Tag Archives: fat

The Aftermath

13 Nov

It is amazing how being sick can throw everything off kilter, and I mean everything! 

"No More Sick Days Allowed!" says me to me

“No More Sick Days Allowed!” says me to me

This past Monday was my first day feeling healthy, yay! 😀 I only had one coughing fit, I got to the end of my work day and still had most of my voice and energy, it was all kinds of good. This means that my days off are being used to get back on track food wise, exercise wise, errands wise, acting wise…you get the idea lol.

I have to go agent hunting, sooooo stressful! There is a lot that has to be done prior to submitting your info to agents when going agent hunting. You need new headshots, you need to get those headshots printed, you need to revamp your demo reel and resume. Submissions are all done electronically now so you have to take care of that.  For some people this might not be a big deal but for me it takes a while because it all costs money, sigh. And not small amounts of money, nope, decent chunks of the stuff, something I don’t have randomly lying around. I got my headshots done a bit ago but haven’t been able to afford to print them. I’m finally able to do that so I’ll be placing the order soon (as in tomorrow when the shop is open). I started the process of revamping my online account so I can electronically submit to agents, I’ll be working more on it after I finish typing this post. I decided I can’t afford to redo my demo reel so I am going to continue using the one I have, luckily I still look the same (for the most part) and I am also working on memorizing a monologue to perform if the agents want to see something a bit newer. Luckily I’ve been working on some independent projects and can provide links to them, or at least to one of them (its on YouTube) and I juuuuust might be able to get a copy of something else I have been working on if I’m lucky! *crosses fingers* So that’s all good, I’m working on getting my submissions out there and while I wish I was moving a bit faster with it I am doing the best I can. 🙂

Food wise, well, hmm, a lot of food went bad while I was sick, oops! What can I say, when I am sick my appetite nose dives, shrug. I did a clean sweep of my fridge this evening and oh wow, soooooo much stuff had to be thrown out (well, technically, it was composted, but still!) I have been talking to a friend at work who is a personal trainer, asking for her help with getting in better shape. The way I work is easy, I need rules, I need someone to give me a list of rules, better yet an eating plan, a very specific eating plan, and I need for them to say “follow this, don’t deviate, deviating is cheating and you won’t lose weight if you cheat, just follow it even though it sucks and I guarantee it will work” or something along those lines lol. I had a friend who isn’t a trainer but who is in really good shape and he did something along those lines a long time ago, I think it was almost 2 years ago, wow, I can’t believe I’ve known him that long, crazy! Anyways! lol When I followed the eating plan he gave me it was hard, it was restrictive, it was not conducive to having any kind of social life but it worked. Something that works is what I want, I want that more then a huge wide variety of food, I want that more then a social life that revolves around eating, I want that more than anything (well, what I want most over anything ever is for my acting career to take off but that’s a slightly different topic…although still related…) I told her this and her response, after asking me a lot of questions and learning my eating habits as they are now, was to go Paleo. Ugh. I will do a whole separate post on what I think about Paleo but rest assured, it is not going to be a sunshiny review, I have not “drunk the Paleo kool-aid” so to speak lol. I started re-reading about Paleo, (I researched it last year), so I could refresh myself on the rules and basically skipped to the back of the book to read the recipes lol After reading the recipes I realized that this wasn’t gonna happen, not because the recipes seemed particularly hard or complex but because I just don’t want to cook that much, shrug. My fix for this whole needing-to-cook issue was to revert back to the eating plan my friend gave me two years ago. What he put me on was Paleo but Paleo gone hard core, as in oh.my.god. crazy hard core! Once I get back in to the routine of my hard core Paleo I will once a week try one of the Paleo recipes. This way, my food won’t be quite as boring, but I’ll be easing in to the whole cooking-in-a-whole-new-way-with-all-kinds-of-different-ingredients-thing while still following a strict but good eating plan. To accommodate my return to this hard core Paleo eating plan I went grocery shopping today, with a list! An actual list! lol It actually felt pretty good, going in there with a plan, getting just what I needed,  knowing that what I was buying was going to be used in a healthy way. I haven’t had that in a while, it was nice getting that back. 🙂

With my exercising, I went to a boxing class with a friend last night. I love boxing! I’ve always loved it but it is so pricey, sigh. It was a one off, I wasn’t actually intending to join the club lol but don’t look at me like that, the friend I went with was intending to join, and did join so we didn’t waste the trainers time. 😛 I maaaay have slightly over done it though, kind of a pushed a bit too hard too soon kind of thing, oops! This morning my voice was not quite all there and the throat was back to hurting and today I’ve been way low on energy, more so than normal. Because of that I didn’t go to the gym today like I intended but will for sure exercise tomorrow. Maybe it’s better to start back with the exercising by going every second day, don’t push the body too too far until for sure it is 100%? At least this is what I am telling myself lol

So the aftermath of my cold is slowly being dealt with, errands caught up with, eating plan back on track, exercising starting back up again, agent hunting preparation underway. That cold put me behind for 2 whole weeks but I’m back in the game now and will make up that lost time quick quick quick! Brace yourself for the awesomeness that I am going to be bringing, it will be epic! 😉

Tags: , , , , , , ,

The Wagon

25 Jul
me waving goodbye to the Insanity wagon, sigh.

me waving goodbye to the Insanity wagon, sigh.

Imagine a wagon that represents the Insanity Program. Now imagine a 5’8″ redhead falling off that wagon, rolling on the dusty road, landing in the ditch, then crawling out of that ditch only to see the wagon never stopped and is too far away to catch so she does the only possible thing, she waves goodbye, sighs a bit, and comes to the realization she has woefully fallen off the Insanity Wagon, and fallen hard!

