Snowstorm, Ahoy!

Tomorrow night we're supposed to get a snowstorm. There hasn't been one of those since I've arrived, and I'm a little nervous about it. The experts are predicting 8-12 inches of snow, which is exciting and horrifying. So far we've only ever had a total snow accumulation of around six inches at a time here in the city. We still have a lot of snow out there, so the 8+ inches on top of that are going to be kind of crazy. I'm not really sure what to expect, so tonight we're going grocery shopping, tomorrow I'm doing laundry all day, and I guess I'll probably stay inside until I absolutely have to run outside and look around.

While we wait for everything that tomorrow's weather will bring, here's a tiny preview: a video of of Monte playing on the balcony at our apartment while it snows.

Monte, calm and collected as ever.

No Thanks, I'm Trying to Quit

Lately, I've been strongly considering quitting things that I spend time on that don't make me smarter/happier/feel accomplished/prettier/more interesting/richer. The big one is Facebook. The little guys are 4chan, anything that facilitates my "e-stalking" anyone, and anything having to do with celebrities, video games, and internet memes. They don't contribute to my life. In the picture I hold in my head of the woman I want to be, those things just aren't there.

Yanked from The Joy of Tech webcomic.

I can tell you with absolute certainty that my ability to flip between tabs, talk to a dozen people at once, look up what every acquaintance I've ever had, and be informed of every internet fad at a moment's notice has pushed me in the opposite of my goals. I'm less socially adept than I want to, should, and used to be. I'm less patient. I judge too easily, and based on too little information. Too much real estate of my mind is inhabited by useless crap that was born and will die on the internet, and will never matter to anyone in the real world.

I'm making progress in my life. Every day has victories and setbacks, but I'm proud of what I'm doing to get where I want to be. I'm proud that I can work through the tears and know that yes, it sucks, and yes, I'm going to do it anyway. I want to keep that ball rolling. I don't want to slip into complacency and laziness and anxiety over things that are ultimately trivial. I don't want to look back on my life and the most memorable things I see to be advertisements, Farmville, the top ten list of top ten lists, lolcats, and status updates.

I don't strongly identify with a lot of the common complaints against Facebook and other social networking sites. A refrain I hear a lot about Facebook and Twitter is that people are boring others by over-sharing, more commonly expressed as, "no one cares what you had for lunch." Well, I kind of do. I care about what you read and learned, what you saw and thought, what you ate and where you went. It's just that, in a flood of all of this unconnected information, it gets lost. In a conversation, it matters. Not just what you ate, but how you felt about it and if I should eat it and if you want to learn how to make it or if you like the restaurant so much that you wouldn't dream of ruining the magic by attempting to cook things from there. Another common complaint is about Facebook's privacy policy, which they say is horrible and too confusing to the average user. It's possible that I'm too ignorant to know just how confused I am, but I don't think I actually have a problem with Facebook's privacy now that I've taken the time to amp my privacy settings way up and accept next to no applications. I do think I had too many pages "liked," which (rather obnoxiously) allows those pages' maintainers to look at my profile, but unliking them today should clear that right up.

My big problems with Facebook are that it's a time suck, it tethers me to people I don't really know and isn't that great a medium to learn more about them the most superficial things, I have an addictive personality that really goes crazy for the constant and ever-changing updates, I feel bad having to friend, unfriend, block, or ignore people on the site because I know they might take it personally, and a lot of what's posted on there either bores or annoys me. I have no doubt that it's a privacy nightmare, but that's not my reason for quitting. Sure, it's a contributor to the greater problem of information overload, but that's not the biggest thing to me. It's the personal reasons that really get to me. I guess I just needed to realize that you didn't have to be a smug tech journalist whining through your newly whitened teeth (thanks, Google AdSense!) about the great Satan, Mark Zuckerberg, to be sick of what Facebook does to your life.



Thanks to Megumi for making me aware of this video.

With that said, I haven't quit yet. I've updated my LeechBlock settings to limit my time on Facebook, along with 4chan, Twitter, etsy, Encyclopedia Dramatica, and other sites. I'm going to take the week to post a few things to my news feed about why it's a good idea to quit Facebook, download all my photos from the site, and message friends from there to let them know other ways to contact me. And in a week I plan to quit. To delete my account. To make sure not to go back there or click any buttons on any websites to "like" or "share" things, because ANY activity, even accidental, in the two weeks following your attempt at deletion, will cause Facebook to re-activate your account. I'm not planning on letting that happen to me.

