Nature Girl and 2009 Recap

I just found this article on MSNBC today: Looking at Nature Makes you Nicer. Cool. I've known for a while that I'm at my happiest when I'm around trees & rocks & water. In fact, when we first moved to the DC area, I started suffering from a Nature deficit - I found that I had to go run out and find a small naturey park and spend some time out there. It's like a reset button. I need it. This year has been wonderful because I've been pushing to be outside more. Getting more sunlight is good, sure, but also explore outdoor exercising opportunities, since I've always been prone to thinking exercise sucks. Sailing was wonderful because it really centered me and felt really primal, just shutting my mind off, listening to the water and paying very close attention to the wind on my skin (I was using that more than visual cues to tell wind direction). There was something very basic about being totally dependent on the weather, wind & water to get where you need to be. I've also been busy exploring all the parks I can find in the area as I figured out my need for trees to keep me interested in running. I'd like to become one of the Running People, but I don't think I'll ever free up enough time in my schedule for that. Now here's the rub. I live near a city, in a pretty densely suburban area, and I think I might currently have more actual access to nature than in rural Pennsylvania. Huh? That's right. This past weekend I went to visit my parents who live about 30 miles +/- southwest of Pittsburgh. The whole area is either farms or suburban developments that used to be farms. I figured I'd find a place to go for a run since there's so much more nature around there. Boy, was I ever wrong. There weren't really any parks within a 20 minute driving radius, other than recreation parks that are open fields and baseball diamonds. Though there were hills and trees and forests all around, they are all owned by someone, and not available for common use. (DON'T get me started on my rant about how Scotland was awesome because of their Land Access Rights... you have rights to go onto, use, pass through, and play on any land even if you don't own it as long as you leave it in the same condition you entered and the owners have a responsibility to maintain access to their land by providing gates or steps over fences.) It disturbed me to realize that in a rural area, full of natural beauty, one does not easily have access to it and that we only seem to regularly get access to it if you live in an area where it seems to be hard to come by and thereby requiring setting aside "nature reserves" and etc. Seems kind of wonky and messed up to me. That's just my thought for the day.

Also, for the record, I now have David Bowie's Version of "Nature Boy" running through my head on repeat.

So I figured it was time to evaluate my Samhain resolutions from last year. All in all, I think I did OK on the stuff that really mattered. I sucked at wearing more hats. I decided not to do the Boo!10K, but am training up for the Jingle All the Way 10K in the beginning of December, so that one kinda worked out. I JUST got a dentist appointment (next Tuesday argh!) because I realized I was running out of time. I ditched those last 10 lbs and toned relatively well. I got better at balancing work, play, relaxation and social, but it was at the expense of housekeeping, so I think I still have a bit to work on there, and I've been much better about the eating better and cooking more part in the past few months. An upward trend is what we're looking for. I kinda let the clothing business slide, but that's because I've kinda let the sewing slide, did a cost benefit analysis on the stress levels that would ensue and started going another direction with trying to figure out how to work on a health and mobility career. Now I'm pursuing certification for Exuberant Animal and things seem to be working out, so we'll see how it goes. : ) I'm pretty pleased. Now to just figure out what to resolve to do this coming year....

"damn having a scientific mind & a compulsion to experiment on myself!"

Just got my blood panels back from my physical - from Jan 08, my Cholesterol is down, the LDL is SIGNIFICANTLY down and I find myself wishing I had another panel from July or August '09... that would indicate whether it was strictly due to weight loss or due to healthier eating (have kinda gone half-paleo the past 5-6 weeks and wonder if/how much effect that might have).

Also, tested negative for Celiacs = yay, cake won't kill me! (if had in moderation)

Also, started training on the Couch to 5K program with my friend for Cherry Blossom. Since 30 sec jog to 90 sec walk is, well... kinda a cake-walk for me, I'm using it as an opportunity to start out slowly with running TRULY barefoot.... not too bad, though it's truly evident that I don't have a callus base yet. I really want to see if barefoot vs. psuedo barefoot has more of an effect on foot arch strength... Though you can feel rocks & etc through the Virbam Five Fingers, I can say with complete certainty now that it is WAY different without shoes - after doing a 30 second jog on a sea of shale-like gravel and acorns, going "OUCH! OUCH! OUCH! OWWWIE!!!" That was a bad trip plan on my part and will wait to attempt that again until I have some calluses built up. : ) Onward with the experiments!

Cat-a-tonic

I've not been sleeping 100% well lately. I find myself stretching in my sleep - a friend came up with a good analogy: like a cat does. That's it. Just like a cat or dog.... I'm sleeping and then I fully extend everything as far away from my body as possible, get a good stretch, roll over & go back to sleep. I wouldn't much mind since it feels good, but I keep waking myself up by doing this several times a night. I wonder why. Am I turning into a cat? If so, will I be allergic to myself? Is that why I've been sniffling? Or is that because my Autumn Allergies are starting up?...

Oh, and I really can't wait for the Run Like Hell 5K in Cincinnati (Oct.30)!!! Should be fun! and tomorrow I will be starting to make headway on my fairy costume. Goodie. I've decided to be a woodland fairy because A) it'll be fun & artistic to make in a manner that it looks beautiful & dramatic as I run, B) I can use it for the MD Renaissance Faire, C) since I've taken to the trees & woods with my running, it seems very fitting - plus, it'll be a hoot to do my RLH dress rehearsal practice runs through the woods with the other joggers/walkers thinking I'm nuts. : ) Yay!

Barefoot & hopeless... let's go back to the drawing board.

Yesterday, after figuring that I'd better get a biomechanical check-up (aka chiropractic visit to see if everything's in the right place) before I continue to embark upon a total movement regimen, I went to my Chiro. In addition to the normal re-evaluation, I had them do another foot scan. I know my toes are stronger and I'm able to support myself climbing in VFFs where I wasn't able to two years ago. I also know my ankles are stronger because it took 4.25 miles on semi-rough terrain to get the same old ankle soreness that I got when I started running. As a result, I was hoping I'd see some sort of empirically significant change in my foot structure. Judging from the scans, I'd like to think I see some slight, slight improvement, but I'd have to say it appears to be a wash. There was a pretty colored pressure depiction too, and if you go by that, I've totally slid backward and become completely flat footed, but there is not enough difference between the two scans to validate that, so I'm prone to thinking something in the calibration is off.

This got me to thinking though... the arguments for barefoot training being pro-foot-muscle frequently have to do with the nerves and touch receptors (or whatever you want to call them) in the bottom of the foot reacting to the things you are stepping on and then triggering a muscle response to pull that portion of your tender little footsie away from the sharp rock. I wonder if, while running in my VFFs, I've strengthened my toes and ankles, but not gotten as much benefit in the foot because the sole of the VFFs dampen a lot of the sharp pointy things that I step on. Walking on gravel in VFFs is DEFINITELY more pleasant than in true bare feet. I think I see another experiment in which to use myself as a guinea pig!

Part of this all is that I am a scientist. The concepts and theories behind the arguments pro-bare feet make sense to me in physical and biomechanical sense. I really want some solid evidence to back it up though. I'd like to have a before and after to support my statements of "I believe this to be better for my body." Guess I'm off to go play in some gravel without shoes.... tomorrow... or the next day. Today I just want to run through the woods with abandon again. : )

Trails, Trials and a new Recipe

Right, so on September 5, I ran in the Arlington Pentagon 9/11 Memorial 5K. I signed up for it with my friend Adi - I told him I would last year. It sounded fun because you finish the early evening race and get a medal, beer & pizza. For two weeks before the race, I went out 2 or 3 times a week to get "back in shape." Two days before the race, I ran a full 3.1 mi. route in a reasonable time and was very happy. It was easy. I showed up at the race, I had a light lunch/ afternoon snack of almonds and carrots and tomato and red peppers and cucumbers and yellow squash... all the good stuff. Lined up, feeling good.... after the first 1.5 mi, I was feeling lousey.... not physically, but mentally. I hated the fool who was standing 60 feet past the starting line telling me we were "almost there, almost done" - I don't care that he was doing it as a joke. I hated the people around me, I hated the route, it was hot (80 degrees, 54% humidity) and sticky... ugh. Then we turned into the last 1.25 mi. It was through a parking lot. With no moving air. Facing into the setting sun. My brain gave out. I walked for 20 feet. jogged some more, walked for 20 feet, jogged, walked & stripped down to my running bra, jogged and finished it out with a ginormous grimace and the feeling that I wanted to throttle someone. I lumbered off grumbling for some pizza and leftover veggies.

