°F you have my permission to complain."  Well I live in Canada and over 30°C (about 90°F) is too hot and it's not 'too cold' until it's like -20°C (-10°F).  So I was thinking it's too hot, and I was thinking about the drawing classes I am soon to take with Amber.

I have posted up pictures I have drawn here before, since this insane heat started earlier last week I have been spending a bit more time practicing specific things and doodling inside the house and staying cool.  And while I don't think of myself as a good enough (or consistent enough) writer to do a "comic" like the guy at The Oatmeal does, or JL8 or various other web comics.  I think I can pull off like the one or two panel type of 'comics'.  Maybe they will be funny, maybe they will be serious, I don't know might just depend on how I'm feeling on the day that I create whatever it is I am creating.  I know I already have one made and I really like it and I think you guys will too.

So, you have that to look forward to/dread.  Maybe you have ideas that are like..  oh it would be funny/cool/interesting to see this idea as a picture? Email me - chrisbarnes47@gmail.com  or tweet me if that's your thing @chrispy47

I want to build up a few pieces so that I can roll things out consistently and then I'll just do the 'comic' on a specific day each week.  Opinions?  Thoughts?  Ideas?  You know how to reach me ↑

Stretching Is Boring!

It is going to be super hot here in Central Ontario the coming week.  Well, super hot as far as I am concerned, over 30°C!  I can't even function normally in heat like that so how the heck am I supposed to work out.  I didn't really think I would miss my gym membership until winter time.  I guess I just forgot about the blazing heat!  Lots of bike riding and weight lifting and less running I guess.  I can deal with the heat riding my bike, but not running!

This past weekend I did what amounts to three separate douathlons! (Biking and Running that is) but only one of them was truly back to back.  Friday I left work early and rode my bike about 20k before going to the gym to meet with Jodi and then ran before dinner.  Saturday I ran just shy of 8k, worked out, went to two hours of karate wrapping all that up at 11am and then biked 26k just before dinner again. Then yesterday I rode just over 21k and then right away ran 5k along the main strip in Bridgenorth.  It was exhausting but amazing!  I was secretly hoping for a bit of rain Sunday so that I would be forced to relax, but not happening.

Ok, yeah the title.  I was told Friday by Jodi, and previously many times by Jenn the chiropractor and Sarah the RMT that I need to stretch more.  I confessed to Jodi that since leaving the gym and not having the 'stretching station' I have done very little, just my legs after runs.  Hmmm  coincidence that my ankle and knee injuries happened after I stopped going to the gym?

Jodi and I both agreed that stretching is boring!  It's way more fun to be running and jumping and lifting things and generally being amazing than it is to stand and stretch various muscles.  It does kind of prevent injury I guess which is a very good thing.  And to that end I am going to be sure that a more complete stretch is part of my routine at my home gym.  I'd much rather do something boring for a few minutes each time I work out than be hobbling around for weeks on end after hurting myself!

Do you stretch? How do you make it interesting?

Being interesting is important I find, like my whole do 50,000 push ups thing has gotten side tracked because it stopped being interesting!  And it got warmer in our house so I was getting sweaty doing like 500 push ups in an afternoon.   That's a whole 'nother discussion though I think.

Maybe I Over-reacted

A Little.

See earlier this week I was nearing about 170lbs.  A nearly 4 pound gain from the week before.  What confused me most about this was that I just did that whole triathlon thing.  How could I go up in weight when I have been working by butt off all weekend, I thought.

Well this week I made sure to count my calories and stay under my target amount, I biked, ran and weight lifted.  Today I made an appointment at the gym with Jodi to do another assessment.  I was irrationally (I suppose) concerned that I was just getting big again.  It could have happened, maybe, in some other universe I guess.  Still I wanted hard evidence that my home gym was working as I had anticipated.

Mission accomplished.

We didn’t do the blood pressure thing this time since that is actually out in the gym part.  My weight this afternoon was 166, perfectly acceptable by me, and body fat is actually still at 8.4%, very awesome!

