give me just one night.

new month. new obsessions.

1. John Legend

2. Fleetwood Mac

3. Clementines by the handful.

4. It Ain’t All About the Cookin’, Y’all by Paula Deen

5. My new view at the office: mountains.

**************

this weekend. Costco. haircuts. Date night, maybe home made pasta, certainly homemade pizza. six miles of running. yoga. maybe twice. farmer’s market. listening to tunes. updating my cooking blog. updating this blog. snuggle time. soccer. little, little hands and feet. s t r e t c h i n g. dreams (to remember.)

******

songs of the week:

* Go You’re Own Way
* Sydney (I’ll Come Running)
* Loser Like Me

*****

It’s almost summer. I can feel it. Off for a threemile run…

Relative Danger: a story of sorelle

Chicks, it’s Friday. I am trying to keep my spirit up, despite the fact that apparently I am allergic to the entire state of California.

Last night was a hectic night, as are most nights at the HAP house. We’re shooting a photo shoot this weekend for Garlic, My Soul, and we had some prep cooking to do. We made doughnuts, pancakes, and muffins last night, and Corelyn spent today decorating our baked goods. Becca will be on hand for makeup and quiche-making, and Jeff will be around for man-power. Literally.

Anyways, this week has been long – and it’s been the week of 2.25 mile runs. I can’t believe I am already past 2 miles, and its killing me. I think it’s because I haven’t been to yoga in a while — too busy!! — but my shins have been KILLING ME. My sorella told me I could take a break, so this morning I dragged myself to the gym to do the elliptical machine. At 6:50, I was already late and turns out, it takes you longer to travel the same distance on an elliptical, unless you pump your legs so hard you have to hold on to the machine so you don’t fall off.

I kept an eye on the clock, and had to jump off at 7:20 to make sure I got to work on time. 1.75 miles is all I got before my time was up. It took 22 minutes in all (which actually was about the amount of time it took me to run it, so I guess I wasn’t that far behind.) I somehow had forgotten my lock (who knows where it is? I am hoping on the floor at home) so I had to go out to my car to get it then hustle back inside to get ready for work.

Needless to say, it was another crazy morning. Where’s the yoga when I need it? But when I got to work, Nikki and I signed up for the race. That’s right, folks; on the day I broke and needed a running break, I signed up to run a 5k that I’m not even sure I can do. We signed up with the team name “Relative Danger” just the right amount of truth and cheese. So cheer me on, send me shin stretches, and good vibes…I’m going to need them.

 

Girl, please excuse me…

As I mentioned in my last post, I am lacking in some gym beats.

Luckily, after Lauren reiterated that I should listen to RadioLab (thanks again Jess for introducing me!) I have been listening away as I walk. Today I walked five miles, three of them home from M’s, and the time past so quickly because I was listening to a podcast about stress. Which, by the way, is intriguing — did you know if you are exposed to high levels of stress you will stop growing? Bodies are so cool.

OK enough on that. So Jeff and I sat down tonight after dinner to talk music. Jeff usually has the most recent radio hits mixed in with the gems from the last twenty years, so it was no problem to transfer some of those tunes to my computer, and BAM I have a new 2 hour and 30 minute gym mix, including, but not limited to:

* 10 Days Late – Third Eye Blind
* F*** You – Cee Lo Green
* Raise Your Glass – Pink
* All I Do is Win – DJ Khaled
* Uncharted – Sara Bareilles
* Caught Up – Usher
* Pump It – Black Eyed Peas
* Are You Gonna Be My Girl? – JET
* Get Out Of My Mind – Hootie and the Blowfish
* All or Nothing – Athena Cage

Monday 2 mile run, here I come.

Running, running, running…

Week 2 of the 5K training is on. It’s Thursday already (How in the WORLD did that happen?) and LA has cranked up the heat. 90 degrees is our high today, and it makes me glad today is  “rest” day.

Yesterday I meant to run in the morning. I packed my gym bag. I packed my things for work. I set my alarm. I knew I’d make myself add to my iPod’s playlist in the morning. Everything was ready. And I woke up…at 6:45. Too late to do ANYTHING about the fact that I was supposed to run. So I got up (at least I could be on time for work) and chastised myself the entire way to work, knowing this meant rushing to the gym after work to run before a scheduled meeting with MMC and Cor.

