And now for something moderately different

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Quote du jour: The way you treat yourself sets the standard for others.
- Sonya Friedman

Yesterday, I managed 50 minutes on the elliptical without any complaint from Damn Knee. Today, I want to try something different. I want to see if I can jog, even just a little. Slow jogging, slogging, for a minute or so at a time with intervals of brisk walking in between. Worth a try. If it turns out to be too much for Damn Knee, then I'll go back to the elliptical for a while longer. Just so long as I get out there and move. Besides, it provides me with an excuse to ignore the housework. That's always a plus.

I figure posting this up here is the one way to guarantee that I'll actually get out there and do it. Otherwise, inertia will claim me for her own.

Done! About 15 minutes walking with some slow jogging. Plus, 20 minutes on the elliptical to warm up.

If it's Friday, that means...

If it's Friday, it's time for Hugh... oh hell, it's ALWAYS time!

Quote du jour: I am of the firm belief that everybody could write books and I never understand why they don't. After all, everyone speaks. Once the grammar has been learnt it is simply talking on paper and in time learning what not to say. - Beryl Bainbridge

Site du jour: This site probably would appeal only to people who like snark or who like writing that pays attention to things like spelling, grammar, and diction ... so you'll understand why I liked it. Reasoning with Vampires. The blogger parses the Twilight books according to the rules of English grammar. Funny.

Exercise du jour: 2 miles jogging at an easy, relaxed pace -- my knees have been bothering me since I got on that dratted bike. I think it must need a tuneup or something like that. I mean the bike needs a tuneup. Unless there are tuneups for knees.

Photo courtesy of cool guyz.

Brainless exercising

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Wince-inducing quote du jour: Sheridan and Delenn are the 'Arthur and Guinevere' of Babylon 5. - Bruce Boxleitner

[For those who've never watched Babylon 5, Bruce Boxleitner was the actor who played Sheridan, i.e. one of the two romantic leads. I don't think he's read a lot of Arthurian tragedy. ]

Site du jour: Annals of Improbable Research, "research that makes people laugh, then think." If you ever need to know about the aerodynamics of a boomerang, this is the site to visit. Even sometimes has useful stuff, like the notice of the FDA recalling a candy called Toxic Waste. My current favorite is a study on how computers are being used to write novels. No, not by you typing on the keyboard. The computer itself indulges in Brainless Writing.

Exercise du jour: Brainless exercising. Actually I think that might help. I think too much about exercising when I should be out doing the dang stuff. 2 miles around the track.
Done! You would've been proud of me. I looked at my schedule for the day, saw that it was back-to-back meetings all afternoon, and decided to go out running Early. (You know me. I never do anything early.) It was a quick impulse decision; I didn't stop to think it through. I did start to answer Just One More Email, but then I realized that if I sat there for another minute I'd start to dally, which would lead to dilly-dallying, which would lead to 6 p.m. with no exercise done. So I went for it.
p.s. All you people suffering through snow and below-insane temperatures? I'm sorry for you, I really am, but today was absolutely beautiful: bright sunshine, blue skies, and all the trimmings. Crocuses are starting to bloom. I think we're getting all this good weather at your expense. Maybe this would be a good time to visit?
Plus, 4 miles walking.

Change of plan

Quote du jour: If at first you don't succeed, skydiving is not for you.

Site du jour: This is probably something that would only amuse academics, but I liked the honesty of it: The Journal of Universal Rejection.

The founding principle of the Journal of Universal Rejection (JofUR) is rejection. Universal rejection. That is to say, all submissions, regardless of quality, will be rejected. Despite that apparent drawback, here are a number of reasons you may choose to submit to the JofUR...

I'm tired of wrestling with wildebeests, so I've made a decision. Rather than keep increasing the distance, I'm going to stick to a mere 2 miles at lunch, but work on getting 'em done a little faster. It's not as ego-boosting, but I can fit it into the schedule.

