Sunday 26 December 2010

Supermarket Chaos Part 3.


SUPERMARKET CHAOS PART 3
Welcome back. We are here, in the Frozen foods aisle where you left us last. Looking for sausage rolls, cocktail sausages and all of that calorie dense yet nutrient light cack, remember?............
 Doors of the huge chiller cabinets open and close in a ripple-type effect, like a freezer version of a Mexican Wave, as shoppers plunge their arms in and haul out their 'catch.’ Sausage rolls, Thin Crisp/Deep Pan/Stuffed Crust Pizzas by the box load, Turkey Twizzlers, Chicken Nuggets, Burgers, chunky/chip shop style/thin cut/crinkle cut chips, Pork pies...your head starts to spin. Everyone is stocking up. Maybe YOU need to stock up too? Maybe they all know something you don't, like that this is the last delivery to the store, or impending bad weather in the next few days? Maybe you need these things too? Yeah they weren't strictly on the list, but....
Having emptied out more than enough 'saturated fat in a box' to give an elephant furred arteries into your trolley, you move on to the jewel of the frozen freezer section.....DESSERTS!!!!!. Hell, it's Christmas so we all plan on treating ourselves, even super-strict Gym Ninja.  Your eyes widen as you stare at the edible porn in front of you. Gâteaux, Cheesecake, Ben & Jerrys, Walls Vienetta  (HAVE to-it's Christmas) Neapolitan ice cream (even though  no one likes the chocolate part because for some reason it's the worst chocolate ice cream ever)...in they all go. Oh, and a box of frozen summer fruit berries as you need those for your smoothies. You put that on the top of the pile to try and cover up the deep pan pizza, the huge stack of Miniature Heros and a cheesecake. If you squint, your trolley seems almost healthy.
Onwards and upwards to the cakes. Who has time to bake mince pies? Not you! Not with all that eating to do. You take a few boxes 'for visitors', plus chuck in a Chocolate Log, a Gingerbread house you build yourself, Christmas Pudding as your other half likes that, Christmas cake...in fact anything edible with a holly motif on it goes in to the buckling trolley that you now HEAVE through the refrigerator area, knocking in 10 udders of milk, (skimmed, ironically seeing as what else is in the trolley), a few yoghurts, some freshly made chilled custard, double cream, single cream, whipped cream...all of the creams as you pass....WAIT! Baileys Irish Cream!!!!!!  You nearly forgot! THAT was on your list surely?
*Woosh*
You're now in the booze aisle. It's packed solid down here as men drag huge crates of lager into trolleys. There is a constant clanging of bottles with their mini satellite dish style theft-proof alarms attached, as people pile it high. You need Baileys..Baileys....hmmm. There is a choice now? Coffee? Mint? Orange? Standard? You've never been good with decisions so best buy 2 of the 4 just in case. Of course the 'visitors'  (aka Gannets by now as you've already bought loads for them!) will need red/white/rose wine. Beer, of course. Bitter and lager. Just in case remember! Champagne for the New Year and maybe Bucks Fizz on Christmas Morning? That's OK as it has Orange Juice in it and that's 1 of your 5 a day....Of course, Uncle Jack likes his rum and Doris from next door but one is partial to some Sherry at this time of year and she always pops in for a mince pie....
You continue like this until there is no room whatsoever left in the trolley, before the backtracking half way down the store aisles to join a checkout queue 3 miles long. You eye up others trolleys nervously for signs of things you may have forgotten. You technically have enough food in there to necessitate never shopping again all month. All for a week of festivities..................................
So, does any of this sound remotely familiar? Even maybe a little bit?  We are all guilty of excess over Christmas. In some ways it can be good to have what is often termed as a 're-feed' to shock the body out of thinking it is in partial-starvation/severe deficit and rev up the metabolism again. If you factor this in as a planned re-feed then a few days won't do too much damage, as long as you get back on track as soon as you can. The 'danger' is, that you suddenly think, "Ahh, I've blown the healthy eating thing so may as well carry on now that the damage is done". Before you know it, you're eating way past the calorie amount required, your processed food intake has increased, as has the salt, saturated fats etc that tend to go hand in hand with this kind of stuff. You feel sluggish so pick at food to give yourself energy. You make excuses not to go to the gym between Christmas and New Year, and then BAM! It's New Year, resolutions and OMG none of your clothes fit you any more! Oh and no, they didn’t shrink in the wash ok?
So what can you do?
Damage limitation is the key here rather than all-out avoidance. It'd be a miserable Christmas if you didn't even sway from your strict nutrition plan.
1. DO try and take in that pre-planned shopping list with you. DO NOT leave it in the car!
2. Standard advice but so true-shop on a FULL stomach so you are not tempted!
3.  Try and buy organic when you can. You will be needing the nutrients to balance out the dodgy stuff you will be eating.
4.  Always read and compare the packaging for nutritional values when buying things you don't usually buy. Not all sausage rolls are created equal.
5.  Reseach online for lighter versions of traditional dishes and then consider baking them yourself?
6.  Do not buy the biggest of everything. You may see it as 'economical' but it's not economical if you end up having to buy a whole wardrobe of new clothing as you cannot fit into your standard stuff is it?
7.  Do not be afraid of THROWING things away. It is not the law that you must finish every last sweet in the tin. Give them away if that makes you feel better. Eating them all will mean wearing them!!!!
8.  Enjoy yourself, but then try and get back on track as soon as you can. No need to wait until a Monday to start afresh is there?
OK, that is Gym Ninja's epic 3-part post. She hopes it has made you chuckle, but also reminded you that you can be healthy at Christmas.
Until next time
Gym Ninja x

