so this week i decided to start retraining my body to wake up and move earlier in the morning. i generally set my alarm for 06:37, snooze it until 06:55, drag myself out of bed, brush my teeth, and start the work day. i am now setting the alarm for 06:00, getting up at… 06:00, getting fully brushed and dressed, and walking on the beach. it’s nothing spectacular but it’s something. and even though i’m just walking, i’m walking in sand which makes my legs feel like they’ve done something. my plan is to try to make this the routine for another week or two before stepping it up. eventually, i’d like to actually be jogging (probably on the street in shoes rather than barefoot on the beach) in the mornings but it is still amazingly hot at 06:00 in florida. after a thirty or forty minute walk, i’m dripping sweat. jogging may have to wait until it starts getting under 90° at that hour of the morning. after a few weeks of getting my body used to waking and moving, i’d also like to throw some lunch-gymming back into the mix but i’m just too tired from getting up so early right now. anyhow, that’s the plan. here’s the execution, thus far:
| monday | tuesday | wednesday | thursday | friday | |
| 25 | 40 | 30 | 30 | 25 | minutes walking |
after two weeks of not quite making it to the bridge, i finally got back on it last night. i jogged slowly, very slowly, to the bridge, walked up it, jogged down it, turned around and walked back up, jogged back down, and walked back to the car. so, i jogged about half of it. and in this sweltering heat, that’s all i really care to do. i was pleased with myself.
in all fairness, i’m sure a big part of my defeat today was due to my complete and total lack of sleep last night. i blame the hubby. we got home at a reasonable time last night. i managed to be very productive before going to bed. i laid down at a semi-decent time. i relaxed and started to doze off… and then hubby started tossing and turning. he rolled and twitched and jerked all over. he even jumped and claimed a nightmare in which i was trying to kill him by… eating him alive. after an hour, he fell asleep and proceeded to rest like a baby. me? i was awake. very much awake. and no matter how hard i tried, i couldn’t get unwound again and i seethed. ugh! i slept… not at all. when the alarm went off at 06:00, i snoozed it angrily and told hubby he sucked. three minutes later, i grumpily stalked out of bed, through on some walking clothes, and dragged hubby for a walk on the beach. we had time to get in a forty minute walk but had to turn around a little over twelve minutes into it because we walked straight into a storm. we tried to beat the rain home but got soaked instead. luckily, that wasn’t such a bad thing since it’s bloody frikkin hot in florida at 06:00. so i got a 25-30 minute walk in. better than nothing, right? but then, after a quick shower, it started.
it was immediate… it was constant… it was brutal… it was…
monday
all. frikkin. day.
by 15:20, when i finally took two minutes to run out to the kitchen and grab a pack of poptarts for lunch, i was broken. as i sat down and took a bite out of my cold poptart and heard the binging of my work instant messenger, i fought back tears. not only did i not get my lunch hour… i couldn’t even have five minutes to eat a poptart! absolutely ridiculous.
i shut down as soon after quitting time as i could and attempted a nap but failed miserably because my tummy was extremely upset (if i get another ulcer because of this daggum job… *shaking fist*). and, since i didn’t get a chance to throw dinner in the crockpot until my 15:20 poptart run, there was no chance of it being done in time for dinner. tomorrow’s dinner it is. which means that i had to come up with plan b. i enjoyed a glass of wine and started to feel like monday was nearing its end. when it was time to get up and head to bed, i remembered that i needed to finish dealing with the contents of the crockpot and transfer them to a refrigerator bowl. hubby headed on to bed. i spent then next fifteen mintes pulling chicken to shreds and digging for a bowl. which is when i knocked hubby’s full cup of watered-down cranberry juice over making a mess all over the kitchen. i screamed at monday and proceeded to clean up the huge mess, expecting hubby to get out of bed to find out what was going on and maybe lend a hand. not a peep. once i had finally gotten the sticky mess cleaned up and tomorrow night’s dinner put up, i headed into the bedroom and found him sound asleep. the man who had slept all night last night while i stayed fully awake because he woke me up at the start. i’m not saying it was right, but i was pissed. i slammed the door, slammed stuff around on my nightstand while taking my meds, huffed around while bathing all of the sticky juice off my legs and feet, and finally jumped into bed much later than i had wanted. he slept through it all.
stupid monday from h3ll!!!