Not a triumphant moment. Then I started thinking about it. whether I keep going or not is all mental. I know at this point that I prefer woods running to urban running. After that race, I decided to set my sights on distance running and working my way up to trails. The following Friday I went and decided to try running the Loop around Lake Accotink. It's 3.8 mi round trip, mostly through trees, with a smooth, clean, gravel/dirt trail. This plan was inherently a bad idea. I had spent the day running around in platform knee boots with a 3.25 inch heel. If you've worn heels, you can do the math... if you haven't... well, by the end of the day your foot muscles have partially atrophied and frozen into the shape of the shoe, it's hard to put your heel down flat because your Achilles is all tight, and probably you've partially bruised the ball of your foot from the abuse of the shoes. So I get home from work, kick my boots off, change, hop into my Fivefingers and drive to the lake. Anyone not familiar with barefooting should be told that to do it properly, you need to have your whole foot relaxed to flex with the terrain and absorb the rocks & bumps properly. Uh... yeah... I take off... the trail's rougher than the normal asphalt, about 1.25 mi in, I'm feeling good, except the balls of my feet are tender. I step wrong on a large stone on my left foot and add a good beating to my already tender left foot. Ow. I keep going, but now I'm favoring that foot. after the turn around at 1.5 (the sun's going down so I nix the idea of doing a full loop), the favoring of the left foot has been throwing off my mechanics, so a stabilizing tendon in my left knee is starting to get angry with me. Also, my stomach is cramping for some odd reason, and I'm getting overheated - argh! In a race this would make me stop. In the woods, I was still smiling and having a helluva lotta fun and kept going, albeit being more careful how I planted my left foot. I finished a full 3 miles back to the car, it felt like I had only been out for 15 minutes, and I was singing with the radio on the way home. That's it. I'm only going to do trail running from now on.

Today I went out to Accotink again and did the whole 3.8... finished it in 39:15. It certainly didn't feel like 40 minutes. I didn't feel done when I stopped. J was doing the south-west half of the lake only, so I passed him on my way around. He hadn't come out of the woods yet, so I ran back to find him, then ran back with him & did a cool down walk. totalled out at 4.25 miles and felt like I probably could have gone farther if I didn't have other things to do. : ) I'm pretty happy. I need to find a bigger loop to work on and soon I need to start making little forays off the groomed trail onto some of the hiking trails that shoot off to the sides... I need to get some of my ankle muscles stronger - the ones that control lateral stability. They're just a little sore at the moment. I recognize this from when I first started running.... they're not used to being used quite that much. They're a lot stronger than they were two years ago, though, that's for sure! So yeah, apparently trails and woods make me happy & I'll just have to stick to that. I always come out of there feeling like I could take on the world. Accotink also looked like it had good opportunities to practice some of my MovNat stuff if I get off the beaten path, so I can't wait to try it. Whee!

Also, yesterday was International Talk Like a Pirate Day! I hope you all participated... I spent most of the day running around trying to find a good pirate hat.
AAAAaaaarrrrrr! to ye!

As promised, here's a new recipe for a side dish that I made up while trying to finish most of the leftover veggies in the fridge:

Eggplant Side

3 mini-eggplant thinly sliced (~1/4 thick, tops), or equivalent large EP
1 stalk heart of palm sliced like EP
~2 Tbsp. minced garlic
~2 Tbsp coconut oil
Copious amounts of cinnamon reasonable dusting across whole pan twice
~1 Tbsp lemongrass herb paste (may be able to sub lemon juice)
~ sauteing eggplant, heart of palm, garlic, cinnamon & lemon grass paste in coconut oil ( in lieu of CO, maybe just butter and then add a bit of shredded coconut for flavor), after a few minutes, added a bit of water & covered the frying pan to add some steaming... cooked until eggplant melted in your mouth (15-20 mins). Taste. Add more cinnamon if necessary, add in maple syrup, stir, & add a bit of spinach at the very end - cooked just long enough to wilt. This served two.

By mini-eggplant, I used these:

Causal Fridays and Barefoot v. Minimal Shoes

Ok, so I just had a total geek-out on my way up the elevator this morning... Today is Friday - for many, Casual Friday. How easy it is to switch letters and change the meanings of words.... Then I thought: "If you just shift the U, Casual turns into Causal. What would 'Causal Friday' be like?" I hope J doesn't read this otherwise he might be ashamed to know me. ; )

Also, I gave some thought this morning to barefooting some more... I mean, I'm sure you all know that I run pseudo-barefoot in my Vibram FiveFingers, but I've eschewed shoes for as long as I can remember. Indoors? barefoot. Running around outside playing as a kid? barefoot as much as I could get away with. Heck, I've always preferred to buy shoes such that I can at least slightly feel the cracks in the sidewalk when I'm walking. It feels weird to me otherwise. So since I've started running around in the FiveFingers more & more, I've been feeling it in my joints when I go back to 'regular' shoes. I feel the shift in my joints and alignment. Or rather, I'm aware of them... Odd. as a result I am now trying to buy my shoes with as flat and thin a sole as possible and as flexible or roomy as possible (It totally goes against all financial sense to pay for as little as possible...) The thing that is intriguing me right now is that even in minimalist shoes, I do not ambulate in the same manner. Barefoot or in my VFFs, I walk lightly and lead with my toes, touching down the forefoot or midfoot first and then compress into my heel. With my minimalist flats, I still find myself landing on my heel and it feels very awkward to try and walk in a different manner in them. I need to ponder if it's because my brain has been "programmed" for so long to walk in a particular manner with shoes on (then one would think it'd translate to the VFFs also) or is it more that the construction of the shoes does not lend itself well to having a natural gait while keeping the shoes on my feet? I need to go contemplate.

Another random thought for the day: I passed a car on the highway yesterday that had 3 wheels - one in front, two in back. Sorry, I did not have my camera for once. It looked brand new. It had a curved windshield, sides, looked like a 2 seater, was TINY, had a normal steering wheel, and a roll bar. It appeared to be a convertible with the top down. Anyone know what that was? I tried to check out the make & model while driving by, but the words were all long, in tiny print, and a script-ish font. What kind of marketing sense does that make????

MovNat Seminar Recap

So, I've been getting a lot of questions (and rightly so) about what is this "Mov- NAT" thingie that I went to. If you'd like the official stuff about it, feel free to go visit the MovNat website. Make sure to watch the Erwan Le Corre video on YouTube also. It's cool.



So, if you want the really short, bare-bones answer, here's what I learned: barefoot movement & conditioning, running, jumping, landing, crawling, rolling, balancing, accuracy, agility, breathing, hanging, climbing, swimming, holding of breath, throwing sticks, throwing rocks, lifting, carrying, using gravity to one's advantage and overall efficiency of movement, some morsels of diet - paleo in specific, sparring, punching, self defense and that I'm a scary, scary woman if threatened. Really if I break most of those down into the subcategories of movement that I haven't named specifically, it's mind-boggling that the seminar was only over 5 days, more like 4 days when two of those were half-days... Really, I'm not quite sure how it all happened because it felt like we only did 2 or 3 things a day (this, said through rose colored glasses, since I can remember spending some days where I was just wishing for it to end).



For more of a detailed description of the experience, read on... and on... and on... (I don't see how it can end up short & concise).



Background

I have to admit that I don't fully follow all the "zoo human" philosophy on the website, or maybe I do, but phrased in a different manner. What I do know is that I feel people in general are dealing with a nature defficiency (myself especially - I go nuts if I don't get enough exposure to rocks & trees & water & stuff), and I feel like our modern western lifestyle is not conducive to health, wellness & mobility over our ever-increasing lifetimes. By talking biomechanics with my chiropractor & others and by reading & researching, I've been becoming fascinated with how our body works and have begun developing a theory, that I'd love to work with some day, that our life-long mobility and ability is determined by the movements we use in our everyday lives. The western world is suffering from some chronic pain issues and mobility issues that are not seen in some other cultures at later stages in life. Keep in mind that I'm not discounting the lack of elasticity in tendons and ligaments that come with age as well as breakdown of cartilage, wear of joints, etc.... BUT a number of mobility problems appear to be preventable either due to avoiding misalignments caused by imbalances caused by lack of use of muscles or by avoiding injury by using proper techniques and keeping critical joints strong and flexible. This is merely a quickie aside...



