So yeah, I'm getting totally ripped

One of my lifting buddies who moved to Omaha to freeze his ass off used to randomly say "Gary, you are one vascular man!" That stopped happening so much when I started gaining weight, and after a while, it stopped. That is because I was no longer a vascular man., I was getting kind of fat.
I have noticed that I am seeing more veins in my arms lately, which means my body fat is dropping.
Today one of my clients got a little creeped out by seeing a vein in my arm. She said something like "Oh my got what is that on your arm, is that cancer?" I was like "It's a vein. Thanks for noticing, I'm about to get totally shredded."

Today I did 3 separate workouts. It snowed, and people freaked out. They cancelled their training sessions, so I literally was stuck at the gym with nothing to do all day.  This is what happens when you have nothing to do:

Workout #1 (supersets)

• Pulldowns 4 X 15 reps @ 120
• Seated close-grip row 4 X 15 @ 105
• 
  
• Straight-arm pulldown 4 X 15 @ 100
• Underhand pulldown 4 X fail @ 105
• 
  
• Inverted row 3 X 15 @ BW
• DB Romanian deadlift 3 X 20 @ 10

No, that's not a typo on the last one. I'm still recovering from my injury, so SUPER LIGHT is what I have to do. We'll see how my back feels tomorrow after the deadlifts.


Workout #2

• Stepmill Interval 3 min at 80 SPM 1 min 60 SPM 30 minutes
• Treadmill Incline 8 Speed 3.5 mph 20 min.

Workout #3 (superset plus cardio interval)

• Wall inverted shoulder press 4 X 6, 6, 8, 8
• Lateral front raise combo 4 X 15 @5
• 2 Minutes elliptical at 12 resistance

During workout #3 I felt a little twinge in the lower back. It was during the inverted shoulder press.
check out this link: http://youtu.be/FknaOcjTQAM That's not me.

Disc error

If my back injury could be a movie, It would be narrated by Ray Liotta, have the above title, and start like this:

I had been thin all my life. As awesome as that might sound to some, for me it sucked. I can't sit there and tell a a 500 pound lady that being skinny can really blow and not feel like a complete a-hole complete with a hair gel faux-hawk and an orange tan, but the fact is if you are a short guy AND you are skinny on top of that, it makes you always feel inadequate around pretty much any other dude, except maybe the guy who was Frodo in Lord of the Rings, but even he is not as scrawny as you are, you girl.

I once read an article in a magazine that was talking about indicators of success. I don't know why I was reading this particular issue of Forbes magazine or whatever. I was like sixteen at the time and should have been doing something else that was not as lame, but instead I was a big fat nerd reading a magazine for rich yuppie types, in a public library. Kill me now.

The author mentioned that in researching the article, they found that among non-obese individuals there was a direct relationship between height and/or weight to success and respect from others.
This may have totally contributed to the now glaringly obvious short-guy complex.

When I was a freshman in college, my weight was bout 110 pounds. I am five feet, six inches tall. For a long time I accepted what was handed to me by that nature (what a bitch) and used it as an excuse for being unsuccessful in life.
If my boss at work was a dude and also a moron, I told myself and other people that he only got the job because he is tall. Yes I am that crazy.

It meant that people respect you if you take up more space. As long as you are not totally fat.

When I was younger I used to skateboard, but I was terrible at it. I fell a lot and one time I hit the ground so hard I had pain shooting down my leg for weeks.
I went to a chiropractor, who treated me for a slipped disc (this is what they called disc herniations in the 1970s). That happened in 1997, but they still called it that.

I still had a big chip on my shoulder about my height, until I figured out that there was something I could do to get bigger. I could gain weight.


I have to tell you something right now: I haven't always been healthy even though I was thin.


To gain weight I went on what I called a fat diet. I was going to get fat like a sumo wrestler. I was playing bass in a punk rock band and thought it would be awesome to be a fat punk rocker. So in addition to my very punk rock diet of cigarettes, Pabst Blue Ribbon, heroin and ramen noodles I was also eating at least a pint of ice cream a day.

I didn't get fat, mostly because I puked up everything when I got high. So yeah. I gave up on the weight gain since I was no good at that and concentrated on being a drug addict, since the only thing I seemed to be good at was drugs. I was awesome at that.

When I decided to get my act cleaned up, fitness was a huge part of that. I learned how to lift weights and run and eat to fuel my body and ended up putting on 30 pounds!
For some reason, it is way easier to put on mass when you are not vomiting three times a day. It is also much easier to have teeth that are not rotted. I liked the way I felt all the time.

I like lifting weights better that skateboarding and better than pretty much every other sport or exercise I have tried. It makes me feel in control. It turns out that in addition to having a raging napoleon complex, I am a total control freak!

