Thank you to everyone who not only tolerated but embraced my Gloom Train post of last week. I’m still riding the rails, but I’m managing to continue on anyway. I’m still going to work and brushing my teeth regularly and slogging along with the infernal home workouts. I even managed to do a 5:00 a.m. session last week. 5:00 a.m. people. The sense of virtuousness that clung to me like sweet cologne for most of the day made it almost worth it. Almost. I don’t think I’ll be doing those very often. 5:00 a.m. is not “my” time and by 8:00 p.m. that night, I was practically comatose. But I would like it to be added to the official record, that I--notoriously Not A Morning Person--did a complete, one-hour 5:00 a.m. strength training workout. On a weekday. Please mail my halo to my home address.
I’m also still managing to distract myself somewhat with video games. After hitting multiple pinnacles of achievement in Stardew Valley by getting the town movie theater up and running (no small feat), breeding a baby dinosaur, and obtaining a Junimo hut from the town wizard, I grew restless and went back to refurbishing homes in House Flipper. I was thrilled to find that since I had been away, they updated the game and now have “cyberpunk” content. And the most astonishing content it is, my chickadees. It comes with multiple vintage pinball machines, a 3-D globe, high-tech hacking equipment, and a neon coffee-maker. And they even added a Japanese Hacker’s Loft wherein you can play with all of their new stuff. I was completely enraptured and spent all of yesterday morning re-doing the Hacker’s Loft to my great satisfaction and to Mr. Typist’s grudging approval. Then I bought the most expensive house in the game—the House on the Moon—and re-did that one with the cyberpunk stuff, too. Personally, I think I did both marvelously. Sometimes I mourn my missed calling as an interior designer, but then I think about all of the conversations I would have had to have with yuppies about granite counter-tops, and I realize I’m okay with that. (And also I realize that the term “yuppie” is not a thing anymore, but I’m using it anyway because I’m a rebel.) At least in House Flipper, no one talks to you.
One of the other things I am doing to calm myself and relax during all of this insanity is to watch videos of bikini physique competitions. I am adding a caveat here that I do not recommend that anyone who is prone to body or eating issues watch those types of videos. I probably shouldn’t be watching them. But they fascinate me and somehow I must. I don’t really understand how it works, but there seems to be one competition category for fitness and one for figure. I can’t discern the difference between the two, but both involve very muscular, spray-tanned women posing in tiny glued-on bikinis. This is something that I always found incredibly silly and ridiculous until I actually started strength training and realized what it takes to build muscle as a female. For some reason, watching these insanely fit women show off their sculpted muscles calms me and makes me feel strangely happy. I think embarking on this sort of endeavor is completely nuts and an invitation to an eating disorder and I don’t think it’s advisable for the vast majority of people. But damn, those women are savages who work like crazy, and I admire that. And it also helps me to see what a defined muscle looks like, especially in the back. I am still shooting for getting a pull-up, a goal that seems far, far away, and seeing real definition in the lats, traps and rhomboids helps me visualize it. I know what it takes to get those muscles to pop out. There are competition categories for women in their 50’s, and it has crossed my mind. I’m pretty sure I could deal with the semi-starvation and I know I could handle the workouts, but the required stripper heels and spray tan would likely do me in. Not to mention that I can’t cope with the thought of gluing a rhinestone bikini onto my body, so I’m out.
I ignored the absolutely absurd, eye-rolling narration of this video and just focused on watching the workouts, which I find incredibly inspiring, even though I am nowhere near close to the fitness or strength of any of these women. A 55-pound overhead press? Not happening anytime soon with this ectomorphic blogger. I can barely get twelve and not without crying.
--Kristen McHenry
4 comments:
Wow, what comprehensive blog with so much enjoyable content to read! :--)
Love it, Kristen!
It is SO FUN to remodel one's body. It does take a ton of work. It's probably good that I didn't get into this till I was an old codger and clearly out of the running for anyone's ideal anything: the joy of it is very pure, and has nothing to do with what anyone thinks of me. (And the spray tan and spangles can stay in the cupboard. Do people really like those things? They must, I guess.)
Thank you, Ofir and Master Poet! And Dale, yes, I do know what you mean by the joy of this being pure when it is personal and just for you. I started very late too--at 49-- I'm not going to be entering any contests involving a bikini, spangly or otherwise. But I do love competing with myself and hitting certain benchmarks and "personal bests" in my quest to Get Jacked. It's fun, and it helps drive me forward in other areas of my life. And never having been athletic, it's a new and revolutionary feeling for me to know what really pushing myself physically means.
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