#42 Exercise: I think my watch is a fake

Last Wednesday, I proudly hit the snooze from 6:30 to 7:20 in the morning, before I finally pried myself out of bed for a morning run. Less than a quarter mile in, I forget how to get off a curb, and land hard. On my phone! (I've had it a month). I've been using it as a timer for my intervals, and to time my fixed run (only 1.5 miles at this point).

Scratched but alive, me and my phone get up and continue for the rest of the workout. I even do weights that night! (The  reason I was running in the morning was missing my Tuesday night workout, but due to cooler weather, I might try to continue it.) However, Thursday I make my way to the store to get a watch.

The Timex brand seems to have good reviews for sports watches, so I pick their "Marathon" brand. In my ignorance, I think a split/lap functionality means it's good for intervals. Wait, no, it's for timing the miles within a marathon!

Friday I was going to run, but I forgot the sports bra, so I ended up using the elliptical, and did the run Saturday. At this point, I'm two days behind schedule. However, I spend an hour on Saturday trying to find the manual for my watch (none came with it). Timex apparently doesn't remember carrying this model, nor does it have any configured this way. Interesting. Using the other Ironman X Lap manuals as a guide, I realize-- my watch is missing all kinds of features, like, REPEATING A TIMER.

So, now every time I want to repeat a 1-minute interval, I have to reset the timer. I also don't have the option of a 2-minute timer, it just goes straight from 1 minute to 3!

Perhaps this is why it was on sale? Should I try to return it?

#42 Exercise: I will Run a 10K

I'm nowhere near as fit as many of my friends, and by that I mean most weeks I'm lucky to move more than it takes to get to the bus stop. However, reality is creeping in: I drew a bad number in the healthy-genes lottery. My diet is mostly good, so exercise is my focus: lose weight, run, and get stronger.

So, I've decided to train for races as both carrot and stick. Carrot: when I finish, I can tell people I did it! Stick: if I don't, I have to admit failure. I already ran/walked a 5K back in May, and there aren't any more 5Ks soon, so I signed up for a 10K! In two months.

In order to do this in a reasonable time, I will have to train quite regularly. I will also have to live a little healthier (give up that occasional cigarette when out with friends, that third cocktail, all that). I also need to care for my knees, since they start to feel bad after about 5K.

I'm a week in, and so far, so good. Weights tomorrow, run Tuesday.

28 Days Later: Still No Soda

Almost a month into my 100-day challenge, I still sometimes crave diet pop but the habit feels like it is finally broken--I am now used to forgoing a Diet Coke at lunchtime. The hardest occassions are those 'special' ones where I am used to having a pop to accompany a treat, most notably the movie theater where water just does not go as nicely with a bucket of popcorn.

The hardest part about this challenge has been finding a decent substitute. Sometimes, water just doesn't cut it and I need a little flavor. I checked out the various iced teas and V8 juices available in my office's vending machines, only to scan the ingredients and see the first ingredients listed include high fructose corn syrup, violating Rule #35. However, I did discover the tasty yet crazy expensive kombucha tea, which is naturally effervescent.

Since June 30th, I've adhered strictly to Rule #36 (pats self on back). I've broken #35 a few times, such as the energy drink I chugged to make sure I stayed awake through a midnight movie on a school night (I'm old). And I still crave orange juice when hung over and fresh-squeezed-all-natural can be hard to come by when you're limited to what's available at 7-Eleven. Overall, I have definitely saved plenty of quarters that would have disappeared into vending machines. 72 days to go....

#37-41: A New Approach

So, so far I haven't been as good about this as I would like. I haven't been terrible, but as you may notice, there are no meal plans posted as of yet on here... because I don't have any. I've been better about what I eat, and was better about cooking at home for a couple weeks, and then that all kind of went down the drain.

One of the things I like to do every so often is go on a detox for a few days, a week, etc... I like being over-regimented. It's like hitting a reset button. It gets me back in the right mindset, remember, oh yeah, I feel so much better without eating all this processed crap... why don't I do this all the time?

