Avoidance of the Gym

Right now, I'm doing exactly what the title of this post states. I managed to get myself out of bed around 9:30 am (which is honestly about 2-3 hours later than usual), drag myself out to the living room, plop my ass down, and not move for the last 45 minutes. I'll definitely work out today, but finding the motivation to start is going to take awhile apparently. Also, the cat is sleeping on my legs which are a little sore from yesterday, so it feels really good - and is definitely contributing to the "why do I have to move?" feeling I've got going on.

Last Sunday was my typical Sunday. I went and got my workout on, and then drug myself up to get a pedicure. I normally LOVE my pedicures - but this time I got a new lady (I think she was new). She was extremely rough, forgot half the steps - which I had to remind her about, and just generally made it so that the hour I was there was not a good hour. My toes look good though - but everything else just drove me nuts. After the pedicure, I was supposed to meet my bar friends for lunch, but I was extremely hungry at that point and they were still deciding where to go, so I just went home and ordered in food with Blondie. And then took a long nap. And then finally headed back out and met up with my bar friends at Pony Bar for several drinks.

Pony Bar was awesome last Sunday - when we came in, we immediately ordered beers, and before we had gotten half of the beer down, the bartender told us next rounds were on a gentleman in the back part of the bar. Apparently, the Walk for the Cure had happened last Sunday, and a bunch of walkers had taken over a large part of the bar (I was oblivious, and it certainly didn't feel any more crowded than normal). Anyway, one of the walkers asked the bartender to buy all the regulars a round on him. To quote our bartender: "You guys are in here every Sunday, sooooo drinks on that guy!" I love that I'm a regular at 3 bars around my house, whereas in SF and TX, I wasn't a regular anywhere.

The week was an incredible week to be honest - every day flew by. It was one of the fastest weeks I've had in a long time (except for Friday from about 3:18 pm onwards - 3:18 pm is when I happened to glance at the clock, and then I swear time ground to a halt). On Thursday, we had our last major code launch of the year, and it went fairly well. Afterwards, my BFF from work and I headed to lunch to celebrate being done. It's been a long year - and 2012 has been kind of shitty, so finishing up the last major code launch felt like a ton of weights lifted off my shoulders.

I took off early from work that day and took a bunch of cupcakes from my favorite bakery home to Blondie. We decided to take some of the cupcakes to the bar (as I truly bought a lot), so we headed over to spend the evening at our local spot, and just got caught up with everyone and enjoyed the evening.

Yesterday was spent doing nothing. I went to the gym in the morning, and then we watched TV all afternoon. Today we are waiting for our groceries to be delivered. And I might head to Pony Bar. And I might not because it's supposed to start raining in a few hours - the start of Frankenstorm Sandy.

This week should be a good week. I have to work Monday-Wednesday, but I'm curious how things play out because they are already talking shutting down MTA in the city. Which is how I get to work. Frankenstorm is supposed to nail us starting Monday night. We're watching our building friends' dogs this week also as they are both out of town - so it's up to their floor a couple of times this week to make sure the dogs are all good (a daschund and a chihuahua). And I have Thursday and Friday off this week - more on that to come, stop back by later on this week for details. SF trip is in 2 weeks, and we get a visit from Bbbb starting this coming Saturday! A lot of exciting plans!

Still keeping the workout train moving forward:
Sunday: 46 mins on bike - 2 mins level 6, 2 mins level 12, 5 min cooldown; weights
Monday: P90X Legs&Back
Tuesday: 30 min hill interval - 2 mins walk at 4.1 mph on 0% grade, 2 mins run at 5.3-5.7 mph on 3% grade, 5 min cooldown
Wednesday: Insanity Cardio Power and Resistance
Thursday: 3.1 mile speed interval - 36:23 - 2 min walk at 4.1 mph, 2 mins run at 5.8-7.0 mph, 5 min cooldown
Friday: Insanity Cardio Recovery
Saturday: 3.1 mile run in 35:43 (not on downhill treadmill!), 5 min cooldown; weights
Sunday: does sitting on my ass count as a workout? Either Precor or Yoga but haven't decided

--K

Good Day To You

Last Sunday didn't quite go as planned. I took my time being lazy after writing my blog post, and didn't get out of bed in time to go get a pedicure. So my feet looked like crap this week. But at least it's getting cooler so I kept my toes covered all week. Instead on Sunday, I finally got my ass out of bed, and drug Blondie with me around 1:30 pm to meet my bar friends at Pony. We spent the afternoon eating, drinking and chatting, before Blondie took off to get a nap in. My bar friends and I then moved down the street to another bar, and spent a few hours shooting darts there before calling it a day. I got home on Sunday night, said hi to Blondie and went straight to bed. Not a bad way to start/end a week.

