Burger Love

Day 2 fully staffed at Fill Creative - yay! We went to lunch at Five Guys Burger and Fries. Delightful. There is a lovely bulletin board as you walk in that has index cards pinned to it which people have drawn on, showing their support for Five Guys. Among the "Five Guys Goes Hard" and "All Other Burgers Surrender" messages was a card someone made professing their love of me. How nice!

Tonight I'm going to do another brick workout. I'm super sleepy from all the food. I had the cheese veggie sandwich, and don't even know what was on the sandwich, but it was tasty. Hopefully it will be good fuel for tonight.

Ode to Bananas

This is for Christen. It's our first day together. And for breakfast, we both had...


Bananas

It's what we both had
for breakfast this morn'.
If you going to the Austin City Limits Music Festival this year
You'll see Pete Yorn.

My banana was good,
Even with all of its brown spots.
This pushed my ripeness tolerance;
It was nearing the rots.

Though some would disagree,
I whole heartedly feel
The best banana has
A pristine yellow peel.

Those with the brownness
Are reserved for bread,
Or frying in a pan to make
Bananas Foster instead.

But it doesn't matter:
We both had the fruit
For our first day together
At Fill Creative. Woot!!!

Change of Workout Plans

Today I had planned to do a second brick workout. Greg and I stayed up late after he got home late, putting my new tire on my bike and putting my bike back together so that I could ride tonight. And, by the way, I did manage to get the tire on this time. Greg does have a little bit of a different technique in putting a new tube and tire together on the wheel, and I found it to be much easier. The whole process is still a pretty big pain in the butt, but I think that next time if I was out by myself and got a flat, I could do it, so that's good.

Anyway, I'm pooped today. Completely drained. I took an HOUR nap... ug. The thought of running fast at the moment sounds pretty near impossible. It's just one of those times. I am pretty certain I have low iron. I know the feeling and this is the feeling. So, no big deal. Just time to start taking the supplements again! No point in trying to get through a really difficult workout and doing it poorly, so I'll do it Thursday instead. I might try to lift and do some core work tonight. It doesn't help that it's so gloomy out, geesh. Come on sunshine! This weekend looks like it's going to be beautiful...and maybe a little warm for the 5K on Sunday!

In other news, I went to a new allergist today. It was just the initial consultation and was pretty simple. I breathed into a couple of different things and those tests show my lungs to be normal, which I was curious about. I feel like I have no lung capacity, but the numbers proved I'm average. I think it's just my allergies. I had marked on my paperwork a note about wheezing that happens while I run on the exhale. So they are making me try an inhaler that I would use before I go out for a run. Half hour prior, I do one puff. Then 5 minutes after that I do another. That is supposed to help the irritation from the environment. I also got a nasal spray, which I've used before. We'll see if it helps me sleep at night better and not wake up sounding like I have a full blown cold every day. And I got a prescription for an EpiPen since I've  had a systemic reaction to almonds. Not really worried about it, but I guess they have to provide you with this stuff. I go back in two weeks for the oh so fun 2 hour back prick and arm tests. Then I'll start shots again...and hopefully, eventually, not be so miserable all day! Woohoo!

Another Rainy Monday

It is not looking promising for a group ride tonight since it is raining. :( Not sure what I'll do instead. I suppose a run in the rain will have to suffice.

Sunday afternoon I weeded while Dad and Greg worked on re-establishing the electricity in our house after something got loose somewhere. My mom helped, which was great! We got a lot more done than just I could have. The right bed is cleared and ready for some weed killer and mulch, once it stops raining. We began on the left side, but there's a lot more to tackle yet. Hopefully I'll get to work on it little by little this week. The reason I'm even mentioning all of this is because my hamstrings are really really sore! This happens every time I weed. It is the position I put myself in, bending over and suspending my body in an angle such that there is apparently a good amount of pull on the hammies. So, some inadvertent strength cross-training I guess! :)

I am officially registered for the Tri for Joe on the 29th. I'm really excited! Not sure I can beat my old best time there, unless I am surprisingly fast on the bike, but I hope I do well. I am a little worried about endurance. I don't feel like I've had long enough workouts to sustain a race level effort for a couple of hours.

Soup is for Winter and Fla-vor-ice is for Summer

This day... it is so nice out. I just want to be in it. I had soup for lunch. And the decision has been made. I don't like soup anymore now that it's warm. Soup = cold weather food. Or maybe if it was dark out I would like it better. Strange I guess.

I took a break and walked around the yard. I didn't go to the studio today. The dogs are keeping me company rather than the sounds of traffc. I wish the iPhone had a better camera in it. It's just convenient and fun to snap photos of things.

Coming back in, I passed the bag of Sour Patch Kids on the kitchen counter and stole one. It was orange, and suddenly out of nowhere I was reminded of eating Fla-Vor-Ice as a kid. Something about the artificial fruit flavor...

