Cheat Day Extravaganza

So, Saturday was my cheat day. OH YEAH.

I started the morning with a delicious cranberry turtle bar (from the bake sale a few weeks ago).



Now there are only two left, which is SAD.



This is me eating the bar. I have no idea why I took this picture.



Next up, trail mix. It was meh. The only good part was the chocolate covered espresso beans. I should have just bought a bag of those.



Since it was a cheat day, I opted for some junk reading, too.



Then I made some date balls (recipe to come in future post), ate some girl scout cookies (5 total), ate a lik-a-stik, made some eggs, and ate a piece of chocolate. I was too busy eating to take pictures.

Then it was time for the main even of the day. BBQ RIBS. Since it was BBQ, I felt my cowboy boots were appropriate.



My ribs and beans (plus I had an iced tea with SUGAR).



Alternatively:



Sky eating ribs, mafia style.



Andrew playing with rib bones.



Walrus:



Vampire:



Zoidberg:



It's clear that I don't really crave wheat. No need for pasta or bread or anything like that. Cheating for me is all about the sugar. Sweet, sweet sugar. Mmmmmmmmmmm.

Mini Goal Monday: Getting My Ass In Gear

So, I'm over my cold. My blisters are still visible, but they don't hurt. I have fewer than three weeks until Ultra-Time.

That means I need to get my ass in gear.



The Given:
--Strength train at least twice (thrice if I Bachelor)

The Bare Minimum:
--Run twice. Once short and fast, once long and slow

The hopeful:
--Run a third time.

The super hopeful:
--Run a forth time?

That should do it. It doesn't matter if it's two miles or twenty (who am I kidding? 1. it matters, and 2. It's a terrible idea to go out and try for 20 right now). DO IT DO IT DO IT.

You guys? Next week it's going to be SO MUCH EASIER TO RUN.

Why? It will be LIGHT OUT when I leave work. For at least an hour. That means I can have wicked hot dates with my favorite trail. I LOVE running out there. It's not a chore or an obligation. It's an experience. The last time I was out there, I practically had to swim the trail.

I don't know what's keeping me from going on weekends. Sure, it's further away from my house than from my office, but not THAT much further. Laziness, mostly.

But, I can't afford laziness anymore. I have my gym clothes packed, and I am going today. I am going to do speed work! It it going to rule!

It's ass kicking time you guys.

Soxy Sunday

Monday:

Tuesday:

Wednesday:

Thursday:

Friday:

Saturday:

Sunday:

Ultramarathon: Three Weeks Away

Three weeks from now I'll be driving Southeast toward Corona, California. Due to traffic, it will probably take me a few hours to get there. Once I'm there I'll be doing my best to nap for a few hours in my car before checking in, grabbing my race number, and setting up camp.

Starting at 9pm, I will be running small circles around a high school track for 24 hours.

What have I gotten myself into?



I plan on bringing:

-enough iced coffee and diet coke to choke a horse (caffeine!!!)
-two ipods, loaded with books on tape, podcasts, and all my music
-my laptop, with satellite internet feed, so I can update facebook with my progress
-my camera. duh
-all three pairs of my running shoes
-compression socks
-dozens of pairs of socks
-three outfits to change into in case of chafing
-sunscreen
-a hat
-two pairs of sunglasses (in case one breaks)
-full runner first aid kid with moleskin, bandaids, anti-chaffing stuff, ibuprofen
-chapstick
-gloves and jacket
-costumes to entertain myself
-ummm, I guess food and drinks? Guess I should look into this.

My strategies:
-have at least two friends there at all times, sometimes running with me, sometimes just on the sidelines cheering for me as I go by. I already have a schedule, and have most of the slots filled. It's tough because it's not close to home, but my friends are awesome.
-Keep myself entertained. Costumes, books on tape, podcasts. I'm going to bring my phone, maybe call random people, strike up friendships with other people running, sing songs. I scheduled my hilarious brother for the overnight part, which will be pretty hard to stay awake/entertained
-Have very low expectations. I have no idea what my body is going to do. 100 miles would be rad, but, you guys, I don't know if that's possible, since it would be four times further than I've ever ran before, ever. Every mile over 26 miles is gravy to me. I will not be disappointed if I don't hit 100, or 75, or if my legs give out and I have to walk the back 12 hours. Doing it is an accomplishment enough.
-Lots and lots of food. Hot dogs. Ramen. Girl scout cookies. Other cookies. Bacon. Okay, so I should probably have a lot of healthy food in there, like sweet potatoes and shit. And I will.

