So auditions for the SCT summer musical were Monday and Tuesday. I sang One Song Glory and Your Eyes, both from RENT. I did alright. I mean, not spectacular but not bad. The songs were a different style than I’m used to singing and the range was all over the place, from low to pretty high.

There were a lot of people that auditioned. Several from Theatre MSU and the MSU choir. It ought to be a good show and a lot of fun. The director is facing a situation that she hasn’t faced before, too many people. I’ve heard there could be cuts but I don’t really know. We should know something soon.

I also heard that we’ll be doing one song from The Full Monty. You know that show where a bunch of guys end up naked at the end? Yeah, well, supposedly we won’t be naked but we won’t be wearing much is what I hear.

Now I’m a modest guy. But I’m willing to commit to this song purely for the fact that it’ll make me get really serious about getting into shape.

A couple months back I did well for about 6 weeks, then Smoke on the Mountain opened and I took about 4 weeks off. And my eating started to slide. I had lost about 7-10 pounds before I quit working out.

The thing is, I’m tall and I tend to carry weight well. So everytime I mention working out and watching what I eat people are like “What? you don’t need to lose any weight.” See, I’m tall and flabby. I don’t like flabby so much. And I don’t want to be flabby if I’m gonna have to take clothes off on stage in front of hundreds of people.

So I had started back to the gym on Monday anyway but now I’m kicking it into high gear. Here’s my plan: 6 days a week, I’m doing cardio. 3 of those will be high intensity interval training. Monday, Wednesday and Friday I’ll do two-a-days and go back to the gym at lunch to do resistance training. I’ll be carb conscious and go low carb a few weeks before the show. It opens 8 weeks from today.

I lost a good deal of weight last summer by eating healthy (mostly) and doing cardio 5 days a week (I put a lot back on over the fall/winter). It worked. But. I am firmly convinced to get the best results in the fastest time, it takes all three things: cardio, weights and clean eating.

About the intensity interval training, it’s 20 minutes of varying levels of intensity. It ends with a full out, everything-you-got sprint, though there are different forms of HIIT. The idea is not to burn a bunch of calories during the exercise, like it normally is with cardio, it’s to rev up your metabolism for calorie burn hours after you finish exercising. You can read it about it here.

My philosophy is to get in the gym, do what I gotta do and get out. I’m not one to go and chat with people and socialize. I never spend more than 50 minutes working out. I recommend the book Body-for-Life as a good starting point for getting in shape.

Anyway, I’m looking forward to the show and it’s gonna be a good time.

I know, I know. That picture is SCARY.