Tag Archives: workout

Don’t Be Catty

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I don’t know what’s up with me, because yesterday I was insanely hungry and today I was hit by fatigue!  Again, it was almost indescribable.  I felt like I was wading through mud all day long, my mind was cloudy, I was even falling asleep over my dead cat.  Yeah that’s right, there was a dead cat.  WARNING –  there will now be graphic pictures from Anatomy Lab.  Cat in a bag.

Oh, and here’s a picture of my lab partner and I with our dead cat.

She smelled fantastic.  Actually, lab was interesting but a bit frustrating because I was having a really hard time identifying the muscle groups.  Anatomy lab is a grade I’m already worried about.  Food lab (after my lunch post) was much more exciting because we got to identify vegetable cuts and spices and herbs, that I can totally do 😀

After class I went to the gym; the following is a short essay about how working out is the panacea to the world’s ills:

Feeling fat?  Go to the gym.  Mad at your boyfriend?  Go to the gym.  Stressed about work?  Go to the gym?  Having trouble sleeping?  Go to the gym.  Exhausted?  Go to the gym!

The time I spent working out was pretty much the only time I felt truly awake today.  I’m not gonna lie, I went to the gym for one reason and one reason only – I was already wearing my Lululemon sports bra under my dress and I didn’t want to “waste” it.  But I was glad I went, even if my legs weren’t moving as fast as they usually do.  Elliptical, random, level 6, 35minutes.

After my 30minute walk I totally crashed again, but it was nice while it lasted.  I was so tired I didn’t even take photos of my exorbatint amount of food (what?  I didn’t say the hunger was gone).  Plus, who wants to see pictures of food after the dead cat?

Have you ever taken a lab course with dissections?  Any fainting action or did you enjoy the learning?

Strawberry Danish Oat Success

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This morning has been pretty much spot on – it’s already mid-week, I’m ahead on my Chemistry homework, I got to workout with the husband, and my breakfast blew my mind!

My insomnia has been rearing its ugly head again but for some reason the 6:24 am alarm didn’t feel so bad.  When I’m planning on working out with Adam I’m excited, so it’s a lot easier to get up.  We dressed in a hurry and I grabbed 60calories worth of energy chews (ahem, Willy Wonka Apple candies) so I didn’t feel empty.

We ran a nice loop around the neighborhood, 2.05miles in 21minutes.  Followed by stretching and pt; I’ve got to start doing pt consistently again, my shins have been bugging me recently.

I ticked shower and some school work off of the list, then worked some breakfast magic.  I’ve always wanted to be an oatmeal person; other bloggers make it seem “cool” and the impending fall makes me crave a warm breakfast.  But oats always fall short for me – they are sticky and gummy and the flavor is always just a bit off.  I’ll do overnight oats from time to time, but cooked just don’t appal to me.  No more my friends, no more.

Strawberry Danish Oats, oh yes, I went there!  I have finally found my oatmeal combo; this was creamy and filling, and the taste was so decadent I might have whimpered a bit when the bowl was empty. 

I was so blown away I even gave this bowl its own recipe page.  For one –

  • 1/3 cup old-fashioned oats
  • 1/3 cup water
  • 1/3 cup milk (I used Silk Almond Milk because it’s so creamy but skim would do as well)
  • a pinch of salt
  • 1 cup frozen, defrosted strawberries (defrosted berries are a bit mushy which I prefer over crunch in my oats, if you only have fresh just cook them a little longer)
  • 1/2 oz reduced fat cream cheese
  • 2tsp brown sugar
  1. Combine oats, liquids, and salt in a bowl and stir to mix.  Microwave on high for 2-3minutes.  (You could stove top cook if you like but these are so creamy that there is really no need.)
  2. Microwave the strawberries, in a separate bowl, for 30-40seconds to take the chill off.
  3. Spoon berries on top of oats.  Top with cream cheese and brown sugar.
  4. Take a bite and gasp with pleasure!

I guess oats (and cream cheese) might be becoming a staple in this house after all!

Are you an oatmeal aficionado?

Locked and Loaded

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It’s been a full day and my to do list’s not even close to empty!  Thank goodness it’s mostly stuff I enjoy.

Tuesday is my 8am class (library) day so an at home breakfast was not going to happen.  Instead I packed some healthy snacks to eat in between classes.  A Blueberry Crisp Cliff Bar,

and a local apple.

We learned about amino acids and proteins in NTR 100 today and it was totally fascinating.  Did you know that only animal protein sources can provide a “complete protein?”  Vegetable sources don’t have the correct ratio of the essential amino acids.  However, through “complementary proteins” vegetarians can get what they need.  For example, beans and rice are a complimentary protein.  I’m obviously not vegetarian, but we do eat a lot of meatless meals so it’s definitely something to think about.

