<p>I am getting back into the exercise routine at home as we have no broadband service. Woke up at five to check email and did my home weight routine (added back barbell equate). The big headache is that my indoor tennis club is still closed. I am hoping that it is back for a lunchtime game tomorrow.</p>
<p>I am doing two videos this morning for about a 35 minute workout doing flutes, stretches and abs and other stuff. I plan to do a short run too later in the day.</p>
<p>Aren’t we a cheerful bunch? :)</p>
<p>BB- I hope you start to feeling better. I hope we ALL do. Well, did 3 horrific miles in the early morning dark. Windy, too. I didn’t take a light- thought it would be a little lighter than it was. I was extremely slow and didn’t trust my footing, although I was on smooth pavement. Lots of adjustments for me right now…</p>
<p>iDad- good luck ont he Airdyne. That thing is brutal and you are my hero for doing it.</p>
<p>Back is still throbbing. Only on the left side above the hip. Trying to decide if I should bike today. Think I will try and see what happens. Wish me luck!</p>
<p>NMinn, please get the pain checked out. Do not do any exercise that aggravates the pain. I had a very same thing going a couple of summers ago, and it became so unbearable that I went to see a neurologist specializing in back pain management. A course of oral steroids (not the Arnold kind :)) helped tremendously and the pain went away completely in a couple of months. What I learned is that sometimes one has to take a step back in their exercise routine to recover and then to be able to leap forward. We have to be super careful with injuries at our age!</p>
<p>MOfWC, thanks. I did not tell anyone, but we had to put our dog to sleep this week. His IVDD came back, and a spinal operation was not an option for a dog who maybe had 6 more month to live (he was almost 13). I did not expect that a pet’s death can be so hard on his owners! Maybe when we finally put him to rest it will become easier.</p>
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<p>I have fallen completely out of Airdyne shape, having done outdoor walk/jog intervals for nearly all my conditioning lately. Airdyne is my bad weather torture implement. So, I’ll have to ease back into it. I’ve been so focused on longer 2 minute intervals lately, that I’ll probably do some short stuff (10 second, 20 second, 30 second intervals a few times).</p>
<p>Do you prefer running with a flashlight or a head lamp?</p>
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<p>That’s probably a good sign. That suggests a back extensor muscle injury rather than a lumbar disk problem. Muscles heal better than disks! The crazy thing with backs though is a disk injury can show up as painful muscle spasms as defense mechanism to make you stop. I don’t know if it’s the right approach, but I stop at the first sign of back pain and stay stopped until it’s better. If I recall, the estimates are that probably half of us have bulging lumber disks that are normally symptom-free. I wouldn’t touch the bike if the lower back is still painful. Maybe a nice easy walk just to get loose.</p>
<p>I’ve been nursing a little tenderness in the muscles at the back of my shoulders/sides of my upper back on one side. I can’t really trace it to anything, but I suspect that the heavier DB deadlifts I’ve been doing may be the culprit – or the one-arm DB rows. Both work those muscles pretty hard just picking up the DBs.</p>
<p>Awww, BB. That’s rough. I’ve had to put two pets to sleep. It’s really hard, but when it’s time, you are doing the right thing.</p>
<p>I’ve never tried a headlight, although I plan to. I carry a small but powerful flashlight. Most of the time I have enough light from street lights until it gets light.</p>
<p>Thanks, idad. It is better if they do not suffer. We went through IVDD surgery and rehab with him once, but that was 2 1/2 years ago, when he was strong and healthy to pull a miraculous recovery, but this time I knew that his old body would not be able to handle the trauma. Loss of mobility in dogs due to disk disease happens so quickly! One day he was climbing stairs, and the next day he could barely walk… Maybe because I’ve seen my pet go through this, I’m so careful about any injury that potentially involves the spine.</p>
<p>Running with a headlight… I tried, and I did not like it. The light was not as powerful as the flashlight, and with the flaslight, I had less control as to where to point it (sometimes, I would point my flashlight into the windshield of a bozo who would turn his high beams on as soon as he saw me running towards him - to give him a dose of his own medicine).</p>
<p>The first cat I had to put to sleep was fairly young. One day, completely out of the blue, it was paralyzed in the rear legs, unable to walk or stand. Had to make the decision, on the spot, in the vets office to put the poor thing down. That was really, really hard. It tore me up.</p>
<p>I think it was easier with the more recent round with a 16 year old cat and chronic progressive kidney disease. In that case, I already knew how it it would end, it just a matter of when. Once I saw that the cat was in pain, I called the vet. It was still hard.</p>
<p>My advice, if it makes sense for you guys, would be to go pick out a new pet. I had gotten a new kitty a couple years earlier so that we would have a transition when it was time for the old kitty. But, the new kitty met its demise one night, never returning from outside. So, in a few months, I lost both cats. A month or two after putting the old cat to sleep, I brought home two shelter rescue kitties.</p>
<p>BB-The Humane society in Bellevue was at Ballard Safeway the other day- they have lots of cats & kittens.