==========================

I'm nervous just thinking about. It want it to be here NOW, and I also want more time.

The hardest part is going to be the mental aspect. But it's going to be so worth it. Oh man.

========================

Have any of you done an ultramarathon? Do you have any tips for this n00b?

Fill In The Blanks Friday

Based on prompting from The Almost Runner (who is awesome, so you guys should follow the shit out of her), I decided to fill your Friday with my blanks.

Wait, what?

1. I am currently obsessed with What I'm going to eat tomorrow. With my current crazy diet, tomorrow is my cheat day, and I'm slowly making a list of all the terrible, horrible, no good, very bad things I'm going to eat, like girl scout cookies and BBQ sauce.

2. Today I am excited because it's Friday, which means I can stay up late tonight (aka midnight instead of like 10pm), and sleep in tomorrow. YAY!

3. The age I am is 29 and the age I feel is anywhere from 24 to 34 depending on how dumb I'm acting or how much I'm taking on.

4. My favorite place is my home town. My mom doesn't live there anymore, but it's such an awesome place to be. If you're from there. Sort of. It's a tiny town in the middle of nowhere, but, I know where everything is, the Humboldt Redwoods are a hop, skip, and jump away, and I can revert to teenager-Rose without worrying too much about what people think of me.

5. Something I have been procrastinating is getting a passport with my married name on it, and replacing one of my backing up lights on my car.

6. The last thing I purchased was fish, parsley, pine nuts, and artichoke hearts, on my drive home from the gym last night. They made a delicious dinner.

7. The thing I love most about my home is that I own it.

Fess Up Friday: I Love Dark Meat

Forgive me Jillian, for I have sinned.



It has been one week since my last confession.

------------------

I love dark meat.



No, CHICKEN. You guys are messed up.

But, seriously, don't do a google image search for "dark meat" unless your filters are definitely ON. WOW.

Anyway, chicken.

Yes, yes, the boneless skinless chicken breast is some sort of holy grail for health food nuts and dieters alike. Low in fat and calories, but high in protein, it's the best of all world.

Except flavor.

It's...bland. Yes, this can fixed by hiding it, but wrapping it in a coat of many flavors.

I know this is all personal preference, and for those of you who love it, more power to you. But, I like my meat gamier, fatter, darker. Cooking chicken thighs is easier. They are far more forgiving, and it takes way longer for them to dry out. They're cheaper.

It's like I lucked in to some terrible joy, as if I enjoy riding "bitch" on road trips (for those of you who didn't grow up where I did, that means the middle seat, with no leg room, a sketchy seat belt, and no window control).

I only offer it as a confession because people seem so surprised that dark meat is my preference. Then again, I love the heel pieces of bread.

Tonight's Workout + Food

Talked about:
-How to scare the crap out of his date tonight
-My up coming (in two months) toga party
-Tosh.0
-If his date is a serial killer
-Dressing up in Lucha Libre masks and running around the exercise class room during a class



Workout:

Foam rolling, which took forEVER, because my calves are still tight from the "barefoot" run.

x3
15 (per side) step ups
15 (per side) lunge to high kick

x2
30 seconds forward lunge and curl
30 seconds sideways lunch and curl
30 seconds backward lunge and curl
30 seconds mountain climbers with feet in TRX of DOOM

x3
20 weighted calf raises
15 hamstring curls

x3
45 second planks

=============

What I ate today:

baked chicken thighs with lemon juice, garlic, and fennel slices
sauted chard and red bell pepper
turkey sandwich meat
walnuts
beef jerky (it has a little bit of sugar in it but, ug, I ate it anyway)

And for dinner we're having:

Broiled orange roughy
beet and artichoke heart salad with lemon juice, parsley and pine nuts

Three Things Thursday

1. The blisters on the bottoms of my feet are healed enough to walk around normally. I spent the last two days limping, so this is a welcome change. I wouldn't trust myself to run around yet, but it's a step in the right direction.



2. The battle against my body for better posture wages on. I rigged my chair so there is NO SLOUCHING. Okay, it's still possible, but I made it really, really hard. This helps, except sitting up straight is harrrrrrrdddddddd. I want to slouch sometimes. NO SLOUCHING! It's easier while I'm standing. Once I'm at home on the couch I ignore my posture. My focus right now is Posture At Work. Jeez. I wish this stuff had been ingrained in me as a kid. It's friggen HARD to learn it now.



