So, I wasn't really sick, I had pink eye. If you don't know what pink eye is, you were never a toddler and/or you never were the parent of a toddler. The point is, I had to take an entire week off yoga and running to prevent the spread of said disease. There are many things about this that stink for me and the rest of the universe. (I will say I still walked a bunch, I did mange to log 16 miles over the week, but I didn't really run and I didn't do yoga at all)
First and foremost, I have a lot of energy. A LOT of energy. I am like that 90's commercial for the energizer bunny, I keep going and going.... I can talk and jump around forever causing all sorts of havoc if I can't exercise. If I don't get my workout in, there is a slight chance that I will start doing push-ups or sit-ups on the floor off my office or, sorry Ryan, I may do them on the floor of some other poor colleague's office. Second, I am able to get out any anger, sadness and general neediness with a good session of yoga or a good run. Less exercise, more time spent talking about "my feelings" with anyone and everyone who will listen (trust me I talk about these things plenty even with my exercise outlet).
So, I was very excited when my antibiotics ran out and I felt safe conquering a short run and a yoga class. I was psyched to redo the beautiful backbend and head stand I had performed just a week and a half earlier. I desperately wanted to up the amount of time I spent at 6.5 miles per hour on the treadmill.
I forgot the main rule of being sick and not exercising, my body was not the same at it was a week earlier and I didn't to do the things I wanted to do with it. Before I started exercising, I forgot that I had eaten loads of cookies, chips and jimmy johns sandwiches while I was sick because I felt sorry for my self and could be bothered to go out. I was a couple pounds heavier than my last attempt at exercise greatness. I forgot that the abdominal muscles have a very short memory and that extra crunches from the week before do not carry over.
I managed to get into a back bend, but it looked more like a deflated balloon than a beautiful wheel. My body didn't even want to go into the headstand. My breathing sounded a wheezing dog than the sound of the ocean (the sound of the ocean is the goal for yogic breathing). As I ran, my body only wanted to go 6 miles per hour and it only wanted to do that for 15 or so minutes before I had to transition to the power walking mode on the treadmill.
This was the kind of workout day that would have sent me further down the spiral of inactivity until I was spending my time sitting on the couch watching Hair Battle Spectacular. That is until I found yoga. Okay, the entire city of Seattle and most of the rest of the country found it first, but I still had to find the studio. Okay, the studio was about 15 blocks away from my house, so I didn't even need to find the studio. Finding yoga was about an unlikely source telling me it was a good idea and deciding that my hamstrings needed some love after so many months of running.
The yoga people have this whole thing about being where you are with your body as it is, everyday. In yoga, you can have an awesome class where you do a headstand one day and be just as awesome sitting in child's pose(the rest pose) half the class, the next. There are no fat days, gross days, I suck at everything days in class. You just are where you are and go with it. And for the next few days, at least, I am going to be slower and less bendy, and I am going to try my yogic brains out to be perfectly okay with that.
Monday, February 21, 2011
Wednesday, February 16, 2011
Illogical Fish Fan (or the story of the tattoo)
I used to hate fish. I grew up in Colorado and our choices of seafood were Long John Silver's and salmon steaks. And I am not sure that either seafood item actually came from anywhere with water. I remember digging into gamey, smelly, reddish, horseshoe shaped salmon steaks and spending the whole meal picking the small bones out of my teeth. Long John Silver's was fine(it is fried seafood like items all put on a plate with fries), but my memories of it were destroyed with the break of the Clarence Thomas scandal.
That all changed in 1992 when I took a trip to Seattle with my family. I was young, adolescent and it was the 90's grunge era. I had six different flannel shirts and would often wear more than one at a time. We went to Pike Place market and I fell in love. These large hunky guys (to my 13 year-old brain) threw around fish and crab and it looked so cool. We went to seafood restaurants and the salmon and crab were amazing. The salmon was flaky and pink and didn't smell like old socks. The dungeoness crab was actually crab and not "artificial crab meat". We went to the coast and I remember the smell of ocean, the seaweed, the tides and the fifteen year-old boy at the campsite across from us.
From that point on, I was determined to move to Seattle. I fell in love with the beauty of the water, the sound of the ocean and of course, "teen spirit"
I had my first crush on a fisherman in 1994. His name was Eamon, and he was the fictional sustanence fisherman from the movie "The Secret of Roan Inish". He was 15 and Irish and he spent most of his time helping his small cousin recreate their family fishing village. I have to admit that I did daydream about going to Ireland, moving to a small fishing village and marrying an Irish man. Too bad the movie was set in the fourties; And, as a 90's grunge girl, I was not cut out for small village life.
