Busy weekend

Friday was an off day, and I spent it hanging out in the Brewers' Art with Ryan, Bill, and Tony.  Hadn't been there in awhile and it was a lot of fun.  Very chill, shootin' the shit and drinking beer down in the basement.  Great place, lots of memories, and wish I went there more often.

Actually, Friday morning I looked at the watch data - and it wasn't as bad as I initially thought.  I was running much faster than I thought, but that first awful run I did start too fast.  I was below an 8 minute mile!  So that was probably why I needed to stop.  But even when I slowed up - I was still running something like a 12 minute mile (5 mph).

The Thursday night run was a lot more even.  I thought I was pathetically slow, but I was basically right around 10 minute miles for the first minute or so. I slowed up after that, but I was still at 12 minute miles for most of the next two runs, but by the second half of the 3 minute run I was getting gassed and dropped to 13, and the last 5 minute run I dropped to 15 minute miles. But I did have a decent kick in the last minute of that fiver, and pulled it back up to around 10.5 minute mile.

So, yeah - Beth's watch is pretty cool, huh? I wonder how it would do in water....

But of course, with Beth being gone this weekend, I didn't get to sleep until 4 am Friday night and had an awful night of sleep.  Dreams of apocalyptic evacuations and not being able to find Beth.  Woke up for good at 11 - much later than I wanted - and spent most of the afternoon puttering around the house.  Nothing major - some laundry, worked on the script a little, jailbroke my old iPhone (more on that one day), and then did my run at about 4:00.

I did it at the gym on the treadmill, but it went pretty well.  Again, Week 4 on the C25K program, I took it slow - kept it at a steady 5.5 mph (11 minute miles) rather than pressing at 6+.  I know I need to work on that, but for right now, until I get that base down, I think discretion may be the better part of valor.

Skipped the strength; I was beat and still had a ghost tour to do that night.

Once again, didn't sleep well Saturday night, either. Woke up later than I wanted to at 8 am. Made it to the Farmer's Market, and after a cup of coffee and an Ethel and Ramone's sandwich was feeling pretty good. Brought my haul back, scurried around, pumped up the bike tires and grabbed my swim suit and goggles and made it down to the gym.

I used the MyTracks Android app. Google designed, I think, and it worked pretty okay. When I got home I uploaded both legs. You can see that it isn't quite as good as the Garmin - but it more or less was free. Not bad. I think I'll keep using it when I don't have access to Beth's watch.

The swim was tough. Lots of people already at 11:30 am, so I need to do this earlier. Got lucky and went to jump in a lane and the guy did one more lap and left, so I got the lane to myself. But I think I started too fast. No fancy gizmos to confirm that, and the first two lengths I felt great. But I more or less stopped and had to tread water for a couple seconds on the third length. I didn't give myself nearly as much recovery time as I had a couple of days ago, and dug back in - slower this time - after only a couple of minutes. Again - real struggle, but I gutted through it. The second intermission was a little longer, but still not the five minutes I was taking earlier in the week. Same struggle with the third set.

Changed, jumped on the bike, and rode hard to get back home. This was more challenging because it was uphill and a little longer, but I was just over 1mph slower than going downhill in the morning.

I came home, checked the distance between jetties at Broadkill Beach - 128 yards - and then sorta crashed before getting moving again and cleaning the house before Beth got home. No nap, mind you, but folded laundry, watched the O's for a little while, and finished up the cuts I had laid out for the script. The nap came after Beth got home, and I passed out for a half hour before making an Amy's frozen pizza for dinner. Nowhere near enough energy to work on the back slab - maybe I can get to that this week before we head to BKB for the 4th.

Whew. Not your typical busy - but it's been two pretty full days. I'm ready to watch a little ESPN Sunday night baseball, read a little, and pass out, so I can hit the strength tomorrow.

A Day Off!

Really feeling pretty good about myself right now.

First, I had a pretty good interim review at work yesterday.  I've made progress, everyone recognizes that, I need to keep going, but "good job" all around, and I've sorta been taken off my performance plan and placed back under a Director, rather than receiving the personal attention of the VP.  Which I'm kind of ambivalent about.  I mean, it shows a certain amount of faith in me, and I seem to get along with the Director in question pretty well.  But it's change, and I liked working with and reporting to Maryann.  She's firm but fair and has taught me a lot, and it granted me a certain ... power?  clout?  prestige?  that I don't think I have now and I'm not sure how that's going to change things.  In my head at least, there was always the - if you don't play nice, it'll come out in his one on one with the veep....  We'll have to see.