Things I Learned from my Mom

Sorry it's a bit late, but happy birthday, Mom! You're so great and I love and miss you so much.

Brussels Sprouts, Spinach, and Flowers

I won't lie, I was scared of Brussels sprouts. Because they smell terrible, look like tiny brains, and are the stuff of horrible food legend. Mom made them a lot when I was younger, but she was the only one who ate them in the house, and we all just smelled them and were sadder for it. Chris wanted us to have them because he likes them and I decided to give it a shot because I want to try new healthy foods, so we roasted them today, using this recipe. If you don't want to click the link, the gist is that you cut the sprouts in half, coat with a bit of olive oil, add salt and paper, and then roast them until they start getting brownish.

Guess what? They were delicious! They were done about 10 minutes sooner than I expected from the recipe, but they were really amazing. Chris thinks that Brussels sprouts have a similar taste to spinach, but I think it's sweeter and nuttier than the leafy greens. Speaking of, today we had some homemade spaghetti sauce on rotini pasta. Chris's mom always gives us chili and spaghetti sauce with either sausage or meatballs, and it's such an easy meal. It's also not too bad for you when you consider it's made with Catelli Smart pasta, which has similar calories but over twice the fiber of regular pasta. But I wanted more veggies, so I chopped up some spinach and tossed it into the sauce as it simmered on the stove. After about 15 minutes, the spaghetti wilted and became a great addition to the food. You don't taste an overwhelming spinachy flavor, it's just more nutrients and more texture and best of all, more food overall. 'Cause I love to eat. I imagine this would also work with white sauce, soups, and stews. We always have lots of spinach for salads and sides, so this is another way to work such an awesome, nutrient-rich food into your meals.

With that said, I have a workout to do with EASA2. As much as I'd love to think that today's great multitasking -dancing, washing dishes, and listening to Lady Gaga- constitutes sufficient calories burned, I wore my heart rate monitor and know I only burned 150 calories. But hey, it's a start! While I get changed into my workout clothes and get to sweating, I'll leave you with this video of my windowsill garden.

Little Things

My boys on the sofa.

Last night Chris and I went to see True Grit with a couple of his friends. This required eating as soon as he came home and dashing off to the movies. I made a stir-fry with carrots, broccoli, squash, snow peas, bean sprouts, and chicken I'd baked a couple days before in ginger stir-fry sauce. I was running behind, so we didn't eat any rice. While it was a really tasty dinner and I'm now cured of my acute DROWN IT IN SOY SAUCE-itus, I was nervous we'd still be hungry when we got to the movies and make iffy choices.

I'm sure you see where this is going. Sneaking food into movies is nothing new, really. I've been doing it for years, and it was pretty bad when I worked as a dollar store cashier right next to a display of movie theater candy, from Reese's Pieces to Junior Mints to my favorite, Buncha Crunch. By the end of my time there, I'd gained considerable weight from the daily sodas, movie candy, and oh, did I mention the store was directly next door to a pizza place?

This was going to be different, though. Tonight, I'd be packing (with some help from Chris while I got dressed) healthy and quiet snacks. Quiet doesn't seem like a big deal, but trust me, no one wants to be the center of attention for cracking open a Coke Zero and crunching on carrot sticks. Trust the voice of experience here. This is what we packed: 5 or six strawberries with the tops cut off, about 10 or 15 blueberries, about two inches of sliced cucumbers, and one of those light Babybel mini cheeses.

I have my bag of contraband snacks and I'm all ready to enjoy the movie!

It was great! I forgot to grab water before we left, so we still ended up paying $3 a bottle for it, but in the end it's better than $10 soda, popcorn, and candy. Plus, smug superiority over eating the right thing without feeling guilty tastes pretty great, too.

Weigh-In #1

This is exciting! It's my first weigh-in since I set my goal! So, I decided to weigh-in on Thursdays for no real reason other than I wanted to weigh-in today and I was feeling like a slacker on Tuesday. The great news is, this set me up for a full first week with a pretty great weight loss. Here it is:

181.8 pounds!

That means I've lost 4.8 pounds this week, for a total loss of 4.8 pounds since I started. Man, that kind of sentence will make a lot more sense when it's no longer the first week of weighing in. My first weight picture was taken in the middle of the day, too, so I have no doubt that part of this is just water weight, since this and future weigh-ins will be done in the morning just after getting dressed. So, what do I have to chalk this up to? How I ate, how I moved, and how I felt.

