Tuesday, December 23, 2008

Automaton (Doot Doo, Doo-Doo-Doo)

I’ve never enjoyed working out. It’s monotonous, inconvenient, time-consuming, and is a rather boring way to spend one’s time. I understand the benefits—really, I do—but they’ve never been enough to keep me coming back for more than, say, 6 months at a time.

For reasons beyond the scope of this post, my energy level had dwindled pretty significantly over the past couple of years. This led me to join a gym several months ago. At first, I was a bit lax about attending—usually about twice a week while keeping my diet the same. Strangely, I started to gain weight. I had maintained the same poundage for over 3 years, and now that I was moving around my weight was creeping up. I know what you’re thinking—maybe I gained muscle—but the amount isn’t really feasible given the amount of weight gain and what I was doing in the gym.

To nip it in the bud, I decided to go to the gym five straight days and make sure I didn’t eat/drink anything questionable. The next week was almost as strict. This required discipline, mostly on the diet end of things. Beer and food taste good, you may have heard.

I lost about 7 pounds. In two weeks. It wasn’t really all that hard.

This scares me, because now I am left with a classic angel/devil dilemma.

On one hand, I am curious to see just how far I can push my body, given proper work/fuel/discipline. I’ve always been reasonably athletic, but I’ve never really just pushed the holy hell out of myself. What might be the results? Do I owe it to myself?

On the other, why don’t I eat and drink whatever I want, since I can easily drop the weight if it starts to creep up?

2 comments:

Lee said...

Hey Josh, don't mean to screw up your diet, but y'all are welcome to join me and the beer bloggers at 75th Street Friday. Not sure of the time yet, but probably in the afternoon. Send your e-mail address to LMN (at) AUSTIN (DOT) RR (DOT) COM and I'll keep you in the loop.

JJSKCK said...

That's a much-appreciated invite, but I'll have to take a rain check. Our journey to Duluth, MN will be in progress at that time.