Week 1, (should have been) Day 2

Today was Day 2 of Week 1 of my 9 week XBox Kinect program. ...Or, it should have been. Instead, after ending the day with a sore throat and a neck that felt tender, I went home to investigate, only to discover white patches on the back of my throat. Greeeeat! That's all I needed. Thank you maternity leave for leaving me no sick days, and of course  tomorrow night I have a work event I am expected to attend.

I opted to spend the night in urgent care getting checked out, just to be on the safe side. Surely, if I went, it would be nothing. But you KNOW if I didn't go, I would wake up tomorrow morning feeling like my throat had been sealed off. Either way, better safe than sorry with little ones around, and  one who can't even tell me what's bothering her. I went in.

I gotta hand it to the urgent care facility. It was quick and orderly, and was fairly empty. I had expected to be one of many. I actually brought my backpack to work on lesson plans while I waited. It didn't take long to get checked out, and while the physician's assistant who saw me did say that it probably wasn't strep, she went ahead and prescribed me a Z-pack, just in case. She agreed that my little splotchy friends in the back of my throat were questionable.

So I'm glad I got checked out, but pretty bummed it meant that my night was pretty much shot. I may need to renounce my former view of morning workouts, as that time is fairly interrupted by little more than the fussings of my Littlest Little...and then only on the mornings that she stirs early, which isn't really every morning. Most, maybe. But not every.

I'll have to play catch up the rest of the week. And just in case you were wondering, and I have had a few people ask me, about the effectiveness of the workout games out there. ....When you put forth effort, it will work. My last/first workout was Monday, and I can still feel it in my abs, arms, and legs.

And with that quick (non)update, I'm headed to bed. Strep or no, my throat is definitely sore. And my neck does feel tender to the touch. I'm getting some much needed rest.

Tomorrow? Water. A healthy lunch, a busy day of teaching (never sitting down counts for something, right?!), and making up Week 1, Day 2. It's gonna be a good, good day. :)

Week 1, Day 1

While I already have a journal that I track my fitness goals and progress into, I figured there might be a higher level of accountability if I know that my progress is trackable and has the potential to beseen by all...or at least everyone who stumbles across this blog.

It's not that I am wholly unactive, but I've had a lot of start and stops. Some stops justified, others not. ...But I think mostly justified. Bad knee. Physical therapy. Pregnancy/post-partum.

I run. Well. I call it running. Really, it is probably more accurately described as a kind of bouncy-plod at a brisk walking pace. Here is the best visual representation of how I run:

...Yeah.... That's probably fairly accurate. Be that as it may....

And then there's a piece of wisdom I cling to, given to me by a close friend who is a coach at the middle school that I teach at, not to mention a veteran marathoner. She says, more or less, that if you're got the "bounce" part of running going on, you're doing good. Well, I bounce. I know that I bounce, because I can feel it in my rear. lol ..Another sign that I've had too many starts and stops, because I also know that after a few weeks of consistent running, that rear end bounce tends to decrease somewhat.

The problem is that running, right now, is not very conducive to my schedule. And by "not conducive", I mean that there are a few areas in which I refuse to budge:

• I will not run in the dark.
  -Maybe I'm paranoid, but I've read one too many news articles that validate this decision.
  -It doesn't help that right now we're in the tail end of winter, which means the days are still pretty short, and by the time I can run, it's already too dark to go out.
• I will not wake up at the butt crack of dawn.
  -I know. I know. Maybe eventually I can/will change this, but as of now, I am not a morning person, and no amount of motivation will cause me to be one.

Hmm...that's probably pretty much it. I needed something that would fit my lifestyle and give me direction. The last thing I need is to google a list of exercises and then just start making up some random "workout" with no rhyme or reason to it.

Luckily, my parents, who have an XBox  kinect, don't actively use it right now. They opted for an actual gym membership, which is something that is not currently in my budget.

Even more lucky, my parents brought the kinect, along with 1 dance game and 2 workout games, down for me when they came to visit recently.

I tried the one game the other day, "Your Shape". Not bad. Definitely a good workout. What I don't like is that you really (or at least I didn't, if you can) modify the workouts too much, and there were several workouts that engage your knees. My problem with that is that my right knee is wonky and gimpy, and exactly what landed me in physical therapy all summer long a couple years ago. Squats, while a great workout, wreak havoc on my knee. I feel like an 80 year old, and I find myself wondering if a knee replacement would correct the issue. Seriously?! No. No surgery!

Today I spent the morning, and I do literally  mean the whole morning, setting up my kinect profile, and then setting up again in EA Active 2. I decided to go for the 9 week program. Today was Week 1, Day 1/4.

Kicked. My. Butt.

My husband came home for lunch as I was closing in on the end of my workout. He wasted no time in making fun of my avatar's running style as I did circuit running. I was too busy trying to make my legs continue to notice, but he was kind of right. lol As I said before, when I say that I run, what I mean is faster than walking, with a bounce. My trainer was insiting I RUN, and since it was a "race", and I do have a streak of competitiveness in me, I had to win! You know, because outrunning a digital guy in spandex is extremely fufilling. :) ...I won.

He also got to witness me doing side to side jumps. He was very.....motivational.... lol "Jump higher! C'mon babe! Keep going!" ...I did complete the exercise, but I'm pretty sure gravity won. ...Kinda don't ask me to do one of those 'jump-in-the-air-and-I'll-take-your-picture' shots. It will be a futile attempt, that looks more like...

So. Anyway. Week One. Day 1/4, out of a 9 week program completed. Is it bad that I'm craving chocolate chip cookies?! lol