Friday, December 25, 2009
Thursday, December 24, 2009
Sunlight is highly underrated
I just got back from my first warm, sunny run in what feels like a very long time. I'm at my in-laws in TN, and, I can say that run was worth the 14.5 hour drive down here yesterday. I was only planning to do 5mi and ended up doing 7. Since I'm restricted to a loop that's slightly less than a half mile, that's saying something.
Otherwise we're just relaxing here. We'll do church at 5pm, dinner, and then gifts!
Otherwise we're just relaxing here. We'll do church at 5pm, dinner, and then gifts!
Tuesday, December 22, 2009
1-1-1-1-1-1-1!
Last day of work. Woot!
It's snowing pretty good outside right now, but "snow showers" today should turn into "scattered snow showers" tomorrow, and we should be in TN before the "wintry mix" hits on Thursday. Hopefully we won't have much trouble with the weather on our drive.
I'm hopping on the treadmill this morning for 5mi??? Something like that. Running and all other exercise will be on a somewhat irregular basis for the next week and a half. I definitely will run and continue with some yoga and push-ups, but I'm looking forward to taking a little break from working out first thing in the morning, every morning.
That's my thing... I'm just so ready to chill out for awhile. I have a couple odds and ends to do at work today. We got page proofs for a paper yesterday, so I spend the entire afternoon checking numbers in tables, one by one. Glad that didn't come today! Then it's packing and sushi to celebrate the end of a very tough semester for D.
Posting will be sporadic over the next week and a half, but hopefully I'll get some year-in-review, new year's resolution, running entries up.
Safe travels to all.
It's snowing pretty good outside right now, but "snow showers" today should turn into "scattered snow showers" tomorrow, and we should be in TN before the "wintry mix" hits on Thursday. Hopefully we won't have much trouble with the weather on our drive.
I'm hopping on the treadmill this morning for 5mi??? Something like that. Running and all other exercise will be on a somewhat irregular basis for the next week and a half. I definitely will run and continue with some yoga and push-ups, but I'm looking forward to taking a little break from working out first thing in the morning, every morning.
That's my thing... I'm just so ready to chill out for awhile. I have a couple odds and ends to do at work today. We got page proofs for a paper yesterday, so I spend the entire afternoon checking numbers in tables, one by one. Glad that didn't come today! Then it's packing and sushi to celebrate the end of a very tough semester for D.
Posting will be sporadic over the next week and a half, but hopefully I'll get some year-in-review, new year's resolution, running entries up.
Safe travels to all.
Monday, December 21, 2009
2-2-2-2-2!
Two more days of work before Christmas vacation!!!!! For better or worse, I have a ton of stuff to do so the time should pass quickly. Aside from a little bit of wrapping and some last-minute ornament assembly, I'm done with all our Christmas gifts. The apartment is (reasonably) clean. All that's left is for D to finish his exam Tuesday afternoon, pack, and leave. Can you tell I'm getting excited?
Yesterday was a nice mix of productive and relaxing. On the productive side, I got the apartment cleaned up, did a bunch of laundry, and put away a few things we still had outside. On the relaxing side, I worked on some ornaments, cleaned out my in-basket, and updated my address book while watching some of Season 1 of 30 Rock that I checked out from Blockbuster. I love that show- especially the doctor. So funny.
Saturday I went to my first hot yoga class in a long time. A yoga studio near us offers community classes on Saturday afternoons, and I've been meaning to check one out. I took Inner Fire Flow, and it was great! I was a little worried about it being too hard, but it wasn't. I mean, there were a lot of things I couldn't do... or couldn't do well... but it was "I could work toward this" hard rather than "I hate this, I want to go home" hard. I definitely want to try to go regularly after the break.
I'm gearing up to do some elliptical and treadmill running at the gym. Next Monday I will not be awake and blogging at 5:51AM. Woohoo!
Yesterday was a nice mix of productive and relaxing. On the productive side, I got the apartment cleaned up, did a bunch of laundry, and put away a few things we still had outside. On the relaxing side, I worked on some ornaments, cleaned out my in-basket, and updated my address book while watching some of Season 1 of 30 Rock that I checked out from Blockbuster. I love that show- especially the doctor. So funny.
Saturday I went to my first hot yoga class in a long time. A yoga studio near us offers community classes on Saturday afternoons, and I've been meaning to check one out. I took Inner Fire Flow, and it was great! I was a little worried about it being too hard, but it wasn't. I mean, there were a lot of things I couldn't do... or couldn't do well... but it was "I could work toward this" hard rather than "I hate this, I want to go home" hard. I definitely want to try to go regularly after the break.
I'm gearing up to do some elliptical and treadmill running at the gym. Next Monday I will not be awake and blogging at 5:51AM. Woohoo!
