Truths

As a man of muscle, I find myself being compared to Mike Haggar, of Final Fight fame. What's this Final Fight, you may hear yourself asking if you've never played a video game console machine in your life? Well he be the biggest, roughest, rootin-tootinest, slab of muscle of a man that will have ever existed in the realm of the video game. If you need further illustration as to who this Greek god of video gaming is, prepare to wet thine pants in sheer amazement:




Now sure, I don't have a mustache or wear a belt like a fool. Nor am I a mayor who takes his damn shirt off and fights thugs to the center of the city in order to save his daughter. But I do have an expansive chest and shoulders a good set of abs. And I have set of nice slacks and shoes I can fight in. Though I still find myself unable to take my shirt off in a public place. I don't think I will ever be big enough or cut enough to be fine with that. Oh hell, who am I kidding? I will never be this cool. Also, I do not believe I have ever played Final Fight as any one but Hagger. There is simply no need to.

Horrible run, great workout

My calves have been so sore and tight all day that I was pretty much not wanting to sit down at all so they wouldn't start to tighten back up. But it's running day so I donned a wifebeater and shorts and went for it - only to run into a couple dead ends along the way causing me to turn around entirely and go a different route. And my calves started to pump harder than I have ever felt around the ten minute mark. I continued to push myself but my legs pretty much called it quits around the fifteen minute mark and I had to haul my big sorry ass back to the gym to finish my leg workout. For the remaining time, I only worked out my quads and hips since my hamstrings and calves took quite the beating already.

Once came the chest workout, I was on a roll. The honor roll. After my many sets of pushups and dips, I did every single bench available, and put together a military press on the Smith Machine. Military presses and Incline presses on the Smith Machine make these real cool muscles along my ribs really pop out. After incline dumbell flyes I headed out. Hopefully I can get the running put together well before the police PT test.

As a side note, I found a ton of really cool jobs I have been applying to. I really hope I get something soon.

And a follow up

I was going to buy a replacement toilet seat and after taking one look at the ridiculous variations in size and all that, I just bought a roll of duct tape and ducked up my toilet seat for now. LOL. LOL, Indeed.

Also, this is post number 50.

Fast Twitch

So after the Jack3d incident, I was determined to find something that could be for me, a pre-workout that would swell me up twice my size without me wanting to workout for more than two hours at a time and does not keep me up for nearly 14 hours after taking it. I was told to try Superpump 250 because it was supposed to be even more intense than Jack3d and I at least thought it would be hilarious. Well, that did not do anything at all so no blog.

Well now there's Fast Twitch and I actually think this one is okay. I drank it before an arm workout today and I started getting a warm feeling all over. After I got off work and into my gym clothes, I went after my arms like a madman. Fast Twitch pumped my entire body up a bit but I did not feel like a balloon. I just do not understand why my chest and traps really get it when I get pumped. My traps end up halfway up my neck with my chest huge and hard as a rock. I did not crash after the caffeine wore off and the swelling went down slowly. As far as pre-workouts go, this is still not something I would use regularly but I would consider using it again. I may do so for my police department PT test.

Gawker

Sometimes you come to a conclusion that you can grow out of websites as well. During my many years on the internet, I have a list of sites I once visited on a daily basis only to eventually grow bored with the schtick on that site and then move onto a different one. Obviously I will not bore you with all of them.

But today I shall speak about Gawker Media's sites. I used to absolutely love Kotaku for their video game news and other silliness. Then I branched into Gizmodo for their gadget news and Lifehacker for all their useful information. And finally I started to go to Gawker's main site for the great videos, some useful information, and some pretty funny snark on the entertainment industry. i09 was alright for comic book gossip every now and then but Deadspin (a sports page that snarks on team sports) and Jalaponik (a site for cars) were clearly not for me.

Then in January they changed their layout entirely in favor of making something more iPad friendly. That would be fine if the re-design would have been useful on anything that is not an iPad but I guess I am asking for too much. Gizmodo and Lifehacker became entirely about smart phones and Apple products. Kotaku became worthless for video game news, and Gawker's main site now hosts ton of stories about sex in order to stay hip with the kids, no more news - just editorializing. Just like everywhere else. Links to videos to go a short writeup about the video and then you have to click a link to actually see the video. Stories shortened up to resemble a Twitter feed all over the place. I can obviously go on. I was going to give them a chance to fix their suddenly humongous list of problems, not that the prior site design was without fault, but it is just too much to take. They introduced some fixes but that did not bring back stories of note and not people being hyperbolic.

So in the end, I just have to walk away from it. They had three months and that is a lifetime in internet years and they just somehow got worse. I will find new sites and this is by no means a huge milestone in my life. But I do have to complain about stupid decisions people make in order to stay hip with the kids.

Also

I managed to break my toilet seat again. How can a 213 pound dude break two toilet seats?

Pumped

Given the events of this week, I needed to workout so damned hard I would have to drag my broken ass to the car afterward. I did my run on the treadmill as it was still cold and raining. Then maxxed out the leg press machine for three sets, twelve reps at 400 pounds, maxxed out the hip abduction machine at three sets, ten reps at 305 pounds - no wonder my upper legs are getting large, eh? Then on to the hip adduction machine three sets, ten reps at 265 pounds, leg extension machine three sets, eight reps at 145 pounds. After that zercher squats three sets, ten reps 135 pounds and then regular squats for two sets of  the same weight. Then on to the hack squat machine for three sets, 8 - 12 reps at 200 pounds. And finally the hamstring machine for 3 sets, 8 -12 reps at 140 pounds and the standing calf machine for three sets, ten reps at 235 pounds. That's just the leg stuff I think is boring.

Now the chest - Split level pushups with a 25 pound medicine ball for twenty reps each arm, close handed stance on the medicine ball for 15 reps. The time killer - wide stance pushups on the Smith Machine moving the bar up one slot until basically arm level and then back down to the bottom for ten reps each level and a short break in the middle - that basically came to 90 pushups in the end. Then I used the Smith Machine to do incline bench presses ten sets, three reps at 145 pounds and after that incline dumbell flyes three sets 8 -12 reps with 45 pound dumbells. On to decline bench press three sets  8 -12 reps at 155 pounds, pec fly machine three sets 10 reps at 190 pounds, and finally dips - two sets, ten reps wide grip and two sets, ten reps normal grip. And my chest is my favorite area to work out. I wanted to do flat bench with close grip but both benches were used and I just did not feel like working in with someone or waiting around for it to come open. And I wanted to do weighted dips with far fewer reps but I could not find the belt.

Now I normally do not work out like that. I really wanted to test my limits and see just how long I can workout. Turned out to be a little over two hours. Needless to say, my chest had to have been twice its size when I left and my legs were feeling pumped pretty large as well.

A couple guys I chat with a lot gave me a pep talk this week. Both commented that I really have bulked up and just are not a skinny dude anymore. One commented that the change to my body is most noticeable through my chest and shoulders. That was nice. It doesn't weird me out when friends comment on my physique but it tends to do that when random people comment.

Anyway, I have come to enjoy a good pump through my muscles. Used to be that only my forearms would pump up but now each part of me that gets worked through real good gets pumped. Sure it could swell me up nearly twice my size for a while but it feels great.