...because I am good and fed up with Blogger and my inability to post from home. So come visit me at http://runorwine.wordpress.com !
Sunday, August 14, 2011
Tuesday, August 9, 2011
It's on like Donkey Kong
I have declared war...on my waistline. Specifically, the extra 10 lbs that has taken up residence there since late winter/early spring. I've made a halfhearted effort this summer to do something about it, but this weekend I had a moment of clarity...not surprisingly, it was right around the time I realized that I only have two pairs of jeans and one pair of (non workout) shorts that fit comfortably and that's not okay. So, this means:
-no fried food. I'm taking this on a week by week basis. Okay, day by day. Yesterday (aka Day 1) was okay...I even resisted the loaded fries (think cheese, bacon, and green onions...with ranch dressing) at the bar we went to for a friend's birthday, which is huge.
-running or gym 5-7 times/week for at least 30 mins/day. And at least some sort of lifting 2-3x/week.
-only one serving of cheese/day. ONE.
-Ice cream 1x/week. Maybe twice.
Now of course, concessions will be made for special occasions and stuff like that. But overall, something has got to give, before my pants give. Out.
So I think you can tell how the eating better part of my life has been going...not great. Thankfully, running/workout part has been going a lot better even with the heat (which I am still praying breaks soon). I'm pacing a half marathon the Sunday of Labor Day weekend, so all my weather powering juju is going towards that morning (for the race) and afternoon (for Katie's wedding). Thankfully the temps are supposed to cool off a little bit this week/weekend so maybe we'll catch a break for a few days.
Is it naptime yet?
-no fried food. I'm taking this on a week by week basis. Okay, day by day. Yesterday (aka Day 1) was okay...I even resisted the loaded fries (think cheese, bacon, and green onions...with ranch dressing) at the bar we went to for a friend's birthday, which is huge.
-running or gym 5-7 times/week for at least 30 mins/day. And at least some sort of lifting 2-3x/week.
-only one serving of cheese/day. ONE.
-Ice cream 1x/week. Maybe twice.
Now of course, concessions will be made for special occasions and stuff like that. But overall, something has got to give, before my pants give. Out.
So I think you can tell how the eating better part of my life has been going...not great. Thankfully, running/workout part has been going a lot better even with the heat (which I am still praying breaks soon). I'm pacing a half marathon the Sunday of Labor Day weekend, so all my weather powering juju is going towards that morning (for the race) and afternoon (for Katie's wedding). Thankfully the temps are supposed to cool off a little bit this week/weekend so maybe we'll catch a break for a few days.
Is it naptime yet?
Saturday, August 6, 2011
Thursday, July 21, 2011
We're havin' a heat waaaaave
...literally. "Real Feel" temps outside are above 100 degrees right now. Seriously?
(before I forget, let me apologize in advance for any formatting issues. Apparently, the "publish post" function on Blogger is not cooperating with my computer, so I end up having to use my Blogger app on my phone to publish, and it likes to take out things like spaces between paragraphs. Fun.)
Okay, where was I? Oh yeah. The heat. Dear lord. You know its bad when its 80 degrees and humid at 6am, which has definitely put a cramp in my running. Yes, I know I can hit the gym...but I don't wanna. Plus, I'm on vacation this week (aka staycation) so that has added an extra degree of death to my motivation. But I'm trying, I swear.
Since my last post, working a/c has returned to my life, and my home. Hallefuckinglujah. There was a small issue with the new a/c unit that almost made me cry but thankfully was easily fixed and since then we've been rocking 72 degree comfort...and its awesome. The return of a/c to our lives had particularly good timing, seeing as we had a bunch of friends and family over this past weekend for our annual wedding anniversary celebration. Yep...three years of holy matrimony. Or unholy unity. Whatever. The point is, three years ago this past Tuesday J and I tied the knot in front of friends and family, with a whole lotta beer waiting for us...so we celebrate our anniversary with friends and family, and a whole lotta beer. Of course, J gave me the eyebrow Saturday morning as I got up super early for my usual run with my running group...but I reminded him that me running=me not turning into a stressed out crazy woman while prepping for the partay. And then the eyebrow went away, and I enjoyed a perfectly nice (but humid) 10.5 mile run.
Oh, running. This has not been easy, with the heat. I try to suck it up, but its not easy. Thankfully, Tuesday's 4 mile run with a friend was super early (like 6am) and we got rained on for the first 10 mins or so which definitely helped cool us off a bit. Hopefully the heat decided to cut us some slack soon, but in the meantime we all get to suffer :$
Oooh, I almost forgot...I won something! A while back, I entered Sam's raffle at http://walkamileinmyboots.wordpress.com , contributed some $$$ to Sam's fundraising effort for the American Cancer Society (and got virtual raffle tickets in the process), and won a book in the process :) I'm pretty excited b/c I never win anything in blog giveaways, so yay for this! I won a copy of Bart Yasso's "My Life on the Run" and its been pretty interesting so far. Bart's run in some really cool places that I will very likely never get to, so its been fun to live vicariously through his stories, in a way.
I feel like I'm forgetting something...oh well. If I remember, I'll post it. Don't melt, everyone!
Monday, July 11, 2011
La di doddy, who likes to party?
Apparently we do, if Saturday's antics are any indication. J's BFF got married, and oh boy did we celebrate. Lots of dancing (and drinking) at the reception, and then more drinking the post reception party at a local bar. The evening ended with J and I taking a cab home (only took two tries to find one that would take a credit card, too!), and coming home to....our sweltering house.
Yep. Our air conditioning broke Weds evening. Found out Friday morning that the part that would fix it would be $400...but there's a good chance that another part would break in the next 6 months (the a/c unit is the original one from when the house was built, so its 20+years old). So we're just sucking it up and replacing it. In the meantime, we are spending the majority of our time in the family room (which is half underground since we live in a split level, and is the closest thing we have to a basement) and having slumber parties in there at night. Thankfully the unit is getting replaced as we speak, so barring any major mishaps we should be back in 70 degree recirculated air comfort by tonight. It's about time-neither one of us have slept all that great and the dogs aren't happy either so we're all ready for a good night's sleep again.
So needless to say, yesterday's hangover was not helped by the temperature in our house. Thankfully, one well timed visit by our friends who happened to have a large fruit punch Gatorade (aka my most favorite flavor of Gatorade EVA) in the cooler leftover from the night before did help, as did the "morning after" lunch hosted by the bride's parents at a local Mexican restaurant. Feeding my hangover with quesadillas and guacamole? YES PLEASE. Add in a coule of doses of ibuprofen, some lying around the house, and a trip to the pool and life was good again. I am getting way too old for this crap.
This ridiculous heat and humidity is not helping my running either. I've been better about getting up early (before work) to run but its been so humid that I still have to take it slow for fear of keeling over. I helped lead the 13:11/mile pace group for a local 5k on Saturday, which was interesting since its nowhere near my usual pace (someone dropped out so I was filling in where needed) but was still fun...and then a fellow pacer and I hit a local park for a hilly 3.5 mile run. Which was not fun, not because of the hills but the heat since it was 10am when we got started. Yucko. I'm still hoping to make it to the gym today, but we'll have to see when the a/c guy gets done...J's at work so I'm stuck here until the guy leaves. Thankfully he got here at 815am, so I hopefully will be off house arrest by noon/1pmish.
La di da....
Tuesday, June 28, 2011
But.I.Dont.WANNA.
Get up early tomorrow to rock out some speedwork, that is. Don't get me wrong...I know this is what I SHOULD do...it's supposed to be warm tomorrow. And humid. And 8 miles of speedworkin' fun is most certainly NOT fun when its hot and humid.
But doing 8 miles of speedworkin' fun when its NOT hot and humid means getting up early to do it outside (or at the gym, when its less crowded)...and I like my bed. It's comfy, warm, and always has at least one dog snuggled up against my legs and/or laying on my feet. Plus, I don't think my phone alarm is obnoxious enough, because I keep sleeping through it.
Tomorrow, however, I must get up and git 'er duuuuuuun. Especially since I inhaled three large pieces of deep dish pizza for dinner tonight. Mmmmm, pizza. So I will report back tomorrow and inform the blog world whether I actually got outta bed or not. If you're lucky, I may remember to tell you all what I thought of the compression socks and headband that came in the mail last week...hopefully the rest of my stuff comes soon, because me and patience do not go well together. Just ask my husband :P
Monday, June 20, 2011
Happy Birthday to Me, Happy Birthday to Meeeeeee...
...Ijustspent$125inAmazongiftcardsonrunningandhealthstuff, Happy Birthday to Me!
Yep, its official...I survived my 30th birthday with no major mishaps. Had a nice run with my running group (and saw a lovely squished frog on the road...no I didn't do the squishing), went to a local farmer's market and Whole Foods with J, then headed down to my cousin's wedding in Cinci. Had a good time at the wedding and visiting with my sister, her boyfriend, and their dog and cats beforehand, then drove back to Columbus. Where I was greeted with a beeeeeeyouteous quart of sugar free tangerine ice from Rita's in my freezer, courtesy of the wonderful Katie who was nice enough to come over to feed our dogs dinner and let them out for a bit while we were gone. Said quart of tangerine ice is approximately 60% gonzo now :$
My parents and sister were nice enough to gift me with, among other things, the aforementioned Amazon gift certificates. Since I can never let these things sit for long, I spent some quality time on Amazon today and ended up ordering...
-my very own copy of the Omnivore's Dilemma, which despite checking it out from the library twice and incurring hefty overdue fees both times because I can't remember to return things on time to save my life, I have not yet finished. So now I can take my time reading it (even more than I already have) and not worry about more overdue fees.
-CEP compression socks in white. I figure these will come in handy as I attempt to slowly lengthen my weekly long runs to 13+ miles. No, I'm not doing anything silly like training for a marathon...I just figure its time to run 13+ miles more regularly than the two times a year I run a half marathon.
-Body Glide. I've actuallly been lucky and haven't had many chafing issues but as it gets hotter and stickier I know this can potentially be a big issue. And a painful one.
-a new Sweaty Band. Because a girl can never have too many things that keep her hair out of her face...no matter what her husband says.
-a canister of Click Vanilla Latte protein powder...because its yummy.
-a shaker cup for making protein drinks with said protein powder.
-A box of Oskri coconut bars. I hear they're delicious and cracklike, and well I'll eat anything with coconut in it at least once. Okay, almost anything.
The protein powder is on backorder but I'll be stalking the mail for everything else over the next couple of weeks. Yaaaay stuff!
In other news, after a lovely reprieve from oppressive heat and humidity last week, its back with a vengeance. Last week's workouts looked like this:
Monday-lovely, breezy, not too hot 5 mile run. At noon. The fact that the weather was tolerable at that time of day shows how nice it really was.
Tuesday-day off, thanks to a sore right quad. Its the kind of pain that says "time for a new pair of running shoes!". Thankfully, my parents also got me a gift card to do just that for my birthday :)
Wednesday-5 miles of speedwork, in the early morning so it was extra nice out. 1 mile warm up/cool down, and 4x1200m at Lactate Threshold pace. Aka hauling ass.
Thursday-spin class at the gym. Love it.
Friday-impromptu rest day, because SOMEONE slept through her "time to get your ass out of bed and run" alarm.
Saturday- 11.5 muggy, warm miles of fun. You know its muggy when your hair is soaked in sweat after 4 miles. Ew.
Sunday-60 mins on the elliptical, to flush out the junk in my legs. They weren't happy at first but felt much better by the end.
I was planning on running this morning but got up later than I'd planned and it was freaking muggy and hot...so off to the gym I went for a couple of easy miles on the track and then spin class. I am currently resisting the urge to eat everything in my house.
So far, 30 ain't so bad...
Yep, its official...I survived my 30th birthday with no major mishaps. Had a nice run with my running group (and saw a lovely squished frog on the road...no I didn't do the squishing), went to a local farmer's market and Whole Foods with J, then headed down to my cousin's wedding in Cinci. Had a good time at the wedding and visiting with my sister, her boyfriend, and their dog and cats beforehand, then drove back to Columbus. Where I was greeted with a beeeeeeyouteous quart of sugar free tangerine ice from Rita's in my freezer, courtesy of the wonderful Katie who was nice enough to come over to feed our dogs dinner and let them out for a bit while we were gone. Said quart of tangerine ice is approximately 60% gonzo now :$
My parents and sister were nice enough to gift me with, among other things, the aforementioned Amazon gift certificates. Since I can never let these things sit for long, I spent some quality time on Amazon today and ended up ordering...
-my very own copy of the Omnivore's Dilemma, which despite checking it out from the library twice and incurring hefty overdue fees both times because I can't remember to return things on time to save my life, I have not yet finished. So now I can take my time reading it (even more than I already have) and not worry about more overdue fees.
-CEP compression socks in white. I figure these will come in handy as I attempt to slowly lengthen my weekly long runs to 13+ miles. No, I'm not doing anything silly like training for a marathon...I just figure its time to run 13+ miles more regularly than the two times a year I run a half marathon.
-Body Glide. I've actuallly been lucky and haven't had many chafing issues but as it gets hotter and stickier I know this can potentially be a big issue. And a painful one.
-a new Sweaty Band. Because a girl can never have too many things that keep her hair out of her face...no matter what her husband says.
-a canister of Click Vanilla Latte protein powder...because its yummy.
-a shaker cup for making protein drinks with said protein powder.
-A box of Oskri coconut bars. I hear they're delicious and cracklike, and well I'll eat anything with coconut in it at least once. Okay, almost anything.
The protein powder is on backorder but I'll be stalking the mail for everything else over the next couple of weeks. Yaaaay stuff!
