Adjusted Reality

“Reality can be beaten with enough imagination.” – Mark Twain

Tag: Weight Loss Page 1 of 8

Chopping the wood and carrying the water

Marathons hit me right in the feels.

Not entirely sure there’s a better feeling than at the end of 26.some miles.

I mean, after running 26.2 miles, you are raw.  You’ve gone through periods where you’ve felt amazing and then subsequently wanted to give anything just to lie down on the side of the road and die for a little bit or maybe even forever.  You’ve felt the highest highs and the lowest lows.  You’ve spent a few hours with yourself and only your two feet (and maybe a kickass playlist, if that’s an option) and that finish line is the most glorious thing in the entire world.   This is a fact both when it’s a standalone run and especially when it’s after a long swim and bike.

I mean, I love shorter races.  There are so many benefits.  You can race them more often without falling apart (mentally AND physically).  You can be to the beer tent by NINE AM.  Specifically for me, my body handles going short and fast (ish) muuuuuch better than going long.  At least right now.  And, I’m more competitive at these distances.  I’ve never even been within spitting distance of a podium if there’s an Iron or marathon anywhere in the name (even with a half qualifier).

But, there’s something about those longer races.  Maybe it’s the glory (my mother, when hearing how long the race was that I won, was like, “oh, that’s all?”).  But I also love the type two fun of the long days of training, maybe even more than racing.  Even when it’s running for hours in the rain (ok, maybe I *especially* like this one).  Or riding my bike for the majority of a workday, even if it’s in 3 mile circles.  Or losing count of how many laps I’ve done in the lake when it’s the temperature of bathwater.  I live for this stuff.

One thing I have to keep reminding myself is that the ultimate goal isn’t to *RETIRE* from those type of races.  I have no qualms that I’ll be back at the marathon and Ironman distances someday.  However, I want to do more than limp through them.  I want to be strong and fit and light enough to maintain a good stride and pace through 26 miles.  I want to be flexible enough that my range of motion isn’t limiting my power on the bike or my hip extension on the run.  I want my core and upper body to be strong to push the bike in aero for 56 or 112 miles like I do for 14 in a sprint.  I don’t want to train through a bunch of niggling injuries, I want to feel good and ready for training days and when I step up to the start line instead of wondering what will break on me this time.

So, the reminder to myself is to chop the wood and carry the water.  I need to get STRONG before I go LONG.  It will be interesting to test the waters with a half ironman in September and see if I can pull off the run I know is in there if my body would stop being such a flimsy and rigid little jerk.  It will be a higher degree of difficulty dive being in Cozumel (hot/humid), but my two best half iron races have been in similar conditions, so we’ll see how that little experiment of one goes.

This probably isn’t going to happen for a while so I’m going to use this picture a few times.  Get comfortable with it. 🙂

However, the focus right now is getting ready for the first two back to back races next weekend and the weekend after.  I am much less likely to win either of these but if I have a great day, like a really great day, it’s not outside the realm of possibility to stand on the podium.  It’s going to be all about the bike on these.  They’re both on the hillier side.  It’s really hard to catch me on the flats but going up?  Yeah… not so much… and then it’s all about what’s left over on the run.  I’ve got a stronger run game than I ever have right now, but my legs have not yet figured out how to match that 6- or 7-minute mile pace (I’m barely able to hold 8-something and not consistently), which standing on the top-step sometimes takes.

Backing up a bit again, I hit most of my training last week with some modifications.

  • I did a harder trainer ride with less recovery than I expected on Monday, so I went 40 instead of 60 minutes.
  • I did both sessions of weights at work with kettlebells instead of lifting once at the gym.
  • We had to work late on Wednesday and missed the team brick, but made up for it with a shorty brick on the top of our parking garage at work.  It ended up being more cornering practice on the bike than anything, but I ran a nice 9 minute flat mile off the bike.  And, it made my mood go from >:( to 🙂 so it was worth it just for that.

