I decided the things I'd logged as VPA earlier in the week weren't truly VPA. I've also updated my tracking spreadsheet to explicitly separate VPA, MPA, and restorative work. (So I don't need to try to remember which was which the next morning when I typically write up my check-in here--or worse: at the end of the week when I'm double-checking my math.) Also: I learned how to get Google Sheets to translate my hiking mileage into MPA minutes for me. So now the spreadsheet does all of the math.
Consecutive days of exercise: 152
I've been doing minimal workouts a lot lately. I've been hitting my Moderate Physical Activity goals consistently. But that's the easy part. (If Shelby and I get even close to our daily mileage goal, my MPA minutes are more than covered by our walks alone.) But my Vigorous Physical Activity has been at or close to zero most weeks lately. I've been finding it difficult to push myself to do it. But this is just a head game. There's no physical reason why I cannot do VPA at this point.
To incentivize myself to be more physically active--especially with VPA--I'm adjusting my metric for maintaining my Consecutive Days of Exercise streak. I'm not going to zero the streak--I've maintained it for 152 days as per the metric I was using throughout that time--but going forward I will consider the streak broken on any day I fail to complete a minimum of 120 minutes of MPA or 15 minutes of VPA.
This new rule still doesn't force me to do VPA. I can still maintain my streak via MPA alone. But I'd have to complete 840 minutes/week of MPA in order to do so. Which is significantly more than I have been doing. So it's a win either way.
Writing:
3 hrs. 44 min. craft study, idea gen, research
Total Hours for the Week: 20:00/20
No Solo Video Games: Day 117
Extended Gaming Rules: Day 35
Total Solo Gaming Time this Week (max 8 hours): 7:05
Low mileage today because the wind was COLD. Shelby and I did short walks in the morning and evening, and went to visit a friend in the afternoon, coming straight home again afterward. Which meant evening arrived with no chance to push my MPA up to 120 minutes for the day. Hence the dance party.
I've been struggling to dance lately. Especially high energy dancing like this. It feels like fiddling while Rome (or the whole freaking world) burns. But I am in no way responsible for the Americans' electoral screw up, and there isn't anything I can do to fix the problems it has created. I did everything I could to ensure my own country did not make a similar mistake. (Huge success there!) I did everything I could to try to ensure my province did not make a similar mistake. (Succeeded on the local front there, but the province screwed up overall.) I have been doing what I can to fight the problems caused by my province's electoral screw up. (Although admittedly I haven't been in every fight. There have been too many of them, and fighting a corrupt administration is exhausting.) Bottom line: My not dancing won't solve any problems. But if I choose to dance in spite of the world being on fire, it might give me the energy necessary to be more involved in putting out those fires. So I'm going to try to dance more.
After this night's dance party I felt the good kind of tired. Then Shelby and I went out for our evening walk. Then we went straight to bed. It was great!
Consecutive days of exercise: 153
Writing:
20 min. craft study
Total Hours Week-to-Date: 0:20/20
Habit Tracking:
No Solo Video Games: Day 118
Extended Gaming Rules: Day 36
Total Solo Gaming Time this Week (max 8 hours): 0
"The risk of failure is far sweeter than the regret of never trying at all. ~C Sanders"
I hear you. Having to deal with the dumpster fire here in MapleMAGAtLand with degenerates wanting to separate and our premiere literally destroying healthcare/education/social services/etc is freaking exhausting. With everything else going on in the world, it's hard to find the joy in the simple things, like dancing. I'm glad you did have a dance party. Hope it was as joyous as P!NK's.
"Nous sommes maîtres chez nous. Et nous le serons toujours. Elbows up, Canada!"
Moderator
to you and for the battle out there @AgileGrrl. The notion of Ontario seceding would be ludicrous. So that's one anxiety I don't need to deal with here (although I do have concerns for Alberta and Quebec, of course). But the rest? Yeah. Very familiar under Ford. Plus there's his ongoing attacks on the environment/naturalized spaces, his power grabs, his corrupt cronyism. And his obsessive hatred of the City of Toronto. What's that about?
Thank you for the song. That is brilliant and exactly what I needed!
"Nous sommes maîtres chez nous. Et nous le serons toujours. Elbows up, Canada!"
Moderator
Tuesday, March 24:
Hiking: 11.1 km
Planking: elbow plank hold
Push-ups (minimum 10): Touch the Bar: 10 hanging knee raises Total Body Strength: (am I even still doing this?) House of the Valkyrie: (or this?)
Yoga: Greet the Day + restorative: 8 minutes
Boreal/Pink* dance party: 24 minutes
* Thank you @AgileGrrl ! That track is definitely going into my dance party mix!
"Nous sommes maîtres chez nous. Et nous le serons toujours. Elbows up, Canada!"
