I Thought Things Were Supposed to Calm Down

*snort* Riiiiight...

Well, to update!

First, the Offspring:

The Gum Zombie had a piece of art selected out of hundreds chosen to hang in our local art museum (in the company of several other children). He was over the moon, and his brother was flatly appalled at having to sit through the awards ceremony.

However! The Elder decided that this year he'd actually turn in his National Junior Honor Society application, in large part to ensure his little brother had to sit through something for him. We all survived his induction, but the Elder's over-the-moon moment didn't occur until he found out he has been placed in Advanced Algebra I for eighth grade.

There are times when I wonder if that boy is my son -- math was not my strong suit. Then I remember labor...

...yep, he's mine. And in my defense, I did finally learn to "speak" math in my late twenties. I survived Calculus I and II as well as statistics quite nicely.

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On the "is Amanda moving or has she become glued to her couch" front, I plead the former. In fact, I'll use it as my entire excuse for not blogging because time is now at such a premium. I have Tuesday and Thursday with my trainer, Wednesday I have belly dancing, and Saturday I head in to the gym with the Elder (we farm the Gum Zombie out to the gym's childcare center), followed up by independent dance practice on both Saturday and Sunday.

Monday and Friday I'm glued to Choreboy, because that poor man barely sees me now. Tuesday - Thursday I don't get home until after 8:00, and it's rare that I'm done eating and hosed off before 9:00. Considering that I'm in bed between 9:30 and 10:00, that doesn't leave much time. So I'm prioritizing.

Other than that, not much is new. I had a brief "episode" with Chipotle overkill (5 out of 6 days I ate there, yikes!) so now I've banned myself as I obviously am not to be trusted. I'll go back in a few months, but just because it isn't as bad for me as McDonald's does not make my burrito bowl with carnitas, sour cream, cheese, and guac into health food.

Off to navigate the Memorial Day festivities -- have an awesome holiday weekend, everyone :)

Humans Rock!

I had my body composition tested by a real, live, caliper-wielding human at the gym this past Saturday, and whaddaya know? 24.7% body fat, baby!

HAH. Take that, BodPod. Skinny-fat my happy asterisk :P

On my way to the gym, I stuffed this picture into my purse:

Isn't it delightful? Note the Diet Coke in my hand. Because that makes it all better.

Anyway, it took a while for the manager to finish with a walkthrough that had been previously scheduled, so I was chatting with a couple of girls at the desk. My workout history came up, and I hauled out The Picture of Doom to explain where I'd been (the picture is from May of 2006, about three months before I realized I'd cracked the 200-pound barrier), my current state, and my determination to never, ever, return to anything resembling the woman in the photograph. When the manager finally walked up, the older of the two women I'd been talking to looked at him and said, "I want her start-up," and then headed out onto the gym floor.

He stared after her kind of stunned, but I didn't think much of it. Turns out she's the head of their trainers and doesn't do the start-up program. Like, ever. But she was really impressed by how far I'd come from where I started, and she wanted "in" since I was finally turning to the professionals, LOL. Very cool lady -- I'm glad things worked out the way they did.

Her analysis of me at this point, after two one-hour sessions, is that she's going to have to keep me from hurting myself. On first impulse I'd say she's off base, but after the pulled back muscle, slipping shoulders, bum knee, bilateral stress fractures and I don't know what-all else that I've managed to put myself through in the past few years (there's a wrist issue in there as well)... okay, maybe she has a point! I just know where I want to be, and I do what I feel I have to do to get there. From what I can tell, she has the experience to get me there in one piece.

You can't beat that.

I'm glad I went in, and I'm glad I joined. I was bored unto death with my workouts, so having new toys to play with is just freaking awesome.

It's about time, too, because Choreboy and I are heading for the beach later this summer and remaining slackerly just isn't an option. I have three bikinis I have to fill out to good advantage. And while the stretch marks don't bug, my legs still do.

Time to kick it into high gear. Have a good one, y'all :)

YES!

