Run, Kick Butt, Roller Coaster, Run

I haven't posted in days so quick rundown:

Thursday-3 miler, so so run.

Friday- Used that Jillian Micheals DVD again. Level 2. Kicked my butt. Again. I was sore all weekend and honestly, I'm still sore. I've got to learn the trick to either warming up better or warming down better or I can't use that workout.
Ruined workout with: a plate of spanikopita and hummus. Movie popcorn (Wanted: extreme violence and humor at the same time. Liked it.) and then tequila. Dos Margaritas gigantica.

Saturday- no workout, except the checkbook. Had to spend money on lots of things. Okay only had to spend money on food but spent money anyway on a new grill (ours finally gave up and was shooting flames in directions it wasn't supposed to) a new backpack and some running singlets. And food. To make the running singlets necessary.

Sunday- worked in the yard for about 1 1/2 hours then drove and hour to the combo amusement/water park to meet the young one and her friend to supervise them on the roller coasters while the friend's dad took the little sister on kiddie rides. I sat out most of the rides. Instead I ate a piece of pizza and half a hamburger and fry platter. Considering we were there all day I guess that's not so bad. I didn't have the funnel cake, or the root beer float, or even the soft serve. I TRIED to actually swim some. I really need to get on the ball with that or I'll never be able to do that triathlon.
joe got to ride 40 miles of dirt and gravel. and he got beat by a girl. only this time it wasn't me. I missed him at the park but he needed the ride and Sarah was happy to have him along.

Monday- another 3 miler, oh so much more of the same ol same ol. It was warm today but not horribly humid. I just wasn't feeling it. Never walked but it was slower than usual pace. My legs are tired.

Quickies

Once again, it's not what you think.

Workout recap:
Monday-rest day, work was hectic and legs were tired from Sunday
Tuesday- short bike ride that for some reason felt brutal. We rode MTBikes from the house. I had to ride my old hardtail that doesn't fit right since mine will be in the shop for at least a week. We rode from our house down to a park and rode the hiking trails which turned out to be a pretty cool ride. Total mileage less than 5. So why was I tired, sweaty and out of breath? Hills baby. Nothing but.
Wednesday- took the dogs for a walk after an unfortunate Chinese dinner. Ugh, crab rangoon are the devil. Don't know how far or how long-didn't pay attention. I took the dog in better shape and less controlable. Got snapped at for not keeping her out of everyone else's way. Dumb dog. We ran some, walked some, investigated a drainage ditch. All good.

And it cooks too

Sometimes I cook. Okay, I cook a lot. My hubby says that's why he's chubby but I think it's the burgers and beer. Sometimes I cook healthy, but more often I cook what's convenient. I had a friend tell me she's finally figured out why Southerners don't eat a lot of fresh produce unless they grow it themselves. It just doesn't keep well here. I never knew there was a difference but apparently in less humid climates...you can actually keep produce more than 2 days without rot setting in. Who knew?

Last year I tried the garden thing but the sun wasn't right in the spot I picked and the damn squirrels ate almost everything. This year I planted tomatoes (way too many of them it seems), jalapenos, sweet onions and squash. In my front yard. Jalapenos are being slowly harvested, tomatoes are on vine but still green. I don't know what to think of the onions, they still seem awful scrawny and the squash...well I think wild bunnies are eating them. What I do have is a butt load of basil. So I made Pesto. I've never made pesto before. I didn't like the flavor so I started messing with it and added a whole roasted sweet pepper and a couple of hunks of sundried tomato. That was better.

For dinner last night we made flat bread chicken pesto pizzas out of it. We spread the fresh pesto on the flat bread, sprinkled a few garlic roasted tomatoes, grilled chicken bits and lots o parmesan on top and baked them until toasty. Yum. I'm sure that despite the copious amount of olive oil in the pesto-this pizza has got to be healthier than ordering Papa Johns (as much as I love a big meat pie)
Then we ruined it with Key Lime Pie for dessert.