It really does make me feel I'm accomplishing something if I can write "Oh, I ran 10 miles today." (I would love to be able to write that. Just once. Maybe someday.) Being able to go a lesser distance but in a faster pace... it's not as impressive. But what the hell. If it makes me fit rather than quit, then you must acquit I'll do it. It's better than trying to achieve a goal that can be easily sidetracked by life, work, and relatives.

Exercise du jour: 2 miles round the trail at lunch. Rain? Who cares. Work pressure? Bah. I'm gonna go for it.

What are you looking at? You were expecting something?

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What?

Why are you looking at me like that?

Yes, I know I swore I'd run 3.5 miles yesterday, but that was written BEFORE 1 pm. Which was the time when, in the middle of the work day and indeed about an hour before I was due to give a technical presentation in the presence of several highly placed VPs and Very Important Personages, that my mother called me up at work, all frantic because they suddenly decided that they needed to reconfigure her router so that my niece could install a wireless card on her computer.

[Far be it from me to point out that one doesn't need to reconfigure the whole bloody router to install a wireless card on a computer that is in another room and indeed on another floor. I highly suspect that this person-whom-they-paid-to-do-the-install couldn't have bought a vowel if you gave him a wad of cash and the entire friggin' alphabet. But I digress.]

And after my mother in the Bay Area called me, then my brother (niece's father) in the Upper-Right part of California called me to try to perform a dual long-distance diagnosis of the problems. Then it was the turn of my brother in the Upper-Left part of the state, the one who'd actually bought and installed the damn router. [Note: these definitions of 'left' and 'right' do not reflect the actual political views of the brothers in question... oh wait. I just recollected their political views. Okay, let's just call it a coincidence.]

Then there was the long evening call to rehash all the things that the technician had done/not done/screwed-up-to-the-point-where-I'll-have-to-fix-it. I finally got to the point of saying Yes, yes, yes, I realize that all of this is terribly important and the fate of the free world depends upon it my niece will probably have to not wait until the last moment to do her work work hard to get her homework done on time. But that will have to wait for another night because ONE of us has to get up in the MORNing tomorrow.

And do a 3.5 mile run, damn it. At this rate, I'm going to have to declare Exercising an emergency in its own right.

Done! Took a longer lunch than usual, but lord knows I'll make that up pretty quickly. It was a beautiful day. It smelled like spring.

Winter

Quote du jour: I prefer winter and fall, when you feel the bone structure of the landscape.
- Andrew Wyeth

Site du jour: Think you know what's been going on? The Pew Research Center has a political quiz that will test your knowledge.

Exercise du jour: Jog 3.5 miles. Or a reasonable fascimile thereof. No wildebeests.

Update du 10:01 pm: I would just like to record it here, for public record and for my own personal satisfaction, that IT'S NOT MY FAULT.

Photo courtesy of Lerdsuwa.

It was a very big wildebeest, if that helps

I didn't post anything this morning because I got tired of writing sniveling posts filled with piffling, petty reasons why the exercise didn't get done. That sort of thing is depressing and it's boring. I know I'd pledged to post my feeble excuses, as a way of holding myself accountable, but it makes for a damned feeble post.

So I've decided to take another approach:

• I didn't get the 3.5 mile jog yesterday because a nuclear bomb exploded right directly on the track.
• I didn't get the 3.5 mile jog in today because I had to rescue an innocent golden-haired child from a rampaging wildebeest before flying off to Stockholm Oslo Maui to accept the Nobel prize for Incredible Wonderfulness.

There. Nothing to do with indigestion, extremely late MAX trains, or general time mis-management.

I refuse to feel guilty about a rampaging wildebeest.

Exercise du jour: A measly 20 minutes ellipticalling

Would you pay me to be awesome?

Quote du jour: Keep away from people who try to belittle your ambitions. Small people always do that, but the really great make you feel that you, too, can become great.
- Mark Twain

Monday? Already? Whose brilliant idea was that? I'd be tempted to go back to bed, but there's too much work to do. My vow for today is to get the run in no matter how much work lies in wait.