Hallelujah, praise the Lord and pass the ammo, I joined a gym. The Elder is aging out of daycare in a matter of weeks and at this point I can float the dual expense for a month.

Yes, yes, YES!!! New toys to play with, a few sessions with a trainer, an assessment WITH caliper body comp testing -- awesome!

Okay, I'll fill y'all in further when I have more to report, but dang it feels good to be back in it.

Retrenching

Heya gang -- I'm still here, still alive. The weight is holding steady at 138 - 142, depending on day of the month, salt intake, etc. Not all who wander off the blogosphere are lost or diving headfirst into a bag of potato chips.

Well, at least not most days.

My posting has dropped primarily because I've been a bit out of sorts since this reflux issue reared its ugly head. I mean, I'm supposed to be the girl with the cast-iron stomach! I ate public school food throughout my formative years and then for another six years after that when I was teaching. I have taken great pride in the fact that I can eat almost* anything and suffer no repercussions from a digestive standpoint.

Now I've turned 40 (okay, 42) and that's all down the tubes, along with my stupid knee and all the other parts of my body that are hollering, "Yo, Amanda! Aging here! Hah!" And it's annoying as hell. I know I'm aging. I can look in the mirror and see the signs. I don't need my body snickering back to me about it in new and interesting ways. Seriously, I get it. The Mortality Clock, she is ticking. Yippie. So could a girl catch a break on this? Please?

Outside of that delightful area of thought, all is well. The boys survived their FCATs. Choreboy is a marvel (and he brought me flowers!!), the cats haven't killed us, and Teddy remains abominably cute.

Belly dancing is rather fun, and I'm developing a bit of proficiency with some of the moves which is tickling me pink. I spent an hour last Saturday practicing, and I get in a bit of other practice wherever I can fit it in. Yes, still in the bathroom at work, even. I am also now the proud owner of four hip scarves, which jingle rather nicely.

Oh, and I have this shirt:


I figure it'll be inspirational ;)


*That said, I absolutely cannot drink 6 mini-cans of spicy V8 in one sitting. That way lies madness... and a dreadful gut-pain.

Randomness

One of my favorite songs:

Mishaela, by Noa (Achinoam Nini).  It's been years since I heard it -- over 20, actually -- but one of my friends tracked it down for me.  If I had a brain I'd have checked YouTube my own damned self. I'm blaming old age for that one.

Oh, because it's in Hebrew perhaps a little translation* would help:


Who knows what is in her eyes?
Grey clouds disperse in the four winds
A dry riverbed overflows
And the horizon opens wide

Up to the heaven she turns her eyes
Searching, diving in to the chilly blue
Floating in the air
Touching the pure golden light
That glimmers in her hair

Mishaela, what do you see?
What is it in your heart
That greets the desolate silence with such
Laughter?

It is one rainbow in the east, she says
It is all I need

What more could I want?
It is all that I need.


*All credit goes to the various folks on YouTube who posted this version of the lyrics.

Out of my Cold, Dead Fingers

There it is: my lone remaining vice.  I've always sworn that you'd be prying it out of my cold, dead fingers.  I quit smoking years ago, I rarely drink, I track every calorie that goes into my mouth, and I figure we're all permitted one excess, right?

Wrong -- or at least my body didn't get that memo.  Because I've developed a marvelous case of reflux (thanks, Reese's Peanut Butter Eggs!) and one of the things that seems to trigger mine the most is carbonation.

This sucks.

I've gone from an-amount-that-shall-not-be-confessed, to 4 per day, to 2 per day, and yesterday I had only one.  I'm toying with allowing myself to stay at that number but I'll admit that there's now part of me that says to just dump it entirely.

On the plus side, my water intake (already in excess of 64 oz./ day) has skyrocketed.  At this point I'm so well-hydrated I could survive a drought.

Oh well.  I'll figure it out.  Probably over a nice, steaming hot cup of coffee.  Because you will pry my caffeine out of my cold...

