Not so fast there, friend, aka, me.

Okay.

So today was Week 6, Day 1. I had some pretty positive thoughts about it and didn't think it would be too bad since there wasn't too much addition to the distance. Yeahhhhhh, about that....I was wrong. Since my train of thought was that it wouldn't be that bad, especially because of the walking, I wanted today to start building up my speed. The first half mile I was done in about 6 minutes, which I was pretty impressed! So I slowed down a bit for the walking in order to rest up enough to tackle the 3/4 mile section. I started off pretty strong, but it felt like it lasted FOREVER! So I get to the next walking segment (yay!) and think that it won't be that bad because it's just another 1/2 mile. It wasn't too bad, but the last 15th of a mile bout killed me haha. When I uploaded my race info, my little line chart was good until the last part and it was another big ole dip haha. But here's the stats for today's run: 3.13 miles (warm up and cool down and walking around the crosswalk until the light changed that took FOREVER), 44:39 minutes, an average of 14:15 per mile (probably because of the slower walking), and 450 calories. Not too bad, but maybe Wednesday will be a little bit easier. :)

I've put up a picture of Henry, so here's Millie. This is right after she got her summer haircut at the beginning of summer (she usually has long/shaggy hair). When I picked her up from the groomers I definitely laughed pretty loud. She looked so naked! And she wasn't entirely sure about the lessening of hair, either haha. But isn't she just so freaking cute?!

HONK!

Well, I got through Week 5 Day 3. What a killer. Not only was I grumpy the whole time, but it was TOUGH! Some of it was just me being in a bad mood, but boy, I pretty much wanted to quit. I mean, I was being a little dramatic, but a little not. Hahah. I got through it, at a not fast pace of 4.5 mph (I started at 5.0 mph but it was just not gonna happen the whole way). I burned 219 calories, ran 2.53 miles, in 36:02 minutes. I think I wanna start running longer runs outside. Inside is SO monotonous, and there is never a downhill to catch your breath and some motivation on. Since I've had a little recovery time, I can say that I'm really glad I ran, and that I'm proud of myself and want to keep going. Thank god I've got my geese!!

In other news, today's class was boring and tedious simultaneously. We are learning how to read heart monitor strips, and the class set up is just completely not logical. So there was that. Plus I asked Natasha for my schedule AGAIN. And she still doesn't have it. It is done, just not with her and not online in the computer staffing program. Sigh. So I know I work Wednesday. And pray I don't have a weekend shift. Not only is all the vocare stuff going on, which is fun and social, but it's my older brother's birthday dinner Sunday night. Grrr.

Random picture time. Here is one of me and my little brother on the first day of school. I was going to 5th grade... Patrick was going to 1st. Please notice how we are the same height. Hahah. The pic isn't great quality, as I scanned it from the original.

Ima lobster/gym issues

Okay so its not that bad but the last two days I have gotten A LOT of sun. I did my week 5 day 3 yesterday and went swimming for 4-5 hours so I got fairly red. Then today I went running during the hottest part of the day, around 3ish. Because I had run yesterday I could feel my arms baking. So from now on I'm either going to be a little more careful of when I run or get some sunscreen.

So Week 6 Day 1. It went pretty well. I was glad to have the walking break in there. My calves didn't hurt as bad today so that was good. I need to try and figure out what I can do to alleviate the burning or just make them stronger so it doesn't hurt as bad. All in all a very positive run I would say.

I'm really itching to get in the gym and lift some weights but money is a little sparse right now. But I think a gym membership might be in the works in the next cpl months. I also am trying to think of where in Valdosta has a lap pool and the only places I can think of are the YMCA and the VSU rec center. And the rec center is the only one to have an indoor pool. So right now it is the leading candidate. The downside is that they have limited hours for alumni and the general hours of operation are very sporadic due to holidays and winter break and summer break etc.

Anyway here are a cpl pics of the floor plan:

this is the 1st floor with the 3 basketball courts and 3 racquet ball courts, as well as the aerobics classroom, locker rooms, rock climbing wall and pool.

this is the 2nd floor with a walking/running track highlighted in blue (it looks down onto the courts which is cool) also this is where all the actual weight lifting machines are and treadmills and cardio equipment is. And the rock climbing wall comes up through to the 2nd floor near the cardio machines, its that open space just left of the bottom left corner of the track. It is a pretty sweet place and I've spent many a hour there back in the day when i was actually working out.

till next time

Matt

maybe I should be more specific....

Okay, so Matt has run in the rain a couple of times now, and every time I think it's going to rain when I run, it doesn't. So I was totally looking forward to running in the rain. So much so that when I went to sleep Thursday night, I was hoping that it was going to rain when I ran on Friday. When the dogs woke me up about 6:30 it was a nice rain and I was okay with that and thought it would be nice to run in. When I got up a couple of hours later, it was POURING. Well, I asked for it, so I might as well run in it, right? The minute I walk outside, it stops. For about 30 seconds. And then the heavens opened and I was soaked soon after. I rain in TORRENTIAL rain. And I kinda liked it. ;) But I was definitely hoping for a lighter rain haha. But the best part was that as I was running, I passed a house where a nice looking elderly man had come outside with his umbrella in his red flannel pj pants and a beige sweatshirt to get his paper and says to me, "A little wet today, huh?" I just answered with a smile, "Yes, sir!" Haha - that was definitely the good moment. :)

