Ass successfully kicked

I went to a spinning class today at 6:45. They pretty much have them every day at my gym and I've been experimenting to see which instructor I like the best. I can honestly say this one kicked my ass the hardest. I was dripping sweat and my legs felt like they were going to fall off at the end.

I had a thing of Trader Joe's Asian veggies in my fridge and knew that I needed to make them soon or they'd go bad. So I combined them with a veggie burger and made a black bean/soy/hot sauce and served it on a bed of quinoa. The sauce had a weird flavor and I'm holding the black bean sauce responsible. I don't really like black bean sauce. It's one of those things; it always sounds good to me but then it tastes gross. This sauce really didn't have much flavor, I had to put more soy sauce on my quinoa. It looks pretty but it was nothing to write home about. (That phrase sounds familiar, like I used it very recently.)

Omaha Un-Steak, Stolen Corn etc

Last Christmas, a vendor gave me and three other co-workers a big
cooler of stuff from Omaha Steaks. Everyone thought it was funny
since I don't eat steak. I gave some to Jamie and kept some in my
freezer for Jason. There were a couple of things in the cooler that
weren't steaks. One of which was crab stuffed sole. I decided that
after six months in my freezer, it was time to cook these up. They
weren't too caloric but they did have HFCS in them. We made baked
them and had them with baked butternut squash and canned green beans.
Truthfully, the squash was the only part of the meal that I enjoyed.
The fish tasted very seafoody. I love seafood so it's strange that I
thought a strong taste was bad. And the beans, well, they're from a
can.



My long weekend was filled with little to no home cooked meals. Jason
and I went to the Brickstore for dinner on Friday. I had the Veggie
Gyro (without the yogurt sauce) and a salad. I strong armed Jason
into getting a Turkey Burger. I also had two Hefeweisins. The rest
of the weekend was filled with various other restaurant food and drink
but nothing to write home about.

We did, on Memorial Day, attempt to grill out. Neither Jason nor I
know the first thing about grilling. There is a grill by my pool and
someone had left charoal by it so we just used that and grilled some
steak (for Jason), smart dogs (for me), and some portabello mushrooms.
They all tasted rather charred and not so good. Perhaps the grill
was dirty (dirty with Lord knows what on it.) But the best part was
that there were these random ears of corn that had been on the grill
for a long time. I don't know who's they were, but we ate them.
Gross! But delicious.

Slacky McSlackster

I was all set to go to the gym tonight and then fell asleep on the couch. In my defense, I had a tough night sleeping last night because my air conditioning was broken and it was HOT. I get mad at myself if I don't go to the gym 5 or 6 days a week. I need to be okay with taking at least two rest days a week, maybe three. Working out four days a week is good and something that most people don't even do.

I had read about how freezing tofu and letting it defrost gives it a different texture and it totally does. I made tofu with broccoli and water chestnuts for dinner. The tofu almost took on the consistency of eggs except it was chewier.



I don't really have anything else to write about.

Jason would like to say

That it was Morningstar Farms soy meat in our burritos not Boca.

A first

I went to a spinning class today. I'd never been to one before. I'm not sure; I was always a little intimidated by them. It was definitely working up a sweat and my legs are tired. I liked it okay but the instructor was sort of hard to hear over the music. Plus, he didn't have us do anything to increase or decrease the resistance. Is that normal? I know I can do it on my own, but I thought the instructors encouraged you to make it harder, like a hill? Anyway, I liked the class and now I'm not afraid to try another one. The only problem is that most spin classes are offered at 6 am.

I bought a bikini today from Jcrew.com. It's my cruise motivation. Let's see if it works. I've never worn a bikini in my life.