Nevermind.  I don't want to jinx myself.

Coming Up for Air

My brain is now officially mush.  What with my birthday, Easter, work exploding all over me -- not that this is a bad thing, as actual productivity in the office rocks -- and the pending FCAT exams (Florida's wretched achievement tests that are directly correlated to scholastic advancement and graduation), I barely know what end is up. 

The Elder's middle school does all FCAT prep during school hours, which is fine by me.  The Gum Zombie's school, however, sends home packet after packet after bloody freaking packet of FCAT practice nightly leading up to the test (which, blessedly, is next week).  I'm absolutely in favor of my child doing well, I'm just exhausted and I'm sure everyone else, administrators, teachers, parents, and children, is likewise fatigued.  I also wonder how in the world parents who have children in various after school activities and what-not are managing to get this stuff done.  It's a squeeze for us, and the boys don't even have consistent extra-curricular obligations at this time.  Seriously, my kids' advancing ages really makes me think that parents who are doing their children's homework aren't necessarily doing it because they're trying to protect Widdle Pweshus from straining his ginormous-yet-oddly-feeble brain.  I'm starting to think maybe some are doing it because there just aren't enough hours in a day.

Ah well, it is what it is, and we'll do what we must.  But I draw the line at doing my kid's homework.  I'll sit there and suffer right along with him if need be, but he's going to have to be the one to strain his brain and develop writer's cramp.  I've done my time.

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As for the rest of life that that isn't utterly, completely insane, all is well.  I survived both my birthday and Easter without any impact to the scale.  In fact, my stupid pants were loose when I put them on this morning; I nearly had to wear a belt.  So I'd have to count that as a win.  Exercise is hit-and-miss (see FCAT, and see earlier posts re: exhaustion), but I'm keeping moving and not rooting myself to the couch.  Next week matters should improve on that front -- the FCAT will be ongoing which will, in fact, make life easier since there will be no homework!

Bliss.

Anyway, my second belly dancing class is tonight.  I've been practicing here and there (you should see me hiding in the bathroom stall at the office to work on my hip thrust -- it's a sight), so we'll see how it goes.  I managed to do "snake arms" effectively at home, but I have a history of freezing while in large groups which makes me unsure I'll be able to reproduce the move in class.  Eh, it'll work out.  Eventually.

Hang in there and have a good one!

It's Alive!

Y'all, I am so not into this new interface Blogger's got going on.  I'm sure I'll adapt (hey, it's free, I guess I shouldn't gripe), but good grief it's annoying.  If it ain't broke... *grumblemuttercurse*

Anyway, here's the annual birthday picture:

It's a bit dark (I don't know what's up with the photo quality -- grainy!) and Hound (aka Teddy) refused to look at the camera, but it'll do.  It's better than last year's which, although it was sharper, also shows that I wasn't doing my resistance exercises.  It shows in my face.  Well, to me at least.  There's only about a 7 pound difference between me then and me now, but I'll take now any day!

In other news, I got the results of my bloodwork in.  My cholesterol (both HDL and LDL) is outstanding, my blood sugar couldn't be better if I'd studied for the test, my thyroid is normal, all is well on that front.  However, my B12 is on the lower end of normal which, my doctor says, can cause one to become symptomatic for Vitamin B12 deficiency, and my Vitamin D levels are abyssmal -- 12.2 ng/ml, when the lower threshold is 30... which is still considered insufficient.  Optimal levels are from 50 - 70 ng/ml.  And one of the big symptoms of Vitamin D deficiency is (drumroll please) fatigue.

At least I have an explanation.  My doctor and I went over my diet and food-wise I'm taking in what I should for good health, so it appears we're dealing with an absorption issue.  I'm now supplementing with 5000 IU Vitamin D and 1000 IU Vitamin B12 daily.  We'll be rechecking in 3 months and go from there.

I'm not noticing any improvement in my stamina yet, but I have hope.

