Exercise goals and nutrition

Well given my recent learning of things the hard way (low blood sugar bad. Eat before working out) I was wondering if there were any other simple revelations I was missing out on.

I checked out the Mayo clinic, and they suggest eating carbs before, either a small amount about an hour before or a larger amount 3-4 hours before.

Wikipedia’s sports nutrition page suggests carbs right after workouts, both aerobic and anaerobic, for glycogen replacement.

I’ve also heard that carbs should be avoided right after workouts because they immediately cut fat metabolism.

I have a few goals. From most important to least important, here they are.

  • I want to reduce my risk/delay the onset of such negative health consequences as diabetes, heart disease, and (heh) cancer.
  • I want to get the most out of my workouts, and that means not fainting in the middle of intense exercise.
  • I want to retain and expand my flexibility.
  • I want to gain muscle mass. Okay, well, really, strength first and showy muscle mass a close second.
  • I want to lose fat. I’m currently just above the unhealthy range for % body fat. Ideally, I’d like to be solidly in the middle, or towards the low end (for vanity’s sake).

What I’ve been doing is this:

  • about 20 minutes of stretching. (I’ve heard that randomized studies indicate that this increases, not reduces chance of injury, at least while running, but flexibility is still important to me).
  • about 30-60 minutes of lifting. 2 sets, 8 reps.
    • Upper body days: lat pulls, dips, bench presses, military presses, various rows, biceps, triceps. lateral shoulder raises.
    • Lower body days: (mostly machine), leg press, leg curl, leg extension, the leg squeezing and leg spreading things that I don’t know the names of.
    • Both days: 20 V-ups, 30 side crunches, each side, 30 legs up cruches, 20 back extensions.
  • 30 minutes of cardio, more often than not, I do this on the elliptical cross trainer. Sometimes I run instead. Very, very rarely, I do the bike.

So all you fitness experts *cough*, offer me your input.

like an idiot, kicking my own ass

I decided to check out my gym’s weight lifting class this morning. It’s been a little over a week since I’ve worked out. But I figure I’m in good shape. I consistently err on the side of more weight than the instructor recommends. After all, most of the people in the class are female, and they’re socialized to be less athletic, right? (okay, so I have an arrogant, misogynist, prick inside, check. But at least I try to keep it in my own head).

Fast forward to half way through the class. I’m having trouble keeping up. Dripping sweat. My mouth has gone dry, I’m seeing stars. I can feel something unpleasant approaching though I’m not sure whether I’m about to vomit or faint. I decide both would be very bad outcomes. I sit down on my bench. When I feel like I’m out of imminent danger, I go to the back of the room to avoid disrupting the class further. This after only 30 minutes. My water bottle isn’t helping.

I’ll go with lower weight next time.

Travel Woes and an Excellent Weekend

I cut it too close.

After I made it through security (airBART was slow, security line was long) I heard that they were canceling my seat if I wasn’t at the gate right then. The gate was about as far as a gate could be from security. I didn’t make it. I’m now flying through ontario and las vegas on my way home. I’m boarding group B for the first leg, but I’ll be functionally boarding group pre-A for the remaining legs. An annoying end to what has been a frickin’ awesome weekend. (okay, so friday was a little excessively mellow for my taste, but that’s not terribly surprising).

Friday evening, there was the late night Harry Potter with , , , and . Saturday morning massage (by a WoW geek, CMT) and haircut. Brunch with , then back to Tom’s to prepare for the wedding. Travel with , Ellen, Tom, and Urso to the wedding. A simple, brief ceremony (where and I were the only people other than the bride and groom named in the ceremony.) A fabulous reception, where I got to embarrass Lili. Very vegetarian friendly. Drinks at the hotel bar with most of the aforementioned and more. And Nathaniel, Ken and I wrapped up the evening with a Shadow Labyrinth instance run (at 5:*mumble* am).

Sunday, it was east bay, post-wedding brunch. There was a film crew from the local public radio for some restaurant show. It was fun. Then I got to meet , neat guy. Back to Simon and Lili’s for a little WoW action. Next a trip to the Eagle for a beer bash for charity. I got to see TomC and Nathan again. Met their friend Jason. Also saw Marco (whom I’d also seen after brunch with Josh), and Ted. Someone I know got a smiley face drawn on their penis with a marker. And back across the Bay to Stef and Eric’s for board games. (Along with Simon, Lili, Angie, Nathan, (who deserved more prior mention in this), Tom, Tom and Ethan. I played much tichu and blokus had many varieties of toasted cheese on fancy bread. Josh, Nathan and TomC played a game of Zavandor (I was embroiled in Tichu at the time, sadly).

Then today’s annoyance with the late and the canceled ticket. On the whole, a wonderful weekend.

This advances my intent to move back to the bay area at some point in the next several years. It’s simply home to me. While I may grow more into Chicago, it will never have the same feeling to it. As a vegetarian, biking, sex-positive, homo geek, I fit in. To (way over-)generalize, Chicago is for meat-eating, motorist, hetero/closeted/sex-embarrassed sports fans. I have no desire to stare across that gulf day in and day out for the rest of my life.