Crap run

My legs were sore and tired from my workout on Friday, but I forced myself to get out there and at least do a little run today. It was cool and breezy out and if I'd been in the right frame of mind, it would have been perfect for running. But my legs felt like lead and I just wasn't in the mood. So all in all, I did 1.3 miles in 13 minutes. That's my normal pace, but it felt like I was hauling ass so I sort of expected it to be faster than that. I think I need another race to train for. I'm not good at setting my own rules. I like the rigidity of a schedule. I thought about Team in Training today. I always think that might be a good idea but then when it comes down to it, I get scared. I don't run with a running group because I'm afraid of accountability. I trained for a month or so for a race with two friends and hated how I had to be up at a certain time because they were counting on me. When I train by myself, I have the best of both worlds; I have a schedule which force me to run but I still have the leeway to do it on my time. But I think that running with a group would be a totally different experience and it might help me become a better runner.

I don't have any energy. I haven't all weekend. My mom insists that taking Vitamin D supplements will help. I try to but I forget. Multi-vitamin, Vitamin D, Claritin, AD, BC, it's a lot to swallow. Literally! Not to mention that I didn't even learn to swallow a pill until I was about 18.

off and on

I guess that's the definition of moderation; sometimes you're on and sometimes you're off. I felt like that this week. I ate mostly healthy. Jason and I made burritos on Wednesday night. They consisted of whole wheat tortillas, boca meat with taco seasoning, avocado, olives, pico de gallo, jalapenos, salsa and cheese. I had one and then some extra filing without a tortilla. Pretty tasty. I had bought some beer for the Radiohead concert the next night but we were good and didn't drink it. I wanted to crack one opened but Jason didn't want to, so I didn't. I'm a sucker for peer pressure, whether it be good or bad.

Bueno Burritos:


Jason didn't have to work on Thursday so he bought some subs from Subway to eat before the show. We hung out at my apartment for a while and then drove down to Lakewood. It took about an hour to get there with all the traffic (both concert traffic and normal Atlanta rush hour). We missed the opening band, The Liars, but no one really minded. At the show, I had a giant Bud Light that was TEN DOLLARS. Yes, ten dollars for crappy domestic beer. The show was good despite the fact that it rained on and off and they didn't play many of their hits. And that the beer was TEN DOLLARS.

Us at the show:


Radiohead:


On Fridays, I normally go to a circuit training class that's taught by a work friend's husband who owns a personal training studio. Normally there is about 4-5 people in the class and we move through circuits, doing each exercise for a certain amount of time. This time, it was only me and my friend from work Desiree at the class so Kristian (the trainer) just treated it like a regular personal training class and we did everything for a certain amount of reps. I liked this format better though I'm not sure why. He said that my form has gotten a lot better and that I've gotten stronger.

I took a nap after work and then Jason and I met Jamie and Dave at Nam for dinner. We had a bunch of wine and I had the Scallops with beans. They were pretty good. I also had a bite of some sort of crepe appetizer that isn't listed on the menu. After dinner, we made our way over to The Highlander and then eventually to Andrew's apartment to hang out.

We didn't get home until really late but of course, I was up at 9 am. When Jason got up, we went over to Northside Hospital to see Ayse. We couldn't stay for very long and there was a lactation nurse there at the time and Erin was trying to shield her breasts the whole time. I still can't believe she has a baby. She was so little!

Ayse:


No gym today. I got a pedicure and some sushi from Whole Foods, took a nap and then made a tortilla pizza for dinner. Today was meh. Not good, not bad. I didn't do anything horrible (eating or drinking wise) but I didn't do anything good either. I just kind of vegged. I think I'll try to go run at the Park tomorrow morning if we can get up.

Beans, beans

A couple years and more than a couple pounds ago, I used to eat virtually the same dinner every night. I used to have can of Old El Paso refried beans mixed with some salsa. I used to go through about a third to half a bag of Baked Tostitos a night, dipping them into my bean dip. At the time, I didn't think there was anything wrong with this by any means. Low fat beans, low fat chips and even veggies in the salsa. But times they are a changin' and I've cut down on the beans. But when I do crave them, I tend to make a more colorful meal instead.

