Gym Options

24 hour fitness sent me an email the other day with a $0 initiation fee and 1 month free offer if I sign back up by sept 5^th.  It’s been almost a year since I canceled my membership with them because even though I wanted to maintain my 24 hour membership AND my Planet Fitness membership, I just couldn’t afford it at the time.  PF was closer and more convenient and also cheaper so if I didn’t go to the gym often or at all, it wasn’t a HUGE waste of money.

 

I would really like to start swimming and doing TRX and other non-weight-machine exercises that they have available for their members that Planet Fitness just doesn’t have.  But I’m not sure.  I mean.  there are 3 options here: 

1) take the offer and also keep my PF membership and just go to 24 when I want to do exercises that PF doesn’t have equipment for

2) take the offer and cancel my PF membership

3) ignore the offer and just stick with PF.  I kinda really want to do option 1. 

 

I want to train for and compete in a triathlon next year, so I’d ideally need a lap pool to build up my swimming fitness so that I’ll survive the swim portion of a tri.  And then, I would definitely prefer to keep my PF membership because the one I go to is just 1.5 miles from my apt and is super convenient,  So, if I don’t have time to drive to a 24 location (which the closest 2 are both about 8 miles away from me…I mean, there is a Super Sport location like 2 miles away from me, but that one takes the $50/mth membership dues in order to access and I’m just not paying that for a gym membership, even if it is the only membership I have), then I don’t have to skip my workout…I can just go to PF. 

 

PF has limited weight amounts on their machines for insurance purposes (how they keep their membership rates so low).  But I’m not maxed out on the available weight on ALL machines, just a couple of them.  But, I have almost a month to think about it.  However, even though I am going to think about it until the end of this month before “pulling the trigger” and accepting the offer, I am like 90% sure I’m going to go ahead and accept the offer.  I’ve spoken to my friend Amanda and she agrees with me that option 1 is the best decision for me with all the different things I want to do.  I mean, I would absolutely LOVE to be able to go for a swim.  Heck, I could ride my bike to 24 (8 miles), swim, then ride my bike home (8 miles) and get a great semi-brick workout!  Heck, if I wanted to, I could even throw in a 2-4 mile run after the swim and before the bike ride home!  Oh yes, I’m really liking this and starting to get excited about the possibilities here.  Oh yea, and they occasionally have an AM boot camp class that would be a fantastic way to mix up my workouts!

Body Image Issues

The last couple weeks I’ve been having an issue with my body image.  I haven’t been berating myself for letting myself regain the weight I had lost in the first 3 months of the year with that 90-day challenge I did.  But I have been getting down about how I look in the mirror.  Like, I don’t mind how I look from the side.  My stomach doesn’t poof out over the top of my underwear from the side and looks fairly flat, even if it’s fuller than I’d like it to be.  But then I turn to the front and I see how squishy my stomach looks and how lumpy my hips are and I just feel disgusted.  I’m really trying to not feel that way about what I see in the mirror…but it’s hard.  And really, it’s not what I see in the mirror that is the actual issue.  What I think I’m actually disgusted with is the fact that I keep losing and gaining and losing and gaining the same 15-30 lbs and I’m so tired of it and fed up with it.  I’m ready to be done with this whole losing weight process and be a maintainer.  I know maintenance won’t be any easier, but at least I wouldn’t have to worry from one month to the next whether or not my clothes will fit or look good on me. 

What can I do about this?  Well, I can make sure that this is the last time I have to go through the whole losing weight thing.  I can stick to my eating plans and make healthier choices, not eat food just because it’s there (ie-spreads at work for going away parties, birthdays, etc).  I can also keep up with working out 5 days a week…and keep up with the variety of the workouts.  Now that I’m pretty sure my break from running is mostly over (but I’m not going to be running more than twice a week for another couple weeks yet…then I’ll start my 12 week marathon training program…d’oh, only 12 weeks, but it is what it is, right?), I can have even MORE variety because I’ll be running once or twice a week on top of the other things.  I want to keep cycling once a week and the gym twice a week.  I have a couple options there.

 

OPTION A:

• gym twice a week, by itself

• cycling one a week, by itself

• running twice a week, by itself

 

OPTION B:

Double up workouts as follows:

• cycling + gym one day

• short run + gym one day

• longer run by itself

• workout DVD

• a “workout” run (ie-speedwork, hills)

 

There are other ways I can break up the workouts to make sure I’m getting all my cross training in every week, that is just 2 examples.  Since I’ll be starting up an abbreviated marathon training program in a couple weeks, I need to start working on that schedule and figuring out how I’m going to do everything.  I think I’m going to keep it to 3 runs a week.  I’m not going for any time goals with my marathons.  I just want to have fun and finish within the time limits.

