Back On The Pavement

This morning’s pre-workout snack was a repeat of yesterday but instead of heading to the fitness center I had previously decided on a 3 mile run outdoors.  My last outdoor run was back on the day before my move so it had been about easily over a week.  With my 5K looming large on Saturday I wanted to make sure running on the treadmill in my fitness center hadn’t screwed up my normal running on pavement.  By the time I woke up it was already 10am and thankfully the weather didn’t appear too bad yet.

The 72 degrees was probably thanks to the massive, intense rain storm that blew threw last night.  When I stepped outside in my shorts and t-shirt I was actually momentarily chilled but I knew that wouldn’t last long.  In case we haven’t already had this conversation, I am constantly, predictably cold.  I bring sweatshirts to the grocery store to shop comfortably and pretty much never enter a restaurant without a sweater and pants on.  However, with running, I know I’m going to heat up so I just take the initial chill with a grain of salt.

As Jack and I were running along the river on the trail we weaved in and out of the woods and through fields and just as we were turning around to head back to the apartment a few deer crossed the path ahead of us and went bounding away.  It was a cool sight to see.  There were a few muddy patches which was a little dicey to run over but all in all, the run went really well.  It ended up being 3.05 miles with an average pace of 7.2mph.  Bring it on Saturday!  I have a date with my first 5K race!

We showered when we got home and then started making lunch since we were in need of refueling.  We made sandwiches since that didn’t require much of anything in the way of pots, pans, spatulas, etc.  Mine had spicy southwestern mustard, honey ham, colby jack cheese, romaine lettuce, red onion, and tomato on it.  May I just say yum?

I paired it with some animal crackers (Jack has almost five pounds of them thanks to Sam’s Club), tiny twist pretzels, an apple, and a pickle.  Great lunch.

While Jack was unpacking and organizing his apartment I spent some time watching old Hell’s Kitchen episodes on Hulu and Stumbling on the internet.  I came across this nice site that had a whole bunch of ways to craft an exceptional life.  Today I have done numbers 1, 5, 6, 9 (puuuuhleeeease, like this was even a challenge, I drink more H2O than anyone you know), 17, 20, 23 (except it was running), 24, 28, 31, 32, 33, 34, 35, 36, 39, and 47.  That is 17 out of 57.  Not too shabby though let me say that some I would never have to chance to do in a normal day, like tipping a taxi driver well (#48).  When do I ever use a taxi??  Anyways, it’s a great way to add some new worthy goals into your day so check it out.

While undoing some boxes Jack came across an exercise ball that needed to be blown up.  After making sure it didn’t have any large, glaring holes or rips he handed off the pump to me and I spent the next forever fifteen minutes getting a nice upper body workout.  When the ball was at its full capacity, or at least what we deemed its full capacity to be, I removed the air hose only to realize that there was no plug.  Awesome.  Wait, Jack says, what’s that?  There is a hole that needs to be stuffed or covered?  You know what that’s a job for: electrical tape!

So we Xed it and at the moment it seems to be holding together well.  We’ll see how long it lasts.  I really think moving makes you much more MacGyver-ish because when everything is in boxes, you have to use what you can find.  Case closed.

As three o’clock rolled around I realized I was kind of hungry so I made myself a snack of strawberry Chobani and a diced nectarine mixed with some Marshmallow Mateys and Coco Roos.

I almost ALWAYS forget how cold and creamy and thick this yogurt is.  I love it.  The texture is spot on and the whole taste is sensational.  Get yourself some.

On a funny note, while I was watching Hell’s Kitchen, Jack asked what I thought was different about these earlier seasons (I’m on season 2 right now) as compared to the current season, number 9, on FOX.  I responded that Chef Ramsey is certainly much more dramatic now than he was back then and to this Jack commented that he thought the “players”, the chefs, were more dramatic in the older seasons.  He didn’t like how they seemed as if they were playing Survivor, plotting all of these backstabbing moves and such.  The then made a stellar point that I would like to share with all future contestants:

“Be a better chef than the other chefs. This is how you win.”

I chuckled pretty hard at this.  It seems so simple and yet, it’s true.  Why must you plot and scheme when you could just concentrate on being the best you can be??  If you being your best doesn’t win, then no amount of backstabbing and betraying is going to make you win.  If  you don’t have the chops, LEAVE!

Other afternoon activities included a walk to the leasing office to report a list of maintenance issues and test out Jack’s old iPhone as my new RunKeeper.  So far it looks like the GPS still works decently so we’ll see how it fair on an actual run, perhaps tomorrow morning.  We then made yet another trip to Walmart for a few more things like a spatula, an ice cream scoop (remember my improvisation yesterday?), and a baking sheet.

On the way home we split a ZERO bar for kicks.

It was delish and a nice afternoon treat.  I rarely have candy bars from the checkout line so when I do, they had better be worth it and this was.

Dinner was around 7:30 and came in the form of burgers!  We picked up these fantastic-looking Old World Kitchen chicken burgers at Sam’s Club in two flavors: caramelized onion & swiss and spinach & feta.

We didn’t have hamburger buns so we just subbed bread and it worked just fine.  Throw a few pieces in a 400 degree oven for five minutes and they end up super brown and toasty, all the more awesome for holding the weight of a burger.

When it came to the main event, I chose the onion variety of chicken burger and topped it with spicy southwestern mustard, ketchup, and a slice of tomato.  The burger, to me, fell a little short of its name.  It didn’t particularly deliver on its caramelized onion promise.  I love that flavor and was sad when it was missing.

We served our main dish with a pickle (second of the day!) and a side of Ore-Ida sweet potato fries.  These were wonderfully crispy and had a great sweet potato flavor.  They were the perfect compliment to the burgers.  I must say there is something about a deep fried fry that you just can’t beat with home-baked versions so this was a nice change up.

As we cruised into the evening Jack helped me to reset the old iPhone so I could redo it all for myself.  It is currently syncing with some of my music as I blog.  While it was resetting to factory defaults we figured we would watch a movie and enjoy some dessert.  We tried to stream Spread to my computer through Netflix but the buffering combined with everything else my computer was trying to do meant that the movie was fragmented and after giving it the old college try, we gave up and finished our bowls of yum.

We pulled the repeat card on mounds of Rocky Road ice cream from last night and then, because I was craving cookies but we didn’t have any, I added Coco Roos and Marshmallow Mateys on top.  They lent just enough crunch to make the experience satisfying.  Definitely a good end to a low key day which was much needed after yesterday’s shopping extravaganza.

In other news, tomorrow I will be posting a discussion about genetic counseling.  I am going to answer some questions about both the field and about my journey into it.  I sincerely hope you find it interesting.  See you then.

Question: How do you keep track of your runs, routes, and pace?