"Exercise Is Boring"

“Exercise is boring.”  Or is it?  I don’t think it is.  As Bob says, you just haven’t found something that you like to do if you find exercise to be boring. 

I know I like to keep things fresh.  Sure, at the gym, I do the same 3 things…at least for now I do…but that doesn’t mean it’s boring to me or that it’s not challenging to me.  There are numerous different programs to choose from on the cardio equipment.  The circuit training area at my gym does the same 10 strength training exercises, but I can still mix it up a little bit and challenge myself with those 10 exercises.  When I can do 30 repetitions of one particular exercise within the allotted 60 seconds, I know I need to bump up the weight I’m lifting. 

I’ve been going to the gym now for about 3 weeks.  Finally, today, I decided to take along a pen and paper to log what I’m actually doing in the circuit training area.  Now, I have something documented that I can base my future rounds of the circuit training area on and improve upon them.  That circuit training area is really the best idea a gym has ever had.  Seriously.  It’s the reason I picked Planet Fitness as the gym I wanted to join. 

How do you keep exercise from being boring?  The easiest ways are to mix it up and keep it fresh, and to do something you truly enjoy doing.  I have a decent sized library of workout DVDs, over 20 in fact, that I can choose from to prevent boredom and monotony.  And then I have the gym which is an open book of possibilities in and of itself.  And then, I always have the option of going for long walks or for a bicycle ride outside. 

Are you tired of the same old same old hum-drum at the gym?  Does your gym offer classes?  Take a class…or two.  Does your gym have a pool?  Do some laps!  Does your gym offer personal training?  Buy a session or two a month to help keep things changing in your routine.  Don’t have a gym membership?  That’s fine too.  You have plenty of options open and available to you.  Is there a school near your house with a track that you have access to?  Run some laps.  Do interval training by running a certain distance (say 1 lap) and then walking a certain distance (say 200 yards) and alternating for a certain amount of time (at least 30-50 minutes).  Own a bicycle?  Go for a ride.  Go for walks.  Do push-ups and jumping jacks.  Jump rope.  Use canned goods and jugs of milk or laundry detergent in place of weights for strength training.  In short, your workout is only as limited as your imagination!  Coming up short on ideas, the web community SparkPeople.com has LOADS of exercise ideas and instructional videos available for FREE!  All you have to do is sign up for a free account.

So, in short, exercise is only boring if you don’t enjoy it and if you don’t challenge yourself.  The only reason I can think of that you wouldn’t challenge yourself is that you really don’t want to achieve your goals.  Which is exactly what happened to me last year.  I won’t let that happen to me again.  I want to achieve my goals more than anything this time and I will do anything I can to make sure I meet those goals.  I will do whatever I can to make sure that my exercise routine is never boring.

Anxious

I’ve had insomnia the past 2 nights.  A few days ago I did not have this problem.  In fact, for months now my insomnia has not bothered me one bit.  And now, all of a sudden, it’s back.  Why?  Well, I asked myself the same question and came up with only one answer.  I’m anxious.  Anxious about what, you ask?  My impending transfer to another department within my agency.  It’s a department that I have worked in before and I absolutely loved it.  I worked in it for 4 years previously and have spent the last 3 years hoping to return.  And now, finally, I am getting my wish.  But why am I so anxious about this, you may be wondering.  Well, it’s because it’s a change in my life and I don’t like change.  I like things to stay the same.  Well, I like the big stuff to stay the same.  I like variety in the little things.  Even though I am perfectly okay with eating the same food day after day or doing the same exercises every day, I try to mix it up a little.  So, I don’t like change, even though this is a change for the better as far as I’m concerned. 

Also, there is the complete flip-flop of my schedule.  I will be going from the 6am-6pm shift to a 10pm-6am shift.  I will have to relearn to sleep during the day, which will hopefully only take about week to adjust to.  I will need to get some of those “blackout” curtains for my bedroom.  I had found some nice ones at Target a little while back.  I will also be investing in NyQuil to help me sleep for that first week.  When I was going through the end of my relationship with my ex and my anxiety level was extremely high and I couldn’t sleep, that was the only thing that could get me to sleep, otherwise I would have been awake for days at a time.