 

How will all this impact my body image?  Well, if I’m doing everything I possibly can to ensure that I’m as healthy as I can be and as physically fit as I can be, then I’m bound to just feel better about my appearance in general.  I will be able to focus more on my body’s strengths rather than its very few short comings.  This past week, even though I am dealing with accepting a 1 pound gain on the scale and trying to keep it in perspective (only .1% gained in body fat, so therefore the gain was most likely mostly muscle gain) and not be upset about it, when working out I’ve been trying to focus on how much more defined my muscles are now that I’m doing strength training on a regular basis.  I’ve been trying to focus on the fact that, thanks to muscle memory, I have been able to steadily bump up the amount of weight I’m lifting on all exercises over the past 3+ weeks. 

 

I think that if I can keep increasing my focus on how my body is functioning and how strong it is and how shapely my arms and shoulders and back are and how nice my legs look in a running skirt, I think I will be alright. 

What's Cookin'

My friend Amanda gave me a Crockpot recipe book last weekend.  So, I decided to flip through it and find a recipe or two that I'd like to try.  There were a bunch I wanted to try, but I picked just one as there was a recipe from my Fast Metabolism Diet cookbook I had been wanting to try forever.  So, one dish for lunches and one for dinners for the week!

AVOCADO CHILI

Ingredients:
• 1 lb lean ground turkey, browned and drained
• 1/2 red onion, chopped
• 2 heaping spoonfuls chili powder
• 2 tbsp minced garlic
• 3 tbsp parley or cilantro
• 1 tsp crushed red pepper flakes
• 15 oz can white or kidney beans, low sodium
• 15 oz can black or pinto beans, low sodium
• 15 oz can lentils or adzuki beans, low sodium
• 4-5 medium zucchini, chopped
• 4 cups (32 oz) tomato soup, low sodium
• 1 tsp sea salt
• 2 avocados, diced

Directions: 
• put meat, onions, chili powder, garlic, parsley or cilantro, and crushed red pepper flakes into a slow cooker on high.
• cover and set aside while prepping the remaining ingredients.
• open, drain and rinse all cans of beans.  add the beans, zucchini and soup to the pot and stir well.
• cook on high for 4-5 hours, or low for 6-8 hours.
• stir and taste occasionally, adjusting seasonings as needed.
• add the sea salt just before serving to preserve its nutrients.
• serve with diced avocado.

**NOTE: I found that to easily dice the avocado, I cut it in half, removed the pit and then cut a cross-hatch pattern in the avocado with a knife and then used a spoon to removed the diced pieces.

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ASIAN GINGER BEEF W/BOK CHOY & MIRACLE NOODLES

Ingredients:
• 2.25 lbs boneless beef chuck, cut into 1-inch pieces
• 2 tbsp peanut oil
• 3 green onions, cut into 1/2 inch slices
• 6 cloves garlic
• 1 cup low sodium chicken broth
• 1/2 cup water
• 1/4 low sodium soy sauce
• 1 tsp Asian chili paste
• 4 packages of Miracle Noodle fettuccine noodles
• 3 cups bok choy, trimmed, washed and cut into 1 inch pieces

Directions:
• heat oil in large skillet over medium-high heat until hot.  sear beef on all sides in batches to prevent crowding, turning each piece as it browns.  sear last batch of beef with onions and garlic.
• transfer to a 5-6 quart slow cooker.  add broth, water, soy sauce, ginger and chili paste.  stir well to combine.  cover; cook on low for 7-8 hours or on high for 3-4 hours, or until beef is very tender.
• drain all 4 packages of Miracle Noodles, rinse, heat in microwave safe container for 4 minutes, drain and rinse again.  set aside.
• when the meat is don
e in the slow cooker, add the noodles and stir, allowing noodles to mingle with the sauce/broth mixture.  add the bok choy and stir.  heat on high until bok choy is tender-crisp, about 15 minutes.
• garnish with cilantro and serve hot.

Weekly Recap

 

And yet again I have a week worth recapping!  Woohoo!!!

