pushing up hill

after a short (2.5mi) run friday after work that felt fantastic (no lingering fever related fatigue), the busy weekend conspired against me. too many obligations to other's, not enough obligation to myself and my training.

the weekend ended with a HUGE dinner at the home of some family friends. my over indulgence didn't bother me from a caloric sense, but it seriously paralyzed me. i was in a food (and wine) coma by the time i got home, so any idea of running sunday night was buried under salmon ball, lasagne and cheesecake. yes, oh yes, cheesecake. when plain ol' cake isn't rich enough, why not add cheese! i was in pain. running was out of the question unless i desired to present the contents of my stomach to unsuspecting (and undeserving) passers by.

the topics of conversation sunday evening included the usuals - sex and religion. prior being exposed to a little more information than i needed about my parents' sex life (thankyouverymuch...please pass the brain bleach), we talked running/training over appetizers. kenny and i are a study in contrasts in working toward our common goal of bloomsday. he is as methodical as i am fly-by-the-seat-of-my-pants. but we're each going about this in the way that works for us. structure v. freeform. i don't do well with regimented structure. i'll set the goal, give myself a rough outline (in this case, hal's 10K for novices training schedule), but i need room to flex and improvise. this, however, does not mean i won't push myself, so when brother recommended that i work some hills into my running, i took this under advisement.

tonight, i ran 3.5 miles in 35 minutes. that's 10 minute miles. i'm slowly knocking seconds of time off my miles. but what i was most excited about was that i switched my route to include a hill. i ran up 15th to fremont, and then east on fremont to 33rd. there is a small hill (not a grade or an incline but a bonafide hill) as fremont reaches 33rd. about 4-5 blocks worth of hill. i felt it for sure, but i kept running (bonus points for running uphill into a headwind!!!). as i reached the top, i started to feel that familiar nausea from over exertion. but i recovered quickly as i started running down 33rd toward knott.

i'm beginning to think i can do this. no shit.

NNNOOOOOoooooooooooo!!!!

a moment of silence, please.








thank you.

edited to add: rough basketball weekend for the entire state of washington... condolences.

the voodoo that yoodooo

so i was talking to mom tonight, and she was asking me about the running, and was i taking care of myself...

"you used to get side aches. have you gotten any side aches?" she asked.

"nope, not a one!" i replied, a little to confidently as it turns out.

tonight i was supposed to run 3 miles. and i did. but about one mile in i got a stitch in my side. not high up under my ribs where i remember getting them, but just to the right of my left hipbone. a very focused pain. like a perma-noogie, just digging in deeper and deeper. i wasn't sure what to do... are you supposed to run through a stitch? are all stitches created equal? because of the location of this pain (not to mention the time of the month, sorry, but if i can run with it you can read about it) i thought it might be a gas bubble.

i made sure i was breathing fully, hoping that would help. one thing i've noticed when i can't get my breath, it is because i'm not exhaling every last drop of air. i'm rushing to inhale. so i'm trying to be patient with my breathing and it is helping. but not with this pain. it was there for the last two miles. didn't stop until i did.

and when i stopped running, instead of feeling light and energized, i felt heavy, my legs like wet sacks of sand. my body ached. i was chilled, even tho i was properly dressed. i'm thinking this has to do with my period, rather than coming down with anything. but i'm drinking an emergen-c just in case!!

much love to all my family... i'm thinking about all of you... i'm not me without you...

four.

i ran four miles today. in shorts. it's the last day of winter, and the sun was high in the sky impatiently waiting for spring. done with moody winter, the sun brushes it off like an unwanted suitor. spring, the striking new guy in town, is catching the sun's eye. yo girlfriend, i hear spring is a player...don't get your warm heart set on any long term commitment...

i wanted to know what it felt like to run 4 miles. it feels just like three, only longer. i know that sounds silly, but there is a threshold or level of physical discomfort that i've found, for lack of a better word, comfortable. that my body can accept. and once i hit that, it doesn't get any worse no matter how long i run. that's when my mind wanders, or empties, and i'll run a few blocks and not even realize i've covered the distance.

i need to get a proper timer, because i've not been very good about timing my runs. right now i'm more concerned about covering the distance. but i would like to know how fast i'm running. i think today i ran about 10+ ish minute miles.

apple tart with currants and apricot sauce. yep, i made that. it was YUMMY!

kneedeep

julian found a new fun thing to do! the new fun thing is to whap snow-laden branches with his ski pole just as i'm walking underneath them. and then snicker maniacally. easy target, i am, so absorbed by what is around me, i'm not paying attention to the ass behind me every time i happen pass under a cedar branch.