I’m anxious that I won’t acclimate back to working nights and sleeping during the day.  I’m anxious about having to relearn everything I was once so proficient at.  I’m anxious about having to relearn all the Spanish I used to know and use daily when I was in this department before.  And I’m anxious because it’s a much more “hands on” assignment than the one I’ve been in for the past 3 years.  You see, I’m going back to the Central Booking Facility of the jail I work in.  There, we deal with freshly arrested people that are still high on drugs or alcohol, or both, people that are suicidal or assaultive or uncooperative.  We have to do unclothed searches of anyone charged with a drug charge or a felony weapons charge.  We have to fingerprint and photograph each person.  It’s a fun place to work, very fast paced.  You’re rarely bored.  I’m just anxious that I won’t do well this time and that I won’t catch back on to the things I used to know so well…things that were second nature to me at one point.

Vacation Weight Loss

“I can’t lose weight on vacation!”  Conda said, “who goes on vacation and says ‘I wanna lose weight’?”  My response to that?  ME, ME, ME!  I do, I do!  And that’s just what I did at the beginning of this month and I lost over 5 pounds in just 16 days.  And I loved every minute of it.  My only regret was not going ahead and getting the new gym membership when I first went on vacation instead of at the end of the vacation.  I could have done so much more during my time off.  So much indeed.  Oh well, I have the gym membership now and for when I go on vacation next time…hopefully at the beginning of May.  One of my best friends, Jessica, will be here visiting me (hopefully my vacation time gets approved…fingers crossed) and we have loads of working out planned.  So, to answer Conda’s question again…Jessica ALSO goes on vacation and says “I wanna lose weight!”

When they were standing on the beach for the surfing challenge talking about their fears, Dolvett said to Kimmy “you’re only as good as the fear you conquer.”  I love that phrase.  It’s soooooo true!  I mean, seriously, you’re only as good as the fear you conquer?  Wow.  Just wow.  It’s like the “you’re only as good as your weakest link” but POSITIVE instead of pessimistic…instead of defeatist.  I have definitely become a “glass is half full” person over the last 14 months that I’ve been on my weight loss journey.  I survived the worst emotional crisis I have ever been through in my entire life.  After that, I figured if I could survive that, then I can do anything I want.  If I didn’t let him stop me from living my life, then nothing will stop me from getting my life back within my control.

Interesting factoid...during the Hawaiian pop quiz they gave the contestants, one of the questions involved how many calories the average sized person burns during an hour of surfing.  The “average person” used to be 150 pounds.  However, now that number is 200 calories.  What does that say about our country?  What does that say about us?  It says a lot, but for each person, it will say something different.  It’s sad really that it’s become okay to be unhealthy…that it’s acceptable to be unhealthy…that the new “average” is actually not only actually overweight but, in a lot of cases, is actually obese! 

Yesterday, at the gym, I had a little revelation inside myself.  I was busting out the side to side step jump I do on the stepper between exercises during the circuit training and I was seriously busting it out and keeping an intense pace and I was keeping it up for most of the whole hour that I made the rounds of the circuit training section.  The thought that popped in my mind was “I’m an athlete!”  When I had that thought, I almost teared up a little because that’s a very happy realization to make about yourself.  That means that what you’re doing is doing you good and you’re increasing your endurance and your ability to meet and exceed the expectations that you set for yourself.  How great is that?  Let me tell you, it’s an awesome feeling.

Reprogramming Myself

Something I’ve had a problem grasping is the whole viewing food as fuel and fuel only concept.  It’s such a convention to try and break up.  I mean, you’re whole life you are trained and prodded to believe that food is a reward that you get when you excel at something or when you do something right or to celebrate something happy and joyful like a birthday or an anniversary or a promotion.  I guess I’m afraid to let go of food as a good time activity.  Food shouldn’t be an activity or an event, I know that, but it’s still a difficult thing to really and truly comprehend on any level.  It’s so hard to turn your world upside down and expect yourself to just pick it all up and start trucking right along like nothing happened…like you did just do a complete 180 on how you’re viewing food in general…like you’re not trying to completely reprogram a portion of your brain to function in the complete opposite of how it’s functioned for over 30 years.  It’s not something that can be done overnight and, I suppose, I really should expect sudden change and complete compliance right away from myself.  However, I do.  I’m a perfectionist when it comes to myself.  I also have no patience when it comes to myself.  I figure if I figured it out and got it all planned out that I should be able to conform immediately and follow through without set back.  The reality of that is that that is a completely ridiculous expectation of anyone.   