Skin folds is next on the chart, even though we did it last.  Improvements everywhere.  The numbers are not as low as when I was super scrawny the summer I lost all my weight, but definitely acceptable, great even!  It is starting to look a little bit cyclical actually, higher skin fold numbers in the winter or end of winter due to less running the last couple winters, and then lower numbers in the summer when I do so much cardio.  Probably connections to be made there.

Something cool that Jodi noted was that my waist girth (I really dislike the sound of that word in a fitness chart) was up slightly, but my illiac crest skin fold was down. This of course would point to more muscle in my core taking up space, nice!

Muscle measurements are again steady.  A few are up, a few are down. I am not getting any bigger and bulkier (good) and I am not getting any smaller either (great!).  I think is we had a shoulder size measurement that would be up, but overall I am pleased.  I have said before and I stand by it, I’m not working to create the Hulk, I’d much rather aim for The Batman.

So, was it reasonable to have my bit of a freak out over 4 pounds?  Hmm not really, but it’s great to know I can see something like that and shift gears,  I think I have to learn to be ok with adding an extra pound or two in the future as long as I am still doing the cardio and weight training that I am currently doing.  If there is weight gain, and I am doing all the work (and eating the right amounts of the right food) then the added weight must be muscle.

I mean, I look pretty good I’d say…

Music

I made a point the last few days of trying to find a few more new songs to use while running.  Being someone that grew up in the 80's and 90's and a boy, I really do like the chip tune style of music, that being what everything on the NES and SNES used to use as music.  Of course these won't appeal to everyone, but I like them, have a listen!  Maybe you'll find something you like, or that at least brings back some memories!

My friend Matt did the last one, it's not from a game, but it's super cool!

Ancient Chinese Proverb

“Those who know do not speak. Those who speak do not know.”

― Lao Tzu, Tao Teh Ching

I take that quote to mean, when you are doing the thing that is making you better, you don’t have whole piles of time to yak on about it!

I’m writing this as maybe a bit of tough love for some of the other blogs I read. I am aware of the irony in using a quote like that and then rambling on, so clearly you can take this with a grain or two of salt.

But.

I read a few blog were things are always *about* to happen. “I’m *going* to do this.” “I *will* bring change into my life.” “In the *future* I will make better choices!”

The problem with many of these blogs is that those promises go unfulfilled. Over and over again.

Many of the blogs that I really *enjoy* reading are about what has happened, or the excitement leading to an event and then the details of that event.

“I did all this at the gym today!” “I can do headstands!” “I tried running 3k, but couldn’t make it, I will try again!

What makes me like these latter blogs is not the success of the writer, but the evident meaning and effort of the writer. The people that know they are pushing for their goals (and it just happens I read a lot of fitness related blogs) don’t seem to typically inform their readers of every little nuance of their plan each day or week. They speak about overarching goals, and the daily talk is about all their attempts, successes and once in a while a failure and how they will immediately right it, not accept it as it is. These blogs revel in spreading the word about the effort put in.

The former blogs go on about how hard it is, how they might have failed but they are ok with that, the tiny details of things that are looking for other people to build them up, not with the high fives and back slaps of success and sharing in victory, but in the pat on the back and reassurance that they are still a good person.

I thought this little bit might be interesting to ponder as well. I know for sure that I know some things, personal experience has taught me some hard lessons. Acting on those lessons is what is important!

He who knows not and knows not that he knows not is a fool; shun him.

He who knows not and knows that he knows not is a child; teach him.

He who knows and knows not that he knows is asleep; wake him.

He who knows and knows that he knows is wise; follow him.

~ Persian Proverb

Triathlon Pictures

I never expected the pictures to be ready so soon.  I have to decide if I want to buy any though because of course they cost a fortune!  But here they all are!

Me First

The camera guy said something about my shirt

Now My Dad

 

The biking was before the running but that isn’t how the pictures were ordered, strange.  I am riding one of dad’s older bikes and he is wearing my old runners, so we helped each other out I guess.

 

If you use your page down key and hit it fast it should look like a motion picture!  Or just watch this below when it’s up loaded

Friend Making Monday - Easy Answers!

