Good Excuses are Still Excuses (and I made some good choices this week too!)

Last week was officially a week from hell.  I'd like to say I handled the stress well and fueled my body with good, healthy foods throughout.  But no, that's not what happened.  On the upside, I did mostly fuel my body with wholesome foods and I exercised a good amount so let's focus on that instead.  Well phooey, this is a fitness blog so you know I'll tell you all about both.

Oh, but before I do that, I'll share a few pictures from my super fun night out at the Mother's Social on Wednesday evening.

Photo booth fun (Hi Michelle & Alison!)

The two Michelles

Can you tell how much fun we had?!  It was great.  And I even won a few things at the raffle.  A birthday party at a local playhouse (where we'll be celebrating Myra's #3 in September), a gift card to an Indian restaurant and to a bakery.  Yum!

These pictures should be motivation to keep up my does-a-body-good ways.  Because as you can see my arms were totally exposed and guess what?  I felt totally comfortable.  Entirely.  I should make a note on my calendar because that's a first.  I didn't worry about all the neurotic, ridiculous stuff I usually worry about.  I think all the people (here and in real life) telling me I'm nuts when it comes to my arms, I think I'm finally convinced they don't look huge or weird.  So the motivation didn't happen that night, I had a couple cocktails and more than enough food, including more deserts than I needed.  And no dancing to balance it out, wasn't a dancing party.

Thursday started out well enough,  went to work and happily social worked away all morning.  Had lunch in San Anselmo at a favorite little cafe that I haven't been to in forever, the aptly named Comforts.  They have a Chinese Chicken Salad that is out of this world.  But instead I ordered healthier items from the deli counter - a grilled chicken breast, black bean salad and steamed veggies.  I can't tell you how satisfied I was eating my meal.  It wasn't that it was the best food ever, though it was quite tasty, it was that I felt good eating what I knew was good fuel for my body.

Then my good day went all to hell when a work situation arose that required me to make a police report.  That's never a good thing.  The good news is my boss told me to take the rest of the day off once I was done at the police station.  After all the unpleasantness I really needed my workout.

I headed to the gym for a spin on the upright bike, 25 minutes, level 8.  That was followed up by strength training - back, biceps, core.  After the gym I headed to Larkspur where I planned to see Wait, Wait Don't Tell Me on the big screen.  They filmed them recording the NPR quiz show.  But before that I grabbed dinner at a local seafood restaurant - I was starving!  I made more healthy choices, grilled fish with two sides - a beet salad and a kale salad.  Yum!  My food was good and the show had me laughing out loud enough times to make up for my not-funny-at-all afternoon.

After the show I was exhausted and dying to get in bed but I stopped at a local grocer for some chocolate, I wanted something sweet.  I ended up with a dark chocolate bar, the over-sized fancy kind, and a bag of corn nuts because...there's no because when it comes to corn nuts, you just want them.  And I ate both items.  So much for my healthy dinner.  No.  Wait.  Bad food choices don't erase good food choices, they co-exist, in balance.

That brings me, finally, to Friday.  The day in which all the week's intensity caught up with me and I sort of drug myself through the day feeling tired and in need of a nap.  I weighed myself, 141 pounds - moving back down thankfully.  I had a nice work morning, a yummy lunch consisting of salad, chicken breast, and a hearty bowl of soup.  I might have had 4 squares of more fancy chocolate.  I went to the gym after work but was pressed for time. I couldn't do my normal 3 mile run so I did what I could, 1.5 miles.  I alternated 6.4 and 7.4mph every 1 minute.  13 minutes, 11 seconds later I hopped off the 'mill and did chest/triceps/core.  For some reason chest presses were hard and I couldn't do my first set of 8 with 30 pound dumbbells.  Who knows.

Yes I ate the whole package :o

Dinner was a grilled chicken breast, quinoa and a salad with avocado.  After the kids were in bed I did some grocery shopping and Mochi ice cream from Trader Joe's (green tea flavor) might have made it into my mouth.  Along with a few bites of 85% dark chocolate.  This was a clear case of, "I've had a hard week and I'm going to do whatever I want."  Don't get me started on the irrational nature of that sentence.  We all know that what I want is a healthy body I can feel good about.  But sometimes what I want now overrides what I want more, and that's what happened last night.

But today is a new day - and the weekend!  We're headed to a birthday party in a few.  I'm going to pack a salad and skip the cake.  I lost a pound this week and I really want to keep it off, possibly lose another.  I'm shooting to be back under 140 hopefully by the end of the month.  If I want to make that happen I can't keep eating chocolate and ice cream and all the rest.  Unfortunately good excuses don't erase bad calories.

Life, it Happens

Ups and downs, downs and ups.  It's the nature of the journey.  Last week was good.  This week was crazy.  I'll take normal for next week please.  I got all my exercise in last week, including a feel-good run on Sunday.  But I'll back up just a bit.  Friday I hit the gym and did a 3 mile run on the treadmill.  I ran at 6.4mph with 7.4mph intervals.  I had to push myself but I got 'er done, as they say.  After the treadmill I powered through strength training, happy to be "back" after the post-pneumonia rebuild.