This is going to involve some retraining on my part.  I’m not entirely sure how I’m going to do it…how I’m going to reprogram my brain to view food as fuel for my body and NOT as a reward for achievements and good deeds.  I haven’t the foggiest how I’m going to stop seeing food as comfort when I’m stressed or hurt, or as something to do when I’m bored.  I don’t have the first clue how I’m going to do it, but I swear I’m going to give it all I’ve got.  I guess I have to just start with telling myself “no” when I get my urges to eat for no reason other than to eat.  If I can tell myself “no” in those situations and am successful, then I can do anything…seriously.

New Position

Today I got word from my supervisor that I’m being reassigned within the agency.  This is great news because this is a reassignment I requested about a year ago.  I’ve just been awaiting an open slot.  It’s a position I’ve worked before and absolutely loved.  A momentary imposition caused me to choose to leave this much beloved position and I have regretted the choice ever since.  I work in a jail and for the past 3 years I have been working in the housing unit areas of the jail system.  Where I am returning to is the Central Booking Facility.  It’s where you go when you are first arrested, where they take inventory of all your personal belongings that you have on your person, give you your free phone calls and magistrate you on the charges against you.  It’s a fun place to work if you like a fast paced environment and you don’t mind a scuffle here and there with some people that are hopped up on drugs or alcohol.  There are so many different jobs to do within the Central Booking area, so you never get bored from doing the same thing day in and day out, like you do in the housing unit areas. 

The only thing I’m worried about is the vacation time I put in for at the beginning of May.  If it doesn’t get approved, then my friend Jessica’s vacation will not be as fun as she had hoped it would be because I will be sleeping all day because I will have worked all night.  Also, I hope for us to make a trip to the renaissance fair that will be going on while she’s here.  If I don’t get the time off from work, we won’t be able to go.  And a day trip to the beach would be nice too.  All we’d have time for would be cooking together and working out together.  The rest of the time I’d be at work or sleeping.  Yuck.  I really hope it gets approved.  They wait until the last minute to let us know if we got the vacation time we put in for. 

I will most likely be put on the overnight shift, from 10pm to 6am.  And that is fine with me.  It just means I have to redo how I do everything in my day to day life.  I will work out in the mornings after work, when the gym has the least amount of people.  Then, I will go to bed and wake up around 4pm.  At that point, I can run any errands I need to run and watch any TV programs I like to watch before getting ready for work.  I’ll leave the house around 9pm for work, getting there a little early because I don’t like to be late or close to being late (aka-right on time) for anything.  I don’t like to take the chance, especially with something as important as my job. 

"I Don't Believe In Myself"

This week’s excuse on Biggest Loser was “I don’t believe in myself.”  This one definitely resonates with me.  I have a lot of problems finding faith in myself and believing I’m actually capable of success.  I have a lot of difficulty believing that I am worthy of that success…of achieving my goals and what I’ve set out to do. 

I want nothing more than to succeed, but if I’m going to actually succeed, I really do need to believe in myself.  It’s just not going to be possible if I don’t think I can do it.  I have to be my own biggest fan.  I don’t have much of a support system in person, so I have to support myself.  The one person that could support me in person feels frustrated when I talk about my exercise and about all my progress that I’m making because she wants to lose weight too but can’t seem to get anything to work for her.  I don’t live with her, so I can’t testify as to whether or not she’s committing herself to her efforts 100%.  I can only take her at her word that she is.  I think she may fall into the small percentage of people who start a program and don’t see any results for the first 2-3 weeks and by then, she’s given up, calling it hopeless.  I feel for her, I really do.

I have been 90% successful thus far.  With the exception of this past week, I’ve shown nothing but losses on the scale, even if it was only .6 of a pound.  But I’ve lost upwards of 5 pounds in just one week.  I’m hoping to renew my efforts this week after the non-productive week I had last week and see a loss on the scale again.  I’m highly tempted to call last week a bad week, but it wasn’t bad.  I exercised more than ever, which is great.  Sure I binged, but it really wasn’t as bad as I want to make it out to be.  It was about 1000 calories over my calorie limit for the particular day.  Sure that was almost twice what I eat in one day, but it was still only about 1000 calories.  I was still within the calories that I would eat to maintain my weight.  So I’m really thinking it was a biological reason for my backslide.  In which case, there is nothing I could have really done to achieve different results on my weigh in on Sunday.

