Fun exercises are the way to go if you want to enjoy your workouts.

 

During the course of my life, I’ve discovered at least eleven fun exercises. They are, in order of preference:

 

Biking

Swimming

Pickleball

Wallyball

Volleyball

Tennis

Baseball

Badminton

Snowmobiling

Hiking

Walking

 

Alas, I don’t remember the last time I was in a lake or a swimming pool, or the last time I played baseball.

 

(Oh, wait!  Yes, I remember the last time I played baseball. The occasion takes up a chapter in my book “Floating Around Hollywood.”  It was during a Hollywood wrap party when I worked at BAYWATCH. David Hasselhoff beguiled me into playing “a few innings” even though I hadn’t played in 20+ years. HA and OUCH!!)

 

Getting into public swimming pools these days requires hefty membership fees (no thank you), and swimming in a lake or Puget Sound around here would probably be too cold, now that I’m technically “old” and have thin skin…

 

My favorite form of exercise today is bike riding. Lisa and I make it a point to ride 15 miles three days a week (unless the weather interferes for days on end).

 

I play pickleball at least ten times a month, on days I’m not riding bikes.

 

I love pickleball, but not in windy conditions because then we spend most of the time chasing after balls that have been blown down the court and away from us, or stopping our play to return balls that are threatening to blow into our court during play. (No one wants to get crippled by an errant pickleball.)

 

B.C. (Before COVID), I played wallyball once a week, too.  Haven’t done that since, but I hope indoor places open up at some point so we can start playing that again.

 

Each of the fun exercise outings I engage in these days lasts at least two hours.

 

My least favorite form of exercise is walking, but I’ll do it when there are interesting places to walk or when there is absolutely no other option (post surgery, for example).

 

This week Lisa and I walked more than ten miles at the Billy Frank Jr. Nature Reserve. I wrote about that in the last post.  So, this week alone we’ve gone 55 miles doing some sort of exercise,  ALL of it enjoyable.

 

The only exercise that I didn’t recover from overnight was the 10+ miles of walking, so you know that’s my least favorite exercise, or I would have recovered overnight.  I rebound from the other, more aerobic, forms of exercise overnight, or there is no recover period at all.  My muscles and lungs are used to those exercises.

 

I did notice that I pedal almost twice for every rotation Lisa pedals. Her tires are narrower and a wee bit larger, so I have to pedal like mad sometimes to stay even with her so we can chat on the way up and back. When my tires have to be replaced, I’m going to see if I can get the same size as hers, and equally narrow, so we can keep pace with each other a little easier. I’m a decade and a half older than she is, and I shouldn’t have to be working overtime to keep pace with her.  (But yeah, it’s good for me and I can do it, so that’s more calories burned on my bike, and I need to lose weight, so I’ll stop bellyaching now…)

 

On days when I don’t exercise in some form, I miss it. I get bored. Unless I can think of something to write or something else to do (look for more clients, hang with the goats in decent weather, etc.), I feel antsy.

 

I read a lot, too, but not for long spans of time. Reading makes me want to take a nap because I usually read at night before bed, so my body starts relaxing into nap/sleep mode every time I try during the day… except for when I’m on my computer.

 

Right now I’m writing this because I don’t have anything else to keep me occupied.

 

And you’re probably reading it because you don’t have anything else to keep you occupied.

 

So hurray for these times.  We can meet during them!

 

How ya doing?! Having fun, I hope!