How do they do it?

I am in awe of any single woman who can handle a full time job and raise kids and run.  If you have a partner, sorry, just not all that impressed.  But a single, working, running mom?  Absolutely in awe.

This is all the running that's getting done around here lately:

And it's only in pictures.  Monday was a migraine, Tuesday was a repeat of the migraine and I didn't get out of work until 7:00 p.m., Wednesday I still feel like I have steel spikes shoved in my shoulders and I got out of work even later....  I need to burn off some of this stress but I'm so exhausted.  Blah.

In other news, I got my trip to my grandparents' booked today.  Yay!  It will be nice to get out of town for a few days.  Planning to get some runs in while I'm there, there should be a track at the high school at the next town over.  And maybe it won't even be raining!

Cheers,
the CilleyGirl

And now, by popular demand, it's Cooking with Lorena Bobbitt!

Based on this post by the Little Fruit Fly, how could I not post this story?

So, I like pork.  The other white meat -- get your minds out of the gutter!  I've come to like it better than chicken and I usually have it every week.  Despite the high, high, high sodium, I really like the Hormel pre-marinated pork tenderloins.  In their natural state, they look like this:

Yes, I too was amazed that they had this picture on their website. 

These are great (except for the sodium content) because they're very flavorfull, easy to toss into a pan and cook up, and they're a lot like the chinese BBQ pork except for the red dye no. 5. 

One night I cooked one of these up.  As I said, they're easy to cook:  You open the package.  You put the meat into a pan.  You put it into the oven.  Cook it.  Cut and serve. 

Now, it is a pork tenderloin.  That's a somewhat cylindrical tube of meat.  Ignoring the obvious joke, no big deal.  Except for that night.... this is what it looked like when it came out of the oven:

No joke.  At first, as I first grabbed the pan, I thought it was just my dirty mind.  Then I sat the pan down and looked at it, and nope!  Not just me.  To be sure, let's get just a little bit closer, shall we?

I swear I am not making this up.  I could show you that pan, I cook with it all the time.  I had to take a picture, emailed it to several of my friends, asking for a second opinion as to whether it was just me.  My mom couldn't stop laughing.  She went into detail about how lifelike it was with the veins....  Stop it mommy, stop it!! 

It made a really tasty dinner.

Hey, has anybody heard from my ex-boyfriend lately?

Cheers,
the CilleyGirl

Spontaneously Exploding Achilles Tendon

Yep, that's right -- I'm on prednisone again!  I think (really really really really hope) that the reason I've felt so lousy over the past several weeks is a wicked sinus infection.  I'm so used to having sinus problems (and lately so busy) that I tend to not really pay attention to the symptoms until it gets to the point where I bend over at the waist and it feels like my head is going to pop off from the pressure.  Finally today I called my allergist and lucked out that he had a lunch hour appointment.  I like my allergist, he's always cracking me up.  He was asking about stress in my life and after I confirmed that work was pretty crazy I also added that I'm training for two marathons.  He immediately says "you know the first marathon runner died, right?"  Yes, I have heard that one before.

So it's a short round of antibiotics and prednisone.  Prednisone has one of the most amusing side effects I've ever seen:  your Achilles tendon can spontaneously explode.  Not necessarily while you're running or anything.  You can be a complete couch muffin and still have it happen.  Of course, it's not the actual exploding part that amuses me; it's that somewhere there was a study done of a bunch of people whose Achilles tendons exploded and they narrowed down the cause to prednisone.  It's also not like the number one side effect or anything; it's one of those "in rare cases...." side effects. 

I've forgotten most of the Shamrock race by now, but here's my race report.  It all started the day before at packet pickup.  When, incidentally, I was accidentally taking Ambien in the mornings.  To my dismay, some how my registration for the race never went through and I ended up in the "please please please let me run this" line.  They took pity on me and let me sign up for the race even though it was officially sold out. 

Saturday night I had a lovely carb loading dinner at The Old Spaghetti Factory with Jules and the Little Fruit Fly and her potential (at the time, now he's official) new boyfriend Biker Boy.  I hadn't eaten all day (and I was coming off of the Ambien) so the cheese bread and crab ravioli were extra yummy. 