My new version:


I'm tired but I need to run. I can't even remember the last time I went running. I was going to go last night but that didn't happen and instead I ate a Frosty. (That little fucker had 300 calories in it). This always happens to me when I'm not training for something; my running becomes so inconsistent. I'm doing the Peacthree in July and probably a few 5Ks beforehand but that doesn't really help because I don't need to train for those. Half marathon again, maybe?

Oh jeez, I just looked at my title and realized that I'm going to have gas at the gym.

Productive day

My Friday night in brief:

Fado, beer, quesadilla, GPS went the wrong way, The Depot, salmon salad, Atkins Park, dropping her off on the corner, I hear you talking about me in the bathroom, The Warren, the hot tub is cold, bathtub doesn't seat two very well, sleep.

I don't want to go into detail but I had a fun night, albeit I was not on my best behavior at all. Oh well.

The rest of the weekend was much more subdued. I spent most of Saturday lounging around and doing nothing. I met up with Erin in the evening and we saw "Forgetting Sarah Marshall." I actually really liked it. After that, we tried to have dinner at Twist but they were too busy so we went next door to The Grape. I had this tortilla thing that had goat cheese and grilled veggies on it. It was sort of like a pizza.

Today was super productive. I managed to: go to Old Navy (although I didn't buy anything), go to Target and leave without spending half my paycheck on random shit, get my eyebrows waxed, go to the gym, refill a prescription, drop off my recycleables at Whole Foods, do some laundry, go to the grocery store and make dinner. Oh and clean the kitchen. I rock.

Speaking of rocking, this was awesome:

I am aware that it looks sort of gross, but it's Creamed Spinach. The "cream" is actually made of tofu, milk and parm cheese and it was really good. I'l be making it again. The salmon in the background was meh. It had an avocado sauce on it that was good, but the actual fish was sort of boring.

I had a diet coke with dinner. And then after dinner, I got snacky. I've noticed that lately I'm not so snacky. I've had a box of cereal in the house for two weeks. I have a bag of granola, some crackers. I don't feel the need to eat it all. But after I had the diet coke, I went rummaging through the cabinet looking for more sweet stuff to eat.

Coincidence? I think not. Buh bye diet coke. Our love affair is officially over.

I write these at work and forget to post them

need to work on my speed. I've been running for long enough that I
should be able to push myself to get faster. I've always heard that
you should work on endurance before you work on speed. I have
endurance. I can run far if I train. I am just a slow poke and don't
want to be anymore. I want to be proud of my race times, not
embarrassed by them.

So last night I did what I thought was a tempo run. It was actually
3.12 miles in 35 minutes. Not fast. BUT, I did walk up a hill
(probably .25 miles) and had to stop for traffic lights. So I am
going to tell myself that I really ran somewhere around the 9:50 mark.
That's why I need that Garmin!

Mission: Healthy Pizza was a success. So successful, in fact, that I
didn't get a picture of it. We used Trader Joe's Whole Wheat dough,
Trader Joe's Marinara Sauce, Trader Joe's Lite 3 blend cheese
(mozzarella, cheddar and monterey jack, I think) and some frozen
pepper/onion blend. The entire pizza came out to roughly 1600-1700
calories. I ate a fourth which filled me up nicely. I had also
snacked on some hummus and crackers beforehand. We paired the pizza
with a bottle of Riesling that I had in my fridge.

I wasn't going to drink last night but I wanted a glass (or two) of
wine. I feel okay today. I think that two glasses is my limit on
school days. Anything more than that and I feel awful in the morning.
I can take the awful feeling if I can sleep it off, I can't if I'm at
work.

I've been using www.thedailyplate.com to count calories. I know that
it can lead to obsession but I really do need to get rid of these
extra 10 pounds that have crept up on me. I've counted yesterday and
today and gotten under 2000 each day with a net of around 1600 when
you factor in exercise. According to this website, I should be able
to lose a pound a week at this rate. So maybe I will be bikini ready
for our cruise in September. Or at least more comfortable in a
tankini.