Feast & Friday

Due to the winter weather, the school lunch scheduled for Thursday was postponed to Friday. A dilemna to say the least, because the meal was my all time favorite school lunch. Today, it is known simply as roasted turkey with gravy. However, to many of us school lunch purists, it is regarded as turkey feast. Though it may look like cat food, it tastes like heaven. I have a weakness for it, and always buy it, though I've cut down on the "double," and even ask for a student portion.

So, despite the fact that I was working out in the afternoon, I ran down to lunch (letting my students out 2 minutes early) to get my share. I've noticed school lunch is a bit better than it was. I can get carrots on demand, and there's always a 100% natural fruit juice available. The flavored milks (chocolate AND strawberry) are all made with skim. Even the vegetables seem of the steamed, frozen variety instead of out of a can (much preferable). Additionally, with the feast, there is always some cranberry sauce, as well as a dinner roll or stuffing. Yesterday, it was the roll. Did I mention they had the little sherbet cups, too? Yeah, that was a bonus.



Lunch was delicious, and seemingly nutritious. But, with it being pizza night, I was certain I'd need a great workout to balance everything. The Friday workout started as it has for a month. I began with squats (3x12-15 @ 135, which I believe became 15-15-13), followed by SLD.


Then, I went to the bench (3 x 12-15 @ 105, which I got 15-14-12), and finished with dumbbell shoulder press on the physio ball.



From that point, it was up to run. The running was where I hoped to make up for my lunch/dinner combo. Though lunch was reasonably nutritous, I had to be concious of the fact that it was pizza night, and how I lose some control (BTW, I only had 6 slices).



The LifeFitness treadmill is great, and my favorite piece of equipment at the gym. Its deck has a great shock aborber system, and its incline changes feel like actual hills. It is the closest thing I've found to actually running outside when using a treadmill. I love its random setting, because every "trail" is random, and elevation changes occur every 30-60 seconds. That makes it less boring, as long as I have a good soundtrack. So, I generally use the random setting at level 1-3 (depending on the time I'll be on the machine). For this workout, I set it at level 1, for 35 minutes, using training paces (6.3-6.5 mph). In that time, I ran 3.8 miles, which is decent. Over the next ten minutes, I slowed down, then walked. In all, I went 4.6 miles in 45 minutes, and felt pretty awesome afterward. Sweaty, sure, but I felt great. In all, I had burned 786 calories, which I felt helped to make up for any digression that may follow with dinner. Additionally, I had weighed in for the contest yesterday, and I had no change. My current weight is still 227.



Workout playlist...seemed like even MORE Fall Out Boy than usual, plus a lot of Queen. Randomally using my workout playlist (50 songs out of 90, chosen by least recently played, and then played at random), I just realized I may be a junky for Fall Out Boy, the Killers, and Jimmy Eat World. Queen was a given a LONG time ago. The list yesterday included...

1. Sophmore Slump or Come Back of the Year-Fall Out Boy (Everytime I hear, I love the line "We're the therapists running through your speakers." You know why? Because everytime I hear it and I'm running, I really think they are. It helps. Even if Pete Wentz's hair scares me...)


2. Fat Bottomed Girls-Queen (Always helps...)


3. Under Pressure-Queen w/ David Bowie (What a great video...ICE ICE BABY!)


4. Sleepwalker-Wallflowers


5. Short Skirt/Long Jacket-Cake


6. Sugar, We're Going Down-Fall Out Boy


7. Dance, Dance-Fall Out Boy


8. I Don't Care-Fall Out Boy (Really, iPod...3 in a row?!)


9. Don't Stop Me Now-Queen (Freddie, you look like a Muppet)


10. Thnks Fr Th Mmrs-Fall Out Boy


11. Where is your Boy Tonight-Fall Out Boy


12. Disease-Matchbox Twenty
13. When You Were Young-The Killers
14. Tie Your Mother Down-Queen
15. Seven Seas of Rhye-Queen
16. I've Got All This Ringing in my Ears and None on my Finger-Fall Out Boy
17. America's Suitehearts-Fall Out Boy (Intro and Key changes make this fun to run to)
18. Great Expectations-The Gaslight Anthem (Fresh sound, yet classic)
19. Pressing On-Relient K (1 Great Song to End the Run)
20. Good Ride Cowboy-Garth Brooks (2 Great Songs to End the Run)
21. Read My Mind-The Killers (and Stretch)