Wednesday 22 December 2010

Supermarket Chaos Part 2:


Back with Gym Ninja to follow up the next  (recycled) stage of the Christmas supermarket shopping nightmare eh? Good. Pleased to see you again....so where were we? Yep-moving on to a new part of the supermarket .........
.....You soon find yourself heading down the tinned meat aisle. It's a rarity for you to be in this section, what with you being into healthy eating and all, so you start to feel a bit 'out of your depth.’ It all seems strange and new down this aisle. The people here are distinctly larger and have trolleys piled high with processed foods, 3 or 4 bottles of frying oil, bottles and bottles of full strength soft drinks plus 5 tins of Quality Street.  Yet now...now you too are here. Spam Aisle! Uh oh. You stare at the strange artifacts. Tinned Spam. Tinned processed meats contain Sodium Nitrate...in small doses it is used to prevent growth of bacteria, yet in high doses, it can be toxic for humans. In fact, if the sodium nitrate in meats is subjected to high temperatures this forms carcinogenic nitrosamines...oh, and these are NOT good.  Quick. Get OUT of Spam Aisle! For God's sake, save yourself! GET OUT!!!!!!!!
You rapidly turn a corner, crashing into another trolley, then head to the condiments section. You're safer here, the Spam cannot get to you .... You browse for quality oils for cooking, spray oil for keeping calories down, plus herbs and spices that you need for all of your fancy cooking over Christmas.   Before you know it, you're heading to the tinfoil section. BIG tinfoil roll. HUGE. That's what you need. You have to be able to wrap the outside of your house in foil should you need to. You pick up a roll of foil that is wider than your door frames at home. Yep. That'll do it. You can always open both of the French Windows at home to get the roll into the house.  Chuck in some freezer bags plus greaseproof paper and you're done here.
But now what happens? You've been relatively conservative so far, sticking mostly to the healthy list (with a few treats) that you are recalling through sheer memory power thanks to 
having left it in the car. Yet you get the sneaking feeling that this is not enough. You are surrounded by heaving trolleys of food. Piled high to a mountainous peak. You can see boxes of Roses Chocolates peeping out at jaunty angles. Miniature Heros taunt you. Hmm, maybe you need some of those as 'emergency gifts’; just in case someone drops in with a present that's unexpected? Damn those Miniature Heros. Full sized heros you can cope with, but when miniaturized you then run the risk of being able to 'justify' eating one or five. STOP IT! Clear your head of the thought right this instant. But no..you can't...they are everywhere you look, like an obligatory part of the supermarket trolley. Plus you like feeling a bit like a giant when eating the teeny chocolates..... 

'Oooh, look at the teeny Mars Bar in my hand. I am a giant and I can eat it with one bite!' 

SO WHAT? Gym Ninja, back in her Fat Kid Days, used to be able to eat a proper sized Mars Bar in one bite! This is how she became Fat Ninja! Yet you do not listen to Gym Ninja's warning. You head directly for the Chocolate and Confectionary Aisle like a heat seeking missile. You are chanting in your head 'It's just because it's Christmas, it's just because it's Christmas' in an attempt to justify why you suddenly need chocolates in your trolley.
You stop....  Suddenly.
You are here. 
In Paradise.
You stand in front of shelves of varying Selection Boxes, sweets, tins of chocolates, boxes of chocolates and other variations on the theme.  You eyeball the Terry’s Chocolate Oranges. Mmmm, you never eat Terry's Chocolate Orange unless it is Christmas, therefore you justify that it is actually a 'tradition' rather than being naughty. In go 3 of them. But wait. You were here purely for emergency gift purposes remember? You scoop up 2 boxes of Miniature Heros. You look at the Roses. Hmm, best get two of those as well, as not everyone likes Miniature Heros. AHHHR, Celebrations! You need those too. 

