A Few Morning Notes

First of all, how in the HELL does Starbucks run out of those little sleeves for the coffee cups? I must look like a circus juggler bouncing my hot cup o’ joe back and forth in an effort not to scar my sensitive, girly little hands for life.
Second, I’m not a big fan of the Tuesday morning spin instructor at the gym. She’s a one trick pony. All she does is have us go from hand position two into hand position three and back into the saddle, repeat. Over and over again, repeat. Depending on the beat of the song she may increase or decrease the pace at which we do so, but it is still the same motions, over and over. No isolations, sprints, jumps, standing climbs, sitting climbs, nothing.
Thursday’s instructor, Maria, is tons of fun. I don’t mean that she’s heavy either. She is all go and she switches pace and activity often. Two weeks ago Maria had a substitute whose name was Tonia, I think. She was the demon spawn of Satan and Saddam Hussein (remember, they slept together in the South Park movie). I burned over 1000 calories in her one hour class. My average is about 800.
Lastly, there are rumors of a watch party at Kings Creek Tavern in Kendall for this weekend’s football game against North Texas. I don’t think it has been confirmed yet but it would be nice to show up en masse to support the Golden Panthers on the road. Here is the phone number if you would like to call and confirm; 305-273-6123.

Where's the School Pride, People?

I was in class yesterday discussing the gym closure with a couple of classmates when I told them how happy I was that I checked my mail the day before and got the notice that the gym would be closed until Thursday, thanks to Hurricane Ike and the evacuees from Key West.  You see, in order to make it to the gym early enough to get a spot in the morning spin class, which fills up quickly, I get up at 4:30, leave the house by 5:30 and arrive on campus around 6:30.  So getting up that early yesterday only to find the gym closed and class cancelled would have been a crappy way to start my day.   When I made this proclamation you should have seen the heads turn in the class. 

“Why do you have to leave so early?” Everyone asked.

“Because I live in Boynton.”  

Even more heads turned at this.  No one could believe that I make the trek, twice a week, from Boynton to Miami to take classes at FIU.  And then it happened.  They asked me the same question that people have been asking me ever since I started school last January: the same question I get each time I tell someone that I commute 68 miles, one-way, from Boynton Beach.

“Why don’t you just go to FAU?”  

Why does everyone ask me that?  Shouldn’t I be proud to go to FIU?  Where’s the school pride, people?

I’ll explain it like this.  I grew up in Boynton Beach, went to two and a half years of high school in Lantana and finished my high school education in Delaware before moving back to Boynton Beach.  While I was going to high school down here, anyone and everyone who was going to college after high school was going to FAU, providing they didn’t get into UF or FSU.  So I always kind of saw FAU as more of a safety net than as a first choice kind of college.  It was a fallback school.  FAU in Palm Beach County is probably a lot like FIU in Miami-Dade, the school that local kids go to when they can’t go somewhere else.  I guess that when I started looking at schools a couple of years back, that thought was still there: I didn’t even apply to FAU.

A few things drew me to FIU, the first being that they were building that beautiful new facility for the Marine Biology program.  Remember, before I realized that science and math just weren‘t for me, I wanted to be Jacques Cousteau.  The new football stadium was also a big draw for me.  As a huge college football fan, being here for the early stages of what has the potential to grow into a great program meant something.  I started following FIU last year during that dismal season and will continue to support them, no matter how frustrating it may be, from now on.  

Lastly, this is my first experience at a four year school.  I didn’t do well enough in high school to get into a four year school directly and had to take the community college route.  Eventually, bad choices and the bills that resulted from them would cause me to put that on hold.  So this experience at FIU is my first true college experience and I would like to try and make it as much like the experience I missed in my early 20s as possible, only without the parties and club hopping.  I’ve been to the FAU campus and, in all honesty, it doesn’t have that college campus feel.  It feels like a commuter college campus.  If I wanted the commuter college experience I would have just gone to University of Phoenix, where the credits are unlikely to transfer to a four year school, making grad school a long shot. 

University Park has that college atmosphere that I was looking for.  Sure, the Greeks never ask me to rush their frat or give me one of their little flyers as I walk down the hall of the Graham Center, and my classmates call me sir, but  I don’t feel like such the outcast.  The insecurities that plagued me during my first semester are gone now.

I like FIU just fine, thank you very much.  That’s why I don’t go to FAU.   

I had an all-time high seven votes in last weeks poll.  Thank you to those of you who participated.  This week's poll will relate to this blog entry somehow, vote away!

Back to School

So my two week school break is done.  Tomorrow it is back to the grind.  I feel as if I've gained 10 lbs in those two weeks since I haven't been to a spin class or to the gym. 

