An award and 7 followers to boot!

This couldn’t have come at a better time. I’ve been having a non productive week in terms of becoming healthier or reaching my weight loss goals, but I’m feeling super pumped about this now.
The Rules of this award are:

1.Post who gave you the Award

Blubeari gave me this lovely award which I have coveted since I first saw one. So thank you!

2.State 10 things that you like

1.I actually like running, I never thought I could do it at all, even though sometimes it hurts like hell
2.Not driving, I use to love it , but then I got a long commute so now whenever possible I do not drive
3.My niece, she’s 8 and just makes me happy because she’s always happy to spend time with me
4.That I quit smoking, one of the best decisions I’ve made
5.Shoes, I like tall heeled pretty shoes that fit my feet well and make it look like my tummy in flatter and I have a butt
6.Blogging, it keeps me honest and it kind of pushes me because I want to be honest and I have to run this mile without stopping if I want to write that I did. And reading blogs. It’s just so helpful sometimes to read about someone else’s journey, it inspires as well.
7.Being a kickboxing or boxing class with a bunch of guys and keeping up. Makes me feel stronger to keep up with the boys.
8.Salsa Dancing, I use to do it every Monday, but I have not gotten it back into my schedule yet, but I think this go around I will be able to last a little bit longer on the dance floor
9.Vegetables, I eat meat, but I have vegetarian tendencies that I like to succumb to
10.TV, I like reality court room and medical dramas. If Law & Order is on, which it is always on, I will watch at least 5 minutes of it.


3.Give the award to 3 other bloggers

1. Julia over at JewliaGoulia, I just recently stumbled on her blog and love it
2. Joanna over at Waiting for two, it’s not a weight loss blog, but it’s an awesome blog with a happy ending (they are finally home with their baby girl)
3. And last but not least Previously Plump... in progress, mainly because she posted the picture below in one of her entries.

A little brown nosing, a lot of thanks

Another reason I ran was because of a few blogs I read and these ladies have been bustin’ it out with the running and that also inspired me to push myself and I wanted to know if I could. First up with the running inspiration is Katie , she wrote an entry about her first mile that I read days before mine and I probably would not have thought of it had it not been for her. So Katie, thanks you so very much for that entry.

Next up is MissHaneefa , she’s done a few 5ks and is currently doing a running clinic for a 10K. She’s from Canada so I like to read her blog with an accent and sometimes add an “ah” in there just cuz, she also has a Garmin which I covet.

Then we have the just all around inspirational blogger for me, Rachel , I just remember seeing a picture her before a race and I want that moment, I want that picture. She's that awesome girl I kind of want to be, she play hockey for crying out loud! She’s moved on to the PX90 and I look forward to getting past the whole “You want me to do a pull up?” hurdle.

And last and certainly not least we have the Canadian bride . She was the first blogger I followed and planted the C25K seed in my head all those months ago.

Ladies, Thank you very much.

8/28 & 29/10 Weekend Warrior

So I guess part of getting older means you sleep in less and less, but for good reasons, to get a lot crap into those two days of false freedom known as the weekend. After a long debate I managed to get myself to the 9:30 am kickboxing class on Saturday. I tried to make it to this class every weekend because I’m lax on the weekend with the calories and food and I like it. So we’re in the home stretch of the class the last 5 minutes where he’s cooling us down and messing with our heads and bodies and he says something like “Come on push yourself, it’s not like you’re going running later”. And in my head I say “Challenge accepted good sir, ACCEPTED!”

I can’t get the idea of running a mile straight out of my head, I want to do it. I will do it! I go to my “fancy” gym down the road and I so totally do it and I take the fuzziest picture ever. It’s very hard to take an iPhone picture while run/jogging, but my time was a little over 11 minutes. If I were in high school I would have passed the running a mile in 12 minutes section! Fuck Yeah! America!


It was also my weigh in day 225! It’s a little fewer than 225, but as you can see its old school and I was naked in the locker room so I’m good with 225.



That evening we celebrated my niece’s birthday with some cousins, a pool and pizza. There was deep dish pizza and with that first bite I knew I would be going to that 10am boxing class, oh yes, it was meat lovers and I ate it, I ate it good. With my workload I knew my gym time would be limited and I’ve never been to that class before, so why not? It wasn’t easy, but it will help me with combination punches and I’ve always wanted to look like I could box. I’d never had this instructor before and he was nice and had a great sense of humor and an awesome playlist, I will never workout without hearing Make It Clap the remix with Sean Paul again. And then… I ran another full mile again! Because I wanted to keep the momentum going and two, I wanted a better picture, I hit the pause button this time, haHA! I beat the machine



All in all it was a good weekend and I’m proud of myself for getting up and moving and pushing myself with the mile runs. Today finds me sore and without any clean gym clothes.

8/26/10 – I got a fist bump!