Today, though, I have a 5010 Stakeholder meeting.  Have to polish up the presentation, but I'm excited I get to tell the higher ups how much progress the team has made.

On the tri side:
- Wednesday was swim and run, and I went for the swim and skipped the run.  The swim was much easier.  I need to do 12 lengths of the pool for the August, and for now I'm concentrating on getting through 3 sets of 4 with a breather in between each set.  First set was pretty easy, and then I took a long break.  Second set wasn't bad, followed by a shorter break.  The third set I did three and then had to stand up in the pool for a few seconds before going on the last leg, which was pretty pathetic and I nearly drowned myself - but I got it done.

I decided to skip the run - meeting Joe for Wednesday night baseball, and my knees weren't feeling great after my Tuesday 15 minute run, and save myself to do the rest of this weeks runs.

- Thursday I went out while Beth was icing a cake.  New orthotics in my shoes, I was on to Week 4 in the Couch to 5K program.  When I looked at it on the iPhone, I remembered this week in the program well.  This was a big ramp up from the previous week.  Week 3 was  two sets of 1.5 minute run, break, then 3 minute run.  And when I ran outside last week - I couldn't do my 3 minute runs; I had to stop and walk in the middle.  Week 4 starts at 3 minutes, a 1.5 minute walk, and then a 5 minute run.  Whew.

I took Beth's advice and took it slow - which I think was my problem the previous week.  Was really gratified when the little voice said "You have 1 minute to go" on my first run.  Timing was spot on so I wasn't running up the entire hill in the little park - just the last third or so.  By the way, the view of the sky and Baltimore from the top of the hill in the little park is amazing.  Done it twice now and the sunsets are just spectacular. 

I made it through the five minute, had a nice 2.5 minute walk, then back to the 3 and 5.  Made it through everything with a little bit of a kick at the end of the 5.  Again - I was slow as shit, and it was prolly more of a jog than a run.  But I made it through in sped up motion the whole allotted time.  I was also outside (which I really suck at), it was sorta hot (but not really uncomfortable until I stopped), and I had no water, so.....

Didn't do the strength portion, though.  Had I gone to the gym I would have done the little set of chest press, leg extensions, abdominals, and lower back.  But I wasn't at the gym.  Prolly throw it in this weekend.

Anyways, today's a day off.  Which my knees are thankful for.  I have a run on Saturday which I'll likely do at the gym, and then a bike and swim on Sunday - which I'm going to try to do early when the pool's not crowded.

And then - since Beth is away this weekend - I might try to root my iPhone and finish up the script!  And clean the house and back slab.

I did it anyways!

Last night my plan was to come home, hop on the bike, and put in 45 minutes - thus saving my knees for the heavier duty running later in the week.  But of course, that's not what actually happened.

On the way home from work, Beth - who was on her way to an info session about a training group - called and asked if I could call about a package at UPS.  There was a little bit of a runaround (the computer was telling me that they had attempted at 2:00 pm and subsequently sent it back and I should call the shipper if I wanted it - and I knew that wasn't right), and then when I started thinking about it, I realized that Wednesday was going to be difficult to go get the package, get a work out in, and meet Joe for Wednesday night baseball.  So I should just get the package now.

So - plan thrown into disarray.  I made dinner, waited until 8:00, got into my gym clothes, drove over and picked up the package at UPS, and then went to do my biking at the gym.  As I got on the bike, I thought - rather than 45 minutes of biking - why don't I bike the 30 minutes and then do the elliptical for the 15 minutes of "running"?  It isn't exactly the same thing, but what's bothering me about running isn't the fatigue and breathing, it's the stress on my knees.  And 15 minutes of the elliptical will save my knees, but I'll still be building cardio.  Yeah!

So, 33 minutes on the bike with warm up, got on the elliptical, and hated it.  Could only stand three minutes with the weird gait - legs too far apart, couldn't make it go as fast as I wanted to, the arms all over the place.  I got off the elliptical, sucked it up,and got on the treadmill.  It was inside, and I was running slow and "taking it easy" trying to save myself for later this week - but I still did the run.  I had to stop and stretch out my calf a couple of times (which was where things went all screwy last year), but I did the running. 

