Little Gremlins

Holy freaking cow. 

Have you ever had a muscle cramp?  Not like when you’re running and you can’t breathe and you get a cramp in your stomach… but just randomly when all of a sudden your muscle cramps up and you feel like you’re being stabbed.  I’ve seen it happen to other people plenty of times, but I’d never had one myself… until today. 

My alarm went off at 5 this morning and I gave a little stretch before I was about to jump out of bed and BAM!  My right calf cramped up so hard I thought there were little gremlins in my bed that were knifing me in the leg.  Yikes.  I knew my calves had been tight lately, but I didn’t think they were that bad!

Since I’d planned on today being a running day, after that little incident, I reassessed the entire situation (my back is really sore from yesterday after skipping my back workout last week and my throat has been sore for the past couple of days) and decided to make today my off day instead. 

I’ve been learning through my NASM studying that tight calves can lead to issues with squatting, lunging, walking, running, and a whole host of other injuries (like shin splints), and I just don’t need any of those things right now.  I’d rather take the day off to rest my body than force a workout and end up getting hurt.  But wow… if that cramp wasn’t a reminder to STRETCH, then I don’t know what would be!

The good news is that I ended up getting an extra two hours of sleep and a view like this from my bedroom window when I woke up:

So despite the cramp, I’d say it was still a good morning!

There was the usual spinach, green pepper, and two-egg scramble for breakfast:

And a salad with leftover (cold) steak, lettuce, spinach, carrots, cucumbers, and my olive oil-red wine vinegar-Italian spices dressing for lunch:

It basically looks like there’s just a bowl of lettuce there, but I assure you, there was much more hidden underneath.  I added the dressing and shook it all up before taking the picture and then, well, everything sank to the bottom, much like my habanero peppers the other day. 

Once I got down in there though, it was all good. 

The funny part is that I was absolutely dreading this salad.  I thought it was going to be totally boring and I actually considered going out on my lunch break to pick up something else instead.  But I’m happy to say that I was very wrong… it was delicious.

I snacked on a super sweet Fuji apple + crunchy almond butter later in the afternoon… always a winning combination.

I’m heading to my parents’ houses for the weekend, where I’ve got a few things scheduled: training my cousin and his friend at the gym on Saturday, picking out some new cross training sneakers, and doing some work for my dad’s company… Nothing too outrageous, but after a busy one last weekend, I’m kind of looking forward to just relaxing!

Questions:

Do you ever get bad muscle cramps?

Do you stretch a lot?  I don’t, which is bad.

What are your plans this weekend?