Some words of inspiration for you…
“Don’t give up. Never, ever give up. Unless it looks like you can’t win or like winning will be hard.” – Pat Dixon
“I bet whoever was the first to say “It’s not whether you win or lose, it’s how you play the game” wasn’t a gladiator.” – Keith Alberstadt
I know, I know. I will. I promise. Just not today. My ass still hurts from falling off the fitness wagon…. Maybe tomorrow…
Meanwhile, anybody wanna BBQ?
I know, I’ve totally been slacking off on this thing. Blah. Right now I’m visiting family in TX and haven’t run since… I have no idea.
My last 5K was on 12/4. It was a night run and it was freaking COLD!!!! And dark. It was the 1st Annual Reindeer Run 5K and Winter Walk. By the time we started (10 min late) I couldn’t feel my toes. :) I did pretty durn good on this one… 107th overall, 25th in my age group. 5K in 33:04. Pace: 10:38/M. Totally happy with that. :) And the nifty, cool shirt I got glows in the dark!!! Whooooot!
So now I’m totally being a slacker and not taking advantage of being in south TX where the weather is absolutely lovely. Oh swells. I have very important people to visit. My sis-in-law leaves for a 15 mo deployment next month, so we have a lot of visiting to fit in. ;)
I hope everyone is enjoying a happy holiday season.
Um, let’s see. I ate too much (of course) and ate too much again. We went to the in-laws’ for Thanksgiving. You may or may not be aware that my in laws live “at the end of the world”. That’s what we call it. They live a little over a mile off the highway (which itself is “country”). We don’t get cell phone service out there, and until recently the internet was *GASP!* dial up. :) I had to come up with a plan while we were there to be active. The treadmill was inaccessible and driving into town to go to the school track not knowing if it was open or not did not appeal to me. So I decided to run the road in front of the house.
The road to the house dead ends… at their drive way. This road is full of hills. So Thursday I decided I’d try to run up the two hills right by the house and run whatever I could in between. Did I mention this is a dirt and gravel road? Yea. It is. So that first day I kept at it for about 45 minutes. Runkeeper glitched out on me, so I don’t know distance. It was probably about 2 miles just go up and down those 2 hills. I had a partner that day. A cool dog from a couple of houses up.
On Friday, I ran/walked to the highway and back and did a loop around the big back yard. That was 2.5 miles in 45 min. Yea, slow. But these hills are no joke, yo. When I told my sis what I was doing she thought I was nuts. She knows those hills and said she never would have made it out the driveway. She exaggerates… She’s pretty badass herself. :) Oh, and I kept forgetting my push ups but finally got them finished around 11 that night. Vacation sure can mess you up!!! I didn’t have Tom to keep me on track. ;)
Saturday, out to the highway and back again. But this time in 38 min. Uh huh. That’s right. Boom! I was beat after that, tho.
I added a couple of new recipes to the Recipes page earlier. You should check them out.
Here are some pictures from my runs:
Run in 40:21
129th of 336
I have A LOT to say about this run. So you might want to grab a snack and a drink.
Shelby’s Run 10K/5K/1K walk is the 5K I ran last weekend. It was…. An experience. They finally got the results posted yesterday, so I thought I’d better get this out of the way before we go out of town and I don’t have internet/cell service to post this.
Shelby’s Run raises money for St. Jude’s Children’s Research Hospital. According to the website, Shelby Grover was a little girl who died in 2007 from an inoperable brain tumor. Shelby’s Run was started in her memory.
When the alarm went off at 7 AM I was up and at ‘em!! “It’s racing day!” The Husband was less enthusiastic. It was his first racing day. Heh, but he’s not as excitable as I am. 
Breakfast was a spinach salad with sunflower kernels and Asian dressing, and a cup of Tazo Ōm tea. Yum!
The race started at 9 A.M. so we were there by 8:30 to pick up our T-shirts and get our bib numbers. The start was at Clever H.S. and when we arrived there were a lot of people already there. There was this huge group of little girls all wearing orange shirts. I later found out they were all part of “Girls On the Run”. What a cool group!!!