How it came about

Anyway, so let's start at the beginning of how I impulsively signed up for this thing. Please see the statement above about the mobility mind-set that I'm in at the moment. So for the past two years I've been mildly intrigued by Methode Naturelle and Parkour. Additionally, I've been trying to broaden my exercise regimen to strengthen and expand my abilities (both because I'm all dooms-day-ish and believe that I could get stuck in some catastrophic situation sometime, and because I'd like to still be able to get up off the floor when I'm 80 - "help, I've fallen and I can't get up" should not enter my vocabulary unless to make a joke or in an instance where both legs are broken). In June or July, I try to find something to use my HTO gift-card on and come out of the store with a FREE copy of Blue Ridge Outdoors Magazine and read this article about the Natural Fitness with an "annoyingly fit" man. It's a great article. So I googled MovNat. I watched the YouTube Video. Then I watched it again. And again. And AGAIN. It turned into one of those obsessive things I do such that I was researching or going to the MovNat page everytime I needed an ADHD break at work (i.e. every 10 minutes). Lastly I saw that they were going to be offering seminars in West Virginia in August & September. Then I got more & more distracted. At some point, the irrational part of my brain went AWOL & said "if you don't sign up for this & try it, you'll always be wondering & regret it." This led to an "are there still any available spaces left?" email, with the expectation of the answer "no". I got the answer: "there's one spot left and we've pencilled your name in if you want it." EGADS! What have I gotten myself into. It's one of those weird things that seemed to be 'fate.' We discussed it at home, I paid, it was all set, I was very excited. Then the "you're crazy" part of my brain kicked in & I started fretting about the cost & what a Paleo Diet was (raw meat?) and vacation time and holding the rest of the class back and killing myself and.... If there's one thing I'm an expert at, it's fretting - especially about the various possible ways for me to meet my demise. Well, anyway, that's how I got signed up for it and there was no turning back after hitting the "pay" button. * sigh *



And so it begins...

Tuesday, August 18, sees me departing a little after 7 AM on my drive to West Virginia. After a 5.5 hour car ride in which I stock up on doritos & a rootbeer (I will be eating Paleo for the next five days! augh!), I arrive at the campsite and find a collection of tents and one or two other people there. Tents -> Ozark Trail, first thought -> "egads, I wish I brought my own tent, this sucker's gonna leak". I spend some time talking to my first co-conspirator, James, a "kid" who's in college and is studying Physics - suddenly I don't feel like I'll be totally out of my element. After a bit of chatting, we decide to go see if Jeff, the assistant, needs any help with lunch. This is when I meet co-conspirator #2, Chris, the first of two Canadians and who drove down from Montreal the night before. I'm betting that was longer than 5.5 hours. Part way through chopping red peppers, we were joined by the other Canadian, Greg, an ex-air force instructor, Jason, and the man himself, Erwan Le Corre. In response to me saying "Oh, you're THE man!", he replied: "What were you expecting, a Zeus?" My reaction was not because he was very average looking, but because I had not been able to ascertain via the website, really what he looked like. A little bit later, we were joined by the last participant, a woman named Liz. It was a cozy little group. I had been expecting something different. The listing had said there would be 12 participants and we ended up with only 6. I had been expecting most everyone else to be fitness professionals and we numbered as a physics student, a patent examiner, a freelance journalist, a mediator, a finance guy, and a program manger. Hmm.... we each had a different level of fitness and abilities too, as was determined over the next couple of days. The first meal was a phenomenal salad of greens, peppers, nuts, oils & vinegar and I think some meat & fruit. Our first lesson was conditioning for barefoot movement - i.e. finding the sharpest gravel on the campsite road and purposely standing on it... "It's like a Chinese massage," says Erwan. Hmmm... Then we went to a local park with playgrounds & pavilions to see that MovNat can be practiced anywhere. I'd say we spend about 4 hours learning some basics, like balancing, jumping off picnic tables, walking on all fours, barefoot running and some warm-up moves. Part of it, I suspect, was for evaluating each of our ability levels. I successfully demonstrated that my Klutz Factor is abysmally high as I was 'balancing' across the wooden backstop to a horseshoe pit and managed to simultaneously fall off of AND onto the 'balance beam', leaving a gash in my leg that will be my souvenir! : )

I should have gotten a prize for "first blood." That night finished with a leisure swim in Summersville Lake, an amazing Paleo Dinner of more salad, veggies, steaks, and a dessert of coconut milk-banana-blueberry-bliss - I could get used to that. Did I mention that Erwan is originally French and oversaw all the meal prep? You can do the math on that one... Mmmm...

Day two involved a warm-up on a steep grassy slope of the campground, just below a couple of RV pads. We spent a significant amount of time learning about stretching and warming up by using practical movements that exercise full range of motion instead of just one piece at a time. Emphasis was put on the difference between motion in context (actually going over or under something), and without context (just going through a motion) and how each action without context can be given context in your mind to give it more meaning. We did a good bit of rolling around in the grass and crawling and then some stretches that were motions one would use if one were trying to hide in grass from predators or prey. The people staying in the RVs seemed to be highly amused by all this. I like to think that when we were practicing looking around furtively and hiding that the RV campers got nervous about an impending attack, because they left shortly thereafter. They also left us a large watermelon as a peace offering. After warming up, we went off into the forest and carried some long logs to our workout site. It was at this time that I re-discovered my 'true nature' of being completely distracted by the things around me... "look! a red mushroom! Look at that flower! Look! That part of the tree looks like a face! We just squashed a blue fungus of some sort..." Either way, I followed along balancing on logs, doing standing long-jumps, jumping off of logs, learning how to properly dead-lift stones above our heads and throw them. About mid-day, the assistant, Jeff, showed up with lunch - a bag of walnuts, a bag of almonds, some bananas and grapes, and a 9x13 Tupperware of chopped zucchini, carrots, peppers, and tomatoes. That was it. I was skeptical, but I followed the suggestion of "just eat what you want, your body will tell you what it needs." I've never tasted almonds so good. The rest of the day, was some more practice of skills and combining skills into a "combo circuit" that was repeated over and over for 15 minutes. Things I learned from combo: I need to have a goal or purpose and then I can enjoy repetitive things. My goal was throwing a rock, chasing it, picking it up, throwing it, and chasing it again. I wonder why I'm so "play" based... the 15 minutes felt like 5.

Day three was spent on the Gauley River and it was, by far, the most fantastic day of the seminar. It was the only truly sunny day we had all week for one thing. Thankfully I started the morning by explaining to Erwan that if I look like I'm not paying any attention whatsoever, I really am and don't mind me - I used to drive my teachers nuts with that. Secondly, though a river setting, there was a variety of terrains, from beach to dirty, to boulders to large flatrocks to rocky flat terrain. I was in heaven. It's a landscape that I've kind of grown up with and love dearly. The first lesson of the day was to walk barefoot across rocky terrain without really looking where you're going. Quite hard, really. I'm apparently way too stiff & have to relax my shoulders. We stopped for a swim, swam onto some rocks in the middle of the river, practiced breathing and holding of breath. Then we played cooperative 'games' of toss the rock & toss the stick and toss the stick while running around obstacles and toss the stick while balancing on a log. Next we stopped for lunch on a large flatrock complex and then practiced jumping up ledges and down ledges and across gaping chasms. We found a funky tree to balance on and that was fun, then we found a rather good Bouldering problem and scaled it. I scaled it 4 or 5 times just because. It was my first real, outdoor climbing!!! Yay! We finished with another swim and practice pushing a log across the river while swimming. I dripped dry while doing another climb. It was a great day.

Day three is also the only day I have pictures of essentially.

