My favorite thing to watch and listen to lately...
Monday, January 30, 2012
Thursday, January 26, 2012
Three Things Thursday
1. Pain relief. After months and months of pain, I finally could take no more and went to the chiropractor yesterday for my shoulder and related pains. I haven't been able to fall asleep or sleep well for over 6 weeks now as the pain has progressed. It started with elbow pain - from desk work, I believe, back earlier in 2011. Then in September I was doing some fairly heavy and repetitive shoulder workouts with my girlfriend and in the first week felt like I injured both shoulders, the right more than the left - and yet, I kept it up. Add in boot camp classes and in came the pushups, pike presses, etc and I'm left with pain so bad that in the past week I thought I would vomit.
My old doctor has moved from chiro to teaching pilates, so I was scheduled to see Dr. Marasco who does a lot of Crossfit AND had the same injury as mine last year. He did some ultrasound for my tennis elbow and then worked with it a bit. Then for my sprained shoulder, I had some lovely massage and a spinal and neck adjustment. What did all that spell?
RELIEF!
I fell asleep fine and slept through the night. I'm to continue twice a week for now and see how it goes. Fine by me :-)
2. My husband saved my dogs life last night. I've had the stomach flu and my three main meals yesterday consisted of popsicles. I left the sticks on the table next to the couch I slept on all day and when I managed to rouse myself to take Mai to basketball practice, the dog decided to eat sticks...which got lodged in the roof of her mouth and throat. Steve came out to find she had puked all over the house and was dramatically scratching at her face and mouth and causing a bloody mess. She eventually started choking so badly that he though she was going to die. He reached in to find two sticks lodged in her throat and made the decision that he must just rip them out immediately and worry about how that might hurt her later. She seems fine now, but was quite the pitiful pooch last night when I arrived home.
3. Our Sisters Of Pain group met up this last week to discuss strategy for the The Wild Canyon Games.
We are an all women team of seven. Our motto? No Mercy. Our signature drink? To Be Determined. We are happily trying out many drinks to find the perfect one that states what we are all about. The goldschlager one is high on my list.
Here are the events involved in this two day adventure:
My old doctor has moved from chiro to teaching pilates, so I was scheduled to see Dr. Marasco who does a lot of Crossfit AND had the same injury as mine last year. He did some ultrasound for my tennis elbow and then worked with it a bit. Then for my sprained shoulder, I had some lovely massage and a spinal and neck adjustment. What did all that spell?
RELIEF!
I fell asleep fine and slept through the night. I'm to continue twice a week for now and see how it goes. Fine by me :-)
2. My husband saved my dogs life last night. I've had the stomach flu and my three main meals yesterday consisted of popsicles. I left the sticks on the table next to the couch I slept on all day and when I managed to rouse myself to take Mai to basketball practice, the dog decided to eat sticks...which got lodged in the roof of her mouth and throat. Steve came out to find she had puked all over the house and was dramatically scratching at her face and mouth and causing a bloody mess. She eventually started choking so badly that he though she was going to die. He reached in to find two sticks lodged in her throat and made the decision that he must just rip them out immediately and worry about how that might hurt her later. She seems fine now, but was quite the pitiful pooch last night when I arrived home.
3. Our Sisters Of Pain group met up this last week to discuss strategy for the The Wild Canyon Games.
We are an all women team of seven. Our motto? No Mercy. Our signature drink? To Be Determined. We are happily trying out many drinks to find the perfect one that states what we are all about. The goldschlager one is high on my list.
Here are the events involved in this two day adventure:
Triathlon:
Swim
Bike
Run
Geocaching:
Challenge Events::
Zipline
Ropes Course
Canyon Swig
Blob Tower/Iceberg
Adventure Course
Cliff Jump
Waterslide
Creek2Peak:
300 Meter Sprint
Cyclo Cross
Obstacle Course
1/2 Mile Sprint
1/8 Mile Swim
1/4 Mile Hill Sprint 1
1/4 Mile Hill Sprint 2
In the challenge events I am doing the 35 foot Ropes Course that includes a "leap of faith". I will be honest and say that I'm a little disappointed to not be doing the Canyon Swing or Zipline, but I'll survive. I'm happy to say I'm not doing the blobbing. Some poor woman broke both ankles on that one last year.