I left work on time, and got to the gym at 5:55. Not horrible, could be better. I stretched, cursed the fact that my jams were SO OLD. I got on the treadmill, already hot (damn 24hour fitness, please turn the air up, please) but determined. As I ran, I tried to keep my speed at 6.0 and above, as my sorella suggested, because it would help my legs not get tired as quickly because they were at my natural stride. I allowed myself less walks. My heart rate was around 180 the entire time, and I pushed, and pushed, and pushed. As I got to a mile, I was at less than 12:30, and I knew I was on to something. I allowed a quick walk, then was back at it. The result?

1.5 miles in 17:51. More than 90 seconds off my previous best time of 19:29. I am feeling good today. I think I need to work on pace (I am a sprinter, walker, sprinter, more so than a jogger) and figure out a way to run outside without falling flat on my face or getting run over in this crazy city. Also I’d like to avoid the loooooong hills that Hollywood specializes in. We’ll see how I do.

With this 90 degree weather today, I will be waiting until next week to see how the outside world is…meanwhile, tomorrow is another 1.75 run, so I will attempt to run that in the AM to allow myself a free Friday evening. This afternoon? A walk through the neighborhood to make up for my Tuesday rest day, possibly to Paula Deen’s book on tape or else some podcasts.

Meanwhile, if you could guys could send a mixed CD my way, and podcast suggestions for my walks, that’d be great.

You’re so sad, and pathetic. So sad! So wilty!

That is what I just exclaimed to the spinach I spied in my fridge. Home from running for the night (we’ll get to that in a minute) and now showered, and starving, I ate a few handfuls of “Trekking along with Cashews and Hibiscus” and realized I needed to figure out what to eat for dinner.

The kitchen left clues that suggested Jeff had pasta earlier in the day. “So I am guessing you won’t want pasta for dinner, too?” I asked. “No, I’ll do pasta again,” he says over the phone.

Do I have the ingredients for cheese sauce? Barely. The showing of the cheese in my fridge is distressing. Only parm, and a half-block of raw milk cheddar. Did we have any red sauce on the shelves? No. Now, to those of you who live in LA, I know this will shock you. Don’t worry – I have the supplies to make a sauce from scratch, but my stomach is rumbling NOW. Plus Jeff has to rush back out to work tonight, so that won’t do.

Jeff offers to stop at TJ’s for sauce and sausage – our favorite quick dinner. So now, to the kitchen to prepare the water for pasta (of which we’re dwindling close to less than 5 pounds. Jeff assures me we must use up our “random” pasta before we add to the collection. I am skeptical.) Spinach and chive linguine I must have bought once at TJs, although I don’t know what possessed me. I don’t like linguine. It must have been for something, but now it’s tonight’s dinner.

And now, a vegetable, which leads me to the conversation with the spinach. I opened the fridge, scared of what I’d fine in the vegetable drawer. The CSA from last week is half eaten, and I went to the farmer’s market yesterday and committed a cardinal sin of the farmer’s market. I was on my cell phone when purchasing. I also (sin number two) was in a time crunch, as yoga started at noon. This led to the purchase of a large bunch of spinach, a medium bunch of kale, two crowns of broccoli, an onion, some garlic, three lemons, and who knows what else.

This melody added to the Swiss chard, artichokes, beets, carrots, baby carrots, onion, and garlic I ALREADY had made for a very green fridge. Oh CSA, why can’t you teach me another way to each artichokes?

Anyways, back to tonight, and my kitchen. Like I said, I had a lot of veg. So I figured Jeff would prefer broccoli to say, chard. Opened the fridge, and spotted the sad, pathetic, ONE DAY OLD spinach. “Really? Really you look like that? I bought you yesterday. Pathetic.” So the spinach went in, and then the broccoli as planned, head shaking all the way.

Luckily Jeff knows that TJ’s for sausage and sauce also means garlic bread, so we have that to look forward to.

Meanwhile, I ran Friday and then again today. 1.75 miles today, 23:35. Not bad, says Nikki, and my feet. My body is so sore from yesterday’s yoga where I had a great aha! moment that involved really working my arms like I should have been all along from plank to up dog. Anyways, tangent. This run was the longest yet, probably the longest distance I’ve ever run just to run, and my feet did NOT blister over. They instead have callused. I take this as a good sign, despite that all this working out has led me to talk to spinach in my kitchen…