I loved being in the gym so much that I wanted to work in the fitness industry. I like how everyone is at the gym because they want to be the best version of themselves, and not always just on the outside. Dedication to and consistency carry over into everyday life and are behaviors of successful people. That is fact.

After I started working at the gym I put on about 10 more pounds of muscle, then I hit a wall (figuratively, that time). I needed motivation and a goal. I was just under 150 pounds and that hadn't changed in a while. I wanted at least 20 more pounds.

This past March I decided to train for a bodybuilding competition that was taking place in October. This was a thing that I could use toward my quest to put on some more muscle. I love deadlines because they make me get the work done.

From March to July I busted my ass in the gym and drank liquefied chicken breasts and put on almost 20 pounds. Some of it was body fat, which really didn't bother me because I knew I could get rid of it, right? I'm a trainer with three certifications, a support system at home and a whole lot to prove to myself.

In late June I notice it was difficult to balance on my left leg and By early July I was walking with a limp. There was pain down my left leg and in my lower back. It turns out after an MRI and a visit to a spine specialist (who tried to sell me a surgery I don't need. I will write about that d-bag later.) that I have a herniated L4-5 disc and a bulging L2-3 disc. It hurt to bend and I spent most of the summer laying on an ice pack. It was one of the hardest summers of my life. Even chilled out things like swimming and yoga aggravated my injury, so I didn't work out for over 2 months.

On top of that, when I was training my clients and it came time to show a new exercise, it bothered my back. Total gimp mode. My job sucked because it was taking cake from a fat girl. I was the fat girl and working out was my cake. I was one angry fat girl.

Unable to train with weights, I lost a lot of muscle and as body hung on to its new fat stores.  Somehow I had gotten into the worst shape of my life.

By now things are getting better with my back. I have been going to an amazing chiropractor who uses mechanical traction to create a vacuum in the disc space. An that's how I got the clever name of this post, because I call that machine a disc-sucker. Not corny at all.

I am finally able to lift weights again, although I have not been cleared to run or jump or lift heavy. That's OK, I am still a beast.

As of a few weeks ago, my body fat was the highest it had ever been (17%). What was I going to do about it?
 So I came up with and idea that I think is going to be very interesting.

A lot of my clients are using the My Fitness Pal app and website to keep track of calories. I figured if I can ask you to do it, I might as well be doing it, too. We will get shredded together, like fitness pals do!

So for a little while this blog will be about my experiment with this method of accountability. If you would like to follow me on My Fitness Pal, my username is Garyberglund. I think you might have to friend me, so don't feel weird if we haven't met, I'll still think you're creepy.

I think that man over there is drowning

Summer has been super hot. I have gone outside exactly three times since the last weekend of May, one of which was to cover my house in tinfoil to deflect the sun's hateful rays away from my cooccon of air-conditioned slothiness.

That is maybe a little exaggerated. But the first time I have exercised outside since May was Sunday afternoon and I was almost run over while I was riding my super-sweet road and wearing my spandex tri-suit (which is like an old-timey pair of swim trunks had a baby with a zip-up vest). God, if you are listening  please don't let me die in spandex unless I wake up one day as Batman.

I must correct myself though. I have been to the pool like EVERY DAY this summer. I have lost about ten pounds from this excessive overuse of cardio, and as a result I can swim like a dolphin.
I have noticed that when I exhale underwater I am engaging my vocal cords and making this retard-screaming sound during my stroke. It's like that sound that a little kid makes when they have been crying for a while but have kind of forgotten exactly what they are crying about.

UUUUUUUUUUUUhhhh! Gulp air. UUUUUUUUUUUUUhhh!

I wonder if the other swimmers can hear me. In the lane next to me is a fat old guy with a moustache that makes him look a lot like a walrus. On the other side is a lean, very tan, man who looks about five years older than me, and he swims very fast. I want him to think I'm cool, because in my head he knows people that I need to meet. He swims like successful people do and I want to be successful like him.

UUUUUUUUUUUUhhhh! Gulp. (pay attention to proper form) UUUUUUUUUUHHhhnnhh!

My wife and I took a master swim class together last summer. She told me she could hear my retard-screaming while sharing a lane. People the next lane over can probably hear it, too. I am sure walrus-man and successful-tan-fast-swimmer-guy have heard my labored breathing and have alerted the life guards to my distress. I'm pretty sure the old ladies in the water-robics class at the other end of the pool can hear me, too. It's only a matter of time before some fourteen-year-old lifeguard tries to drag me out of the pool with one of those hook things they keep on the side.

