Inadvertent hiatus

I didn’t mean to not post for days on end, it just happened. I was dead tired Friday, plus busy at work then busy at home. I was gone from 6 am to 10 pm Saturday, then went to a friend’s house Sunday. So it was very busy. Food wasn’t too bad – until yesterday.

I went to the gym after work & had a really great lifting session. I went home all happy & pumped up, with a great dinner planned. Hub and I had a really bad fight. Really bad. One of those where there isn’t a lot of shouting, but you feel like the foundation of your marriage has just experienced an earthquake. First I couldn’t eat, then I couldn’t stop. I had a small pizza for dinner. Light cheese, not all the crust, but an entire small pizza. And 2 beers. It tasted like crap, and I ate every bit of it just so I could stop feeling for just a few minutes.

Right now I feel tired (needless to say, I didn’t sleep so hot) and thoroughly defeated.

It’s my blog and I’ll whine if I want to!

While singing the praises of creatine, I snuck the down side in and no one even noticed. Creatine works its magic (in part) by drawing water into the muscles. Extra water = extra???. Yup, the scale was up 2 pounds. Ouch! I know its just water, and that water is helping me feel better and lift better, but as paranoid as I am about the freaking scale right now, that hurt.

I was all ready to finish the week out on a high note, but no. Hub wanted a beer last night, which meant he wanted company drinking a beer. When I said no, he badgered. I told him straight up that I was tired and one would be too many and 12 wouldn’t be enough. I warned him. Remember that T-shirt “Instant a$$hole. Just add alcohol.”? Yeah, that was me last night. There went my free night. Jinkies. I ate a bunch of crap, and woke up this morning feeling defeated. Like I’ll never be able to lose weight, I’ll always be a slave to food, and I had a headache to boot.

I am only working a half day today – I have loads to do this afternoon since I’ll be out of town both days this weekend (on 2 different road trips). It’s gonna be a busy one. At least I won’t have a lot of time to lay around and eat crap.

Fall?

The past couple of days have been overcast & rainy – giving us a brief hint of fall. Tomorrow we’re back to sunny & 80, but for yesterday & today its low 70s & cloudy. I had the perfect dinner planned for yesterday – baked pork chops, sweet potatoes, and creamed spinach. Even my son said “This is the perfect dinner for today.” Some days it’s the little things that make me happy.

I went to the gym yesterday afternoon. My legs were still pretty sore from kickboxing, so I left my leg exercises off and did the rest. I was shocked at how much stronger my upper body was! I upped weights and/or reps on everything. Was it because I left off the leg exercises? I dunno, but I was pleased. It felt awesome. Then I went home, had a hot bath, & fixed supper.

I must’ve been tired last night because I totally slept through my run time this morning. Not I “decided not to get up”, I mean I never even noticed I was supposed to wake up – I just slept. Well, I guess that means I needed it. I had planned to take this afternoon off anyway, so I guess maybe I’ll walk 2 miles. It’s going to be cool enough.

Things are still going well with exercise & food. My only gripe is that I wish this felt normal. It feels good, but I keep waiting for the shoe to drop. I want to throw the shoe away!

Promise made, promise kept

Can I just take a moment to say how much I didn’t want to go to kickboxing yesterday? (Of course I can – it’s my blog. Ha!) I mean really. Did. Not. Want. To. Go. But I got in my car, called a friend, called hub. He was sympathetic “Yeah, I know how you feel. But go.” So I drove past my first exit, then my second, and that’s all the exits there are for our town – I was committed! It was hard, and I was tired, but I was truly glad I went. I had a light supper and that was plenty. It’s like I told myself in the car, if I had gone home, what would I have done? Eat? Yeah, probably. Going was the better option for sure.

This morning’s mantra was “feet on floor.” I was tired, but I got in a good 2 mile run. It’s been super busy here today (I got here early. Not only my boss already here, but he was already on the phone with HIS boss!). So the day has flown by. In short, things are going well.

Do I want to lift weights this afternoon? Heck no! What would make a good bribe? The promise of a nice long tub? Getting tomorrow afternoon off? Must. Go. To. The. Gym.

