Race Report: Shamrock Shuffle (Virtual) 5K

Posted on March 16, 2020 by Thistle

This was my first virtual race, and a major race fail in so many ways. The original event (non-virtual) had to be canceled due to COVID-19 (sadness!). They still gave out finisher’s awards, though, so Jason and I both picked up those. I grabbed a coffee mug, leaving him to grab the pint glass so that we wouldn’t get two of the same thing, ha! And of course, while it wasn’t necessary for us to actually do the 5K, I was determined to do it virtually. And despite what I said in yesterday’s Sunday Coffee, I decided to run this race** yesterday morning.  This is where so many things went wrong for me.

**My toe was fine, though. That’s about the only thing that went right!

One: The weather was god-awful. I woke up yesterday morning and looked at my weather app. While it was cloudy out, it wasn’t supposed to rain until afternoon. The temps were decent – high 60s – though the humidity was a horrendous 90%. It looked like it was going to rain. This is where I probably should have paid more attention to my instincts than to my weather app. But no. I geared up and headed out to my favorite hiking trails park. I joked to Jason that I’d probably be soaking wet by the end of the run.

It began raining on the way to the park. The park is literally five minutes’ drive away. I debated with myself – worth it to just get the 5K over with? Especially since it’s supposed to rain for the next two weeks straight? Or should I just turn around? I wanted to run this and not wait for a few weeks, and by the time I got to the park, the rain had stopped. I figured that a few sprinkles every once in awhile wouldn’t hurt.

(soaked)

Generally, that was true. But about halfway into the 5K, it began to pour on me. I had to be very careful with my steps, especially whenever I ran, to make sure I didn’t slip on mud, or slide on slick rocks. Water poured down my face from soaking-wet hair, and my skin was stuck all over with bits of oak pollen buds. It wasn’t pleasant. Around the two-mile mark, I could have quit and gone to my car (as I pass the entrance to the parking lot). The rain was insane by then. But I didn’t want to quit, not two miles in. I kept going as the mud got worse and parts of the path began to pool and flood.

Long story short: my joke came true, I did my virtual 5K in some of the worst possible conditions ever, and I was soaked through by the end. In a further twist of irony, afternoon/evening dawned with clear skies and lovely temps and no rain in sight.

Two: Thanks to another stupid decision, I ended up doing more than a 5K. I recently downloaded Map My Run. Previously, I’ve been using a bare-bones app called Run Log to track my distance and pace. Its GPS is fairly consistent, though a little low (especially on cloudy days), and it doesn’t track elevation or mile-splits. I also use my Fitbit for heart-rate and step data, but find that it’s often overzealous about distance. For example, the section of the park that I run for my mile timing is actually 1.07 miles long. Run Log says 1.05 to 1.06 depending on the day, and Fitbit says 1.1 or higher. These may not seem like huge differences, but they add up mile to mile. I thought Map My Run could do more for me, but as it turns out, its GPS is terrible. I should have tested it before using it for a race-5K.

(on the trail)

In the end, I don’t know the exact distance that I went because I was using Map My Run primarily. I could tell something was wrong because the all-run mile split was much higher than normal (16:19 pace) and went much further than the 1.07-mile spot. In the end, MMR told me that I did 3.09 miles at an 18:11/mile pace. Contrasting that was Run Log, with 3.2 miles at a 17:42/mi pace, and Fitbit with 3.35 miles at a 16:52/mi pace. I’d personally guess that I walked/ran 3.25 miles in about 56 1/2 mins (each timer is slightly different due to turning them off one after another), putting me at a pace of ~17:23/mi. But I really don’t know, because my primary GPS was so wonky. (The data it gave was similarly messed up – sometimes I was going a 4-min-mile pace, sometimes a 33-min-mile pace; not to mention I started and finished in the same location but it says that I ended at an elevation 169 feet above where I started, etc.) So Map My Run is right out, and I’ll be trying RunKeeper next.

Three: This is actually a funny story. I mentioned in yesterday’s post that I’d begun listening to the podcast Real Life Ghost Stories. I had an episode on while on this 5K, and right as I entered a dark corridor of trees with a malignant sky above me, the hosts began to play an audio of a possessed child. Hoax or not, it freaked me out and I kept jumping at birds and squirrels rustling in the woods. Plus I kept looking back over my shoulder to make sure no one was there. I’ve literally been to this park hundreds (if not thousands) of times over the last 15 years and have never once been spooked. Ha!

So there you go. My total fail of a virtual 5K. I have another virtual 5K coming up in April, a Run Across Morocco 5K that I’ve already received my package for. I plan to have tested out RunKeeper and any other apps prior to running that one. Hopefully I’ll be able to finish that one without so many FAILS. But on a brighter note, I got to cross out another square in my running bingo!