*Clunk*.

Your trolley has oodles of boxes of chocolates in it now.  AHHR! Quality Street! Now THAT is a tradition. Best get the humungous tin as you can reuse that (you never do, but you can, so that's why you buy the bigger tin ok?). Oh wait?  What happens if someone visits who does not eat chocolates? Well you'd be a bad host if you didn't lob in a tub or three of Haribo Tangfastics now wouldn't you?  You turn round quickly, only to spot a family with a convoy of trolleys one after the other piled high. One trolley is just not enough for this time of year. You spot the Pringles in their trolleys! PRINGLES!!!!!!!! Lordy you nearly forgot.  I'm sure they were on the list no? Just as one of the treats? Ahem.
*Zoom*
Like a heat-seeking missile you are heading to the Crisps Section. The 'healthy eating with a few treats' list is a distant memory.  CRISPS! You'd be better off eating chips you know. But you know that don't you, yet here you are, stopping to knock a few tubes of Pringles into your trolley, you grab some Twiglets (as Christmassy as Santa himself surely, ahem). You also need one or two of those pre-packed party snacks of various shaped Twiglet-themed crispy thingies. LOADED with salt and saturated fats but you don't care anymore. Hell, they don't even taste nice, but you have them on the table when people come round for drinks. It's 'expected.’ You are in a Supermarket Frenzy! Your eyes are glazed as you 
bump trolleys with other shoppers reaching for Cheesy Wotsits. COCKTAIL SAUSAGES AND MINI SAUSAGE ROLLS! OMG you so should have gone to Iceland for those!!!!!!!!!! Quick! The freezer cabinets!!!!!!!!!!!!!
..........OK...and breathe. That is more than enough for one day. You can see how this trip is hurtling into an 'off the rails' moment. More tomorrow....

Tuesday 21 December 2010

Recycle Ninja: Supermarket Chaos Part 1

Listen up. This is the only way Gym Ninja will have time to provide a Blog Post.  Apologies to those who read it last year, but you can re-read it and still enjoy it you know! One of Gym Ninja's pet hates is how chaotic supermarkets get over the festive season, so this is a 3 part blog post helping you all 'recreate' that supermarket chaos.................



Supermarket Chaos PART 1....

