Waiting for the Slow Down

This is how I feel lately.... That is all.

Soft Mommy Tummy

 

Its been a very frustrating month for me, mostly because it feels like I am working my butt off with running and adding in some strengthening exercises and….NOTHING.  I have nothing to show for it.  Not a pound lost, not change in the mirror, not a change in dress size.  I have steadily increased miles over the last three month and I am running a better mile pace too. I need to scream obscenities…

I just don’t get it. So depressing.  But after some long time spent in contemplation (or in a wine bottle) I have determined just exactly why I remain unchanged.  That pudgy, stubborn mommy tummy that most women have in some fashion is meant to be there.  Especially for when you have small children.  Those of you with little kids will know what I am talking about.  Example: Little girl #2 come running at me from across the house, full bore, and does a header right off my abdomen.  Now if I had a fantastically ripped set of abdominal muscles she might have hurt herself when slamming her forehead into my stomach.  But since I have a soft midsection it just cradles her like warm bread with butter. (and she seriously jumps around like a crazy wild animal most of the day)

Ok, wrong type of kid, but you get the picture of what I’m working with here.  So from now on I plan on living in my own little fantasy world of delusions of why I may need to keep some softness to my form.  I mean, truly, its for the kids.

Get Off the Phone

 

Fourty minutes spent in the “sweat box” otherwise known as my front porch and I am miserable.  I trudged through 4 miles, wished the whole time that lighting would strike and disable my electricity so that the treadmill would die a horrible death.  But alas there was not a cloud in the sky and I paid the electric bill for last month, so I kept moving forward. 

Perspective, right!!! I’ll stop complaining.

You should see the amount of sweat on the front of my treadmill after today.  It might even constitute as a bath for it. Little girl #2 referred to me as juicy when I came inside, which I still can’t decide if I should be offended by…

Since my move last year I have had to do a whole lot more driving to and from work than I ever have in past.  I have come to the conclusion that other drivers suck, and I shouldn’t have to deal with their stupidity.  GET OFF YOUR PHONE WHILE YOU ARE DRIVING.  YOU WILL KILL SOMEONE OR YOURSELF!!!.  That’s all.

Work is so much WORK!!!

 

This body was not designed for hot weather.  It needs a nice moderate climate that requires such clothing as jeans and light jacket; perhaps a lovely decorative scarf.  The pacific northwest perhaps.  Of course we all want what we don’t have. (like skin that doesn’t fry at the mere threat of sunlight.)

After little girl #1 and #2 had gymnastics class we came home a worked in the yard.  I successfully rescued two evergreen bushes from their captor (the ground), trimmed some twigs, sticks, freaking huge branches from some trees, and uncovered some paving stones that I remembered used to be a small walkway from the porch to the driveway. We are buying my grandparents home and after living in it for a year I have decided that things need to be done that make it “mine” as opposed to “grandpa’s house”. So I started with outside improvements, hence all the yard work today.

this is actual footage of me working

There is now a nice little sun burn on my back, cause I’m an idiot, and my lower back is killing me from the chunk of time I spent hunched over pavement pulling weeks and liberating stones from the ground. But I feel accomplished.  And then I ran 4.5 miles at a 10:10 pace which is like lighting for these hunks of meat attached to my torso. Plus I started season 2 of 24, which is starting off much better than season 1. I’m seeing a lot of runs with me catching up with Jack Bauer’s high jinx across Los Angeles.

This image disturbs me in such a way that I don’t know if I will be able to sleep tonight.  Jen? You?

Arms of Fire

 

3 miles on the treadmill and a random workout video later and I’m pooped.  Not so much from the running but from following the instructions of a skinny minny woman in a tiny leotard.  This particular video was a “body ballet sculpting” video, whatever that means!  The reviews say it’s the same woman that trained Natalie Portman for The Black Swan but I think she is just a woman who has perfected the art of torture.  You know, the kind of torture that’s like watching a crazy woman prantcersize, but in your arms.

Seriously, my arms are on fire.  Who does she think she is making my muscles do things that they haven’t done in years?!?!?  I can’t even imagine what they are gonna feel like in the morning when they feel like this now.  I’m in for it.  At least it wasn’t as bad as this workout.

Even though I think that woman may make my arms fall off I plan on returning to the torture; something that hurts that bad must be doing something good. It’s what I’m telling myself these days.

Just lie to me, ok, and make me think it’s making a difference.

How Else Am I Going to Know I Stink?