However, I think the happiest thing last week was those run miles off the bike.  I ran three more over the weekend, and the splits were 9:07, 9:01, and 8:59.  I’m consistently able to approximately hit that 9 minute mile and in most cases, I have another gear that I could summon on race day.  I’m still not running a lot, but it’s been quality.

Cycling seems to be going well, I’m getting better at the ability to hold higher power for longer instead of just in short intervals.  It’s been nice training on the TT bike outside with the team and trying to chase the faster riders!  Weights work is still continuing even though I’m going through the same phase I always do around this time – where my mentality switches from “OMG I love weights, I need to prioritize this work year round” to “man, it’s really hard to lift, run, bike AND swim all in the same week…. hmmm…”.  But, I’ve committed to 2x week, even if some of those weeks end up me just throwing around kettlebells in my work parking lot, it’s better than what I’ve done previously.

And I do <3 me some Black Betty.

Swimming is just a solid fourth right now.  I made it to the pool twice last week.  I didn’t swim fast or far, but I swam.  At some point, I need to do sets.  At some point, I need to swim in the lake.  But, for now, I’m showing up, and that’s a start.

This week’s plan:

  • 2 weights sessions (1 DONE!)
  • 2 20-30 min swims (maybe one of these in the lake, perhaps)
  • 3 bike rides – one 90 min commute (DONE – that was rough), one 45 min smashy brick, and the weekend’s ride is TBD depending on the weather.
  • 3 runs – two easy with some more miles (one 4 miler DONE, one more planned), one fast 2 mile brick
  • Stretch + roll + boots and ankle/shoulder exercises almost every day.

It feels like nothing in terms of hours when I’m planning it, then my week gets super busy and it’s all I can and want to do right now.  And it seems to be working, so I’ll take it and not try to pile on a million more hours.  Yet.

Our post-Easter Easter feast.  My only indiscretion was a tiny sliver of chocolate cake and ice cream, which was plenty.

In the other front to #getfaster, I hit a nice milestone last week.  My average weight is finally back in the 170s (179.6, but still).  Keeping score – this is 6.1 lbs in 4 weeks.  I am now officially lighter than I’ve been since the beginning of August 2015.  I expect this week to be an exercise in frustration because it’s that time of the month in which I feel like a water balloon, but we’ll see how much of that is giving into crappy cravings and eating badly and how much of that is actually my body.

I have five weeks before vacation, and I should be faiiiiirly close to seeing an odd 169.9 on the scale the week before I go if my progress stays even.  That would be RAD!  To keep myself motivated, I’ll remind myself about the fact that about 30 seconds has melted off my running paces in the last 4-5 weeks, and if I don’t eff it all up, another 30 seconds could magically melt off by my last race of the spring.  How cool would that be?

Last week’s numbers:

  • Last week’s average calories: 1607
  • Last week’s average daily burn: 2301
  • Average deficit: -693
  • Average diet quality: 22.8
  • Average weight: 179.6

This week should be fairly easy in the grand scheme of things.  I don’t have any social functions, and my only planned splurge is lunch out on the day we ride bikes.  I just have to stay the course and hopefully I can report similar numbers to those above, with a lower average weight!

I’ve got nothing related to this section so please enjoy this view of two canoes on a lake.

I am happy to report that we have two CLEAN cars in our garage now.  The kitchen remodel is 100% fully and finally over. *cue the angels’ chorus*

I’m making my way through The Essential Guide to Getting Your Book Published and I’ve gotten to the chapter about how to pitch your book and what you should send in a package to a publisher.  The good news is that this is some GREAT information.  The bad news is that for non-fiction books, you’re supposed to do this stuff BEFORE you write the whole book.

I decided it wasn’t a terrible thing.  I have proved to myself that I could finish a first draft.  For my own confidence, that’s a wonderful step.  However, I will probably never put together almost 300 word doc pages again before I do this again because it’s a great judgement on whether you SHOULD EVEN WRITE THE BOOK.  It will be a great exercise with the 3-5 other ones knocking around my head before I dive into the deep end with them.

However, first on the docket is editing and reading and letting my husband read it.  He’s getting antsy.