My week was a weird week to be honest. Some good parts, some not good parts, some "what the fuck" parts.

Monday was "eh". I had a side system launch I had to be on a launch call for - which took 6 hours out of my day. The call went okay, but 6 hours on a headset really does a number on you. I felt stiff and sore by the time the day was down, but really happy that everything had gone okay. I didn't even get to catch up with my friends at work because of being on the call all day - so while the day went fast, it was super boring.

Tuesday was "good". Tuesday is one of my busiest meeting days and normally I hate it, but I had an unexpected break on Tuesday when one of my meetings cancelled, so my friend and I went to lunch (I'll be honest - I also blew off a non-cancelled meeting to do this). We spent about 1.5 hours out of the office, generally snarking on whatever came to mind. When I got back to the office after lunch, I also went ahead and booked my tickets out to SF. I had been going back and forth about whether I should go, but finally decided I would. I also managed to convince Blondie to come with me for a few days, so we'll be heading out on a Saturday in November, hanging with Shelbs and Bbbb for the weekend, seeing our SF friends on Monday, saying goodbye to Blondie on Tuesday, and then I'll be coming back on Thursday. It will be a nice mini-vacay with the Blonde One and I'm truly excited for it.

Wednesday was "what the fuck". One of my favorite people (not one of my BFFs, but just a good guy - awesome developer) gave his notice. It was a really sad day because he announced it very first thing in the morning. It took the wind out of my sails. And then I had to get back on a launch call for another 6 hours to finish up the launch from Monday. So I sat at my desk, a little depressed, on an extremely boring call for 6 hours. What the fuck indeed.

Thursday was "not good". The day started off with a meeting where someone announced that a problem we've had for awhile, that the technical teams didn't think was customer facing, was in fact, customer facing. So we spent the morning trying to figure out how to deal with that. They left it up to me to break it to the business that this was the case, which made me angry. Topped that off with another meeting which left a bad taste in my mouth, and still feeling blah about the person who had given notice on Wednesday, and I locked myself in my office for the afternoon for all my calls (normally I take calls with my office door open, but not on Thursday). I finally came out late afternoon after my calls were done, hung out in my BFF's office for awhile, and then called the day a disaster and left.

Friday was "eh". The weather was completely shitty on Friday (pouring down rain, not chilly but completely humid which made you sweat like crazy) so just trying to wake up on Friday morning was horrific. And the day went slow. The good part was that I found out that both of my BFF's will be in SF the week that Blondie and I are in SF. So work at least will be fun. The bad part was I just wanted my bed. Friday was a 3 cup of coffee day. I came home on Friday night, and Blondie was out (he had been at an all-day mobile gaming convention and had stayed out with some people he had met there), so I just watched my crappy TV shows, ate some eggs, and then crawled into bed.

Saturday made up for Friday big-time. It started with me getting on the scale - I've been super good about watching my food and working out, but I still dread weighing myself. I talked myself onto the scale on Saturday, and saw a number which is extremely low for me - making it around 30 lbs I've lost since August. I came dancing out to the living room in my underwear (yay for Blondie) and was just generally happy. I then headed to the gym and spent about an hour down there, before coming back up to the apartment to finish my workout. Blondie spent the afternoon working on something, and made HUGE progress, so around 4 pm, we decided to take the rest of the day and just enjoy it. We ordered some food, cuddled, watched TV, made a junk food run (pretzels, frozen yogurt), saw a girl puking in our lobby after our junk food run, watched more TV, and went to bed around midnight.

Today Blondie is going to finish up what he was working on yesterday, and I'm about to head to the gym. I will be getting a pedicure today as my toes are disgusting. And possibly I'll meet up with my bar friends at Pony this afternoon.

