Weight and Measures

W: 153
M: 40-32.5-40

March Challenge

Obviously, I'm not going to meet my March Challenge. It was very do-able, which strangely enough could have been its downfall. But, when it got down to the nitty-gritty, I just had more important things to deal with this week than pounding out the necessary miles and workouts to get this done. My comprehensive exit exams for my master's degree were today, and I think I did ok. My sleep schedule is back under control, so that's nice. A bedtime before midnight, what's that about? Ha.

I'm not at all disappointed about my "failure" in the March Challenge (yes, I know it really ends tomorrow, but I don't think much will change). Part of it is that I don't really want my reward--a new outfit inspired me for a brief amount of time, but not long term. I also know that I will get my yearly Easter/weddings dress this weekend probably, and I would actually prefer to have cycling shoes and pedals. Yeah, I could have made those two things my goal, but I am going to get them no matter what. So, the next time I do a challenge, I will need to have a really good treat.

Also, about Sunday, I sat down and thought about how I could finish out the week and beat the challenge. I realized that it was very possible, and all I needed to do was schedule it in. Once I realized I could do it, it was as if I didn't have to. There was no more Challenge, because I knew I would be able to get all my miles and workouts in if I focused. Strangely enough, it is as if I prefer impossible challenges and then, when they are in the realm of possibility, I lose interest.

BMR: 501.5
FMR: 369.48

Really, this isn't so bad. I only have 870.98 miles left in the year long challenge, so I have finished the first 100 miles. Hmm, I will need to step it up. Luckily, April is going to be a wonderful month for me, where I enjoy myself and my last semester in school.

Update

March BMR: 1.5
March FMR: 19.48
March Strength Remaining: 8

1 Year!

Today is the one year anniversary of my blog! It's hard to believe that I have been here that long, but time seems to creep up on you like that. When I started out, I wanted this place to be a record of a more structured and disciplined life. It's fair to say that I'm not there yet. My first step on that journey was to work toward a healthy diet.

How have I done? Well, ok. I have stopped drinking sodas, and my water intake has increased dramatically. I started paying more attention to my diet, and learned that I needed to eat more dark green, leafy veggies and watch my sodium levels. Fitday has been a great tool.

Looking at my benchmarks, I have lost five pounds over the past year. That's been about on par for the previous two years after I gained a lot of stress weight from my first year in law school. I'm about the same weight I was before I started running that summer. I've lost four inches in my measurements in the past year. Using the same body fat calculator as I did in May, I have gone from 32% body fat to 30.88%. I am below average now, but still almost 9% higher than ideal.

Where could I go from here?

1. Recommit to recording my eating in fitday.
2. Plan my meals better, so I can keep my RDA's up, sodium down, and protein up.
3. Increase whole grain consumption, besides yummy oatmeal! Hello, brown rice.

I also want to be more active and fit.

1. Plan to exercise every morning.
2. Work on achieving my goal to run 10 miles in 2008.
3. Increase flexibility (backbend!).
4. Get serious about strength training.

Also, I need to increase the amount of sleep I am getting. Six hours of sleep is just not enough for me, and it makes it impossible to get out of bed to exercise.

I would like to thank all of you who have read my blog in the past year, as well as those who have written comments. I appreciate it!

MR

March BMR: 1.5
March FMR: 20.08
March Strength Remaining: 8

2.29 miles in 40 minutes and 45 seconds, walking. Slightly hilly.

Weight: 154

March BMR: 1.5
March FMR: 22.37
March Strength Remaining: 8

One down, one to go

Well, one of the major procrastination bits is over. The next one is next Friday, but I'll make it! Big study session tomorrow.

Anywho, I have got to get going if I want my end of the month treat! I found the greatest, funniest shoes the other night at the mall. They have pandas on them! It could hardly be better.

In that vein, I walked to the grocery store tonight which is exactly one mile from my doorstep. If I didn't have to cross four lanes of fairly busy traffic without the benefit of a crosswalk to get there, I would probably do it more often. Maybe next month! Next month is going to be fabuloso!

So, updates. I also need to get back in the habit of logging my food in, but that might have to wait until I am inspired enough to start cooking/eating again. I hope there will be another update to the Strength numbers tonight as well.