I realize at some point that I will not drown if I don't scream underwater, so I try it. I hear bubbles. Just bubbles until I get near the end of my breath out. Then I hear a whale sound. Almost like the sound a dog makes when he's scolded. A whistle.

The only explanation for this wale whistle is that somewhere in my family tree, way back in time, off the coast of Scandinavia, a mother whale gave birth to a human-whale abomination. Which would explain why when I was a young man, a woman once looked into my eyes and told me I was most likely the Antichrist. Or maybe she was a nutcase. Whatever.

I continue by new breathing for a while until I see that my pool neighbors have left. Now that they are gone I will scream underwater in peace.

As I finish my laps, I start to think about how if I was shipwrecked would sharks be attracted to or scared of my screaming. I have read that human swimming looks like the way an injured sea creature swims, that's why sharks attack.
So I wonder to myself do I want to sound like a whale or do I want to sound vicious. Should I try to growl?

You can bet your ass the next time I meet a marine biologist I will be asking nothing but hard-hitting questions like those. Nothing but the truth.

Have a great summer.

Awesome grocery store finds

Here is some cool stuff you can find at the grocery store and how to use it.

Buchi brand kombucha  (Fire flavor)- find it in the cold case at Whole Foods. Brewed with ginger and cayenne it is the most delicious kombucha I have tasted yet. Apparently two hippie ladies is Ashville, NC make it and in my opinion have mastered the craft. There is another flavor, Limited Edition or something like that, but it tastes a litle venegar-y. Stick to the spicy flavors, granola faces!
You can use kombucha as a tasty beverage. In fact, if you use it in some other way, you might not want to tell anyone about that. A few weeks ago a man started talking to me about having a coffee enema. It was weird. I kept trying to change the subject, but it was like a train wreck and there was nothing I could do.
Some people say it (kombucha, not the coffee enema) has a weight loss benefit when consumed before or during a meal. The main reason to use it is to restore balance to the digestive system, the same way you might use yogurt.

Anywhoo, here's some other stuff that is perhaps a bit underrated:

Kale
Sweet potatoes
Apples
Clementines
Tomato
Shiitake mushrooms
Goat cheese
Kefir
Coconut oil - I just found out about a coconut oil spray but have not used it.
Grapes
Blueberries
Peaches

I realize this looks like a grocery list because that's kind of what it is. Put some of these items on yours.

What do I do with all these chicken breasts?

If you are trying to gain muscle, you already know how imprtant it is for you to have a super high protein intake. In other words, if you are not stuffing your face full of chicken breast in between breaths, you are not eating enough.

I'm not one of those people who is all "I'm SO skinny poor me you fatties have it so easy!" This is just a simple fact that if you want to gain lean mass, you have to eat the equivalent of a small village of lean meats. Although I do not recommend you actually eat a small village. For real. Don't Dahmer it up.

I was reading a sausage-meathead-fitness magazine a few months ago and there was an interview with a cop who is also a bodybuilder. He was saying that he has to work long, weird hours and that becomes a challenge when it comes to meal timing.

Since the rules are to eat every 2-3 hours no matter what, he decided to take a blender and throw some chicken breasts and water in it and make himself a smoothie for the road.

I admire that kind of determination, but that sounds totally gross. I have taken the idea and modified it. Here are 3 variations.

My wife has forbidden use of the blender (she thinks it is gross), so I use the food processor. That is what I tell her.





Post-workout chicken smoothie:

9 baked, grilled or boiled chicken breasts
3 small potatoes (microwaved or baked)
3 cups fibrous vegetables (broccoli, cauliflower, etc.)
Black pepper to taste
Cayenne to taste
Water (until the mixture is smooth and has the texture of a blended soup)

Put it in the food processor and hit GO.
If you are using a blender you might want to cut the chicken and potatoes and add them with the water.


My friend Ambre is a powerlifter and she told me to try a thai version chicken with peanut butter, lime juice and cilantro. I've also been reading a lot about coconut oil and the medium-chain triglycerides that are found in only two foods: coconut and human breast milk. Since I am too lazy to hit up the local Babies R Us and rob lactating women for their breast milk, I decided coconut milk is more thai anyway.

9 cooked chicken breasts
1 16 oz can Coconut milk
1/2 cup peanut butter
1/8 cup lime juice (add more to taste)
1 tbsp. Chili Paste
1/4 cup cilantro

GO.

This is not for post-workout, bcause of the high fat content. this is for when you are stuck at work and can't eat normal food. Welcome to my life.


I have one more recipe, but I am going to save that for later. I have to go lift weights now. Peace out.

Would you like some cheese to go with your whine?

