Thursday Thirteen

1. Training: I've run 80 miles in October so far. 80. EIGHTY. Miles.

2. My new boss (me): I'm teaching therapeutic parenting classes and building a caseload of clients. I used my Social Worker and counselor contacts, and now the phone is ringing. There's a shortage of this being taught by people such as myself, who are licensed therapist.
More on this as it develops. The really cool thing is that most of what I need, I have: a home office, lots of teaching supplies, and a laptop computer. Oh, and a spouse that tolerates my career flights of fancy. 

3. BTW: Did I say I ran eighty miles so far for October? EIGHTY.

4. Bleh: I've had kinda of a shitty week. That's right, I used the "SH" word. I had a social work law midterm, and I suck at memorizing lists of words and facts, so while I passed it I probably did not do as well as I am used to doing on tests. Then there were other sources of stress and no nice long runs to burn it all off because I'm tapering. No comfort eating either because I'm not training! This weekend, I'll have a nice lovely run for about 7 hours--oh, who are we kidding, probably EIGHT hours--and then it's back to training, thank goodness.

5. Thyroid stuff: One week on the new meds, and I feel more like my old self again.  Also, I'm 4 pounds down since the beginning of the month.  That may be the meds, or it may be the extra training, or both.

6. Testing, 1...2...3:  In the past, my training has consisted of a 3 or 4 miles run (one) during the week and then a long run on the weekend. This time, the long run wasn't as long, but I put  a lot of volume over 4-5 days a week. It will be very interesting to see how my experience at Palo Duro compares to last year.

7. Ohmmmmm: I've really gotten into Vinyasa yoga. I've never really stuck with it this consistently before, though I've always liked it.  I'm getting better at it, too, less wobbly. It's good core work. It's a great compliment (or is it complement?) to ultrarunning. Plus, the stretching. The stretching, y'all. Feels n-i-i-i-i-ce.  I really like Yogatic!on YouTube.

8.  Cheap: Didja know you can download videos from YouTube using Real Player? It converts them to iPod format too. I haven't yet figure how to make use of Yoga videos on my two-inch iPod screen, but I will. 

9. Stages of Change: I have a repeated experience where friends call to say they've "really got to do something" about their fitness, then ask if they can come run with me.
Then, there's several weeks in a row where they cancel, cancel, cancel, and then I stop hearing from them.  What up with that? 

 10.  Looking back: In January of 2005, at 194 pounds, I joined WeightWatchers, and by eating sensibly I lost nearly 30 pounds.  Then after I started training for my first marathon, I lost another 15 pounds.  Then in 2008, the weight started creeping up again; I think that's when my thyroid started failing.  If I'm back to more of my "normal" self, then I can start back toward my goal of 145 or so pounds, which is a sensible weight for my height of 5'6".

11. Purr baby: I have a cat who will not WILL NOT give up my office chair.  Finally, I move her; if I lean forward while in my chair, she'll leap up into the space behind me, and stay there, and won't move.

12.  Hyperfocus: I have to set a timer once an hour when I'm working in my office.See, my computer not only has internet access, it has a TV card.  Once an hour, I get up and do something housework-y or fitness-y. Exceptions: writing a paper or studying for a test.

13.  Social Work School: The semester from hell is half over.  Looking forward to a break. 

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