Speaking of things I am not cut out for, I next decided to work as a fisherman in Alaska the summer after my senior year in high school. My plan was to be one of the people who gutted the fish on an assembly line. Nevermind that there have been times in my life when my lack of coordination has caused my friends to suggest I have supervision when I use cutlery. Nevermind that I got seasick on a cruise ship only months earlier. I was determined. I was going to gut fish, live in Alaska and live the life of a seaman. Luckily, I did not make enough money to pay for the ticket to Seattle on my own, and my parents were not interested in seeing how many fingers a girl like me would come back with.
Next plan: move to Seattle and marry a fisherman. I transfered from Colorado State University to the University of Puget Sound my junior year of college. I planned to move somewhere close to a port and become like Brandy(immortalized in the one hit wonder by Looking Glass) There were only two problems with this plan(okay, there are several problems with this plan, but these are the most important). One, the University of Puget Sound was in Tacoma (which, coincidently smelled similar to the landlocked Salmon I ate as a kid). Two, there were no fishermen hanging out at the student center of my liberal arts college.
The closest I got to my ocean dream was an interdisciplinary humanities class on Salmon Recovery in the Puget Sound. I built on that with a summer research grant on the Philosophy of Salmon Science(yes, I am that nerdy). It was pretty cool, I went all over the northwest, studied scientific papers on salmon recovery and ATE lots of nummy salmon. By the end of my senior year, I knew when I could get the tastiest salmon(copper river) and which salmon stocks were about to croak. I got to spend days at the offices of the EPA, the intertribal fish commision and the National Marine Fisheries Service(NMFS, try to pronounce the acronym, it sounds dirty ).
As I met tribal members and learned about the commercial fishing tradition in the Northwest, my adolescent obsession became a true love. Salmon tastes amazing, but there are cultural connections to fish in Washington that go back to the earliest Native American Tribes in the state. There are commercial fishing families in Ballard, Edmonds and Bothell that go back generations. I started to read books about salmon and the history of the Columbia River (okay, I read the books I was supposed to read in my interdisciplinary class, but who reads books for class?).
I have developed crushes on other fish over time, but Salmon remains my true love. Hence, the larger that I ever thought it would be tattoo. I got it in law school, I was hoping that the salmon stocks would find it sexy.
Fishy Stuff :
That all changed in 1992 when I took a trip to Seattle with my family. I was young, adolescent and it was the 90's grunge era. I had six different flannel shirts and would often wear more than one at a time. We went to Pike Place market and I fell in love. These large hunky guys (to my 13 year-old brain) threw around fish and crab and it looked so cool. We went to seafood restaurants and the salmon and crab were amazing. The salmon was flaky and pink and didn't smell like old socks. The dungeoness crab was actually crab and not "artificial crab meat". We went to the coast and I remember the smell of ocean, the seaweed, the tides and the fifteen year-old boy at the campsite across from us.
From that point on, I was determined to move to Seattle. I fell in love with the beauty of the water, the sound of the ocean and of course, "teen spirit"
I had my first crush on a fisherman in 1994. His name was Eamon, and he was the fictional sustanence fisherman from the movie "The Secret of Roan Inish". He was 15 and Irish and he spent most of his time helping his small cousin recreate their family fishing village. I have to admit that I did daydream about going to Ireland, moving to a small fishing village and marrying an Irish man. Too bad the movie was set in the fourties; And, as a 90's grunge girl, I was not cut out for small village life.
Speaking of things I am not cut out for, I next decided to work as a fisherman in Alaska the summer after my senior year in high school. My plan was to be one of the people who gutted the fish on an assembly line. Nevermind that there have been times in my life when my lack of coordination has caused my friends to suggest I have supervision when I use cutlery. Nevermind that I got seasick on a cruise ship only months earlier. I was determined. I was going to gut fish, live in Alaska and live the life of a seaman. Luckily, I did not make enough money to pay for the ticket to Seattle on my own, and my parents were not interested in seeing how many fingers a girl like me would come back with.
Next plan: move to Seattle and marry a fisherman. I transfered from Colorado State University to the University of Puget Sound my junior year of college. I planned to move somewhere close to a port and become like Brandy(immortalized in the one hit wonder by Looking Glass) There were only two problems with this plan(okay, there are several problems with this plan, but these are the most important). One, the University of Puget Sound was in Tacoma (which, coincidently smelled similar to the landlocked Salmon I ate as a kid). Two, there were no fishermen hanging out at the student center of my liberal arts college.
