why I broke up with Daily Mile

Will this blog ever talk about food again? Better question: will I ever have time to cook and eat again? Sadly I’m right in the middle of preparing for the comprehensive exam for my MA and honestly cooking is low priority right now. Hopefully this weekend I’ll get in the kitchen and make something delicious, but for now my random thoughts will have to suffice. Apologies, etc, etc.

(Oh and if you’re joining me from Skinny Runner, thank you for clicking over!)

So, riding on the coattails of my half marathon I figured I’d talk shop a bit about running. I guess now that I have a medal, I can consider myself a real runner? I think it is funny how new runners are, typically, reluctant to call themselves “runners” because there is a very clear image that goes along with being a runner.

But, I honestly think a website, Daily Mile, has the fault for a lot of my running woes. When I first started running I was logging my miles religiously on Daily Mile, a kind of Facebook for fitness. I found other local runners who friended me and would comment on my workouts and I on theirs. But I started to get really into it — too into it. I compared myself to them, pushed myself to keep up with them, and ultimately pushed myself too hard. I got an injury in my IT band and virtually quit running, mad at the running gods of the universe.

I took over a year off but when I came back to it for this half marathon training, I started my DM account again. And the cycle continued. I completely deleted it and began to log my miles on a spreadsheet on my computer, comparing my stats to no one but myself and much happier, despite my slowed pace.

This is not to say that DM is evil. I met some great people and even had a few group runs because of it. I got to know some local athletes who inspired me in my running and could pass on their wisdom to a newbie like me. But ultimately, social networking of my workouts was not for me. I am far too competitive of a person for it to be productive.

So now I use SmashRun, a website with a much better interface (I think) with the option to push notifications out to Facebook or Twitter. I do neither and keep it all private, but I like the analysis it does of my runs. It tells me that I rarely get my butt out to run on Mondays. It tells me that when I run after 10am, I’m a good 20 seconds/mile slower than average! And it tracks cumulative miles so I feel super impressed that I’m almost at 100 for 2012.

These are just my 2 cents on the issue. Do you use DM and love it? Had you never heard of it before? Do you track your fitness (of any kind!) on some kind of website? Are my questions stupid? 

Lent already?

Whoa. When did Lent sneak up on me?

Clearly I’ve been out of it for a while because I suddenly looked at my calendar today and saw that it is Ash Wednesday. Did it sneak up on anyone else too? Perhaps this explains all the weird Facebook status updates about not using Facebook for the next 40 days?

So last year I attempted to give up alcohol for Lent. Not because I have a drinking problem (which is nothing to joke about) but because I thought it would help me save money and concentrate on finding ways to spend time with friends outside of happy hour. Well it was an epic failure because I forgot and only realized it halfway through a happy hour at Fado’s in downtown Austin a week into Lent. But, I figure it is fate that I forgot about it because that is the happy hour where I met Rahul!

This year, after quickly debating (read: today) what I am going to give up for Lent I decided that I’m not going to give up anything. I won’t get deep into religious doctrine, because everyone has their own beliefs and why would you care about mine… but basically, I don’t feel like giving up something like dessert, beer, or meat will bring me closer to God.

Instead, I am going to continue to live my life as usual, but save all my receipts from coffee shops and bakeries — purchases that I consider total luxuries and certainly not a necessity. At the end of Lent, I will total up how much I’ve spent on all of that and donate it to a charity. I’ve yet to choose a charity (suggestions?) but I am thinking something to do with the military since my big brother is in Afghanistan. It won’t be much money, I’m guessing maybe $30-40, but maybe I’ll divide it into a few small donations to a few charities.

I also saw this, the 40 Days of Water mission that looks amazing. If I hadn’t failed so miserably to give up alcohol last year I might consider it. But I think this sounds incredible! Let me know should you feel so inclined to participate — I’d love to hear your experience! (And it doesn’t have to be for religious reasons, either!)

So are you giving up anything for Lent? Do you have a suggestion for a charity? Do you think we church goers are crazy?

obsessed

Hello my name is Meredith and I’m obsessed with my juicer.

For approximately 2 years I have been lusting after juicers. I’ve seen them all over the blog world and always treated myself to a healthy juice on my trips to Whole Foods (which are rare, considering I am a grad student). For Christmas 2010 I was all set to get one and had told my mom all about it, but then reality set in and I realized there were things I needed more in my life and an extra appliance in my kitchen wasn’t it. But since then, I’ve kept my eyes out for a deal, promising myself I’d jump on a deal if I found one.

