My relationship with squats is a bit of a love/hate.

In fact, it's a lot like my feelings towards Don Draper on Mad Men.  On the one hand, you realize that Don is an absolute slimeball who has conned together a large majority of his professional and personal life.  On the other hand, it can be just so dang hard not to like him!  You can't imagine Mad Men ever being a hit without the intricacies of his character, or his drunken antics.

(And as someone who once had a three martini lunch in my old cubicle days, how did those ad men ever get any work done!?)

Enter: The Front Squat.  

Back when I worked in a desk job, I like to think I knew a thing or two about creating a stellar Facebook page (no, really, that's what I did).  Other than the ridiculous sums of money companies would pay for something that was free AND took 10 minutes to make, I realized a few things:

1. If you want likes and comments on Facebook or Instagram, post sunsets.  People like colors.  It's just that simple.......well, that or babies.
2. Sardines on whole wheat bread (sans condiments) are not a suitable sandwich combination
3. I was constantly behind the eight ball with my diet and exercise, due to all of the noise (Intermittent Fasting, Paleo, 7 Minute Workout, Crossfit, running, etc.)

Fast forward to today, and I'm fortunate to love what I do and do what I love.  Beyond that, I've realized certain principles - either ones that I've reverse engineered, or heard from another source - that can change the game when it comes to getting stronger/losing weight.

Wowsa!  A LOT has happened this past week.  

First, the Boston area has been blanketed in snow - 40.5 inches in 7 days will do that to anyone. While it's not Buffalo, I'm now reneging on what I wrote last week about this snow not being a big deal.  Old Man Winter has obviously never had to deal with street parking, and the ridiculousness of saving your space by putting a lawn chair/garbage can/life-sized teddy bear in it. (In fact, I'd like to argue that these parking space shenanigans are literally the Tragedy of the Commons....just on a different scale.) 

In fact, I'm pretty sure the 3 year old in the following video accurately sums up New England's collective feeling towards this snow:

Before tackling this week's topic, I'd feel remiss if I didn't at least touch on the two feet of snow that was dumped on New England this past week.  Of course, the perks of living in the city were on full display for us, as we didn't lose power and almost everything we need is in walking distance.  Plus, mother nature is going to have to try a lot harder to keep me from the gym - after all, it was still a squat day.  

So, despite CNN treating this storm as the actual Snowpocalypse (and it kinda was for those on Nantucket), I'd classify it as only a minor annoyance.  In fact, the most annoying aspect of the storm was almost getting run over - both inside and outside - at Whole Foods.  But, despite those select individuals (I'm pretty sure their battle cry was "Give me kale or give me death!") the storm could be summed up with this quote by Massachusetts Governor, Charlie Baker:

This isn't the first time it's snowed in Massachusetts..

I'm in a nutritional state of mind this week, as I've been preparing for my second nutrition lecture: "Are All Calories Created Equal?" It'll be on Feburary 7th, at The Training Room in Somerville (Washington St) at 2 pm.  As last time, I promise to keep the references to Channing Tatum to a maximum, and the pictures of Richard Simmons to a minimum.

(But no promises.)

Anyway, as I type this post I have five different academic journals open in my browser (yes, I just counted). To say I'm geeking out on nutrition would be a slight understatement.  And besides all of those open tabs making my computer run a bit slower, I have to say, my powerpoint slides are going to kick some ass.  <-----The only thing that could make me sound more like a nerd would be if I actually said "Bazinga!!"