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Sunday Coffee – Noteworthy This Week

Posted on March 15, 2020 by Thistle

There’s been quite a bit happening this week, so today’s Sunday Coffee will be one of those rambling posts on many topics…

Coronavirus
Obviously this is a big one going on right now around the world. San Antonio had its first case (unrelated to our quarantine center), and immediately things began to shut down. School is closed for the boys next week. Siclovia has been canceled. UIL is delayed. Fiesta (a major holiday/event here) is moved to November. Libraries are closed for the next week. Jason was sent to work from home on Wednesday and will remain so until further notice. Beyond San Antonio, Morrigan’s school (KU) has gone to online-classes only. Then, of course, there’s our Planniversary cruise to Alaska scheduled for late May. It leaves out of Seattle, and we have no idea if the flights will still be happening, or the cruise, or if the ports will change, etc. I guess we’ll see. And while some of this might be frustrating for some – is the toilet paper and egg hoarding really necessary?? – I’m glad our city is taking proactive steps to contain the spread of the virus.

Spring Break
In the meantime, the boys were already home from school this past week because of spring break, and due to virus protocols, we didn’t really do anything but stay home. (I’ll be honest – we probably wouldn’t have done anything anyway. We all kinda wanted to just relax at home.) This meant a lot of movies – we finally saw the new Aladdin movie, for instance, and Laurence watched Knives Out – and other cooped-up activities. I’ve not really felt like reading for the last month(ish), so I found other things to do with my time. Which leads me to:

Real Life Ghost Stories
I’ve never in my life been able to get into a podcast before. I’ve tried dozens and dozens. They’ve just never done anything for me. But then Andi mentioned Real Life Ghost Stories, and I began listening this week, and I fell completely in love. I love the hosts and the stories and how they combine the creepy and the silly all at once. I think it helps that it’s more storytelling than anything else, so it’s like having mini-audiobooks. Plus, I have SO MANY ghost stories and paranormal creepy experiences from my own life, and I love hearing what others have experienced. All that ads up to be perfect for me. So YAY for finally finding a podcast that I actually enjoy! Thanks, Andi!

Solar Panels
This is a weird one, and a bit of a long story. On Wednesday, a solar panel installation company showed up in the morning to install panels on our roof – only we hadn’t approved any panel installation. The city has a partnership program with several companies and essentially it goes like this: You take out a loan for the cost of the panels you need, based on your electrical use plus 10% more energy for the city’s use. The cost of your loan is the same cost as your average electrical needs, so your actual payments don’t change and you eventually have no electrical bill at all. It’s a great program, and we signed up to be considered, but our sales guy stopped contacting us at one point. We never received the plans for putting panels up, nor signed any loan paperwork. Plus we haven’t lived in this house long enough to know what our average electrical use will be (summer bills are crucial here).

So on Wednesday, we made a lot of phone calls and texts, and sudden our sales guy tells us that we signed papers and that if we don’t install now, we’ll be out a $2500 fine. None of that was true or legal, and we’d signed nothing but pre-approval paperwork to make sure we qualified. The sales guy then claimed to be the owner of the company, when the real owner (it turns out) was on vacation this week. We talked to the contractors – a different company than the sales one – and they said to absolutely under no circumstances continue working with that guy, that the real boss was informed and would be dealing with the situation next week when he returns. Also, they encouraged us to wait until we had several months of a/c summer usage here to get an actual estimate of our needs. We ended up speaking to the real boss via phone on Friday, and it turns out his sales guy was lying to him, too, saying that someone had come to trim back our trees already and that we’d ordered the system etc. The whole thing has been crazy and I have a feeling there’s a certain sales guy who might be in a frick-ton of trouble right now…

Injury
So late last week, I smashed my pinky toe into an ottoman, cracking the nail and causing a blood blister to form under the nail. Yikes. Thankfully, I didn’t actually break the toe! I really needed to rest and let the injury heal, but y’all know me. I don’t really like to do that. So on Sunday last week, I taped up my toe so protect it while out on a 5.6-mile hike. And it felt fine…until the last mile, when I developed a blister on the underside of the toe because of the tape. Really?? Then on Monday, I had this huge compulsion to run despite injury, rain, and heat/humidity. It’s been so long since I’ve felt that wonderful sensation, so I gave in to it and did my next C25K session. I left the foot rest on Tuesday, but was back out on Wednesday. After that point, the toe swelled up and got really red and itchy. Clearly, I needed to stop being stupid! Honestly, I was planning to still do my Shamrock Shuffle 5K yesterday, with my toe taped…only then the 5K was canceled due to this COVID thing, so I guess that was a blessing in disguise. Though I’m still sad about it. I’ll do it virtually at some point. After my toe heals, yes, I promise.

