March 2007 Archives
Finally, some drama up in our neighborhood. Although I haven't been home yet (and apparently it's going to be like the good old days where I'm walking from 23rd street up to 116th), I'm pretty sure this building is just around the corner from our apartment so Tink and Ding should be just fine but I bet they got the cat pee scared out of them...and then I bet one of the little darlings puked from the anxiety. Such is life with the two girls.
The beloved Dell I bought four years ago has, for the recent past, been acting up in not-fun ways. It would suddenly stop in the middle of several programs, freeze, then switch over to a blue screen which wasn't exactly the Blue Screen of Death since I could reboot and get everything back on line (note: though now that I look at the picture accompanying the Wiki entry, that's exactly what my screen looks like, so maybe I am getting the BSOD). Annoying but I could live with it. Of course I've been quietly backing up everything onto and external hard drive and burning DVD's to make sure when the system finally craps out, I haven't really lost much. But in the past month, my reboots don't always take on the first or second time and this past weekend, it took me six times to get the reboot to take and the system to start up.
As a last ditch effort, I decided to go ahead and wipe out the hard-drive and reinstall the XP operating system this weekend, so I gathered all my disks and notes from previous OS installs and sat down with a big cup of coffee to have at it...only to be told, succinctly, via a black screen of ass, that damage to one of the partitioned drives wouldn't allow me to reinstall the OS. Fucker. And that was that. My skills at PC-doctoring only go so far and reinstalling an OS is about as far as I go. My only conclusion is that my C: drive is and has been damaged and there is nothing I can do about it. Weighing options and being completely afraid of Windows Vista horror stories (and lets be honest, nothing has been more effective then the I'm a Mac/I'm a PC Apple commercials for scaring the bejeezus out of PC users), Jeff and I are making the switch. We ordered this 20" gorgeous piece of heaven yesterday.
We took in '300' this evening. My. God. So many ab-tastic dudes walking around in leather speedo's and harnesses, and Gerard Butler as King Leonides in a beard. Yeah there was blood and gore for the other men in the audience but for us, it was all about men in underwear 'cause we're just that shallow.
It's unfortunate to report that I am that guy in the beginner yoga class I started last week. I wanted to be the A+ student, the one who, without any previous training, is able to do amazing poses and be in total sync with my body and breathing. I wanted to be that favorite pupil to the instructors; the no-bother, no-worry student. But no...I'm none of those things. I'm the class SWEATER. After the first ten minutes of our Sun Salutation, I look like I've been hosed down by the NYC Fire Department. Seriously, I've never thought of myself as an overtly persperate kind of guy but something is happening because I'm simply drenched by the end of class...and everyone notices!
When I mentioned to the instructor who walked by to re-pose me in Downward Dog that I was sweating like a pig and sliding all over the mat, he very kindly let me know that was just my body getting rid of all the unhealthy toxins and it was natural. Toxins, what? I've been on the most healthy diet for the past six weeks and haven't put a scrap of crap in me since January and I'm detoxing from what, exactly? So I'm not liking the detox line, but I appreciated him not saying how gross I was.
This week was even worse then last week though I did manage to bring a towel with me that I used frequently. My Downward Dog is a bit better but my Warrior 1 needs some major work. I can't be the bow and arrow when my inflexible, tight unworked 36-year old arms don't bend like that, McFlexible. I know the other class members were still just agog at the river pouring off me but I felt a little more in control AND I did lose about two pounds of water weight by yesterday morning which I've since put right back on, so there is that. Hi, I'm Beau and I'm a sweater.
I'm at the end of my six-week Abs Diet program today. I did my final weigh-in (unofficial since I'm weighing myself and not for any non-judgmental, unbiased person) to see where I stand this morning...to see if this damn thing actually worked at all. Of course the irrational worry is that I'm doing all this work and nothing is happening which I know isn't true because I can actually get some fingers in my 34-inch Levi's without sucking in the gut (and I do love slipping some fingers in my pants every now and again). On the other side of the spectrum is the irrational frustration that I'm working my fucking ass off and only getting this far? I mean, WTF? I work extremely hard in a difficult, challenging, frustrating management position and am compensated accordingly so it's a little shocking that in six weeks, I'm not down to 138lbs with rippling abs. Unrealistic, I know but that's where my head is.
