Exercise Equipment : We Have Opinions!

[By Crabby]

No, this isn't a useful product review of the best and worst fitness equipment out there. (There are plenty of those around and they all contradict each other). This is just a list of things I like and why. Chances are, you'll all have opinions of your own that are different—because of course you're all wrong we're all unique individuals, and isn't that what make the world a wonderful place!

(Note: at some point soon we'll also do a “worst exercise equipment” list. After all, this blog is not called Cheerful Fitness is it?)

So here we go,

Crabby's Entirely Subjective List of Best Exercise Equipment Ever:

Big-Ass Weight Machines: And yes, I love the girly kind where you just move the little pins, not the macho kind where you lug big plates around and try to wrestle them onto each new machine like you're building the damn thing from scratch.

It’s very out-of-fashion to like these anymore. You're supposed to be doing free weights or having a personal trainer devise sadistic unendurable creative ways to use your own body weight to get stronger or whatever. It's uncool to use a machine to isolate just one set of muscles at at time.

Well, screw that. I like to sit down on a comfortable machine and only be miserable in one body part at a time. (And I only do one set apiece, at the heaviest weights possible, so it doesn't last long). Is using a bunch of big machines like this less efficient? Is it less functional for carrying groceries or hand-to-hand combat with invading aliens? I don't give a crap. I can still schlep groceries with the best of them; the aliens have not yet arrived; and I like my big-ass machines.

Elliptical Machine: This is another relatively wimpy choice, in some people's eyes, compared to the treadmill or the stairmaster. But getting on a treadmill to walk or run just makes it obvious that you're not outside, where such activities are much more entertaining. Even though I do use a treadmill, it is essentially a compromise machine. And a stair-stepper (especially the backwards escalator kind) is a torture device. Whereas an elliptical machine?

An elliptical machine is a RIDE! If used properly, (or actually, improperly) an elliptical machine is fun! Here's how to make it a piece of playground equipment and much less of a chore.

You must:

• Play awesome kick-ass music with exactly the right cadence so that each step is to the beat.
• Get a machine without the stupid handlebars, or if you can't find one, try to avoid getting smacked by them when you forget they're there.
• Pump your arms vigorously and cultivate the ability to balance, both going forward and backwards. (This must be good for some core muscle or other, don't you think?). Finally, the most important part:
• Launch yourself higher in the air than you need to on each upswing so that you feel like you're sproinging along like an antelope to the beat.

It's fun, really.

WARNING: Following these instructions puts more stress on your knees and may result in your looking like an ass. (Especially if you close your eyes, add some dance moves, and lip synch to the music. But that part is totally optional).

Big Bouncy Inflatable Ball. I know you’re supposed to do all sorts of challenging exercises on it and that it will get your core muscles in great shape, but I lost the little pamphlet that came with it. (And also the pump, so it’s kind of squishy now).

But what I love about the big goofy green ball in our basement is that it’s a great way to stretch out my back. I sit down on it, then lean back until my head dangles upside down, trying to keep my feet somewhat balanced on the ground so I don’t lose control and crash-land on my head and split my skull open. Once equilibrium is obtained, however, it's a great stretch--you can feel all the little vertebrae spreading out and relaxing and putting their feet up, happy to have a little personal space for once.

It’s also my impression (based on something I read somewhere long ago that probably isn’t even true), that using gravity to pull your spine apart will keep you from shrinking as you get older. If this is a totally preposterous theory, don't tell me, because part of the fun of the stretch is my belief that it's making me taller.

Ipod
Well, duh. Gotta have tunes. (On the other hand, this device, or at least my old-fashioned version of it, has enough infuriating quirks that it will also be appearing on Crabby's Entirely Subjective List of The Worst Exercise Equipment Ever Invented.)

Heart Rate Monitor
Notice how I'm running out of steam here, and all of a sudden the sections are getting shorter? Sure, I started off with lots of energy, but now, wow, this is getting old. I'm tired. Am I putting out enough effort still or am I just going through the motions and secretly slacking?

