Slashdot Mirror
Getting Back Into Shape While At The Office?
rhuntley12 writes "Personally, I sit at a computer desk for 10 hours a day with very little actual work. I've also started to get a little belly and out of shape. I know it's real bad in my office, especially with all the beer I consume. What do you do to stay in shape? Any secrets? Recently I've started to do sit ups, push ups, and running up and down the stairs. I get a lot of odd looks, and would prefer something that doesn't make the whole office stare at me.
I've looked through some websites with equipment, but it's all serious equipment I can't/won't lug into work. Any suggestions?"
I still have a ways to go, myself, but I can tell you it works.
http://flwd.com/5bx/main/index.html
11 minutes a day, can be done just about anywhere. I'd suggest cutting back on the beer a little, and anything else with carbohydrates in it.
-- PhoneBoy
The views expressed herein are not necessarily those of anyone, including the poster.
I ride my mountain bike to work. I only live about 4 miles from work, which translates to a 15 minute ride to and from work. It's enough to keep me in pretty good shape.
Oh wait, also give up beer.
Fidgeting burns calories.
It has definitely made a difference for me.
Operator, give me the number for 911!
First, let me preface this by saying that I am not a doctor, nor do I play one on TV.
I started to worry a bit more about my health when I hit 30 a few short months ago. I've been blessed with a decent matabilism, but even a good burn rate can't help you when you sit on the ass 12 hours a day between home/work/stuff.
So here are my own tips that have kept me pretty good so far:
Eating Habits
Eat more meals a day, smaller amounts. Between 4 and 6 is good. Instead of taking that lunch break and loading up on tons of stuff that just leaves you sluggish, keep some food at your desk. And try to keep it to good stuff. A veggie platter is good with ranch dressing or something like that, maybe even a meat tray with mustards, I like sardines in mustard/tomato sauce with saltines off and on (which is why my coworkers are glad I have my own office).
My personal adage for food is that it's better to eat a bit of something that tastes good, rather than a lot of something that tastes bad. Fats and oils are not the pure enemy - as long as you do it in moderation. I think Jon what's-his-name from Good Eats had a good point back in a slashdot interview when me mentioned people don't eat fats, then they get hungry later. Good point. So veggies good, dressing with veggies good, meat good - don't just have junk food.
And I'm sorry - but loose the beer. I don't drink it myself, but that's because I think it tastes like shit. At least cut down, go lite beer - whatever. It's a lot of calories you don't need.
Exercise
Again, I have my own office, so about the chime of every hour I'll stop, do some pushups/situps, and go back. Not a lot, but just enough to get the heart pumping a bit. After work, I am again blessed to have a gym right on the campus I work at, so I can hit the treadmill for 30 minutes before I grab my stuff and go home.
If you can't do that, then do what I did at my last job - squeeze it in. Park at the farthest point you can so you have to walk into/out of work. If there's public transportation you can use, do that - if you have to drive all the way in, then park far. Believe it or not, but my last job I parked about a good block oway.
When you go to lunch, don't drive there, walk to it. You know that Jared guy? I don't think he got thin off of the Subways, it was the fact he walked back and forth from the Subway to work every day. Never, never, never use the elevator or escalators - always the stairs. Make less phone calls to co-workers if you can - get up, go walk to them.
Now, I know some people will say "But - I'm a telemarketer/I can't get up/some other excuse". Bullshit. There's always something you can do.
You don't have to change your whole lifestyle, but if your health is important and you want to be more when you're in your retirement than a rotting bag of bones, you have to make the time now. And it's not much - studies I've seen show 30 minutes a day is the rule, but it doesn't always have to be consecutive. A few minutes going up the stairs to a meeting, a little bit walking down the block to your car, maybe you buy an Eyetoy (I had a reader who loved hers - the boxing/kung fu games alone should get a good sweat) and play with that, or a Dance Dance Revolution pad for parties. And I will kill for a set of the official Sambe De Amigo maracas - not the cheap ass rip offs. Whatever.
