Month: March 2022

Treadmill workout 129: The effect of after-affects

UPDATE, April 2, 2022: As it turned out, I was probably already suffering from COVID-19 during this workout, so that probably had a wee bit of an effect on my performance, too. See here.

Here it is three days since I ran the 5K on Monday, and it is still affecting my workout performance. I am clearly not the iron man I thought I was. The solution is, I suppose, to run more.

But in the meantime there is today and on the positive side, I was able to run at the regular speed without my legs calling me nasty names, as well as do my now-usual 5K instead of the previous workout’s mere 3K. The downside was just generally being slower, as I’m obviously still not fully recovered from Monday. I am tentatively planning on running a 5K at the river tomorrow, but we’ll see if that happens and how it goes. The weather looks like it might be soggy, and I’m not sure if I’m prepared to run and suffer both sore muscles and rainfall.

As of today, I completed the month of March with 33 workouts. Pretty good! Note that a few were just outdoor walks where I’m walking at my usual manly pace, so not exactly beefing up the legs or anything. Still, averaging more than one per day is something I’m not likely to replicate reguarly.

Stats:

Speed: 6.5
Incline: 5

Pace: 8:51/km (8:49/km)
Time: 48:43 (47:05)
Distance: 5.50 km (5.34 km)
Calories burned: 478 (335)
BPM: 130 (120)

Book review: Gotta Read It!

Gotta Read It!: Five Simple Steps to a Fiction Pitch that Sells by Libbie Hawker

My rating: 3 of 5 stars

This short book is about pitches. The story kind, not the baseball kind. I got it as part of a book bundle and I love short books, so I dove in.

And it’s fine. Hawker provides plenty of her own pitches as examples and while it may seem ego-driven at a glance, it’s nice in that there is an authenticity to the pitches. She’s not “writing to the crowd”, she’s providing examples of work she has relied on directly to help sell her novels.

The writing style is light and the book can be finished in an afternoon, all the better to apply the lessons therein. I don’t foresee myself making use of it much with my own writing, but for those who may need to work on and use pitches, this is a concise and worthy resource.

View all my reviews

Weight loss report, March 2022: Up 0.3 pounds

Yes, I was up slightly. Boo and all that.

Early in the month I was tracking downward, then mid-month something shifted and the trend reversed. I’m not entirely sure what happened, as I totally for real did not start scarfing bags of cookies. The trend then began going back down in the final week until a weird 1.1 pound gain overnight and then stalled, so for the month overall it was basically treading water. Or retaining water.

And that got me thinking. Because I’ve worked out nearly every day this month, is it possible I could be gaining a bit of muscle mass? I went to grab the cloth measuring tape to find out, but it has vanished, so I’ll need to get a replacement, then read up on where exactly to measure (that’s what she said :drumroll:).

My sub-quest to reach 160 pounds by June 1st is thus more difficult now, as there are 61 days and 17.7 pounds between now and then. To hit that number, I need to lose an average of 0.29 pounds per day, or just over two pounds per week. Two pounds may not sound like much but again, look over the last month. I should have lost about eight pounds and gained 0.3 instead. Oops.

So for April my plan is thus:

  • Continue to workout like a madman, or at least someone who works out a lot
  • Swear off all snacking save for the following items:
    • Bananas
    • Other types of fruit I am not currently consuming
    • Vegetables

Easy peasy! I’ll report back in a month, when I will no doubt be…

169.7 pounds–or less!

Ho ho.

One tiny bit of good news: The 0.3 pound gain did not offset the 0.4 pound loss of February, so I am still down overall for the year to date.

Stats:

Weight:

January 1, 2022: 180.6 pounds
Current: 172.4 pounds

Year to date: Down 8.2 pounds

April 1: 177.0 pounds
April 30: 172.4 pounds (down 4.6 pounds)

Body fat:

January 1: 23.2% (42.1 pounds of fat)
April 30: 20.8% (36 pounds of fat--down 6.1 pounds)

The day after the day after (and bonus pandemic update)

The sun was out, so I asked my legs for permission to walk to the mall (a 30-minute walk). My legs were, “All right, but we reserve the right to yell at you in all caps later if it turns out to be a bad idea.” But it was fine. The leg muscles are still sore, but in a distant sort of way. I can feel the soreness, but it’s buried down below.