If you’ve taken part in FMM then you know the rules. If you’re new, please take a moment to answer this week’s question on your own blog then add your link in the comments section here and over at: www.alltheweigh.com so we can all see your FMM questions and answers. Please invite your blog readers to add their links here too so everyone has to opportunity to be seen. The idea is to connect with other awesome bloggers so take a moment to post your own FMM post and comment on a couple of other posts. Now it’s time for this week’s topic!

Easy Answers

1. Are you a planner, or do you prefer to see where the moment takes you?

Do I really look like a guy with a plan? You know what I am? I’m a dog chasing cars. I wouldn’t know what to do with one if I caught it! You know, I just, do things. The mob has plans, the cops have plans, Gordon’s got plans. You know, they’re schemers. Schemers trying to control their worlds.

2. How often do you blog?

I blog a few times, a week, I try to go for three or four.  Not usually on set days but it kind of works out that way most of the time it seems.

3. Do you color your hair?

Nope

4. If you had to choose between running or riding a bike, which one would you choose?

Depends on the occasion.  If it's for pure workout purposes I would choose running.  If it's like a million degrees outside I would choose my bike.  In general I think I would choose bike because then I could go way farther than on foot.

5. Have you ever traveled outside of your home country?

Yes I have, mostly in the Caribbean and a down to Philly

6. Do you like weddings?

Boring!  I like them better than funerals though.

7. What is your favorite guilty pleasure on TV?

I don't feel guilty about anything that I watch really.  I guess from my wife's perspective it might be that I still watch a lot of cartoons.

8. Are you good at math?

Yeah, pretty good.

9. What is the last movie you watched?

Last movie I watched at home was The Dark Knight Rises last in theater was Man of Steel

10. Share five adjectives that your friends would use to describe you.

Funny, sarcastic, fit, crazy, nice.  That sounds about right I think.

Bonus: Did you celebrate Independence Day? If so, what did you do?

Nope, I'm Canadian, I didn't really do anything for July 1st (Canada Day) either though.



Now it’s your turn to answer this week’s questions. Don’t forget to come back and link up in the comments, and say hi to someone new this week. Happy Monday, folks =)

Canoe – Cycle - Run

Yesterday was a great day!  My first triathlon and I didn’t even have to swim.  I slept over at my parent’s house in preparation for the event since we had to leave from their house at 6am in order to get to the race location in Sydenham on time.  We arrived at 8am and got our Canoe in the water and the bikes set up in their place.  It turns out that we were the only canoe entered and there was about 14 kayaks or so.

So automatically we were going to be 1st and 2nd place in our event.  While cool, it’s also a bit of a let down to be winners by default.  It was then that I decided that we were actually racing the kayakers.  This is something that put us at an immediate and severe disadvantage.  We had a white water tandem canoe, and some of these guys had actual racing kayaks.  But we were in a race and there must be competition!

We set out and within seconds on guy was way ahead of the pack, we settled in to the 6th and 7th spots (since there was the two of us).  We actually held this the entire length of the boating portion of the event!  It was a 4k paddle, which the lead guy finished in 26:09.  We finished this portion of the race in about 32 minutes, so at a 6 minute disadvantage off the lead. I say about 32 minutes since they take that time from when you cross over the line with your bike and I stopped to change my shoes and socks since they were wet from the boat, dad didn’t and so he gained 30 seconds on me here.

We headed off on the bike part and that 30 seconds was enough for dad to pull away from me.  The first portion was a pretty big hill up and away from the water but since it was the start of the bike part I gunned it right up and passed quite a few people.  On the flat parts of the course I was pushing about 34km/h and over the 20k I was just barely over 30km/h!  Fast!  At about the half way mark dad was going back the other way by the time I was almost half a kilometre away from the turnaround point.  He had stretched  his 30 second lead to about 2 minutes.  By the time we made it back to the transition point it turns out he was about 3:30 ahead of me.  He finished the cycle portion in 36:18 and I did it in 39:41.  So thanks to my sock change going into the 5k run portion he had about a 3:53 lead on me.