A few weeks ago I decided to cut some body fat. I cut out nighttime carbohydrates (with a few exceptions) and started circuit training. I lost 5 pounds in two weeks.
Once I could see my abs again, I decided to start adding more mass. I have been eating more and lifting heavier for a week now, and as of this morning I have gained only one pound!

Total downer.

Most people do not want to hear about how I have a hard time gaining weight. I have been told how lucky I am for this wonderful blessing and been told I have good genes blah blah blah. When I have to to listen to that kind of crap, I want to give a big thumbs down and make one of those fart noises by sticking my tongue against my lower lip and expelling air (and hopefully a little spit).

I've been skinny fat, and it sucks. Imagine you are skinny and have zero strength. Unlike a regular fat person (who builds muscle by hauling around extra weight all day, every day), the skinny fat person has nothing but skin, fat and bones held together by the rotator cuff or some other small muscle group.

The point is I will never be skinny fat again. More importantly, I will never feel weak again.I am frestrated because things are not progressing as fast as I would like.
I wish I had some awesome insight to this, but all I can say is that it sucks to be working hard and not get results as fast as I want them. I am still up 8-10 pounds, so that is good.

That's what's up. I have to go eat now.

What have I been up to? Oh, you know, getting huge.

March 1, 2001 wt. 150 pounds. I should have taken a before picture, but whatever. The moment for that is gone like Lindsay Lohan's career and hot-girl-next-door looks. These days she reminds me of that old crone in the Princess Bride. A total shame.

April 21, 2011 wt. 163 pounds. I have been force-feeding myself and knocking back weight gainer more frequently than one of those really annoying drunk girls knocks back shots at a party.

And much like a drunken starlet, I appreciate the compliments about my chest, why yes it is bigger than the last time you saw it, thank you for noticing!

Although bodybuilding is a total vanity sport, the coolest thing about it is how strong you get. It feels awesome to know that should I have to rescue anybody from a burning house, I don't necessarily have to use the door. I can just crash through the wall and say "Oh, yeah" like the kool-aid pitcher! How awesome is that?

So I have gained abouut 13 pounds in 7 weeks (including 2 weeks of soul-crushing setbacks). So that's really like 5 weeks. According to my very inaccurate off-the-cuff estimation (which I am doing in my head right now), that is between 1.8 and 4.4 pounds per week, depending on how you want to look at it.

So anyway, I'm getting huge. So next time you see me - bring me some food.

Namaste, bitches!

I have been drafting this next entry for a few weeks, to make sure it is up to my super-high standards of stellar-ness. But after realizing I haven't posted in a while I said whatever and decided to go ahead an post. So here you go, it's crap.

03/31/2011
Dear diary:

My back is healing up nicely and soon I will be back in the gym lifting weights. In the mean time I have come back to my yoga practice, which I should have never let slip in the the first place and which I vow to never neglect again.

You know that pet owner whose pet has run off for a while and when that pet comes back the owner is all teary-eyed and they have a moment (well actually just the pet owner because the pet is like "whatever, maybe you should let me pee wherever i want to next time")?

I have always believed that the universe gives you messages all the time. They don't have to be these grand ephanies about saving humankind from our own depravity and bloodlust. You don't have to bust out a oija board or tea leaves to get a sign from the universe. As much of a lame hippie cliche as this sounds like, all you have to do is listen to what life is telling you. And now you have proof that I am a big patchoolie hippie douche.

I work out like an animal. Heavy weight low reps - I love it. Plyo - totally. Functional training - in the bag. HIIT sprints at 12.0 - all day long. If I don't feel completely exhausted I keep going. I have become the definition of balls to the wall. My coworkers have started calling me by my initials followed by "the beast." for example when giving tours, my club manager introduces the trainers and he has introduced my as GB the beast several times to some sweet middle aged couples from the suburbs.

Life told me to slow down and that pissed me off, so I didn't. Then life told me again (see my previous blog entry) when my back decided to wake up with scoliosis or whatever (my back was hung over from 2002) so as far as exercise goes that leaves me with restorative (translation: super chilled-out and easy, like for silver sneakers) yoga for a little while.

But I am always pushing things and fighting, so I am doing some warrior poses along with my child's poses and cat-cows.

So now I am practicing yoga again and thinking to myself, "how is it I haven't done this since February?" In the years I have been practicing yoga it has helped me with back problems and helped me find peace on a daily basis,

I heard a really cool idea while taking a yoga class: we were working on some breathing and the teacher said something like, "In the breath we find our true selves, and our true meaning."

Every time I do breathing exercises I think about that and it is a little bit like when you wake up and don't know where you are, then after a while realize you are in your own bed.