The weird thing is I have fun when I get there, so why don’t I ever want to go? Mystery of the ages people.

Be in the now

I was thinking as I was running this morning about how often when I am exercising, my mind is on the 43 things I will be doing after I work out. On the weekend I'm thinking about when I'll finish my run, what time I'll get out to the grocery, how long the shopping will take, etc etc. Weekday weight lifting sessions are filled with what time I need to finish to pick up th eboy to get dinner done... you get the idea.

I feel like I'm cheating myself in my workouts - instead of putting the most into my workout, my brain has already moved on to the next thing. I know that during the week I need to set limits so that I'm back by 6, but when I leave the house I generally have a good idea of how far I can go and get home on time.

Today I lifted weights after work. I only looked at my watch once. I didn't promise to pick up the boy - as a matter of fact I was so tired after my workout that I called hub and asked him to take care of that. To get the most out of my workout, my brain needs to be there as well as my body. I don't promise that I will always be this mindful, but I'm trying.

My workout was awesome - I really pushed myself and it felt great. I ran 2 miles this morning - mostly running, and that was good too. I had a beer both Saturday and Sunday nights, but other than that, my food was pretty decent this weekend. I'm working on it. :-)

Well, that's about it.

Hello

Hmmm... I am in the mood to munch, so I am posting here instead. So far this has been a nice weekend. Friday we cleaned up the house some, so that we could go out of town for the day Saturday. We got up yesterday morning, went to the gym and lifted weights, then came home, packed the car, & headed out. We had a nice day, although it was very hot. As much as I love spring & summer, I'm looking forward to cooler weather.

My workout yesterday morning was excellent! I'm not sore, and I really pushed it hard. My 2 free meals were Thursday and Friday evenings, both of which I overdid a bit. But yesterday was fine, and today has been okay so far. I was scheduled for a 5 mile run this morning, but the heat really took it out of me yesterday. I walked 2 miles instead - I will either do my run tonight or in the morning - it depends on how I feel.

We did teambuilding at work Friday, although our boss had a couple of meetings at the office. I have the feeling that we are going to have a very busy week! This presentation is turning in to a 2-headed hydra. I am looking forward to it being over I must admit, although it has been a great opportunity and challenge.

Well, I am going to go. Enjoy the rest of your weekend!

“Anger is a gift.” – graffiti by the side of Pla-de-Beret.

Rant on.

I was so pissed off this morning! Here’s the deal: my neck is still hurting and my PMS is killing me and I’m working hard and I feel like poo…. I go home last night and while hub is taking the boy to tkd I make a nice supper. They get home and immediately get into a big fight – the boy is upset that hub has set out mouse traps (we have a mouse that is getting from the garage into the kitchen.) He asks me to pick up some of those “humane” traps with the one way door, which I do since I had to stop by W-M on the way home anyway. They had one, so I bought it. The hub refuses to put it out or take down the spring traps. The boy gets all upset (he loves all animals) and goes to his room, crying. So dinner is ruined, I feel like crap. I eat and head for the tub, after which I had a beer (just one – I went to the store and bought just one) and finished off the pint of lowfat Haagan-Daz coffee ice cream. Hub meanwhile spends the evening watching tv, talking to friends on the phone, and emailing. What do I wake up to this morning? If you guessed a filthy kitchen you’d be right. I totally lost it. I cook, and he’s supposed to clean, but “he didn’t feel like it.” I packed my lunch & left – no breakfast made for anyone, no lunches packed. The boy can buy it and hub can pack his own damn lunch. Oh yeah – and the mouse? He’d avoided the spring traps for days, but was in the humane trap in under an hour.

Rant off.

I had an awesome (anger fueled) run this morning. I flirted with the idea of sleeping in, then told myself I could “just walk”. By the time I left the house I needed to run harder than a race horse. Two miles later, I was sweaty, panting, and my calves were cramping up. Good times.

Other than last night, food is going fine. I won’t be in the office tomorrow, so I weighed today – I was down half a pound. I would’ve liked more, but it’s a start.