Moderator
Wednesday, March 25:
Hiking: 13.1 km
Planking: inc. in yoga
Push-ups (minimum 10): Touch the Bar: 10 hanging knee raises Total Body Strength: (am I even still doing this?) House of the Valkyrie: (or this?)
Yoga: Quiet Room yoga flow: 4 minutes
80s hits dance party: 24 minutes
Yeah. I meant to delete Valkyrie yesterday. I just forgot. I'm still undecided about TBS.
I've been enjoying the dancing lately. And the yoga. (The Alo Wellness content going free is for me both a blessing--there's lots of great content there I want to try--and a curse--deciding which class to do takes time that I don't have. But I do enjoy yoga flow as a movement modality.) With the weather warming up here, Shelby and I are getting outside for longer and longer walks. And it will soon be much easier for me to get back into running too.
Calisthenics, on the other hand, I just don't like. I put DAREBEE Programs on my schedule because they do the decision-making work for me. I don't need to spend time deciding which yoga flow to do or which songs to dance to or what clothing I need to put on to go for a run today (not to mention the time needed to get into and out of the specialized clothing, or the space needed to deal with the large volume of sweaty clothing that winter runs create). With a Program I know I only need to call up the next day and do it, and I'll get a well-rounded training program over time. I just don't do it. Because I don't want to.
I have to fight with myself every day just to do ten lousy push-ups. They're not difficult for me. I can almost always do them in one set these days. I can do them in whatever clothing I happen to be wearing (or not wearing) at any point during my day. I can do them in any room in my apartment (including my bathroom--although that's a bit of a tight squeeze). I can do them outside. (This isn't a great idea if the ground is snow, ice, or mud-covered. But outside is a perfectly fine option where I live most days for 7 months out of the year.) I can do them (and have done them) in indoor public places. They take up less than a minute of my day. And yet still it is a battle for me to do them. (And I sometimes miss.)
I'm keeping the push-ups (unless I start doing a lot more upper body focused yoga a lot more regularly) because my other activities really don't do much to target upper body strength, and I want, at a minimum, to maintain enough upper body strength to be able to execute 10 push-ups with good form. But do I need to be doing a DAREBEE Program if I'm regularly hiking, dancing, practising yoga, and even semi-regularly running? Nope.
This is my second attempt at TBS. Part of my brain is telling me: "Get it done! Get it over with! At Level I you can do multiple workouts each day and be finished by the end of the month! (And then you won't need to abandon the same frakking Program twice over!)" But most of me knows this is a sunk cost fallacy. I won't continue to do TBS-style workouts once I finish the Program. So if my other activities don't provide the same training benefits, I'll lose any gains I made through suffering through TBS anyhow. And if my other activities do provide the same training benefits, then I'll achieve those same benefits without completing TBS.
Maybe I'll be Smart Laura today and break free from the sunk cost fallacy. But first: I'm going to have some breakfast.
"The risk of failure is far sweeter than the regret of never trying at all. ~C Sanders"
I am on my third attempt at the Cardio Blast challenge and when I get halfway I run out of incentive to continue on. We'll see how this attempt goes. Drop TBS and do what makes you shine inside. You know you want to.
"Nous sommes maîtres chez nous. Et nous le serons toujours. Elbows up, Canada!"
Moderator
Thursday, March 26:
Activity
Details
Time
Distance
This Week
Hiking
neighbourhood walks
13.5 km
__ __ __
Push-ups
__ __ __
Touch the Bar
__ __ __
Yoga
__ __ __
Dancing
__ __ __
Running
__ __ __
Aikido
__ __ __
I'm trying some new formatting to pretty things up.
TBS and Valkyrie are officially dropped. (Thank you @TopNotch and @AgileGrrl .)
Planking is dropped as something to track separately since it's included in doing push-ups anyway, plus almost always included in yoga, plus my TtB work these days is usually core-focused as well.
Running and Aikido are on the chart, even though some weeks I don't run at all (and am okay with this) and Aikido is usually only one night a week (and some weeks class is cancelled or I'm not able to get there).
These are all fitness activities which I want to maintain as regular parts of my life. Their frequency varies from things I do absolutely every day (hiking) to things I'm likely to do anywhere from not-at-all to daily within any given week.
I like the and icons in this format as an easy way to see which days in the week I got to do each activity. ( in this format isn't a failure. It only indicates a day off.)
Things I'd like to be doing but don't have the means to be doing regularly at this time at any point in the year (such as SUP) aren't going in the chart (unless I actually do them some week).
Similarly, activities I do sometimes but not regularly (DAREBEE special events, cycling, maybe roller skating, etc.) can be added to the bottom of the chart in weeks in which they happen, but I'll leave them off for weeks in which they don't.