Wow just seeing a picture of it that I just found makes me almost able to feel the frosty cold tube in my hands! Marvin and I used to eat this stuff all the time. It was stored in the freezer that was in our garage, so it was pretty easy to access. I remember both of us eating all of the green first. I think orange was my second favorite. And blue was fun because your tongue might turn blue. If purchased today, I wonder if the packaging would be the same – you had to cut off the top to open them. I remember getting the box cutter from Dad's tool bench and using that if Mom didn't give them to us cut open already (she'd use scissors). I also remember finding scissors and angling the sides of the sharp plastic to avoid cutting the sides of my mouth. I preferred to push the ice tube up from the bottom and let the melted, bright liquid collect there to drink afterwords. Marvin liked to eat his and mush his up a little bit into a slushy format. Sometimes, when a chunk would get out too far, it would just fall off. Then it was for the dogs to clean up. I don't think it was ever a big loss, like dropping an ice cream cone. We could just go get another one if we felt slighted. I love how the name is broken up: Fla•Vor•Ice, as if it's some sort of dictionary entry for summer.

Ok flashback over.

Morning of Working not Running

I didn't get up early enough to run this morning before I had to start working. But that's OK. I'll go later. It's going to be a beautiful day. Then I probably won't do anything else until Saturday – I want my legs to be nice and fresh for the possible sprinting I'm going to have to do to keep up with the little runners at the Girls on the Run 5K.

Wow, a bird just played a really long, complicated song right outside the living room window, sang at a constant forte. Dexter is looking and cocked his head as it went along.

Time to get back to work!

Advantages

So might need to make an amendment to the Ode to Cuties post. I seemed to have a bit of an allergy reaction after eating them this morning. Haven't had anything else to eat or drink except coffee, so not really sure what was going on. I got itchy all over (still am a little bit) and had the chest pain like I did when I ate almonds. So I went home to where the benadryl is. Haven't taken any and I'm fine. But...now I'm working from home on this stupidly gorgeous afternoon - yay! At least I can be outside!

Monday Morning

Wow it is a gorgeous morning. I wish I could have just sat outside on the back porch, on the comfy loveseat with the dogs and a cup of coffee, catching up on reading. But here I am at my studio. :)  It was a beautiful short drive to work. The moon was still out and everything was very misty. The sky is perfectly blue. It's going to be a tough day to stay motivated!

I forgot my checkbook for rent, so I guess I'll go home for lunch and get that. And it's Monday, which means there's a group ride, so I'll also grab my bike and gear for that tonight! I need a do-over after the last ride and bonking. I'll make sure to take some food with me this time- wearing a new jersey with pockets = no excuse! I don't think they went last Monday because it was rainy, so we'll see what is in store. In fact, now that I think about it, I think Rich has a big 4-day, 400 mile ride coming up this weekend. So maybe we will go pretty easy. I don't care, I just want to get out there and ride.

And now it's time to be productive. I've already crossed some things off of my list this morning. Sometimes I put "gimme's" on my list just so I can have something to cross off and feel good for accomplishing it. Such as: "Sit down in front of computer" or "open blinds".  Ok, not really ;)  My list is really long though and has everything on it from work projects to looking for hotels for our trip to Greece. And oh how the weeds at home are calling my name... They've scrawled their presence onto my list as well.

This is what our house is going to look like soon if I don't address those weeds this week:

Long Week

So the countdown is on until the switch from SSC to Fill Creative! And man, it can not come soon enough. I think I have the same kind of fever you get when you're about to go on vacation. Suddenly, all you want to do is go on vacation - screw all the work! This week has been rough. Everything just seems to have been flying at me all at once. But I have still managed to get all of my planned workouts in, so I'm happy about meeting that part of my recent "goals". Today I am not sure if I'll have time to sneak a run in before heading down to Covington to meet up with Greg and his work friend (who goes by "Dude"). But here's hoping!

I am working at Lux today so I went over to the lovely cafeteria to purchase the worst veggie sandwich I've ever had. But at least I got to walk outside. It is really windy out - so a run would be pretty fun! A bike ride, however, would not.

So last night I was overwhelmed with work, but Christen was able to help which saved me 4 hours that I didn't have! I emailed her some files and she did it and emailed it all back - beautiful.  Recently when I've been talking to people here at Lux, I start to tell them how things are changing soon and I'm getting a partner. I get giddy talking about it! So far everyone has been very receptive and excited about it. I still need to figure out exactly how to let them all know...maybe some kind of letter? It's got to be quick and simple.

You know what else is on my mind? Weeds!! They are out of control at the house and I think when I was working in the wee hours of the morning last night I heard one trying to get into the house. Maybe I'll get to that this weekend a little bit too - once the ground is nice and soft from the rain. The battle is on weeds. You're gonna lose.

Oh boy, my belly is not liking the sandwich as much as I didn't like it. Trying to dilute it with some water...