Here though is where my strength would come out and his weakness.  Dad is not much of a runner even though he has the cardio for it, he doesn’t do it very much and so his calves were cramping up pretty bad.  I wasn’t having my fastest 5k but I was going along at a decent pace.  It was really humid, but thankfully the sun was not out.  Dad was still ahead of me when we first crossed paths just before the 2.5k turnaround point and I caught up to him at about the 3k point.  It started to rain in the final parts of the race and I knew I wasn’t in danger of anyone passing me when I came up on the final stretch.  I motored a bit at the end, but didn’t have my usual sprint as there was no one to catch and no one catching up on me either.  I finished and dad was only about 50 seconds behind me!

I finished in 1:39:10 and he was 1:40:09!  His quickness biking was just not quite enough to hold me off in the end.  I think that if I had to I could have pressed a bit harder to win if I had needed to but, that won’t be an issue until next year!

So I was Gold, he was Silver.  If we included the kayak racers, who had about an 8 minute lead off thanks to the superior water vessels, that lead guy finished in 1:31:21, 1:37:25 and then us at third and fourth and then next would have been 1:42:29.  Which says to me, all things being equal, we would have been challenging for first and second!

A pretty awesome day indeed.  Pictures soon to follow!!

I got the breakdown in times in pictures from the stats van, online all they have are finish times as a whole.  But there was just a 5k run as well.  If I had entered that, even with this slower time after biking 20k I would have been 18th overall and 2nd in my age group, dad would have been 28th overall (including me) and 2nd in his age group!  Very decent runs especially you you consider that these folks has not just done a 20k cycle!

Triathlon

Tomorrow I race in my first ever triathlon.  My dad suggested it to me about a month ago or so, just before he left to ride around Ireland.  It’s a race where I won’t actually be swimming though as the water portion will be in a canoe.  We get to paddle together but then you obviously ride and run on your own.

I’m more concerned about the ins and outs of all the transitions of the race rather than the race itself it seems.  I think part of it is simply that I know that I can’t have any sort of expectation going into this as I have never done a canoe race before and I have never done a bike race before.  So this will become the benchmark for all future bike races.  the distances are pretty straight forward 4k for the paddle, which will take probably about 35-40 minutes so I’ll be dying at the end of that! and then a 20k bike ride (no big there) and a 5k run, simple enough.  I think the hardest portion will be the paddling and the run if it’s super hot again.

What might throw me off a bit will simply be that I have to wear a bike helmet, which I never do at home, and I can’t have my ipod on for the bike portion, which I always do at home.  I can hear the gasps of disapproval right now I know.  But old dog and new tricks and all that.  When I was 10 I used to ride my bike from our house in the sticks to Matt’s house in Buckhorn and helmets weren’t even invented yet and I would wear my walkman the whole time.  If it was safe enough for me then, it’s safe enough for me now!

Anyways, I will be hoping for a top 10% time running at least, and maybe top 20% biking, the paddling I have no idea what to hope for, so just have to see how it comes out and even how many people are in our actual race.

If you are in Sydenham, Ontario come check it out, my race starts at 9:20am

Being Your Own Coach

Marion over at Affection For Fitness posted yesterday about being your own coach, I thought it was a pretty powerful message and you should go read it. Right now. Click the link.

If you did that and then came back some of what you are about to read might be a little redundant, but hopefully you read it anyways. She posted a couple of questions and a few statements at the end that I told her in the comments I was going to steal and post here, and then put my own answers or twists on them. I think that Marion and I think alike in a lot of ways, so it’s a good fit on this space as well.

You will find that most of my coaching references refer to hockey teams!

If You Are Your Own Coach…

What rules does your team have?

You’ve got to set up rules so that the team knows how to operate.  These would be the goals and the basic plan of getting there I think.  The rules for my team used to be incredibly strict, now they are not so bad, however there are still rules. 

‘Nothing more than 1600 calories’ used to one of my rules, and there was hell to pay if it got broken, now that rule is ‘Between 2300 – 2500 is alright’

‘Workout every single day’ used to be on the list and it meant cardio.  Now the rule is ‘The gym (my garage) or the road minimum 4x a week’ rest days are a necessity now, I’m not trying to lose weight, I’m building muscle, and doing events that are hard and such.

