matthearn.com

I’ve been talking a while about my fitness and diet regimen (not that I used the word “regimen;” if you have been using the word “regiment” to describe anything but a military unit, you are a stupid-ass), and figured it was time to share a little results in the form of imagery:

The new hotness, right? And I’m still about 20 pounds away from my goal.

Quick update on what I’ve been up to vis-a-vis diet: I tried a “Protein Sparing Modified Fast,” which is basically eating nothing but pure protein and green vegetables, leading to a rather dramatic caloric deficit. I was taking in 1400-1500 calories a day, which is well over 1000 calories under what my body needs to just stay alive for 24 hours, and I lost something like 8 pounds in 10 days. Then my body said “Hey, enough of this crap,” and I spent most of this past weekend fighting what amounted to a 2 day migraine. Horrible headache, stomach issues, occasional diarrhea, and an odd sensitivity to heat on a weekend when the daily high was near 90F. Bad times. The only thing that made me feel better was, unsurprisingly, eating, so by Sunday I was having a sandwich or bowl of cereal every few hours just to keep me feeling hale. I gained every ounce of that weight back as my body soaked up water like a sponge. Now I’m back to the infinitely more reasonable LeanGains cut, and plan to stay on it solidly into the fall, at which point I hope to have rockin’ abs and a minor role in a CBS soap opera.

It’s been a loooooooong-A time since I’ve made fun of the…unique, let’s say, searches that people put into their googlers that lead them to this site, so let’s make the MAGIC happen! (The numbers at the end of each line are the number of searches made with that string, that led people all up ins hurr.) Apparently Dwyane Wade is a popular fellow:

dwyane wade muscle 70
dwyane wade muscles 32
dwyane wade men’s health 14
dwyane wade shirtless 11

Those are just the top 4 of literally dozens of ways of saying “Hey Google, I wanna see naked D-Wade, get on it.” Well, heaven forfend I fail to please my “fans,” so here you go, America: Dwyane’s balls.

There were also a bunch of things related to fitness, which is hardly surprising since I’ve been rapping on that topic frequently:

how to gain 15 pounds of fat 15
running weight loss before and after pictures 8
south beach diet before and after 6
will love handles ever go away if enough weight is lose 3

The answer to the last one is, of course, “Yes, if you are Dwyane Wade.” Apparently people are fond of tennis, as well:

andrea petcovic 15

I only vaguely remember mentioning Andrea Petkovic in a post from 18 months ago, but apparently it’s enough to get over a dozen hits in the past 3 months from people looking for her. If only someone could have predicted that just dropping the names of attractive women is the way to a high hit-count? Megan Fox, Katharine McPhee, and Kate Upton know what I’m talking about.

I gave away my old Mazda almost 4 years ago, and yet old posts keep bringing the hits.

mazda protege 98 5
1998 mazda protege white 5
1996 mazda protege white 5
98 protege 4

That was a good little car that deserved a better driver than me, and we donated it to some kind of shady agency that I’m sure uses it to transport drugs up and down the eastern seaboard. ::pours out a small bottle of 10-40 oil for his homie::

matt hearn auburn 2

I’m really more of a dirty blonde, really. In that my hair is somewhat blond, and I am personally dirty, and I think you know what I’m talkin’ about. I’m talkin’ DOWNTOWN.

white guy 3

Now you’ve got my number.

running butt before after 2

I really hope this actually belongs up with the fitness-related searches, and isn’t the final google search of two completely separate poor souls whose butts are running.

guy eating guy who looks like a thumb 2

Uh…wh…what?

milrf 2

Mothers I’d Like to…Ridiculously F***? Religiously? Rastafarianly?

the fatness.com 2

That sounds like a decent name for a medium-sized jazz combo, amirite?

souped up tempo 2
hi hat with a souped up tempo 2

I’m on a roll. It’s time to go solo.

transgender elf 2

Somebody get Will Ferrell on the phone RIGHT THE HECK NOW.

fish oil and testicals size 2

I wish they’d specified if the problem was shrinkage or inflation.

vera zvonareva feet 2

Probably pretty stinky, right?

enormus testicles 2

Is this just narrowing down the fish-oil problem?

plumber’s cleavage 1

1) Why would you actually search for this? 2) What have I done wrong that it led you HERE?

how does a woman look if she weigh 150 1

Probably pretty hot, unless she’s only 4 feet tall.