I have to believe in myself.  I really do.  And I have to do more than try, I have to actually DO it.  If I don’t support myself, why should anyone else?  If I don’t believe in myself, then there’s no point in trying because I will only undermine myself time after time. 

Self Control

I’m really struggling when it comes to emotional binge eating.  I keep writing about this because this continues to be a problem that I have to face every day.  Even in the smallest way, I’m frequently having the urges to binge.  Thankfully, for the majority of the day, when I’m at work, I’m far, far away from any food that isn’t rationed out for me to eat at specific times during the day.  I’m forced to control myself when I’m at work.  But in the evenings after work and on my days off, it’s more difficult for me to control myself.  That’s why I’m really excited to put this going for a walk theory into practice when I get the urges while home.  I can control the urges while I’m out and about because I am NOT buying junk food.  I’m not stopping off to get fried chicken or a hamburger…not unless it’s been planned out ahead of time.  Like when I went out for Tex-Mex with some friends on Monday and had a taco salad and chips and salsa.  I don’t like to eat out too often because even when I plan the calories well, it can still have an adverse affect on me because there’s too much fat or too much sodium or whatever in the food. 

I’m hoping that within the next month, I can get at least a loose grip on my urges to binge.  If I can’t, then I’m going to seek outside help in the form of therapy.  It’s not that I don’t want to go to therapy; I really don’t mind it at all.  It’s just that if I can manage to get a handle on it without help, then that’s the cheaper route as that doesn’t have insurance co-pays or gas usage.  If I do decide to go for therapy, I will research my therapist as well as I can, looking for one that has experience in eating disorders.  This urge to binge isn’t really serious, but it is an eating disorder.  When I get the urge, I cannot control myself.  I simply cannot stop myself from shoveling food into my mouth, no matter how hard I will myself to stop.  It just doesn’t work.  It won’t be dissuaded.

I know that if I can’t get at least some control over these binge urges that any weight loss I do achieve will be short lived.  I will end up gaining the weight back no matter how diligent I am with myself.  I will binge here and binge there until the pounds creep back up.  No amount of exercising will help stave it off either.  My binge monster is a very conniving beast.  He will get his way in the end if I can’t rein him in. 

Being assertive isn’t necessarily my strong suit in life.  I can be aggressive, but not really assertive.  Assertive requires some amount of tact and tactic.  Point in case, this morning, I was presented with donuts.  I ate 3.  I started to give myself a little guilt trip about it, but then I stopped myself and told myself that “sure, it was 3 donuts, but they’re not going to derail me.  I will eat right the rest of the day, like I’ve planned out.  And I will eat right the next 2 days, also like I’ve planned out.”  Sunday is a different story because I’ll be going to a festival and won’t have access to my healthy foods for most of the day.  But this is planned, so it’s okay.

The key is, when I am unable to control myself or find that I say “yes” instead of “no” to something, I have to not let myself beat myself up.  I have to realize that this one little slip is not going to mess up my whole week.  I have to realize that as long as I eat right and healthy the majority of the time that is what actually matters in the long run.

Starting Fresh

I’ve got to start being accountable to myself.  I was doing so good and then I had a few slip ups and I got away from being as close to 100% accountable as I can be.  I started leaving things out of my food journal that I had binged on and that weren’t part of my planned eating for the day.  All I’m doing when I do that is lying to myself.  It doesn’t mean that the calories weren’t consumed.  Far from it.  It just means that I don’t know the full extent of what I did on those days. 

Yesterday I started fresh.  I’m going to stick to my calories and the “right” types of food.  I will be eating the foods that are more beneficial for me.  For instance, for dinner tonight, I will have a 4 oz ribeye steak, some baked zucchini, and some sautéed mushrooms and onions.  I’m really looking forward to eating all that.  Also, for my lunches, I bought some whole wheat bagel thins (less than half the calories of 2 slices of bread), some ham lunchmeat and some reduced fat cheddar cheese for making sandwiches for lunch. 