i did it. i got up at the crack of good-grief-it’s-early on a saturday morning, registered for a race, and ran my first official 5k.
ready to race at 07:00
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i mostly walked the bridge again tonight. the only stretches that i ran were the downhill stretches. great idea on my part! i did try to step up my walking pace and i think i was fairly successful in that. it took me under forty-four minutes to walk the 3.2 miles which is well under a fourteen minute mile. not too shabby, in my opinion. back at the parking lot, panda mentioned to hubby that she’s doing a 5k at the naval base saturday morning and i guess he told her that she should talk to me about joining her. when i returned, the peer pressure began. at first, i laughed. soon enough, i was considering it and gave her a “maybe.” panda ran the bridge while i walked so i couldn’t really get a feel for her pace but i felt that it was fairly comparable to my own. she assured me that, since it will be her first 5k as well, she plans to do a walk/run. before we left, i told her that i’m “leaning toward it.” i know i can do it. and i think i’d like to. especially if there’s a chance that i could do my first race with someone. my one hesitation is that i saw hubby swim/run with these military folks and get put in his place. and hubby is an athlete but these people are just… more. it’s a bit intimidating because i always said when i run my first race my only goal will be to not be last. however, under these circumstances, i think there’s a very real chance that i will be so i’ve got to get okay with that before saturday morning. we’ll see.
after the run, we came home to get cleaned up and then went back out to meet mello, nightingale, and faith at a club where their neighbor’s band was playing. nothing like dinner, conversation, and entertainment after a run (walk)! my favorite part… mello’s amazement at me “letting my hair down.” ha ha! i know that i’ve had my hair down in front of that crowd before but he swore he’d never seen it down and couldn’t believe i had so much hair. i laughed and gave him the pouty “you never pay me any attention” line. fun times!
they decided to mix things up a bit with the yoga. instead of meeting in the store and watching a video, we met on the beach. yoda had a battery operated cd player and we all laid our mats out around it near the dunes. the gulf-side setting was ideal for the mental side of yoga. the logistics, however, were off. if you know me, you know that balance is not my forte. trying to balance while the sand shifts under my mat… not too hard to get the picture. i was a mess. i did almost no yoga because every time i tried a pose, i’d fall over. then there were the ants. they had it out for me. during the rare moment that i was successfully holding a pose, i’d have to break it to smack the ants off my feet. that’ll teach me to get up so close to the dunes. i’m not saying that beach yoga was a bad idea, it was a nice change, but it just wasn’t a good fit for someone of my *ahem* skillset.
last weekend we headed up to the smokies to hike up a mountain. a couple friends of ours have some standing reservations at the mt leconte lodge and invited us way back on new years eve to accompany them. unfortunately, as the time approached, they found that they were unable to go due to injuries and such so they asked that we go in order to keep them from losing their reservation for next year. and so we went.
our trip actually started after work last tuesday when we made our way to north ga to see some friends and work from the office for a day and a half. it’s a six hour drive that took us seven and a half because of an accident just below atlanta. i kid you not… i was PARKED on the interstate for an hour and ten minutes. seriously… no movement whatsoever. you can guess how happy i was that night and the next morning after getting into our friends’ house so late, staying up even later to visit, not being able to sleep at all, and then getting up ridiculously early for the commute to the office. most of the office showed up on wednesday to see us so we had a good time visiting with the coworkers and, more importantly, i got to eat at la parrilla!
thursday we worked a half day at the office and then headed to pigeon forge to meet up with our friends who weren’t able to make the hike. we spent the evening hanging out with them and then parted ways. they had told us that the trail we were taking was only going to take about two hours so we took our time getting around friday. i slept in a bit, we had some breakfast, and got checked out of the hotel. at the last minute, we realized that we would be parking our car on the side of the road over night so we decided to call a coworker who lives in the area and took our computers to his house for safekeeping. we slowly made our way back to the trail-head for alum cave bluffs and got started on our hike after 14:00.
