Another day, another run. And they keep feeling better. I keep hitting walls around the same points in my runs, but I’m moving faster, as my time for my 3.2 mile loop has gone from 45 to 39 minutes (a rough estimate based on the time on my Fuze
. (Yea, it does start to sound silly when put like that.)
Anyway, nothing else to report today…just pumped that I’m already cutting more time off my run than I had expected to so soon!
Ok, so I got my run in on Friday, took the weekend off, and got back into the swing of things tonight. And tonight’s run felt horrible (I was cramping bad at some points, and I also left almost a half hour later than usual), but it was my fastest so far (3.2 miles in about 41 minutes). That really surprised me! I guess I am getting a little more in shape. Slowly, but surely.
Speaking of slowly but surely, I also had my “weekly” weigh in on Saturday. Turns out, I lost a pound. Sure, it’s no Biggest Loser first week, but I have a full time job and a 16-month-old to chase around when I get home…plus I hit up a Greek food festival and the Three Rivers Arts Festival (aka fair-type food), so losing any weight last week was a plus. However, I do need to work on getting my diet in line with my workout regimen, or there really is no point. I’ve already started cutting back on my Mountain Dew intake, and I just have to make sure I eat reasonable stuff the rest of the week.
In the meantime, I’ll keep hitting the pavement and try to make the diet changes little by little. It’ll be a long process, but in the end I want to lose the weight and keep it off, so taking it slow is probably the better thing to do.
So, after being extremely sore for two days and a day of rain, I still managed to lace up my shoes and hit the pavement. Did the same loop today, but it felt better even though I started out with sore muscles. However, at least I ate lighter (and no burping up potato salad…a big plus) and hydrated better today, so I think that balanced things out.
I also have to admit that I already feel a lot better than I expected. Yes, my muscles hurt (even my abs, which I didn’t expect…I guess that’s from all the heavy breathing), but I already have more energy and want to keep on the healthy track.
Oh, and while running, I realized that I hadn’t gotten a “before” picture so that I could compare now to wherever I get to (hopefully). Yea, it may not have the same impact as The Biggest Loser before/after photos, but I’m curious to see the changes. So, here’s the “before”, and it’ll probably be a few months before we get an “after”:
Disclaimer: This is going to be a continuing series of posts on me trying to get my lazy butt back in shape. If you’re not interested, feel free to skip on over it.
Right now, I am very sore…
Why? (You may ask.)
Well, that’s because I just attempted a 3.3 mile run jog, the first time in more years than I can remember. (Was it in college at Hiram? I almost hope I’m wrong about that…) And by attempted, I mean that I probably only successfully jogged 2 intermittent miles of that and walked with bad lactic acid buildup in my legs (note to self: spend more time hydrating over the course of the day, and don’t eat potato salad before running). I’ve exercised in many different ways since I last ran, but I’ve mostly avoided straight-up running because I found it boring, and, yep, difficult.
So why did I suddenly pick running as my exercise of choice? Well, it’s hard to say exactly, but I needed to exercise, and to do something to get out in this beautiful warm weather (because ellipticals are great for the winter and storms, but not much fun when you have the opportunity to get out).
And yes, I did slip in that I NEEDED to exercise. It’s something I’ve been putting off for far too long, and something I want to do for Graem. I want him to be able to go out and run and play with his dad, and I want to be able to teach him to play sports and have fun outside. The way I had been going, I’d simply been getting too lazy.
So, after almost a month and a half of tracking my weight (see below…it was my failed attempt to convince myself to eat better [maybe something to do with traveling for two weddings and the advent of grilling season]…at least I stayed within 2 pounds of where I was…), today was the day I went to the outlets and got me a pair of running shoes (adidas Outlet Store + 20% coupon = great deal) and got busy with actually trying to make a dent in the number that was too high for my tastes (ok, so 260 isn’t going to get me on The Biggest Loser, but it’s pretty close to as big as I’ve been).
So, why am I writing about this, even on Day 1? Accountability. Too many times I’ve started making changes, only to give up on them or push them off because “something more pressing” came up. Well, it’s time to stop that, so I’m going to share my progress (or lack thereof) with the Intertubes, and let y’all encourage me or yell at me to quit slacking off. I’d really appreciate either…honestly. It’s time to make some (here comes the cliche) life changes, and I know it’s not going to be easy…
Ok, last cake post for a little while, as I’m all caught up and there aren’t any more family birthdays for a few more months…
So, with my sister’s birthday being just a few days ago, I decided to try my hand at making a cake from scratch. All my life I’d made cake from a box, and it’s just not very satisfying to spend the time decorating knowing that there’s box cake underneath (maybe it’s just me, I dunno). Anyway, I went with just a plain white cake for my first attempt, and it went pretty well. It smelled great when baking and after coming out of the oven, but it was a bit dry (IMHO). I’ll likely be tweaking that recipe in the future to make it moister in the future, but for a first attempt, I was very happy.
As far as the decorations go, I decided not to go too crazy, but to do something nice and spring-like. I couldn’t make up my mind what colors I wanted to use until I sat down to decorate, but I came up with the following:
As a bonus picture, so you can get a better shot of the combing, here is a shot of my son helping his aunt blow out her candles!