Of course, coming down the stairs at the gym, my kneecap felt like it was going all over the place.  And laying in bed, my knee and calf felt kinda numb.  Not really pain - but not a real great, hunky dorey feeling either.  This morning it's better, but still not great.  It feels kinda weak, and I twisted it just making lunch for Beth, which caused some pain. 

So....  I think tonight might just be extra swimming instead of 15 swim and 30 run.  We'll see how the knee feels throughout the day, but I think a day off of running will do more in the long run.

And I'm off

So, the reason I'm trying to get back into the groove here:

I'm running a sprint triathlon on August 7th.

Yeah, scary.

So, I've been trying to follow Hal Higdon's Triathlon training plan.  There are two, and this is the second, more intensive one.  Not great, because it's geared towards runners who want to do this, not people-who-really-like-and-are-kinda-okay-at-swimming-and-biking-but-really-suck-at-running.  It's 6 days a week of activity.

So it's kicking my ass.  I'm also trying to use the Couch to 5K plan for the runs.  Six week program to get you up and running from having no experience to a successful 5K.  I have used it already, to train for the 5K's I ran last fall.  But since the last "injury"/foot pain in November's race, I'm out of running shape.  And it's only a 5K for the sprint, so I figured - well, might as well use that again.

What's neat with that plan is there are a plethora of Android and iPhone apps to help out with the program.  The Get Running app is really the main reason I keep the iPhone around (plus, I want to root it and use it as an international phone.)  But Android has a bunch of apps, too, which I haven't tried.

So, basically, I'm a little loosey-goosey with it.  Last week - the first week - I hit 4 of 6 nights of exercise.  Including a first night of biking and strength.  By the time Thursday came, I just couldn't do it, and had to take the night off.  Felt great on Saturday after two days off and ran an easy Week 3 on c25k (which takes 25 minutes, which I figure is close enough to the 30 Hal prescribes).  But Sunday being Father's Day - and a long conversation with my Dad - I didn't get out to do the swimming or the running.

Last night was really the first time in the pool.  Got my 300 yards in (the length of the tri) and a little strength, so I feel accomplished, but ... man, I'm kinda beat already with a full week of work outs!

Tonight?  30 minutes of biking and 15 minutes of running....  Which isn't on the 5K plan.  Tomorrow - Swim 15 (yay!) Run 30 (boo).  Thursday?  Run 30 and strength....  Maybe if I just did 45 minutes of biking tonight?

A year and a half on....

So, a little while, someone hit me up on the Intertubes asking for my Blogger domain.  They had a good reason: they would use it and it appeared as though I hadn't touched it in almost a year and a half.  And they were right.  I got an email today that appears to maybe back up their claim....

But, you know, I rather like the name - and while I'm not blogging with it - I keep meaning to do so.....

The problem is - keeping it going.  I've looked over the last several years, and it always starts the same.  A couple of very frantic weeks while I post a bunch of stuff, and then.... nothing.... for vast .... stretches of time.

This has been no exception.

And rather a lot has changed since the last post in September of 2009.

• TOTALLY new kit, it seems - I'm now an Android owner and made the switch to using it (very nicely) as my main electronic gadget.  Which means the old PDA and phone and DMP are all Droid X.  And therefore a whole slew of new apps.  Though I also own and enjoy an iPad (original).  Oh, and the laptop is long since gone.
• I'm looking at my N800 links and well ... I'm not even sure I can find my N800 any more.  
• I've been playing with a lot of new stuff, too.  Booted up Chrome off of Hexxeh's builds awhile ago but surrendered the cute lil' laptop to the theater (which hasn't used it yet.)  A myDitto personal network storage device has been installed, along with a good cloud backup service.
• We went in on a beach house in Delaware last year, so a lot of time has been spent down there - and more time will need to be spent as we redo the room.
• And recently, I've started to train for a little sprint triathlon in early August.  And I've found myself the last couple of days really wanting to comment on it.  That should be good for about 8 weeks.

So, of course, here's another start.  And of course, Blogger has introduced all sorts of new templates that look pretty good, so I'll likely have to check that out as well....

And something occurs to me.  I spent a lot of time fretting about setting up two blogs - one more techy and one more generic me - and screw it.  Beth's blog is successful pursuing her many hobbies - food and baking and running and travel.  So.... mebbe I should just concentrate on one journal, tag the living beejeezus out of it, and let Blogger sort the damned thing out....

Here goes ... again....