training | Run. Dog. Cat. Cat. Me.

Archive for the tag “training”

17 May 2013

Confidence? Reality? A spoonful of sugar?

“To do your best, you’ve gotta believe in yourself. There is a functional link between physiology and psychology. If you have the confidence to do something, your body will respond. With confidence you can cope with various race day obstacles, but even slight problems are magnified if you lack it. Achieving goals – long training runs, consistent mileage, increasingly faster times in speed workouts and races – builds confidence, which results in further improvements in performance. Reflect on these successes as you approach a race and during it to keep your confidence strong.” Bob Glover, The Competitive Runner’s Handbook

It’s ugly at the rundogcatcatme household this morning and it doesn’t bode well for the rest of the day. And, yes, coffee: on the third.

Chunker must feel the tension because she is prowling about mewing and chirping at her stuffed toy ‘babies’. Just now she climbed up on the washer and dumped her kibble into the washing machine. Now I’ve got cat food pellets stuck under the agitator. I mean under the agitator in the washing machine, not the agitator in fur, mewing.

CHUNKDAMMITYOULITTLESHIT

Oddly just minutes before we were discussing yelling at our furry children and that our furry children didn’t have middle names to make the shout effective like it did when I would yell TRAITOR MIDDLE NAME CHILD DAMMIT I TOLD YOU BUT, NO, AND NOW WE HAVE TO GO TO THE EMERGENCY ROOM. AGAIN.

Apparently Chunker does have a middle name and I had just forgotten it.

Last night we gave the lake swim another try. Heather bravely faced the lake and announced there had better not be any &^%%&** snakes this time. I felt fine, buoyed by my new-found comfort and lack of fear in the lake Tuesday. Unfortunately I failed to realize I had a couple factors against me. First I forgot to use my inhalers yesterday and a front had come in (my trigger). Secondly, and much more importantly, Hubs was home. Home, and on the boat following us in the lake.

I have performance anxiety. I don’t mind failing or struggling in front of others (too much) but can’t stand to do so in front of Hubs, which is ridiculous because I usually manage to screw something up on a daily basis so I should surely be used to it by now. It embarrasses me, and he tries to fix everything which frustrates me (it’s a guy thing, isn’t it?). After all these years I should get over it. For some reason he’s fascinated by the thought of me swimming. He keeps saying, “I’ve never seen you swim” which means every time we’ve been to a pool he’s been struck blind? Or perhaps that doesn’t count if it’s not laps or something? I don’t know. I just know, at this point, that the pressure is on and it’s building and I cannot stand it.

B&H are two of the most mothering and nurturing people I have ever met, polar opposite of me. Becky stayed back with me when we set out. Every damn time I looked up there was that boat with Hubs, watching. The water was cool, I didn’t warm up and within a couple minutes my chest said Ciao, see ya later and shut down. I’d doggy paddle for a few minutes and set out again, Becky waiting and watching. I told her to go on, I’m fine. I swam a bit and floated a bit and doggy paddled a bit but I could never catch my breath, wheezing and pissed off, knowing that Hubs was watching me struggle. Finally I saw a dock and headed for it. I held on, trying to catch my breath, looking at our dock across the cove, a million miles away. Hubs and the boat swung around. I got on. ”I’m done. I’m fine, but I’m done.”

The reality, with no sugar-coating, is that inhalers or no, Hubs or no, I am not a strong enough swimmer to go even 400 yards. I will have to stop and I will have to stand in the 6 inches of marshmellow-y fish poopy fish burial mud until I can catch my breath and then I’ll have to start again. I’ll just have to boil my feet when I get home.

Well, SH*T.

One of my BRFF’s, Lisa, called yesterday to see how I was doing facing this weekend. She did her first Tri last summer. She told me how helpful Hubs was at the race start, consoling her with positive reinforcement. “You can FLOAT, cantcha?” he asked her. She nodded. ”You can DOGGY PADDLE cantcha?” She nodded. ”OKAY THEN, you’ll be FINE,” he boomed. She nodded.

Someone posted the quote above this morning. I can’t decide if the issue is that I don’t believe in myself enough and I need to pump myself with spoonfuls of sugar-y positive thinking and reinforcement all day, or if the issue is what I stated: I am simply not a strong enough swimmer at this time.

And if the reason is the fact that I am simply not strong enough at this time, is it negative to admit that? To be afraid, and to feel angry because I’m afraid?

Posted in Triathlon and tagged cat, coffee, exercise, fitness, healthy-living, Journey, muddy lake, positive thinking, Run, running, sugar coating, swimming, training, triathlon

16 May 2013

5 Comments

Good luck with that.

I’m sure it’s the same for you two faithful followers of my world-famous, mind-numbingly fascinating blog in which I constantly whine about butts falling off, snakes, crappy weather, and tigers in bathrooms; probably you, like me, think that everyone around you is somehow doing just a bit better, somehow just one percentage point less nervous, less worried, more happy, more confident. Probably the boss likes them one little bit better than they like you. Probably they’ve never walked out of the bathroom with toilet paper hanging out the back of their shorts.

A while back, when Becky and Heather were finally medicated to an acceptable level and allowed back out in public, they would message me.

HEY! I’m going swimming tomorrow, wanna go?

No.

It’ll be fun!

No.

Come on, you’ll like it once you try it.

No.

The entire time I was saying no I knew I needed to do this. This was where I had a choice. Become a smaller person, saying no, tightening my circle just a bit, then a bit more, then a bit more. I’m sure a lot of people are the same way, but there’s only me living in this head and in this life, only what I interpret. I assume there are more of me out there, struggling not to get smaller, not to live a more circumscribed life, scared and uncertain how to achieve it, but I only know myself.

Heather and Becky make it look so easy that I figure they’re cool with it all. They use words like “fun” which makes one think more of things like birthday parties and cake and ice cream. Or coffee. Or wine. Or anything other than swimming with the eventual goal being getting out of the pool and into a fish poop filled lake. After the snake issue on Tuesday, however, I realized that they have just been doing a better job than I of hiding it. Becky doesn’t like her wetsuit and neither of them like snakes at all. The messages are flying.