Site du jour: The Awesome Foundation. They give away money to encourage people to be more awesome. (I realize that some of you guys are awesome for free, but I'd definitely be more awesome if someone were paying me to be.)

Exercise du jour: Still need to do the 3.5 jog that I couldn't fit into the schedule on Friday.

Update du 10:12 pm: Look, the plain truth is that I'm hopeless. I only managed a 2 mile run on Friday, due to work constraints. Today, I didn't even have that excuse. It was beauuuutiful running weather outside today, and I kept putting it off because I had more work to do. Like the work couldn't have waited until after the run?
I thought I'd have time to do the run tonight, not knowing that the Max would decide to have emotional problems tonight. In other words, I got home over an hour later than scheduled and didn't have time to run. Does it help that I walked 4 miles? No, I thought not.
On the plus side, I did spend so much time at the Max station that the guy sitting next to me started mentioning my sparkling eyes and bubbling personality... does that mean I resemble a bottle of champagne? I would have been more impressed if he hadn't mentioned his several ex-wives. I mean, one ex-wife is a tragedy, but several ex-wives looks like carelessness.
To quote Scarlett O'Hara, "@#$!"*

*[That's also been translated as "Tomorrow is another day." Today, I prefer my version.]

Photo courtesy of Tableatny.

Blogland needs more pictures of Hugh Jackman

Quote du jour: When I became an adult I put away childish things, including the fear of seeming childish and the desire to be very grown-up.
- C.S. Lewis

Site du jour: Finger length indicates athletic ability. An odd study lifted from Dr Mirkin.

Having a ring finger that is longer than your index finger is associated with greater athletic ability in men (American Journal of Human Biology, Mar-April 2009) and in women (British Journal of Sports Medicine, December 2006). The longer your ring finger is compared to your index finger, the better athlete you usually are (Strength Conditioning Research, published online August 20, 2010).

The ratio of the ring finger to the index finger is determined by how high your testosterone levels were in the uterus before you were born. Testosterone stimulates bone growth. Men exposed to higher levels of testosterone in the uterus also tend to have higher levels of testosterone later on.

On the average, men tend to have longer ring fingers, and women tend to have longer index fingers. The higher the testosterone in utero, the greater the length of the ring finger and the more "masculine" the resulting child - whether male or female. The difference between men and women in digit lengths usually is greater on the right hand.

In men, a longer ring finger is also associated with increased risk for prostate cancer; see the 12/5/10 eZine.

Exericse du jour: Jogging 3.5 miles at lunchtime.

Photo courtesy of Nehmans2020.

The Battlestar Galactica Workout

So, confession time.
No, not like St. Augustine.

I don't spend money on gym memberships or things like that, but even my freestyle exercising can cost money. Especially when I run out of motivation.

When the inner slug waxes wroth and kicks my motivation down the street and into the neighbor's recyclable bin, I tend to bring out the heavy guns re: exercise motivation. In other words, I go shopping.

As a Luddite, my inclination is to ignore anything new. That includes the "hot" TV shows... at least until they've had time to cool off. But after years of denial, I finally watched the TV series Battlestar Galactica. I needed something to watch while I did the elliptical, so I downloaded the first season and watched them while I pedaled.

If you've never seen the show, it's got a lot of conflict and tension. That is a great way to make the time pass while you're exercising. Anyone have any other tense TV shows or movies that help with the workout?


Exercise du jour: 2 miles around Nike. Hopefully at a nice, brisk pace. Maybe I should try to watch a TV show on my iPod while jogging around the trail. Or maybe not. I can just see the headlines. (News at 10: woman injures herself while jogging. "We told her to use a treadmill," friends say.)

Done! Weird -- awful run, hated it. Still faster than the other day. Except that for some reason my knee is bugging me.

Page from Augustine of Hippo's Confessions courtesy of Tomisti.
Cylon courtesy of Fernando Estel.