Hacked
I woke up on Friday morning to a message saying my appleID had been used to log into some unknown-to-me MacBook at 4:51am. So I spent most of Friday morning changing passwords and strengthening my security measures. The worst part was that I’m a dummy and had that same password for about 75% of my accounts. Even though it was a fairly safe password, one hack means potential multi-hacks. So now I have a bunch of crazy-safe passwords that are all very different, which is more difficult to remember and keep track of, but hey. The irony is that I started with my appleID password, and didn’t write that one down on my temporary password index card. By the time I finished all the rest, I had no idea what I’d changed that one to, so I had to change it again. Of course, as I was typing that last sentence, I suddenly remembered. Too late! Heh.

Birthday
Laurence’s birthday was on Friday! My baby turned 16, and will have his party this afternoon. We had lunch out on Friday at Magnolia Pancake Haus, mmm, and let him open one of his gifts. The rest will be saved for this afternoon. We were also supposed to have an online murder mystery dinner party tonight with Jason’s extended family. The mystery was set in a mansion in the 1930s. I was playing a former fashion model famed for her “far east eyeshadow” and Laurence was playing my rich husband (ha!). The online party was to celebrate a whole bunch of birthdays – Laurence, his grandmother, and his aunt’s boyfriend all have theirs on the 13th, and his grandfather’s is on the 23rd. Unfortunately, with the virus canceling everything, this party has also been canceled/postponed. I’m not sure exactly why, since it’s all online, but apparently there were travel plans involved that are no longer happening. So that will all have to wait. Ah well.

So that’s our week. It’s been insanity without much actually happening – how’s that for weird? I hope everyone is staying healthy and safe and out of the panic zone!!

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Sweet Sixteen

Posted on March 13, 2020 by Thistle

At 5:10 pm on March 13, 2004, my giant 10-lb baby finally came into the world, cord wrapped around his neck and skin blue. It was not an auspicious start, but sixteen years later, Laurence is healthy and as happy as you can expect a hormone-addled teen to be.

He’s a huge fan of football, Marvel movies, video and phone games, necklaces, electricity schematics (yes), mock-drafts, role-playing games (especially creating his own), history, theatre (both acting and tech), and cheesy romantic comedies.

He’s not yet sure what he wants to do post-high school, and he’s intent on exploring many different career avenues in the meantime. Over the years, he’s explored the idea of being a dentist, a chef, an electrician, a musical theatre performer, a doctor, a sportscaster, a small business owner, and a few others that aren’t coming to mind at the moment. It changes about twice a year.

He prefers adults for company, especially older adults (we’re talking the 70+ age group), and dislikes the angst that is so prevalent among teens.

He also gets angsty himself whenever he doesn’t have a goal to work toward, or when he’s secretly not behaving the way he knows is right, or when he doesn’t get enough sleep. (Also, don’t joke with him in the mornings. He doesn’t truly wake up until noon, no matter how early he went to sleep. Even as a baby, he wanted to sleep in. He would cry through opening presents at Christmas if he got woken up too early.)

Laurence has always been his own person, an old soul. He’s my baby, and it’s been wonderful to see him grow all these years and to become more accepting of who he is. I look forward to the next few years of having him at home before he leaves to create a life of his own.

Happy 16th, Laurence!

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Coffee Experiments: Part 1

Posted on March 10, 2020 by Thistle

Since coffee is now a potential suspect in my health, weight, and medical problems, I’ve been doing a lot of research on the subject and have set up a few experiments to try. For more details on why coffee is a suspect, see the above link.

Background: Prior to 2013, I didn’t drink coffee at all. That fall, I would occasionally get a chocolate coffee drink while at a cafe write-in with friends. For Christmas that year, Jason got me a Keurig. I began drinking coffee a couple times a week, highly diluted with milk and homemade chocolate sauce. By the end of April 2014, I was drinking a small cup of chocolate-coffee each morning. But in May that year, because of Whole30, I cut the milk and chocolate from my coffee and began to drink it black. Since then, I’ve either had my coffee black or with just cream (no sugar), and I drink far more than a single small cup daily, with a few exceptions over the years of cutting back to once a day for a month or two.