In Creek2Peak I am starting things off with the 300 meter sprint. It is one of the most important jobs of that event as the race starts to get very crowded once runners are forced into a narrow tunnel to complete the race. We need to get a head start in order to have the rest of this race run smoothly. Consider me working on my sprinting skills.
On day one, three teammates are competing in a triathlon while the other four teammates are off geocaching over 177 square miles of Eastern Oregon wilderness. Because my team hates trusts me, I have been honored with the job of geocaching. This is so wrong on so many levels but I'm up for the challenge. We've decided to wear BRIGHT colors so we won't be like those two guys that were so lost last year that they had to spend the night out by themselves and most of the next day because the helicopters could not see them for rescue.
*Both times I've been to a chiropractor, they have rocked my world. Have you ever used one?
*What's the wierdest predicament your dog as ever been in or the funkiest thing they've eaten?
Have you ever had to be rescued?
Monday, January 23, 2012
Monday Morning $h!t Women Say...
This may have already been passed around over the past weeks because these $h!t vidoes are everywhere!!!..., but I wouldn't know because I haven't been able to keep up with anything lately. I can't for the life of me think of the perfect MM Dance Party, so I'm exchanging it with $h!t Women Say to Personal Trainers...because this one actually made me laugh because I've said A LOT of these things before! :-)
Sunday, January 15, 2012
In Pursuit of God...
...and why do I feel like He's avoiding me?
I can totally feel when I'm off course and often I just let myself wander along until I'm hit in the head with how completely dumb I am being. Like today.
I had promised the kids I would take them geocaching and the closest one to us said it wasn't kid friendly. BUT>>>I took them anyways. I mean, what's the worst that could happen? Right?....right?
Off we went to find our "treasure" and as we stumbled upon our coordinates, I realized we were under an overpass and the only way to go was up into a very dark and dank space. It was here that I hit upon the "hint" button to make sure we were on to something and discovered that our cache was a PILL BOTTLE. That's what the hint said - Look for a pill bottle. What the what??
Even my husband had a bad feeling on this one. I received the following text from him:
So...among all the empty 40s and urine stains, we found our broken and battered pill bottle. I don't know what might have been in it before it was cracked and destroyed and I don't think I really want to know. What I do know is that I was in pursuit of something I shouldn't have been and my treasure avoided me.
I feel like this many days in my pursuit of my Heavenly Father. Although He is on my mind in what seems to be a constant buzz, I find that I am not following the path I'm supposed to be following in this pursuit. I've taken off on a simple route that is close to home that feels ...well...easy. Comfortable. Not too out of my comfort zone. Maybe some days, I don't even follow a path at all, but expect to arrive somewhere without the movement it requires. And the smashed empty pill bottle that lies waiting for me is simply because I moved too fast, without thinking it through, without my true end destination in mind.
I get angry that He seems so elusive to me. Like a child, I want my way and I want it NOW. He doesn't go by my desires, though. He DOES ask me to Rejoice in confident hope. Be patient in trouble, and to keep on praying. (Romans 12:12) and so tomorrow I will again rise and pursue Him. His treasure is in each day, each person, each lesson. As I end this day, I'm still thinking on my lessons learned. I know it comes together for His good - even my missteps. So tomorrow I will rejoice in the confident hope that I know He wants me to continue my pursuit, even with all the crazy side roads I take, I'm to keep on praying and to rejoice in confident hope.
He's not avoiding me.
He's waiting patiently for me.
I can totally feel when I'm off course and often I just let myself wander along until I'm hit in the head with how completely dumb I am being. Like today.
I had promised the kids I would take them geocaching and the closest one to us said it wasn't kid friendly. BUT>>>I took them anyways. I mean, what's the worst that could happen? Right?....right?
Off we went to find our "treasure" and as we stumbled upon our coordinates, I realized we were under an overpass and the only way to go was up into a very dark and dank space. It was here that I hit upon the "hint" button to make sure we were on to something and discovered that our cache was a PILL BOTTLE. That's what the hint said - Look for a pill bottle. What the what??
