PCB2 & MORE!!!

WHEW! What an awesome past few days it’s been!!! Suz flew down from Detroit to Nashville last Friday AM where I picked her up & we headed south for Panama City Beach, FL! We only had a little construction & 1 short detour to feed the rental mobile & grab a bite of lunch heading down. We arrived in PCB mid-evening, got settled into our beach facing suite on the top floor of the Seahaven Beach Resort in time to soak in the tail end of a beautiful sunset then walked next door to Sharky’s for a yummy, fairly healthy, dinner while a decent cover band cranked it up. After dinner we took a walk on the beach behind Sharky’s still listening to the band while gazing at the stars & listening to the waves crashing on the beach…JUST AWESOME!

Saturday morning we arose & headed down the road a few blocks stopping at an old fashioned stainless steel diner for a great breakfast then walked next door to a beach attire shop to get Suz a hat to block a little surplus sun then cruised across town so I could get a quick haircut after which we spent a good long while WAY out on the county pier & walking around the beach before grabbing some lunch. In the afternoon we went walking around the open air Panama City Pier Mall doing a little surprise shopping for a special Suz souvenir, pictured below! After walking the mall for a while we headed back to the Seahaven to chill for a bit until wedding time for Myl & Marine. Attended their really sweet beach sunset wedding service then journeyed over to the reception where we hung out a while then came back to Sharky’s to round out a set of PCB souvenir mugs for Suz’s kids & some more beach time. Sunday came along & we headed west along the coast a few burbs over until it seemed “town” was getting scarce & we stopped at a little mom & pop joint for some brunch. I’d never ever heard of a grilled shrimp omelet but it was fantastic! We then spent a good while beachcombing & walking up & down the gulf’s white sands. Ended up walking the Pier Mall again Sunday evening a while then spent Monday back in the saddle getting Suz to her flight even a few minutes early after stopping at a really cool H-D bike shop around lunchtime along the way.

Another thing that was neat was a benefit through my day job insurance, to track some of my fitness efforts, they’d given me a cool little “digital accelerometer” aka a schnazy pedometer that talks to my computer uploading my steps each day. Looking at the weekend numbers they made pretty good sense except Saturday looked way short compared to Sunday even though our walking  was about the same then I remembered that Saturday I wore my sandals a good deal of the day without the gizmo attached. Anyhow the results showed we walked just shy of 9.5 miles not counting a good half of Saturday so even though I missed a couple days of FiCX’s week 2 I felt pretty good about staying active while in PCB!

Got back Monday night & realized all my FiCX info was on my laptop that I’d dropped off at the office heading home so I wasn’t sure what Week 3 days 1 or 2 was even supposed to be SOOO, knowing I’m heading north to visit the grandbaby Memorial Day weekend I just blasted a beastly core & cardio morning then today being Week 3, Day 3 was leg day you KNOW I burnt it down!

I’ve been having increasing problems with my right knee since starting the squats & lunges in FiCXs lineup & while in PCB I really managed to piss it off, walking in the shifting white powder I think, so even though I had my leg day sheet this AM I was forced to adapt to what I could do, sticking with seated calf presses, abductor/ adductor & a slow & gingerly ground out set of glute back kicks, setting a new PR for seated calf press along the way! I’m now acquiring a list of English speaking knee docs who are “in network” on my insurance to get it checked out. About 13 years ago I slid down a creek bank while deer hunting, having my left leg slide out in front while my right foot caught & folded back. I ended up slamming full force down, folding my right leg shut TIGHT, sitting my hiney down on the bottom of my right boot with a solid thud followed by a loud grinding crunching ker-pop! Being a bull headed guy I limped & gimped for about a month until it seemed to get better enough not to garner attention but either squatting or lunging seems to have reaggravated it to a point of severe discomfort hence the doc’s list. I’m hopeful it can be tweaked back into happy without much fuss but time will tell meanwhile I’ll keep after it best I can.

Rock on pals!!! Kicking FiCX off right before PCB2 with a visit back to the hometown immediately following wasn’t the best of planning on my part but as I always said while in Body for Life…life will always happen so there’s no time like the present!