A sampling of things I learned during my research:

  • For most people, coffee is anti-inflammatory, which makes it an unlikely candidate to cause inflammation unless I have a particular sensitivity to it.
  • However, newer studies have correlated coffee amount with increased inflammatory blood markers in women, and more research needs to be done.
  • For people who already struggle with metabolic problems, studies have shown that caffeine can cause blood sugar instability. (Personally, I cannot drink coffee in the late morning, or I will have a hypoglycemia attack within half an hour. It’s been that way since 2015.)
  • Hot coffee and cold-brewed coffee are very different products, mostly because there is far more acidity in hot coffee, and said acidity can cause gut flora problems in sensitive individuals.
  • Coffee and/or the heat of hot coffee can become a hot flash trigger in peri-menopausal and menopausal women.
  • Most people don’t weigh their coffee beans and so usually end up getting more caffeine than recommended per cup. (I weighed mine just to see, and it turns out I’m getting LESS.)

Experiments: (Not necessarily in this order.)

1) Replace morning hot coffee with iced coffee. Reason: After drinking hot coffee in the morning, I experience a hormone and body temp shift that causes me to feel overheated, accompanied by lots of sweating. It’s not a hot flash, but it’s still unpleasant. Research suggests that this is a reaction to caffeine overdose, but since it doesn’t happen any other time, I suspect it’s the result of the heat itself and want to check my suspicions by drinking iced coffee in the morning instead.

2) Replace all coffee with cold-brewed coffee for several weeks. Reason: Because the acidity in brewed coffee can cause problems with gut flora, it stands to reason that several weeks with cold-brew coffee only can help determine if the hot coffee is causing problems for me personally.

3) Cut coffee to a single cup per day. Reason: In the past, switching to only a single cup per day has correlated with easier weight loss. It’s possible the weight regain and inability to lose are tied to coffee or caffeine, or a particular threshold of either. It’s also possible this is purely coincidental, so it’ll be good to test.

4) Switch from coffee to tea. Reason: If coffee itself is the problem, and not caffeine, switching to a caffeinated tea should show improvement in my symptoms without causing as many withdrawal symptoms as simply cutting coffee. Potential issue: I cannot stand tea.

5) Switch to decaf coffee. Reason: If caffeine is the problem rather than coffee, switching to decaf should eliminate or at least greatly lessen symptoms, and can do so without disrupting my habits/patterns/rituals as much as cutting completely or switching to tea. It can also be done more gradually.

6) Cut coffee and caffeine both out totally. Reason: If none of the above experiments help, or if a partial cut like experiment #3 help a little, it stands to reason that I should cut all coffee and caffeine for at least several weeks to see how my body reacts and changes.

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Sunday Coffee – A Perfect Day

Posted on March 8, 2020 by Thistle

I had a really good birthday this year, so I wanted to document it in detail. Feel free to ignore me, heh.

Morning time was taken up by the Get Your Rear in Gear 5K, which of course I already talked about. And as I said in that post, the 5K was followed by gluten-free pancakes with nutella on top. Mmmm.

I didn’t have any big plans for my 41st birthday. Of course, last year was my huge Buzzard Party, and after that, I figured we’d just have a nice, quiet day this year. Jason and I watched a few episodes of the Great British Baking Show in the late morning/early afternoon, and I made deviled eggs for my afternoon event.

My hiking group was founded on March 2nd last year, and so the group got together for an anniversary potluck on Sunday afternoon. I only joined the group in December, but it’s already made a huge impact on my life, health, and emotional wellbeing. Even though it was my birthday and even though I really don’t like driving long distances to unknown places, I knew I had to go. The potluck took place in a nearby town called Boerne, which might not have been such a long way away (45 min drive!) if the entire trip hadn’t been under construction. Oy. I’m just thankful my GPS got me there in one piece without any real trouble! Food, speeches, gift exchanges, group photos…it was worth the drive. I love these ladies.

(Sadly, I had to leave before the big group photo was taken. Photo courtesy of the SA PS Women’s Hiking Group.)

One really cool thing happened there that I have to write about. I didn’t expect to eat much at the potluck (gluten free and all), but one woman, Alia, made this Middle Eastern chicken and rice dish called biryani. Lebanese food is my favorite ever, so I got a little of this dish to try. Because it had onions in it, I didn’t think I could eat it. I haven’t been able to eat onions since my anosmia distorted in October 2018 and made everything smell of rotten onions. (Thankfully, it’s now only oniony scents that smell this way, not everything!) Indeed, much of the food at the potluck must have had onions in it, because the whole area smelled rotten. BUT. The onions in Alia’s dish tasted sweet and caramelized and exactly like they’re supposed to. Maybe it was just because my nose was partially stuffed up, I don’t know, but you can believe I went back up and got a bunch more of the dish!! Onions were my FAVORITE before this stupid anosmia issue!