3. I keep having to stop myself from buying more exercise Groupons. I have, currently unused, 3 yoga groupons (for a total of 25-30 classes I think?), and 1 crossfit groupon (for 15 classes). I need to use these bad boys before I think of buying more. It's all about staggering them, so I get the best use before they expire. But there are such good deals out there!



Bonus Thing: I'm *this* close to buying a Kindle. I'm going to be doing some longer traveling this year, and, to give you an example, I brought 6 books on my honeymoon, and ended up buying 10 more while there. I read. A ton. And quickly. But I'm having these moral quandaries about loaning books and used book stores and killing the paper and stuff. I don't know. I need to think about it.

----------------------------

What are your thoughts on eBook readers? Do you have one? Do you LOVE it? Are you against them?

The Bachelor Workout: Blisters and Hangover Edition

So, my feet are still a minefield of blisters, and Sky presented himself with a hangover forged out of 72 hours of Vegas, so we did some minor swaps. Dips for burpees, crunches for push ups, laziness for sweat.

We still got our workout on, but with burpees almost entirely out of the mix (for good reason, the few we did were painful on my toes!), the sweat factor just wasn't there. It was still moving, which will always be good, but it wasn't the kick ass workout of yore.

Anyway, the tally:

240 crunches (they would have been push ups, oh man)
100 tricep dips (they would have been burpees)
70 jumping jacks
30 lunges
30 push ups
25 squats
20 pull ups
5 mofos
5 burpees
30 seconds of mountain climbers

I need to figure out the best camera setting for working out inside at night, because, as you will see below "sports" setting just isn't doing it. Boo.

Dips:


Push ups:


Burpees:


Jumping jacks (I'm levitating!):


Squats:


Sit ups:


Pull ups:


Bonus:
Thrift store top: $3.99
Thrift store pants: $4.99

Okay, the pants are a little short on me when I have shoes on. I guess I'll use them for yoga only. Lame.

Work Out Wednesday: The Censored Edition

First, danger will robinson! Danger!

Why did I buy 7 boxes?



2.

I took off my wedding ring (I only wear one) last night while dealing with raw meat, and I forgot to put it back on. My finger feels naked. So, I improvised.


-------------------------------------------

What my trainer and I talked about:

First, this happened:

My trainer: Have you put on weight?
Me: What? No! I don't know. Do I look like I have?
Trainer: I meant, your shoulders look more muscular.
Me: Why didn't you say that??

Bastard.

Other things:
-his date last night (success! Though, she might be a serial killer)
-Human Centipede
-really creepy pornos
-The movie Deadgirl
-How long you should wait while dating before putting out
-stuff I refuse to post here due to graphic nature, and to maintain my reputation. Yes, worse than the stuff listed above. I know.


-----------------

My workout:

We started off with what is most likely some physical therapy stuff. Shoulder stretches using a wooden dowel and stuff. I think our arm days are likely going to focus on strengthening my shoulders for a while. I'm not going to list that stuff, mostly because I don't know how to describe most of it, and partly because it's embarrassing how difficult simple motions with low weights are for part of my shoulders.

x3
15 seats rows

x3
15 wide grip trap pull downs
15 tricep pulldowns

x3
15 machine assisted pull ups
15 push ups against the smith machine bar


-----------------
Weight: 142.5lbs

That's a 1.25lb loss, which could be the size of one dump, so it's not significant. Yet.

My trainer used calipers on me to measure BF%, but he's going to do the calculations at home. Last time he measured my BF% the readout said 27% which is fucking crazytown, and cannot be right, so I don't know whether to hope for something better or preemptively write off the results.

------------------
Diet:

Yesterday I ate:

Chicken in coconut curry sauce (just curry powder and coconut milk) with carrots and spinach
a shitton of broccoli
handful of walnuts
2 diet cokes
1 cup coffee
shitton of water
Mexican Chili (lean chicken, green chiles, pickled jalapenos, corn, black beans, garlic, cumin)
more broccoli!

The chili is delicious, but I think the pickled jalapenos (in brine) added a crapton of sodium. But, delicious. And I'm not going to worry about that stuff right now.