Workouts:
Monday: P90X Shoulders&Arms
Tuesday: 30 min hill run; 2 min walking at 4.1 mph on 0% grade, 2 min running at 5.3-5.5 on 3% grade, 5 min cooldown; little bit of weights
Wednesday: Insanity Core Cardio and Balance
Thursday: 3.1 mile speed work run; 2 min walking at 4.1 mph, 2 min running at 5.8-6.5 mph (37:22), 2 minute cooldown
Friday: Insanity Max Cardio Recovery
Saturday: 3.1 mile run in 36:03 (not on downhill treadmill!), 5 minute cooldown; little bit of weights; P90X Ab Ripper X
Sunday: ??? Headed to the gym - not sure if I'll bike it or elliptical it.

--K

Officially Official

I felt my age this week. Which is "almost 40". Actually, I felt about 20 years more than my age this week - so I guess "almost 60". Allergies combined with the let-down of no visitors after 2 weeks of visitors knocked me flat on my ass this week. Yay. Yay for getting old.

Tuesday I woke up with the sneezes. And when I get the sneezes, it happens like 20 times in a row before settling out. As soon as I started sneezing, I knew I was in for a bad week. Tuesday itself was okay, but I felt completely drained for the most part. I also get this feeling sometimes that my eyes are swelling shut - they aren't, they look completely normal, but I feel like I can't keep them open because glue is pulling them together - I had this feeling on Tuesday also. So yeah, it was a 4-cup-of-coffee day which I haven't had in awhile.

Wednesday I woke up and felt worse. No energy at all, sneezing, just flat out blah. I decided to take a sick day, texted my boss to tell her, and promptly went back to bed for 2 hours. When I woke up I felt better so I did a workout. And then crawled back in bed with Blondie to watch TV the rest of the afternoon.

Also, Wednesday was our official anniversary - making 9 years officially official. I wish I would've felt better but it was still a nice day. While we were watching TV in bed, Tigga joined us so basically we had a family afternoon being lazy. After a bunch of TV, we made dinner - Blondie grilled up some filet mignon and then did a big pot of mushrooms and onions. It was sooooo tasty! I inhaled my plate and immediately claimed the leftovers for lunch on Thursday.

Thursday it was feeling no worse (no better) but it was back to work anyway. The day flew by - I felt like I barely got to work and it was over. Not sure why, because I didn't have a lot of meetings or anything, but it was one of those "blink and it's over" days. I got home that night and Blondie suggested our local bar for dinner - I was totally in as it had been almost a week since we had stopped over to visit. Blondie had shepherd's pie for dinner and I had caesar salad and whiskey. And we got caught up with both our bartender and the weekend bartender who happened to be hanging out. Our bartender wanted to know where Mr Pooh was, and when he would be back - which tickled me because everyone in NYC who has met Mr Pooh loves him.

Friday made up for Thursday in that it felt like it took forever. Blondie was going to come meet me for lunch at 1 pm, and then my BFFs decided to go to lunch at 12:15 pm, so I decided to hang with them until 1 and then meet Blondie. But Blondie loves these guys so he came over early and all 4 of us went for sushi and then fro-yo. Blondie loves the fro-yo place as it's self-serve; he kept saying "I'm so glad we don't have one of these by our house!".

The weather was kind of crappy and chilly all day on Friday. When I finally got done on Friday, I decided to walk home - something about that kind of weather made me want to saunter 2 miles through the city. It felt like walking weather. I actually thoroughly enjoyed my walk home, made even better by an older gentleman (late 50's, early 60's) who started a conversation with me as we made our way past Pony (close to my apt) about the song Down Under - he just came up and said "have you ever had a really bad song stuck in your head?" and it went from there. He was walking my direction slightly, so we talked for about a block before he struck off. After that, for the rest of my trip, all I could think was "vegemite sandwich".

Friday night and Saturday were lazy to the extreme. We ordered in mexican for dinner on Friday, and then got in bed and watched The Dictator - which made us both laugh until we about peed ourselves. Saturday I did a long workout in the gym, finished up in the apt, showered, got back in bed and was still lying there about 2 hours later watching TV. We spent most of the day watching episodes of "Once Upon a Time" off Netflix before ordering in pizza for dinner.

2 days of downtime was needed though as I'm feeling a bit better now - more energy anyway. I'm off in about 10 mins to get a pedicure, and then it's meeting up with my bar friends and possibly my building friends for Sunday Funday.