So tomorrow I'm starting the Whole30 - it's a month long paleo detox plan. I have a feeling Poppy, being as into health and fitness as she is, may have some strong opinions on plans such as this. But the bottom like of it, which I always agree with, is to start eating whole foods. Only. The stuff I know I should do and know how to do but then forget how to do and man do those potato chips and diet coke and hot dogs sound awesome right now....

The one thing I will really miss I think is the legume restriction - especially as a former vegetarian I'm really into beans. That doesn't mean I can't ever have them again, just not for the next 30 days. I can do anything for 30 days.

Since this will be a shift from what I'm used to, I will definitely be creating some meal plans to keep me on track, so stay tuned for those as I figure out this new diet and develop my new eating strategies!

#61. Use Retinol - Again With I Get By With A Little Help From My Friends

Man, I just got into bed after Go-Go's wedding. Getting up...

Can I tell you though, I showed my ID to the bouncer at Five Star on draft night and he goes, "You are fucking kidding me."

Health #41. Summer heat.

I had gone many many days without the dreaded sugar. And then a heat wave hit. The kind of heat where you can't cook, don't want to eat and basically hate life. Enter ice cream. I had been talking about ice cream for a full 24 hours. Saying how I only want ice cream for dinner. One very hot night the roommate was heading to CVS for cigarettes and asked if i wanted anything. Ice cream. By the time he had walked back to our apartment, my dinner was sweating and soft and I ate half the pint before bed.
Ultimately, I don't regret having some ice cream on a very hot summer night. But it did start a downward spiral of sugar. I had the entire pint within 24 hours. And 2 visits to the Mexican bakery while at school. I had another stand off with the vending machine's Twix today. I imagine a wild west show down. I size the Twix up. My eyes squint as I read, 75 cents. D5. Timidly wiggle my digits near the pockets of my pants, where there's a george washington crumpled within. I extend my finger and poke the glass right in front of D5, "you're not worth my time, Twix. Get outta here!" Lifted my chin high, slowly rotated my shoulders and body towards the door and walked out, hearing imaginary and scary-as-shit spurs clinking as they hit the ground with each step.

#61. Use Retinol - I Get By With A Little Help From My Friends

Just got back from volunteering at Pitchfork, showered and in bed on the internets and Biggie's post just popped up on my Google Reader. Getting up to put on the goddamned retinol...

I'm doing it pretty regularly, I think I've missed two nights when I was super tired. Which I am now. Getting up, though.

Back2_6pack Health #41. Food Log

I had a concussion. To heal a concussion you sit in a quiet, dark, cool room for as long as possible. I think I made it a week before going stir crazy. You cant read, you can't watch tv, and you definitely can't exercise. I use exercise as a mood-booster. Without exercising, I can be very unpleasant to be around. I got very sad and since my brain wasn't quite working properly, I started eating a ton of junk food. Take-out, cookies, brownies, ice cream, anything that would temporarily boost those serotonin levels that had dropped since the concussion. And it became a habit.
A few friends and I pinky swore on my formerly broken and currently disfigured pinky to start being healthier. Here is my journey to regain my six-pack stomach.

The quest started off fantastic. I bought well-planned mealsat the grocery store. For about a week I kept a food log. Each day had almost the same foods throughout. The log went something like this: 1.5 cups of coffee, 1 egg over easy+ 2 pieces of toast. romaine lettuce salad+cashews olive oil and pepper. 1 glass lemon-ginger-echinacia juice. handful of blueberries, TraderJoes vegetable soup. Vanilla yogurt with blueberries. Multiply this by about 5 days.

I traveled up to my family's lake house for the 4th of July. My parents have stocked the place with the wonder ingredients for rootbeer floats and smores. I fell to temptation. Deep. We had stayed in Michigan for less that 24 hours and I had consumed 3-5 smores and 2-3 rootbeer floats. Wah-wah.
Ok, so that happened. Mistakes happen. I can get back on track again. Maybe the rule is, I have to eat healthy in Illinois. Out of state = anything goes.

I have been doing pretty well since the 4th. Yesterday I was tempted to go to the delightfully cheap (seriously, a gigantic chocolate cupcake for 80 cents!) Mexican bakery, but I stayed strong. And today I won in a stare down with the vending machine's Twix Bars.