Intensity Minutes:
Level
This Day
Week-to-Date
Victory Points (Goal = 10/Week)
MPA
135
455/600
VPA
0
55:27/150
Consecutive days of exercise: 156
Writing:
Time
Week-to-Date
Victory Points (Goal = 10/Week)
1:00
5:40/20
Habit Tracking:
No Solo Video Games: Day 121
Extended Gaming Rules: Day 39
Total Solo Gaming Time this Week (max 8 hours): 3:30
"Nous sommes maîtres chez nous. Et nous le serons toujours. Elbows up, Canada!"
Moderator
Monday, March 30:
Activity
Details
Time
Distance
This Week
Hiking
neighbourhood walks + moving crew*
2:06:00
23.85 km
Push-ups
Touch the Bar
Yoga
restorative
0:15:00
Dancing
Running
Aikido
I was still helping with the move.
Additional VPA
moving crew
4:46:00
* My watch logged my total mileage for this day at 23.85 km, but much of this was counted as VPA, not MPA, as it involved carrying heavy loads up stairs. The time I've logged on the Hiking line is only the MPA time. The remainder of the time is accounted for on the Additional VPA line.
Intensity Minutes:
Level
This Day
Week-to-Date
Victory Points (Goal = 10/Week)
MPA
126
126/600
VPA
286
286/150
|
Consecutive days of exercise: 160
Writing:
Time
Week-to-Date
Victory Points (Goal = 10/Week)
0:20
0:20/20
Habit Tracking:
No Solo Video Games: Day 125
Extended Gaming Rules: Day 43
Total Solo Gaming Time this Week (max 8 hours): 0
Shelby and I are well. Well... I am well. Shelby is losing too much weight. But she seems happy, LOVES to go for her walks, and is VERY MOTIVATED to eat treats. Just not her kibble. We are doing some tests to try to figure out what is going on.
Our mileage is down now because of the heat. This next week is going to be especially brutal. Walks at 5AM and after dark only. Even after dark it's still going to be unpleasantly warm here. But at least I don't have to worry about Shelby's black fur getting hot enough to fry an egg when the sun isn't up!
I am still doing Aikido whenever I can get a ride to class with my friend. I finally got my tires pumped on my bike. But it is too hot now to cycle to class.
I have not been dancing. I've not felt motivated to do high intensity work at all. This will only get worse now with summer's heat here.
I did sometimes feel tempted to go for a run when we had nice weather. But I feel bad about going out in the nice weather without Shelby. So usually we just go for longer walks on those days. In May we did a 29 km hike to a conservation area that's across town from us. The following week we hiked the same conservation area with a friend (but drove there, so our total mileage was less), then hiked the Marsh Trail in Rondeau the following day. 36 km total across the two days. A week ago Saturday we hiked the Ponds, doing almost 20 km on that day. Since then, due to stormy and/or hot weather, we've stayed close to home.
Mileage summary:
Week
Mileage
March 30 - April 5
60.5 km
April 6-12
50.4 km
April 13-19
39.2 km
April 20-26
58.3 km
April 27 - May 3
73.2 km
May 4-10
84.3 km
May 11-17
74.8 km
May 18-24
85.5 km
May 25-31
75.7 km
June 1-7
56.9 km
June 8-14
50 km
June 15-21
74.5 km
June 22-28
53.9 km
Our target is 84 km per week. With the exception of a couple of weeks, we've been considerably off the mark for the past few months. [But actually done better than during the winter when somebody was a wimp about the cold weather. (The somebody was not Shelby.)]
We've agreed to cat sit for the next couple of months for a couple of cats who live ~ 2.3 km away from us. This will force us to walk at least 4.6 km every morning to go to feed the cats. (I'm looking after them in their apartment, not bringing them here.) Then we'll do a second walk in our own neighbourhood in the evenings, after dark. Unless it's truly stupidly hot out, the plan is to add in our local conservation area to our morning trips to visit the cats. This will make our morning walk a little over 10 km. So we'll just need a short walk in the evenings to hit our mileage target for the day.
Other than hiking (hopefully 12 km per day--although it won't be that much this week!) and (hopefully weekly) Aikido, I am trying to get back into doing regular yoga. I want to be doing more strength-training work, and yoga is the path of least resistance for me in that regard. The flexibility work won't hurt either.
I have actually been to a couple of public yoga classes lately. Our friendly neighbourhood realtors know a young woman who is just finishing her YTT. They have provided their office space for her to get some practice teaching in. Since I live around the corner and am a yoga teacher myself, I have been going to support her. (Also: it's a chance to do yoga for free in an air conditioned space!) This is intermittent though, and I want to get back into a daily yoga habit. This week is going to be a tough week to start that, because the days are truly going to be stupidly hot, and it's not going to cool off enough at night to get our apartment back down to a comfortable temperature. I may be plastered to my kitchen floor with ice packs draped over my body by the end of the week. But we'll see how it goes.
