The little workout that kicks my ass

It should come as no surprise that exercise is my enemy.  Me and cookies, we’re bffs, but exercise not so much.  The last time I really put any effort into making my body move more than to the cookie jar was when I was playing hockey.  For the record that was almost 6 years ago.  I’ve walked the dog on occasion, but never really did anything to make myself physically fit.  I have a naturally fast metabolism and couple that with my normal low food intake (except for the cookies) I’ve managed to be fairly thin most of my life.

Last Spring I started working and despite working in a nursery, where you would think that I heft large trees and bags of soil, I have gotten fat.  The problem is this.  I work with two middle twenties bachelor boys who don’t cook for themselves and we have a cooler that is perpetually stocked with soda.  Because the boys don’t cook they order in food on a daily basis.  Their favorite thing is to “pick up the tab” when it comes to food so I usually eat what they eat.  Again, they are bachelor boys in their twenties and they don’t always make the best food choices.  We frequent the greasy pub down the street.  I also have become lazy when it comes to nursery work because I work with boys.  I let them do all of the heavy lifting.  Add on top my cookie habit and you see where I’m going.

We have grand plans of joining the Y this Spring, but we have to wait until I start working more so we can afford it.  The Y has a pool and I’m likely to swim before going into work.  Walking or running isn’t my favorite because of messed up knees and hips and swimming is something I love.

“Spring” is still two months away and I thought I’d do a little exercise in the mean time.

I spent the last weekend with my girlfriends (consuming waay too much food) and Jenny was telling us about a workout that she heard about at her MOPS group.  I thought it was a great idea.  Yesterday I put the idea into action.

Here is how it works.  Get a deck of cards and assign an exercise to each suit.  For example hearts would be push-ups, clubs sit-ups, diamonds lunges, spades leg lifts.  Deal out a set number of cards (10 is a good starting point) and do that many of the corresponding exercise of the suit you drew.  For example, I just dealt 10 cards and got the jack, 3 and 5 of diamonds.  I would do 19 lunges (with each leg) (jacks are 11, queen 12, king 13, ace 14).

I started this little workout yesterday and today I can barely walk.  It is mostly evidence that I’m fat and need to get off of my butt.  However, I like that I didn’t have to think about it, it was short and a good starting point for someone like me who doesn’t exercise regularly.

Give it a try.