By the end of this weekend, I would like to have another video recorded and at least the background of my next painting done and our workout room tidied up.  But only if it’s not stressing me out to do all that stuff.  Because it’s triathlon season, and that means adulting and crafts get ignored unless I feel like it.

Also, I’ve currently decided that I’m going to look into is selling my digital photography.  My husband, under the influence of vodka, bought me a really nice new fancy digital underwater camera that actually takes pictures in the proper format to do this, so my goal is to see how long it will take to make back the money it cost to order it!

I figure this *might* be worth something to someone besides just looking pretty on my social media and blogs.

And on that note, I’m going to take my unfocused self (squirrel!) and go focus on something.  Happy Wednesday!

Baby steps

I went and did things on a boat last week.

Let me show you how much it sucked.

And we’ll get to that, but now that today marks 30 days since doing THIS THING, it’s time to take baby steps away from being a slothy mc slotherpants.  It’s Monday, so it’s time for some goals up in here.  However, just like it’s a bad idea to go directly from tallying how many pieces of bread and butter you ate as an appetizer before your appetizer before your second appetizer at dinner (answer: a lot) to eating chicken and quinoa, we’ll be taking some time to get there from here.

Oddly enough (or not so oddly with the three days at the gym and then three days of between 2-4 hours chasing fish with cameras in the water), I seem to have stabilized around the same weight I was at before I left.  I think I’ve *finally* figured out how to not gain the 5-7 lbs typical on a cruise.  That doesn’t mean I’ve got all the answers to life because I’m still looking at about ~35 lbs I’d like to be rid of, but at least I haven’t doubled that in a week somehow.   Baby steps.

So, this week looks like kind of a slow start because these were a lot of things I was doing before.  At least kind of.  But for now, going back from *margaritas the size of my head* to *things that feel like normal healthy life* is plenty enough.  This is the week of baby steps.

You thought I was kidding right there. #senorfrogsdrinkingteam


Movement goals:

Unfuck my poor back.  On day #2 of the cruise my back started hurting and you wouldn’t have guessed it, but a bunch of whisky on the rocks as painkiller and traipsing around in heels all night did not help things.  Day 3-6 it was out of alignment and SUPER cranky when I was not horizontal (swimming or laying) or actively stretching it.  I have a chiropractor appointment today, but since it’s been out for a while, I expect it will not be immediately better and there will be some muscle carnage.  The focus of this week is to stretch and roll for 10-15 mins per day, and do anything else she wants me to do to make it happy.

Status quo.  In this light, I’m going to lay off the weights and running and anything serious for ONE more week.  I plan to ride bikes on Wednesday and maybe once more this weekend and swim as much as I can and MAYBE do some bodyweight stuff or yoga or something fun like playing in the lake later in the week if I feel better.  Or none of this if I don’t feel up to it.

10k+ steps per day.  Normally on cruises this is no problem at all but for some reason, we walked much less than normal (perhaps the back thing, perhaps our room was more conveniently located, perhaps I took my watch off sometimes when I wanted to look fancy so it didn’t count all my steps).  I definitely need to make sure this doesn’t fall off because this is a big part in weight loss when I’m not training as much.  Steps matter!

Fun fact –  it counts as training if you wear your IM shirt to the pool even if you don’t actually swim laps.


Consumption Goals:

On the record. I’ve finished my Ironman.  I’ve had some downtime where I enjoyed myself a bit.  Now, it’s time to get serious about trying to get down to *race weight*.  To this end, tracking food each meal when I eat it (not 2 days later) and daily logging on the scale starts TODAY.  This week, we’ll start with the goal to eat approximately 500-750 calories less than fitbit says I have burned.  If I do better than that, great.

Water water water.  At least 4×24 oz bottles before I leave work for the day.  I’m really bad about this if I don’t pay attention and I think on the cruise I lapsed on this pretty hard.  When beer and bottled water cost the same in Mexico….you know what I’m going to choose, right?