I may not check in much over the next week or so as I'll be trying to minimize computer use so as to not add any additional heat to our apartment. But I will be back!
"Nous sommes maîtres chez nous. Et nous le serons toujours. Elbows up, Canada!"
Moderator
It is so freaking hot here! (My computer's fan was in overdrive from the moment I turned the machine on. I won't stay on long for the machine is old and I fear a meltdown in this heat!)
Mileage is down because of the heat. We do what we can.
I worked up a weekly yoga schedule with one hardcore strength workout and one flow workout for each day. (Except Sundays, which will just be one longer flow.)
I have not started this schedule yet though, because of the heat. I am doing some restorative yoga each day. That is it right now.
Yesterday was a holiday here! (Happy Canada Day to all Canadian Bees!) I was invited to a barbecue luncheon at the home of a friend. Said friend has air conditioning, in theory. But it was broken. So our lunch was still hot. But the food and the company were excellent. Shelby, thankfully, did not melt while I was out.
I hope any of you who are also being hit with this extreme heat are staying safe.
"Nous sommes maîtres chez nous. Et nous le serons toujours. Elbows up, Canada!"
Moderator
It's still too hot here during the day for me to do much of anything in the way of high intensity workouts. It does cool off overnight most nights, however, and has been staying pleasant for a bit later into the morning most days. So Shelby and I have been enjoying longer walks (mostly within our neighbourhood as Shelby has many friends here who she likes to visit). I'm still doing Aikido on Monday nights, and also still cat sitting. Shelby, however, is done with the cats. She has made it quite clear she does not want to go out there anymore. So most days I go on my bicycle. So that's 5.4 km per day of cycling most days.
We received some hard news from Shelby's vet at the beginning of this month. So far Shelby is still happy and doing well on her walks. We're taking life one day at a time and enjoying our time together as best we can for as long as we can.
What else? Yesterday @neilarey made me do push-ups. Twice. (A good thing. I need to be doing more push-ups if I want to achieve my fitness goals.) Also some squats and jump squats. Check out DAREBEE's new Fitness Test (for assessing where you're at currently w.r.t. DAREBEE training levels) if you've not had a chance to do so yet. It's short and sweet and pretty neat.
My diet has been a mess all summer because I just cannot cook in the heat. But yesterday I learned how to make salmorejo, and tomatoes are in season here currently. I suspect this may become a staple of my diet for the next little while. (It is so, so good!)
I've been feeling this song lately.
(No. Don't ask. The details are unimportant. But the main fallout is that I realized I've been wasting my time on something. I am therefore now no longer wasting my time on that thing. Which is good.)
I've got a bunch of stuff on my plate over the next couple of weeks (some social, some administrative, more cat-sitting, plus dog-sitting, etc.) I'm hoping to return to a more regular workout schedule, more regular logging here, and more regular checking in with all of you, beginning on Labour Day.
Thank you to everyone who continues to check in on me here. I'll be back soon!
We received some hard news from Shelby's vet at the beginning of this month. So far Shelby is still happy and doing well on her walks. We're taking life one day at a time and enjoying our time together as best we can for as long as we can.
So far, Shelby is still doing very well. I don't know for how long this will persist.
Shelby had an ultrasound on August 4 that revealed she has a mass on her spleen. Statistics say it is most likely an aggressive cancer. But we don't know. There is a possibility it could be "benign". (There's no way to test it without removing her spleen.)
Splenectomy is a major surgery. Especially for a senior dog. (Shelby is 15 years old!) I won't put her through that. If the mass is cancerous, splenectomy won't buy her much time, and she'd lose it all to recovering from major surgery. Plus the surgery itself could kill her. If the mass is not cancerous, then a successful surgery would be curative--for this issue. But she'd still be laid up afterward for the recovery. So I have to weigh the scales: balancing how much time surgery could potentially buy her versus how much quality time she'd lose to the recovery period. She's already losing strength in her hind legs. A post-operative period of forced inactivity would exacerbate this. Plus she'd be more susceptible to some infections without a spleen. If the mass is benign, Shelby could possibly live for many months yet and die of something entirely unrelated. But there is a danger that, without surgery, her spleen could rupture. In which case she'd bleed out fairly quickly.
Like I wrote previously: it's a hard diagnosis. I've decided against surgery, because the risks of doing it are too high and the potential benefits too small. Right now Shelby is still so happy. But her happiness is predicated on being able to get outside every day and go for walks to visit her many friends (and collect treats!) I cannot take that away from her on a gamble that maybe buys her a few weeks but maybe kills her faster and most likely leaves her with a lower quality of life overall than she had before the surgery. So we are keeping on as we are, and enjoying whatever time we have.
Right now, today, Shelby is still happy.