So I was throwing another internal tantrum about going to the gym, this time for my lunch at La Boxing. It’s kickboxing and I enjoy it and it’s a great workout, but I wanted to be sedentary and I don’t know online shop at Amazon instead. But I put on my gym clothes and went. I was a few minutes late, but it looked like the same hated routine from Tuesday, awesome. I lucked out, there were no more 15 pound weights so I grabbed the 12 pounders, those 3 pounds make a world of difference. We started out with renegade rows 10 on each side and a push up in between, so a total of 20 – I still do them on my knees, hence the rug burn.


Then we do burpees or good mornings, I use to have to put one leg back at a time and forward again, but I can finally do these little bastards with some resemblance of the actual exercise.


Then to round out the circuit, we did power squats, now I’m okay with squats, I can do squats, but lord by the time you get to these and you have 12 pounds in each hand and sweat stinging your eye, it’s a bit harder.



That goes on for 25 minutes and our instructor tallies how many we complete. I did 7! And got a fist bump from one of the larger muscley men in my class! Because I did more than him! That was a proud moment for me in my class. And to think I didn’t want to go. I felt stronger too, way better than Tuesday. We finished up the class with combinations and ab work and it was a good workout. And my rug burn got re-burned and I now consider it my battle wound.

8/25/10 My thighs are spreading like rumors

I thought my day would be okay, I also thought I would do well with my eating and it would be a rest day for me. Fast forward to 2 o’clock and I’ve had mac n cheese and a slice of red velvet cake on top of the salad I had order for lunch. Stooopid office birthday lunches! She’s a nice girl and all, but she’s young and eats fast food for every meal I see her eat. Part of it is I’m jealous she can have a McDonald’s breakfast three times a week and her thighs still don’t touch. It just isn’t right. But she did reveal that she’s gained 10 pounds and can’t seem to stop eating. So even “thighs don’t touch” intern girl is having issues with food? I guess we all have our problems.

So I had already crashed from my sugar high and I put in extra hours at work and the last thing I wanted to do at 8 o’clock was go to the gym. I had already decided that with the knee issue a 20 minute run would be out of the question, but a 5, 8 and then 5 minute run with 3 minutes of walking between would be just fine. But lord knows I wanted to just go home and sit on the couch and eat something and then drift off to dreamland. I was chatting with a friend and she said whenever she felt that way she just says to herself “A, your thighs are spreading like rumors!” so I tried it and it kind of worked and is hilarious to boot, especially if you say it in an old Hollywood voice or Roger from American Dad.

So I did it, I ran Week 6 Day 1! I made it all the way through with just a touch of quitter talk. I’m almost up to 3 miles and I think a 5K is 3.1 miles so I think my goal will be to finish the September race in 45 minutes, at the most. But if I stay with my friends I think they may slow me down, they haven’t really been running and smoke, so we’ll see about that. I’m nervous about this race, but excited as well.

Keeping it going 8/24/10

I went to kickboxing for lunch and I really felt like I should apologize to my instructor, I was just dragging today. I have no good reason for it, just excuses and I didn’t even want any of them to pass my lips. I just want to do it and do it well. I had that inner struggle with the fat chick inside of me who wants to quit and eat the pizza my department ordered (bastards). But I kept going and granted I didn’t feel 100% the sweat pouring from my body told me otherwise. And an added bonus, the instructor commented that I looked smaller, that gave me an energy spurt of 3.8 seconds, but it was nice to hear. Four hours later and I’m still giddy, I told him I hope so because that’s the reason I come to see him. Take that 2 pound gain.

My eating thus far has been good; I think I really need to not react to my cravings right away. I had my lunch. Kashi Pesto Pasta Primavera and as always (except the sweet and sour thingy, too sweet for me) it was good and I didn’t feel guilty about having a microwave meal. After I finished I had a something sweet craving and I had some water and I just realized I didn’t give in and I forgot all about it. Luckily I have a banana and a mango for when I have snack. The only down side I would say is the coffee I’ve seem to keep having in the morning. I put sweetened condensed milk in it and I enjoy the hell out of it and that keeps me for a bit so I can have a late breakfast so that I have energy (not today though) for my afternoon workouts.

In other good news, at the end of July my sister K had some clothes she was getting rid of and there was a trench like coat she was going to donate and I tried it on, it was a little tight, but I knew I would need a jacket for when the earth isn’t baking the earth on high so I pulled it. I tried it on last night and I think maybe 5 pounds, if that it will fit perfectly. It would be my first non workout stretchy item of clothing that’s a size L. Trippy!

Compliments

I want to talk to compliments because they a sweet words of encouragement. To date my favorite is “The months have been good to you.” From a friend who last saw me at my heaviest. I’d like to see my sister D’s response, I haven’t seen her in just as long if not longer and she’s always been encouraging and I can only imagine what my dad will say, I haven’t seen him since New Years. He’s always loved me, just not my extra pounds and yeah…that. But I digress, what’s your current favorite compliment. And would it be weird to write it on a post it and put it up by my bathroom mirror? I think we should.