For the last several weeks, i’ve been spending more and more time in the gym. Some days i do some weights but most of the times that i go, it’s so that i can work on my cardio. I’ll start by doing some planks. I’m up to one minute for at least two of those planks. They are excruciating.

I think i mentioned this in another post i made about transitioning from an XXL to an XL but i’ll repeat myself anyway.

I used to do a brisk walk on a treadmill for 30 minutes. Don’t get me wrong; it was a good cardio workout but it needed to be better.

In mid November, i dared myself to run for a bit. So i did. I made it ten minutes. I felt absolutely miserable. One week later, i was running fifteen minutes and feeling less miserable.

For the last two weeks, i’ve been able to make it to 25 minutes. Then right before Christmas, i managed to make it 27 minutes. Good lord those last four minutes hurt but i did it. I’d been chomping at the bit to make it a half hour but decided to call it off before i hurt something like… ME! When i began running, my bpm was sustained at about 170. I can still push myself to 170 and on at least one occasion, deliberately pushed myself to 200 bpm but i’m staying at about 164 now.

Yesterday, i made it to the half hour mark. At about 20 minutes, i thought i had a lot left in me. I was fairly sure i could make it to thirty minutes. At twenty five minutes, i wasn’t so sure. The treadmill i was on didn’t have a pane of glass in front of it like all of the other ones do however, it does have a large pane to the right side of it. I looked over and saw me run. It was all i could do to not laugh.

It’s kind of funny. Normally when you’re running on one of these things, you get to look at yourself in your reflection, straight-on. You’re there and pushing yourself. You see the focus in your eyes and you can imagine yourself as a stand-in for a Gatorade commercial, fluorescent colored drops of sweat squeaking out of your pores, then the hot chicks come running after you to smear and lather you with Axe douchebag body spray and soaps and then large breasted girls with the IQ of a bag of hair will pelt you with cans of Diet Coors. But when i saw my reflection to the side of me, i just about burst into laughter.

I’m a lug. I’m a huge, sweaty lug with a fuzzy head and i’m not running. I’m LUMBERING. I look like i should be holding a burning log aloft in one hand and screaming, “DERP DERP DERP DERP!” as i trundle across a golf course, pushing old ladies down and pelting children with palm sized turtles that i keep in a sack at my hip and screaming at them incoherently.

I’m a parody of myself but yaknow what? I don’t care. The ones that command my respect at the gym are the ones there because they are making huge changes in their lives. I’m trying to be one of them. So who cares if my inner lug is screaming, “DERP DERP DERP DERP!” ? I’ve just run lumbered for half an hour… HALF OF A FUCKING HOUR, BITCHES! (Amy gives me a high-five when i give her the news).

To recap: i’m running about 6.5 miles a week by going to the gym at least three times, sometimes more, a week. I’ve cut back my intake of beef, pork and poultry to about a quarter to a half a pound a week and i’m eating a LOT more fish. Sometimes cod, sometimes mahi-mahi. I’ll have a crab cake with it too along with a grip of steamed broccoli. This is my meal about three to four times a week. It’s all beginning to make a difference, too. I cannot tell you how much better my heart feels. I can lay in bed and sometimes i hear it whisper to me, “Derp derp derp derp.”