Red Randoms

Today, my brain doesn't really process full thoughts, so you get a numbered list instead...

1. Due to the ice (see above), I tried to go do the 3 miles for Tuesday on a treadmill. 
2. The gym was packed to a level I have literally never seen. All machines had someone on them.
3. Instead of waiting around for someone to hopefully yield after their 30 minutes, I came home and tried our tv's "fitness on demand." 
4. The first lady had  "Madonna arms."
5. The second lady was entertaining and had way less distracting arms.
6. Somehow, pilates and yoga have made my arms, especially triceps, hurt. A lot.
7. I scoped out the sidewalks today on my drive home from work. The 3 mile route sidewalks were clear. The 2.4 mile sidewalks? Not so much. BEHOLD A SIGN FROM THE RUNNING GODS!!!
8. So I did my 3 miles. After the first half mile, my legs literally kicked into gear. They knew the hill was done, and it was all pretty much level from then on. Good little legs :)
9. My mom got me a Cookout t-shirt for Christmas. I forgive you if you've never eaten there because you either live out of their area or you don't want to swell up thanks to their burgers, shakes, chicken nuggets and onion rings. By the way, you can get one of each of those for under $6. 
10. There's a Cookout in walking distance from my work...doom doom!
11. Anyway, the point of the Cookout story is that I wore it today on my run :)
12. As you can see below, its bright red!
13. By mile 1, my arms were the same color. 
14. There was lots of wind today! It was a headwind on the way out and a tail wind on the way back. 
15. I got so used to breathing in to the wind that when I turned around, I had to re-figure out how to breathe.
16. I get post-run cough these days. My mom got to hear the full effect of it during our Sunday talk this weekend and I fear she will hear it tonight during our Wednesday talk.
17. We only talk Sunday/Wednesdays, I swear. Usually. Unless something great/bad/cooking happens :)
18. No clue how long the 3 miles took. Loving the arm band. Fred does good :)
19. By the way, Fred got rear-ended today. Thankfully, not his fault, but the poor boy is hurting. Haven't seen the car yet but Fred's descriptions sound slightly foreboding...
20. Large scary man was "walking" 2 dogs and by "walking" I mean "getting pulled by" and so I waited til there was a break in the busy 4 lane divided highway to step on the blacktop, off the sidewalk, to pass the stopped man and leering dogs. Large scary man then yelled "hey! get off the road!" at my back....seriously, dude?!
21. I feel a little hardcore running in sub-30* weather.
22. Unfortunately, this weather makes me twitch a lot. My muscles get unusually tense or loose these days. Nothing feels weird when I run, but when I stop and the next few hours after, things feel a bit off. Still running, just cautiously.

Woo Cookout shirt :)

I wanted this to show that my arms matched my shirt. They did...but then I cooled down a bit :/

 Here's to the next TV timeout :)

-Syd

In prep for the storm...

We had "work at home and fear the storm!" day again today :) Even Lucy got in on the action at the table, at least for a bit! See the evil snow coming down?...yeah, its weak, even by NC standards.

With the impending snow, KR convinced me to wake up not one, but almost 2 hours before sunrise on a Monday morning to get a gym workout in. I had a feeling that yoga would be canceled due to weather, so I did 15 min on the elliptical, then another 20 minutes on the bike afterward. This was not fun- I got super sweaty and my legs yelled at me the entire time. 

 

They continued to yell at me at work later when my boss asked me to do the evil bending/leaning/moving-terra-cotta-pots-around task. By the way... my jeans? Don't really fit anymore. I've always thought fitness bloggers were crazy when they said they couldn't find jeans that fit, but omg... Jeans that fit 2 weeks ago are rebelling! I had to keep pulling them up every time I leaned over, for fear of blinding them with crack! Totally okay with having a problem like this, but oh dear... I live in jeans! And my dress pants, which I will hopefully have to wear for some mysterious real job in the future, don't like to stay up anymore either. Hurry up summer so I can wear skirts and dresses???

 

Here's to the next TV timeout! (And maybe even non-snowy weather tomorrow? I need a good 3 miles!!!)