I’m sure I could think of other rules I had made but you get the idea.  When you are playing on a crappy rag tag team, you need strict rules with severe consequences.  Once you are on a team of all-stars you can let them dangle out there a little bit.

What are your team standards?

Everyone needs standards, Gordon Ramsey screams it at chefs all the time on Hell’s Kitchen and Kitchen Nightmares. If you don’t have standards then how do you know what you are working toward? Personally I think that my team standard is “Give everything you’ve got, and then give a little more”. When it comes to races and workouts I want to be winded at the end, like I left it all out there.

What is your team currently working on?

Having a goal that everyone is on board with is important, if people are going in different directions nothing gets done well. From a fitness perspective it’s analogous to people that work like crazy at the gym, but eat crap food. Sure they aren’t getting fatter, but they aren’t having any success with weight loss either.

Currently my team is working on the balance between returning to my preferred amount of running/cycling/working out and re-injury of my left Achilles or right knee. A tricky balance, but it has almost sorted itself out.

What happens if you fell off the wagon?

Here I don’t necessarily consider one day or event to be ‘off the wagon’ some people call them cheat days or whatever. I look at those types of days just as they are, if I was using a coaching metaphor for them it would be the games were you lose 7-2 in hockey and the coach them skates you into the ice at the next practice. You know it’s not going to be pretty, but you suck it up and do the extra work to please the coach, message sent – message received. Off the wagon would be when those types of days become the norm rather than the exception. You then have to decide how you are going to turn it all around, who are you benching and who are you putting on the ice.

If I was falling off the wagon you can bet there would be the clamps put on food, back to strict tracking of my diet and more hours spent on cardio, I have a plan, and even the last couple days have shown me that I can enact it at the drop of a hat.

Trust yourself. But if you don't know what to do, ask for help.

Solid advice, and nothing truer ever said, even the professionals confer with other professionals when they have something that they don’t know come up. My go to is Jodi, she knows what’s what.

You need to be a kick-ass coach for yourself. If you have a terrible day, you do the best that you can, with no excuses. That's what a fair but awesome coach would expect from you. No reputable coach allows days off for "emotional days" of feeling self-pity. Every day is not going to be optimal, but no day has to be a cop-out, because your coach (meaning you) does not accept that kind of attitude. It's only with consistently good attitude and effort, that your team gets winning results. Consistence is crucial to success.

I left the whole thing of Marion’s there because I can’t say it any better. Your goals (not matter what they are) don’t care if you are sad or happy or whatever. If you are not working toward them they won’t be achieved, no amount of ‘woe is me’ with get you fit, the laundry done, a report turned in, or a black belt at karate. You want to achieve? Then suck it up and get to work.

You are your own best coach and your own best friend. Make a strategic plan for your fitness and weight loss, have standards and goals, analyze your results, improve. You deserve it--this quality guidance in your life.

I know that I am a bit less of a ‘players coach’ than Marion is, she likes to make sure her body is getting all the right messages at the right times and she’s listening to it all the time too.  I’m more of a “Win this thing no matter what the costs” kind of coach willing to throw away the game plan in the final minutes to put it all out there!

If you liked all that, read more of Marion’s stuff, she’s knows what’s going on!

Gentlemen, It’s Time To Spread The Word.

And the word is, Panic!

Earlier this week I weighted in at 169.9 pounds.  I shrugged it off a little since my weight does bounce around a few pounds, especially on hotter days.  Yesterday I weighed the same 169.9 and I thought, this is not just a blip.

Now I have been doing a lot of weight lifting with Sarah lately and it wouldn’t surprise me if I was adding a bit of muscle, and I have been doing a lot of bike riding which is going to be building muscle as well.  BUT I have been under 170 pounds (and 168) for nearly three years and the threat of going back over that threshold was something I was not that keen of doing.