Even my husband had a bad feeling on this one. I received the following text from him:
So...among all the empty 40s and urine stains, we found our broken and battered pill bottle. I don't know what might have been in it before it was cracked and destroyed and I don't think I really want to know. What I do know is that I was in pursuit of something I shouldn't have been and my treasure avoided me.
I feel like this many days in my pursuit of my Heavenly Father. Although He is on my mind in what seems to be a constant buzz, I find that I am not following the path I'm supposed to be following in this pursuit. I've taken off on a simple route that is close to home that feels ...well...easy. Comfortable. Not too out of my comfort zone. Maybe some days, I don't even follow a path at all, but expect to arrive somewhere without the movement it requires. And the smashed empty pill bottle that lies waiting for me is simply because I moved too fast, without thinking it through, without my true end destination in mind.
I get angry that He seems so elusive to me. Like a child, I want my way and I want it NOW. He doesn't go by my desires, though. He DOES ask me to Rejoice in confident hope. Be patient in trouble, and to keep on praying. (Romans 12:12) and so tomorrow I will again rise and pursue Him. His treasure is in each day, each person, each lesson. As I end this day, I'm still thinking on my lessons learned. I know it comes together for His good - even my missteps. So tomorrow I will rejoice in the confident hope that I know He wants me to continue my pursuit, even with all the crazy side roads I take, I'm to keep on praying and to rejoice in confident hope.
He's not avoiding me.
He's waiting patiently for me.
Friday, January 13, 2012
Triple D means Triple Yum!
Diners, Drive-Ins and Dives with Guy Fieri. You guys love it as much as I do, right? Between Triple D and Man Vs Food, I've got a lot of restaurants on my list that I need to try. After Steve saw this episode a week or two ago, he just KNEW he had to take me there for lunch.
So, not knowing whether or not I would feel guilty about indulging in this spectacular goodness when my Biggest Loser group starts at the club on Monday, I figured yesterday was as good a time as any to take Steve up on his offer for lunch.We headed to Pine State Biscuits and wanna guess what I ordered? Well...Biscuits OF COURSE! And sandwiched in between those buscuits was the yummiest deep fried chicken, topped with bacon and cheese...topped with gravy...topped with egg!
Ohhhhhhh....the delight! If you're ever in Portland...and you're in a gravy mood...you've got to check out Pine State Biscuits.
Next time in, I'm trying their biscuits with butter and local jams. Holy Yum!!!!
No worries, Biggest Loser Team...after the dust settled, I did an amazing 20 minute HIIT run on the treadmill before heading to work. And no surprise, I ate this at noon and didn't get hungry again until 8:30pm!!
So, not knowing whether or not I would feel guilty about indulging in this spectacular goodness when my Biggest Loser group starts at the club on Monday, I figured yesterday was as good a time as any to take Steve up on his offer for lunch.We headed to Pine State Biscuits and wanna guess what I ordered? Well...Biscuits OF COURSE! And sandwiched in between those buscuits was the yummiest deep fried chicken, topped with bacon and cheese...topped with gravy...topped with egg!
Ohhhhhhh....the delight! If you're ever in Portland...and you're in a gravy mood...you've got to check out Pine State Biscuits.
Next time in, I'm trying their biscuits with butter and local jams. Holy Yum!!!!
No worries, Biggest Loser Team...after the dust settled, I did an amazing 20 minute HIIT run on the treadmill before heading to work. And no surprise, I ate this at noon and didn't get hungry again until 8:30pm!!
Thursday, January 12, 2012
All Cached Out
I have no sense of direction. It's a fact. From a very early age, I knew that I was different than most people. Maybe it is that I don't pay attention to detail, maybe it is that my head is in the clouds, maybe I just never thought it was very important. One of my favorite tv shows is Amazing Race. I want to go on that show. Badly. However, I know that my team would be the first to get booted off, because I. HAVE. NO. SENSE. OF. DIRECTION.