On August 4, our friend from Cambridge came out to visit us, and we all went hiking in Rondeau together.
It was a bit hot out, and we only hiked 13.5 km in total on the day. Definitely not one of our longer hikes. (Not by a long shot!) But still pretty freaking good for a 15-year-old dog!
On August 13, our friends from the Booming Metropolis (who we walked with most days when we lived there) came out to London to visit us, and we took them on our regular hike through our neighbourhood here. Shelby showed her friend Hendrix all the good places to get treats in Wortley Village.
This past Sunday I was supposed to attend one of the social events I'd mentioned in my previous post. But I bailed at the last minute. The event was a barbecue, but it was out of town. Going would have meant leaving Shelby home alone for 8 hours. And I just couldn't do that at this point in her life.
As it turns out, Shelby was fine. She would have been fine if I'd gone to the party, and just spent the time sleeping. But I'm happy I chose to stay home with her, nonetheless.
Sunday was also Jazz in the Village, which I knew meant Shelby's realtor friends would be in their office. These friends stock treats for Shelby, which she stops by to collect regularly. But we hadn't seen them in several weeks. They're currently hosting a shoe store and a fashion accessories store within their space. So the space has been open 4 days a week for Shelby to collect her treats. But the realtors themselves we hadn't seen. Jazz in the Village was an opportunity for Shelby to see her actual friends (not just eat the treats they buy for her).
The afternoon had been pretty rainy. As a result, the realtors had moved all of their displays and activities for the day inside. But one of them was standing outside with a little megaphone, calling out to passers-by to alert them to what was going on inside. When she saw Shelby and me approaching, she turned her megaphone into the store and called out:
"Shelby is here for her treats. Please bring treats for Shelby."
When someone brought the treat bag outside, she said (again into the megaphone):
"Shelby would like four treats please. Four treats for Shelby. Her mom will tell you she only needs one treat. But that is incorrect. She needs four treats."
While Shelby was being served her treats, I told the realtor about Shelby's medical diagnosis. She then called the person with the treat bag back outside:
"I was wrong. Shelby needs four more treats please. Four more treats for Shelby."
So Shelby got more treats.
Then the other realtor came outside to see us, and she wanted to give a treat to Shelby too.
Needless to say, Shelby was very happy I had stayed home to take her to Jazz in the Village. And I was too.
In other news: I am deeply grateful to Dominic LeBlanc, Janice Charette, and their teams for all of their efforts on behalf of our great country, and also, of course, to our Prime Minister, Mark Carney, for standing strong and refusing to kowtow to the bullying tactics of the administration south of our border.
Nous sommes maîtres chez nous.
Et nous le serons toujours.
It's always a hard choice when it comes to the animal companions we love @Laura Rainbow Dragon - I totally feel you and also agree with your thinking. Having been through it several times I always say that my role is to do what is best for them, not what is good for me. You're doing the right thing.
This past week was a good one for Shelby. No special hikes. But we did good mileage on our regular routes. Yesterday's mileage was down (only 4.3 km on the day) due to rainy weather for most of the day. But we covered 72 km in total for the week. So still pretty good over all. Shelby made it to her Very Important Park meeting most days during the week and also collected treats from her realtor friends and her neighbour friend who maintains a treat box for the puppies. She also visited with friends who gave her behind-the-ear scratches and butt massages.
We were dog-sitting Oreo for three days over the weekend. I'm also still cat-sitting. Since I don't like to leave the dogs home alone when Oreo is with us (there's a lot of foot traffic on our street, and Oreo is quite barky), a friend came over to sit with the dogs for an hour each day so I could go out to tend to the cats. She brought liver treats with her. So we had two very happy puppies during her visits!
No Aikido last week. But I did cycle out to the cats 5 days on the week. On Tuesday I got a ride there with a friend as I was going to her house afterward. On Sunday I couldn't cycle as it was raining. (My bike is an old junker. But I don't need rust problems on top of everything else. And I have to store the thing inside my living room. So getting it covered in rain and kicked up road spray isn't a great option.) I couldn't walk out there either though, as my friend was here to look after the dogs. So I couldn't take too much time. My solution was to run out to the cats' place and back. Twice 2.4 km.
I'm not going to lie: the running was rough. I hadn't been running at all since... *GULP* -- my birthday run back in January. Yikes! I honestly had not remembered it had been that long. In hindsight, pushing as hard as I did yesterday was not a good idea, given that long training gap. And I did know while I was doing it that I was pushing things. But I did not want to abuse my friend's time.
The good news is that I survived my folly without incurring a major injury. The bad news is that I did cause some Achilles tendon strain. So further running will be off the table for the next little while, and ankle mobility, calf stretches, and foot and calf strengthening exercises will become a regular feature of my days. Which they're supposed to be anyhow. I had been, for a long time, alternating doing two sets of either Sore Feet or Ankle Recovery with Dragon Protocol each day. That was a good plan, and one I need to get back to. Yesterday I did Sore Feet--though I had to do the calf raises with bent knees to avoid straining my Achilles too much.
