Benched again

My 4 miles on Monday turned out to be slightly premature. On Tuesday I got benched for another month. Now I can add the $30.00 Bridge Run fee into my pile of cash I've used to sign up for races that I couldn't do. I have a bunch of t-shirts though (that I never wear or I leave/lose at the gym).

Now I've started thinking about all those shirts/things that I haven't seen lately and I am sure I left at one of the gyms somewhere along the way. The most frightening right now is my heart rate monitor chest strap. Where the hell is that? I haven't been wearing it. I haven't seen it arbitrarily in my gym bag or at home. In the past 2 minutes I've become convinced that it's lost forever. Like my super comfy Gap sweater with the faux fur lined hood. That sweater was super cute and only 2 months old.. I have no idea where it is. WTF?! Later on I will forget that I've lost these things and only remember them again when I am in a position where I cannot go and look for them. It's a vicious cycle.

I did bootcamp this morning which included a LITTLE bit of SLOW running. Not enough to even register on the radar and YES I could feel shin discomfort. The rest of the group did a 1 mile run for time while I went inside and did a mile on the elliptical with the elevation and level turned up. We did some pushups, which seemed easy today. Usually I loathe pushups. When I get off work I will go back and hit the elliptical again and the weights. It's chest and triceps day.

I have another bootcamp tomorrow. I signed up for it before the spending freeze. It was $10.00 and the money goes to battling childhood obesity, which is actually one thing that I am (quietly) very passionate about. However, not having kids I don't feel like I can be spokeswoman against it since I have no experience from which to speak. However, if I were Miss America you can be sure that I would be on the wagon with Michele O in this cause. I'm hoping the bootcamp kicks my ass.

That's all folks. Pretty lame blogging today.. sorry.

Cheating

I cheated today, I couldn't help it. After a breakdown yesterday which included tears followed by a nap on the couch, I woke up this morning bound and determined to run. After all, I see the Dr tomorrow so wouldn't it be ok? I ran just under 4 miles. I'm sure in the eyes of the P.A. (I call her a Dr just because) that 4 miles is probably NOT OK. Oh well, I did it and I was happy. My speed was ok once I figured out that my legs weren't going to break out from underneath me. I ended up with just under a 10 minute mile pace. In my pre-injury days that would have been laughable. Now I consider it good. I tried using a longer stride, something I've always wanted to work on. This is my time to reinvent my running style.

How do the shins feel? They feel fine. There was some slight pain early in the morning but it resolved as the day went on. I did a P90X video when I got home. What's sad is that I worked out for 80 minutes today and I feel that it's not enough. My new minimum has become 2 hours a day.

My marathon medal frame is set to be delivered tomorrow. I'm exited to see it. It's going on the wall right above the T.V. My first half-marathon frame is going to look pretty shitty next to it. I will post pictures once it arrives.

OOHHH. I entered a triathlon. Did I blog that yet? I don't think so. It's April 18th, which is the day after my 33rd birthday. It's going to be quite cold in the ocean, and the biking is probably going to suck, which will make the running suck afterwards. When I'm done, I can cross it off my list. It's a .6 mile swim, 16 mile bike, and a 4 mile run. Wish me luck.

I'm off to find things to Ebay so that I can sign up for a triathlon training clinic. I've made a vow to stop spending so much money.

Myrtle Beach ... Marathon wishes

Friday night we drove to MB (Myrtle Beach) to stay for the weekend. As I stated in my previous blog, the purpose of this was to pick up my race packet and because we had a room there already reserved, the room was free (long story) and I didn't want it to go to waste. The predicted snow showers had turned into a prediction of 3 to 5 inches of snow, for the first time in 10 years.

Amazingly, the news wasn't wrong. It started snowing at about 6:00 p.m., while we were driving. By the time we got to the convention center to pick up the packet, the snow was accumulating. I was getting regular emails on my phone from the marathon committee with updates on the run. Ultimately they moved the race start back 30 minutes (like that was going to make a difference). Then at 10:30 p.m. they canceled the race altogether.

I declare this Marathon canceled bitches!!!

Mind you, I am not running this race due to the stress reactions in my shins, so I happened to be up at 10:30. Had I been running the race, I would not have been up to hear this news. Many people showed up at the start only to be told that it had been canceled. Some die-hards (who I throughly admire) ran it on their own.

I drove past some of these runners on my way back from stuffing my face at a buffet (It was my husbands idea to eat at a buffet, I was an innocent victim). I became intrigued by seeing the solo runners and began to wonder what was happening when they finished. I did a slow drive-by past the would-be finish line and noticed that two of the race officials were at the finish line handing out medals to the finishers. I thought this was pretty awesome but it also made me sad that I wasn't running the race and getting a medal.

After we got back to the room I proceeded to spend the next 30 minutes wondering if I could get a medal. Why couldn't I get a medal (uhhh.. .maybe because you didn't RUN??? ABSURD). What are they going to do with 11,000 medals?? Maybe I should just go back to the finish and see what's going on? No.. they will know I'm fishing for a medal. Bite nails... bite nails.. pace around... picture shiny medal. I paid for this medal didn't I? (N0, you paid for the race, you EARN the medal). But NO ONE ran (mostly)?? Bite nails... Bite nails... pace around. It would be dumb to go back by! Picture shiny medal. What would it hurt? They aren't going to give you a medal? But they MIGHT! Picture shiny medal. OK, I'm going but only to see what is going on. I want to congratulate the finishers. Picture shiny medal..