That is me, sigh.

😛

Have no fear though! I am jumping right back on…on Monday. 🙂

Now, I hate when people say “I’m starting a new diet on Monday” or “I’m going to start exercising on Monday” or anything else along those lines. Why wait till Monday?? What makes Monday so special? If anything, start Friday, people hate Mondays, they are tired and cranky and just want the day to end on Mondays, how is that a good day to be starting anything let alone a new diet and/or exercise plan? *rolls eyes* Start on a day you are happy, a day you enjoy, a day you aren’t counting the minutes down until you can go home and do nothing.

Anyways!

Since last weekend when I was out of town racing I have been an epic fail at following the Insanity Program, food wise and exercise wise. I’m ticked at myself over this, royally ticked! Grr to me!

I knew I wouldn’t be able to follow the eating or exercise  plan on the Saturday and at least part of the Sunday but I thought once I was home Sunday I’d do the exercise session I’d missed on the Saturday and jump right back in to the eating plan…that soooooo didn’t happen! I was super tired and just couldn’t bring myself to exercise, that was already compounding the issue that not only had I missed the exercise dvd on Saturday I also didn’t have time to exercise on the Friday so that was two days in a row missed, ack! Plus, on the Sunday I was too tired to care about cooking or making sure I was eating the right amount of calories per meal or even the right amount of calories per day. I did eat meals from the Insanity Program meal plan once home on the Sunday but that’s about all I can say that I did slightly ok.

Then Monday I forgot to take my food to work with me so I had cereal for breakfast (my high protein cereal so that’s alright) but I had no mid morning snack. For lunch I ate food from work (salad with chicken on top, super yum!) then had stuff to do after work so I didn’t get home till after dinner time which means my timing for meals was way off that day! I somehow got my arse in gear and did an exercise session but I was lost as to which one to do…the one I should have done on the Friday? Or perhaps the one I should have done on the Saturday? Or should I just do the one I was supposed to be doing that day? I didn’t feel it was right to do the session that was originally planned for the Monday since i’d missed two, it seemed like cheating somehow but I didn’t want to be constantly three days behind for my exercise sessions…I ended up doing the one I should have done on the Friday, figuring I’d do Friday’s and Saturday’s exercises then on Tuesday I’d do Monday and Tuesday’s exercises and voila! I’d catch up! Lemme tell ya, that was a flawed plan. Epic-ally flawed. After the cardio workout I was all nuh-uh! I’m tired. It’s late. I wanna go to bed. I’ll catch up the next day. Catching up Tuesday made more sense, I’d be able to do one workout in the morning, one in the evening, spread em out a bit, sounds solid, right?

Tuesday did not go as planned. lol. I had a hair appointment that started a half hour late then took way longer than normal. Then I ate but didn’t have time to cook so I had Subway, then I went and did errands that couldn’t be put off, then while out got invited to a movie that evening so right from my errands I went and met with friends and before I knew it I wasn’t getting home till late. I didn’t follow the eating plan that day, or the exercise plan, while it was a fun day it was not a “good day” if you know what I mean. *rolls eyes*

From there it just kept getting worse, and now it is Thursday, I haven’t done an Insanity workout since Monday and I’ve been totally going back to my old ways of eating (that is, I’ve been skipping meals and not eating the combo of protein, healthy fat and carbs that I am supposed to be eating). I’ve been trying (for the most part) to choose things to eat that are close to what I should be eating but I’ve been nowhere near as strict as I should have been.

So I’ve decided enough is enough. Every day that I don’t do the Insanity Workout or follow the Insanity Eating Plan I feel like a big fat failure. It gets me down and I hate that. Should I have done a better job of getting back on track? Yes, without a doubt. Did I? No, obviously. But I am human and as a human that means I am allowed (and pretty much expected) to screw up, it’s just what we do! Don’t believe me? Check out the damage to the ozone layer! 😛

Instead of feeling like a failure, feeling like I suck at this, like I can’t do the Insanity Program I have decided to get more upbeat and come up with a plan of action. 🙂

I am starting back, as best as I am able, with the eating plan tomorrow. It won’t be perfect cause I haven’t gone grocery shopping but I will do my best and for the next three days that is all I am asking of myself. I will do my normal workout stuff, so gym, running, things like that, for the next three days and allow myself to feel good about just in general being active. On Monday I will start back at the beginning of the Insanity Workouts, that’s right, back at Day 1. I won’t redo the fit test since I don’t feel it will have different results but otherwise, it will be like I just started the program. I will also get my butt into gear, go grocery shopping, go back to my food schedule so I know what I am eating and when and I will no longer be “doing my best” with room to not get it right, instead I will be “following the plan”.

Sure, there are still going to be days where something goes a little wonky, but that’s life right? For the most part though I feel I should be able to get right back in to the Insanity Plan without too big of a hitch in my stride, and get back on that freakin wagon I shall!…on Monday lol 😉

p.s. fyi the reason I am waiting till Monday to start the plan again is because Insanity has you working out 6 days a week and I want my rest day to be Sunday. If you do the math that means I have to start on Monday…

Tags: , , , , , ,

Insanity: Day 5, 6 and 7

24 Jul

Ok, now don’t freak out at me, I’ve been busy and haven’t been able to update about my Insanity workouts and foods but I’m back so all is good again. lol. 😉

I do that!

I do that!