Well, if you're exercising instead of blogging and the same questions come up, you'll have an answer--if you own a handy-dandy heart rate monitor!

(So was that the lamest segue ever??)

Actually, part of the reason for not saying much down here is that I already wrote a whole post on the awesomeness of heart rate monitors. The bottom line? They give you a concrete number to fixate on and become completely obsessed with inform you about your progress. (And you can also use them as handy biofeedback devices).

Anyway, I've been opining for long enough--I want to hear about other people's favorites. That is, if you have any opinions about exercise equipment... or anything else for that matter. At Cranky Fitness, we love opinions!

Random Friday

[By Crabby]

Sorry About the Mess!
I've been trying to change my template, and what looked fine on my computer is apparently a disaster on everyone else's. Will do my best to get things up and running soon! Anyway, on to the Randomness..

Tired of Good Food/Bad Food?
If so, then you may not want to read about how regular consumption of grapefruit might increase breast cancer risk. Or even that there's more good news about extra virgin olive oil. (Recent research suggests it may help prevent cell aging, osteoporosis, and cancer. However, the headline seems to promise more than the article delivers--I like olive oil anyway so I'm totally prepared to believe it'll cure anything).

Oh, and there's also more confirmation that oatmeal is really good for you. Too bad I just don't like it at all unless it's a cookie. A hot bowl of oatmeal? Blechh. But I know all the rest of you love it in all its bland gloppy glory, so don't mind me. (Note: the oatmeal item was discovered while browsing the Happy Hospitalist--a cool blog written by a hospital internist who, like me, has lots of opinions but who, unlike me, actually knows something about medicine).

Which Gym is Best: Big Chain Or Local Place?
According to Consumer Reports, your best bet may be a local gym, not a national chain. The New York Times Blog has more, noting that "national chains were often criticized for long wait times for machines, problems with contracts or fees, poorer cleanliness and less adequate locker rooms than other gyms."

As someone who has taken a lot of road trips, I've visited many Wonderful and Awful gyms--and the chaininess or locallyness of them didn't seem to figure in much. My recommendation? Take advantage of day passes and work out a couple of times before you sign up anywhere, national or local. No huge nationwide survey is going to tell you whether the gym down the street will keep the temperature sauna-like or blare weird music at you or have friendly instructors or great equipment or long waits or smelly locker rooms. Gotta find that stuff out yourself before you fork over big money.

Fat Because You're Broke?
It's no secret there's a link between obesity and socio-economic factors. But for a great no-holds-barred exploration of why these two often go together like coffee and Krispy Kremes, you have to check out this post (and the follow-up) over at Violent Acres.

For example: "Celebrities aren’t wearing size 00’s because they possess more self discipline or willpower than you....These people aren’t better than you. They’re richer than you and it’s likely that they spent more on their bodies than you made last year."

I was new to Violent Acres, and liked the screw-it-all honest style of writing, so I went to look for the comments section so I could suck-up and maybe siphon off some new readers share my appreciation of her writing, but guess what? No comments. Want to know why? Check out her FAQ:

"Why don’t you allow comments on your site? Why don’t you post your email address?"

"Because I don’t want to interact with you...I don’t want to feel obligated to reply to your boring emails. I don’t want to take time out of my day to moderate your silly little comments... Networking is just a fancy way to say ass kissing and a link from you is not important enough to me that I’d actually pretend to like you."

Damn, she saw me coming!

Another Reason Why Crabby Will Never Appear on Jeopardy:
Besides not knowing much about anything, I apparently have an appalling slow reaction time. This slightly addictive self-test is billed as way to figure out if you're tired, but even wide awake, I discovered I suck relative to other people when it comes to reaction time. I tested two different times of the day--didn't help. The thing that's cool about this is that it counts the milliseconds and you get instant feedback as your time gets better or worse. When it's over, they tell you what's average--which for some of us, can be really depressing.