March BMR: 1.5
March FMR: 24.62
March Strength Remaining: 8

Update

March BMR: 1.5
March FMR: 26.7
March Strength Remaining: 8

This past week, I sat on the couch, ate very fatty foods, and procrastinated because of stress. Still doing that. But, on Sunday, we walked at this very pretty park near where we live in NC and where I can ride my bike to easily and have fun all the time when I live up there. Whee!

BMR

47+ miles today on the bike. Beautiful weather. Three tough climbs, plus rolling hills and steep descents (I hate). Overall, I feel good but I'm really tired. More to come later perhaps.

March BMR: 1.5
March FMR: 28.7
March Strength Remaining: 8

Weights and Measures

W: 153
M: 39-33-40

Yum

No exercise today because I am full-on procrastinating. Well, not quite, but somehow it feels that way.

One good thing is the bulgur-lentil salad I made tonight for dinner. SO yummy. I have eaten more cherry tomatoes this week than I have in a year! Which isn't saying much, since I generally hate raw tomatoes of any sort. But there's something about them and hummus or lentils that is wonderful. It was a really easy salad--cook lentils and bulgur, chop up the veggies, mix together. Plus, I had asparagus. Of course. Cleaned the kitchen a little bit more, and I'm slowly getting the laundry done. I have to go back to the library tonight. Grr.

Blah

Today was a blah day. I am a little stressed about an upcoming event, but can't do a lot about it right now. No exercise today because I am being lazy. No cooking dinner because too many dirty dishes (ew, I know--but I washed a load of dishes tonight). No getting up early because I didn't go to bed early. I even skipped a class today because I wasn't prepared. Procrastinated by reading a management book my mom sent me. Worked on my resume and wrote some emails, which is about the only positive thing I have done today.

Tomorrow I am not going to spinning because I want my legs to be fresh for Saturday's ride. So I guess I can get up early and do a strength workout. Yawn. To start my morning exercise ritual, I need to start getting enough sleep--which means I should go to bed now instead of listening to the news. Whatevah! Haha.

Tired

I didn't get enough sleep last night, thanks to the mocha I drank for lunch yesterday. No caffeine! No more! Well, at least not in beverage form. ha!

Spinning was great today, even though the sub was there. She is growing on me. Then a mile afterwards on the track--no running because my sides were cramping up a little and I was keeping a good pace walking.

Tonight for dinner I was going to fry up some slices of the leftover polenta from last night, but that didn't turn out so well. Eh, not everything does. But I had creamy tomato soup from a box (yum) and some asparagus, my favorite spring vegetable! I only eat asparagus this time of year, so it a real treat. Plus, since Dr. MM isn't here, I could eat it every day if I wanted! Sometimes I want to. Dr. MM is not quite as big a fan as I am of asparagus. Tsk, tsk. A quick dinner, but I know that I haven't eaten a whole lot today. . .so I'm deciding between going out to get ice cream and eating the second half of the soup. Maybe both! I am in charge, so watch out!

No morning exercise today, although I did get up earlier than usual. I think that I will focus on doing either strength or walking in the mornings. At least right now, since I can't really wrap my head around anything else right now. And thanks for the link to the exercises, Trixie! I will have to scour it for ideas.

March BMR: 48.5
March FMR: 28.7
March Strength Remaining: 8

A new ritual

Trixie asked in her last post what new rituals we could create that would operate to empower us in our daily living. I keep trying to post comments there, but since I switched to the new blogger stuff it won't let me! (So. . . thanks, Trixie, for your comment here!) For me, something that really worked out well in the past for me was exercising in the mornings before anything else got in the way. Today, I hit the snooze a million times so I didn't get off on the right foot--but I still got up and did half of my strength exercise (the abs component). Tonight I have done the arms part. I will have to write up what I am doing for my arms and get suggestions from those of you who workout about what I could do differently. I would love to have some links to good strength training sites that you have found informative! Or your strength routine. And stretches! All I have are a 5# and 10# set of dumbbells and an exercise/stability ball. And a yoga mat.

