Historical summaries

We’ll go reverse chronological.

The plan is to stick with movements I can or could do, with links to in-depth explorations.

Goals (passive exercises): Continue being able to do the following:

1. Complete weekly shopping while walking roughly 5 miles.
2. Skip steps when leaving and entering the apartment daily.

Goals (active exercises): Perform the following every day:

• 1 one-minute plank.
• 1 regular pushup.
• 1 inverted row.
• 1 air squat.
• Walk 1 mile in less than 30 minutes.

• September 2024
• August 2024
• July 2024
• June 2024
• May 2024
• April 2024
• March 2024
• February 2024
• January 2024

Goals (passive exercises): Continue being able to do the following:

1. Complete weekly shopping while walking roughly 4 miles.
2. Skip steps when leaving and entering the apartment daily.

Goals (active exercises): Perform the following every day:

• 1 one-minute plank.
• 1 regular pushup.
• 1 inverted row.
• 1 air squat.
• Walk 1 mile in less than 30 minutes.

• December 2023
• November 2023
• October 2023
• September 2023
• August 2023
• July 2023
• June 2023

Goals (passive exercises): Continue being able to do the following:

1. Complete weekly shopping while walking roughly 4 miles.
2. Skip steps when leaving and entering the apartment daily.

Goals (active exercises):

In the early part of the year, I contemplated active exercise movements. When I visited my doctor, I mentioned wanting a chest x-ray, bone density test, and something to know where I was regarding connective tissue.

None of those tests were pursued, and I was given the okay to start actively exercising.

Shortly thereafter, I came down with acute appendicitis. (I don’t remember if my toe acted up before or after appendicitis.)

It took about 3 weeks to recover to a point where I only felt pain in extreme circumstances. I didn’t take the OxyContin that was prescribed, just the ibuprofen.

About this time or shortly after, my right big toe went apeshit: swelling and limited mobility. The hypothesis is that it’s gout. It took about a week to recover. I had another flair that same year.

Goals (passive exercises): Continue being able to do the following:

1. Complete weekly shopping while walking roughly 3 miles.
2. Skip steps when leaving and entering the apartment daily.

Goals (active exercises):

I didn’t have any goals regarding active exercise.

While we were all working virtually due to the pandemic, Becca’s office had various fitness and mobility “challenges” to improve camaraderie and maintain the health and wellness of the employees. One of these challenges was planking.

We eventually got to a point where we were doing 5-minute planks. I did not struggle with my breathing or muscle tension during this time. On the other hand, Becca, who is more of an active exerciser than myself, would be “feeling the burn” toward the end.

As an experiment, I also tried doing a 5-minute deep squat (no load), and it didn’t become strained then, either.

I did try to do 3 bent-knee inverted rows, thinking I would add them as a pause point before going outside to take a break from work. In other words, as I walked out the door, I wanted to stop at the station in our apartment, do 3 inverted rows, and then leave. When Becca observed me performing the movement, my shoulder went into the full shrug position—not good.

I did not attempt this again.

I got shingles this year and also injured my right big toe. Shingles were treated with medication, and the toe was treated as turf toe, improving in about a week.

Goals (passive exercises): Continue being able to do the following:

1. Complete weekly shopping while walking roughly 4 miles.
2. Skip steps when leaving and entering the apartment daily.
3. Walk to the office without getting winded or sweaty; roughly 4 miles.

Goals (active exercises):

None.

Goals (passive exercises): Continue being able to do the following:

1. Complete weekly shopping while walking roughly 6 miles.
2. Skip steps when leaving and entering the apartment daily.
3. Walk to the office without getting winded or sweaty; roughly 6 miles.

Goals (active exercises):

I started what I called the aesthetics project. Long story short, at the peak, I had a three-day-a-week routine that consisted of a warm-up, three rounds, a cooldown, and a long shower.

1. 10 push-ups,
2. 10 inverted rows (feet on a 12-inch step),
3. 20 steps (on the 12-inch step), and
4. 20 bodyweight squats.

The warm-up had lunges, squats, jumping jacks, arm circles, and similar activities.

Initially, I experienced delayed onset muscle soreness and started with fewer repetitions, but after about three weeks, I could always do the routine and increase the difficulty without noticeable pain.