 

• Saturday: this day was a kind of a crap shoot, so to speak.  I was going to try to get up early enough to workout before meeting a friend for lunch at the Indian buffet, but I didn’t because I was sooooo tired from working overtime the day before.  I told myself that if I felt like it, then I would go to the gym later in the day, but that rarely happens, so I wasn’t really expecting to get a workout in this day.  However, when I put my sliced salmon in the bag of homemade marinade and it needed to sit in there for at least 2 hours, I got the itch and ended up at the gym and got in a kick ass workout.  So, I’m super proud of myself for 1) going and working out when I hadn’t exactly planned on working out, and 2) not phoning in my workout and actually upping the weights on some of the exercises.

• Sunday: I had a 25 mile bike ride planned for this day.  I stayed up super late tending to the salmon jerky Saturday night and so didn’t get out of bed until like 10am.  I had plans with my friend Amanda, so I cut the ride short to just 20 miles.  I headed out the door and was cruising along.  I hit mile 5.4 and BOOM flat tire.  Ugh, great.  I almost called Amanda to see if she could come pick me up, but then remembered that Target wasn’t far away and they sell bike inner tubes, so I made the 1 mile, mostly uphill in 90°+ heat and no breeze, walk to Target to get an inner tube.  I then changed my tube and discovered that my tire had been skewered by a headless nail.  Nice.  I abandoned the 20 mile ride and adjusted my route.  Ended up with 15 miles on the bike and 1 mile walked.

• Monday: the gym was scheduled for this day and the gym is what was done.  I like to push myself a little harder each time I do the stair climber to do at least 1 more floor of stairs in my 10 minutes.  My ultimate goal is to do 100 floors in 10 minutes.  This means I will basically be running up the stairs and I really like this idea.  After the stairs I hit the weights for about an hour.  I’m thinking that since I have going to the gym twice a week down pat as a habit right now that I should maybe split my workouts into 2 different workouts: upper & core and lower & core.  This way I think I can make more progress with the exercises I’m doing than I am by doing a full body workout every time I go to the gym for weights.  And by doing core both times, I can add more core exercises, like leg lifts, Russian twists, and so on, to improve my core strength. 

• Tuesday: got up and did the Bob Harper’s Yoga for the Warrior workout DVD.  I cut it pretty close with this one.  I got to my therapy appointment with like 6 minutes to spare.  Oops.  Shouldn’t have hit snooze so many times, but I just did not want to get out of bed.  Anyway, I did the Yoga for the Warrior DVD that I had meant to do last Tuesday but didn’t get up early enough to do it.  It wasn’t much of a calorie burning workout, even though it was a challenging one.  I ended this workout hoping that I would be sore later or the next day.

• Wednesday: REST DAY!!!! Sort of.  I had CPR/AED recertification class this day.  I wore my chest strap as I wasn’t sure if it would be enough physical activity to count as a workout.  Plus, I thought that maybe, just maybe, I would hop on a rowing machine as well.  I didn’t turn on the heart rate monitor while doing CPR training…it wasn’t enough to be considered exercise.  Not even close.  But, I did go across the way afterward to the gym and use the rowing machine for 2000 meters!  Yay!  Not much, but every little bit counts and, well, this was technically a rest day.  I’m proud of myself that I chose to do something active, no matter how small of an effort it was.

• Thursday: was thinking that since I’d already gone to the gym twice this week that maybe I would get up early and go for that 10K run to earn my virtual race medal (well, one of them…I now have 2 waiting to be earned…haha), but I decided by the time I went to bed Wednesday night that I wouldn’t even try getting up early and that I would be heading to the gym for day #3.  I did decide to mix it up just a smidge but changing the way I did a couple exercises and added the leg press machine to my workout.  I changed from the seated bicep curl and tricep curl machines to the cable machine with the rope attachment for standing bicep curls and over-the-head tricep extensions. 

• Friday: REST DAY!!!!  I worked overtime Thursday night, so I just slept in the morning before having to head right back to work in the afternoon.  Then I worked another double shift.

 

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I made salmon jerky last weekend to eat for lunch most of this week.  I only say “most” because while I used an entire side of salmon, it was only enough for four 4.5 oz servings of salmon.  I had intended on it being enough for all 5 lunches this week.  Instead, I had the last remaining serving of fried rice from last week’s dinners for the 5^th lunch.  I have to say that my first attempt at making jerky is a big success for me!  It’s super yummy and not over dried!  I will be making it again! 

