Bad for you?

I’ve been thinking about exercise lately. Yes, thinking about it.

Those of you that know me, know my philosophy that ‘exercise is bad for you’. This is born of knowing no one that partakes on a regular basis that hasn’t sustained an injury from it and my own experience of having to having my hip reconstructed at the age of 18 because of my love and vast abilities at hockey, field, not ice.

Don’t get me wrong I’m not a complete couch potato. I walk, a lot. I dig the garden. I cycle on occasion, but not so much since my cycle buddy went missing.

I’d like to use the stairs more often, but despite having to travel between levels 3 and 2 a lot when at work, I am forced to use the lift due the fire doors being closed off except for an emergency.

With recent studies showing too much sitting is likely to end your life earlier, I would have thought offices would be encouraging the use of stairs between floors. No, they would like us to inconvenience our fellow office dwellers by making us go one floor in the lift.

Considering I’m more than 40% likely to die in the next three years because I spend more than eight hours a day sitting, I’d like to use the stairs a bit more.

Let me break it down…
Car to station: 10 minutes
Train trip: 45 minutes
Desk time: 8 hours (that’s my story and I’m stickin’ to it)
Train trip: 45 minutes
Station to car: 10 minutes
Telly watching and evening computer time: 2+ hours

That adds up to far too much sitting. A bit scary really and no wonder I have the fitness of a 80 year old.

How about exercise for the day, I know it isn’t nearly as much.

From car to station x 2 : 10 minute walk
From station to office x 2 : 5 minutes including 35 steps
Lunch time stroll/walk: 50 minutes

At the weekend, maybe a few hours of walking in total. I do plenty of standing too. I stand when I do my music practice and I stand to cook. I also stand at the photocopier/printer waiting for my latest masterpiece to pop out.

So, I do my 150 minutes of exercise and more per week which increases my chances a bit, but the odds still aren’t great. I repeat, I think I’d like to use the stairs at the office more.

Or… I need a dog that forces me outside. Or as noted in previous posts, a different form of employment ;-)

How does your sitting to exercise ratio stack up?


http://news.yahoo.com/too-much-sitting-kill-study-suggests-200408243.html

Harbour Cruise - My Bruised Arse

Saturday morning saw me making melba toasts (cut up bread, place on baking sheet in 200O oven until crisp) for Todd’s harbour cruise while I waited for the real estate guy to come round and do a house inspection. Far too much to deal with a Saturday morning if you want my opinion!

Around noon I left the house with my new red shopping trolley loaded with pate, melba toasts, wine, ice and my camera. I was going to get the bus, but after waiting twenty minutes I jumped in a cab. Once again the taxi won the Taxi V Bus race. I met Todd and some friends at King Street Wharf and we waited for the boat.

Now please bear in mind I was expecting something big and stable to CRUISE around the harbour in. You can imagine my surprise when a sail boat slipped into the pick up position. We all climbed aboard, and settled in as we motored out into the harbour under the bridge. It was actually very relaxing and I took heaps of photos to remember the day, Todd eating nibbles, drinking wine and generally being the hostess with the mostest.

We (there were 11 of us on the boat and the skipper) drank, laughed and chatted. Some of us reminisced about the bad habits we had picked up from Todd and some just listened and thanked their lucky stars they hadn’t known him long enough to pick them up. We stopped and put down the anchor and a few went for a swim. I was happy on board taking pictures.

Once the swimming was over the skipper suggested we go for a little sail. He informed us that because it was a little windy we would only use the little sail at the front. The anchor was pulled up, the sail was unwrapped. It flapped about for a bit then it caught. We took off like a bullet from a gun and the boat tipped. From 0 -15knots (17mph/27kph) like a racing car.

I slipped of my perch, thinking first and for most about the camera I flipped my right arm over the edge of the galley as my legs vanished over the edge of the boat and into the water. My left hand grabbed onto anything (turned out to be a rope winder), my legs bounced about on the edge of the boat as I pulled myself up and finally got a foothold on the little wooden plinth on the side. I wasn’t near anyone, so I didn’t have help like a couple of others that also experienced the pleasures of sailing. I’m told it only took a few minutes to right us again, but it felt like an hour. I was soaked. The only dry thing about me was my camera hand.


