Normal day mostly!

Today was a fairly normal day. I don't think I have had a "normal day" in quite some time. I guess that technically makes it an "abnormal day" - different from my regular days! :-)

I hung around the house after breakfast in my PJs doing ... god knows what, until I had a bit of a panic attack when I realized it was already 10:45 am!! Holy Cow! I had to get to Curves, and get in my walk and then get my grand-dogs! And maybe a few other things, but no biggy. An off day for sure, but if I didn't get my butt in gear, I wouldn't get those simple things done.

So I headed for Curves. The competitive part of my nature hit those machines HARD! I wasn't going to be happy with any yellow bumps on my computer lady this time. I pushed, and pushed and pushed. When I finished (sweating buckets), I put my key tab into the computer kiosk - and everything came up Green!! I was really pleased. As long as I don't kill myself competing with myself, I should be fabulous by summer! Well, at least more fit!

I added my usual walk to the end of my Curves workout. It was an opportunity to walk in a new place - well, sort of new. I never walk around Town Center. I discovered that Lake Kidamukundi, the lake in Town Center, was undergoing dredging. All the lakes in our city need dredging, and I guess it was this lake's turn. As you can see from the pictures, the day was overcast, the shrubbery was still wearing its winter face, the wild life had moved on to less noisy places, and heavy equipment was the center piece of this lovely man-made lake. Kind of sad, but important for the health of this lake.

This picture shows one area of lake front with sculptures of James Rouse, developer of Columbia with his brother. Behind me are a number of restaurants and behind those restaurants is The Columbia Mall.

Here is another view of the same area. The large white building used to be the headquarters of the Rouse Company that managed the city for many years. My husband used to work there.

I walked for about 40 minutes taking whatever path curiosity directed. Walking behind some buildings I suddenly came upon a large bunch of snow! It as been weeks since I have seen any snow around our community. I guess this slowly melting mound of snow was as tall as the parking garage at one time, snow from the surrounding parking lots - and it finally has melted to this. Amazing. We have had weather in the 60 and 70s for days. To still have this snow was a surprise.

Then it was off to get my son's dogs for the day. Our new "regular" weekly dog schedule is now Tuesdays and Wednesdays for Meathead and Grimace. Thursdays and Fridays for Milo. And the weekend is pretty much everyone.

As write, my son's two boys are sleeping and snoring beside me on the couch. It is such a comforting sound. Everyone's been fed, and walked, and done their business and now it is time to nap beside Grandma.

I love my peaceful dog days.

First Day: I have many green bumps.

My first day using Curves Smart and I am a happy person!

Since starting this program I have been mostly orienting to a different Columbia center, the new staff and the new equipment.

• I needed to figure out their schedules ( Zumba classes are held at various times so the equipment is not available.)
• The staff at this center are really more interested in helping you to use the equipment correctly - that is different from my last experience.
• This center had 3 new pieces of equipment to me. And the Curves Smart technology takes some getting used to.

So today was my day to get onto Curves Smart. Each person is issued a Curves Smart ID tag. Before using the equipment, your tag is entered into the Tag Reader at the kiosk. Information about you and your previous workouts are downloaded to your tag. The tag is then inserted into each piece of equipment you use. After finishing your workout, the tag is returned to the Tag Reader at the kiosk - information is uploaded and you can review your results. Pretty nice set up.

A staff member moved around the circuit with me to insure I used the equipment correctly and I understood the Curves Smart feedback at each machine.

She kept reminding me that since this was my first time, I shouldn't be too alarmed when I uploaded the information. New people always have a lot of "yellow flags" ... areas of improvement highlighted with yellow marks on the electronic female figure displayed at the kiosk. Green flags or dots on the female figure mean you are doing fine that area of the body. Yellow flags or dots mean you need to work harder on certain areas of the body when you get to the appropriate equipment. She must have reminded me 3 times not to be discouraged while I was working out!! The thought crossed my mind - guess I look pretty weak! She is trying to set expectations low. My expectations were pretty low, but still ...

So I get to the kiosk after my work out and insert my tag ... waiting for the feedback. All the time wondering, "Man... I worked hard, this kiosk better not tell me I am a weeny!" And then the information filled the screen. I had no idea what I was looking at, of course. The staff member was looking over my shoulder and she commented enthusiastically - "Wow, you did great!! Usually new people have a screen full of yellow." I had about about 60 to 70% green and the rest yellow. I started to feel better about having worked my butt off!! Not so bad for someone is almost 64!