Regarding the belly dancing class, it was fun!  I'm also just as uncoordinated as I remember.  I can do the foot movements, or the hand movements, but putting them together just ain't happening yet.  And when you add "traveling" to the entire shebang, holy crap.  It's all done.  Remember, I trip over carpet lint people -- this is no joke.  I walk into doorways I know darned good and well are there.  So "grace" is not my middle name.  But I'll never improve unless I try so I figure I'll keep on and give it a whirl.

Have a great Easter weekend!

I am the Answer!

Sidebar now updated to reflect current age.  Geek points to those who get the reference*.

Have a happy day, all!

*And major hattip to my friend Angel, from whom I totally and shamelessly hijacked this pic ;)

Hmmm...

I did a measly 10.6 miles on the bike yesterday evening. It was a variable speed program rather than my usual, and I think I need to look at the manual a bit because all it did was start out higher resistance then keep decreasing. BOR-ring... okay, that plus it's hard for me to keep up speed when the resistance is too low.

Tonight I think I'll play with another Jillian workout. I'm looking at today's on her site (I'm a member, yes -- my utter lack of any intuitive athletic knowledge leads me to seek out those who know more, even at a price) and it seems I won't have to make any modifications other than putting all the cardio blasts on the bike because my knee is still peevish. I'm tempted to try one circuit with mountain climbers or even the treadmill cranked up to max incline, but with the amount of fuss that stupid joint is giving me I'd better behave.

Sigh. Oh well. Good news is I can still lift, and at least I can do the bike. It could be worse.


In other news, I'm starting something new next week. In line with me attempting to make my leisure time activities a bit more active than, say, bonding with my browser's "refresh" button, I've signed up for a beginner's level belly dancing class. I am as coordinated as an eleven-month-old child who's just staggering to his feet, so that should tell you all you need to know about my past dance history. It ain't pretty. But I've been interested since my college days when I was peripherally involved with the international students' association and saw some of the girls dancing. It was amazing. And I don't think that I have a prayer of moving like a twenty-year-old -- even like I did when I was twenty -- but it should at least be interesting.

I'll keep y'all posted. First class is Wednesday. I'll be 42 by then.

Yipes.

OUCH!

So I was bored with my workouts. The bike wasn't too bad, but too much cardio isn't going to do me good with my need to build more muscle and my limited time, and the circuits I'd been doing myself were meh, so I went to my Jillian Michaels source and found a lovely circuit training combination to try.

Oh. My. Hell. My glutes hurt, my biceps hurt, my upper back is not pleased and I once again hosed my knee because I'm too stupid not to do mountain climbers. Or was it the jumping jacks that did it?

It feels great. Not the knee -- I need to limit myself to zero or one circuit with a higher impact cardio option (because changing stuff up is good) so I don't completely hose my mobility. But other than the knee it's a good kind of sore -- muscular, not joint or connective tissue related. I think I'll throw these in a couple of times a week, just for giggles.

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Regarding my time of day for exercising, I'm going with evenings again for awhile. I appear to have the boys in gear for doing their homework on their own while I'm busy breathing heavy, then I can help them out after I've hit the showers. Waking up at 5:00 isn't off the table, but until I figure out why I'm so tired I'm going to go with the basic explanation of "You need more sleep, silly" and leave the early alarm out of the equation.

Choreboy sprayed the yard for fleas last night, and I'm bringing Hound home tonight. We'll see how much good it did. Here's hoping!

Present!

And accounted for. To an extent, at least.

Wednesday, 45 minutes, circuits with Tabata intervals
Thursday, 40 minutes, 11.5 miles (new distance record -- yay!)

Unfortunately, I managed to injure myself somewhere in there by irritating the cartilage in my ribs. Okay, I know how I did it, and I'm trying to figure out how not to do it again (it has to do with my dumbbells and lifting the right one up while rotating my back onto my exercise ball for my supported squats... now aren't you sorry I got all specific?). But in the meantime, that combined with ticking off my knee -- I might have worked a bit too hard to up that mileage-- meant that I needed to put everything on rest mode. Which is irksome because I hate getting off-kilter with my momentum.