Now, as previously stated, this was “an experience”. The first “off” thing that caught my eye were the number of people wearing mp3 players. The rules CLEARLY stated no headphones. I was okay with this because I know I need to get used to that. But this was The Husband’s first race and he would have been more comfortable with music to help him keep a rhythm. It was very disappointing to see that they WERE allowed. Sorry, The Husband. Booooooo.
We wandered in and out of the gym a few times so The Husband didn’t get overheated. Too many people in the gym. We walked back and forth to the car a couple of times to drop off t-shirts and water bottles and get his phone. Then decided we’d hit the head. Dude!!!! The bathrooms?? Oh man. The whole hallway smelled like shit. Literally. Shit. I was cracking up. Once I got INTO the bathroom (ladies, you know how those lines are) I realized it must be the men stinking the school up. Ha ha!
One of the times we wandered outside I noticed that alongside the snack/water/Powerade tables was an old dude with a table of bibles. Really?? Heh. Whatever. Made sure not to get too close to that table. Didn’t want to be responsible for the lightening hurting anyone….
FINALLY it was time to get started. And by started, I mean at 9 o’clock, they corralled everyone into the gym. The guy with the mic thanked everyone for coming, gave props to the “Girls On the Run” group (again, super awesome kids!), blah blah blah. I say that because it was hot in there. HOT!!! And the dogs were restless. Lots of people brought their dogs. More on that later…
I tuned back into what the dude was saying and realized… HE’S READING SCRIPTURE. And he’s acting like we all KNOW these passages. Um, yea, no. I was now super not happy about standing in this hot gym with all these people and their dogs LISTENING TO SCRIPTURE. Ugh. The Husband said he needed to go to the head again, so I followed. Screw this God/Jesus/Bible noise. **Interesting note: Clever is in CHRISTIAN County.**
When we came back in, he was telling everyone to bow their heads in prayer. No thanks. I started looking around and saw my friend Josie sitting in the bleachers!! And, HAHA!!, she was looking around like me!! But she didn’t see me. So while these Jesus people (and the ones too embarrassed to NOT bow their head and pretend) prayed, I texted Josie “What the hell are you doing here?” I saw her head come up and she reached in her pocket as her teenage daughter looked at her like, “Are you serious?” HAHAHAHAHA!!! (Sorry, Miranda!!!) I finally caught her eye as the prayer ended and went over to say hi. Her daughter, Francis, was in the gigantic group of awesome little girls in orange shirts!!! BadASS!!!! It was her first 5K. I wished her luck and told her to have fun. What a beautiful smile she has!!!! Like pure sunshine, I tell you!!!
“Here’s how the waves will go…” 10K first. Then 1K walkers. Then 5K. Weird, but okay. Oh, and the maps they had up? Not super helpful. More on that in a minute… Their instructions on where to line up in the parking lot included “at the big crack”. Should have realized at THAT point…
The Husband and I lined up. Not in the FRONT front, but not too FAR from the front. I wanted to avoid the dogs if possible. And finally off we went! “Good luck!” I told The Husband, and then I ran off. I was following the GOOD sized group of 5K runners in front of me. I’m not familiar with Clever and for some reason, coming out of the parking lot, everything looked totally different to me than when we checked it out a few days before. Oh well.
About the dogs… I have nothing against dogs (more likely to have a problem with their owners), and I think it’s cool people bring their dogs to run. As long as the dogs are under control, not running all over the place and dragging the owner along for the ride. And as long as they’re not SHITTING ON THE ROAD IN FRONT OF ME. Guess what shoes I was running in? Yea, VFF’s. Guess how disgusting that would have been if I had run through the large pile of dog shit? I almost did, too. Because the woman realized what was happening and tried to get off the road, but was cutting people off in the process. Grrrr…..
