Great Balls of Fire

For this step on my journey to wellness, I actually revisited something from several years ago and added a new piece of exercise equipment to my regimen.

It used to be called the Power-bee (or something similar). It is now called the DynaFlex Pro and has been somewhat remodeled. I owned one several years ago and had largely forgotten about it until I saw the DynaFlex Pro on the shelves of our (relatively) local Eastern Mountain Sports store. Given that I had a little extra cash thanks to a check I had gotten for my birthday, I bought myself a new one. So, what the heck is it?

The DynaFlex Pro is a wrist and hand exerciser. It is essentially a ball encased in an outer shell that works like a gyroscope. By spinning the inner ball and holding on to the shell. Getting the ball rolling can be tricky, at first. Once it is spinning, you keep it spinning by making small movements with your hand and wrist. The spinning ball generates considerable torque. The combination of maintaining your grip on the shell, the torque generated by the spinning ball, and the small hand and wrist movements really gives the muscles in your forearms quite the workout! As far as this being a step along my journey to wellness...well, forearm exercises are not huge calorie burners. They certainly are going to help me get back into shape all by themselves. For me, though, it is great to feel the burn in my muscles - even from a relatively small muscle group - as it helps me get motivated to do more exercise. Sitting in a chair and watching TV or surfing the internet isn't terribly motivating and I can easily end up wasting a lot of time this way. By picking up the DynaFlex Pro and giving it a spin for a couple of minutes, I get that wonderful feeling in my arms and get motivated to get out of the chair and do some more exercises that will have a greater impact on my overall wellness.

The DynaFlex Pro is not terribly quiet when in use, so using it while watching TV or while sitting at your desk at work might not make others around you very happy. Also, it does require a bit of concentration to maintain your grip and to keep it spinning, so using it while driving is not advised.

The song reference for today - well, the 'ball' itself isn't on fire (though, it does tend to get a little warm while in use) but it does give your forearms a good burn. I couldn't resist paying homage to Jerry Lee Lewis with Great Balls of Fire as the title for this post, though technically while the ball is spinning, there is also a Whole Lotta Shakin' Going On.


A-Z Challenge

For a change of pace, I have accepted the A-Z Challenge for the month of April. The idea behind the challenge is to post a new article every day during the month of April except for Sundays that have a topic that begins with the corresponding letter of the day - starting on April 1st with the letter A and working your way to the letter Z (30 days in April minus the 4 Sundays = 26 days). The post could be a written article or simply a picture of something that begins with the letter of the day.  For this challenge, I am not sure that I will be able to continue the trend of linking the article to a song title. In fact, these posts are simply going to be titled with the letter of the day. As well, I plan to make these A-Z posts in addition to any posts that are specifically about my journey to wellness. While my current plan is to write articles about things that have an impact on my journey for this challenge, they just may not be quite the same as the rest of this blog.