In the last six weeks, I've lost 10lbs bringing me down to 198lbs or 1/3 to 1/4 of where I want to be, depending on the day. I had been shooting for losing 2lbs a week to get me to 196 by now so I'm marginally disappointed in my end weight but on the plus side, losing any weight and getting fit is most important and I embrace it. Also, my diet needed very little tweaking which might account for the slower weight-loss I've had these past weeks. I was not starting from a 3-Cokes, 14 cookies, and a can of frosting-day diet. I had a pretty sensible diet with some fast-food issues around dinner time that needed attention as well as adding daily exercise. I'm looking now into reassessing the good carbs I'm taking in to possibly exchange and reduce them further, focusing on more protein.
My original goal of 170 was based around the BMI chart but my general opinion, based on what I'm seeing in the mirror, is that I need to seriously reassess at 180lbs before losing anything else. I like a little meat on a man and I have no interest in being ectomorphic for the sake of getting down to 170lbs. I still have a buddha belly but it seems incredible to me to think that I'm could still be carrying an extra 30lbs. Maybe I'm in denial or maybe I'd feel differently if I had quickly dropped 15lbs over the last six weeks but reassessment around 180 is pertinent, I think.
Additionally, I'm moving out of obsessing over the weight goals. They're good to have but I'm focused more now on what I generally look like. The waist and stomach are definitely disappearing and the muscles are growing. Jeff caught me several times flexing in the mirror to stare at the arms, shoulders, pecs that seem to be taking some definition right now. I do kinda get hard looking at myself so there is that.
So it's all good with me right now. I feel terrific, centered, focused, and healthful. We're six months out from the Big Gay Cruise and I'm heading into what is typically seen as a good growth period in terms of working out. I've always read that the first month or two using weights is really nothing more than waking up the muscles. I expect to see some visible growth and increased strength as well as increased cardiac capacity (God willing, I'm tired of feeling like I'm going to puke after 30 seconds of jumping jacks). I'm also just into my 8-week high-intensity interval training which is suppose to melt pounds like butter in a hot skillet so I'll be interested to see how that pans out as well as starting my escalating density training with weights which is suppose to produce some significant muscle gains over the course of the next eight weeks. Add in a modest decrease in carbs and I think my next goal date, April 27th, should show some significant progress. Even at an expected, steady 1.5 - 2lbs a week, I could potentially be almost to the low 180's and with time to reassess how much I want to molest myself on a daily basis. The test will be putting on a white t-shirt and seeing if I have a perky ridge of moobs with the arm-holes straining around the guns.
The Big Gay Cruise. Big because it spans 17 days from the end of August until mid-September this year. Gay because we've booked ourselves on Atlantis Events Gay Cruise line, and cruise because we're going to be on a Royal Caribbean ship with 2000 other homos. Big Gay Cruise. Pretty self explanatory.
Jeff's turning 40 this fall and we've been planning on doing something big for several years though we weren't sure what, exactly. He's always mentioned wanting to go to Greece and over the years, several people have mentioned putting a trip together out of southern Spain and heading towards Greece. Then, after taking several cruises and finding that cruising totally fits our lifestyle, we started hunting Mediterranean cruises that fit us. Someone suggested taking a gay cruise which initially we ruled out because has anyone seen the brochures for those cruises? Abs! Abs! Abs! And then some Pecs! Who needs that kind of pressure? But more people discounted the brochures as nothing more than gay marketing and assured us that gay cruises are fun and fantastic from start to finish. We started hunting around and found two possible cruises for us on Atlantis Events: The Spain, Italy, and Greece cruise or the Greece, Turkey, Venice cruise. What to do? How do we decide?
We didn't have to decide on one or the other. In a rare flash of inspiration and folly, I suggested to Jeff about putting the two cruises together in one, fantastic, mega trip since the two cruises sail back to back and the first ends where second begins. What could be more amazing? The idea was quickly crushed though because of work responsibilities and other assorted details and my heart was broken. I could just see how amazing this trip could have been but Jeff had ruled it out and so, moping, I resumed my search for something practical and within our time constraints.
But the seed had been planted and in a few weeks, Jeff and managed to rearrange his schedule and get the necessary time off and the trip was ON! We booked it in January and immediately started going to the gym with lofty goals of many pounds to lose, abs to find, and pecs to build. And now the research begins for all the stops: Barcelona, Valencia, Ibiza, Florence, Rome, Santorini, Athens, Mykonos, Rhodes, Kusadasi, Istanbul, Corfu, Split, and Venice in 17 days on a big ship with 2000 raging homosexuals. Woohoo!