For some background, Russell used to love eating Creme de Menthe cookies around the holidays. Besides the great chocolate-mint combination, when he found out that a liqueur was used to make the mint layer he used to love telling people he could feel himself getting drunk from eating the cookies.
Years later, those memories were harnessed and turned into the Creme de Menthe cake:
Now, this was not a cake for the faint-hearted. It was DENSE, but extremely tasty. Unfortunately, after you had a slice, you were probably set on chocolate for the next few weeks. However, it was a very good slice that was a lot of fun to make!
Ok, so it’s been almost three months since I made them, but I just realized I never posted pictures of Graem’s First Birthday cakes! And yes, I made two so there were plenty for all our guests.
Here they are:
Not too bad if I do say so myself!
Johnny Spillane Celebrating His Silver Medal
I have to admit, I love the Olympics. The raw competition of athletes around the world who truly appreciate the sports they play, and dedicate their lives to the one moment, or at best few moments, they are given to shine. There’s just something great about seeing elite athletes in obscure sports step up to another level, and seeing unexpected athletes, like the cross-country skier from Brazil where they don’t really have winter, giving their all (and the crowd and fellow competitors cheering them for it).
There is an air of respect and honor around the Olympic games that still makes it special. It always feels like the world puts aside their differences and turns their attention to friendly competition.
Probably the most amazing thing so far, and highly under-reported, has been the success of Johnny Spillane and the US men’s Nordic combined team. Spillane not only won a silver medal in an event where the US had never medaled (leaving only biathalon where the US continues to struggle), but the team put 3 competitors in the top 6! That’s quite an accomplishment in a sport where our country has struggled for so long.
So, only a few days in, I’m really enjoying it (except for the extensive figure skating coverage, which I could go without), though I am pacing myself. After all, NBC likes to add in too many “human interest stories” and “other crap” (like the piece on polar bears who live on the other side of the country) that I just don’t care about. Thankfully, there’s plenty of other coverage on their family of networks to keep me interested most of the (and if not, I can go online, or at least find an NCIS rerun). Thankfully, they mix in a fair amount of Al Michaels trying to figure out why he’s at the Olympics after a 30+ year hiatus, which has a fairly high “unintentional humor” value.
And today’s when the real fun kicks off! With curling and men’s hockey getting under way, it’s two of the bigger drawing sports that will carry excitement throughout the next few weeks!
Not that I won’t happily sit and watch hours of cross-country skiing anyway…they’re still amazing athletes who deserve the attention and recognition after their years of sacrifice.
So, Google Buzz has arrived, seemingly out of nowhere. And I have to say, it’s OK….
And just OK at that. While it’s not the potentially revolutionary step that Google Wave could have been, it is Google’s best effort at tackling the “Social Web” so far.
The problem is that it comes across as a hackneyed attempt to compete with Twitter and Facebook. First, it’s essentially a Twitter clone, without the character limits and plus links to outside sites (like Twitter itself), so there’s nothing really new in place. It’s really hard to justify “buying in” on Buzz when you’re already invested elsewhere, and until Buzz can differentiate itself, I’m sure many others will view it in the same light.
Second, it’s basically just slapped into the gmail interface. Let’s not understress this point, because if you have a track record of launching new tools seperately with possible ties to one another, then why make your first legitimate foray into the “Social Web”, then why just slap it into something already existing? With gmail, which I’m sure many people simply access via POP or IMAP like I do at home, there are millions who may not even see the new service if they are not logging in through the gmail web interface.
It’s like the Google team said “Well, Wave didn’t take off as we had hoped, but we need to do something to compete with Twitter and Facebook…like clone them and mash them together!”
While I’ll be playing on Buzz for a little while to see if the Google team can take it to the next level that it so desperately needs (yes, just two days after launch), if they can’t take it there, it will just be gathering dust in the near future…
Back to the drawing boards, Google team!
Dear Idiot,
Nice job committing insurance fraud and completely lying to your insurance company about what happened. I mean, I had started backing out, and saw you throw your car into reverse and start aiming at me, yes…but I stopped my car and honked THREE times at you to get your attention, which was clearly diverted elsewhere.
However, you tell your insurance company that you saw my car moving in order to cover your own butt (which, from the way you drive, I can only assume you’ve had to do before). Of course, if you actually saw my car moving (which implies you were paying some modicum of attention), it begs the question, “WHY THE HECK DID YOU KEEP BACKING UP???”
The clear answer is that you were preoccupied with something else (talking up some girl on the phone or drowning out the world with music, I don’t know…). However, it’s much easier to lie than to admit that you made a mistake, huh?
Except for at the scene, apparently, where you actually claimed responsibility for the accident. You never said what distracted you, but you managed to vocalize that you were at fault.
At least until your insurance agent called. Then you’re changing your story again to try and keep your growing premiums down.
So then I have to go through more than a month of dealing with your crappy, unresponsive insurance company and driving my crunched-up car while they twiddle their thumbs and finally offer to split the $3000+ in repairs 50/50.
Fortunately, I have real auto insurance with a reasonable deductible that allowed me to reject their offer and finally get the repairs done at a fair price (not as fair as the $0 I should have paid for you ramming your car into mine, but much better than $1500).
Next time you get in an accident, I sure hope the other party gets the police involved to get a clear report that you won’t be able to flip on.
-Greg Nilsen
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