Ah, San Francisco

Well, I got into SF safe and sound last night. Ironically, dinner ended up being Chicago style pizza. Good to see and again. I like the new pad. the bookshelves no longer loom. =)

Every time I come into town, I think about how this place feels like home to me. Homo hippy vegetarian nerd and all that. Chicago has those things within it, but it is not known for any of them, while san fran is known for all of them.

I’m not jumping ship immediately, but it may be that I won’t grow into Chicago to such a degree that I don’t want to go back to the bay area. I’m not infinitely flexible, and the parts of me that aren’t changing are more at home in san fran.

I still have several opportunities in Chicago that I intend to take advantage of. My current job is an excellent opportunity for skill development and resume expansion. Not to mention debt reduction and retirement saving. If I really want to play the town hopping game, I could switch to Seattle while not changing much else about my GAO employment. That I may do. For a year or two. Then settle in San Fran. Canada does sound nice, but it’s a separate country. I should work on improving my own, rather than fleeing to a [perceived] better place. =) (Why then don’t I apply that principle to my choice of cities? =)

Exalted Campaign

Let the nerdity commence.

I’m going to be starting up an exalted campaign in the near future. Three people have already expressed interest. I may have room for one or two more. It’ll probably be a weeknight at my place in Chicago. We won’t start actually playing for a month or two, because I need to pull a story together and mold it for the players, but there will be some fairly extensive prep work. I’m going to ask all players to fill out a short/quick survey on what they enjoy in gaming and want out of a game. I’ll also ask them to come up with a couple pages of background on their characters. (hey, I’ll be writing way more than that, so no bitching).

The player characters will be solar exalted recently (a week to a month ago) rescued from the secret police, a lynch mob, or other such mortal social danger, by an as yet-un-named group using guile, trickery, stealth, etc. They were not liberated with an open display of force. They are a rather mismatched group of extraordinary people, drawn together by a common danger. Wacky hijinks will ensue.

Lemme know if you’re interested.

time for lj

I haven’t made time for lj lately. I started a very frequent, if not entirely regular, gym habit. And it appears to have come straight out of my already reduced LJ time. This is very sad. Self improvement shouldn’t come at the expense of social connection (and this is probably my favorite site for that, if my least immediate). This morning, LJ is coming out of my gym time. Sad, but true.

Currently in Denver, or more accurately, a 20 minute drive SW of downtown denver. I rented a car for this trip. Stupid B&B lost my reservation and forgot I ever made it (next time, don’t trust them when they say “just make a reservation at the government rate, and we’ll fit you into whatever room is available.”) Hotel is a hotel, not bad, but nothing to write home about.

I do intend to see Red Rocks Amphitheatre while I’m out here. I’m told it’s neat.

Btw, this training is fucking lame.

Leaving town thursday afternoon to head to San Fran. Staying near the Civic Center with Thursday through Monday. Simon and Lili get hitched on Saturday. Must prepare toast for the occasion. I hope I get to see alot of you cool California people while I’m out there. Need to make arrangements for watching Harry Potter on Friday.

Past couple weeks have been pretty busy too.

My dad’s welcome back from Iraq party. I had some trouble with this one. From the DVD of the photos of dad smiling in uniform with other folks in uniform, animated and put to stirring music, essentially played on repeat the entire time (to which my immediate and reaction was “Oh my, propaganda, how … nice.”) Not even the relatively clean pictures I’ve seen, like the guy who accidentally got some celebratory fire in his wrist on its way back down to earth (no serious damage), let alone the people with the back of their heads blown off, which I know my dad has pictures of. Mom refused to let him show them to other people. I want to see them, but keep forgetting to ask. Two nice little old ladies completely disconnected from one another, who know me only as my father’s son asked me if I was married yet. One even mentioned her daughter. I limited myself to “No” and “not any time soon”. Telling them to talk to Congress seemed unneccessarily obnoxious, even if I was very annoyed by the question. Besides, it’s my dad who’ll have to deal with these people in the future. Not me. They weren’t asking for me to bludgeon them with my politics. And I wasn’t going to be the one to deal with it afterwards. It seemed irresponsible to stir things up like that. Or was it just cowardly?

Then there was Origins in Columbus the following weekend. I got to play 3 new board games. (portobello market (not yet for sale), alchemist and fisherman of catan (new to me, anyway). I played Fisherman with a really interesting, rather cute gay guy who wore his sexuality on his chest (in the form of a button, and maybe his t-shirt, I can’t remember what his t-shirt said). I’ve invited him and up to Chicago for Market Days. Should be fun times. I also played two old favorites. I handily won a game of Puerto Rico with my lazy/bad wharf/factory/harbor/5 goods strategy. It was technically a tournament, but not really in practice. It would have been a very different game had the other guy who knew what he was doing ended up playing in any position other than right after me. And a pickup game of St Petersburg. I don’t remember how that went, played that one with . I made it back in time for dinner with before taking off for Denver on Monday (annoyingly long trip. Massive delays due to thunder storms).