Is it okay if I'm assertive?

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Quote du jour: I'd like to be assertive, if that's all right with everyone.

Site du jour: Get up from your chair every four hours, or else. Another study that finds sitting at a desk all day is unhealthy, even if you do exercise each day. Getting up even for a minute or two trims the waistline. The article suggests that the act of rising up from the chair, using the large muscles of the legs, provides a small but significant workout. (Another reason to do squat!)

I need to be reminded about this. When work is all about pressure, I feel guilty for taking a lunch break to eat -- I eat at my desk instead. (See? I'm a good, hard worker. I sacrifice my lunch time for work.) And taking a whole hour to get out of the building and run around in the rain seems utterly frivolous.

This is all in my head. So long as the work gets done, nobody cares if I get all self-sacrificial. My problem is that the amount of work I need to do, and the time I have to do it in, are not realistic. Not when you consider that they want it perfect.

The heck with all that. I'm back in the habit of exercising every day, and I'm not going to give that up, gain weight, lose momentum, and stress myself out just to make needless brownie points.

So today I am going to ignore the nagging little tug of guilt at the back of my mind, and put myself first at lunch time. I Have Spoken. (And putting that assertion up here is another way of making sure I don't cave in when lunch time rolls around.)

Exercise du jour: 2.5 miles around the track. It shall be done. At lunch.
And behold! I did run at lunch. Odd weather: the sky was blue instead of grey, and this was this bright yellow thing up in the sky that made the run much hotter than a normal January workout.

Because if I don't post this, I won't do it

Bizarre du jour: Okay, so you probably already know that the Wikihow site can be a bit odd at times. They offer articles like "How to be more popular" or "What to do when the airplane is on fire and the pilots have developed amnesia and can't remember how to land" (or something very close to that). So it's always a good idea to take their posts with a grain of salt, if not a whole shot of tequila. Even so, this one has me stumped: How to make people think you're immortal. I mean... why?


Inappropriate quote du jour: Feeling guilty has never burned a single calorie. - John Tesh

Bah. What does John Tesh know.

This blog is all about guilt.

Well, okay, it's all about getting me to get out there and exercise, but guilt plays a huge part in that. So I'm posting this up here to make me get out there and run today. There are people running under far worse conditions.

Exercise du jour: Jog 3 miles
Done! Finally. A good run. Rain, shmain.

U.S. Navy photo by Mass Communication Specialist 2nd Class Dominique M. Lasco

Next time, snazzy shoes

Quote du jour:


This is the true joy in life, the being used for a purpose recognized by yourself as a mighty one; the being thoroughly worn out before you are thrown on the scrap heap; the being a force of nature instead of a feverish little clod of ailments and grievances, complaining that the world will not devote itself to making you happy.


- George Bernard Shaw





Goal of the month: Still going strong with the vegetarian stuff. Oddly enough, I don't miss what I'm not eating. Doesn't seem to be slowing down the exercise either. (Dear Lord, please don't let that become one of the self-fulfilling prophecies.)



Imaginary Internet People & Fun

Another goal that I haven't blogged much about is the goal to get out, to stop being such a home-bound hermit. Thanks to Julie and Glynis, I got to fraternize with Imaginary Internet Friends. It was great fun. Talked for hours, and the time went by quickly.

The only thing is... next time, I'm wearing snazzier shoes.

Guess which shoe is mine?

The perils that lurk in the heart of a restaurant salad

Doesn't the name Apple Cranberry Chicken Salad sound good? Healthy?

When I met up with the I.I.F.s at a restaurant, I thought I'd just order a vegetarian salad. Would you believe they didn't have one? It wasn't a big deal for me to remove the chicken, though I was surprised that the salad didn't just include chicken; chicken took up about half the salad, six or seven ounces. (In which case it should qualify as a Chicken Apple Cranberry salad, but I digress.)