we snow-shoed for over 3 hours. it was great to be out in the snow, breathing to the bottom of our lungs. how often do you do that? breath all the way to the bottom of your lungs. do it. i've been doing it a lot lately. i've been reminding myself, even when i'm not working out, to breath deeply. just take a few deep, slow breaths. feel them move in, down, up and out of my lungs. like watching one single snow flake make its way from the clouds in the sky through the trees and down to the earth, i visualize and follow my breath all the way through my body.

ringo had an excellent time on the trail, falling into his trail scout role he assumed when we backpacked in idaho. he'd run ahead, and then sprint back to check on us, full-bore, and then skid out in a cloud of kicked-up snow as he slid to a stop at our feet. he ended up with snow/ice balls dangling from his ankles like some kind of doggy-leg ornaments.

tomorrow, a four mile run. my first. i'm a little nervous. a good night's sleep should help. so that's what i have planned for this evening.

day off!

finally got my run in lat night between boisterous rainstorms, so i didn't have to spend an hour on the dreadmill. today we're going snowshoeing, tomorrow will be my off day, and then sunday [insert menacing music here] a FOUR mile run.

the shamrocks are in my room, always peeking out my window. i've had them since grandpa died, which has to be a record long relationship for me and one plant. but they are a straight forward plant, they communicate with me clearly - droopy and brown = water me. so i oblige...and they live on. it's those vague, evasive plants that don't let you know what they need that i have problems with. don't expect me to read your mind, plant. orchids are the worst, they look fantastic one day and the next they've dropped every leaf and petal and are just a stick in a pot. nice.

happy st. patrick's day! go zags!

last resort

got up this morning to run and it was raining SO hard. i'm packing my bag and going to try the treadmill at the gym tonight. don't like the gym, but i'm left with no choice. if the weather looks okay later on i'll come home and run my neighborhood route, but it doesn't look promising...

the treadmill. rodent wheel for people. don't like 'em. boooooring. but i have my nano, and of course my never ending internal monologue to entertain me. and then there's the people watching... there's that, i have that...

self-inflicted torture

the thing with torture is, the human body responds to it. it tries to protect you. you submit it to torture, and it hurts. you keep up that same level of torture, and the body adjusts to accept it. the threshold for pain moves higher. protecting you from discomfort.

so explain to me why my measly 2.5 mile run this morning was such torture, and my 3 mile run on saturday was the proverbial cakewalk?

one thing i think is my body doesn't like to go from bed to run. i think i need to get up, move around, have some tea before i go. remember that strength i was talking about? it has a friend. discipline. i need to have an affair with discipline. bedtime is important. sleep is important. and when my alarm goes off, get the hell out of bed!!

strength

i bet y'all thought i was giving up last week... didn't ya? it's okay, i get it. but get use to being wrong, SUCKAAHHSSSSS!!!!

but first, i just had a lovely meal of caesar salad, steamed cauliflower with butter and lemon, and a small tenderloin steak that was TO DIE FOR. just melted in my mouth. simply prepared - a little s&p rubbed in, then sizzled two sides in a hot skillet. perfect. now if i only had some wine... oh well. a little dark chocolate with hazelnuts, more rooibos tea for me, and then off to bed. with some music to guide me into slumber on this full moon night...maybe lucinda williams...

today was stretch and strengthen, so i did an hour of pilates. i was pleasantly surprised at my ability to successfully perform nearly all of the exercises, even the ones that make my body shake and tremble. just keep breathing and connecting the breathing to your core. my back didn't twinge, and i only had to stop once when one of my toes did that weird thing where it kind of pulls out of joint and you can't move it? you know what i'm talking about? like a charlie horse in your toe?? GOD i hate those. i get them in yoga as well and they just drop me to the ground. stupid dumb toe.

strength. this training is strengthening my body and my mind. i'm more determined (about a lot of things) than i've felt in a while. and i think a huge part of strength is recovery. how you recover from a setback. not just how quickly, but how true. last week i had a setback. it really bogged me down, made me a self-defeating sourpuss (just ask julian...bless him). this week? i'm over it. and moving forward.

strength.

oxymoron of the day :: fun run

my brother asked me if i want to run a 10k with him a week before bloomsday. i'm thinking about it... might be a great way to cap off my training, and then ease off the week before the run.

thinking...

damn you kenny and your infernal contagious enthusiasm! DAMN YOU!!

reason no. 17 to run :: escape

i'm finally on the other side. friday night i was at work until 1, and then in bed spinning until 3:30 or so. i couldn't turn off my mind. work stress had unleashed random insecurities that took the wheel and wouldn't let go. i woke up saturday with one thought.

run.

escape. escape the week. escape work. escape the thoughts that kept me up at night.