I said “oh well” about things not looking familiar. NOT “oh well”. We ended up going about 2 blocks PAST the first turn. And please understand this means we ran past 2 or 3 people wearing yellow vests that had they been paying attention should have TOLD people they were going the wrong way!!! EVERYONE was going the wrong way!!! *sigh* So we all turned around and had to run AGAINST the sea of people coming at us. I was yelling and waving to them “5K is that way!” Sheesh.
Finally, we made the turn into the correct road. And this is where I got REALLY pissed. So far I’ve endured scripture, prayer, dog shit, crazy dog OWNERS and having to turn around because they didn’t mark the course. NOW, I keep getting stuck behind these jackasses that want to WALK (we’ve just started… why the hell are you walking???) 4 across on this country road. FOUR ACROSS!!!! Trying to get around them is insane at this point because there are so many of us. We got so bunched up due to having to turn around that there is no other way to describe this except to say that it’s a cluster-fuck. *sigh* And to make matters worse, the road we’re on is shit. Like I said, it’s a country road. So while I’m trying to go around all these yahoos, I have to watch for potholes, cracks, divots and DOGS. And children- if I run into an adult, who cares… If I run into a kid I’m gonna feel bad.
I realize this is very long, but I warned you, geez!!! Here, I’ll try to sum up the rest:
Pros:
*Those little girls were super awesome to see along the way. Very determined, smiling, confident young ladies running doing a fantastic job!
*There was this cool old dude wearing a Clever Fire Rescue shirt (I believe he really IS fire rescue), and denim shorts over a pair of blue sweatpants. He also had on a knee brace. He made me smile.
*Saw 2 guys running the 5K with their kids in strollers. Well, I ASSUME they were their kids. I could be wrong. But I thought that was great!
Cons:
*There was this kid… a skinny little boy who was probably about 10. I wanted to pick his skinny ass up and chuck him into a field. He kept stopping in front of people. And then, for whatever reason, decided to only do it to ME. Grrrrrr….. I try not admonish other people’s children. Not nowadays when you have crazy stupid parents who think little Johnny can do no wrong. But I really did think about throwing him into the nearest pile of cow shit (there was plenty; did I mention we were in the country?).
*The Husband almost tripped over the same dog 3 times. What the hell????
*A different kid came to a full stop in front of me at the water table. Almost plowed him over.
*About ½ mile from the end, the mail had to be delivered. The mail man was hell bent on getting the mail out. Almost ran over the kid I wanted to throw in the field. Meh.
So in conclusion, I’ll do this run again, but with a TOTALLY different attitude. Josie and I decided we’ll run it next year together just for funsies (but we promise to stay the hell out of the way of the serious runners).
Not a lot of activity this week… My little toe hasn’t wanted to fit into any shoe I own, which makes running awful hard. (Might help if I’d stop running it into every door, wall and stray shoe lying around…) And until today, our weather has been perfectly shittastic, so no riding either. Not that I can get my foot in my cycling shoes. *sigh* I HAVE been keeping up on my push ups, tho. I love doing those! Those push ups will come in handy one of these days…
I did, however, swallow my fear and register for spring classes today. That’s right. I’m almost 35 and have finally given in to the idea of going to grown up school. I enrolled in an Associate of Arts program with an emphasis in Psychology. I think I’ve lost my mind.
Oh, I’ve discovered I like vodka if it’s in flavored coconut water. YUM!! My favorite so far has been Vita Coco coconut water with passionfruit with Skyy Vodka. It’s one way to fight dehydration…
I made this crazy-delicious cream of carrot soup tonight for dinner. I didn’t tell them until they finished eating that it had tofu in it. ;) You should try it. Super awesome!!
One more thing…. I have REALLY fallen for running. I love it. I can’t wait to be better at it! Ha ha! NOT running this week has suuuuuuuuuuuuuucked. But I need to make sure I can do Shelby’s Run on Saturday! :) This will be my 2nd 5K. I’m excited!! The Husband is doing this one, too and it’s his FIRST!!! Woohoo!!