And This Is Why Crabby Will Never Ever Get on A Roller Coaster:
This is either a very funny or very painful video, depending on how much of an anxious wreck you are. Being the high-anxiety type myself, I treated it as an Dire Warning: do not EVER let anyone talk you into doing something you know is going to scare the crap out of you. (How's that for personal development advice? All you "face your fears head on" folks can count me the f*ck out).

Anyway, check out this poor newscaster try to be a good sport and do a live report on a new roller coaster. (Note: it takes about 2 minutes to get to the good/horrible stuff, but it's worth it, and as usual, turn the sound down).

Don't Lie: LOI.
So there is now a new movement to stamp out the misleading and inauthentic use of the acronym "LOL" by web users who are not actually laughing out loud. The use of "LOI," (Laughing on the Inside) is suggested as a replacement, and this is an idea which Cranky Fitness heartily endorses.

And finally, a gratuitous Lolcat psychological test:


(Plenty more lolcat silliness at icanhascheezburger)

So have a great Friday everyone!

WARNING: Site Weirdness Ahead

I'm going to be working with the template this evening, and I've discovered I can't do much on preview so all the little ugly comings and goings are going to be evident. It will all look very bizarre. I'm hoping we'll be up and running for Random Friday tomorrow.

Thanks for your patience!

Placebo Power: Is Your Doctor In On It?

[By Crabby]

Cartoon by Mike Bannon at Mordant Orange

So you go to your doctor with some painful or otherwise bothersome medical problem, and after perhaps running some tests and/or poking around, the doc nods and mmmh-hmmms a lot and finally takes out the prescription pad.

"Take this twice a day for the next two weeks. It may help your condition--and it certainly won't hurt."

Would you be upset if you later found out that the "medicine" you were taking (and paying for) had no active ingredients that could do anything at all for your ailment?

Because it turns out that 45% of doctors in a recent placebo survey copped to prescribing medication to patients as a placebo. Only 4% of them told the patient that's what they were doing--which kind of make sense. "Take this, it won't help you at all unless you think it will" is somehow not nearly as persuasive.

But is it ethical? It's sort of misleading. But it's not an easy question to answer, because, well, placebos work for a lot of people. That's why they have to have control groups whenever they test a new medication. If you tell people you're giving them something that may help their arthritis or their hemorrhoids or their ear-wax build-up or whatever, a good portion of them will obediently get better even if the medicine itself is useless. The freaky thing about giving people placebos it that it actually results in physical changes in the brain that make people feel better.

Can the placebo effect actually cause you to lose weight? Kateio at Sister Skinny recently alerted us to the hotel maids study. This was a weird one: maids who were told that their hard physical jobs actually burned enough calories to meet the surgeon general's definition of an "active lifestyle" started losing weight and lowering their blood pressure. Those who were told nothing... didn't. Can abstract knowledge actually burn calories? Wouldn't that be weird if it did?

(Note: I'm still a bit skeptical of this study, perhaps because it just seems so amazing. But I wonder: if you were an overweight maid who thought you weren't getting any exercise, and then you suddenly found out you were getting plenty, would that change your attitude about the food you were eating? Might that not be an incentive to make some dietary changes?)

Still, if it turns out to be true, the study has amazing implications. You can think calories away! I'm going along with Katieo on this one, and am going to repeat to myself every day: "blogging burns 300 calories an hour." Or hell, make it 700!

So back to the question we started with. Given that placebos can actually trick some people into feeling better, would you be annoyed to find out you're been given one by your doctor?

Unfortunately, as I mentioned before (in a post about placebo doping in sports), I'm just not a very good placebo person. Being a cranky pessimist, I usually expect things NOT to work. So if I shelled out money on a fake drug that didn't help because my doctor thought she could trick me into feeling better, I might be less than grateful.

On the other hand, I've been doing better with knee pain since I started wrapping ice packs around my knees. Is it the ice? Or is it my tiny little suggestible brain believing the ice is helping? Who knows? (It's the ice, I swear).