Six Birds, One Stone: The Brass Monkey 5K Virtual Race

Tonight I simultaneously:

-broke my not-running streak
-practiced barefoot running
-completely a virtual 5k
-practiced my running posture
-cleaned my treadmill off (With my bare feet)
-learned a valuable lesson about blisters
-terrified my husband

Wait, what?

Today I ran The Brass Monkey 5K Virtual Race.

I was competing in category 2:

2. Running with the least amount of clothing (without violating any provincial or state laws). Each item is considered one piece (e.g. 1 sock, 1 shoe, 1 pair of tights, 1 jacket are all considered one.)

Which makes the picture of me on the treadmill make more sense. I'm going to continue to refer to it as "running barefoot" so I don't pop up during any creepy google searches, okay? Okay.

Things I learned:

1. I felt really silly. I didn't tell my husband beforehand. In fact, I was trying to go as fast as I could so I would finish before he came home. This didn't happen. Our treadmill is in the garage. I heard him bring the trash cans up from the drive, so I was prepared when the garage door started opening. I shrieked "NOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!!!" Thankfully he heard me, and stopped, otherwise the neighbors would have had quite a show. He came through the side door to investigate, and yeah, he was a little shocked to see his wife running, erm, barefoot.

2. Apparently I don't need a sports bra to run, if you know what I mean. This is both neat and really sad.

3. Barefoot (actual barefoot) running on a treadmill is painful. Blistery painful. Can't walk from room to room without walking on my heels and even then it hurts kind of painful.







And for Chris K, a bikini picture. I'm not so good with the art, so forgive me.



Anyway, yes, Brass Monkey Virtual 5k time: 27:53

Excuse me while I spend the next three days gimping around on my crippled feet.

Was it worth it? Maybe.

Cheat Day Laundry List

Saturday was my diet cheat day. I was supposed to, nay, encouraged to eat as poorly as possible.

So, here is what I ate, including stuff that's allowed all the time:

2 cups yerba mate tea
4 glasses iced tea (with a single packet of raw sugar each)
3 cups coffee
1 rare burger with bacon and runny egg, on a normal bun
1 serving french fries (I only ate about 1/3 of them)
1 beignet (french donut) with some chocolate and rasberry dipping sauce
3 spoonfuls of the rasberry dipping sauce (once everyone was done with it)
1 oatmeal raisin cookie (that my mom sent me for Valentine's Day)
1 cranberry turtle bar. It might have been two fused together
1 handful chocolate covered cherries
1 small heart shaped chocolate with chocolate ganache filling
1 glass fresh OJ (made from four oranges)
1 apple
1 serving Persian crispy rice
1 serving Persian chicken with pomegranate walnut sauce

-------------

I think that's it. It's really not bad. I normally don't eat out twice in one day, but other than that, I didn't go too overboard. Not feeling awesome probably helped.

Pictures of me eating:

The cookie my mom sent me was sort of shaped like a heart.




The most amazing, delicious burger. I couldn't decide if I wanted breakfast or lunch, so I special ordered a combo:





A basket of fresh made French donuts:



They were really rich, and I was pretty full, so I only ate one.



------------------

Fueled on a burger and bacon high, I was feeling pretty good. We headed off to Nordstrom Rack, and thanks to gift cards and shopping the clearance rack, I got the following Nine West shoes and Betsey Johnson dress for $2.12 ($110 before gift cards) out of pocket:





And yes, as the picture implies, I tried on the dress in the middle of the store.

It even looks good with pants on.



===================

Being out and about for most of the day probably caused the sickness relapse. But, looking at the dress and shoes, it was pretty worth it. I did end the day with Cheat Day Belly Bloat [not pictured]. Understandable. It will probably be gone by the time I poop today.

Yesterday, back on the diet, I ate:

2 egg + 2 egg white omelet with salsa and sliced turkey
More of the turkey/chard/mushroom stuff I've been eating all week
Handful of almonds
Lamb shank with vegetables and garlic spinach
yerba mate tea
blackberry tea

The lamb might have had some seasonings not on the list, but nothing super noticeable.

I'm getting my body fat measured on Wednesday, so I'm cutting out majorly sodiumeque foods. It's not a big concern since most people's major sodium intake is from packaged food, which I'm not eating on this diet. But, I probably took in a ton of sodium on cheat day, so I need to flush it out times a billion so I don't carry Cheat Day Belly Bloat into my body fat measuring. Anyway.