And I did! This juicer was randomly being offered as a Groupon Goods deal and I happened to have a gift certificate to Groupon (thanks, Mom!) so I ended up paying 1/4 of the retail value plus $10 in shipping. Not too shabby! I got the Juiceman JM400 Jr., which for a newbie juicer like me works perfectly fine — here’s the link on Amazon if you want to see.

The reviews led me to believe that this would be a great juicer for someone who isn’t planning on making huge batches of juice every day, more for the casual juicer than the religious detoxer. Since I’ve gotten it, I’ve made a juice about every other day and it has held up just fine.

If you are thinking of investing in a juicer, here are my basic recommendations:

• Start small, you can always upgrade your model if you want something bigger and better, but you’ll always regret spending $200 on something you found out you never used.
• To keep a juicing habit affordable, buy produce that is on sale and in season. With the 3 for $1 small apples, $1 bunches of kale, 3 for $1 lemons, and a knob of ginger root, my favorite juice costs me less than $1!
• Only buy produce you would eat otherwise. You may get sick of your beet juice and regret having a surplus of beets in your produce drawer.
• Get bang for your buck: produce like cucumbers, apples, and citrus produce a high volume of juice.
• Clean the parts as soon as you finish juicing! It takes about 5 minutes, but I let my juice sit after I make it and force myself to rinse everything off. This way, the sticky fruit juice and pulp doesn’t get crusted on everything.
• If you have a dog or other small mammal, consider feeding it the juice pulp. I feel a little wasteful throwing mine down the garbage disposal. For my all-vegetable juices, I save the pulp and throw it in pasta sauce.

I love my juicer and I love making fresh juice. My skin is looking great and I feel good knowing I’m getting in my vitamins when I sometimes might not meet my daily fruit and vegetable goals. I even love my juicer so much that I keep it near me at all times and somehow spilled acetone nail polish remover on it and it damaged the plastic coating. Go me! 

do you believe in ghosts?

Okay this is totally random and off-topic… but since when do I have a topic?

Do you believe in ghosts? I’ve always been a firm believer in ghosts. I grew up in a very historic and haunted area of Virginia, where supposedly many ghosts from Colonial times up to the present reside. I’ve taken a ghost tour of Colonial Williamsburg, driven on Elbow Road in Virginia Beach, and been too chicken to hang out on the old battlefields late at night.

I don’t normally give my belief in ghosts that much thought, but on New Year’s Eve I was in Richmond, where I went to college, and a friend and I decided to visit the Edgar Allen Poe House Museum (which, by the way, is totally worth $5).

Before going, there was some general discussion among my friends about how ghosts supposedly appear in the windows of the courtyard at the museum. I started asking everyone about their belief in ghosts and then I busted out some knowledge: ghosts appear as orbs in photographs. You can Google it.

Well, I have proof of this. You see, my mom’s wedding was held the day after my dad’s funeral. (Yes, you read that right. They were divorced and his death was, obviously, unexpected).  So anyways, there is a picture of me from the wedding with a floating orb which appears in no other photo from my camera or from that room. I 100% believe it was my dad’s spirit.

You can’t miss it! (Nor can you miss how fat I was. Wow.)

Okay so there’s part 1 of your proof. Ready for the second? At the Edgar Allen Poe House, I snapped tons of pictures of windows hoping to see the elusive ghosts. On first glance, I didn’t see them on my camera. But after putting the photos in iPhoto, I can totally see them! There are TWO orbs in this picture, can you see them, too??

It isn’t quite a clear as the one from my mom’s wedding, but there they are! (On the right side, for those playing along at home).

So after all that, do you believe in ghosts? Or do you think I’m crazy and have decided to never read this blog again?

no fun november

Apparently people are participating in No-Shave November by growing beards and lovely lady leg hair.

I will not be participating in that. However, I will be participating in No Fun November in an effort to push myself to do something not fun, but which will help me.

With the input of some friends and a few ideas of my own, here are my No Fun November goals:

1. Do 15 push ups every day with correct form <— I usually wimp out and do the girl push ups;

2. No fried foods (as in, deep fried);

3. Find a way to get back into yoga, no matter what;

4. Drink 8 glasses of water every day!

Are you going to make any No Fun November personal goals?

gettin’ ripped

To change subjects entirely, I would like to redirect your attention to my muscles.

In addition to training for a half marathon (read my story here and consider donating here!), I am currently enrolled in a good old fashioned PE class through the institution where I am studying for my Master’s degree. This has been an amazing class and I can feel my body changing every day. I have definitely gained muscle in my arms, back, and legs, and my abs are getting stronger each day.

