kicking a little more butt and happy new year!

i've been kicking a little more butt lately on the tready. i'm still sticking to an hour, but i'm getting more mileage in. i've gone from 10 minute miles to a 9:30 mile on average! this also means that i'm burning more calories for my cookies and milk habit i started this christmas season :) i'm going to have to let that habit go after the new year, but it's been so darn comforting these past few weeks.

i leave for colombia, south america tomorrow morning. cab will be here at 4:45 AM. um...yeh, A.M. paola and i will be staying with some of her family members in cali and then going to salento (coffee region) for a few days on our own before heading back to ring in the new year on the salsa floor! i found out two weeks ago that cali is the salsa capitol of the country....which explains SO much about her family! they are all mad, crazy dancers!

happy holidays to all! see you in 2011!

jody

what i've been doing lately:

shoveling

playing soccer (championship game is tonight at 9pm!)
shoveling

reading (omg, couldn't put down the damn salander saga series...borrowed the first two, then splurged and bought the third one...but it was 30% off at target)

shoveling some more

it's been 3 FULL days since the blizzard went through MPLS. today, i come home from work and the ally way is BLOCKED...why? because mpls plowers FINALLY plowed the street going east/west! 3 DAYS!!! wtf?!

running

i signed up for a marathon a couple of weeks ago. yikes! i'm going to run a rock n' roll marathon in seattle on june 25, 2011. i signed up for this particular marathon for 3 reasons:

1) it's in june, which means training starts in february, and besides snowboarding, what else do i have to do in the middle of winter in minnesota? training for a marathon seemed like a good idea.

2) it's a GREAT excuse to go to seattle, one of my favorite cities, slash areas in the world. the PAC northwest is beautiful and i love hiking and tramping around in the area.

3) AND last but not least, my friend valria lives in seattle and she is going to run the half marathon. she's a fantastic human being who i adore and look up to for so many reasons.

it's a little early to start training, but i wanted to get on the treadmill and start getting used to the idea of running. i did two one hour runs on the treadmill and one outside on the sidewalks.

camper cabin

i know, i know, my last post was in august. AUGUST! oh. em. gee. i thought i would blog a lot more than i do, but i'm going to get back into it. i'll start with this weekend. after an october filled with weddings, birthday parties and lots of work (thank god budgeting season is over), paola and i rented a camper cabin in sibley state park in west central minnesota. although it was short, it was just what the doctor ordered. it included cribbage, a three hour hike, a two mile trail run, and of course, lots of reading.

work hard, play harder

last week was HOT & HUMID. i got two good runs in and 3 decent bike rides. i went to a welcome back party on wednesday evening and to my sisters house for a pork shoulder dinner on thursday. then, i went to a twin's game, which included a pre-game and post-game party. saturday was filled with errands and playing frisbee at calhoun followed by a trip to the orpheum to see wicked. sunday included yardwork and a birthday party....and then - BAM! monday hit and i had a 8+ work day and today was a 10 hour day....this weekend will be a grad party and a half marathon. you know what? i'm ready for summer craziness to end and autumn relaxing to begin! i can't wait for lazy football sundays! i mean, don't get me wrong, ALL of it was SUPER fun, but when it comes down to it, i'm exhausted right now.

no tuna...again!

tonight is the SECOND time THIS MONTH that i've made rice...(fine, the rice cooker made the rice, but still) and go to put tuna and mayo in it...AND THERE IS NO TUNA!!! seriously. i'm. not. that. old. am i already starting to lose my mind? it's one of my favorite meals and i typically only make it when paola is not around and i get all excited when she isn't going to be here for dinner, and i think about it, i crave it, i get all fucking giddy and EXCITED about my tuna/mayo/rice combo! i SWEAR that the last time i was at the store i purchased 4 cans of tuna (i always buy 4 cans at a time, don't know why). so, for the second time this month, another half cup of rice goes to waste. and i have this lame sandwich instead :(

just another thursday

it's been an active week for me. after monday's 9.5 running miles, i got out and biked 27 miles on tuesday to loosen up my legs, which i needed BADLY. omg, i was SO sore on tuesday.