How I Ate

According to MyFitnessPal, my average calorie intake each day this week was about 1450 a day. Sunday was the highest because we had a big breakfast (fried eggs and two slices of toast with margarine) and went to Chris's parents' house, where we had a big dinner, including steak. Saturday was a bit scandalous, too, as I had McDonald's chicken mcnuggets and fries for lunch. Again, overall it was a very positive week with just two meals that stand out as especially calorie-dense, and a lot of really great choices.

All the specific foods are at my MyFitnessPal site, so I won't bother retyping them here, but I'm happy overall with both the variety and quality of the food I've been eating this week.

How I Moved

I missed an exercise this week and had to make it up the next day, but other than that I've been on track with my EA Sports Active 2 workouts, a bit of walking outside, random barbell moves while watching TV, and a little Wii Fit. According to MyFitnessPal, this week I hit 1186 calories on my Wii Fit/EA Workouts. I haven't been tracking my calories for the weights, because I've been doing them somewhat haphazardly this week. Also, I figure if I lowball my estimated exercise calories, the only thing that might come from that is a better number than expected.




I'm having a bit of ankle pain, and it's kind of stressful, but the ankle is neither swollen nor warm to the touch, signs of sprain. Hopefully this pain, which has been hanging around for over a week now, will fade in the coming days.

How I Felt

Most days are great. I am dealing with some weird anxiety about leaving the apartment, as well as little bouts of sadness, but that's kind of average for me. I'm reading a lot about nutrition and exercise, as well as watching Village on a Diet and The Biggest Loser. I'm constantly thinking about eating right and exercising. Some days I'm so excited and impressed with what I accomplish in terms of health and homemaking, and other days I just shut down and hide under a blanket all day. It's a struggle, but I feel like, even if I'm crawling, I'm going in the right direction.

Village on a Diet, and a rant about foodie elitism

I like to watch TV that reflects what I'm going through with this fitness thing. I won't lie, a big part of it is watching overweight people work out. I love it! I love watching them push past their limits and accept themselves as the athletes they can be. Also, yes, sometimes they fall off treadmills and that's pretty good, too.

In addition to The Biggest Loser, Chris and I have been watching Village on a Diet, a Canadian show about a small rural town in BC with a weight problem. 60% of its residents are overweight or obese, and many residents in the town are now working with a team of experts (a psychologist, two personal trainers, a dietitian, a doctor, and a chef) to try to lose a ton of weight in ten weeks.

Citizens of Taylor, BC, from Village on a Diet.

All in all, it's a great show. Unlike on TBL, you get to see people in their natural environment, making changes and having success, struggling with spousal indifference, and talking with a psychologist, trainer, or doctor about their struggles with their weight. The last episode cast light on issues people struggle with like childcare hassles and an unsupportive husband, a parent putting too much pressure on his overweight kid to lose weight, and adjusting expectations about the pace of weight loss. You trade the drama of competition and huge numbers for something a bit more real, if a bit less satisfying (where's my 100 lbs lost in ten weeks?).

The show has a serious weak point, though, and I'd like to see if you can find it. Here's a hint: it's in the picture below:

Who gives horrible cooking advice and plays
the invisible accordion? This guy.

What's my problem with him, besides the apron making him look like an old timey railroad conductor? He makes it all way too hard. For a majority of townspeople, dinner before the Village on a Diet crew showed up was eaten out, ordered in, or something moved from the freezer to the oven, like fries or chicken fingers. How does ol' stripey try to break the villagers into healthy eating? With wild rice with mushrooms, leeks, almonds and apple cider vinaigrette. I'm sure it's lovely. But by serving it right off the bat, along with other dishes like mango salsa, tofu kebabs, and bean and quinoa salad, Chef Jonathan Chovancek presents this all or nothing view of eating healthily that just isn't true.

You know how people who always buy prepackaged food feel about touching the raw ingredients that make up real meals?

• Fearful. What if I get salmonella from touching this?
  
• Frustrated. Why do I have to go to all this trouble when I could just open a box or a can and have a meal in just a couple minutes?
• Like failures before they even begin. I'm not a cook, why am I even trying something this out of my league? This is going to go so wrong, just like all the other times I've tried recipes.
  

I know this. I used to be scared of cooking. I can't tell you why, only that I was, and the more distance I could put between myself and the actual ingredients in my meals, the better. I congratulated myself for cooking a homemade meal when I made Hamburger Helper, and I sometimes ate fast food three times a day. I was really grossed out the first time I made anything with raw chicken in it, because it was so cold and slick and full of horrible diseases that, if not cooked the hell out of it, would kill me, or at least leave me with explosive diarrhea, right?

