Thanks for the recommendation! I'll take a look for it; there are a couple of great beer stores around here that I've been wanting to go to for a while... I really like milk stout and so does John.
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"If 'toning' is the goal, strength is the method." ~ Mark Rippetoe
We ended up not doing go-karts. We went on the biggie roller coasters (MAN what a rush) and a few other rides and were going to check out the go-karts toward the end of our stay, hoping there'd be fewer people. As it turned out, a huge storm rolled in and they closed the park early so we had to go home. Oh well!
We rode on the mamba, which was quite possibly the best rollercoaster I've ever been on. The first hill is 200 feet high and the descent is 75mph. I could easily get addicted to that ride!
Dinner was non-compliant (1/2 hot dog, 3 slices brisket, 2 pickle spears, and about 3 Tbsp ice cream), but I planned my day so I didn't go overboard on the calories. I also had 3 beers - Bud Light of all things, but I really wanted beer! We had a great time, and I got to know 2 of my coworkers a little better and found out we have more in common than I initially thought. Two thumbs up for that company picnic!
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"If 'toning' is the goal, strength is the method." ~ Mark Rippetoe
I'm really hungry today - maybe it was all the adrenaline from yesterday.
I went to the grocery store and picked up some fruit & veg, even though what I REALLY wanted to get was a package of soft cookies.
I bought 6oz of raspberries and 2 small apricots as well as a tub of carrots & celery. I ate all the raspberries and apricots, so with my lunch of lettuce & tuna salad and string cheese, I just ate about 365 calories, 47% of which were from fat, 33% from carbs, and 23% from protein. Low on the protein, high on the fat & carbs, but what a delicious lunch.
I did just get 17g of fiber, though, which was awesome. I love apricots.
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"If 'toning' is the goal, strength is the method." ~ Mark Rippetoe
Me too. I saw that someone had 1 liter baskets (~4 cups) for 3.49 and I was kind of tempted to add it to the shopping list for tomorrow. Then I figured that I'd be eating them all, so decided against it. I'll wait until the local ones are ready and pig out on them at that time.
hehe I'm sure the local ones will taste much better anyway - picked ripe, for one thing.
My workout today:
Warm-up: 3 chin-ups. I did my first one from a step (elbows just slightly bent, maybe 10 degrees) for a warmup. The other 2 were from a dead hang. The last one had a few little kicks to help me get over the bar, which is cheating (if not Cheating, it's cheating to me).
Then 45 minutes of steady state cycling. The intervals just weren't in me today, so I skipped them for the first time in a LONG time. Well, I did two, but that doesn't really count. So I did my steady state on higher resistance, levels 5 and 6, to at least make up for part of it (even though I don't get the elevated metabolic rate for as long).
We're going to go out tonight. I'm going to be good on my food and cheat with beer. So it's a higher carb day, with the fruit & beer. But not so bad.
I met another weightlifter at work. He works in the same division I do and I've been working with him on some scripts I need written for a project. He always has almonds & peanut butter & protein powder at his desk so I figured he lifted weights or something along those lines. Then all I see him eating for food recently (other than the above) is salads & chicken breasts...
so I was eating my lunch in the cafe area today & he started heating up his lunch, so I asked him if he's on a specific program or if he's just doing his own... he is doing what his trainer is having him do, and it sounded similar to TNT phase A (or one of the many other VLCDs out there). He just started lifting in January and has lost 15 pounds of fat and is trying to build some muscle. He's doing your typical "Monday, legs. Tuesday, arms. Wednesday, shoulders. Thursday, back. Friday, chest." type program and doing an hour of steady-state running 7 days a week as well. X.X He said he's been frustrated lately because he's hit a plateau... but he was just going by weight, and I've "plateaued" at my weight for nearly 2 months now but continue to lose body fat, so suggested he could be experiencing the same. He said the other day he could put his entire hand sideways between his waist & the waistband of his jeans, so something must be changing. LOL. Anyway, we talked for like 45 minutes over lunch and shared accomplishments and goals. It was nice to meet someone else with similar interests.
I did invite the other weightlifting woman at work to eat lunch with me some time but she never emailed me back. Oh well!
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"If 'toning' is the goal, strength is the method." ~ Mark Rippetoe
Yeah, this time of year is food nirvana. Delicious salads, fresh summer veggies, fruits...
Weight this morning - 144.4, down from 146.6 last week. woo hoo! I broke 145 for the first time in .... 12 years! And this time, I'm not doing it because I'm too poor to afford food.