I almost got one ( it has been several years since our two cats who lived into their 20’s had died), but knowing how long our cats live- I didn’t want to be impulsive about it!</p>
<p>Besides I also want a dog & most of the dogs at the shelters are advertised as not being good with cats.
I was thinking that getting a dog would maybe get me out more in the rain.
Have to get another lab I guess, they don’t even notice the rain!</p>
<p>Losing pets is horrible. I feel so sorry for you, BB. My big Golden is 8 and the cats are younger, and I need them all to outlive me.</p>
<p>BB, so sorry about your doggie. Idad, that sudden paralysis happened with one of our cats too. The vet said it is the cat version of a stroke, and nothing can be done. It was so sad. We had to put our other kitty to sleep just recently, she had kidney failure. Waaaah.</p>
<p>MOWC, sounds like your new job will be a nice challenge :)</p>
<p>So today’s run was 4 miles. I feel a cold coming on, and normally I would talk myself out of running, but I really wanted to run with my new garmin, so out I went. I love this thing! I ran 4 miles in 38:02, which included 2 min of walking because the last mile was up a big hill, and I just couldn’t make it all the way. But the first 3 miles I did in 28:02. It’s interesting to see how erratic my pace is, everything from 7:10 to 11:45, but this route is a lot of up and down hills so that’s part of it. I need to find a flatter place to run.</p>
<p>Thank you, all. So sorry about your pets! I feel better getting this off my chest. We do have our two kitties to keep us company; they are still young, 3 and 2. I do not think we are ready for another dog yet. H said that he would not be able to go through another such heartbreak (the dog worshiped H).</p>
<p>Blankmind, that is a great run. Every distance runner has to accept the fact that it is OK to slow down (or even walk!) going up big hills, according to my marathoner friend.</p>
<p>EmeraldKity “I was thinking that getting a dog would maybe get me out more in the rain.