I ended up eating enough at the potluck that I decided not to go out for dinner that night like Jason and I originally planned. Our birthdays always include one special prepared meal and one restaurant meal. Nutella pancakes were obviously my prepared choice, and I saved my restaurant for later in the week. So instead of eating out Sunday, we had cake for dinner. Mmm, cake…

You might notice the sloppiness of the above cake. That’s because this particular dessert was an experiment of Jason’s and Ambrose’s, chosen by me. None of us are really huge traditional cake fans. Morrigan always chooses a cookie cake, Ambrose likes pie, Laurence likes muffins, etc. This year, I wanted an entremet cake using my very favorite dessert, chocolate bavarois. So this cake had four layers: a gluten free shortbread crust, a blood orange curd, a chocolate bavarois, and a chocolate-orange mousse. Extremely decadent! Unfortunately, the curd didn’t set. Boo. That’s what you see slopping around in that photo. But messy or not, the cake was amazing and the sort of dessert where a little goes a long way, meaning there were lots of leftovers to enjoy all week! (And yes, I did eat all my layers separately, so that I could save the bavarois for last. If it wasn’t SO bad for me, I’d have asked just for a bowl of bavarois for my birthday “cake.”)

Then there were the gifts. Jason is the most amazing gift-giver and always has been. This year, he decided to theme my gifts. He called them my “year of adventure.” There were glass coasters with photo inserts so I could celebrate my past adventures. There was a Pop doll of Anne Wheeler (love her!!) from The Greatest Showman, to share others’ adventures. (It’s also kind of a wishful thinking adventure, as I’d LOVE to be able to do acrobatics one day!!) There were hiking poles, a map of the nearby countryside, and a membership to REI for my current adventures. Last but not least, there was a travel guide to Hawaii to plan for (distant right now) future adventures. It was so perfect.

I also received a few other great gifts and cards from friends and family throughout the week. Plus I won free leggings from my Lularoe dealer (ha!), and got gift cards and movie tickets from various businesses I frequent. It was all quite nice.

My birthday night ended quiet and calm. Lying on the couch with Jason, watching more silly baking shows, getting my legs and feet rubbed post-5K, enjoying my first birthday in our new home. It really was absolutely perfect.

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Favorite Photos of February

Posted on March 6, 2020 by Thistle

I had a really hard time narrowing down my February photos to my favorite dozen. I tried to choose a wide spread rather than all wedding, all nature, all 5K, etc. In no particular order:

Top left: Jojo looking contemplative. Top right: Gorgeous Esperanza flower at early dusk. Bottom: Woodlawn Lake at sunset.

Left top: blurry full moon taken while on a walk with Jason after we received some bad news. Left bottom: happy me on a hike with my group. Right: Laurence and Ambrose pose on the beach.

Top left: Jason and I the night before our 5K in matching hoodies. Top right: wedding kiss. Bottom: Periwinkle blooming in our new yard.

Left top: blood orange. Left bottom: giant hands sculpture at Morgan’s Wonderland. Right: shadow on bridge. (I love shadow photos. I’m not sure why, as no one else really likes them. But I adore them to pieces.)

That’s kinda my February in a nutshell – beach wedding, lots of exercise, 5K with Jason, flowers, and cats. Yup.

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Race Report: Get Your Rear in Gear 5K

Posted on March 4, 2020 by Thistle

On Sunday, I walked a 5K with Jason and Stephanie. In my last Sunday Coffee post, I discussed the nostalgia aspects of this event. The thing I didn’t say, and the thing that makes this event double special for me, is that my aunt Cheri passed away from colorectal cancer in 2014, mere weeks after my family arrived in Boston. We were too broke for me to come back to Texas for her funeral services. It was one of the first heartbreaks of moving to Boston. So yes, this particular 5K and its cause is close to my heart for several reasons. And I almost didn’t get to walk it. –>

Rewind to last Friday. I went out for a walk at my normal trail park, and decided to take a benchmark running test. In September, I’d twice run 1.1 miles nonstop on a particular route, and hadn’t done the run again since then. With making a current personal best in last week’s Chocoholic Frolic 5K, I thought I should test my mile time as well. These tests are run on a 2/3rds downhill route at a comfortable pace, no pushing. And I did end up improving my September time by a significant amount. More relevant to this post, however, is that I injured something in my right ankle-knee-hip connection during the run. I didn’t feel any injury or pain or slip, but a couple hours later, the outside edge of my right foot began to hurt, and the pain traveled upwards. I foam-rolled and iced all those areas, and thought some movement would help. Jason and I went grocery shopping Saturday morning, and I had to go sit in the car for the last 20 mins because I could no longer put any pressure on my right foot.