Workouts! Woot, everyone's favorite:
Tuesday: 30 mins hill run; 2 min walking at 4.1 mph on 0% grade hill; 2 min running at 5.3-5.5 mph on 3% grade hill; little bit of weights
Wednedsay: Insanity Max Cardio Interval (60 minutes of hell)
Thursday: 3.1 mile speedwork run; 2 min walking at 4.1 mph; 2 min running at 5.7-6.5 mph - 37:42 mins
Friday: Insanity Cardio Recovery; 2 mile walk home
Saturday: 3.1 mile run in 36:22 (did my first mile in less than 11 mins; was NOT on downhill treadmill!); weights; P90X Ab Ripper X
Sunday: P90X Yoga

--K

WHEW! THANK YOU TO THE SUPER V's AND MR POOH!

Last Sunday took a turn when my bar friends texted around 1 pm to come meet them at Pony Bar. Blondie was waiting for his sis and her family to show back up, so I went up without him to hang out. We tried out some new items on the Pony Bar menu (fish donuts = suprisingly YUM), and enjoyed several frosties. We had just tabbed out to head to another bar when Blondie texted that his sis was there. So I took my leave of my bar friends and headed home to hang with the fam. We spent the evening catching up on their weekend, playing with the nieces, and enjoying some Ethiopian food before heading to bed for an early night.

Monday was a crazy day. I had taken the day off from work, and so we headed out around 11 am to go to Lombardi's for pizza. We all split a salad (crazy good) and breadsticks, and then Blondie and I got sausage and mushroom pizza and The V's got prosciutto and tomato pizza. Um, shame face, but I also had a sangria with my lunch. After Lombardi's we headed over to show The V's the Freedom Tower - we were going to wait for them to tour the memorial but it was a 4 hour wait for tickets and none of us wanted to hang out that long.

From Freedom Tower, it was back up the island to go through FAO Schwarz. I was in heaven almost instantly as this time I found the candy, and they had a gummy bear as big as my head. I took my picture with it, and sent it to my SF friends who know my love of all things gummy. Afterwards, we played a lot with the nieces on some train sets and the giant piano, before sneakily buying the 2.5 year old niece a Hello Kitty I Love NY doll. FAO Schwarz is almost directly across from Central Park, so after the store, we headed into the park to crash out (adults) for a bit and play (kids) for a bit. The day was beautiful so we found a nice patch of lawn in the sun, and watched the kids run around. We then cut all the way back across the park to the John Lennon Memorial and Dakota complex, before catching a train back to our hood. Dinner that night was at our peruvian restaurant, complete with a couple of glasses of sangria.

I had to go back to the office on Tuesday but it was all good - I got completely cleared from the cervix scare in August (everything healed and looks fabulous) so that made my day aok. I met Blondie and The V's for dinner at a local italian place that night, and afterwards we bought a bunch of sweets to end our night. Wednesday it was a goodbye to The V's - they headed back home. It was soooo good seeing them - their kids are dolls, and they rock themselves! Work that day felt a lot longer - I was sad to say goodbye, but then also looking forward to Mr Pooh arriving. So just a really long day.

Thursday sucked. My role at work is an amalgamation of a lot of different pieces, and another one got dumped on me on Thursday. I spent the morning talking to my friends about it, trying to decide if I would say yes or not. I ended up talking myself into a shitty mood, so the 3 of us (my 2 friends and I) took off for a long lunch. Where I also talked myself into saying yes. Pbbbtttt....

Friday was WAY BETTER than Thursday. It started off with a 2.5 hour work out in the gym, and then Mr Pooh was here! I showered up and then me, Mr Pooh and Blondie took off for Lombardi's - yes, we ate there Monday and Friday. We split a salad again, and then a large pizza with sausage on it all, and spinach on half and meatballs on half. Mr Pooh and I downed a pitcher of Stella also. After lunch, we walked over to NYU and hung out in Washington Sq Park for awhile. We listened to a brass band play some songs, made fun of the naked hairy guy, and cringed at Pigeon Man (a guy covered in pigeons). Mr Pooh tried to convince Blondie to take a picture with Pigeon Guy but Blondie didn't go for it.

After the park, we headed back to our hood and stopped at poison bar to waste the afternoon away. One of my bar friends joined us also, and we got pleasantly tipsy. It was then a trek over to our local bar to end the evening. Well, almost end the evening. The real end of the evening came with a stop at 7-11, and then eating junk food while watching Rock of Ages. All in all, a fabulous start to the weekend.

