Sunday, March 30, 2008

High Stakes Negotiations

Yesterday, Taz and Rainbow engaged in a little trade. He gave her a $5 bill and in return, she gave him a $10 bill.

Needless to say, I was concerned that she didn't understand the art of negotiating and that she'd agreed to a bad deal.

Then they told me the rest of the terms.

He agreed to be nice to her for a long, long time.

"Forever?" I inquired.

"Mom..." Rainbow crinkled her nose and shook her head slightly. "You know he couldn't be nice for that long."

Smart girl.

I think I'm going to slide Taz a $5 and see if I can get the same deal.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Update: Taz had to return the ten spot by noon the next day. Ah well. He tried.

Saturday, March 29, 2008

Rat Dog

For some reason, I find this absolutely hilarious.

Our new-to-us dog got her first haircut that we've seen on Thursday. Here she is before:


And here she is after. Doesn't she look like a sheered lamb? Or a rat dog?


I can't stop laughing every time I look at her.

Friday, March 28, 2008

Spring Break

OMG I am a big fat slug.

My kids have been on spring break this week and I have done no exercise. NOTHING. Not one run or visit to the gym or bike ride. Zero. Zip. Nada. For the entire week.

I'm going crazy.

I desperately need a run.

But I can't figure out how to make one happen.

Tuesday, March 25, 2008

Workout Week in Review

I know, I know. I'm even later than usual.

Sunday: Ran 13.1 miles with the Bean at the Shamrock Half Marathon. It seems like we did it a lot longer than a week ago!

Monday: Somehow dragged myself to the Y for weights class. I'm not sure how. Or why.

Tuesday: Ran four miles with Beanie, somewhere in the 10s.

Wednesday: Biked 17 miles with Patty, 17.3 mph. She is a crazy girl and it was a blast.

Thursday: Ran four miles with Beanie again.

Friday: Finally realized that a recovery period is a good idea following an event and took the day off. It was helped by the fact that I had to be at my kids' school for most of the morning.

Saturday: Really nothing but I'm trying to make myself feel better about it since I went on a two hour hike. That's kid pace two hours though.

Yes, I made you wait for that. And I'm terriby sorry.

Friday, March 21, 2008

Wednesday, March 19, 2008

No Zumba but Still a Fun Wednesday

Warm weather... how lovely! My Wednesday crew, sadly disheveled without Jennifer's leadership, opted for an outdoor bike ride instead of Zumba today. Here's how that little plan played out...

Courtney, Patty, Caroline, Annnn and I met at Starbucks for pre-activity caffeination:


Then Courtney, Patty and I headed to West Creek for a ride. Patty and I opted to venture out of the loop but Courtney didn't have the balls... um I mean time. It was unbelievably windy, and somehow we always had a head or cross wind. I was bitching while Patty was laughing and cracking jokes about getting blown. Needless to say, we had fun. Here's our self-photo:


Then we headed to lunch/happy hour where we met back up with the coffee crew plus Lesley and Liz. I forgot to take a photo while everyone was there unfortunately but here are the stragglers:


And here's what we did while we straggled. Well, some of us anyway:

New 'do

Mary Jo has been easing me into a new 'do that involves a darker shorter more layered style. The idea is that my roots will not be so obvious as they grow out and my hair will get healthier over time. This is a self portrait so just look at the hair!

I think it will grow on me.

BAH HA HA HA HA

Tuesday, March 18, 2008

Shamrock Half Race Report

We did it! Beanie and I ran our first half marathon on Sunday!

I'll back up a bit and relay the whole experience...

Saturday afternoon, Beanie picked me up at school. She came zipping up in her mommy mobile, blasting Funkytown, and we headed to Virginia Beach. She kindly let me download from my school day and then take a nap - which had to totally suck for her. What a great friend! I love that Bean.

Total aside, Taz told me something "sucked" today and I was completely horrified. God I hope he didn't pick that up from me.