ARG! I woke up next to the bed beating the invisible spiders I just dreamed of!!

ARG! What’s the lake temp??

ARG! I can’t breathe in that wetsuit!!

LOL, snake code:
~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Snake
_____________ Dead snake
—___—___— Oops, just ran over a snake.

ARG! Just because ARG!!!

After realizing this was not the Bataan Death March – which was truly a horror – seriously, I’m not gonna die. I’m not going to lose my family or job or anything, I’m just going to swim in a freeking lake - which is only 4 feet deep and I’m 5’8″, so standing up is an option. Then I just have to ride my bike, which I could fall off of, but then I’ve already stepped on my own finger; at some point you have to accept that stuff happens. And finally I get to do my favorite thing: run. So I managed to switch off a couple of the Panic Buttons in my brain.

I’m a believer in signs, albeit a rather fair-weather believer. Obviously when things line up like I prefer it’s got to be a good sign. If the signs are bad I may or may not give it some consideration. For instance, the sign that says Speed Limit 55. Because personally, that’s just stupid and I’m not going to give that any consideration. I’m sure most people are like me, but there could be some who prefer bad signs and not having anything line up well. Those people probably also do 55 in the 55mph zone. Then they probably also get yelled at by me, which will surprise you both, that I would be in my car yelling &^$$# driver (*&^ your mother is a $#@!!!!

I have a chin hair roughly the width and tenacity of a piece of baling wire, which I’ve had since the twins were still in high school, making it about 10 years old. A quick internet search shows that the anagen phase of growth of a hair follicle is an average 2 to 8 years. My chin hair, which I should probably just go ahead and name since we’ve grown so close, has obviously surpassed this lifespan. If it were a person it would be my Grandma Alice, who lived to 103 years, only she was nice and did not resemble a piece of baling wire in any way.

The reason I mention this is that I managed to pluck the damn thing out in one try yesterday morning. This is an incredible stroke of good luck on my part, having ruined several pair of tweezers over the past 10 years, not to mention accidentally slamming my hand against the mirror repeatedly when the tweezers fail. That hurts. Hey, at least I never broke the mirror, right? Otherwise for sure the damn thing would live another 7 years. I expect that, having outed my chin hair in this public manner, I will no longer receive anonymous emailed marriage proposals or offers for £1million to be deposited directly into my bank account. So you see how much good luck that is!

Then Heather saw another dead snake on her bike ride yesterday, making it two days in a row of dead snakes! That’s a much better sign than live snakes. And when we were first starting out on the bikes, before we even started, I almost fell over! So that was good! The almost part, I mean. After the ride I got in the car and it was 12:34 which is my lucky number. And THEN – I got Taco Bell for lunch. That is a very good sign. You might think a person can get Taco Bell any day, but you can’t. If you have no money in the car, you have no Taco Bell in your tummy. Yes. Now you understand how tenuous the hold on luck can truly be.

So you see, luck is in the eye of the beholder. Well, except when it’s actually your real eyeball and it’s the bug that flew in Becky’s on the bike ride at the very same time a rabid ant was in her cycling shoe biting the stew out of her foot, which seemed rather unlucky. Although it was a lot unluckier for the bug and the ant, both of whom got squashed rapidly.

I’m telling you what, with all this good luck floating around I expect that I may not have to worry about the swim, for all I know I’ll be able to walk on water by Saturday.

Posted in Triathlon and tagged BFOS, Butt Falling off Syndrome, exercise, fitness, good luck, healthy-living, invisible spiders, Journey, lake temp, Run, running, swimming, swimming in a lake, training, triathlon

14 May 2013

4 Comments

Well, that went swimmingly.

7:42am *boink* B: Swimming today?

*boink* T: Sigh. Guess so. Just checked, water temp is still 70

*boink* B: I am not worried about the temp of the water really…wet suit–I must wear it, swim in it, and just do it. Intestinal fortitude.

*boink* T: studies show intestinal fortitude is highly overrated. And you can always take Imodium for it.

7:48am *boink* B: can you see the lake on google earth?

*boink* T: Checking. Been taking your meds, eh?

*boink* T: Yes, I see it. It looks like distance to the boat launch is 162 yards. I’m putting Kahlua in my coffee right now.

*boink* B: riiiiight….

8:18am *boink* H: Just catching up, you two swimming in the lake this morning?

*boink* T: I DON’T HAVE ANY KAHLUA

*boink* B: Can you put some Merlot in the coffee, then?

*boink* H: OMG I’m so nervous. Every night this week I’ve worried about snakes.

*boink* T: there are no snakes in my lake. I swear. I promise. I’ve never ever seen one.

8:57am *boink* T: how far you going?

*boink* B: I don’t care. What you need, is to get in the water and get the feel for it–and for the love of all that is holy DO NOT WORRY ABOUT TIME

*boink* T: no, right, just get in the water.

*boink* B: I repeat just get in the water…and swim some…no pressure

*boink* T: Right, that’s all I’m planning to do, I’m not concerned for distance.

*boink* B: there are no drills, no specific length just tip toeing through the tulips.

*boink* T: tiptoeing through fish shit, you mean.

8:32am *boink* H: I’m back. You’d better be right because if I see a snake I will die. Or maybe I’ll kill you.

*boink* T: I SWEAR.

*boink* H: okay

9:31am *boink* B: On my way

9:34am *boink* H: me too

I woke this morning feeling resigned and peaceful. Yesterday afternoon it occurred to me it was a swim in a lake, not the Bataan Death March. Seriously. I thought, what, I’m gonna die? I still wasn’t thrilled of course, but I seemed to feel a little more realistic about the situation. I’ll get in the water, I’ll get to the other side somehow, and then I’ll get back.

I was surprised, at 70 degrees the water didn’t feel too cold. It was chilly on my hands and feet but they quickly warmed; I’d expected to feel cold the entire time.