I have been reminded that yoga is a part of who I am and that becoming distracted from something that centers you can happen very easily. It can happen to anyone, and most likely happens to everyone at some point.

I resolve to lift weights again, just as soon as my back feels good. And I also resolve to keep up my yoga practice no matter how obsessed with gaining muscle I become. What is going to happen is I will still be a beast, but a peaceful beast.

So I have one thing to say and one thing only:

Namaste, bitches!

The crap week (or two)

It seems that among awesomeness there is always some crap. Think of a band you you love. I bet there is a crap song or two, or somebody in the band that is a weak link.

Let's use Lou Reed and the Velvet Underground as an example. I loved Velvet Underground, but there are some crap moments in there, like when Nico would sing.  She opened her beautiful Swedish mouth and some crap fell out. To be exact: I can't stand the way she indefinitely prolongs the "s" sound. Otherwise I me and Nico are cool.

Another Example is the LP I Think We're Alone Now by Tommy James and the Shondells. Although it is filled with syrupy 60s pop (which I love), there are a few tracks that are just gross. I literally run across the house to pick up the needle and move it when Let's be lovers comes on. I hate the bassline and the lyrics. That song can pretty much go to hell.
Which proves my point that within every solid album or band there are a few things that suck.

Speaking of downers, I have had some setbacks to my goal of being totally jacked by the October deadline for this bodybuilding thing. I am hoping to weigh another 20 pound by then, but things are looking difficult.

A few weeks back I had some knee pain and figured I should go get it checked out. I found out I have tight IT bands that are pulling my kneecaps to the outside edges of my knees. Physical therapy exercises - done.

by the way, if you are having IT band problems, don't buy chicken tenderloins because when you cook them and then try to eat them you have to remove the IT band while you do and that is really wierd. It made my knees feel like jello being scraped down a chalkboard (does that work?) during meals.

Then I got some kind of bug and lost 3 of the 4 pound I had eaten all those chicken tenderloins for.
At the doctor they gave me a prescription for some antibiotics for hydrocodone (LOR-TAB). And they were generous with it too. I decided not to get the Lor-Tab prescription filled since I am not a junkie or a wuss.
Ironically, you used to have to get a prescription for aspirin while heroin was an over-the-counter drug. Fact.
Welcome to Baptist minor medical center have some Lor-Tab! They should just put it in a candy bowl up front.

At least I was still up one pound. As soon as I got better I hit the weights in addition to doing my physical therapy exercises. No big deal, I'm just awesome, that's all.

I must have been putting some kind of cocky asshole energy out there or something because a few days later I woke up pretty much paralyzed with back pain and muscle spasms sent to me from satan himself.
It was like the unverse was saying, "HAHA you are going to be a short little bastard until you DIE!!!!"
Has your back ever hurt so bad it hurt to breathe? It was like that. I considered getting that Lor-Tab prescription filled.
My regular chiropractor was not in the office that day, so I went to this quack chiropractor who started obsessing over my neck and I had to remind him my back was the problem. then he told me my muscles were full of poison and that I needed to heat my back to let the poison leach out, which is the last thing you should do to an inflamed area. I think he just wanted me to re-injure myself so I would be back soon.
But just to be clear, I will not be back. I will be going to my regular chiropractor who plays music from his amazing record collection and there is a dog running through the office.

So that is what happened the past couple weeks. Right there in the middle of a life that I really enjoy there is a crap week (or two). It is Newton's Law. Things eventually go back in the right direction.

Universe: I am ready for some more awesome. And I will get that 20 pounds.

It is official...

.. I have been talked into training for and competing in a bodybuilding competition. I should tell you, it wasn't difficult.
The other trainers at my job invited me to join their quest and I was like "OK, I'll get super jacked." and it then I got really excited because I had set a goal for myself.
This thing is in 8 months and I just realized I will have not only walk across the stage nearly nude, but strike poses that present and show off what I have been working so hard to gain. The only reasonable options are to work hard, eat right and invest in a case of PAM cooking spray. Oh, and some kind of spray tan. Extra orange please.

The eating right is harder than it seems. I have a super high metabolism and eating a chicken breast every time i take a breath is harder than you might think. yesterday was my first full day eating like a body builder. My fridge is loaded full of tilapia, chicken, frozen broccoli (convenience), brown rice, and the most disgusting eggwhite product I have ever had the duty to mash down my gob. seriously it tastes like something they would serve in a Charles Dickens book. I have to take a break now and try not to vomit up chicken tenderloin.
Out of convenience and trying to save time I have put together my meals in the laziest way possible and maybe that will screw up my plans of becoming gary the man-beast by november. But I am counting on my iron will to make me choke down this disgusting and boring assortment of gruel.
My boss/trainer says I can still eat my beloved PB&Js but will have to wash them down with my 700 calorie per serving weight gainer. As a snack.