 

Even though I ate an entire medium pizza on Sunday, I had more than enough calories (thanks to exercise) to cover it!  And I had a bunch of calories left over at the end of the day.  YAY!  Something I noticed this week was that I’m leaning toward making better choices with my food (with the exception of the entire medium pizza…ha!).  Hooray!  3 weeks of tracking what I eat and counting calories and trying to stay within a specific calorie count has made me subconsciously start making better choices.  There was leftover cake from a party on the shift before mine at work on Tuesday and I only had a small piece and was satisfied.  On Wednesday there was a fundraiser at work that was selling sausage wrap plates and while I love sausage wraps, I wasn’t even tempted to go get one!  YAY!  But, that said, I worked overtime on the night shift Thursday night and they were having a going-away party for one of the guys who was going to a different section in our agency and there were chicken salad croissant sandwiches, pickles, potato chips and cheesecake.  I had a little bit of everything, but I don’t really think I overdid it.  I didn’t gorge myself and I certainly didn’t eat until it hurt.  I just ate what looked good until I felt satisfied and that was good enough.

 

I got the word from my supervisor last weekend that my time off request that I put in for the South Padre Island Marathon is approved, so I registered for it!  Also, I have been in contact with the social media managers for this marathon and I am pretty sure I will be helping to promote it!  WOOHOO!  I’m super excited for that!  Also, since my time off request starts on November 12^th and not the 13^th like I thought it did, I might just head down to South Padre on the 12^th and stay 2 nights and make it a mini-vacation!  I’ve never actually been to South Padre Island, so I think it will be fun to do a little bit of touristy stuff on top of just going down there to run a marathon.  

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Now to go over my weekly weigh in portion of this post...here's the scale and Omron:

Yep, that says "+1 lb."  I'm so frustrated with this.  I do great for a couple/few weeks, a month, maybe 2 months, and then BAM I start putting weight back on no matter how much I adhere to my eating plans and my workout plans.  I don't understand why this happens to me.  I know that it does happen to people, a lot of people, and I'm one of those people.  I do have to keep a few things in mind:

• my body fat only went up .1%...that's 1/10th of a percent.  That's nothing.  

• I have gone to the gym and lifted weights, and have been steadily increasing the weight I'm lifting over the last 3 weeks, 2-3 times a week.

• my pants are looser than they were last week.

• my stomach is looking closer to flat.

With all those things taken into consideration, I'm going to tell you that I am swallowing my pride and am going to just wait it out, keep up my eating plan and working out at least 5 times a week and see what the numbers are next Saturday.  Now, a friend requested I take and post a current set of "before" (or maybe they're more accurately "during") pictures.  

I am now 2.8 lbs down from where I started 3 weeks ago.  I'm hoping that I will see another drop when I step on the scale next Saturday.  I have a goal to lose as much of 20 lbs as I can by October 24th.  That's 12 weeks to lose 20 lbs.  If I can lose an average of 1.6 lbs a week, then I can hit that goal.  

I bought some new running shoes today.  They're Hoka One One Cilftons.  They are last year's model and thankfully (HALLELUJAH!) they had one pair in my size left!  I saved about $40 or so by being able to buy last year's model over this year's model.  I have never run in Hokas before, so expect to be reading a product review from me after I've run in them for about a month.  I'm still on my break from running, but I'm seriously hoping these new pretty shoes will kick start me to be done with my break sooner rather than later.  I have to be running regularly again mid-August to make sure I'm decently trained for the South Padre Island Marathon on November 14th.

Orange Leaf Half Marathon Recap

This was a small, local race, so there was no expo for the packet pickup.  I was completely cool with that because I had no money to spend at an expo anyway.  This race is hosted by Orange Leaf Frozen Yogurt company, so the packet pickup was located in their New Braunfels store.  There wasn’t a line for pickup and me and my friend Kirsten were able to basically walk right up to the table, give our names and get our bibs and shirts.  We were in and out in less than 5 minutes.  Easy peasy, lemon squeezy.  We didn’t indulge in any frozen yogurt as there would be free frozen yogurt the follow day for all runners post-race!!!  How cool is that?