In other news, after a lovely reprieve from oppressive heat and humidity last week, its back with a vengeance. Last week's workouts looked like this:
Monday-lovely, breezy, not too hot 5 mile run. At noon. The fact that the weather was tolerable at that time of day shows how nice it really was.
Tuesday-day off, thanks to a sore right quad. Its the kind of pain that says "time for a new pair of running shoes!". Thankfully, my parents also got me a gift card to do just that for my birthday :)
Wednesday-5 miles of speedwork, in the early morning so it was extra nice out. 1 mile warm up/cool down, and 4x1200m at Lactate Threshold pace. Aka hauling ass.
Thursday-spin class at the gym. Love it.
Friday-impromptu rest day, because SOMEONE slept through her "time to get your ass out of bed and run" alarm.
Saturday- 11.5 muggy, warm miles of fun. You know its muggy when your hair is soaked in sweat after 4 miles. Ew.
Sunday-60 mins on the elliptical, to flush out the junk in my legs. They weren't happy at first but felt much better by the end.
I was planning on running this morning but got up later than I'd planned and it was freaking muggy and hot...so off to the gym I went for a couple of easy miles on the track and then spin class. I am currently resisting the urge to eat everything in my house.
So far, 30 ain't so bad...
Thursday, June 16, 2011
I like big butts and I cannot lie
Good thing too, because I feel mine expanding by the minute. Damn you, birthday funfetti cupcakes (my coworker made them for me) sitting on the shelf above my desk. I already ate THREE of you, stop calling to me! Guess who's getting her run on before spin class tonight?
I have been stuffing my face this week and it feels great...though my jeans undoubtedly will not (good thing I wear scrub pants to work, right?). Dinner out Monday, four pieces of deep dish pizza deliciousness for dinner Tuesday, a mostly healthy dinner of fish and "fried" (meaning breaded and baked) artichokes last night but oh so delicious Chipotle for lunch, and so far three yummy funfetti cupcakes down the hatch today. And we haven't even gotten to dinner yet. Or hell, Friday. Thank you baby Jeebus for spin class, and hopefully getting up for an early morning run tomorrow. And 10ish miles of fun with my running group on Saturday. Nothing says "Happy 30th Birthday to meeeee!" like getting up at the crack of dawn to run 10 miles....right? FTR, despite all my sarcasm that is exactly how I'd like to start out the Dirty 30.
Now on the other hand, I am slightly whiny about having to drive to Cincinnati later that day for my cousin's wedding. Okay, more than slightly whiny. It's not an "OMGGGGGGG how dare she have her wedding on my speshul birfdayyyyy" whine, it's an "OMGGGGGG I don't wanna drive to Cinci on my bday, I wanna go out to dinner and let my friends get me drunk instead" whine. But said cousin made the trip from Atlanta to Columbus for my wedding almost three years ago (!!!) and we have no good reason NOT to go (and no, my birthday is not a good enough reason)...so we're going. And driving back that night instead of spending the $$$ for a hotel and dogsitter because we have FIVE FREAKING WEDDINGS TO GO TO BETWEEN THIS SATURDAY AND OCTOBER. Omfg. I thought we were done with the crazy wedding summers. But no. Bless the tiny infant Jeebus, J is a groomsman in one but we're off the wedding party hook for the rest...that one and another are in town, the other three are not, but we're probably not going to one and if I go to the October one it'll be with my coworkers (since its a girl we work with that's getting married). I had to be the party pooper and say that we are NOT staying in a hotel downtown after the wedding next month (cost+making dog arrangements is a huge PITA), but something tells me after the wedding in question J is going to be drunk and want to go home to his dogs (because that's how he was after the last wedding we went to. Unfortunately, we were in Dayton and had already checked into our room, so I told him no we were NOT driving home piss drunk at 1am and waste a perfectly good hotel room. Instead, he woke me up at 7am and we were in the car headed back to Cbus by 8am. Jerk.)
So that won't be an issue. But still...bachelor/ette parties, tux, wedding gifts, shower gifts, a new dress for moi (because I neeeeeeeeed one...that isn't too tight :$), and at least one cab ride home from downtown? I think I hear my wallet crying.
Back to the state of the size of my butt. Thankfully, I've been good about not slacking and either running or going to the gym almost every day...besides Tuesday, but I was having some funny groin/quad pain and decided it was in my best interests to take that day off. Luckily it was gone by the next morning, just in time for speedwork. Yay. So my butt is not quite as big as it could be, given all the CRAP I've been eating (did I mention the cookout over the weekend, at which our chef friend made the most amazing mac and cheese ever? Of which I ate my weight in? Omfg, a.maz.ing.) Bless you, exercise gods, for keeping my weight in check.
On that note...I think I hear the cupcakes calling to me again. Kidding!
I have been stuffing my face this week and it feels great...though my jeans undoubtedly will not (good thing I wear scrub pants to work, right?). Dinner out Monday, four pieces of deep dish pizza deliciousness for dinner Tuesday, a mostly healthy dinner of fish and "fried" (meaning breaded and baked) artichokes last night but oh so delicious Chipotle for lunch, and so far three yummy funfetti cupcakes down the hatch today. And we haven't even gotten to dinner yet. Or hell, Friday. Thank you baby Jeebus for spin class, and hopefully getting up for an early morning run tomorrow. And 10ish miles of fun with my running group on Saturday. Nothing says "Happy 30th Birthday to meeeee!" like getting up at the crack of dawn to run 10 miles....right? FTR, despite all my sarcasm that is exactly how I'd like to start out the Dirty 30.
Now on the other hand, I am slightly whiny about having to drive to Cincinnati later that day for my cousin's wedding. Okay, more than slightly whiny. It's not an "OMGGGGGGG how dare she have her wedding on my speshul birfdayyyyy" whine, it's an "OMGGGGGG I don't wanna drive to Cinci on my bday, I wanna go out to dinner and let my friends get me drunk instead" whine. But said cousin made the trip from Atlanta to Columbus for my wedding almost three years ago (!!!) and we have no good reason NOT to go (and no, my birthday is not a good enough reason)...so we're going. And driving back that night instead of spending the $$$ for a hotel and dogsitter because we have FIVE FREAKING WEDDINGS TO GO TO BETWEEN THIS SATURDAY AND OCTOBER. Omfg. I thought we were done with the crazy wedding summers. But no. Bless the tiny infant Jeebus, J is a groomsman in one but we're off the wedding party hook for the rest...that one and another are in town, the other three are not, but we're probably not going to one and if I go to the October one it'll be with my coworkers (since its a girl we work with that's getting married). I had to be the party pooper and say that we are NOT staying in a hotel downtown after the wedding next month (cost+making dog arrangements is a huge PITA), but something tells me after the wedding in question J is going to be drunk and want to go home to his dogs (because that's how he was after the last wedding we went to. Unfortunately, we were in Dayton and had already checked into our room, so I told him no we were NOT driving home piss drunk at 1am and waste a perfectly good hotel room. Instead, he woke me up at 7am and we were in the car headed back to Cbus by 8am. Jerk.)
So that won't be an issue. But still...bachelor/ette parties, tux, wedding gifts, shower gifts, a new dress for moi (because I neeeeeeeeed one...that isn't too tight :$), and at least one cab ride home from downtown? I think I hear my wallet crying.
Back to the state of the size of my butt. Thankfully, I've been good about not slacking and either running or going to the gym almost every day...besides Tuesday, but I was having some funny groin/quad pain and decided it was in my best interests to take that day off. Luckily it was gone by the next morning, just in time for speedwork. Yay. So my butt is not quite as big as it could be, given all the CRAP I've been eating (did I mention the cookout over the weekend, at which our chef friend made the most amazing mac and cheese ever? Of which I ate my weight in? Omfg, a.maz.ing.) Bless you, exercise gods, for keeping my weight in check.
On that note...I think I hear the cupcakes calling to me again. Kidding!
Saturday, June 4, 2011
Ah, summer...
...aka one of the few things that can drag me out of bed at 545am on a Saturday in order to get most of a run in before it gets too hot outside. 'Cause damn it's hot. We got a break for the last few days, with low humidity and temps in the 70's but today we're right back to 90 degrees and humid. Gotta love summer in Central Ohio....right?
Or something like that.
I've been trying to get up early to either run or go to the gym because of the heat...even the gym in the evening is hot and stuffy and sweaty. "Trying" is the operative word here, because as much as I like getting my workout out of the way, I like my nice snuggly bed even more :D I'm trying, though...working out in the morning does put me in a really good mood. Maybe its the hunger, since I also want to eat everything in sight for the rest of the day. Or maybe its endorphins. Either way, I need to get back into the routine of early workouts...comfy bed be damned.
Running for shits and giggles only is feeling really nice so far. I ran 10 miles this morning because that was what I felt like running when I woke up this morning, and it felt really good. Far better than last week's hung over, beer-sweating-from-pores run, at least. Aka "what happens when you try to keep up when drinking with your spouse's 25 year old coworkers"...which I apparently cannot do anymore. I made it through my run okay, but my stomach reacted unpleasantly to the big cup of Gatorade from concentrate+hose water that I drank after the run which kept me either on the couch or trying to puke in the bathroom until almost 5pm last Saturday. Lesson learned, I guess :p And that lesson made today's run feel even better. I could get used to this!
Other than last weekend's liver abuse, not a whole lot is new. I'm still happily on my mental training break and though the itch to run the Columbus 1/2 this fall is creeping in, I'm trying to keep it under control for now. I finally got my veggies in the ground (two heirloom tomato plants, two cherry tomato plants, a red pepper, a mild hot pepper, and two cucumber plants in the garden, plus basil, cilantro, lettuce, and strawberries in containers on our deck) so right now lets just hope we don't end up overrun with tomatoes like we did last summer. The dogs are staying out of trouble (with the help of Eddie getting Benadryl 2x/day to help with what appears to be a mild environmental allergy), J's working a lot and golfing not a lot but c'est la vie. My schedule is changing at work in a week, which means I go from Thursdays off to Mondays off. This also means that J and I will both have Mondays off, and will hopefully mean we'll get the family room painted and the deck stained sooner rather than later...but yeah. We'll see how that goes. J and I both tend to be fairly lacksadasical (sp?) about house/lawn projects, which drives my dad nuts but suits us both just fine right now.
Pictures to come of the garden and some other stuff...but for now, that's all I got :)
Or something like that.
I've been trying to get up early to either run or go to the gym because of the heat...even the gym in the evening is hot and stuffy and sweaty. "Trying" is the operative word here, because as much as I like getting my workout out of the way, I like my nice snuggly bed even more :D I'm trying, though...working out in the morning does put me in a really good mood. Maybe its the hunger, since I also want to eat everything in sight for the rest of the day. Or maybe its endorphins. Either way, I need to get back into the routine of early workouts...comfy bed be damned.
Running for shits and giggles only is feeling really nice so far. I ran 10 miles this morning because that was what I felt like running when I woke up this morning, and it felt really good. Far better than last week's hung over, beer-sweating-from-pores run, at least. Aka "what happens when you try to keep up when drinking with your spouse's 25 year old coworkers"...which I apparently cannot do anymore. I made it through my run okay, but my stomach reacted unpleasantly to the big cup of Gatorade from concentrate+hose water that I drank after the run which kept me either on the couch or trying to puke in the bathroom until almost 5pm last Saturday. Lesson learned, I guess :p And that lesson made today's run feel even better. I could get used to this!
Other than last weekend's liver abuse, not a whole lot is new. I'm still happily on my mental training break and though the itch to run the Columbus 1/2 this fall is creeping in, I'm trying to keep it under control for now. I finally got my veggies in the ground (two heirloom tomato plants, two cherry tomato plants, a red pepper, a mild hot pepper, and two cucumber plants in the garden, plus basil, cilantro, lettuce, and strawberries in containers on our deck) so right now lets just hope we don't end up overrun with tomatoes like we did last summer. The dogs are staying out of trouble (with the help of Eddie getting Benadryl 2x/day to help with what appears to be a mild environmental allergy), J's working a lot and golfing not a lot but c'est la vie. My schedule is changing at work in a week, which means I go from Thursdays off to Mondays off. This also means that J and I will both have Mondays off, and will hopefully mean we'll get the family room painted and the deck stained sooner rather than later...but yeah. We'll see how that goes. J and I both tend to be fairly lacksadasical (sp?) about house/lawn projects, which drives my dad nuts but suits us both just fine right now.
Pictures to come of the garden and some other stuff...but for now, that's all I got :)
Sunday, May 22, 2011
Back at it
Ladies and gentlemen, its that time of year again.
The time of year where I have to put on sunscreen for any run starting later than 8am.
The time of year where I can kiss my insulated tights goodbye until October/Novemberish. And probably my capri tights until at least September. Oh, and my long sleeved tops and the majority of my short sleeved ones too.
The time of year when I take water with me on any run longer than four miles (if after 8am), and grab a pop to put on ice as soon as I get back (my usual post-hot run craving).
The time of year when I don't wear my wedding ring for most of my runs, because my hands usually end up swelling and it takes forever to take off.
And of course, the time of year when I come home from every run soaked in sweat.
Summertime is here, my friends.
As is tradition (heh, South Park reference for those of you who don't know), the weather in Central Ohio has practically gone straight from wet, rainy, crappy weather to 80ish degree heat. This means yard work, dogs who want to stay outside all day long (and eat junebugs all night), and making every effort to run early in the morning or late in the evening because that's the only time of day that makes it even slightly tolerable (and even then, sometimes its not tolerable).
