Pour Some Sugar on Me

I had a chocolate dipped vanilla ice-cream cone from Zesto last night after shivering at Little League practice with my kids for a couple hours. Mmmm-Mmmm. Cheap soft serve ice cream had never tasted so good.  I stood in line with all the walks of life that frequent the south side Fort Wayne ice-cream mecca.  Noticed the mostly dirty side walk, dark splotched and sticky little ponds,  from the days ice-cream spilling activity.  There is something innocent, true and genuine about the south side Zesto.  It's kinda dirty, super old, tightly placed at a relatively busy corner.  The ethnic diversity is strong. I don't think I would even flinch if shots rang out; just get the kids to the car.   My kids love the place.  Liam announced to me that we could get a better price on our goods if they had any 'Mess-Ups'.  Sorry kid,  - no mess ups last night. Had to go full price, even had to scrounge for loose change to settle the bill.  That Zesto will forever be a good memory for my children.  And me.  Sure wish they took debit though.   

I had sugar guilt later and did a series of Manbuilders.  Manbuilders you ask, suspiciously?  Why would a man such as myself need to pursue building? Nothing intellectual of course.   Manbuilders are kind of like burpies with dumbbells.  Squat down, kick back into push-up position, row with one 25lb weight, do a push-up, row with the other arm, do a push up, jump to squat position, then stand, dip with the weight, then press over-head.  Oy vay.  A very fitting name.  Sick and sweating after a while I sat with the boys and slowly did sit ups watching TV.  Some new series about a kid that sees patterns in numbers, something along those lines. The son has autism maybe, not sure, and Kiefer Sutherland, the dad, runs around telling people that he thinks his autistic son wants him to meet them for some universally parallel dimension bull shit. It's really quite interesting.  I just kept doing sit-ups. 

all I need to do with this one is something with the horizontal line, then sign it. 

It's Over

My seven week Paleo diet and CrossFit Challenge has come to an end. 

It was a good experience.  Mostly.  I was faithful to the diet.  As best as I could be - cutting sugar out of your life is a hard thing to do.  As you see there is sugar in red wine.

OK, I failed on the wine part.  Shame.  But - I did workout a fair amount.  I can do those pull-ups finally.  My dead lift increased by about 60 lbs.  I lost three inches in my waist.  But - only dropped one silly pound.  Of course I quickly reasoned that I must have gained an incredible amount of rock hard muscle.  Then they took the bicep measurements: nothing.  No change.  Those fibers just won't do it.  They are slow twitch to the end.  Barely a pulse.  So, I don't know.  I ate mushrooms, spinach, carrots, avocados, eggs and bacon for 7 weeks.  Ah, bacon huh?  I did hit the cashews pretty hard also.  And I almost forgot the bananas.  I put down some serious bananas. 

I never have taken the time to monitor what I consume.  I rather miss the days in college swimming when Hendrix and I would go to Arby's after practice, each get  5 roast beef sandwiches for $5 then in a matter of just a few minutes sit and eat all of it.  Youth.  We burned a whole lotta calories in those days.   

I need something else. A race.  A triathlon.  And maybe even carbohydrates again.  I don't know about the no sugar life.  It's still life without sugar.  It's just not as sweet.  My pancreas loves it though apparently.

callous

I'm getting hands like a cowboy.  Gristled. Calloused.  Torn-up.  That's what you get when office hands meet the pull-up bar.  We did a nice workout at CrossFit a couple days ago - 10 pull-ups, then 15 box jumps, repeat 5 times.  The workouts always sound so short and sweet.  It's two little moves.  But at the completion of 50 pull-ups, and 75 box jumps, dripping wet, torn, pained, laying on the floor looking at the steel beams in the warehouse roof you get a different perspective.  It's not like working out at the YMCA.  No one falls to the floor in a pool of sweat at the Y.  But people routinely do it at CrossFit. 

When I get up there's a nice little sweat angel on the floor.  Eewww.

Yesterday we did medicine ball cleans for 1 minute, then burpies for 1 minute with 30 seconds rest between each move.  Repeat 5 times.  Again, sounds kind of easy but I felt weakened after the first round.  CrossFit is intense fitness.  I can see why and how people are getting hooked on it.  I think it was likely created by the Orthopedic and physical therapy industries as a means to increase revenue.  My long term swimming shoulder is throbbing even now. 