Day 5 (Friday):

Was supposed to be a Pure Cardio day buuuuuut I was so busy getting ready for my trip that even though I got up earlier than normal that day I just didn’t have time to fit in the workout. Bummer. 😦 I followed the eating plan as best as I could – we all know so far I have been sucking in that area lol 😛 I had all my meals planned out, ate fairly close to schedule before going to work and at the beginning of work was doing well but then I got so busy I just didn’t have time to eat, hey, it happens! After my shift was over (at 9pm) I had to go buy some stuff for the trip that I of course forgot *rolls eyes* then hightail it home to get my gear and hug the cat then I had to hightail it over to where one of my team mates was waiting so I could pick him up and we could head on out. We got to Harrison around 11:30pm-ish, met up with the team and of course by that time I was hungry and wishing I had one of my missed meals from when I was at work earlier lol. I didn’t have them, duh, so I drank some water and crashed…don’t go thinking I’m lazy, the whole team crashed lol we had to be up early Saturday!

Day 6 (Saturday):

Saturday was RACE DAY!! wOOt!! 😀 It started early, at 7am, and went till about 2am Sunday lol. No, the racing wasn’t that long, just the day! We had four races that day and we killed it! We qualified for A Division, which is awesome, normally we are B Division, and we got offered a spot in the Hong Kong dragon boat festival in 2014!! Holy crapola dude! How amazing is that?!?! 😀 We missed out on a medal by 3/100th of a second but we aren’t bummed about it. I mean sure, we wanted a medal, but we earned a spot in A Division and we were sooooo close to getting a medal that obviously we deserved our spot in that medal race. It would have been so embarrassing to qualify for A Division then be way far behind the other boats in the race, eek! Races were done around 6pm or so, after everyone had a chance to shower (it was so windy that day we were all covered, literally covered, in sand!) we all ate then partied. 🙂 What else would we have done? lol That day I didn’t do my Insanity workout (case you hadn’t already figured that out lol) and I also didn’t follow the eating plan. On race day we eat little bits that are high protein high sugar between races but you can’t eat a lot because racing when full is not pleasant, or advisable. When I finally got to eat a meal I had a personal sized pizza topped with a mixture of super yummie veggies but I regretted ordering it because I really wanted some protein. My team mates got burgers and I was so jealous of them lol Oh, I also had an ice cream cone, in a waffle cone!…a waffle cone dipped in chocolate and skor pieces! omg sooooo good! I drank my share of alcohol after the ice cream but didn’t get ridiculously drunk…I’m pretending the amount of racing and the sheer energy used during the day is helping to offset the ice cream and alcohol lol 😉

Day 7 (Sunday):

The day started off in Harrison where the team went to this little place that had been recommended to me and had brekkie. I got the french toast, it also came with two eggs and two sausages, a ridiculous amount of food if you ask me. I gave the sausage away since I don’t eat pork but I ate the eggs (over easy) and the french toast, which uh, had caramel drizzled over top and sliced banana. It was quite tasty. 🙂 By the time I got home I was exhausted. I had intended to exercise when I got home, or soon after getting home but ha! like that happened?? Nuh-uh! I unpacked, partially, sat my butt down and immediately wanted a nap. I actually did end up napping, oh the shame! 😉 I ate Insanity approved meals after that, as well as a bit of fudge I brought back from the trip lol so the day wasn’t a total loss. It sucks I didn’t manage to get off my lazy ass and exercise but it just wasn’t happening. sigh, so lazy. 😦

So, let’s recap shall we?

Out of three days I followed the food portion of the plan 1.5 days and the exercise part of the plan 0 days. Not exactly a great way to finish off my first week of the Insanity Program huh?

I’m mad at myself for messing up so badly so early on in the program but at the same time I knew something like this would happen. I was so uncertain when to start the Insanity Program because I knew I had trips that would be happening during the 60 day program that would mess with my ability to follow the eating plan and would most likely cause trouble with the exercise portion as well. I decided to start anyways because I didn’t want to put the new phase of my healthy lifestyle on hold because of life. I mean, even if I had waited, and had 60 days where I wasn’t going anywhere there will always be things that pop up and have the potential to throw a program off track, right? I have to learn to make Insanity fit in to my life, not completely alter my life to work around the program. If I can’t make it fit in to my life then (in my opinion) the Insanity Program takes on the qualities of a fad and fads are no good, you may have success when on a fad program but as soon as you finish the fad you lose all your progress because you can’t live your life long term following the rules. What would  be the point of that? I don’t want to lose what I manage to accomplish, does anybody? I’m thinking no! 😛

Tags: , , , , , , ,

Insanity: Day 4

18 Jul

Soooooo, I’m getting worse lol Not on purpose! 😛

I was up early-ish to meet a friend for breakfast, we went to a diner type place and I actually wanted some form of meat…I never want to eat meat! lol It’s not that I don’t like meat, I do, I just, shrug, I dunno, don’t make it a priority I guess?