Today, I will go do some grocery shopping after work.  Nothing fancy because I still have to get in a workout.  So, just what I can get done in 10 minutes or less.  I’ll need some veggies and some protein and some yogurt.  I want to start making baked veggies to go with my protein for dinner.  And I want to take fresh fruits and veggies with me to work to snack on, also Greek yogurt to mix with berries for snacks.  I think I’m going to eat whole grain oatmeal for breakfast for a while.

On Friday or Saturday, I’ll start back up with cooking for up to 6 days worth of meals at a time.  Portion control is so much easier when you cook up a dish and then divvy it up and store it in the individual serving sizes.  I don’t know yet what I’ll make.  Maybe a meatloaf for dinners and a casserole of some sort with chicken for lunches.    I will have to flip through all my recipes that I have and figure something out.

Sunday, I’m going to the renaissance fair with some friends.  That will be a planned splurge day for me as they really don’t have healthy food options available.  But it’s only one day out of the week and it’s at the beginning of my week so I have all week to burn off the excess calories from the day.  I’m hoping this coming Sunday is a more positive day for me than this recently passed Sunday.

The Doctors

While reading this month’s Self magazine, I read an article where they interviewed the doctors from the show The Doctors, asking them 5 questions.  I thought those 5 questions would be a great way to write a blog.  So, here it goes.

What’s your mantra?

I don’t really have one, but I guess I do tell myself not to worry about any occasional slip ups like when I have a binge session.  And I am constantly trying to figure out better ways to do things…especially when it comes to my binge eating as it is a recurring problem for me.  Something I’ve come up with quite recently is when I feel a binge urge, I will take myself a 15 minute walk around my apartment complex taking away my ability to access food, which should be enough time for the binge urge to pass and I’ll be “safe” to reenter my apartment where there is food available to me.  And Dr. Stork’s answer is a really good one that I whole-heartedly agree with: “If the majority of my choices are healthy, I’m good to go.”

How do you fit it all in?

I like to work out as much as I can.  For instance, tomorrow I have 3 hours of exercise planned: 2 hrs of cycling (either outdoors or on a stationary bike at the gym) and 1 hr of circuit training at the gym.  On days that I work, I work 12 hr shifts and am away from home for about 14 hrs.  It can be really difficult to fit in any exercise on days that I work.  But I make it a point, as soon as I get home in the evening, to pop in an exercise dvd or turn on my Xbox Kinect and get 30-40 minutes of exercise.  Sure, it means I’m eating dinner at 8pm, only an hour before I go to bed, but since losing 23.4 lbs so far this year, I no longer have a problem with acid reflux, so eating right before bed isn’t a problem for me.  So, basically, I make exercise my number one priority.  If I don’t, I won’t do it, simple as that.

What’s your worst habit?

Binge eating.  Seriously.  When I get a binge urge, it takes over total control and I am literally helpless against it.  I can’t stop myself.  Like I mentioned before, I’ve been trying to think of ways to avert it and distract myself when it comes up and I really think that taking that 15 minute walk when I feel the urge begin will make all the difference in the world for me.

What’s your best habit?

I’d have to say making exercise my number one priority. 

What do you wish people knew about their health?

That it’s all in their control.  If you’re tired all the time, exercise, it will give you energy.  If you have high blood pressure, diabetes, or are just overweight, exercise and eat right and you will notice a difference quicker than you think you would.

Disappointment

Right now I’m struggling.  I’m struggling with disappointment and feelings of failure.  Last week, on 2 occasions, I binge ate.  I felt horrible when I was doing it, but as usual, I was powerless to stop it.  I hate that I get like that and I hate it even more that I am powerless to stop it.  I’m such a strong-willed person it doesn’t make sense that I can’t control what would seem to be a simple compulsion…a compulsion to stuff my face with any and all food I can find available.  But it’s anything but simple. 

I recently read an article that describes the compulsion to binge eat as a sleeping beast.  You never know when it’s going to wake, but when it does, there’s no stopping it.  It just takes what it wants and won’t be quelled until its ready to be quelled.  Something that this article mentioned trying was when you feel the beast of binge stirring within; take a walk to distract the beast.  Just a 10-15 minute walk is all you need to distract the beast enough for it to lose complete interest in bingeing and to return to its slumber. 