And so, yesterday I was very strict with what I ate.  I made sure I had my meals and no significant snacks, I wanted to be well under my usual 2400.  My tummy was kinda churning all day as well and I had to make a few pitstops (if you know what I mean). I ran when I got home as well, it was a blistering 30°C (about 90°F) 7k (no pain again which was nice).

This morning after all that, I’m at 166.8 pounds again.  So was it a food thing? No, not really, was it a fitness thing? Not likely.  More of a body function malfunction kind of thing.  But I was all ready to be in weight loss made again, a little panic is not that bad of a thing I suppose.

More Races!

I think at the start of the year I said something about not being in as many races.  I know for sure I made a point of avoiding summer races.  I remember the Warrior Dash in mid-July and how unbearably hot it was.  And I recall the Uxbridge Mudnewton and how awful the heat was there too.  I pledged I was going to not race in the summer heat unless completely necessary this year.

I guess, so far I have done three races, the KMs for Care, my own WCP Race Weekend and The O Course.  I was about to type that bit and say I had only done one race, but I might actually be on my way to doing the most races I have ever done in a year.

Dad and I are in a Sprint Triathlon next weekend, and I’ve got Tough Mudder at the end of September and just last night I signed up for Run or Dye in Kingston Ontario!  The run or dye sounds really super fun, and I’ll end up with a cool shirt all dyed and junk when I am done.

These type of things, these races, either the challenge of something like The O Course, knowing I have a chance to win like at KMs for Care, so something just totally for fun like this Run or Dye is what I love being fit and able to all this stuff.

I have still successfully avoided summer races except for the one this coming weekend, but it’s shouldn’t be to bad, paddling, biking and running.  Hopefully it’s a nice day on Sunday!

Warrior and Training

So I was watching American Ninja Warrior last night, it made me think of course about if it was something I would be able to do or not.  I think I would have ate it on the nun-chuck part.  If it was a horizontal bar I could make it but not where you have to hold yourself up with a vertical grip.

This is the type of thing that I would love to have the chance to be able to do though.  Or like American Gladiators.  I actually think that would be more my speed, except for the rings part.  I’d love to be able to put a few of those gladiator types in their place.

I’m not really sure if I have much else to say about all this really at the moment, but it makes me excited for Tough Mudder in the fall and sort of makes me want to go do the O Course again.  I know I was thinking I would never do it again as I was doing the O Course, but as long as I have a way to get to a real shower afterwards.

During one of the little interview/profile bits on the show they had this guy where all he did was train for the Ninja Warrior course. I have no idea how he paid his bills, or if he had any, but his “job” was fitness and training!  How awesome would that be?  I could totally do that as a job!  I did spend about 3 hours Saturday weight lighting and bike riding and then about 2 hours running and riding Sunday and over and hour again today running and riding.  I could totally do training as my job.

I have been working and training with Sarah each week though, and that has been a bit of fun designing workouts and doing training with her.  I have said a few times that I couldn't be a personal trainer, and while I doubt anyone is going to pay someone that has no certification or whatever, I think that maybe it is something that I could do with the right clients. 

All that said I know now that I only have 90 days to be ready to kill it at Tough Mudder so I have to get working on my shoulder and crossing some monkey bars and stuff. Because even without the goal of Tough Mudder, if I go back to the O Course, I`m going there to be able to do all the obstacles!

Friend Making Monday–By Chris

So many people are off on this Fitbloggin’ thing that I guess that I’m just going to have to make my own Friend Making Monday post.  I’ll try to have it be as good as the usual I suppose.  Put your thinking hats on and see if you can come up for answers to these questions.  Once you have, link up in the comments here and cruise around to some other blogs, and hopefully make a few new friends.

My Very Own 10 Random Questions

1. Did you set goals for the year?  (I don’t necessarily mean weight loss or fitness goals even.  Did you set out to learn to draw? complete a task?  Go skydiving?)

I stated my goals again just yesterday, Along with their progress, I did set some I think five.

 

2. It’s the half way point of the year, how are you progressing on your goals?

I have met two of them, going to complete a third next weekend and the other two are on pace to be completed.