Day four is when I finally fell apart. I was not having the issues that some other people had - some of the guys were light sleepers and/or not used to being in the woods and hadn't been sleeping much at all. I come from a breed that A) grew up camping and B) have a family history of being able to sleep through train derailments. Sleep was NOT an issue for me. Except that night it rained a goodly bit and 1/3 of my air mattress and bedding got wet. Additionally, they started the day off by saying "OK, now today is going to be pretty intense!" That is the LAST thing I ever want to hear. We went back to the playground/park and warmed up with some out of context stretching and brief bursts of high intensity motion. Then we started learning self-defense and sparring techniques. This is where I discovered that I could cause damage if threatened. We were to practice protecting our heads. With the technique we learned, one could not only parry blows, but also fight back a bit with one's elbows. So we paired up and Chris was put in a position of 'attacking' while I was to defend myself. well, after a a few minutes i had to call a time out because my mind was getting into it and all of a sudden he was not my friend anymore, but a real attacker and I was about to leap & try to rip his head off... I kinda knew I had this in me, I felt it coming on, so I called a time-out. This combined with the 'rage' I exhibited when I was instructed to "hate the target" while Greg was holding it, resulted in me being labelled both 'scary' and 'dangerous' by the guys later. The latter half of the day, as promised, was filled with a smattering of intensity workouts.... series of intense bursts of conditioning, some fast combos and etc. In the midst of all this, it poured buckets on us on and off and when it wasn't raining on us, we were rolling around in soaked, muddy grass. The best part was when we were walking back from the restrooms to the playground. We passed a ginormous puddle on the sidewalk that was 2-3 inches deep. We stopped, we stomped, we kicked water on each other as if none of us were over the age of 15. It was great!!! Then there was another combo set up... theoretically it was nothing to be worried about... balance on a railroad tie for about 30-40 feet, go up a ladder, slide down a slide, run across the playground, duck under a bar, do 5 jump-pull-ups, jump off the steps 3 times and repeat. For some reason, before we started, I started feeling ill. I recognized the feeling from the one and only swim meet that I ever participated in. I hated the pressure & competition. I don't know why I felt that way on the combo, but whatever. The last thing we did was a longer combo... run to a tree, run to the bathrooms, do a small combo from earlier, run to the swings, run back to the bathroom, run to the playground, do the big combo, and then run back to the tree. The end. I started, I did half of it, between the swings & the bathroom I started having trouble breathing... It got worse! A freakin' anxiety/asthma attack! I got soooooo mad! It made it worse. I had to stop, I calmed down by the time I got to the top of the slide. By the bottom of the slide, I was OK, but I ended up being the last one to finish the route. I was sooo mad and pissed. There was no reason for it except a mental breakdown or will. ugh.

Day Five was the final day and it was a half-day only. We lost one of the participants in the morning at breakfast because she had a plane to catch. This is the last picture of us all before we parted:

We took a whitewater style raft across Summersville Lake to an island or peninsula which had a good collection of rocks. On the way, we worked on swimming and swimming under things while holding breath. We worked on accuracy of rock tossing. We also worked on various high-intensity series of lifting & pushups & etc. It was hard, but I knew it wasn't going to last long. The last thing before paddling back was a series of balancing along a wet log, jumping into the water, swimming under it, running back to the other end & repeat. One thing I liked very much about Erwan's instruction was that he got a good sense of each person and knew when to push you... literally. My first circuit, I got onto the log & froze.... Erwan pushed me off into the water. The next time around I went across the wet log with no problem. I don't know if I needed the push as a challenge or to show me that no harm would come by falling off... or maybe both, but I needed to be pushed off. Lastly, we rowed back while Jason & Jeff swam across the lake and finished up with lunch & said goodbye.

The Aftermath...

There were a couple of surprising results after all was said & done. For one thing, by being "Paleo" for a week has given me a particular aversion to "food products" (i.e. processed foods) - this I can only see as being a good thing. I've been doing some research on Coconut oil because, at least at first glance, it appears to potentially be a miracle food. I've also paid more attention to the things I buy.... the fewer ingredients the better.... whole raw nuts, sun dried raisins, no sugar or sulfates or salt added. I'm seeking more fruits & vegetables (again) and less grain products. The grains - breads, & etc - I'm noticing making me feel even more sluggish and uncomfortable than ever before. Actually, right after getting back and going back to a "normal" diet, I got a weird rash on my lower back and both my elbows. A lot of other weird things were going on too, like my leg swelling due to the wound getting infected, but the rash is making me think perchance I should look into Celiacs.... I'm not really sure I'd want to know though. Can you really enjoy a piece of cake with the knowledge that it could kill you?

In addition to diet changes, I was shocked to find that I DIDN'T come away from the experience sore & immobile. Just goes to show you that your body can adapt rather quickly. Also, I found I was able to do a goodly bit more than I had expected. I got kudos points for at least trying stuff even if I couldn't do it. I was known as having a "fighting spirit" by the end and that made me feel good. I also learned a lot about myself - how I work mentally. Competition, big surprise, is my downfall. I am best motivated when I want to do it for myself. I found that I had to fight an urge the first day to "prove myself" to the guys. They never said anything other than encouraging things. There were no disparaging remarks, no talking down, nothing but brotherly encouragement, yet I still felt like I had to prove-down the stereotype of "weak woman" and I found that this was mostly in my head, not theirs. I ended up coming up with a new personal motto, "I can't right now, but I can certainly try"... Huh? Meaning that I know my limits, but that won't stop me from trying until I can, whether it takes me hours, days or months, because I know that I can do most anything if I work on it. I also learned that when threatened or pushed, something else kicks in. I'm by no means going to throw caution to the wind and subject myself to danger, but I got reassurance that if I ever had to protect myself, I could either do a good job of it, or take someone else down with me.

Well, I guess that's all for right now... I think I'm on the verge of having bleeding stumps for fingers from typing so much. I'll write more later if I think of more.

Odd aside for the day: Spellcheck on here doesn't like 'egads'.... Tee-Hee!

Amazing Pizza

So yesterday I tried to continue with my eating healthy & fully with a salad bar lunch at Whole Foods (hot squash medley in tomato & onion sauce and a salad of spinach & field greens with Broccoli, Quinoa, shredded carrot & grilled chicken breast topped with Balsamic vinegar). Then I made a salad & pizza for dinner. It's one of my famous Trader Joe's Pizza Concoctions... I "hunt & gather my way through the store. It was amazing. Try it sometime. : )

Trader Joe's Pizza #5

• 1 ball of Garlic & Herb Pizza Crust Dough
• 2 hunks of Hearts of Palm=, sliced into circles
• 10 Pitted Kalamata Olives, sliced into quarters
• ~ 5 Marinated Artichoke Hearts, juice squeezed out & separated into different leaves
• ~10-12 large leaves of fresh Basil
• ~ 5 baby portabella mushrooms
• 1 Tbsp Coconut Oil
• ~1/4 cup of Quattro Formaggio Shredded Cheese Mix
• 2/3 jar of TJ's Vodka Sauce

Preheat oven to 425 according to crust package directions. Put 2/3 of the jar of Vodka Sauce into a sauce pan and boil over Med/Hi heat until turns into a wet paste consistency (~15-20 minutes). Either slice mushrooms or chop coarsely with a chopper. Saute mushroom pieces in Coconut Oil for ~ 5-10 minutes. Roll out crust to size of pizza pan or stone (mine's about 14-16 inch). Top Crust with Vodka Sauce Paste, basil leaves, sauteed mushroom, chopped olives, Heart of Palm & artichoke. Finish topping lightly with cheese. Bake for ~7 minutes or so. This crust never seems to get "golden", so just poke it. Cut, serve & enjoy!

If sliced into 8 pieces, this ends up being about 230 +/- calories per slice. : )

In addition to the pizza, I made a small entree salad of baby spring greens, fresh garden tomatoes, pine nuts, a medley I got at Whole Foods comprising coconut shavings, raisins & Cacao Nibs, and some sweet chicken I made by coating chicken breast pieces in a mixture of honey, agave, & Cassia Cinnamon. This was topped with Extra Virgin Olive Oil. I made the mistake of putting in the Kalamata Olives. Bad idea. Don't do that with a sweet salad. Lastly, there were Champagne grapes for dessert.

Hope you get a chance to try the Pizza & enjoy!

Another Diet Shift

I just got back from a 5 day MovNat (Natural Movement) Seminar with Erwan Le Corre and will discuss more of that at some later date... I've had a minor epiphany though concerning what I eat.