The oldest offspring was at the house for dinner and a late birthday (hers) and a late father's day celebration. Not really a celebration- we didn't buy her anything as she's in the process of changing abodes and we want to get her something she doesn't have to move twice. HE got more tools. With all she's learning about set construction-she's much better at buying useful tools than I have been. Maybe he'll even use these to build me something. That would be nice. She did mention (twice at least) that she's now 21. Her father continues to ignore this as in his head he'd prefer she was 12, still thought boys have cooties (sorry Jeremy) and had no intention of growing up. Ever. Good luck with that dad.

Death by Dorito Dust

Joe found a tick crawling in the hair on his leg so he crushed it between fingers coated in orange dust from the doritos he was having for lunch. Bad day for the tick, cough cough.

The dorito break was a lunch al fresco beside our car at the parking lot at Camp Robinson. We were out for a bit of moutain biking. 18 miles of it. None of it all that fast but we had fun. The few times I've been out there we ride mostly one portion of the 30someodd miles of trail. Yucca, portapotty,10 bridges, outerloop, 5mile loop. Today we wanted to try some stuff we hadn't done so we went on airport, dead elvis, flatlands and can o corn. I've mentioned my confusion about the naming before so it comes as no surprise that I was curious to know if Flatlands was aptly named or a cruel trick. Of course it was a trick. I kind of liked it though. The roughest spot of the day was getting off Can o Corn (huh?) and deciding to ride a gravel road back to the car to get some eats and refill water bottles. Oh my what a road. Straight up. Forever. Or so it seemed. ugh. I was ready to ride over any rock garden to get off that road. At some point after lunch I noticed that my back end wasn't bouncing. Not my personal backside, my rear suspension. Dang. I don't know how long it had been like that but I had nothing. Not to dis riding hard tail, my first bike was a hardtail I'm just sayin that I remember why I wanted to get rid of it. No control, bouncing all over, beating the crap out myself. Fun. I said a while back that Porta Potty is my favorite trail out there but I'm having to rethink it since once I broke a seat post on it and this time I lost my rear on it.
I crashed last night after getting a little bit of hammock time and doing laundry, grocery shopping, cleaning the upstairs and making pesto and a dessert for tonight's dinner. I crashed hard. I think I might have needed help to bed since I fell asleep on the couch. I really have to find a way to relax more on the weekend.

Things Forgotten

I've forgotten the joy of the skating rink. I spent most of my childhood in one. Started skating for fun (as it was very popular then) when I was 6, really started going all the time when I was about 10. Got my first for cash under the table job at a rink at 14 and also started competing about a year before that. Worked and competed until about age 16 when I got a "real" job and pretty much stopped skating when my coach left town. Since then I've skated for fun. Even kept my 4 wheel skates for a long time but bought blades about 5 years ago. I love those things. But I don't use them enough. Thursday night the small one was invited to a skating party. I asked if it would be alright if I came and skated. You know, cause they're 12 and parents are well, embarrassing. She goes "yeah since you can skate it won't be so bad". What an endorsement. What I didn't think about was that we haven't replaced the blades she outgrew because she's been going ice skating instead so she wanted MY skates because the rentals were bad. Yuh. And then she just stood around talking to her friends. So I threatened to knock her down and take them. Yeah I know, my parenting skills need work. She wouldn't even let me have them back while they ate...oh god she'd have to go thru the trouble of taking them off and putting them back on!!!
Okay so I bide my time till the end of the party by putting up with the nasty brown rentals. That's okay. At the end of the party I got my skates back and did a few laps. Joy, rapture, freedom.
Last night I convinced Joe that the small one needs to learn to ride the bike better so we should go back to the river but I want to blade this time instead of ride. I'll keep up because I NEED a workout. I topped out somewhere about 13 mph or so along the River Trail on the NLR side by Cook's landing. We parked there not realizing that the trail had flooded and we had to do a short little loop to avoid it but all was good because lightening started to flash and it was raining by the time we got back to the car. It was pouring by the time we got to 4-30 and there was an accident on the other side with a truck sitting up on the embankment and someone running back to it from another car, it looked like 3 were involved. We tried to call 911 but when they transferred us to the State Police we got no answer. I hope someone else was calling so they got help fast.
Long story about absolutely nothing even longer.... I love skating. I wish it wasn't uncool. I wish the small one had what I did as a kid...a place to go, get exercise, mess around with your friends, hear good music (or bad) and a place I'd feel safe leaving her.