3. It’s a long weekend here in Canada and I know my American followers get the 4th off.  How are you celebrating your countries birthday / Independence?

I’m actually not going to be doing very much likely, I have run and rode my bike a lot so far this weekend, Damion might come over today to watch a movie or something but that’s about it.

4.  Have you ever shot a gun?

I have shot many guns in my life actually.  Growing up my dad had two .22’s, one was semi automatic with a scope on it and another that was just one shot.  He had a pellet gun as well.  Eventually I got my own pellet gun that looked like a .357.  I fired a shotgun a few times too when my friend Dan had people over that brought a clay pigeon launcher as well.  I hit my first shot, I was also knocked over by it since I didn’t know to have the butt of the gun firmly on my shoulder.

5. If your spouse or significant other was at work all weekend, every weekend how would you spend your time?

This happens to me every weekend!  I usually ride my bike for an hour or two in the afternoon, watch movies that she doesn't care for and play video games.

6.  Do you have a pet that had some weird habit?

I do now! Talia has taken to opening the kitchen cupboards.  She doesn’t bother to go in, or even look in really, she just likes to open them.

7.  Would you rather go Skydiving or Bungee Jumping? (you can’t say neither)

I’m not really sure which one I’d pick if the cost was equal.  Amber’s brother asked and said that Bungee Jumping was only like $30 I’d do that.  A friend at work just went Skydiving! I think it would be a bit scary!

8.  What’s your favourite board game?

Amber is huge on board games and we have a whole giant closet shelf full of them.  I tend to like games that involve thinking or strategy.  I would actually have a hard time narrowing it down to one, so here is your chance to maybe learn about some new games!  I’d say my favourites are:

Lords of Waterdeep – it’s a collect the pieces and do missions type game

Carcassone – build the map with tiles and complete cities and roads (and eventually many other rules)

Trivial Pursuit – Invented by Canadians!  I like games like this.

Pictionary – I can draw, and so I win at this game a lot.

9.  Where would you like to go on a day trip? (In other words, what is exciting near you?

I like going to Toronto on a day trip, I have lots of  friends there and there is lots to do and see. 

10.  What is one thing you can’t live without?

I think that would have to be my computer, it’s a tool I use for so many things!  My phone can do lots, but my computer does just that little bit more that I want, including writing this right now!

Bonus.  Who is your favourite person you follow on Twitter?

At the moment it is @GregCapullo the artist for Batman, he has great tweets!

So there it is, have fun answering them and them post the link!  Happy Canada Monday Friends!

 

Looks like Kenlie did a FMM after all, it just didn’t update on the side of my blog, so here is hers too

The Internet

1.  Have you ever met anyone online before meeting them in person? 

Yep, quite a few people actually!

2.  What is your opinion on social media’s impact on our society?  Does it make life better or worse? 

I think it makes things better, it’s way easier to interact with people on a daily basis.

3.  Do you believe that it’s possible to fall in love with someone that you’ve never met in person?

I think it’s possible to fall in love with the ‘idea’ of that person for sure.

4.  Do you prefer to shop in stores or online? 

Generally I like to ship in store, but I buy a few things online, like graphic novels.

5.  What blogging platform do you use?  (WordPress, Blogger, something else?) 

I use Windows Live Writer to write my blogs, and post on blogspot.

6.  Have you ever blogged for another site?  Would you?

I have written like interview answers, but not a whole post for someone else, but I totally would, I think it would be great!!

7.  Do you use services like Netflix and Hulu? 

We have Netflix and we use it pretty often, we cancelled the movie network on our cable because we have it, at half the price.

8.  Would you prefer to get blog comments or to interact on twitter? 

I really enjoy both.  Sometimes I miss comments on here, but I always see the tweets.

9.  Do you prefer to read books or e-books? 

I don’t do much reading of actual novels, but I like my comics the old fashioned way.

10.  Share at least one experience that you would not have had without being a blog author. 

I wouldn’t have done the couple interviews that I have done, but nothing too major really.

Now it’s your turn to answer this week’s questions.  Don’t forget to come back and link up in the comments, and say hi to someone new this week.