Weekend Round-Up: Long Run and Good Food

I wished I have pictures to show you of my run Saturday morning. But they were blurry like this.

We ran out to the neighborhood I used to live. And out again to this highway. That was about 3 miles.

Along this highway, I counted at least 10 beer cans in less than a span of 1 mile.  Littering is bad.

But drinking and driving and littering?
Oh no!

Running Friend had it at 5 miles so we cut short our run and walked/jog back.
He said his insoles or shoes are giving him trouble.
It was a timely call anyway because it started to sprinkle.
I headed home and ran the remaining miles.
At 11 miles, I thought, well, I can do 12.

At 12 miles, I thought, well, I can do 13.
At 13 miles, I thought, well, I can do a little bit more to finish this movie I was watching.

That's it.
13.22 miles in the bag. 

I am proud of myself.

Sunday, I went to church to see this little sweet baby cousin get christened.
She had fallen several days ago because her 2-year sister tried to be helpful and picked her up the steps and dropped her. 

 

 I was just glad to be part of this sweet baby's milestone in life. 

I love my family. 

I went to the grocery store again to pick up not-good-stuff but rather yummy stuff.

There is reason for this madness.

Well, they are mostly for the boyfriend.

I usually just get one of those mini cones and will be plenty satisfied.

 

I came home and got busy with bread.

I made stromboli - kinda. 

This is made with home-made bread. 

Roll out the dough.  Place cheese, Canadian bacon, olives, mushrooms and a little pizza sauce.

Roll it up and let it rise a little more. 

Bake. 

Yummy mess!

For the rest of the dough,
I rolled it and made a hearth-kinda bread (whatever that means).
I like bread that looks like this instead of loaf.
Sprinkle some cheese, Italian herbs and seasoning.
Pop it in the oven...

Sheer delish!
I am about to open a bottle of wine and just read a book and enjoy the rest of my Sunday night.
I LOVE MY FABULOUS WEEKEND!

Push-Ups: 15 (graduated from counter push-ups to girly knee on floor pushup and 1 real push-up)
Push-ups for This Month: 185
Push-ups Left:215
 



Addiction

Addiction: The state of being enslaved to a habit or practice or to something that is psychologically orphysically habit-forming, asnarcotics, to such an extent that its cessation causes severe trauma.

Hello, my name is Christina and I might be addicted to RUN. 

When I wrote my earlier post, I was pretty sure and bummed that my long run wasn't going to happen. All my dedicated hard work on Thursday and Friday trying to fuel up and hydrate well pretty much went into the drain on Friday night. It left a very limp, old, withered Christina. I was in bed resting but I cannot shake that long run off my mind. It was eating me.

Finally, I decided to just take it easy. I know how to take it easy. I'll just walk A LOT and run some and when I am done, I am done. I played Ken Burns' Prohibition (disc 1) on my lap top while I ran.

http://www.pbs.org/kenburns/prohibition/photos/

First mile went well. The second one went well. The third one went well ....
I stopped at every half a mile to take a sip or two of water. At mile 5, I took a Jet Blackberry Gu gel. Sometimes, I stopped to stretch. Sometimes, I slowed to a walk. Sometimes, I hit the bathroom. Eventually, I hit the nine that was on schedule and thought, I can do another mile. All 10 miles on the treadmill. And I loved it. Addicted? I am not sure. But let me just say, while my stomach is still feeling funny, I am feeling wonderful - like I am lifted.

 

The sight of this brings a smile to my face.

Long run done!
Eleven miles in 2 hours 14 minutes or so.
Not bad. (More about that after my Paddy Wag update).

Paddy had her shots for nibbling on rat poison on Wednesday. Now, I have to give her two pills each day. 
And it turns out, she is having allergic reactions to those meds/shot.  So I took her back to the vet yesterday and got another shot and some doggy yogurt Bepto-like thing.  Poor baby! Sure hope she gets to feeling better soon.

Now, about the less interesting thing - my long run. 
The first six miles were done with Mr. J.  We have a usual 6 mile route and today, we ran that route in reverse. It seems longer and the hills seem hillier. It seems safer because we ran four miles in the dark on road with a wider shoulder. The last 2 or so were on a road with no shoulder and we had to occasionally hop onto the grass. I coughed many times during the run. Mr. J finally said he was able to only do 6 because he might be coming down with something.  It's fine. I was more than happy to have company for the bulk of my run this morning. So, after that 6th mile, I said bye to him, went inside the Y, had a Gu, and hopped onto the treadmill. Ten was on my mind today. I wanted a 10. But when I hit the 4th mile on the treadmill, I decided to go that extra one. Eleven.
I was happy. It wasn't a fast, speedy run. But it was a good run. The run was hard in a way, but physically, it was kinda easy. I had Food network on, so that made it easy. 
I think I am kinda ready for my half marathon at the end of this month. :)

"Farting Glitter"

To hold myself accountable for my 9-miler today, I made it public on Facebook that I will be waking up at 4:45 a.m. to run 9 miles.  Yes. It worked.

I had a Nutella on a slice of bread and called it pre-run fuel. Last night, I had a serving or maybe two of chicken spaghetti. Delish! I do make a mean chicken spaghetti. So Yummy!

The run was ok. It took a few miles to wake myself up. And then, it was easy. Mentally, I told myself that this was going to be three 5Ks. When I hit the 4.5 mile mark, I told myself, I am half way done. Mind vs. Body.
Mind emerged victorious today!