“my father’s perm” 1

This might’ve been me. I need to get my hands on the pictures of my dad from the 70s, his hair was beyond description.

do lips stay small after weight loss? 1

Not to get too gross, but…which ones?

many men has one testicle 1

It sounds like the fish-oil problem led to a serious explosion, and some poor fellow is just trying to reassure himself that everything’s gonna be okay.

college dudes 245 1

Check manhunt.com.

daniel craig duckface 1

He is notorious, isn’t he?

ychromes delaware a cappella songs wacking off 1

I’m proud to admit that 1) I know the song in reference is “Prayin’ For Daylight,” originally by Rascal Flatts, 2) I arranged it, and 3) I sang lead on it when I was still in the group.

how to lose facts in ass in one week 1

I…I guess just kinda lube up an encyclopedia and do the best you can in the time you have?

hands and knees sex elf 1

I feel like manhunt.com could probably help here too?

strict but funny 1

Sounds like my sex life. ::rim shot::

Have a pleasant week, allsayalls!

Been hell of busy. Three kids, man. Three.

That being said, there’s been much going on. Our good friends Sarah and Zak got married over the weekend; my own personal Sarah was the matron of honor, and I did me some singing and guitar strummin’, and also got a small group together to sing an arrangement I did of “Seasons of Love” from “Rent,” a show that I have not seen and will endeavour to avoid seeing forever because I figure if I want to see La Boheme I’ll go damn well see La Boheme, but I shall admit that the song I arranged is catchy and fun.

The wedding took place at Sweetwater Farm, which I cannot recommend highly enough and which I hope to visit again at some later date and stay at the bed and breakfast. Grace Winery is on site, and the wedding actually happened in a renovated barn that also contains most of the vintnering equipment. There are little cottages and several acres of extremely pretty land to admire, ideally while drinking a nice glass of pinot noir and/or Scotch.

And now, we find ourselves in the holiday season. Thanksgiving is, in case you haven’t recently checked a calendar, merely 2 days away, and Advent starts on Sunday, even if most commercially made Advent calendars will not recognize this fact until December 1st because Advent calendar-makers are bloody HEATHENS! As usual, my holiday season is spent either singing in concerts and services or rehearsing for concerts and services, so my wife will spend most of the month single-handedly trying to corral all three of our semi-truculent children. This means that I had better come up with one hell of a spectacular Christmas present for my wife, because no matter what it costs, the inevitable divorce will be more expensive.

Since I’m all over the place anyway, might as well throw in a little fitness update. As of a few weeks ago, I’ve switched over to “bulking” mode, which I like to pretend is “clean” but which consists of large amounts of meat and the occasional Twix bar. As a result of deliberate weight gain, my lifts have been progressing nicely. Today’s workout I squatted 290 pounds for three sets of 5, failed spectacularly to overhead press 137.5 pounds (5 reps, 4, and 3), and successfully power cleaned 155 pounds for 3 sets of 5 (all this with warmup sets, obviously). The other day I also bench pressed 192.5 pounds (I expect to get to 200 next week, woooooo) and deadlifted 370 pounds, which is 1) really bloody heavy and 2) not far from what’s going to be the maximum for a while because I only have 390 pounds of weights.

Another pair of 45 plates will be needed, but my options there are either to spend $100 on a set of brand new plates, or to call the guy I know downstate and go get a used set for $50. I’m leaning towards the latter, but don’t have the 3 hours to get down and back. Plus, if I do that I’m leaning towards getting TWO sets so I’m never likely to run out of weight (I’ll keep progressing as long as I can, but I highly doubt I’m ever going to need 570 pounds). Maybe the next time we go to the beach I can stop en route, but we probably aren’t doing anything like that until January, so I suspect I’ll just get to 390 and then keep adding reps and/or sets so at least I make progression in volume if not weight per rep.

I hope that your Thanksgiving is chock-full of tryptophan and red wine, and that you enjoy parades and football all the live-long day.

This is yet another in the seemingly unending series of posts in which I say “Sorry I haven’t been posting!” and “I’m going to start posting more!” followed by disappearing into the ether for another 4-7 months because I’m a schmuck.

My bad.

It’s not deliberate. I still feel that explanations are owed, however, so here it is: I got two kids, playa, and a third on the way. It is amazing how much time is taken up by entertaining two children while trying to keep up with housework and keeping one’s overly-pregnant wife from going Hormone Crazy and throwing daggers at you. Not metaphorical daggers: literal daggers that she keeps in a belt, looking like Danny Trejo in Desperado but without all the tenderness.