What caught me by surprise were the glazed pecans. I always thought of a glaze as something that was found on the surface, but these nuts had been saturated in butter and brown sugar to the point where the plain nut had been turned into pure candy. I'd worry about a diabetic eating this salad.

Exercise du jour: 2.5 miles jogging. Slightly less mileage this time, so perchance will be a slightly faster pace? The goal is to slug-jog fast enough that I could actually pass a little old lady with a walker.
Well, sorta. The jury's out on whether this deserves a star or not. No, I didn't jog. It was too cold, and I knew what would happen if I tried. I did, however, walk 4 miles instead. So maybe I should put up half a star.

Photo of paragliding in Slovakia courtesy of lietac.

Doing squat at work

Not an actual picture of my office... just an approximation

Word du jour: Am-knees-ia (n). A condition where you forget how bad your knees are until you try to bend them.

It doesn't actually help with getting through long tedious meetings, but doing squat turns out to be useful for other things besides challenges.

At work, there are a large number of computers that need to be kept from overheating and are not stored in a closed-off room. The office thermometer must stay on the low end of comfortable, so I tend to go around bundled up in several layers, like a globular bear. (Yes, even in July.)

Now, if I'm cold or really want to freak out annoying co-workers find myself getting sleepy after lunch, I do a few squats. Because squats use the largest muscles in the body, doing them gets the blood flowing and the body warmed up pretty quickly.

Also, doing the occasional squat helps my knees remember how to bend. Flexing the knees helps keep them from stiffening up.

Now I just need to figure out how to do squat and get paid for it. Any ideas?

Goal of the month: All vegetarian, all the time. So far, so good.
Done!




Exercise du jour: I really hate posting this goal, since I've flailed on the jogging for the last week or so. A couple weeks ago, it was effortless. I'm wondering if the difference is the temperature -- maybe I just need to adjust? Especially hard after coming back from a balmy Christmas in California.

Jog/walk/crawl 3 miles, depending on the temperature.
Done. 4 miles. Didn't crawl, at least. Plus, 30 minutes on the elliptical and 100% veggies means HBBC = 7
1/4 - HBBC 1 (veggies)
1/5 - walked 3, veggies HBBC 4
1/6 - walked 3 miles, jog/walked 3 miles, ellipticalled 15 minutes, veggies. HBBC 8


United States Air Force photo by Senior Airman Joshua Strang

Patterns: the obligatory end-of-the-year review post

Quote du jour: My life seemed to be a series of events and accidents. Yet when I look back I see a pattern. -Benoît Mandelbrot

Things I've learned:
Looking back from the time I've started this blog, I really have actually learned things.

- Exercise is for every day, not special occasions. If you force yourself to exercise every day, eventually, eventually, eventually it becomes a habit to do something every day.

- Vegetables aren't all bad. And I love the way I feel after I eat a salad -- light, full of energy -- as opposed to how I feel after I eat a McGreasy burger.

- Even a fat chick can train to run a 5k, do 100 push ups, 200 situps, or 200 squats.

- An injury doesn't mean I need to stop exercising.

Things I still need to pound into my thick skull:

- I still react the wrong way to stress and negative things thrown at me. I want to eat bad food, drink wine, curl up in a ball under a fluffy comforter until the mean people go away. I want to be the kind of person who will get on the elliptical and sweat the anger/fear/frustration/hurt feelings away. And then go calmly confront the mean person, who probably didn't mean to be quite that mean, if you see what I mean.

- It's okay to push myself a bit more sometimes. I don't know my limits until I injure myself, but that's okay. I learn, I avoid the problem next time, and I keep going even if it's at a slower pace or through a different form of exercise.

- However, when I do injure myself, I need to stop and not try to stubborn my way through the pain.

- My exercise plan doesn't have to be followed perfectly; my diet plan doesn't have to be followed perfectly. They just have to be followed. I don't have to be perfect.