I have a new watch. Says “Ironman Triatholon” on it. I say, “Maybe someday…” Pretty sure you have to swim to do those…
Runner’s World says cereal is good for you! It’s like they KNOW me!!!
It’s been a coupla days, I know. Been… Let’s say “busy”. Whatever. Thanks to my awesome gracefulness, I’ve managed to hurt BOTH my feet in the past week, but they’re on the mend looks like. Yay!!!
Saturday night, I did this:
Can you tell what that is? My foot got into a fight with an ottoman (which sparked a spat between my knee and the coffee table) and my little toe was a casualty. Hard to tell by the picture, but it was purple. Well, still IS a little bit purple, but that day it got fuuugggglyyy!!
And then on Sunday morning I did THIS:
Yup. I got skillz, yo. That is what happens when you run barefoot without picking up your feet. Oh, and you MAY get blisters on the bottom of your feet. Just sayin…
Well, I can get my VFF’s on again, so I ran yesterday. Not bad. Just under 2 miles. After walking all goofy for 2 days, everything from the waist down was really tight, so I was sore after. But feeling better this morning. My toes are getting better, but I sure am paying more attention to where I walk…
I’ve signed up for my second 5K for next weekend. The money goes to St. Jude’s. :) And I think I’m doing another on December 4th. Whoot!
Today, I’m off to see this magical little girl:
I’m wicked excited to see her… It’s been a little bit… 
Isn’t she gorgeous??? :D
That’s what The Husband kept asking me after my FIRST RACE EVAH !!! on Halloween. :) It was superfantastic, I loved it, and I’m totally hooked!
Okay, so here’s how it went down:
My whole house had to wake up at 6 a.m. The sun wasn’t even up yet, but The Husband happily rose out of bed and got ready. The kids, well, they’re kids. ;) Our friend who was visiting isn’t a morning person, but she got up, too!! I ate a banana with a cup of coffee and then some water. Strapped on my Vibrams (heh, that sounds so dirty!) and wrapped my left leg in the truck. I drank some coconut water on the way there. We got there about 30 min before the start. Most everyone was waiting inside as it was about 33 degrees outside in the wind! It was fun to look around at the people who had dressed up… I should have taken pictures, but I was so nervous I didn’t think to! I’ll do better next time. :)
Well, finally the time came to go outside and line up. Squeeeee!!!! I was so excited and totally nervous!!! There were so many people!! There was some talking, rules explained (“make sure you go over the timing mat!”), the national anthem and the countdown. And we were off!!!! OHMYGAWD!!! I was on my way!! But not fast like a lot of those people because I’m not fast. It didn’t take too long before I realized my ears were cold and I had forgotten to pull my fleece headband up, DUH!!! So oh-so-uncoordinated me had to pull my earbuds out (yes, I was listening to music so I could drown out my own crazy-ass labored breathing–it was freakin’ cold!!!) and pull my headband up with one hand, wearing gloves, without falling on my face. No, seriously. I’m so not graceful.
Now, I had checked out the route because as previously stated, I was really fucking nervous. No, I know. But seriously. Don’t be a douche-monkey-curse-word-Nazi. That word gets across how serious I am about my level of nervousness!!! Anyway, I checked out the course on Wednesday and all it did was increase my anxiety. Why? Shit, I don’t know!!! Maybe because this was my FIRST RACE EVAH!!! The course started in front of Bass Pro, went down Campbell (normally a very busy main thoroughfare) and turned to the right into neighborhoods.
My goal was to not be the last 5K runner in. That was my whole plan. Oh, and run as much as I could. But up until this point, I hadn’t run more then 2.67 miles. So I had already resigned myself to a 45 minute (or more) 5K and figured, “Hey! That leaves a shit-ton of room for improvement!” :) I expected people to pass me, DUH, but I had already picked out a few that had better not. They didn’t.
