Exercising on the road: A typical Crabby day

[By Merry]

Well, Crabby wasn't sure how she was going to manage staying fit while on the road, so out of pure helpfulness I've drawn up a little schedule. I visualized how a typical day on the road would go for the Crab and the Lobster, while they try to balance road trip with fitness stuff.

6:00 a.m. Get up out of bed, start the coffee brewing. While waiting for a cup, go outside and jog around the Wal-Mart parking lot several times. (Note: might want to get a faster coffee maker. Just saying.)

10:00 a.m. Stop at a roadside rest stop to stretch your legs. While you’re at it, throw in some squats and do some jumping jacks as well.

10:05 a.m. Explain to the nice policeman that you’re from California, and people do things like that there. Really, nothing to worry about, officer, we’ve only been drinking coffee.

12:00 noon. Have a picnic lunch by some scenic spot, by a river or in a park or something like that. Eat healthy food that you’ve picked up at the last health food store you stopped at. Try not to remember how long ago that was. Expiration dates are only suggestions, aren't they?

2:00 p.m. Try cat-lifting in the back of the van, while the Lobster pretends she doesn’t see what you’re doing. Stop after a few minutes, since a) there’s not enough room and b)there's a limit to the number of band-aids in the first-aid kit.

4:00 p.m. Stretch your legs. Just stretching, that’s safe.

6:00 p.m. Stop at a local fast food restaurant and inquire if they have bean sprouts and tofu on the menu. Explain that you’re from California.

10:00 p.m. Find a handy Wal-Mart to park in for the night. Jog around the parking lot. Explain to the nice security guard that you’re not running away, you’re running around. Decide to stick to running in the morning, when the security people are less awake vigilant.

Okay, so it's just barely possible that Crabby might want to seek a second opinion on how to combine traveling with exercise. Anyone have any better suggestions? I know they're camping in the van, so hotel gyms are out. And I don't think they arranged their schedule to include guest passes at gyms on the route, but there have to be other options for exercising on the road. Crabby said she would check in if she had a chance, so I'm sure she'd be glad for any ideas you have.

p.s. Yes, I know this is a silly post. But last night I posted a guest post, written by Karly, that's serious and discusses important issues. (I didn't want you to think that I was letting the blog get too frivolous in Crabby's absence.)

Cranky Fitness: Blog Update!

Screw These Dumb Blocks, It's Time for Pie!

So, what's new at Cranky Fitness?

Hmm... same tired old cupcakes.... same unsophisticated design layout... same inability to post videos, create tabs, or move to a 3 fancy column format...

But wait!

What's that thing sitting there above this post? No, not the weird naked figures playing with blocks. Further up... Why yes, it appears to be a guest post, but nowhere on it does it say: Guest Post!

What does this mean?

Well, maybe nothing. It's an experiment. Cranky Fitness is trying to lure a new contributor to the blog, Mary, whom you already know from her witty comments, previous great guest post, and amusing blog Sheesh. Crabby is hoping to talk her into co-blogging, but for now, let's just say she's going to be hanging out here a bit and testing the waters.

Here's the deal: Crabby would love to have some company. She'd like Cranky Fitness to have plenty of Crab, but also other stuff too! She's thinking perhaps, eventually, a small team blog, one that encourages guest posts too, especially by writers who are funnier and better informed about Health and Fitness than Crabby is. So that readers don't have to put up with a million posts by Crabby, but can still check in pretty often and see new stuff posted.

Crabby, being both ambitious and slothful, would like Cranky Fitness to Grow and Grow, but she wants other people to do the work for her! Seems perfectly reasonable, doesn't it?

It's actually not all just laziness--Crabby would really like to spend some of the time she spends blogging getting back to her unfinished novel, or tackling her not-yet begun series of Crabby McSlacker self help books. But the blog has become a Really Important thing in the Crab's fairly uneventful life, and the last thing she wants to do is get too slacky and lose the great readers she already has.

(And yes, she is aware that normal people can do more than one thing at a time. But "normal" is an adjective very rarely used in the same sentence as "Crabby McSlacker.")

So Crabby will still be here, posting almost as much as usual, and maybe Mary will stick around too if we don't scare her off--and who knows, at some point there may be other regular or occasional contributors as well.

Of course this may be one of those ideas that Crabby announces with great fanfare and then fails to follow through on and has to retract later. But if somehow it happens, Crabby will have even more than usual to be thankful for next Thanksgiving!

(And if you haven't already done it, go read Mary's Holiday quiz!)

Have a Great Thanksgiving or a Happy Thursday!

Accidental Death, Evil Empire, and Other Pleasant Sunday Subjects

Some blogs go sensibly dark on the weekends; others just keep plugging away as though their authors and readers had no actual lives. Welcome to Cranky Fitness!

At some point Crabby may well have to explore the "dark" side herself, and think about taking weekends off. She seems to be blogging all the time now. Yet she has a novel to finish, a Crabby McSlacker self-help book to consider, and a Crabby McSlacker Health and Fitness Empire to build. (She will, at some point, fill readers in on her Sinister Scheme for World Domination).

For now, however, Crabby is mostly just blogging and there will usually be something here for loyal readers to peek at, even on weekends. Maybe not both days, but at least one of the two.

A warning, however: weekend posts may be short and random and disorganized.

Well, okay, sometimes weekday posts will be like that too.

So lacking an elegant transition (it being a weekend) Crabby will just present you with some random research and news that she didn't fit in during the week.

Accidental deaths have been rising, and are up twelve percent, worrying those who track such things. In particular, there are more drug overdoses, more old people falling in their homes, and, wait for it, more Baby Boomers wiping out on motorcycles. Crabby isn't kidding about that last one--feel free to write your own punchline.

Speaking of weird causes of accidental death, a teenage athlete died from over-use of "muscle cream" (think Bengay, Icy Hot, etc). Apparently she was a cross-country runner who used "topical medication to excess" and absorbed too much methyl salicylate, an anti-inflammatory. Yet another (strange) reminder: everything in moderation!

And to continue our cheerful theme, Crabby was just passing a newsstand and spied a headline on a newspaper rack that's become all too common these days: "Five-year-old finds gun, kills himself." Should Crabby venture her opinions on guns, gun ownership, and the general idiocy of the American legal, cultural, and political systems when it comes to this issue?

Perhaps not, at least not on this sunny Sunday. Another day.

Enjoy what's left of your weekend, folks!