 

-Syd 

Armband Buddies

So Lucy is now apparently smart enough to brush her own teeth, thanks to the use of a child's toothbrush from the standard neighborhood dentist and chicken flavored toothpaste. Personally, I like my Crest, but to each, their own :)

I went back to the site of my freakish 3-in-30 to run with C, owner of the sheepdogs today. KR had "3 miles, slow" on the agenda for today. Unfortunately for C, she usually just goes out and runs at whatever pace and distance she wants, and has built up to a 9-10 min pace. She bounced. A lot. Meanwhile, I had a lot of grimacing, looking at the ground, cursing my iPod for going on "all" shuffle, not just my "running" playlist shuffle. That's the only explanation for hearing this around the 2 mile mark... Not a very motivating song!!! Both C and I had our iPods in armbands, me listening to lots of Glee, C listening to lots of Muse. She's obsessed. Just a bit ;)

C was sure her route was just 3 miles, but, having run there just this week with GPS in my ears, I knew we had gone farther, so when we got to the playground about a half mile from her house, I ran towards the swings, not home! We took a nice swing break before finishing home. I LOVE SWINGS! They're still my favorite playground equipment, although slides are pretty fun!

Sure enough, the route was 3.4 miles :) No clue the timing Thank you gmap-pedometer! I had side stitches for the first time during a run and oh the sore pains I have now :P Shoulders, shins- what is it with these things hurting?! Will be super-sure to keep stretching. Trying to talk KR into yoga tomorrow as I type. It'll be packed with returning students and January joiners, but I want group stretching!!!

Here's to the next TV timeout!

-Syd

bike a lil, run a lil

The joy of a gym pass is that when you don't really feel like doing your 3 mile run, you can still go and do pre-pre-pre-pre-triathlon training and bike a little, run a little :) On KR's plan today was a 3 mile run and OMG I didn't have it in me. I didn't know when I wanted to do it, what route to run and most importantly, what to wear ;) Okay, so it was typical indecisive NC weather with the forecast calling for snow, and yet partly sunny 40's. Ugh...

I finally realized the perfect thing to make me run- a partner :) KR was off on a long run- I even passed a running KR as I drove to the gym ! I honked and she turned around and saw my awesome unique license plate, so I made her smile. Once at the gym, I was quite glad I hadn't decided on a run at that time. I wanted to bike 5 miles then see how far my legs could go without feeling like I'd really pushed them, given that I'm definitely doing 3 tomorrow. Brick workouts are when you do one part of a tri- swim or bike- then immediately do the next part of a tri- bike or run. I didn't feel like swimming (actually, I suck at it and am semi-deathly afraid of the deep end of pools, lakes, etc) so it was bike/run. 

The 5 miles took me 20 minutes, so I decided to see how the run went. As I was biking, it turned into a full-blown bilzzard! Everyone was looking out the windows because its North Carolina! It doesn't snow this far south/east! Ignore what happened on Boxing Day, I promise!!! From what KR told me after, she thought she was hallucinating with the snow :)

the snow that tried to stick, but melted instead :)

For the run, I set the treadmill at 11 min pace. Nothing "clicked" like it usually does. It all felt loose, and I had to really concentrate on taking a step and not just falling. I fall a lot ;) After a half mile, I could just feel the pain, so I said "enh, good enough!" and walked for a bit. Work this morning meant lots of bending over, writing things while bent over and moving terra cotta pots full of plants around at odd angles. I never had back issues until this craziness started!

Super excited to run my 3 miles and see the sheepdogs tomorrow :)

Here's to the next TV timeout!

-Syd

Go fast!

This will be short because I think my eyes are rebelling from so much screen time- laptop, work screen and Droid :) This totally falls into this category : http://whitewhine.tumblr.com/

Today's scheduled run was 2 miles, "fast". I came up with a 1 mile route that left from work and planned to do an out and back- until I went on the route. My work is really close to NC State's campus, technically part of it, but its on a way far side of campus, surrounded by houses, churches, mosques, apartments and random little businesses. Also, I decided to use the fancy new iPod armband Fred got me for Christmas- and yes, we finally did our "Christmas" this Tuesday :P Since I was rocking out to the tunes, I wanted to see if I could push myself without GPS in my ears. 

As I went out however... I had sidewalks that were more like this --> \ / than this --> _ _ _ .... Even better? I passed a work crew half on the sidewalk, half on the street, and all eyes on me :$ The street I turned on next routed me under a semi-creepy bridge, made even more creepy by people actually hanging out under it! 

Highly creeped out, I turned down a street earlier than I'd planned and didn't just turn around. I knew this route would pass me by the police station and my NEW JOB :) Its part time, but its cool research that's super useful and gives me some interesting and varied experience. Oh, and plenty of time to finish writing... and run ;)

I looked at the timer I'd started on the iPod to guess how far I'd been running. At the 16 minute (and "crap, running up that hill was hard") point, I knew I hadn't been running *that* fast, so I took my 30 second pout and finished the run. Did I mention there were a few ups and downs in this spastic route??