Anyway.... we zipped down to Va Beach remarkably quickly to me anyway, since I was sleeping for at least half the time, and headed straight to a nice pasta restaurant to meet TriGirls and my non-TG racers Alison and Becky. There wasn't room to cram all four of us in at the table, so Alison, Becky, Beanie and I shared a lovely dinner at the bar. Perfect for us! Beanie and I split a mozzarella/tomato/basil appetizer then I had penne pasta with a spicy marinara sauce and shrimp. Yum! I sopped up every bit of sauce with bread cuz you know I was carbo loading for the race. And what's a pasta dinner without some nice red wine?!?!?! I somehow stopped myself from order an entire bottle - it's more economical, you know - and reluctantly limited myself to two glasses.

While we were at dinner, Alison checked the weather and reported rain and 22 mph winds at the start. Yikes.

Next we headed to our hotel, the Cavalier, which is a gorgeous old historic hotel conveniently located at the starting line. I felt like I was staying at my grandmother's house with the old creaky doors with glass door knobs and separate hot and cold water faucets. Our room was actually two separate but connected rooms with two beds and two bathrooms - very nice. And very convenient for me since poor Beanie didn't sleep much that night. I'm normally nervous before an event but seriously I hadn't had time to even work up a sweat over this one (if you'll excuse the typically lame pun). Beanie told me she laid awake most of the night listening to the wind howl and worrying about the race. Meanwhile, I slept like a rock.

The race started at a pre-dawn 7:00 a.m. Fortunately, since we were staying right at the start line, we didn't have to get up until 6:00. Which translated to probably 5 a.m. for Beanie and 6:15 for me. We ate oatmeal/power bars, made our Accelerade, and headed down around 6:45 not knowing quite what to expect from the weather. Fortunately, it was foggy but only spitting a little. Clearly it had rained all night as puddles were everywhere and from what I understand there was rain all around us.

Beanie and I were both a little apprehensive and quiet at this point. We slowly made our way through the crowd to our race corral, watching in awe as the front line competitors warmed up, dressed in skimpy shorts and tanks against the 40ish degree chill. We agreed that the first 2 - 3 miles would be our warm up. On the way, we saw the adorable TG Melissa who was shooting for a PR and sporting a cute shamrock on her cheek. Once in line, we saw Jill and a cute new TG. We had seeded ourselves too fast because I was aiming for the White Lake half IronMan when I registered, so we started slow and were quickly passed by Alison, Becky, TGs Debbie and Lynn and others. TG Charlotte caught up with us and stayed with us for the first half of the race which was great. For us anyway; I don't know how she felt about our usual nonsense.

We were actually both uncharacteristically silent during the first half of the run. Usually, you can't shut us up. I could not get my mind into the race and Beanie said later that she was very cranky. Beanie is pretty much never cranky so I can only attribute it to nerves.

The first two miles went by quickly and soon we were on a long wooded stretch. I was predominantly focused on how badly my ankle hurt and it was pissing me off. Predictably, I had to go to the bathroom almost right away and although there were port 'o potties at each water stop, there were not many and the lines were long. Many industrious boys and some girls were finding alternative methods in the woods which was just not enticing. Finally, we stopped just short of the six mile mark. I mention this mainly because it skewed our recorded time as compared to my Garmin time because I stopped my watch while we waited. And waited. And waited. And thanked the boys who used alternative means.

We each had a Gu while we waited and that must have helped revive us because we were both in better moods when we started running again. Poor Charlotte was still putting up with us at this point. At the half way mark, our average pace was 10:54 which was faster than any of our long training runs. We turned the corner into a brutal headwind and spotted the ocean. Beanie turned to me and said, "The seas were angry my friends," and we both cracked up. (Remember Seinfeld? George and the whale?)

That was the turning point for me mentally. Soon after, we passed a DJ cranking Bon Jovi whom I love dearly and we were both singing that song for the next few miles. Until we heard another DJ playing AC DC and then I seriously scared people by belting out the lyrics at the top of my lungs.