If I only had a brain.

When I was a kid I participated in a play.  Third grade I think.  Maybe earlier.  All I can remember is singing the song "if I only had a brain".  You know  - the one that the scarecrow does when he's flopping around, refilling his straw and limberly strutting about.  At least that's how I remember it. 

"I could while away the hours.  Confirrin' with the flowers"

Memories.  They stay forever huh? 

I've been continuing my endless pursuit of outputting mediocre artwork. Confirrin' with my own flowers.  The flower has to be one of the most universally attempted objects to paint.  They have so much going on: color, depth, shadowing, beauty.  Every flower has an interesting perspective.  Like the crocus.  Those little beauties come up first, early in the Spring, and do take my breathe away.  I can remember long ago telling someone my own brief glimpse of life, my outlook:  we are like flowers.  We have a season, a prime, we flower, stand around in the sunshine for a while.  And then fade.  Lose our petals. We too each have an interesting perspective. Some of us have good qualities even.  It's what you do with yourself before the fade thats noteworthy.  Enjoy your days in the sunshine.  Enough rambling. Enough perspective.

I'd hate to be a Narcissus. Spending all my time starring at myself.  Although I've been trying to paint them.    Queen Anne's lace isn't all bad, but it's a weed.  Sure looks pretty cycling past it in the summer though.  A Tulip?  No way.  Classifying yourself as a Tulip is as common as drinking Merlot, and  "I'm not drinking any fucking Merlot" as so poignantly stated in the movie Sideways.

Cheers!  You've just read one of my most twisted efforts to date.  Go smell the flowers.  I'm drinking Pinot Noir tonight, otherwise known as the heartbreak grape.  And, I'm proud to say I was an actor in a third grade production of The Wizard of OZ!



   

no cyclometer

It was nice to finally get my bike out yesterday, track down all my gear, and pedal in the wind.  Everything is blooming in Northeast Indiana.  The day before I even had a nice butterfly flutter deftly into my mouth.  Poor fella. Everything was going so well for him.  He just came out of his shell into the beauty of the world only to be quickly salivated and spit to the ground.  A Spring casualty.  Or fate?  We just happened to collide at the wrong time.

 I felt half way strong in the saddle (i.e. CrossFit legs).  We went East to Hoagland, IN (not even sure how we got there - I just followed) then West to Poe.   Hadn't been down Poe way in a while.  Not much had changed. 

I've been riding without a cyclometer.  Those little electronic devices that tell you your distance and your speed.  I used to obsess over my pace, forever trying to maintain at least 17 miles per hour, even in a headwind (which at times is incredibly difficult if not impossible). And I always had to hit a certain mileage, log it, know what my cumulative mileage was for the month, for the year, etc.  I really had my bearings. 

But now I'm just pedaling.

shoes.

When life's not going your way, join a Cross Fit gym, go on a Paleo diet, and buy new footwear. 

There you have it.  That was easy huh?

I have noticed something slightly peculiar about Cross Fit: it's in the shoes. I resisted in the beginning.  Me and my high heeled running shoes were just fine.  But as we did more and more box jumps together, and jump roping (double unders suck, btw,  but I'm getting better), and progressed along toward the more complicated and heavy lifts with the bar my shoes and I decided to part ways.  Running shoes are good for running.  (And, I'm not even so sure of that as I have ran a few times recently in a pair of Brooks Pure Connect and felt like a gazelle). 

I too decided to join the club with a low rise, light weight shoe.  People are wearing those funny things where your toes fit in like a glove, a lot of New Balance Minimus going on, some other CF specific brand called Inov.  Everything is either black or fairly bright and light weight.  I started out with a pair of super odd bright blue beauties from Brooks mentioned above.  I look and feel strange in them.  I ran in them at Foster and I swear people were staring at my feet.  I felt compelled to stop and ask the heavy-set walkers if their snickers and sideways glances were directed to my shoes.  Obviously they don't understand Cross Fit fashion.

(Reebok does.  They are all over the marketing of CrossFit and have sunk some money into the trend...a little business oriented sidenote).

Anyway, in conclusion of this blog entry that should be titled "Much Ado About Nothing" I settled on a pair of New Balance myself, not Minimus, but some funky silvery trail running shoe.  They feel lighter than a good pair of Smart Wools.  Happy Trails!