The closest I got to my ocean dream was an interdisciplinary humanities class on Salmon Recovery in the Puget Sound. I built on that with a summer research grant on the Philosophy of Salmon Science(yes, I am that nerdy). It was pretty cool, I went all over the northwest, studied scientific papers on salmon recovery and ATE lots of nummy salmon. By the end of my senior year, I knew when I could get the tastiest salmon(copper river) and which salmon stocks were about to croak. I got to spend days at the offices of the EPA, the intertribal fish commision and the National Marine Fisheries Service(NMFS, try to pronounce the acronym, it sounds dirty ).
As I met tribal members and learned about the commercial fishing tradition in the Northwest, my adolescent obsession became a true love. Salmon tastes amazing, but there are cultural connections to fish in Washington that go back to the earliest Native American Tribes in the state. There are commercial fishing families in Ballard, Edmonds and Bothell that go back generations. I started to read books about salmon and the history of the Columbia River (okay, I read the books I was supposed to read in my interdisciplinary class, but who reads books for class?).
I have developed crushes on other fish over time, but Salmon remains my true love. Hence, the larger that I ever thought it would be tattoo. I got it in law school, I was hoping that the salmon stocks would find it sexy.
Fishy Stuff :
- Seafood Watch - I did a large research project on Blue Fin Tuna in law school which cemented my concern about global fish stocks. This site looks at sustainability issues and helps consumers make good choices.
- Intertribal Fish Commission - Northwest Native American views on how to deal with the demise of Salmon in the northwest
- The Secret of Roan Inish - Still one of favorite movies. It is a fairy tale about fishing and a seal woman.
- WWF community Fishing Program
- The Deadliest Catch - umm sweet....but I get to scared to watch.
Monday, February 14, 2011
Not funny at all, but interesting
CDC obesity data
Found this when I was looking up obesity data for the U.S. I am interested in why we are getting fatter, and whether we should care.
When the data came out, media outlets talked about Mississippi as the fattest state and Colorado as the thinnest, but that does seem to accurately portray the 2009 numbers.
The map shows a large rise in rates of obesity in the 50 states over the past 25 years. What I found interesting is that all of the states had a marked increase in obesity rates. Mississippi, the current #1 ranked state was always heavier than #50 Colorado. It seems more important that both states had at least 100% increases over a 20 year period.
The state by state differences have existed since at least 1992, the story over the last 20 years should be focused on the nationwide issues.
I will pontificate on the national issues that have led to current obesity rates later.
- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone
Found this when I was looking up obesity data for the U.S. I am interested in why we are getting fatter, and whether we should care.
When the data came out, media outlets talked about Mississippi as the fattest state and Colorado as the thinnest, but that does seem to accurately portray the 2009 numbers.
The map shows a large rise in rates of obesity in the 50 states over the past 25 years. What I found interesting is that all of the states had a marked increase in obesity rates. Mississippi, the current #1 ranked state was always heavier than #50 Colorado. It seems more important that both states had at least 100% increases over a 20 year period.
The state by state differences have existed since at least 1992, the story over the last 20 years should be focused on the nationwide issues.
I will pontificate on the national issues that have led to current obesity rates later.
- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone
Saturday, February 12, 2011
The one thing diet
After reading almost every diet book in existence, I have decided, aribitrarily, with no scientific proof, that there is a class of diets called the "one thing diet". These diets involve either eating one thing or giving up one thing in an attempt to create perfect health and wellness. For example, Atkins is a one thing diet because it requires you to give up sweet, yummy carbohydrates. Apparently, following this diet makes you full, happy, healthy and thin. The problem with Atkins is two-fold. First, most of the people I know who have used Atkins do not get enough fiber and and have to take laxatives. Ewwww..... Second, sugar tastes good, and as soon as that large chocolate cake with super chocolately fudgy frosting comes by on the dessert tray, Atkins ceases to exist.
The low-fat diet is another example of the one thing diet. Really, it makes sense when you think about it, removing fat from your diet should remove fat from your body. And fat is 9 stinking calories per gram (compared to 4 calories per gram for protein and carbohydrates), so it seems like another brilliant way to get thin, and become extremely attractive to anyone you meet. But, as with carbs, FAT tastes good and low-fat foods generally taste horrible. So, when you are at the restaurant choosing between the lean turkey burger and the fatty, fat burger with a side of mayo, it gets increasingly difficult to choose the low-fat option.