While at the mall, I contemplated getting something to eat at the food court–how post-pandemic of me! Except in the end, I couldn’t find anything that grabbed me, and skipped it.

And speaking of the pandemic (queue segue music)…

The Omicron variant wave is ending, and we’ve been without a mask mandate for just under three weeks now. A few days in the past week have seen hospitalizations in BC go up (though they did drop today) and looking around the world, it appears that another surge is all but guaranteed, this time courtesy of the Omicron sub-variant BA.2 (“The most infectious variant yet! For now.”) During BC’s now-diminishing Omicron wave, we saw:

  • A high degree of vaccination
  • A wide public mask mandate
  • Caseloads go through the roof anyway. Basically, everyone ended up knowing someone who got infected with COVID-19
  • Hospitalizations managed to stay below critical levels, though

Now, with an even more contagious sub-variant taking hold and the mask mandate lifted, what will happen? I figure a lot of people will get infected again, hospitalizations will go up again, then peak before going critical, and the wave will subside in time for summer.

If the pandemic continues as it has for the past two years, we’ll get a very brief respite before yet another wave starts with a new variant that can infect people who just happen to exist at the same time as the virus or something. I mean, I don’t know. It all seems kind of silly and unending now.

My new hope (“Help me, Obi Wan!”) is that the pandemic will be considered effectively over, even if COVID-19 is not gone, by the end of this year. That would be nice. I like nice things.

Treadmill workout 128: Baby steps

After making myself so very sore (see previous post), I opted to do a more namby-pamby version of my usual treadmill workout. At first I thought I’d just do a 30-minute workout and keep everything else the same, but when the treadmill ticked up to its full 6.5 speed, my legs said WHAT ARE YOU DOING WE ARE STILL VERY SORE. So I turned it down to 6 instead, which meant for a mellower, more soothing workout in which I sweated just a little. This is reflected in the stats below.

Since I was more limber by the time I did this workout (at around 8:30 p.m.) I’m hoping my legs will not be yelling at me in all caps tomorrow. We’ll find out soon!

Stats:

Speed: 6.5
Incline: 5

Pace: 8:51/km (8:49/km)
Time: 48:43 (47:05)
Distance: 5.50 km (5.34 km)
Calories burned: 478 (335)
BPM: 130 (120)

The day after

Not to be confused with movies about nuclear war.

Today was the day after my first 5K outdoors in months, which also featured 8 km of walking to and from the lake. And how did I feel?

Tired. Very tired. I napped in the afternoon.

Sore, very sore. My legs are like, “What have you done to us? We treat you so well with the mobility and such and this is our reward?”

As of writing this now (around 5 p.m.) I have managed a 15-minute walk to limber up without overdoing it and I have a little more energy. I suspect most of the fatigue and stiffness will be gone by tomorrow, but it is an interesting and fun (?) reminder of how keeping in shape requires…keeping up with regular exercise. Weird, I know.

Here is an animated gif of a cat running as reward for reading of my suffering:

Run 672: First run of Spring 2022 with bonus poop

Today, I finally did what I had been planning for the last few weeks–I went running in the actual outside part of the world!

My overall pace was quite slow and I kind of cheated a bit unintentionally, but I did run a full 5K. Here are my observations in handy list form:

  • I changed from running the river trail to doing a loop back at Burnaby Lake as I headed out
  • The weather was quite pleasant–partly cloudy, light breeze, and a high of 15C
  • When I hit the halfway point I had to use the loo, but there was no loo in sight
  • I had to walk farther up the trail to find a spot discreet enough to attend to my biological needs
  • This had the effect of giving me a decent break halfway through the run
  • This break did not result in me being any faster, as I was slow
  • BPM was quite acceptable at 152

I deliberately kept to a slower pace, but I think I was still a little too enthusiastic in the first km, and this led to me burning out a bit afterward. In terms of how I felt, the legs were fine (not on fire), stamina obviously still has a ways to go–those slow burn treadmill workouts have not done much to help me there. My right hip did creak a bit in the latter half of the run. I think this will probably sort itself out as I limber up. Time will tell. As will my hip, but hopefully not by screaming WHAT ARE YOU DOING TO ME.