so i did. i escaped for a good 3 miles in 35 minutes in the bright sunshine and the cold crisp air. a new route, up 15th, left on 7th, down to knott, up to 21st, right and back down 21st to hancock and home. it was (relatively) easy. it felt great. i thought about what i was running from, and what i was running toward.

i've realized something about running. it is meditation in motion. if you do it right, your mind empties, and all you hear is your breathing, your feet hitting the earth, your heart pumping blood throughout your body (and in my case, mike doughty's rising sign). you're aware of how your body feels, positive and negative. you're open to the instant feedback. as your mind clears, the troubling whitecaps smooth into a reflective clarity, like the columbia on a rare windless day. you see things in ways you've not seen them before. secrets are revealed. answers come.

that's all. this will be a better week.

what day is it??

is my mother reading this? because i'm about to use some colorful language...

*deep breath*

seems if it isn't working until after 10pm, it is a few inches of snow in my way. tomorrow, i'm packing a gym bag and going to the gym. i hate it, but desperate times call for desperate measures.

what did i want to do today? i wanted to get up, go for a run, go to work, have a productive day, leave work at a reasonable hour, trip to trader joe's, do a little house cleaning, pet mookie, see my boyfriend (maybe get snowed in together), watch a movie, drink some tea, snuggle, sleep and dream. what did i do? wake up late to no alarm other than mookie walking across my chest to drink from the glass of water at my bedside, scramble to shower/get ready, drive to work in the snow exacerbated traffic, work until 10pm, drive home in blobby snow, chat w/julian on the phone, go to bed.

and now my project is threatening to shit all over my weekend as well. i'm just not going to allow that to happen. that's all there is to it.

i'm very frustrated.

painting by laura walker scott

day 10 :: falling down

i let work invade my space today, and the thing that dropped was my workout. last in, first out. i didn't get home until after 10, and it was all i could do to make tea and crawl into bed. i've set the alarm for an early morning run, but it is going to be bitch-ass cold out there. warm bed...cold, wet street... tough choice, that.

the good thing about the weather is that it is dumping snow on mt. hood, and i'm hoping to snow shoe this weekend with julian. maybe we'll make anatomically correct snow peoples. the picture is one i took while skiing with friends. snow always makes me think of my grandma, who used to be so grumpy if it didn't snow enough... she would take poloriod pictures of her backyard blanketed in snow and send them to me with a note like "eat your heart out, babe!" equal parts sharing the joy and rubbing my face in it!

day 9 :: the only way to finish...

...is to start.

and then, of course, you have to keep going. not much time to write, i'll be late for work. i didn't want to run this morning, so i put it off until i got pissed at myself and forced myself out the door. mind over matter. as i'm finding out, i always feel fantastic when it is over.

tears stream down my face as i run. why is that? the weather? my body's involuntary reaction to the sustained physical torture that is running? i don't know, but it happens every time.

i'm eating an orange my dad brought back from california. it's like sunshine on my tongue.

happy birthday!

happiest of birthdays (belatedly) to my auntie donna and my cousin bleefy...er... boofy...my apologies for my lameness on sending out greetings in a timely fashion.

which brings me to some family business. so far, by my count, those in on the run are:

_kenny
_heather
_boofy
_erin
_ben
_heidi

any other cousins out there down for the torture and have an amenable schedule? bonus: it is a great prelim for a summer backpacking excursion...!

days 6/7 :: learning to spit

saturday was to be a cross training day. i started my training with a lovely scramble of garlic, olives, spinach, smoked salmon, sundried tomato pesto, feta and jack cheese, and eggs. then i helped julian drag large amounts of wood (2x4's, boards, siding, flooring etc.) out of his shed so he could inventory it. it was a bit of exercise, but not enough. i went home and took my friend's bike out for a little leisurely spin before dark. i don't know how far i went, but i was gone for about an hour, tooling around the side streets of irvington/alameda/alberta. steering clear of the main roads because i'm a bit nervous to ride in traffic. not much experience in urban cycling. i came home and intended on taking a nap (up too late the night before) and then meeting some friends out around 10pm. i lay down at 7, and the next thing i know it is 12:30! whoops - there went saturday night. and i was WIDE awake at 12:30. stayed that way until about 3 - tooling around the net, listening to music...

i fell back to sleep between 3 and 4... not waking up again until 8. i snuggled in bed with mookie (the fat cat) for a couple hours, procrastinating my 3 mile run. i made tea, had a small breakfast, got back in bed... soon it was 11 and i was irritating myself with my procrastination. so i threw on my shoes and hit the pavement. ipod dialed to mike doughty - so far he's my favorite running companion. his music is uptempo w/o being manic. a nice backdrop to my journey. (i just downloaded some harvey danger and can't wait to take it running...i think it will be perfect...)

