April 19, 2010

Happiness is a Home Gym

Who cares that we finally got around to putting a home gym in our basement? Well, nobody, probably, but that's why it's great to have a half-dead blog visited by a bunch of imaginary blog readers. I can post stuff occasionally when I get all excited and just pretend people are reading it. (And if the lovely folks at Blogher decide to syndicate the post), I even get to feel like a real blogger again for a few minutes.

So yeah, after years of petty, bitter complaints about our local gym (The temperature! The squeaky equipment! The "having to share!") we finally decided to create a more functional exercise space in our basement. We already had a super-cheap but quite serviceable treadmill (thank you, Sears warehouse) as well as some dumbbells and other odds and ends.

The problem? We figured a workout space that didn't evoke suicidal thoughts might be nice.


But this is what we started with:

Nice, huh?

Though for some perspective... here's a shot of that same space when the previous owners occupied it:

Walking lunges? A bit of a challenge.

And now? Well, we're still dealing with a poorly lit, unfinished basement-- complete with an exposed ceiling, ugly pipes, rusty beams, inexplicable holes, odd protrusions and miscellaneous dangly things. But at least it's now a freshly-painted and cleaned-up unfinished basement.

Voila!


Note the low-tech approach: what we couldn't slap paint on, we covered up with shower curtains. And the gym "flooring" came from Costco and cost approximately the same amount per square foot as toilet paper.

Now wait... what's that back there under the window? Is that... no... could it be?

Yes it is! It's a Precor 5.23 elliptical! Crabby has been pining for one of these babies FOREVER.


Yes, this was the real motivation for the "dump the gym, workout at home" initiative. We hunted for a refurbished Precor, shopped it to death, and finally found this EFX 5.23 for a tiny fraction of what it cost new. Which was still a crapload of money.

But hell, we figure in about 147 years, we should save enough in gym dues to totally make up for it!

Let's see it from another angle, shall we?


See how happy I look? I really have wanted one of these since the dawn of time.

Note: the Lobster was also photographed on the elliptical, and looked totally adorable, but she failed to appreciate this obvious fact and refused to let me post her photo. Spoilsport. But I do let her use the elliptical sometimes too, I promise.

What else is in our home gym? Well, lots of miscellaneous doohickeys we've accumulated over the years. You may notice the collapsible Crabitron in the background; it's still one of my favorite workout machines.


Another awesome feature that the handy Lobster added was a pull-up bar. Now, after years of failed attempts, I can finally do two whole pullups in a row. Or even more fun, three chin-ups! (Yes, some people work doggedly to save the earth, create financial empires, build massive skyscrapers, heal the sick, find inner peace... my goal was one unassisted pull-up before I turned fifty. I'm so proud.)


And yeah, I'm actually still using that TRX thingy you see hanging there, though not to make fitness porn movies, I swear.

Now here's where a real health blogger with a non-imaginary audience might offer some fresh tips on creating your own home gym. But, well, I'm too lazy. I can, however, offer some stale tips written 6 months ago on budget home gyms.

In any event, it is rare for me to be so HAPPY about working out. I'm sure when the novelty of our new home exercise space wears off, I will go back to my usual whining.

How are all my imaginary friends--having a good spring? Finding any new fitness options that don't suck? I miss you guys!

76 comments:

  1. Do you really think I'd delete you from Google Reader when I held out such hope that this very event would happen?

    And how I wish I could do a pull-up. Some day?

    Lastly, the home gym looks great. Color me jealous AND waiting for whatever gems you can't hold in your head anymore.

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  2. You're so sweet Amy! Thanks for hanging in there.

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  3. Yay, you're back! We hoped this day would happen.

    Oh, a home gym. I'm stricken with just a teensy bit of envy right now but still am very happy for you that you have one :)

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  4. I'd never take you off my Google Reader! Your home gym is great. Mine consists of a few exercise bands, a Bosu ball, and some ankle weights. Lame. I'd love to have an elliptical.

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  5. Glad to see you back, Crabby! And now I wish I had a basement so I could build a home gym! Yours looks great!
    And go you with the pull-ups!

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  6. Great to see CF back! The next time you do pull-ups, try tipping your head back to look at the ceiling. It helps engage your back muscles, so you might be able to squeeze another 1/2 rep out.

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  7. Glad to see you back; I had just discovered you and poof, you were gone. I love your humor:)

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  8. Crabby, you look so happy and fulfilled working out in your home gym. It's a fine-looking place, too, so no wonder.