Other things I need to get back to:
Daily hand & wrist exercises. I alternate between Talk to the Hand and Wrist Pain doing one set with DP of one or the other each day, plus two sets with DP of Hand Tendons every day.
Daily pushing and pulling. For the pulling work I'm going to keep things simple for now and make my goal to do one active hang per day. Even if it's only for ten seconds per day, that's better than doing nothing. For push-ups, I'm considering incorporating the 5-Minute Push-ups EMOM workout into my schedule. But not every day. That workout would be a lot for me every day right now, even on Level I. And my resistance to starting the workout would be pretty high. Plus I do want to get back into regular yoga practice, which includes push-ups. I don't need to be doing extra on top of the yoga every day. But maybe one day per week of 5-minutes EMOM and one day per week attempting a max reps set? I'm still thinking on this.
And, of course, the aforementioned daily yoga practice.
I had planned to launch my new schedule on Labour Day. I'll be finished looking after the cats by then, which frees up ~ an hour per day of my time. But I've been slacking on a lot of fronts this summer. Trying to go from zero to 360 overnight on everything is unlikely to be a successful strategy. So I'm trying to ease into things with a soft launch this week, adding things in where I can with the goal to be fully up and running with my new fitness schedule by Labour Day.
A proper writing schedule is going to take longer to get back on track as I have a huge To Do list of administrative and organizational tasks I need to take care of, including some time-sensitive items I really need to get done soon and some longer items that will take up an entire day or more. But this is in the works too. Ditto for improvements to my diet, which are already under way.
What's not on the agenda for the next little while at least: running, dancing, or other high impact activities. I need to get my tendons healed up!
"Nous sommes maîtres chez nous. Et nous le serons toujours. Elbows up, Canada!"
Moderator
Monday, August 31
Shelby's VIP meeting didn't happen due to rain. Shelby and I still went out at the appointed hour, however, and Shelby got treats from me at the designated treat spots. Additionally, we met up with Shelby's friend Aurora (one of her VIP meeting friends) who was out for her walk at the same time, so both pups got treats from both humans (as is customary) on their meeting. Other than that we just did our short around the block walk twice. (Shelby very generously sacrificed some of her usual mileage in deference to the needs of my Achilles.) But we saw one of Shelby's realtor friends on both of the shorter walks, so Shelby scored a whole bag of Walleye Twists and also a few Lamb Puffs. (Shelby is very fond of her realtor friends. They always have great treats!)
I made a few modifications to my training plan that's meant to start next week. I had originally included a couple of dance workouts but have replaced them with more yoga for now to allow my Achilles to heal properly. Here is the new schedule:
Plus Aikido class on Monday nights, plus daily walks with Shelby.
As you can see, the 5-Minute Push-Ups workout made the schedule twice. But there are only three days on the week when I'll be trying to force myself to set aside time specifically dedicated to doing only push-ups. Push-ups in some form or other occur in almost all of the yoga workouts, but I have significantly less mental resistance to doing them as part of a yoga practice--even when the instructor cues several reps in a row or cues a long hold in the bottom position. We'll see how this goes.
Since I already had the schedule made up, I decided I might as well start it a week early. So on Monday I did:
Mobility: Greet the Day - 4 sets Pushing: 5-Minute Push-Ups - to give my Achilles a break I did kneeling push-ups and so did the workout on Level II Pulling: active hang Yoga Flow: Rise & Shine: Love (18 min.) Strength: Fit 15: Feel the Burn (12 min.) Hands: Talk to the Hand (1xDP) + Hand Tendons (2xDP) Feet: Ankle Recovery (2xDP) - I normally do the calf raises one-legged but could not do one-legged on my left side this day due to my Achilles tendon issue. So I did one set on the right leg and one set two-footed. Hiking: 6.64 km Cycling: 5.4 km Aikido: skipped due to Achilles tendon grumpiness
This is not a promise to keep up with the full schedule for the remainder of this week. For one thing, the Monday yoga flow and strength workouts are selected to be shorter ones than later in the week due to Mondays also being Aikido nights. And I didn't attend Aikido this week due to my ankle. Also: I still need to deal with the cats for three more days. (I've already been out to see them today, Tuesday.) This takes up almost an hour of my day and involves the 5.4 km of cycling. Which is hard for me in the heat. (I'm pretty exhausted right now, having just cycled home in 30°C with a humidex of 41°C.) Our current heat wave is predicted to persist into Thursday, with no real relief coming until the early hours of Friday morning. On the other hand: my workout room has a ceiling fan, a pedestal fan, and a box fan. I can make it pretty drafty in there. Which should help me to at least do something. (After I have a nap to recover from cycling in the heat.)