So today, I celebrate a new distance ran on the treadmill. Nine miles. All of it! :)
And because I spent so much time on the treadmill cos' I am kinda slow, I got to witness this:

So, I learned that the timer thing rolls back to 0:00 after 99 minutes. 
I'm proud I finally got the chance to "discover" that!
Three more long runs left for half marathon #4 training!

You guys probably know I like quotes. So here are some I'm going to share with you because I swear that RW Quote Of the Day read my mind this week.

On Wednesday (when I had that sucky run), the quote was:
"Do the work. Do the analysis. But feel your run. Feel your race. Feel the joy that is running." (Kara Goucher)
I was overanalyzing. I was too critical of myself. I forgot to feel the joy that should be running in me.

Yesterday, it said:
"Relish the bad training runs. Without them, it's difficult to recognize, much less appreciate, the good ones (Pat Teske)."

And in the words of Vanessa over at Gourmet Runner: My 9-miler today was so awesome that I am "farting glitter!" Yeah!

Friday Fillers - No Pipe Dream and No Tooth Fairy

Let me shoot for 5 filler things for Friday.

#1
My butt cheeks hurt.
My quads hurt.
My hamstrings hurt.
My back hurts.
My triceps hurts.
But I am feeling FABULOUS!!!!
It's a good hurt/sore. It means cross-training this week was a success. I'm LOVING IT! 

#2:
I got up early at 5-ish and headed to Y. I ran 8 miles in about 96 minutes on the treadmill.
I've got the proof!!!! And being blurry... you know I was still running while taking this shot!

The run got progressively easier actually. Not faster, but it felt like everything was falling into place. It wasn't a pipe dream to finish the 8 miles. It was possible. Everything and anything was possible. And I am going to make it happen.
I'll make things happen with a smile. :)


#3:
I got home from my run and Limit (the dog I am dog-sitting) came up to me. And pop... out comes the tooth. Upon closer examination, I think it must have been a carcass he was chewing on or something and not his actual tooth.

 

#4

During therapy, little girl told me this .....

Little Girl: Mommy gave Daddy time out.

Me: Why?

Little Girl: Cos' Daddy bad.
Me: What did he do?
Little Girl: Cos' Daddy didn't listen to mommy.

#5: 

Breakfast: Protein powder + 1 orange + skim milk + ice + orange yogurt 

Lunch: Subway chicken teriyaki sandwich + baked chips + diet Coke

Snack: Skinny Cow chocolate wafer thing (delicious)

Dinner: I'm going to make something with chicken breast. For dessert, I am going to have a medley of fruits.

Weekend Roundup #2

The boyfriend and I went to a wedding on Saturday.  Our friend from India (groom) weds his girlfriend from Nepal. They had a ceremony in India for his family, a ceremony in Nepal for her family and a ceremony in the good ol' U.S.A. for their friends in America.  Being in America, you gotto do the usual American wedding things - white dress, unity candle, garter toss, bouquet toss.

We got home early enough, watched "The Last Emperor" on DVD and slept. I was ready to pound out that 9 miles I was nervous about a few days ago.

Sunday 5 a.m. rolls around. I didn't want to roll out of bed. But I did! And I was early and waited on Ms. M and Mr. J.  It was a blustery morning. Ms. M, being the seasoned runner and all, taught me about how to "read" winds. After our 4.5-mile loop lesson, Ms. M headed home and Mr. J and I were left to our own devices. I had to "read" the winds to make sure that we don't come back head-on with that wind. Not too shabby. But I clearly need more practice. It was "HEAD ON" on our last 0.3 mile.
Funny how 9-miles today were much easier than the 4-miler killer runs earlier this week.
And we managed a very nice negative splits run. Check this out!

12:44
12:37
12:20
13:07,  13.04 (stopped to take the reflective vest, get a drink of water, and got my Gu Chomps)
11:34
11:29
11:27
11:17
9:42 (last stretch - uphill and we made a quick strong dash for it too!)

After the run, I headed home for a hot steamy shower and got back into bed for a nap.
Woke up and had breakfast fit for a princess at 1 p.m. (pancakes with real maple syrup with nuts, turkey bacon, coffee, OJ, eggs). I ate well and enjoyed a pretty sight outside the window because we got some snow, baby!

Looks like a bli-bli-bli zzard out there.

 I'm so scared that I can't seem to stand still for a picture

Done! Done!

Oh yeah! Let me try to be short on this post since I have quite a bunch to do today.

I ran my long run today. Eight miles. Eight miles on the treadmill. Guess who feels like a lab hamster right now? Ahem. I do! I'm not going to lie. It was not 100% fun like hamsters made it out to be. I almost went bonkers as I plopped one foot in front of another for forever.

Turns out running is a mental sport. And I must be a mental patient. I ran the 8 miles into 2 segments because I thought it would hurt less and make the 8-miles more palatable. Yeah right!
So, first, I ran 3 easy miles.

Then, I ran another 5 miles.

Just because I am such a sucker for torture, I ran another 0.28 miles to complete my 3rd virtual race hosted by MCM Mama. It's her birthday.

So, there you go. A grand total of 8.28 miles in 1 hour 37 minutes at about 11:39/mile pace.
After my run, I went home and took a good semi-cold shower. Does that count as like a ice bath?
And then, I drove to MacDonalds. I know. Don't judge. I got some yummies for my belly.

Chocolate milk, anyone?

And pancakes. And a hashbrown. 

Now I have to read that Consumer Reports Used Car Buying Guide.