Tonight was one of those nights where I wanted nothing more than to swaddle myself in fleece and curl up in bed. Gym? No thanks. Dinner? Eh. Walking the dog in 30 degree weather? GAH, no way.

And it would have been so, so easy to do just that. Well, I mean, the dog had to get walked, for sure. But everything else...it was just one of those nights. Even though PhillyGuy and I had emailed a bit earlier about how we planned to hit the gym after I got home from work, he conveniently "forgot" about it, suggesting that he make dinner while I walked the dog.

No stress. I called him out, and to the gym we went.

Tonight was short cardio for me, followed by legs. And ooh, legs are a challenge. Not "challenge" in the sense of "OMG I am weak," but "challenge" as in "OMG, I have a crappy condo gym with no straight bars, no leg press, no smith machine, and in short, none of the things I used to use when I lifted legs regularly."

Here's tonight's routine:

- Elliptical (aka hamster wheel of death), 15 minutes on the random program, level 11
- Stiff-legged deadlifts with 45-lb dumbbells (total 90lbs lifted)
- Wall sits, 2 x 30 seconds each (I had to stop these because of the stress they put on my knees)
- Leg extension (machine), 3x12 at 55lbs
- Squats, 3x12 with varying weights, trying to find a good configuration (15lb dumbbell held at chest level, 20lb dumbbell held behind neck, two 15lb dumbbells balanced one on each shoulder -- that was probably the winner)

That's probably not enough, although we'll see how my legs feel tomorrow. The deadlifts are as good as they're going to get -- 90lbs is a little light for me, but there are no heavier weights. I will probably have to add in lunges, but those tend to stress my knees a lot. I'm open to any other suggestions!

After the gym, though -- THAT was something to get excited about. Spiedies!

Here's a little secret. PhillyGuy is not actually from Philly. No, he's from outside of Binghamton. It's not the most exciting place I've ever been, but his hometown has brought one amazing thing to my life: spiedies. Roughly bite-size chunks of chicken breast, marinated in vinegar, olive oil, and herbs. We stock up on them every time we visit the in-laws. After Christmas, we've got about 12 pounds of these bad boys in my freezer.

PhillyGuy grills them in a basket. He made himself some brussels sprouts and mashed potatoes to go alongside his spiedies. I put mine on a ginormous salad (romaine, grape tomatoes, white mushrooms, vidalia onion, red pepper, and kalamata olives with salt, pepper, garlic powder, and rice wine vinegar) in a mixing bowl. GOD, I love spiedies.

Now I'm in my sweats, ready to shower and then call it a night. Life isn't SO terrible sometimes.