In high school, I took weight training (instead of AP Biology--it was science fair year) and really enjoyed it--but I barely remember the exercises and I don't have that kind of equipment. That was the best class--and not just because it was the closest thing to a senior skip class we had! The last class of the day, and we had to run around the school everyday to the weight room and then did weights for 40 minutes. It was great to see how much improvement we could make. I went from being unable to bench the weighted bar to benching almost twice as much by the end of the class. The athletes had to take it, I think, but a handful of us non-athlete girls took it too. Why? Because that's what the cool kids did, and we were on the periphery of cool. No, seriously, that was the reason.

Tonight for dinner is stuffed peppers--the stuffing is polenta with onions, rosemary, corn, and white cheddar. It's completely chock full of fat, even for me--and it takes an hour to bake! I didn't read that part of the recipe before deciding to make that this week, but whatever. I will have lots of leftovers! I know what I'm having for lunch tomorrow! Plus a spinach salad. Next time, I will probably put some sausage in it because it makes me want sausage tonight. That will totally lower the fat, won't it? Hee!

To update:

March BMR: 48.5
March FMR: 29.7 (I walked to the mailbox this evening and back--of course, I had no mail.)
March Strength Remaining: 8

Living Again

Today I went to the special organic/whole foods store in town to buy groceries (right after I locked myself out of the house and had to pay a locksmith to let me back in) for new recipes. It's only special because it is such a different store from the ones I grew up with--it smells different, most of the packaged food is different, there are bulk bins, etc. It's like traveling to a new place without ever leaving home! I go there sometimes as a treat for myself, just to walk up and down the aisles and see all the things I've never tried. People who grew up in a city probably don't act like tourists in grocery stores. But I wouldn't change it for the world--and I can't wait until I live in a real city so I have even more chances to walk around in wonder at what they will have thought of next!

Ha.

Anywho, I made a delicious dinner tonight. Roasted potatoes, asparagus, and salmon with an orange-bell pepper salsa. It was wonderful, and as I washed and chopped the different ingredients it felt like part of me was waking up again. I felt less bored by myself than I have felt in a very long time. Cooking is so enjoyable to me, and recently I've just been throwing whatever together and eating quickly. I don't love salmon (unlike potatoes and asparagus, yum!), so it's not that the food is a million times better than my favorite quick pasta dish--but a lot of it was the preparation that gave me pleasure: chopping the potatoes and pepper up, whisking the vinaigrette for the salsa. It took a tiny bit more time than a quick pasta dish--probably 40 minutes from prep to table--but nothing that I can't do most days. Apparently, I need to make this a bigger part of my life because I was just irrationally pleased with making dinner tonight. I have a new recipe for every night this week--which is a huge no-no for goal achievement, but something I will never accept naturally--so maybe I will be able to extend that pleasure this week.

Arg.

What I really wanted to eat this evening was a nice steak, baked potato, and a cad. egg. Delicious. Did I have any of that? No. I didn't want to go to a restaurant tonight because I would have to put on makeup, and I always get sticker shock at steak in the grocery store (which you can go to without makeup). Potatoes would take too long to cook. The grocery store was out of cad. creme eggs. (Or at least the regular kind.)

So, I bought a frozen dinner w/ beef tips, green beans, and roasted potatoes. Disgusting--well the roasted potatoes would have been great except for being covered in fake cornstarch gravy, like the beef tips. Green beans were ok, and I ate all of them. I ate about 5 pieces of beef. Half a pint of B&J low fat chocolate frozen yogurt. Almost a half a cup of cottage cheese. I feel like I've eaten more than that, but I think it's just that I ate at the frozen yogurt twice. I am still hungry. Not to mention that's enough dairy to make a baby calf sick.

Also, today I read all of PastaQueen's archives. Reading years' worth of archives usually means that I am procrastinating in leaps and bounds. Today, I could have vacuumed my place and put more things away--but I cleaned my bathroom, washed dishes, picked up a lot of stuff (there's a path to the door now!), and printed some more off of the project I'm working on. Not too bad. I also sat on my exercise ball while I read some, until I needed to go back to slouching because the good posture made me sore.

Reading PastaQueen's archives reminded me that I have gotten away from cooking and enjoying cooking. I have so much to do in the evenings that I eat completely random things that are quick, but not necessarily great for me. Also, I need to plan better for the time I have. Usually, I am so hungry by the time I am able to get some food in me that meals need to take 20 minutes or less to make. There are plenty of healthy foods that fit in that category, but I am in a bit of a slump about it. And I could try some new recipes to help me feel more energized in the kitchen. I'll work on that this week.