On the plus side, I did do massive housework again on Sunday, so it's not as if I've been bolted to my desk chair or anything. Just nothing "formalized". So tomorrow it's back in the saddle for me.

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Good news is that I got my blood drawn today and in about a week we'll see if there's any testable reason why I'm so freaking exhausted all the time. I worked out in the evenings all last week again, hoping that would help perhaps, but it seems that waking up at 5:00 AM isn't the issue. I eat enough; in fact I've upped my calories again to see if my food intake is playing any part in this. Thus far? No difference.

That said, even eating more calories I'm still weighing in at 139, so it appears that I can handle more food than I've been taking in. I'll keep mucking about with that and see where my final tolerance ends up. Perhaps if I stick at a higher calorie level for awhile, with steady physical activity, and then drop the calories like a red-hot poker after a few months, maybe I can also drop those last few pounds that won't leave my mind? I know, I know, 139 is a good weight. There's a part of me that knows that just fine, and yet there's another part of me that says "But 130 would also be good!"

Then there's the cheap part of me that says 130 would actually stink because then my stupid clothes would all be too big. Arrrgh!!!

I give. It's Monday. Time to take out the trash and then stare at the clock for half an hour more. Have a good one, y'all! My neuroses and I will be here all week...

Slacker :P

Only with posting though! I've got in my workouts.

Monday, 45 minutes, circuits with Tabata intervals
Tuesday, 40 minutes, 11.3 miles

Now I will grant you both of those sessions were in the evening rather than in the morning. I woke up somewhere between 2 and 3 AM on Monday and didn't get back to sleep for over an hour, so when the alarm went off at 5:00 I smacked that sucker silly, and promised I'd work out that night. So I did. And last night Choreboy was closing which makes the evening workout arrangement work a little bit better.

I'll also be riding the bike tonight, but Thursday I'm going to have to haul myself out of bed early on because the Gum Zombie has his spelling test on Friday so we've got to be sure to get those words studied which is a bit difficult to do when Mommy's trying to pump iron.

Speaking of which, I am such a pansy. I tried to bench two 20 lb. dumbbells and learned that it just wasn't happening. I couldn't even get those suckers up an inch. Good grief. Two 15-pound weights? I'm fine. But just up the ante by a measly 5 lbs each and I'm toast. Oh well, at least it's something to work on.

Outside of that, the only interesting thing I've done recently is get my driver's license renewed. I had to get a new picture taken this year, and likely it was a good thing as this was the picture I had (taken in 1999):


and this is the new one, taken just this morning:


Pretty dramatic shift in the hair color department. Also, my face is thinner now thanks to having (finally) lost all the pregnancy weight from the Elder, who was born about 8 months prior to the earlier picture.

I think I can live with it.

Exercise 0 - Activity Infinite

My kingdom for an infinity sign because, let me tell you, the past couple of days have been a corker. Rest? What rest? Hah! There were no actual "yes, see, this is Amanda, exercising!" periods during either day, but rather endless movement, of the tiring and boring variety. None of it was as intense in the moment as one of my workouts tends to be, but considering my natural state is best described as "bonded to the couch", I have a feeling I ultimately burned more than I would have if I'd just done my workouts and then planted myself in front of the computer.

This weekend featured The Great De-Fleaing of the house, which has to occur at least once per quarter thanks to the four-legged members of our household. We have been invaded by these horrible, pesticide-resistant fleas, and the best we can do is just stay slightly ahead of the nasty little bastards. We spray the yard, we spray the house, we vacuum, we use the flea meds on the dog and cats, and it's just an endless, brutal cycle. I even had pest control come out once because I was terrified we were infested (my skin crawls just thinking about it), and after the bug guy stopped laughing he told Choreboy there was no way we were infested, that he didn't see even one flea while he was there, and that we just needed to keep doing what we were doing.

