Lent Day 25

In addition to strengthening my relationship with God through Lent, I did set a few other goals.  Well, I did assume that God would bless me with peripheral benefits if I would live my life with obedience.  I wanted to get down to 200 pounds by Easter (47 days).  I did it in 25 days.  The only problem with attaining goals is that people tend to stop there or reward themselves too much.  This was not going to be the case for me.  Of course, it is much easier to not be so prideful knowing that this is still Lent. 

The exercise today was focused on endurance while having fun.  The exercise was with family and friends today.  We walked, walked, and then we walked some more.  We skipped while holding hands.  We jogged to hurry to that next exciting thing.  I carried a 36 pound weight on and off for hours.  I had to weigh Blake when we got home to see just how much weight had been pressing down on my shoulders.  There was very little sitting down time and we were on hard concrete.  Our feet, ankles, legs, and knees where aching by the time we got back to the car.  Oh it felt good to sit down.  It was a wonderful time with friends and family at the Jacksonville Zoo.  I should always remember that the best exercise can be time spent with great people.

We couldn’t stop there.  We went downtown to the Jacksonville Landing to walk around some more.  We watched the boats go up and down the river. We even got to see some tall buildings and big bridges.  Some of the bridges would raise up for the big ships.  We even saw a multitude of pigeons and seagulls up close, because seeing all those animals at the zoo wasn’t enough.  We enjoyed dinner outside overlooking the river.  Then you would never guess what we did; we walked some more. 

It was about a two hour drive home.  As I drove home, I noticed a few things.  First, I noticed my wife sound asleep before we even left town.  Second, I noticed that my feet were swelling up and aching.  I had to take my shoes off.  Later, I noticed that Tyler was sleeping soundly.  Fortunately for Blake, he also noticed Tyler sleeping and decided to reach over to see what he could get out of Tyler’s back pack. 

Home at last.  Normally this is the moment after a long day that I want to say forget the junk in the car, just let me go inside and lay down on the couch.  I forcibly put my shoes on and went inside where I realized something important; I had not done any “cardio” exercise today.  I changed clothes and decided to go jogging before dark.  As soon as I started getting warmed up, the blood flowed into my legs and feet.  The muscles in my legs stretched out.  I had full range of motion in my legs.  I had . . . no aching feeling in my body anywhere. 

They say some days you step in it, some days you don’t.  Today, we smelled all kinds of nasty stench at the Zoo.  There was hog poop, giraffe poop, zebra poop, bird poop, alligator poop, fish poop, monkey poop, and certainly plenty of stinky people.  We saw so many kinds of animals today and everyone one of them had an aroma of their poop near them.  However, we did not see any horses today.  Well, I guess I should have been watching where I was running tonight when I kicked that pile of horse poop in the middle of the road.  Awe man . . .