MOUNTAIN EXERCISE PROGRAM PROGRESS

That title is a mouthful -- and a lie.  There is no progress.  But there is a program and I am doing it.

Exercising at this altitude (8600 feet, according to my Lowrance GPS) takes a lot more effort and burns a lot more oxygen than at lower altitudes.  Hence, for people like me with coronary problems that extra demand for oxygen is hard to satisfy.  Nevertheless, I try to do the exercises I recommended to you last week three times a week.  Today was the first time this week.

Today was the first time this week because we were away on vacation visiting family in Denver over the Labor Day weekend.  I don't usually exercise when visiting at other people's houses.  It's embarrassing when you vomit on their carpet or fall exhausted on the floor.  (That doesn't actually happen, but I sometimes feel as if I might collapse on the floor and I would rather do that in my own house.)

To report: I managed to get through 20 minutes of the program before running out of steam.  I could not go on.  The demand for oxygen on my lungs was more than I could supply.

Plus, I add some exercises to the program I hope you printed out.  Year before last I had a problem with my left shoulder.  My orthopedist suspected a torn rotator cuff.  After several weeks of therapy we settled on surgery as the final option.  My cardiologist, however, vetoed that option because I was on Plavix due to having recently had two coated stents installed.  So, we went back to an exercise regimen designed to help strengthen the shoulder muscles and, hopefully, allow the shoulder problem to heal with surgery.

I still do those exercises as they seem to be helping; I have almost full range of motion in my left shoulder.

After 20 minutes of exercise this morning my body said, "Enough!"

I must share with you, however, the joy of doing exercises on the deck of our mountain retreat.  On clear, crisp dry mornings like this one (sunny and 59 degrees), I prefer to do my exercises out on the deck in the fresh mountain air.  Below is a view of the valley I get to enjoy when looking to the southwest.

And, yes, we are starting to see some "color" in the Aspen trees.  Fall is rapidly approaching here in the high country.

Yesterday after arriving home from Denver we found ourselves house bound for a while when an afternoon shower raced through the area dropping large and very cold drops of water.  I was outside re-loading the bird feeder when the rain started and I was chilled to the bone before I could get inside.  Fortunately, though, I got inside before the hail started.  We were pelted with marble-sized hail (some smaller) and, I swear, a few snow flakes.

True to life in the mountains, the storm passed and 30 minutes or so later the sun was out.  The temperature, unfortunately, remained cool through the evening and I was compelled to build a fire in the fireplace this morning to take the chill off.  I can't get my wife to run around the house naked when the outside temperature is below 40, as it was this morning.  (I can't get my wife to run around the house naked anytime, regardless of the temperature, but it's one of several fantasies I harbor.)

NEWS FROM THE BIRD FEEDER:  The stellar blue jays continue to be frustrated in their desire to get to the bird feeder trays and gorge themselves on the seeds there.  That they find plenty of seeds on the ground -- the other birds flip out the larger seeds such as sunflower seeds that they can't eat -- does not sway them from wanting to feed at the trough.  To this end one jay we have name Jake has found that he can fly up to seed tray from underneath the shelter ledges I added to keep the jays out and then by gripping the tray, while hanging upside down, he can arch his head over and grab a few seeds before gravity forces him to let go and drop to the ground.  He is determined even though he could, no doubt, get more seeds easier on the ground.  He is also comical to watch.

The stellar jays were joined this morning by three mountain scrub jays.  Don't know where they came from, but they are welcome.

THE URGE TO KILL ... MY COMPUTER

If you are reading this you surely have a computer.  And if you have a computer you have surely had the urge, more than once, I imagine, to take a shotgun and blow the damned thing to hell and back.  No, that would be easy.  You want it to suffer some -- as you have.

A quick death is too good for it.  It must experience throes of agony, wondering what it has done and how to correct it.  After all, that is exactly what you have been going through, isn't it?

My computer decided this morning that I did not have a blog account.  I could use the URL to go to the blog, I just could not edit it.  I was denied access because I was not the author.  When I tried to go to the Dashboard, my computer again reminded me that I did not have a blog account.  It did, graciously, offer to help me set up one, however. 

That's when thoughts of shotguns began to enter my head.

OK, something has become corrupted.  Don't take it personally and above all, don't take it out on the poor dumb computer.

I decided to just do a system restore to earlier this week when everything was working fine.  That should do the trick.

Wrong!

Next, I decided to run a system check/registry check program I have to see if it uncovered anything.  Well, apparently it found a lot of junk that needed attention.  But I still could not get into the administrator side of my blog account.  I WAS NOT THE AUTHOR OF AN ACCOUNT!

Time to go for a walk, kick the cat (I don't have one) or yell at my wife (always dangerous).  I went for a walk.

After a cool-down walk I decided to try Plan B before getting the shotgun.  Get out of every program that is running and turn the computer off.

