Inside Man Gym

I've been having a hell of a time making it to the gym during the week this school year. I joined the YMCA, but have been only once. I joined it so I could go to the gym in the mornings, but have not made it yet this school year. I feel healthiest and fittest when I'm working out every morning, but haven't really been on that schedule in a couple of years. I go some mornings, some evenings, and sometimes I skip it. This week, I've skipped it three days in a row. On Monday, I went to the gym but felt a little woozy so I went home. On Tuesday, my alarm went off at 5am, but I pushed snooze until 7 and couldn't go after school because of a play at Center Stage. Today, well, I've been working ever since I got home and just couldn't get away. Tomorrow, I'm going to a concert and am not planning on getting up at 5am.

This is frustrating because I had a great weekend at the gym. I ran two miles on Saturday and three miles on Sunday, and lifted weights both days. It felt great. But I didn't ride that momentum into the week.

It's a bunch of excuses, I realize. I've just got to get my act together. I think once baseball season ends, that I'll be in a much better position to go to bed earlier and get to the gym in the morning.

***
This weekend, I was proud of myself, as I sat down and watched a movie: Inside Man. I've been wanting to see it for a while, because it stars Jodie Foster, for whom I would pay to watch read a phone book. Plus it's directed by one of America's finest directors (at least when he's on), Spike Lee, and starring one of our finest actors, Denzel Washington.

The movie was about what I expected - a solid adult thriller, well-performed and written. I also thoroughly enjoyed the director's commentary. Spike Lee is a really interesting guy, not nearly as caustic as he comes off as in print interviews. He's the type of guy who would probably be an interesting partner on a bar stool for hours.

I was especially happy to see Darryl "Chill" Mitchell in a small role. This guy starred in one of my favorite TV shows from the early nineties, when I was glued to the television. Remember The John Larroquette Show? It was a solid, dark sitcom starring a really interesting cast - Mitchell, Liz Torres, Chi McBride, and a few others. The show lost its edge in the second season when sitcom killer Allison LaPlaca was brought aboard, but it was angry and funny in that first season, and Mitchell was a big part of it. In around 1999, he got in a bad motorcycle wreck and was paralyzed, and later starred on Ed, one of my favorite shows of the 2000s. He doesn't act that much, so it was nice to see him in this movie.