I've been able to exercise and since we practice in a very hot practice space, I've been sweating off this unwanted dough overlay on my stomach. I am already regaining some definition.
Did you hear that? That's the first can of this sixpack being cracked open.

#35-36: No more soda or artificially sweetened beverages

I became a Diet Cokehead back in college. As a non-coffee drinker, it has become my standard caffeine fix. I have no problem throwing back a can first thing in the morning if I need a jump-start to my day. The crazy thing is, when I first started drinking diet pop, I didn't even like the taste--it was metallic and chemical-ish and weird to me--but I forced myself to get used to it until I grew to tolerate, then even enjoy it. Oh, the things a silly young girl will do to avoid empty calories.

I've seen enough reports out there to know that diet pop is not good for me--the fake sugar can cause our bodies to crave real sugar, giving us the urge to binge later in the day. Not to mention who knows what those lab-created additives are doing; if I drink too much diet pop I end up with a splitting headache. That cannot mean anything good.

While giving up pop, it made sense to also include #35 which is to avoid any artifically sweetened or sugar-filled beverages and stick to 100% fruit juice. I don't drink too much of that stuff except when I am really hung over and craving a truckload of Vitamin Water, but I do enjoy freshly squeezed juice. It also seemed like a good idea because when I eventually find myself fiending for pop at the vending machine, I will not be able to turn to other crap that's not good for me either. So now it's just me and my trusty Nalgene water bottle, a drawerful of green tea, and some serious self control on those hungover mornings.

# 37 - 41: Stop Eating Like Crap

I'm combining all of these steps together because I feel like they all go hand in hand. This is already something I've been doing the last few weeks, and I think this is a great way to keep the ball rolling and maybe get some support/motivation from others.

The frustrating part about it is that I know how to eat well. I've been doing it for years. I recently ended a 3-year stint as a vegetarian, mainly because it was getting harder and harder with my schedule and I lost my resolve. Weaksauce, I know. Nothing makes me happier than a gorgeous Sunday morning at the farmer's market loading my bag with way too many fruits and vegetables that I've never even heard of or will be able to eat in a week before the next market.

But over the last year or so, work, reverse-commuting, skating, singing and grad school have made it almost impossible (in my warped mind, at least) to fit in cooking and food management and still have time with friends and fit in some sleep in there too. Overall, I have always been terrible at self care. And I've started to pay for it in terms of energy level and waist size.

But grad school is over, my commute has gone from over an hour each way to 10 min, and my motivation to get back in shape and be a better skater has finally brought me back around to the kitchen and I couldn't be happier about it.

I think part of the tricky part is not only getting back in the kitchen, but being inspired about it. And also trying to find what works best as a lean yet appropriate diet for one who likes to fancy herself now as an "aspiring athlete". The last few weeks a lot of my inspiration has come from Poppy Spock's blog (she's amazing!), and it's been a great start so far.

So, here goes nothing! Hope some of you will help keep me motivated and honest!

#61. Use Retinol - Taking It On The Road

I successfully remembered to pack my tube of retinol for my ECDX trip, and Zombea nicely reminded me to put it on. I was also nicely reminded that one of my great vanities is looking a lot younger than I am, when Uni asked how old I was again and I said that I'd be forty four in August and the hipster boy who was roadtripping with us musingly said, My dad is forty six...

#61. Use Retinol - Removing Bottlenecks

So if I'm going to wear sunscreen every day, I guess I should actually go to the store and buy a new bottle of moisturizer with sunscreen to replace the bottle than ran out about three weeks ago. Achieving escape velocity from my house requires an unbelievable amount of energy, really it's something of a measure of how much I love skating. And I guess, publicly committing to something dumb.

#61. Use Retinol

For the next 100 days, I'm going to actually put the retinol cream that's in the tube in my bathroom on my face. Yeah. This is going to end world hunger. And it's not even on the list. That's how I roll.

Then I have to be good about sunscreen, don't I. So also I will actually put on sunscreen every day. That's a good thing to do, Kurt Vonnegut said so. Yes, I know it wasn't Kurt Vonnegut.

How This Got Started