So we do. And god, it's making me insane. Moving furniture, vacuuming, spraying underneath, removing all cushions, vacuuming those, spraying, coating all the damned carpet in the house and every nook and cranny, all while keeping the cats isolated in the Elder's bedroom which had been treated the previous day -- and let me tell you, those felines do not appreciate what we do for them -- arrrgh!!!

Oh well. True infestation would make me battier. But I'm thinking not by much.

In addition to the flea control festivities, yesterday was St. Patrick's Day which some folks use as an excuse to consume mass quantities of beer, and which I use as an excuse to consume mass quantities of carbohydrates and delicious, fatty, processed meat. In other words, soda bread, beer cheese bread, and corned beef brisket.

I don't bake much anymore, because I am a complete carb fiend if left unfettered access to baked goods so I really have to keep it under control. I used to just feed whatever I'd made to Choreboy but then he labeled my cookbook "Amanda's 'Let's Make The Husband Fatter' Book" so I had to, uhm, take a teensy hint? :) But it was time, and I'd been wanting to make both breads. They turned out wonderfully. This is the soda bread:


I read further about soda bread after I'd put this into the oven, and it turns out that this isn't historically accurate as it includes both raisins and sugar. In this form, it's more properly known as cake, which makes sense to me! But it was good. The carraway seeds in it add just the right touch.

And the beer cheese bread rocked my world. The Gum Zombie and I both share an unholy fixation with Alton Brown's Good Eats (RIP to the show, dagnabbit), and this is one of his recipes:


I made it with a pale Irish ale and Kerrygold Dubliner cheese. It was amazing.

And yes, this splurge remains in the weekend and won't be carried forward into the work week. The remains of both loaves are wrapped up and awaiting transport to the office in the morning, because although I've been able to hold myself to a slice of each per day I am reaching the end of my willpower. Thankfully, my coworkers are not afflicted with my need to count every calorie and will consume these with great speed and barely-restrained glee.

I love the fact that I work with 90% males. It makes life so much easier, especially when it comes to disposing of excess baked goods.

Now I've just got to pry myself out of bed at 5:00 AM tomorrow. It's time. Have a good one, folks.

Gearing Up

6:50PM, 40 minutes, 11.2 miles

It'll do. And I'm out -- I've planned tomorrow's grocery shopping trip and am just finishing off the menu (so determining if I have to add MORE to the list).

Happy weekend and early St. Patrick's day, y'all!

Momentum Rocks!

6:55, 40 minutes circuits with Tabatas (and the Tabatas were at the increased resistance too)

My arms are still shaking. Not sure what my legs are doing because I'm not trying to do anything with them outside of recline. But I know I did well on my upper body at least, and with the increased resistance on my bike I like to think it gives me a bit more of a leg workout as well as increasing cardio effort.

I went to my appointment with Dr. Awesome yesterday, and she is, well, awesome. We spent a portion of the appointment ripping our hair out over the FCAT, and the rest running over why I'm so tired. Just from a look-see-listen type check, I'm fine. Revoltingly so, even, considering my raging hayfever. My most recent bloodwork was great, but since it's been some time so we're going to run it again, and also check my D-levels and my B12. If there's nothing there to explain my exhaustion, I think we're chalking it up to that marvelous thing called "life".

New episode of Swamp People is on tonight. I am totally obsessed. Yes, I'm aware this is sad beyond belief. Now ask me if I care :P

Later!

On the Upswing

6:35PM, 40 minutes, 11.3 miles

I increased mileage in addition to upping the resistance on the stationary bike, so I'm pretty tickled with that. I'm also a soggy, sweaty mess, but an accomplished mess. I'll take it.

One thing I really like about the bicycle as opposed to my beloved/hated treadmill is that I'm more independent when it comes to increasing the intensity of my workouts. I can go faster just by pedaling faster, no buttons to push, and I go as much faster as I want without being limited by the machine's speed. I enjoy that -- the flexibility is awesome.