Good thing I got the giant multipack of sunscreen at Costco last month, huh? It takes work to maintain my own personal shade of superpale skin :)
In other news, the summer/fall session of my training group started yesterday with a lovely sliiiightly warm 6 mile run (for me). I'm still leaning towards not full-tilt training for a fall race, though with being a pace coach this summer comes pacing probably a half marathon in September so I need to keep my mileage up. We'll see what happens...I'm starting to get the itch to go for a sub 1:50 half this fall again, and am trying to squelch it. Tryyyyyyying.
The local farmer's markets started up a couple of weeks ago, and I managed to go yesterday after I got done with my run. YAAAAY farmer's markets! Since its a little early in the growing season here, there was plenty of meat and cheeses and other non-produce stuff but other than a variety of veggie seedlings (some of which I'll be picking up next weekend for our garden) there wasn't a TON of produce. I managed to get some good asparagus and lettuce though, which will come in handy here :) I'm looking forward to picking up more fun stuff as more fruits and veggies become available...we're so lucky to have so many options for local produce available to us this time of year.
Enough of my ramblings, though...time to catch up on the DVR!
The time of year where I have to put on sunscreen for any run starting later than 8am.
The time of year where I can kiss my insulated tights goodbye until October/Novemberish. And probably my capri tights until at least September. Oh, and my long sleeved tops and the majority of my short sleeved ones too.
The time of year when I take water with me on any run longer than four miles (if after 8am), and grab a pop to put on ice as soon as I get back (my usual post-hot run craving).
The time of year when I don't wear my wedding ring for most of my runs, because my hands usually end up swelling and it takes forever to take off.
And of course, the time of year when I come home from every run soaked in sweat.
Summertime is here, my friends.
As is tradition (heh, South Park reference for those of you who don't know), the weather in Central Ohio has practically gone straight from wet, rainy, crappy weather to 80ish degree heat. This means yard work, dogs who want to stay outside all day long (and eat junebugs all night), and making every effort to run early in the morning or late in the evening because that's the only time of day that makes it even slightly tolerable (and even then, sometimes its not tolerable).
Good thing I got the giant multipack of sunscreen at Costco last month, huh? It takes work to maintain my own personal shade of superpale skin :)
In other news, the summer/fall session of my training group started yesterday with a lovely sliiiightly warm 6 mile run (for me). I'm still leaning towards not full-tilt training for a fall race, though with being a pace coach this summer comes pacing probably a half marathon in September so I need to keep my mileage up. We'll see what happens...I'm starting to get the itch to go for a sub 1:50 half this fall again, and am trying to squelch it. Tryyyyyyying.
The local farmer's markets started up a couple of weeks ago, and I managed to go yesterday after I got done with my run. YAAAAY farmer's markets! Since its a little early in the growing season here, there was plenty of meat and cheeses and other non-produce stuff but other than a variety of veggie seedlings (some of which I'll be picking up next weekend for our garden) there wasn't a TON of produce. I managed to get some good asparagus and lettuce though, which will come in handy here :) I'm looking forward to picking up more fun stuff as more fruits and veggies become available...we're so lucky to have so many options for local produce available to us this time of year.
Enough of my ramblings, though...time to catch up on the DVR!
Sunday, May 8, 2011
Race Report-Capital City Half Marathon
Aka "Lessons Learned". But first, lets go back to the beginning...
The Expo-great. Not too big or difficult to navigate, and no crazy lines (though this may have been due to the fact that I went less than an hour after it opened, when lots of people were still at work). Plus, getting my corral assignment changed (insert ominous music here) was no problem. There were some great sales on running gear and I could have blown a ton of money but managed to limit myself to a few headbands (Chica Bands, which are pretty similar to Sweaty Bands) and a shirt (in addition to the below race shirt, which is pretty nice).
The night before the race was uneventful. I picked up some mini chicken gyros from Greek Express (mmm, drool), came home, ate, hung out, and got my stuff laid out for the next morning.
The sticker next to my number refers to my changed corral assignment. I was feeling ambitious and got switched to a faster corral. Cue more ominous music.
I slept pretty well, and was up on time in the morning. Hit a little bit of traffic getting to where I wanted to park, but nothing major. Found my training group's meeting place, got my bag put in the truck to get taken down to the tent set up in the finish area, and headed over with a girl from my training group that I know from our speed workouts. She was in the same corral as me (her goal was a 1:45 finish, mine was sub 1:50) so we walked over to the start, found our corral, and got situated closer to the start than I've ever been. Which was kind of scary, but super exciting at the same time. We started right at 8am, and off we went!
Cue that ominous music again.
The first four miles were fab...I was rocking 8:00/mile pace, which was faster than I'd planned on running but I was feeling good so it would be fine. Right?
Wrong.
At about mile 5, my legs ran out of gas...hardcore. So I slowed my pace, which helped for a little while, but eventually I had to suck it up and do the unthinkable (for me, at least). I slowed to a walk for a bit. Less than 1/10 of a mile, but still. I was hoping that this short walk break would miraculously restore all the juice to my legs, but alas...it was not to be. I spent the rest of the break taking a short walk break or two each mile, as the fatigue in my legs (specifically, my quads, got worse and worse). Even at a slower pace, it was like my legs forgot all the training I had done over the last four months. And it sucked.
My chip time, however, was not as bad as I thought it would be. 1:57:22. Which is not my best time (1:52:xx, fall 2010) and not my worst (2:07:xx, spring 2010), and certainly not sub 1:50...but that's okay.
I do have to say, the race itself was awesome. The start and finish areas were extremely well organized, the hydration stations were plentiful and very well staffed, and the crowd support was awesome. My favorite signs were from the staff of the local Lululemon store...the only one I remember off the top of my head was the one that said "Don't poop.....out" but they all gave me a much needed chuckle.
So, lessons I learned? The biggest one, of course, is DON'T GO OUT TOO FAST. A little ambition can be a good thing, but too much ambition is not and will come back to bite you in the ass. This was likely the biggest contributor to my undoing yesterday.
The other thing I learned is that apparently I was not as well hydrated as I thought I was. I stuck to my usual routine of stopping for water at every other water stop (which in this case worked out to every other mile) and taking my Shot Bloks around mile 7, but with the slightly warmer than I would have liked temps yesterday it (and the hydrating I did in the days leading up to the race) apparently wasn't enough. After the race, I didn't feel horrible but I felt very bleh. A couple of bottles of water helped, as did some Gatorade when I got home, but I noticed that even after taking a shower my face felt dry and tight like it does when I'm hung over...and therefore dehydrated. So if I felt like that AFTER bottles of water and Gatorade, I'm thinking that I was more dehydrated during the race than I realized.
Overall, yesterday was a huge reminder that your training can go great, you can think you're doing everything right, and it can still all fall apart come race day. But in the end, you survive, and you learn. And sometimes, you get a big.ass.medal out of the deal. I mean, LOOK at this thing! (and forgive the fact that the picture's upside down, please)
So, what's next? A lot of taking it easy and getting back to running for the hell of it and not because my training program says I'm supposed to run x miles on x day. More biking and swimming, and enjoying my summer :) I'm still planning on sticking to my "not training for a fall race" mantra, but admittedly after the way yesterday's race went I can feel my resolve waning juuuuuuuust a teeny bit. So we'll see what happens...
Tuesday, May 3, 2011
La di da
Me=bored. Take one day off work for a funeral and apparently the next day goes to crap. I've seen four patients all day. FOUR. And will probably only see one more. Blech.
Want to know what else is crap?
This weather. April showers, fine. But WTF, nothing but rain so far in the month of May? Though I guess I should count my blessings that so far, the forecast for my race on Saturday is looking to be decent.
Yeah, that's right...my race is SATURDAY. Holy crap.
And I'm ready...I think. At least, I'm as ready as I'll ever be. So bring it onnnnn!
Want to know what else is crap?
This weather. April showers, fine. But WTF, nothing but rain so far in the month of May? Though I guess I should count my blessings that so far, the forecast for my race on Saturday is looking to be decent.
Yeah, that's right...my race is SATURDAY. Holy crap.
And I'm ready...I think. At least, I'm as ready as I'll ever be. So bring it onnnnn!
Tuesday, April 19, 2011
Ten on Tuesday
A local forum I post on often has "Ten on Tuesday" posts, where the posters list pretty much the first 10 things that pop into their heads. I'm sitting here killing time and watching DVRed Army Wives b/c J's poker night is going on upstairs, so I decided to have Ten on Tuesday riiiight here. So here goes...
1. I managed to get a good solid 5 mile run in this evening WITHOUT getting rained on! Considering the craptastic rainy weather we've had since about 3am today, this is a miracle.
2. One day shy of two months left in my twenties...yikes!
3. And I'm plotting to ask my mom and dad to get me the new Verizon iPhone for my birthday. Yeah, I'm asking my parents to buy their kid a new cell phone for her birthday. Her 30th birthday. Don't hate, appreciate!
4. J and I NEED to get going on getting the family room painted...real bad. Its depressing, how much I hate the current paint color.
5. On that note, we need to get on getting our veggie garden planted and flowerbed mulching done. Oh, and staining the deck.
6. I'm so excited to get the veggie garden done-buying fresh, organic produce at the store is expensive and growing it myself is way better.
7. And the farmer's markets will be starting up soon, so whatever I don't have the room or expertise to grow myself I can buy at the market. Along with yummy cheese and meat :D
8. We need to get back into the routine of walking the Terrible Twosome every day (or almost every day). We started slacking off this winter, once we realized they didn't HAVE to be walked that often anymore.
9. I need to get Eddie's right rear leg checked out-he definitely tweaked it wrestling with Georgie yesterday and limped for a few minutes after, but I think I've caught him limping on and off for the last week or so. I might just be paranoid, but either way I want to make sure my wee man is okay :(
10. Getting my hairs did on Thursday! Cut and color, here I come :D
1. I managed to get a good solid 5 mile run in this evening WITHOUT getting rained on! Considering the craptastic rainy weather we've had since about 3am today, this is a miracle.
2. One day shy of two months left in my twenties...yikes!
3. And I'm plotting to ask my mom and dad to get me the new Verizon iPhone for my birthday. Yeah, I'm asking my parents to buy their kid a new cell phone for her birthday. Her 30th birthday. Don't hate, appreciate!
4. J and I NEED to get going on getting the family room painted...real bad. Its depressing, how much I hate the current paint color.
5. On that note, we need to get on getting our veggie garden planted and flowerbed mulching done. Oh, and staining the deck.
6. I'm so excited to get the veggie garden done-buying fresh, organic produce at the store is expensive and growing it myself is way better.
7. And the farmer's markets will be starting up soon, so whatever I don't have the room or expertise to grow myself I can buy at the market. Along with yummy cheese and meat :D
8. We need to get back into the routine of walking the Terrible Twosome every day (or almost every day). We started slacking off this winter, once we realized they didn't HAVE to be walked that often anymore.
9. I need to get Eddie's right rear leg checked out-he definitely tweaked it wrestling with Georgie yesterday and limped for a few minutes after, but I think I've caught him limping on and off for the last week or so. I might just be paranoid, but either way I want to make sure my wee man is okay :(
10. Getting my hairs did on Thursday! Cut and color, here I come :D
Saturday, April 16, 2011
Close calls...
Omg figured out how to keep this from being one long paragraph! YAY!
...we had one today.
By "we", I mean the crapton of people both in my training group and otherwise who needed to get their run on this morning. You see, the meteorologists here in lovely Central Ohio have been predicting nothing but high winds and heavy rain for us, starting last night and continuing through late tonight. The thought of this made me want to puke, as I hate running in heavy rain even more than running in the cold.
However, what did we get?
A brief spurt of heavy rain last night, some wind and rain during the night...and besides that, not a whole lot. The odd sprinkle here and there, but we actually saw the SUN for roughly the first half of todays 12 mile run and for that, I am so grateful. Mother Nature actually came through this morning...hopefully she keeps it up in a few weeks for my half marathon!
This morning's run actually went pretty well. I was only supposed to do 11 miles but was feeling pretty good so I decided to do the extra mile with the rest of my group. Today was a progressive run, meaning starting around mile 6 we gradually increased our pace and finished miles 9 and 10 at around 8:45/mile pace. My legs were heavy at first so I was kind of worried about how things would go but thankfully I was able to shake the sludge out and kick it into gear :) Plus, I haven't heard a peep out of my right calf/shin in a couple of weeks so hooray!
As excited as I am about my upcoming race, I think at this point I'm even more excited for the break I'm taking from training. As in, not planning on training for a fall race. I'm not taking a break from running or anything silly like that, but I need to shift my focus-to rounding out my fitness abilities a little more with biking and swimming, and to actually putting some sort of strength training program in place. Plus, I signed up to be a coach for the 10 min/mile group through my training group for a handful of local races this summer/fall/winter so that'll give me something to look forward to as well as an opportunity to NOT focus in setting new PRs.
Overall, though, the biggest reason is that training for a certain time goal can be freaking exhausting. Needing to hit certain paces during speedwork and on shorter runs, making sure to get your mileage in each week without overtraining, fueling properly, resting enough but not too much, etc. It can get old after a while...for me and for J. He tries to be patient and supportive, but its hard when your perspective is different. He's not a runner and never has been, which is fine by me...but its hard for him to understand why I'm up and out the door by 7:30am every Saturday morning instead of sleeping in with him, and why I've been putting myself through punishing speed workouts every Wednesday night instead of coming home to spend time with him. And its hard to explain. J feels like I'm choosing running over him, but I feel like I'm trying to keep balance between things I enjoy. But I know that while I'm chasing this sub 1:50 HM goal, its going to be more difficult to really balance and really enjoy everything that I'm trying to balance and enjoy. So after this HM, its time to take a break and run for the hell of it...whether I run a sub 1:50 or not.
But that's enough of that. Now, time to enjoy this lovely lazy Saturday afternoon with the Terrible Twosome :)
...we had one today.