I'm no Richard Simmons (I like women too much), and I'm no Arnold, but I've been able to stay fit enough for wild monkey sex with my wife. I could probably even cut out the treadmill if my family was down here with me just running after my son when he steals my Gameboy Advance SP.
Anyway, that's my take. These may not work for you, and I'm no expert, but hopefully these help.
52 Weeks, 52 Religions with John Hummel
Commute to/from office by foot, bike, etc. While this is not at the office exercise you can extend the idea to be getting to/from your office. I sometimes cycle to and from work (5 miles), other times I hitch a ride (organized via my wife or friend) and then run home.
Better yet, my employeer offers a program where we get up to 2 hours of credit a week to do lunchtime exercise. Thus, if I put in an extra 1/2 hour of work I get to take 1/2 of my work time. Thus, I can take an hour long exercise break and only make up an additional 1/2 hour for a maximum of 2 hours a week. What a deal, being paid to exercise.
Ask you employer about a program. It has many benefits. I am actually more alert and productive many afternoons after exercising.
1. Wake up: Max out on pushups, shower.
2. Dry: Two minutes of crunches
These first two steps wake me up from my 4-5 hours of sleep quite nicely
3. Get to office: Take stairs. I may huff and puff a little bit ascending to the 6th floor, but I can feel it nicely in my legs.
4. Lunch: Go for a walk
5. Break: Go down then back up the stairs
Not too much actual activity at the office.
6. Return home: Do a few minutes of crunches before I let myself use my computer.
7. Evening: Go for a 15-20 minute run/jog before dinner (don't want to puke or anything, and I'm a puker). Nothing that will kill me, but something to get my heart rate up.
8. Before bed: Max out on pushups, crunches, flutter kicks (those things are a bitch).
That's like 30 minutes of exercise a day (15-20 extended aerobic, which is good). Spaced out over the course of the entire day, and incorporated in such a way as to fit in with my routine makes it very easy to stick to. I absolutely hate running, but it helps tire me out so I can go to bed at a reasonable hour. This, combined with eating somewhat sensibly has actually lost me five pounds since i implemented it!
no thanks
The U.S. is the only country in the world where people drive 4 miles to the stationary bicycles.
Ever since then I have been bicycling a couple times a week. It gets me to and from work (sometimes in combination with a bus [Seattle has bike racks on the buses]).
Even if it is too far/dangerous/whatever: keeping a beater bike at work and riding around during lunch minutes is pretty helpful. I find the change of scenery makes it less boring than most exercise and being out of the building (albeit nearby and pageable) helps freshen my brain.
One way I found to keep at least a marginal amount of excercise while I sit and work is to sit on a ball instead of a chair.
Have a look for example here (i'm in no way associated with these folks....)
It helps improve your balance, strengthens your back/stomach muscles and does a great job of preventing Repetative Strain Injury. You really notice the difference after you used it for a while and than go back to a normal chair. It feels all stiff and uncomfortable...
I've enjoyed it for more than two years now. I got some weird looks in the begining, but now there are a number of people in the office using them too. Hope it helps.
Complexity is a measure of our ignorance...
I've never been able to feel the benefit from quick office workouts.
If your work schedule is flexible, try to get out of the office for a real workout. Head to the gym for 30 minutes on the stair machine or treadmill.
My office has showers, so I sometimes bike or run in the afternoon. I find that I have more energy later in the day when I do this, and I am more focused.
I worked with a technical manager who did just that - for lunch, he'd walk about a mile to Subway, do the Jared thing, then walk back. Over the course of a year, he probably dropped 100 pounds. It was amazing to see.
Stop by my site where I write about ERP systems & more
Amen! If there is no gym close by, get up early and work out in the morning. Get some dumbbells and do a 15 minute routine. Mix this up with mornings of situps and pushups. Follow that with a jog. Work up to 2-3 miles a day. No records here--take it easy. In the Army they call it the airborne shuffle: 8.5-9 minute miles. Even us older guys can handle that. If you don't like running or think winters are too cold, buy a Nordic Track. They take some getting used to but are great! At a modest pace, twenty minutes on one burns 200+ calories. You can even read while you do it. And don't forget to stretch before and after a workout.