March Challenge

March BMR: 48.5
March FMR: 30.1
March Strength Remaining: 9

I used the 10 pound weights today and I'm going to have trouble getting dressed tomorrow! I can already tell! If I get my house cleaned up, I am going to go for a walk. I'm thinking that it will be too muddy to run, unless I go to the track.

Weight and Measures

W: 154
M: 40-33-40

I normally just record my weight and measurements as an accountability measure, since once I stop doing that and blogging and fitday that means I am on my way to being a land slug again. Health and fitness are what I try to focus on in my blog, and weight/measurements aren't really a good measure of those things in my opinion. But, I do find it interesting to see how my body changes as I become more fit and healthy.

Last month, my first weights and measurements recording was:
W: 157
M: 40-34-40.5

So, I've lost an inch from my waist and a half inch from my hips. For a few weeks, I was down to 39 for my bust measurement but that wasn't there today for whatever reason. I've lost three pounds--although that happened in one week, and I've maintained for about three weeks.

My first recording for this year was:

W: 156
M: 41-34-41

Which shows that I have lost only two pounds since the beginning of the year, but an inch off of each measurement. This is why I like to measure and weigh, because there can be a slightly different picture based on the two. Losing two pounds (net) in two months doesn't sound like much, but losing an inch (net) off of every measurement does make a difference. Frankly, I would prefer inches to pounds anyway, and fitness to both.

For March, I hope that I will be able to ride 50 miles on my bike (to get my bike miles remaining number lower) and start running more for the fun of it. Also, I am going to do my strength workouts again, since I've slacked off on those a little. If I lose any more inches, I will have to either punch a new hole in my belt or get a new one because I'm on the last one. My other belt has also moved two notches. Of course, my belts don't sit on my waist. My clothes are fitting better, and by the end of March I'm thinking that I will need to go shopping for some new things.

HMM! That sounds like a goal!! I think that if I continue on my 1000 mile journey and break the 500 mark on BMR and the 350 mark on FMR AND do 10 strength workouts in March, then I will reward myself with a new head-to-toe spring outfit. I can probably afford that, if I save a little bit and stop buying random stuff I don't need. Woohoo!

Tired

I was so tired tonight that I drove almost all the way back to the gym from home and seriously considered just going home and taking a nap. But I refused to give in!

The spinning substitute was there again tonight--I really don't like her or the music she chooses, but that is my problem I guess. The workout was ok. I've been drinking about 50 oz of water right after I get home, and it makes me sweat so much more. That is a little gross, but I can deal with it.

My gym hero wasn't there today! But that's ok, because The Bunny was. That's not meant to be disparaging, by the way. She was a person who was doing warm up exercises--she was taking little, short strides, and did some lunge/leg lifts. The way she started off, made me think of a bunny. . .but then, THEN she was 3/4 of the way around the track and started high-stepping. Which made her ponytail bob up and down exactly the way a bunny's ears might. I thought I would be thrown out for grinning like an idiot for a moment there. Anyway, she was too cute and I ran behind her for a lap.

Yes, ran. I decided that I would run, just for fun and see how I liked it. Just two non-consecutive laps out of 8, but it was great. Even though on the second lap, my legs wanted to jerk themselves out of their sockets and beat me upside the head for doing this. The rest of me had a great time. And that is really all that matters. Heehee.

Also, I have been looking at my fitday calculations recently and reading a few things here and there--and I have low protein consumption! Not that this hasn't been staring me in the face forever, but I didn't really think about it. The great, all knowing internet says that I can/should consume .8*154 = 124 grams of protein a day, or up to 30% of my calories. Today, when I was attempting to eat more protein, I ate 52 grams or 14% of my calories! Evidently I will need to overcome my aversion to cooking meat or other protein source every evening. I bought some protein-friendly foods for lunches and snacks this last trip to the grocery store so we will see how it works out this week. Also, I need to eat more. Today I just had a bagel for lunch, because I was supposed to buy something to go with it--but I wasn't hungry after I ate it, and I ran out of time. Oh, well, there's always tomorrow.

See you later!

BMR: 548.5
FMR: 380.1