Lifestyle All Fluxed Up

In July of 2007, my employer bought a new building and we moved into it immediately afterward. We increased our square footage by at least double, which afforded the owner — and his employees — some opportunities impossible at the other place. Among them was enough space to create a workout room, where he has installed a gym-quality elliptical trainer and a recumbent cycle trainer. He also had a large shower room built in at the rear of the building. Since sometime in the summer the owner and my former boss have been making good use of the workout room.

Since I began working out with a personal trainer, I've had to alter my morning routine. At first it was just Mondays and Wednesdays, as I have early workout times (6:00am and 6:30am, respectively), and since the office is approximately mid-way between the workout office and my home, I've just been driving to work from my workouts and showering and dressing there.

George, the Personal Trainer, has recommended that I get in some cardio in the days between workouts. There's a small gym here at my apartment complex (it turns out I picked a really nice apartment complex!), but it doesn't open until 8:00, it seems, so working out here and getting to work at a decent time are not possible. So now I've started going to the office early on my non-George, the Personal Trainer, days!

I'm not showering at home, any more, except on the weekends! Not only that, but I'm unable to eat breakfast at home, either. Oh, by George's suggestion, I nibble on some cottage cheese and sip some fruit juice in the morning before I head to my workout, but I don't want too much on my stomach for that. This morning (Tuesday) I brought a bag of Kashi Heart To Heart cereal and a half gallon of my milk (which does not bode well...see below) to the office, where I had a proper breakfast after my 30-minute cardio session on the elliptical trainer.

I feel like I'm living at the office, these days. I don't like that feeling.

LD Hell
I got some sorta bad news Monday morning. The doctor with fingers the size of elbows, who insisted on giving me a prostate exam Saturday (for the entire 42 minutes he was probing around in there, I kept saying to myself, "Some people actually ENJOY this?!"), called me to tell me that my lab results from my physical and blood work had come in.

My cholesterol is high. My good cholesterol level (HDL) is below the point it's supposed to be above, and my bad cholesterol level (LDL) (Why don't they just change them to GCL and BCL?) is above the point it should be below. For the first time in my life, I'm not average!! My total cholesterol is 984 or something.

Maybe more like 238.

Crap.

So it would seem that I've chosen the right time — perhaps a little behind the curve — to start working out.

And once I get this tingling sensation all up and down the left side of my body to stop, then I'll really hit it!



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