Make up the lost time by cutting back on evening TV and eating lunch at your desk. Supermarket salad bars provide quick, easy, healthly lunches.
Above all, don't go thinking you're too valuable or too busy to take some time away from your desk. The first week or so will be hard but you'll end up being fresher and brighther for staying in shape.
"Love is a familiar; Love is a devil: there is no evil angel but Love." --William Shakespeare ('Love's Labors Lost')
- eat less (less snacking)
- eat healthier (fruit instead of chips)
- pushups, situps in the morning before shower
- do something to get your heartrate up for like 20 mins/day like running, swimming, intense masturbation, etc.
- more liquor, less beer
i know, the last one hurts... but try finding one person who looks decent who is a) a big beer fan and b) doesn't hit the gym a few times a weekI always believed that lifting weights with less weight and higher reps was better and that I wanted to tone (I'd rather be slender and toned than muscular and bulky). I'm curious: why lift more weight for muscle instead of toning?
A wok is the Atkin's dieter's best friend.
Basically, with Atkins all you get to eat is meat and vegetables.
A wok makes making a meal out of meat and vegetables fast, easy and fun. Twenty minutes, including clean up, and you get a cheap and nutritious meal.
Best of all, you don't need a cookbook! Half the fun is just picking shit at random out of the grocery and throwing it in the wok and then experimenting with how to spice it up so it tastes the best.
Is this truly the only Earth I can live on?
Going to the gym during lunch is great advice. You can get in an effective weight/cardio workout in 45 minutes by lifting weights with less time between sets. Currently I'm doing a 4 days/week split weight plan, then jog on Wed(if I need to kill some energy) and one of the days of the weekend.
Most places in the U.S., you're perfectly fine drinking water from the tap. I heard ("conventional wisdom") that spring water loses any befirts after having been out of the ground for 2 hours. I haven't researched this, but it doesn't taste any different than good tap water to me.
I bring a plastic cup to work and refill it from the water fountain. Much cheaper*, and has the added benefit of making you GET UP every so often.
If you get bored of water all day (understandable), you can try fruit juice. But please, do REAL fruit juice and not colored hummingbird food. Juicy Juice and Ocean Spray 100% are my favorites. Also, don't spend all day drinking it or 1) you'll go broke, and 2) food will seem to pass straight through you without slowing down.
High water intake, OTOH, is a very good idea, and most people don't drink nearly enough. It's something like 2 quarts per day for an adult. May sound strange, but if your urine is clear, you're set.
* For those who haven't read YMOYL, it has the sensible notion of a "real hourly wage". Deduct the money you spend on work clothes, eating lunch out, transportation, everything, from your salary. See what you're really earning.
WMBC freeform/independent online radio.
I'm pretty lazy as it is, and overweight, so I received an Eloton Simcycle for my birthday. (About $75-$99 from a Sports Authority or so). It's roughly the size of a medium-sized dog or cat, but the difference between a dog or cat and this Simcycle is that you can pedal on the Simcycle, and the Simcycle is largely heavier and more solidly constructed than most dogs or cats. It's just two pedals on a large solid metal disc, with tension resistance from a nylon strap, in a chrome-plated type get-up.
The interesting thing is that it has a serial-style interface that plugs into Windows PC's and comes with integrated software. Among other usual things (like reporting your speed / time / calories burned), it also has about 7 movies of outdoor courses which you can bike through, and an integrated MP3 player.
Honestly, though, the software don't lend itself well to maintaining attention -- at least for me, anyhow. It makes me think of being on Gilligan's Island, and what would happen if the Professor rigged up a bamboo stationary bike to run a movie projector (which may very well have been an episode).
But if you're looking for something to do while sitting down for hours on end (like I do on the couch while watching 80 channels of nothing on TV), and are content not to burn calories in as dedicated fashion as real exercise, you might try this. There's also apparently a strap you can get to lash your wheeled-chair to the Simcycle in order to stop you from careening off into the other end of the room.
I haven't lost any weight from using this machine, and the thing now prevents my wife from sitting on my end of the couch, but it's fun to show people random technology, I guess.