We start every day with a brief overview of the workout and then we are led in an intense warm up, followed by our workout. If you are interested in doing a more structured weight training program, here’s what I do twice a week in class and once a week on my own:

Warm up:
15 crunches
30 penguins
15 leg lifts
10 zulus <— my own personal hell
25 flutter kicks
15 reverse crunches
30 bicycles
10 bird dogs (per side)
10 standard fire hydrants (per side)
5 forward loop fire hydrants (per side)
5 reverse loop fire hydrants (per side)
10 Superman pushups <— I can’t actually do the pushup component
10 push up plus
20 mountain climbers
10 donkey kicks
10 sky divers
10 back divers
30 second side plank (per side)
die in a pool of sweat

Weight training (sets x reps):
1 x 10 bench press warm up, 45 lbs (just the bar)
3 x 5 bench press target, 60 lbs
1 x 10 bench press warm down, 45 lbs

1 x 10 squats warm up, 45 lbs (just the bar)
3 x 5 squats target, 70 lbs
1 x 10 squats warm down, 45 lbs

3 x 10 bicep curl with dumbbell,  12.5 lbs
2 x 10 (per side) dumbbell row, 15 lbs
3 x 10 French press, 15 lbs <— do this for fierce arms
3 x 10 tricep pull down, 15 lbs
3 x 10 overhead press (with bar or dumbbells), 35 lbs

3 x 10 leg press, 150 lbs
3 x 10 calf raises (toes pointing in, toes pointing out, neutral stance)

**If you don’t know what some of these are, a quick Google search will get you images of them all!

Before starting any weight training, remember that I am not a professional, I am not your doctor (so talk to your own!), and that you shouldn’t try for the weights I am lifting if you are not capable of lifting them! For bench press and squats, you will need a spotter to help you (so modify and do traditional squats with hand weights if you don’t have a rack or lie on a bench and use dumbbells for bench press).

Do you have a weight training program? Or do you just do a few standard exercises after finishing up your cardio?

refrigerator facial

As I mentioned in an earlier post, a representative from Avocados from Mexico (hi, Ginny!) sent me some avocados to use in a breakfast recipe, which I did when I made a Pineapple Avocado Smoothie! I’ve also used the delicious avocados to top salmon burgers, to top my eggs, and in salad.

But one way I never thought to use avocado? A face mask!

Since a current beauty trend is using natural ingredients and getting rid of all the unnatural yucky chemicals, I figured that avocado had to have more benefits than one can get by simply eating it.

My skin is chronically dry (thanks, thyroid) so I decided to go for the avocado moisturizing mask. While mine didn’t look as pretty as this…

(in fact it looked more like this…)

… my mask did make my skin feel great! The ingredients were totally normal and something you’ll easily find in your refrigerator and pantry: avocado, plain yogurt, and honey!

My skin has continued to feel softer and more moisturized a few days after the facial and I can see this becoming a bi-weekly beauty ritual. Plus, it smells great

Try it, your skin will thank you!

important facts about my life, vol. 3

For the previous installments of important and very random facts about me, please see volumes 1 and 2.

My favorite animal in the whole wide world is a shark. I own Shark Week on DVD.

My favorite color is green.

Babies and animals love me.

I don’t know my right from my left. Seriously, owning a GPS has saved my life.

The summer I lived in Mexico, I spent a week living on a beach and rescuing sea turtles. The braids were a very bad decision.

My favorite bread is sourdough.

I have spent approximately 5% of my life so far on crutches. I fall down a lot.

I can make a can of PBR stand on its side. It takes talent and a bit of time, but it stays like this as long as no one jostles the table.

happy Easter to me!

Happy Easter, Passover, and springtime! It has been consistently over 90* for more than 2 weeks here in Texas so I know spring is in full blossom (along with the flowers and pollen!).

I got a fun Easter surprise this weekend from my Mama…

Now I shall go curl up and read this cover-to-cover and patiently await the next issue in the subscription.

I’ll be back tomorrow for our regularly scheduled programming.

things I’m bad at

In no particular order, here’s a list of things I’m really bad at:

1. Waking up.

2. Shipping packages in a timely fashion.

3. Washing produce.

4. Deciding what to order at a restaurant.

5. Parallel parking.

6. Admitting when I am wrong.

7. Using a vegetable peeler.

8. Remembering names in a group of new people.

9. Walking gracefully.

10.  Ending sentences with prepositions (see first line of this post).

11. Looking attractive as a 4 year old.