The other class of one thing diet, is the "only eat this" and life will be perfect, diet. I think there is a cabbage diet, several bar and shake diets and I think I once heard of an ice cream diet. I have tried two of these fun eating regimes. They both involved drinking a large amount of juice for a couple of days and eating nothing else. They were supposed to "detoxify" my body, make me lose weight, etc..... The problem was that the only toxin that left my body using the juice diets was WATER, and I am pretty fricking sure that water is not a toxic substance. I also noticed that eating a very small amount of food every day made me kind of crabby. It is not really a surprise that not eating enough turns a nice ordinary overweight citizen into a mean person. But I guess the point is that you can be a hot, thin, mean person. I'd rather be nice and overweight, thank-you very much.
So after realizing that the other one thing diets sucked, I decided to go on a mission to create my own, "one thing diet". Okay, it was more like I was desperately giving up random things in an effort to lose a couple of pounds, and my colleague started asking me, "what are you giving up today?" in an overly sarcastic voice. After a couple of weeks of general office harrassment, I decided to just go with it. The idea was that I would give up one bad thing everyday, it would change up and this would gradually make me a happier, heathier person. The diet started out great. I would give up alcohol one day, sugar another, fried foods on Thursday, coffee the next (just kidding, I live in Seattle, we don't give up coffee). I think it was working to a degree, I was more conscious of what I ate and I was giving of something unhealthy every day.
The problem came when I realized that my diet had way too much flexibility. I had the power to give up anything I wanted, right? And that is when the diet devolved. I am still following the one thing diet....and this is what I gave up last week:
The low-fat diet is another example of the one thing diet. Really, it makes sense when you think about it, removing fat from your diet should remove fat from your body. And fat is 9 stinking calories per gram (compared to 4 calories per gram for protein and carbohydrates), so it seems like another brilliant way to get thin, and become extremely attractive to anyone you meet. But, as with carbs, FAT tastes good and low-fat foods generally taste horrible. So, when you are at the restaurant choosing between the lean turkey burger and the fatty, fat burger with a side of mayo, it gets increasingly difficult to choose the low-fat option.
The other class of one thing diet, is the "only eat this" and life will be perfect, diet. I think there is a cabbage diet, several bar and shake diets and I think I once heard of an ice cream diet. I have tried two of these fun eating regimes. They both involved drinking a large amount of juice for a couple of days and eating nothing else. They were supposed to "detoxify" my body, make me lose weight, etc..... The problem was that the only toxin that left my body using the juice diets was WATER, and I am pretty fricking sure that water is not a toxic substance. I also noticed that eating a very small amount of food every day made me kind of crabby. It is not really a surprise that not eating enough turns a nice ordinary overweight citizen into a mean person. But I guess the point is that you can be a hot, thin, mean person. I'd rather be nice and overweight, thank-you very much.
So after realizing that the other one thing diets sucked, I decided to go on a mission to create my own, "one thing diet". Okay, it was more like I was desperately giving up random things in an effort to lose a couple of pounds, and my colleague started asking me, "what are you giving up today?" in an overly sarcastic voice. After a couple of weeks of general office harrassment, I decided to just go with it. The idea was that I would give up one bad thing everyday, it would change up and this would gradually make me a happier, heathier person. The diet started out great. I would give up alcohol one day, sugar another, fried foods on Thursday, coffee the next (just kidding, I live in Seattle, we don't give up coffee). I think it was working to a degree, I was more conscious of what I ate and I was giving of something unhealthy every day.
The problem came when I realized that my diet had way too much flexibility. I had the power to give up anything I wanted, right? And that is when the diet devolved. I am still following the one thing diet....and this is what I gave up last week:
- Monday - Pilsners
- Tuesday - Sugar Packets (not the sugar from a cannister or the cubes, just the packets)
- Wednesday - Boones
- Thursday - Vegetables (okay, that one was really bad)
- Friday - Burger King (this one might have actually been tough if I had eaten at a Burger King in the last 10 years)
Friday, February 11, 2011
Go Go Gadget Girl
My colleague is a barefoot runner and occassionally will wear a watch. He is the ultimate minimalist runner. He looks like he is running when he is out on the trail. I, on the other hand, look like I am auditioning for the next installment of the Inspector Gadget movie franchise. Inspector Gadget had to run as well, Right?
I choose to bring the world with me when I run. At the very minimum, I wear a GPS watch, a heart rate monitor, a foot pod (a device that calculates my mileage, if God forbid, the GPS watch fails) and my Ipod. At times, on my long runs, add a cell phone, my water bottle and a pink camoflauge fanny pack (Fanny Packs are back in, I swear.) There are literally times when I am unable to go on my run because I cannot find part of my equipment. I mean, what if the distance from my house to Golden Gardens suddenly changes? Or what if my GPS stops working for a milisecond and I don't have an alternative way of tracking the distance I have already memorized. And the worst case scenario, what if I don't have my Ipod and someone needs me to look up the lyrics to whatever I am singing out load as they pass me on the trail?
