December Update

So Dr. Phil really inspired me. After my awful November Calendar:



I ran much more in December:



I upped my normal mileage from 3 miles to 5 miles. Long about December 28th my legs were really starting to stay sore for a couple of days past running. Then I noticed my mileage for the month, over 50 miles. That's double what ran in November. That made me happy. I was hoping to get a six mile run in before the end of the year, but I came down with a rotten head cold and the weather SUCKS. It snowed Wednesday morning and was too slick to run outside. I attempted a run today, but got caught in a freak sleet storm, so I only made 3 miles. I'll shoot for 6 on Saturday, and if I make it, I'll sign up for the St. Louis half marathon in April.

Less Of Me to Love

I've noticed my clothes have been fitting better. For a long time we didn't have a scale, so I'm not sure what I topped out at, but I think a safe bet is somewhere in the 230 lb. range. I started noticing my clothes fitting better, so I bought a scale. I'm down to 213 lbs. Now that I finally have a scale, I've re-read the Hacker's Diet. The whole premise is your body is 75% water and your weight at any given time is a reflection of how much water is in your body. A night with a bag of salty chips will cause you to retain water and weigh a little more the next day. To solve this, you monitor your weight on a daily basis then run some fancy math to calculate a weighted average. Then you monitor your trend line to see if you are gaining or losing weight, and to see what your calorie excess/deficit is. It's easier to show you:



A daily deficit of 500 calories will lose you a pound a week. I haven't started on a diet yet, I've basically just been logging how my weight is acting without a diet. I'll probably start by cutting out soda/vitamin water after the first of the year.

Look, Ma, I Have a Running Blog

I had an odd thing happen to me over Christmas weekend. One of my cousins referred to this blog as my "Running Blog". I'd never really thought of this as a running blog before, but looking through my latest posts, it kind of is. I'm not saying that's all I'll ever post here, but maybe this blog has found a purpose. The name even kind of fits. I've found quite a few running blogs that I've been following over the past couple of months for inspiration:

Frayed Laces
This girl is crazy. She's an ultra-marathoner. I'm focusing on just a regular marathon someday, but this girl is a huge inspiration.

Half-Fast
This dude is funny. His writing style is a lot like mine.

MegaNerd Runs
This was not what I thought it was going to be. The MegaNerd is actually a chic. I would have figured a dude. Anyway, she's about ready to run her first marathon, so she's about a year ahead of me on running. It looks like she can cook up a storm, too.

The Booze Hounds Inc. Running Team
Booze. Running. Need I say more?

New Year's Resolutions

Putting more resolutions to digital ink. My three health related resolutions this year are to a) lose about 40 lbs, b) run a half-marathon, and c) do the hundred pushup challenge. I'm really not looking forward to the last one. I hate, hate, HATE pushups. I'm trying to recruit some coworkers to try this with me.

Running Confession

Even though I've run two 5K's in less than two weeks, my running schedule for November left much to be desired. October's training schedule was all pretty, three runs a week, weekends off:

From Blogger Pictures

Some bad weather days and a couple rounds of with a bad back left November looking like this:

From Blogger Pictures

That kind of consistency is never going to get me to a half marathon in April. So I was thinking over the weekend about making a motivational sign to hang, to keep me focused. It was going to be a list of all the reasons I run:


I RUN BECAUSE...
High blood pressure, heart disease and high cholesterol run in my family,
Diabetes and depression run in my family,
I eat and drink too much,
I want to be there for my kids when they are older,
I intend to spend that damn 401K money I'm saving,
I want to play tag with my kids without running out of breath,
I'm really sick and like the feeling of sore legs after a hard run.


I was all set to print that out to motivate me, and that same day I get the following email from a friend:

From Blogger Pictures

I printed that out instead.

P.S. I also run because I ate this for breakfast this morning:

From Blogger Pictures

Yes I'm serious, and yes, that is the most delicious thing I've had for breakfast since I poured chocolate milk over cocoa puffs.