They had us on a Paleo Diet and the switch was not bad, especially since the food was prepared by a Frenchman, but I noticed no major effects. When I returned to normal everyday life, I went for a gourmet Mushroom puree pizza, some buffalo chicken croquettes & a pint or two of beer. The next day, I went on to an amusement park, got the Mahi Mahi Fish & Chips, ate only half, added an afternoon snack of fries, and topped it off with a Margarita, chips & salsa, and a half of an enchilada dish. he next day started with my normal breakfast Luna Bar, and a quickie lunch at McD's of Fillet o' Fish & apples. By mid-afternoon, I was feeling lethargic & irritated. I immediately ran off to Trader Joe's to stock up on natural Raw Almonds, unsweetened natural sun dried raisins, a couple of packages of grapes, some fresh spinach, fresh mozzarella, Bananas, blueberries, more almonds, and some coconut milk, coconut oil & agave. Last night I ate about 4 oz. of steak, seasoned & grilled, a salad of fresh spinach with some basil from the deck, copious tomatoes from the deck, raisins, almond slices, olive oil, & balsamic vinegar, then a side of grilled veggies, an ear of sweet corn, and a dessert of bananas, blueberries, almonds in coconut milk, honey, agave & coconut oil (the last 3 in small amounts). half way through the meal I started feeling alive again & was more than full, but not unpleasantly so... Further, I was not hungry this morning and only ate my breakfast bar because I needed something with my antibiotics (will explain later). Today I brought the Almonds & raisins and some dried apples with me in case I wanted a snack (didn't really) and then ate a gyro salad for lunch. I'm staying full & not feeling nearly so lethargic today. Hmmm... idea: more raw, more fresh, more veggies, add some healthy fats, avoid processed foods altogether. We'll see how this goes. : )

Public Service Announcement

Oh my holy __(fill in expletive of choice)__! It's been a longtime since I posted anything. Honestly, I've been crushed under the guilt of not being able to write up a description of our trip to Alaska since I was unable to post the photos for a long time. Ah well...



I found this CNN story today... Why? Really WHY must people demonize playing and having fun? Is fun something that is only allowed for kids? If so, then I might as well just kill myself now or revel in being a self-centered, perpetually adolescent generation Y-er. I mean, seriously... what's the purpose of posing and being staid & reserved? There's this whole social stigma about "This is what you wear at this age, this is how you act, this is what you look like and this is the way you move, this is what you like..." etc, etc, ad nauseum.... What a load of bunk.

Anyway, done with my rant and on to playing a bit of catch-up with you, my dear readers (all one of you...). : ) The alaska trip was fabulous and I'll hopefully devote an entire post to that at some point. The summer's been hell-a busy, so I've been going quite crazy, getting behind, and falling quite short on a lot of my resolutions.

At some point, I've gone crazy and decided I needed to be getting a more well-rounded exercise regimen. I found a theory called MovNat, an updated version of Methode Naturelle, which has been on my radar for about 2 years now, but I've never done anything about it. I also found an exercise concept called Exuberant Animal, which is all about full body & mental wellbeing through play-activities. Conveniently, the local Rec Center has classes by one of the only EA instructors on teh East Coast. Yay! Basically, it's a minimally structured exercise class based on being silly and whatever the Kwame decides seems fun at the moment. So far we've used such recognizable childhood favorites as Tug-of-War, Follow the Leader, Crabwalks & Wheelbarrow races among other thing. There's a lot of partnering and cooperative aspects too. It's a good silly time. I hope tonight's class is still on! At some point with all of this, I went crazy, decided to be "spontaneous" and signed up for the MovNat seminar in Summersville Lake, WV. I embark on that adventure tomorrow. Bright & early. Let's hope I come back in one piece.

This past weekend we went to the Jane Austen Ball at Gadsby's Tavern & hit a pool party downtown that ended up being a filming location for MTV's "The Real World". Interesting.

I think that's about it for now. I'll get more pics up someday and see about taking photos of the seminar. Fun.

Roadkill I am not! (at least for now...)

So as I said last time, I decided to try this Bike to Work Day thing, although I didn't officially register because there were no "Pit Stops" on my way to work at all & I don't want the cheesey T-shirt & I was going to do it or not based ont he weather forecast. So for the past two days I cleaned my bike, oiled my bike, inflated the tires & attempted to attach the headlamp & tail light. I still need to replace my front tire & probably my back brakes, but it was ready to go. The weather cleared, at least for this morning... if it's too miserable come time to go home, I'll probably just take Metro & bus and come back for my bike later.

Riding to work was a relative success... I got out the door & discovered that my shifter wouldn't work, so I oiled it and fiddled with it and then I only had one of the three gears, so I fiddled with it some more... got it to the point where I had all 3 gears, most of the time, and got going. The headlamp and taillight were useless - the taillight because I dropped it and then it refused to light, and the headlamp because I had to McGuyver it to my bike basket and it kept sliding so that it pointed straight down or straight up. Will figure out a more permanent solution someday. It was a nice ride, pretty relaxing until I got into the parts of G--D--- Alexandria, where they don't allow you to ride on sidewalks & don't provide any bike lanes. Fortunately, that was only a small part of the trip & most of it was spent in neighborhoods and riding with a good view of Cameron Run (a stream). I think it seemed like a good way to start my day, except I'm already getting hungry. DOH! Maybe I'll try to do this more often on nice days. I have to admit, though, that I am a wuss and would not choose to bike commute on cold days, snowy days, humid days, rainy days, etc.... so I think it'll only be an occasional thing unless it ever becomes a necessity. It'll be interesting to see how much my bottom hurts later.... I have a cushy old-school cruising saddle seat with the springs at the back and then have put a gel padded seat cover on top of that, but I still remember hurting after the last time I rode it for any distance. We shall see.

Sailing update: We did get to go out for class last night, and my lessons are now done with... I didn't get failed, I feel pretty comfortable with the boat now, so Yay! I get one free week of sailing to practice with and then I'm going to have to start paying (boo!) Maybe I should just get a boat.... ; )

Step 1 in Quest to Become a Real Pirate

Last year, Jonah & I discovered a number of sailing clubs and marinas that rent sail boats in our area. This is great! We love sailing (he loves sailing, I loved clinging to the side of the boat in fear - going from 125 ft of solid wood around me with high gunwales, i.e the Niagara, to an 11 ft. fiberglass boat is a bit of a change). So with all of this excitement about our new-found resources, we promptly didn't go sailing at all last year.



This year, I decided that I should learn to sail. There was at one point a possibility that we might get a boat, but I think that's on hold. Also, I'll feel more comfortable going out with J for an afternoon if I a) get comfortable and realize that a small boat is NOT out to get me, and b) know what to do in case, heaven forbid, anything were to happen to Jonah while we were out & I'd have to get us back safely.

So here I go, I've signed up for a 10 hour sailing class at the Belle Haven Sailing Marina and it's 4 nights after work of 2.5 hours of instruction per night. It's cheaper to take a weeknight class, and, upon taking it, I think it's better since it *feels* like I get to go out more since I go out four nights instead of two days.

Anyway, so here's how it's been:

• Day 1: Not so sure I like the instructor, though I like everyone else at the Marina. My fellow student & I can hold all of about 2 words worth of a conversation and then end up staring at each other. The 19 ft. Flying Scot feels a heck of a lot more stable than I expected. This is a good thing. We learn rigging and where the sandbar is, and that the Orange Buoy is named "Bob." We switch turns controlling the tiller and the jib sheets while Bill, the instructor, controls the main sheet. Eventually the one on the tiller is put in control of the main sheet two and I quickly discover that my gut instinct, when the boat starts to heel, or lean too far, is to do exactly the right thing to make it capsize. This does not bode well. Lastly, we're called in early because there are large ominous black clouds moving in quickly & I have a minor internal freak out since I don't trust the boat or myself or anyone else in a storm.
• Day 2: I start filled with great trepidation, but I am entertained by the resident dock dog, Hunter. He's a Chow or part Chow and OWNS the dock. He supervises the comings and goings. We get out to the moored boat & rig it & get ready to sail. I don't take out the boom crutch in time, the tiller gets stuck (because the crutch is in the way) and the boat spins around, promptly getting the mooring line tangled around the centerboard. eek. Laura strikes again. We can't raise the centerboard, the rope is stuck on it, we can't push the rope off since it's wrapped too tightly. Eventually dear fellow student determines which in which direction the line is anchored & I figure that if we rotate the boat ( using it like a canoe), we can unwind it. Goodie! It worked. Off we go. I get more comfortable, I'm not trying to capsize us anymore. We get lots of good quality time in, we make it out onto the river channel, learn right of way rules, & channel markers and have a generally successful day.
• Day 3: Beautiful, sunny day. I find myself wishing that my office window did NOT overlook the waters that I sail on. I want to play hookie. We have a new guy on our boat who is joining us since his class before had to be rescheduled due to weather. we practice tacking & jibing and man overboard drills. Bill goes to throw a life vest in the water as man overboard, but knocks his hat in as well. We practice 4 or 5 man overboards until we can successfully retrieve his hat, which seems to be camouflaged with the water (sentimental value?). It goes well enough, I'm feeling pretty darn comfortable, but I'm irritated by the new guy who'd rather talk than pay attention to the sail trim... he's letting the main sail, the one that provides the power, luff, i.e. not hold wind. It's not like you can't tell. The sail makes noise when it luffs. You hear that noise, you look, you take in the sail. It's easy. I got to see an Osprey fly off with a fish too. Yay!
• Day 4: sitting at my computer desk feeling like I'm rolling with a boat. I think it's lack of sleep. Most likely class will have to be rescheduled because of forecasted scattered thunderstorms. Wish the darn thing wasn't so weather-dependent. Will keep you all updated.
  