My colleague, the minimalist runner, thinks that all these devices add enough weight to my body that they are actually causing me to run slower. He has also noted that it is possible to run without a constant string of tunes playing in one's ear. I choose to not believe his overhyped rhetoric. So, if you see me on the trail, bob your head along to my awesome rendition of "Cheeseburger in Paradise" or "It's the end of the world" and I will be okay when you turn your head away and pretend you don't know the girl with the camo fanny pack.
(Go to www.clifbar.com if you want the shotbloks, www.apple.com for the ipod, www.runningwarehouse.com for everything else except the iPod cover, www.belkin.com.
Running Warehouse and Clif Bar ROCK (and I hope they don't get mad at me for using their pictures))
I choose to bring the world with me when I run. At the very minimum, I wear a GPS watch, a heart rate monitor, a foot pod (a device that calculates my mileage, if God forbid, the GPS watch fails) and my Ipod. At times, on my long runs, add a cell phone, my water bottle and a pink camoflauge fanny pack (Fanny Packs are back in, I swear.) There are literally times when I am unable to go on my run because I cannot find part of my equipment. I mean, what if the distance from my house to Golden Gardens suddenly changes? Or what if my GPS stops working for a milisecond and I don't have an alternative way of tracking the distance I have already memorized. And the worst case scenario, what if I don't have my Ipod and someone needs me to look up the lyrics to whatever I am singing out load as they pass me on the trail?
My colleague, the minimalist runner, thinks that all these devices add enough weight to my body that they are actually causing me to run slower. He has also noted that it is possible to run without a constant string of tunes playing in one's ear. I choose to not believe his overhyped rhetoric. So, if you see me on the trail, bob your head along to my awesome rendition of "Cheeseburger in Paradise" or "It's the end of the world" and I will be okay when you turn your head away and pretend you don't know the girl with the camo fanny pack.
Wednesday, February 9, 2011
Poses for my Yoga Studio
When I open my own Yoga studio, years in the future, I will include these poses to make beginners and people like me feel better about themselves:
Real yoga poses and links to information about this life changing activity can be found at yogajournal.com
Real yoga poses and links to information about this life changing activity can be found at yogajournal.com
- Full Moon - This pose involves wearing skin tight pants that are too small while executing a forward bend, nuff said
- Flat Tire - There is a beautiful pose called wheel in yoga. It involves doing a full back bend, it looks gorgeous and feels great on the back. Flat tire is the pose that happens when either the arms, legs or butt won't lift all the way or at all.
- Blow Out - This is a pose that is nastily created by slipping and falling in one's own sweat while attempting wheel.
- Peeing Dog - This pose is halfway between downward dog and three-legged dog. The leg lifts, but it does not bend back beautifully in the air behind you.
- The Elaine Dancer - This pose is a variation of dancer. The legs are the same but the outstretched arm flails in an odd way behind the practitioner
- Forest Pose - This is just sickenly cute, it is the pose that involves both my preschooler and I having our legs in Tree Pose while holding hands.
- Zombie Pose (reanimated corpse) - This pose is executed by either sneezing or getting a really bad itch during corpse pose.
Monday, February 7, 2011
The story of my first 20 minute run - or seriously if I can run, most people can run
It was a saturday morning, during the spring. I was wearing my best pair of brown old woman sweat pants and an oversized orange long sleeved t-shirt. My shoes were the fancy $20 kind from the local Big-5 sports store. My hair was tied back in a sexy ponytail with a regular rubber-band. I tied my shoes and despite looking like I was needing to get back to the mental hospital, I went outside anyway.
I live very close to the sound, I am eight blocks away from the ship canal and four miles away from a beach that overlooks the sound. Instead of enjoying the beautiful scenery, I decided to run a loop that showcased the warehouse district by my house and the local Safeway.
When I started my run, I was determined to run 3.1 miles. I had run little spurts of a block or so and decided that I was ready to take the plunge and do a 5k. As I finished my first block, I decided that I was going to run 2 miles, or maybe 1.5 miles and it was going to be fabulous. When I run now, my feet lift and fly past each other as I move towards my destination. As I ran that morning, my feet did this weird shuffle hop thing. one foot would move a little, fall, as the other foot lifted and did the same thing. I am sure it looked awesome. It was a real self-esteem booster when several joggers, some who must have been octogenarians, glided by me as if I was standing still.
