We're In Training

Let's start with the basics. I'm a few months away from my 53rd birthday and do computers for a living so I spend much (most) of my life sitting (when I'm not sleeping). I stand 6'5" tall and tip the scales a touch over 280 pounds.

My exercise life isn't as good as it once was. I used to run 5 miles after work every day. I hated running but I did it anyway. I once finished a triathlon and used to run multiple 10k races every year.

Today...not so much.

But I DO know how to train and I do it at least once a year. Every year I ride the MS-150 which is now called "Bike MS".

For those who don't know, it is a 150+ mile bike ride over 2 days to raise money for MS research. Our whole family does it. The training starts mid-November and I train until May when the ride happens.

The point isn't that I did a triathlon when I was younger or that I ride Bike MS now. The point is that I know what training is.

And we're currently training.

Oddly, I didn't plan on training. I just noticed it, pondered it, and confirmed without a doubt that we (we being Michelle and I) are definitely in training.

We had ice cream every night this week. That's rare for us these days. Ice cream isn't rare. We have that every now and then but we almost always go out because we rarely keep the stuff in our house.

A couple of days ago I realized that starting the middle of last week we were eating ice cream every night.

The thing that brought it all together for me was what happened last night.

Mandy came by and wanted to do some horse trading for some of my home-made Italian sausage. I didn't really need a horse so I told her to pick up a couple of pounds of Blue Bell pralines and cream. She brought back a half gallon. I handed it to my wife (with a spoon of course) and I went to the freezer and snagged a pint of mint chocolate chip.

We both sat in the living room and ate the ice cream. As we happily munched and slurped it occurred to me that we started our new routine last Tuesdays with Popsicles. Then Wednesday we had a pint of cookies and cream but it took us 2 days to finish it. Friday we got two pints and finished them off by Sunday night. Michelle got us another pint on Sunday and then Mandy brought the half gallon on Monday (or maybe Tuesday - there has been so much ice cream that it escapes me).

See - that's how it is when you train. You start out small and work your way up. Looking back on the ice cream consumption that is just what we were doing ... and then it hit me.

We're leaving on a 7 day cruise this weekend. Unlimited food. Unlimited deserts. It just wouldn't be prudent to hit something like that cold turkey. You need to work up to it.

The truly great thing about this is that it reminds me that this civilized life can't take the raw animal survival instincts away from us. For some reason ducks know they need to fly south before winter gets here. Dogs get all restless before a tornado strikes. Pregnant women get this nesting instinct thing just before a baby is born and apparently we fat 50 year olds instinctively know when it is time to eat ice cream and train for an upcoming vacation.