The only problem with wanting meat at breakfast time is pretty much everywhere only serves pork products for breakfast, what’s with that?? I asked, and this place didn’t have any turkey (or any other animal) alternatives so there went my fantasy of eating some form of meat. I ended up ordering french toast, yeah I know right? Way to dive right off the deep end with the meal plan! lol *rolls eyes* It was super yummy (duh!) but a lot smaller then I expected and it left me feeling hungry, there were three pieces of bread (small pieces but whatever), I’ve never still been hungry after eating a diner/restaurant breakfast of french toast (or pancakes), I don’t know if I was still hungry because of the craving some form of meat thing or because the bread was smaller than what I am used to or what…

After breakfast I was meeting up with my lil sister, we did a quick errand (I bought a blender! yah! an on sale blender! super yah!) then hung out at a Tim Horton’s cause that is what she wanted to do. I went from bad to worse with my food for the day, I got an Iced Cap (made with milk, not cream) and…a donut *hangs head in shame* We stayed there for hours hanging out and catching up (she’s been on vacation so we haven’t seen each other in weeks). Right when we were leaving I decided to buy a chicken wrap thingy because I knew by the time I got home I would only have enough time to grab my dragon boat gear and rush to practice and I figured it was better to eat something that finally had some meat in it then power through practice on a donut lol

It was a great practice, we race this coming weekend so we worked on some race pieces and had some endurance training. 🙂

After practice I rushed home cause I have a hundred an one things to do, a big thing I had to do was prep/cook food for tomorrow…oh yeah, and exercise!

You didn’t think I forgot to do my Insanity workout today did ya? Silly! 😛

Today was Cardio Recovery Day. I actually kinda liked it. 🙂 Twisted huh? It was mostly stretching, yoga style. Think deep stretching, think kinda painful stretching lol There were a couple where I actually couldn’t hold the stretch for the full time cause my muscles were all “nuh-uh you crazed nutball!” lol Some of the stretches you had to really focus on your balance, I learned quickly to face away from the tv because if I am looking at the movement on the tv while trying to hold my balance on one foot I lose my balance super fast! lol 😛 Also, some of the exercises you are basically folded in half so you can’t see the tv but then he says to move in some way and I don’t understand his explanation so I had to get out of the position to see what he was doing, it was annoying because then I missed out on some of the reps watching what he was doing then getting back in to position so I could try. This has been happening with every work out so far so I figure the more I get used to the program the fewer times this will happen, I hope!

I can normally do this stretch no problem...but not while watching the tv!

I can normally do this stretch no problem…but not while watching the tv!

The only food I ate today that is part of the meal plan was the Protein Pizza Muffin, it is basically one whole grain english muffin topped with 1/4 Cup tomato sauce, 1/4 Cup mozza cheese and 2 oz grilled chicken. I was supposed to eat it with a side of broccoli but I don’t have any and frankly, it is late and I didn’t want anymore food, shrug. I had a little under the 2 oz of chicken because I cooked my second to last chicken breast thinking it would be enough for my meal tonight and one of the meals I prepped for tomorrow but when I was part way through weighing out the diced pieces for the Pizza Muffin I realized it wouldn’t be big enough for both meals to have the correct amount. I figured, split it as close to even as I could eyeball and get a little under 2 oz chicken in each of the two meals. Better that than one meal getting the full amount and one getting nowhere near, right?

I figured out that it is waaaay easier if all (or most) of my food for the day is prepped and or cooked the day prior. If I had food already prepped for today then I would have been able to grab something that was part of the meal plan when I ran home to get my dragon boat gear instead of buying a turkey wrap thing that I had no control over the contents of. With that in mind, I have made 2 of my five meals for tomorrow, and have items for two others (meals I will be eating at home) beside each other and ready to be used. Tomorrow is going to be a super busy rushed day so hopefully this prep work pays off! *crosses fingers* 🙂

Tags: , , , , , ,

Insanity: Day 3

17 Jul

I swear, at the rate I am going, the whole 60 days of this challenge are going to be about how I messed up and what I changed to suit my likes lol. 😛

I slept like the dead last night, didn’t get to bed till super late and completely ignored my alarm this morning so I ended up with a whopping 10 hours of sleep, crazeeeee! I’m figuring my body needed it from a combo of sleep deprivation over the past 4 days, lots of activity but not lots of food yesterday and just general laziness lol.

Because of the sleeping in I slept through my first two meals of the day, oops! I wasn’t sure which was the best option, start with Meal 1  even though it was past noon or skip ahead to Meal 3…I opted to skip to Meal 3 but increase the calories of that meal to jump start my eating today, also I planned to speed up the timeline for when I had my first snack. I figured if I upped the calories a bit of each meal I might be able to slightly make up for my missing the first 2 meals.

I think I was wrong though…*rolls eyes*

So, my first meal of the day which was technically Meal 3 was:

1 cup of red lentil and veggie soup

2 slices whole wheat bread

4oz deli turkey meat

sliced tomato

minuscule amounts of mustard and light mayo

Here’s what my meal should have been!

1 Cup black bean soup

1 slice whole grain bread

4 oz turkey meat

1/4 of an avocado sliced on top of open faced sandwich

Why the changes you ask? Well! I couldn’t for the life of me find a can of black bean soup when I was shopping, I searched quite a lot so don’t think I skimped on this! I could have made black bean stew from scratch (and according to the meal book that is allowed) but that is waaaaaay too much work so I opted for buying soup but not the type specified. I chose red lentil and veggie soup because lentils are a bean…and uh, that’s about the extent of my reasoning lol I changed the sandwich from an open faced one slice of bread sandwich to a two slices of bread sandwich because 4oz of deli meat turned out to be a ridiculous amount of meat for one slice of bread. Oh, and I didn’t get to have the avocado because sadly my avocado was nowhere near ready to be used, hard as a rock! I put some sliced tomato on top instead, mostly because the sandwich would have been really dry without something replacing the avocado, shrug. It was just a tiny amount of tomato so I don’t think that is too big a deal.