The end result was 1.7 miles in 18 minutes, a 10.6 minute pace. Not as fast as my fluke run, but weirder route on the 3rd straight leg-cardio day. Definitely doing weights tomorrow, probably arm stuff and yoga :)

Here's to the next TV timeout!

-Syd

Weirdest Mantra to Date

I found myself today thinking "this is so dumb" over and over again as I went for my run. I guess I should explain a bit of the background... Knowing I was frustrated by the "too easy" and "too hard" plans for 10ks I'd found, KR made me a "Goldilocks" plan- just right ;) Her setup had it as a MWF, but since I ran Sunday, I decided I'd make the first Monday today. On the list? 3 miles, easy. KR knows my pace, so "easy" was 12 min miles, enough to be able to hold a conversation while going along. 

I went to my friend's house to let her dogs out. This is typical of how it went: The boy leading, saying "let's GO!" and the girl mozeying, taking her time sniffing the sidewalk. Girls, seriously!

Before I'd driven to the house, I looked up a good 1.5 mile route that I could do an out and back, as long as I was already outside and away from work. The doggy-mom and I have run together in her neighborhood before, too, so I had some ideas, and knew that for the most part, the area was very flat. Its around a golf course, so no evil hills there!

Again, I set my gps/phone to give me updates pretty frequently. I didn't want to overdo it, especially since I'd never run 3 miles without a walk break before. Even during my 5k, I took 2 walk breaks, but those hills were mean! The first update told me I was going 6.3 mph, so I slowed a bit. Next one said 6.1, but I literally couldn't slow myself down. The mechanics wouldn't do it. Every time the nice MyTracks lady came into my ears to tell me I was going at 10min mile pace, I kept thinking "this is so stupid" but I kept running :) 

Overall? 3 miles, no walk breaks, in 30 minutes. I would've made a mad dash to the end, but the phone started to yell at me for low battery right about then. My usual post-run stretch routine was broken up by grocery shopping and I want to apologize right now to all the people at the WalMart Supercenter who smelled me post run. I swear, I bought new deoderant today!

We'll see how I feel tomorrow :/

Here's to the next TV timeout!

-Syd

Icky weather

Today was one of those days where there were lots of "shoulds"- I should go to church, I should wake up from my post-church/lunch nap, and of course, I should go for a run. I went to work dressed up for church, and oh the comments that garnered and so I did go to church- I would've gone without the comments. However, being the only person in dress pants in a greenhouse, moving around plants for a couple of hours on a Sunday morning when your co-workers and even boss are in jeans or pj's makes you stand out. Juuusssst a bit ;) Oh well! My handsome reward was a full choir to sing along with the Christmas songs!

Post church/lunch, I started falling asleep while checking up on stuff. I gave in and napped for a nice 2 hours. Mmm. But getting up with weather that was icky and rainy was not a way to motivate myself. However, new clothes? ALWAYS WORK! I put on my running tights, even though it was probably 50 outside, hat to hide the hair that had gotten smushed in the nap, and figured out my route.

The snow is all melted, so I conquered the evil hill from the last run first, ran the majority of my time on relatively flat sidewalks, then had a nice 1/2 mile hill down to end my 2.44 miles. My awesome new Android has an app called My Tracks and I set it to tell me my distance, time elapsed and pace, every 2 minutes. My goal was to keep around an 11 min mile pace. Yes, its slow, but my first race 2 months ago was 12 min miles, so I'm improving :) Oh, and running, not walking, the hills ;)

Why yes, you are indeed the route I ran today and exported to google maps!

 To make things even more cool, the app exported the data, both the route to google maps, and the pace/distance/etc info to google docs. Muwahahaha! I'm using the runner's day-by-day log my mom got me for Christmas and they mesh well together :)

My goal for the month is 15 run days, 10 weight/strength training days. Making the double batch of risotto I had for dinner last night doesn't count for strength training by any chance, does it?! Also, I get to keep track of how many miles I run, which I sort of do here, but if you asked me off the top of my head how much I run, only now can I say "well, this week it was 7.5 miles, but I'm hoping to keep increasing my mileage, but no more than 10% per week." <-- true story :)

Here's to the next TV timeout!

-Syd