Detox… but just a little. Booze must fit into both the parameter above (calorie deficit goals) and below (sleep goals).  Let’s not go crazy with any further restrictions.  It IS Memorial Day weekend. 🙂

Beer 4$.  Water 4$.  I choose beer.


Life Goals:

All the shut eye.  I’m going to say 8+ hours of sleep a night is something I’ll put out there as a priority this week.  I’m feeling a bit run down after playing hard on vacation and my own bed felt SO AMAZING last night.  So, this week, I make sure I get lots of sleep.

Non-fiction reading.  While I’m relaxing in bed, I’ve got a few books I’d like to work on getting through (the big yellow Maffetone endurance training book, finally cracking something regarding online marketing and PR, etc).  For the next month, I probably need to hold off on reading more “marines in space” books even if they are actual physical paper books and not on my kindle.

The office.  I’m not saying we need to finish it, but so many other things hinge on getting this one space cleaned out that I want us to spend no less than *THREE* hours on it this weekend.  I would love to be able to move the table that’s been sprawled over the side of the guest bed for a year into there.

The kind of non-fiction reading I *don’t* want to do.  Seriously.  We’re a joke everywhere.

And while I have so many other things on my list (financial planner! doctor! hiking! comedy club! creating a business plan! book outline!), these are the things I’m willing to tackle this week.  Laying out ALL THE THINGS like #projectspring last year seems overwhelming and exhausting right now.  I’ll focus a little smaller and revisit the plan again in 7 days.

So I ask… what’s YOUR plan for the next 7 days?

10 years and 5 top tips for healthy new years resolutions

Ten years is a really long time.  I keep saying “it’s about a third of my life” because I still THINK I’m about 30, but I’m getting closer to it being a fourth.  Still a long time, regardless.

2007-1

I don’t enjoy dredging this picture up every January but it proves a point.

Anyhoo, about ten years ago, I barely fit into size 24 jeans.  Walking around my apartment complex or across my tiny work campus was a WORKOUT.  I drove the mile to work because “I would get sweaty” or “there’s a hill”.  A marathon was something you did watching a lot of a TV show.  A triathlon was eating pizza, drinking whiskey, and working or playing games at the same time.

While I was proud of my work accomplishments, I had given up on the rest of my life.  I figured that I wasn’t young anymore, so I had missed my opportunity to do something fun for fitness like I did as a kid.  Hello, I was in my MID TWENTIES.  Who thinks that?  I thought if I wanted to lose weight I needed to do the elliptical (ho hum) and lift weights (bleh) and eat low carb (HATE).   I would stick to this stuff for a little bit, then I’d get bored and have no overlying goal besides wanting to hate myself a little less, and get frustrated and quit.

However, a decade ago my New Years resolution was to lose weight, and it actually stuck!  I’m down a small human from where I was ten years ago and I’m fit, active, and competitive (sometimes) in triathlons.  However, there are days, weeks, and months where I’ve felt like an utter failure at it.  I’ve gained weight back.  I’ve let myself get so far off the strength training wagon I’ve become weak, imbalanced, and injured.  To be a little nerdy and quote Alfred from Batman, “Why do we fall?  So we can learn to pick ourselves up.”  I’ve learned that the key is lifting yourself up over and over and over.

Change is uncomfortable, and you’ll occasionally revert back to comfort and then feel frustrated about it.  You’ll have a bad day at work and scarf down a burger and a beer and feel a bunch of guilt about how weak you are.  You’ll get sick or busy and get out of the workout habit and berate yourself for not sticking to it.  The scale will, for NO GOOD REASON, go up one week and you’ll want to cry and say FUCK IT, my best isn’t good enough, I guess I deserve to be fat now.  I have done ALL THIS AND MORE and yet, still, here I am.

Odds are, you have a health or fitness related goal for 2017.  Since it’s coming up to that pivotal time where you’re either going to quit when the going gets tough or persevere, here’s my 5 top tips for actually succeeding with a health/fitness related New Years resolution.

jan9-2

Instead of being too busy to work out because you have all the errands, don’t drive there – get a cheapo commuter bike and some storage (my bike was 200$, my storage cost less than 100$, bike adventures instead of sitting in traffic – priceless).

