New Year's Resolutions: 2015 Edition

It’s that time of year again. Time to pull yourself out from under the tree, apologize for your horrible behavior the night before, vow that this year will be different from the last and then go about living your life exactly the same as before other than writing a different date on your checks except that you don’t even write checks anymore so the entire concept of a year is effectively irrelevant. Anyway, as always I have put together my list of resolutions for the year and since I have my own website I figured that I would post them in an effort of personal accountability and public ridicule. Here we go…

1)      Weigh less than 180 pounds and maintain that weight: I’ve actually gotten my weight under 180 several times over the past few years, which is great given that I maxed out at about 215 back in 2009. But, I can never seem to maintain the weight and over the past few months, which have been extremely stressful personally with the added addition of people continuing to put holiday cookies in front of me, I’ve fallen back to 195. So, back on the weight loss program, back to DDP Yoga (I swear it works. I don’t know how or why but it really does work.), and back to fixing my diet. This time I’ll keep the weight off.

2)      Take Landen for one long walk daily: Of our two dogs Landen, our black lab / border collie mix, has taken to following his daddy’s example and gained weight as well. So, in addition to my weight loss efforts Landen will join in the action as we will have scheduled daddy – doggie bonding walks around the neighborhood. He’ll love it because he will get to be outside more, I’ll love it because I will get away from looking at a computer screen for every hour, and hopefully we will both be healthier for it. If you’re wondering our other black lab Katie has seniority over me in the household and I can in no way tell her what to do. If she wants to go for a long walk I will take her. Hell, if she wants to go for a ride she’ll grab the car keys and bring them to me.

3)      Get Lasik surgery: This has been a point of contention between Kim and me for years and between myself and everyone else I know since third grade. As most people know I have worn glasses since I was nine years old and have absolutely horrible vision without my glasses on. However, unless most people who get glasses as a kid I did not convert to contacts as I grew older event though I looked much better without glasses and the glasses that I wore made me look like I was intentionally trying to get the role of “third guy in the computer lab” in every college movie ever made. The idea of contacts and touching my eye just goes entirely against my internal programming. I’ve discussed Lasik for years but have always pushed it off in that it was a new procedure. Well, twenty years has passed and Kim personally knows one of the best doctors in the country so I really don’t have an excuse anymore. Plus, finally I would be able to wake up in the middle of the night and get to see what is causing that noise.

4)      Write one blog post a week: Yes, this resolution has been scaled back over the years. I’ve had this blog for more than a decade now and have gone from a five day a week posting schedule for years to a more sporadic schedule to the current, “let’s try to start writing again only to quit after two weeks.” But I was thinking about some writing advice I heard last year from Philip Margolin, who I met at a book fair. When he started writing he was a criminal defense attorney and I could not imagine just how he found the time to write. He explained to me that he set up an agreement with his wife where he had four hours on Saturday morning and four hours on Sunday morning where he could close the door in his office and spend that time writing. He figured that gave him a full day’s work every week and it was done in a way that he could work it in with his personal and professional life. My old method of writing five nights a week means finding a half hour every night and I just can’t do that anymore. But an hour or two once a week is doable so I will go at that pace. Plus, I hope that less content will equate to more quality but who knows. I’ll just be happy to be writing again.

5)      Listen to a different album every day: Ok, this one may seem odd. I have a massive music collection but I have discovered three important facts over the past few years 1) I only listen to a few albums, 2) I am really, really out of touch with the current music scene and 3) I feel a lot better when I am listening to new and different music. So, I am bringing back the random CD project, which because I am running it involves spreadsheets, random number generators and surprisingly complex algorithms just to pick a CD. Hopefully this will bring me back into music and help me to fill in the gaps in my collection. I’ll be posting the random album daily to Facebook so if you read my Facebook feed expect the spam and consider it revenge on all the people who continue to send me Farmville notices as if Farmville is still a thing.

6)      Read forty books in the year with at least ten different female authors: Forty books is for some reason a difficult threshold for me to break. I have been keeping track of every book that I have read since 1998 (no, I am not OCD, why do you ask?) and only once have I ever broken that milestone. Last year I read 38 books, 37 the year before so you get the picture. More embarrassingly, of the 38 books I read last year only four were written by women and the year before that the total was five. If you ever wanted quantifiable data that I am a sexist pig there you are. Thus, time to at least get the number of books I read written by women up to a quarter of my total.