From bodybuilding.com: “So, what is creatine? Our bodies naturally make the compound, which is used to supply energy to our muscles. It is produced in the liver, pancreas, and kidneys, and is transported to the body's muscles through the bloodstream. Once it reaches the muscles, it is converted into phosphocreatine (creatine phosphate). This high-powered metabolite is used to regenerate the muscles' ultimate energy source, ATP (adenosine triphosphate). Creatine's ability to enhance energy reserves in muscles comes from its muscle protein synthesizing action, while minimizing protein breakdown. This occurs because creatine has the awesome effect of super-hydrating muscle cells with water. It enhances muscles' growth too-making muscle fibers bigger and stronger.” That says it better than I could.

Well, back to the salt mine. Have a good one.

Ahhhh, the magic of creatine

I don’t take a huge number of supplements, but I am willing to try something new. Several folks have recommended creatine to me, so I ponied up the cash and ordered a bottle off bodybuilding.com. I have to say I’m impressed. I went to the gym yesterday and lifted pretty hard – I did my best to kick my own a$$. But I’m not sore today. I slept pretty hard, which is typical after a good weight session, but no soreness. Hurray!

I got up this morning and walked for 2 miles. I ran pretty hard yesterday plus lifted, so I decided to keep it light today. So that’s the workout. Tonight is more sewing.

Food is about the same as yesterday, except dinner tonight is baked fish, salad and ??. Rice, maybe.

I hate to even write about it and potentially jinx it, but I’m in a good place right now. Instead of making a bunch of charts and checking them, I’m trying to slowly change my habits. Getting up is easier this week, and I did a lot more at the gym. Food is much better. I’m still planning out my meals, but I’m pretty much just taking everything one day at a time. I’m afraid if I start setting up a bunch of fancy charts for myself, I’ll set some impossible goal & then freak out when I don’t achieve it. I have a ramp-up plan, but no hard timeline around it – just ramping up a bit more each week until I’m at my exercise target. I am adding a mile a week to my long run – I did 4 miles this past weekend. Baby steps, right?

It’s in the rain (my run that is)

I previewed my first workout DVD from Netflix – “Crunch Bootcamp”. It was pretty decent and would make a good sub for a trip to the gym. Not sure it would be a good sub for a run IMO. Anyhow, I still don’t have the tv set up, nor do I have a good cardio DVD. Yesterday morning I skipped my run due to rain, opting to do it in the afternoon. It wasn’t raining and it was cooler, but it was pretty muggy. I did for 4 miles, mostly walking. This morning I was kinda cranky when I realized it was raining again, but I opted to run in the rain. I did 2 miles, mostly running. It wasn’t too bad – I had on a hat. My shoes got pretty squishy, but only on the top. The bottoms of my socks were dry, so I wasn’t worried about blisters. This morning felt like a really good run. I took my MP3 player, and as I came into the final cool down stretch, what song came on? Enya’s “It’s in the rain” from her new CD. Who says god doesn’t have a sense of humor? ;-)

Eats are going pretty good – although I really wanted to nosh last night while sewing. I wonder if the urge to snack after supper will ever go away? Here’s today’s food for the curious:

B: 1 egg, 1 egg white, ½ c oats with a bit of whey protein and mixed berries
S: cottage cheese and mixed berries
L: part of a steak, vegetable soup, salad
S: shredded chicken with bbq sauce, grapes
D: Family is having chicken casserole and green beans. I think I’ll make the casserole a side, and have chicken, a small serving of casserole, and green beans.

Here’s wishing you all runs as fun as mine was today!

Mixed bag

Food was better this weekend, exercise wasn’t. We were out of town all day Saturday, and had guests all weekend. I woke up to run this morning, but it was pouring. Must get hub to set up tv for workouts.

I am either going to run or go to the gym & do some cardio this afternoon. I have done something wonky to my back/neck, so no lifting today. Food is planned for the week – I’ve just go to stick to it.

October 17, 2003

Why is that date important? That's the last time I weighed as much as I did when I stepped on the scale this morning. 162 pounds. Ouch. I very much want to beat myself up right now, but that won't help I guess. I made a promise to myself I'd never get above 160 again, but I blew right by it. I'm very, very upset.