1. Work the goals around your life, not your life around the goals.  Are you not a morning person?  I’m not either.  Setting a goal to wake up at 5am to work out every day is PROBABLY not the best first step.  Try finding 30 minutes a few times a week that makes sense for you.  Use your lunch break.  Take 30 minutes out of your social media or TV time.  Stop at the gym on the way home from work.  If you have trouble getting out of the house, find workouts you can do inside (treadmill, trainer, videos, active video games).  Maybe it IS the mornings, but if it’s not, don’t force it.  Find the time you are MOST likely to work out and do that.

2. Have lofty goals but take realistic steps.  Want to lose 100 lbs?  Awesome.  Set that really scary number aside and concentrate on losing 5 lbs this month.  Or better yet, use process goals, like tracking your food and steps and eating 500 calories less than you burn daily as measured by fitbit.  You can’t lose weight just by wanting it really hard, you have to go through a process to do it.  I know – I tried for MANY YEARS to just want to lose weight as if it was magic.  It may be a little mystifying, but I guarantee you, the more you quantify your actions, the more success you’ll have.

3. Have an ultimate (quantifiable) goal.  Wanting to be skinny or get fitter is admirable, but hard to quantify.  What’s your motivation for wanting it?  Do you want to fit into a pair of jeans?  Do you want to be able to play soccer with your kids?  Do you want to run your first 5k?  Once you identify this, figure out those incremental steps to get there and make a plan and set a date.  As they say, a goal without a deadline is just a dream.  For the 5k example, you may say you’re going to follow the Couch25k program (giving yourself a few extra weeks just in case) and sign yourself up for a 5k in 3 months.  This means you can’t just say “someday”… someday is in 12 weeks – get to it!

4. Be gentle with yourself if you falter.  Progress is not linear.  We are human.  The aforementioned bad day burger and beer, missing workouts, and scale being a fuckwit WILL happen.  Let me shout this one.  IT IS NOT INDICATIVE OF YOU BEING A WORTHLESS HUMAN BEING.  However, why do we fall (because we all fall)?  To learn how to pick ourselves up again.  After the burger and beer day, wake up in the morning and eat a healthy breakfast and go sweat a little.  After missing a week of working out, get back to it.  If the scale is not cooperating, keep trying, because the other option is giving up and I guarantee you, this is not a good alternative.  Sometimes we vacation off the wagon, and that’s fine, but we should live ON it.

5. Celebrate when you succeed.  Did you lose 15 lbs and your jeans are loose?  Fuck yeah!  Go buy yourself a new pair that fits and looks good.  Even if you’re not at your goal weight.  Even if you have to go to the thrift store to do it.  Just because you are not at your vision of perfect yet doesn’t mean you shouldn’t celebrate the little steps along the way.  Progress should be should be met with a hearty fist bump, not a sigh about how far you have left to go.

In ten years, some things have not changed.

sept19-1

Yep, this is still a thing…

Sometimes I’ll eat like an ass just like before.  I love me some french fries.  I still have pizza and whiskey nights in my life.

I still hate the elliptical.  And I constantly fall off and restart on the weights bandwagon.

Right now I’m cranky about barely fitting into some of my jeans.

However, when I eat like an ass, 99% of the time it’s because I’ve just finished a super long workout and I can justify the calories.  I may hate the elliptical, but I love to swim, bike, and run.  And the jeans I’m cranky about?  They’re half the size (or less) than in 2007.

So, there are some things that HAVE changed.  And while 2007 me and 2017 me are very different people, it was through very gradual evolution every step of the way.  2007 me would have balked at my current workout schedule and many other things that are just part of my normal life now.  But 2007 me DID find it acceptable to do 20-30 mins cardio and 15 minutes of light weights three times a week, and track my calories.  And then it evolved from there.

If 2007 me could do it, 2017 you TOTALLY can.