Maybe if I pass the class I'll get myself a pirate hat & become the fearful "Bloody Binkle of the Potomac"!

Speaking of weather, I am working frantically on getting my bike (I think mine is a 1971 model, same shape & colors though... different seat) in shape for summer with the hope of participating in Bike to Work day on Friday, just to see how that is. However, I don't think I'll do it if it's too miserable. Boo!

I don't think it's enough

$3825.00The Cadaver Calculator - Find out how much your body is worth.

So I totally don't think it'd be worth that to sell my dead body to science.... I mean, it wouldn't even cover funeral costs, I bet, and well I guess you'd save money on burial... but daggnabbit, I want to be buried in a grave easily forgotten so I can potentially be rediscovered by archaeologists in a couple of thousand years. So please don't sell me.

Forming a new religion around the internet...

Why would I do this? Because the internet is my SAVIOR!!! I've had rusty looking gunge leaking out of my fridge periodically for close to2 months. I figured it was the drip pan overflowing or something? This morning I found 1/2 inch of water in the bottom of the fridge under the veggie drawer.... Issues! So I googled "water leaking into bottom of refridgerator" and foudn a lot of answers to that question stating that there's a drain from the freezer to the drip pan & that it gets clogged & probably needs to be cleaned out. YAY! I disconnected a bunch of sh!# and lo-and-behold, after getting brown/greyfridge splooge all over my arm, I found that my drain part was clogged. I've since openned it up, cleaned it out & confrimed that water is now flowing just fine through the drain. let's hope that does it. : ) I'm also builing a religion around headlamps because I cannot think of a more useful device invented by man.

Unfortunately, I started fixing my fridge be taking apart the freezer compartment (which turned out to be completely unnecessary). On the upside, I got to see what the cooling mechanism of a freezer looks like & it's pretty darn cool...

So that happened.

Well, on to more happy things... Last night was the Glen Echo Evening with Strauss (Viennese Ball). As always, it was fabulous! We got dressed to the nines & had a nice evening, though we were constantly mistaken for Prom-goers over dinner.

I had so much fun & even got to get someone on my dance card for the Polka!!! Even better, he bore a striking resemblance to Steve Martin. Too bad I didn't get a picture... The best pic of the night though, was one I got of J on the carousel...

I don't know about anyone else, but with that profile and the tux and the hair the way it is, he totally looks like a romantic lead from a Jane Austin movie, don't you think??? : ) Maybe it's the side-burns...

Better Health Through Better Eating?

It's no secret now that I have noticed a difference in my overall health when I change my diet & eat better. It's led me to pay more attention when news articles talk about "eat this and not that". Totally fascinating. I don't buy into it 100% because for every article you find saying 'red wine is good for you', there's a corresponding one that says 'red wine is not good for you, especially women' or some such. I ran across this article the other week that continues to fascinate me: Better Together. I like all those food combinations, and I don't thinkit'll hurt any to try & eat those things together a little more often, though good luck remembering it all.... but what really fascinates me is the proposition on the first page that we may have evolved to like those combinations because it it more beneficial. I'd like to know more about studies that test that hypothesis.

Going Green?

This weekend we were up at Syracuse for J's grandfather's memorial service. We'll miss you Papa.

While we were up there visiting, I got to spend some time talking with J's aunt, dreamer. I've always enjoyed being with her and this time was no exception. She makes very nice jewelry out of natural gemstones and was talking about how she's had to learn about the different meanings or 'powers' of the stones since she does a lot of her selling at psychic fairs and such. One stone I've been drawn to a lot is Serpentine. It's just pretty, but for a lark, I looked up the meaning on Emily Gems via a google search. Here's some of the interesting things the site said... "Serpentine makes an exceptional meditation stone. It helps you to find inner peace. Some of the uses of serpentine include: Protection against poisonous creatures such as snakes, insects, etc; Balances mood swings; Encourages the ability to solve conflicts by peaceful means." Interesting coincidence considering I've been feeling under a considerable amount of turmoil until recently and have been finding a great desire to wear the serpentine bracelets that I have. Also, I've noticed that I've been drawn to a ridiculous amount of green items lately - a green purse, a green hat, several green shirts & sweaters, green jewelry etc.... Is it that there is a lot of nice green available this year or is there more to it? So I figured I'd look up symbolism of green too. "Green contains the powerful energies of nature, growth, desire to expand or increase. Balance and a sense of order are found in the color green. Change and transformation is necessary for growth, and so this ability to sustain changes is also a part of the energy of green.
Put some green in your life when you want: a new state of balance; feel a need for change or growth; freedom to pursue new ideas; protection from fears and anxieties connected with the demands of others"

Coincidence? Who knows. Maybe it all goes along with some people's theories that horoscopes and astrology are generic and seem accurate because you read what you want to into them. Maybe not. Maybe there's something to "all of it" - the ancient theories and arts. But regardless, none of that negates the fact that green is apparently making me feel good right now and there seems to be no harm in wearing it. : )

Barefooting

I find myself frequently facing questions about my crazy running shoes and Barefoot Running in general. The long & short of it all is that I think biomechanics is cool and I totally buy the theory that "supportive" shoes do more harm than good if worn your whole life. Regardless of how I feel, you can make up your own minds on the subject if it even interests you at all. I'll even make it easy for you and share my links that I've found either useful or fascinating.

• This guy's site has a lot of reading.... http://runningbarefoot.org/
• This has some opposing viewpoints... http://runningtimes.com/rt/articles/?id=5810 and http://www.runwashington.com/features/barefootrunning.html
• Blog of a barefoot runner... Has an interesting running technique video.... http://runbarefoot.blogspot.com/2007/10/form-video.html (the most fascinating part is at about 4:50 if the narration irritates you)
• Has some interesting stuff... http://completerunning.com/running-blog-mark/index.php/archives/category/barefoot-running/
• Also kind of interesting... POSE is frequently paired up with Barefooting since they use the same posture principles and POSE frequently makes use of running flats which are the next best thing to barefoot, mechanically... http://www.posetech.com/training/archives/000198.html
• Here's something from a marathon site... http://www.marathonandbeyond.com/choices/clift.htm
• a phys site... http://www.physorg.com/news84737938.html
• http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/06157/696125-114.stm
• South African Medical Research council: http://www.mrc.co.za/mrcnews/july2005/running.htm
• NY Times articles: http://www.nytimes.com/2005/06/23/fashion/thursdaystyles/23Barefoot.html and http://www.nytimes.com/2009/02/08/sports/othersports/08barefoot.html?_r=1&scp=1&sq=barefoot%20running&st=cse
• These are interesting, but I am skeptical of anyone who refers only to excerpt and not the text as a whole, who knows what else was found... http://www.barefooters.org/medicine/
• From National Geographic: Oldest Footprints with modern anatomy found and Humans were born to run
  

That all being said/shared, I'll let you know how my "strengthen your foot for greater mobility later in life" experiment goes.... I don't think that one will be solved for at least 30 years though. : )

UPDATED: Thanks to Karina for posting this in the Comments: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/home/moslive/article-1170253/The-painful-truth-trainers-Are-expensive-running-shoes-waste-money.html