7)      Listen to everything Kim is saying before acting on the first request: Like all husbands I am flawed and in my case probably more flawed than most. Sometimes they are sins of omission, sometimes they are sins of commission and sometimes they are things that may be completely out of your control. But, I feel that I should at least try to address one of the things that I do that drives Kim insane. She will be talking to me and say, “Put the sheet in the dryer,….” and before she can finish pausing for the comma I am immediately walking away with the sheet in my hand because I am a robot and will perform the first task given to me regardless of the fact that she hasn’t even finished her sentence yet. I do this all the time. I’ll walk away in mid-conversation because somewhere in there was an action I was told to make and it’s as if I operate on a one task at a time, complete immediately basis. It’s annoying and rude as hell and it is a habit that I need to break.

8)      Kim’s choice: As always, I feel that one of your resolutions should be to do something that someone else tells you to work on so Kim gets her choice here. Keeps a bit of mystery to the process as well.

9)      Update five year plan and note cards: Roughly eleven years ago this week I sat down and on a set of note cards wrote down the goals that I had for the next five years of my life. I then folded them up, put them in my wallet and whenever I needed to remind myself what I should be doing with my time I would look at them and see how I was progressing. The amazing thing is that, for the most part, I’ve accomplished everything I put on those cards. Sometimes it took longer than five years, sometimes they took on different forms but those note cards with my overall goals were always with me and it worked. But it is time to update them and figure out what I want to do in the next five years and redo the note cards.

10)  Take Kim on a work free vacation: I cannot recall the last time I went on a vacation and did not work. I’ve taken conference calls in Disney World, Las Vegas and the French Quarter. Kim has had it even worse and has emailed clients from Iceland and called people from the emergency room in which she was the one who had been taken to the emergency room. We need to get away and spend some time away from work, email, phones, computer screens and everything else that we cannot escape. Not sure how we are going to do this but it is a necessity.

There you go. Should be an interesting 2015 even if I still don’t have my freaking hoverboard yet.

What is your Workout?

I was thinking after what I wrote last night about my fitness regimen and what I have done to get into shape. I know that this sounds totally bizarre coming from a two sport lettermen in high school whose two letters came in football (as the student trainer) and baseball (as the scorekeeper). While I’ve always loved sports I have never been athletic and was always the tall, gawky, skinny kid who could never get out of the way of his own limbs. As I got older that all stayed the same except I went from skinny to pudgier than I would like with no gain in athletic prowess. However I did try a number of different things to get into shape and after several years I have found myself in what is probably the best shape of my adult life. Here is what worked, what didn’t work and some things in between.

Treadmill: This was my default workout for years, including those years when I was woefully out of the shape. I consider it the basic workout for the person who lives in an apartment complex with a small exercise room and no clue what to actually do. I am lucky in the fact that I can do forty five minutes on a treadmill without losing my mind from boredom but I can’t say that this has been the best workout for me. That said, when I start up on the Couch to 5K routine in a month or two this will get more play.

Wii Fit / EA Active: When you are starting out trying to get in shape it is best to start small. Really small, like just playing video games as activity. I have to say that I primarily used my Wii for the fitness applications and while they weren’t the best way to get in shape these two programs definitely helped. Wii Fit was my first interaction with yoga and discovering just how horrible my balance is (which was finally explained by the fact that my legs are not the same length). I can’t say that it was the most challenging workout though I have fond memories of the boxing game (where your coach sounded just like Adam Corrola) and the step aerobics (in which I must have looked like the biggest idiot ever). EA Active was better in terms of overall fitness though it had two drawbacks. One was, like all video game workouts, it was highly dependent on the Wii picking up your movements and there is nothing worse than spending half your time trying to convince the game that yes, you did just do a squat. The other is more a personal quibble in that for lifting they utilize those power bands / cords that you see in every Target. I’ve never found a set of those that I like because they never seem to be made for my height and strength. I always going with either no resistance or insane resistance.