Sunday, it was raining.  It was cold.  It was wet.  Soon I was cold and I was wet.  I met up with Jules and found the Little Fruit Fly and we huddled under the bridge with 30,000+ other racers to wait for the start of the race.  They started the other races then we joined the pack for the 15K start.  It took us ten minutes to get to the start from the gun. 

Then it was uphill for about five miles.  In the cold.  And the wet.  Did I mention it was raining?  The rain was lighter than from earlier that morning, but 9.3 miles in the rain will still get you wet.  Since my only blister has come from running in wet shoes, I had been sure to use BodyGlide and it did its job, no blisters.  My feet were thoroughly wet and squishy by the time I was finished but with my SmartWool socks my feet stayed at least nice and warm.  I finished in 2:17:02 according to my Garmin Big Red, which was exactly my chip time.

As a side note, I just realized my Garmin has been in my car's glove box all week.  Which explains why I didn't have any data on my last run. 

The Fruit Fly had brought us shamrock necklaces and head bobbers, here's us in all our glory after the race:

The medals were again bottle top openers, this year they were gold in the shape of a pilsner.  The tech tees were really nice, this year they had long sleeved shirts in white.  I'm probaby going to wear it to work tomorrow.  Because I can.

I have to add this.  I've been a long time fan of the Fruit Fly's blog and have always been envious of how photogenic she is.  Part of that is because she's really pretty, but I found out at Shamrock that part of it is that she has this pose that snaps into place as soon as someone raises a camera.  Point in fact, I pulled out my camera after the race and turned it on to check that the wet hadn't damaged it.  As soon as I had it up near my face, pointing in her direction but not intending to take a picture, she immediately -- and I mean immediately -- went into this pose:

I had to take the picture just because it was so perfect!!  I wish I could figure out how to pose for the camera, all my pictures are usually some variation of "don't take my picture, I always look horrible!"  I'm so jealous.

This past Sunday, Jules and I planned to redeem our Shamrock performance by doing a 15K without the hills or the rain.  Unfortunately, we did not plan on a freezing headwind for the first 4.5 miles!  Seriously, at points it was like we were mimes, running into the wind but not getting anywhere.  We both had legs of lead and while we did do nine miles we walked most of it.  A shorter distance, but it took longer.  That wind, though, it was a killer.  When it stopped blowing, it was the perfect weather for a run. 

Well, I can feel the drugs doing their thing; I'm rapidly losing what little energy I had left today.  I plan to take the weekend off; I can't keep up with this pace without some sort of a break.  It's starting to look like I might take a week off in April before the next big push starts.  I'm hoping by Friday the drugs will have done enough magic that I'll be up for a run, at least get some mileage in this week.  And of course Sunday is the Sunday Run Club.  We have eight miles on the agenda, and if the weather is decent we'll try for a run along the Columbia.  But if there's any hint of a headwind, we are outta there!

Cheers,
the CilleyGirl

ABCs of Me

I'm tired of feeling like I'm the one who does ALL of the work at my office -- a gripe for another post -- so I thought I'd cheat and do this meme.  Never sure if it's pronounced to rhyme with Jem, but for this one I'll go with "mee mee".

(A) Age:  40.

(B) Bed:  Queen.  A good thing since I share it with a big dog who never stays completely on her side of the bed.

(C) Chore You Really Dislike:  It's a toss up between mopping and dusting.  Dusting because you always knock the shit over you're trying to dust and it turns into a big production.  Mopping because it seems like it should be a lot easier than it is.

(D) Dogs:  Two.

(E) Essential Start Your Day Item:  Diet coke.

(F) Favorite Color:  The bluish-purple of twilight.

(G) Gold or Silver?  Silver or white gold.

(H) Height:  5'8".

(I) Instruments You Play:  I can muddle my way through a smidge of clarinet, flute, piano, and guitar.  But just a smidge.

(J) Job Title:  The One Who's Always Here, Doing the Actual Work, While the Clueless People Who Make Way More Money than I Do Are Off On Vacation A-FUCKING-GAIN.