It was a tasty meal, and while not exactly what the book says it should have been I think what I ate was still pretty close to what they say to eat…sorta…well, in my head it is lol 😛

I went out afterwards and was out for hours. I toyed with the idea of taking some sort of a snack but nothing in my meal plan makes a good portable snack, especially since most everything needs to be refrigerated and oddly enough I don’t have a mini fridge in my vehicle, do you? 😉

By the time I got home I was quite hungry, and had been for a while. Seems by only day 3 of this challenge I am already wanting to eat more, weird huh?

I decided to eat before exercising mostly because I was cranky from being hungry and wasn’t willing to wait any longer for food lol. So my second meal of the day (which was supposed to be Meal 4, or possibly even Meal 5 considering the time) was Tuna Salad in a Tomato, it involved:

4oz water packed tuna

1/4 cup celery, chopped

1/4 cup red onion, chopped

1 tbsp light mayo

1 tsp mustard

1 large tomato, hollowed out

1 whole grain english muffin

This was slightly altered from what is in the book, the book wanted Dijon mustard and I used normal mustard, and I was supposed to eat an apple with the meal but forgot.

I’m not sure why but the tuna mix was stuffed in to the hollowed out tomato, I don’t understand why I sacrificed the innards of a perfectly good tomato just to stuff the tuna mix inside…I found it mildly awkward to eat and an odd thing to do lol I’d like to know what kind of crazy tomato the people who made the recipe used because nowhere near all of the tuna mix fit inside of the tomato! lol Oh, and I had slightly less than the 4oz of tuna required because I am not allowed to open a can of tuna without sharing some of it with the cat, I’m pretty sure I’d be killed in my sleep if I attempted to keep all the tuna for myself! lol I feel safeguarding my life was well worth the cost of some of the tuna. 🙂

Today’s exercise dvd was Cardio Power and Resistance. So, cardio with some exercises in there to strengthen muscles. There was jumping but not as much as yesterday which is nice because it meant I didn’t hit the ceiling as much lol. I also learned a new way to work my triceps. Go in to downward dog, then bring your feet in and scrunch down so you are in a bit of a ball, have your weight on the balls of your feet and your hands (your hands are placed on the floor in front of you), while in that position do push ups. I found a youtube video of a girl showing how to do this exercise so you can watch instead of try to visualize what I just wrote lol

There were some exercises that I can’t do. I do girl push ups, hey, don’t judge! I’m a girl and my upper body is not as strong as I would like…yet! Anyways, there are these push-ups where you do 1 push-up, then in plank position move to the right, do a push-up, stay in plank position and move to the right, do a push-up, then repeat but move to the left. It’s moving left and right in plank position and each time you stop you do the push-up. Uhhhh, yeah, so not happening! lol Instead, I did girl push-ups the entire set, I figured better to do push-ups that are actually me going all the way to the floor and back up then me doing some half ass push up that doesn’t actually do anything for me, make sense? Well, it makes sense to me. 😛

The workout was really good. Any workout that is hard enough that at some point I am actually yelling a bit because of how hard I am working to push myself through is awesome in my opinion. Means I am really working! 🙂

After my workout session I had a protein shake. A tragedy happened while making the shake though, my blender died. I mean dead dead dead! It was making this scary noise and starting smelling like burning electrical ickyness so I stopped it, waited a bit, then retried lol Hey, I really needed that shake to be blended! In the end I had to use a spatula and mix it all up which was fine to a point, didn’t help with the big pieces of frozen fruit though. 😛 It was the lumpiest shake I have ever had, buuuuut it still tasted good. 🙂 I will have to buy a blender tomorrow, sigh. Mines be slowly dying for a while now but I kept putting off replacing it, looks like I don’t have a choice anymore, I can’t go a day without a blender, I use it that often!

I’d like to count day 3 of Insanity as a success buuuuuut if I am being realistic I had yet another day with not enough calories…least I only exercised once today! So not as bad as yesterday, right? 😉

Tags: , , , , , , ,

Insanity: Day 2

16 Jul

Alrighty, so day 2 of this program and guess who messed up…again?! Yeah, me, sigh. 😛

I started the day off fairly well, I had my first two meals of the day on schedule so that’s good. 🙂

I was done work at a weird time though, at 1pm, so my plan was go home, exercise, then eat Meal 3. It was either that or eat Meal 3 right when I got home then have to wait an hour or so to exercise and I knew if I did that odds were high I’d not want to exercise sooooo exercise first!

Today was my first real exercise session with this program since yesterday was the Fit Test. I thought I was doing fairly well but towards the end I sucked lol. It was a Plyometric Cardio Circuit workout, it is based on the interval system but reversed. Instead of doing lower intensity for 3 minutes then a burst of high intensity for 1 minute you do high intensity for 3 minutes then have a 30 second break, then repeat. The circuits were made up of about 4 or 5 different exercises, you do the first circuit of all 5 exercises, get a 30 second break, then repeat the circuit but even faster, get a 30 second break then repeat the circuit again going as fast as you possibly can go. You then get a quick break before moving on to the next circuit.

Lemme tell you, I was sweating more from this workout then from any home workout I have ever done!

I did have some problems in some of the circuits towards the end though. There were exercises where you are in the push-up position, you hold that plank and sorta jump/tuck in your legs, then jump them back out to full plank. Or, same position but you jump/tuck to the side, then jump back out. There were other exercises that had you in that plank position and I knew my legs and core could keep doing the leg motion part of the exercise buuuuut my arms couldn’t keep supporting me. The shoulders just weren’t strong enough and my arms starting folding. It was so annoying!

