Buffy & eBay

I’m taking a night off from the gym because after two really hard workouts Saturday and yesterday, I’m sore all over and I wouldn’t be able to get much of anything meaningful accomplished other than going through a lot of unnecessary pain. The workouts on this program require a couple of rest days during the week and today is one of them. Back at it tomorrow.

I tried to record Land of the Dead last night but I came home to find it not on the DVR. Even though I’m guaranteed to not like the movie I still need to see it for zombie reasons, but I’ll have to get my undead fix by watching Season 1 of Buffy the Vampire Slayer.

Molly brought home the DVDs she borrowed from a friend at work and we started watching them this weekend. I never watched this when it was on, but it’s a really good show. This season is pretty cartoonish, complete with amateurish monster costumes, ridiculous plots, and predictable characters, but it’s pretty compelling to watch (partially due to the undeniable presence of Sarah Michelle Gellar in her prime).  I throughly enjoy this show.

The villains on Season 1 Buffy are hilarious. Between the She-Mantis, Robot Gremlin, demon hyenas, and the collection of ever-present clay-faced vampires, it’s pretty hysterical. I also find it funny and kind of disturbing that before Buffy arrived at Sunnydale High, all these supernatural happenings and dead students were going on unchecked. Every episode a student or teacher is murdered by a ghoul of some sort. After watching enough of these episodes, I cannot help but be grateful that Plymouth North evaded all this mayhem.

I spent the day on eBay yesterday gauging the XBox 360 market. After trying to buy Madden 09 for my poor little GameCube yesterday only to discover that they don’t even make it for the Cube anymore, I’ve come to the realization that my system is obsolete and it’s time to upgrade. That meddlesome girl I’m marrying told me to wait until the wedding before making any major purchases, but she’s not the boss of me. I looked on eBay to find a used or wholesale 360 and determined that $150 is what I’ll have to spend to acquire this beautiful piece of machinery. I decided to place a couple of bids at $100, not thinking I would either one. I went to the gym and came home to find that I had in fact won the first XBox, only to read the fine print and see “for parts or repair.” I wrote the guy asking to get out of the sale and he angrily obliged. The second system came down to the wire as I was less than 1 minute from winning it for $108. Since I never intended to actually buy anything, I’m glad those close calls went the other way. I’ll get one in a couple months, unless I become an eBay loose cannon again.

Chest + Rambling

Yesterday at work actually went pretty well. I did the new evals while giving the new therapist most of the treatments for the day, which left me by myself most of the time and I got a lot done. So while not perfect, the work week is off to a good start.

Chest last night was really good, too:

inclines:

• 135 x 12 x 2 (warm-up)
• 170 x 3 x 1 (easy)
• 195 x 3 (4 with spot) x 1

declines:

• 135 x 12 x 2 (warm-up)
• 185 x 6 x 1
• 215 x 2 x 1 (actually pretty hard, but I left a couple reps in the tank)
• 230 x 3 (4 with spot) x 1 (surprised I got that much)

flat dumbbells:

• 65s x F x 5

incline Hammer Strength machine:

• 135 x 12 x 1 (warm-up)
• 185 x 7 x 1
• 185 x 6 x 1
• 185 x 5 x 1

dips:

• bodyweight x F x 3

Numbers went up on the major stuff, though I still don’t know if I should be doing more volume, which is why I threw in some more incline stuff at the end. At this rate, in a month I should be done 215 for sets of 3 on incline and 245 for sets of 3 on decline. Not quite my old form of 245 on incline and 275 on decline, but it’s getting there.

Other News and Notes:

• I’ve been coughing my lungs out since Friday despite physically feeling better from the weekend. I don’t know what this is but it doesn’t feel like a regular cold. A lot of people at work have been sick. The cough is brutal.

• Jaylynn called in sick Sunday, so later on that day we saw Dark Knight. Definitely a very good (not sure I want to call it ‘great’) movie and Heath Ledger was awesome. The more time that passes from seeing it, the more amazing his performance was. All I can talk about right now is Batman and Batman villains. I sound like a child. “…and Batman did this and this and this, and he can do this and this, and he has the Batcycle which does this and this…” Molly and I have been hypothesizing and reading rumors about the next movie in the series and who could be the villain. The two I’ve read so far are Daniel Day Lewis as The Riddler (not happening) and Philip Seymour Hoffman as The Penguin (brilliant!). Despite that it’s all I want to talk about, I still think I’m in the camp of the movie almost living up to the hype.

• Some trailers I’m excited for: Watchmen and The Day The Earth Stood Still. Definitely in a sci-fi mode.

• I don’t think I’m going to go into work till 9:30 today when I have a patient scheduled. I just want to relax for a bit.

• Listening to so much Lil Wayne recently, both Carter II and Carter III. It took me a while to buy him as a great rapper, especially since my only real exposure to him since “Tha Block is Hot” and “Get Off The Corner” were his garbage verses on Kanye’s “Barry Bonds” and Jay-Z’s “Hello Brooklyn 2.0.” However in anticipation for my New Orleans trip I figured I’d get reacquainted with Lilweezyana, and man is he good. I still don’t quite get why Time is writing features about him and I don’t know how he sold 1.1 million albums in a week, but I’m now in the Pro-Weezy community.