(K) Kids:  Only in observation.

(L) Live:  Portlandia, Orygun.

(M) Mom's Name:  It's not "Mom"?

(N) Nicknames:  A shortened version of my first name.  Also, SandraDee, Micky, HoneyBunny, and now the CilleyGirl.

(O) Overnight Hospital Stays?  Other than maybe when I was a day old, none.

(P) Pet Peeve:  Clueless people who make way more money than I do who are always taking time off when there is work that needed to be done yesterday.

(Q) Quote from a Movie:  "I killed the President of Paraguay with a fork.  How've you been?"

(R) Right or Left Handed?  Right.  I am the least ambidextrous person ever.

(S) Siblings:  I have a half brother.  He clearly takes after the family that is not related to me.

(T) Time You Wake Up?  Any time after the snooze alarm has been doing for about an hour.

(U) Underwear:  Under there!

(V) Vegetable You Dislike:  Onion, green peppers, actual tomatos (sauce is good).  Many, many others I regard with suspicious.  Like eggplant.  It seems confused. 

(W) What Makes You Run Late:  Going to work.  I'm on time for every thing but the office.  Freud would probably have something to say about that.

(X) X-Rays:  Pretty much all of me at one point or another. 

(Y) Yummy Food You Make:  Eggs benedict.

(Z) Zoo, Favorite Animal:  Sea otters.
 
Cheers,
the CilleyGirl

A Tough Tuesday Run Followed by Orgasmic Pizza

As you may have seen from yesterday's post, I did do my scheduled three mile run yesterday.  I didn't do it in the morning like I should have.  My dog kept waking me up to go let herself out and then she wouldn't jump back up on the bed.  Which wouldn't be so bad except that means she paces back and forth in my room.  Which also wouldn't be so bad except she's panting like an obscene phone caller the whole time and I just cannot sleep through that!  I have to get up and boot her in the ass coax her to jump up in the bed so we can all go back to sleep. 

Anyhow, one of these incidents coincided with time to get up for the gym but I realized that I would be getting off work early for the dentist so I revised my plans to go to the gym after the dentist.  Luckily I have really great teeth -- my new dentist sounded almost disappointed that I didn't have any issues for him -- so my mouth wasn't sore in the slightest when I went to run.

But everything else was.  And by everything else I mean my legs.  One big cramp they were.  Plus they felt swollen too; maybe all the cankle problems I've read about with all my friends was catching?  And my boobs felt too big.  So it was tough to run.  And I started out at a speedy (for me) pace, even when I was trying to slow down I was still in the 11 minute miles.  Oh, I almost forgot -- it was also stuffy and humid and HOT up on the indoor track and I hadn't used my inhaler before I started so I had a hard time breathing. 

Yet I had a secret weapon.  As I was driving to the gym, I was starting to get hungry and the idea of pizza popped into my mind.  Partly because I wasn't sure if my teeth would be up to gnawing on the steak dinner I had originally planned.  Partly because, hey, pizza.  I made a deal with myself that if I finished my three miles in under 40 minutes I could get pizza for dinner.  That deal came strongly into play during this run; I don't think I would have been able to make myself run more than a half a mile total otherwise. 

I got into a pattern of running two or three laps (ideally three, but it was so hot up there) and then walking one.  I stopped frequently for water breaks.  Around the two mile mark I FINALLY was able to breath and the cramps in my legs started to dissipate.  I think some of that (the legs part) was from Sunday's long-run-out-of-the-blue and part of it was from my shoes maybe being tied too tightly.  I think they shrank a bit initially after being so wet on Sunday.  My legs felt a little better after I loosened my laces, and my shoes felt back to normal after I finished the run.

My finishing time?  I kid you not -- 0:39:59.  Nike+ shows me speeding up over the last half mile or so; I knew if I had any chance of finishing under 40 minutes that I'd have to run all of that, and I did.  I was panting like my obscene phone caller dog when I got back to the locker room; I had to tell this poor stranger woman at the locker down from mine what I'd done. 