By "we", I mean the crapton of people both in my training group and otherwise who needed to get their run on this morning. You see, the meteorologists here in lovely Central Ohio have been predicting nothing but high winds and heavy rain for us, starting last night and continuing through late tonight. The thought of this made me want to puke, as I hate running in heavy rain even more than running in the cold.
However, what did we get?
A brief spurt of heavy rain last night, some wind and rain during the night...and besides that, not a whole lot. The odd sprinkle here and there, but we actually saw the SUN for roughly the first half of todays 12 mile run and for that, I am so grateful. Mother Nature actually came through this morning...hopefully she keeps it up in a few weeks for my half marathon!
This morning's run actually went pretty well. I was only supposed to do 11 miles but was feeling pretty good so I decided to do the extra mile with the rest of my group. Today was a progressive run, meaning starting around mile 6 we gradually increased our pace and finished miles 9 and 10 at around 8:45/mile pace. My legs were heavy at first so I was kind of worried about how things would go but thankfully I was able to shake the sludge out and kick it into gear :) Plus, I haven't heard a peep out of my right calf/shin in a couple of weeks so hooray!
As excited as I am about my upcoming race, I think at this point I'm even more excited for the break I'm taking from training. As in, not planning on training for a fall race. I'm not taking a break from running or anything silly like that, but I need to shift my focus-to rounding out my fitness abilities a little more with biking and swimming, and to actually putting some sort of strength training program in place. Plus, I signed up to be a coach for the 10 min/mile group through my training group for a handful of local races this summer/fall/winter so that'll give me something to look forward to as well as an opportunity to NOT focus in setting new PRs.
Overall, though, the biggest reason is that training for a certain time goal can be freaking exhausting. Needing to hit certain paces during speedwork and on shorter runs, making sure to get your mileage in each week without overtraining, fueling properly, resting enough but not too much, etc. It can get old after a while...for me and for J. He tries to be patient and supportive, but its hard when your perspective is different. He's not a runner and never has been, which is fine by me...but its hard for him to understand why I'm up and out the door by 7:30am every Saturday morning instead of sleeping in with him, and why I've been putting myself through punishing speed workouts every Wednesday night instead of coming home to spend time with him. And its hard to explain. J feels like I'm choosing running over him, but I feel like I'm trying to keep balance between things I enjoy. But I know that while I'm chasing this sub 1:50 HM goal, its going to be more difficult to really balance and really enjoy everything that I'm trying to balance and enjoy. So after this HM, its time to take a break and run for the hell of it...whether I run a sub 1:50 or not.
But that's enough of that. Now, time to enjoy this lovely lazy Saturday afternoon with the Terrible Twosome :)
Tuesday, April 12, 2011
Judgement
There are judges (as in, "Your Honor" judges). Judgment calls. Using your best judgment. And a theme that I've seen brought up in more than one forum that I frequent...people who judge others. AKA Judgy Mc Judgersons. Now, don't tell me you NEVER judge others about anything. That's a load of BS and we all know it. We judge based on superficial, "outside" characteristics-hair, clothing, weight, car, where someone lives, what we read, etc. We judge based on more personal, "inside" characteristics-political/religious beliefs (though for some religions, this could also be considered an outside characteristic based on required clothing items), sexual orientation, what childrearing decisions people make (aka the Mommy Wars), where we grew up, etc. Some judge others within the same "group" as them-people at church, or the gym, or school, or work, or who share the same hobby as you (running is the example I'm going to use). I fully admit to people watching at the gym and raising my eyebrows at certain things-usually either the guys who think they're hot shit because they drop their weights on the ground after a deadlife and make a noise that causes half the gym to jump out of their skin, or girls that come in clearly to be seen and not to work out. (Please note-yes, I go to the gym after work and do not wash my makeup off beforehand. Those who do something similar are not who I'm talking about. Those who clearly have not come straight from work but rather put on a bunch of makeup just to work out at 9am are who I'm talking about.). From a running standpoint, I've encountered those who have very specific criteria for who and who is not a "real runner" and judge the hell out of anyone they deem NOT a "real runner". (Views on what makes/doesn't make a "real runner" and whatthefuck a "real runner" is anyway will be a topic for another day). For example, you're not a "real runner" if you: haven't completed a marathon (without walking), or can't maintain a certain pace, or don't own a Garmin or other GPS watch, or prefer to wear cotton t shirts to "tech" shirts. Some may find this ridiculous (personally, I do), and some may agree. The more I think about it, the more I find myself asking "Why?" Why do we feel the need to judge others? To feel better about ourselves? To feel like we understand someone better, even when that someone is a perfect stranger? Because we were raised with preconceived notions about certain groups of people? Human nature? I don't know, but I don't like it. Ideas, anyone? And OMFG what is UP with this formatting issue?! I swear, this was not one long paragraph when I started it! Sorry :(
Saturday, April 2, 2011
5 weeks to go!
Zomg, sorry for the huge runon paragraph. I swear when I typed this post there were paragraphs, but I've edited twice and its still not cooperating! >:( ('til race day) and I'm slowly but surely getting excited. There's a lot to get through before then-more speedwork and two long runs (11 and 12 miles), one cutback week (next Saturday, 5 miles), and then taper time after the 12 miler. Which is a run that I'm still trying to figure out how the heck I'm going to get done, since the day I'm supposed to do it is the same day as my cousin's bridal shower. In Cincinnati. And the next day is Easter. So right now its looking like I'm going to be joining the early crowd at running group this morning, and crossing my fingers that my mom doesn't want to leave before 10am :$ This past week, training looked like THIS: Sunday-rest Monday-3 miles easy Tuesday-5 miles at a pace faster than easy, but not goal pace Weds-Speedwork. 8x800 Yasso 800 style, with 1 mile each warm up and cooldown. I still can't believe I survived all 8. Thurs-spin class Fri-4 miles easy Sat-10 miles mostly easy, with picking up the pace for the last 2-3 miles. My shin has been pretty well behaved, and my calf discomfort tolerable (without ibuprofen) to nonexistent (with ibuprofen). Yeah, I've been popping a couple of ibuprofen before long runs to manage the discomfort...at this point, its so mild that doing this keeps it at bay completely during the run, and it doesn't come back once the ibuprofen has worn off. Even during speedwork on Weds, the discomfort minus ibuprofen was pretty minor and nowhere near what it was for a couple of weeks so hopefully I can keep this managed through the race. In other news...lets see here. Well, there's not much. Things have been blessedly quiet around here, which is never a bad thing. Especially since springtime means yard work and house projects...yay? I'd better enjoy this quiet time while I have it! :) And yeah...Grey's Anatomy? No more musical episodes, please. I just watched Thursday's ep (thank you DVR) and, uh, that was weird. Please, stop the madness.
Saturday, March 26, 2011
Or, maybe not...
Last weekend, we enjoyed some glorious 60+ degree weather.
Now? Not so much. Insane hail on Wednesday, a dusting of snow when I woke up Thursday morning...now, THAT'S spring in Central Ohio for you. And here I was thinking I'd be able to retire the insulated tights soon. Notsomuch.
Said tights got busted out for a chilly 10 mile run with my training group this morning. After not being able to go for various reasons over the last few weeks, it was nice to run with people again. Even though we did some crazy hills. Stupid hills :D Thankfully, my shin/calf decided to behave itself, and other than the hills the run was actually fairly pleasant.
This week's training looked something like this...
Sunday-3 miles easy. I think. Last Sunday was a while ago...maybe I should start writing this all down?
Monday-rest.
Tuesday-3 miles easy. Supposed to be 5 miles but I added length to...
Wednesday-Speedwork. 1 mile warmup, 2 miles at goal pace (roughly 8:15/mile), 1 min rest, 2 miles at tempo (7:45-8:00/mile), 1 min rest, 1 mile at goal pace, 1 mile of strides (at the gym, this meant pick up the pace for half a lap on the track, slow down for half a lap. 8 reps+1 lap coolwdown=1 mile), .5 mile cooldown (I know I can't skimp on the cooldown but I was running the risk of being late for work). The original plan was for that last 2 mile block to both be at goal pace THEN 6-8 strides but I didn't have time so I had to adjust. Calf was twingy but otherwise okay.
Thursday-5 miles easy. Calf/shin felt the best it had in a while. Could I be on the mend?
Friday-rest
Saturday-10 mile long run, at 9:30/mile pace. With some fun hills :$ Calf/shin=still pretty good. Hooray!
Other than that, not much is going on. Ohio State's men's basketball team lost last night, which meant one very cranky husband...thankfully, he seems to be over it now. We're now rooting for Kansas and Butler :) This spring/summer is shaping up to be pretty busy, so we're enjoying the down time while we have it.
6ish weeks 'til race day!
Now? Not so much. Insane hail on Wednesday, a dusting of snow when I woke up Thursday morning...now, THAT'S spring in Central Ohio for you. And here I was thinking I'd be able to retire the insulated tights soon. Notsomuch.
Said tights got busted out for a chilly 10 mile run with my training group this morning. After not being able to go for various reasons over the last few weeks, it was nice to run with people again. Even though we did some crazy hills. Stupid hills :D Thankfully, my shin/calf decided to behave itself, and other than the hills the run was actually fairly pleasant.
This week's training looked something like this...
Sunday-3 miles easy. I think. Last Sunday was a while ago...maybe I should start writing this all down?
Monday-rest.
Tuesday-3 miles easy. Supposed to be 5 miles but I added length to...
Wednesday-Speedwork. 1 mile warmup, 2 miles at goal pace (roughly 8:15/mile), 1 min rest, 2 miles at tempo (7:45-8:00/mile), 1 min rest, 1 mile at goal pace, 1 mile of strides (at the gym, this meant pick up the pace for half a lap on the track, slow down for half a lap. 8 reps+1 lap coolwdown=1 mile), .5 mile cooldown (I know I can't skimp on the cooldown but I was running the risk of being late for work). The original plan was for that last 2 mile block to both be at goal pace THEN 6-8 strides but I didn't have time so I had to adjust. Calf was twingy but otherwise okay.
Thursday-5 miles easy. Calf/shin felt the best it had in a while. Could I be on the mend?
Friday-rest
Saturday-10 mile long run, at 9:30/mile pace. With some fun hills :$ Calf/shin=still pretty good. Hooray!
Other than that, not much is going on. Ohio State's men's basketball team lost last night, which meant one very cranky husband...thankfully, he seems to be over it now. We're now rooting for Kansas and Butler :) This spring/summer is shaping up to be pretty busy, so we're enjoying the down time while we have it.
6ish weeks 'til race day!
Sunday, March 20, 2011
Happy first day of spring!
...especially since the first day of spring=free regular ice day at Rita's! Needless to say, stopping by there on my way home from the store was a must. They didn't have my favorite (Sugar free cherry) but did have my second favorite (SF Tangerine, which tastes like an orange popsicle) so I'll take what I can get :)
We've been rocking some seriously nice weather in Columbus lately. A few rain sprinkles on Friday but other than that its been gorgeous since at least...Wednesday? Unfortunately, I spent a solid 8ish hours Thursday/Friday/Saturday at a speech/language conference here in town...but I still got in a couple of decent runs (Thursday and Saturday) and a fab spin class (Thurs AM) so I can't complain. Plus, the conference was located at a big shopping/dining complex here in town, and I got to have lunch/dinners with some good friends from work and a couple of old friends from grad school so between all that and the fact that I'm good to go on continuing ed hours for the year, it's all good.
I got the chance to try out a couple of awesome restaurants while I was at this conference. Thursday's lunch with my dad was at Bon Vie, which is a French-style restaurant. I'm a sucker for seared ahi tuna, so their appetizer containing such yumminess was right up my alley. On Friday, some coworkers and I ended up at Northstar Cafe, a local chain that emphasizes organic ingredients and serves sodas with pure cane sugar (as opposed to high fructose corn syrup or artificial sweetners)-their tomato and cheese flatbread (aka cheese pizza) was fantastic, as was what my coworkers had. Aaaaaand dinner on Friday with two good friends from grad school was at Restaurant Hama, a Japanese restaurant I didn't even know existed until J & L pointed it out to me. Wine+edamame+four different types of sushi rolls (plus one that I took home to the hubs)+raspberry marscapone for dessert=perfect end to the evening.
I did miss another group run with my training group Saturday morning, making it three in a row I've missed...but thankfully this was a dropback week for me (meaning I only had to run 4 miles instead of 9 like last week/next week) so not a huge deal. My shin/calf are starting to feel better-still a little twingy for the first mile or so of a run but will usually stop after that. I hope this keeps up, I've got less than 2 months 'til go time!
Now, time to kick it with some beers and watch Ohio State continue to beat up on George Mason...Go Bucks!
We've been rocking some seriously nice weather in Columbus lately. A few rain sprinkles on Friday but other than that its been gorgeous since at least...Wednesday? Unfortunately, I spent a solid 8ish hours Thursday/Friday/Saturday at a speech/language conference here in town...but I still got in a couple of decent runs (Thursday and Saturday) and a fab spin class (Thurs AM) so I can't complain. Plus, the conference was located at a big shopping/dining complex here in town, and I got to have lunch/dinners with some good friends from work and a couple of old friends from grad school so between all that and the fact that I'm good to go on continuing ed hours for the year, it's all good.