How about you guys--would you whomp that lying doctor upside the head with your big bottle of fake pills? Or would you give that doctor a hearty thanks for creative thinking about pain management?

True Confessions

So yesterday we were talking about New Years Resolutions and whether people were keeping them or not. And I explained that like many of you, I hadn't made any official resolutions, but I'd already announced earlier I was going to do a couple of things.

• I was going to get more serious and structured about interval training; and
• I was going to stop trashing my knees by running.

So today, I'm going to try to explain justify rationalize make up some weasely lame-ass excuses as to why I'm Zero for Two on those.

Yes, like one of those wholesome house-wifey drug abusers straight out of a made-for-tv-movie, I've been keeping up appearances but sneaking out the back door to get high. I may say "exercise" or "workout," but for the last month or two that's included running, and it feels wonderful, so much better than dork-walking! And yeah, my knees do hurt a bit more sometimes (but not THAT MUCH, okay?).

Is this some sudden magical change in the physiology of my middle-aged knees? Maybe that fish oil and glucosamine are finally kicking in, even though I've been taking them for years? Or is this is yet another short-term experiment that will only end badly?

Any sensible person knows the answer to that question--but someone who desperately craves running endorphins is not a sensible person.

Why no doctor visit? Well, the reason is boring--it involves our moving, and filling out insurance applications again, and my wanting to look like I never actually visit a the doctors office. But I swear I'll go once I'm set up again. It's not like I'm doctor-avoidant or anything...

In the meantime, I've discovered icing.

Not the fun kind of icing, like on cupcakes. I discovered that kind of icing quite a long time ago. No, I mean the kind where you wrap something freezing cold around your injured joints after you abuse them. And (this may be wishful thinking, but...) icing helps! I'm pretty darn sure that my knees are not nearly as crotchety after a run as they used to be.

I started with the low-tech version of a Cold Pack:



And yeah, I know you're supposed to use peas or carrots or something more pliable, but we didn't have any of those.

(By the way, Frozen Asparagus? Works way better as an ice pack than as a side dish. Some vegetables just should never ever be frozen and asparagus, it turns out, is one of them.)

Anyway, now I have an Official Expensive cold pack instead, which is good, because the asparagus bag finally split open and was dripping foul asparagus ice-water all over everything.

So enough about the running and the asparagus. What happened to the intervals?

Well, I still do them, because I do think they're really good for you. But I bailed on the whole "structured" part, which worked better on a treadmill. It was too creepy going all-out on a treadmill and hoping I didn't trip and fly off the back and slam into a wall and kill myself. (Paranoid? Who me?)

So I'm back to doing un-timed, unofficial intervals when I run--and these tend to coincide with hills or really great songs on the ipod. I think I'm pushing myself further and harder with these intervals than I did on the treadmill, but in all honesty, I'm probably not doing as quite as many of them.

Whatever. Close enough.

So of course there's two ways to frame this. "Bailing on my resolutions..." or, the much better sounding "Being Flexible!"

And thanks everyone for checking in about your own progress yesterday. Since this is sort of a continuation of yesterday's post, it doesn't leave a whole hell of a lot to stuff to comment on. So feel free to say hi or not or weigh in something totally unrelated that made you happy or cranky or amused you today.

On a personal note, I'll be in and out today, as the Lobster and I are going to be visiting a notary and signing a stack of documents about two feet high, then wiring what seems a rather whopping sum of money cross country. If all goes well, by close of business we'll be the official owners of a place in Provincetown, Massachusetts!

We plan to visit it next week, start getting it fixed up, and put our California house on the market as soon as we can after we get back. (We'll also be in DC again, as the Lobster has some Business to Attend to and I get to come along for the ride). So if I'm a little lax in blog visits etc these days, I promise I'll get much better once things calm down a bit. ('Cause I'm obviously so good at keeping promises).