I finally let go of the dock and we swam to the boat launch and back. I did get dizzy, I might consider some Dramamine for the next couple days, and I called it at one lap.

B&H returned to the boat launch for a second lap. It all went well until they saw the snake. That it was dead did not make any difference to them. Heather threw Becky to the wolves and hauled ass. Becky did some speed work. Being dead and all, it stayed where it was, but, still, it was a snake.

Later we drove around to the boat launch to be sure. Maybe it really wasn’t a snake.

There were a couple guys working on the house next to the launch.

“Are you the ones that swam across the lake?” they asked in that tone which indicates they are watching carefully and are ready to back away slowly if necessary.

“Yes, we did, and there’s a f*cking snake in the water!” said Heather, delicately.

“Really?” Suddenly this was a lot more interesting. Men with trucks and power tools. Three women squealing about a snake, what’s not to like?

“Yeah,” intoned the younger one, walking to the shore to check it out, “That IS a snake.”

He threw a rock at it, it bounced on the waves, obviously dead.

“It’s dead.”

Heather shook her head. “It’s still a f*cking snake.”

Maybe that didn’t go as well as it could have, after all.

Posted in Triathlon and tagged coffee, dead snake, exercise, fitness, healthy-living, Journey, snake, swimming, swimming in a lake, training, triathlon, wetsuit

02 May 2013

5 Comments

No. Try not. Do…or do not. There is no try.

All due credit to any triathlete out there. This is a bunch of hard work – not that I doubted that, having watched hubs do every distance from sprint to Full Ironman over the years. I’m doing, to my knowledge, the shortest Tri you can. I think the only way I could do a shorter race is to trick my way into a Kid’s Tri. ”Hey, I had a growth spurt! I’m tall for my age!” I won’t do that though, not because I’m an honest sort of person, but because some tiny dudette would go spinning past me on their little training wheels bike sporting a white wicker basket with pink streamers and I would cry. I would get off my bike and throw it on the ground and stomp my feet and cry.

Crazy Becky Heather Killer Hubs cannot seem to quit dropping helpful hints about triathlons. Very helpful hints, too, with the exception that I still can’t figure out if I’m flattered that hubs, while discussing this Crazy Weather and whether it would be a wet suit legal race, offered me his wet suit. Not so much even that he offered it, but that he seemed to think it would fit. Isn’t it in some hubanding manual somewhere that you never indicate that your dainty wife could fit into anything belonging to your manly self??

The learning curve is steepening rapidly. Suddenly what seemed to be an hour or so consisting of doggie paddling in a warm, shallow lake, peddling along a highway and then going for a little jog has turned into Mothra vs. Godzilla, and we all know what happened to Mothra.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mothra ”Mothra is known for her habit of dying somehow in many of the movies she has appeared in”

(I’m just quoting Wiki. Sentence above she is referred to in is somehow dying.)

I realized this weekend that I didn’t even know the distances of all three events. I thought it was a 5K run, and I know for a branded-in-my-brain fact that the swim is 400 yards but had no idea what the bike was. Ten miles? Eighteen miles? Who knew? And what kind of special stupid do you have to be to register for a race for which you do not actually know the distances?

Me, and one other lady.

I trained for three or four months for my first half marathon. I talked hydration nutrition elimination clothing shoes for months. I bought a Garmin and tracked every single mile like a new religion. Date, time, distance, pace, weather, everything. The day dawned. I’d set everything out the night before, of course, nervously reviewing it all 37 times. Hubs and the twins were going to meet me at the finish line, so I hitched a ride with a friend, a seasoned runner, marathoner and triathlete.

She noticed I seemed a bit nervous – probably the incessant leg jiggling, which I’m actually doing right now, I guess Pavlovian leg jiggling as I remember the story? Can leg jiggling be Pavlovian?

Yes, it’s my first half! I told her, jiggling, head bobbing, jerking slightly and slavering a bit at the corners of my mouth, my water bottle full of bubbles as it shook uncontrollably.

Well, I lived. I did the half and thought I’d conquered the world. Tired, stiff and sore – yes, I did – I wore my race shirt triumphantly to work the next morning and told everyone who couldn’t hide fast enough every excruciating detail, mile after mile. I did not wear the finisher’s medal only because it kept clanking against my desk in a very irritating fashion.

The second day, as even more soreness set in and I was forced to grab the edge of the desk to sit or stand, my friend came into my office.

“You did that half marathon, didn’t you?” she asked.

“Yep! It was great I was so excited I did it! It was hard but I did it!” (Why was she asking this? I’d talked about it every day for the past several months.)

She then told me that a lady she bowled with the evening before was limping terribly and could hardly get to the line to bowl. She asked the woman if she was OK. The woman (a smoker who walked a mile or two daily and bowled as her forms of exercise) related this:

She’d registered for “that 5K” over the weekend; she wanted to walk the 3 miles in support of the charity. Except after a while, when she thought she surely should have hit three miles by now, she looked about and realized there was no finish line. In fact, what she saw was a sign that stated Mile 4. Asking around she discovered there was no 5K, only a half and a full marathon. Well, what to do? So she continued on and walked the entire damn half marathon with NO TRAINING. Her feet were covered in blisters and she could hardly move her legs.

And she was my age.

After my brain stopped exploding I asked the woman’s name and immediately looked up the race results. Fortunately she was about the last in our age group, or my running career would have been over right then.

But you gotta admit, the woman did not give up.

And I won’t, either.

Anything you’re looking at that intimidates you? Are you going to try?

Posted in Triathlon and tagged bike, biking, exercise, fitness, Garmin, half marathon, healthy-living, Journey, swimming, training, triathlon

22 Apr 2013

Happy freeking Monday.

As you two might already know, I have a couple of Monday issues happening here.

First, I’m supposed to be having an “off” day. Obviously most of my days are “off” so I expect you’re both wondering what’s so unusual about that. Cynics, both of you, I’m supposed to be taking the day off from working out. So of course I slept wonderfully and didn’t get up until 7am, waking refreshed and enthused about maybe swimming (right, OK, not really enthused, but you know…sorta not hating the idea. That’s a lot like being enthused.)