After we got our bibs and shirts, we headed just slightly down the road to our hotel and checked in.  We watched TV for a couple hours.  This was a “treat” (as she said) for Kirsten because she doesn’t watch TV and hasn’t watched TV for about 5 years.  So we watched junky TLC shows.  It was awesome.  We went to dinner at BJ’s Brewhouse.  I had never been there before but had heard great things about their pizzas.  As I said, I didn’t have much money to spend on things this weekend and had to keep my dinner tab (with tip) limited to $36 or less.  Kirsten bought us a calamari appetizer.  OMG, the best calamari I have ever had.  It was so smooth and buttery.  Not rubbery at all.  I got the mini BJ’s Favorite pan crust pizza and the strawberry and ice cream “beignet.”  I say it that way because an ACTUAL beignet is served topped only with powdered sugar.  I should have done what Kirsten did and gotten a McDonald’s hot fudge sundae with nuts on the way back to the hotel.  Oh well.

Here’s my flat runner:

We watched more junky TV until it was time to try and go to sleep.  Kirsten had no problem dropping off to sleep.  However, I had slept until 11:15 (hooray being pseudo sick with allergies and sinus issues) that morning so I had a lot of problems falling asleep.  Part of the problem was the a/c was set to 70° and I was warm, so I got up and clicked it down a couple degrees and that was better.  I finally got to sleep but woke up a few times during the night.

4:45am came early.  We were going to stop and grab me an iced coffee at McDonald’s on the way to the race start area.  We got parked and chilled in the car for about 5 minutes before Kirsten announced she was going to go do her warm up shuffle.  I almost joined her, but decided not to.  Maybe if it was a 5K I definitely would have joined her.  We had gotten to the race start way early so we got super close parking.  There was a short line at the portas, but I mostly went out of habit.  Then we went near the start area so I could do my leg swings and other warm ups I do.  While I was doing that, a guy wearing a Half Fanatics shirt came over and let me know they were doing a group photo in a couple minutes if I wanted to get in it.  Of course I did!

Shortly after the photo op, we made our way to the start line.  Like I said, this is a very small race.  There were 381 participants this year. 

Okay, so let me tell you how this race went.  Kirsten was pacing me and we were hoping for a 2:15:00 finish for me.  That meant we had to do a 10:20 pace for the majority of the race and then kick it up a few seconds per mile for the last few miles.  I felt great at first.  Around mile 2.5, it started feeling harder and my breathing was more labored.  We slowed down a little.  Finally, around mile 4.5, I told Kirsten to go on and run her race.  I ran for about a mile with a nice lady named Donna at about a 12:00 min/mi pace before I had to stop and walk.  I got emotional when I stopped to walk.  I haven’t walked in a race beyond walking the water stops since Helvetia last June.  I was so disappointed in myself.  But, then, what do I expect?  Honestly.  I haven’t run more than once a week the last few weeks, the few weeks before that I hadn’t run more than twice a week.  I was far from trained for this race and I attempted to run like I was trained.  Mistake.  Biiiiiiig mistake.  And I paid for it.

Everything was okay until mile 8 when the wheels started to fall off and I ran a 13:59 mile.  Ugh.  I had taken a Stinger Ginsting gel at mile 5 and hadn’t felt any difference…no little boost at all.  I was taking in the cups of Gatorade at every aid station that had Gatorade.  My back started cramping and when I would take my walk breaks I had to stretch it.  Probably around mile 9, I noticed that it felt like I was developing blisters on a couple of my toes on my right foot.  At about mile 10.5, I discovered I had to go to the bathroom.  Ugh.  Mile 11 the wheels straight up fell off the cart.  A 15:16 mile.  What the heck?  Seriously?  I did pick it up a little after that and mile 12 was 14:58 and mile 13 was 14:51.  I ran the final .23 at an 11:31 pace.  I refuse to WALK across the finish line.  This was my second slowest half marathon EVER.  The only time I ran slower than this was at my very first half marathon after I hadn’t ran at all for 6 weeks.  So, I guess that running just once or twice a week is NOT enough to keep up my fitness levels.  Duh, right?

Kirsten had told me when she took off from me after mile 4 that she would run back along the course and find me to help me finish strong.  So, I figured any time after mile 11.5 I should expect to see her running back toward me.  However, she didn’t do it.  She was waiting near the finish, probably about 100 feet from the finish line.  She told me after she finished that she was actually starting to get worried.  She saw the guy in the Half Fanatics shirt that had approached me pre-race about the group photo and asked if he had seen me.  He said “the girl with the tattoos?  Yea, she’s right behind me.”  Haha!  Kirsten said it is a good thing I like to dress up for my races…makes me easy to spot!