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The magical growing shirts from last August

Last August, I went thrift store shopping and bought a bunch of shirts.  Like, a metric boatload.  It’s REALLY fun to do that when they all cost, like, 3 bucks.  I was super excited to be able to refresh my closet.  Some of the shirts went beyond the typical ironic or triathlon related t-shirts I typically wear, and made me look a little more (just a little bit) like a grown up.  Not that I need that on a daily basis, but it’s kind of nice to be able to wake up and decide if I want to look 12 or more than 12.

Aug18-1

One of said new-not-new shirts.

Sadly, due to the great nutrition experiment failure of 2015, most of those shirts had shrank so much that I couldn’t comfortably wear them by mid-September.  It was pretty crazy depressing to have gained that much in a month.  So, for almost a whole year, I have been staring at a bunch of shirts that didn’t quite fit that I’ve never worn.

Zliten, who has also lost a bunch of weight, decided to start wearing his size Large shirts after I continued to tease him about how his XL shirts were looking like tents.  Or mumus.  Or mumu printed tents.  Now, he is at the point where he’s just a few lbs away from his goal.  I am… somewhere in the middle of this process.  I’ve got a long way to go to get to the same point.  However, I figured I owed it to myself to try the same.

Oddly enough, those shirts have sat there long enough that they have grown again to their previous size.  Who knew that 5 months of working on weight loss would have that effect?

I still am cranky that it has taken me 5 months to undo this.  I still am cranky that the numbers say I should be losing about 8 lbs a month and I’m losing 2-3.  However, seeing the pictures I don’t hate, seeing myself in the mirror with a smile and not a grimace, seeing the progress even if it’s slow?  It’s worth it.

Mar7-3

Feeling a lot different than this girl from March even if it’s only ~15 lbs or so difference.

I’ve accepted a lot of things in this process.

For some reason, I’m always going to need to stick to the -1000 calories to make any sort of progress.  My body just seems to process calories differently than the fitbit thinks, the nutritionist thinks, that logic dictates.  I’ve read some studies about losing a bunch of weight, and how your body actually burns less calories overall.  While my nutritionist told me that was bull honkey, I think that math seems to back it up in my case.

I’ve accepted that I will probably be at this for a long time, and I should just stay the course because it takes so long to get rolling once I stop.  While I’d love to have been able to diet for 4 months of offseason and have gotten to race weight, it’s just not how it goes for me.  I have to track my food.  I have to maintain a deficit that is small enough to still train but large enough to make a difference.  I have to be patient, persistent, and relentless.

I’m going to probably not be able to come up to 100% form this year.  Last year, I felt a big change between maintaining a deficit and eating enough, or more calories than I needed.  I don’t feel very different right now, but that’s because I’ve been doing this for months.  I *know* that once I’m done with the weight loss, and I bring my calories up, my performance will increase a bit automatically.  I have to be kind to myself when I fail to hit run paces I think should be easy, because they will come easier when it’s time.

I need to remember that the time to skimp on food is NOT before, during, or after a workout.  Yeah, it’s more fun to eat pizza than it is to eat cyborg boob milk gels, but unless I can either eat the pizza as pre- or mid-ride fuel, or consume that pizza within an hour of my workouts, it’s not doing me much good.  My workout sucks, and instead of being able to use that fuel to power a workout, it powers it’s way to my adipose.

Aug2-3

This would have gone straight to the thighs… except it was at hour 2 of a 5 hour bike ride.  So it actually went straight to the quads (in a good way).

I also need to realize that I’m in the danger zone right about now.  This is what always happens.  I make some progress, I’m feeling good about myself.  I want to lose more weight, but I no longer hate the mirror, some of my clothes fit… and I loosen up on tracking.  I can see it starting already.  I haven’t tracked since yesterday afternoon.  I’ve totally been busy, but obviously not so busy as I’m writing this blog.  This is the way that progress ends.  Not with a bang, but a whimper.

On that note, off to track, off to be persistent, patient, and relentless, and maybe I’ll be able to find that the next size down shirts have also magically grown again.