And then I went and got a pizza that was so good, it was nearly orgasmic.  And this, my friends, is why we run.

Cheers,
the CilleyGirl

Week 2 Recap and Week 3 Schedule

At least I think it's Week 3.  I'm laying down on a heating pad on my couch with the laptop balanced somewhat precariously on my pelvis.  Hmmm.  Too bad this thing doesn't vibrate ;)

Let's see, so Week 2 was supposed to look something like this:

Monday - Rest.  Done!
Tuesday - 3.0 miles.  Done!  One of my best training runs to date.  I ran at a 12:07 min/mile.  Yay me!
Wednesday - Rest.  Done!
Thursday or Friday - 3.0 miles.  Nope.  Funny story with that below.
Saturday - Rest.  Done!
Sunday - Shamrock 15K Challenge.  Done!

And on to the funny story.  But not funny ha ha, just funny in a don't do that again kind of way.

Thursday evening I went to pick up two prescriptions from the pharmacy:  Ambien (a sleeping pill) and Atenolol (a blood pressure medication).  The aide tells me that they've changed suppliers with the one and it will probably look different.  So she opens the bottle and taps it out and shows me a white oblong pill.  Doesn't look like my Atenolol, which is usually a white round pill, and tell her I'm glad she shows me because I've got two others that look just like that and I definitely would have wondered.  She says that's why they put these bright green stickers on the bottles where the pills have changed.

I go home and put my Atenolol -- the pills from the bottle with the green stickers -- into my pill wheel for the rest of the week (Friday, Saturday, Sunday).  Friday I wake up super tired.  I shower, etc., and take my pills for the day.  I remember thinking as I was leaving my bedroom and heading downstairs that I was still so tired, it felt like I was walking through glue.  I'm tired all day, thinking I'm getting sick.  By late afternoon I'm feeling better though.

Saturday I do chores then shower and go to meet Jules for packet pickup for Shamrock.  I didn't manage the time to eat anything so I was a little grumpy and tired.   But we had an early dinner (late afternoon) and I felt a lot better after eating. 

Saturday night I get home and I was tired but kind of wired so I go to take an Ambien so I can get some sleep before the race.  I literally have the pill in between my lips and I'm reaching for a glass of water when I realize.... the Ambien isn't a round white pill.  I spit it out and grab the bottle.  It's not Ambien -- it's Atenolol.  I pull out the bottle with the green stickers and it's the Ambien.  One of the two other oblong pills I take.  I realize for the past two days I've been waking up and taking a sleeping pill.  And then doing things like driving a car. 

No wonder I was perking up in the late afternoon.  You know, eight or so hours after taking A FREAKING AMBIEN.

The moral of the story is that you shouldn't take drugs unless you read the damn labels.  I do pay attention what the pills look like and I know which one is which.  I just assumed that when she said the appearance had changed that she meant that it HAD changed and therefore it was the Atenolol. 

In retrospect I guess there is a funny ha ha to the story.  On Monday several oopsies I made at work on Friday while under the influence came to light.  Nothing major, but the second one turned up as I was telling my coworker about the mixup of the pills. 

Moving on, I still need to get my Shamrock recap together.  I'll do it the next time I'm upright and on the laptop.  I'm way behind on reading everyone's blogs too.

Week 3's schedule looks like this:

Monday - Rest.
Tuesday - 3.0 miles. 
Wednesday - Rest.
Thursday - 4.0 miles.
Friday - 3.0 miles.
Saturday - Rest.
Sunday - 7 miles.

We just had a flash of lightning and now a rumble of thunder that's been going on for a good six seconds so I'm going to sign off now to go drug up my dog who doesn't like thunder.  Hey, maybe I'll give her an Ambien!

Cheers,
the CilleyGirl

Marathon Training - Week 1 Recap & Week 2 Schedule

Well, as I mentioned earlier, Week 1 of marathon training blew chunks thanks in large part to a boss that has gone completely off the deep end.  If I don't kill him by the end of the month, we'll both be lucky.

So, here was the schedule and the results for Week 1:

Monday - Rest.  Success!  I always manage the rest days.  Go figure.
Tuesday - 3.0 miles.  Did not do.  I let work get in the way.