More to come next week

Sage, Swaha and Savasana

Dear diary,

Today I am at a yoga workshop. The smell of sage is everywhere because the room had to be purified with burning sage before we began.

I have been practicing yoga for almost 3 years and I love it.
I tried yoga one day at the request of my girlfriend. We went to a class at the gym across the street and the instructor told us when and how to breath and then guided us through some contortions. I remember thinking, "I will try this one time with an open mind."

I loved it. I wrote in my MySpace blog about it. I loved how with just body weight, balance and stretching it is possible to focus the mind on one thing only, the task at hand.
I love how when you lose focus one what you are doing in the moment, you lose your balance. I would relate that to life, but when that concept is put in words it sounds super cliche.

I will say sometimes it is necessary to put the outside world aside for a second and focus on something as simple as breathing. Or something that is not as simple like lying on your stomach, grabbing the feet behind you and straightening the legs until you are in a colossal backbend, then chanting the om sound. Try thinking about your to-do list in that moment.

"Press the pelvis into the earth."

Let's see, I need to go to the cleaners and pick up that tie that my wife dropped off three weeks ago, pick up snacks for work because i have no time EVER to make snacks, and then call my client's doctor to get that fax number so I can fax a medical release form. That thought never entered my mind today in that hippie back bend. Not once.

"Let both the upper body and the legs come up equally from the floor."

I was actually thinking, This is SO DIFFICULT! And my junk is getting smashed and I need to adjust it, but how do I do that without looking like I am playing with myself? So much for being classy.

"OOOOOOOOoooooommmmmmmmmm."

The woman who is teaching the workshop is cool. She keeps making jokes out of different situations, letting people know that if they have to fart or go to the bathroom that she is not stopping them. she taught the class how to have a Mr. Rodgers moment as she put on her wireless pop star microphone, drawing an analogy between fumbling with a mic and taking off your shoes and jacket and donning a cardigan. She had us making pretend digeridoo noises just for fun and and got everybody to do a silly dance and then made a joke about seeing people at church speaking in tongues. After that we all chanted a mantra.

"Om Srim Hrim Klim Glaum Gam Ganapatayei Swaha"

Good thing they passed out these books with translations in them.

When we were about to break for lunch and went into savasana, she said " Now it's time for a little Shavvi." I thought that was awesome, because a lot of yoga people can be very serious and weird. Not that this isn't weird to some people.

For those who don't know, Savasana is the best part of yoga. You have just worked up a major sweat and now it is time to lie on your back and do nothing but breathe. It comes at the end and it feels like you have just been born. I have never been so thankful for something as simple as breath. If you practice yoga, you know exactly what I am talking about.

Which brings me to the question a lot of people ask. "Isn't that some weird hippy new age stuff?" to which I reply, "Probably, but who cares. Somebody call the police!"

So I have a few more hours of sweaty contortioning and hippie chanting to do after our lunch break, so I better sign off.

BTW the teacher's name is Shiva Rea and she is really famous and awesome so look her up. Some of the people here audibly peed their panties when she walked in the room.
I did not, but she has made a fan out of me. Excuse me while I go try to find her on Facebook.

P.S. I have been on a burrito kick today and yesterday so I bet you I will fart in class before the day is over.

The name of the yoga studio putting together this amazing day of prana flow is Give Yoga Memphis
check out their website and go to a class. I am not being paid to say this, but it is run by an amazing bunch of people. If I was being paid to say it I might come up with a tagline like Yoga that will rock your face off. Link below.

www.giveyogamemphis.com

Grocery shopping

One of my favorite things to obsess over is food. I have dreams where I am eating, finding or preparing food. Food shows up in my dreams at least once a week, as it has done since I can remember.

According to the dream site I just checked between this paragraph and the last, food dreams symbolize physical or emotional nourishment.
Dreams containing fruit symbolize sensuality, which I find a little disturbing because from ages four to seven I have a recurring dream I had about walking through a citrus grove and a grapefruit falling into my hand off one of the trees. So it would appear I was a little pervert back then wouldn't it?

Before I digress on some kind of weird analysis of my childhood, I have to talk about some exciting ways to get more out of food.

Everybody knows that eating fewer calories means eating more produce. But part of the problem is that we get stuck in ruts with our eating and it is sometimes scary or difficult to try anything new. In short, we eat the same boring food all the time.

Chances are if you are reading this blog, you are trying to improve your fitness. And one of the most obvious effects of being fit is an optimal body composition. Which means you look good in a bathing suit, Sunday suit or birthday suit. What, you thought I meant naked? you're the perv, pervert.