So that’s where I was at on Saturday, foam-rolling and icing like a mad-woman, because I REALLY wanted to walk this 5K on my birthday!! Sunday morning, I immediately put on a compression sleeve over my ankle (see above photo), and made sure my shoes were on tight. A few videos of me walking barefoot and in my shoes showed me the issue. These shoes are made for hiking, and while they’re called trail runners, they’re not supportive enough for my troublesome feet when I run. I roll outward – a problem I’m trying to slowly correct – and so my foot is literally shifting so that I’m walking on the outside edge with the shoe almost diagonal on my foot. The compression sleeve (for support) and the really tight laces were crucial for the day’s 5k. And I still knew that I might not make it.

The 5K was very early. Jason and I were up before 6am, me with a whole giant glass of iced coffee, heh. (see above) We got to Morgan’s Wonderland (starting location) right as the announcements had begun, and met up with Stephanie. Everything ran fast after that – kid’s run, the runners’ start, and then the walkers were going under the starting arch without any real call for us to go yet. Heh. The walkers were untimed for this 5K, but both Stephanie and I put on our fitness devices for personal accuracy. Because of course.

(before the 5K)

The good news: After about a half-mile, my foot stopped hurting completely for the rest of the 5K. Clearly, that sleeve and tight shoe worked! So what’s the bad news? There isn’t any!! The rest is just more good news. We walked our 5K (or actually 3.2 miles) in 58:41, an 18:29/mi pace, and that’s even with stopping twice at water stations AND being stuck in a slow crowd for the first half-mile. Clearly, we’re getting faster and stronger!

(Why yes, we DID walk through a giant inflatable colon)

We didn’t stay long once we were done. Just long enough to get some bananas or breakfast tacos or cereal or granola bars and sit down to eat (below). (Thank you, sponsors, for having some gluten free granola bars, and thank you KIND brand for making so many delicious choices!) Then we all went off to the next parts of our day. Jason and I headed home to make some nutella pancakes for my birthday breakfast…but birthday celebrations are the subject of another post.

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February 2020 in Review

Posted on March 2, 2020 by Thistle

There are a couple months in the year that I expect to be insanely busy. Late November through December (holidays!), May/June (end of school!), October (October!!). What I don’t expect is for February to be absolutely nuts. February. Normally quiet, no birthdays in my household, only one small holiday, only one school holiday. It’s a month where I tend to recover from my headlong rush into goals in January, heh. No time for that this month, though. February was insanely busy. But also awesome:

  • Feb 1st: 3.8-mile hike on Cibolo Creek with my hiking group AND Jason replaced our back French doors
  • Feb 2nd: Super Bowl Party
  • Feb 8th: Laurence got honored at the rodeo for helping to set up the electricity for the booths AND I hiked 3.5 miles at Eisenhower Park with my group
  • Feb 9th: 3.1-mile hike at Comanche Lookout Park with my group
  • Feb 14th: sold our house AND hiked 3.2 miles with Jason at Eisenhower AND went out for Valentine’s Day
  • Feb 15th: Port Aransas for my cousin’s wedding
  • Feb 16th: wedding festivities part two AND a 2.7-mile walk around Woodlawn Lake with my group after returning to San Antonio
  • Feb 22nd: saw Howl’s Moving Castle in theatre with a friend while Jason took Laurence back to the rodeo (he got free passes for his volunteer work)
  • Feb 23rd: Chocoholic Frolic 5K AND the HPWU Community Day
  • Feb 26th: VOTING!
  • Feb 27th: abdominal ultrasound

And that’s just the events. It was a crazy month!

Books
With as much time as I spent doing other things, I didn’t get a lot read this month. To be honest, I did have several books out from the library from my to-investigate list, and they all went right back to the library as not-for-me. I guess after reading some really brilliant books this year so far, I didn’t want to add any that were just meh. So I ended up reading three books in February: a really good one (A Beginning at the End), a so-so nonfiction (Caffeine), and a re-listen to one of my favorites (Howl’s Moving Castle). I try not to choose rereads as favorites for the month, but I can’t help it this time. Howl is just the best.

Goals
Both my career and writing goals were 100% neglected this month. I did work quite a bit on health stuff, which I’ll talk about in my health section below. My other big goal category for the year is finances. There was of course some good progress here. We sold our house, so we no longer have two mortgage payments. With the proceeds of the sale, we were able to pay back any debts accrued from the several months of double-houses. We also got Jason’s annual work bonus and a small tax refund. Those paid off the credit card debt accrued due to unexpected vet and dental bills. They also paid for our May Planniversary vacation up front. Whew! Beyond that, we researched and found a car insurance plan that was more reasonable – our previous one skyrocketed 500% after the boys got licenses, even though one lives in Kansas – which cut down a major bill. And then we rebalanced our monthly budget to include the new circumstances and made a plan to pay off our debt consolidation loan by June 2022 (instead of October 2023). Faster if we put future work bonuses, tax refunds, etc toward it.