my route was much the same, with a small addendum to push it into the 3 mile mark. that little addendum included a hill. ugh. it hurt me. it brought back all the feelings i hate about running... i couldn't catch my breath, my stomach was cueing up in my throat wanting to spew forth, my heart was beating like a meth addled drummer in a speed metal band right between my ears. so i walked for 3 blocks. once i recovered myself, i started running again. felt much better... felt human... felt like i'd found my pace again. i was proud that i didn't give up. i was proud that i didn't feel defeated. at the end of the run, i felt really good.

so, week one down. i stayed on schedule with little impact to my daily schedule, which is really nice. today after swallowing too much air, decided i need to learn how to spit - i've never been good at it and to do it while running w/o getting it over myself is my next milestone. not so keen on the snot-rockets tho, i'll wipe my runny nose on my sleeve until it is crusty before i'll blow snot out of my nose onto the pavement.

this isn't going to be easy, the training or the run. but i'm already feeling that it is going to be tremendously worthwhile.

day 5 :: REST!!!

today... nothing. i'm actually afraid of the rest day, because i'm afraid i'll lose momentum, energy, drive. but all training schedules i've read include one day of rest. so who am i to argue with such wisdom?! off to a nice breakfast with friends. enjoy the day!

day 4 :: daffodils

spring was heavy in the air as i ran my loop early this morning. daffodils did their best imitations of the sun, sweet daphne perfumed the way. i swear daphne smells the way sweet-tarts taste.

i covered the same distance but in about 30 minutes. i didn't get an exact time because my cool down walk included a trip to peet's coffee where i snagged myself some banana maple coffee cake. which would be delicious were in not vegan!!! please vegans of the world, do not foist your dense and rubbery baked "goods" on the unsuspecting public. okay, admittedly i didn't read the teensy sign close enough, and missed that the bakery's phone number ended with "v-e-g-a-n". i was distracted by the anticipated mingling of banana and maple flavors. not exactly the "treat" i was hoping to give myself. next time, i'll walk the extra few blocks to grand central and grab a hand pie or one of their soft-ball sized cinnamon rolls... next thing you know some raw food outfit will start distributing blobs of shredded raw carrot, raisins (wait, are raisins raw??), honey, molasses, oats, flax seed and sprouted wheat under the guise of "carrot cake". gah.

i have no beef (heh) with vegans. really. but where you lose me is honey. honey is the nectar of the gods, transmitted to us through the humble, bumble bee. i dream one day of keeping bees and harvesting my own honey. i guess i just don't get how something so magical as honey, so pure and healing, so of this earth, used by culture after culture as medicine and nourishment, could be offensive. i found this page explaining why honey isn't vegan and discussing the enslavement of bees. and while i'll admit that like any commodity there are ways of producing and harvesting it that are mindful of the bees and of the earth, and ways that aren't. but COME ON PEOPLE??!! so i'm dreaming of becoming a slave owner. and my hives will be my plantation. yeah, right.

so to continue my workout schedule, i need some strength training today. that will have to wait until after work...

beautiful daffodil painting is by laura walker scott and i picked it because it reminded me of shelby...

day 3 :: p-p-p-pilates

continuing the training program, i am to cross train for 30 minutes today. i didn't feel like going to the gym and running on the hamster wheels with the rest of the rodents, so i decided to do pilates at home. i have these tapes, winsor pilates, that i picked up at an estate sale. (as opposed to windsor pilates because who wants to see the queen mum with her knees up around her ears!!) while i probably should have done something aerobic, i also need to work on my core strength, and that is what pilates is all about.

my lower back has been hurting... sometimes more, sometimes less... since the weekend of my birthday. i'm sure it was due to the herky-jerky trying to maintain my balance reflex movement while xc skiing coupled with less than rock hard abs. i was a little nervous to do the pilates - your back will tell you loud and clear if it isn't up for the session. but mine held up, as i concentrated on my breathing and keeping my core pulled in strong as my limbs stretched out. if you've never tried it, you must. it looks simple and graceful, and you might not feel like it is a workout, but if you do it right, you'll feel it the next day.

overall my body feels good. i have a slight tickle in my throat, pushing up a cough every now and again. feeling a little tired, but i've been up late the past couple nights. so tonight, in short order, it's rooibos tea and bed for me.

tomorrow a 2 mile run plus some strength training. i'll probably do the same run i did last night...if i'm getting up early to do it i don't want to have to bother with figuring out a new route. i'll be lucky to drag my ass out of bed, to be honest. but if i do, i'll reward myself with a yummy pastry from peet's or somesuch. because why the hell not!