Now on to the actual run....oy vey. It was difficult, that's for sure. I was betting on about 40 minutes or so to get through both the warm up and cool down walks and the actual 2 miles. The first mile went pretty well - the second mile, now that was the hard part. I had to stop a couple of times and stretch out my calves a little bit. They were just not happy with me. So as I was going down the street and looking at my Nike+ wristband counting my mileage, I kept thinking that I was going faster than I really was and I should just circle back so that I wasn't doing a forever long cool down walk back to my house. I circled around about three times haha. My first mile was a pretty good pace, but the second mile was definitely the old man shuffle, without a doubt. I think that was the first time that I was really incredibly ready to be done.....oy vey! So I said I thought I'd get done in about 40 minutes, right? Oh it was 34:24 minutes for 2.58 miles and 371 calories burned with an average pace of 13:18 a mile. Yay! I wasn't happy about the stopping and stretching parts or the old man shuffles (I set some high expectations for myself sometimes), but overall I was happy with myself. And the rain? Oh, yeah - this is what I looked like when I was done:

The shirt grew a few sizes, for sure - I promise it's not that long! Nor is it that dark - this is a really light grey shirt and baby pink shorts, not that pretty regular pink color. (If you can't tell, I promise there was a definite color change!) I'm excited to see how much improvement I get done next week just b/c it's more running and a longer distance. My goal is to pick up my pace and to get at ease with running outside. So we'll see what happens!:)

And on a completely unrelated note, FSU's first game is against Miami on Labor Day and in honor of that I bought a new tshirt. I liked the front and never unfolded it to see the back until just now when I got home and got even more excited about it when I saw the back. So here ya go Matt! :)

Front Back

GO NOLES! :)

I about didn't make it today

Today was week 5 day 3 for me and it was really tough. This week I've run a total of 9ish miles, from last Saturday's 5k to today's 2 miler. And that is NOT including the walking segments of the training days. So I think I may have over exerted myself some. Today's run my calves (calf's?) were burning almost from the start so I really wasn't sure if I was going to make it. But I settled into a little bit faster pace than the old man shuffle and just went for it. Soon enough 8 laps became 4 laps left then 3, then 2, then 1. It was probably my slowest time in a while. Something like 38 mins to do 10 laps (1 warm up lap + 8 running laps + 1 cool down lap).

So before I left the house to run my sister called me and told me that she needed me to watch my oldest nephew, Tucker, for a few hours today. While I love my nephew, I don't so well with last minute changes and I had planned on having most of the day with no plans. So I did my run and tried to put it out of my mind and when I got home I called my sister to have Tucker bring his swimming trunks because I thought we could go swimming at the Jester's. But it turns out I didn't need to watch my nephew so I spent the afternoon at the Jester's swimming. Which was awesome because A) I love swimming and 2) it gave me a chance to stretch in the pool which is much easier than in...air...? easier than in not pool....you get my meaning.

And in closing since I forgot to take a picture of the Jester's pool here is a place where I would like to go swimming. I don't know where it is just a picture I found on the interwebs.

Pretty huh?

Matt

Slow and steady wins the race

Yeah I was forced into running slowly for the second half of my Week 5 Day 2 workout. I was going strong for the first half, at a decent pace of 5.0 mph. And then the walking segment was also going well... and then I had 4 sips of water. Bad idea. About 0.1 mile into the last running part I got some side stitches from hell. I tried to keep going at the 5.0 pace and lasted another 0.12 miles, then dropped down to 4.5 mph for the rest of the running. All in all I burned 203 calories, went 2.56 miles, in 36:58 minutes. Woot.

I am like... a fan of the couch to 5 K, on facebook. They post articles pretty much every day. What I've read so far has been good, even though I am sometimes suspicious, from a nursing standpoint, of the validity of some sports/exercise articles. But so far I like these.

I am pretty sure I had a lot more to write about but forgot it. So. Here is a picture of my mom's dog, back when she was a puppy. You cannot tell from this picture what an awesome dog she is. Her name is Kenzie, and her ears move independently from each other, like little satellite dishes on top of her head. Also, she has an almost constant sarcastic smirk on her face (developed after puppy-hood, during which she usually just looked terrified). She also goes by Foxy Woxy and Mrs. Boodle. Both characters from somewhat obscure books. The second picture is when I made her stand between two reindeer around Christmas time. She was thoroughly unamused; I was thoroughly amused.

Big ol' fat rain

So today should have been my Week 5 Day 3 but like a dummy I did Week 5 Day 1 twice. So today I did Week 5 Day 2 and it was awesome! I say that not because I kicked the run's ass or anything, the run was actually pretty tough. It was awesome because I got to run in the rain! It was coming down HARD too. See this picture:
Yeah that shirt was a blueish grey and the shorts just regular grey. I was raining water out of my shirt as I ran. Here is another crazy pic.


That pile is everything I had on while I was running. I know shoes weigh a lot anyway but all that weighed 6.5 lbs!

So as you guys know I've been having a rough week. But I think I turned a corner today as I was running in the rain. I told Liz W that the run was very cathartic for me mentally and emotionally. I felt very cleansed after. All in all I did 2 3/4 miles (including a 1/4 mile warm up and a 1/4 mile cool down) in approx 36 mins. A pretty good days work.

Matt
-- Post From My iPhone