I got the chance to try out a couple of awesome restaurants while I was at this conference. Thursday's lunch with my dad was at Bon Vie, which is a French-style restaurant. I'm a sucker for seared ahi tuna, so their appetizer containing such yumminess was right up my alley. On Friday, some coworkers and I ended up at Northstar Cafe, a local chain that emphasizes organic ingredients and serves sodas with pure cane sugar (as opposed to high fructose corn syrup or artificial sweetners)-their tomato and cheese flatbread (aka cheese pizza) was fantastic, as was what my coworkers had. Aaaaaand dinner on Friday with two good friends from grad school was at Restaurant Hama, a Japanese restaurant I didn't even know existed until J & L pointed it out to me. Wine+edamame+four different types of sushi rolls (plus one that I took home to the hubs)+raspberry marscapone for dessert=perfect end to the evening.
I did miss another group run with my training group Saturday morning, making it three in a row I've missed...but thankfully this was a dropback week for me (meaning I only had to run 4 miles instead of 9 like last week/next week) so not a huge deal. My shin/calf are starting to feel better-still a little twingy for the first mile or so of a run but will usually stop after that. I hope this keeps up, I've got less than 2 months 'til go time!
Now, time to kick it with some beers and watch Ohio State continue to beat up on George Mason...Go Bucks!
Saturday, March 12, 2011
Holy crap, is that...
SUNSHINE?! No, it can't be!
Oh but it is, my friends. The SUN has returrrrrrrrrrrrrrrned to Central Ohio! (Five packets of GU will be in the mail to you if you can tell me who I'm imitating with that last line-if no one guesses I'll tell you the next time I post. I got a free case of the stuff for signing up for a full year of my training group before a certain date and am looking to unload some of it-there's a variety of flavors too, I'll let you pick :D)
Now, back to matters at hand. The sun. You see, Central Ohio has seen pretty much nothing but rain rain rain for the last week. Oh, and some snow Thursday night/Friday morning that thankfully didn't stick to the roads and was totally melted by the time I left work last night. So you can imagine how happy I was when I got up this AM (later than planned, more on that in a sec) to sunshine and reasonable temps! And by reasonable, I mean "ran five miles comfortably in a short sleeved top and shorts" reasonable. Why only five, you ask? No, not a cutback week...I signed up for a 4 mile St. Patrick's Day race near my house that's going on this evening, so I did 5 miles this morning instead of my planned 9. This way I'll still have 9 for the day, just not at once...which thankfully will not mess with my training at this point.
So yeah, I overslept this morning. Meaning I missed Bart Yasso's talk (which I believe I posted about in my last post, if I didn't...he gave a talk at Ohio State today) and my group run. Again. And am missing my group run next week thanks to a conference I'm going to Thursday/Friday/Saturday. It's in Columbus which is good, but starts at like 8am. So no running group for me next weekend. If I had to oversleep any Saturday, though, this was a good one to do it since I was only planning on running 5 miles this morning. I do runs of that length from my house all the time, and have an out and back route that I know extremely well. If I'd had 9 miles planned...I would not be as "meh" about oversleeping. I guess my body was trying to tell me something.
Speaking of my body...it's falling apart, I swear. First, shin splints/sore right calf. Neither of which have gotten worse, but aren't feeling great either. With ice, stretching/foam rolling, and ibuprofen, though, they're manageable. Now, my lower back is bugging me. Kind of like it does when I'm sitting in the car for more than 2 hours at a time, or sit in a movie theater seat for a really long movie. I kind of forget about the pain until I go to stand up from whatever chair I'm sitting in, and then it hits me. This came up suddenly last Saturday morning, so I figure I must have twisted something in my sleep. I'm trying to gently stretch it when I can because that actually makes things feel better, and crossing my fingers that it goes away. On the upside, it doesn't hurt when I run. Because there's gotta be an upside, right?
Let's see, what else is going on? Oooh I know....MARCH MADNESS! I get excited about this no matter if Ohio State's got a chance or not, and they might actually have a decent chance this year. Depending on who's in their bracket and how they play, that is. Either way, this is a fun time in our house...lots of obsessing over brackets, smacktalking, and beer drinking. Speaking of which-when J realized that I was going to be at my conference all day next Friday while he's off work to watch lots of basketball, the first words out of his mouth were "Oh boy, I'm gonna be so drunk when you get home." Nice. I may run home at lunch that day, pick him up, and drop him off at a sports bar near where my conference is (a huge shopping/dining area in Columbus, so there will be plenty of options) otherwise he could be in rough shape by the time I get home. Lord, give me strength...
So, that's what's going on in my world. Happy Springtime (and hooray for the impending return of Daylight Savings Time, and my ability to run after work!)
Oh but it is, my friends. The SUN has returrrrrrrrrrrrrrrned to Central Ohio! (Five packets of GU will be in the mail to you if you can tell me who I'm imitating with that last line-if no one guesses I'll tell you the next time I post. I got a free case of the stuff for signing up for a full year of my training group before a certain date and am looking to unload some of it-there's a variety of flavors too, I'll let you pick :D)
Now, back to matters at hand. The sun. You see, Central Ohio has seen pretty much nothing but rain rain rain for the last week. Oh, and some snow Thursday night/Friday morning that thankfully didn't stick to the roads and was totally melted by the time I left work last night. So you can imagine how happy I was when I got up this AM (later than planned, more on that in a sec) to sunshine and reasonable temps! And by reasonable, I mean "ran five miles comfortably in a short sleeved top and shorts" reasonable. Why only five, you ask? No, not a cutback week...I signed up for a 4 mile St. Patrick's Day race near my house that's going on this evening, so I did 5 miles this morning instead of my planned 9. This way I'll still have 9 for the day, just not at once...which thankfully will not mess with my training at this point.
So yeah, I overslept this morning. Meaning I missed Bart Yasso's talk (which I believe I posted about in my last post, if I didn't...he gave a talk at Ohio State today) and my group run. Again. And am missing my group run next week thanks to a conference I'm going to Thursday/Friday/Saturday. It's in Columbus which is good, but starts at like 8am. So no running group for me next weekend. If I had to oversleep any Saturday, though, this was a good one to do it since I was only planning on running 5 miles this morning. I do runs of that length from my house all the time, and have an out and back route that I know extremely well. If I'd had 9 miles planned...I would not be as "meh" about oversleeping. I guess my body was trying to tell me something.
Speaking of my body...it's falling apart, I swear. First, shin splints/sore right calf. Neither of which have gotten worse, but aren't feeling great either. With ice, stretching/foam rolling, and ibuprofen, though, they're manageable. Now, my lower back is bugging me. Kind of like it does when I'm sitting in the car for more than 2 hours at a time, or sit in a movie theater seat for a really long movie. I kind of forget about the pain until I go to stand up from whatever chair I'm sitting in, and then it hits me. This came up suddenly last Saturday morning, so I figure I must have twisted something in my sleep. I'm trying to gently stretch it when I can because that actually makes things feel better, and crossing my fingers that it goes away. On the upside, it doesn't hurt when I run. Because there's gotta be an upside, right?
Let's see, what else is going on? Oooh I know....MARCH MADNESS! I get excited about this no matter if Ohio State's got a chance or not, and they might actually have a decent chance this year. Depending on who's in their bracket and how they play, that is. Either way, this is a fun time in our house...lots of obsessing over brackets, smacktalking, and beer drinking. Speaking of which-when J realized that I was going to be at my conference all day next Friday while he's off work to watch lots of basketball, the first words out of his mouth were "Oh boy, I'm gonna be so drunk when you get home." Nice. I may run home at lunch that day, pick him up, and drop him off at a sports bar near where my conference is (a huge shopping/dining area in Columbus, so there will be plenty of options) otherwise he could be in rough shape by the time I get home. Lord, give me strength...
So, that's what's going on in my world. Happy Springtime (and hooray for the impending return of Daylight Savings Time, and my ability to run after work!)
Tuesday, March 8, 2011
Omgggggggg....
...am I on sugar overload. J and I inhaled three boxes of Girl Scout cookies (1 each of Samoas, Tagalongs, and Do-si-dos) in less than 48 hours, which is a new record for us. I also ate my weight in fancy chocolate last night and in chocolate Easter candy (Cadbury Creme Egg and a coconut cream egg) today in preparation for...Ash Wednesday. Aka the day I give up chocolate. 'Til Easter Sunday, approximately six weeks or so away. Eeep.
Back to the fancy chocolates, though. Two of the postrace goodies for the half I'm doing in May are apparently pink champagne and fancy chocolates. Like, pretty colored and shaped chocolates. Since my training group is in partnership with this race, we got to sample the pink champagne and fancy chocolates after our Mardi Gras fun run last night. Yes, you heard me. Mardi Gras. Think beads (which did not annoy me too badly), masks (which I refused to wear), and glow sticks (because it was dark out). You could go as long as you wanted (I went 4 miles) and as fast as you wanted (which ended up averaging 8:45/mile pace, not too shabby), and whenever you got back there would be bubbly and pretty yummies waiting for you. Why can't every run be like that?
Speaking of running, let me tell you what's not fun. Running 72 laps (aka 8 miles) around the track at the gym. "Why did you do this, silly girl?" you ask? Three words-torrential f'ing downpours. Which is what I woke up to Saturday morning. I could have sucked it up and gone to my group run. I SHOULD have sucked it up and gone to my group run. But I didn't. I went to the gym instead. And learned that it IS possible to survive 72 laps. And that those laps are much easier with quick water/calf stretching breaks every 2 miles (aka 18 laps).
Yeah, you heard that right. Calf stretching breaks. I think I may have a combo of a mild right calf strain+mild shin splints. So I'm stretching the hell out of both and icing whenever I can, and things seem to be feeling better. Lesson learned? Before you leave the house for a long run, make sure the shoes you're wearing are your most recent pair. And not the pair you replaced six months ago. Whoops :$
One more running geek moment, I promise. If you're not a running geek, stop reading now.
I get to go hear Bart Yasso (aka the Chief Running Officer at Runner's World) talk on Saturday! He's giving a talk at Ohio State that's organized by the running store that my training group is sponsored by so its all I've been hearing about for the last month. I figure it should be an interesting talk, since Bart's done all sorts of cool stuff. I'm going to try to squeeze in part of my long run beforehand-I'm planning on running a 4 mile race Saturday evening, so my morning run will probably only be 5 miles since I need to do 9 total this weekend. We'll see what happens.
On the food front, I am back to buckling down. Weight is starting to creep on again and I don't like it. Maybe its the extra rest I've been doing thanks to my shin/calf issues. Maybe its the rainy weather. More likely, it's probably due to the fact that Cadbury Creme Eggs are now everywhere I look (at the grocery, anyway). Either way, this shit has got to stop. Veggies, I'm coming for you...
Last week's training:
Monday: a miserable mile on the track at the gym. Was supposed to be three but got cut short due to shin pain. Went home and iced instead.
Tuesday: rest
Weds: Shin felt better so I attempted speedwork. 1 mile warm, 2 miles at tempo, 1 min rest, 2 miles at lactate threshold (aka approx 15 sec/mile faster than tempo), 1 min rest, 2 miles at tempo, 1 min rest, 1 mile cooldown. My shin/calf did not hate me. YAY!
Thurs: Spin class. Oh, how I missed spin class.
Fri: Rest
Saturday: 72 laps (aka 8 miles) of long run fun on the track at the gym, thanks to Mother Nature.
Sunday: Rest. And by rest, I mean sheer laziness.
2 months 'til the race...yeeha!
Back to the fancy chocolates, though. Two of the postrace goodies for the half I'm doing in May are apparently pink champagne and fancy chocolates. Like, pretty colored and shaped chocolates. Since my training group is in partnership with this race, we got to sample the pink champagne and fancy chocolates after our Mardi Gras fun run last night. Yes, you heard me. Mardi Gras. Think beads (which did not annoy me too badly), masks (which I refused to wear), and glow sticks (because it was dark out). You could go as long as you wanted (I went 4 miles) and as fast as you wanted (which ended up averaging 8:45/mile pace, not too shabby), and whenever you got back there would be bubbly and pretty yummies waiting for you. Why can't every run be like that?
Speaking of running, let me tell you what's not fun. Running 72 laps (aka 8 miles) around the track at the gym. "Why did you do this, silly girl?" you ask? Three words-torrential f'ing downpours. Which is what I woke up to Saturday morning. I could have sucked it up and gone to my group run. I SHOULD have sucked it up and gone to my group run. But I didn't. I went to the gym instead. And learned that it IS possible to survive 72 laps. And that those laps are much easier with quick water/calf stretching breaks every 2 miles (aka 18 laps).
Yeah, you heard that right. Calf stretching breaks. I think I may have a combo of a mild right calf strain+mild shin splints. So I'm stretching the hell out of both and icing whenever I can, and things seem to be feeling better. Lesson learned? Before you leave the house for a long run, make sure the shoes you're wearing are your most recent pair. And not the pair you replaced six months ago. Whoops :$
One more running geek moment, I promise. If you're not a running geek, stop reading now.
I get to go hear Bart Yasso (aka the Chief Running Officer at Runner's World) talk on Saturday! He's giving a talk at Ohio State that's organized by the running store that my training group is sponsored by so its all I've been hearing about for the last month. I figure it should be an interesting talk, since Bart's done all sorts of cool stuff. I'm going to try to squeeze in part of my long run beforehand-I'm planning on running a 4 mile race Saturday evening, so my morning run will probably only be 5 miles since I need to do 9 total this weekend. We'll see what happens.
On the food front, I am back to buckling down. Weight is starting to creep on again and I don't like it. Maybe its the extra rest I've been doing thanks to my shin/calf issues. Maybe its the rainy weather. More likely, it's probably due to the fact that Cadbury Creme Eggs are now everywhere I look (at the grocery, anyway). Either way, this shit has got to stop. Veggies, I'm coming for you...
Last week's training:
Monday: a miserable mile on the track at the gym. Was supposed to be three but got cut short due to shin pain. Went home and iced instead.