I'll leave off today with this song by a family from my native land which pays tribute to my adopted land. I think the Marsh Family nailed it with this one.
"Nous sommes maîtres chez nous. Et nous le serons toujours. Elbows up, Canada!"
Moderator
Tuesday, September 1
Good VIP meeting Tuesday with lots of treats. On the way home we saw Shelby's puppy friend, Diesel, out in his yard with his human. This involved more yummy treats. (Diesel was jealous because he must perform for his treats. But Shelby gets them just for visiting. Sometimes age has its perks.)
Mobility: Posture (1xDP) Pushing: yoga only day (but I didn't do any yoga) Pulling: active hang Yoga Flow: none Strength: none Hands: Wrist Pain (DP each side) + Hand Tendons (2xDP) Feet: Sore Feet (2xDP) - did one set of calf raises on the right leg and one set two-footed Hiking: 8.79 km Cycling: 5.4 km
My Achilles felt fine walking this day, but still not quite ready for one-legged calf raises. I'm going to commit to doing all of my calf raises two-footed for the remainder of the week. I'll reassess next Monday if my left ankle is ready to go solo.
Hiking mileage was short because it was stupid hot and humid out. Even late at night it was still hot and humid. My yoga flow and strength workouts did not happen.
"Nous sommes maîtres chez nous. Et nous le serons toujours. Elbows up, Canada!"
Moderator
Wednesday, September 2
Shelby has been nervous about attending the VIP meetings lately because one day last week another dog at the meeting attacked her. This dog is a big Airedale Terrier who the owner knows has it in for Shelby. Yet for some reason she had her dog off-leash. In a park where dogs are required to be on leash. At a time when she knew Shelby was likely to be there.
When we arrived at the park, the dog ran right at Shelby. I tried to stop her. But the dog got around me and got Shelby by the neck. It was several seconds before the other dog's owner was able to get to us and help me separate them.
Thankfully the mean dog did not draw blood. But Shelby and I were both pretty shook up by the incident.
Since the incident the mean dog's owner has kept her on leash in the park. And I always check now, when we are still far away, that the dog is indeed attached to her human, before we proceed to the meeting. But Shelby is still afraid.
I don't want Shelby to miss these meetings because all of the other dogs and all the humans love her, and she loves them, and she gets lots of treats (which she also loves), and afterward we walk with some of the nice dogs. Which means even more treats. Basically we walk everyone home, and everyone gets treats every time we drop one of the dogs off at their home. Shelby and I walk the farthest. Which means Shelby gets all the treats! Then she and I continue on just the two of us, we visit Shelby's friend's treat box and sometimes meet up with other friends along our route after that. The VIP meetings have been the highlight of Shelby's days. I cannot allow one mean dog to ruin them for her. So we're still going. And when Shelby balks I explain to her that the mean dog is leashed and cannot hurt her, and Shelby does follow me into the park, albeit hiding behind me.
The mean dog does not walk with our crew after the meeting. But she does exit the park via the same side. This morning the mean dog's owner left first, trying to keep her dog well away from Shelby. And Shelby and I hung back, giving them plenty of space. Still the mean dog kept stopping and turning around to glare at Shelby.
Eventually the mean dog made it out of the park. Then we were able to catch up to Shelby's friends, and Shelby got her meeting adjournment treats, and we all headed off together.
When the post-meeting crew was down to just Shelby and one other dog (her friend Spock), we met up with another of their friends, Jack. Jack does not usually walk with us. But he's part of the treat crew when we see him. So everyone got treats again. Then, after we had parted ways with Spock, we crossed paths with Jack two more times. More treats!
By the time Shelby and I made it back to our own street I only had one treat left in my little treat container. Then we met up with Shelby's friends Betty and Marshmallow. Sadly we could not do more treats on that meeting as the one treat I had left was too small to split amongst three dogs. But Betty and Marshmallow knew of a lady on our street, who lives only one block from me and Shelby, who has yummy treats. They took Shelby to this lady's house and introduced them. So now Shelby has a new human friend!
Mobility: Anti-Aging Mobility (1 set) Pushing: 5-Minute Push-Ups - My shoulders were still tired from doing this workout on Monday. So I did kneeling push-ups again, and only on Level I. I would not have made it through the workout trying to do more. Pulling: active hang Yoga Flow: Earth | Foundational Flows: From the Ground Up (29 min.) - leg work! (lots of long held squats) Recovery: none Hands: Talk to the Hand (DP each side) + Hand Tendons (2xDP) Feet: Ankle Recovery (2xDP) - two-legged calf raises for both sets Hiking: 10.65 km Cycling: 5.4 km - was smart this day and beat the heat by going out to feed the cats at 6AM
I decided to put a "recovery" workout on the schedule for hump day, instead of a dedicated strength workout. These will still be yoga-based workouts. So will contain some strength work. But the primary focus will be on mobility. I didn't have time to get to it today, however. I may try to add it in to tomorrow's work.