I have to admit I no longer look at swimming like it was my second pregnancy and this time I knew what natural childbirth felt like and knew I was going to have to go through it all again anyway. See? That’s positive, right?

I remember being pregnant with the twins, sitting in a chair, unable to see my toes. Hubs asked me about the Lamaze classes, wondering how learning a breathing technique was helpful. ”Does it make it hurt less, then?” he asked.

In the most polite way possible I told him to go shut his buddy in the door over there and work on breathing slowly and deeply, which would be helpful in demonstrating to him both the feeling of labor and the benefit of proper breathing. He politely declined and indicated he was happy to take me at my word.

So today I’m not going swimming or running or biking (but I am going to sneak in some yard work SHHHH be vewy vewy quiet.)

Since I’m full of energy and it’s a pretty day and also I put it off for the past three days I decided to go to Kroger’s and buy food. Secondly, I decided to actually make dinner tonight. Fasten the seatbelts, it’s going to be a rough ride. I even looked up a recipe. Then I decided we don’t need no stinking recipe and I’m going to make up my own plan. Baked pork chops, rice and veggies. I’ll let you know if hubs survives. There’s really no other option because I forgot to buy the Lean Cuisines and I’m not going back to the store. I figure more than once a week in Kroger is probably a leading cause of brain leakage, and I have reason for that belief.

Part of the problem is the Muzak. Usually I can handle a little bit of the orchestral remakes of Back in Black or Somebody to Love because once those get stuck in my head, as they will undoubtedly and without fail do, I don’t feel like I need to thread dental floss through my ears and clean out my head.

Oddly, I kept feeling I should not go to Kroger this morning. Not that I didn’t want to, I was actually feeling rather enthused about buying food and cooking it, as opposed to buying it and letting it rot. And I kept thinking of other things to take care of instead of going to the store, but I didn’t want to go this afternoon because I want to get outside in the sunshine and rake up 10 millionbajillion leaves from the 87 trees on our lawn.

OK. FINE. It’s not really 87 trees. I don’t want to count them though, because then for the rest of my life at some point every freeking day my brain would randomly announce WE HAVE 23 TREES ON OUR LAWN and when I’m in the home and don’t recognize my own toes my brain would still randomly announce out loud to the nurse WE HAVE 23 TREES ON OUR LAWN. The nurses will all call me Tree Lady and they’ll all know which resident they’re talking about. Sometimes they’ll just shorten it to “23 needs a bed pan” and they’ll all know then, too.

Anyway, I didn’t listen to my own inner psychic and I went to Kroger. Probably, too, if I weren’t so damn well hydrated it would still have worked out OK. But, no, I’ve had like 40 ounces of water already this morning plus three coffees, so of course I had to go to the Ladies’ Room – this is the polite term for bathroom in public places – which when you think about it, they can’t call it a bathroom because it has no bath. If it did have a bath I would totally not go in there because I have no clue what I might see at that point, but – without meaning to point fingers – if that woman in front of me in the checkout was naked in a bath and I saw that at Kroger’s I would probably go blind or end up in the home tomorrow telling everyone about the freeking damn trees and drooling.

This is precisely why I will never make it as a nurse. I’ll never play piano either, but if I did, I can tell you one song I would NEVER-NEVER-EVER play: Please Mr., Please which, unfortunately, came on overhead just as I was checking out.

AND THIS IS THE SECOND TIME THIS HAS HAPPENED AT THAT STORE!! Let me repeat that as I’m sure you are both completely stunned and cannot believe what you just read: THIS IS THE SECOND TIME THIS HAS HAPPENED AT THAT STORE!

How can the odds possibly work out that I would hear that damn song twice in the same store? How random is that, anyway? Shouldn’t I have fallen into a black hole first, or hit a hole-in-one at the Masters even though I don’t golf? Wouldn’t those chances be better than hearing that song twice in the same place??? AND it happened in the check out line. If I’d just not gone to the Ladies’ Room. Dammit.

But, no. Here I sit, two hours later, and that song is running through my head like a warm murky stream on a grossly hot day. I even youtubed AC/DC and played it real loud to try getting it out that way, but they can’t seem to kick Olivia out. Probably by Wednesday or Thursday it should be gone.

Secondly, “at my age” which the doctors seem get some perverse joy out of saying, I think there should be some perks. One of the perks I think I should be able to enjoy is not have a pimple grow in the middle of my nose.

I’m concerned that hearing Olivia warble about B17 has flashed me back to my teen years and my pores felt obliged to make me feel right at home. Soon I shall don my jeans that are far too short because my legs are too long and they don’t sell jeans by the inseam yet and get some broccoli stuck in my braces so when I laugh out loud during Monday afternoon Spanish class the popular kids will laugh too.

What do you mean, they weren’t laughing with me?

Dammit. I HATE Mondays.

Posted in Biking, Running and tagged AC/DC, biking, coffee, earworm, exercise, fitness, grocery store, healthy-living, Kroger, mental-health, Olivia Newton John, posterchild, Run, swimming, training | Leave a Comment

17 Apr 2013

8 Comments

I haven’t been right here. Where were you?

I was abducted by Aliens!
I was sucked into a Black Hole!
I was transported to an alternate universe!
I fell deeply asleep for forty years!

Ok, maybe I just got busy and then went out-of-town. Sorry, I know both of you have completely stopped breathing while waiting for a wonderful, life changing post. You don’t look so good, not breathing and all that. Maybe you should get a life?

Anyway, taking up where we left off two weeks ago on the last tantalizing and mesmerizing post about how hard my poor life is, AT&T was firm in its resolve that I was not getting anything fixed for five days. Whether they have too much stuff that breaks or not enough people to fix the broken stuff, either way they were intractable.