Tuesday: rest
Weds: Shin felt better so I attempted speedwork. 1 mile warm, 2 miles at tempo, 1 min rest, 2 miles at lactate threshold (aka approx 15 sec/mile faster than tempo), 1 min rest, 2 miles at tempo, 1 min rest, 1 mile cooldown. My shin/calf did not hate me. YAY!
Thurs: Spin class. Oh, how I missed spin class.
Fri: Rest
Saturday: 72 laps (aka 8 miles) of long run fun on the track at the gym, thanks to Mother Nature.
Sunday: Rest. And by rest, I mean sheer laziness.
2 months 'til the race...yeeha!
Thursday, February 24, 2011
Time for the return of...
The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly! Da da da DAAAAAAAAA!
The Good-this time last week, central Ohio was rocking some seriously gorgeous weather. I was able to run in a short sleeved top and shorts last Weds for speedwork with my training group, and a tank top and shorts last Friday (more on why I wasn't at work later). Plus, aside from an intermittently sore right calf, half marathon training is actually going fabulously (knock on wood!). While speedwork may at times be miserable (more on that later too) I'm definitely feeling myself getting faster which, in turn, is actually making me feel like I might run a sub 1:50 half in May after all!
The Bad-cold weather is baaaaaaack with a vengeance! Last Wednesday's speedwork session was in a short sleeved top and shorts, and last night's session was spent in insulated tights, a short sleeved top, a long sleeved top, jacket, and gloves (the only reason I didn't wear my ear warmers too is b/c I couldn't find them). I ended up taking the jacket off halfway through but damn it was cold when I wasn't running.
Ah, speedwork. Last Weds, it was 2 mile repeats at tempo pacex3 (total of 6 miles, or 7.5 with warm up/cool down). Last night? 1 mile warm, 1 mile tempo pace (so for me, around 8:00/mile), then 2x400m at 6:45-7:00 pace, rest, 1x800m at same pace, rest, 1x1600 at pace, rest, 1x800 at pace, rest, 2x400 at pace, rest, 1 mile at tempo, 1 mile cooldown. Excuse me, 800m cooldown. By that point, we were SO done with the track. Especially since it was icy. Ohhhh jeebus that was hard. And definitely one of those times that makes me extremely thankful for my training group b/c otherwise there's no way I would have made it through a workout like that on my own. The things I put myself through in the interest of making my time goal...
The Ugly-aka, my left eye. Last week, the corner of my eye had been looking a little pink and had me thinking pinkeye but the lack of itching and goopiness got me thinking otherwise. Until I got home from last Wednesday's speedwork and found that the whole white of my eye had gone pinky red, like something out of a horror movie. Ew. Said eye proceeded to feel kinda goopy and slightly crusty whenever I woke up during the night, so needless to say Thursday morning I put my glasses back together (they'd been broken forever...like since my honeymoon. In July. 2008.) and marched my happy ass off to the nearest CVS Minute Clinic to find out what was going on. Again, I feared pinkeye but the lovely nurse practitioner informed me that based on my symptoms and their progression no, she did not think I had pinkeye. Rather, an eye infection caused by something on my contact lens that I had not changed in...six months? (Hush. I don't want to hear it.). So I got a week's worth of eye drops and instructions to not go back to work for 24 hours after starting said drops and therefore winning me the chance to take a half day off work the next day (hence last Friday morning's lovely run). And a ban on wearing contacts or eye makeup at all for seven.days. Gah.
Thankfully, my eye now looks normal again and after a trip to the eye doctor's today I have new contacts AND glasses on the way. I learned my lesson for sure. :P
Now, back to counting down the days until springtime! I'm sick of the Terrible Twosome coming in from the backyard with muddy paws, and NEED to get back into the routine of walking them daily. They're like children who have been cooped up inside all winter and have been driving me nuts. Like, getting all their toys taken away and put in toy purgatory (aka the family room closet) because they won't stop bickering over them and generally being annoying. Plus, I'm sick of bundling up before I go run. Come onnnnn, Mother Nature....
The Good-this time last week, central Ohio was rocking some seriously gorgeous weather. I was able to run in a short sleeved top and shorts last Weds for speedwork with my training group, and a tank top and shorts last Friday (more on why I wasn't at work later). Plus, aside from an intermittently sore right calf, half marathon training is actually going fabulously (knock on wood!). While speedwork may at times be miserable (more on that later too) I'm definitely feeling myself getting faster which, in turn, is actually making me feel like I might run a sub 1:50 half in May after all!
The Bad-cold weather is baaaaaaack with a vengeance! Last Wednesday's speedwork session was in a short sleeved top and shorts, and last night's session was spent in insulated tights, a short sleeved top, a long sleeved top, jacket, and gloves (the only reason I didn't wear my ear warmers too is b/c I couldn't find them). I ended up taking the jacket off halfway through but damn it was cold when I wasn't running.
Ah, speedwork. Last Weds, it was 2 mile repeats at tempo pacex3 (total of 6 miles, or 7.5 with warm up/cool down). Last night? 1 mile warm, 1 mile tempo pace (so for me, around 8:00/mile), then 2x400m at 6:45-7:00 pace, rest, 1x800m at same pace, rest, 1x1600 at pace, rest, 1x800 at pace, rest, 2x400 at pace, rest, 1 mile at tempo, 1 mile cooldown. Excuse me, 800m cooldown. By that point, we were SO done with the track. Especially since it was icy. Ohhhh jeebus that was hard. And definitely one of those times that makes me extremely thankful for my training group b/c otherwise there's no way I would have made it through a workout like that on my own. The things I put myself through in the interest of making my time goal...
The Ugly-aka, my left eye. Last week, the corner of my eye had been looking a little pink and had me thinking pinkeye but the lack of itching and goopiness got me thinking otherwise. Until I got home from last Wednesday's speedwork and found that the whole white of my eye had gone pinky red, like something out of a horror movie. Ew. Said eye proceeded to feel kinda goopy and slightly crusty whenever I woke up during the night, so needless to say Thursday morning I put my glasses back together (they'd been broken forever...like since my honeymoon. In July. 2008.) and marched my happy ass off to the nearest CVS Minute Clinic to find out what was going on. Again, I feared pinkeye but the lovely nurse practitioner informed me that based on my symptoms and their progression no, she did not think I had pinkeye. Rather, an eye infection caused by something on my contact lens that I had not changed in...six months? (Hush. I don't want to hear it.). So I got a week's worth of eye drops and instructions to not go back to work for 24 hours after starting said drops and therefore winning me the chance to take a half day off work the next day (hence last Friday morning's lovely run). And a ban on wearing contacts or eye makeup at all for seven.days. Gah.
Thankfully, my eye now looks normal again and after a trip to the eye doctor's today I have new contacts AND glasses on the way. I learned my lesson for sure. :P
Now, back to counting down the days until springtime! I'm sick of the Terrible Twosome coming in from the backyard with muddy paws, and NEED to get back into the routine of walking them daily. They're like children who have been cooped up inside all winter and have been driving me nuts. Like, getting all their toys taken away and put in toy purgatory (aka the family room closet) because they won't stop bickering over them and generally being annoying. Plus, I'm sick of bundling up before I go run. Come onnnnn, Mother Nature....
Sunday, February 13, 2011
What is that I see?
Is that...sunshine?! And temps above bitterly freezing cold?! I don't know what I did to deserve this, but I'm not complaining!
Apparently, Mother Nature heard all of the complaints from me and my fellow Ohioans re: how sick we were of super cold weather and ice/snow, and had decided to bestow upon us a lovely week of nonsubzero temperatures. What does this mean? It means the kids can get out of the house and play a little bit, and that parents don't have to feel homebound by the weather. It means the snow is finally going to melt, and we'll see grass again. It's brown grass, but its grass. It means there is currently a small pond in my backyard, which will only grow as more snow melts and provide endless amusement for the Terrible Twosome. Joy. But best of all, it means I can go on a run without slipping on the snow/ice and having to bundle myself up within an inch of my life! Thursday, I might even get to wear shorts! SHORTS! Insanity, I tells ya.
Half marathon training is going well so far. Random aches and pains, but nothing persistent. I'm trying to be a very good girl about sticking to my training plan and getting the appropriate mileage in each week, and have actually been good about doing my speedwork too. This week's workouts looked like this:
Monday: 3 miles easy
Tuesday: 3 miles easy, plus some elliptical
Weds: 1 mile warm up, 3 miles at approx 8:15 pace with 2-3 min standing rest between each mile, 1 mile cooldown.
Thurs: 4 miles easy, plus some elliptical
Fri: Off
Sat: 7 mile long run
Sunday: 6o mins mixed cardio (20 mins each on two different elliptical type machines, plus 20 min on the Arc trainer).
THIS is the kind of schedule I need to be more consistent with. I find it far too easy to take days off early on in the week. Hell, it took half an hour of inner monologue with myself to get off the couch and put on gym clothes today, then another fifteen minutes to get me out the door. This week, I was motivated by the fact that my husband had a nasty case of the flu. Because, you see, I wanted to be as far away from his germs for as long as I could. The poor guy had the cough, the congestion, the fever, the body aches, and the stomach upset (both kinds)...and I wanted nothing to do with it. It didn't help that his grandpa passed away last Saturday so we had the funeral on Weds-meaning, lots of people who wanted to hug him or shake his hand, and lots of people he had to tell "Uhhhh, you don't want to touch me right now." We even skipped the family lunch after the service so he wouldn't overdo it-we picked up lunch at Panera and took it home instead.
So apparently, nothing motivates me to go to the gym quite like a flu-ridden spouse. Thankfully, he's feeling much better and I have shown no symptoms at all...very possibly due to my work-required flu shot. Either way, I'm not complaining.
Hopefully, this time next week, I'll be able to add "bike ride" to my record of what exercise I did this week. Because maybe, just maybe, I can get in a ride on my new used bike next weekend...once I pick up some bike grease. And a helmet. And probably new pedals too. Cross your fingers!
Warmer weather, here I come!
Apparently, Mother Nature heard all of the complaints from me and my fellow Ohioans re: how sick we were of super cold weather and ice/snow, and had decided to bestow upon us a lovely week of nonsubzero temperatures. What does this mean? It means the kids can get out of the house and play a little bit, and that parents don't have to feel homebound by the weather. It means the snow is finally going to melt, and we'll see grass again. It's brown grass, but its grass. It means there is currently a small pond in my backyard, which will only grow as more snow melts and provide endless amusement for the Terrible Twosome. Joy. But best of all, it means I can go on a run without slipping on the snow/ice and having to bundle myself up within an inch of my life! Thursday, I might even get to wear shorts! SHORTS! Insanity, I tells ya.
Half marathon training is going well so far. Random aches and pains, but nothing persistent. I'm trying to be a very good girl about sticking to my training plan and getting the appropriate mileage in each week, and have actually been good about doing my speedwork too. This week's workouts looked like this:
Monday: 3 miles easy
Tuesday: 3 miles easy, plus some elliptical
Weds: 1 mile warm up, 3 miles at approx 8:15 pace with 2-3 min standing rest between each mile, 1 mile cooldown.
Thurs: 4 miles easy, plus some elliptical
Fri: Off
Sat: 7 mile long run
Sunday: 6o mins mixed cardio (20 mins each on two different elliptical type machines, plus 20 min on the Arc trainer).
THIS is the kind of schedule I need to be more consistent with. I find it far too easy to take days off early on in the week. Hell, it took half an hour of inner monologue with myself to get off the couch and put on gym clothes today, then another fifteen minutes to get me out the door. This week, I was motivated by the fact that my husband had a nasty case of the flu. Because, you see, I wanted to be as far away from his germs for as long as I could. The poor guy had the cough, the congestion, the fever, the body aches, and the stomach upset (both kinds)...and I wanted nothing to do with it. It didn't help that his grandpa passed away last Saturday so we had the funeral on Weds-meaning, lots of people who wanted to hug him or shake his hand, and lots of people he had to tell "Uhhhh, you don't want to touch me right now." We even skipped the family lunch after the service so he wouldn't overdo it-we picked up lunch at Panera and took it home instead.
So apparently, nothing motivates me to go to the gym quite like a flu-ridden spouse. Thankfully, he's feeling much better and I have shown no symptoms at all...very possibly due to my work-required flu shot. Either way, I'm not complaining.
Hopefully, this time next week, I'll be able to add "bike ride" to my record of what exercise I did this week. Because maybe, just maybe, I can get in a ride on my new used bike next weekend...once I pick up some bike grease. And a helmet. And probably new pedals too. Cross your fingers!
Warmer weather, here I come!
Thursday, January 27, 2011
Ah, blessed silence...
...the kind that comes with a husband at work and two dogs napping upstairs in the living room. And control of the remote of course :) Hooray HGTV!
Anything new this week? Let's see. I finally got around to picking up a new pair of running shoes. One of the running stores in town (which also happens to be the one I get my training group discount at) is about 10 mins from where I work Monday/Friday so thanks to the obscene amount of cancellations I had last Friday, I made it over there for shoes before Saturday's long run. They didn't have Adrenaline 10s in my size, but had the 11's so yay! And not shockingly, I've barely heard a peep out of my knee since. Thank goodness, for me and my husband-I'm a whiny injured runner and I don't know how he put up with me last winter when I was actually injured :P
In other running related news, I made it to my first training group Weds speed workout last night. See, these things start at 6pm and I don't get done at work (20 mins from where the workout is) until 5:45pm at the earliest...unless either 1. my last kid cancels or 2. my second to last kid cancels and I call my last kid's mom to see if they want to come early (which they always do). Luckily, the latter was the case last night. Or not luckily, considering the speed workout (for me, with a time goal of 1:45-1:49:59 for my next half) consisted of:
1 mile warmup
4x1200m at 6:45 pace (did I mention that the 600m out and back route was downhill going out and therefore uphill coming back? No? Yeah. That sucked.)