At about mile .75, when I went under the Ballard Bridge and turned onto 15th street, as the exhaust from the cars wafted nicely in my nose, my back got that special twinge. The pain wasn't bad enough to stop me, but it hurt. I bent over, and now was sweaty, hunchbacked and shuffling.
Next came the side pain, you all know the one. It feels like you are getting a message from God on the side of your waist telling you that running is not something meant to be done by human beings. The side pain slowed me down a bit. But at that point, I was rounding by the Safeway and was almost home, at mile 1.
I kept going, I don't know why, except that I really wanted to be able to run a mile and a half without stopping. I started walking at about 1.25 miles, when I got to the park by my house. I took off my shoes and immediately sat down. When I tried to stand up, I realized that my back had gone out. And it was out for the next three or four days. I actually went to court on Monday morning hunched over and unable to fully stand up to address the judge.
And two weeks later, I said to myself, I did that, I might as well do it again. One day something just clicked and my feet moved and my body moved and I didn't end up injured at the end.....but more on that later.
Here is a video of the run I should have done that first time: Golden Gardens at Sunrise
I live very close to the sound, I am eight blocks away from the ship canal and four miles away from a beach that overlooks the sound. Instead of enjoying the beautiful scenery, I decided to run a loop that showcased the warehouse district by my house and the local Safeway.
When I started my run, I was determined to run 3.1 miles. I had run little spurts of a block or so and decided that I was ready to take the plunge and do a 5k. As I finished my first block, I decided that I was going to run 2 miles, or maybe 1.5 miles and it was going to be fabulous. When I run now, my feet lift and fly past each other as I move towards my destination. As I ran that morning, my feet did this weird shuffle hop thing. one foot would move a little, fall, as the other foot lifted and did the same thing. I am sure it looked awesome. It was a real self-esteem booster when several joggers, some who must have been octogenarians, glided by me as if I was standing still.
At about mile .75, when I went under the Ballard Bridge and turned onto 15th street, as the exhaust from the cars wafted nicely in my nose, my back got that special twinge. The pain wasn't bad enough to stop me, but it hurt. I bent over, and now was sweaty, hunchbacked and shuffling.
Next came the side pain, you all know the one. It feels like you are getting a message from God on the side of your waist telling you that running is not something meant to be done by human beings. The side pain slowed me down a bit. But at that point, I was rounding by the Safeway and was almost home, at mile 1.
I kept going, I don't know why, except that I really wanted to be able to run a mile and a half without stopping. I started walking at about 1.25 miles, when I got to the park by my house. I took off my shoes and immediately sat down. When I tried to stand up, I realized that my back had gone out. And it was out for the next three or four days. I actually went to court on Monday morning hunched over and unable to fully stand up to address the judge.
And two weeks later, I said to myself, I did that, I might as well do it again. One day something just clicked and my feet moved and my body moved and I didn't end up injured at the end.....but more on that later.
Here is a video of the run I should have done that first time: Golden Gardens at Sunrise
Exercise
After a few difficult weeks in my personal and work life, I decided that what I really need is a few kick butt weeks of sweat and movement. My dad always used to say that exercise would cure everything. He would suggest exercise as a cure for things that didn't always make sense, and we would often create even more ridiculous scenarios that exercise could cure. I remember once feeling awful, with a bad cold, and not being very interested in my dad's suggestion that getting out and training would somehow make my headache and runny nose go awayy. Got a broken leg, "just bike it off", need a new job, "take a run instead." As long as I was willing to break a sweat and discuss philosophy at the dinner table, life was good in the Bennett household(okay, my childhood was good anyway, no . My dad has calmed down as he has gotten older, he believes in rest days and taking care of one's self as a way to health. But he has a point about exercise as a cure all. I have found over the last year especially, that movement is key to emotional and physical health.
When I have a stressful day, I go to yoga and it helps me feel refreshed and meditative.
When I am stuffed up, I run and my body feels less congested.
When I am hurt, I run and pretend that I am running away from the person who hurt me and I feel a sense of catharsis as I go.
When I feel weak, I move my body into a pose, like a headstand, that I was previously unable to achieve and I feel strong.
When I feel old, I run as fast as I can, smile as I go, and I feel young again.
When my mind is racing, I go to yoga, and it stops racing for an hour and a hald.
Exercise is not a cure all. It can't give money to the poor, fix a broken leg or the flu, but if you have never worked out issues in your physical and emotional life through sweat, I urge you to give exercise a try.
When I have a stressful day, I go to yoga and it helps me feel refreshed and meditative.
When I am stuffed up, I run and my body feels less congested.
When I am hurt, I run and pretend that I am running away from the person who hurt me and I feel a sense of catharsis as I go.