Short Sweet and to the Point

3 miles- avg pace (9:30 or so) Just easy breezy but sunny. 81 degrees felt really good standing still not so much after 2 miles.

Ahhhh the joy of Summer

Technically, Summer is still 5 days away. Today we are having a cold snap and it was only about 80 degrees when I went outside to run today. Ah.

3 mile run, comfortable but working pace.

Edit: Tonight we went on a short bike ride along the river with the small one. We really have to get her on the bike more often. We rode about 5-6 miles. I was totally shocked at the temperature. I wish I had a few more hours to spend outside-it is phenomenal tonight! Just about perfect.

Quit ur Whinin'

I realize that my post about my surprise party was a load of .....

So it didn't turn out as planned and got cut short by my boss, who happened to be carrying 3/4 of the guests in his car, who had to bail early because he broke his arm while farting around with one of my other colleagues in the parking lot. Yes these people have PhDs folks.
The real story should have been...
My husband planned a surprise party for me. Because he felt bad that my actual birthday was spent with me at work because I was leaving for a conference the very next morning and had important stuff to do. Because the evening was dedicated to the middle kid's graduation ceremony and then the oldest and her boyfriend catching up with the grandparents. My husband planned a surprise party for me. Not only planned it, had to plan it twice, and keep it a secret from me for weeks. This was no easy task as he says, it's hard to keep secrets from the person who keeps the schedule for everything. No easy task for a man who is the epitome of "why do today what you can put off till tomorrow" attitude. He enlisted friends to help him with addresses, got food from a 'fav' place and tried hard to make it special. That should have overshadowed all the other. So thanks Joe for giving me a special day.

Two Outs in One Tough Inning

This weekend was the District Champeenships for the small one's softball team. She missed the first game with the coaches blessing because of the conflict with my birthday party that had to be rescheduled from a non ball playing night. Her team lost. Saturday morning we missed the first game of the day but her Mark ( stepgrandpa) took her and he tells us she got a hit off to the grass that got caught unfortunately and adink and a walk. She's had a tough time adjusting to this new team and to the new coaching structure. She just turned 12 and all her teammates but one other girl are 13-14. She holds her own.
They played again at 3:00 so J and I had about 2 hours to get home from the CARTI ride, shower, change and get to the fields. We got there in time to see her play 3 more games because... they fought their way out of the loser bracket to face the team that put them there in the first place in the championship game. And they won. McKenna's shining moments of that game were 2 plays made in one inning when she was playing left field and caught 2 hard and fast balls that were headed out to pasture. Whew, those batters would NOT be crossing home plate this inning! Now because they had already lost once to this team, they had to beat them twice to win 1st place. The second game started off with the other team getting 3 runs right off the bat. It was tight though and the girls fought back hard. Our girls managed to tie it up with minutes to go and forced an extra inning. Our girls didn't get any runs so it was a matter of stopping the other team again but no cigar. They got one past the catcher who was working her tail off and our girls got 2nd place. Not too shabby. Congratulations Lakewood!
Oh yeah. I don't have any pictures. Ha

40, 62 and 90k. What do these #s have in common?

So I already blogged about my birthday and I thought the whole 20 minutes of attention it got on the actual date was good enough. My husband obviously didn't think so. He planned a surprise party for me, had it all lined up and ready to go when...the person who took his reservation for the location realized 2 days before the party that she had double booked. Poor thing had to scramble for another date, let everyone know and then rearrange all the plans including continuing to hide it from me. Well long story only a little longer, due to all the misunderstandings, or perhaps as a testament to how my "friends" really feel about me, several people either backed out due to the date change or said they'd come but didn't show up. We are going to be eating BBQ for at least another week there was so much leftover. Not to dis the people that did show...

