Shred Day 18

... is done. *phew!*

The bee in my bonnet

Shred Day 17 is done. Thirteen days left. Fourteen days till I leave for the East Coast.

And now:

This workout is killing me. I crawl to the fan each day and die for about 15 minutes after I'm done. I feel like I lose about an hour of ultra-fine motor skill function each time.

But.

I can do this. I know I can. I know I'm capable of powering through this and finishing strong in time for my vacation. I won't be bikini ready. I never hoped for that. But I'll be strong. I'll be able to walk the beach, pound the pavement in New York, dance the night away and fearlessly face down a lobster roll. That's my goal.

And since I know I can do this, it's got me wondering: What else can I do if I put my mind to it?

A friend in London is considering starting P90X. Ninety days is just thirty days three times over. I can do that. (*gasp* *wheeze*)

My cousin has invited me to run the Seattle half-marathon in November. I've never run a race in my life. But Runner's World has a nine-week training program.

If I start P90X the week after I get back from vacation and start the serious half-marathon training nine weeks out from the race, there would be 27 days of overlap in the training. I'd be exhausted.

But I think I could do it.

I think I'd feel like a ...

Tough Mudder.

Which is what I want to be able to do next year in Seattle.

This may be the jumpstart I need to kick my butt into gear to tackle something hard, something worth bragging about.

I'll let you know what I decide.

I've got a bunch of beach time and lobster to tackle first.

Shred Day 16 & 4.2 miles

Done

8.4 miles this week

35.4 miles this month

269.4 this year

walk

I haven't done today's Shred yet, but I will. Did day 14 yesterday. Walked around the lake today & discovered, with the help of my handy new GPS-enabled phone, that I've been short-chanhing my mileage by a fifth of a mile ea h timeout walk the lake. This may mean a re-tallying of the year's mileage. I haven't decided on that yet ...

4.2 miles today.

4.2 miles this week

31.2 miles this month

265.2 miles this year

Shred Days 13 & 14

Are done. I really despise how chipper Jillian Michaela is. Conversely, I've been eating myself out of house and home .... No matter how much I eat, I'm still hungry. Dang ...

shred day 12

Done.

Also: since I for back from vacation, I have lost 2.4 pounds. From my super-high freak weight spike in April, I'm down 12.2 pounds. Still nowhere near what I was last spring, but considering where I was a couple short months ago, I'll take it ...

shred, walk

I took my break in the Shred workouts a day sooner than I had planned, & Tuesday just turned into a big "comfy," lazy blessing, complete with birthday cake & ice cream on the back patio, in fellowship with neighbors, in the perfume of a very flowery back yard.

I did Day 10, Level 1 of the Shred yesterday, & I began Level 2 today. Ouch. *whimper*

I started walking again yesterday, too - 4 miles around the lake, & then a mile or so in an unintended late-night jaunt to the grocery store ... so 5 miles. I'll do the tallies later. Gotta get ready for work. If I can raise my arms over my head.

*LATER*

5 miles this week
27 miles this month
261 miles this year

239 miles remaining

Shredding

Days 8 and 9 are on the books. That break after Day 10 is looking ever-more appealing ... we'll see. Still no walking or running this week. I'm beginning to think that this afternoon's mixing of meds was a bad idea.

Day 7

Shredded. Boom. I'm getting the knack of these push-ups ...

Shred, Day 6

is done. I'm considering taking a one-day break after Day 10. I almost took a break today, and afterward, I kinda wished I had ... it was a rough sprint to get ready for work and to get to the office in time ...

Shred Day 5

... is done.

Unfortunately, I'm high as a kite on cold pills, cough syrup and nasal spray (none of which will interact. I know what you were thinking), and when those things wear off, I'm miserable as heck. Can't wait for this mess to clear up. I want to get back to running and not feeling loopy/wobbly/dizzy. Gosh, that'll be a great day.

Not much walking (but still Shredding)

I'm down with a funky allergy attack, which is leaving me feeling pretty much spent, though I'm making a point to stick to the Shred workouts. I hurt less, so that's good. I didn't take breaks during pushups. Even better. I plan to walk tonight after work ... we'll see.

Days 2,3 and 4 are on the books and done. (yay!)

I did go to Portland yesterday, where I meandered around the Pearl District some more and then happily lost myself in the International Rose Test Gardens. Beautiful. I'm going on the conservative side and calling the day 3 miles.

3 miles this week.
22 miles this month.
256 miles this year.

244 miles remaining.