What I am talking about is packing in the most nutrition for the least amount of calories. I am talking about the produce department.
Adam and Eve were nudists and they lived in a produce department. They walked around the garden in the nude until some classical painter guy made them cover it up with a fig leaf.

Since we are usually in the habit of making the same ten or so dishes when we cook, we tend to go to the store, pick out what we need for those dishes and then go home and make them and then watch Dexter while chowing down to the the same boring casserole/beans and rice/meat and potatoes that we always do and basically living the same boring day that we did last week.

What if instead we got some kind of new produce, planned the meal around what is fresh and in season and got the whole family involved in preparing a delicious feast?
Although my wife and I do not have kids, I often include our cat in the preparation of dinner by letting her smell what we are making and then mocking her by making hissing noises, like another, bigger, territiorial cat who knows how to make a london broil.

But in this internet blogorific world where everything I say makes sense and is ridiculously simple yet somehow genious, this is what the family kitchen should look like.

• Head chef - Parent
• Sous chef - Other parent or oldest child/pet
• Line cook - kid or pet
• Prep cook - kid or pet

... and so on.

Everybody cooks, everybody helps. It's what socialism wants to be when it grows up.

Let's get back to the produce. Produce is super tasty and it can be very inexpensive if you know where to find it. Unless you are addicted to heirloom tomatoes (I have not found anywhere that has them for less than what I would expect pay for a wino's liver. That is a few dollars a pound).
Here are the places you need to be buying produce right now:

• Winchester Farmer's Market. Winchester and Kirby in Hickory Hill (across from that crazy church with the statue of liberty holding a cross). It is not a farmer's market, despite the misleading name. It is like America had a baby with all your favorite ethnic foods. The store is in a defunct Schnucks and I literall had to pick by jaw up off the floor in the produce department. Bananas, apples, guava, papaya, chinese and indian eggplant, a thousand different kinds of mushrooms and peppers, purple sweet potatoes, weird squashes and melons with spikes all over them. Some of these vegetables could double as a weapon! BTW cheap awesome prices. We got what seems like a bushel of basil for a dollar!
• Viet Hoa Market. Cleveland and Court in Midtown. Has a ton of exotic produce as well as live eels swimming around in tanks. What's not to love?
• Easy Way. Various locations. Hands down one of the best places to pick up old ladies. All you have to do is talk about this weather we've been having and you are golden. You may have to watch some of the prices, for example pineapple can sometimes be more than $3 (which is a fair price).

That is all I've got for right now. But I want to post theis recipe for slaw. It goes really well in a wrap with some chicken breast or london broil.

you will need:

• 6 or so baby bok choy
• 3 radishes
• chili paste or crushed red pepper
• 1 tbsp. rice vinegar
• 1/2 tsp. low sodiom soy sauce
• 1 tsp. sesame oil
• 1 tsp agave nectar 

Slice bok choy into shreds. Sliver the radishes. Put vegetables into a bowl and add the other ingredients. mix it up.

Music to work out to

I love going to estate sales and satisfying my morbid obsession with peeking into other peoples' lives. the place I like to head when I get to an estate sale is the tool shed or garage. after that I head immediately for the records. There is nothing like going through someone's record collection and finding out if they are a sad bastard with a tear in my beer, into show tunes and jazz hands, addicted to shaking their ass to anything with a beat, angry at the world, secretly (or not so secretly) into Kelly Clarkson, the list of possibilities is endless.

You get the idea.

Now you are about to hear some of what I like to listen to. Sometimes the music we work out to isn't the stuff we listen to at other times, but sometimes it is. Sometimes it is really lame music.
I have to admit a Lady Gaga song got stuck in my head. It was like a gay bar DJ had taken over the radio station in my head and left the song on repeat while he left to get another blueberry mojito and do a line off a drag queen's somewhat recently shaved caboose in the bathroom.

So my wife and I share I-tunes because we like a lot of the same stuff. She also likes some very womany music, and although I might never mean for it to happen, I listen to some of her playlists while running. This is for a couple of reasons. The First is that I am lazy and can't seem to make more than one playlist per season. Second, she seems to constantly be making new playlists, thus contributing to my own sluggishness on that tip.
Sometimes something so girly will come on (like female rapper Peaches) that I will need to change it. But I don't. Because it has a constant rythm, good beats and lyrics that are so raunchy that I have to look around to make sure no one can hear what is coming out of the tiny i-pod earbuds that are drowning in a moat of sweat from my ear canal.
And then there are the Black Eyed Peas. So vanilla and safe, yet with that constant beat that is great for cardio.