Deep and Meaningful…

…just aint workin’ for me today.  So let’s finish up this doozy of a week with a snappy little 5 Random Things Post.  Tricked ya, didn’t I?  Just WAIT until you get a load of what I’m planning for April Fools Day (guess I should let ME know because I haven’t decided yet, tee hee).  Ok, it’s not even technically Friday, and my brain is in crazyland already.  This does not bode well…

1.  I still need to experiment more with it and I’ll do a whole post soon, but OMG, I LOVE LOVE LOVE my garmin forerunner.  I never realized what I was missing but OH GOD I don’t ever want to do another outside run without it.  It always bothered me that I didn’t exactly how far and how fast I was running (some days it didn’t matter to me but I never am opposed to having a reference).  The coolest thing?  It pulls data points about once a house and shows me my pace at each one.  And I can sort of watch my performance after the fact in a graph and go – “ok, that’s where I crossed the street, that’s where the hill started, that’s where I was booking it to make up some time, etc”.  You can import it into google earth even and I could see where I ran around someone who was blocking the sidewalk.  I never REALLY wanted one before (well I did but… it’s expensive!) but it’s seriously awesome.  Today, I’m going to play around with the heartrate monitor strap for my cross training workout. EDIT:  Boo, it doesn’t do heart rate indoors well.  It took my heart rate alright, but said I burnt 18 calories.  Not quite.

1b.  For those of you accustomed to doing 10+ mile runs, do you ever feel like you’re getting ready for a trip?  Workout clothes, sunscreen (if I remember), attach runner ID to one foot, attach shoe wallet with sport beans to other, apply body glide liberally to cleavage/arms, fill and attach camelback to myself, then strap on my zune, find my running sunglasses (they’re thinner and give me less owl eyes – yes, I’m vain), and in the winter find my headband?   It’s exhausting before I even start my warmup!

2.  I’ve been on the spark again calorie tracking.  I retroactively put in Monday and am still going today.  Oddly enough, it motivated me to eat LOTS and LOTS of good for me food.  Fancy that?  Yesterday, I felt so full I was afraid I was going to lose my cookies (err…carrots I guess) later on the ‘mill.  And I came about 250 calories under my goal because I just couldn’t put another damn thing in my cakehole.  Monday was a little under 200 under goal.  2000 calories of healthy food is HARD. 1500-1700 feels about right.  Good thing today is a cross training day, so 1500 is the goal.  I’m at about 1k now after a gigantic snack (carrots/pea pods/hummus/necatrine/jerky/wheat melbas and laughing cow), and looking forward to an awesome healthy dinner.

3.  The scale, it moved yesterday!  Yeah, I probably shouldn’t be weighing every day but since I’m tracking it seems to feel right to weigh every day.  And this morning it sung to me like a songbird, 156.0.  Only 1lb to go until I can start the “I-trust-myself-at-maintenance” counter.  I’m going to predict 2 weeks of tracking and then I’ll be able to go back to fumbling my way through it without numbers.  I totally know why I’m NOT doing this for the majority of this year.  I’m learning pretty well about how to be pretty un-neurotic about my food and just do this thing naturally, but I start getting crazy when I have to be SO accountable.  Great for weight loss, bad for trying to figure out a “rest of my life” thing.

4.  The weather, while NOT beautiful today, has gone from stupid cold (for us) as in highs in the 30s and lows in the 10s, to decent, meaning highs in the 50s and lows in the 30s, to rainy today and tomorrow, but starting Saturday and extending into next week, it’s supposed to be upper 60s/70s and lows in the 40s/50s.  I AM SO LOOKING FORWARD!  I missed this weather something terrible over the last few weeks.  Don’t ever leave me again!  It should be perfect conditions for a nice long run outside this weekend, and maybe I’ll have to see if I can get in a lunch/after work run next week before the sun sets.

5.  Uhhhm, I’m kind of out of ideas now, so I’ll just say Archer on FX is pretty much hilarious.

Have a great weekend, everyone!  I’ll probably be playing some rock band, running a lot, possibly going out on the town, and hopefully enjoying outside time on Sunday.  What’s your plans?

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