Slashdot has mentioned this "bike" before, in the context of an accessory, the GameBox, which allows you to control video games (partially) with the pedals.
(I am a medical doctor, but none of this constitutes medical advice, nor is it an endorsement for the product.)
(That being said, one piece of non-medical advice I do tend to give out to patients, and to not follow myself, is to tell people to physically remove their couches from their living rooms and replace them with exercise equipment.)
You can always get a good mountain bike with Specialized Nimbus tires -- they are narrow and similar to a road-bike on the regular contact patch, but grippy on the edges. It makes a mountain bike much faster, without completely sacrificing handling in dirt.
Slashdot's first reaction to VMware
> If you can't do that, then do what I did at my last job - squeeze it in. Park at the farthest point you can so you have to walk into/out of work. If there's public transportation you can use, do that - if you have to drive all the way in, then park far. Believe it or not, but my last job I parked about a good block away.
A report that was published in the last week or so gives more credence to the above then you would think at first. Walking from the back of the parking lot to and from work adds almost 1000 steps on average, and it only takes 2000 to keep off the 2-3lbs that Americans gain on average each year.
We don't need an "overrated" so much as we need a "you completely missed the parent's point, dumbass..."
My Dad lost a lot of weight on Adkins ... but it killed his kidneys and that caused congestive heart failure.
Three doctors have told me that staying fat is healthier than doing Adkins.
Someone already said it: watch out for the impact of running. If you want to start out running, use a treadmill (it absorbs some of the shock), and GET GOOD SHOES. Running on the road might be considered an endpoint by itself (if the original poster is doing 70 miles a week, he is a professional runner... much of his advice may or may not apply to you for quite some time).
If you are not built like a runner (I happen to be, and run 15 miles per week to stay in shape), you should be careful you don't overdo it when you start out. If you're already heavy, running might not be a good exercise, at least until you shed a few pounds.
Low-impact exercises like biking, swimming, stairmaster (crank one of those up; it will take EVERYTHING you've got to give), or some kind of eliptical machine... those would be good start-out choices until you thin down. Once you are thinned down, running would be a good way to maintian weight.
Always remember that most osteo-arthritis (distinct from rheumatoid, psoriatic, and a few other sub-types) is a wear-and-tear phenomenon, and repeated injury will predispose you to earlier arthritis at a younger age. Incidently, that macho no-pain-no-gain stuff is bullshit; one of the great secrets to maintaining a long-term exercise program as a lifestyle change is avoiding injury. (taking weeks off to heal a bad sprain, or a YEAR off for an ACL tear could effectively kill your exercise program).
Just my thoughts. Get in shape, and you'll never regret it... You'd shudder if you saw all the problems life-long obesity can bring you. BTW, IAAD (I am a Doctor).
Even if a man chops off your hand with a sword, you still have two nice, sharp bones to stick in his eyes.
I find it hard to believe that no one has mentioned this yet. I could never get into "purposeless" exercise, or working out for the sake of fitness alone. But with martial arts, I'm improving my mind and my body, and in more ways than just fitness or strength. Awareness, balance, flexibility, toughness, etc.
:) Then you do less of them before you wear out, so it's faster. Try putting your hands on a ball and doing pushups that way, the difference is amazing...)
It's practical. If nothing else, an "impact art" (judo, jujitsu, aikido) will teach you how to not get hurt when you fall down. This should not be underestimated. Everyone falls down, and many people reach for the ground and break a wrist. You won't.
If you're going in for the exercise, keep in mind that I know a brilliant Tai Chi instructor (and a damn good oud player) who weighs about 450. Mainly internal arts are probably not what you want right now. I view the "impact" arts listed above as a good compromise between internal and external (karate, etc. would be external). My favorite is Pentjak Silat, but it can be much harder to find a school for that in your area. The nice thing about Silat is that it has forms (like Tai Chi), so you can practice by yourself.
(I've also found that the stick exercises in Silat are GREAT for wrist problems. It helps when your instructor is a chiropractor. And for those exercises like pushups and situps, it helps when your instructor adds a 15-pound medicine ball
WMBC freeform/independent online radio.
