Monday

Monday was a good day foodwise - I stuck to my plan (and I also had salad at both meals, no dessert at either and no french fries!).

I also went to pilates - I haven't been in such a long time (6 months or so!). I remembered most of the positions/moves, but my abs have got much weaker, so I wasn't able to do them as well. (My big problem with pilates is my neck. For some reason I tense it a lot when I'm doing anything that requires me to lie down and hold my head up - crunches and a lot of pilates exercises. When my abs were stronger that problem got better, but they're back to being weak again :(. I need to work on that!).

The pilates also felt gooood after my run yesterday. I am still really sore from it (much more than I would normally be). I'm also really feeling it in my hip flexors which is a bit strange. During the run yesterday (with the new "barefoot" shoes) I felt it in different areas to normal - the top and sides of my feet and the insides of my calves. I also think I really overdid it. After I came back from the run I read more about it all (trying to make sure that I was doing it "right"). Apparently you can seriously mess yourself up if you don't build up slowly. So...the new plan is to try to run in them for 2 x 10 minutes during my two cardio gym trips. I was able to run for longer than normal in them, and I felt better running than I normally do. I'm hoping that once I build up and can run those distances "safely", the shoes will help me to enjoy running again and start solving some of my foot issues!

Midterm grades are starting to trickle in slowly. I'll probably do a post on them in the next few days.

In other news, my poorly sister has to have a colonoscopy tomorrow (a bit tmi, I know). I am sure it'll all go okay, but I'll be thinking of her and keeping my fingers crossed. Also, fingers crossed for this helping to work out what her "illness X" is!

I'm in lab...on a Saturday

One of the downsides of lab work is that a lot of people (maybe half my lab) works a 6 day week. I don't have to (I'm not paid for it), but I'm still trying to impress my boss/make him think that I am serious and dedicated to my work after the lead debacle. Truth be told, I do actually really like what I'm doing in lab at the minute. I'm working on some compounds that have really cool colours (pink, orange, green and aqua), which is kinda fun! Anyway, my plan for the rest of the day (interesting to me, boring for everyone else!) is:

now - 3:00 Lab.
3:00 - 3:15 Walk back to room, pick up dinner (chili) on the way so that it has time to defrost (I think I posted about this, but last weekend I cooked lots of food for myself and then froze it.)
3:15 - 3:45 Snack/Lunch (apple with peanut butter and plum)
3:15 - 4:30 Go running along the tow path (my favourite place in the whole world is the tow path by the river near by house. The one at college isn't quite as good, but I'm really luck to still have a tow path near me. I've never run along it before, and I rarely run outside, so I'll see how it goes! Annoyingly, the gym is closed today, so that's why I'm not going there and swimming, which is what I'd really like to do.)
4:30 - 6:30 Shower, do laundry, start rice, read (I'm (re) reading "What the Dog Saw" by Malcolm Gladwell. I'm enjoying it so far, but I much prefer "Outliers", which is another one of his books. The good thing about "What the Dog Saw" is that it's short stories that are each about 25 pages, so it's good for pre-bed reading!)
6:30-8:00 Dinner
8:00-8:30 Set up vitamins. I've been bad and haven't taken them for a really long time, so I need to get back into the habit of doing that. To "kickstart" myself I'm going to set them up for the next four weeks (I have a little holder thing) so that I don't have to worry about getting out all the little bottles every day.
8:30 - 9:00 Breathing. I haven't used my Coherence program for a really long time, and I'd like to get back into that. I have spent (a small amount of) time doing it, but not with the program and I'd like to get back into that.
9:00 - 10:30 Read or watch a movie
10:30 - 11:00 Take psyllium and set up aduki beans for breakfast tomorrow (they need to soak overnight).

So, thrilling plan for today, I know.

This weekend I'm not going to eat junk - candy, chocolate, crisps, anything else like that. I've found that it's really easy to get a bag of something and then just finish it, which obviously isn't great, so I want to try to break that habit. Depending on how things go this weekend I might try to do this every weekend....

Feeling a little bit better

After I posted that post yesterday I went for a run (with the boyfriend). It was a tough run - partly because I wasn't really in the mood for it, and partly because it was an outdoor run, which I don't normally do. I ran a little slower than usual (according to my gizmo). But, the good news is that I ran for 22 mins 30 seconds, which is even better than my goal for this month!

I also reflected on some of the good things that happened to me yesterday. Something I've been working on is getting less distracted when I'm studying. I have a really bad tendency to be studying and remember that I need to do something (send an email or something) and feel like it can't wait. One thing I did yesterday that seemed to work well was to put little sticky notes in my reading (randomly) that had little rewards on them (e.g. email, have a snack, facebook etc). It made it all a little more a game, which was good!


I still haven't lost any weight (130.8 lbs), which I'm a bit annoyed about. I know it takes time, but I've been feeling like I've been being really good, and usually weight comes off me pretty quickly. Anyway, I'm just trying not to get discouraged.

My skin is also getting a little dicey. Maybe its because of all the water (which is meant to clear your skin, but the skin will probably go through a bad period first, while it's clearing), the sunscreen (I'm not crazy about my current one, but I should be wearing it. And it is a resolution for this month. I think I'm going to give my skin a day off from it today...), stress, or me picking at it/touching it more. I'm going to try to be super nice to it today :)

Anyway, I should get some studying (Sociology) done!

Running

Before the beginning of this year I didn't run for exercise, ever. At the beginning of this year I decided that I needed to be able to run. Sometimes I do need to run for a bus or to class. I decided to start off running for  five minutes and increase from there. I've actually decided that I really like running now - it's a great workout! I also have something which means that I can record time/distance/speed/calories on my ipod, so I can track my progress which is good.

I think I mentioned in one of my earlier posts that I hadn't been to the gym forever - the longer I don't go for the harder it is for me to convince myself to go. But...I went today! And I ran. I actually succeeded in running for 20 minutes, which is pretty good given that I haven't run since February (according to my IPod...oops).

I'm feeling much better after the run - more focussed and also like I'm doing what I need to do to get to my goals (I was 129 lbs this morning, which isn't awful, but I'd really like to be 124-125 before the boyfriends 21st, in less than a month!)