As a child, I visited my grandparents house often. They lived in our town and our visits were plenty. At the age of 15, I received my learners permit and over the valley and through the woods to Grandmother's house did I go. Well, sort of. You took the main road from our house to their house with a few odd streets thrown in and there ya go. I panicked. I doubted myself. I wasn't sure how to get there. I was a wreck! 29 years later, I've had plenty of similar experiences and I typically give myself extra time in order to get to where I need to go - maybe an hour extra to reach a location only 20 minutes away. I just KNOW I'll need it. Even when prepared, I won't pay attention to the details, and end up 3/4 of the way to my destination before I realize I've forgotten the last page of my mapquest printout. Aw...c'mon, man! What were you thinking? You've done this like a dozen times now. Won't you ever learn?????????
Over the last few years, this poor sense of direction, or of following directions, or lack of attention has poured over into my athletic endeavors as well. Each early morning group bike ride begins with me waking up and knowing that I'm a back of the packer. I dutifully tape my bike route to my aerobars with every intention of being able to follow the directions, but know deep in my soul that I have no chance. I MUST keep up with someone, anyone, in order to not get horribly lost. Admittedly this has been great for my biking skills and I would now consider myself a middle of the packer simply because I've HAD to keep up. No option.
As some of you will recall, I am one of the Sisters Of Pain team that is participating at the Wild Canyon Games this June. A big portion of that first day is geocaching, here explained by Wiki: Geocaches vary in size, difficulty, and location. Simple caches are often called "drive-bys," "park 'n grabs" (PNGs), or "cache and dash." Geocaches may also be complex, involving lengthy searches or significant travel.
Lengthy searches or significant travel? Sounds like me trying to get to the grocery store!! That's right up my ally. HAhahahahaha.
So...I decided to take a stab at it with the kids in tow. Our first cache that we chose was supposed to be 1/2 mile from our house. We set out at dusk in brutally cold weather the other day expecting to be back warm and cozy to our house within minutes. 1 Hour!!!! and 3 miles later, we eventually gave up the search and headed home. You can see my children were thrilled to be out there...
Actually. it was a great adventure, but WAY too cold. We were all almost in tears by the time we got home - no gloves, no hats, and me in a workout skirt. We arrived home in the dark and with our little geocaching hearts a little cracked.
The next day, we set out again on a new search for a new cache...and EUREKA!!!
I'm assuming this is the simplest cache that we will ever find, but we DID IT!! Unfortunately, we were basically just following a compass on my phone and coordinates did not play a factor in our search.
I am hoping.
I am praying.
I am begging my Sisters of Pain.
Please...Please...Please do not make me do this leg of the race.
Please.
Pretty please.
I will get lost in the desert and die.
Just sayin'.
As a child, I visited my grandparents house often. They lived in our town and our visits were plenty. At the age of 15, I received my learners permit and over the valley and through the woods to Grandmother's house did I go. Well, sort of. You took the main road from our house to their house with a few odd streets thrown in and there ya go. I panicked. I doubted myself. I wasn't sure how to get there. I was a wreck! 29 years later, I've had plenty of similar experiences and I typically give myself extra time in order to get to where I need to go - maybe an hour extra to reach a location only 20 minutes away. I just KNOW I'll need it. Even when prepared, I won't pay attention to the details, and end up 3/4 of the way to my destination before I realize I've forgotten the last page of my mapquest printout. Aw...c'mon, man! What were you thinking? You've done this like a dozen times now. Won't you ever learn?????????
Over the last few years, this poor sense of direction, or of following directions, or lack of attention has poured over into my athletic endeavors as well. Each early morning group bike ride begins with me waking up and knowing that I'm a back of the packer. I dutifully tape my bike route to my aerobars with every intention of being able to follow the directions, but know deep in my soul that I have no chance. I MUST keep up with someone, anyone, in order to not get horribly lost. Admittedly this has been great for my biking skills and I would now consider myself a middle of the packer simply because I've HAD to keep up. No option.
As some of you will recall, I am one of the Sisters Of Pain team that is participating at the Wild Canyon Games this June. A big portion of that first day is geocaching, here explained by Wiki: Geocaches vary in size, difficulty, and location. Simple caches are often called "drive-bys," "park 'n grabs" (PNGs), or "cache and dash." Geocaches may also be complex, involving lengthy searches or significant travel.