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i’m happy to report that hubby ran the bridge last night. he did good, nice and slow; not pushing too hard. recuperating well.
me.. i walked. it’s just too hot. and there was smoke in the air thanks to a 900+ acre controlled burn that got out of control (gee, it’s summer in florida, was that really so much of a suprise?!). and… well, i don’t need to make any excuses. the fact is, i said i was taking the summer off from pretending to be a runner and that’s just what i plan to do.
and you know what? i liked it! yep, i had a very enjoyable walk. all by myself with nothing but my tunes for company, i watched the scenery and the traffic and the passersby and truly enjoyed myself. even though i did nothing but walk, i was pouring sweat by the time i got back to the parking lot because it is just that farooking hot.
we hung out and talked a bit and then faith and train disclosed a wing plan so we headed home to change and then we… walked some more! we walked to our favorite plaza to meet up with faith, train, panda, and some other military guys for $.60 boneless wings. the food was yummy, the company was fun, and conversation was eclectic. we got back home right around 23:00 and just in time for a big storm. that would have been a lousy walk.
altogether, i got nearly six miles of walking in today. and i’m pretty happy with that.
last night was a lousy night. hubby has had pain in his lower abdomen for several weeks now, he who hates going to the doctors had been twice in the last two weeks. last night it changed; it moved to his kidney and was bad enough to make him sick. i spent several hours on the bathroom floor with him, trying to make him more comfortable. work at 07:00 was not fun. hubby went to the doctors (again!) while i worked and waited for our house guests to arrive. they sent him to the urgent care center for a ct scan and diagnosed him with a 3mm kidney stone in the uvj just above the bladder. he made it home just as i was helping our guests with their luggage in the parking garage. i finished out the work day and we hung out with our friends who we have not seen in two years.
happily, my camera finally arrived too. she is sleek and shiny i shall call her cobalt canon.
reflections of cobalt
we had to leave work a bit early to go to the dentist for our cleanings. sylvis accompanied us and then we took her to our running store so that she could get herself some new running shoes before the bridge run. peach met us at the parking lot right before the run. sylvis and i stayed together going over the bridge. ironically, i slowed down for her. by the time we started back over, however, the heat was taking its toll on me. it was 113 with the heat index – by far the hottest whether i have EVER tried to be active in – and i started blacking out. i let sylvis go on ahead and i slowed down. every time i tried to speed up, i blacked out. by the fourth time, i found myself stumbling into the railing and decided it wasn’t worth pushing myself to the point of passing out. by that time, sylvis was already out of my range anyhow so i slowed to a walk and took my time getting back to the parking lot. so there you have it, my first time having friends for the bridge run and they totally smoked me. ah well, such is life. i think my running is going on sabbatical for the summer. i seriously cannot deal with such heat.
after the bridge, we went to the concert in the park where we ended up meeting up with mello, nightingale, faith, and a couple other runners.
hubby, sylvis, and peach
me and hubby chillin' at the park
hangin' with the runners
when we got back home, it was time for some mariokart action. i wasn’t even dead last every time!
mariokart time!
last night was my favorite bridge yet! why? because i didn’t run and i wasn’t alone. it rawked! since i had just stopped limping from the twisted knee last weekend, i was planning on taking it pretty slow anyhow. and then, just before we left, my belly got very upset making me even more apprehensive about putting too much effort into it. luckily, when we got there, nightingale mentioned that she was considering walking because her stomach was hurting. and then tat got there and said the same thing. and then yoda showed up with her little ankle-biter and said she would be walking since the dog couldn’t keep up with a run. so i got to be part of a comfortably walking foursome. having conversation was such a refreshing change for the bridge! we only walked half of it, turning around shortly before reaching the top because the dog was having a tough time climbing the hill.
after a little of the parking lot hangout, we headed to our plaza for their summer concert in the park series. we set up our lawn chairs and grabbed a bag of five guys and had a nice picnic while listening to good music in the park with thousands of our closest neighbors. it was a good night.
even though i got up ridiculously early yesterday to run, i managed to go to yoga last night. i actually liked the dvd track that we did last night. it was a killer on the legs but it was a good slow one. other than the crazy pretzel handstand thing that none of us even tried. i’m glad that we went because it really helped my left leg, which was a bit tight from my phenomenal run.
we celebrated by getting up at 05:15 to meet up with our group for a 06:00 bridge run. seventeen of us dragged our crazy butts out of bed to do that early run. although, i think i’m the only one who’s not a morning person to begin with.
i purposely tried to keep a very slow pace as i’m still nursing my legs from last thursday’s run. since it was just going to be a once over for everyone, i considered cutting mine in half too by turning around when i got to the top of the bridge. for some reason, i got to the top and kept going. about halfway down the backside, tat was waiting with her camera to take a pic of me running.
like the wind!