I made up a song about the issue:
It’s my blog and I’ll rant if I want to rant if I want to rant if I want to.
You would rant too if it happened to you

Well, unless you were the Hubs who has the patience of Job, only not as many cows and wives. ”Ok, I’m accepting, I’m accepting,” he said when I told him. Well, sure he was accepting. His work still had internet, right? What was to accept on his end? Working and getting things done? That’s tough.

I said something cranky. Imagine that.

To continue with the comparison of Job: this is why Hubs, with the patience of Job, if he were Job, would have lots of cows but would balk at more than one wife. One is one too many most of the time, I suspect. Also, you pronounce it JOBE. Even though it’s spelled JOB like “I have a job”, it’s pronounced JOBE, like I said. Like, “I have a JOBE.” Of course, if you tell people you have a JOBE they will think you have a dog or a friend or something named Job pronounced JOBE and will think you are a ne’er-do-well who doesn’t work. I think you should just shut up at that point, but that’s just my opinion. Go ahead and try it. Don’t come crying to me.

I felt irritated and cranky until it occurred to me that what we are dealing with, here, is a First World Problem. Put on the Big Girl pants. Which I did and then I went to BeckyB’s house and borrowed a cup of wireless for a couple of hours to be sure any work hot spots were stomped out. AT&T showed up the following Tuesday (which was about a year ago at this point, thankfully I have a good memory) – at my house – a live person – who immediately detected the location of the issue, found that in the box at the end of the street where my service arises out of the deep dark hole of underground life were two wires, a black one and an orange one. When these two wires are dangling, loose and unconnected, voilà! No Service! When they are connected, voilà! Service! And then he stayed until I got everything hooked back up and working. Nice guy. I have his name and number. Let me know if your internet quits. Black connects to black, orange to orange. Crazy sh*t, I know, it takes an expert.

So then, since I had nothing else to do that week before I had internet resurrected, my crazy friend and I worked out with Killer. Then I went to my anonymous crazy friend’s house, where BeckyB set Matilda up on the Cycleops and we did Suffer-O-Rama Spinnervals for 45 minutes (seriously? Suffer-O-Rama? How can this possibly be good??) and then quick like little bunnies we hopped off, put on our running shoes and did 1.7 around her neighborhood. My first Brick. With mixed emotions I have signed up for the Memphis in May Sprint Tri. When I told hubs he started to smile and then he froze as though Big Foot just showed up on our front lawn. Don’t move Don’t move Don’t move, you might scare it. Carefully moving nothing but his lips he said, “oh, good.” Pat Big Foot softly on the head. Nice Big Foot, there you go.

I thought about that a lot – the triathlon, not Big Foot – the next day as I swam back and forth back and forth like a hamster running on its little wheel going nowhere. I thought about how I have a few more weeks to learn to swim 400 yards without holding on the side of the pool every 25th yard. I thought about being in a lake and looking down as I swim, seeing nothing. I considered closing my eyes while I swam in the pool, to practice not seeing, but I didn’t really feel like bumping into the side of the pool in front of everyone. I wondered if maybe you see stuff but it’s kind of slimy and squishy, and some of it came out of a fish? Or do you see fish? I bet you don’t see fish. They’re probably too smart to swim where crazy people are. I hope so, anyway.

Finally I had internet and to spare. The next morning I sat on the patio, Jamaica Me Crazy in my steaming mug, foggy and zero visibility. I could see the trees, random black outlines twisting and curving against the grey fog, a cacophony of birds cheeping chirping tweeting and squawking and an awkward squirrel ran down the side of a tree, little shards of bark breaking loose and falling in front of him.

I was reminded of one of my favorites from Morning Prayer, the Canticle of Daniel:

Every shower and dew, bless the Lord.
All you winds, bless the Lord.
Fire and heat, bless the Lord.
Cold and chill, bless the Lord.
Dew and rain, bless the Lord.
Frost and chill, bless the Lord.
Ice and snow, bless the Lord.
Nights and days, bless the Lord.
Light and darkness, bless the Lord.
Lightnings and clouds, bless the Lord.

Let the earth bless the Lord.
Praise and exalt him above all forever.
Mountains and hills, bless the Lord.
Everything growing from the earth, bless the Lord.
You springs, bless the Lord.
Seas and rivers, bless the Lord.
You dolphins and all water creatures, bless the Lord.
All you birds of the air, bless the Lord.
All you beasts, wild and tame, bless the Lord.
You sons of men, bless the Lord.

Thankfully, although I forget to do this most of the time, the birds, squirrels and budding plants remembered. I need to watch them more often.

Isn’t this better than internet?

Altho there could be some Zombies out there…

Posted in Biking, Rants, Ruminations, Running and tagged coffee, exercise, fitness, healthy-living, Journey, Run, running, swimming, training, triathlon, zombie, Zombies

07 Mar 2013

9 Comments

It’s all fun and games until the clowns show up.

If you are an athletic type – and I mean any type of activity, walking, running, swimming, cycling, exercise classes – you know how hard you had to work to achieve whatever level of fitness you desire and you know how much easier it is to lose it than to gain it in the first place. Also, as you both know, one thing I’m really excited about right now is that I’m enough out of shape that I’m burning extra calories doing my regular workouts trying to get rid of the extra weight I got from being out of shape.

The wheels on the bus go ’round and ’round, ’round and ’round…

Another cool thing is that it’s all fresh and fun again. There are more chances to have a feeling of accomplishment – I did 5 miles! I haven’t done that since September! I did 7 miles! I haven’t done that since September! I swam a mile! I haven’t done that since Septnever!

Now that Becky’s foot is on the DL she’s concerned about maintaining fitness at just the time she planned to ramp up her triathlon training. She can still swim and cycle but her running is being cut in half. She is also, apparently, off all meds. Again. Every single time she gets on the Crazy Bus she gets me a ticket too. And then I get on the damn bus with her. And I’m ON my meds.