But you wanna know who did??? A chick in some “sexy cop” costume with super short, hawt tight shorts. What an ass! Oh, sorry. *Ahem* At about a mile, I was passed by a middle aged dude wearing khakis, a TWEED sport coat, and a nice fedora. Damn, that sucked. He passed me on the right as we made a left turn. I looked to my left and saw a “chef” with a “knife” (whew, it was plastic) going by at a nice clip. Crap! People with PROPS are passing me!! Oh swells. As long as that “bunch of grapes” lady stays behind me….
About halfway they had dudes with Powerade. I wasn’t so much thirsty as I was curious to see if I could grab the cup without spilling it all over the place. :) Heh heh. I.AM.AWESOME. I spilled it on my shirt while trying to DRINK it, but I didn’t spill that shit when I grabbed it!! Muahahahaha!!!
Powerade down just in time for what is, to me, a decent hill. Luckily, I have occasionally run on similar hills in my OWN neighborhood. I tried some Zentri (“I see you hill”) and made it like 3/4 of the way up before I thought about stopping. I didn’t tho. Not on that one! Later, there were some more “inclines” that I made it about 1/2 way up, walked a few seconds and then finished it. Heh, turns out the hills see me right back!
Know what else saw me on that hill? That damn “bunch of grapes”. She knew what the hell she was doing. Oh, maybe I should explain. Grape lady was this older lady with pink hair whose costume was a bunch of purple balloons somehow attached to her person. Yea, she passed me. I’m boycotting wine for a while.
About 1/4 mile out, I stopped. NO, I’M JUST KIDDING!!! I’m no Bobbo. ;) But for real, I got passed by a kid. She looked to be about 9 or 10. Man, she looked all smooth and was starting to pull away from her own mom!!! Good for her, but damn her for passing me. Boooooo. Right after that, some weirdo wearing black came flying up, apparently pacing himself by the race ambassador on the bicycle. Crazy.
Not much farther and I finally stopped getting passed. I knew I was almost done, so I looked back to make SURE there were people running behind me. I didn’t look to see what color their bibs were so that I could pretend they were ALL 5K RUNNERS and not WALKERS or 10K runners. :) I saw a good-sized group back there and thought, “Whew! All is not lost!”.
Then I was in that final stretch. There was a group on the right cheering. There was a group on my left with miniature cowbells. And up ahead I could see that final turn into the store (yea, it ended in the store). “OHMYGOODGRAVYI’MREALLYGOINGTOFINISHTHISFUCKINGTHING!!!” Shut up, fool, if you want to know what was going through my head, THAT was exactly what I was thinking!!! Closer, closer, closer… Scan the crowd… Where are they? I know they’re there… Closer, closer… THERE they are!!! I see them!! The Husband, The Kids and Kat!!! Sweet!! And the people are cheering and clapping. One more turn… Into the store. Hey, there’s a clock! 35 what???!!! No, I had to see that wrong. Keep running until you’re over the mats!!! Dude, I know you’re there to take my picture but you’re kinda in my way. Thanks.
DONE!!! I JUST FINISHED MY FIRST 5K, BITCH!!! Oooooh, cooooool! A free towel and YES I’ll have some water!
I found a place out of the way and cracked that water open… YUM! Then I pulled my iPhone out of my pocket to check my program…. It said 35:45. HOT DAMN! That’s insane! For me, that’s fucking FAST!
The Husband, The Kids and Kat found me… Hugs and congrats all around and that’s the 1st time The Husband asked me, “Do you feel awesome yet?”. I was trying not to be emotional because I was superfucking proud of myself right at that moment and in danger of going all female and crying, so I can’t remember what i said. He asked me again later, when we got home, and yea. I feel pretty damn awesome. :)
Thank you to The Husband, The Kids and Kat for dragging your asses out of bed to support me in my first race! Thanks so much to everyone who encouraged me and was excited for me! And thank you, “coach” dude, for your suggestions and awesome willingness to help me be able to “do the work”.
I can’t wait to do it again!!! :)
Official times:
225 22/45 4016 Amy Gordy 34 F Republic MO 35:01 11:18
FEMALE AGE GROUP 30 - 34 (500) 21 4016 Amy Gordy Republic MO 34 F 35:01 11:18
Monday. What can you do with a Monday, ya know? You have to survive it. Lucky for me, my Mondays now mean running and 100 push ups. :) Whoot!