Health
Let’s start with the not-so-great stuff. I was tested for autoimmune disorders this month, and came back with all positive indicators and off-the-charts inflammatory markers, but no individual disorders tested positive, so my doctors blew off the rest. Then I learned that I need surgery on my wrist to remove a fibrous ganglion cyst. I also finally received my Lumen this month, a device I backed and purchased on indiegogo 18 months ago, only to discover that 1) it no longer gives the information it promised to give (basil metabolic rate), and 2) it advocates a combination of keto/low-carb diets and carb-cycling, rather than actually testing an individual’s metabolism. Grr.

On the positive side: I did great on my nutrition and fitness this month. Smashed all my 20-20 mini-goals! I ate tons of good fruits and veggies, avoided sugar, only had one glass of alcohol (at the wedding reception, of course!), exercised 20 days for 18:21 total hours, walked/hiked/ran a total of 45.2 miles, started to incorporate more strength-training, and kept my phone off after 9pm almost every night. I also walked/ran a 5K with Jason and smashed my previous 5K times (post-regain), and got a current PR for a one-mile nonstop run a few days later. Sadly, I didn’t get much further on my running goals this month between all the hiking on clear days and the many, many other rain days. But I’ve done some indoor running whenever I turn on old SVU reruns or other junk TV, so that’s good. I also removed gluten from my diet for a big portion of February, as autoimmune disorders tend to be exacerbated by gluten for reasons unknown. Better to be safe than sorry. I’ll admit, I definitely have felt better being off gluten, and each time I caved and ate it again, my throat/nose/sinuses would flare up and I’d feel like I was getting a cold. That seems a clear indicator that I’m doing something right by removing it, yeah? In terms of weight, I lost about 3.5 lbs this month at a slow, steady pace, so I hope this won’t turn out to be part of my normal fluctuation range!

Highlights of February
Of course, the big highlights are listed above – my cousin’s wedding, all those hikes with friends, Howl’s Moving Castle, my 5K, etc. But there were a lot more wonderful things this month that I don’t want to forget!

  • We completed our taxes and actually got a small refund this year. Nothing compared to before the asshat Trump took away credits for having dependents, but at least we don’t have to pay extra like last year!
  • Jason also got a decent bonus at work which helped us pay down our debts.
  • After two months, we finally FINALLY got the keys to our new mailbox!
  • Got to hang out with my longtime friend Nat for the first time in months.
  • After closing on the house, Jason and I used a small amount of the proceeds to upgrade our phones, so now we both have 11s and passed our iPhone 8s down to Ambrose and Laurence, who were still using (very broken) iPhone 6s.
  • Discovered how to make my own small batches of iced coffee to save both on money and on the environment (no more plastic bottles from the store!)
  • Found out we have a gorgeous variety of periwinkle in our new front yard, just started blooming this month
  • Early voting!!! (Even though in the end, my candidate dropped out before the main voting day, so my presidential vote was wasted. Ah well.)
  • That broom-standing stunt. Totally a hoax but so hilarious to punk my boys with it.
  • Jason got me a Choose Your Own Adventure board game for Vday.
  • We also bought together a 52-date-night ideas canister that we plan use each week. We’ve already had our first night, a “luau” involving Hawaiian music, a hula dance lesson, and really delicious virgin daiquiris.
  • Crossing off the first of my running bingo squares!
  • Seeing measurable progress in both my walking and running times this month compared to several months ago
  • Delicious GF treats like blueberry muffins and chocolate cupcakes (I appreciate the companies who make these things so much!)

Coming up in March
Birthday season! Not only was my birthday on the 1st this month, but my stepmom, brother-in-law, youngest son, and both of Jason’s parents have birthdays in March. Laurence and his grandmother actually have theirs on the same day! There’s also spring break this month – always happens the week of Laurence’s birthday, heh – and primary election day, and a whole heck of a lot of planned hikes and 5Ks, and the next Siclovia. So it’s probably going to be another busy month, which will hopefully be just as lovely as February has been!

Posted in Personal | Tagged , , , , | 2 Comments

Sunday Coffee – Happy Birthday to Me!

Posted on March 1, 2020 by Thistle

Hello everyone! I’m pre-drafting and pre-scheduling this post, because at the time I’d normally be publishing it, I’ll be walking a 5K. Yes, another one! There’s a bit of a funny story behind this.