Do you know how to beat the Christmas queues?
Head to the gym! 
The gym is the ONLY place you will not have to queue this week. The gym is desolate in the run up to Christmas. An odd situation that always surprises Gym Ninja. After all, it is the party season, major indulgences are ahead, party dresses need to be squeezed into and yet, the gym is empty?  Don't get her wrong. Gym Ninja loves a quiet gym for purely selfish reasons. It means that her workouts this week have not taken as much time as usual due to the availability of equipment, nor having to change what was planned because someone is using the dumbbells...grr.
Hmmm, maybe the last minute planning, food shopping, gift buying and partying take up too much time in the busy lives of everyone?  There is never enough time.  It is also truly amazing as to how much time is spent in the supermarket on the run up to Christmas. Think about it. The supermarkets are closed two whole days. Two days. Not a week. Not a month. Two days. Have a look in your cupboards and freezer now? You have more than enough in there to keep you going until Spring. You're not going to keel over and die if you don't stock up, yet every year we all find ourselves queueing down the aisles for hours to buy an overloaded trolleys worth of stuff....allow Gym Ninja to talk you through a typical Christmas supermarket shop and see if it rings any bells....??
You: "I'm not going to overdo it like last year. I'm going to keep things simple and not go crazy. I threw out most of the stuff I bought last Christmas so it was such a waste! Plus, I need to stay on my healthy eating plan anyway. Yes, that's it! Just the basics with maybe a couple of treats. Yep. Oh and I'll not go at the busy times like last year.  No, I'll head to the supermarket first thing/last thing to avoid the rush (delete as appropriate)."
You pack your ‘Bag for Life’ x 18 (well, you usually forget to pack them and end up having to buy a new one at the till so you have a bit of a backlog now!) in the boot of the car, and set out super early/super late to the local supermarket to beat the queues, with your basic shopping list  sat on the car seat next to you.
You pull into the car park......CHAOS! Everyone and his dog has decided to avoid the busy times and the car park is now rammed! People are throwing themselves in front of your car with a supermarket trolley as a battering ram whilst you search for a parking space. You see one. Lordy, there is a space! FANTASTIC! You go to pull in and.....ahhhhr SMALL car! Small cars should not be allowed to park at Christmas with their evil 'this space is empty' trick that they do. You are now trapped between a conga line of shoppers and a pensioner reversing into a parking space 'to save time.’ How reversing into a space ever saves time Gym Ninja does not know? You have to reverse either in or out at some point so it defeats the object surely?  You carry on...there are no spaces and you are being wafted by a 'Car Park Attendant' in a high viz yellow jacket towards that far part of the car park you've only ever seen from a distance. You may need a trail of breadcrumbs to find your way back to the car it is that far away from the store. Surely no one has ever been in this part of the car park other than skateboarding teenagers with bottles of cider? Ooh, that's a thought-maybe some cider, seeing as it's Christmas....?
You drag the 18 Bags For Life out of the car and head towards the speck in the distance that is the supermarket. You can already see there is a shortage of trolleys so grab the nearest abandoned one on route. You feel smug that you have a trolley. Within 5 minutes you feel cursed as you have a trolley with a wheel-defect......clunk clunk clunk.....
Once in store you are overwhelmed by a blast of heat, then physically rammed by 4 shoppers from different directions. No room for dithering in the supermarket today! Think fast, move fast.  You pass the display of Poinsettias. Hmm, do you want one? It IS seasonal after all no? They are only £1.99. You pick up a Poinsettia and put it in your trolley. 4 leaves fall off it immediately. Stupid plant. You head towards the Fruit & Veg. Good. Healthy eating is the plan remember?  
In the Fruit & Veg section you brace yourself and reach for your shopping list. Basics plus a few treats remember? The list....the list...hmmm....where is the list? Bugger! The list is still on the seat of the car. AHHHR! OK, so no big deal. You can remember what was on the list, right? You head towards the broccoli. You have to fight a burly pensioner and a bad tempered mum of 3 for a few heads of broccoli that are more stalk and less head.  Aha....SPROUTS! You hate sprouts but they are Christmassy so you technically need them. You have to boil them into a sludgy lump that smells of farts or it is not a proper Christmas.  You then move on to the carrots where everyone is fighting for the biggest carrots they can find. Ladies! Will you NEVER learn that bigger is not always better?  Talking of such things, you soon find yourself heading over to the nuts. Some things never change eh?  This was on your list surely? After all, you need nuts at Christmas to fill up the teeny tiny small spaces left in your stomach after the main meal...you cannot possibly leave any gaps in your stomach on Christmas Day....’tis the law.
With nuts and various selections of fruit and veg placed into the trolley, you accidentally bang into a few pallets of potatoes and head towards the main part of the supermarket. You run the gauntlet of Husbands wearily slumped over the trolley as their Wives pile ‘em high.  You narrowly avoid children running amok through the store whilst their parents ignore them. Far worse is when the child is put in charge of the trolley to keep them ‘interested.’  Yeah, well it MAY keep them interested but it just lost you your big toe as the child has yet to learn the dimensions and controls of their trolley. Grr. You decide to be 'efficient' and park your trolley at the bottom of each aisle as you dash up and down them to gather up what you need. Basics, basics, basics.....Ok so that's tinned tomatoes and tomato puree for adding to stuff, flour for baking, a low fat spray to keep the calories low as you cook. You feel smug at this! SMUG! See? Your healthy eating is SO on track this year. You head towards the chiller section......
 It's cold! 
You do an audible "brrrr" you only ever do in supermarket chiller sections as you clang your trolley against 5 others who are congregated around the turkeys. The turkey area looks like a whole rack of mooning bottoms, and you are now part of the vast crowd staring back at them. Cue much prodding of turkeys, then feeling slightly pervy at prodding the turkeys as it feels ‘a bit funny,’ then not actually knowing why you are prodding them? What you DO know is that you wanted that one that the lady in the red coat has just picked up. Grrrr! Stressed! You settle for a huge turkey the size of next door's dog, and heave it into the trolley. You notice that the turkey also has goosebumps. Or should that be turkey-bumps?  Anyhow, this pondering is not helping so you start to maneuver the trolley towards the sausages. It's one big innuendo this shopping trip so far. You need the sausages for many many reasons. Mostly because it just wouldn't be Christmas without rolls of reconstituted nostrils, testicles, ears and nipples (aka sausages-can you tell Gym Ninja is not a fan??) to munch on. This supermarket shop is now in Frankie Howerd territory! 
CHEESE!!! 
Surely you added cheese on your list? You remember you had added one....but look? Look at the pretty cheeses. Thousands of them. All different colours, with fancy names, italic lettered labels, oh and the ones in the cute boxes. They look fun. Oooh, and the one that smells of rotting feet. Ah, now you probably meant to add that to the list no? Plus you need the round one. Your Uncle likes the one that has blue bits of mould running through it that contaminates anything within a 5 mile radius so that needs to be bought. Hmm, best to add 7 or 8 cheeses to the trolley 'just in case'.......*clunk* goes the ton of cheese that hits the bottom of the trolley, squashing the broccoli as it falls.
Sound familiar so far......? Yep. Thought so.....! Well, it is getting a tad long this blog so Gym Ninja has chopped it up for easy bite sized (low cal of course) blog chunks, so be sure to report back tomorrow for your next stage of the Great Christmas Supermarket Shop.......tomorrow we leave the chiller section for pastures new...!