At least I got on the scale this morning. At least now I know where I am. I want to lose 13 pounds in 17 weeks. I can do this. I WILL do this. I don't want to keep ignoring my body. I don't know whether I should be comforted or discouraged by the fact that there is no end to this thing called keeping healthy. I admit, right now I'm leaning toward discouraged.

I will not use this as an excuse to pig out this weekend. I will not!!!!!!!

Aren't I crafty?

Rainy day.

We are getting thunderstorms here. Which I totally love, except they make me want to sleep! I was pathetically tired last night – I went to bed at 9:30, and slept until after 6! :-O I woke up so stiff and sore – even though I did so little, I overdid it at the gym. I’m going back this afternoon – all I can do is work through it.

So I’m feeling a little discouraged on the exercise front, but I keep telling myself that Rome wasn’t built in a day, and jumping back into my routine isn’t going to happen. Oh well, still slugging along.

I have a ton of stuff to do at the office today – 2 meetings plus a lot of stuff for my boss. Yesterday we found out our weekend company is coming Friday night rather than Saturday morning. That’s great, but it means less time to get everything in order, you know? Luckily, hub will have the day off tomorrow so he can clean, then all I have to do is pick up here and there when I get home. Tonight I need to finish up some sewing for our medieval thing this weekend so I can get my sewing toys all picked up.

Well, that’s about all I know today.

Wireless baby!!!

I am sitting in my easy chair in my living room, watching the last half of alame sci-fi movie on the tv, plugged into nothing in the world, typing on my thinkpad. How freaking cool is that??? technology rocks.

Done nothing but sewing this evening, so I'm feeling pretty relaxed. Don't worry - I promise to wash my face with my new super good for my skin face wash and brush my fangs before turning in early. I'm still stiff, and 5 comes mighty early.

Um yeah, it’s like that

Oh. My. God. I went to the gym yesterday afternoon. The nice thing about not keeping track of your workouts or food is that you are able to delude yourself into a false sense of complacency. I have no idea when I last went to the gym - I quit writing the date at the top of the page. According to the way my muscles feel today after that wimpy workout yesterday, it’s been at least 6 or 7 years! I decided to do one circuit of my total body routine. I take small breaks between exercises, but run through the whole thing once, and then back through again. Not so much yesterday. I’ve lost a lot of ground. :-( SO, my weight lifting plan is this: Do a total body circuit twice a week. Do the circuit one time through this week and next, then for 2 weeks go through the circuit twice. After that, I should be ready to split my routine into upper and lower body. Right now I need to work everything lightly a couple of times per week to build back up.

Hub went to the gym this morning and did basically the same thing. He was shocked at how inflexible he was. So we both clearly have a lot of work to do.

This morning I just walked. I ran yesterday plus lifted, and I stayed up a little too late. So I went ahead & got up (I have to get back on schedule!) and walked for 2 miles. I’ll get there – it’s just gonna take a while.

I feel a lot like the Goodyear blimp shoved into a pair of brown capris today. Eating yesterday was on track, so what’s up with that??? Oh well, stay the course.

I think I have a tentative workout schedule planned:

M-F a.m. run and/or walk
Sat or Sun a.m. long run
M & Thu afternoon lift weights
T afternoon kickboxing

I’d like to add one more kickboxing in there, but that’s my goal for the next couple of weeks. That adds up to 9 workouts and I will give myself one “pass” per week. So my goal is 8 of those 9. Yes, I require a lot of exercise. And I’d rather work out twice a day rather than one really long time.

I am so freaking sick of tuna – I’ve had to absolutely choke down my afternoon snack the past couple of days. Maybe if I cover it in bbq sauce??? Tuna is a mainstay of my diet. I eat 5 or 6 times per day with three of those here at work, so I rely heavily on cheap & convenient sources of protein like tuna and cottage cheese. Maybe deviled eggs? But those are only good fresh – sounds like a lot of work. Hmm. I know some folks do protein shakes, but I much prefer not to drink my food. I wind up feeling deprived. Need to think about this one.