on wednesday, i biked over to the tin fish and met my dad and little sister for dinner. it's a super cute little 'order at the window' place on lake calhoun. very minneapolis. i love being able to bike there in 15 mins and meet my fam for weeknight dinner. when i got home, my neighbor was in the yard so i borrowed his ultra heavy duty hedge clipper thingy and cut some weeds, or should i say, little trees, growing behind my garage. as we started chatting he cut me some zenias from his yard for my table. he's just SO darn nice!! (picture attached)

tonight i went for a quick 5 mile run after work and made dinner for paola. she's been working so much lately, i feel so bad for the poor girl. here i am running and biking and meeting people for dinner and she's been slaving away at work :( hopefully it doesn't last too much longer. she did, however, stop and get a chirimoya from byerly's. i've never had a chirimoya before. you know, it's one thing i LOVE about dating and being with a colombian, or, i guess, an immigrant in general. i get introduced to so many different foods i probably wouldn't try. i STRONGLY suggest trying a chirimoya. it kind of tastes like a pear. SUPER bien ;) (picture attached)

gaby and marco, our current housemates, came home shortly after we had finished eating. gaby is one of paola's bff's and they are staying with us for the month of august. they LOVE phoebe, and it's SO cute how affectionate they are with her! phoebe is getting SPOILED with this double attention. she's going to have withdrawls when they leave.

9.5

i tend to life in the extremes. i'm all in, or not in at all. i took off at 5:30 and ran 9.5 miles. it was HOT. it was HUMID. it was SLOW. in fact, it wasn't pretty at ALL. but i DID it. and the only reason i did is because i woke up this morning and told myself i was going to run 9.5 miles. i wanted to see if i could, if i had it in me after all this time not running or training. you see, i signed up for a 13.1 on august 22nd back in may, before my accident. although the accident didn't leave me with any broken bones (thank god), it did leave me with a sprained foot, and whenever i run or put extra stress on it the next day it's really sore and aches and just doesn't feel right, so i've been extra careful, perhaps a little too careful, on not over doing it. but two weeks ago i ran a short 5 mile and 3.2 miles with only a day in between and the foot felt pretty good. because i was in texas for work last week and consumed with work i didn't get any running in. so this week, i wanted to test myself. and that's exactly what i did today. damn! it was painful. damn! i'm out of shape. but damn it, i'm running 13.1 on august 22nd, ugly or not!

go, go, go

i left for dallas monday evening around 7pm. a fitness center needed some help with some accounting issues so i went down to help out. it reminded me of my audit days and my auditing experience sure helped me solve the problems and figure out how to implement new processes. of course nothing can be solved in three days, but i feel like i accomplished what i intended to, and that feels GOOD! i might be seeing more of dallas in the coming months...but i guess i'll cross that bridge if/when it comes. i do know that i worked 10 hours on both tuesday and wednesday and i didn't get to my hotel and in bed on monday night until midnight or so. by thursday afternoon i was EXHAUSTED. i went into work early friday and left at 4pm. what i REALLY wanted to do was have a relaxing evening reading a book or watching a movie, but nope, we had a camping trip planned.

i came home at 4 and immediately went upstairs to pack my clothes and help load up the jeep. an hour later we were off for wild water state park, about an hour and a half north of the cities along the st. croix river. we camped with a bunch of paola's friends and some of her friend's friends; there were 13 of us around the campfire on saturday night! i do want to pause and and promote wild river state park, though. it was my first time there and i was impressed! it was beautiful, clean and HEAPS of activities to choose from. we tried to rent canoe's, but they were fully booked, which i was totally bummed about, but instead, we went for a short mile and half hike to a beach area and played there for the afternoon. it was fantastic. dogs were allowed, so of course, phoebe had a blast chasing her ball all afternoon, i took some time to take pictures and paola and few others swam. when we got back to the site a bunch of others had arrived, so we basically...ate, drank and were merry :)

we got up early this morning so i could get back and do laundry from the weak, shower and clean up and then i hopped on my bike and rode into the office to do more work. since i was out for 3 days doing other work, i have WAY more than is humanly possible right now, so i wanted to at least get a few things done so i'm not working 12 hour days this week. i really wished i could have spent the afternoon canoeing and enjoying the park more, but i'm SO glad i got some work done. i'll be thanking myself monday morning!