 

Anger and hatred do not adequately express the appropriate feeling I have had towards my computer over this last week.  Many a thought has crossed my mind of just tossing it out the second floor window at home and watching it explode on the concrete, or taking a bat to the darn thing a few thousand times.  And just when I begin to come to terms with the thought that my 4 year old laptop might be wheezing its last breath I realize I have been mad at the wrong inanimate object!!!!

The wi-fi switch somehow just magically turns itself off rending my internet useless.  I would repeatedly turn the internet switch back on and just as quickly it would be turned off again.   And then I started to notice a pattern.  Clue #1- no one else in the house seemed to have difficulty with this problem. Clue #2- it happened every time I get on the computer which just happens to be after my runs. Clue #3- it’s me and I’m dumb. (I mean it only took a week for me to figure out what was going on.)  I hate technology (that I don’t understand).

Every time I go to download my daily run from my Garmin 405 I have to use the ANT+ stick to transfer the data and every time I tried to do that it would shut off my internet!!!! WTF!!!!! I have had this watch and computer for around the same time and this is the first time I have had this problem.  From what I can figure, Garmin is doing some sort of fancy upgrade on its website for downloading activities but it can’t yet support the 405 (shocker!), rendering the product only half useful in my eyes.  I rely on that little bugger to tell me just how mediocre I ran so that I can pretend that I am going to get better.  What am I supposed to do if I can’t do that????

I’m just lost right now and I can’t even begin to express how mad I am at Garmin. I ran 5 miles today and I really wanted to look at my splits without using that dang bezel on the watch.  I know, I know, I’m whining about silly problem.  But they are my problems, and they are all I've got.

You better step up your game Garmin. This is not a happy girl.

So confused

It is necessary that I share this with you:

I have no words for this situation. What exactly is going on here? How does this stay in place?!?!? It makes no sense. I must now go and scour my eyes with comet. You just can't unseen something like that.
On Saturday I ran a whole 5.25 miles. It was pretty good, but slow. I realize that most all my runs are slow. I want to be faster but I don't know that I have the drive to get there. I also have no clue how to really train to get faster. When I investigate training plans, they always use all sorts of jargon like splits and fartlek and tempo. Now I can intellectually understand these directions. I just have no real understanding of how to realistically put a training plan in place.

Maybe someday it will all come together. Or I'll become extremely wealthy and hire a coach to train my pants off...literally.

Until then I will live in mediocrity...

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Put On A Happy Face

I had absolutely no intention of running tonight. And I mean none! But I was threatened with bodily harm and financial ruin if I didn't get off my butt and hit the pavement. Ok, that last part might be a slight exaggeration of the facts, but it was my sister and she can be pretty scary if she needs to be. And remember how I said the other day that I havng run out side in forever? Yeah, that was a slight problem today...

 

Look how threatening she is. I was not the happiest camper by the end of the 3 miles. It was slow and humid and there were these things in the road that seemed to increase in elevation, I think they call them hills? Crap if you ask me. I need to start increasing the elevation on the treadmill so this isn't as much of a problem in the future.

 

Ok, so it might have been a little more fun than I let on initially. And despite the fact it was unplanned I was glad to go and have it done.

 

I plan on hiding from her tomorrow though....

 

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Buzzkill

 

I had 4.25 really good miles today.  The kind of miles that go pretty easy and you’re not quite sure why.  I’m not going to think too hard about it and ruin my high, cause that’s pretty much the story of my life

One of my little private joys, that I will deny if you every tell anybody, is that I really like to catch up on my TV shows while running on the treadmill.  I don’t want get to watch TV a whole lot, not that I have a burning desire to spend gratuitous amounts of time sitting and vegging out, as fun as that sounds.  But I do enjoy being undisturbed by miniature versions of myself while watching a “grown up show.” So enters the iPad while running in place.  If you would have asked me a year ago if I liked running on the treadmill I would have said no, but now I think I like it. 

So my current “running” show is 24.  I never saw it when it was on air originally and my sister has this sick little obsession with Keifer Sutherland.  So I decided to give it a shot or risk her beating me to a pulp.  Other than the fact that the cell phones are all flip phones and it appears that people can stay awake for 32 hours or more it’s pretty good.  Of course I’m not all the way through so I will save my final judgment for another day.

Wait… Is that not Jack Bauer?????

Side Note: We recently tried to make the family watch Lost Boys at a shindig get together thingy.  It did not go over well. 

Seeing that I only get to watch a show once per day it’s gonna take a freaking long time to get though all 487 seasons.  I should be 50 by the time I finish 24.  Good times.