Oh, look! A Google search for "YMOYL" turns up the book I was mentioning, first hit. Oh, the agony of my strenuous effort! Would you like me to try a Google search for "AC get stuffed" next?
I feel better when I have more water. I drink more than most people, and I rarely get sick. Are these necessarily related? No, but I don't see any health problems from drinking a good amount of water, so I'll continue to do it. I'm not talking about an uncomfortable amount, just more than most people.
("megadosing" vitamins, OTOH, has measurable detriments, or in the case of water-soluble vitamins, is just useless.)
As for bottled water, you should be able to tell by tasting your tap water whether you really need it or not. Some tap water is just bad; don't drink it. My tap water is good, so more $$ for me. Something has to make up for everything closing at 10pm.
WMBC freeform/independent online radio.
Let's talk about what happens when you eat carbs vs. when you eat fat.
Let's pretend you eat a pound of butter for lunch. Your body, which is not digesting fat, but rather accumulating fat (you are getting fatter, right?) will simple expel the butter. It can't store it.
Let's pretent you eat a pound of sugar for lunch. Your body will absorb the sugar into the blood stream after breaking it down. Your cells will take what they need -- but they are probably already pretty well off, and your body won't need as much sugar as you put into your system. So your body releases insulin to have the fat cells absorb and store the sugar as fat. (Incidentally, you have likely gained a resistance to insulin, so your body probably releases too much, and having too much insulin without any sugar leads to hunger.)
The idea of limiting carbs is to switch your body from carb-burning mode to fat-burning mode. When you start burning fat, you stop gaining fat. Why store fat when there are no excess carbs to store?
So that pound of butter you ate for lunch is partially burned, but mostly crapped out. And that pound of sugar? You won't be eating much sugar anymore.
Once you get over the initial two days of limited carbs, your body's insulin will be pretty low or maybe close to nil. Your constant hunger will disappear, as long as you don't overdo the carbs again. And you will be able to eat a couple of slices of cheese and hold off on food until dinner.
The radical sect of Islam would either see you dead or "reverted" to Islam.
Why aren't you exercising at home or at a gym. If you have to work long hours, then just wait until it's late to do your excercising (which will cut down on the number of people there), or just start going to the gym at, say 7 no matter what, and coming back to work if you need to. The brain break will help you work anyway.
-no broken link
It's all about calories. It's simple: If you take in more than you burn per day, no matter what the source, you gain weight.
... there's a lot more to it than that. There is insulin, and how the levels affect the way your body handles storage of fat and use of calories. There are also hormones, which can be affected by the types and amount of food you eat, such as leptin.
Actually, no
You can read more than you ever wanted to know in this article by John Berardi.
Like he says, it's never as simple as people would like to believe it is.
I'm going to get off the ideology of not consuming large quantities of saturated fats momentarily and reflect on one of the more notable long term real life trials that exist today. This example is based from evidence drawn from a sterilized clinical trial, but rather a true to life example of the Masai and other tribes existing for the last 10,000 years (kinda beats any existing trial out there by far). This tribe consistently ate over 300g of fats/day, mostly saturated. The tribesmens' diets consisted of virtually no carbohydrates. In the end, autopsies of these tribal members discovered that the evidence of lipid build-up in the arteries was marginal. In addition, treadmill tests (of live tribesmen of course) resulted in these individuals having comparable or superior performance to Olympic champions.
I invited you to google research performed by Professor George Mann from Vanderbilt University. Although the evidence wasn't aggregated in a labratory as such, it cannot be argued that the duration of this standing test beats out anything the FDA has implemented.
In conclusion, most evidence of kidney failure and such are attibuted to high fat/high carb diets. When carbs are drastically reduced/eliminated, the problem is severly mitigated.
Bicycling magazine did this article on riding to work. After reading the article, I was able to adjust my habits to accomidate biking to work in the morning.
I'm still working on pushing towards showers at work, but baby wipes seem to work just fine.