Exercise du jour: Wanna do the 3 mile jog. The sun is shining, but it's also cold out there. If the asthma kicks in and I can't jog, I can walk. Or I can whine stay indoors and lift weights. One way or another, I'm going to get a gold star up here.
Done! No, not the jog. I walked instead, but to make up for the slackness of not running I extended the walk to 5-1/2 miles instead. Very brisk walking, thanks to the cold. It was exercise, definitely. (HBBC 5)

Happy New Year!


Mandelbrot set courtesy of SiriusB.

A goat? I'm sure I asked for a pony...

I now own a goat.

The good news is that someone else has to feed it and milk it and deal with any cleanup. Maybe they get to walk it as well.

Some charity organization lets you sponsor a goat or other useful whatnot for people in poorer parts of the world, so instead of buying presents for all her children, my mother bought us all goats. The grandchildren got the gift-wrapped goodies; I got to listen to my brother make jokes about how "that gets my goat."

Actually it's a good thing, feeble jokes aside. Most everyone I know already has everything they need. Indeed, many of them are trying to get rid of stuff, live simply. I like the idea of giving people things that they need instead of a gift they have to unwrap, exchange, and write a thank you note for.

Plus, I'd hate to try to take a goat on the plane.

HBBC:
12/24 - Walked 6 miles
12/25 - Walked 2 miles
12/26 - Walked 2 miles

Exercise du jour: Jog 3 miles

Oh hell. I'm floundering here. The parade of feeble excuses continues:
12/27 - Skipped the jog, did 30 minutes on the elliptical instead (2 points). Told myself it was okay since I'd been up since 4 in order to catch the damn plane.
12/28 - Skipped the jog, did 10 flights of stairs instead. (1 point). Would have gone jogging, but couldn't find an iPod. Couldn't face the thought of jogging without an iPod. So easily we become spoiled.
I wonder what feeble excuse will present itself tomorrow? One of these years, as God is my witness, I'll run again.
12/29 - Well, the excuse du jour is the weather. Mother Nature couldn't decide between hail, snow, rain and sunshine, so she gave me all of them. I couldn't be expected to run in sunshine, could I? Well, I could've if it had lasted for more than three minutes at a time. Sigh. At least I ate all my veggies (1 point)
12/30 - A measly 2 mile walk. Does eating my veggies still count? (3 points)

Limitations? Bah humbug

Quote du jour: Please drive slowly. Those are cats, not speed bumps.
- A sign next to an alley that I went past today

I don't like acknowledging limitations. Pfui! as Nero Wolfe would say.

I concede that Damn Foot has been a problem in my running schedule, but I was dealing with it. I've gotten accustomed to wearing orthotics, I'm willing to dispense ibuprofen after a run, I'm dealing with it.

Then my body throws me a curve ball out of nowhere, which really pisses me off.

I've been getting more and more stressed about the holidays and the end of the year and all the things left undone that I swore I would get done before that time. I could feel the panic building inside me, but I thought (and rightly) that this was a stupid thing to panic over. So what if I didn't make my goals? They are arbitrary and mostly decided on a whim. I want to get to this point by that time, so let us try for it. Well, sometimes those goals are not within my grasp and I'll just have get it done whenever. It's all good.

Which is fine in theory, but in practice the anxiety kept building up inside me until I really did have a panic attack Monday night. And paid for it on Tuesday with an asthma attack. I could not stop wheezing, so it really was bloody stupid optimistic to venture forth and try to run. (I thought that since the stress-induced asthma was in part caused by stress at work, getting away from work and running would be a help, not a hindrance. I thought wrong.)

Tuesday's run was horrible. I ran about one mile before the lungs made it absolutely clear that they weren't going to play nice and let me get an adequate supply of oxygen. Grrrr... stupid lungs. Stupid body. Why is it playing games like this with me? My legs could have kept going, Damn Foot wasn't complaining, and I still couldn't friggin' get the run in.

Today, I'm taking a vacation day from work to devote myself to all the things I need to get done. Included in this list is yesterday's three mile run. Away from work. Away from incredibly rude co-workers.