I am so excited to try this idea out.  Of course, I do not, under any circumstances, wish an episode of this compulsion on myself, but when it does come around, I’ll be excited to try out the talking a walk theory.  I’m highly interested to see if it will indeed work for me.  I have high hopes that it will.  I really enjoy walks so I don’t know why I didn’t think of this idea on my own.  But the article suggests doing anything you enjoy to distract yourself long enough for the compulsion to pass, which usually takes about 10-15 minutes.  I know me and I know that just opening a great book won’t do the trick.  I will continue to obsess over food until I can cram it in my mouth, so completely removing me from the vicinity of any and all food by taking a walk is the only way.  It’s the only thing that could work for me. 

The other thing I am struggling with is the apparent consequences of my bingeing last week.  The scale showed a 4 pound gain this week.  Of course, part of the problem is my unreliable bowels and the fact that there has been no movement for a few days.  I took a laxative, but all it did was give me gas.  No help.  I guess this week is a total wash.  I will not count any loss or gain as there are extenuating circumstances as to why my weight is what it is at the moment.  I don’t know what else to do to help myself out.  I already take a hefty dose of a psyllium fiber supplement every day and I get plenty of fruits and vegetables.  I don’t know why that function is so dysfunctional in me…except genetics.  My dad and one of his sisters have the exact same issue. 

So, I will go on with this week as if I had not weighed in and seen that horrible number on the scale.  I will workout regularly and eat diligently and healthfully.  I will continue on and hope next Sunday’s number is a good one, gone in the right direction. 

Slacking Off

Yesterday was my first day back to work after being on vacation for a little over 2 weeks.  It was also the first day in over 2 weeks that I worked out for less than 2 hours in a single day.  I know I was doing as much as I had time to do…a 30 minute super sweat session workout DVD by Bob Harper.  And I felt good during and after the workout.  But let me tell you, I felt like a slacker.  I felt like I should have done more than I did, even though I knew there was no way I could have done more, not without losing sleep.  And that’s definitely not an option.

On my way home from work, I even had the thought of “why bother?  If I can only do 30 minutes, what’s the point?”  Well, the point is that it’s still 30 minutes…30 minutes more than I would get if I just went home and watched some television program.  And any exercise is better than no exercise, so any amount of exercise is beneficial to me and to my health, so therefore, it must be done.  And I always feel better knowing I’ve exercised.  And I didn’t let the ever decreasing voice of my inner critic win.  Not even close.  All he got a chance to do was ask his question.  There was no hesitation on my part in retorting that I would not be skipping my workout. 

Tonight is daylight savings…we get to “spring forward” and lose an hour.  Not a fun prospect when you work a 12-hour shift like me and have to work both the day before and the day of daylight savings in the spring.  I’m not looking forward to only getting 6 hours of sleep tonight instead of my usual 7 on work nights.  I could forego my workout tonight and go to bed an hour early, but I don’t think I’d be able to fall asleep.  So I will do my workout and go to bed at my usual 9pm.  I’ll just be getting an hour less sleep.  But I should sleep good tomorrow night as a result. 

I wish I could workout during my work day.  I work in a jail and do a walking visual of my unit every 30 minutes to check on the welfare of the inmates housed there and the security of the unit.  The jail is 2 stories tall, so I go up and down 1 flight of stairs twice an hour for a total of at least 24 flights of stairs throughout the day.  Seems like a lot, but it’s really not.  They just installed these pieces of workout equipment in all the housing units.  One side is a pull-up bar and the other side is a suspended abs station.  Per agency policy, we’re not allowed to do any kind of exercise in front of the inmates because it can be seen as an intimidating behavior.  But there’s nothing that says I can’t use the equipment during times that the inmates are locked up in their rooms.  And I am quite curious to see if can even do a pull-up.  So, I may start doing a pull-up each time I walk past the equipment during the times they are in their rooms.

I used to work out on my lunch hour because I do get a whole hour for lunch.  I would do intervals on the elliptical machine, but then I’d be all sweaty afterward and even a quick rinse off with cool water wouldn’t help when I got back in my stuffy polyester-blend, long- sleeved uniform.  So I stopped.  Now I just read a book on my lunch break.  That has the added benefit of allowing me to transport myself to somewhere completely not related to my job.  So it’s very relaxing.

I try to find any way I can to add more exercise to my daily routine, even if all I do is choose to stand at my desk instead of sit (the desk is a high one, in between waist and chest level).  I will just make up for only getting up to 40 minutes of exercise done on my work days by working out for hours on my days off.  Haha!