When I feel weak, I move my body into a pose, like a headstand, that I was previously unable to achieve and I feel strong.
When I feel old, I run as fast as I can, smile as I go, and I feel young again.
When my mind is racing, I go to yoga, and it stops racing for an hour and a hald.
Exercise is not a cure all. It can't give money to the poor, fix a broken leg or the flu, but if you have never worked out issues in your physical and emotional life through sweat, I urge you to give exercise a try.
Saturday, February 5, 2011
Where did the nickname red come from
It happened at band camp....it involves my lack of ability to tell the difference between red and magenta...and frankly that is all anyone ever needs to know
- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone
- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone
Current List of AWESOME food policy books I am reading...reviews to follow
1) Safe food: The Politics of Food Safety by Marion Nestle - It is disturbing enough that it is almost a diet book. Best line so far, "Irradiated poop is still poop"
2) The End of Overeating by David Kessler - Once again disturbing, but because of its descriptions of how the food industry entices us to eat fatty, salty, sugary food, you will gain 10 pounds while reading
this book.
this book.
3) The World is Fat by Barry Popkin - obesity rates in America have gone from 8% to almost 30% in the last 30 years, this book will apparently tell me why. I vote for poverty and high food prices(but I am a liberal, so of course that is what I believe).
4) Food and Philosophy - Haven't gotten into it, we shall see if it is as bad as the other "Philosophy and __________" books
5) The Way we Eat by Peter Singer and Jim Mason - Peter Singer does not eat meat and is a utilitarian (In short: the greatest good for the greatest number), I eat meat and am not a utilitarian, but he writes interesting books.
Weight-Loss...or why I stopped worrying and learned to run.
I discovered I had gotten fat somewhere around my 26th birthday. I looked at a picture of myself from a birthday party and did not see a waistline. Instead, I saw ill fitting jeans and a really lame t-shirt that did not cover up my increasingly I had been fat for the three years prior to making this discovery, but the plus sized clothing and the wrenching pains in my knees really had no effect on me. When I looked in the mirror, I saw the cute, pain-in-the-ass 22 year-old who could drink anyone under the table and still not gain a pound. Unfortunately, that 22 year-old had gotten older, developed hypothyroidism, and, had not stopped eating and drinking her friends under the table when her metabolism had stopped cooperating.
I really was mad at 22-year-old me, but decided that I would not deal with my issues because I was going to be an enlightened 21st century, don't mess with me "fat girl". I planned to embrace my weight, attempt to eat a little better and live with fat pride.I also wanted to buck the yo-yo dieting trend that seemed to make every woman in my parent's generation go back and forth between Kate Moss and Roseanne Arnold. I found the entire idea of moving back and forth between a life where I hated eating to one where I despised how I looked, nauseating. This don't care attitude was great for the self esteem, but fracking horrible on the knees and the back. And it also sucked that I moved slower than my thin friends, and couldn't shop in normal clothing stores. My stay fat plan, lasted about 2 years.
Plan B was to find the most awesome fad diet ever, lose the weight in an entirely unhealthy way and then make the slow transition back to normal eating without regaining the weight. I LOVED, and still LOVE reading the diet books. Diet books are the cable news of nutrition. They provide endless hours of edutainment, and don't bog down the material with factual information. I tried Atkins, Sonoma, South Beach, various "Detox Diets" (P.S. Detox just means "this diet will make you poop a lot") and even Slim Fast. I lasted at least an hour on plan. Usually by the end of the day, I was getting bogged down in the reality that I what I was doing eating gross food and following ridiculous advice from a variety of experts whose main goal was to live the American Dream by making a lot of money selling diet books.
Then I tried Weight Watchers, it works and is not a fad diet. Mostly because it works on the basic principle that if you eat less and exercise more, you will lose weight. The problem for me, on any diet, including the rational ones, is that I really ENJOY food and dessert and beer and all of those things that I had to eat less of to lose weight.
And this is when I discovered running. I had been walking, using the Wii and taking the stairs to get in my "30 minutes of movement on most days" But all of those things only provided me about 200 extra calories a day. That is ONE pint of beer or half a cookie at the awesome bakery down the street. Running gives me 750 calories an hour, I can do it anywhere and I can drink a beer after I am done(okay maybe after I have a glass of water). I lost 30 pounds (but gained it all back plus 20 during pregnancy) with the diets. I have lost 60 pounds with running and get to eat what I want. I still write down all of my calories (because believe me, if I could eat 10,000 delicious calories a day without gaining weight, I probably would), but I now can focus on other aspects of what goes into my mouth rather than, "will this make me fatter".
