P90G - Week 4

Day 25: Today marks the beginning of Phase II. I’ll be moving on to the next round of workouts, some the same and some different. Apparently a program is more effective if it incorporates “muscle confusion”, meaning you never work the same place long enough or in the same way for it to get used to it, and begin to slack off. Personally, I think my muscles were pretty confused by exercise at all.

Day 26: A brand new workout today – Core Synergistics. I’m pretty sure I didn’t even have a core, but it got worked anyway. And whatever it is, now it can’t move, either.

Day 27:  I was supposed to do this lovely martial arts workout throughout the entire process, but had lost the DVD. After searching everywhere for WEEKS, I finally sent for a replacement. Within 48 hours, the other disk was found. I wasn’t too surprised – that’s how it always works. Now I have 2 to lose.

Day 28:  This should have been easy. It’s all lovely stretching. Piece of cake – not! Whatever was left after the core workout is gone.

Day 29: And….back to the core. Really, peoples? This is just cruel.

Day 30: It was supposed to have been another round of Stretch, aka I-Always-Wanted-to-be-Rubbery-and-Green-Like-Gumby. Awaking with a sore throat, I opted to sleep in and try to fit a workout in later. It didn’t quite go according to plan.

The end of the day found me at the store, nearly sundown, no workout, and with way too many groceries to carry. Just then, Tina arrived to save the day! Or so I thought. She saved part of the day, giving the groceries a ride home with Devon and Tiggy. I told her to go on ahead, and I was going to walk home in the obscenely cold weather in lieu of a formal workout.

Have you ever heard of that wacky diet idea where you drink a gallon of ice water a day? The theory is that you burn X number of calories warming yourself back up, so you don’t have to exercise. Personally, I suspect most of the calorie burning comes from running to the bathroom every 2.9 seconds. I’m not down with all that, but one of the most effective ways to consume fat around here is to turn YOURSELF into an ice cube. Your body will have to work overtime warming back up from…oh…-47F, and voila! Burnt calories! (The only small flaw in this program is that your body then swears, “Never again!” And goes into overtime producing 72 more layers of fat for protection.)

Anyway, it was all I had left. As the cold began to sink in, my walk increased to a shuffle, and then a jog. Well, as joggy as I could be with full snow gear on. Picture a penguin running at warp speed.

Just then, Tina’s van rounded the block, stopping to wait as I crossed the street. Instead of driving my children and food home, she crept along, keeping pace with my frantic waddle. “This is even worse than exercising in front of Jack,” I thought to myself.

Then I saw that my little workout was being captured for posterity. Curse you, iphone inventor!  Even at his most ANNOYING, Jack only took still photos. Trust me, video is much, much worse. Tiggy is going to be lucky if she’s ungrounded by the time she’s 30.  

The closest to a "before" picture you're likely to get.

Well, I was pretty cold all right, even with enough fabric to wrap an entire walrus. It took a long while, and many calories, to restore me to some semblance of warmth. It felt so good that I hardly minded the extra 36 pounds I gained by morning.

Day 31: This is it! The end of one full month. I don’t look much thinner yet, but I feel different…better. I like it.