How to Ask for Christmas Abs

An idea recently settled on my mind - an idea that must've blown in on the first chill breeze of autumn. This idea jostled about my brain for a few days, and then blindsided my consciousness like a ninja saddled to a seeing-eye dog.

The idea is simple: the perfect Christmas gift is a set of abdominal muscles that you can take home with you after the holidays. The best scenario would be to have that gift on Christmas Day, there hiding under your clumpy sweater... before the presents are even opened. In this case, your New Year's resolution wouldn't be to "lose weight," it would be to "maintain the health level I accumulated through the end of last year." Goals you say? Golly!

Sure, I could give this gift to myself, but that would be about as fun as calling Santa for phone sex. Instead, I think I'll give it to a few people around me, and hope that one of them gives it back. If not, I'll give them dead puppies for Christmas to go along with that flexing armadillo under their ribcage.

I think the best way to give this gift is as a loose collection of constraints that slowly tightens around the waist as Holiday chimes draw nigh:

1. No TV during daylight hours. This is one constraint that will actually loosen. As daylight hours lessen, you'll find this rule easier to follow. Of course, by then, you might have enough of a routine established with any of the following alternative activities that you may not have time for TV.
   
   
   Alternative Activities: Walk the dog (yo-yo or bark-bark). Read a book. Write a letter to an old friend. Attend a free class online. Watch a TED talk. Bite a few bulletpoints off that bucket list. Scrabble. Scrobble. Scribble.
   
   
   
2. Make your own lunch 4 days a week. If you forget to pack, hit up Subway for $5 footlongs. Use the money you save to buy something health related (pedometer, Groupon exercise class, massage).
3. Don't sit down, sit up. Move every 30 minutes. Sitting is for babies and their sitters. If you sit at a desk all day, feast on this. Start with 20 minutes of abdominal exercises a week. Increase as it becomes easier. Exercises are included below.
4. Walk or run ~3 miles 5 days a week. On days when you end up moving a lot throughout the course of the day, a short walk should suffice. If you were more sedentary, go for a jog or a take a longer walk. 
5. Feed with intent. No one else is to blame for what you put in your body. Unless you are a 2-year-old with a craving for blended peas, you should take a few minutes everyday to tell yourself "I choose what, when, and how much I eat. No one forces food down my throat." I find it inwardly amusing and socially grating when someone who has just inhaled their food needs to seek out others to point out that they haven't cleaned their plates or that it looks like they are "struggling to finish." As I said, you choose what, when, and how much to eat; no one else.
6. Feed to your need. If your are eating for longevity, health, and maintenance, 40% protein, 30% carbs, and 30% fat should be just fine. For steady weight loss, increase the amount of protein by stealing some percentage from carbohydrates. It should be noted that consumed carbs should be free of trans fats and processed as little as possible. No sodas, juices, flavored chips, crap snacks... you know the drill. I and others have had moderate to great success using a 4-Hour Body style diet; very high in protein 6 days a week, 1 "binge day" where anything goes and you are encouraged to overeat.
7. When you do bad, do it all. Then erase. If you are going to have a binge day, try to fit all the stuff you wouldn't do outside of that day into that 24-hour time frame. If you are going to drink heavily, do it then. If you are going to snort cocoa powder, do it then. Whatever you do, don't bring it back into your living space. Externalize those actions and material needs and cravings, internalize the great stuff during the rest of the week. Do everything with intent.

Crunch Time (Ranked):

1. Myotactic crunch with the "Peanut"
2. Bicycle crunch
3. Captain's Chair
4. Vertical Leg crunch

Thinking Off Your Feet

We live in a world full of complex problems. I understand, sometimes it's just too much. Sometimes there is so much pressure to do the right thing that it's hard to breathe. 

For example, what do you do when the pizza delivery cowboy gets an attitude and doesn't take the coupon your daughter made you for "1 Free Hug," and to make matters worse, your daughter is standing right there, watching the awkward exchange?

What coping mechanism should you adopt when you find out moon landings are as fake as Pamela Anderson's double-breasted fur pantsuits?

How do you avoid drive-by cubicle warfare when you've just finished a one hour game of mid-day basketball and you're toting a can of chili for lunch but have no bowl to microwave it in?  Well, that one I can answer.

First, locate two microwave-safe cups. These will be used to heat your chili - in a rapid fashion, quite fortunately for you. Two cups heat faster than one bowl. Because each second you spend away from your shoes is another second an innocent bystander can be sneaker attacked, it is imperative that you plan out this entire sneakquence ahead of time.
Second, take the shoes off in a safe place. There is no reason to assault a co-worker with your rancid sweat scent... unless they have been complaining that you grind far too much pepper for someone who is more sugar than spice. In that case assault away. If you take the more humane route, you're going to need a safe place to do the deed. The safest place, in my opinion, is the dark area under the stairwell.

