Right. So, my last post was December 11. I had a great day, I worked out, lifted weights on Sunday, and I expected to have DOMS the day after. Which I did. I had also extra-hurt my quads so it hurt to walk. However, as the days passed, and Monday turned to Tuesday turned to Wednesday, I thought I should be getting better. I didn’t. Sure, the DOMS faded, but I felt like I was sick. I thought (hoped) I was just dehydrated. Enter Wednesday night and my throat started to hurt.
It hurt all day Thursday, and at noon I made an appointment to get seen to take a strep throat test. I also saw white splotches in the back of my throat. Friday came, I got tested, and I got a positive diagnosis. Got my drugs. Saturday it just hurt to do anything in my mouth because I think what happened is that I got a canker sore right next to my uvula that itself got a lovely splotch of bacterial growth. You don’t normally think about it, but whenever you swallow, the back of your tongue goes up, rubs against that area, then goes back down. That means that even swallowing water hurt. Oddly, the only thing that didn’t hurt was popcorn. Even ice cream hurt.
Then, with the winter storm forecast, and no longer being contagious but still sick, I changed my flights to go back to Ohio to Wednesday. Made it, but I was then a victim of the Southwest Airlines meltdown. Instead of going back home on Tuesday, I flew home on Friday. Then we had NYE and I made my first bûche de noël, and now we’re here, New Year’s Day 2023. *cue*noisemakers* 🎉
The picture for this post is one I’ve posted every year, but I’m going to ignore it this year. It’s 2023, a new year that OCD-ly starts on a Sunday, the first day of the week for me ’cause I’m in the USA. I spent time today updating and shifting all my fitness tracking stuff so it’s set up well for 2023. I weighed in and I’m back near my peak: Yesterday I was at 228.8, today 227.5 lbs. So … sigh.
I am working to set New Year’s Resolutions. Fitness-wise, I have six, which really should be doable as long as I stick with things and don’t stop after <150 days: (1) Don’t let travel mess things up or get me off-track. (2) Every week should have at least 50 points. (3) Weigh less than 200 lbs by my 40th birthday. (4) Reach my 170 lb goal and start my first bulking phase. (5) Set at least one new personal best for weight lifting. (6) Set new personal bests for longest bicycling [11.9 km now], most calories when rowing [332 cal now], and most calories when walking [1002 cal now].
The most important is #1. I have a lot of travel planned this year. I don’t expect to be home more than a month at a time with travel currently planned most months:
- Three work trips currently planned for mid-January, mid-March, early-August. At least one or two more are likely.
- A trip potentially to Hawai’i for my 40th birthday in May.
- A trip to Australia with my mother probably in August/September, might shift to October due to weather there.
- Thanksgiving and Winter Solstice travel back to Cincinnati. Cincinnati for the anniversary of my dad being killed in August. Grand Rapids and then Cincinnati when my significant other’s sister visits their mother in Michigan. One or two additional trips to Cincinnati in February and/or April to help my mother.
- At the moment, that leaves only June with no travel.
With that in mind, my mom might sell her house. If she does, that will necessitate more time for me in Cincinnati. Additionally, my significant other’s mother (aged 80) suffered a stroke while visiting her daughter in Australia. She’s stable, but we’re in daily contact and monitoring things. We might need to go to Australia in the very near future. And regardless of that, we will need to go to Grand Rapids to help her when she is stable enough to come back to the USA. So, definitely additional travel.
At the moment, I expect at least 15 weeks of travel. Which does not sound like a lot, but that’s being gone one week out of every five-ish.
Which really underscores the importance of that first goal: I cannot let travel mess things up or get me off-track. If I do, this year’s fitness goals (and likely other goals) will never succeed. It’s as simple as that.
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