3 min rest in between sets (meaning standing with my hands on my knees desperately trying to catch my breath)
1 mile cooldown
Total workout mileage: approx 4.8 miles, according to my Garmin.
All I have to say is...omfg. Thankfully, a former and soon to be current coworker (she's coming to work where I work) was there to keep me company, and we made friends with a few girls who were in our group. There is NO way I would have made it through a workout like that by myself. No way in hell. I do far better in groups. Misery loves company, perhaps?
My legs were exhausted last night, and have been pretty much all day today. I did get out for a 4 mile run at what felt like long run pace (so 9:30ish) to get my blood moving and clear the junk out of my muscles. So I rewarded myself by convincing J to take me to get sushi for lunch :) My legs weren't particularly happy with me throughout the three grocery stops I had to make after that (regular grocery, Trader Joe's, and Whole Foods) but whatev.
Yes, you saw that right. I'm one of those multiple grocery store people. As we've (okay, mostly me dragging J kicking and screaming) been making the move towards more organic, less processed foods, I've found that there are more options for better prices at other stores. Like Trader Joe's. And there are stores with a better selection of organic produce and locally grown/made items. Like Whole Foods. So to give you a visual, here's roughly how today's shopping trip went:
Giant Eagle (aka regular grocery)-fat free half and half (aka J's crack. Dude gets angry when there's no half and half, b/c he won't drink his coffee without it. And you don't want to deal with him when he hasn't had coffee). Diet pop (aka one of my not so guilty pleasures. Recognize.) Organic skim milk (a local farm makes this stuff, and J's super hippie crunchy sister swears by it so it must be good. Plus, it was cheaper than the GE brand organic milk). Canned pumpkin (for the dog's Kong). Frozen waffles and OJ for J. And deoderant.
Trader Joe's-J's Kashi strawberry cereal, avocado salsa verde, guacamoles (yes I meant "guacamoles", you can thank Supertroopers for that one), frozen fries, chicken and cilantro wontons, center cut nitrate free bacon, coffee, pretzel chips, and popcorn
Whole Paycheck...I mean, Whole Foods-organic red peppers, fair trade bananas, local honey, buffalo burger patties, and stew beef from an Ohio farm.
As I've become more aware of where my food comes from, I've found my grocery bills increasing. Because stuff like organic produce, fair trade bananas, and locally farmed and/or grass fed beef costs more. Sucks, but its true. And while Columbus is chock full of farmers markets in the summer, there ain't diddly squat in the winter. So for now, off to Whole Foods I go.
I recently picked up two books from the library-The Abs Diet and the Omnivore's Dilemma. Hopefully by the next time I update this thing, I'll be able to report back on at least one of them...but we'll see. Right now, though, it's time to make sure the Terrible Twosome aren't getting into shenanigans upstairs!
Anything new this week? Let's see. I finally got around to picking up a new pair of running shoes. One of the running stores in town (which also happens to be the one I get my training group discount at) is about 10 mins from where I work Monday/Friday so thanks to the obscene amount of cancellations I had last Friday, I made it over there for shoes before Saturday's long run. They didn't have Adrenaline 10s in my size, but had the 11's so yay! And not shockingly, I've barely heard a peep out of my knee since. Thank goodness, for me and my husband-I'm a whiny injured runner and I don't know how he put up with me last winter when I was actually injured :P
In other running related news, I made it to my first training group Weds speed workout last night. See, these things start at 6pm and I don't get done at work (20 mins from where the workout is) until 5:45pm at the earliest...unless either 1. my last kid cancels or 2. my second to last kid cancels and I call my last kid's mom to see if they want to come early (which they always do). Luckily, the latter was the case last night. Or not luckily, considering the speed workout (for me, with a time goal of 1:45-1:49:59 for my next half) consisted of:
1 mile warmup
4x1200m at 6:45 pace (did I mention that the 600m out and back route was downhill going out and therefore uphill coming back? No? Yeah. That sucked.)
3 min rest in between sets (meaning standing with my hands on my knees desperately trying to catch my breath)
1 mile cooldown
Total workout mileage: approx 4.8 miles, according to my Garmin.
All I have to say is...omfg. Thankfully, a former and soon to be current coworker (she's coming to work where I work) was there to keep me company, and we made friends with a few girls who were in our group. There is NO way I would have made it through a workout like that by myself. No way in hell. I do far better in groups. Misery loves company, perhaps?
My legs were exhausted last night, and have been pretty much all day today. I did get out for a 4 mile run at what felt like long run pace (so 9:30ish) to get my blood moving and clear the junk out of my muscles. So I rewarded myself by convincing J to take me to get sushi for lunch :) My legs weren't particularly happy with me throughout the three grocery stops I had to make after that (regular grocery, Trader Joe's, and Whole Foods) but whatev.
Yes, you saw that right. I'm one of those multiple grocery store people. As we've (okay, mostly me dragging J kicking and screaming) been making the move towards more organic, less processed foods, I've found that there are more options for better prices at other stores. Like Trader Joe's. And there are stores with a better selection of organic produce and locally grown/made items. Like Whole Foods. So to give you a visual, here's roughly how today's shopping trip went:
Giant Eagle (aka regular grocery)-fat free half and half (aka J's crack. Dude gets angry when there's no half and half, b/c he won't drink his coffee without it. And you don't want to deal with him when he hasn't had coffee). Diet pop (aka one of my not so guilty pleasures. Recognize.) Organic skim milk (a local farm makes this stuff, and J's super hippie crunchy sister swears by it so it must be good. Plus, it was cheaper than the GE brand organic milk). Canned pumpkin (for the dog's Kong). Frozen waffles and OJ for J. And deoderant.
Trader Joe's-J's Kashi strawberry cereal, avocado salsa verde, guacamoles (yes I meant "guacamoles", you can thank Supertroopers for that one), frozen fries, chicken and cilantro wontons, center cut nitrate free bacon, coffee, pretzel chips, and popcorn
Whole Paycheck...I mean, Whole Foods-organic red peppers, fair trade bananas, local honey, buffalo burger patties, and stew beef from an Ohio farm.
As I've become more aware of where my food comes from, I've found my grocery bills increasing. Because stuff like organic produce, fair trade bananas, and locally farmed and/or grass fed beef costs more. Sucks, but its true. And while Columbus is chock full of farmers markets in the summer, there ain't diddly squat in the winter. So for now, off to Whole Foods I go.
I recently picked up two books from the library-The Abs Diet and the Omnivore's Dilemma. Hopefully by the next time I update this thing, I'll be able to report back on at least one of them...but we'll see. Right now, though, it's time to make sure the Terrible Twosome aren't getting into shenanigans upstairs!
Thursday, January 20, 2011
It's baaaaack...
The White Death has returned! It started snowing around 830am today, and hasn't stopped yet. I've heard predictions of 2-4 inches, 3-5 inches, and "whoTF knows how much snow we'll get" so I guess only time will tell. I'm just glad I had the sense to get up and get my major errands (gym, grocery x 3-yes I'm one of those multiple grocery store people, and oil change) out of the way before things got really crappy. Plus, J got out of working tonight so now we're looking forward to cooking out buffalo burgers and making oven fries. Yes, we're those crazy people that cookout in snow storms. We've done it forever and have the pictures to prove it :D
One of the items on today's "to do" list that could, and did, get postponed 'til tomorrow was picking up a new pair of running shoes. The discomfort in my knee is telling me that its time, I just havent had the chance...and going to the running store on increasingly crappier roads was not a risk I was willing to take just to pick up new shoes. Especially since I go by the running store on my way home from work. Hopefully this does the trick for my knee issue..I guess we'll see how Saturday's long run goes! I haven't run all week in an effort to let it rest, so that should work in my favor.
Now, onto more important things...time to find out what time we'll start dinner!
One of the items on today's "to do" list that could, and did, get postponed 'til tomorrow was picking up a new pair of running shoes. The discomfort in my knee is telling me that its time, I just havent had the chance...and going to the running store on increasingly crappier roads was not a risk I was willing to take just to pick up new shoes. Especially since I go by the running store on my way home from work. Hopefully this does the trick for my knee issue..I guess we'll see how Saturday's long run goes! I haven't run all week in an effort to let it rest, so that should work in my favor.
Now, onto more important things...time to find out what time we'll start dinner!
Saturday, January 15, 2011
My word for 2011...
(which I am shamelessly stealing from Colleen at Irondiva because it's very fitting)...Balance.
Balance.
Hmm.
WTF does THAT mean, you ask?
In my case, it means a lot of things. It means work-life balance (something which we discuss ad nauseam at work, so I'll only touch on it a bit later). It means home life-social life balance. And sometimes, it means home life-workout/running balance.
Work-life balance: This a popular topic for discussion in our department at work. Management is big on it, but sometimes the requirements placed upon us for productivity and other things make this a little difficult. Overall, though, they stress making sure to schedule your allotted paperwork time (and not see kids all the time instead), actually eating lunch at lunchtime instead of working through lunch, and not getting to work super early, staying super late, or coming in on your day off to get things done. The new electronic medical record system we switched over to in June has made this a lot easier, as we are no longer required to do 6 month progress reports (yay!) and paperwork is overall easier to do and is finished more quickly. Personally, I feel like I have a lot more of a balance in this area now than I did at my old job, where I was constantly getting to work early/staying late to get things done and still doing boatloads of paperwork at home. So this is something I'm constantly keeping an eye on, but for once feel is actually staying fairly balanced.
Home life-social life balance: This one can get a little tricky sometimes. As I've gotten older, I've found myself becoming more and more of a homebody who ::gasp:: likes to sleep more than I do go out drinking. The result is that if I don't watch myself, I turn into a hermit and it can be weeks before my friends see me in public. I'm trying to be better about this...even if it does mean taking a nap during the day so I can "embrace fun" at night.
On the other side of this is the fact that some weeks, J and I work pretty much opposite work schedules. I work 4 10 hour days, Mon/Tues/Weds/Fri, and his schedule varies weekly. Sometimes, he works more days than nights, and we actually get to hang out. And sometimes, he works nights, and we never see each other. Throw in the latter with the odd social event planned way in advance and you get a husband who gripes b/c he "hasn't seen me all week" and a wife who "only hangs out with her friends and not with her husband". There has been much discussion about this in my household, for two reasons: 1. J and I don't know what his work schedule is going to be like until the Friday/Saturday before the posted schedule; and 2. Based on my friends' and I's crazy schedules, we often plan things in advance. Like, 3-4 weeks in advance. And I can only say "Well, I MIGHT be able to hang out then but it depends on J's work schedule" so many times before I get the side eye.
So I'm having to learn how to balance cancelling the occasional long planned night out with friends b/c I have barely seen my husband all week against reminding J that I can't always plan things and then bail b/c of his ever changing work schedule.
Speaking of J, this brings us to balance area #3-Home life-workout/running balance. This could get long, as this is something that J and I had a heated discussion/fight via text message about last weekend.
I run, or work out at the gym regularly. J does not run, and is sporadic in his gymgoing. Running is my hobby. Playing video games is his (right now, Black Ops is his game of choice). I try to get my running done before he wakes up or while he's at work, and he tries to keep his Black Ops playing to while I'm at work or asleep. Unfortunately, due to the fact that it's dark until close to 7:30am and is dark by 6pm right now, me running while he's still in bed isn't always an option, while playing Black Ops is done indoors and therefore can be done anytime. This means that sometimes, I'm leaving to go run as he's getting up (and if he has to work that morning, won't see me before he leaves). This is sometimes an issue on Saturdays, which is when my training group meets...when he has to work in the morning on a Saturday, this means we don't see one another. This also means that if he feels he hasn't gotten enough "attention" (if you catch my drift, sorry if you're scandalized) that week, he gets pissy. And feels like I'm choosing running and running group over him, yada yada yada. Hence the long text discussion/fight last Saturday.
As a result of said discussion/fight, I think we came up with some agreements. I will do what I can do run later in the day, after he has left for work or is otherwise occupied. And he understands that going to running group 1x/week is my opportunity to geek out with other running minded people. He had his video game loving friends, I have my running friends. The fact that sometimes his work schedule gets screwy and he has to work Saturday AM does not mean that I should automatically have to give up going to running group, because I wouldn't expect him to not have video game time with his friends if I happened to be home. We also agreed that while Black Ops is his time to blow off steam, running is mine. It's my therapy, and sometimes the only thing keeping me out of the looney bin (or more likely, the Betty Ford Clinic). And expecting the other to blow that off on a whim isn't fair.
So I guess you could say we're both working on balance in that area. Balance is a good thing. And something that I continually need to work on. I guess that's a New Year's Resolution for me-work on maintaining balance ALL the time, not just when shit hits the fan.
And there you have it. A novel. So in a short recap of the last week: Snow on Tuesday. Blech. Managed to maintain planned workouts regardless, though I'm currently sporting a lovely pain in my left knee. Methinks it's "time for a new pair of shoes" pain, so hopefully picking up a new pair of Adrenaline 10's (if I can get them) or 11's (if I can't get 10's) should do the trick. Hopefully no more snow this coming week-I've had enough. And I just downloaded an obscene amount of 90's and more recent pop onto my Shuffle...I'm a dork, and that's okay :D
Balance.
Hmm.
WTF does THAT mean, you ask?
In my case, it means a lot of things. It means work-life balance (something which we discuss ad nauseam at work, so I'll only touch on it a bit later). It means home life-social life balance. And sometimes, it means home life-workout/running balance.