Saturday I convinced Mr Pooh to work out with me, and then we took a walk over to the High Line park and walked all the way down it. We did this because David Blaine was in town doing a stunt at the end of the High Line (Electrified!). Mr Pooh and I stopped to see him - it was free and nobody was in line. We got about 20 feet from him and then laughed for like 5 mins. It was pretty cool, but also pretty cheesy.

After David Blaine, we caught a train down to Chinatown and did some shopping before heading back to our hood and meeting up with Blondie for lunch. After lunch, we stopped for a few beers before crashing out for a nap and a movie that afternoon. Around 5:30 on Saturday, Mr Pooh and I headed out for another walk. We hit Hudson River Park and saw the Intrepid, and walked about 1.5 miles up towards Harlem, before cutting over to the west side. We made our way to Central Park, had a really long serious conversation about what we would do if we saw Alec Baldwin (and also a really long conversation about how fun it would be to drunk-heckle David Blaine at 4 am), and then wound our way around Columbus Circle.

On our way back to the hood, I mentioned to Mr Pooh that there was a whiskey bar I had been dying to try, so we stopped in there and had a blast. The bartender was awesome, he convinced us to try several really good bourbons, we had some great conversation, and we got "happy". We texted Blondie and he ended up coming out to join us, but he was starving, so it was a trip to an Irish bar down the street that had awesome fish&chips. And then we headed home, stopping of course at 7-11 for some tasty grub to finish the day.

Sunday we went for breakfast (bagels) and then were going to hit up Intrepid. But the line to get in was super long, so we decided to skip. We went back to the apartment and played a bunch of Fusion Frenzy before meeting up with one of my bar friends to watch the Packers (sigh. Seriously? Packers?) We cheered them on to no avail, got drunk, and ate some delicious nachos. After the game ended, Mr Pooh, my bar friend and I headed to Pony for a few drinks while Blondie headed home to relax/calm down after the shit show of a game. We eventually called Blondie to come meet us as we were going for fried pizza for dinner. Which ended up being not that great. The regular pizza rocked, but the fried pizza was too much like a doughnut and not enough like a pizza. After dinner, we caught a cab home, amused the fuck out of our cab driver with our drunk banter, and then said goodbye to my bar friend for the night. A drunk-face-time call to Mr Pooh's kids completed our night - they are SO adorable, and seeing their giggly faces made my night!

Today I walked Mr Pooh up to Penn Station - he's off to NJ for the week for work. It was hard saying goodbye - I know he would laugh at me if he saw me getting weepy so I basically just said "See you!" and ran. Work today actually went okay - I was very sad all day, but the meeting I was d.r.e.a.d.i.n.g turned out to have good news so that worked out well. I got home tonight and did a workout to clear my head once and for all. We ordered in peruvian for dinner, and now I'm ready to relax and do nothing for the rest of the night. And a big huge thanks to Mr Pooh for coming to visit also! We love you!

Workouts were still pretty dang good.
Monday: 45 mins on bike - 2 mins level 5, 2 mins level 9; 5 min cooldown; weights
Tuesday: 30 mins hill running - 2 mins 4.1 mph walk on 0% grade; 2 mins 5.3-5.5 mph run on 3% grade; 5 min cooldown; weights
Wednesday: 3.1 mile run - 37:42 - 2 mins 4.1 mph walk, 2 mins 5.7-6.5 mph run; 5 min cooldown; weights
Thursday: Insanity Cardio Recovery; P90X Ab Ripper
Friday: 2.5 hour workout - 3.1 mile run in 35:30*; 5 min cooldown; ton of weights; 10 min on bike - 5 mins at level 12, 5 min at level 13; 5 min cooldown; 10 min walk at 3.4 mph up 6% grade hill; 5 min cooldown; abs; stretching
Saturday: 28 min on Precor - 2 min at level 6, 2 min at level 10; 5 min cooldown; little bit of weights
Sunday: 20 mins on treadmill - 2 mins 4.1 mph walk, 2 mins 5.7-6.5 mph run; 5 min cooldown; little bit of weights
Monday: P90X Legs&Back

* = I felt great on my run, loved it - felt SO EASY. Then when I was riding the bike, I noticed that the treadmill I was running on didn't look flat. So I took a look after my bike ride - and realized the front of the treadmill dips down a little, so it was like running downhill the entire time. No wonder it was so easy.

--K