After 10 work out sessions, the system will make an evaluation of my program, and if I have gotten stronger, put more resistance into the equipment. Then I will probably go back to more yellow flags until I can get stronger and make them all green again ... and then the resistance is bumped up again ... and so on ... until I look like Arnold Schwarzeneggar.

OK - so maybe that is an exaggeration, but it did pop into my brain!

While I was changing my shoes and getting ready to leave - the Zumba class was gathering. While I packed up I watched the class for about 10 minutes. Zumba is available to all members for a small extra charge of $2 or $10 for non-members. As I watched I was very impressed by the level of energy, movement, jumping around, and overall effort required to do this. These folks were really working hard!! Great cardio work out. It looked like they were having a blast!

As I was beginning to leave the Zumba instructor called out something like: "Great job everyone, now we have our muscles all loosened up." I stopped dead and said (out loud, apparently loud enough to be heard over the music!!): "What!! That was just the warm up???" The comment brought "the house down" so to speak! Everyone was laughing including me.

So the lesson I learned today is this - although I had 60-70% green bumps on my computer lady's butt and other areas, and I was feeling pretty full of myself on the simplest level of difficulty - my exaggerated opinion of myself was filled with "yellow flags" as I realized how far I was from doing Zumba.

There is always tomorrow!! :-)

Preparing, preparing - working, working

I know I have been absent almost a week. But not idle.

The Blogging A to Z Challenge - the prep work for the April 2011 Challenge is taking some time. I have been picking topics, snapping pictures, writing posts all in preparation for April 1st. It didn't seem like such a big deal when I signed up, but now I see that this challenge could be pretty difficult to sustain. There are no negative consequences to missing posts or not keeping up, and it is a challenge for sure. Haven't even started and I am feeling the pressure.

My walks continue to be great, but alittle shorter than normal in the last week. I think they are shorter because I started Curves last week. I made some interesting discoveries about myself:

• I wasn't sore from the first sessions. That is good.
• I wasn't as tired leaving the gym as I anticipated. I did feel that I had worked pretty hard. That is good.
• I do seem to run out of steam during my walks around the 30 minute mark. That is not so good. I think I have just run out of available energy. Need to improve.
• My energy levels overall have picked up noticeably from January. That is good.
• The flexibility of going to Curves on my schedule rather than on a class schedule is a big improvement. I have worked harder this week in total than in previous weeks. That is very good.

The best news is that the Curves program has greatly improved over my experience from 2 years ago. The new program is called Curves Smart. Curves equipment now is electronically tailored to you and your progress. As you improve, it senses these improvements and puts more resistance in the machines - upping your effort. This is great news. When I used Curves several years ago, as you improved, you seemed to work less - so to improve your effort you needed to increase your repetitions or go around the circuit more times. Now that is not necessary. And at the end of each work out you can see your progress on a computer terminal. It is a very positive improvement.

So things are looking up - I haven't blogged much, but progress is being made.

Back Again - to Curves!

OK, so I returned to Curves yesterday.

Curves is a gym designed for women. The Curves program includes all five components of exercise - warm up and cool down, cardio, strength training and stretching -- and works every major muscle group while helping to keep you in your heart rate in the training zone.

I belonged to this gym several years ago and found it very effective. You can get a full body work out in 30 minutes. The gym has long hours, is open 6 days a week and can be used on your own schedule. I think this change will fit my fickled personal schedule better than attending a class with a fixed time.

My goal of staying active remains a high priority. Progress walking is moving forward well, but it isn't improving my strength. And although I found Tai Chi to be beneficial to my balance and leg strength, getting to a 4:00 Wednesday fixed class time seems to be doomed lately. I have missed more and more Tai Chi sessions this winter due to conflicting demands and schedules. And once it is missed, it can't be made up at another time. Unfortunately - after 2 years of practice, Tai Chi has taken a back seat to so many other things that just happen to fall at the same time.

So I will replace Tai Chi with Curves.

Yes, I have a crazy schedule at times, and yes, there are priorities that do bump my personal life with increasing frequency, but if an exercise option is flexible enough, it can fit into anyone's schedule - if you make it so!

Welcome back to my life - Curves!