Work-life balance: This a popular topic for discussion in our department at work. Management is big on it, but sometimes the requirements placed upon us for productivity and other things make this a little difficult. Overall, though, they stress making sure to schedule your allotted paperwork time (and not see kids all the time instead), actually eating lunch at lunchtime instead of working through lunch, and not getting to work super early, staying super late, or coming in on your day off to get things done. The new electronic medical record system we switched over to in June has made this a lot easier, as we are no longer required to do 6 month progress reports (yay!) and paperwork is overall easier to do and is finished more quickly. Personally, I feel like I have a lot more of a balance in this area now than I did at my old job, where I was constantly getting to work early/staying late to get things done and still doing boatloads of paperwork at home. So this is something I'm constantly keeping an eye on, but for once feel is actually staying fairly balanced.
Home life-social life balance: This one can get a little tricky sometimes. As I've gotten older, I've found myself becoming more and more of a homebody who ::gasp:: likes to sleep more than I do go out drinking. The result is that if I don't watch myself, I turn into a hermit and it can be weeks before my friends see me in public. I'm trying to be better about this...even if it does mean taking a nap during the day so I can "embrace fun" at night.
On the other side of this is the fact that some weeks, J and I work pretty much opposite work schedules. I work 4 10 hour days, Mon/Tues/Weds/Fri, and his schedule varies weekly. Sometimes, he works more days than nights, and we actually get to hang out. And sometimes, he works nights, and we never see each other. Throw in the latter with the odd social event planned way in advance and you get a husband who gripes b/c he "hasn't seen me all week" and a wife who "only hangs out with her friends and not with her husband". There has been much discussion about this in my household, for two reasons: 1. J and I don't know what his work schedule is going to be like until the Friday/Saturday before the posted schedule; and 2. Based on my friends' and I's crazy schedules, we often plan things in advance. Like, 3-4 weeks in advance. And I can only say "Well, I MIGHT be able to hang out then but it depends on J's work schedule" so many times before I get the side eye.
So I'm having to learn how to balance cancelling the occasional long planned night out with friends b/c I have barely seen my husband all week against reminding J that I can't always plan things and then bail b/c of his ever changing work schedule.
Speaking of J, this brings us to balance area #3-Home life-workout/running balance. This could get long, as this is something that J and I had a heated discussion/fight via text message about last weekend.
I run, or work out at the gym regularly. J does not run, and is sporadic in his gymgoing. Running is my hobby. Playing video games is his (right now, Black Ops is his game of choice). I try to get my running done before he wakes up or while he's at work, and he tries to keep his Black Ops playing to while I'm at work or asleep. Unfortunately, due to the fact that it's dark until close to 7:30am and is dark by 6pm right now, me running while he's still in bed isn't always an option, while playing Black Ops is done indoors and therefore can be done anytime. This means that sometimes, I'm leaving to go run as he's getting up (and if he has to work that morning, won't see me before he leaves). This is sometimes an issue on Saturdays, which is when my training group meets...when he has to work in the morning on a Saturday, this means we don't see one another. This also means that if he feels he hasn't gotten enough "attention" (if you catch my drift, sorry if you're scandalized) that week, he gets pissy. And feels like I'm choosing running and running group over him, yada yada yada. Hence the long text discussion/fight last Saturday.
As a result of said discussion/fight, I think we came up with some agreements. I will do what I can do run later in the day, after he has left for work or is otherwise occupied. And he understands that going to running group 1x/week is my opportunity to geek out with other running minded people. He had his video game loving friends, I have my running friends. The fact that sometimes his work schedule gets screwy and he has to work Saturday AM does not mean that I should automatically have to give up going to running group, because I wouldn't expect him to not have video game time with his friends if I happened to be home. We also agreed that while Black Ops is his time to blow off steam, running is mine. It's my therapy, and sometimes the only thing keeping me out of the looney bin (or more likely, the Betty Ford Clinic). And expecting the other to blow that off on a whim isn't fair.
So I guess you could say we're both working on balance in that area. Balance is a good thing. And something that I continually need to work on. I guess that's a New Year's Resolution for me-work on maintaining balance ALL the time, not just when shit hits the fan.
And there you have it. A novel. So in a short recap of the last week: Snow on Tuesday. Blech. Managed to maintain planned workouts regardless, though I'm currently sporting a lovely pain in my left knee. Methinks it's "time for a new pair of shoes" pain, so hopefully picking up a new pair of Adrenaline 10's (if I can get them) or 11's (if I can't get 10's) should do the trick. Hopefully no more snow this coming week-I've had enough. And I just downloaded an obscene amount of 90's and more recent pop onto my Shuffle...I'm a dork, and that's okay :D
Tuesday, January 11, 2011
The White Death
aka what I am staring at from my office window right now. I've heard reports saying we're supposed to get 2-4", I've heard 3-5", I've heard 2-6", who knows? All I know is it's snowing now and it"s snowing hard. Ew. Something tells me my planned Thursday run is going to be inside. At least I got up at an ungodly hour to rock out a 5 mile tempo run (1 mile warm up, 3 miles 5k pace aka hauling ass, 1 mile cool down) before work, b/c there's no way I'd be driving to the gym after work in this crap.
In other random news:
-I got to enjoy a lovely snowycold run with my training group last Saturday. I haven't been in the mood to follow the prescribed program for my next half yet so I did 8 miles b/c I felt like it...and it was nice. Cold, but nice. I realized about halfway to where our training runs start that I had forgotten my jacket at home but thankfully remembered I had a lightweight North Face fleece in my trunk that, while covered with dog hair, suited the purpose just fine. Plus, since I signed up for a full year of training group, I got me a lovely day glo yellow jacket to wear when its cold...or dark...or both. Because this thing is bring enough to generate heat. Maybe if you're lucky I'll post pics of it. And because I can't go into the running store without buying SOMETHING, I picked up a lovely teal fleece lined running hoodie. It's sweet, and was 20% off thanks to my group discount. So yay!
-Eddie (aka wee doggy, and el Presidente of the Itty Bitty Pittie Committee) has an ear infection. This means I've become quite good at wrestling slippery black dogs and putting them in headlocks, seeing as I have to do this twice a day to get his drops in his right ear. Thankfully, he's started putting up less of a fight...once I catch him after chasing him around the house that is. More importantly, he's stopped shaking his head all the time and there's no more brown yucky crap in his ear. Because there was A LOT of it in there on Thursday (when we took him to the vet) and it made me feel horrible for him. Poor wee doggy :(
-My left knee has decided to be sore today. I'm hoping this just means I need a new pair of shoes, and not that I'm actually injured. We'll see.
-What else? Not much. I had all these great post ideas, and now the snow has sucked them all out of my head. Damn you, White Death!
In other random news:
-I got to enjoy a lovely snowycold run with my training group last Saturday. I haven't been in the mood to follow the prescribed program for my next half yet so I did 8 miles b/c I felt like it...and it was nice. Cold, but nice. I realized about halfway to where our training runs start that I had forgotten my jacket at home but thankfully remembered I had a lightweight North Face fleece in my trunk that, while covered with dog hair, suited the purpose just fine. Plus, since I signed up for a full year of training group, I got me a lovely day glo yellow jacket to wear when its cold...or dark...or both. Because this thing is bring enough to generate heat. Maybe if you're lucky I'll post pics of it. And because I can't go into the running store without buying SOMETHING, I picked up a lovely teal fleece lined running hoodie. It's sweet, and was 20% off thanks to my group discount. So yay!
-Eddie (aka wee doggy, and el Presidente of the Itty Bitty Pittie Committee) has an ear infection. This means I've become quite good at wrestling slippery black dogs and putting them in headlocks, seeing as I have to do this twice a day to get his drops in his right ear. Thankfully, he's started putting up less of a fight...once I catch him after chasing him around the house that is. More importantly, he's stopped shaking his head all the time and there's no more brown yucky crap in his ear. Because there was A LOT of it in there on Thursday (when we took him to the vet) and it made me feel horrible for him. Poor wee doggy :(
-My left knee has decided to be sore today. I'm hoping this just means I need a new pair of shoes, and not that I'm actually injured. We'll see.
-What else? Not much. I had all these great post ideas, and now the snow has sucked them all out of my head. Damn you, White Death!
Sunday, January 2, 2011
A year in review...and the year ahead
(Holy hell, its been over six weeks since I updated this thing...whoops! One of my plans for 2011 is to get better about that, but more on that in a bit.)
So. 2010 is no more. There were certainly some ups and downs, both running related and not. I had quite possibly my worst race ever, the Kentucky Derby Festival miniMarathon (aka half marathon) at the end of April. It was muggy, warm, rainy, and way more hilly that I had been able to discern from the elevation maps. My time was over six minutes slower than my previous slowest time, and that pissed me off big time. I also dealt with a nasty running slump, punctuated by a nagging soreness in my right quad. Luckily, some rest, stretching, a new pair of running shoes, and some new routes helped get me back on the right track. It was also the hottest summer I remember having in quite some time, and definitely the hottest since I started running. This was the kind of weather that makes me question whyTF I run, and it was not fun. Neither was all the laundry I was doing b/c of the sweaty running clothes.
On a nonrunning note, we adopted a second dog who put us through the wringer emotionally. There will be more on him in the "good part" section, but suffice it to say the first month was hell. I also experienced crushing sadness for two good friends and coworkers who lost children this year-one at five months gestation, and one at five months of age. That kind of stuff just isn't supposed to happen and really made me question a lot.
Now, onto the better stuff...maybe partially thanks to all the hot weather running I did this summer, I had a PR in my fall half (the Columbus Half Marathon in October) by running a 1:52:something. I also joined a local training group, which turned out to be awesome and now I'm signed up for the full 2011 racing season (meaning spring and fall races). Plus, I've managed to get my weight back under control and have lost most of the 10 lbs I put on last winter and have thus far managed to keep it off :)
Things have also settled down quite nicely with the new dog. He still has his issues, which we are working through, but he has wormed his way into our hearts nonetheless and we would do anything for him.
My friends have amazed me with their strength and grace as they've dealt with their sadness. The one who lost her little girl 5 months into her pregnancy is now pregnant again with a perfect, healthy baby girl and due in May...we could NOT be more excited for her, it's been a long road for her and she and her husband are so ready for their happy ending. My friend who lost her little girl suddenly at five months of age is adjusting to the way things are now, and she and her husband have been able to draw so much strength from each other. Their little girl has sent them some signs to show them that they're going to be okay, and I know that's been a comfort.
And now...hello, 2011! I can't wait to see what you have in store. For me, I'm hoping to train for another couple of half marathons and emerge injury free and with a sub 1:50 half. I'm also planning on buying a road bike from my friend Colleen, to add another choice to my outdoor fitness options and maybe even spur me to train for a sprint triathlon. I'd like to get more consistent with my strength training (which is currently nonexistent), and be better about getting up and going to the gym before work.
My other evil plans for this year include getting some debt paid off, putting the Terrible Twosome in some training classes, and maybe even (eep!) considering trying to have a baby (eep!).
And yes, I plan on blogging more :)
What are YOUR plans for 2011?
So. 2010 is no more. There were certainly some ups and downs, both running related and not. I had quite possibly my worst race ever, the Kentucky Derby Festival miniMarathon (aka half marathon) at the end of April. It was muggy, warm, rainy, and way more hilly that I had been able to discern from the elevation maps. My time was over six minutes slower than my previous slowest time, and that pissed me off big time. I also dealt with a nasty running slump, punctuated by a nagging soreness in my right quad. Luckily, some rest, stretching, a new pair of running shoes, and some new routes helped get me back on the right track. It was also the hottest summer I remember having in quite some time, and definitely the hottest since I started running. This was the kind of weather that makes me question whyTF I run, and it was not fun. Neither was all the laundry I was doing b/c of the sweaty running clothes.
On a nonrunning note, we adopted a second dog who put us through the wringer emotionally. There will be more on him in the "good part" section, but suffice it to say the first month was hell. I also experienced crushing sadness for two good friends and coworkers who lost children this year-one at five months gestation, and one at five months of age. That kind of stuff just isn't supposed to happen and really made me question a lot.
Now, onto the better stuff...maybe partially thanks to all the hot weather running I did this summer, I had a PR in my fall half (the Columbus Half Marathon in October) by running a 1:52:something. I also joined a local training group, which turned out to be awesome and now I'm signed up for the full 2011 racing season (meaning spring and fall races). Plus, I've managed to get my weight back under control and have lost most of the 10 lbs I put on last winter and have thus far managed to keep it off :)
Things have also settled down quite nicely with the new dog. He still has his issues, which we are working through, but he has wormed his way into our hearts nonetheless and we would do anything for him.
My friends have amazed me with their strength and grace as they've dealt with their sadness. The one who lost her little girl 5 months into her pregnancy is now pregnant again with a perfect, healthy baby girl and due in May...we could NOT be more excited for her, it's been a long road for her and she and her husband are so ready for their happy ending. My friend who lost her little girl suddenly at five months of age is adjusting to the way things are now, and she and her husband have been able to draw so much strength from each other. Their little girl has sent them some signs to show them that they're going to be okay, and I know that's been a comfort.
And now...hello, 2011! I can't wait to see what you have in store. For me, I'm hoping to train for another couple of half marathons and emerge injury free and with a sub 1:50 half. I'm also planning on buying a road bike from my friend Colleen, to add another choice to my outdoor fitness options and maybe even spur me to train for a sprint triathlon. I'd like to get more consistent with my strength training (which is currently nonexistent), and be better about getting up and going to the gym before work.
My other evil plans for this year include getting some debt paid off, putting the Terrible Twosome in some training classes, and maybe even (eep!) considering trying to have a baby (eep!).
And yes, I plan on blogging more :)
What are YOUR plans for 2011?
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