Personal Trainer: I think that I have used four different personal trainers over the years due to a combination of location and the fact that my trainers kept on quitting on me. You will find a lot of differing opinions out there about using a trainer and especially if it is worth the money and my view is that a good trainer is worth it, especially at the beginning, but that you should definitely reach the point where you no longer need one. When I started out with trainers I was really starting from scratch with no idea what exercises to do and worrying that my shoulder and hip injuries would make workouts impossible. With a trainer you have someone to lead you around the gym, learn how to use certain machines and have someone watching you to make sure that you are using the correct form. That is perfect when you are starting out but once you reach the point where you know your various routines you should be able to go on your own. Plus you always have to deal with the fact that a trainer can push you too hard or too little and both have their drawbacks. My view is use one to start if you can afford it but don’t worry if it does not turn into a lifelong partnership. You’re not a contestant on the Biggest Loser.

Gym Classes: There are people who swear by the classes at gyms and while I can’t really complain about the ones that I have gone to (they all were great workouts) they simply are not for me. First off, the fact that I have to drive to the gym uses up to much time for me to begin with so that makes having the classes fit my schedule is a massive challenge. Then there is the fact that when you start a new class you are typically dealing with a class where everyone else is a regular so you spend the first few sessions just trying to figure out what everyone is doing. This is even worse in yoga where the instructor will say “go into alligator. Ok, now go into crocodile” and you apparently should know the difference when the only difference that I can remember between the two is one has visible teeth and the other doesn’t. Finally, all of the classes that I have gone to have been predominately female. When I go with Kim this is ok as I am the supportive husband who works out with his wife. When I go alone I am the creepy guy in the back who can’t keep up. Just not my thing.

TRX: This is a bit of a subset of the last two as it was a Trainer / Class that got me using this. These are those suspension cables that you can use to perform a ton of body weight exercises. It is extremely good once you get the hang of it and all you need is a good doorframe in order to get started. Like a lot of things you can push yourself too hard though and wind up hurting yourself. I’m hoping to do more TRX in the coming year.

DDP Yoga: My current obsession and by far the best workout routine I’ve ever come across. One of New Year’s Resolutions is to finish the Advanced program and I am on week nine of thirteen (yes, I know that we are in week eleven of the new year. I fell slightly behind). To reach this point I’ve done 30+ workouts and if you have ever purchased fitness DVDs how many of them have you played thirty times? Especially after having used them for the previous eight months as well? I’ve never come across any fitness program that has held my interest like DDP Yoga.

Maybe it is the fact that it was made and hosted by a retired professional wrestler, which is just so random that it makes it exciting. Maybe it is because it combines regular body weight exercises with rehab exercises and yoga poses into something that gives you a good workout while improving your flexibility. It is common to go from a squat to a push up to downward dog in the course of two minutes. But the biggest complement that I can give this program is the fact that it is the first exercise program that I have ever seen that is made to start as a beginner and grow with you as you get better. If you look at so many others you seem to either need in insane shape to just get through the first workout or they are at the “miniature golf has great fitness benefits” level. With DDP Yoga there are so many options to modify a move that is too challenging for the time being and the workouts themselves range from twenty five minutes to an hour so as your cardio improves the length of workout increases with you.

(Oh, and they have real people doing the workouts. When you have a 60 year old and a 300+ pound guy completing the workouts you can’t really tell yourself that this is impossible.)

As with all workouts this probably isn’t for everyone. If you want to put on twenty pounds of muscle or run a marathon it wouldn’t be your primary option. But all I can say is that I look forward to working out and anything that can make that happen is a good thing. 

Dennis Rodman: Threat or Menace?

Ok, I will have to admit that I have gotten old and turned off the BCS title game at the start of the fourth quarter. Every time I flipped to the game it looked like Florida State was never able to get into a rhythm and I was tired and really didn’t feel like staying up to see how it all turned out. So, yeah, I missed the ending. That said, as an East Coast resident I can complain about having the game end after midnight when some of us have jobs to go to in the morning. Ok, that doesn’t explain the years when I would be out at a concert until three in the morning on a Tuesday but I am old and grizzled now and can make those complaints.

(But I did watch much of the Old School Raw and was thrilled to see Jake “The Snake” Roberts close out the show for several reasons: 1) He was one of the best all time, 2) He looked to be in pretty good shape and 3) I am stunned that he is actually still alive. Trust me, if you know anything about Jake the Snake is that The Wrestler was based on his life and that was the nice version of his story. Plus I take this to be another success story for DDP Yoga. As I’ve mentioned before I am a proponent of DDP Yoga and I know that Diamond Dallas Page has spent the past year working with Jake to get him in shape and healthy and the fact that he has made this much progress is pretty much a miracle.)