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"If 'toning' is the goal, strength is the method." ~ Mark Rippetoe
Negative Chin-Up
1 chin-up
.5 chin-up, hopped up to the bar & did the 20-second descent
1 chin-up
Underhand-grip Lat Pulldown
4x2x110
4.5x2x115
1x2x110 (phew, tired...)
Barbell Split Squat
1x6x80
2x6x85
Push Up
3x6
Did these with my feet raised on a weight bench
I was going to do squats after this, but was so tired that after doing my "warm up" with the 45-lb bar, I changed my mind. I'm SURE it was because my eating was sub-par today.
We're putting our "clean eating" on hold during our vacation to give ourselves a break and reset the ol' hormones & shake the body up a bit. I've eaten reasonably well today, but I did have a rather large martini at lunch () and haven't eaten in several hours because I've been pretty full from lunch... so I'm sure my energy stores were depleted to begin with.
That said, time for dinner. I'm hungry!
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"If 'toning' is the goal, strength is the method." ~ Mark Rippetoe
Weight this morning - 144.4, down from 146.6 last week. woo hoo! I broke 145 for the first time in .... 12 years! And this time, I'm not doing it because I'm too poor to afford food.
Weight this morning - 144.4, down from 146.6 last week. woo hoo! I broke 145 for the first time in .... 12 years! And this time, I'm not doing it because I'm too poor to afford food.
We rode on the mamba, which was quite possibly the best rollercoaster I've ever been on. The first hill is 200 feet high and the descent is 75mph. I could easily get addicted to that ride!
Ooh, Worlds of Fun! I went a couple of times as a teenager and had a blast! I don't actually remember any roller coasters, though. Of course, that was back in the dark ages before the wheel had been invented, as my kids like to tell me.
Thanks! It was temporary, but I'll be back down there soon.
I'm in Quebec, and though I walked up & down hills all day today and burned quite a few calories, I drank more than my share!!
I found this great little pub that had several Unibroue ales on tap, so I had an imperial pint of Maudite and a bottle of La Fin du Monde, along with a pizza. It SO hit the spot. With dinner, I had Quebec IPA (which was VERY bitter and enjoyable). Tomorrow is another day with opportunities to find other pubs; Belgian ales appear to be popular here, so my mission tomorrow will be to find a little hole-in-the-wall type place to hang out in.
There's a decent gym across the street so I am considering going there tomorrow to do a long workout. While part of me wants to dive head-first into vacation and just go all out, I am also really enjoying stage 6 and want to keep doing it. We'll see. I could really feel my glutes today as I climbed up the hills.
I had another Unibroue yesterday - Trois Pistoles. My pronunciation is so terrible - note to self, it's "twah pistoh" not "twah pistolay"...
Anyway, I've been feeling guilty about my gluttony/drinking so I did an extra long workout today while I did some laundry. The hotel gym only has dumbbells that go to 30lbs so I made due by doing a bit more. I'm not sure whether I should consider this an official stage 6 workout since the weights were lower than I'm able to do, or just a supplemental vacation workout. Thoughts?
Reverse lunge, db on shoulder: 6x30, 2x10x30
Dumbbell 2pt row: 3x10x30
Dumbbell push press: 3x10x25e (these are harder with dumbbells than a barbell!)
Back extension - 1x10 on a weights bench, didn't work so well, so I held a 30lb dumbbell on my traps and did good mornings. 2x10.
Incline reverse crunch - 3x10
Push-ups with feet on weights bench: 3x10
Squat: 3x10x30e
HIIT on treadmill:
3x45s at 8mph, 2 mins recovery
1x60s at 9mph. That was so awesome - what a rush!!
20 mins of walking at 4mph and jogging at 5.5mph (trading off whenever I felt like it)
Now I won't feel AS bad eating poutine for lunch.
I also took pictures of my back to compare to the one I took in March (pardon the messy hotel room):
March 28th 2008:
June 18th 2008:
I think my shoulders look better than the chick on the cover of the book, and when I bought the book I thought, "pff, there's no way I could look as good as that airbrushed picture - yet again, setting false expectations for women."
sometimes it's nice to be wrong
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"If 'toning' is the goal, strength is the method." ~ Mark Rippetoe
Thanks you two!! Now that I'm really able to see differences in details of my body, I feel so proud of what I've been able to accomplish. What's exciting is that I feel like i'm only just getting close to my "baseline" for building muscle. I'm really anxious & excited to develop my strength and see what I can do.