Have to get another lab I guess, they don’t even notice the rain!”</p>
<p>Kind of like D’s Irish soccer coach, to whom anything less than a torrential downpour or six inches of snow was, “a fine soft day for soccer.” And then, “Kick the bloody ball.”</p>
<p>BB – Very sorry about your dog. Pets become such a big part of our lives. </p>
<p>MOWC – You need a parrot or something similar. Desert tortoises, too. They live a scarily long life.</p>
<p>I’m grumped about walking at the moment. Beautiful day – sunny and cold, but all the trees are dripping as the snow melts, and cold snowmelt falling upon me just doesn’t work. Walking while it is snowing is a lot easier. Meanwhile, the indoor strength training is going great guns. I decided to get another two of the nifty gizmos that keepeth the stretchy bands from smiting me, and permanently (for the winter, at least) put them at the top, side and bottom of the never-used back door so that I don’t need to keep opening it to reposition. I think I might just acquire a couple more sets of bands and leave them prepositioned as well. I also need to find some 15# and 18# dumbbells. I wonder if that is the kind of thing that I’ll start seeing ads for as we approach the Christmas selling season? Shipping charges seem to make mail-order less useful on these.</p>
<p>iDad – Dinner last night was one I think you would have enjoyed. I got a pork shoulder (blade) roast, salted and peppered it and left it open in the fridge for two days, and then slow roasted in the oven for six hours at 275. Delish! I just wish I’d remembered to buy the cauliflower to do as a puree on the side. Made do with roasted carrots.</p>
<p>Hmmm. Pork roast sounds good! I’m killing off my yankee pot roast tonight, although I froze some of the veggies and juice for doctoring up soup down the road. I did the brussel sprouts as an alternative to putting potatoes in with the pot roast. They actually turned out to be a superb options.</p>
<p>On stretchy bands, I have a bunch of those 99 cent caribiners so I can clip one or more bands to various anchors and quickly configure for any exericise. My bands all have nylon webbing loops on the ends with separate handles that I clip on with carabiners.</p>
<p>On dumbbells, WalMart sells the plain gray metal dumbells (the kind Alwyn Cosgrove calls “prison dumbbells”) in five pound increments from 5 lbs to 40 lbs. So you can get 15 pounders and 20 pounders. Cheap. No shipping. Just carry them to your car. If your Wally World doesn’t have the size you want, you can order on line and get free shipping to your nearest store for pickup. By far the cheapest way to buy DBs; under $1 a pound. I’ve collected a pair each in 10 lb, 15 lb, 20 lb, and 25 pound, then I use weight plates and dumbbell handles to put together heavier ones. It would be nice to have the really fancy gym dumbbells, but they are double the price of the “prison dumbbells” and – honestly – does it really matter?</p>
<p>OK, so no Airdyne. It was too nice today to miss an opportunity to go outside for a hilly walk/jog. Slightly overcast, but 60 degrees. Shorts and short sleeves, although I probably should have worn long sleeves. I did this route in the second fastest time ever and I wasn’t really trying to push. I’m starting to feel a little more loosey goosey relaxed while jogging, which is nice. 38 years of smoking, I don’t think it’s ever going to be easy for me, but, if getting winded jogging is the worst of it, I’ll count my lucky stars.</p>
<p>I’ve extended a sixth jogging interval at the end of the route which is steeply uphill to my house. That’s a slow interval (5.3 mph today), but a good chance to jog uphill. All the other intevals were above 6 mph.</p>
<p>I really prefer rubber-coated dumbbells to hard steel.</p>
<p>No run today. Too hectic a day trying to get Internet service running at home. It looks like it will still be a few days for that.</p>
<p>WalMart has a rubber/poly coated hex dumbbell set with rubber handgrips. 90 lbs of weight (2 x 10 lb, 2 x 15 lb, 2 x 20lb) for $115 or $1.27 a pound. Free shipping to your nearest store for pickup. That’s pretty good deal for a little nicer DB:</p>
<p>[Walmart.com:</a> 6-Piece Polyurethane Infused Dumbbell Set Value Bundle (qty 2 each size): Exercise & Fitness](<a href=“http://www.walmart.com/ip/6-Piece-Polyurethane-Infused-Dumbbell-Set-Value-Bundle/15711144]Walmart.com:”>http://www.walmart.com/ip/6-Piece-Polyurethane-Infused-Dumbbell-Set-Value-Bundle/15711144)</p>
<p>Wow. These one-legged squats are hell on your legs. I tried to do a few this afternoon after doing a set of five on each leg yesterday and my legs screamed bloody murder with the very first one! Maybe tomorrow. Or maybe these will be a once a week deal for a while.</p>
<p>Not only is full bodyweight a lot of weight when only one leg is doing the work, but the same leg has to stabilize the body at the hip in all directions.</p>