I hate the spots on my face. The wrinkles on my forehead don’t bother me too much, but I really hate the spots. I’m considering going to the doctor for a peel. Thoughts?
Well, that’s all I got. Have a good one!

p.s. I’ve posted my pennsic photos on my yahoo photo site – they are under “Pennsic 35.” I haven’t posted my cool craft projects yet though.

This house is clean!!

No, not of poltergeists – I got rid of the cheese dip and 2 beers that were lurking in the fridge. Okay, it wasn’t a healthy dinner exactly… In any case, the crap is out of the house – I threw the taco chips in the trash this morning. I got up and ran, and I have my weight training log so I can write out what I’m doing at the gym this afternoon. This is very much going to be a baby step, one day at a time process for me until I get back into my routines. Food during the day is under control, I’m back waking up at 5 am, and I have healthy dinners planned for the week.

I stayed up until nearly 10 last night doing cross stitch! It’s so much fun to be doing something like that again – I’m glad I dragged it out. Tonight I have some sewing I want to work on.

It is amazingly muggy here right now – I was a fright when I got back to the house this morning!! Hair all matted to my head, face beet red…. Lots of room for improvement! But I had a good time. I added a bunch of songs to my MP3 player so we could use it in the car – time to get the driving tunes off so I don’t have to skip over them when I run.

I bought a book on the history of the Tour de France to take with me on vacation. I haven’t touched it. I glance at cyclingnews.com and just get sad. I feel a little like a kid who no longer believes in Santa. I don’t know how I’ll feel when the season starts back up next year, but right now I feel like pro cycling has been ruined for me. Which is really sad.

I've updated my weight chart in Excel. Sometimes it gets a little sad to see how long I've been at this, but then sometimes it just reminds me that this is a lifetime commitment and there is no rush.

Goals

I’m back from vacation, the house and garage are cleaned up, and its time to start setting some goals for myself. I haven’t gotten on the scale yet, so I dunno what that will bring, but here are my current thoughts:

1. Weight. There are 17 weeks left in the year. I’d love to finally break the 150 point. That’s a loss of around 10 pounds by year end. That should be doable. More than any specific number, I want to be consistent. To that end, food goals:

2. My big thing at first is to start writing down my food. My planned meals are fine – it’s the extras that kill me – especially in the evenings and weekends. Writing would add a level of accountability. Another big help would be

3. Cut out the beer. Totally for a bit. Vacation saw too much beer – which is fine on vacation but its over!

4. Gym – lift weights twice per week. I can never seem to break into that magic 3 times per week, so I’m gonna quit trying. Instead I plan to focus of 2 good workouts, and maybe a good calisthenics workout on another day to supplement.

5. Running. I’m back at it! I’m slow and still doing mostly walking, but that’s okay. I did 3 miles Sunday and my plan is to build up until I’m doing a long run of 10 miles every weekend. At that point I’ll stop adding distance and start working on speed. No specific run in mind, but I need some structure around my program. That will keep me busy for a bit.

That’s it. Nothing spectacular, but a good start.

I had a very nice weekend. I did a bit of sewing, and I got my cross stitch back out. I haven’t worked on that in years, and it felt really nice. I want to find a good balance between my 2 hobbies of exercise and craft stuff. I tend to do one or the other, but I enjoy both, so I need to balance my time.

Work is very demanding and very busy, but it is also very exciting! I’m feeling more fulfilled in my work than I have in years. I’m tired at the end of the day, but also invigorated, if that makes any sense.

All in all, I give life right now a B+. It would get an A, but (as usual) money is a little tight. A friend invited us out to visit her in Seattle – I wish I could afford it. Oh well, a B+ is mighty darn good!

Change is afoot

I am slowly getting back into a routine. I am waking up at 5 (as opposed to going to bed at 5), and I am walking in the mornings. I am thinking about putting together a calisthenics routine (push-ups, mountain climbers, sit-ups, etc) to compliment going to the gym. We are going back to the gym next week. Unpacking is about halfway done, and we’ll finish this weekend. In short, life is slowly getting back to normal.