Lengthy searches or significant travel? Sounds like me trying to get to the grocery store!! That's right up my ally. HAhahahahaha.
So...I decided to take a stab at it with the kids in tow. Our first cache that we chose was supposed to be 1/2 mile from our house. We set out at dusk in brutally cold weather the other day expecting to be back warm and cozy to our house within minutes. 1 Hour!!!! and 3 miles later, we eventually gave up the search and headed home. You can see my children were thrilled to be out there...
Actually. it was a great adventure, but WAY too cold. We were all almost in tears by the time we got home - no gloves, no hats, and me in a workout skirt. We arrived home in the dark and with our little geocaching hearts a little cracked.
The next day, we set out again on a new search for a new cache...and EUREKA!!!
I'm assuming this is the simplest cache that we will ever find, but we DID IT!! Unfortunately, we were basically just following a compass on my phone and coordinates did not play a factor in our search.
I am hoping.
I am praying.
I am begging my Sisters of Pain.
Please...Please...Please do not make me do this leg of the race.
Please.
Pretty please.
I will get lost in the desert and die.
Just sayin'.
Wednesday, January 4, 2012
When In Doubt...Look Up
My friend, Brooke, had me thinking the other day. Instead of resolutions, she asks God for a word for the year. Last year her word was Believe (reminds me of Polar Express :-) and this year it's Joy (love this one, too!!)
I didn't ask God for a word, but I think I've been given a phrase: When in Doubt, Look up. Actually, it was on a rickety sign outside of someone's house today when I was papering neighborhoods with boot camp flyers.
Sooooo...maybe it's not directly from God...but it still seems to me to be a pretty good motto.
There were many times this last year when I was in doubt, but stubbornly refused to let it seep in too deeply. Maybe I was looking up on the inside and just didn't always realize it. I think this year I'm going to take it a step further and actually look to Him and "believe" that he wants "joy" in not only Brooke's life, but in mine as well. I find great comfort in knowing that this amazing God wants a relationship with me as much as I want one with Him...and in knowing that he does want me to have Joy...that beautifully mysterious peaceful joy that can only come from Him.
Whoops...here comes my word.
Trust...well THAT just popped into my head right here while I was typing.
Ya...maybe that's my word. Trust. I'll have to ponder that one. Seems to fit rather well with my phrase don't you think?
Well, that was weird...and a little awkward. Sorry for the interruption.
So, I'll start off this update (as that seems to be how my blogging is going lately...little spurts of updates that don't amount to much) with saying that I really hope to blog more frequently sooner rather than later. I miss it. I know I'll eventually get settled into a routine, but right now I feel like I'm spinning around and around.
Ok. Top news is that with help from Good Ol' Nelly, I was the overall winner of my women's NFL pool. Woot!! I'm rollin' in it!
And...I know you all are wondering how the Sign Wars are going.
EVIL sign haters: 3, Me: zero
I'm losing the battle here. I don't get people.
Um...I still have two children. Mai, the athlete, is starting basketball today (I know you're not supposed to label your kids, but I'm gonna) and Jack, the absent minded professor, is starting an after-school class called Mad Science and also just joined the chess club!! What a brainiac!
Me? Glad you asked. I was smart enough to not apply for the 1/2 IM mentor position that I had planned on with TNT this year, but am I smart enough to realize I'm too busy to train for Pac Crest again this year? Hmmm....When in doubt, look up! Consider me looking up right now for some divine advice on this one.
Oh yes!! I love me a cute workout skirt and thanks to my extreme knowledge of everything "Michael", I won a $25 gift card to Road Runner Sports and finally got around to spending my $$ today on this cutie:
These are super comfy!!! I already have one in black, so she's going to surprise me with a new color. I LOVE that my new job(s) require me to wear work out clothes!!! WOOT!!
So??? What's your go to word or phrase for the new year? Don't have one yet? It's still not too late to ask for one :D
Monday, January 2, 2012
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