And thanks to Eric, a mentor from the UW/CV days, for possibly being this blogs sole reader. :) I'm glad to hear about G. As soon as my body quits getting exhausted at the slightest flap of a butterfly's wings and my lungs quit feeling like they've been scrubbed with steel wool, I'll get back on the running wagon.

Foot-sore and heart-happy

I keep forgetting to add the distances I walked in the airport(s), too ...

We'll say, between the two trips, it was about a half-mile. (.5)
Saturday night in Portland, I got about 4 miles in, walking in the Pearl District before settling in at the Deschutes brewery/pub and having a very interesting conversation over a couple glasses of very good beer ...

So.

4.5 miles.

19 miles last week
19 miles this month
253 miles this year

I'M MORE THAN HALF-WAY THERE!!

247 miles remaining


Also: I'm in the midst of renewed determination to get back on the healthy eating weight-loss wagon, which (for me) means a return to the OLD Weight Watchers POINTS system. It's how I lost 50 pounds; it's how I plan to bring things back under control. That began today. I'm armed with two new Hungry Girl cookbooks to help me along the way.

AND

I began Jillian Michaels' 30-Day Shred today. I have 33 days 'til I see my family in Rhode Island. Bring on the smaller clothes.

So: 30-Day Shred, Day 1, Level 1.

Oh, boy ...

Crap. I knew this was going to happen - that I'd forget to keep track while I'm on vacation.

Let's see:

Friday: Took the dog for a walk. I think that was about a mile (1)
Saturday: Took the dog on a much longer walk, and it took a while for him to forgive me. Two miles (2)
Saturday: Ran my 5-mile route around my parents' place. (5)
Sunday: I don't think I did any walking this day.
Monday: I know I walked to Hastings (we'll call that ... um ... .5 total, round trip). Had lunch with Brooke. Went to Dad's wound therapy appointment with him. Went for pie with Mom. Watched a thunder storm on the back deck and got an AMAZING picture of the lightning forking across the sky. So. Beautiful. (.5)
Tuesday: Birthday! I decided to take a walking tour of the neighborhood where I grew up. Either I've become the Jolly Green Giant since I left, or everything there shrank. It (all) used to be much larger. What happened? The hill that used to terrify me when I was on my bicycle? It's barely and incline now. The rock wall in my neighbor's yard where we used to hide when we played Hide and Seek with the neighborhood kids? It's shrunk down to the point that it wouldn't hide a Yorkie now. the only things that got bigger were the trees. Goodness. The tree Mom and Dad planted for Matt is absolutely enormous. I wandered through the park where I used to play, around the subdivision where we used to deliver newspapers, up the hill past the public elementary school where I went for one year and past the junior high school that's home to the Terrifying Sledding Hill where Matt almost broke his nose one Christmas Day. I'm going to call that hour-long meandering two miles. (2)
Wednesday: Laramie! EM and I walked all over downtown Laramie, toward Washington Park, and almost once completely around before my altitude exhaustion caught up with me, and I begged to spend the rest of the time just sitting on the (beautiful) grass while we chatted about various things, including my neuroses about various ex-boyfriends. I'm calling that day's wanderings about two and a half miles. (2.5)
Thursday: Laramie! More downtown wandering and some reconnecting with the UW campus, but not as much. I think I'll call the whole day about one and a half miles. (1.5)
Friday: No walking (yet) today. I've had a wonderful morning with KJW and have been working on updating photos and blogs and such while Mom naps. Shopping and visiting is in the forecast for this afternoon, as is an appointment with Dad's wound therapy people.

OK. So tally time. 14.5 miles since I've been on vacation. That's not a bad vacay, I guess.

I haven't gained any weight, but I certainly haven't been shy about eating, either. It IS vacation, after all ... :)

14.5 miles this week
14.5 miles this month
248.5 miles this year

251.5 miles remaining.

Something's still wrong (I still hurt)

I knew why my legs were lead-weight tired (the toning workout I did just before hitting the treadmill; but it was good that I did it before instead of after, because I never would have done it otherwise, and I theorize that running after will minimize the pain in my legs that usually follows that workout ... anyway ...). But my feet are still painful, and the blisters aren't healing. I keep taping them, so they don't get rubbed/irritated nearly as much, but ... owie.

Due to very, very tired legs, I could only run 2 miles last night. The rest was walking (logged 4.75 miles total on the treadmill).

9.75 miles this week
70.75 miles for the month (FINAL)
234 miles for the year

266 miles remaining