Disaster. About a mile into my run last night something happened in my left hip. I limped back to the car, and the internet diagnosis is bursitis. ow ow ow ow. So ibuprofen, no running until it heals, and really slow going on stairs. Damn. At least I can walk - slowly…
I am going to rest for a couple of days and then try out the machines at the gym. Maybe rowing or biking would be ok. I can also do upper body weight training. This is too new a habit, I can’t let it stop now or it might all slip away again.
I am very sad about this. I knew it was too good to last.
So I am amusing myself by planning my mini-vacation to Chicago in 2 weeks. This week is Thanksgiving, which means travel to the parents’ home, lots of home cooking and baking (aargh) and next weekend I am taking off for a four day road trip just because I can.
Considering where my head was in June, when EXLB dumped me in a particularly mean and childish way, I am very proud of myself right now. The last few months of that thing were very hard, and I take full 50% responsibility for that. Ok, well, done. As they say, it is called a breakup because it is broken.
Immediately I started exercising, and set a goal to be able to run for 5km without stopping. I can do that now! And to my surprise, it was fun getting here. I enjoy the running and it has become a good habit. I feel great, even though I am still a fat middle-age woman I feel svelte and strong. (Maybe svelte-er and strong-er). I am eating much much healthier and my tastes are changing….I had a cookie yesterday and didn’t like it…WHOA what is that about?
I finally did the motorcycle course, something I have been talking about for years and was too afraid of failure to try. Well, it was hard, but also so much fun. I felt like a kid playing as I learned all these new skills and could see myself actually doing it!
Overall this has been a great summer, and I hope I can carry this through the dark days of winter. The hiking trail right now is particularly beautiful as the leaves change colour, but the days are getting shorter and winter is coming. That’s ok, that will bring snowshoeing and maybe this year, downhill skiing! (Although Son #2 last night took his life in his hands by suggesting I think about lawn bowling ‘like the other old people’…just wait till he gets home for Thanksgiving…lol)
Thanks to everyone for your encouragement….I hope I can give back as much as I am getting from this place!
I ache. Legs, arms, bum - 7 hours on a itty bitty motorcycle going around in circles. I have never had so much fun IN MY LIFE!!!!
I am so glad I have improved my fitness or I might be road kill. The course started with an hour of pushing each other across a parking lot - no engines, just muscle power. So I pushed, someone pushed me, repeat, yada yada yada….then we were allowed to turn on the machines and it was just SO MUCH FUN (did I say that already?) Yay for no snow. Cold though, damn northern ontario climate. I came home at lunch for my ski pants…lol
It’s 7:30 and I am going to collapse in front of the tv. Thank goodness Son #1 thinks he has to pay me back for borrowing the car and is going to walk the dog later.
Did I mention how much fun this is???
I continue to struggle with the device that is the scale. My measurements are changing, my clothes fit, I can do things I couldn’t do 4 months ago, and still the numbers barely move at all. I have started viewing it like the lottery - completely governed by the goddess of chance.
Fine.
This weekend I am taking the beginners’ motorcycle training course. I have a shiny new helmet, and got my license and paperwork settled out today. I am very excited, this is something I have always wanted to do. Only downside - the weather station is predicting SNOW! I am not making this up. It is early but not unheard of to have snow this time of year. Of course it just makes for a miserable day or two, then warms back up again. But, STILL.
I DID IT!! 101 km in the month of Sept! YAY ME!!! Not fast, but determined!
So far:
June = 45.56 km, 10:45/km
July = 63.93 9:49/km
Aug = 78.67 9;05/km
Sept = 101.13 km, 9:15/km
WOO HOO
The one bad thing about this hotel is that the room comes with a scale, ironically the very same one I have at home. According to that device I have added exactly 2 lbs in the last 4 days. Might be true - monthly bloating, and although I don’t feel I have been out of control I have been eating in restaurants and food courts so the food is heavier and fattier that I would normally have. I am not going to panic, it is all over and I am on my way home.
The trade show weekend is going very very well. The booth is drawing in lots of people, I was able to arrange to have dinner with my sister and some friends, and the hotel is very nice. I have been eating well, and have not joined the groups heading out on the town each evening. I went for a one hour bike ride Thurs, travelled here, did the treadmill thing on Fri, took yesterday off and will try the treadmill again after we shut down our booth this evening. By the 30th, I will have logged over 100km in September wunning - I would say 50% running (slowly, oh so slowly) and 50% power walking. I never, ever thought I would be able to say anything like that.
The Toronto Marathon is today, and this morning I walked over to the finish line and watched the 1/2 marathon run. All shapes and sizes cranked it over the course, and the marathoners were blowing by in their own lane at the same time. I have no desire to race, but I would like to think that I had the ability to cover the distance. I am going to spend the next month getting better at covering 5km at running speeds, and then start the ‘from 5k to 8k’ training plan for my nike ipod thingy from podrunner.com. Maybe that will get me through the winter even if I am mostly forced onto the boring treadmill.
I should be getting caught up on the tremendous backlog of work I am facing but I can’t make myself do it. I am causing big problems for myself, I need to get myself back to the grindstone.
Wine is definitely not my friend. More a frenemy. I like it and all, but I had 2 glasses last night and immediately puffed up again. It also did not help the insommnia. Skinny healthy people only have alcohol on special occassions, right? A two hour phone call should not be classified as a special occassion.
Got up early this morning and went for a 40 minute bike ride (10km, according to googlemaps) before work. Although I am not a morning person by any stretch of the imagination, I must say I did feel really good for the rest of the day. So much so that while still floating in the cloud of endorphins I agreed to buy a new car. I’ll go arrange financing tomorrow and if all goes according to plan I will have a new Honda FIT by next week. I am a bit worried about insurance rates, but other than that I am pretty excited.
Then I am going to plan a road trip to meet a friend in Chicago for a weekend at a fancy hotel. I need a change of scenery and that would be just the perfect break. (I have completely abandoned the ‘get control of the finances’ plan).
Now I am going to bed early - another new habit I am trying to develop - so I can force myself out into the cold morning air again tomorrow.
Dagnabit, the scale is FINALLY moving in the right direction
but v e r y s l o w l y. Seems to me it went UP a lot faster.
Still working hard and feeling better about myself. I need, need, need to have a better self-image than I have had for the last few years. Since moving here, I have really struggled with feeling out of my element, unattractive and unfocused. All of that is starting to fade.
Exercising again is so important to changing this thought pattern. If I am the kind of person who can make her body do all these wondrous things, then, I can do anything. Also, being back on my own, sans man, sans offspring, has given me lots of room to eat healthy on my own terms. In my experience, men are fattening! For all sorts of reasons.
Hey, I know this. I know that being an active person is healthy, in all dimensions, and it makes me feel fantastic. I am almost ready to face the gym…torture because there are so many acquaintances there and I feel on display…like anyone is doing anything but obsessing about their own appearance.
Speaking of gyms, the last time I was there I was watching a ‘kettle boot camp’ class. OMG it looks so dangerous - they were throwing those heavy things from hand to hand! I would be terrified of a broken foot. I wonder if steel-toed shoes are mandatory?
PS - 6km 48:19 after work