I had a mental setback that threw the routine out the window.

Goals (passive exercises): Continue being able to do the following:

1. Complete weekly shopping while walking roughly 4 miles.
2. Skip steps when leaving and entering the apartment daily.
3. Walk to the office without getting winded or sweaty; roughly 4 miles.

Goals (active exercises):

I’d go to the climbing gym with Becca and John fairly regularly.

I never experienced muscle soreness. Did little in the way of warmup.

Goals (passive exercises): Continue being able to do the following:

1. Complete weekly shopping while walking roughly 4 miles.
2. Skip steps when leaving and entering the apartment daily.
3. Walk to the office without getting winded or sweaty; roughly 4 miles.
   1. During the walk, there were some railroad tracks. I’d walk along the tracks like a balance beam. If I fell, I’d return about six feet and get back on the track.
4. This was in northern Virginia, where there’s a Metrorail. When riding the rail, I’d skip steps up any escalator I came to. And some of those stations had long escalators.

Goals (active exercises):

I worked at an office building in a plaza.

Three days a week, I tried to maintain a similar routine to what I had in 2010.

1. Roughly 10 hop squats down one set of stairs.
2. Bound up the other stairs; one-foot landing per large stair.
3. Jogging.
4. Lateral plyometric pushups.
5. Cat walk (parkour or foot-hand crawl (MovNat) for about 40 feet.

I’d do three rounds. I considered this my warmup.

Then I’d practice different movements: jumping rails, press-ups on a nearby wall, and vaulting benches.

Injuries: I was doing a wall jump into a press-up. I planted my right foot higher than my hip on the wall and messed up my ankle. While vaulting over a bench, my left foot caught the bench (all but the big toe). In both cases, I had X-rays and an MRI done. Nothing turned up.

This one is hard to explain because it’s not traditional exercises in a traditional setting. (I may get to the point of adding images.)

Near where I lived in Georgia was a park with multiple baseball diamonds. The circuit I developed was a quarter mile long. The bulk of it was around one of the baseball diamonds.

Part of my goal here was to move with such control that I didn’t make a sound.

I would start by walking on the curb surrounding the baseball field, a balance beam. If I fell, I would walk about three feet back and start again. When I ran out of the curb to walk on, I would jog to a set of wide stairs leading down to the field, about 13 steps.

Initially, I would step down, do a squat, and do a squat. At my peak, I was doing plyometric hop squats down the stairs. I would go down, rise to jump to the center of the next step, squat, and immediately do it again, all the way down.

To get back up, I would climb onto the railing, which was a few inches wide, and I’d essentially turn into a chameleon for a moment while I went back up the stairs (quadrapedie). Once back up, I’d jog over to a set of bleachers (you know? where the parents sit).

I would do lateral plyometric pushups. Feet on the bottom bench and hands braced on a higher-up bench. Go down slowly, go up quickly, and throw my upper body to the left, trying to get my right hand to end where my left was. Then I would throw my feet into the air and get them to land in the center, putting me back in the starting position, slightly to the left on the bench. One more pushup. It would take around 5 pushups to make it across the bleachers. Then I’d do the same thing but to the right. Initially, I’d use the picnic tables and do plyometric pushups using those; start low, start slow. When I used the table, I aimed to throw myself to the point of standing upright before doing a controlled fall back onto the table.

I would continue to the walkway that led to two more baseball fields. There was a low wall and about 10 narrow stairs.

I would go to the wall and do about 10 positive presses. I wouldn’t use my feet to help me up; it all came from hip flexors and shoulders. I would also try not to use my feet as a lever.

Then I’d do hop squats up the narrow stairs.

At the top of the stairs, there was a narrow curb, like a triangle. I’d balance beam it to the snack station. Then I’d walk back and do it three more times.

Injuries: One day, I decided to try and jog along the curb. I misplaced my right foot and slightly sprained my ankle. Not significant, and I was able to walk it off.

One of the professors was a martial arts instructor and former Turkish military. I decided to trade a website for being able to take classes.

The first day he had us doing ninjutsu rolls the entire time. The primary goal was to roll without making a sound. I did pretty well on both sides.

The next day, it felt like I was in a body cast. It took a few days to recover.

My friends and I used to do martial arts sparring. We’d do swordplay as well.