March – almost perfect
So, then. March turned out to be the month when the Sit Up Challenge 2014 really became a proper challenge. Until then I’d been a bit impatient, longing for it to be a bit more, well, challenging. And now it is.
The month started well and I was still complacent… until about a week in when I put my back out. Not great if you’re trying to do 70-odd sit-ups every day. I worked out that I could still manage trunk curls without making things worse. Did they still count as sit-ups? Well, it was trunk curls or nothing, so I decided they did.
Wilson in happier days
So far so good, except that fate intervened further. Our beloved family dog, Wilson, who’d been ill for a while, deteriorated rapidly and on the evening of 17th March we had to do a mercy dash to the vet to have him put to sleep – one of the most difficult calls we’ve ever had to make.
The next day, 18th (or in sit-up terms, day 77) went by in a bit of a blur. Bereft and sad, I became clumsy and forgetful. I kept dropping things. I went to London without the keys to the flat I was staying in. And I forgot to do my sit-ups for the first time this year.
Technically this means I’m out of the challenge, as it’s an all-or-nothing kinda thing, but I’m keeping it going nonetheless. If I can make it to the end of the year – which I now realize is far more of a challenge than I’d originally thought – it’ll still be an achievement. I can’t deny that I rather like the effect it’s having on my midriff, too.
Day 77
Of course it’s hard, being a perfectionist, to focus on the 30 days crossed off – I can’t help noticing the one day that’s not. But I guess that’s the nature of a challenge. When it doesn’t go so well, you stop looking at the bigger picture and take it a day at a time.
So. Eighty-seven, eighty-eight, eighty-nine, ninety, NINETY-ONE. That’s today’s done, anyway.
