I have been really lax in updating this blog for for the past month. Some of the reasons are good, some of the reasons are not so good. I hope you will forgive me, my dear imaginary readers, for my lapse. After more than two years of near-daily updates, I got a little behind. But it doesn't mean I wasn't working out or watching Doctor Who, not by a long shot.

As you, my dear imaginary readers, have surely noticed, I am not posting here nearly as often as I used to. The simple truth is that after two full years of writing on this blog very nearly every day, and after watching almost a thousand episodes of Doctor Who and its various spinoffs, I just don't feel the need to write on a daily basis. That doesn't mean that I am not working out, or that I am not still watching Doctor Who. Quite the opposite. It does mean that I have been shaking up my routine. That led to this past week's encounter which I would like to talk about. Here, then, is the tale of how I quite literally worked my ass off for two full years only to be called Morbidly Obese by a perky twenty-something personal trainer.

The nice thing I have learned about sit-ups is that if I wake up with a kink in my back, doing several sets of sit-ups will sort it right out. In hindsight it seems obvious, the movement is exactly what is required to naturally get the spine back into shape. The first time I discovered that, though, I was more than a little surprised. I had hesitated to do the workout, but decided to try it slowly and carefully. During the first set my back was sore -- not in an OUCH something bad is happening way, but in an *ouch* something is out of place kind of way. After my first rest, when starting the second set I realized that whatever had been out of place had moved back into place and all the soreness was completely gone. Sure, by the end of the fifth set I was completely exhausted, but dang if my back didn't feel fantastic...

If I had to pick one word to describe this morning's treadmill viewing, it would be "disrupted". On the whole I think I am a good father, but I will be the first to admit that sometimes my reaction to my autistic son's obsessive behavior could be better. Case in point, this morning he was absolutely focused on his small red camera not working. It is worth noting that he has four, count them four digital cameras. Three of them were working properly, but he interrupted me on the treadmill no fewer than four times because that particular one was not. Fortunately my wife stepped in and contained him so I could finish my workout, because by the last time around I was responding less patiently than the autistic person. That's always a bad sign. In any case, I did finish the middle third of Shada. Here's what I thought.

You know what I learned today? Taking antibiotics causes weight gain because not only do they kill off whatever infection you are fighting (in my case, a middle-ear infection), they also kill off all of the helpful bacteria in your gut that helps you effectively digest food. I had finally been trending back downward in weight until mid-December, when it started to spike back up again. You know what else happened in mid-December? I had to do a round of antibiotics due to diverticulitis. So, there's at least a partial reason for spiking up again. On the upside, today not only did I do 200 push-ups, but I also managed over 4 miles on the treadmill for the first time in ages. So that was nice. Also today, I jumped back to finally start watching the infamous Shada for the very first time.

Good lord, what a long day. For the past eleven months I have been watching two 25-minute episodes per day, but this morning's viewing was the twentieth anniversary special that is effectively a movie with no breaking point. That meant that I spent a full 102 minutes on the treadmill, walking further than I ever have in a single day. Then I had a full day of work, and then a big birthday party. Aside from being Alexander Hamilton's birthday, today is my wife's birthday (and also my boss' birthday, and also a friend's birthday), plus my own birthday is on Monday. So we had a whole big thing planned for tonight. Unfortunately my wife has the flu and couldn't go out, but we filmed everyone singing to her. After that I had to go back to work to do a software release, and so now here I am at nearly midnight just finally writing this post.

So let's talk about the big twentieth anniversary special.

I actually got to sleep in a bit today, which was nice. Then I hit the treadmill for an hour, go cleaned up, and went and did a performance of my show. It was a special one for me, a Sensory Friendly performance specifically for autistic persons and their caregivers, and my son was in the audience. It was pretty dang cool. Now I"ve got about thirty minutes before I need to go back to do the evening show.

So that gives me enough time to talk about today's viewing.