Switching gears, is there anyone else moderately concerned that our foreign policy strategy with North Korea rests in the hands of Dennis Rodman, who was an excellent rebounder but was also a participant in Celebrity Rehab and that was one of his highlights in the past decade. If we are going to rely on former basketball players couldn’t we at least use someone like World B. Free, Majestic Mapp or, in a perfect world, God Shamgodd? It just seems stunning that the person who has the best access to a world leader who recently “fed his uncle to wild dogs” is the guy who kicked a cameraman in the groin and appeared on Monday Nitro to wrestle Karl Malone. It’s like we have all just admitted that the world has gone completely insane so we might as well not even bother anymore.

That is pretty much it for tonight. I will go through my New Year’s Resolutions tomorrow. As is my tendency I do not officially state my resolutions until after the first week of the year. That way I know that I will have done better than ninety percent of the people in that I can’t fail until the eighth of the month at least. Success by delay is success none theless. 

DDP Yoga: The best workout you are not doing

(Sorry, keyboard got a little dusty there. It always seems to whenever I watch that video.)

Let's set the stage here a little. Over the past few years (not coincidentally since Kim and I have been together) I have tried to get in better shape. I tried fitness through video games (EA Active for the Wii got me in shape for my wedding), worked out with trainers but nothing really seemed to stick. The video games were weird and finding time for the trainers was a huge challenge especially given my constant travel. I never tried any workout DVDs mainly because nothing I saw seemed focused towards my needs. P90X and Insanity both seemed to be directed towards people who were already in shape. I have a bad shoulder and a bad hip and was never an athlete in my life. I looked at those workouts and knew that there was no way that I could start at that level.

I knew of Diamond Dallas Page from my years of watching wrestling and heard that he had become a motivational speaker and was doing yoga. The fact that I can tell you the post wrestling careers of many wrestlers (Paul Orndorff owned a bowling alley for a while) as well as their real names gives a sense of my intensity from the wrestling side. When the above video went viral though I realized that I had to give DDP yoga a try. There is no way you can watch that video without being inspired to get off your ass and work out. If Arthur can do that using DDP yoga it has to have something to it. So for our anniversary Kim got me the DVD set.

I am on week eight of the program and I am just thrilled so far. First off, any exercise program that you stick with for eight weeks is a good one. It is so easy to get tired of a routine, expecially when you are doing the same workout for the fifth or sixth time, and just quit. Somehow, DDP makes the workouts interesting with a good level of energy. Plus, all you need is a yoga mat and the will to complete the workout.

The workout themselves are a mix of traditional yoga and more traditional exercises. Yesterday I mentioned how yoga has a learning curve but DDP makes it easy by starting out with clear examples of each move and changing some of the names to either a) make them clearer (raising your hands over your head is Touchdown) or b) make a bad pro wrestling pun (Warrior poses are now Road Warrior poses but without the face paint). You start out with relatively easy routines with plenty of options to make them easier or harder. That is a great thing as I really feel that anyone could get started with this program. Today I did the introductory workout again and I was impressed by the challenge still but happy that it had become much easier. Typically you do a lot of lunge related moves, some dynamic resistance, and then a lot of core work.

Over time you get into harder workouts. Right now I've maxed out at the Diamond Cutter workout, which is 50 minutes of hell. One of the hallmarks of the rountine are slow count push ups. You hold yourself in a plank for a three count, then lower down on a three count, hold low for a three count and when your arms are burning like mad you push back up on a three count. In this workout you do more of those than you can imagine. While the entire workout is no impact you never stop working so it is great for cardio. You'll sweat, you'll be tired but you never feel as though you are about to hurt yourself. After eight weeks I have definitely become more flexible and I feel stronger. I don't have six pack abs but at least I feel like I have abs, which is an accomplishment in and of itself.

I don't expect that this workout will turn me into a star athlete but I don't expect it to do so. But it gets me off my ass and I can do the workout wherever I find myself that day. As I said before, the best workout is the one that you actually do. I really recommend giving DDP Yoga a try. It is a great gateway into yoga and workouts in general and if you stick with it you will see results.