Getting Pumped

Summer break is here and I am loooooving all of the free time I have.  At the end of the school year I was really looking forward to the summer and planning all of the great research I was going to get done.  I was thinking that it didn't make sense how I didn't really get anything done last summer.  How could all that time fly by?  Then summer hit and I remembered that it can fly by very quickly with lots of non-work related things!

With all of this new free time I have decided to work on a few non-work things that I have been letting slide.  The first* is getting in shape/getting healthy/losing weight.  This is a constant issue running through the back of my mind, but when I get busy I let it drop pretty quickly.  As I mentioned here before, this spring I really did try to diet and do Jillian Michael's 30 Day Shred program.  I was pretty good at it for a while, and I was getting back into shape a bit.  But eventually, like all things, I faded away from it.  I also got discouraged because over two or three months of really dieting and kinda working out I only lost 5 pounds.  I promptly gained those 5 pounds back on my trip to Austin.  (Hmm, I never wrote those vacation blog posts.)  It just seems so futile to work so hard for so little result.  Yes, I know it is about being healthy and feeling better and blah blah, but I want to see results too!

So now that the school year is over I decided to join a gym.  This is actually the first time in my life I have joined a gym, since I have always been a student and had access to school gyms or apartment gyms.  As a faculty member I have to pay $100 per semester to use the gym on campus, and I just never signed up.  Rather than doing that I opted to join a local gym instead.  I decided that I didn't want to deal with seeing my students, and I like taking aerobics classes which would surely be all students.  (Remember this is a small campus, I already run into students everywhere.)  The downside is that gyms are expensive!  It is $40 a month!  There are some slightly cheaper options around, but they all involve driving 15-30 minutes, which isn't going to happen.  My gym is a locally owned place in town and I can walk there in 5 minutes.  Hopefully the expense will keep me going.

I joined about a week ago and so far it has been good.  It isn't super crowded and most of the other patrons are older or like me.  In other words, I don't feel like a fat lazy blob compared to sorority girls and bodybuilders.  I haven't yet done the aerobics classes because I cannot get on a schedule at all with the summer freedom**, but I've peeked at them and they look good.  Every so often I do notice a young man about the premises, and it makes me wonder how on Earth anyone can actually flirt at a gym.  I am all makeupless and sweaty and stinky, my boobs are all squished down, and there is certainly no spandex anywhere on my body to showcase my physique.  Alas.

With my membership I get two free sessions with a personal trainer, and I had my first one this morning.  I was imagining a Biggest Loser style beat down, but it was actually much nicer.  We spent most of the time on the machines with her showing me the proper technique and things.  The main difference compared to what I do on my own was the amount of weight we were using.  I tend to use lower weights and do bunches of reps.  She had me on heavier weights, doing only 12 reps, with the goal that the last two reps were really really hard to finish.  She says that I should focus on building up muscle because that will help my metabolism get going.  Hopefully that's what I've been doing wrong since I usually do focus more on cardio.  Even without cardio by the end of the hour I was definitely sweaty and lightheaded.  On the plus side, my trainer thought I was about 21-22 years old until I told her that I was a professor***.  Go me!

So my new aim is to walk to the gym regularly.  And if I want to be really awesome I will then walk to the grocery store across the street to get fresh and healthy food to take home for dinner afterward.  This is not likely to happen regularly, but I did manage it once so far.  However, I also walk past two pizza places and two ice cream shops (as well as Burger King and McDonald's, but those don't appeal to me) on my way, and I have succumbed to both of those already as well.

In addition to the gym I also think I'll join a local nature preserve (yes, we have to pay to be in nature, and it ain't cheap) and go for regular hikes and I also want to start up swimming again. (Again, I have to pay to join the local pool,**** but there's an old lap pool on campus I can use for free during restricted hours.  Exercising is expensive!)  By the end of the summer I should be super buff!*****


* Stay tuned for future posts about the other summer projects.
** Making a schedule is largely inhibited by the fact that I have been sleeping like crazy.  I mean, like more sleep than seems possible.  I have been sleeping for a good 12-13 hours a night, and when I set my alarm clock to only 9-10 hours I am groggy all day.  What??  Getting out of bed around noon makes it tough to actually go do anything productive that day.  Hopefully this is school-year rebound and I will get back on track soon.
*** Familiar conversation: "Professor of what?" "Physics and Astronomy." "Wow, you must be smart."  I never know how to respond to this.  I have decided to go with the not at all humble, "Yes, I am smart."
**** We have both a town-owned and county-owned pool nearby and both of them charge residents for use!  As a homeowner who pays a ridiculous amount of taxes this outrages me.  I cannot figure out what in the world my taxes go to besides the police department (we have a volunteer fire department) and the little decorations they put on the utility poles down main street.
***** I don't really have anything to add, I am just amusing myself with all of these footnotes.