Another little issue I discovered is there was a lot of jumping in this routine and I live somewhere with super duper low ceilings. You do the math! lol I had to refrain from jumping as high as I could and not fully extend my arms above my head – even then I hit the ceiling with my hands quite a few times, oops! I’m contemplating taking a little table outside, putting the laptop on it and working out in the backyard but I dunno…I don’t care for exercising in front of people and even though it is the backyard it still seems too public for me lol

After I completed the cardio workout I made Meal 3 which was the Chicken Ranch Wrap (same as yesterday), while the chicken was cooking I made the Turkey Burger patties. I was supposed to have a turkey burger last night but it didn’t happen and for some reason I thought I was supposed to have it again this evening so I figured why not make it now while I had spare time? Totally makes sense to me…well, here is another oops! After making the patties, freezing two and sticking the other in the fridge I took a look at my meal plan for the day and uh yeah, wasn’t supposed to be eating a turkey burger today! lol I decided to keep it on my menu because well, I’d already made the patties and how long does ground lean turkey last in the fridge before it is unsafe to use? I dunno the answer to that question so I figured better safe than sorry! lol

I almost wanted a snack after eating the chicken wrap and before going to dragon boat practice, not because I was hungry but because I was worried I would get hungry…weird huh? I didn’t snack, obviously, since feeling all full and gross when paddling is soooo not my thing but I regretted it when on the boat because I was so freakin hungry! My stomach was full on growling and all I could think about was how hungry I was instead of thinking about my form. Not cool. I also had way less energy than normal and was really straining to be able to keep up. Erg.

I cooked the turkey burger when I got home and instead of having the green beans the menu book said to pair with it I had mixed veggies (because those are what I have in the freezer lol), I’m feeling a little hungry again but I am also exhausted and really need to sleep so definitely no more food for me today, the tummy will just have to wait!

So to recap, I was supposed to eat 5 meals and 1 snack today, that would have still had me under my calories for the day but not by much. Instead I ate 3 Meals and 0 snacks and the meals I ate were modified by me to utilize foods I already have. *rolls eyes* Oh, and I exercised twice! I’m thinking I’m breaking too many rules over here…

yup, that's me, I'm such a bad ass lol ;)

yup, that’s me, I’m such a bad ass lol 😉

 

Tags: , , , , , , ,

New Gear!

26 Jun

I am a girl, this means I love to shop! Don’t go saying I am being sexist, it’s practically written in to my DNA, just like my love of chocolate and ice cream. 😛

Here’s where I veer a bit off the so called “normal” girl path. Sure, I get happy buying fun things to wear but I get waaaaay psyched when buying new workout gear! I think because work out gear is usually fairly pricey, I can’t afford to buy it all that often, and really, how often do you neeeeed to buy it? No point in buying a new pair of runners when the ones you have are still in good shape. No point in buying more work out clothes when you have enough to get you through the week and they still fit. No point in buying more work out equipment when you have nowhere to put it and again, no money to be able to afford it lol.

Which means buying new gear, any type of new gear is a major treat in my world, and something I really look forward to!

Today I got to buy shoes, *happy girly sigh* and yes, that is pluralized. Shoooooooes! 😀

The first pair look like…

New Dragon Boat shoes!

New Dragon Boat shoes!

They are strictly for dragon boating, suuuuuper strictly! I get to break em in tomorrow at practice and am so looking forward to it!

I have been wanting new shoes for dragon boating all season but couldn’t justify the expense. In the cold months I wear an old pair of converse sneakers that take forever to dry but are old so I sacrifice them to the nasty water and in the warmer months I wear flip flops from WalMart that cost a whopping $3. I figure if I lose them to the water no big loss money wise. The flip flops aren’t great to wear during warm up but I’ve been able to make em work. That all ended yesterday!

We have upped the intensity of our warm ups (in addition to some other changes) in an effort to shave a couple seconds off our race times. (We came in fourth in our division at the big dragon boat festival this past weekend…sooooooo close! arg!) so now part of our warm up is running. That’s right. Running. ugh. Like I don’t do that enough as is I now have to run in a pack before hopping on to the boat. *rolls eyes* Could be worse though, right? And hey, I’m totally all in when it comes to doing my part for helping our team get a better time…even if I do bitch a bit lol

Thing is, I have tried running in my flip flops, it doesn’t go well which means I need an actual shoe. I took my normal work out runners yesterday but between finishing warm up and going to the boat there isn’t enough time to put my runners in to a locker and no way do I want them exposed to the nasty water that splashes over the side of the boat (although they did come in the boat yesterday) which led me to shoe shopping! Gotta love the wind-ey logic that got me in to the store don’t ya? 😉

The shoes are made by Skechers, are all mesh which means quick dry, wOOt! and the bottoms have a nice good grip which hopefully will do its job when I am running…tomorrow will tell! 🙂

The second pair were not an intended purchase, I swear I only meant to look, maaaaaybe try on but not buy! Buuuut, I am weak, and I bought, eek! *hangs head in shame*

The second pair look like…

My new running shoes! Treadmill here I come!

My new running shoes! Treadmill here I come!

These shoes are made by Adidas, and are meant for running, indoor treadmill running to be specific. To be fair, I am sure they would be perfectly fine running on a smooth trail but the most outside wear they will get will be when I am walking/running to the gym and back lol. They have these holes on the side of the tread that allow for ventilation that will apparently help my feet stay cool, I’ll reserve judgement on that till I actually use them lol.

