Springing into action

Well, according to the calendar, we're into Spring!  Coulda fooled me-I would have told you that that happened a few weeks ago and we're rounding the bend to summer...it's almost 80 out there today!  Not that you're gonna hear me complaining. Nope. Not at all.  Spring means flowers. And sunshine. And running in the rain when it's not as sunshiny.  And skirts.  Ahhh, spring.  I hearts ya.

Well, since I'm kinda short on time today, let's do some bulleted notes for catching up so I can spring into action on my to-do list (clearly, the change of season hasn't made me any funnier or wittier :-P)

*  Speed work does not work when you're sick. I thought I was gonna die on the treadmill today.  4x800 on the treadmill became 3x800...and then a .22 nubbin.  Better than nubbin nuttin.  Also, I would like to give a ginormous thanks to my gym buddy who thanked me for being sick this weekend so he could beat me in the race. Next time, sir, you are toast.  Hah.

* My nephew is doing a school project where he is collecting postcards from all over the state, country and world.  If you want to help, drop a  postcard telling something that you do in your location and what the weather is like. Please mention that you are friend of Wyatt's family!
Mrs. Butrick's Class
Fall River Elementary
1400 Deerwood Drive
Longmont CO 80504
Don't you remember when you were a kid and that stuff was cool?  You can spare a buck for a card and postage.  Be a hero :-)

* Kohl's has awesome 50% off deals on their site right now and shipping is free today and tomorrow.  C'mon, you know you need new sandals and shorts.  I scored both for less than $20 bucks.  Use the code SMS295 for an extra 20% off. You're welcome.

I'm pretty sure a triathlete wrote this!

*  Speaking of good deals, check out this free kindle book.  Who doesn't want to know more about Jackie O.?  She was one hot mama back in the day.

* Did I mention the gorgeous weather??  I'm off for a bike ride until dinner time (because I hear you can blow snot rockets easier when you ride) and I think you should get out to.  Don't have a bike?  Go buy one- ever store has last season's models on sale now....and you know what they say....

Happy Spring :-) 

The Babe with the Power

It seems as if the population of Western New York is split in two.
Those that enjoyed the sunshine over the weekend....got outside, washed their cars, went for bike rides....
And those that spent the majority of the weekend surrounded by tissues, bad movies, and books/magazines/ereaders.
Which camp were you in?'
Clearly, I was in camp #2.  The weekend consisted of saline spray, snot rockets, my kindle, whining, and bad movies.  Aren't you jealous?  Oh there was green involved too.  But it wasn't beer.  We're just gonna leave it at that!
Sinus infections blow, literally.  Amidst my love affair with the Kleenex box, I managed to get through 3 movies and 2 books...not bad for 48 hours.

The books: 
"Unbroken" By Laura Hillenbrand. (Better known for "Seabiscuit")  I randomly picked this book from the NY Times best seller list because it featured the life of a runner-Louie Zamperini.  I'm not usually one for war stories, but this book sucked you right in.  Incredible.  And disturbing.  Hillenbrand goes into extreme detail over the POW experience in Japan during World War Two...it's heartbreaking, but extremely well written.
 "The Pact" by Jodi Picoult.  Somehow I missed this book in my quest for her books a few years ago-once again, a total heart breaker-about love between two young people, how far you are willing to go for love, and the chasm between generations. 
Hmmm....maybe it was my book choices that made the weekend a bit dark?  No worries.  I made up for it with movies.
The Labyrinth-for the millionth time.  David Bowie in tight pants.  Yum.  Just a note....did anyone else notice that when they talk to "Hoggle", both David Bowie and Jennifer Connelly's character refer to him as "Hogwart"?  Early Harry Potter inspiration??  No?  You were too busy staring at David Bowie's pants? Well,I can't say that I blame you.  Moving on....
Arachnophobia.  Oh man.  Did that movie really used to scare me when I was a kid?  And how did I miss that they referenced "triathlon"back in 1991?  Impressive!

Source

Lake Placid. Clearly, I was on a late '80s early '90s kick!  I've been meaning to watch this movie since IMLP floated into my mind a few years back, but had no intention of doing so until I was sure I was done swimming in Mirror Lake.  Yes, I know Mirror Lake is not Lake Placid. I know the movie was not even filmed there. And I know that there is no such thing as ginormous man eating crocodile infestations in upstate New York.  But I do know....that you never say never.  And that Betty White is still kickin'...and completely unpredictable.  And that was good enough for me to wait.  So there.