After class I headed over to the gym.  It’s a 30minute walk from my apartment (1hour roundtrip) so gyming it in the morning this year is just not realistic; instead I’m trying to make my workout part of my on-campus time.  This weekend I picked up a pretty pink lock –

and today I brought a bag full of gym essentials – sports bras, socks, shoes, outfits, scrunchies, water bottle – to store on campus.

Today’s workout was 30minutes on the elliptical, random, level 6.

Adam could even give me a ride home so I didn’t have to walk in the sun, yay!  We had some business to take care of so I replenished with coconut water while I waited for lunch.

Lunch-lunch was a package of Allergaroo Chili Mac.

I ‘beefed it up’ by stirring in 4oz of frozen peas.

Yum.  This packet was still part of my shipment of free samples but I think the chili mac is fantasmic, I’ll definitely buy more with my own $.

I’m still looking for a fruit-dairy component to lunch so I’ll probably have a study snack in a bit, I’ll update the post if I do.

Dinner’s gonna be exciting…..

***Updated to add -I found my dairy-fruit (+ sweet!) snack.
I started with an Oikos free sample, 0% strawberry.
 
I don’t know why I was expecting this to be flavored yogurt, but I was a bit surprised to find plain with jam on the bottom.  In the end I loved it though; it was the perfect amount of sweet!
 
I topped my yogurt with a sliced black plum, a sliced plucot, and part of a crumbled cookie.
I definitely did not need the cookie (this was really sweet), but I had to throw out the last of the burnt granola and I had my heart set on something crumbly!
Do you have a locker at your gym?  Do you bring your stuff for the day or keep a bag stocked at the gym?

First Day Flops

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I have a hard time coping when things are not just so.  I’m working on it.

For example, I wanted my first day of school to be perfect.  I’d go to bed early the night before, get up for an early run, review all my materials, have a great brain food lunch; perfect.  Do you think it all went down like that?  Actually, Adam stayed up super late studying for his first test of the year, and then we stayed up super later while he dominated me in Word Feud (Scrabble for cell phones).

This morning I hit snooze a billion times and lamented my lack of the “perfect” start to my school year.  Breakfast just might have been eaten on the couch…..naked……and consisting of a mini container of cookie dough ice cream.

But then I pulled it together and went out for a run.  It sucked, of course; I hadn’t fueled or stretched properly and it was way too hot.  I had to take so many walking breaks that my 2+ish mile “run” ended up taking 23minutes. 

But that’s ok.  I’m still proud of myself, in fact.  I did something, and that’s better than nothing.  And even though I walked earlier than I wanted, I didn’t stop until I reached my planned distance.  I’m learning not to be so all-or-nothing.

But I won’t be proud if I’m late to my first class, gotta scoot!

Super Saturday > Fail Friday

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Today has been one of those perfect days where Buffalo felt like a fabulous place to live and all was right with the world!  It didn’t exactly have the smoothest start though, our fail dinner was like the gift that kept on giving (and giving and giving).  I don’t want to fully blame Wine Thief, because I did help myself to way too many of the husband’s salt and vinegar chips, but I spent my midnight throwing up and cursing date night.  Thankfully my super Saturday has all but canceled out fail Friday to restore the balance.  90% of the day has been walking, so that’s pretty much my perfect day right there 🙂

We started our morning with a mega-tour of my new campus.  I start class on Monday so I needed to figure out exactly how long it would take me to walk to school (~35minutes) and where all my classes were located.  Adam and I had a fun time exploring my new digs.

Here’s where I’ll be taking Organic Chemistry –

From there I walked over to the Elmwood Art Festival.  Is there anything more wonderful than a good street festival?  I think not.

After taking in the sites, I also took in some tasty treats.  Fresh squeezed maple lemonade.

Peanut butter popsicle dipped in dark chocolate.

Plus a new cereal bowl that I’m sooooo excited about (I’ll show it off later).  I actually went home for a spell and then came back with the husband.  On our final loop I picked up some kettle corn,

which was the perfect snack for my next activity – the movies!  The husband had to go to the lab so I decided to go solo to “The Switch.”  We are big movie talkers so I packed plenty of snacks to keep myself occupied alone.  A smaller portion of my fair kettle corn.

I probably could have eaten the whole thing, but I definitely didn’t need too!  What’s in the cooler?

A Ginger Root Beer Zevia sample,

and some frozen lemonade.

My kettle corn was sweet and crunchy, my lemonade tasted like summer, and my Zevia had a great kick – it was the perfect movie meal!  The movie was a win itself; Aniston and Bateman were the perfect foil and the plot was sweet and funny.  Eating Chalk recommends it!

Now I’ve got to get going on dinner.

What was the last fair, festival, etc, you had the pleasure of attending?

Carrot, Cookie; Same Dif

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Today was another morning when I was finding it impossible to get going.  I’m going to have to shake a leg once school starts!  Finally I bribed myself with a cookie,

and went for a run.