I have needed new running shoes for a while, mine have had stress lines on the tread for ages which means they are dead but going back to the whole money thing, I couldn’t afford a new pair so I’ve been making do with my old ones. These were on sale and honestly, once I tried them on I was screwed, I was bouncing around the store in them and abso fell in love with them. I forgot how great new runners feel!

I really wanted to take them directly to the gym to give em a go on the treadmill but my knee has been killing me all day and since it was hurting just to walk running was not in the cards today, sigh. But hey, there is always tomorrow! 🙂

So there we have it, my new shoes, both lovely pairs, I can’t wait to put them to the test! 😀

Tags: , , , , , , , , ,

What’s In My Head

21 Jun

Don’t wait for tomorrow to reach farther, run faster, fight harder.

Push and reach those goals today so tomorrow you can do even better.

Tags: , , ,

I Didn’t Sweat

18 Jun
notice she isn't actually sweating?

notice she isn’t actually sweating?

You may or may not have seen the above image, or one with the same message. They always make me feel a bit guilty, like I am not working hard enough if that day I didn’t have a sweaty messy I-almost-collapsed workout.

Yesterday I kind of worked out…I’m not really sure what I would classify it as, it was hanging out with KL, we went to the seawall and I biked while she roller skated. I biked for 13.25km (she skated for the same distance, obviously lol). Now, if anyone had told me they did that I’d be all “wow, great workout!” and KL for sure seemed to feel like she got a great workout, but me? I didn’t feel it. 😦

I am used to being all sweaty after a really good workout, but this time I wasn’t.

There is a belief (myth!!) that the more you sweat when exercising the better in shape you are…unless you are super obese then it’s a sign you are way out of shape. Now, this sucks for me cause my body has never liked to sweat, ever! I remember, years ago when I was in shape, I worked out all the time and the first day I had an actual bead of sweat drip down my arm I totally stopped what I was doing and just stared at it in amazement thinking “finally! proof I am pushing myself hard enough to make this workout count!”

As with many things I thought about fitness back then, I was wrong. sigh. *rolls eyes*

Our bodies sweat so we don’t overheat. The sweat glands, all 2-4 million of them, are either from the eccrine or aproccine gland and they produce moisture on our skin that then evaporates, cooling us down. If you watch sports you’ll probably have noticed that professional athletes sweat like crazy during their game/sport. Can’t really make the argument that they aren’t in shape right? So what does the amount you sweat when working out mean?

The more you sweat the better your body is at regulating your temperature and managing itself. If you are working out at a level that you think means you should be sweating but you aren’t sweating it isn’t that you aren’t working out hard enough, it is that your body is not so great at keeping itself at optimal temps.

For most people all this means is that you should keep working out, keep trying your best and keep hydrating! Your body is smart (and sometimes stupid lol), but in this case smart and will eventually figure out how to regulate your temp and keep you cool while you work out. You’ll become a sweaty mess one day, honest! Until then, enjoy the working out sans icky sweat, cause those days sure won’t last! 🙂

For me, I hadn’t been keeping myself hydrated for the past week or so, I had cut down quite a bit on the amount of fluids I was taking in (not on purpose, I just sometimes forget to drink, oops!) which means my body didn’t have a lot of fluids to release to help keep me cool. Also, I tend to be cool-cold almost all the time so it takes a while for my body to work itself up to feeling warm, then hot, then feel like it needs to cool itself down. Weird huh? Since we were outside and I was biking I was being constantly cooled down by the rush of air as I biked, pretty much insuring my body would not heat up.

I would have liked to of been sweaty at the end of the bike ride, it would have made me feel I had a good workout buuuuut I wasn’t which left me reflecting on the bike ride and trying to figure out how to push myself harder the next time. After having some time to reflect on it though I don’t think I should be quite so hard on myself, biking for 13.25km is better than doing nothing, right? Being out in the warm evening weather, enjoying the feel of the air on my skin, seeing all the different people that were also enjoying the seawall, getting to hang with KL, those are all good things. And sure, I could have gone to the gym, ran on the treadmill then done some weights and known exactly what I got out of the workout but switching things up is a good thing, keeps the body guessing, keeps the brain from getting bored lol 😛 And who knows, maybe if I was someone who wasn’t perpetually cold and I had been hydrated I would have been at least a bit sweaty after that bike ride…I was certainly tired! 😛

Tags: , , , , , ,

Rest Time Is Over!

4 Jun

Last Wednesday I managed to hurt my foot, this meant I now had a sore left knee and a very sore right foot. Least my injuries were on opposite sites of the body, so I wasn’t unbalanced! lol

I gave myself a bit of a resting period after I finished my 30 Day Challenges so my knee could recover, and also so my foot could recover from the heavy stuff that fell on it *rolls eyes at myself*

Today was the official end of the resting period! 😀

I didn’t really think about it when I was getting my gym gear together last night, at most I thought, get the bag packed now so I have no excuse to not take my gym stuff to work and if you feel like going to the gym after work then you can go. See, I have this defect, it is called laziness, I have another defect called “my cat is in charge” so if I go home after work with the idea I will change and head out to the gym, well, it never happens because (1) I end up sitting down and then I am comfy and no way in hell are you dragging my lazy ass out of my comfy living room chair after a day at work and (2) the cat gives me sad eyes because he’s been alone all day and I feel bad so I end up cuddling him then he is comfy and sleeping on my lap and in my world you don’t disturb a sleeping cat. The cat has me well trained lol. 😛

If I have any intention at all of exercising after work I can NOT go home! Sad but true.