I was 103^rd out of 200 total females and 15^th out of 22 in my age group.   Heh, at least I wasn’t dead last, right?  And, even better than that, at least I finished!  As my friend Kirsten posted in response to my Facebook post about this race, I “sucked it up and finished.”  And, really, that is ALL that matters.  I embraced the suck and I did it.  I’ve said it before…I NEVER regret a run or a race.  While I was running this race and it was sucking, I had the realization that even though it sucked I was actually still having fun!  Yep!  It’s true!

Just past mile 1 on the way out (this was an out-and-back course) there was my favorite sign.  But, at that point I was still going for a PR.  Well, on the way back, I had clearly abandoned any chance of a PR, so I decided to stop and snap a photo of it!

Kirsten snagged 2^nd in her age group!   So awesome!  She ended up finishing in 2:02 and some seconds.  Her friend that runs with her in Rogue got 1^st in her age group.

I was so happy to run into Donna after the race.  I truly do love running and how it brings so many people together.  Donna and I had some great conversation in that one little mile we ran together.  It got me thinking a lot about things I need to do to make myself a better version of myself.  So, thank you so much Donna!

Overall, I’m very happy with this race.  There were aid stations almost every single mile.  All had water and most also had Gatorade.  I would definitely like to do this race again next year and see if I can keep up my training up until the time for the race and THEN start my break from running for the year.

Best funny from this race?  My shorts were on backwards the entire race!  I discovered this fact when I was using the porta post-race.  Hahahaha!

Weekly Recap

Seems like I’m starting to get in a good habit of working out more days than not.  The last 2 weeks I have worked out 5 out of 7 days.  Last week I exercised all days I didn’t work overtime at work.  This week, I exercised all but one day that I had the opportunity to work out.  I only worked 1 shift of overtime this week, but still took 2 rest days.  I could have worked out last Saturday, but didn’t.

 

• Saturday: I was contemplating doing a run this day but ended up doing nada.  I can’t remember why.  I just know that nothing workout-wise happened.  So, REST DAY!

 

• Sunday: went for a 16 mile bike ride with my friend, Sam!  We made these plans early last week, so I’d been looking forward to it for almost a week.  I haven’t ridden a bike WITH another person in well over 10 years, so this was really nice.  I didn’t let him know that he was obligated to take a selfie with me until I was about to take said selfie.  Ha!  Ninja style!  Nah, he was cool with it, actually.  It was a really good ride and we both agreed that we need to do this again.

• Monday: I was going to do a 10K run this day but, 1) I had random and unignorable nausea Sunday night which prevented me from falling asleep for over an hour and then I just slept horribly after that.  THEN, as if that wasn’t enough, I set my alarms for the wrong day, so instead of waking up at 6:45, I woke up at 10.  Oops.  Good news is that I did still have time for a gym workout, sans the stair climber.  So, that’s what I did!  No excuses!!!

• Tuesday: since I didn’t run on Monday, I decided would run on Tuesday.  Did I?  Nope.  I slept horribly the night before yet again and was completely not up for getting up at 6:45am.  So I reset the alarm for 7:30 and then proceeded to hit “snooze” for an hour.  Ugh.  I had changed my workout from running a 10K to doing the hour Bob Harper’s “Yoga for the Warrior” DVD workout (an hour long), but ended up only having time to do Bob Harper’s “Bob’s Workout,” part 1 (30 minutes).  But, wow, I forgot how hard that workout is…and didn’t even go all out because, well, it was hard.  It was a good workout and, as usual, I never regret a workout.

After my workout and before work, I had my first therapy appointment with the new therapist.  His office is like 2.5 blocks away from work, so I parked at work and walked over.  This saved me money on the parking meter AND I wasn’t quite yet at 100% of my daily activity per my Polar M400 after the workout I did.  After my appointment, I walked to Einstein Bros Bagel Company and got a fountain drink, then walked back to my car, moved it off the hot roof of the parking garage to a lower level and turned the a/c on full blast.  Thanks to my post-appointment walk, I reached 100% within a couple hours of going in to work.  YAY!