The weekend was filled with social gatherings.  We went to a pizza birthday party on Saturday for some sweet and zany 4 year old twins we've known since they were still wet behind the ears.   To avoid pizza I brought my own food - a salad with tuna and healthy dressing.  I view this as strong-arm tactics but I just needed to draw the line on the junk food.  I had two bites of cake - one from Marek's and one from Myra's.  So good.  Saturday evening was dinner out and I made the healthiest choice I could - grilled chicken breast, veggies and a salad.  Flan might have also made it into my mouth.  I had one beer.  Better than several.

Pinkastic (can you tell we're all runners?)

Sunday was another birthday party - a Pinko de Mayo fiesta for a gorgeous 2 year old friend.  They served fiesta food so I was able to make healthy choices (grilled chicken, salsa, beans).  Here I am with the birthday girls' mom and another momma friend.  Love these ladies!  I skipped all the enticing adult beverages at the party because of my planned run later.  It's always nice to surround yourself with people who understand and support your goals, who when they offer you a drink and you say, "no thanks, I'm running later" they get it.  My shorts look white in this pic but they were actually a pale pink.  It wasn't called Pinko de Mayo for nothin'!  I bet you can tell by the hot bodies these two ladies are sporting that they're runners too :)

The desert table was crazy and I might have done a full-body tackle of said table.  Cookies, cupcakes, wafers - you name it, I ate it.  But I justified it with my planned run and moved on.

Speaking of... I left the party and met Miguel at his post-soccer gathering at a local taqueria.  We did the kid swap and I changed (in my car - always fun) into my running clothes.  I hit the road, wearing my Garmin for the first time in quite a while.  I didn't have a goal pace in mind, I was mainly curious how fast my comfortable pace is.  I initially thought I'd run for an hour but then decided to go for 7 miles, considering I have a half-marathon in a little less than a month.  Here are my splits, and full Garmin stats if you are interested.

After about a half-mile I decided to shoot for a sub-10 minute mile pace.  I was happy with my pace, including pushing myself up some slight inclines during mile 5.  Except for the overpass there were no hills to speak of.  I came home and plotted out a plan to train for the See Jane Run half coming up on June 8th.

Week	Mon	Tue	Wed	Thur	Fri	Sat	Sun
1 (5/5 – 5/11)	Bike + strength	4 m run	Rest	3 m run + strength	Bike + strength	Rest	8 m run
2 (5/12 - 5/18	Bike + strength	4 m run	Rest	3 m run + strength	Bike + strength	Rest	9 m run
3 (5/19 – 5/25)	Bike + strength	4.5 m run	Rest	3 m run + strength	Bike + strength	Rest	10 m run
4 (5/26 – 6/1)	Bike + strength	4.5 m run	Rest	3 m run + strength	Bike + strength	Rest	11 m run
5 (6/2 - 6/8)	Bike + strength	3 m run	Rest	3 m run + strength	Rest	Rest	Half-marathon

 
It starts this coming Sunday with an 8 mile run.  As you can see I don't get past 11 miles but given this is my third half this year I think I'll be fine.  I also might continue to do strength training on Tuesdays if I have time.  I don't really want to cut back strength training to 3x a week. 

As far as food, I'm continuing to make improvements in my evening snacking.  There might have been an evening with me, a spoon and a jar of peanut butter - but other than that, I'm getting better.  And then came Monday.

I got a call from one of my closest friends that her husband had died.  He'd not been well for some time but it was still a surprise.  I spent the afternoon and evening with her and our other friends and took yesterday (Tuesday) off to spend with her.  Comforting and doing what I could to help was my focus.  All concerns about calories and whatnot went out the window and I ate crackers, cheese, chips, cookies and plenty of chocolate.  When tragedy strikes, eat.  I remember thinking, "I can worry about food tomorrow."  I didn't exercise on Monday and totally could have yesterday but instead opted to go shopping.  I needed a little retail therapy.  Really, exercise would have been better therapy but I'm not perfect.

And today is my day home with the kids. We're headed over to a friend's house in a bit for lunch and then tonight we're headed out to a big party to celebrate motherhood.  Food, wine, deserts - all of it.  I don't really have a game plan for this event, I just expect to do more socializing than eating.  Remember those blue dresses I posted on FB?  Well, I didn't end up deciding to wear either of those.  Instead I'm wearing a black dress that is quite fitted with spaghetti straps.  I'm sure I'll have pictures in my next post.  Maybe the dress and skin exposure will inspire me to keep my eating and drinking in line. 

Anyway, that means I'll only get in three days of exercise this week instead of five.  Life, it happens.  Until it doesn't.  Grateful to have the rest of this week and all of next week (and hopefully years to come) to make better choices.