And the awesome thing with running is that once you get over the back, knee and side pain, it gets into your blood. Jumping on the treadmill at the end of a hard day starts feeling almost as good as a chocolate bar or a dip in a hot tub. There is something about making your body temporarily fly through the air as you move from step to step that provides a combination of energy, meditation and catharsis.
More to come on running and weight-loss later....
I really was mad at 22-year-old me, but decided that I would not deal with my issues because I was going to be an enlightened 21st century, don't mess with me "fat girl". I planned to embrace my weight, attempt to eat a little better and live with fat pride.I also wanted to buck the yo-yo dieting trend that seemed to make every woman in my parent's generation go back and forth between Kate Moss and Roseanne Arnold. I found the entire idea of moving back and forth between a life where I hated eating to one where I despised how I looked, nauseating. This don't care attitude was great for the self esteem, but fracking horrible on the knees and the back. And it also sucked that I moved slower than my thin friends, and couldn't shop in normal clothing stores. My stay fat plan, lasted about 2 years.
Plan B was to find the most awesome fad diet ever, lose the weight in an entirely unhealthy way and then make the slow transition back to normal eating without regaining the weight. I LOVED, and still LOVE reading the diet books. Diet books are the cable news of nutrition. They provide endless hours of edutainment, and don't bog down the material with factual information. I tried Atkins, Sonoma, South Beach, various "Detox Diets" (P.S. Detox just means "this diet will make you poop a lot") and even Slim Fast. I lasted at least an hour on plan. Usually by the end of the day, I was getting bogged down in the reality that I what I was doing eating gross food and following ridiculous advice from a variety of experts whose main goal was to live the American Dream by making a lot of money selling diet books.
Then I tried Weight Watchers, it works and is not a fad diet. Mostly because it works on the basic principle that if you eat less and exercise more, you will lose weight. The problem for me, on any diet, including the rational ones, is that I really ENJOY food and dessert and beer and all of those things that I had to eat less of to lose weight.
And this is when I discovered running. I had been walking, using the Wii and taking the stairs to get in my "30 minutes of movement on most days" But all of those things only provided me about 200 extra calories a day. That is ONE pint of beer or half a cookie at the awesome bakery down the street. Running gives me 750 calories an hour, I can do it anywhere and I can drink a beer after I am done(okay maybe after I have a glass of water). I lost 30 pounds (but gained it all back plus 20 during pregnancy) with the diets. I have lost 60 pounds with running and get to eat what I want. I still write down all of my calories (because believe me, if I could eat 10,000 delicious calories a day without gaining weight, I probably would), but I now can focus on other aspects of what goes into my mouth rather than, "will this make me fatter".
And the awesome thing with running is that once you get over the back, knee and side pain, it gets into your blood. Jumping on the treadmill at the end of a hard day starts feeling almost as good as a chocolate bar or a dip in a hot tub. There is something about making your body temporarily fly through the air as you move from step to step that provides a combination of energy, meditation and catharsis.
More to come on running and weight-loss later....
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| Post-Running |
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| Pre Running |
Anne Lamott,blogging and discipline
One of my favorite authors, Anne Lamott, spoke at Seattle University this morning. I think she resonates with so many people, especially women, because she is the person we see underneath the layers of self-doubt and attempts to try and impress the world. She tells people that it is okay to fail, it is okay to admit that we are not perfect, it is okay to be emotional and angry and happy. And it is okay to move through life without a well built plan for how to get from point to the next.
I love reading her books and seeing her speak because she is like me, all over the place, hard to pin down and yet full of life and energy. She, like me, seems to be in about 100 places at once and is passionate about everything that she does. I carry her passion for life, but I discovered in her talk today, what she has that has moved her from spirited observer to someone who is able to provide so much to the world around her. Anne Lamott has created discipline in her life: she mediates the same time every day, writes the same time every day and has routines that help her put all of the jumbled up pieces together.
I have the desire, the love and the spirit, but I am lacking the discipline. I will sometimes come up with four or more books that I want to write in a day, I will make an amazing discovery about my feelings on life, love or exercise, but I don't have the discipline necessary to carry out my dreams. But as in all inefficient journeys, I realize that it is not too late for me to start a disciplined practice and stick with it. I am going to start my journey to a free-spirited, passionate but disciplined life by writing in my blog at least once a day. Hey, if I can update my Facebook status multiple times a day, I should definitely be able to blog about my life in the evenings.
If you have not read Anne Lamott, here is a link to Travelling Mercies, a book that changed my life during a very difficult time. Travelling Mercies
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