Other than my treadmill interval workouts, I’m making a big effort to run continuously instead of taking walking breaks.  Today I ran the entire distance, minus a quick stretch stop a the halfway point.  ~2.04miles, 20minutes, 30seconds.  Don’t worry, I do walk to warm up and cool down on these short runs, I just don’t include it in my time/distance stats.

I’m going to do 5ish minutes of strength and stretching and then hop in the shower.  I’m meeting Katie soon for something very exciting…

Sugar Sodas Are Toast

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Today was another one of those days where I plan to go to the gym and then get distracted for hours.  This means that working out gets pushed back, and lunch gets pushed back, and so on.  I’ve got precious few days left until school (i.e. real life) starts again though, so I’m enjoying the unstructured time!

I had to go to the co-op for a few things this morning so I extended my walk a couple of blocks to The Spot for coffee.

Grande iced toddy with skim milk.  The caffeine was supposed to power me through my work out on an empty stomach – I’m, perhaps, a bit gun-shy from yesterday – but I messed around so long that I finally had to cave and eat breakfast.

Toast with Smart Balance and Crofter’s Strawberry Spread.

I never ever eat toast for some reason, but I really enjoyed this.

My right leg (my tendonitis leg) had a bit of a twinge in it all morning so I planned a treadmill interval workout that would allow me to get in the amount of time I wanted without too much impact on my legs.  Since I knew it was going to be a longer work out I put a packet of Cherry Lime Propel (thanks, BlogHer) into my water.

Thumbs up, Propel!  This tasted great and I have to believe it played a role in the fact that it took me forever to get hungry this afternoon.

My treadmill work out –

  • 6 minutes walking, warm up
  • 20 sets of intervals – 2minutes running/2minutes walking (40minutes total)
  • 4minutes walking, cool down

In the end that added up to 50minutes; 4.13miles.  I finished things up at the gym with 10minutes of abs work and stretching.

When I did finally get hungry in this afternoon I made myself a protein packed lunch –

Broccoli, eggplant, and cole slaw mix sautéed in some homemade peanut sauce.

Just yum!

To drink (in addition to h2o, of course!) was a Zevia Ginger Ale.

I’ve worked with Zevia before, and while nothing can replace my Cherry Coke Zero love, I’m a big fan.  Soda with no sugar or chemicals?  I’d say that’s pretty perfect for an addict enthusiast like me!  Zevia was recently featured in Oprah’s magazine so they sent me some free samples to celebrate.  I’ll be doing a giveaway later on too.

The ginger ale was yummy, just like “regular” ginger ale but a little less sweet.  And it didn’t have that awful spice aftertaste that some brands get.

What is your favorite flavor/brand of soda.  My very, very favorite thing on Earth is fountain diet coke (with ice and a straw) with a shot of cherry coke!

A Cautionary Tale

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So this afternoon, after I spent the entire day rocking my running skirt, I got sucked into blogs and didn’t realize until 5:40 that my campus gym closed at 6pm.  Fail.  I can’t take a day off from exercise, because one turns into twenty, so when I found a post-card in the mail informing me that our old gym membership expires on the 28th it felt very serendipitous.  We loaded into the car and set off toward a healthy evening.

I was hungry by then, so during the ride I ate a Banana Soy Joy bar, pulled from my BlogHer stash.

Meh, at the time I didn’t love or hate it.

We didn’t have much time at the gym so I tried to bust my butt the entire visit.  “California Girls” by Katy Perry is surprisingly motivating, as is this song.  30minutes on the elliptical, random, level 6.  I did a mix of backward and forward pedalling, as well as some sprint intervals.  I ended my visit with 10minutes of strength and stretch moves.

As I stretched my legs I felt an unpleasant tightness in the back of my neck.  During my sit ups I started to feel nauseous.  While we were leaving the gym I could taste that stupid Soy Joy bar through all the water I was chugging.  And five minutes later we were pulling over so I could throw up.  Mega fail.

We haven’t quite narrowed it down, but basically I have an intolerance for some food preservative(s).  I also have a major allergy to some specific preservative that is found in Hawaiian Punch products, but that’s another story.  I’ve eaten other Soy Joy bars before without incident, but the Banana flavor is definitely off-limits for me from now on.

By the time I had pulled myself together and Adam had stopped at Walgreens to purchase himself a snack (thanks for the concern, husband!) I realized that I would not be able to stomach the dinner we had planned.  No, the only thing that would do was jalapeno poppers, with cream cheese, NOT cheddar.  I know some people would feel sick just at the thought of eating poppers, but they were literally the only thing that appealed to me.

I’ll make a very long and sad story short – three stores (and some time on Yelp) later we claimed defeat.  Adam told me I had to eat something for dinner, and also to stop whimpering or I was going to be walking home, so I went the Buffalo sauce route, a close 2nd to jalapeno.  I was starving at that point, and a bit unreasonable as well, so dinner was a huge buffalo chicken finger sandwich and a huge thing of french fries.  Ultra mega fail.

Clearly I hated it.