Anyway, being under weight, I've considered buying some weight-gainer stuff. (I've been ~130lbs since I was 16. I'm 24 now.) But since I sit on my ass for a minimum of 10 hours a day and work out for a twentieth of that time, I figure weight gainer wouldn't help me gain weight *and* stay in shape.
So for those that exercise regularly, what keeps you from saying "aw, fuckit. I'll exercise tomorrow instead."? How do you keep motivated to do it?
And for those that might be in my position, how do you go about healthily gaining weight? What (online?) resources have helped you have a healthy diet that will help you gain weight (slowly or otherwise)?
Forget the girlfriend, just send a picture of the bike. I can just take the seat off and kill two birds with one stone.
Forget the bike!
Buy a real musclecar. Not some silly Honda with a bunch of stickers and a 3" exhaust tip on the 1" diameter manifold-back pipe, but something old and with a V8 driving the rear wheels. And restore it for the fun and love of the machine.
*Nothing* keeps you in shape better than lying on the floor of your garage trying to hold a transmission above your head with one hand while you fumble the bolts in place with the other hand. The threat of having a transmission fall on your head makes you discover strength you never knew that you had.
Carrying an engine block into your house to keep it from flash-rusting over the winter, or dragging a pair of cast iron cylinder heads *and* a toolbox from one end of a self-service junkyard to the other, all serve to keep you in excellent shape.
Never mind the feeling down below when you start that motor up for the first time, freshly rebuilt with 12:1 compression, a lopey camshaft and solid motor mounts... forget the bike! :)
Also, I drink like an Irishman, I eat like a pig, and I walk a lot because I like it.
Net effect? 6'4", 34" waist, 200lbs even, toned all over, and I can lift and hold a LaserJet 4si above my head. Also, mechanics coveralls and a welding helmet make a good Halloween costume when you're too lazy to go shopping.
Dating isn't a problem. (But make a habit of holding the drink in the left hand so that the right isn't cold and clammy when you shake hands with potential mates...)
Are you fat? If you want to fix the situation, the solution is really easy, but often overlooked. Stop eating so much, and/or get more exercise. That's it, that's all.
Fire and Meat. Yummy.
The first thing I had to do was stop beating myself up for being fat and accept that my body was how it was. I began looking in the mirror and saying, "Hey, that's not me" rather than, "God what a piece of shit." Changing my attitude toward myself allowed me to take the next step.
That next step was finding an activity that I really liked. I love to ski, but I don't get to do it often. But rollerblading is very similar in feel and fun aspect. I began rollerblading after work every night. I wanted to do it for an hour every night, but it was so damn fun I didn't want to stop before two hours.
Six weeks later I had dropped 30 pounds and had very nice, firm calves and legs. And DAMN did my butt look good. I've floated around 170 since then. Sometimes I'm in better shape; sometimes not. But I find that the key is finding activities you enjoy anyway and people to do them with.
I also took a diet/exercise course a little while ago that showed *why* eating healthy helps your body to remain healthy and strong as well as how to exercise effectively. Better to simply eat right than worry about cutting calories.
Fruit, vegetables, whole wheat and grains, dietary fiber, drop enriched/processed/refined foods, etc. Skip the Atkins diet as it's just not necessary, and there's enough evidence that it's not safe.
Freedom to fear. Freedom from thought. Freedom to kill.
I guess the War on Terror really is about freedom!
1. In order to store calories as fat, the body needs insulin to get the sugar from the blood into the cells.
2. Most carbohydrates drive up the blood-sugar level causing the release of insulin.
3. If you greatly reduce or eliminate carbs from your diet, you have a very hard time storing excess calories due to the short supply of insulin.
Let me suggest a different rationale. Have you ever looked at how many calories there are in various meats vs pasta/bread?
The most fatty highest calorie meat has between 80-90 calories per oz. Leaner meats fish and chicken are between 50-60 calories/oz. Most beef and lamb is in the 60-70 calorie/oz range.
Next look at a box of pasta... ~100 calories/oz (uncooked). Look at bread ~100 calories/slice. Look at other high carb foods (chips, pretzels). They tend to be in the 100 calories/oz range.