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  9. Congrats Crabby! I love having my own little gym in the basement - so much more convenient. Glad you are enjoying your new equipment and improved space!

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  10. Super yay for a post on here!

    Yay for a home gym! I do not have the space to dedicate to a home gym since I live in a small box...although some would argue my living room is my home gym since it is where my bike is set up on the indoor trainer and all my workout stuff is in the corner. I'm looking forward to my move this summer since my new apartment has a 2nd bedroom aka my new workout room!

    Glad to see you still have the writing spirit in you!

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  11. What a cool gym!
    For some reason I am having a hard time motivating myself to exercise at home. Maybe if I had a nice gym space like that... maybe.

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  12. We have the same treadmill! And the same bench, almost, except mine has 1" thick plywood on it instead of padded, rotten MDF!

    And I want the rug under your tready in the first picture. Freight to my address, KTHANX.

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  13. Love hearing what you all are using (or not) for exercise. I feel kinda obnoxious crowing about our new set-up, but after decades of longing for something like that it was just too hard not to share.

    Anon, thanks for the pull-up tip about looking at the ceiling, will try that next time!

    And Jo, the rug is yours, complete with numerous cat barf stains. Just come n' get it any time!

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  14. Happy to see your smiling face :)

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  15. Nice to see a post from you. Yay!

    I'm jealous you have an elliptical trainer. I'd love to have one, but it's not in the financial cards right now.

    I'm soon to be in the market for a decent used treadmill, though. We've decided to go ahead and buy the house we've been renting, which means I can commit to major purchases for my studio. :-)

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  16. I know it's going to be a good week when I can start it by reading a Crabby post! Love the home gym! So that's where you were when I went looking for you on twitter :O Congrats on the pull-ups, a fine accomplishment for sure!

    The latest addition to the home gym for me is various size medicine balls. They come in different weights (and pretty colors ;)and I like to do front squats with one held against my upper chest to engage the old core.


    Thanks for making this a great Monday with a great post, and here's hoping you need to empty your head again soon!! :D

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  17. I think it's perfectly acceptable to blog when inspiration hits.

    Your gym looks very nice.

    The fitness option that I'm completely digging right now is rock climbing. I'm so smitten it's not even funny...

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  18. Of course we still secretly haunt you. (Or just left you in our reader feed, praying for the day...)

    Awesome! You're giving me some inspiration. My treadmill (also, thank you Sears!) is in what's supposed to be the office, but is currently the "catch-all" until the basement is finished. I think it's time to clean that sucker out and make it more user friendly!

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  19. I miss you too Crabby! This was my favorite fitness blog! I am wanting to get a barbell set one of these days for my own living room home gym.

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  20. AHHHH so glad you have returned!!! The TRX is awesome and you probably won't get bored with that for years and years!

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  21. Of course I am still around. I'm like a bad penny, I always turn up.

    I'm not sure which tickles me more, that you posted or that you and your exercise space look so happy.

    Don't let your head explode, or your Lobster get crankier than you about having to listen to those thoughts. Come share, I'll listen.

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  22. Of course we're still here, and we're Very Jealous. If I get virtual drool on your elliptical will it start squeaking?

    Mary Anne in Kentucky

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  23. Great to see you back again, Crabby.

    Your new gym looks wonderful - I'm green with envy. I'm another of the "live in a shoebox" brigade so all I can do is dream. We do have an unused garage but it's full of gardening gear and a freezer.

    And let me say you're looking very toned and polished. Is this new laid back life style agreeing with you?

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  24. See, you didn't imagine us; we're real!! :)

    Now I'm incredibly jealous that I don't have a dimly lit unfinished basement to house my home gym because yours looks so fantastic!! Do you have a personal step class teacher in there, too? Maybe you could start charging gym fees and letting others come there to help pay for the elliptical :)

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  25. Damn, I'd forgotten how fun it is to read comments--you guys rock.

    We're packing up & heading off to boston for a few days... not for the marathon, but for a work thingy. We've got internet though, thank goodness.

    Thanks all, for stopping by!

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  26. Yeay!!! You're back for a visit! Glad to hear that you and the Lobster are doing well. (And yes, of *course* we left you in Google Reader, hopeless dreamers that we are. :-D )

    Love the workout space! Like the *other* 99.99% of homes in California (yours obviously falls into that elusive .01%), we have no basement in which to create a home gym. So I've got weights stashed under the bed and on top of bookshelves, resistance bands in the dresser drawer, and an unmentionables drying rack--er, I mean, *exercise bike* crammed into the bedroom in the 2 feet between the end of the bed and the window. But then, I work right next door to my gym-, so I can't gripe about it too much.