Wednesday - Rest.  Success!

Thursday - 4.0 miles.  Did not do.  Again, work.

Friday - 3.0 miles.  And ditto.  Stupid gainful employment.

Saturday - Rest.  Success!  If I could just rest my way to the marathon, I would do awesome.

Sunday - 5.0 miles.  Surprise -- success!  I had a great time doing 6.39 miles of the Terwilliger hills with Jules and Nikki.

Total scheduled mileage:  15.
Total actual mileage:  6.39.

Week 2 is supposed to be the same except that the long run is six miles.  However, the Shamrock 15K is on Sunday -- 9.3 miles for you playing the American version of the home game.  I don't think I should go from 6.39 miles to 19.3 miles in one week.  It seems just a tad over the 10% rule, n'est-ce pas?  Here's what I plan instead:

Monday - Rest.

Tuesday - 3.0 miles.  Done! 
Wednesday - Rest.
Thursday or Friday - 3.0 miles.  At this rate, I'm going to be at the office all night so it's dealer's choice.
Saturday - Rest.
Sunday - 9.3 miles, aka the Shamrock 15K.

Total scheduled mileage:  12.3.  That looks better.

I did do my Tuesday run as scheduled, although it was in the evening which I'm not fond of doing.  I find it easier to run when I'm not really awake.  However, I rocked this run -- did an average 12:07 minute/mile for a total run time of just over 36 minutes, which is one of the faster training runs I've done.  I tend to go easier in training runs, which results in little improvement in race times.  Heck, I would've been happy with this as a race time.  The last half mile was a bitch to pull out; it was hot and stuffy up on the running track at the gym and I've been doing cold weather runs for the past six months.  But I just kept telling myself that the faster I did it then the faster I would be done (amazing logic, yeah?).  I also came up with a new running mantra. That I have since forgotten.   Oh well, I'm sure it will come to me the next time I run. 

Well, back to the proverbial grindstone.  My plan to take the whole weekend off from work is almost certainly not going to materialize.  Bleargh.

Cheers,
the CilleyGirl

Week 1 is a big do over

Well, I am off to a less than auspicious start to my marathon training.  So far, I've missed three runs.  And how many have I had scheduled so far?  Three.  Oops.

I had the greatest of intentions and was all pumped up to start this week.  Then Monday I didn't get home from work until 7:00 p.m.  When my alarm went off to get up for the gym the next morning, I'd had less than six hours of sleep.  I know from experience that was a sure fire way to trigger a migraine so I decided to run that evening.

And then I didn't get home from work until 7:00 p.m.  Again.  Thanks, boss.

So I thought, one missed run at the beginning of training isn't that big of a deal.  Thursday, I'd be back on track.

Wednesday, I didn't get home from work until 7:00 p.m.  AGAIN.  I took an Ambien to help me sleep, thought I had eight hours to get it out of my system.  The alarm went off for the gym and I had only the barest sliver of consciousness going for me.  If you've been reading for a while, remember how I don't remember the first couple of hours of the marathon because of Ambien?  Yeah.  I've decided it's a bad idea to drive in that condition.  No problem, I'd just go for a run after work. 

I did get home at a normal time.  Still feeling like I was in an Ambien haze.  Was in bed by 8:30, no more drugs, hoping to sleep it all out of my system. 

Mmm hmm.  11:30 p.m. and I still hadn't fallen asleep.  And I'm all stuffed up, so much that even my ears hurt.  So no run this morning. 

Bah.

Well, I could have decided that since I suck, I should eat.  Burgers and fries and cake and stuff.  But I haven't.  Oh wait, let me get the frosting off of the keyboard.  No, seriously, I haven't.  Or I could decide that since I suck, my training is blown and I'm never getting back on track.  But I haven't done that either.  Tomorrow I will sleep in, after taking some NyQuil tonight.  Sunday, I will do my long run with Jules as planned.  Then I will do week two of my training as scheduled.  One day at a time.  Because I have faith in myself.

Cheers,
the CilleyGirl