Goal Accomplished and Exercise!

Okay, so I finished my week of drinking nothing but water and then extended it because I had a sore throat and was trying to stave off a cold. I'm feeling fine today other than the occasional clearing of throat. Go me.

My eating healthy thing is still going quite well, I'm proud of myself. Today is day... umm... runs off to find day planner ... 13! Over 1/3 of the way done now. Wow, who'd have thought I'd get that far without missing my fast food? I miss deserts a little, but not too bad.

Now, for the big super awesome reason for this post:

I JOINED A GYM!!!

You see, it all started when Danielle and I went to a bridal show. She won a free year's membership at Fitness for 10. A gym on 8th street that costs - you guessed it - 10 bucks a month. While I did not win anything, I got a free pass to go to the gym. So on Friday, Feb. 4th, I took my free pass and Danielle and I went to the gym. I enjoyed it.

Now, just to make sure you got the right idea from this - it was fun. I wasn't thinking about exercising or reps or what time it was. I was just plain having fun. I kind of just followed Danielle around the gym. Treadmill for about half an hour and then we were checking out a couple of the other machines. There have been times in the past where I exercised and it wasn't bad. I wasn't frustrated or anything. I just kinda went and did my thing and then it was over. Even yoga, which I found thoroughly relaxing while making my muscles burn wasn't quite as enjoyable as this. During yoga I was calm, relaxed, focused. I often took the time to pray during class and if it wasn't so darned expensive, I would still be taking it. But this... gave me the same happy feeling that sitting down to play a good videogame or read a good book gives me. Better, even! Content, fun times. Except instead of being lazy, I'm being active! Go me!

So pretty much on Friday, I walked in with a free pass and walked out with a membership. That's how awesome I felt.

Today I went to the gym by myself. I was worried at first that I might not enjoy it as much because Danielle wasn't there to visit with. I felt a little awkward climbing up onto the treadmill next to a girl who pretty much jogged for what seemed like an hour. She was jogging when I got there and she got off the treadmill only like 5 minutes before I did. Crazy jogger lady. Anyway, I felt a little awkward but within a few minutes I was in my own little zone, enjoying the movement, watching the machine tell me how fast I was going and how far I had gone. I really need an I-pod or something now though because the sounds of all the machines was kinda drowning out the music they had playing. Oh well, not a necessity though, so that's just a different thought.

So all in all today, I did just over 3 miles on the treadmill. I was alternating walking and jogging and it took me about 41 minutes to get to 3 miles. I was at almost 43 minutes by the time I did my cool down though. I also had it at a 2% incline the entire time though and I did 315 vertical feet by the end of it. I'm pretty impressed with myself. After that, I went to the machine that I found on Friday that I absolutely LOVE. It's an assisted chin up/assisted dip machine. You choose how much weight it assists you with and then proceed. I put it on 80lbs assistance and proceeded to alternate through dips and chin ups until my arms were really tired. Then I went to the crunch/sit up machine thingy that Danielle showed me and did 10. Then 5. Then 5. Then I was exhausted - those things are hard when you do them properly! I was going to go back to the assisted chin ups machine then, but another lady was using it so I went to another machine that seemed similar for a short while.

I was wondering when I got home whether or not I would feel my exercise tomorrow and I can already tell that I will. I have been sitting down for less than an hour but when I got up to get myself something to eat, I could already feel it. Tomorrow is going to suck. Oh well, it's a start :)