 

• Wednesday: I had planned on a 10-ish mile bicycle ride.  I was talking to my friend Sam Tuesday evening at work and mentioned this and he asked if he could go with, so I of course said yes!  Riding bikes is way more fun with a friend!  So, I got up early, though not as early as I had planned because I set my alarm for the wrong day…ugh…third time in the last 7 days I have done that.  But I still got up early enough that it didn’t mess up our plans.  We rode 10.75 miles per my Garmin Edge, took our selfie together, and then went and ate pancakes!  He went home, I showered and then laid down for an hour and a half nap.  I slept GREAT for that hour and a half!!!  My abs are starting to get a little sore from Tuesday’s workout DVD.  By the end of this day, however, they were pretty dang sore.

• Thursday: I woke up before my alarm by over half an hour this day, but laid in bed until after I’d gone through all the snoozes on my alarm.  Haha!  Some days you just don’t want to get out of bed.  But, I DID get out of bed and got ready.  I went and filled my car up with gas and got an iced coffee from Starbucks before heading to the gym.  I did 46 floors in 10 minutes on the stair climber, then about an hour of strength training.  My abs were super sore from the Bob’s Workout DVD I did on Tuesday, so I had to adjust the weight down a little bit on the exercises that use my abs even ever so slightly.  But, on some of the other exercises, I actually upped the weight I was lifting!  YAY!

• Friday: REST DAY!  Worked overtime on the morning shift, so no workout this day.  Also, my abs are still pretty sore from Tuesday’s workout.  I think I definitely need to do 1 workout DVD a week just to mix things up and use different muscles than I’m used to and to using.

 

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So, I completely spaced on doing my tape measurements last week.  So, here are my measurements and my current weight and body fat % and BMI stats:

I'm down another 1.8 lbs and .6% body fat from last week's measurements.  I didn't use my Omron when I weighed in a couple weeks ago, but i'm down 3.8 lbs since that weigh in 2 weeks ago.  I'm pretty happy with my results so far.  I just hope I can stay motivated and keep losing every week.  I'm really hoping to hit my goal of getting as close to 170 as possible by the Austin Halloween Half Marathon on October 24th.  I really want to look as good as possible in my costume for that race.

What's Cookin'

A few weeks ago, one of my co-workers brought in some homemade fried rice for a going away party we were having.  She's part Filipino, so this is sort of what would be called a "family recipe."  Except there is no actual recipe.  There is basically just a method.  I asked her to explain the method to me, and am now putting it down here as a recipe.  She said to start with whatever meat you want to put in there and season it with whatever spices you want, so I chose shrimp and beef seasoned with garlic powder, cumin, and black pepper.

SARA'S FILIPINO-STYLE FRIED RICE

Ingredients:
• 1 cup dry rice of your choice (I chose Basmati as it's my favorite)
• 1 lb cubed stew meat
• one 12 oz package precooked medium shrimp
• 2 cups water
• approx 3 tbsp extra virgin olive oil
• 1 medium onion
• 1 package frozen mixed veggies
• 1/2 tbsp Kikkoman low sodium soy sauce

Directions:
• cook the rice in your preferred method.  For ease of prep, I simply followed the package's directions on how to cook rice in the microwave.  Once the rice is cooked, set aside so it can cool to room temperature.

• next, brown your meat in a non-stick skillet with some of the oil.

• when the meat is fully browned, add your frozen veggies, still frozen.  Cook until the veggies are tender and fully mixed with your meat.

• remove meat and veggies, with juice, from pan and set aside.  Put the rest of the oil in the pan and turn up the heat.  Heat the oil until it is HOT HOT HOT.  Add the rice and soy sauce and fry the rice.  Be careful to scrape the bottom of the pan to keep the rice from sticking/burning.

• add the meat and veggies back into the pan and mix with the rice.  Do NOT put all the meat/veggie juice into the rice or it will be soggy.  You do not want soggy fried rice.  Trust me.  I added about half of the juice into the rice/meat/veggie mixture.  Cook the meat, veggies and rice until they are fully combined with each other.

• Now, I got a little mixed up when I was cooking and sort of skipped a step.  I say sort of because I prepped the onion by rough chopping it and setting it aside.  HOWEVER, I completely spaced on cooking it when I was "supposed" to.  Per my friend, you're supposed to cook the onions IN the rice as you are frying it.  So, since I forgot to do this, I just sauteed the onions by themselves and then added them into the mix.  No biggie.

This is surprisingly a fairly healthy dish.  You can add more rice, if you wish, but in my dish the rice is just sort of an add in and not the main focus of the dish.  Also, I made this as a main dish, not a side dish.  If you're doing it as a side dish, then I would suggest doubling the amount of servings to 10 instead of the 5 I did.