After last week’s 5K, I began looking for others that I wanted to do this spring. I already knew of one in May that my hiking group was planning to do together. I figured three in spring and three in fall would be perfect for 2020. (Forget summer. 100 degrees = no 5Ks.) So I started searching. (Side note: Do you know how hard it is to find accurate information about upcoming 5Ks? There are like five different companies that promote different ones, and the only way I could find to get most of the information in one place was to rely on Google’s event search. Oy.) One of the first races I saw was the Shamrock Shuffle, followed closely thereafter by the Get Your Rear in Gear 5K.

Flashback: In March 2010, I walked my first ever 5K with a group of friends. I had no real concept of the distance of a 5K and had no idea what to expect. Jason and the boys waited at the end as our cheer squad. Our group was slow – we had a couple little kids with us – and I have no idea how long it took us to finish. This was my first taste of 5K events, and the first stirring of my love for them. The event was the Get Your Rear in Gear 5K, its very first 5K event in San Antonio.

(look how cute 30-year-old Jason is!!)

Fast forward to 2011: In January and February that year, I completed Couch to 5K indoors and could now run for 45 mins straight. I signed up for a 5K in March to try to run one officially. A few fellow Sparkers (from Sparkpeople) also signed up for the same 5K. During that event, I discovered that 1) indoor running and outdoor running are very different things, and 2) I was running more up/down (like running in place) than forward. Still, it was my first 5K where I both walked and ran, and I came in with a time of 53:54. Ha. It was also a good marker for me in time/weight – I’d lost 25 lbs at that point from my highest weight. That 5K was the Shamrock Shuffle.

Furthermore, I signed up for a 5K in late March 2011, the Get Your Rear in Gear 5K. I didn’t try to run this one, due to bronchitis, but I walked it with my cousin Jen – the one who just got married on the beach! – while Jason and the boys waited to cheer me at the end.

Those were my first three 5Ks. In 2012, I looked for both the Get Your Rear in Gear and Shamrock Shuffle events. Neither existed, or at least, I couldn’t find them. (See note re: difficulty finding 5K events accurately above.) And I haven’t seen them again in the last decade. So now, I discover that both are happening this March, one of them on my birthday. I’m not ready to walk/run another 5K so close after the last one, but you can bet that in honor of my first 5K in 2010 AND as a personal birthday celebration, I signed up to walk today.

Jason and I are walking this one together. This is pure nostalgia and celebration. Can’t wait to tell y’all all about it!

PS – Not only are we doing this 5K this morning, but my hiking group is getting together for a potluck to celebrate their one-year anniversary. Lucky me to get to celebrate in so many different ways with so many people I love today!

Posted in Wellness | Tagged , , | 1 Comment

Caffeine, by Michael Pollan (audio)

Posted on February 28, 2020 by Thistle

Well this is apropos, listening to a book on the history and science of caffeine while doing my own experiments with the stuff. This short book – what’s the novella equivalent of nonfiction? – discusses how the human race discovered and spread caffeine in the forms of coffee and tea across the world, and how that spread changed our culture and biology. Coupled with that are Pollan’s own experiments with caffeine abstinence and re-introduction.

A couple thoughts on this book. First, it could have been much longer and encompassed a whole hell of a lot more information. I’ve enjoyed most of Pollan’s food-history books in the past and this one felt like it barely skimmed the surface of the subject. I suppose that’s what you get for a two-hour long audiobook. Because of the short length, I didn’t learn nearly as much as I would have liked. I’d hoped to use this as a supplement to my own research into caffeine, but other than a few facts about bees and caffeine-infused nectar, I didn’t really learn much. It was definitely beginner’s nonfiction.

Second, I’m not sure I react to caffeine the same way as most people. Pollan described his reaction to caffeine after three months without it as an insane drive to go-go-go. It reminded me exactly of Alice’s reaction to coffee after a week without it in What Alice Forgot. I’ve never had any kind of intense energy or drive to do stuff after drinking caffeine, not in the beginning, not after going without it for longer than normal. I thought that was just something that happened in fiction, to be honest. It was interesting to hear about this happening to someone in real life, especially as it apparently happens to Pollan every week as he tries to abstain every day except Saturday. Do you all experience caffeine as a jolt or rush? I’d love to hear about those experiences. I find that quite fascinating. For me, drinking a cup of coffee is no different than drinking a glass of water or a cup of orange juice. (Or a cup of decaf coffee, for that matter.)

Altogether, I’d say that this book was okay. Could’ve been better/more, but I did get something out of it.

Posted in 2020, Adult, Prose | Tagged , , | 2 Comments