Thanks Sarah and Aaron-2 of the bestest people on the planet, maybe even the universe

They got me this rockin cake. Apparently black icing was requested but the cake person said "that's just mean" so it was a pretty cake until my mom sent the black balloons and buzzard along with "over the hill" tableware and a big plastic grim reaper that said :

"Don't worry, I'm just here for the cake." hahaha

A few of my friends from work came and Jim from Joe's work. I got some nifty gifts including some fancy margarita makins and a cool hippy bag . 'The boy' got me an arm band for my new iPod. Joe booked the pavillion at Pinnacle State Park (twice, poor guy), the one by the Big Maumelle River and the fishing dock, not the one by the mountain. It's really nice.

We had BBQ from Famous Daves complete with awesome baked beans and cole slaw. And Beer. Lots of Beer. We will also have beer around the house for weeks to come along with the 4 gallons of sweet tea. I don't know how many friends my husband thinks I have. I don't have any more pictures because as artistically talented as my husband is at photography, he has never once taken a picture of me that I can say is really good. We don't even have wedding photos. Another case in proving this point is coming up.

That was the 40, so what about the 62? The 62 is for the morning following the party when we hauled our lazy butts out of bed in the midst of a thundershower to load our bikes up and drive to NLR Burns Park for the CARTI Tour de Rock mentioned in an earlier post. Okay, I have to say that though the rain was a bummer, it was so nice and cool for the first 40 or so miles of this ride, it was worth being wet. It would have been close to unbearable in the heat wave we've been having. There were policemen out at the big intersections of the race. Luckily there were really only a couple of those but it was so nice to have them there. Shout out to NLR police and the Sheriff Dept in Scott. The rest stops were awesome, at 48 miles or something like that there were the yummiest bananas!

This is at the start of the race and I have to tell you that the sea of people in front of us are the "advanced" riders that planned on hitting all 62 miles at a speed of over 20 mph. There was another sea behind us of riders either taking it slower or doing a shorter route.

Joe and I had planned on riding 50 but when we got to the halfway mark to turn, we decided we felt good enough to tackle the whole 62. At mile 51 I realized that I could have been done by now. Not that I was hurting or even really tired. I think I was bored. I started singing. Sarah would not have been so proud. I depend on her for the singing and I could start a song but I never could remember all the lyrics. During the last 15 miles we glommed on to a couple of groups and kept our speed up pretty good but eventually I'd look at Joe and go "you done?" and we'd fall off the back to just ride togther. When we got the bikes past the finish line (of which I do not have a picture, see comments above) Joe says hey, we went 64 miles not 62. Here's the proof. Avg speed with pee stops, banana breaks and general slow pedal zones: 16.7 mph

After we loaded out bikes back on the car and hit the bathrooms to clean up a bit, we headed over to the afterparty. Thanks to all those folks who grilled chicken breasts and loaded buns with pulled pork. I couldn't stand the thought of any more BBQ but the chicken was phenom. I was so hungry and thirsty!

Joe ended up raising about $530 for CARTI from people he works with. I ended up with $0 since I am not allowed to solicit at work and you already heard about my "friends". Next year I think I'll hit up McKenna's school mate's parents. I saw at least one of them on the ride and I think as a group we could really get some interest in contributions. 90K. That's how much the paper said CARTI raised from the ride. That's a lot of dough for a really great cause. Way to go organizers. Hey Darron!

I don't have any pictures of myself except for one nice butt shot of my CHAINWHEEL shorts. It could be any chick with a big ass. But Joe got about 6 pictures that look pretty much like this:dork

Jillian Micheals Kicks Butt, Mine

So from reading my posts about my Tuesday night "Biggest Loser" obsession, it's easy to tell that I think Jillian kicks tail. So the other night while wandering around Best Buy with the man, I saw this DVD on the shelf and for $13, I thought heck-why not?

ALLEGEDLY this workout starts out at Level 1 and goes to Level 3. I should have caught on quickly that I SHOULD have done my own warm up. I have issues when I am not properly warmed up and I'm almost always sore if I don't. 3 workouts x 20 minutes. I made it 20 minutes. Now I like to think of myself as fairly active. I'm no athlete but I think I probably get out more than the average American woman my age. Jillian holds no punches-she flat out says that if you're only going to give 20 minutes it better be a tough damn 20 minutes lard ass. Okay so I added the lard ass but come on! This is actually a pretty tough workout if done right. I think the dumbbells I chose to use were a little on the heavy side for what this called for. I used 8lbs and I think 5 may have felt light but would have been enough for a good workout especially if I had actually done more than the first 20 min workout.