i joked with her about being the paparazzi and expected her to go along her way back to the parking lot. instead, she turned and trotted along with me. i told her she didn’t have to but i was really quite happy to have the company. after we had turned around and started climbing the bridge again, she started giving me some pointers about my swing, strike, and breathing. she also kept updating me on my pace, which i greatly appreciated and found encouraging. about a hundred yards from the top, she made me sprint. sadistic witch!!! i didn’t think i had any more in me but she managed to drag it out. at the top, we went back to a slow and steady pace and pretty much kept it up all the way back to the parking lot… which we reached in 37:58! that is under a twelve minute pace, overall!!!!! and i was seriously trying to go slow this morning.
we got back in time to see mello getting interviewed by the local news and then i headed to the car to get my water and eye the donuts that were waiting for us. i walked around a bit and talked with folks until i was cooled back down, at which point we were asked to go over and stand behind mello while he was being interviewed. so those of us who were still there clumped up behind mello talking amongst ourselves and “acting natural” while he taped another interview for the noon news (which i watched and clapped at myself for being such a tv star!). i broke down and grabbed a donut, thereby ruining any caloric benefit from the run, before hopping in the car to get home and start the work day.
how did you celebrate national running day?
sheesh, between work being a madhouse and being super busy on my own time, the rants have seriously suffered. this will be a long catch-up of everything that’s happened since memorial day weekend.
my run last night started great. i managed to keep up with the woman twice my age all the way to the top of the bridge. my head was killing me and i kept telling her i was done but she cheered me on and i made it to the top by her side. you would think that i should have easily been able to stay by her side at that point because it was then downhill. unfortunately, my head was pounding so badly from all of the exertion going up that i just couldn’t keep up with her any more. i didn’t add any distance, just the basic one-lap bridge (3.2 miles). i made it all the way down the other side, turned around, and slowed to a walk as soon as i started back up. i was very disappointed since i haven’t had to walk any of it since march but i just couldn’t put my head through more uphill. i didn’t even try to walk fast; it was slow, dragging my body up the incline. i started jogging again when i got to the top and met up with hubby on my way downhill. he turned and started back with me and made a comment about how great my pace was. i confessed that i had only just started running again but he insisted that i was still on track for a great overall pace. actually, i think he was right. i finished in forty minutes. i don’t remember if i ever timed myself on the basic once-over before but i timed a 5k once a month or two ago when running around the park and it was forty-five minutes. the bridge is just over a 5k with inclines so i’ve got to think forty minutes was improvement for me. just imagine if i hadn’t walked!
the bridge runners from last night, minus a few stragglers who showed up after we started running. yes, i am the only one in pants.
tuesday:
ran 2+ miles around our plaza’s park. i really need to do something about measuring my progress but i felt like i was faster. i forgot to even look at the clock before we got out of the car but my figuring is that i was down to nearly a thirteen minute pace. who knows. all in all, it was a super sucky run. i REALLY did not want to start. and i never got to the point where i wanted to keep going. it was hotter than heck and ridiculously bright. i think the only reason my pace was better (if it actually was) is because i was trying so hard to get it over with. i was upset that for all that pushing and suckitude, i didn’t even get to do my third lap. we were a bit short on time since we had folks coming over for a poker night. next week i’ll have to get an earlier (and, therefore, hotter) start so that i’ve got plenty of time to finish my full workout.
wednesday:
yoga at the running store. they did an audio only thing this week which was tough for me because i totally depend on watching the video to see what i’m supposed to be doing. i felt far more uncoordinated than usual. i gawked at my fellow yogaers trying to make my body twist into the same shapes as theirs. speaking of gawking, we had an audience as well. about halfway through the cd, i started to notice people looking in the windows. it was a huge group of asians, totally cupping the windows to look in. they watched through one side, walked around the corner and watched through the other side (right behind me). it was highly uncomfortable. seriously, they watched us for close to ten minutes. it was one whole series of exercises. we even called mello out to chase them away and but they wouldn’t leave. it was very odd. the workout itself was pretty tough for me. there were some balance exercises i just couldn’t pull off at all. and the last track was abs, which wasn’t really hard for me, but it was tough. the sadistic voice on the cd must have had some learning difficulties because her counting was drastically slower than ours. she said we were going to do fifty bicycle crunches but she didn’t count aloud. by the time she got to fifty, i had done well over one hundred. and i feel it today… not that that’s a bad thing.