Overall, it was nice to be back out. I suspect I’ll be a bit sore tomorrow, but will be back on the treadmill then, with another run hopefully set for Wednesday.

Stats:

Run 674
Average pace: 6:28/km
Location: Burnaby Lake, CCW
Start: 1:12 p.m.
Distance: 5:02 km
Time: 32:27
Weather: Sunny with some high cloud
Temp: 18ºC
Humidity: 41%
Wind: light
BPM: 155
Weight: 173.5
Total distance to date: 4973 km
Devices: Apple Watch Series 5, iPhone 12, AirPods (3rd generation)
Shoes: Brooks Caldera 5 (93 km)

Treadmill workout 127: Lazy Sunday defeated

I lazed around most of the day and in the back of my head knew I would regret it at least a little because it would mean a late evening workout tyo complete my rings and not be a total fat slob.

And so here we are.

I kept tonight’s workout to 30 minutes, as this still put me at 10 p.m. with all the usual post-workout stuff to do, not to mention actual sleep at some point.

The workout went fine, though I have to admit 30 minutes (a little over 3 km) feels kind of short now.

Also, I’m running out of good videos to watch from my usual sources. I’m so demanding.

Stats:

Speed: 6.5
Incline: 5

Pace: 8:51/km (8:49/km)
Time: 48:43 (47:05)
Distance: 5.50 km (5.34 km)
Calories burned: 478 (335)
BPM: 130 (120)

Burnaby Lake, March 26, 2022

Apart from a few light showers here and there, the weather held up and the light was actually pretty good for a cloudy day.

Here are a few photos I took.

Northern pintail x2
Coot under good lighting to catch every weird detail
Mountain bluebird. First time I’ve seen one, woo!
Mountain bluebird couple hanging in the drizzle.
I was wondering if I would see a goose going berserk. I was not disappointed.
Sandhill cranes grazing and keeping clear of that goose.
Piper Spit
Looking down Still Creek

Things I wish I had more of

These would be nice, but not essential.

  • Hair. In a way, having a shaved head is nice. It’s very low maintenance. I can’t have bad hair days. But a big, lush head of Robert Plant hair would be nice to tousle in slow motion. Until I had to wash it, and you know, actually take care of it.
  • Money. Would lots of money turn me into an evil, hedonistic monster? I’d be willing to find out.
  • Better taste in clothes. I’m not horrible, but I’m not great, either. I wear (nice) sweatpants with little shame. I can’t see where exactly this would help me, but it seems like something that would be nice to have.
  • Patience. Everyone can always use more of this, right? Not to be confused with the Guns ‘N Roses song, which is okay and does not try my patience.
  • Passion. Passionate people are weird and scare me, yet I long to join their wild-eyed club. My passion is more like a warm bowl of soup. It’s fine, but it doesn’t last and you can only re-heat it so many times before it gets kind of gross.
  • Muscles. Who doesn’t want to be big and brawny? Well, me, actually. But to have nicely-toned muscles, to have a body that makes people notice without immediately thinking, “Loser must live in a gym”? I could handle that. What I can’t handle is the exercise necessary for getting these muscles.
  • More as they cross my mind.

Shhh, let people enjoy things

I saw this posted in the comments of this Ars Technica article on mechanical keyboards (I am typing this on my Keychron Q1 mechanical keyboard and the CLACKS are so very satisfying). It was in response to someone writing that “Mechanicl (sic) keyboards are the nerds’noisy crotch rocket.”

It is my favorite thing on the internet today, and something I will try to remember when someone likes something I don’t like.

Credit to Adam Ellis

Know Your Meme explainer: https://knowyourmeme.com/memes/let-people-enjoy-things