Phew!  How's that for loafing around for 2 days?  No impressive eats....nothing smells good. Of course, you know that means I'm not starving myself....but who wants to look at canned soup?  Meh. Not me. 
Back in action Monday....I'm about 50% better, which means I took my Bowie-inspiration to the pool for some interval sets....that's right, I'm the babe with the power :-)  Or something like that....my 400 swim test time is 23 seconds slower than in September....that can't be good.  Clearly, long slow swims in the off season make you just that....a slow swimmer.  I gots some work to do in the next 17 weeks...

How was your weekend?  Drink any green? Play in any green?  Win any green?  (I take donations if the latter applies!!)

The nose knows

Ahhh, we had such a great time running this morning!  Yep, my nose and me :-).  

I kinda knew a PR would be a long shot this morning with my good ole sinus infection, but, hey, you can't win em all, right?  Let's just say it was an interesting race. And I feel bad for anyone behind me cause man, those snot rockets were flying.  Oh, I'm sorry, was that TMI? :-)

Back to the beginning. The day was gorgeous.  2500 of my best friends and I (yep, that's 800 more than last year) trouped out to the War Memorial to kick off racing season 2012.  I was decked out in my RATS gear, with the obligatory green nonsense attached to my head for luck.  Too bad I can't really create magic with those 4 leaf clovers :-)  My legs felt great.  My lungs...not.  My nose...even worse. Hey, who needs to breath when they run?  Pffft. And off we went!
Aside from the expected logjam of 2500 runners going for it (it took about 30 seconds to cross the start and I was toward the front!) I settled into an even rhythm.  Mile 1-7:54.  Mile 2:  15:50.  Sweet.  Then all hell...or snot...broke loose.  The one downside of the nice weather?  No gloves or sleeves!  (Which, if you're a runner, you know what I mean :-P).  I started stopping every 5 minutes or so to blow snot rockets and get some air into my lungs.  Hit the turnaround in 20:32-no way was I getting near my PR (37:36) or even a sub 40, I knew, so I just ran with it (heh.)  Annoying, because my legs were ready to go, but one usually finds it helpful to be able to breathe while running, no?  

I guess I ask for too much :-)  Mile 3-25:15. At this point I hooked up with my friend Kim, who runs about the same pace I do normally, but I couldn't hold her.  I started running for one song (about 4 minutes) then stopping for 20-30 seconds just to breathe (at this point, it was all mouth breathing.  If someone could have cut my nose off,I would have done much better.  lol)  Mile 4- 33:15.  The last mile of this race is pretty much downhill, so I hit over the last "hill" (Ford St Bridge) and aimed to bring it home under 42-which I just barely did-41:51.

Hey, win some, lose some.  I would call running a race on a beautiful 60 degree day winning, wouldn't you?

The hubster thought so.  He bought me some flowers to celebrate the fact that I'm an idiot trooper.

What a keeper!

Time for this party animal to crash and try to get rid of this mess.  I'm such an old lady.  But if I'm old...well, we won't say what the hubster is.  He's been passed out for 2 hours :-)  we're such a crazy couple.

What are you up to tonight?  Any wild parties?  Or is the party in your living room with a green beer instead?

Book review: The Hunger Games

Whew!  Spring has sprung in Western New York, and it figures...I'm a sick guy.  I've been fighting this messy sinus/allergy/cold thing for the last few weeks, and yesterday, it hit big time.  Needless to say, I spent most of the day in bed, eating jello, yogurt and drinking lemon tea...while burning up the battery of my kindle reading "Unbroken" (awesome book) and "Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close" (only halfway through-the writing style is messing with me, but I'm working through it!)
I'm somewhat back and alive today, though still a bit under the weather.  Hopefully, I can law low and kick this thing-first run of the year is up tomorrow!  I want some fast running....not snot spewing...racing!
Enough of that gross stuff. Let's talk about books.

Okay....fine fine fine.  JUST for Drew and Alexa-I did it.  I finally finished all 3 books (okay, less than a week after I started book 1.  pfft.)  Which books?  The Hunger Games, of course.  I'm a little behind on the times-the books came out last year, but I had no luck finding them at the library because they were so wildly popular.  But I got lucky enough to get them for my kindle, so I've spend the last week plowing through them.  So addictive.
Let me 'splain.  The trilogy is made up of (no kidding) three books: The Hunger Games, Catching Fire and Mockingjay.  The books follow the life of Katniss Everdeen, a teenage girl who is living in a modern day dystopia comprised of 12 districts and a Hitler/big brother esque regime under "the capitol".  Every year, two people from each distrcit must participate in the "Hunger Games" a fight to the death winner take all between the 24 participants.  Bottom line- weathy people in charge getting enjoyment out of dog fighting, but with people instead.  The socioecomics of the twelve districts are varied, but most of them are severely lacking in food and other resources. 
Book one-who will win the Hunger Games?  (I'll give you a hint.  It's a 3 parter and our heroine is one of the contenders.  Hmmm.).
Book two (Catching Fire) : What happens post Hunger Games?  How will the Capitol react to what happens in the Hunger Games?
Book three (Mockingjay):  How will the districts fare when they go head to head with the Capitol?
Of course, intertwined with all of the struggles in the book is the obligatory love triangle between our heroine and the boy next store (Gale) and the selected counterpart champion from her district (Peeta).  Who will she choose? What will happen?  Will they both survive?