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  27. (Of course, with your new home gym, sadly you will be unable to participate in MizFit's t-shirt craft project, although you might be able to revisit in a few months. ;-)

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  28. I'll take your stale home gym tips!! I just posted to my blog asking readers for help in creating my own home fitness area in my own poorly lit, block wall basement!
    http://corgipants.blogspot.com/2010/04/basement-to-fitness-center.html

    Thanks!!

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  29. We miss you too, Crabby!

    I love your fab new basement makeover...it's amazing what a little bit of paint and some shower curtains can accomplish. And don't all those decorator tips say to splurge on one major focal point? Nice job.

    Good to see you with a big ol' grin on your face, too. The best workout is the one you like. Have fun!

    And come back occasionally...many RSS feeds are keeping tabs on you.

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  30. How could anyone delete you crabby...

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  31. I must have deleted you. Thank goodness a picture is worth a thousand words. I can skip the words.


    Loved the pics of you. Loved seeing those cluttered corners of doom. Especially since I read the first chapter of "Hoarding: One Pig's Trough is Another Pig's Poke: What our hoarded piles of stuff tell us about who we are and whether we should be committed."

    Now

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  32. Yay! You're baaaack! Space looks great... a decent machine makes all the difference... you look extremely cute and also like you have not been slacking off at all during your blog hiatus. Go Crabby!

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  33. O Happy Day! Crabby's back! I've missed your posts, and hope you're inspired to write on more than an occasional basis. By the way, I'm on a quest to find my own low-tech dip station, Crabby-style:the walker-lol. I KNEW my home gym was lacking something!

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  34. i stop by every now and then ... glad i did today.

    and the gym looks awesome!

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  35. Looks awesome!!

    I would luuhhhv a dimly-lit unfinished basement. Or to be your neighbor and come over and run on your treadmill. And we could *not* watch the Biggest Loser on your awesome gym tv!

    And AWESOME on the Precor! (although I would most definitely go with Satan in my basement ;)

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  36. Aww - you look positively joyous on that elliptical! And the basement cleaned up nicely. It's good to see you (and "see" you) again!!

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  37. So friggin exciting to see you!!!!! You look awesome! Wish you had shown yourself more before!

    Congrats on that chin! GO!!!!!

    Thx for coming back.. are you staying for a bit or just visiting!

    Check out my Sunday girls gone wild post with my high school friends! More pics to some at a later date!

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  38. Hoooray my force of habit of clicking on cranky fitness even though you said you quit has paid off!

    I love the home gym space!

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  39. It is SO nice to hear your level headed post. I had been floundering in the scary land of fitness blogs. There's some freaky stuff out there. Rest assured we are always here, waiting for your humorous, cynical, interesting posts.
    Happy Cranky Fitness.

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  40. Yea! My patience has been rewarded.

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  41. Hello from another imaginary reader! ::poof::::

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  42. I was so excited to see a new post! I've kept you on my blogroll in the hopes that you were as addicted to posting as I am to baked goods...maybe you'd need a full photo of me to appreciate that statement!
    I prefer to work out at home as opposed to spending an extra 40 minutes driving to and from the gym. That's like two punishments!

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  43. I've missed you Crabby! Glad to see you drop in. I love the new home gym and I'm very jealous you have your very own Precor. I spent 99 minutes on the elliptical today and would love to be able to get that sweaty at home. Come back soon, you hear?

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  44. Love you Cranky! Thanks for the inspiring post, good to know you are still out there, and keeping it real..

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  45. Hey, welcome back! Are you sure you want to do this? :) Oh, I know, it's just a pop-in. Glad to see things are going well with your new digs.

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  46. Wooo! I've missed you (and the Crabitron). I was so happy to see this post pop up in my Google Reader. Bravo on the home gym set up-- looks fantastic.

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  47. Thanks for the article, I love the pictures! I love my home gym too!

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  48. I was just thinking Crabby thoughts today and wooosh! There you are.

    Love the new gym, especially the beautiful new elliptical. I was at a lovely hotel last weekend with one of those reallllly nice ellipticals. My better half was finally able to appreciate the perfection as he had only used the one in my building gym and had nothing to compare it to.

    Glad to read a post from you.

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  49. Hooray, a new post! Thought it might be too hard to resist! You could just do irregular posts when you're fit to burst and we'll all stop by when you do...

    Hope the new job's going well. Wish I looked as happy as you when I'm doing a pull up!