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In other news, my car is back from the shop and it's running nicely so far. The big test will doubtless be this weekend, because the Elder (again) needs new shoes, so we'll be out shopping and the like, and it's during those multi-start/stop scenarios that the ignition wouldn't catch.

Also, I'm really tickled because, in spite of mortgaging the boys' college educations for the repairs I had done, I also splurged a little and had the car detailed including having all the upholstery cleaned and the carpets shampooed. It's a 13-year-old car (2000 model -- is that thirteen in car years, or twelve?), and I'm its third owner so it was about time, especially since I've been driving it with two messy children inside it. But the children are older and less sloppy now, plus they kind of like having a nice looking car, so I might have a snowball's chance of keeping it looking at least semi-presentable.

Oh, and the presentation from HELL is finally done. FedEx came and picked that sucker up late-afternoon, and you've never seen a more happy group of people than those of us who were working on it.

Anyway, it's about time for Survivor so I'm going to have to head that way. I don't know why I bother -- every week I post the same thing for my Facebook status: The stupid, it burns!!!

Those poor dumb kids. And Troyzan? The heck?

Have a good one, y'all.

Still Going Strong

6:30 PM, 40 minutes 11.2 miles

Not bad, especially for a somewhat "off" evening.

“There are so many fragile things, after all. People break so easily..."
-Neil Gaiman

I do my best to be kind. Not because I'm some sort of saint. I'm not. I get into moods where I'm a hairsbreadth from exploding and it's all I can do to keep myself in line. But I do it because I knew, intimately, people who crossed that line daily. It's a hellish way to live, and it's a hellish thing to live with.

And I will not, by all I hold holy, be that kind of person.

I'll be glad when Choreboy gets home. It's been A Day. But there are good things, and he's one of the best.

Be good to each other, people.

Still Not Loving Mondays

6:30 PM, 45 minutes, circuits with Tabata intervals

I'm exercising in the evenings this week not just because I'm homework-free, but also due to the fact that the wretched "Spring Ahead" messes with my system for a month or better, so I know I need at least this week to adjust before I start waking up, effectively, at 4:00 AM.

Outside of that, I got nothing*. I'm moody thanks to hormones (the endometrial ablation does NOT in any way remove PMS from the equation), and I'm crabby because my stupid car is refusing to catch when I start it (it turns over quite happily though!) and I'm worried it's going to leave me stranded. Therefore, I get to use vacation time to take it in to the dealership in the morning. They will then charge me hundreds of dollars to tell me that they're not sure quite what's wrong, but they tweaked something they think might work, and please just call them and bring it in again (along with a blank check, iff'n you please) if that doesn't work!

Beauty.

*Note: this too shall pass. It's all good. I'm just wreck-ish tonight.

Title? Nah...

2:45 PM, 45-ish minutes or thereabouts, circuits with Tabata intervals

Kill me now. I upped my weights because I wasn't worn out enough after my last time with my weights, and now I want to puke.

On the plus side, no doubt I pushed it today. I killed it on Tabatas, chanting "Do you want it? Do you want it?" over and over in my head during the high speed parts, and gasping and gulping during the rest periods.

No clue what "it" was, but as long as it works I'll take it as a mantra.

Tomorrow's my rest day, then Monday it's circuits again. Body fat dropped 3/10ths of a percent in 3 weeks, via my circumference measuring, so we'll just see how it is in another few weeks.

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Dinner tonight is Mahi Mahi steaks with wilted spinach and oven roasted tomatoes. Pretty! Tasty too. I had almost no meat all last week, barring one Chipotle run and the can of sardines I ate last night, and I'm feeling it. Time to play carnivore again.

Have a good one, y'all!

***Update: dinner was awesome -- my first time cooking mahi, but it was excellent. Plus I got all nerdy and used Choreboy's thermal laser gun thingie (infrared/ no-contact thermometer, per Himself) to verify the temperature of my cast iron skillet before I plopped the fish on. Beauty.