This is not warm fuzzy workout. The encouragement phases are what you expect from her...not "you're doing great! rest if you need to" It was come on, I've trained 400 lb people who can do jumping jacks, you can do it so don't listen to people who say you can't. You have to work for it if you want change. Right On Jillian.

Last Minute Fundraising

my CARTI Tour de Rock page


So for those who don't know what CARTI is, it's an acronym for Central Arkansas Radiation Therapy Institute. I think I got that right. They provide state of the art, cutting edge radiation therapies for cancer treatment. They serve people from all over the country, the world even, not just Arkansans. Personally, my local circle of loved ones hasn't had need of their services, but one day we might and I will be glad to know that I or someone I love doesn't have to go far to get the best treatment. Though my local loves haven't needed them, some very special people that I hold dear have needed the types of services that CARTI offers and man am I glad they found a place that could give them what they needed that was close to them. My lack of personal experience doesn't mean I haven't heard tell that they not only offer the best medical treatment but the staff knows that treating a cancer patient's disease is only part of the battle. They work with families, loved ones and the patients to make sure the are as comfortable and as stable as possible.
I know it's only 3 days away- yeah I KNOW I waited too long blah blah blah, cough up some dough and I'll try to post a good story (maybe even pictures) of me torturing myself in the Arkansas heat.

An actual workout posting

Bike ride to the bus stop- probably less than 4 miles, I forgot to set my odometer. Rolling hills.

Upper Body
w/u/ with gravitron at 65 lbs 1 x 8 each dips and pullups
reset to 80lbs 2 x 8 dips, 1 x 5 pullups ouch
bench press 3 x 8 x 55? once again I was in a postition not to know what the bar weighs-I'm guessing
incline bench press 3 x 8 x 45
tricep pulldown split rope 3 x 8 x 30
cable chest fly 3 x 8 x 20 each side
seated cable row 3 x 8 x 50
dumbbell pec fly 2 x 8 x 15
db fly 3 x 8 x 12

I'll have to ride home but that route ends with the nasty climb up Mountain Drive. Ugh. In the heat. At the end of a long day.

I'm having issues and I need more food. I'm having difficulty cutting back, it's hard.

70 Mile Weekend

So since the title of this stupid thing is a reference to fitness- I should probably post some fitness crap.

1) I forgot to mention my 40th birthday present from my sweet hubby. A few weeks ago I was having all kinds of issues with my running companion-the very cheap, very light and very convenient iPod shuffle. Turns out it was jelly in the on/off switch. Don't ask. Anywho, I got it all cleaned up and working fine but apparently I had bitched enough. I got a new iPod for my bday. Not just any iPod, but for the technophobic non music listener that I am, I got the mother lode. A new Nano. Ingraved no less. Now my man isn't one to whisper sweet nothings. He's not a gooey romantic. So the ingraving should not have caught me off guard.

"Quit whining, Run FASTER!"

Yup, that's my baby.

2) After a solid week of next to no real exercise, we hit the bikes hard this weekend. Those who know us know we don't train. Ever. We just sort of decide to do stuff and hope for the best. I've been riding my bike on the trainer a lot more than I ride it out on the street so hopefully the winter hasn't been a total loss. Joe wants to do the Tour de Rock 50 miler next weekend. I had a month's notice and one of those weekends was a loss to Boston. So we packed all the training into this weekend. Smart huh?
Saturday: long loop on the River Trail, starting at Cajun's to the end of the trail in NLR and back but we threw in Ft. Roots each way so it made it just under 30 miles at about 15 mph average. I haven't done any hills in a LONG time. I chose to pick up the phone and call Granny (gear) the first trip up Ft. Roots but that was too easy. I was trying my darndest to catch Joe by the top but it wasn't happening. I middle geared it up the second time and was closer to him but he still beat me.

Sunday: The idiots went back out starting under the Big Dam Bridge on the LR side and riding to Scott and back. We stopped at the Stonelinks Golf Club for Gatorade. Thanks Sarah and Aaron for introducing us to the saving grace of the coldest gatorade for miles around. Just a thumbs up-the folks there are so super nice. Total mileage- just over 40, 15.7 mph pace avg.