I’m really enjoying the push ups. Push ups make ya stronger. And make you scarier. Rawr!!! :)
My run was good. I felt good. 29:28 min… 22 min running and 7 min walking. 2.25 miles. I’m happy with that. And my left leg didn’t hurt as bad as usual. :) Yay! I ran in my red VFF’s (of course) which was fun because it was all drizzly and cold. :) I like to splash in the puddles. Oh, and I ran on the sidewalk today. Which reminds me: Thank you, neighbor, for NOT letting your dogs shit on the sidwalks. Gah! It was a small dog. I could tell that. Why the hell do these people let their dogs shit on the sidewalks???? Probably the same reason they just let them roam around and shit in the street, I suppose.
TOMORROW IS TATTOO DAY!!! And Wednesday? Wednesday is no slouch either. Kat, a very good friend from Texas is flying in on Wednesday for a visit! I’m very excited about her visit. She comes once a year, always around Halloween. It’s AWESOME!!! Wait, I think I told you about Kat before…. I’m going to try to get her to do 100 push ups with me on Friday. :)
Okay, well I’ll see ya tomorrow!!!! After the inkage happens!! Woohoo!
Friday -
I went to the gym to do my run because it was icky and cold outside. Booooooooooring. I didn’t see ANYONE in denim yesterday, but there was one dude in a flannel shirt. WTF? That’s weird. But still not as weird as the Fed Ex guy who lifts in his uniform or the various people that work out in denim and work boots.
I tried using Runkeeper Pro but it doesn’t work for treadmill stuff. Ha! I knew it wouldn’t. I mainly just wanted to use it to keep track of time which it will add to my online profile. But I laughed when I saw the stats it came up with….
Im slow but Im not THAT slow!!!
I don't REMEMBER the treadmill moving around...
What I ACTUALLY did was 2.19 mi in 30 min. Meh. I’ll get there.
Once I finished running, I went over to the floor space where they keep mats and and swedish balls and I did my 2nd set of 10 push ups. Then to the stupid stationary bike. Blech. I wasn’t looking to do anything special on there. I just wanted to keep my legs moving for a little while. So I rode the bike for 20 min. Then I went BACK to the back and finished out my push ups. I did some crunches and squats in there, too. But doing all of those push ups freaked out the old people a little. :) It was awesome!
It was later determined by my lunchmates I should NOT do 100 push ups all before lunch because it made me quite hyper and more obnoxious than usual. :) Score! I’m okay with that. I’m usually only that giggly after champagne! Whatever, lunch was fun. Tho, I’m not too sure Cap’n Cate’s DAD enjoyed it too much. We confused him a little with talk of bikini shells and massage bands…
Saturday -
I woke up and was really antsy (and mad that I was awake before 8 on a Saturday) so I decided to take a short run. 15 min total run/walk. A little over a mile. It felt good. It was about 35 degrees when I left and the sun was shining bright! :)
The REAL excitement for today was when I went and made my appointment to get my new tattoo!!! Whoot! Come Tuesday night I’ll have fresh ink!!!
Is it Tuesday yet?
Just a quickie:
Sometime around May I set a goal for myself: Get your fat ass down to 170 lbs, you get a new tattoo. I already knew what I wanted and where. But I needed a goal to finally get this ball rolling.
Today I met that goal! I’m beyond happy and surprised at how suddenly I’m not scared anymore. I was afraid that every pound I lost was going to come back the next week. Or the week after. That happened once or twice, but I took responsibility for those weeks. Those were my fault. Suddenly this morning, I’m not afraid. I’ll keep losing weight until I’m healthy and comfortable. I don’t have to be afraid of the scale. I can do this!
Hopefully tomorrow I’ll have time to go by Kaleidoscope, Ink to talk to Jason about getting this done next week. He did my last tattoo and I love his work.
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