Here's what the chef should do:

1. Teach the citizens of Taylor about basic ways to prepare lots of veggies. Steaming, roasting, and pan-frying. Instead of presenting a few recipes with very specific ingredients and proportions, show these people, many of whom have never cooked a whole meal by themselves, a handful of ways to cook almost everything. Give them the basics to succeed.
   
2. Show them the leanest cuts of meat and how to prepare them. Again, building blocks. They don't need 23 ways to dress a Cornish game hen, just the basics about grilling, broiling, baking, and pan-frying meat.
   
3. Advise the villagers how to construct a meal. Instead of saying, "You're only supposed to have four ounces of meat on your plate!" and skipping off into the sunset, show us a balanced and filling meal and explain why it is so. Point out what has fiber, what has healthy fat (and what that even means), and why that would make you full, even without an entire rack of ribs.
   
4. Teach a lesson on herbs and spices. At this point, the people of Taylor will have basic cooking techniques down. Show them how to dress up a meal. When to add salt, how to change an entire dish with just a couple spices. Show them how easy it is to start an herb garden, but that for a lot of things, dried works well, too.
   
5. Before presenting them with the Top Five Healthiest Foods You Absolutely Must Cook Now (And if You Don't Eat Them, You're Going to Die from Obesity or at Least Vengeful Meteors), ask what they like to eat. Use their existing food preferences to guide what is presented. You'll have a lot more success that way.

I know, I know. I'm ranting. But it's stuff like this, this finicky foodie slow foods forced vegetarian antioxidant good cholesterol kale and barley and fiddlehead crap that makes it all seem so inaccessible to the average person. If you see that most residents can't make the room in their budget or schedule to go to the market, try to organize a car pool or something to get people there. Showing up with truckloads of veggies ONE TIME is a classic case of giving a man a fish, you know what I'm saying?

A huge part of getting healthier for me has involved cooking. I started from nothing. No knowledge at all. So what I'm going to do in my humble, non-foodblogger way, is present some simple recipes that will help anyone interested in cooking but freaking terrified of it jump in with simple things. I'm not a great cook! I haven't been doing this long! But I like to try new things, and as much as I've experimented, I haven't yet made anything yet that was inedible or lead to food poisoning.

I really believe that if you want to lose weight and you don't make an ungodly amount of money, you need to learn some basic cooking. In the days and weeks to come, I'll share what I know, and from there we can keep on learning, together.

Click here to buy this fantastic art print. For me.

This is hard!

Domestic Good Enough-ess.

This isn't going to be news to anyone, but getting several parts of your life on track at one time is really challenging. As I mentioned before, I'm no natural at typical homemaking duties. I struggle with prioritizing different tasks, the willpower to delay gratification ("Just five more minutes!" might be one of my top five phrases), and am not known for cleaning as I go.

A month ago, I'd started to really rock it in terms of keeping the apartment in order, crossing off things on my to-do list, and making great meals, even for company. That's when my eating fell off a cliff and I gained, well, I don't know what I gained, because I was too scared to step on the scale. Now everything has flip-flopped and I'm down a few pounds, eating and exercising like a rock star, but struggling to wash the dishes every day.

I fall prey to my internal perfectionist, the one who tells me if it's not going to be perfect, why should I even bother? The one who doesn't accept partial credit, the one for whom anything but the best is never enough. You know what? It's time to bring in the FlyLady, because that seems to be the only voice my crazy perfectionist brain will hear when it's all worked up. You ready, crazybrain? Here we go:

"Housework done incorrectly will still bless your family. It may not be done the way your Momma taught you. But it will be done. This will make your home shine and you will smile. I am so proud of you for Blessing Your Home!" - FlyLady

You hear that? Ease up! Only cleaning one corner of a room means there's that much less to do the next time you walk in there. Only having the courage to leave the house for an hour will make it that much easier to break out of the prison of anxiety the next time you feel like you really need to get out of the house. Only having the time for frozen vegetables instead of fresh is so much better than just throwing up your hands and going out to eat. Baby steps, Whitney!

Baby steps!

Back on the fatfront, today I weighed myself and I was 182.6 lbs. That's great! To be fair, I was naked, where my original weigh-in picture on Thursday was clothed, but it's encouraging! I was thinking of doing a weekly weigh-in on Thursdays, but it might be more fun to do it on Tuesdays, since September 20th is a Tuesday. Hmm. Well, I have I day to figure it out, I suppose.