The Airedale and Shelby have a mutual human friend. The first time the Airedale met Shelby, we were visiting said friend. And the Airedale got jealous. Which is silly. This friend is very gregarious and has many friends, both human and canine. And Shelby is not jealous of her friendships. Even I am allowed to be friends with other dogs. (Shelby is secure in the knowledge that she is my #1.) But the Airedale decided not to like Shelby, and that was that.
The Airedale was not at the VIP meeting this morning. So that was nice.
"Nous sommes maîtres chez nous. Et nous le serons toujours. Elbows up, Canada!"
Moderator
Thursday, September 3
Did not do any catch up work this day. Did not do this day's scheduled work either. I just walked with Shelby and, in the evening, with Shelby and Oreo. I'd meant to do my yoga workouts after the evening walk. But we ended up visiting with a friend and getting home far too late. (Which didn't stop me from eating a late meal, on the fantasy that I was actually going to stay up and workout, then procrastinating for hours because I'd just eaten too much food to do a workout, and then finally crashing in the not-very-wee hours of the morning, having done nothing but a few calf raises.)
Mobility: nope Pushing: nope Pulling: didn't even do this. and it's a 10 second thing. Yoga Flow: nope Strength: nope Hands: nope Feet: calf raises Hiking: 11.42 km Cycling: 5.4 km
On the plus side of things, Shelby had a great morning walk! The mean dog was not at the VIP meeting. We walked afterward with Shelby's friends Zoe, Aurora, and Spock. At Aurora's house we ran into a human friend who we used to walk with last year with her dog BamBam. We've not seen her much this summer since BamBam, sadly, passed in the spring. So it was nice to see her. After dropping Spock off at his home, we later met up with Shelby's friend Cubby who was out walking with both of his moms. Then we saw the human friend we'd met up with earlier's mother. It was good to see her getting out for a walk since she's been pretty house-bound lately caring for her husband. Finally, on our own street, we saw Diesel and his human (who told Shelby she keeps Diesel's treats on her front porch, and Shelby is welcome to just come by and help herself anytime) and Shelby's new human friend.
In the afternoon we just did a short walk. But Shelby got treats from her new human friend (yes, twice in one day), and from her realtor friends, and from our neighbourhood busker.
In the evening we walked with Oreo. We got treats from Shelby's neighbourhood friend with the treat box and then we visited with another friend (the one who the mean dog is jealous of Shelby being friends with) in her garden. Oreo only barked a couple of times. Which is pretty good for him.
"Nous sommes maîtres chez nous. Et nous le serons toujours. Elbows up, Canada!"
Moderator
Friday, September 4
We made it to the VIP meeting this morning but could not walk with our usual crew afterward since we still had Oreo with us. (He does well walking with just Shelby. But a whole crew of dogs is too much for him, sadly. He just barks and barks and barks if we try to walk with them.)
When we got back from our morning walk, Oreo's human was waiting at our place to pick him up. Then I hopped on my bike and headed out to see to the cats one last time.
I am done cat sitting!
(The cats, I expect, will be almost as happy to have their regular human back as I am happy to be done with having to clean up after them.)
Mobility: nope Pushing: nope Pulling: didn't even do this. and it's a 10 second thing. Yoga Flow: nope Strength: nope Hands: nope Feet: calf raises Hiking: 6.15 km Cycling: 5.9 km
Another slacker day on the workout front. After getting back from seeing to the cats, I slept. Shelby and I did not even make it out for an afternoon walk. After dinner I did get started on some much-needed housework, however. (This was almost entirely neglected over the summer due to the heat and always being busy either walking Shelby or visiting the cats during every non-middle-of-the-night hour that wasn't too hot to move.) After that, Shelby and I did a short evening walk and a short visit with a friend.
We have arranged to go back to walking with this friend, not simply sitting in her garden to visit. (Her garden is lovely. But I do entirely too much sitting!) We had tried this in the spring, but fell away from it during the summer because our friend is not generally ready to leave the house before 10AM, and that is far too late for us during the summer. So we mostly visited late at night. But our friend doesn't want to walk at that hour. So we've just been sitting and talking. Now that the days are slightly less brutally hot, I figure Shelby and I can handle a short walk at 10AM. So we will start back with that plan tomorrow.
Now, however, it is 12:25 AM Saturday. In the interests of trying to get our schedule at least somewhat back on track, I'm skipping my workouts again in favour of going to bed.
from
to you and 
for the battle out there 
from
from
Even late at night it was still hot and humid. My yoga flow and strength workouts did not happen.