• I’m about 50 pages away from finishing Jared Diamond’s Collapse, a book I’ve spent the better part of a month trying to get through. It’s about this close to reading a textbook, but it’s still pretty interesting. It makes me feel smart.

So that’s about it in my recent world. As you can see, nothing earth-shattering. Back and a little biceps tonight.

American Screw Job

America, you really screwed the pooch on this one.  Michael Johns is a star.  He was robbed on Thursday night.

Your king will be crowned soon, America, but he will sit on a throne of lies.  It is clear that the Archuleta Juggernaut cannot be stopped. While he can sing reasonably well, if you look away from the TV during his songs he sounds like a mediocre Usher without any personality.  The real entertainment world will eat him alive.  He has that weird home-school-Scientology vibe to him, and I pray and pray for his downfall.

Not to mention having to suffer another week of the Kristy Lee Cook Era.  That nightmare should have ended weeks ago.

For shame, America.

A Valid Reason for Renewed Commitment to the Gym…

…is pictured above.

Jaylynn and I booked our honeymoon on Saturday at AAA.  We are going to Sandals Grande St. Lucian Spa & Beach Resort for a week on October 14, two days after we get married and we’re super-excited.  We spent over two hours at the travel agency waiting for an obnoxious family who was taking up everyone’s time, but once we finally got to the desk, we sealed the deal in about 20 minutes.  Our trip is all-inclusive and very affordable compared to others we’ve seen.   Before deciding on this I was pretty apathetic about choosing the honeymoon spot (my only real job so far for the wedding plans), because as I’ve always thought, “a warm beach is a warm beach.”  However, after reading about the night clubs, scuba diving, golf courses,  restaurants, and other all-around awesome stuff, I’m psyched.  This is great motivation to get back in gear and get on a structured gym program.  There are (I think) 32 weeks left before this trip.  That is plenty of time to reach my goals.

Speaking of goals, I weighed 195 yesterday morning! After hovering around the 198 mark for a few weeks, I’m down another couple of pounds.  It’s sort of surprising given that I’ve felt pretty sick and only worked out Monday and Tuesday of this week, but I guess I’ve been pretty good about TNT.  The nicer this weather gets, the nicer I feel.  Onward and upward.

Watched 3:10 to Yuma yesterday and it was only ok.  I guess it’s my own fault for not knowing what the movie was going to be about.  I just assumed Christian Bale and Russell Crowe were in rival posses trying to take over a ghost town.  Also re-watched The Da Vinci Code and was reminded that it’s pretty entertaining despite being the worst-acted movie I’ve ever seen.

Watching the Suns and Spurs.  I’ll be back at the gym tomorrow.

Wednesday Night

6:35 PM: Just got back from work, tired, pissed off about the possibility of snow on Friday afternoon (I swear, if this interferes with our weekend at Park Plaza, I’m going to kill someone). I haven’t been to the gym since Monday and I worked later than I was planning. I am going to an orientation in Andover tomorrow morning at 9:30 AM so I wanted to make sure all my paperwork was in order for when Chris covers for me tomorrow at Bourne. Actually a pretty good day, it just interfered with my workout plans. I just begrudgingly put on my gym clothes and grabbed my iPod, I’m headed to the gym and will hopefully be back in time for American Idol (never thought I’d say that). Hopefully my mood will improve by the time I get home.

8:34 PM: Home, in a slightly better mood, watching Idol, eating an omelet.  Slogged my way through a basic upper-body routine, 4 sets of 10 for chest, back, shoulders, and traps.  Nothing to write home about, I barely broke a sweat.  It felt like one of my old workouts from college and I can’t imagine how I made any gains that way.  But, as it has been lately, something is better than nothing and I didn’t want to go but made myself go through with it.  A moral victory.

Weekend

After my big weigh-in Friday morning I’ve celebrated by eating everything in sight.  Not quite, but a little cake here, some pizza there, some wine pretty much all the time…I’ll be okay, I had fun.

Friday night was a miserable drive to MGH IHP for Jaylynn’s graduating class’ get-together.  I missed made the wrong turn twice (I won’t say whose fault that was, but I’ll give a hint: She’s 5′3″, brown hair, and recently had knee surgery), and got there 45 minutes late.  I am the worst Boston driver in the history of Boston drivers and I fear the day I have to do it again.  Good time at the party, though.  A couple glasses of wine and dinner at the Tavern on the Water.

On Saturday Jaylynn and I actually did something on our date instead of going to the movies or reading magazines: We went bowling in Shrewsbury.  I started off well, beating her 115-78 in the first game, but then the wheels fell off and I had one of the worst collapses in modern sports.  I lost the next two games after rolling gutter ball after gutter ball, while she stayed relatively consistent.  I’ve always been a terrible bowler but I had myself fooled during that first game.  I’ll get her next time.  Next Saturday we’re apparently making pottery at a place in Worcester.

