Wii Fit

I gnash my teeth in lamentation. It appears we are in the midst of an plumping trend. Perhaps yesterday’s debauchery is catching up with me. I may need to step up my efforts this week.

For what it’s worth, the Wii Fit age is down. I was slightly better at standing perfectly still today than I have been in the past.

Today’s EA Sports Active workout focused on the upper body. It was during a shoulder press that tragedy struck.

Farewell enormous dental dam. We hardly knew ye.

This put a damper on the rest of the workout. I have another resistance band, but it’s got hard handles which makes it difficult to hold the Wii Remote and Nunchuk. EA Sports Active won’t recognize some of the exercises unless you’re holding the controllers in very specific directions. Also, the cable between the Nunchuk and remote kept getting caught.

I ended up finishing the workout sans resistance band, since it was too difficult to get the game to properly register a rep. Of course this turned the exercise into a laughable pantomime, so I’m sure the stats below are inaccurate.

Is anyone out there using an alternate resistance band with the game? Can you recommend one with handles that work well?

After a couple of days of curious embiggening, things have finally taken a downturn. I was alarmed by the sudden hump, but pleased to see that overall my weight is down about a pound from last week. I suppose the downside of weighing yourself everyday is that you have a tendency to to overreact to fluctuations rather than keeping the trends in mind.

The balance board in its infinite wisdom decided I would be 24 today. I am old enough to have to look after myself, but lacking the context to make good decisions. I will eat nothing but ramen and drink nothing but Kool-Aid and vodka.

EA Sports Active knows me quite well. I am a force to be reckoned with on the basketball court. I would surely be in the NBA if it weren’t for one fatal flaw. Dribbling, like tying my shoes, is one of those skills I was never able to develop. Velcro solved one of those problems. But despite my best efforts, it could do nothing for the other.

Today the trainer introduced the hold squat. This sounds filthy. In practice, it just means getting into a squat position and holding there for about a minute.

I don’t think it would have been a problem had it not been for all the jump lunging, inline skating, and basketball hopping that preceded it. My legs felt kind of burny and wobbly, and toward the end of the second hold squat I needed to use my hands to keep myself up.

One day I hope to be as mighty as this lady. She could squat all day long, and so she did.

Gadzooks! Could at be that I’m not far from breaking into the 160′s? Whenever there’s such a major change from day to day I’m always inclined to think that it’s just a fluke. But here on the cusp of something that feels like a milestone, I want to believe.

No such luck with the Wii Fit Age. Today I tried something a bit different on the one-legged balance test. I tried using my left leg instead of my right. Turns out this wasn’t the best idea. I only scored in 50′s, where I usually get in the 70′s – 80′s on the right leg.

EA Sports Active was completely lunge happy today. Almost the entire program consisted of alternating side lunges with toe touches, alternating lunges, alternating reverse lunches, and balance board volleyball with lunges. My lunging abilities are going to be fantastic at the end of the 30-day challenge! I’m not sure what the practical applications are though. I guess I can lurch out of dark alleys and spook people.

Today’s workout also involved kick ups on the jogging track. Kick ups differ from running in that you try to kick your legs up high enough to strike own butt with your heels. As much fun as it is to kick your own ass , it’s also pretty tiring. I think I may have done it faster and sloppier than intended just to get through it faster.

Dinner tonight was a tasty chicken in a wine sauce with salad, quinoa, avocado, and bread. A Guinness was perhaps consumed as well. nom.

My weight bounced up by a little less than a pound. It wasn’t significant enough to warrant a rebuke from the balance board. Despite the slight increase, it’s still lower than it was a couple of days ago.

The Wii Fit Age on the other hand has skyrocketed up to 37. I attribute this mostly to a really poor performance on the second agility test. It was the one where you have to lean left or right to avoid obstacles, and I failed on one of the early obstacles.

I was very confused to see that EA Sports Active thought that I had taken Wednesday off. I was equally confused when today’s workout turned out to be the same one I did on Wednesday.

As it turns out, it didn’t save Wednesday’s workout, so I had to do it again. I guess that if you turn off the game on the results screen it doesn’t bother saving. Boo! I was surprised that it doesn’t save as soon as you wrap up the workout. I imagine a lot of people have probably quit at the end of their session thinking that they’d be okay.

So I ended up having to do the squat jumps and jump lunges all over again. I found the squat jumps easier today, but the jump lunges were still frustrating. I think part of the problem is that the game asked me to do 20 regular lunges before transitioning to jump lunges. So my legs were already tired from holding the lunge position.

Nevertheless, the results were all right.

I also did the daily burn dumbell workout for chest and back. Since the last time was a little too easy, I increased the weight by 5 lbs. per arm. It was still relatively easy, but I don’t want to overdo it an hurt myself. I don’t have a weight bench, so the flies and bench presses don’t have the full range of motion that they should. At some point I may get a cheap bench, especially if I increase the weight.