Saturday, December 19, 2009
Fun, fun, fun
First I want to say I'm sorry about my bad attitude about Christmas cookies yesterday. That was a pretty dumb thing to go on and on about. Life's too short, right?
In fact, Thursday's ugly sweater party was fun. This was the Christmas party for youth group leaders. We didn't wear ugly sweaters, but some people did. Mostly it was guys who borrowed something from their mother's closet. So they weren't necessarily ugly... just sequins are out of place on a man in his late 20's. It was catered by Qdoba (mmmmm) and held in the house of the Badger's Women's hockey coach (who was also on the Miracle on Ice team in 1980). It was pretty cool to see all their sports memorabilia up on the walls. Both he and his wife are hard-core triathletes now.
The funny thing I found out at the party was that my sophomore group actually won the gingerbread house decorating contest. This makes us undefeated (as far as I can tell) in youth group competitions this fall. We won the song lyric contest with "Going to Aunt Claire's" (to the tune of Livin on a Prayer), the Amazing Race competition (with some generous help from me at the event I was running), and now the gingerbread competition. We tried to make a real house, but the roof collapsed, and the kids decided to make it a gingerbread mobile home. They used icing lids for wheels, and I think one got a satellite dish on the top. Pretty funny. I guess it was creative enough to win the contest. There were a lot of other teams that had much nicer looking products.
Last night we went over to a friend's house to play games and drink Christmas-themed adult drinks. I had a candy cane martini that immediately had to be diluted with an equal part of water so I didn't spend the evening asleep in front of the Christmas tree! In any case there was good conversation and it was a lot of fun. The couple who hosted the party are also into singing/playing bluegrass music and want to play with D sometime, which would be nice for him because it's not often he gets that opportunity.
We didn't leave until 11:30 and I didn't get to sleep until 12:30 (had to finish Pride and Prejudice and Zombies, haha) and wake up until 7:30 this morning. Unheard of for me. I feel like I'm in high school again. I feel a little guilty for sleeping so late, but really, I don't have that much to do today. Just run, finish wrapping presents, and clean up the apartment.
The last point of business for today is that I finished reading the New Testament this morning. One of my 101 in 1001 goals is to read the Bible (+notes). Now that I've finished the NT, I'm what?, a third of the way done? I'm not sure if I can get through the entire OT next year, but we'll see.
I'm going out for 6mi in a few minutes. It's much warmer and less crazy out there than last week. Hope everyone has an awesome Saturday!
In fact, Thursday's ugly sweater party was fun. This was the Christmas party for youth group leaders. We didn't wear ugly sweaters, but some people did. Mostly it was guys who borrowed something from their mother's closet. So they weren't necessarily ugly... just sequins are out of place on a man in his late 20's. It was catered by Qdoba (mmmmm) and held in the house of the Badger's Women's hockey coach (who was also on the Miracle on Ice team in 1980). It was pretty cool to see all their sports memorabilia up on the walls. Both he and his wife are hard-core triathletes now.
The funny thing I found out at the party was that my sophomore group actually won the gingerbread house decorating contest. This makes us undefeated (as far as I can tell) in youth group competitions this fall. We won the song lyric contest with "Going to Aunt Claire's" (to the tune of Livin on a Prayer), the Amazing Race competition (with some generous help from me at the event I was running), and now the gingerbread competition. We tried to make a real house, but the roof collapsed, and the kids decided to make it a gingerbread mobile home. They used icing lids for wheels, and I think one got a satellite dish on the top. Pretty funny. I guess it was creative enough to win the contest. There were a lot of other teams that had much nicer looking products.
Last night we went over to a friend's house to play games and drink Christmas-themed adult drinks. I had a candy cane martini that immediately had to be diluted with an equal part of water so I didn't spend the evening asleep in front of the Christmas tree! In any case there was good conversation and it was a lot of fun. The couple who hosted the party are also into singing/playing bluegrass music and want to play with D sometime, which would be nice for him because it's not often he gets that opportunity.
We didn't leave until 11:30 and I didn't get to sleep until 12:30 (had to finish Pride and Prejudice and Zombies, haha) and wake up until 7:30 this morning. Unheard of for me. I feel like I'm in high school again. I feel a little guilty for sleeping so late, but really, I don't have that much to do today. Just run, finish wrapping presents, and clean up the apartment.
The last point of business for today is that I finished reading the New Testament this morning. One of my 101 in 1001 goals is to read the Bible (+notes). Now that I've finished the NT, I'm what?, a third of the way done? I'm not sure if I can get through the entire OT next year, but we'll see.
I'm going out for 6mi in a few minutes. It's much warmer and less crazy out there than last week. Hope everyone has an awesome Saturday!