We hit a water stop at the 10 mile mark and the volunteers were extremely encouraging, shouting that we were almost finished. Soon after we saw the ever phenomenal Deanna L, running a PR race. You go girl! We were chatting when suddenly the Bean took off, tossing back over her shoulder, "I've got to get this over with!" I sprinted to catch her and literally blocked her with my arm and told her there was still a long way to go. I promised to tell her when it was time to sprint it out.

We saw the leaders in the marathon, those who started an hour after us and were already on their second half. They were unbelievable, totally focused and striding it out. I couldn't run that fast for 100 meters.

The next two miles passed in a blur and soon we were making the turn for the boardwalk. I looked at the Bean and told her it was time to turn it on. She was off like a shot and I was in hot pursuit. We were passing people like they were standing still and it was awesome. We crossed the finish line together, high fived and hugged. We ran a great race for us, at a 10:39 min/mile average pace and we were thrilled.

We ran the gauntlet of medals, cool hats (nice unexpected bonus!), chip retrieval and water then headed for the party tent for beers.

Ahhh... I don't know that I'll do a half again but this was most definitely a great experience to savor.

Friday, March 14, 2008

Just a Quick Update...

... to let my reader (you know who you are) know that I'm slowly wrapping my head around being back in school. We had another team meeting this week and it was much better - the group was more effective and I was more resigned to the fact that I had to be there and much time would be wasted.

Not that I can't waste a ton of time working on my own... OMG all my bad college habits have come flooding back. I can sit in front of my computer or reading material for hours and accomplish absolutely nothing. Well, except maybe weight gain - studying makes me want to eat! Anything will do and this week I've gravitated towards Cheetos and cupcakes.

This is a school weekend so I'm cramming today's assignments together this morning. As much as I said I didn't want to still be doing homework on Friday night before Saturday's class, guess what? Yep. I have a paper to finish.

Which is actually what I should be doing now...

Monday, March 10, 2008

AUGGGGG!

Oh f*ck this moment came much sooner in my post-collegiate back to school experience than I anticipated.

I just spent four hours with my "team" where I seriously almost lost.my.mind with the detailed conversations we had over minutia. For this, I paid a babysitter. Which actually seems pretty trivial as I type it and remember the cost of my tuition.

Then I came home and rummaged through the refrigerator desperately wishing I had saved a piece of chocolate pie to have for dinner.

Then I realized that I have to bake 24 corn bread muffins to take to Rainbow's class tomorrow.

I'm stabbing myself in the eye because it feels better than my life tonight.

Seriously.

Sunday, March 9, 2008

Note to self...

Even when pie is made with Xylitol instead of sugar, eating three pieces of it at one sitting is a bad idea.

But damn it was good... here are the recipes in case you'd like to try them. Scouter loves the lemon; I prefer the chocolate. Both are tasty.

Lemon Chess Pie
2 9" pie shells
6 eggs
3 cups sugar or Xylitol
3 teas. corn meal
6 Tbl. melted butter
9 Tbl. lemon juice

Beat eggs; add sugar. Beat well. Add butter, lemon juice, and corn meal. Mix well.

Bake in pie shells at 325 for about 45 minutes or until firm when shaken.

Chocolate Chess Pie
2 8" pie crusts
2 1/2 cups sugar or Xylitol
7 Tbl. cocoa (this is the unsweetened powdered stuff)
4 eggs
1 1/4 cups evaporated milk (skim is fine)
1 Tbl. vanilla
1 stick butter, melted

Preheat oven to 350. Put all ingredients in the blender and mix well. Pour into pie shells and bake 35 - 40 minutes or until top of pie has puffed. The center will be shaky when taken from oven.

Enjoy!

Okay I really need to do some homework now...

Workout Week in Review

I'm supposed to be doing homework right now. I've been sitting in front of my computer for hours, talking on the phone, checking email, hopping up for any excuse, now blogging... some things never change.

Anyway... last week!

Sunday: Surprisingly, I ran five miles, 9:47 min/mi average pace. It was an accomplishment just to be out there.

Monday: Weights class. Chris taught which was a nice surprise. She kicked my ass. Literally, my ass was sore for days afterwards. I told her that Jennifer and I want to track her schedule and attend all her classes, after which an embarrassed Beanie said I'm a stalker.