No team Gale or Teem Peeta, please.  Let's move beyond Twilight.

Overall, I would highly recommend these books. They aren't rocket science, and, as usual, the second and third books aren't as good as the first (I have this issue with sequels...although these did very well, they never match up to the original!) but the whole series flowed rather well and was interesting, fast moving, and completely sucks  you in (evidence in the third book, which I stayed up until 3am one night just to finish it!).  I would say it's a good cross between Lord of the Rings and Harry Potter...most definitely better than the Twilight series!
And, of course, the movie comes out in two weeks....so, get reading, people!  (I always think it's better to read the book first, then see how the movie stacks up.)
Two thumbs up!  Get your reading in-and have a great weekend!  If you're in New York, enjoy the beautiful sunshine, it's supposed to be gorgeous out! 
Tomorrow= Johnny's 5 miler.  Are you running?  It's the kick off for Rochester's running season 2012-hopefully this damned sinus infection that I was just diagnosed with doesn't mess with me too bad :-P  I don't feel like I'm in PR shape, but hopefully I can nose in under 40 minutes :-D

The other Half

Well, hello there!  Good thing today was another sunshiny day, seeing as I spent 4 hours in my car!  Training in Buffalo for work = early start, too much thruway and a long day for me!  Still, can't complain....we got to go out to lunch at Olive Garden on the company dime (sweet!) and I managed to find enough energy to get in a 20 mile tempo ride when I got home.  Sweet!  Which reminds me....I'm sitting at a table with 5 women and two men during this lunch, all social workers from across the state, and we're networking.  We start talking about families and what we do for fun.  So this one woman asks me..."What do you do for fun?"  "Well"  I say, "I'm a runner".  My boss rolls his eyes and goes "She's modest.  She does IRONMANS". And the woman goes "You do what?" So one of the guys tells her what an Ironman is.  And the woman looks at me like I'm nuts and goes....so....you train for a race that's essentially from Rochester to Buffalo and back in terms of miles?".  "Um, yeah".  I reply.  "So"  she says..."What do you do for fun".  Oh man.  Time to lay off the Ironmans, Rae.
 Well, funny you should say that.....
Cause it's half time!
No, not football.
And no, not the Buffalo half marathon (though I did see part of that course today-I smell a PR!  (yes, I'm thinking positive)).  Speaking of which for a sec, my half marathon training is going pretty well...haven't really hit as fast as I want for tempo runs, but I've done well with speed repeats and the long run, which isn't too darn bad for taking the last 5 months as an excuse to be a lazy Reese's eating cat lady :-)
Ahem. Sorry.  The other half.  Yes.  This week marks the beginning of tri training season for me....my 18 week Musselman prep!  Woot woot!  Yes,I know I was going to take the year off.  But when my secret boyfriend Jeff Henderson (crap, I outed myself) sends a free entry my way, what do I do?  I TRAIN.  I lift things up and put them down.  Errr....I swim, bike and run!  Yay!
I'm trying something new this year though.  I am still following my ever faithful trigeek plan (which has served me super well for both the full and half distances) but I am subbing out some of the workouts to suit my own goals.  For the next 9 weeks, I'm subbing out the runs with the runs from the FIRST plan = 3 runs a week (speed, tempo and long).
I'm doing one long ride and one speed and/or tempo ride.  Goal pace = 19 mph.  I averaged almost 18 on my last Ironman, so I think I can I think I can.
And for swims = 2 swims a week-one speed work and drills, one recovery with no lap counting.  Because, really, I'm super type A and I need to give it a rest!
2 full body strength workouts.
And 2 yoga/stretch sessions a week.
Yes,I plan to sleep.  If I do it the right way, none of these workouts (save for the long ride and run, which are done on the weekends) take more than an hour.  I take Mondays off, do 2 a days on Tue-Thur and one on Friday. Weekly volume = 10-15 hours.
Game on, sub 6.  You are so mine. I can taste you!

Bachelor Ben

So.....let's talk about the "B"word for a sec. Balance, I mean (well, first and foremost anyways...haha).  We balance out exercise with rest days....oatmeal with cake.....biographies with romance novels.......and good TV with....The Bachelor.