Saturday 11 December 2010

Spintastic Ninja

RUBBISH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!


Gym Ninja is rubbish at blogging isn't she? Pfft! Have you even returned? HAVE YOU?


Well Gym Ninja has a backlog of gym fodder for you, starting with.....oh ok, your favourite type of blog. A SPIN blog!


*cue cheers from the few of you who have bothered to turn up*


Gym Ninja did two spin sessions on two consecutive days. The typical Saturday Session was a long hard painful ride, reminiscent of a guy Gym Ninja once dated: Boring, uncomfortable and carried on far too long leaving Gym Ninja with painful nether regions...... so the next day Gym Ninja was determined to select a different bike.


Dangly came in and watched Gym Ninja faffing with bikes.


"You do realise the seats are different shapes" He said, a smug look on his face.


Gym Ninja stared at the seats. She was unaware of this. True to what Dangly said, there were indeed two distinctly different shapes of seats. One seat was smooth, and the other had a small channel down the middle.


"That'll be for guys" Said Dangly, pointing at the channel.


Gym Ninja looked blank...and then twigged. 
Oh God yeh, ahem, right.


"I see" Replied Gym Ninja, keen not to take that chat any further. "Right, I'd best get a smooth saddle, what with being a girl and all..."


But no.


Dangly didn't want to let it lie.


"You know WHY it's got that groove in it don't you?" He questioned.


"Yep, yeh no need to go into detail as I know how it works now!" retorted Gym Ninja as she rapidly unscrewed the seat with the ravine in it and replaced it with a smooth seat.


"It's for the BALL SACK!" At this, Dangly beamed.


Oh. Dear. God.


Gym Ninja winced. It was a Sunday. No need to talk ball sacks with Dangly Earring man. 


But would he let it go? No. Like a dog with a bone. 
"They kind of rest their ball sack in the gap, so it doesn't get all squashed. Obviously you women don't have those so you don't need them".


NO NO NO NO NO!


NO Biology lesson from Dangly please. How terribly awkward. Did Dangly think Gym Ninja was unaware of the difference between male and females or was Dangly actually double checking?


Right..........and so the class began and Gym Ninja, having fatigued herself doing a corker of a session the day before, found the class a tad more challenging and started to flag in the last 15 mins.  The Aircon wasn't working and the whole room was sodden with other people's sweat. Gym Ninja's sweat too of course, but this is ok as she is used to it. By minute 45 Gym Ninja looked as if she'd been for a swim.


The Instructor was about to start a track to run to. That's when you stand and sprint fast and have seated rest intervals. TORTURE!


"Who's finding it hot?" She shouted.


Gym Ninja made a hot sounding noise, obviously, and the Instructor looked over.


"Here, you are always getting too hot. Come up here on the podium and use my bike. YOU can take us for run intervals"


WHAAAAAAAT?


Everyone turned around and started to nod. Oh great, Just as Gym Ninja had planned to take it easy, she would now have to climb up onto a spotlit platform in front of everyone else and lead the sprints, which of course meant extra effort.  Gym Ninja sloped towards the podium...never one to miss an opportunity to make a bad situation worse, Gym Ninja decided to make the most of it.


"I'm available to hire you know, as a freelance Personal Trainer!" 


