Princess Leia, Retirement & a 50K

This week, we lost not only Carrie Fisher of Star Wars fame, but her mother too.  For this nerd girl, it was a very sad week.  I was driving to work on Tuesday and was listening to one of the rock music stations on my satellite radio and they played a song by the band Gemini Syndrome called “Remember We Die” and the DJ dedicated it to Carrie Fisher, saying “RIP” afterward.  My immediate response was “noooooooooooooo!” and I started crying.  Not even gonna lie.  I cried over the death of a person I’ve never met.  I do have a friend or two that have met her and they said she was an incredibly kind and funny person.  Sure she had her issues, we all do.  But she was a wonderful person that did so much for so many people.  She was an icon.  As was her mother, who I’m convinced died of a broken heart.

I’d like to switch gears and say I’m proud of myself at the moment.  Wednesday, I CONTROLLED MYSELF!!!  That’s right, I ate ONLY the food I brought for myself to eat.  Even though I wanted to go to Starbucks and buy a Holiday Spiced Flat White, I ultimately decided not to.  I even wanted to go out to my car and get a couple bucks so I could hit up the vending machine for some trail mix.  Also decided not to do that.  So, I ate around 1300 calories and had a deficit of just under 800!  That’s just awesome!  As a result, I showed a loss of 2.6 pounds.  Which, I don’t know how much that means because I had started off on Monday at 167.9, then dropped 3.9 pounds of most likely water weight when I weighed in on Tuesday.  Then there was a retirement party on my overtime shift Tuesday night and when I weighed on Wednesday I had plumped back up by 3.1 pounds.  There were a LOT of salty foods, so I’m sure that the weight loss shown on the scale on Thursday was the same as Tuesday: water weight.  I’m still holding out hope for the scale to say 159 come Sunday morning (New Year’s morning).

 

Speaking of the retirement party!  He’s not just someone I worked overtime with.  The nature of working in a correctional facility is that they rotate staff assignments every few years, so you don’t work with the same people your entire career.  It’s supposed to help with burn out.  Anyway, so I have worked with Jerry a few times over the last 14+ years I’ve worked for our agency.  He retired with 24 years under his belt.  I can retire at the 25 year mark.  That’s 11 years away.  Sooooooo far away.  I’m hoping it’ll “be here before I know it,” like everyone tells me it will be.  Come on 12/31/27!!!

There’s a race in March that I want to run.  The problem with it and why I haven’t already registered is that it’s on a Saturday in a place that is a 3.5-ish hour drive away from where I live.  I am planning to run the 50K and that race starts at 7am.  They do have race morning packet pickup.  So I’d want to be there by 6am at the latest, which means I do 1 of 2 things.  1, I drive up the morning of the race, leaving my apartment around 2am.  OOOOOR, I get a hotel or camp in the park and drive up the day before.  We’ll see if I can get reservations.  Oh, there is a 3^rd option…drive up the evening before and sleep in the back seat of the car.  Not really an attractive option, but it is an option nonetheless.  Honestly, I will probably drive up the morning of the race.  So, anyway, I asked my supervisor yesterday if it was possible for me to get the day before the race off work and he said that it looks good, so I’m going to register for it mid-January.  I’m registering for another race (who’s reg fee goes up when the beginning of the new year) with my end of December paycheck, that’s the only reason why I’m waiting. 

 

I’ve been breaking out all over my face the last week and a half.  It’s so annoying and it makes me very self-conscious.  I try cleaning my face more, but it’s not helping.  So, I stopped and bought some acne spot treatment stuff and I’m hoping that’ll help clear it up.

 

Today’s workout consisted of 3 miles on the track.  It was supposed have eight 100-ish meter sprints, but I could tell before I was even done with the first sprint that 8 sprints weren’t going to happen.  So I settled on 4 sprints.  I warmed up with 4 laps around the track for 1 mile at a 9:07 pace, then I started my four 100-ish meter sprints with 300-ish meter recoveries and finished that mile with an 8:37 pace overall.  My final, cool down mile was a 9:22 pace.  Usually when I do track work, I run the 1.35 miles to the track, do my sprints and recoveries and then run back home.  But today I was little strapped for time, and I was going to the gym after the track, so I just drove to the track.  After the track I went to the gym.  My workout at the gym consisted of:

• Seated dip 85#x8-105#x8-8
• Bicep curl (cable) 65#x8-8-8
• Pec fly 85#x8 8-8
• Seated mid row 105#x8-125#x8-8
• Lat pull down 125#x8-8-8
• Shoulder press 78#x8-8-8
• Ladder machine x10min
• Monster walk (green resist band)
• Sumo walk (green resist band)

 

I know I’ve only been back at the gym for 2 weeks and have only done 3 workouts so far, but I’m feeling really good about it.  I like that I’m moving in ways I haven’t moved in MONTHS.  It feels good to be sore again.  It feels good to realize that I didn’t lose as much strength as I thought had.  That part feels real, real good.