Friday, December 18, 2009
No... more... cookies... please
There are a lot of deserts out there, but the two that really tempt me are ice cream and cookies. Fortunately ice cream has largely been out of the picture lately, but it seems like I can't go anywhere without delicious cookies in front of me. I can turn down a Chips Ahoy any day, but homemade cookies... oh man. And the problem isn't having a cookie. The problem is that once I start, I can never eat just one. Which was definitely the case at our HS ministry leader party last night.
Tonight we're going to a game night (love games + socializing) with drinks and treats (kind of scary after yesterday's eating), and I hope I can stay away from the sweets. Drinking too much alcohol isn't a temptation because in my hands it might as well be called Ambien, but one drink can soften my resolve to steer clear of the chocolate chip cookies.
I'm sure I'm making too big of a deal about this, but I'm so afraid of gaining back the weight I lost over the summer and fall because I have zero self control in some situations. Okay... deep breaths... I didn't know I was going to go on that long about this topic.
Now for something completely different...
I think the treadmill run on a different treadmill was successful. I put the speed where it was supposed to go, and it was hard but not really fast (which I guess is what a tempo run should feel like). We've really come to the point where (at least for me) doing speedwork of any kind outside is not going to work. Although the sidewalks and roads are much better, there are a lot of places where you have to be careful about footing, and it's hard to do that when you're trying to haul it. I do plan to do my 6 mile loop outside tomorrow.
Hope everyone has a happy Friday. Only 3 more days of work for me before Christmas vacation. Woohoo!
Tonight we're going to a game night (love games + socializing) with drinks and treats (kind of scary after yesterday's eating), and I hope I can stay away from the sweets. Drinking too much alcohol isn't a temptation because in my hands it might as well be called Ambien, but one drink can soften my resolve to steer clear of the chocolate chip cookies.
I'm sure I'm making too big of a deal about this, but I'm so afraid of gaining back the weight I lost over the summer and fall because I have zero self control in some situations. Okay... deep breaths... I didn't know I was going to go on that long about this topic.
Now for something completely different...
I think the treadmill run on a different treadmill was successful. I put the speed where it was supposed to go, and it was hard but not really fast (which I guess is what a tempo run should feel like). We've really come to the point where (at least for me) doing speedwork of any kind outside is not going to work. Although the sidewalks and roads are much better, there are a lot of places where you have to be careful about footing, and it's hard to do that when you're trying to haul it. I do plan to do my 6 mile loop outside tomorrow.
Hope everyone has a happy Friday. Only 3 more days of work for me before Christmas vacation. Woohoo!
Thursday, December 17, 2009
Treadmill Experiment
My plan this morning is to try an experiment in treadmill tempo running. I have found that running on the treadmill (definitely my home treadmill and the treadmills at the gym I went to in NM) was way harder than it would be outside. HOWEVER, I think the treadmills at the UW gym seem a bit easier. This could be because it's cooler at the gym than at home or I'm more awake when I use them or any number of things.
Last week I was supposed to do 4x12 minute tempo intervals at a set pace that would have been a little difficult to do outside but definitely achievable. On my treadmill, not so much. So I'm going to see if I have a different experience on the gym treadmill. It's not that I want to make it way easier on myself and delude myself that I can run faster than I can, but I want to give myself a fighting chance on workouts where I'm trying to hit certain paces.
So anyway, we'll see how it goes.
Tonight we are going to my youth group leader Christmas party. It will be catered by Qdoba or Famous Dave's (BBQ) so it should be pretty good. It's an ugly sweater party (is anyone NOT having an ugly sweater party this year?), but we don't have ugly sweaters and are not going to buy something dumb like that. We entertained the idea of D wearing one of mine and me wearing one of his, but he will definitely not fit into one of my sweaters without ruining it so that won't be happening tonight.
Whew... wish me luck... 2 more busy days at work this week and 2 more next week. The end is in sight but I have SO MUCH to do before then (although, woot, we got almost all our Christmas cards finished last night).
Last week I was supposed to do 4x12 minute tempo intervals at a set pace that would have been a little difficult to do outside but definitely achievable. On my treadmill, not so much. So I'm going to see if I have a different experience on the gym treadmill. It's not that I want to make it way easier on myself and delude myself that I can run faster than I can, but I want to give myself a fighting chance on workouts where I'm trying to hit certain paces.
So anyway, we'll see how it goes.
Tonight we are going to my youth group leader Christmas party. It will be catered by Qdoba or Famous Dave's (BBQ) so it should be pretty good. It's an ugly sweater party (is anyone NOT having an ugly sweater party this year?), but we don't have ugly sweaters and are not going to buy something dumb like that. We entertained the idea of D wearing one of mine and me wearing one of his, but he will definitely not fit into one of my sweaters without ruining it so that won't be happening tonight.
Whew... wish me luck... 2 more busy days at work this week and 2 more next week. The end is in sight but I have SO MUCH to do before then (although, woot, we got almost all our Christmas cards finished last night).
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