"Do you want to wear the head mic?" Asked Instructor. Gym Ninja looked at the battery powered mic and felt how sodden her hair was. Hmm, best not otherwise death via electrocution was a distinct possibility. 


Thus began the world's longest track..or so it seemed? Gym Ninja sprinted far longer and harder than she ever had done before, and so the class copied. Oops. Gym Ninja forgot they were copying her! By the time the track ended the class were almost dead.


At the end of the session Gym Ninja got a nice round of applause that appeased her ego (ahem) & after the cool down Gym Ninja walked across the Gym with Dangly.


"You did well" He said, begrudgingly. You have to love someone so negative all the time. But no, he wasn't about to be all nicey nice!


"I noticed you didn't want to wear the head mic for fear it'd mess your hair up though!" At this, Dangly smirked. 


Gym Ninja looked at Dangly and pointed at her hair, which was by now a total mess and plastered to her head. 


"Er, I think you'll find that's NOT why. My hair is already a mess".


Dangly nodded. "Yeh, looks like Furby hair!".


WHAAAAAAT? The cheek of the man!


Gym Ninja then finished off her cool down stretches and headed to the changing rooms, walking past the marathon runner who always mooches around the changing room area in freaky flesh toned underwear that makes her look, from a distance, like a censored pair of breasts (no nipples).  Flesh toned underwear. WHY? Unless you are wearing transparent clothing, then is it REALLY needed?????


Short and sweet but at least there IS a blog today! Gym Ninja MUST try harder!!!!

























Saturday 27 November 2010

Roller coaster Ninja

Hi.


Obviously things have been going on, hence the lack of blog posts (again). 
Uhh, remember the good old days when Gym Ninja blogged daily? Let us pray those days return as Gym Ninja's head is full of blog fodder ready to spill over into this area of online faffiness.


Thursday saw the return trip to see Vole, the Physio given the task of de-tingling Gym Ninja's arms and hands. The condition (most likely a trapped nerve) was brought on by heavy mileage driving the Blandmobile if you recall?  


Vole: "How are you getting on? Any better?"


GN: "No, in fact if anything it's even worse. More tingles that keeps me awake and affect my grip".


Vole looked back, with her non-responsive face.


Vole: "What about the exercises I gave you? Have they helped at all?"


Hmm, now you can all read back to the last post to see what they were. Effectively a bit of faffy stretching and some rubber band work. Of course, if Vole listened properly then surely having heard Gym Ninja's comment about the tingling growing worse, she'd realise that this in turn meant the exercises had not helped whatsoever?  Gym Ninja clarified this with Vole. Vole looked glum. 


"Oh".


Then followed some physio-waggling of Gym Ninja's arm. Gym Ninja had to say how it felt in certain positions whilst lying on her back like a Muppet.  After much waggling, Vole decided it was definitely upper back/neck muscular tightness that was compressing a nerve that was in turn causing tingles. Great. We kind of knew that before we came here.


Gym Ninja was asked to sit on the bed whilst Vole stood behind her.  Vole pressed Gym Ninja's neck and traps. At one point Gym Ninja mentioned something to Vole.


"I often press there as it kind of helps relieve the pain or discomfort when it flares up".


Vole continued to press on the trigger point silently as Gym Ninja sat in front of her. Gym Ninja felt as if she were posing for one of those Victorian photos-the ones where you sit/stand in a fixed position for ages whilst the camera  takes the shot. 


"What I want you to do, is press on this area and when the pain subsides, press a bit deeper, OK?"


Riiiight. So Vole wants Gym Ninja to do what Gym Ninja has already been doing
Fine. 
No problem. 


Then Vole waggled and twisted Gym Ninja's arm out to the side, flexing the wrist.


"I often do that when it gets tingly" Said Gym Ninja. "It seems to help".


Vole nodded. Well, Gym Ninja assumes she nodded, as Gym Ninja was sat in front of Vole  in the Victorian Photo position.


"OK, so the other exercise I want you to do is this..." And with that, Vole then flexed Gym Ninja's wrist in the EXACT SAME WAY Gym Ninja had already said she already did.


Great. 


Phyiso exercises for THIS week are exactly what Gym Ninja told Vole she does anyway, and Vole repeated back to her. Fan. Bloody. Tastic. 


Confessional Ninja.


Gym Ninja, has 12 days to a Secret Project,  therefore is eating clean with a vengeance. Everything is being focussed onto this project and Gym Ninja's meals and training sessions are super strict to reflect this. Saying that, sometimes the body just refuses to play ball and forces Gym Ninja to fall headlong, face down, into a bag of chocolate buttons. 
UHHH!
Why?


