I love Fridays. It's not for some silly lessening of responsibilities. No, it's for a simple pleasure: to refill my vitamin weekly dispenser. You see, I take 5 units of vitamins, some full tablets, some halved. I also take iodine droplets, but I'd prefer not to lick the dispenser. The great thing about me, is that I don't take any toxins prescribed by some guy with a BMW in the parking lot. When life sucks, I either find solutions or just grin and bear it. As I have high blood pressure, I know how to fix that: reduce sodium, shred the fat off, and put the good stuff in. It's about proper maintenance of this machine I'm commanding. It just makes sense to pour in the high octane fuel of a nutritarian diet. Shake cheesy poofs down the gullet and I'm going to get cheesy poofs results. I mean C'MON, "Because I ate donuts that made me fat, I feel sad and pathetic so I better eat a donut."

I guess I feel particularly inspired because I used a temp FB account to bookmark people I'm considering to add in September; I don't want to sit there and remember; rather, I can just blow up my browser with open all tabs. I haven't looked up folks in awhile since I've been unplugged. Wow, what happened to everyone my age? I mean, I get it, growing up, I was a fat kid—not the fattest of my grade, but I was at least in 2nd or 3rd place. Not that it took a lot back then; everyone was tiny. Then came the summer of '92 before high school when I dropped twenty lbs and grew two inches—suddenly I was like everyone else. I even graduated from high school lighter. Still, throughout that time, I saw a lot of seemingly healthy-looking friends. Today, almost to a T, EVERYONE ballooned, sans the few whom seemed to have realized the keys to victory early on. Truly, it's an epidemic: EVERYONE is getting pudge face! I mean, the next time I go bowling with my friends, I won't need a bowling ball, I'll just roll one of them down the lane!

Ok, that analogy was harsh, but I can speak from it, because I'm exactly that right now. I made the post-college gains, but tore that down by 74 lbs through veganism, but until now, I never could shake the marriage pileup. But, now I have both the knowledge, the passion, and the fortitude to do what is right. The only thing left is the time for it all to play out. Come Monday, there will be the metrics of the progression, a first volley onto the onslaught.

Still, it is...shocking, for me to see people whom I've known all my life to be healthy to look...like the Stay Puft Marshmallow Man. At least I had the excuse of a chunky childhood with an endearing nickname of Brick from neighborhood football...but, you guys, smh.

To everyone's defense, I drove by my alma mater, the University of Memphis, around noon one day and I was appalled by how fat everyone was. There they were, in the easiest years to be in shape of their life, waddling on campus while mesmerized by their smart phones. Simply wasn't the '90s, I can say that! If that's what we look like now in the physical prime of our lives, no wonder my peers look like they can be bounced around at a beach.

And to my friends, I implore you: "a lil' mo' ca-dio!"

There's nothing like having a stall in your workout when your TREADMILL needs to download an update. I mean, C'MON, the function is pretty straightforward—get-out-of-the-way and let the hamster do his work!

It's been a long haul since that first week through the Rock's Jumanji workout, now that I'm in the fifth week of training. This is what I ran through this morning:

WARMUP & TKD

• 5-min Bike Warmup
• 5-min Stretch
• 1 Chon-Ji – 3/4 speed
• 1 Dan-Gun – 3/4 speed
• 3 Do-San – 3/4 speed

RESISTANCE

• for Deltoid, Posterior:
  Dumbbell Seated Rear Lateral Raise
  5 reps at 20 sec each, 4 sets

• for Deltoid, Lateral:
  Dumbbell Lateral Raise
  5 reps at 20 sec each, 4 sets

• for Deltoid, Anterior
  Dumbbell Arnold Press
  5 reps at 20 sec each, 4 sets

CARDIO

• 30-min Bike Intervals
• 30-min Treadmill Incline (grr, it irritated me that these two had to swap)

An aspect of having your own home gym is that you can flip the lights off and work in the dark in the cardio phase. I love listening to music in the darkness whether generating the amperage or shutting it down in the shower later.

While this shoulder workout is a smaller regimen than my standard, super-slow resistance sets my muscles on fire! I can actually feel each specific delt after the specific exercise that works it.

I'm consider on concentrating my resistance this way so that I can spend more time on cardio, TKD, and research. Additionally, I've been playing around with sneaking in a cardio session toward the end of my day. I've been feeling like my intercostal injury will let me return to my abs regiment if I focus specifically on the abs themselves and fight momentum...obliques may be pushing it.

As far as my workouts go, it was a weird morning; I didn't have my workout codified beyond generalizations. Previous, I had 9 or so Tabata sets with Taekwondo and 4 Abs exercise.

Nevertheless, I press-performed through Chon-Ji and Dan-Gun a couple of times, through and did 6 reps of Do-San. I followed that up with 30-min on a 3% incline on the treadmill, 30 min bike intervals, and finished off to 6AM with a 11-min return to the treadmill incline.

I felt invigorated after my workout—well, after the initial fatigue passed. Since the cardio or kata really isn't something new, well, I did do the bike and the latter treadmill in the dark, I'd have to guess that my switch over to intermittent fasting is the difference maker...or maybe my body broke through some weight plateau that I haven't been tracking.

I am excited about Monday's weigh-in. I could take an educated guess at where I am +/- 5lbs. Whatever it is, I'll celebrate in the moment, record it on my chalkboard in my gym and later post it on this site. Then I'll quickly move on toward the next after 6 weeks weigh-in on June 25. Sure, wins are great but they belong on the mantle, not the hand; I'm nowhere near where I need to be, the vision I see. Even the Facebook emergence come September is a milestone to hit, but it's not the goal. Now, my hope by then is that hitting weight targets will be a thing of the past, and by then, it will be achieving performance...like, I would absolutely love one day to have a home gym with some elements from American ninja—so, a bodyweight focus. And clearly, martial arts is a focus. Freely moving through three-dimensional space holds far more desire within me than picking up metal blobs just to set them down again.

But all of that is in the future. And while dreaming can inspire action, I've got tomorrow's shoulder workout coming, one that has modified for super-slow motion. It'll be a first for me.