Sunday was also the day that my mother pointed out that my daughter, who is still at least an inch shy of being as tall as I am, has longer legs already. Like I don't know that I have stumps. I'm happy for her and still hoping for another good growth spurt-I'd like to see her taller than I am so she doesn't have shop in petites her whole life. Of course the little snotbag started comparing and going "my legs almost come up to your waist" blah blah blah As if being a tweenager hasn't given me enough reason to throttle her senseless? Not that I would. I'm just sayin'.

And I'm Not Even a Baseball Fan?!

After the panic of last week, we finally got on our way to Boston on Friday the 30th. This was following several days of togetherness and happy events a la graduation, birthday and visit from family.
The trip as a whole probably deserves about 4 entries but I'm going to highlight one night. Fenway Park. Now we had looked at buying game tickets as soon as we knew we were going to be in Boston. There were none to be had by conventional means. It seems the best bet is to show up on the MORNING of game night and stand in line for the few tickets they hold back. Hmm. Probably not an option for us since we're supposed to be working. Then we get the invitations for a party hosted by a company that is well known for throwing the bestest shindigs during our convention. This year it's at Fenway Park. Minus the actual game of course but still. We got shuttled to the park and into the newer parts of the stadium for a buffet of hot dogs, chicken thighs and BBQ. Uh yeah, we're from Arkansas and we sure as hell don't go to Massachusetts for BBQ. So we had wieners of course. And beer. There was an open bar. All night long. Here are the happy people enjoying their free beer, ball park dogs and a great view.

While some of our group was down in the bowels of the park in the batting cages, Joe and I got a guided tour of some of the park. The lead in shot above is from atop the Green Monster. I'd love to be able to watch a game from up there, what a view.
We got to sit in these seats---from 1937. I think I got that right. They are the second oldest seats in the house, the oldest being from 1912. That's right, this ballpark has been in use for 96 years. I learned a lot of Fenway trivia that night, maybe it will come in handy someday. Since I'm not a baseball fan. Am I making any real fans jealous yet?



Toward the end of the tour we got to go over to sit in the press box. That was interesting. The top row of seats in the box has an obstructed view. So much so that they put in monitors because you really can't see the field. That's where they stick the press from the Yankees organization. Ha.


We really had a blast in Boston and if we didn't have a list of other places to visit, we'd be going back soon. It took the small one a whole day and half before she decided that she wanted to be "real smart" so she could go to school there or move there when she grows up.

I only got one workout in the entire trip, a 3 mile run along the harbor. But we did an incredible amount of walking. I felt like the only time I wasn't on my feet was on the plane and when I was sleeping. Ouch. The shuttles for the convention were so slow I walked to and from each day. Sometimes twice a day. I got some really great blisters from my "work appropriate" shoes. Actually even my flip flops were wearing on me with all the walking we were doing. After Joe and the small one left for home, (they went home before I did) I went on a 2 hour walk with one of my colleagues after I found it she'd only seen the hotel and the convention center. It didn't turn out to be the tour we started out on because we got a little turned around while chasing a path that wasn't marked well, but we enjoyed it nonetheless. If we hadn't gotten lost we wouldn't have met the nice policeman who told us about the traffic jam we witnessed and how if we came back to that spot the next day, we might see Bruce Willis cause he's filming a movie. The trailers and big light rigs were snarling traffic. And we made it back to our hotel unscathed.
Joe has already posted on his blog about the great transportation/cycling/pedestrian issue but I'd like to say that man did we run into some helpful people. Not just the service folks, I mean Joe's right, it's a town that makes a huge living off tourism so you expect decent service, but we got help from averageguyonthestreet too. We had good food and a really good time there. And a history lesson via the Freedom Trail but that adventure is worthy of its own post. But on the reference to Food. Maurizios in the North End right on the corner of Paul Revere Square. It was without doubt, the best meal of our trip. Because as we all know, It's all about the food!

Ham and cheese on foccacia bread- And salmon with a shrimp cocktail, yummmmm. We were just in time to catch the end of Sunday Brunch !