Figuring Stuff Out

I've been figuring some stuff out and it's feeling really good. I had a "mental" week last week... I got some info early in the week that shed a lot of light on a problem that I've had for going on 2 years now, and it led to a lot of emotional ups & downs while I processed & figured stuff out. In the end, I'm feeling soooo much better, but it led me to figure some other things out as well. For instance, my shoulders started knotting up about 2 weeks ago. I know it was stress related. No matter what, I could not get them to relax out. Then I went mental, and that exacerbated it. Finally, I gave up & went for my first real massage yesterday - it's worth the money to me to get it worked out & relaxed now before I have a 7 hour drive and a maybe stressful/maybe not weekend. Anyway, that worked out he kinks & loosened up my neck and it was wonderful, but today I am noticing that my shoulders are so used to being knotted up that they are trying to revert to that. I'm having to fight my own body today and it's very weird. I keep noticing my shoulders wanting to hunch up near my ears and etc.... Secondly, I discovered, or made the connection rather, that my worst "Mental" days the past month have been days where I am excruciatingly tired. I KNOW I don't handle lack of sleep well... If I stay up too late I get psycho & depressed. Cast parties in Highschool, while theoretically fun, were when I usually scared myself the most by getting into unreasonable paranoias and depression. Needless to say that when I put 2 and 2 together, it made a whole BUNCH of sense that my "depressed" feeling days were when I had gone too long without good sleep. The result of this realization is that I've set myself a goal of trying to get at least 7.5 hours of sleep a night. It's a mid-year resolution? Well, anyway, out of the past 3 days, I've succeeded twice in 3 nights. Not too bad to start.... AND I've been feeling GREAT!!! (even though the weather's sucked & been rainy & I think I'm starting to get mouldy...) If all I need to do to be happier & healthier is to eat better and sleep enough, well DAMN!

Ah, lastly, Joy-of-joys! I can finally have that Peanut Butter Milkshake!!!!!!!!!! I made & have maintained my goal weight for at least a week! Woot! I will officially stop dieting now. I will still track what I eat to manage and maintain what I've done. I will be doing more Rock Climbing soon and keeping up with my running hopefully, so if you see me getting any skinnier from this point (doubtful), it'll only be due to toning. Well, Cheers, everyone!

What now?

I am bothered by this... more later.

Cherry Blossom 5K

Well, it was that time of year again. The Cherry Blossom 5K has come and gone. Three of us ran it this year: myself, J & Lori. (see pic). Yes, those are the infamous Run Fatboy Run Shorts again. A special thanks again to Jason (AKA PunkJr) for the kindly gifting of the shorts last-minute last year. He will forever have a special place in my heart. Our times were posted yesterday. You can either look for yourself, or I can tell you that I came in at 29:55 total with an avg pace of 9:38 per mile. I was #168 out of 1056 women. Not too shabby. I am happy with the overall improvement... A year ago: 11:44 pace, 196 lbs., 34 inch waist. Today: 9:38 pace, 136 lbs., 26 inch waist. I'd say this has been a productive year. So as far as running goes, I'm hoping to form a running group to keep me to it this summer. I'm setting a goal to continue to work up to a 10K by this fall & see how I feel. I'd also like to improve my pace a little bit. I can do one 8 min mile if I really want to and I'd like to see if I can work up to that for next year. That would be cool. Do I think I'll get to a 10-miler at some point? Who knows. The only thing I DO know for sure is that I won't have the same breakfast next year. I might go back to my Kraft Mac & Cheese at 5 AM breakfast.... This year, well I figured eating at 6 AM when my race would start at 8:40 would be fine since that's nearly 3 hr digestion time. I had 1 Luna Bar, a 1/2 cup 1% fat Vanilla yogurt, & about 3-4 tbsp. Hummos to get some extra protein. My stomach cramped up during the race. I hate my digestive system.

In other news, I had an awesome Hanami weekend with Luke and perfected my banana-PB-Nutella crepes. More to come later.

Are we married?

Today in the news is an article about a bill that passed in Vermont Legalizing gay marriage that will probably be shot down by the Governor and an Iowa supreme court ruling that overturned the definition of marriage as between one man and one woman as unconstitutional.

That got me to thinking once again if Virginia technically consideres J & I married. Here's the letter of the Virginia State Constitution (it's Article I, section 15-A if the link isn't cooperating). I remember when this law was on the ballot a couple of years back. It made me mad on a number of levels and I voted against it. Let's not even get into a discussion about gay Marriage and whether or not gays should be allowed to marry or if it should be called marriage or something else. There are a zillions ways you can argue and discuss the topic. I don't feel like going there. I'll be blunt and say that in my own humble opinion I believe in equal rights and equal treatment for all and leave it at that. As such, regardless of whether you think it's right or wrong, isn't marriage part of the "pursuit of happiness" for some people? How can you exclude that from some when the constitution if the state garauntees the pursuit of happiness? Here's the main thing... if you ARE going to write a law that's designed to exclude a particular group, OR if you're going to vote for a law that excludes a particular group. You sure as hell better write the language properly.

The intention of the amendment was to define marriage as between one man & one woman and then also prohibit recognition of a gay marriage legal status from another state. According to the wording of the section, the VA constitution now fails to recognize any status from another state that is not "marriage" but "intends to approximate the design, qualities, significance, or effects of marriage". Where does that leave heterosexual couples who get a civil union in another state?

It will probably never effect J & I since I don't think anyone will give two shakes about our legal status since we're still "one man, one woman", but they could. We did not get married by a religious official. I don't know if our union, by Pennsylvania definition, was legally a "marriage" or a "civil union" since it was performed by a Justice of the peace. If it's a Civil Union, we should not get the same rights as married people? And people voted for this thing without taking off their gay-blinders and considering how the language COULD effect others not intended as the target. This just illustrates how this whole thing is a load of bull shit and ignorance seems to overpower reason at every turn. I hope it all turns around soon.

Pretending like I'm going to Scotland.

I finally made the excursion to the Royal Mile Pub last night to try out their special scotch tasting night. Thank you to everyone who braved the trek with me. Sorry I got stuck in the middle of the table so I couldn't mingle - I was thinking we weren't gonna push all the tables together. : ( I was pleasantly surprised to find that the food was excellent and remarkably fresh tasting (not like processed US pub food at all). I TRIED THE HAGGIS!!!! And even more exciting: I liked it! *shhh... don't tell!* Now that I've spilled my tea on myself 3 times, I find I must swear that I am neither still drunk nor hung over. Lastly, and sadly, the Beef & Guinness pie was not a replacement for those that I loved across the ocean. It was good. try it, but it was more beefy-oniony-gravy than I was looking for. Maybe I should stop trying Guinness pies and just give up & make my steak & ale pie recipe I found online. Anyway, the wait-staff was lovely and efficient and I had a nice evening. I've also determined that when my friend Dave comes down, I MUST take him here & camp out for the night.

The other main reason I went was for the scotch tasting. They have an extensive list and a special pairing on Thursdays.
And this is how it went:

• Starter: 16 yr old non-chill filtered pairing of Glenlivet & Longmorn - I wish they had been paired with the regular equivalent... it's hard to tell the difference between regular & non-chill filtered otherwise.
• Inchmurrin - was OK, not my favorite, but drinkable
• Caol Ila 12 yr. - tasted more like a campfire than Laphroaig, and had no other body to redeem itself with
• Glenrothes Special - by far, one of the nicest of the night.. full bodied, yet sweet almost to the point of being like a sherry - it paired up extremely well with the Trifle that we had for dessert.

Experiment Update

Day 1: started with 2 qt. tea, worked 6 hrs., finished off 1-1.5 qt.
Day 2: Started with 2 qt. tea, worked 9 hrs., the 2 qt. was GONE by 11:30 am.
Day 3: started with a little under 2 qt. tea (spillage on way to work), regulated better, worked 8.5 hr. ended with 1/2 qt. left
Day 4: fell off bandwagon due to lack of sleep and went straight for soda. Started with 1.75 qt. tea, at 2:05 PM, I have 1.75 qt. minus 1 mug left.

The adding in veggies thing has definitely worked. Apparently my body loves veggies and hates everything else I put in it. Today I weighed in at 134.5.... the first time under 135. I'll see if i can hold under 135 for a week and if so, PB shake for me!!!! Yahoo! Today I made sure to get green beans with my bison cheeseburger and tonight will be nothing but meat & carbs (i.e. steak pie & scotch, and more scotch). But back to "being good" tomorrow! They had better serve the steak pie with Peas. Every steak pie we got in Scotland came with a side of peas (granted, that was the worst steak pie we had)...