Bachelor Ben

Why am I dedicating more valuable internets space to this d-bag?  Well, because it consumed 3 hours of mine and the hubster's Monday night (yes, I made him watch the finale with me.  Hopefully Ben and Courtney won't be the only couple headed for splitsville in the next week.)
So, in case you live under a rock actually have interesting things to do on a Monday night, last night was the season finale of the Bachelor.

Lindzi aka Marcia Brady

Seriously!

If you REALLY live under a rock...Bachelor Ben had his pick of 25 women to find "true love"and has been systematically weeding out all the good ones to end up with two final ladies....Marcia Brady and the Wicked Witch of the West (who incidentally likes to take her clothes off for the camera).

Last night, he picked his new bride to be.

It wasn't groovy.

Yup, for the last few months, I've been sucked into this train wreck of a reality show, watching doofus Ben fall in love with the stripping, baby talking, two faced witch.  Blech.

Not that all the girls were amazing....we had a real stripper, a manly personal trainer, a lesbian, and an emotionally unstable blogger representing, yo (no, I did not go on the show.  Greg would have truly killed me then.  But I would have gone...for Andy.  Not this lame-o.

Court the witch

So....we get to the finale. Finally.  Poop for brains voted off my favorite (Kacie B.) back two weeks ago (she was way too good for him anyways) and we are down to the final two:  Marcia and Wicked, we'll call them for short.
Ben invites the women to meet his mom and sister (who looks like a dudebro version of Jillian Michaels on steroids) in order to "get a feel for the women".  I start to hope.  Sis hates Courtney (Wicked here on out) before she even meets her and dubs Linzi (Marcia here on out) as "super fun and relateable".  YAY!  Then....she meets the witch.  Cue crafty TV editing, and it looks like Mom and Sis are onto Wicked.  No such luck....they give Ben the big high five and tell him to go for it.  Awesome.
But wait....our fearless hottie is "Oh so confused" and "Oh, I don't know what to dooooo!" Dude. You've been trying to justify how OMG so wonderful Miss Witch is to everyone for ages....I think it's pretty obvious.  The big engagement day arrives.  Shocking no one (well, except with the dress....homegirl looked like a black ostrich) poor Marica gets the boot and Ben-ster proposes to the witch, who, appropriately enough, looks like Cruella Deville on crack.  (Seriously, who wears elbow length gloves to potentially get ENGAGED?)  It was the most vomit inducing proposal ever (which sucks when you're not feeling that hot to begin with) and post ring acceptance, Miss Thang was way more interested in the bling than her man.  Natch.

It's a good thing the hubster stole my kindle and removed all sharp objects....I only had pillows to throw at the TV. Meh.

Source

If that wasn't enough, we needed an additional HOUR to rehash the "post rose ceremony" to find out what Ben and Courtster have been up to since the final rose.  Shockingly, they broke up because Ben was oh so upset at Courtney's behavior on the show and couldn't understand why none of the women told him really how bad she was.

Face Palm.

Ben, you're a moron.  Everyone told you that.  You broke up with Emily when she did have the guts to tell you!

I finally turned off the damn television at that point, but I hear that he did re-propose, which I'm not sorry in the slightest that I missed.  I might do Ironmans for fun, but I'm no masochist.  Hah.

Someone needs to use the parental controls on my TV to block this crap from now on.  Hubster?
And thank you for reading if you got this far :-) Anyone else watch that mess??

Spring has Sprung!

Yesterday...was not meant for blogging.  Or anything computer related.  It was meant for...opening the windows.  Getting the bikes outside.  Grilling dinner.  Going for a long walk.  Or all of the above :-)

All in all, a red letter day. (Yes, I'm a loser).

The hubster and I got in our workouts, ate some grilled chicken (her), steak (him) and salads (both) and then went out for one of those "happy to be alive" walks.  Apparently, there's a bunch of trails about a mile away from our house that we've never visited, so we set out to make it happen!

 Pretty cool! 

Although, after awhile, we did realize it was really "trailblazing for idiots".....

Kinda hard to lose the road on this trail, huh?

Ahh, well, 5 miles on foot on a sunny 60 degree day is nothing to shake a stick at.

On the way home, we encountered some ray blasting motorcycles....

I got a bit scared, but the hubster devised a fool proof plan. 

"Run for it!" he yelled.

So I did.

And then kicked my shoes off in a fit of joy when we lost 'em.

Seriously, who leaves a shoe in the middle of the road? 

(No, guys, that was not me.  I do have my limits).

I hope he didn't get struck by a car....

How was your spring forward day?  Get outside and enjoy at all?