I have been known to take my gym gear then say “screw it, I’m too tired” at the end of the day and just go home but generally that is when I am running on 3 hours or less of sleep so I don’t feel so bad when that happens lol

Today however, when I was at work, I made a decision. Not an exercising decision, a food decision. See, at work, whoever does the morning shift (sundays and mondays that is yours truly) does the baking for the breakfast that gets laid out buffet style. It is little muffins, pastries, croissants. They are killer. They are all empty carbs, full of refined sugar, no redeeming nutritional value to any of them, but they taste so freakin good! lol The croissants are my weak point. They are small croissants so you don’t feel as guilty eating them, but just cause they are small doesn’t mean they aren’t wicked bad for you right? Right!

Normally I nibble. That’s right, I nibble! So sue me! If I accidentally decapitate a muffin when taking it out of the tray I eat it so it doesn’t get thrown out and wasted (like how I can justify it? lol), when I’m plating the croissants I “accidentally” put one on a plate for me…then, if there are croissants left over at the end of breakfast I more often than not swipe one, or two…so in case you aren’t doing the math, that is a potential 3 mini croissants in one morning! That is on top of the toast I make myself…which great, right? even more freakin useless carbs, *groan* Not a good way to start the day!

Today, for some reason I decided to not eat any of the breakfast baking. I still had the toast cause it was either eat toast or have no breakfast at all and I figured the toast was better then starvation lol but the pastries? the mini muffins? the mini croissants? Nope, I’m good thanks. 🙂

Oddly enough, what I kept leaning on when I was tempted to grab something was that I had completed the 30 Day Challenges. Those sucked at time but I finished them, didn’t cheat, didn’t skimp out on anything, I got all the way through and if I could handle all those squats and all that ab work for 30 days surely I could manage one day of not eating the bakery items?

I found myself walking towards them a couple times out of habit but when I realized where I was aimed I turned and went somewhere else, luckily there is a lot to do at work so I could always find something to distract me.

And guess what? I made it through the day without touching a single item from that breakfast display and when the day was over I felt a little bit stronger for that. Not so much for holding out but for making the healthier choice. For putting my goal of eating healthy and getting in shape ahead of the instant satisfaction of something tasty. By not caving in with the breakfast goodies it made it that much easier to choose to go to the gym after work. I was tired, kinda didn’t want to go, was coming up with all kinds of reasons to skip it but lo and behold I ended up at they gym and well hey, once you’re there you can’t turn around and leave, you’d just look stupid if you did that lol 😛

The gym however almost killed me. lol. Not the working out part, although I did push myself on the cardio, but the gym itself was an oven, the air conditioning is broken so as soon as you step in to the gym you are hit with a blast of heat that doesn’t let up the entire time you are there. Oy! You could easily have started to sweat just from being in there, wouldn’t even have to do anything to work up the sweat!

Well whatever right? I got changed and headed to the treadmill. I had such a (surprisingly) good run just a bit before I hurt my foot I was feeling super optimistic about todays run and almost decided to set it for 45 minutes. The only reason I didn’t was I was parked in a one hour only zone and wanted time after my run to stretch out soooooo 30 minutes it was! I am so grateful I set it for only 30 minutes! I was running at a decent pace (for me), but by the last ten minutes I was doing that deep, slightly louder breathing and it just kept getting louder the longer I ran. Also grateful no one was on the treadmill near me lol Part of my brain was saying “stop! for the love of all that is holy just stop! you don’t have to tell anyone, it’ll be ok, you can’t take anymore!” but this little voice in my head was whispering “you can do this, you have done this and more in the past, you ate well today, you have the fuel in you, just keep going, prove to yourself you can finish, don’t quit” the “don’t quit” voice was no where near as loud as the desperate wheezing pleading voice that wanted me to stop but I clung to it, repeated over and over “I can do this!” in my head and what do you know, I did it! I ran for 30 minutes, on a random hill program, at a speed of 5, level 4, with inclines ranging from 0-5 and not once did I stop. *puffs up with a bit of pride* I know I used to do way better before, was on a higher level, doing intervals, running at a base speed that was faster then the speed I did today, with higher inclines but instead of dwelling on how I did so much more and did it so much better last summer when I was more consistent with my running training I am going to be happy at what I accomplished today. Getting back to the shape I was in last summer doesn’t mean starting at the levels I left off at last summer, it means starting a little lower down and earning my way back to where I was.

I went and stretched then headed to the locker room where I shocked myself silly when I looked in the mirror! lol Imagine a sunburn, the worst face sunburn you have ever seen, the pinkest, the reddest, the brightest, now times that by 100 (cause I am a redhead and super pale and burn worse than other people) and that was my face! I kid you not! I was soooooooooo red! lol It was quite embarrassing actually, I made sure to keep my head down while I was walking out of the gym and to my suv. I go quite red when doing cardio anyways, but the combo of the cardio, plus the over heated gym, plus the treadmill was radiating heat (not even kidding! when I stopped I realized blasts of heat were coming from the lower part of the machine and hitting me full body) I guess my poor skin just couldn’t take it and it turned me in to a tomato! A highly unattractive tomato! lol I am so not attractive when I work out and going red really doesn’t make it any better, *sigh* No wonder when I was done running I was a bit unbalanced if I was that over heated!

Ah well, who cares if I get a red face right? Just means I worked hard, I earned that red face dammit! Well, partially earned it and partially got cooked in a room with no air conditioning lol 😛

tomato running on a treadmill, aka me at the gym today

tomato running on a treadmill, aka me at the gym today

Tags: , , , , , , , , , ,

← Older Entries
Newer Entries →