Another reason is that my life’s been sort of devoid of things to share with all-a-y’all. Over the last 9 months, my primary activity other than job and family has been attempting to turn my body from a blancmange into something approximating Captain America, or at least The Tick. I considered writing a bunch of stuff about it, but there are already fitness blogs on the internet written by people with more success and more knowledge than I’d ever be able to come up with. I didn’t want my site to become a fitness blog, where I just throw up a weekly post saying “Got my squat up to 245!” or “Diet was crappy this week, so I’ve decided to give up eating until Labor Day!” Those are lame and useless, and don’t exactly promote great readership.

Then I said, well, it’s not like I have any readership now. (Oddly, my site still gets page-views, mostly from people looking for information about 1998 Mazda Proteges. A fine automobile, for sure, but not exactly trending on The Twitter.) And while other fitness sites have lots of information, they 1) aren’t MY experience, which might be useful for someone in a similar position, and 2) they aren’t funny. I can usually be relied upon to do something funny, usually at my wife‘s expense.

So, here’s the deal. This is still not a fitness blog. I’m hoping that just getting back into the swing of writing every few days will get my brain operating in a manner conducive to writing about all kinds of things just like the heyday of 2002-2005. I’d like to talk a bit, for example, about how Hunter Pence makes my heart go pitter-pat. But, a lot of the posts you’re going to see here for a while are going to be about my process from flab to fly (current status: flower). I’ll endeavour to add plenty of hilarity, so please tolerate me while I get it out of my system and return to discussions of why someone should start a Hobo Eating Competition (in which the hobos are doing the eating, not being eaten themselves, as I believe the latter would be illegal in most jurisdictions).

Gracias!

Here’s a fun little secret you probably would have been able to guess on your own: I like to curse. I am a curser. There is nothing quite as cathartic as stringing together a remarkable series of expletives and animal sounds, and I have to tell you, some of my improvisations are truly memorable. Like the time I called my computer a “cockserpent,” which is kinda redundant, but somehow not. Or the time I dropped my sunglasses in Wawa bathroom and yelled “Son of a f***-wh*** s***-c***!!!”

Obviously around my kids, grandparents, in-laws, etc., I go into what radio professionals call “FCC” mode, in which I cut out anything stronger than “dang” and “heck” and avoid telling jokes like the one about why the hooker had a runny nose. But if I’m alone, or just hanging out with friends my own age, it gets all Andrew Dice Clay up in this piece, but without all the class that the Diceman brings to his act.

What made me think of this was the random recollection of the time in college when I was advised by an older female student that I might have better luck meeting ladies if I cursed less. At the time this seemed like pretty good advice, and so for a period of time I tried curtailing my profanity. Looking back, however, it was completely ridiculous. It’s like telling someone, “You know, you might have better luck meeting ladies if you weren’t so heterosexual.” Changing a core value (specifically, “Bad words are awesome”) to try and attract mates leads to poor communication, failed marriages, and colon cancer. Look it up.

In the end my future wife (who curses like a pirate) and I ended our ill-advised “break-up,” married, and have produced two children, the elder of which chastises me if I say the word “stupid” in his presence. In fact, he’ll object to any word that sounds roughly similar to “stupid,” such as the other day when he protested my use of the word “stupendous” and later in the week when Sarah said “striped” and got called out for it.

When he turns 16 I’ll teach him real curse words. I’m sure he won’t have picked up any on his own.

I’ve had this funny spot in my vision for a couple days, and also I haven’t seen an optometrist in roughly ever, so I scheduled an appointment to have my peepers examined yesterday. I’m the only person of my age that I know who doesn’t wear any kind of corrective lenses, but recently things have been…not necessarily blurry, but definitely less well-focused than they were ten years ago. It was time.

I knew the basic drill from what my various friends and family reported, so I read off the letters and words and impressed the hell out of the technician by reading the bottom line of the close-up card without even squinting. Then Dr. Nguyen came in and we got down to Business. He put the big metal Mardi Gras mask in front of me and started twisting dials, checked for astigmatism, all that good stuff. Then he grabbed some eyedrops off the shelf, which I assumed were to dilate my eyes, but instead he said “These are a bit of anesthetic, they may sting a bit,” and quickly dropped them in before I could ask “what exactly are you about to do that might cause me pain?” which turned out to be an important unasked question.

Then he flipped off the lights and used another tool with a bright blue light to look at my eyes, and tossed off the following sentence like he was asking a waiter for an extra spoon: “I’m going to press this blue light against your eyeball. Open your eyes wide.”

You’re going to do what now?

Hey, uh, could you not, um…okay, bright blue light, getting closer, that’s close enough, OKAY PLEASE STOP PRESSING THE BLUE LIGHT AGAINST MY EYEBALL and he pulled it away.

“Now for the other one!”