I mapped out my treks on the google pedometer tool and I walked about 7 miles on Monday and 8 miles on Tuesday. So far today I've walked 3 plus my workout... Now that I know how far I'm walking, I don't feel so bad about eating about 2200-2500 calories a day the past few days. I think I'll head out now for another mile or two, to get some lunch.
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"If 'toning' is the goal, strength is the method." ~ Mark Rippetoe
Beer update - John found a B&B that has nearly 200 different belgian beers (mostly in bottles). It has Westvleteren which you can't really get without going to Belgium (or eBay or whatnot) so we trekked out to the place. It took about 45 minutes by bus to get there.
Fallen Soldiers:
L to R: Pink Killer (ale with grapefruit juice), Enghien Noel, La Guillotin, Westvleteren, 't Smisje Bourgondie, Rochefort 10. I had the 3 on the left; John had the 3 on the right (and Sailor Babo pretended he had all 6).
I had mussels & fries for lunch in true Belgian style. John had a beef & veg dish.
Great adventure, very delicious. And the proprietors were extremely friendly and quite entertaining.
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"If 'toning' is the goal, strength is the method." ~ Mark Rippetoe
[soapbox]The reason you don't find Westvleteren here is that the monks who make it only want it sold from either the monastery itself or the monastery-owned cafe (across the street from the monastery). So any you see here was purchased under false pretenses, and as such should be avoided in accordance with the monks' wishes.[/soapbox]
Thanks for the link - if I find myself in Quebec again I'll definitely look it up. (And should you guys find yourself in Philadelphia or its environs, let me know - got lots of places for you to visit).
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Tom
No "happy hours" makes for a lot of miserable days. - Mahler
Yeah, I felt a small twinge of guilt when we ordered it but it didn't last long. I figure we'll find ourselves at the monastery someday & will spend more than our share. And I'm a firm believer that you can't expect to control something once it leaves your hands. They can state their wishes, but if you sell a case of bottles to someone, you can't expect that it's always going to be for private consumption. In any case, I'll still sleep at night.
In other news, we went to Montreal yesterday and found a great little brewpub called Dieu de Ciel. Definitely worth a visit - they had over a dozen brews on tap (all their own), three of which were smoked a la Bamberg. Two of the brewers sat next to us at the bar so we chatted with them for a bit. They talked down Rogue and Unibroue, saying they used to be spectacular but have lost quality in the past couple of years. I suggested to the guys that perhaps their tastes have changed, but they instisted that the quality of the beer has declined. OK, whatever. They named Brutal Bitter (one of my all-time faves) as one of the beers that has lost quality. Eh. They can think what they want. They were meeting someone from New Belgium & had to ask us what state New Belgium was in. tsk!
Despite their conceit & ignorance, the beer was fantastique. We had mussels & beer for dinner last night; I will miss the mussels when we get back to Kansas City. They're so delicous and perfect with a glass of beer.
Montreal was a bit much, though, and we were glad to head back to Quebec.
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"If 'toning' is the goal, strength is the method." ~ Mark Rippetoe
Well I think I'd call it more conceit than anything, as they do know how to make some good beer (witness the price/furor Peche Mortel fetches in the states).
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Tom
No "happy hours" makes for a lot of miserable days. - Mahler
Ah, so you know of them! They said they didn't distribute to KC; how much does their beer cost in the store?
I'm starting to feel gross and am looking forward to getting back into our routine. Vacation was great and much needed (I haven't had a vacation like this (where I traveled somewhere for several days & didn't work) in about 7 years!). But, I'm feeling a bit... sludgy. Can't think of a better word for it. We're heading back today and the clean eating & exercise start back up again tomorrow.
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"If 'toning' is the goal, strength is the method." ~ Mark Rippetoe
Ah, so you know of them! They said they didn't distribute to KC; how much does their beer cost in the store?
I'm not entirely sure, but I've heard single 11.5oz bottles going for $5 or $6. No idea what a case would be. (Talking about Peche Mortel here, their most famous beer that beer geeks orgasm over. I've had it and it was certainly good, but when talking Russian Imperial Stouts, I'd say Stone (CA) and East End Brewing (PA) have superior offerings.)
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Tom
No "happy hours" makes for a lot of miserable days. - Mahler
We went on the biggie roller coasters (MAN what a rush) and a few other rides and were going to check out the go-karts toward the end of our stay, hoping there'd be fewer people. As it turned out, a huge storm rolled in and they closed the park early so we had to go home. Oh well!
I did my first one from a step (elbows just slightly bent, maybe 10 degrees) for a warmup. The other 2 were from a dead hang. The last one had a few little kicks to help me get over the bar, which is cheating (if not Cheating, it's cheating to me).
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