3TT: Such An Odd Day

 How has your Thursday been?  Mine was rather uneventful on the big scale, but full of some small oddities...

Dreams

We've all had odd dreams.  There's the ones that seem so real you swear they actually happened.  Those involving creatures or places seemingly out of a Picaso or Dali painting.  There's nightmares, dreams you try desperately to return to, those where you are falling and wake up with a jolt upon impact, and then the ever more rare wet dream.  You laugh, but no amount of denial will cover the fact that they happen.  And don't get me started on what dreams you do or don't remember and why. 

Well, my day started out with a jolt.  From my memory, I had woken up around 8:30am and rolled back over.  Then I wake up suddenly completely tense.  My mind was racing!  "Where am I?  What happened?  ...Huh?"  I grabbed my watch - it was 7:30am.  That didn't help my confusion.  "What's going on?!"  Then it hit me; it was all a dream!  Sometimes I swear our minds are bipolar, pulling pranks on themselves.  I had a little laugh at myself and thought "Hey, at least she was hot!"  ;)

Remember that underwritten rule...?  Something along the lines of "Bloggers will share just about anything."  Yeah... 

Ice Breaker!!

hahaha

Do What You Love.  Love What You Do.
I had a bit of a surprising meeting with my company's vice president yesterday.  She had "an intriguing opportunity" she thought I'd be excited to hear about.  Let's stop and agree to agree here - when upper management says "intriguing opportunity," we all know that could go many different ways.  haha  But to make a long story short, I was offered a new job, our group training/fitness class instructor.

We've been attempting to fill the position for close to a month now and after some time, it came to my manager as well as the VP that my... "addictive" relationship to fitness and my expressed interest in eventually doing personal training made perfect sense.  I was rather surprised at the sudden offer, but I admit I was excited. 

I took the night to mentally digest the offer and of course figure out other details.  After thinking about it during my morning run, the answer came to me while I was on the trainer - "They're asking me to be one step away from being paid to work out."  I get to be a fitness nut and encouraged to be so.  On top of that, I get weekends off to race to my heart's content!  Why would I ever say "no" to this?!

Do what you love.  Love what you do.  They're not my words, but they're the best pieces of life advice I can give you.

Active Recovery Week? Workout
If you follow me on facebook, you saw my Tuesday Bike-Run-Bike workout.  Having today off, I decided to switch the events and do a Run-Bike-Run.

Run: 2.94 miles in 20:08 (6:51 pace)

Bike: 26.3 miles in 1:00:15 (26.19 mph)

Run: 3.86 miles in 26:36 (6:53 pace)

I admit that it was difficult to get myself out the door for the first run, but once that was done, Holy Secret Speed Batman!  And you wouldn't believe what I fueled that all on...

1 banana 

~6 tbs of peanut butter

2 water bottles

1 peanut butter GU

It's 4:00pm and I've had an approximate total of 850 calories and and 1:46 of exercise.  I see a large dinner and a very hungry morning monster in my near future.

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Questions

1.  What's the last dream you remember?

2.  Have you ever had rather sudden job changes?
While I'm super excited about the new job, I admit the suddenness of it is a bit odd.

3. Do you have recovery weeks built into your training plan?
I built them in for two reasons: 1) to avoid injury and let my body repair every three weeks and 2) to give me opportunities to test my speed without the demands of distance.


Swim fast.  Bike smart.  Run hard. 

The Dust Seems To Have Settled (...we hope)

Thursday, Blogger was down for the count.  Friday Blogger came back up and it was a battle of Blogger vs. Bloggers to get posts back up and virtual life resuscitated.  Saturday was such a mix of resurrected posts and new ones that it seemed like deja vu in the Matrix.  Admist all of this, I put up the weekly review HERE (albeit, minus a number of inclusions because of lost progress) and stepped away to let the "dust settle" so to speak.

So here's a recap of my life since Thursday (because I know you've all been holding your breathe).

THURSDAY

Interview &  new job!  

I had a secondary interview Thursday morning and left with a new job!  Say "hello" to the newest member of Cardio Express!  It's a local set of privately owned gyms.  Yay fitness job!

"Celebratory" bike ride.  

After the interview, I wanted to make use of the beautiful weather so I went for a bike ride.  I was only going to go one loop around town, but on my way back decided I needed to stay out longer in the beautiful weather.  Total of 1:20.  I need to get up to 3:00 eventually.

...followed by a celebratory dinner with wine.