Um…do we have to, uh…wait…wait…no…BRIGHT BLUE LIGHT AGAINST MY EYEBALL AGAIN TOTALLY NOT COOL and we were done.

“Ocular pressure’s totally normal.” Yeah, thanks for that.

Also thanks to everyone who had had this procedure done but didn’t warn me that SOLID OBJECTS WOULD BE PRESSING DIRECTLY AGAINST MY PUPILS. Awesome times.

After that, he did dilate my eyes, and to rule out a neurological reason for the funny spot in my vision, he had a technician do a peripheral vision test which I passed with flying colors. After my pupils were as big as pupils have any business getting, he shined a painfully bright light around my retinas for a while.

“Okay…first of all, your vision’s 20/15. You don’t need glasses.”

Just like Ted Williams!

“I do see a little scarring on your retina…” (Perhaps from the fact that you just shined an automobile headlight into my eyeball? Just throwing that out there.) “…but that’s normal.”

The funny spot is probably just the eyeball equivalent of a bruise, and will probably disappear soon. Yay! I don’t have eyeball cancer or syphilis or something!

“We’ll see you next year for another appointment!”

Great, ’cause it’ll take me that long to forget what it was like to have A BRIGHT BLUE LIGHT PRESSED AGAINST MY CORNEA.

Not surprising, I guess. I do love me some tweetin’.

Created by The Oatmeal

I ambled over to TweetPsych.com and got a nifty
psychological analysis of my tweets. Things it revealed:

You often talk about the physical characteristics of things.

Uh…okay. I’m not sure what this means. If you’re talking about a thing, seems like the physical characteristics of it would come up.

You talk about yourself a lot.

Obviously. I’m as self-centered as anybody. Also, it’s Twitter. It doesn’t lend itself well to profound theological thought, unless Nietsche came back to life.

You express plenty of negative emotions.

I’m 30-something American male. It’s how we roll.

You often make references to physically upward movement. Like upstairs, climb, etc.

I don’t know what the hell this is about. Oh wait, yes I do: I have a secret life as an escalator salesman. Subconsciously, it must come out in my Twitterin’.

Grilled cheese is pretty delicious, I have to say. Probably my favorite, uh, meal. (Read the comments, they are fantastic.)

It’s like playing 20 questions, if the questioner is outrageously stupid. Stolen from Chris Turner via Facebük.

1. First thing you wash in the shower? My face, in a (so far) almost complete and utter failure to try and keep my skin clear.


2. What color is your favorite hoodie? Rojo.


3. Would you kiss the last person you kissed again? In case my wife reads this: yes.


4. Do you plan outfits? Only if I’m getting really dressed up for something. Most days I just get up and put on pants, and then find a matching shirt.


5. How are you feeling RIGHT now? Tired, but looking forward to facing the weekend.


6. Whats the closest thing to you that’s red? A small heart on my shirt, which reads “i [heart] hot moms”


7. Tell me about the last dream you remember having? I had a dream about Rachel Maddow the other day.


8. Did you meet anybody new today? A little boy, named Curtis, who is in Charles’s preschool class.


9. What are you craving right now? A beer.


10. Do you floss? No. I know I should, but I hate tooth maintenance. I wouldn’t brush my teeth if my breath didn’t smell of elderberries; I hate the lingering taste of mint. It throws off all my meals. And I love meals.


11. What comes to mind when I say cabbage? Charles Babbage.


12. Are you emotional? I think the survey would say X.


13. Have you ever counted to 1,000? While I do believe I have a mild case of Asperger’s Syndrome, I haven’t quite gone that far.


14. Do you bite into your ice cream or just lick it? I lick it, but keep in mind my tongue is large and can slurp off a lot of frozen dessert in one lick.


15. Do you like your hair? I like the color, but it’s too fine to do anything with.


16. Do you like yourself? Mostly. I wish I wasn’t so lazy.


17. Would you go out to eat with George W. Bush? Let’s put it this way: I never like being the smartest person in a conversation because I can’t learn anything. I think a conversation with the former President would make me feel so superior I might start funding eugenics research.


18. What are you listening to right now? Thomas the Tank Engine, being played on the TV while no one pays attention, but of course if it were to be turned to the Phillies game there would be wailing and gnashing of teeth.


19. Are your parents strict? Not particularly. I never really had much interest in stretching the boundaries; I was quite the boring fellow.


20. Would you go sky diving? Sure, if someone else paid. It’s just another expensive pursuit, I can’t afford the hobbies I already have.