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  50. Yay-good to hear from you!
    Wow...you've inspired me. We're trying to turn our beasement pit into something a bit more inspired/less dingy for our elliptical and my other misc gym junk...I never thought of shower curtains to cover space.
    genious.
    Genious about the pull up bar...I've dreamed of a punching bag for ages but never thought of that.
    Neato...
    Now I have to go home and plan...muhahahaha

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  51. Gym looks great! Hope the newness never wears off for ya. I love our home gym. Even though I have Free access to the 65,000 sq ft. athletic club with all the bells and whistles (along with 10 others in the area) that I work in, I prefer working out in my beloved garage gym. My little sanctuary. Weird I know, but then I love exercise too and get crabby if I don't do it.... Also love your wit and humorously crabby viewpoint of the health and fitness world. It so helps me take myself less seriously.

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  52. the space looks great! almost like a "Clean House" moment!

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  53. Super-Duper site! I am loving it!! Will come back again – taking you feeds also, Thanks

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  54. Crabby! Crabby! Crabby! Yaaaaaayyyy!!!

    Missed you SO much, don't know your recent story but will try to catch up through back posts.

    Mine is just working to keep a roof.

    My exercise room is a buncha thera-bands stuffed into the glass top of a candle lantern sitting on a bookshelf in the living room, lol. My whole house would fit into that basement of yours, all that space looks like heaven to me, but I love my little rental and am praying the landlord keeps paying his mortgage...

    So please check in when you want to say hi and stay in touch, we love and miss you and welcome you any time! It's ok if life gets in the way, just keep living it with that great smile on your face and with your lovely Lobster.

    I am hoping you still have The Moo? and imagine your trip back to PTown is / was in Fran.

    Lotsa love just sent your way!!!
    XOXOXO

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  55. That is great that you have created a home gym. Talk about easy motivation! You can get up, stumble down the stairs half awake, workout for a while, and walk back up the stairs all energized and ready to attack the day.

    The pictures are great. You've got cardio and weight areas to use to get your dream body. Congratulations.

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  56. Wow! Congratulations! You actually succeeded in making a home gym, whereas I am still in the midst of making yet another mental draft of how I would turn the somewhat-spacious tool shed at the back of our house into one. What's more, you did a pull-up! Congratulations. I found myself drooling over your pictures, all the while feeling so cranky due to overwhelming envy. I just couldn't decide what I am more envious of: your home gym or your doing a pull-up?

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  57. Sometimes it is nice to be able to get straight to the workout without having to worry about driving both ways to the gym. Thanks for sharing.

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  58. Space to burn, literally!

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  59. It's nice to see you back. It's a great thing to have a gym at home rather then to go to some other place for it to keep our body fit. I got a nice tip from this post. Thanks for sharing this through this post.

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  60. Love the me home gym! I am still trying to figure out how to make the chin up0 bar work in my house. Great pics!

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  61. Nice work with that space!

    Especially after seeing the rat's nest that the previous owners left you with.

    Those cool semi-opaque cabinet doors and interlocking rubber floor mats seal the deal for me. Nice!

    The pullup bar hanging from an I-Beam is a nice touch as well.

    Now you really have no excuses!

    All the best,

    Ian

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  62. Wow amazing I like your home gym. I like the pictures too it is awesome.

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  63. I like your home Gym its amazing. I also create one home Gym at my home its also look like your Gym.

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  64. Well, well, I clicked on your bookmark not really expecting to find anything new, but here you are!

    I LIKE the unfinished basement look. That's Hard-core style!

    Guess what? I've got a blog now! (Not a fitness blog and I don't write every day, but I do attempt to be amusing.)

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  65. It seems that, for most people, simply going to the gym is a difficult enough task. A home gym is a great solution. It's possible it may cost more for the equipment than for a gym membership but it could be more beneficial. Thanks for posting.

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  66. Nice at-home gym! Thanks for sharing the pictures with us.

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  67. The home gym looks great, but being around others when working out can help in motivation and good feelings, but working out alone is good at times too. Good luck.

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  68. Great Home Gym, I'm jealous! Enjoy your workouts

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  69. I enjoyed this post about home gyms. It looks like you spent a lot of time creating the right kind of space.

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  70. Recently I'm joining a gym,but I have never go gym before i join this.I'm doing very hard work in the gym...!

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  71. It is a good step that you have decided to create a more functional exercise space in your basement. And then freshly-painted and cleaned-up unfinished basement.

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  72. help in motivation and good feelings, but working out alone is good at times too. Good luck.

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  73. Nice post, I would like to request you to one more post about that Keep it up

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