I came up with a list of stupid questions I already knew the answer to.

1. Is the post race party still happening? (YES)

2. Is the race going to be rescheduled? (NO)

3. How many people ran it anyway? (Ok, this one I didn't know the answer to)

4. What does the medal look like? (Maybe they would get distracted and I could put it in my purse)

Innocently, I drove back to the finish and walked up to the van where they were handing out shiny medals. My questions were primed and ready and oh looky there.. I happened to have my race number in my purse! Maybe it would fall out when I reach for my keys and the race official would say "oh did you sign up??? It's so sad you couldn't run! Here's a medal for your trouble".

I walked up with that casual 'Hey Guys!!" attitude (Hands in pockets, shoulders kind of shrugged, awkward wave....I didn't really do this but it makes the story better). I'm telling myself "be calm, don't act to suspicious." (My goal was to NOT ask for a medal because begging is lame). Race official number 1 was talking to some people in another car about the post race party, so I went with race official number 2..... Here it goes.. be calm... casual small talk...

RO #2 looks at me and says "What did you sign up for??" 'Full Marathon" I reply. He reaches into his van and pulls out a shiny flip flop medal and says "Here you go!".

Classic. All my preparation and ultimately the receiving of the medal was completely non-eventful. I still felt the need to make idle chit chat and talk to a runner who had finished the marathon on his own. (His first marathon). Then I split with my shiny piece of non-deserved hardware...

I'm shaped like a stinky post-Marathon foot!

Needless to say I didn't put the medal around my neck. Somehow I feel that would be wrong. It should only go around the neck if it's deserved. Maybe when I get back to running I will do a solo marathon and then have this waiting for me at the end.

I plan to start running again tomorrow.....

Improv

Improv class starts tomorrow... i guess I need it because I really don't have anything to add after saying that. I'm thinking of taking the new bike with me and biking over to the class, but that familiar 'what if' logic gets into my head and all of a sudden it's what if... it rains. What if... I get hit by a car (it will be dark). What if.. someone steals the bike (despite the lock I got for it). It's all downhill from there.

This weekend is valentines day.. whoopeee. What this weekend really has been to me for the past 2 years has been half marathon in Myrtle Beach weekend. Now it will just be, going to Myrtle Beach because I have a room there and I'm not running the full marathon weekend. There's a chance of snow showers Friday night. What's up with that? Running this one would definitely not be warmer than running Disney.

My diet has been going well. People are often surprised to find out that I 'diet'. I guess it's more of a way of life. I don't eat whatever I want and then work it off later, that is called exercise bulimia. I have been known to practice it from time to time. I find it much easier to avoid the 'eaters remorse'.. see previous post, not sabotage my workouts, and eat things that are good for me. I fail about 20% of the time but 80% is still a passing grade.


Look at all of that improv I just typed out! Not that any of it is funny. My fear is that I find things funny that other people don't. I also had some stuff I was thinking about talking about during improv but then the old what if said. What if you hurt someones feelings? Isn't that what it's all about. Comedy= tragedy + time. I hope I don't get pulled off stage with a giant hook. Actually that would be kind of funny.

Eaters Remorse

I just trashed about two paragraphs of blogging. I have nothing to say but I feel that I owe it to my reader to post something regularly. The truth is that I don't think I have a lot going on right now other than my obsessive working out, my inability to run due to stress reactions (different but close to stress fractures), bowling, and the comedy improv class that I start next week. So... yeah... I guess that's probably a lot of stuff that is going on.

I also joined the biggest loser competition at work. I did it kind of out of a joke and kind of because I would like to lose 3 lbs. If were even halfway decent at 3rd grade math I could probably figure out what percentage of my body weight that would be. Alas, I suck at math and I'm too lazy to figure it out. The only thing I really know is that a percent to a decimal is 2 to the left.

Thanks to the magic of the internet I found a calculator tool that does simple math for me.

http://www.fitwatch.com/qkcalc/calculate-weight-loss-percentage.html


It's really probably impossible for me to lose 3 lbs. I hope I don't come off as stuck up, I'm just being real. I've been trying to lose it for about 7 months now.

3.52% is what I would like to lose overall which would be like 5 lbs.

Anyhooooo... my purpose here was to talk about the phenomenon known as Eaters Remorse. But now this blog is kind of long and discussing eaters remorse would only make it longer. The bottom line is that I don't like eaters remorse which I have defined as the feeling of remorse associated with devouring something that completely ruins your diet and the 2 1/2 hour workout you did today. I'm going to try to avoid this feeling while the biggest loser is going on. Hopefully I can lose my 5 lbs.

POST BLOG BLOG:

So after I posted this blog I noticed the clever google ads which appeared on my page:
Those google people think they know everything. I found this to be quite funny.