Guess what?  After turning the computer back on it allowed me direct entry to the Dashboard program.  I can be an author once again.  Hence this article.

I'll put the shotgun away ... for now.

THE BEST GYM IN THE WORLD? YOU'RE LIVING IN IT.

Why would anyone exercise if they didn't have to?  Don't we get enough exercise cleaning house, doing the dishes, mowing the lawn, washing the car and picking up after our children, just to name a few things?  Exercise?  Hell, I'm tired enough at the end of the day without going to a gym.  And for exercise?  Ha!

The truth is, we do get quiet a bit of exercise in the course of our day doing all the things mentioned above, and more.  But that's not enough; we need more.  Just go to any shopping mall and watch the girth of the people passing by to understand why.  As a nation, we are overweight and out of shape.

But in addition to badly needed weight control, we need more strength exercise, more flexibility exercise and more exercise to build endurance -- precisely so we are not exhausted at the end of the day.

I've been somewhat of a health nut ever since President John Kennedy created the President's Council on Physical Fitness back in the early 1960s.  Before that I was like most young men, willing to get by on my native, i.e., youthful, strength and flexibility.

In high school I went out for the football team, but I never took the conditioning program seriously.  I was young and strong, more or less, and that was good enough.  In college I was too busy burning my candle at both ends to give much thought to my health.  Even while serving in the U.S. Army I did only what was necessary to stay out of trouble.  When we fell out for morning PT (physical training) at the ungodly hour of five o'clock, I did what I had to do to keep from getting, in his words, the sergeant's "boot up my ass."

I'm not even sure why I became more interested in maintaining or improving my health in the early 1960s except that the president made it seem like the patriotic thing to do.  Which, on reflection, is a pretty dumb reason for getting involved in an exercise program.  Nevertheless, I got involved and have been involved ever since.

I ordered the president's book on physical fitness and both my wife and I started doing the exercises.  It's been an on-again off-again affair ever since.

I never seemed to have the time or the money to go to a commercial gym.  Besides, back then you had to get a gym membership for a full year and I knew that I would not be able to take advantage of my membership all year.  For one thing, I was gone part of the summer working at a 4-H camp as lifeguard.

So, I concentrated on walking and on doing the exercises in the government booklet.  I've always been a good walker, and walking, I understood, was one of the better forms of exercise.  It was a low-impact exercise that works many of the major muscles.

After moving to Schenectady, NY I found that there were too many months when getting outside to walk was next to impossible.  That's when we bought our first treadmill.  Actually, now that I think about it, we bought an exercise bike first and later bought a cheap treadmill.  Never buy a cheap treadmill!  It is a waste of money.  Cheap exercise equipment is always a waste of money.

Over the years I kept going back to some of the strength and range-of-motion exercises.  I created my own program as my body aged and my needs changed.  And at one point, after retiring, I taught an exercise program for seniors at one of the campgrounds where I spent the winter.  (It helped me stay in shape and earned me a reduced campground rate for the winter.)

Well, time marches on and your body ages with time.  Rheumatism, tendinitis, coronary problems, knee and shoulder problems and other joint, muscle or breathing problems cause most, if not all, of us to curtail our physical activity -- including any formal exercise program we may have had in the past.

Fear not.  I found an exercise program that you can do right in your bedroom, family room or wherever YOU are.  It is the Real Age You2 Workout that you can find at this link: http://www.realage.com/StayingYoung/YOUToolsTips.aspx?tip=21. 

This great exercise program requires no special equipment.  The authors claim you have "the best gym in the world.  You're living in it."  Celebrity trainer Joel Harper designed the program and he says you can do the 18 exercises in fewer than 20 minutes.  I have not yet reached that point myself, but you might.  Just the same, imagine being able to get a "complete strength-and-stretch workout" in 20-30 minutes anywhere you might be: home, office or motel room.  No equipment, no excuses.

Here are the first two exercises to give you an idea of how low-impact they are.  (I hope it's all right for me to copy and paste these pictures here.)

1. Yo-Yo (Warm-up)

Stand with your feet shoulder-width apart and your knees slightly bent. Interweave your fingers and bring your hands and elbows up to shoulder height. Turn your palms out, so now you can see all your knuckles. Keeping your torso upright, slowly twist to the right and left, 10 times each side, to where it feels comfortable. Inhale going to one side, exhale back to the other.

2. Punching Bag (Strengthens arms and shoulders)

Lift your hands and elbows to shoulder height, make your hands into fists, and turn your knuckles facing away from you. Spin your hands around in a circle as far away from your chest as you can. Keep your shoulders relaxed, away from your ears. Do it 20 times clockwise, then 20 counterclockwise.

Please check out the link above.  Download and print the workout program.  Then start transforming your body.  You'll be glad you did.