The rest of the ‘cruise’ I hardly moved. As the saying goes ‘It’s all good fun until someone get hurt, then it’s bloody hilarious’ I was the butt of jokes. But weirdly enough I didn’t care. If we tipped again I was secure and oddly I was having fun. The adrenaline had kicked in and I was what can only be described as high.

I was however, really glad to be back on dry land when it was over. If it hadn’t of been over dramatic I would have kissed the ground. I went home to shower before our dinner to find a few purple masses gathering under the skin on my legs and arms.

Dinner at IThai on King Street Wharf was lovely, more reminiscing, good food and wine and an early night for all. After the drama of the boat I think everyone was completely knackered.

Travel Options

For the last few days I have been walking to work, the weather has been fine and a new found freedom has brought about a desire to sashay. It’s a rather pleasant twenty five minutes walk if I dawdle and window shop, fifteen if I power walk and take in nothing of my surroundings. I’ve only power walked it once and that resulted in sweat which is neither pretty nor elegant, so I won’t be doing that on a regular basis.

This morning it was raining so I caught a bus from the stop just across the road from my house. The 303 from San Souci to Circular Quay. It took a grand total of five minutes to get down Crown Street then another five to walk from Campbell Street to work. So all in, all I didn't get as wet as I could have, nice! It wasn’t too bad an experience despite the driver giving me dirty looks for having the audacity to ask which way the bus went and then sending me flying through the air as he pulled out of the stop.

I think I prefer to walk if it’s not raining, but the bus will suffice for rainy days and longer trips.

Mixed Fortune

So I thought ‘Ohh… Ohh… Gotye new album Mixed Blood is out…I shall go and get a copy at lunch time so I can listen to it this afternoon at work instead of listen the to voice of the annoying b*tch in the pod next to me all afternoon (the woman is shrill, loud and never stops talking).

So I left the office with a spring in my step (I’m also in training for City2Surf on 12th August) and headed for the Red Eye Records on Pitt Street. Sold Out in both stores!
Then I popped into Citymark, they have two records shops…one only sold Chinese music (well, it is Chinatown) and the other one Hip Hop, eww!
Next stop, Sanity in Market City. The chickie looked Gotye up on the computer after asking ‘who’s that then’ and after a brief time of looking confused at my disapproving looks and consulting the computer, she informed me that Sanity Sydney (that’s all stores in Sydney) is still waiting for its stock to arrive.

Shocking!

Stopped

I got stopped by an RBT last night after dropping off Edna. It wasn’t a too pleasant experience, but the policeman was rather cute, so the eye candy took the edge off a bit.

I had spent the evening swimming, spaing and saunaing with Edna and I’d had a shower before taking her home, so I was dressed in my finest trakkie daks and t-shirt. All I had with me was my mobile phone and car keys.

NOTE TO SELF : You MUST have your driving license with you when driving.

I hadn’t been drinking, so no problem there, but no license meant they looked up my rego and I had to tell them who the car was registered to, to prove I was who I said I was. They then asked me were I’d been and where I was going. Then they looked over the car. Except for a mouldy chip down between the driver’s seat and the gear stick they found nothing bad. I was sent on my way.

I popped in to see Trixy briefly (she lives just round the corner from were I was stopped) so she could tell me how well the exam she’d just taken went, had have half a glass of champagne. I got home at just after 11.

What a fun filled evening?

Swimming 19

The first swim since last Wednesday was brief, again, 'cause i'm going out. Only 20 lengths in 15.14. I figure it's better than nothing and I did power walk over to UTS and back from work at lunchtime.

Luncheon Dip

‘Cause I’m going out straight after work today I decided to squeeze my swimming into my lunch break. So, due to time constraints I only did 30 lengths and it took me 22.26. The rest of my seventy minute break was made up of walking home/back to work (approx four blocks), getting changed and showering. Lunch was consumed at my desk about ten minutes ago ;-)