We had dinner at our favorite restaurant, Amici’s Trattoria in Shrewsbury, and spent the entire $75 gift card her parents got me for Christmas.  I had a nice Pinot Noir, buffalo chicken pizza, and a caramel-covered cannoli called “The Dynamite Stick.”  It was awesome, I love going to Amici’s.  Next time we’re going to do the steakhouse next door.  I love me some steaks.

We also watched The Bourne Ultimatum last night, and while it wasn’t a total clunker, I was really bored.  How many times do we have to watch Matt Damon try to find out his past (and by the way, didn’t we figure that out by the end of the first movie?) and get into car chases in New York City before people stop seeing these films? I thought The Bourne Identity was a great movie, The Bourne Supremacy was forgettable (evidenced by the fact that I forget most of what happened in it), and Ultimatum wasn’t anything really different than those two.  The only real difference is the city where all the shit happens and the CIA chief who is trying to kill him.  First it was Zurich and Chris Cooper, then India and the blond, and now this guy with glasses in New York.  I’ll put money on The Bourne Legacy being a series of car chases in the Czech Republic and somebody like Willem Defoe will want Bourne in a body bag by sundown.  That’s my Pontiac Prediction of the Week.

Back to the gym and work tomorrow.  I’m drinking a ton of water, getting a good night’s rest, and doing whatever I want to in terms of working out.

Christmas Time is Here

All my shopping is done.  This is where I keep reminding myself that I have a real job now and will be making real money in 9 days, because I spent more than I thought.

I need to step up my holiday movie-watching.  Usually by this time I’ve watched Love, Actually and at least a few of the clay-mation ones on TV, but I’ve been slacking.  While I own the DVD, I’ve never actually seen It’s a Wonderful Life, so I should probably watch that.  The Holiday was a surprisingly good movie last year, I’d like to see that again.

Going to a Christmas party tonight which is (for some reason) Sinatra-themed. I’m all for Blue Eyes, and I assume we will just be wearing suits listening to the Rat Pack’s Christmas album.  No problem with that.

Seeing as how I’m in no mood for health or fitness (I guess the holiday spirit has sucked it right out of me), I’ve eaten a couple Christmas cookies and haven’t worked out the last two days. I knew I wouldn’t be able to hold out, so I just need to make sure I don’t go crazy with them. One peanut butter blossom from breakfast is enough.  I have no desire to work out, so maybe I will take this week as my off week as opposed to next.  I just need to eat reasonably.  I’m not going to get to my 200-pound goal regardless, there just isn’t enough time left and I’m still 205.  I’ve had to look at my diet and really look at what needs improving.  I don’t think Adam’s Diet is really working out for me (the post-workout shakes just have too much sugar), so that means either the TNT or Abs Diets after New Year (I said that the TNT Diet is an update of Adam’s Diet, and from what I hear the first phase of it has no carbs during the workout window.  Six weeks of that could mean some serious fat loss).  Here’s to not gaining 10 pounds in the next 10 days.

Happy holidays.

Sunday

Lousy weather here in Massachusetts. 6 inches of snow Thursday, 5 inches this morning, non-stop rain ever since.  I’m surprised and thankful that my bedroom isn’t flooded.

Nothing really fitness-related today, though the new episode of The FitCast gets posted later tonight so I’m looking forward to that.  If I decide to get crazy I could do another bodyweight workout tonight; it’s only 6:17 PM right now even though it feels like 10:00 PM.  I had two cheat meals in the last two days (Olive Garden last night, turkey and stuffing tonight) which brings the weekly total to three.  As full and bloated as I feel right now, along with a giant insulin spike, it was a very successful week in terms of fitness.  Back to the gym tomorrow morning.

I’m listening to a couple of Bob Marley songs over and over, as I saw I Am Legend last night and two of his songs were prominently featured.  As for the film, I thought it was a terrifying, emotive, excellent movie.  It’s the kind of movie where the person in the theater experiences every emotion the main character feels. I know I’ve said I’m a total sucker for anything zombie/apocalypse-related, and this definitely did it for me.  I’m also a sucker for movies that feature my dog.

I think I will practice some single-leg squats before I go to bed.

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Now playing: Bob Marley – Redemption Song
via FoxyTunes

In Keeping Secrets of Silent Earth: 300

I used to link to the Lord the Rings/IKSOSE:3 mash-up before, but I think this is much better, despite the bad audio editing in the middle.

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Now playing: Coheed & Cambria – In Keeping Secrets Of Silent Earth: 3
via FoxyTunes

I Am Legend

I want to see this movie, but I really want to read the book.  I’m a sucker for any End of Days/Zombie/Vampire media, and this involves all three.  Plus, is this or is this not the scariest book cover you’ve ever seen?

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Now playing: Jonathan Katz – “HEY WE’RE BACK” Episode 4
via FoxyTunes