Still around, starting going again

I started exercising on the cross-trainers again last week. Been going well with regular morning sessions.

Took delivery of a new multi-trainer yesterday, and spent a happy couple of hours putting it all together. I did have a TotalGym1000 which I really liked and which I thought was effective, but I found it too much of a faff changing it around to do the different exercises.

Also, one of the main reasons that I don't exercise is that I find it bloody boring. Running, riding, cycling out in the countryside just makes me feel like I'm in prison. Apart from the fact that I don't particularly enjoy the feeling of a work-out (I've never been a relish-the-burn sort) I just find it dull, dull, dull.

I work in the countryside anyway, so going out into it for a run or whatever is not a bonus. Lots of people say that they do lots of thinking whilst they are running. That doesn't work for me. I love to spend time alone in my head. I can plan and plot and think about all sorts of things that need cogitating. Unfortunately, however, I find that my brain does not work well whilst exercising. I am a man - I can't multi-task.

Like the cross trainer, this new toy can be used in front of the telly, which the TotalGym was not very well designed for. This way, my mind can be diverted whilst my body slaves away. I have a digital TV recorder which means that I can record stuff that I fancy at any time (I hardly watch any real-time TV) and watch it whilst I work out.

My game plan for the next couple of months is to use the Cross-Trainer for half an hour every morning (or as many as I can) and to use the Multi-trainer three times a week, for half an hour or so on Tuesdays, Fridays and Sundays. This schedule will fit in with the work regime riding, when it changes in September.

Weight-wise, I haven't weighed myself in a while, but I know that I will be back up at the top end of the 15st range (all my good work last year piddled away... sigh...)

Having done a bit of training, I shall weigh myself Monday morning to see where I am starting from this time.

I think that I shall also take some measurements, as weight doesn't really bother me; it's more shape that counts. I don't want to "get ripped", as they say in fitness-geek-speak, I just want to get a bit more definition and lose some more of that flab - the eponymous Middle Aged Spread.

On other matters, I'm still not smoking. I have had a couple since February and that's it. I had a drag on someone's fag a few days ago, just out of curiosity more than anything else, and I really didn't enjoy it. A real case of "why on earth did I like that?" As I've said before, I think I will always be an occasional puffer, but I’m not sure that I will go back to being a regular, this time. We shall, however, see.

I'm also trying to psyche myself up into doing a "before" photograph for a before-and-after set, but we shall have to see about that one.