Tuesday: Beanie and I ran 10 miles at a 10:54 min/mi average pace. We actually had a slight negative split which was exciting. Ten miles actually felt doable after the heinousness that was 14 miles last week.

Wednesday: Yet again I followed my sloth and skipped cycling in favor of meeting the girls for coffee. Jennifer, Patty and I went to Zumba and yoga, then hooked back up with a larger group for lunch. I couldn't indulge in cocktails because (drum roll please) I had an interview that afternoon. Thanks, Margo!

Thursday: Another run with Beanie, this time five miles at a relatively smokin' 10:35 min/mi pace. As usual, the run accompanied our good chat.

Friday: Weights class. Another excellent instructor and class, after which my chest and my butt hurt. Gotta love it.

Saturday: Rest. It was intentional although I didn't have time to work out anyway.

Did you notice the distinct lack of cycling? I really need to sign up for a tri to make time for my bike. As much as I love it, it is too easy to skip right now.

Oh and maybe that would make me contemplate swimming a little, too.

Friday, March 7, 2008

Some Cool Healthy Foods

While catching up on blog reading (somewhat), I found two recommendations for healthy food that I tried and loved. Here they are!

IronWil posted about Xylitol which is a natural sugar substitute. It has 40% fewer calories than sugar and actually has benefits. I was a little skeptical so I gave it my hardest challenge - lemon chess pie which is almost all sugar. I made the pie to take to a dinner party tonight and snuck a little sliver to make sure it tasted good. And it was awesome! I'll definitely buy it again and use it to replace sugar in all my recipes.

Then Nytro posted - I should say raved - about protein shakes. While I was at Good Foods picking up Xylitol, I got a single serving of a vanilla flavored mix.

Now I need to digress just a tad into my more common unhealthy habits. I swear it's connected!

Last night Scouter and I had some red wine. When I say "some," what I actually mean is "a lot." Okay, really I mean "too much." My head was fuzzy and achy this morning as I dragged out of bed at daybreak to get the kids ready for school. I contemplated going back to bed but I didn't really have time so I made breakfast instead - the protein powder with orange juice, fresh raspberries, blueberries and ice in the blender. It tasted a tiny bit powdery but still really good and the best part? It TOTALLY helped my hangover. I was a new woman!

I'm buying a case and writing the company to tell them they are missing their best marketing opportunity.

If you have other tips, let me know!

Wednesday, March 5, 2008

You're not going to believe this...

... but I RAN on Sunday. Me. Running. On a weekend. Now that hasn't happened in awhile...

But you know I really don't think running twice a week is adequate preparation for a half marathon. I may actually fit three whole runs in this week, a scarce two weeks before the event. Sure, that's plenty of training. I'll be fine.

So. I procrastinated as long as I possibly could. I even convinced myself that attending a TriGirl seminar on race preparation was a good excuse to skip my run. And I even called Annnn and talked her into meeting me at said seminar. Then it was pointed out to me that I hadn't been home much all weekend and I realized that a race preparation seminar is not particularly valuable to someone who isn't even racing so I called Annnn back and bailed. You can imagine how pleased she will be with me and how little grief I will receive for that maneuver. And then I got my shit together (literally not metaphysically) and ran.

My Garmin will attest to the fact that I was completely unmotivated. The first half of my scheduled five mile run was at a none-so-speedy pace and included a 10 minute "rest stop" while I chatted with Cate. After berating myself for being a lame ass, I picked it up for the second half and had a huge negative split. I ran the last half mile under 8:00 pace which is smokin' for me. I must have subliminally had TG40's "shower nap wine" mantra in mind. Which in actuality was "feed the kids get them showered and collapse."

At least I looked really cute in my pink and blue running skirt. The one I've bitched about before because it doesn't have shorts underneath, just a bathing suit bottom looking thing. Very attractive. And I discovered, completely impractical. The fat on my legs rubbed together so badly that I literally look like I have rug burn. Chub rub, if you will. On my inner thighs. High on my inner thighs.