Let’s Cut the Crap

Candy crush is destroying lives!  Mine, namely.  I found my self spending large amount of time mindlessly shifting pretty little colored candies around the computer screen.  It would suck multiple minutes per day; hours per week.  Ask me what I got out of this? The only positive I can think of is hand eye coordination.  The negatives started to stack up quickly when I really got to thinking about it.  I neglected cleaning the house, playing with the kids, reading good books, the laundry, or even sleeping.  ME…. SLEEPING!!!!! 

So I finally made the decision to (gasp) delete the app.  That was 5 days ago.  And much to my surprise I am still alive and potentially better for it.  This small victory over the “internet” has me thinking of other areas of my life that are truly wasted time.
We make so many excuses about not having “time” for anything that we should do that is actually good for us and then spend so much effort wasting the actual time we “don’t have.”  I want to read good books and exercise appropriately without excuse and give my kids a mother who is present for them.  So starts my journey to cutting out the crap.  I almost can’t wait to see what else I can get rid of that truly doesn’t matter and doesn’t add to my life. Except candy, candy always matters.

Today I ran about 4 miles today on the treadmill at my super slow peanut butter pace but the good news is that I can go 4 miles and not die during the process.  The next goal I have for myself is to increase the pace I am running but still run the same amount of time.  It’s my own little theory to increase my pace time.  It may not work, but I figure at least if I’m still running it can’t be all bad. Right?

At least I’ll be upright.

Random Thoughts

 

So…. It’s completely nutritionally sound to eat Hummus by the spoonful, right?  I mean, I thought so, I just wanted to make sure somebody else thought so.  It’s like I can’t stop (and I won’t stop).  It doesn’t matter how socially unacceptable it is to bath in the stuff, I’m going to start, and my family better like it.

It has been almost a year since I was able to run outside.  A YEAR!!!!  This treadmill has it’s perks, don’t get me wrong.  Catching up on seasons of shows is easy when you can do it while mindlessly running in place.  But there is something I miss about running outside.  If only the state didn’t look down on leaving small children alone for long period of time… Can dog’s be considered babysitters?

That looks like what I need.

I guess I will just continue to keep at the treadmill until I convince one of the neighbors that they want to watch the hellions for an hour.  Maybe I could just get them to knock on the door and sit there until they call the police. And by that time I should be home. Lets go with that plan.  I can see nothing going wrong with this plan…

Except that it’s my kids.  And they are pretty much crazy.  It’s the same reaction I have to them every day.

When Life Throws you a Curveball

Sometimes, life just gets in the way and there is nothing you can do about it.  You do your best to claw and scratch your way out of the hole you find yourself in and all you can do is cling to the edge and hang there until you find the strength to pull yourself out.  So you put off doing those things that don’t seem to matter as much any more… like writing.  But now I find myself with thoughts in my brain and no where to write them down.  So what better time to pick back up with the blog and let the endless word association game commence.  And maybe this time life won’t seem so heavy.
I had a dream last night.  It was one of those dreams that I hate.  I spent the entire dream attempting to get to the start/finish line of a race.  Now, I have no clue what type of race it was other than a “running” race; 5K, 12K, or a marathon.  I have no clue.  But I spent the entire dream trying to find shoes and socks while waiting in a line for the the port a pot that was never ending and listening to the start gun explode all the while trying to get my crap together.  It was maddening, I tell you.

My type A personality just couldn’t handle it.  And I never did get the race started.
I have been running, more on than off and it feels good.  I’m trying to make less excuses for why not and trying to just “do”.  Here’s to hoping that I can maintain that thought process.

Lessons Learned Today

After 3 agonizing miles at 0630 this morning in some humid 75 degree heat I realized I recently have learned a few lessons.

 

Lesson #1- I have grossly undertrained for the race this weekend. Seeing that I'm a lazy slob I'm not sure why I thought intermittent running would get me ready for a 4 mile race. Also not really varying the speed or incline on the treadmill will severely limit your ability to run outside. Who knew? Ok so I knew that but I was hoping for some magical event to happen that would make me run fast and look good all at the same time. Still waiting on that...

 

Lesson #2- I hate the heat. The treadmill provides me with the ability for comfort. I have my fan, Sydney Bristow, and a cold bottle of water at my disposal through out my run. A back country road provides me no comfort. And this whole getting hot at the crack of dawn thing is getting old fast. I like cold weather running for outside. Until I move to Alaska to run I'm going to continue to complain about the heat and humidity.

 

Lesson #3- Country folk are more considerate drivers. This was the most pleasant lesson today. As I have been in Minier all week (AKA middle of nowhere) I have been able to utilize the back roads for my torture sessions. Every time a car/truck/tractor/semi has been headed my way it has not only slowed down considerably but it has also driven on the other side of the road and the driver waved to me. Now they might have been just making sure I was not on the verge of death as it may have appeared, or as I like to think it, they are just nice people. That and if they hit me, it's more than likely they will actually know me and have to tell my parents they smeared me across the road.

