No running tuesday

I had warned you yesterday that I was going to eat a ton of sushi and saki and that I did.

After B picked me up from my house we drove about 15 minutes to Allen, TX to this cute little shopping center jam packed with little restaurants and indulged in a bunch of different rolls with his mom and dad. We're pretty lucky that his parents usually take us out to dinner for sushi when we are in town since good sushi is so expensive and we can't exactly afford it on our own.

The night didn't end there, afterwards, we went to a pub called the Londoner and I got to drink my favorite mixed beer of hard apple cider and Harp (otherwise known as snakebite) and B ordered even more food because he wanted to try out the chips and curry, which I'm sure you can guess means a plate full of pub fries and curry sauce.

It's a good thing I did 40 min of cardio on the elliptical and some weights yesterday.

Now to today:

I have slept about 1/2 of the day already and it's not even because I went to bed late. In all actuality I went to bed extremely early (somewhere around 10:30-11ish). I'm going to blame it on little Sampson because he's been cuddling with me the whole time. It's hard to get up when you got that little fur ball resting on your tummy!

Now I'm going to go on what I'm hoping will be a 5 mile tempo run with a mile warm up and mile cool down. We'll see if thats what my body wants to do today.

Lady Gaga!

Even though I'm no longer in school it doesn't mean I can't have a spring break, right?

Yesterday I woke up early (8:30AM early) and laid around the house until I drank enough coffee to get me moving and out the door for a 7 mile run.

It was freezing cold and windy (and I hate wind) but I still managed to finish in 58 minutes which was much better than I thought it would be. Surprisingly, I'm not even that sore from the 25k on Saturday! 

Then, B and I packed, showered and drove down to Dallas for me to see Lady Gaga with my mom and sister and for him to spend some quality time with his family. 

We started off the evening at Kenichi where my mom took her first ever tequila shot (sometimes I don't know how I am her daughter) and then we snacked on sushi and drank some more...much more. It was great. 

Lady Gaga was AMAZING! Even though we were up so high I had to squint to see her, I had a blast. 

Currently, it is around 3:30 and I've just had a bowl of peanut butter cup ice cream and am trying to will myself to go on an easy run. I don't even care how far I go, it could be just 3 miles, but I NEED to run. I'm going out to sushi tonight (again) with B and his parents and undoubtedly there will be saki and beer and so much food! Oh well, its my spring break. 

Why do I run?

Whenever I am feeling miserable during a race/run, this question tends to sneak its way into my head quite often. "Why am I doing this?!"
But then I think about it and here are just some of the reasons why I run:

I run because it reconnects me to the world around me.
I run because it calms me and releases all the negative energy and feelings that I may be hoarding inside.
I run because of the amazing feeling of accomplishment afterward.
I run because I love to eat food.
I run because no matter what I feel beautiful when I'm done.
I run because the world melts around me.
I run because I can't get enough of that runners high.
I run because it gets me out of the house and into the sun.
I run because it's my prozac.
and lastly,
I run because I can.

One phrase that I've always enjoyed goes something like, "your life is dictated by the choices you make." I've made more bad decisions than I can count and am continually learning to accept responsibility for my mistakes and take control of my emotions. At the same time I can take credit for my good decisions.

One of the best decisions I ever made was joining the girls cross country team in high school. Here's why:

I remember when I first joined cross country as a young whipper snapper. I was shy, insecure, and entering 9th grade. Now, I should tell you that at this time I was also on the 9th and 10th grade pom squad and was having a hard time of it because of the stereotypical cattiness that comes with it. There was gossip, cliques, glares, and the "divas" always had to be in the front and center of all the routines. In short, it was misery.

But then at my mom's urging I found the cross country team. It was a breath of fresh air. The older girls didn't shun me as a possible prospect of beating them, they took me under their wing. At practices, they would encourage me and we would run as a team even though it was the most individualized sport at the school. If one of us felt like they needed to slow down we wouldn't let them. Many times that was me and I would always get the "come on Erica, we're almost there!".

At one particular meet in Missouri we had five of us running right next to each other and as we passed a coach from another team he screamed out "Come on girls! Now that's a team!"

So I loved cross country for what it did to me. It helped me become comfortable in my own skin through the "awkward years" and gave me much needed confidence. I know this is such a sappy post but it's true and I think it gives some reflection to the running culture. Even though it is a very competitive sport it's full of the most encouraging people I've ever met.

Today was a long and rough day. I'm glad it's almost over.

Yesterday, however was actually a pretty good day. I'll stick with talking about that. 

I woke up early and drove to Panera Jack Rector Beacon 25k with Brent who was also my photographer for the day. I finished with an official time of 2:17:11. I'm not very excited about it but I'm glad that I went and finished. It's nice to have gotten a 16 mile run under my belt. I haven't run that far in at least 2 years.

The run was basically out and back and I clocked in my first 8 miles at 1:06 and thought I had it until I had 5 miles left. Then I died and my pace went to what felt like a shuffle. 

I had some more pictures taken on my camera but I am missing the cord that allows me to upload them on my computer so hopefully I will find that soon and put some more up. Oh and it was also Brent's first ever experience at a road race. He did a fantastic job and supported me the whole way.