We all know that your body is primed for absorbing nutrients within 30-60 minutes of ceasing exercise.  That first glass of wine hit me QUICK!  haha

Burgers, corn, and a Chardonnay

FRIDAY

Friday workout

 

I rode my bike to the gym, swam, rode around doing some errands, and rode home.  It's great doing exercise AND saving gas all in one!  It's been three weeks since I've filled up my gas tank and I still have a quarter tank left! 

 

"Willy Wonka Junior"  

Friday evening I saw a middle school musical that a bunch of friends had directed.  I had been told that it would be "entertaining at least."  After only five weeks of practice, this was the first time the entire cast had been together (talk about nerves for the directors!).  However, these kids pulled off an incredible show!  They're not hitting up Broadway any time soon, but they did an incredible job. 

SATURDAY

Monro Muffler Morning

Yes, my car needed MORE work done.  (Shoot me now!)  After three replacements, my car needs yet another catalytic converter.  This is getting ridiculous!  (Thankfully, it's still under warranty)  They also identified the source of a squealing sound I've been having - my brake pads.  Therefore, I have another brake job to do!

New Team Awesome video

Don't know what Team Awesome is?  It's all explained HERE.  While I was at Monro, I worked on new video for Team Awesome.  Remember the previous video HERE?  During our NC trip, we made a few more videos and I was working on a montage to send out.  I'm sure you'll see it soon.  And no, Danny, the videos did not cause the above mentioned car issues; we were in a different car.  =P 

Bargain shopper extraordinaire!  

After the car was taken care of, I stepped into a phonebooth, twirled around really fast, and did my best not to puke while trying to find the door out in a completely dazed state.  (Superman makes that s*$# look EASY).  Anyways, I needed black athletic pants for my new job and if I may say so, I did pretty darn good even without a cape.  I got a pair at JCPenny's on clearance for $4.97 and another at Target on clearance for $4.98.  I rock!

Errands finished!  Time to work out.  ...and save gas.

I rode my bike to the gym and did another swim workout.  On my way home, I detoured to Autozone to get a new set of brake pads and the grocery store to get food for my starving belly!  Again, three weeks without filling up on gas.  I'm hoping I can stretch it to a full month!

Welcome back to high school.  Surprise!

While at the gym, I decided to weigh myself; I haven't done so in a loooong time (a couple months or more).  I stepped on the scale and...  "No way!  That's got to be off."  I thought maybe I had dropped five pounds.  The scale told me it was fifteen.  I verified it last night on the scale at home.  In the last two months, I've lost fifteen pounds which means I am back to my high school weight.  Surprise!  I was 160 lbs max in high school; 140 lbs during the swim season.  Honestly, I'm not sure what I think of it.  I was SKINNY in high school and I've put on some muscle since then, so seeing that number has thrown up a flag of caution for me. 

Body Composition Do-Hickey

I warn you that these numbers are inherently inaccurate and that I am only sharing them because I believe it's part of the Blogger code (or something like that).  I also decided - while at the gym - to test out those body composition do-hickeys.  The machine has you set your body type, height, weight, age, and gender and then uses a bioelectric impedence analysis to determine your percent body fat.  I set it up with stats of "normal" body type, 6'0" height, 165 weight, 25 age, and male.  I had the trainer at the front desk take a guess as to my percent body fat.  He said twelve.  

This was my second attempt - 5.7% body fat and a BMI of 22.4 (first attempt was 4.8%).  I should correct the weight to 155, but at the time I didn't believe the scale at the gym.  There is also an "athletic" body type - I don't know what that means. 

"You must be the one I saw Whizzing by!"

While I was at the grocery store, I was stopped by a lady in her 80's who told me "You must have been the one I saw whizzing by on the road."  You caught me!  She does a lot of walking and is on the treadmill a lot this time of year because of bad allergies, but she praised me for being so active and healthy.  She urged me to continue doing it because "even if it's a lot of work, being able to run long distances cannot be bad for you."  I'm telling you this for future reference.  An elder of mine told me to continue training.  I might just keep that in my back pocket for future use.  But it was great talking to her.  I'm always happy to have my fitness activities spark conversation.

Ok, you can breathe now.  You are caught up on my life!  haha

We had a few half iron racers this weekend too.  I can't wait to get caught up on their lives!!

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Questions

1.  How do you celebrate little things in your life?

Do you think of a workout as a celebration like I do?

2.  Have you ever been in a play or musical?  Do you have kids who are in them?

3.  When you shop, are you able to look beyond the bargain items (sales, clearances)?

I shop solely for sales.  Outside of a rare occasion (and some foods), I never pay full price for anything.  I've had the "bargain shopper" mentality drilled into me.

4.  Would you like or not like to be back to your high school weight?

I'm not sure myself.  It was such a surprise that I'm not sure what to think. 

Stay fit.  Stay healthy.