 

Lesson #4- I better start cross training. This is just fact. I will never get better or be in better shape if I don't do that. The question is what to do for a cross train?

 

In other news, little girl #2 decided that it would be a good idea to take a poo in the wagon outside in the driveway for us to find later. My conversation with her went like this:

 

Me: Did you poop in the wagon?

LG2: Yes I did.

Me: Why did you do that?

LG2: I was trying to be funny.

Touché little girl, touché.

 

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Moving

I don't know how people keep up with blogs and manage to have a life. I can't seem to hack it and I'm pretty darn organized. Of course maybe it has to do with the many life changes that I am going through. Not "The Change" but some pretty drastic changes none the less.

 

He sleeps like this every night, on my side of the bed, quite rude.

 

This last year has been rough for me and my family so it was decided to move. And I'm not talking about move to the other side of town, I mean move to another state and uproot your life in the process. The house here in Terre Haute is on the market and I have quit my job at the hospital (which was tough, having been there almost 10 years). I am still working a part time gig at another facility in Terre Haute that is more flexible in scheduling. In the mean time the job hunt is on. The husband has an interview today and I have an interview on Monday. I have had some other phone interviews as well but this one on Monday is the one I really want!!!! Here's to hoping...

This made me laugh so hard, and I don't know why.

Needless to say, I'm a bundle of nerves. Not only do we need a house, jobs, and to get out of this house, I need to get little girl # 1 into 1st grade by the fall in Minier, Il. (That's where we are moving) Unless you are from there you don't know where it's is, so don't ask. I also need to enroll little girl #2 in preschool and set up some type of Childcare (which is all dependent on jobs). And let's not even talk about packing the house...

She really doesn't care about moving, pampered snot.

It's hard to type this with her using my arm as a pillow.

All in the meanwhile I'm still running. Today I did 3.5 miles, and it was my first run outside since like 1986. Ok I might be exaggerating a little, but I seriously haven't ran outside in this calendar year. And it was pretty good, considering I can't pace myself for crap. Temperature was around 65 degrees and it was overcast at 0700 in the morning. PERFECT!!!! Except for that sudden urge to poo myself at 3.5 miles. I could have run at least another half a mile if my gut wasn't ready to explode. Ah, the things they don't tell you when you get into running.

 

View from the run. Probably could have dropped one there and no one would notice.

 

Maybe I could just go back to my job as a fashion model, that used to work pretty well.

 

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Buns of Steel

Day 4 of the challenge, and I'm not dead though I did think about eating butter once...

 

 

I'm up to 40 of each of the squats and push-ups. And I am completely amazed and flabbergasted that I don't have pop eye biceps or buns of steel yet!!! I should have purchased a warranty or something.

I remember my mom having these.

Today I ran 2.7 miles. Not quite sure what happened to keep me from getting to 3 but I'm not going to keep stressing about all my failures and short comings. At least I moved my a$$ for 30 minutes instead of eating ice cream (which by the way I'd rather do). But those habits will not help me explain to the doctor on Monday why I'm fat.

I have a plan in my head to run in the morning before work again tomorrow. And just like last time it probably won't happen, but it's wishful thinking.

 

 

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Lets do some squat thrusts

Life happens and then you move on, at least that's what I keep telling myself. Keep moving Jess, keep moving. My runs have been few and far between lately, but like any bathing suit fearing woman I too see the rapid approach of swim suit season and plan to make a rapid dash for that finish line, sliding across head first if need be.

 

 

In this new gusto of enthusiasm I have decided to challenge my self with some simple workout goals. After doing a little Internet investigation I found some different push-up and squats challenges. I figure that these things can't hurt, and if anything I may gain a little strength in the end. But of course I can't do anything by the instructions and have decided to make up my own rules for the challenge. Day one= do as may of each of these as I can. Then on each consecutive day thereafter do at least the same amount if not more than the day before. I made my self a chart just to satisfy my OCD and seeing as I am only 2 days in I'm feeling pretty good about my progress. I bet by day 10 I will just want to give up and eat butter or something.

Just remember this picture next time you at someone else's house with cats...

 

Runs are still happening on this plan of mine, I'm just not sure how far they will go or if I will do long runs. We shall see. I think I need a squats buddy to kick my in the pants and keep me motivated. Please feel free to be that person, but only if you will do the push ups and squats with me. K? Thanks!!!

Kinda like this?

 

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