The best thing I have found for cardio is Girl Talk. Girl talk is a DJ who does insane mash-ups of different genres. He does a Black Sabbath guitar riff with a Ludacris vocal track and it works! Another one is a conglomeration of Beastie Boys, Iggy Pop, and Lady Gaga (looks like she got stuck in someone else's head). Another example is the Ramones with Missy Elliott! One mash-up flows into another into another so seamlessly that you have just completed your first marathon when you realize you were just going to get on the treadmill for a few minutes before you had to go work. So you call in and go buy yourself some icy-hot, because you're a winner.

So these are some of my cardio guilty pleasures. When I lift weights I need something more manly, like the Misfits, GG Allin or Minor Threat. Because I am still a man, despite the occasioal listening to girly cardio music and that close call when Lady Gaga invaded my brain that one time. Don't judge me.

What is your favorite workout music? Any guilty pleasures? Write it in the comment box. I want to know!

HIIT you in the face

Cardiovascular conditioning is a strange beast. Some people love it. Some people hate it. Sometimes we love and hate it at the same time.

I have that love/hate thing with cardio. I get bored if I have to run a really long distance, because it means doing exactly the same thing for a really long time.

That said, I love running outside. I love swimming. I hate ellliptical machines. I thought I hated treadmills, too.

Until high intensity interval training happened to me. That's HIIT for short.
I like to think of HIIT as a way to make treadmills less boring. Kind of like alcoholic beverages make boring people somewhat more interesting. Or ugly people more attractive. On the flip side, HIIT will never be the reason you have sex with an uggo.

The idea is short bursts of maximal effort followed by periods of rest or recovery, like running sprints. This is a great way to blast fat and raise your metabolic rate for several hours. Unlike distance running, it breaks up your run into manageable chunks of time. As you progress through your run you see yourself achieving each of the smaller goals you have set for yourself.
At the end of the run you have an awesome feeling of accomplishment, which makes it easy to stay on track with your workouts and healthy eating.

Here is how to get a great HIIT workout:

Imagine a scale from 1 to 10. 1 is almost no effort at all and 10 is maximal effort. This scale is called rate of perceived exertion (RPE). Maximal effort is different for everyone because we all have different levels of conditioning.
A highly conditioned athlete can run at a 6 mph pace for 30 seconds with very little effort, translating to a 2 or 3 on the RPE scale. That athlete can probably run at 10 mph for 30 seconds at an 8 or 9 RPE.

A sedentary overweight individual might struggle to run 6 mph for 30 seconds. That would be that person's 10. Maybe that person can walk briskly for 30 seconds at 3.5 mph for 30 seconds. That might be a 2 or 3 for them. Making sense?

Here are two killer HIIT workouts for you to try:

5 minutes warmup begin at a fast walk and at 3 minutes begin an easy run RPE 2-4
1 minute sprint RPE 8-10
2 minute recovery RPE 2-4
Repeat sprint and recovery segments 5 times
5 minute cool down

or

3 minute brisk walk
30 seconds at a 9 RPE. Remember 9 RPE doe not mean 9 MPH. You may feel like you are going to die, but you will be OK.
30 seconds recover (jump your feet to either side of the belt) and catch your breath. It has never felt  so good to stand still.
Repeat the 30 on 30 off sequence 20 times.
3 minute cool down brisk walk.

The second workout is one that my boss at the gym showed me. He is completely insane.

Protein-packed silver dollar pancakes w/ blueberry syrup

Holy crap. 2010 is over and it is next year already. Everybody is making plans to conquer the world. How about some breakfast first, slugger?

The best way to start your new year is with a delicious breakfast that is also good for you. You may have  made wrong choices up to this point, but it doesn't matter now because you are going to kick ass this year.

These silver dollar pancakes are busting at the seams with protein, fiber and deliciousness. This recipe uses oats, which provide the slow carbs that will give you energy without the crash.

Top your pancakes with the blueberry syrup and make your tongue slap your brain in the face.

Here's what to do:

1 cup low-fat cottage cheese
3 egg whites
1 banana
1/4 cup water
1 cup oats
1/4 tsp cinnamon

Put all the ingredients in a blender. Process until you don't see chunks. Spray some olive oil onto a pan and pour batter in 2 inch circles. wait until you see bubbles start to form around the edges, then flip.

2 cups frozen blueberries
1 tsp agave nectar (optional)

In a saucepan, heat blueberries and agave nectar over medium-low heat until they are hot. Do this while you are cooking the pancakes. When all the pancakes are cooked and the blueberries are nice and hot, you can use a blender to make the blueberries into a syrup.

Makes 3 servings.

Calories 399
carbohydrate 60 g
fat 6.5 g
protein 22.5 g