21. Do you like cottage cheese? No, it’s like eating cold bone marrow.


22. Have you ever met a celebrity? A few U.S. Senators and other politicians, that’s about it.


23. Do you rent movies often? I almost never have 2 hours to sit and watch anything, so no. About once a month, I’d say.


24. Is there anything sparkly in the room you’re in? My wife’s bracelets.


25. How many countries have you visited? 8, I think; St. Kitts-Nevis, Iceland, Norway, Germany, Austria, Switzerland, France (for a quick afternoon), and the UK.


26. Have you made a prank phone call? Nah. Seems like juvenile humor to me, and while I am a connoisseur of the tasteless joke, prank calling involves picking on random people for no good reason. This is also why I skip the portions of “Jackass” where they’re just being rude to people or taking dumps in toilets displayed at hardware stores. I’m more amused by them injuring themselves.


27. Ever been on a train? Road the Strasburg Railroad a few times, and last summer took a train home from Manhattan.


28. Brown or white eggs? We buy white, but I don’t really care. My grandmother used to cook the brown ones, they taste the same.


29. Do you have a cell-phone? Yes.


30. Do you use chap stick? Only once my lips are too far gone to be saved.


31. Do you own a gun? A couple airguns, but sadly most of my income is spoken for by electronics.


32. Can you use chop sticks? Being a yuppie WASP, of course.


33. Who are you going to be with tonight? A bunch of theater friends! Who has two thumbs and is excited? Moi.


34. Are you too forgiving? Depends. To their face, I let people get away with stuff. But then I hold a grudge and talk about them behind their back. I’m like a 13-year-old girl, down to my bizarre fixation with Miley Cyrus.


35. Ever been in love? Constantly.


36. What is your best friend(s) doing tomorrow? We’ll be going to dinner at her parents’ for her brother’s birthday.


37. Ever have cream puffs? Yeah. Made ’em myself! They were…so…awesome.


38. Last time you cried? Probably earlier this week, watching the Harry Kalas memorial service I’d taped.


39. What was the last question you asked? I do not remember.


40. Favorite time of the year? Whichever time is coming up. In winter, I want spring. Spring: summer. I’m never happy with what I’ve got.


41. Do you have any tattoos? I plead the fifth.


42. Are you sarcastic? <SARCASM>No, not at all.&lt/SARCASM>


43. Have you ever seen The Butterfly Effect? I saw a few minutes of it and threw up in my mouth.


44. Ever walked into a wall? My torso is something like 3 feet wide. Doorframes are not made with me in mind. I constantly bang my shoulders into them. I’ve been known to knock the frame out of plumb.


45. Favorite color? Blue.


46. Have you ever slapped someone? I’ve spanked my son a few times, and instantly regretted it each time.


47. Is your hair curly? Hell no.


48. What was the last CD you bought? I downloaded Jim Gaffigan’s latest effort yesterday evening. Actual disk? Jeez…I think it was a Celine Dion album for the wife.


49. Do looks matter? Of course. I look fabulous!


50. Could you ever forgive a cheater? Depends on the particular action.


51. Is your phone bill sky high? Yes, only because iPhone bills ain’t cheap. But if this supposed to mean “Do you talk on the phone a lot?” the answer would be oh hells no. I hate talking on the phone. That is why the Good Lord Sweet Crying Baby Jesus invented texting, email, and Twitter.


52. Do you like your life right now? Reasonably so. I’d like to be further advanced in my artistic endeavors, but one does what one can.


53. Do you sleep with the TV on? Only if I fall asleep watching baseball.


54. Can you handle the truth? I believe I’m entitled to the truth.


55. Do you have good vision? Very good, actually, which is annoying because in most other ways my body is very defective. I have something like 20/10 vision, but of course my hand-eye coordination is abysmal so I can’t, say, hit a fastball.


56. Do you hate or dislike more than 3 people? Probably, but I try not to dwell on it until they bug me.


57. How often do you talk on the phone? Maybe once a day.


58. The last person you held hands with? Charles, walking across the parking lot from Home Depot.


59. What are you wearing? Camouflage shorts (in case someone tries to hunt me), tan-ish tshirt, brand-ass new New Balance kicks.


60. What is your favorite animal? Anything feline. Large rodents are a close second.


61. Where was your default picture taken? Since this came from Facebook, you can’t see it unless you are my frien’, so check it. We were at a picnic at Breck’s Lane.


62. Can you hula hoop? For approximately .08 seconds.


63. Do you have a job? Yes; I work for AIG 21st Century Farmer’s Insurance.


64. What was the most recent thing you bought? The aforementioned kicks.


65. Have you ever crawled through a window? Sure. Cars, homes, morgues, you name it.

Wow. That’s it? Okay.