Third, open your chili. If the can doesn't have a tab with which to unveil its innards, wrap it in as much paper or plastic as politically possible and head for the stairwell. You're going to play crack the can. This step comes third because you wouldn't want to slip on chili juice while disrobing under the stairs. Don't be silly, walk-through the steps in order.
Fourth, pour whatever chili isn't coating the walls of the stairwell into the cups, picking out any pieces of paper you see. Shuffle to the breakroom and pop them in the microwave for a minute... maybe ninety seconds. When you hear a beep, grab the cups and sprint. However, don't forget to apologize to the person that made the mistake of getting coffee while you were in there. You're a person in a hurry, not an asshole in a crackhouse.
Fifth, tilt the chili so the air hits it as you sprint back to your cube. This will minimize the amount of time it takes to cool the chili. When you recover your breath from the sprint and stairs, drink the food like you would a cup of treason: very carefully.
Sixth, put the empty cups into the ankle holes of your shoes. This simple action will effectively staunch the prospect of your getting noticed for being weird for having soggy basketball shoes in your cubicle. :)

Did you Mean Coitus?

I thought I would take a break at work to learn a bit more about the Cisco Cius device, which is Cisco's business-specific tablet offering.

I must have been in the wrong place at the right time because not only did I fail to get search results, I was assaulted with a very aggressive/suggestive search suggestion.

I was going to follow up with a "coitus" search, but instead I snapped up my laptop and hustled the hell out of there. I'm not in the business of getting caught in the act.

A post-coitus Cius face-to-face. All business, of course.

your body the magnet

repulsive endeavor
that i never
end over ender
remember the fender
refender the member
crumpled entendre
and tender

and tender

resend her
the ceder the cinder
the trunk full of clothes
plot full of holes
yes full of knows
holes in your hose
the penchant for ash
country hair flash
dusty insultress

dusk swallow us
Fox chasing chicken
impulsing in rust
plot starts to thicken

cant quite catch the cusp
questing ionic
circle to trace
participacing
particulation
ironic the chill
of break and mistaken

you enter tainted
room full of traps
insider floors
incinder the snaps
bird wet a nest
fish castanet

two enders end
over end
meet and repair
perforcery
this sorcery
is the blackset widow
tangled in bed
webbed to the window

Details.

Details.

I don't have the time or the money for details. This guy wants me to fork over $700 of my God-earned cash for details? The car is a fucking bruise-colored PT Cruiser. A PT Cruiser! This guy is practically certifiable.

I push the door open from the lobby into the quiet outdoors, but only partway. I keep my body inside. Just the eyes go out, I need to stay cool. For now. The parking lot is hot, shadowy, sparse. That's a word, right? Sparse? I think it just might be. 

My lucky day.

Sparse.

Inside I can hear "Jim" still slobbering bullshit into the mouthpiece of a oil-stained handheld, detailing a plan involving bleeding and brake pads. Disgusting. Beside me, silver balls acting as bells wait to cheer on my impending escape.

I think I'm gonna run.

Disconnect to Connect

To the mountains, but not beyond. Driven by the need to reset (to rest,) once we arrived in the mountains we didn't even attempt to interact with other humans. Sasquatch, yes. Definitely yes.

The leading party (more to come!!) consisted of five youthful coeds, of which I displayed the least leadership and the most aggressive 'quatch call. We arrived on Friday afternoon, ready to "camp." Camping turned into cabining, complete with leather couches and not-so-basic cable. As the theme of our weekend was "Disconnect to Connect," I asked everyone to pull the batteries out of their cell phones and keep the TV off. After this speech, I slinked off my soapbox to the empty stares of those gathered and tripped over at least three phone chargers in my rush to turn on the air conditioner.

On Friday night Logan taught us how to perform 'quatch calls. Our first round of calls only succeeded in evoking lust from a colony of frogs under the porch, but from there things got interesting in a furry hurry. Keeping a low voice and a low profile, I belched out the perfect pitch of 'quatch cacophony while Logan pummeled a tree with a hiking/wizard staff. Not five seconds later, across the valley and through the laurel, some animal - probably a dying goat, tortured mallard, or indentured servant... but possibly a 'quatch - answered the call.

It's kinda queasy bein' green.

We cheered for about as long as it takes for a park ranger to chop down a blade of grass before we realized that getting inside as soon as possible had just become our immediate priority. Logan turned to the door only to have the handle rattle uselessly in his hand. One of us had locked the door on the way out. Don't shoot the messenger, but I'm about to deliver some bad news. The 'quatch - at this point we were sure it was a 'quatch - called again, louder than before. 

We nudged the bathroom window open with the grace of a dying deer tick, but the screen still provided a translucent blockade. I was about to tell Logan we could use my knife to pop the screen off when he changed his name to Bruce Lee and poke-chopped the screen into pointlessness. We shoved slightly-sized Trevor through the child-sized hole and before long were safe inside. 

We didn't sleep well that night.

The next day we went hiking.