The almighty marathon

Chris and I have been watching a lot of The Biggest Loser lately. It's reality trash, we know, but it's fun t watch something that reinforces our daily struggle with diet and exercise, and he also really likes to watch people cry and vomit. So far we have seasons two and ten under our belt, and right now we're watching both the current season as the episodes are uploaded to the internet, and nine.

Besides the obvious, "Wow, season two was so much more helpful (back then, the show aired the parts where the trainers talked to the contestants about nutrition, and not just to plug Subway) and realistic than season ten!" we both have a problem with the recent trend of "The Biggest Loser Marathon," a goofy way for the producers of the show to cram more human drama and pictures of sweating fatties into the season before it ends.

This is a spoiler for the season we're watching now. Shh, don't tell me
what's happening, I'm trying to squint and not see anything!

Our problem is that, as we understand it, the goal of weight-loss is not something you can do effectively while also training for a massive, grueling run. I mean, running marathons demands an intake of thousands of calories, right? And repetatively working the body in the same way will cause wear and tear on the joints while training, right? Especially for contestants who are still overweight? And a lot of the time for these contestants could be better spent building up muscle which will work to burn up calories as they close in on their goal, right?! Okay, I need to calm down.

The thing that bugs me is that, for a show that works so hard to have these dramatic, unbelievable transformations in its contestants, The Biggest Loser's producers should recognize that this unnecessary challenge at the end is hindering its participants' weight loss. Blerg. It's fun to watch people who came into the challenge weighing 400 pounds finishing a mind-boggling 26.2 miles, but it just doesn't seem consistant with the aim of the show, which incorporates overall physical fitness, but uses black and white, concrete pounds lost to determine winners and losers. Who are referred to as "losers" and "not losers" respectively. I never said the show made any sense.

Don't take my word for it, though. Here's the thoughts of someone who has completed her weight-loss journey, run multiple marathons, and also has a problem with this aspect of the show: You Don't Have to Run a Marathon.

Below zero

Well, it's often been below zero since I got to Toronto. They use the wacky Celsius system, so where your average American would call freezing 32 degrees, they call it zero. Okay, Canuks. But today, in real people measurements, it was below zero. And it felt like -13. (That's -17 feeling like -25 in Canadian.) And you're reading the blog of some genius who just spent 30 minutes in it.

So much more stoic than his human counterpart, who
can't see the camera through her frozen tears.

Chris and I just got back from the dog park with Monte. It was fun. We saw a dog we've seen there before and a couple we haven't. He got into some fights, but nothing serious, and the other owners were cool and understanding. Who cares, the story is it was way too cold and I think I'm going to have to complain to Celine Dione or someone about it.


Here's what I wore:

A hat that covered my ears
The awesome fuzzy purple scarf my aunt and uncle gave me for Christmas (thanks, guys!)
Long underwear top
Long underwear bottoms
A long-sleeved shirt
A long-sleeved sweater
A puffy ski-type jacket
My o woolies
Jeans
My big ol' winter boots
Mittens

Here's how I felt:

Like I was naked


Okay, not really. My top part was pretty well taken care of, which is good considering I looked like a puffy peach Michelan man, but my legs and feet could have used one more pair of long socks and a pair of short ones for my frozen toes, and maybe a pair of gloves under my mittens or a second pair of mittens or something. Jesus, Canada. What are you trying to pull?

New cancer news

This week, Mom and Dad talked to me on Skype to tell me that the doctors had found more cancer in Dad, this time in his brain. He's got pea and dime sized masses in his brain, but it sounds like all they're doing about this is adding an extra session of radiation to the end of two of his existing treatments they're already doing.

Dad says he feels fine and not to worry. I am, of course, worried. But what can I do? So I wait here. I'm lucky to have the opportunity to be away, to be in a different country with my boyfriend and all these new experiences, but I'm looking forward to going home to see my family again. I'm sure they don't need me, but hopefully I can help with household things, and if I can sort out some sort of transportation, get a job to help financially, too. We'll see.

Chris assures me this wouldn't work if my dad came to Canada. What does he know?

What I look like while playing EA Sports Active 2

Want to know what an obese 25 year-old looks like while playing an intense fitness game for the Wii? Of course you do! Many thanks to the helpful sadists at EA for making the game and my lovely boyfriend for photographing the whole thing.

Not all EA Sports Active 2 workouts have these exact same activities, but there's always a series of warm-up activities, a mix of cardio exercises, strength training, fun fitness activities, core moves, and a cool-down.