So, if you eat 16oz of lean meat you might get around 1000 calories at most. You eat 16oz(dry) of cooked pasta and end up at 1600 calories.
My hypothesis is that it is just easier to maintain calorie restrictions on a high protein diet because it harder to stuff the extra calories in your stomach. I think most diets and weight loss books are really about how to make eating less than you burn easier. For example:
1) Eating high protein makes it easier to eat fewer calories.
2) Eating breakfast every day give your metabolism a little noost early in the day, so you burn a few extra calories each day.
3) Drinking a lot of water can make you feel fuller, making it easier to eat less.
4) Eating 6 small meals each day prevents hunger pangs preventing binging, and helping maintain low calorie eating.
5) Eating give your metabolilsm a little boost, os more smaller meals gives youa bunch of littel boosts to help burn more calories.
5) Exercising increases daily calorie burn.
Really take a look at the little tricks you hear about dieting and they are pretty much all about helping people increase the calorie deficit with less pain.
This advice comes from some one who has lost 20 lbs in 12 weeks through exercise and 1600(initially)-1800(now) calories per day by just changing how much I eat, not what I eat.
Dastardly
Here's a simple solution: get an Otis MP3 player from www.AUDIBLE.com, download electronic narrated books. Coming home from work, park your car 3 km from home, then walk the rest of the way while listening to interesting books. Next morning, walk back to the car & drive to work. Pretty soon you're walking 30 km a week, and having a blast. I've heard more books in the last month than I have time to read in a year.
Slashdot entertains. Windows pays the mortgage.
Just to elaborate, I knew somebody who advocated the 'hot piss' diet.
The basic premise is to keep a glass of water by you at all times, effectively drinking constantly.
The constant drinking of water stops you feeling hungry and prevents you from snacking (major cause of weight gain).
It also means you aren't feeling empty come dinner time, so you eat smaller meals - 5 small meals a day is better for your metabolism than 3 big ones.
Finally (the answer to the 'hot piss') all that water that you consume goes in cool(ish) and comes out at body temperature. That's right, energy loss... you're heating the water and pissing it out, burning calories in order to maintain your body temperature.
The shakey science sounds right, but the proof was in the pudding - the guy lost 2 stone in a month!
Then he quit it and put that 2 stone back on in the following 2 months, just going to show that no diet is a decent substitute for regular exercise.
Free Gamer - Free games list and commentary
Here's an alternate strategy for losing weight: move to China. If not permanently, at least for several months. I went there in 2001 and in 9 months I lost about 20 pounds without even trying. I didn't deprive myself in any way, I ate what I wanted and was very, very happy. But I did ride a bike more and fatty foods are just not readily available there. Ice cream before bed? Doesn't happen. Cheesecake for dessert? They don't have it. Buttered popcorn at the movie theatre? Doesn't exist.
...
I'm not trying to be flippant but really, it was the easiest 20 pounds I ever lost. Granted, it took 9 months, but I wasn't even trying, and I didn't go on any special diets or anything. Just the change of lifestyle did it for me. Oh, and I had a great time there.
Of course, I've been back in the USA for a year and a half and almost 10 pounds have come back. Time for another trip
I had a really sweet (not sweat;) deal when I worked at Micron Technology in Boise ID. The busses there have bike racks on them and I lived on a hill. All I had to do was hop on the bike, roll down the hill and pop the bike on the rack on the bus. Then I enjoyed a nice leisurely ride to work while reading my magazine. With this setup, I could wear normal clothes in the morning and not need to have a shower when I got to work. Then, I could change into the cycling clothes I had in the paniers and put my work clothes back in the paniers for the 12 mile ride home. Heck, I could even do a little grocery shopping on the trip home if I had to.
Some people seemed to think that this would take a lot of time, but the bike commute was 45 minutes and driving took 30 minutes with all of the traffic, so I got 45 minutes of exercise, plus 30 minutes of reading, avoided the hassle of driving and it only cost me 15 minutes a day!
Unfortunately, I now live in New Jersey where it's not even safe to drive a car, let alone a bike, the roads are in horrible shape and I work from home, so there's no commute. Ah well, good things never last.