*BOINK*
Terri! LOOK:
“If you start pool running for several days doing high-intensity workouts, you’ll notice something odd: you will be able to eat much more than usual! Even though your workouts are of a similar length to before you were in the pool, the thermal load of the water will spike your metabolism.”
AND: “Since water is a much better heat conductor, it will force your body to generate more heat to stay warm (and therefore burn more calories). As detailed in Tim Ferriss’ book The Four Hour Body, this is how Michael Phelps is able to eat over 7,000 calories per day. It’s a combination of the time spent in the pool and the effect of the water.”
HE CAN EAT 7000 calories a DAY!
WHAT??!!

I say, obviously someone needs to take away Becky’s Googling rights.

I found myself digging aqua belts out of the pile at the pool where the Senior water working-out class was going on. I had the brilliant idea of wearing my HR monitor and putting my Garmin inside my hat to keep it dry. The Garmin wouldn’t stay on my head long enough to get the baseball cap over it. Finally I held it in place and Becky put my hat on me, except then my hand was stuck in the hat and when I tried to pull my hand out I ended up with the Garmin strap as a new kind of earring. In the end, when I got home, it was for nothing because apparently the radio signals from the strap to the watch won’t go through water.

I say, smart radio signals.

Of course we had no clue what we were doing, strapping those stupid belts on and heading for the deep end. As we got deeper in the water the belts started to try to float and soon the aquabelt was asphyxiating me. I struggled to shove it back down on my waist and choked on a mouthful of water which I then snorted out my nose. OUCH that burned. Do not laugh when the water is at your chin. Of course Becky found that hysterical, and then the Senior water worker-outers started staring at us. I think several of them were former schoolteacher nuns. Fortunately rulers are not part of the Waterworks Class equipment.

We bobbed forward, legs spinning out behind us. We bobbed backward, legs spinning out in front of us. We bobbed up and down. We kicked back and forth and up and down and snorted water while we laughed like idiots in bumper cars rolling in circles. ”RACE YOU TO THE OTHER SIDE!” We took off ‘running’ going the speed of slow, pumping our arms and running like mad, going nowhere. I would be talking to Becky and realize that my back was to her because I’d spun off in another direction. We could not quit laughing, and I kept thinking of the circus clowns who all climb out of the tiny little car and go running madly in circles, bouncing off one another. The Senior water worker-outers were really cutting their eyes at us now. Hey. Exercising in Water is Serious. Cheer down right now.

In about 5 minutes my HR was up enough that I had to stop for a minute and catch my breath. The problem with having to catch your breath is if you quit the pool running you tend to start tipping over again, so if you’re out of breath, you have to make your way breathlessly to the ropes or the edge. You can bob up and down again like the bobbing bird toy I had as a kid if you prefer, but you might end up snorting more water. We kept going, back and forth. Then we ran in circles, doing laps around the deep end. One old guy in the water exercise class finally quit altogether and just stood in the pool, watching us working our a$$es off going nowhere. He kept looking at us with the same expression Mo gets when he sees the coffee pot start: head slightly to one side, intent, curious and slightly baffled.

“I see it, but it makes no sense.”

Posted in Running and tagged aquabelt, exercise, fitness, healthy-living, Run, running, swimming, training, water running

05 Mar 2013

7 Comments

Calories Calories everywhere…

Since I’m so ecstatic about being out of shape so I can burn more calories, calories now show up everywhere. It’s like when you get dressed up all nice to go out to dinner. Then, on the way to the restaurant to meet your friends, you realize that the rogue chin hair you’ve been waging battle with for so many years it’s gone and turned grey – but hasn’t died – has suddenly sprouted to 1/2″ in length. Overnight. Now all you can think of is this stupid thing sticking out of your chin like a lighthouse beam. You’re pretty sure it’s picking up signals from Jupiter. Others in the restaurant seem to be staring at you. Your chin, specifically. Although certainly you are just being paranoid.

Not that it’s ever happened to me, like, Friday night.

Meanwhile it’s become obvious that the kitty chow I got last month was very yummy and loved greatly by Munker and Mo, who were asking me about every 90 minutes for more. Even more obvious than the frequency of the requests was the unmistakable thickening of kitty waistlines and the greatly more audible THUMP of Chunker hitting the floor. I have responsibilities here. We do live in an earthquake zone.

Yesterday we ran out of the Crack Kitty Chow. I bought some ‘Adult’ cat food with reduced calories. Now the kitty food bowls remain full while cats look at me questioningly. ”Mom? What happened to our food?” Fortunately they don’t seem to connect the crappy new food to me and Kroger.

I told Hubs I’d bought adult diet cat food and not only did I think the reduced calories would help them slim down, the fact they wouldn’t eat it would probably rapidly increase the weight loss. Hubs thinks this is a great policy to pursue with the cats and not at all optional for humans. I don’t think it’s very workable anyway, since basically the only thing I won’t eat is Brussels Sprouts and slimy stuff like eels. I haven’t seen eels at Kroger.

So, the calorie thing now seems to be lit up like a Vegas show. As evidenced by this post, which popped up a while ago:

What. The. Heck? That SUCKS. 674?? that’s all??

However, my good running buddy (and Mo’s first stepmom), Elizabeth, turned to Al Gore’s most awesome creation, the Inter Net Web Thingie, uncovering the data that an M&M has, in fact, 3.44 calories, making the total amount of M&M’s you can eat after running a marathon and burning 2900 calories 843.02325 and not 674 lousy candies.

The good news here is that, probably, if you are out of shape but still manage to stumble through a marathon, you might could eat even more M&M’s. If you had enough energy left to chew. Maybe you could just lie down face first in a pile of them, then you could eat them without any extra energy expenditure. Perhaps the RD’s of marathons should consider a pit of M&M’s like the pit of colored balls in the kiddie section of McDonald’s. Runners could finish the race and jump in, swimming through the M&M’s, chomping away.

Also I did the math, if you burned 2900 calories on a marathon you could eat 6.17 servings of an Enchirito and a Mexican Pizza. If you called it even and only ate 6 servings you’d be at a net calorie loss.

And people think runners and marathoners are crazy.