And yet… there are some big changes. As I said, we elected to begin doing our medieval recreation stuff with a larger, more mainstream group that has folks closer to home. As a result of that, we’ll be able to be more active. And because we have completed most of our house projects, we have time again to play. So our social/hobby life which has been lacking will be picking back up.

Based on my efforts prior to vacation, my job has morphed into something quite different. I’m at a place I was hoping to be 2 years from now. Instead of just managing small projects, I’ll be running a project office, coordinating efforts & reporting around a large group of projects which will fall under one large strategic umbrella. This is very exciting! And I feel confident that I can handle it.

I still miss the friends I made on vacation. My friend Misha called last night – it was so nice to hear his voice again. After vacation, life seems a bit blah. So I am glad I have some stuff to look forward to at work and at home to help stave off the post vacation blahs.

I am still catching up on blogs and I can’t wait to read about your adventures! So forgive me if I’m not commenting with my usual regularity. And I am putting a structured running program in place in the next couple of weeks – I’ll keep you posted!

With a song in my heart

I returned to the office to find that I had met my annual goal for re-engineering saves in my absence (my boss fought for me on my big project). I now have the luxury of working on a much larger, more strategic project. Pretty impressive for 8 months on the job. So, work is good. Make that great.

Hub and I have decided to drop out of the group we had been doing combat recreation with, and go with the more mainstream group most of our friends were already in. That allows us to jettison a lot of stress & baggage – there was a lot of drama in that group. But hub had been a member for 5 years when we met, and I didn’t want to ask him to give it up.

That frees us up to pursue some stuff locally. And our best couple friends decided to leave the belly dance troupe they’d been heavily involved with for the past 2 years as well – which frees them up too. So, we’ll be seeing a lot more of our friends, doing more fun stuff close to home, and don’t have the huge travel commitment of participating in a group based out of Pittsburgh.

We got up and walked a mile this morning (with a couple of stints of jogging for me). That’s not a lot, but the main thing this week IMO is getting back into the routine. The alarm went off at 5 – pretty drastic when you consider last week I was getting home from parties at 3 or 3:30. And food is back to normal which is also good. I introduced the Aussies to marinated mozzarella balls and to cream puffs (both from Costco). I eat lousy at Pennsic – my schedule is whacked, I’m eating out of cans, the food court, whatever folks toss out of their coolers…. But hey, I have 50 weeks to recover.

I was feeling stressed on many fronts when we left for this vacation, I’m feeling so much better – happier & looking forward to fun times with friends. And to running - exercise doesn't seem so much like a chore or punishment any more.

Life is good.

The Pennsic Beer Garden will live forever in my heart

Warning: this is going to be a long post. If you aren't interested in the detail: I had a terrific time, I'm home safe and sound, and I feel more relaxed, focused, and energized than I have in over a year.

Details follow.

First, I have to give some background on pennsic for this to make any sense, so here goes: A group that does medieval recreation started this "war" 35 years ago (the sca). It has been held in the same place for the past 30 of those years. During that time, it has grown into much much more than this group ever imagined, not to mention the group has grown as well. Now, folks come from all over the world. And not just from this one group, but from numerous other groups that do battle recreation of a similar style. and also just folks that just want to come and party with 12,000 or so other folks. It a cross between a ren faire and woodstock, but better organized than either.

Hub was on staff this year, so we stayed with the head of security & his group, over from Australia. They were terrific! We had a total blast camping with them. They were a fun bunch who fought hard and played harder. It was the most relaxed, fun-loving group of folks I could hope to spend 2 weeks with. We set our chairs up in a circle out under a tree, and every afternoon after battle we sat around in the "beer garden", snacking, having a cold beer, & visiting. It was the most fun, relaxed, vacation I've ever had.

The thing I hated most of all in the military was spending 2 years or so sharing all of your life - work, home, and play, with your close friends, only to move away. We don't generally share that much of ourselves with anyone other than our spouse, so those relationships are extremely tight. That was the way I felt leaving this past weekend. We are already going to start tightening our budget to get our finances to where we can pay our new found friends a visit in a couple of years.

I can't wait until next year. It will be a new group of folks, but I know we've fallen in with a great bunch.