And Scouter thought I sucked for stealing his slippers. Wait 'till I have to explain this little debacle.

Sunday, March 2, 2008

On why it must suck to be married to me...

Last night, Scouter was a man on a mission. He wandered the house, searching high and low, muttering and bitching for a good 20 minutes. He went up and down the stairs. He circled the same spot 15 or 20 times. He muttered some more.

Finally, he came to rest in front of me with his eyes firmly planted on my feet, which were snugly ensconced in his slippers.

"Oh," he said. "Didn't you hear me? That's what I've been looking for."

Saturday, March 1, 2008

Workout Week in Review

Look at this... a WWIR that is on time and under budget! Just like Wilder...

BAH HA HA! Such the political satirist I am!!!

Anyway, back to our regularly scheduled blog post...

All in all, not a bad week. The big disappointment is the complete and total lack of biking. Not even an indoor cycling or spin class to be found. Big sigh. But onto the stuff that did happen...

Sunday: Nothing. Well not much anyway. I did a little hiking as excessively described and vividly photographed for my previous post. I've been sucking big-time on weekend exercise lately with no significant improvement expected in the foreseeable future. But on the bright side I was well-rested for...

Monday: Weights class. I sorely missed weights class last week (if you'll excuse the pun!!!). Monday's class was great and my glutes and pecs in particular were very sore for...

Tuesday: Beanie and I ran 14 miles. FOURTEEN freakin' miles. That is the new official longest distance for both of us. Our pace wasn't stellar (11:15 min/mile average) but we didn't care. I am so darned proud of us for doing it. I felt like I was preparing for a journey - a good night sleep, layered clothing, adequate nutrition and hydration, planned route including bathroom breaks - and in many ways it was a journey. We ran a long way from home. The run was even pretty good until the last two miles when it started raining a little bit, my hips and hammies tightened up, and the absolute monotony of running for over 2 1/2 hours started kicking in. I could never ever ever in a million years have done that run without Beanie. We chatted and bitched and gossiped and solved the world's problems as we ran. Fourteen miles. And our kids said we couldn't do it! I rested on my laurels for...

Wednesday: I honestly did not have the motivation or the leg strength to contemplate cycling so I slept in and met the Z-Crew at Starbucks afterwards for a skinny latte. Lesley and Caroline dropped us like a bad habit after coffee while Jennifer, Patty, Courtney and I headed for the Y. Courtney and Patty swam while Jennifer and I went to...

Wait for it...





ZUMBA!

With our favorite teacher, Chris, who is an aerobic goddess. Seriously, we had a blast in her class and followed it up with a relaxing yoga. This time, we brought several additional layers of clothing which helped tremendously. Beanie somehow managed to do a weights class after the previous day's run which is phenomenal to me, then she met us for yoga. Sadly, I had a conflict and couldn't join the girls for lunch. WAH! I hate it when my Zumba day gets cut short. Next week, girls, I'm all in! And I was pumped up for...

Thursday: I didn't have time to run during the day like I usually do but Scouter was kind enough to let me fit in a run that night. I strapped on my reflector bands and my iPod and ran four miles at something approximating 9:30 min/mile. It felt faster but my Garmin did not capture the distance properly so I don't know for sure. Ah well. Anything under 11:00 is fast for me these days. I was reasonably well rested for...

Friday: Weights class. YES! Two in one week! Honestly my legs were still tired from Tuesday's run but nonetheless it was a great class. Beanie and I giggled and chatted through the whole thing like we do with everything else. Fortunately the teacher seemed to find us amusing instead of annoying which is what we actually were. Which brings us back to...

Saturday: Instead of my long-lost Saturday ride with the cycling posse, I got to go to grad school! which is equally draining and fun in an entirely different way. I saw my business and triathlon guru/mentor Joe there and we joked about my nonexistent triathlon season. Like the great guy that he is, he assured me that it will always be there and encouraged me to do what I can while I'm in the program.

Other than the tirimisu, cake, and chocolate candy I ate with complete abandon, it was a good week.