I am excited for my first fall semester at college.  Sure, I was excited for spring too but fall is when most of the excitement is.  Fall is when the majority of the new students are coming in.  It is also a return from summer break, which is the longest break.  Winter break is only a couple of weeks and doesn't create the sense of truly being away the way that summer break does.  Most importantly, fall means football.  Not just any football either, college football.

Now is the time to break out the portable grills, face paint and rally towels.  I couldn't care less that my beloved Golden Panthers--there is a rumor going around that they will be dropping the Golden--are 1-23 over the past two seasons and not expected to be much better this season.  Personally, after seeing the strides they've made between the spring football game and this summer's scrimmages, I'm rather optimistic about this season.  I plan on tailgating my happy little rear end off this year.  All of our home games are 7 p.m. games, which leaves plenty of time for tailgating, grilling, drinking, tossing around the old pigskin and whatever else comes to mind.

As far as school goes, I've coordinated a perfect Tuesday-Thursday schedule.  My first class starts at 9:30 and the last one ends at 3:15.  That allows me to attend a 7:30 spin class at the gym with plenty of time to shower and stop at the campus Starbucks on my way to my first class.  It also means that I can beat traffic on the turnpike and be home by five o'clock on school days to help Tina with dinner.  On top of all that, only having to drive to campus two days a week saves a ton on gas and allows me three whole week days to devote to studying.

Top priority right now is this weekend because I am Atlanta bound.  For the last two years my friend Mike and I have been going to Tuscaloosa, Alabama for the Crimson Tide's season opener.  You see, the first weekend of college football always falls on or around Mike's birthday.  His wife, Amanda, or his mother usually get him tickets to the opening game and we make the road trip.  Lat year we were joined by Mike's brother as well as their childhood friend Ron.  

This year, the game is being played in Atlanta as some kind of SEC vs. ACC challenge and the Tide are playing Clemson.  Ron will be joining us again.  I can't wait.  I am leaving Thursday following school, spending Thursday night in Jacksonville, driving up to Atlanta on Friday, going to the game on Saturday and flying home on Sunday.  Should be tons of fun.  I'll try to take tons of pictures to post.  

Excuse me, I just Wooted!

Does anyone here use woot.com?  It's a pretty cool website that I discovered thanks to someone over at Fried Chicken.  Basically, they sell one highly discounted item per day.  Once it is sold out, that's it, you have to wait til the next day for the next item.  I stop by and peek at their offerings daily but until Friday had never actually purchased anything.

I popped in Friday and they were offering a Reebok heart rate monitor/calorie counter for $19.99.  It just so happens I've been looking for one for quite a while but a decent one is hard to find for less than $80, especially one with the calorie counter as well.  I've looked into the Polar brand as well as Nike and Timex but never a Reebok so I'm unaware of how it stands up to the other more established heart rate monitor brands.

I've recently gotten back into spinning twice a week and am often curious to know how many calories I burn in a 45 minute spin class.  I know that on an elliptical machine I burn around 600 in 45 minutes but I don't get my heart rate nearly as high on the elliptical as I do in a spin class.  Now, once my item ships in 5 days and school starts again in 2 weeks, I can see how many I am burning.  God I hope it's about 900+.

Last year, spinning 3-4 times a week, as well as a healthier diet helped me lose 30 pounds in a relatively short period of time.  But once I moved I stopped going to the gym until about 3 months ago when I started using the school gym on the days I was on campus.  Problem was, on my own I don't really work hard enough so being on the elliptical doesn't really help if I don't do what is necessary to get the old ticker pumpin.  So I decided to start getting to campus earlier so I could take a 7:30 a.m. spin class prior to my classes starting.

By the time I get out of spin, my shirt and hair are completely drenched and I am gassed but man do the results start showing quickly.  After about 2 weeks of being back in spin my shorts are hanging a bit lower on my hips and I have more energy during the day. 

Even though school is out for 2 weeks I plan on going to a spin class on Tuesday so that I can go ahead and get my books before the lines get out of hand.  While I am there I may also attend the football team's last open scrimmage of the fall.

Woot doesn't offer things I am necessarily interested in on a daily basis but I'm sure there are people out there who have no use for a heart rate monitor either.  Mostly they offer computers and other household electronics.  They also have links to other auction style websites offering similar deals.  Yesterday I found a 16G USB/Flash drive for $34.99 on one of their partner sites. 

So the moral of this story is shopping at woot.com can help you lose 30lbs.  I'm not receiving anything for this post either, just trying to share the savings.

Have a happy Sunday-ELI3