Firstly allow Gym Ninja to explain. She rarely eats chocolate and never eats sweets. Gym Ninja cannot eat sweets as it was SUCH a horrendous addiction that she once had, that the only way to recover and wean herself off the sugar and chemical roller coaster was to go cold turkey. No sweets/ Zero tolerance. This happened May 2009. Now Gym Ninja does not crave sweets. The chemical addiction has been broken. But occasionally, if standing near her Niece's chocolate button stash, she is tempted.....
Yeh. Her 3 year old Niece's chocolate buttons. Gym Ninja took chocolate off a child. OK, so not quite OFF the child. The child wasn't aware the chocolate buttons were in the draw at her grandparents' house. Gym Ninja knew of this.  Gym Ninja's body demanded she try one...and before GN knew it? GONE!


The trick to handling such a disaster is to draw a line under it, and get right back on track with what one was doing before. THIS is how you succeed. Do not use the chocolate button feast as a trigger to launch you into a day or week-long binge Or use it to stop with the healthy habits completely, declaring yourself a failure. Accept it happened. LOOK at why it may have happened? (Gym Ninja had been particularly stressed that day and was lacking in sleep-two factors that make the body crave instant gratification and energy). Then ensure it doesn't happen again. 
It will NOT Happen again. The reward you crave long-term regarding health, fitness and physically how you look and feel, is WAY more rewarding than a 5 minute scoffing of chocolate buttons. Use that focus and move on.


Finally, in this 'erratic' blog post, Gym Ninja would like to tell you all of something wonderful that happened today. It brought more than a few tears to Gym Ninja's eyes & has reminded her that people are truly wonderful and that we often forget it.


A few days ago, Gym Ninja had been on Twitter and posted a tweet asking if anyone had a copy of Lord Sugar's Autobiography she could borrow? The guy is inspirational in terms of how he built his empire out of nothing, how he recovered from major setbacks and pulled himself together and grew stronger because of it. Gym Ninja  decided she would learn much from such an inspirational man and as funds are currently dire, borrowing a book would be a sensible option.   Today, the Postman attempted to batter down Gym Ninja's front door.


SHUSH Postman! Gym Ninja is not sleeping as she has a major gym session planned. Oh and incidentally, why DO you call 3 hours earlier on a Saturday than a week day? THAT doesn't make sense now does it? Anyhow...the door was buckling under his ham fists. Gym Ninja yanked open the door.


There was a parcel. Oh. GymNinja hadn't ordered a thing? Was it an error?  Opening the parcel, Gym Ninja was stunned to see a copy of Lord Sugar's Autobiography.... and a note.  The note was from an online client who Gym Ninja has only known via the wonders of email for just under a month. The client had seen the tweet and bought Gym Ninja a copy of the book.


AMAZING!




Truly the nicest thing anyone has done for Gym Ninja for as long as she can recall. Completely out of the blue and such a thoughtful gift. Hopefully Gym Ninja can use Lord Sugar's book to assist her in working towards her own goals, which in turn, are helping others achieve theirs.....


So Gym Ninja is now off to read the book.......


PS


Maximuscle have extended their ever-changing Deal of The Day so you may want to click on a side link and go check out what money you can save today....see? It's all about helping others xx





Friday 19 November 2010

Physio Ninja

Yep.
It is true!
Even Gym Ninja requires some help every now and then.  Physio!!!!!!

If you cast your mind back you may recall that, thanks to a previous sales role that involved driving the most hideous Blandmobile Company Car for hours at a time across the UK, Gym Ninja ended up with a compressed nerve or two that lead to aching muscles and numb tingly arms/hands. That in itself also landed Gym Ninja in the MD's office and also straight out of the door having been sacked because of it. (Fondant Fancy was the code word remember?)  Nice. Cheers. Fantastic. 

That was in May. Last week Gym Ninja FINALLY had her first Physio appointment. Well, there's a waiting list apparently.  Gym Ninja's Physio was a quiet woman. VERY quiet. A Physiotherapy equivalent of a Vole. Let us call her Vole.  She wore cartoon socks too. Hmmmmmmmm.............


Vole asked Gym Ninja many many questions about the tingly arms, numbness and how it affected her grip (lucky for anyone who may annoy Gym Ninja, her grip is slightly compromised!).  Vole wasn't exactly exuding confidence. She merely scribbled down some notes, paused and then asked another random question. Listen up Vole, if you don't know what the problem is, just say so? 