For lunch after the race I gorged myself on Indian food and later in the evening enjoyed a few good brews at a gastropub.

Then today happened.
The result of working a double at work and no running is a very unhappy girl. In order to placate my frustrations I ate about a gazillion calories and felt even worse afterward. Thankfully its a whole new day tomorrow.

Good night!

Outside it is BEAUTIFUL!

Finally, it's starting to warm up here. Oklahoma is not supposed to be cold (at least in my mind) and I'm ready to be playing around in some 70 degree weather.

I ended up running 6 miles yesterday because I was feeling good and thought an extra mile would only make me stronger. Today I'm going to rest since I'm planning on running a 25k tomorrow morning. Maybe I'll do a little yoga or elliptical. Who knows.

Green thumb? I wish.
Now that we're getting into spring with full force its time for me to start working on my garden. One thing about me is that I do NOT like to plan. I don't even like to say the word, really.

So last year I tried to plant a garden and it failed miserably. My tomatoes (which I found out are supposed to be caged in one of those wire things) spread out everywhere taking over my squashes and cucumbers and everything else just died because I got too lazy to water and weed it daily, or even weekly.

I also never put up a barrier around it so the dogs went traipsing around it crushing the last living bits. Complete and utter disaster.

I did have some survivors in the form of flowers and random potted peppers though. 

See? This is one of two of my little knockout rose bushes that are STILL alive just not blooming yet!!!

I also successfully grew a pot of little hot peppers but wasn't quite sure what to do with them because I had forgotten the actual type after I planted them. 








So this year is going to be different. I'm going to PLAN PLAN PLAN and make an awesome garden that will actually grow veggies that I will use!

One day my backyard will look like this:

And I will take a picture of me standing happily in front of it just like I  stood in front of the hydrangeas (my favorite flower) at the Arboretum in Dallas last summer.

On another more serious note, my thoughts and prayers go out to those suffering in Japan after the massive earthquake. I am chilled to my bones after watching this film taken from the NY Times website. I can not imagine what the victims must be going through and it breaks my heart.

Rise and Shine

I woke up extra early this morning. Not on purpose, but because I nudged Sampson (my dog) to make sure he was still alive (I periodically do this in the middle of the night because I have a fear that I may crush him in my sleep) and he didn't move. So for a second I panicked and rolled him over and he woke up and looked at me very annoyed. 

This is actually a very old pic of me sleeping that an old roommate took as a joke, but thought it was still appropriate for this post.

I guess since I'm up and already have a cup of coffee flowing through my blood stream I should get out there and run my 5 miles. It is less windy.

It's apparently the international day for awesomeness. 

Maybe I'll have an awesome run? An awesome day today at work? 

Let's hope so.

Today's Run

Today my workout consisted of a mile warm up, 3x1600 repeats with 2x800 jogs in between and a mile cool down.

1st mile: 7:17

2nd mile: 7:30 (struggled with this one)

3rd mile: 7:20 (redeemed myself)

Total miles: 6

Then, a nice walk with the dogs.

A little bit about my dogs:
(scroll down to see a little video)

What else do I love besides running, my family, and my boyfriend? My two little babies, Sampson and Jackson. Ok, they're not really babies and truly, only one of them is little, the other one is rather big.

Here's a little history about them:

Sampson a schnoodle (for those that don't know that's a schnauzer poodle mix) once lived on the harsh streets until he was jailed up in the pound. One day, I came in looking for a furry little friend to keep me company since, at the time, I lived by myself in an apartment and wanted some companionship. What had drawn me to my little Sampson was that he was the ugliest, dirtiest little doggie there. His hair was matted and he was covered in ticks and fleas so I adopted him (err as I like to say, bailed him outta dog prison), cleaned him up and give him a pretty awesome home. He is now groomed and tick and flea free after a long and difficult process of several deep cleaning baths.

He looks a little unhappy in this pic but one interesting thing about Sampson is that he always looks like he's upset because of the way his eyebrows are shaped. Kinda weird.

See? I'm not even holding him and he still looks unhappy.

My other dog, or rather my boyfriends dog that I claim as my own, is Jackson.

Jackson is a pretty awesome husky and has become best buds with Sampson.

Here they are snuggin. Pretty adorable if you ask me.

One thing about these two is that every time they see me put on my running shoes, they think I'm going to take them on a walk. If you're not familiar with huskies, they have a tendency to "talk" or howl which is pretty entertaining until it becomes annoying and Jackson uses it to his full advantage, roo-rooing around the living room until I give in to leashing him up and heading out the door. So now, no matter what, I have to walk these two after every run because even if I put them outside in the backyard they seem to use their dog sense to know when I'm lacing up the Asics and will cry and whine at the door. Relentlessly. No matter how tired I am.

I tried to get into the habit of walking them before I ran, but the ordeal of walking an ADD shnoodle that zig zags from side to side and a husky with a will to chase after and attempt to eat stray cats depletes my energy enough to expel any motivation that I may have had to run.

Here's a video from today of Jackson and his way of telling me that now that I'm done running, its his turn.