Done. Well, sorta. Still not feeling great, so walked one mile and jog/walked three. Better than nothing.



HBBC: 4

Last week of the C25k

Quote du jour: The only way of discovering the limits of the possible is to venture a little way past them into the impossible.
-Arthur C. Clarke

Quotes like this one tend to annoy me. I mean, basically he's saying you have to screw up before you can learn anything. It's probably true, but that doesn't make it any less annoying.

Damn Foot is a case in point. I pushed Damn Foot until it developed the pinched nerve before I stopped and went to the foot doctor. Now I'm getting back into the running slowly enough that I'm not pushing past its limits. (It still hurts, but not especially after running. Usually it hurts most first thing in the morning, when my feet are swollen anyway. That, I can live with. For now.)

Exercise du jour: Week 9 of the c25k
Brisk five-minute warmup walk, then jog 3 miles (or 30 minutes).

Not really done, but I'm putting the star up for jogging 1 mile, walking 3.



HBBC: 5 (exercise & veggies)


Photo courtesy of Nevit Dilmen.

Maybe I'm just easily forgettable

Poetry du jour:
The goal is oblivion
I have arrived early.
- Borges, Fifteen Coins

So I went to the Christmas party at work. Ran into a woman that I know. I complimented her on her ruffly blouse, she warned me to avoid the cookies that looked like lemon drops since they contained licorice (which we both loathe). Brief friendly chitchat, then I moved on and so did she.

An hour or so later, I ran into the same woman upstairs in the restroom and the following conversation ensued:
Woman: Did you go to the Christmas party?
Self: Yes, I was there.
Woman: Oh. I didn't see you there.

I guess that's better than leaving a bad impression... right?
(Note: I don't feel bad about this conversation. It struck me as funny.)

Exercise du jour: Playing catch-up. Last run of week 8,c25k.

Brisk five-minute warmup walk, then jog 2.75 miles (or 28 minutes).

This might be tricky. I have found it much easier to fit the run in at work, even though it means changing to run, cleaning up and getting back into work clothes/work mode. Why is this easier than working out at home, where I have much more time and no one cares if I'm dressed for work? This maketh not sense. I'm recording it here in the hope that publicly announcing the exercise du jour will guilt me into actually getting up out of this chair and doing it.

Done! Finally. And may I say, I achieved a new PR (procrastination record) for the hours I spent putting that run off.

HBBC Yesterday, zilch. Today, 4 (the run & ellipticalling, though again I do think they should award HBBC points for gold-medal quality procrastination like that I achieved today)

'Tis the seasonings

What, your family doesn't get dressed up a bit at Christmas?

Quote du jour:

In the old days, it was not called the Holiday Season; the Christians called it 'Christmas' and went to church; the Jews called it 'Hanukkah' and went to synagogue; the atheists went to parties and drank. People passing each other on the street would say 'Merry Christmas!' or 'Happy Hanukkah!' or (to the atheists) 'Look out for the wall!'
--Dave Barry

Not sure how I'm going to survive Christmas with the family. Meal-wise, I mean. Oh, okay, maybe old frictions too, but mostly meals. Turkey and pecan pie and stuffing and mince pie and rolls and pumpkin pie and ... okay, you're getting the picture.

All the more reason to work out while I can.

Exercise du jour: Week 8 of the c25k

Brisk five-minute warmup walk, then jog 2.75 miles (or 28 minutes).
Done! It was a bad run, but I felt good about it. I know that doesn't make any kind of sense. Thanks to the cramps, I couldn't eat anything all day. Went out to run anyway, but I had to take walk breaks whenever I got too dizzy and light-headed. I was a couple minutes slower than last time, but I still felt good about getting the run done. Also, walked to the Max and back.

HBBC: 7 (4-1/4 miles walked, 2-3/4 miles jog/walked)

No, this is not an actual picture of my family at Christmas. This is from Santa's Little Helper Match.