This was the last work-out of the first phase (of three) of the nine-week fitness program.

Warm Up:


It started innocently enough, as it always does, with some warm ups. This is me performing a windmill. On days when we perform these, we're usually asked to do eight, or four touches to each foot.


We continued warming up with a stretch the game calls a "good morning," though there's already an exercise called that that doesn't resemble it at all. Basically, the EASA2 good morning is a warm-up stretch where you lower into a squat with your hands on your feet, lift your hips and butt up, then follow by lifting your chest and arms. This next picture is of the end of the stretch, where you lift your arms above your head and stretch back a bit.


I wish this warm-up was performed a bit slower on the screen, as I occasionally find myself hurrying to catch up with my in-game trainer, who seems to move a little unnaturally quickly. You can also see our bench and barbell in the background.

The Workout:


Next, I was challenged to a sprint against three in-game competitors. Two of your fellow runners tend to have a rather slow and steady pace, while the third, your trainer, tends to speed up and slow down right around your character no matter how quick you're doing. In this shot, I'm sprinting at the very end to beat my trainer. It's amazing how competitive I am against fake, video game people!

There are a lot of straight-up cardio activities in this game, including running in place, but I love the intensity of the races. It elevates a basic calorie-burning exercise into a more intense activity in which the heart rate is elevated more than it would be because you just want to win the race.

Here I'm performing an alternating reverse lunge. These are ROUGH! Especially in the middle of a workout that's lower-body intensive, these can be serious killers. Unlike with the traditional lunge, these require you to step backward, and seem much more reliant on balance. Phase one of the EASA2 nine-week program asks participants to do 16 reps of this, eight for each leg.


Sorry for the blurring in this picture, but this a typical shot of me performing what is perhaps my least favorite exercise, mountain climbers. These are evil. With that fact out of the way, it really is great to see how much I've improved in these. The game calls this activity cardio, but it feels a lot more like a rapidly performed bodyweight-based strength-training move. From the push-up position, one moves his or her legs up and. down in alternating steps. It's like some kind of nightmare bending over lunge. But I'm getting better! I haven't cried during mountain climbers in a week at least. Yaaaaaay!


More lunges! This is a shot of me performing a side lunge, which was only one of 16 or so I had to perform during this exercise. Not much to say about this picture other than that I look like a total badass, and rightly so.


Another blurry cardio shot! In this picture, I'm performing foot fires, a pretty fun exercise where one pops from the ball of one foot to another rapidly. The game isn't 100% accurate in gauging exactly how many bounces you've performed from one foot to another, but you're aiming for 180 recorded foot fires, in this phase of the workout plan.


This is part one of a squat jump, a wicked exercise that utilizes the lower-body killing move of the squat with an explosive jump. I don't remember exactly how many of these I performed (because I was dying), but I think it was around 12.


I'm mountainboarding! This is such a fun and punishing fitness activity. In this exercise, you squat to move your on-screen character down the mountain quicker, jump from one side to another to grind down a rail and collect medallions for points, jump over barriers, and run once you hit parts of the mountain that are uphill. It's intense. In many cases, you're holding a squat for five to ten seconds, jumping, holding another long squat, and jumping again for as many as eight times before you get a "break" to RUN UP A MOUNTAIN. It sounds crazy, but after holding squats alternating with precisely-timed jumps, you're begging to stand up straight and run.


How sleek, sexy, and capable do I look here, huh? I know, I'm looking a bit rough, but at this point I've burned over 200 calories and am being forced to do one of my least favorite things: core work. In this shot I'm performing a leg lift, an exercise that wouldn't be so awful if, when asked to put my legs back down, I wasn't instructed by the game to hover them above the darn ground while waiting to lift my legs again.

Cool Down:



Pretzels! This is part of the four-part cool-down process of the workout. Since this workout, I've started doing my pretzels sitting up more and with my leg closer into my body. The stretch, which I'm not really crazy about (but looks so cool, am I right?) feels more effective that way.

It's Over!


Yaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay! I finished phase one! Just two more (more difficult) phases to go! The game awards milestones for certain achievements, from hitting certain amounts of calories burned to time spent working out in the game. It's like "achievements" that gamers earn playing regular games on the XBox. It's satisfying to collect these, like this one I got for completing phase one.


Glug glug glug! Workout over!

So what do you think? Sound like the kind of exercise you'd like to do, or game you'd like to play? Anyone else hate mountain climbers as much as I do?