Who knew?

I guess I'm in style, according to this... 17 Ways to Style Your Hair (or something like that).

Who knew? I do this almost every other day because it is super fast & easy. I agree with them that it's good to use bobby pins because they break your hair less, but I do NOT agree that it needs to be done on Day-old dirty hair. I always do it when my hair is wet. And actually, if you have any sort of natural wave to begin with, you can usually work a nice wave into the sections that you're putting up before you pin them... just gently push the wet hair back toward the roots and see where the waves form. Leave them there and arrange the hair in a pin behind that. Maybe spray with a little bit of hairspray if you want the wave to stay super defined & you're done. You may notice, if you increase the pics, that I wave it on one side and not the other. That's because one half of my head doesn't do it. I'm a minimalist and don't force my hair to do anything it doesn't want to most of the time.

Experiment on self #221

In great quantities, over long periods of time, soda is bad for you. Who knows what the artificial stuff in Diet soda will do really? You know that. I know that. The fact still remains that I am addicted to soda. At work, I drink for one of these reasons: A) I'm thirsty, B) I need caffeine, C) I want something flavored in my mouth, D) because I suck on any consumable liquid put in front of me. With the exception of maybe, MAYBE reason B, There is no reason why I need to drink soda specifically. So why do I? Because I'm lazy and forgetful. Some days I just don't feel like walking down the hall, cleaning and filling my teapot and waiting for the water to boil (lazy). On days that I DO go get water & put it on to boil, I start doing work while it boils and realize 2 hours later that I've never made my tea. I turn the hot-pot back on and then promptly forget about it again, ad nauseum... Really, it's much quicker and yeilds more predictable results if I go pop money in the vending machine and grab a diet Coke. Finally I've hit a breaking point and realized that I MUST stop because the amount of soda I'm consuming disgusts me and the waste from all those bottles disgusts me and the waste of money that is my habit is disgusting.

I've come up witha solution and I will be seeing if I can stick to it.... A big vat o' iced tea. This satisfies both my need to drink and ease on environmental and financial impact while appeasing my lazy, forgetful self. I went out and bought a Thermos Pump Carafe in a 2 qt. size. and made 3 qt of iced tea in my tea maker last night. This morning, pour tea in carafe & off to work with me. I have my stainless steeel travel mug and plan to refil it all day. I dunno if 2 qt. will last all day, but we'll see. If this works, and I strongly suspect that it will once I make it a routine, please don't harass me about bringing my tea with me when I come to visit on long road trips.... It's really hard to find good unsweetened bottled tea in gas stations and 7-11s.

In other health and experiment related news...
I'm always impressed at how well minor home surgery seems to work. I took a spill in a parking lot over a week ago (literally tripped over my own feet, quite embarassing) and scraped up my hand. I must not have cleaned it & dressed it well enough the first time around because after 5 days it was still hurting, a bit red, and raised in one spot. Seemed like beginning infection to me.... So I reopenned it, applied alcohol, HO, and more antibiotic cream and it cleared up by the next day and was completely fine in another 2. Love it when that works.

Also, allergy season is starting up full swing again and I am once again going to try to subject myself to as much fresh air as possible to acclimate to the allergens. Yay! So far, so good.

Lastly, after realizing that I was no longer on a "plateau" for weight loss, but rather the La Brea Tar Pit (yeah, that's me...), I started looking at what I was eating and I've once again dropped all green vegetables, if not all vegetables period, out of my diet. AGAIN. So I've been trying to get 2-3 servings of veggies in per day again. I think it's helping already and that's only been 4 days ago. Wheee.... veggies are so critical.

Birthday Suit... uh, I mean dress....

P3250099
Originally uploaded by binkle52

Yup, well, it's a tradition started by my mum when I was little. She made me Birthday dresses as a kid. I think, maybe, it stemmed from the idea of Easter dresses since my birthday is generally close to Easter... eventhough we don't really celebrate Easter... hmmm... Well anyway, at some point I got "too old" for birthday dresses. Then, Freshman year in college, I found an awesome dress in the local vintage store... $22 - way too rich for a college student... so I bought myself a birthday present. : ) That restarted the tradition. I still have that dress. It was a stretchy Hawaiian number from the 600s so it stuck with me through all my weight shifts. I think the Elastic is FINALLY starting to go though, so I'll probably have to get around to replacing that. Anyway, so I stick with the idea of the birthday dress. Here's this year's birthday dress. Yay! This is, however, regardless of the fact that it's 40 degrees out. not cute dress weather at all. Oh well!

Do Neutral Colors have to be "Neutral" to be Neutral?

Neutral colors... you think tan, creme, brown, navy, black, and maybe white depending on how it's used. Supposedly these colors can go with anything. I don't like them. Black is good for shoes, clothes and dresses and that's about it. I do not like my coats to be black or any other "accessory" that is typically mass marketed in black. For the past couple of years I've had an awesome purse that was an olive faux-suede, well structured thing with a copper buckle. The olive color went with EVERYTHING. It is awesome; however, I've had that thing for close to 5 years and I'm not sure how much more life it has left. You see, I'm a practical purse person... I don't like to switch it out. I want it to look clean, be small and functional to fit my essentials in a well-organized manner. (The "small" is a must because I am a packer and can get an amazing amount of stuff into ANY given space and the more space = the more stuff, and quite frankly, I value a healthy back.) I want it to look neat and not like something a middle-aged business woman would carry (i.e. not shiny black or brown). It must be easy to get into so I can access my money quickly and not make everybody in line wait as I fiddle with my purse. It must close well to be relatively Klutz-proof, because I am one. Most importantly, it must go with everything I own so I don't have to change it out. Actually, I did see these awesome bags one time... Miche Bags. They'd be a great solution for me, but don't fit my final must: it MUST be cheap. I destroy things. The likelihood of me accidentally destroying something (re: Klutz discussion) is directly proportional to how expensive it is. Given my needs, I've been in hall trying to find a purse this season. Almost everything is big, looks like a bag and has no structure, is made out of that obnoxious "designer initial" fabric, looks like a middle-aged business woman purse, or is too expensive. Finally, in a fit of desperation, I found one that was small, had at least 3 pockets to appease my organizational sense, and closed reasonably well, although it is still bag-like. I will deal. Here it is, my new baby:

So now the question must be asked - can I make Lime green be a neutral? I have been pondering it and I think I can do it. It doesn't make any sense. It'll be an accent piece when I wear black, true, and maybe with white too, but i don't frequently wear white. But for most other things... I wear a goodly amount of green, but not shades that will clash. It'll go with browns, oranges, purples, blues, yellows... I think it'll work. Just don't expect to see my running around in matching pumps. It seems there is only a certain type of woman who can pull off lime-green pumps (hint: not me - I also don't feel like I can pull off those gigantic bead necklaces either).

Wish me luck! : )

What must people think of me?

OK... I just realized that I can't figure out how two parts of my personality coexist... I don't know if I should bother thinking about this, but here's what I was pondering:

Part A: I'm paranoid about what people think of me.
Part B: I could care less what people think of me.

Huh?

Examples of part A: I constantly think other co-workers must think I have IBS because I literally RUN to the bathroom every time I have to go. I constantly worry that if we're out at dinner with a group, if I get up to go to the bathroom at the end of the meal, I'm concerned that people will think I'm Bulimic (especially since I've lost so much weight this past year).

Regarding part B, even though I have concerns as demonstrated by the examples of A, I don't let it stop me from running to the bathroom, or going after a meal out. Also, I don't seem to care what anyone else thinks of me in general. I do what I like regardless of whether it's "normal." I wear costumes to work, I run randomly (through shopping plazas, through the halls at work, etc), I put my hair in pigtails even though I'm nearly 30, and have no qualms to rocking out to Bubble-gum J-Pop at odd times.

I don't know how to reconcile the two.

Ah, and the running through the halls at work set me to thinking that school is what was probably responsible for me not running at all until recently. You are told so often when you are little, especially at school, not to run. "Don't run in the Halls!!" etc. Daggnabbit. We'd all be in better shape if they'd stop yelling at us not to run. Thoughts....