After about 15 mins of questions, Vole decided to examine Gym Ninja. Oh. OK. So Gym Ninja has never had Physio before and hadn't realised she'd probably need to wear a layer over her underwear and beneath her jumper. Without this layer, it meant that Vole got an eyeful of Gym Ninja's Assets in what can only be described as lingerie that isn't everyone's daytime choice...

After much prodding and faffing Vole decided Gym Ninja may have a compressed nerve. OK. So even Gym Ninja had worked this out! Thus followed a few demos of  neck stretches and a delightful upper trap/shoulder and neck massage.

WOW!

Gym Ninja LOVES Physio. The massage was AMAZING! Gym Ninja has a neck that is hot-wired for pleasure so when someone strokes it then it feels fantastic. Gym Ninja bounced out of Physio promising to return the next week having done her neck stretches 4 x daily.

One week on. 
Gym Ninja had maybe managed to remember to stretch her neck twice a day? Ah well. It's not like she wants to become one of those tribal women with the elongated necks with rings is it?Also, thanks to some additional driving and heavy lifting at the gym (the lifting was at the gym, NOT the driving BTW) , the tingling was worse, and painful too. 

Vole greeted Gym Ninja on her 2nd appointment.  Asked how things had been and showed a level of concern that maybe mustered a 5 on a scale of 1-10 when Gym Ninja explained the worsening of the problem? Vole then asked Gym Ninja to lie on the bed and dragged her arm about for a few minutes. 
Gym Ninja's arm, not her own. That'd be weird. 

After the dragging of the arm, Vole now decided Gym Ninja had incredibly tight (and Gym Ninja is now QUOTING Vole directly) "Thingie muscles".

WHAT?

THINGIE muscles? 

"Oh you mean the rhomboids/traps and upper lats?" Asked Gym Ninja. 

Vole nodded. 
"Yep, They are probably compressing a nerve & must have tightened up when you were driving for hours at a time. We need to mobilise it". 

EXCELLENT! More massage! 

Oh wait. But no. No. Vole wanted to teach Gym Ninja some moves to do. The first rehab move was as follows.

To sit on a chair and arch the back over the chair.
'Repeat.'

"Amount of times?" Enquired Gym Ninja

"A few times" Said Vole, unhelpfully.

A 'few'? Is that higher or lower than 56? OK so Gym Ninja needs to sit on a chair and arch her back a few times. Riiiiiiight. 

Okaaaaaaaaaay.

Next exercise.

Grab a resistance band and hook it around a door handle.

"Do you have a resistance band?" Enquired Vole?
Hmm.
Vole knows Gym Ninja is a PT.

"Yes I have about 15" Replied Gym Ninja.

The next rehab move was as follows:
Loop resistance band around door handle and stand in front of door gripping each end of band.
Twist from left to right whilst pulling with arms, keeping hips still.
Do this a 'few' times.
UHHH!
Theres that vague word again. 

"How OFTEN should I be doing this a day?" Asked Gym Ninja.

"A few times" Replied Vole.

Gym Ninja raised an eyebrow.

"Er, maybe every few hours?" Said Vole. 

MAYBE?

Nobody likes a Vague Vole!

"It'll loosen up the thingie muscles" Said Vole.

Gym Ninja looked at Vole. Great.

Next it was time to lie face down on the massage bed. YESSSSSSSS!

But wait.
No.
Vole merely wanted to prod Gym Ninja's thingie muscles as if trying to pop bubble wrap. 
This was rubbish!

"Do you think it would help if I did some Self-Myofascial Release work on it?" Asked Gym Ninja helpfully.

Vole looked confused.

"Foam Rolling? To loosen the tightness?" Gym Ninja tried to explain further.

"Er....yeh I suppose you could?" Replied Vole, looking blankly at Gym Ninja. 

Jeeeez!.

 After 3 minutes of Bubble Wrap work, Gym Ninja was sent away.

Whaaaaaaaaat?
NO massage?

Remarkably, this Vague Vole work has now inflamed the nerve endings which resulted in aching limbs for Gym Ninja last night. Damned Vole! 

So do return next week for your thrilling installment of Vole Watch.

Laters

Gym Ninja x
PS

Gym Ninja forgot. The Offer of The Day from Maximuscle.... clicky clicky linky for a bargain!!!!!

www.maximuscle.com/promotions2010/dealoftheday.html


Gym Ninja hears there is a saving of over £60 on Today's offer.....