I Try.

Today's workout was disappointing. I seem to have pulled muscle in my butt, which affects all the tendons down my leg. Don't know how this happened, as I didn't feel the "pull" until two days after a workout a couple weeks ago. Subsequently, my workout with Stein caused a lot of pain. What a crock of shit, and I'm so frustrated with myself and my stupid little aches and pains... so now I'm on 100% upper body work, which in and of itself is a lot of crazy hard work, but when you don't have those big leg muscles working out, it feels like the work out itself is almost inconsequential.

Let me elaborate on that: When you can't work out your lower body, you have torso (back, stomach, sides) and arms (a bunch of tiny muscles in the deltoids, as well as the larger arm muscles), all of which are strong and sturdy, but none of which, collectively, work the oxygenation of your system overall. It's like to work to a painful end by stressing the muscles so hard you can't push anymore, but you don't have the overall exhaustion of the oxygen-stealing huge muscles, i.e. those in your thighs.

I spent most of yesterday sanding, spackling and then painting my 'granny unit... 400 square feet of teenage boy abused space... black-ink Sharpie penned inscriptions all over the walls, thousands of pin holes from darts thrown from various directions... an entire room of teenaged boy disaster that I had to recover and recoup in order to make a living space for my aging mother. God Damn. After four hours of secondary clean-up (having spent several hours in previous weeks prepping for this), I painted... and painted... and painted... Today the room is a bright light yellow glow, all clean of graffiti and other crappy avante garde, shitey artwork. but my arms were in total pain, tendonitis in my elbows having set in rather surprisingly.

Which brings me to today: Stein declares NO lower body at all. It's better to have no workout than to cause any additional injury that could result in a three month recovery. Of course he's right, but I'm frustrated, knowing I'll be doing all upper body work. Have to mention, I don't want to be whiner, but my elbows are hurting like crazy; I mean, it's like I have tennis elbow except I don't play tennis. Oh what the heck, I did some upper body work I've never done before, and it was kick ass. So I have a couple icee hot stickers on my body after the fact. It's all good.

I go into my workout anyway, make a small mention about the fact my elbow tendons are in pain... nah...

By the end of the workout, my arms and upper body are whipped, but the fact is I feel like I cheated. My legs and butt are singing melodious about how they didn't have to endure pain and I'm figuring my ass and legs need it most of all!

So today I write it off. I believe Stein is right; if I overwork a strained muscle I'm in for several months of recovery; if I let it rest for this week I'll be up and ready for the upcoming week. Still, in spite of lat and deltoid pain I'm suffering, which is severe and all-encompassing, I know that i'm gearing up for a serious whole body workout next week.

Carter got his first dose of Crossfit. I encourage anyone who thinks they've got what it takes to take a look at crossfit.com. This hard-core workout is for those who are ready to be worn out, but ready for all physical emergencies. Carter rocks; damn he rules! He did the Fight Gone Bad. It was a knock out, and he wasn't sure he could make it through the first set (after the bottle of sake last night), but he did... Damn he makes me feel so proud. Wish I could do what he does; so glad he does what he can. Crossfit.com; check it out. You might be inspired.