Posted in Running and tagged brussels sprouts, calories, cat, cat food, Enchirito, exercise, fitness, food, healthy-living, M&M, marathon, Mexican Pizza, Pet, Run, running, Taco Bell, training

04 Mar 2013

10 Comments

Wild and Crazy. Nothing stopping us now.

I saw Dr. K this morning and my back is definitely better, so I headed out for a slow easy 4 miler in the neighborhood to practice my stride. Beautiful morning – sunny and breezy, it was great to be outside. Yesterday afternoon, just to have a reason to be outside in the pretty afternoon sun, I swept leaves. Carefully, slowly, with my back straight, abs tight. Just a few leaves. Someday I’m going to count how many trees we have, I don’t actually know. I can see 14 just looking out the window over my desk. We have a lot of trees. It will take four adult men two days to get rid of these leaves, so my little sweeping of the front porch and sidewalk was just a hobby. Sort of like me doing a slow four miler when some friends did the Mississippi 50K and 50 Miler Saturday…I’ve done 50K a few times – but 50 miles? Wow. That is some mental strength for sure. Plus the 50K friends beat my best time by well over a half hour.

I’ve discovered a really great thing about being on the DL off and on for a few months. When you get back moving again you’re not in as great shape as you used to be. You’ve lost efficiency, your aerobic capacity is reduced, and of course you aren’t as strong physically. So everything takes longer and more energy. This is a good thing, because, personally, I’ve also got about five extra pounds to get rid of. The five pounds isn’t so awesome, but the extra energy required right now is; when I got home my Garmin and HR monitor announced proudly that I had burned 538 calories. When I’m in shape it would be about 400. So I have a net 138 extra calories burned.

Sweet!

Now I only have 9,862 to go! YAY!

When I had three boys living at home food pretty much disappeared with little need to remove it from the grocery sack. If there was anything I wanted to have around more than three hours it had to be hid. I put my chocolates in an empty feminine products box. Never once did the boys find those…

Every once in a while I would start getting a craving for one of my favorites - one of my favorites other than the hidden chocolate, which I had every day. One year Fr. Ernie said it was ‘no fair’ ‘giving up chocolate’ for Lent, you needed to come up with something that would be a reminder of the reason for the Lenten sacrifice, something that would have a daily impact. I said, I eat chocolate 2 or 3 times a day. He looked stunned. What the heck? Doesn’t everyone eat chocolate 2 or 3 times a day??

My weaknesses back then were Panchos cheese dip with Fritos or a DQ Peanut Buster Parfait. There was never a specific reason; I’d be vacuuming or looking for the missing sock in each load of laundry when suddenly my brain would announce ”PANCHOS” or “PEANUT BUSTER PARFAIT!”

I’d wait for the perfect day – kids all at school, maybe I was extra hungry or I’d been busy shopping and was tired and I would get the DQ, or buy the Panchos and have it for lunch, that’s all, just the cheese dip and Fritos. Then I was done and I’d leave the rest for the kids.

More recently my favorite blowout has been Taco Bell. (hahahaha playground snickering, “blowout” “Taco Bell”) An enchirito and a mexican pizza. I eat the enchirito first, then the pizza. I eat the enchirito first because then I cut the pizza carefully into quarters with the handle of the Spork; apparently people who frequent Taco Bell cannot be trusted with plastic knives. Or spoons. Or forks. Just Sporks. So you can see that otherwise I’d have Taco Bell all over the handle of the Spork if I ate the pizza first and that would be messy. I use one package of mild sauce per quarter. All washed down with a diet Dr. Pepper with just a bit of real Dr. Pepper on top because, of course. What else is there?

The biggest issue I have with losing weight (really, what is not to like about losing a few extra pounds, right?) is the eating less part. I don’t know about you two, but I think someone missed the ball when He was up there in Heaven creating calories. I plan to discuss this with Him but not right away. I’m willing to wait a bit for the talk.

Also I’m going to ask him what the hell – wait, can I say “what the hell” to Him?

I’m thinking.

I think, yes. Yes, I can. If anyone ever proves there’s a scoreboard I’ll quit cussing, but until then it’s open season on the swear words. As evidenced by miles 10-13 of the Oxford Half.

So I’m going to also ask Him what the hell was He thinking when He made mosquitoes or arranged for their evolution or however it happened that things worked out. Seriously? Mosquitoes?? Probably it will turn out, at the end of time as we know it, that mosquitoes were actually the Super Glue of the cosmos and held everything together, and here I am, bashing them. Then I’m going to be all like, OK then. Sorry. Please don’t bite me. And I will be forced to fight them all off with a Spork.

To encourage myself to eat less and lose five pounds I announced publicly to Becky that when I lost five pounds we would have Taco Bell. Being a good sport Becky acted like Taco Bell would be awesome. The day arrived! I texted: “BECKY! TACO BELL!”

I was SOOOOO excited. I’m wild and crazy. There is NO stopping me! We swam first and I was so hungry! I’d burned even more calories since I’d weighed! This was going to be incredible! TACO BELL! ENCHIRITO! MEXICAN PIZZA!!! SPORKS!!!!

I was giddy with excitement. I clasped my hands excitedly. The lady at the register looked at me oddly. “I know what I want!” I announced. Becky perused the menu, but I couldn’t wait and maybe I did a little skip up to the counter. The lady behind the register looked at me oddly. I placed my order and described my Diet Dr. Pepper with the little bit of real Dr. Pepper on top. The lady behind the register … looked at me … oddly. I was starting to wonder if not everyone is as pleased to be at Taco Bell as I was.

Isn’t that sad to think? Not everyone is happy to go to Taco Bell?

nah. It’s gotta be something else.

I tell you what: that enchirito and mexican pizza were awesome. I felt so happily guilty, my diet blow-out, my wild and crazy diet reward, it was doubly sweet.

The next day Becky and I were working out with Killer. I described to Killer in minute detail the awesome Taco Bell reward we’d celebrated the day before. Calories be DAMNED! We were unstoppable! We threw caution not just to the winds but to the hurricanes! Swept away! Washed ashore in a distant land!