Signatures are a waste of bandwi (buffering...)
Nothing worked for me until I tried aikido. Aikido was, at long last, something that held my attention, kept me interested and got me fit. After four or five months I suddenly realised that I'd lost all the fat I'd been trying to shift for a decade and had, mirabile dictu, acquired some muscles.
Even better, I haven't had to give up beer or good living. I still eat pretty much the way I always have.
Aikido may not work for you, but I recommend trying some martial art. They're interactive and absorbing in a way that solo exercise can't compete with.
My waist line has gone from 36" to 30" in less than a year. Magic.
I remembered a presentation a while back ago about the difference between overweight people and skinny people. There was a study whereby a group of people were given the same amount of calories in their diet. They lived within a confined space, at the same time. At the end, with the same amount of food eaten by all, some gained as much as 15 pounds and others didn't. The difference between these two groups? The individuals who gained the least amount of weight tended to be people who fidgeted a lot more. They tended to shake their leg while sitting more often, and got up and out of their seat more often. The take home message? Well, maybe try to move around more often, even simple repetitive "useless" movements may help (and no, I don't mean the M word, that'll probably get you fired).
Linux at home
I'm thinking that trying just to lose weight is a very negative goal. Instead, you should be trying to convert fat to muscle, and build fitness and energy levels. Best option for doing this I've seen is this approach: Body For Life.
Check out some of the "before" and "after" pictures on that website. Those are ordinary people, who found that a simple commitment to fitness and exercise can really change your life.
Paul Gillingwater
MBA, CISSP, CISM
Well, as an AC commented it seems you suffer not only from lack of fun training but from depression. And considering your situation it's understandable.
The best way I've found to get out of depressions is to try radically different things. The more you are doing the same things as always the more time you have to consider your current situation, and that is really something you want to avoid. Not because there are no reasons to feel sorry for yourself, but because it's not really going to change anything.
Now if you want to get into better shape it could be a good idea to combine the change with training. Look up stuff that you can do on your way from work. Try them out in periods of weeks or so before moving on to the next (if you don't find a thing you particularly like). Personally I really like martial arts, because you get both a typically well rounded training and you get to know a couple of people quite well (since with martial arts clubs you typically train with the same people each time). Different clubs can have very different moods, try to find one which is right for you. It's more important that you like the people you train with than that the actual system of MA if you want to train regularly.
Now I know that it's often quite hard to get yourself to "get to training" each time. The most important bit here is to make sure you do it regularly, if you start skipping it's harder to go the next time.
If training doesn't do it for you try to find something else which can catch your attention. You might want to look up on chess clubs, help out with some "community service" (eg I have a friend who helps children at a local school with homework), take a photo course take evening classes in ancient history or a new language. You could try visiting a library in the area, I bet you can find out about more things going on in your area there.
To get out of your local area you could plan a trip in the country (to go to a place you've thought of or visit a friend/your parents/relatives but make sure the trip is part of the goal) or go on a trip abroad.
Changing yourself and change in general is really, really hard work though. And in all honesty I try to avoid it as much as possible. But in all the situation where I have forced myself to do things I wanted to avoid good things have come out of it. In some cases what you force yourself to do isn't the best thing you get out of it. The change of enviroment or the fact that you did it might be sufficient for fueling a new change.
And as someone else pointed out, if you are in a really bad place then try to get help from a counselor. Just getting to talk to someone else who will try to help you out could be a big change in your situation. And I assume that the advice for looking excercises goes here too, you might not hit off with your counselor and you may need to try a few. I don't have any personal experience with that (yet) so I can't give any real advice unfortunately.
I bet you have considered a lot of this before, and I may not be saying anthing new at all. The most obvious and important thing to realize (as I see it) is that nothing is likely to change on it's own. If you are not satisfied with your situation it needs to be changed. And the only one who will do that is you. Trying to do the same things you have always done and "just get by" won't change things. If nothing else try to think of something you can do which will make the people who know you say "I would never think he'd do something like that" and do it.