Feeling Good in the Neighborhood

After a couple weeks of minor setbacks, I am actually starting to enjoy the exercising. 

The first few trips to the gym were a little rough.  On day one, there was the barking knee after only about 5 minutes on the eliptical trainer.  I made it to ten minutes before giving up the eliptical machine.  Leg cramps in the night are a real pain!

The second or third trip to the gym was interesting.  As I entered the gym with water bottle in hand and towel over the shoulder (must look like I know what I'm doing)  I noticed a man on an eliptical trainer going about 137 miles per hour!  Well, it seemed so compared to my pace.  He was really flying!  His legs and arms were hammering and the sweat was glistening.  Of course, experienced gym rats such as myself know that you have to "pace yourself".  After a vigorous and exhausting 15 minutes on the eliptical at low resistance, and a few minutes gasping on the rowing machine, I did a few mediocre abdominal crunches and a few shaky chest presses and headed for the locker room feeling pretty good about myself...until I passed by the guy on the eliptical trainer still going strong after over an hour.  I suppose he was pacing himself after all.  I think I need to work on pacing myself at a little higher level!

Since then, I am doing better.  I'm up to 15 hard minutes on the rowing machine and 25 killer minutes on the eliptical machine, as well as a good hard effort on about 4 other machines.  I'm really surprised at the difference.  I have lost nearly 14 lbs and my blood pressure, which was 139 over 78  has gone down to 118 over 70 in a month. My clothes are are fitting in a pain-free manner, which is good, and the last time I picked up something off of the floor I did not even grunt or gasp!

Now for the hard part...staying with it. 

P.S.  If anyone has any extra willpower, I'll take it.  There is a carton of gourmet white chocolate macadamia nut cookies on my kitchen counter.  I must resist...