“Yeah. So, about that big celebration?” Becky asked. “I looked it up. Your enchirito and mexican pizza? 470 calories, crazy woman. Way to blow it out.”

SONUVABITCH.

Posted in Running and tagged 50 miler, 50K, calories, Enchirito, exercise, fitness, food, healthy-living, Mexican Pizza, Run, running, spork, Taco Bell, training

02 Mar 2013

2 Comments

There goes the castle.

It’s a grey cold windy day with flakes of snow blowing sideways past my window. None of it is sticking, although we woke to enough to lightly blanket the grass and the deck was white. I have Italian herb bread in the bread machine (I cheat, but it makes such a nice dough! Then I bake it in the oven, not in the bread machine.) and minestrone will soon be on the stove. Murphy is curled up in the bed and Chunk and Mo are off somewhere asleep. They should be, they were crazy this morning. thudthudthudthud thundering down the hallway. thudthudthudthud back down the hallway. thudthudthudthud up the stairs. thudthudthudthud down the stairs. Suddenly the happy little felines went thudthudthudthud through the kitchen nearly knocking my coffee mug out of my hand. Near death experience for cats.

Don’t break my new coffee cup!

I Love Grumpy Cat. *heart* *heart*

Everything went well in Oxford and Sunday I was surprised – I was not sore at all. Rather like someone who just bought a matching set of Ford Pintos, I was, however, feeling deeply remorseful over the Fbombs exploding in my head Saturday and showering all over poor Maggie, who happened to be running next to me when they started igniting, and was regretting my effing slightly effing negative effing attitude. Not that I’m always Little Mary Sunshine anyway, but I’m thinking I may have also been spitting pea soup in a circle on the course.

Unfortunately Monday morning I apparently tried breathing or thinking or something and suddenly my lower back went “EFFFINGSUNUVABEECH” only louder and with a lot more intensity. Who knew, we actually have live wires that run through our body and my back had stuck its finger in the socket. I moved and it hit again. My back was in labor. I already have a back. I don’t need to birth another. I’m not even registered at Babies BackwardR Us. Thank God for Lamaze classes, little did I know decades later I would be using the breathing techniques again.

Tuesday it was no better and I called Dr. Krackurback – who is out of the office on Tuesdays, oh yippee skippy – and got an appointment for Wednesday, resigning myself to spending the day walking around like a puppet on a string, jerking erratically. Hey, it gave the cats something to look at. Murphy slept through it all, curled up on his blanket. Just don’t touch his blanket. Ever. He jumps like it just exploded and looks at you: WHAT? WHAT? WHAT DID I DO? all sleepy-eyed and confused. It makes you feel really guilty. Especially the 7th or 8th time.

Wednesday Dr. K explained to me that muscles are like a castle wall. Muscles are the first line of defense. If the muscles hold the castle then all the kings and queens and little knaves and knavettes are safe. If the invaders start knocking the wall down, and the wall is already rather rickety – maybe made out of bamboo instead of bricks – pretty soon the wall gives in, the castle is invaded and everyone starts screaming and trying to shove knives into the knaves and pouring boiling oil all over the place.

He’d already figured out that my Quadratus lumborum is weak and gave me some exercises to do but noted it would not be a quick fix, need to get the muscles strengthened and that takes time. (Seriously. Quadratus! lumborum! Doesn’t that sound like some made up word that Harry shouted at Voldemort? ZZZaaaaat!)

No, it’s just a stupid muscle in your back. The short of it is I slightly sprained my SI joint (castle) because I strained the QL (rickety wall of bamboo) because it’s a sorry a$$ 99 pound weakling at the beach, all white and puny and skinny getting sand kicked in its face, stupid thing. Probably it got a bit tuckered out, poor weak little jerk, feeling sorry for itself because my butt never invited it to the Falling Off Party and later when everyone else was all laughing hahahaha at inside jokes that happened at the party the QL got jealous and decided to go remedial.

So, it’s all good. I know what happened and how, I know what to do to fix it, and I can be patient working on it. I took it easy this week and moved carefully in order not to re-strain anything; every day it’s better.

I can’t feel too badly about any of this – I’m in a lot better shape than Becky, who’s got a stress fracture of the 5th metatarsal and possibly 6 weeks off running. Today we swam. I used the swimming buoy so I didn’t kick (no need to upset QL, the whiny brat, I’d go down like a rock) all arms pulling which is great as they also need to get stronger. I did OK, got 1750 yards. I wanted 2,000 but was losing my form – no need for that, just another way to get hurt.

While I was swimming, backandforth-backandforth-backandforth, for the first time I thought, this isn’t too bad. I could breathe well enough. I didn’t have to hold onto the side at each turn. It felt … good.

Posted in Running and tagged BFOS, Butt Falling off Syndrome, cat, coffee, Coffee mug, dog, exercise, fitness, Grumpy Cat, healthy-living, Journey, Keurig, Quadratus lumborum, Run, running, swimming, training

Run. Dog. Cat. Cat. Me.

Everything you need to know about running and life and any other random crap I find bouncing through my mind like a ping pong ball. And always be sure your shoes are happy.

Archive for the tag “training”

Confidence? Reality? A spoonful of sugar?

Good luck with that.

Well, that went swimmingly.

No. Try not. Do…or do not. There is no try.

Happy freeking Monday.

I haven’t been right here. Where were you?

It’s all fun and games until the clowns show up.

Calories Calories everywhere…

Wild and Crazy. Nothing stopping us now.

There goes the castle.

Recent Posts

Archives

Categories

Meta

Follow Blog via Email

Tags

Blogs I Follow

Blog Stats

Follow “Run. Dog. Cat. Cat. Me.”

Everything you need to know about running and life and any other random crap I find bouncing through my mind like a ping pong ball. And always be sure your shoes are happy.

Archive for the tag “training”

Post Navigation

Recent Posts

Archives

Categories

Meta

Follow Blog via Email

Tags

Blogs I Follow

Blog Stats

Follow “Run. Dog. Cat. Cat. Me.”