around 5pm, paola met me at my office and we loaded our bikes into the jeep and headed over to the highland park reserve in bloomington, not too far from my office. we got 20 miles in and discovered some awesome trails!! - for running, blading and biking. there is also a super cool park area where you can picnic/grill and rent canoes or kayaks. we will definately be hitting this place up again. i can't believe i hadn't been there before. i had been to parts, by the ski hill, but not where we were today. it was good find to end our week....or, should i start the week ;)

this week FLEW by, and, um, it's august people...o.m.g.! here we come monday and let the july month end close start!

hot weekend

wow. what an incredible, wonderfully hot, weekend! friday was awesome, because #1 - i kind of learned how to write a macro in excel using visual basic (yeh, i know, total geek, but SO cool) and #2 - i got a new bike!!! after learning the visual basic syntax (okay, mostly paola trying to explain it to me, haha), p and headed over to the hub on the westbank and tried a couple a more bikes. i was at the east bank hub a couple of weeks ago and couldn't decide between giant or orbea, but when i got on the XS giant avail frame, i knew i found my bike! we woke early on sat morning and took piru to the dogpark, then jumped on our bikes and headed over to Red Bull Flutag in st. paul. although it was incredibly packed and very hot, it was awesome and we even saw a world record take place. we biked back, hopped in the shower, and had dinner at my friend's place. today was filled with CLEANING. we not only cleaned the house, we cleaned the GARAGE! oh. hell. yes. feels. SO. good. we took a bunch of stuff to the goodwill and also cleaned the basement because a couple of p's friends are going to be living with us for the next month or so while in transition. i totally wanted to get another 35-40 miler bike ride in today, but i must admit, it feels awesome having a clean house and garage...now, only if those weeds would pick themselves ;) all and all, it was a great weekend in the twin cities.

cafeteria/skybar

p and i have pretty much been out of town for the past month. it started with our trip to south africa to watch world cup group games, a long fourth of july weekend in and around seattle, a weekend at my parent's cabin (what would a MN summer be without the cabin, really?) and a whirlwind trip to chicago, in which the primary goal was to get paola's colombian passport updated, but the real highlight was renting a couple of bikes and taking a 28 mile roundtrip ride through chicago on a 90 degree day on fat tires...whew! btw, lake michigan feels really effing good on a 90 degree day. otherwise, stay away, cause it's COLD. but, the point of this post is about the cafeteria and support group, which opened it's doors sometime while we were out of town. on tuesday, p and i decided to go check it out. mostly, to check out the skybar views. now, don't get me wrong, i like stella's and seafood, but let's face it, it's rather expensive and the rooftop rarely has space available. and the other rooftop competitor, drink, is just...well...LAME. so i was kind of excited to check this space out. i read some reviews and they were pretty much summed up in, "the food was okay, the waitresses were nice, filled with uptown pretty people, and the view was great." aaaand, the reviews were pretty much right. the food was okay, but i'm not a foodie, so whatever, a burger was fine with me. our waitress was nice, but lacked personality. the view was GREAT and the place was filled with normal looking people, which was a total bummer, because i was ready to look at lots of pretty people. i personally think my backyard spot, cafe maude, has MUCH prettier people, and that's not just because i go there frequently ;) all and all, p and i, without ANYBODY else, enjoyed a pleasent evening to ourselves.

torchlight

the torchlight 5k was a success. it was a beautiful run through downtown minneapolis, across the stone arch and ending on st. anthony main. clearly my running partner and i were having fun in the first mile ;)

1st run, in a long time

i signed up for the torchlight 5K today while at work. i told a friend that i would do it with her. she reminded me of it via email today. dangit! so after work, i walked over to REI and paid the $20, got my number and t-shirt, and signed up. around 8pm i thought i'd better go for a 'test run.' i haven't run, or really done ANY SORT of vigorous (and yes, a 5k is considered vigorous right now) since my bike accident nearly 7 weeks ago. so, i went for a run. i did 5 miles in 56 minutes. i used to that run in 40 minutes. oh well. i ran FIVE miles. a 5k is only 3.2. yay! i'm ready for wednesday. oh, and special thanks goes to grace potter for getting me through it ;)