Honest Scrap Award

I got the honest scrap award from Jill at Running to Sanity.  I love her blog. Check out her header. It is a great picture and one of my favorite headers.  I need to answer the following 10 questions to accept the award.

1. Best Meal Ever: This is a tough one (as they all are) as I have eaten a lot of good meals in my lifetime.  I am going to go with a  restaurant meal and unfortunately it is a restaurant that has closed. I am not a big meat eater but I love a good teriyaki steak. Sirloin Saloon had the best along with excellent bread, a salad bar to die for and wonderful wonderful moose pie for dessert. Any favorite meal of mine includes dessert.


2. Best Sleep Ever: The first night my "baby" slept through the night. When they do this you can forgive them anything.

3. Best Cup of Coffee: I love Green Mountain Coffee and not just because I am from the Green Mountain State. They have so many good flavors including Mocha Nut and Caramel Creme. How can you not want those?

4. Best Romantic Moment: Our honeymoon 25 years later.  Actually a 25 year anniversary trip but my husband insisted on calling it our honeymoon!

5. Best Childhood Memory: Dancing on my father's feet as he sang along to the music.

6. Best Moment of Your Life: How about moments: marrying, having children, completing a marathon

7. Best Moment of Revenge: No clue

8. Best Thing Someone Has Done For You: Supported me through new eating and exercising and complete life changes

9. Best Thing You Have Done For Someone Else:  I am not sure about this one.  A little thing I do is send letters and cards to some people who don't get out much.  I like writing letters and I know they like getting mail.

10. Best Life Changing Moment: Having my gall bladder out and knowing it was because of my own choices I had been making. Then turning things around completely. And getting the support I needed from my husband and family  to do this.

If  you haven't done this consider yourself tagged. It is harder than you think!  

Compression Tights Rock

I have only worn my new compression tights on two runs but I may start wearing them:

To work

To buy groceries

To shop

To take out the garbage









You may be wondering why I am going to wear them everywhere.

Is it because they speed recovery of my legs after running?  


Is it because they lightly massage my muscles as I am running? 


 Perhaps it is because my legs don't get as tired when I am running a long distance?

Well any of the above could be true but I have not had them long enough to know the answer to any of those questions. What I do know is that after I posted a picture when I was wearing them I read comments like you look:

"like a lean, fierce running machine"


"look awesome, tough and hardcore"


"cute in compression"


"make you look super fast"


"make your legs look SKINNY" (the caps are my touch)


(plus very flattering comments from my husband and running partner!)

So do I care what they do??? NOT ONE BIT! It's all about the look you present. So what if people were reading my blog when they were tired and their eyes must have been blurry or after that 6th cold brew!
I'm going with the comments posted and LOVING my new tights!

Is there such a thing as too much chocolate?

Trying out my new compression tights - Loved them!

We had a great 8 mile run this morning. With the recent snow we were back to a picturesque snow covered route.  The temperature was reasonable and T was running with me.  As we ran we discussed the possibility of entering the Seattle Marathon.  It's kind of a 50/50 deal right now with work being in the way for T.  I would love to do it as the time works out supremely well for me.  I also gave T a recap of the half marathon I ran last weekend. She is always a great audience for as many race details as I want to give her.  Her son is down visiting my daughter in DC so we spent some time speculating what they had on tap for today.

Temperatures are warming up but the river continues to look cold!

This afternoon my husband and myself as well as two friends headed up to Burlington's Mardi Gras parade. There have been many years where I have FROZEN at this.  No worries this year, the temperature was almost balmy!  It is always a great parade. I tried to take some pictures but I mostly got arms reaching for the many things being thrown from the floats. I saw one of my students there who was busy collecting his own beads.  

Waiting for the parade to start

The owner of Magic Hat Brewery Who Sponsors the Parade

Most of my pictures of the floats look like this, arms reaching for the multitude of stuff being thrown

Okay I'm finally getting to the chocolate referred to in the title! We left there and went to a local restaurant. We sat at the bar sporting our many colorful Mardi Gras beads.  We chatted and enjoyed wine/beer before we all ordered burgers.  That should have been enough but I looked over the dessert menu. I found out it was Chocolate Fest which meant there were many chocolate offerings and you could have as many as you wanted.  Thankfully my friend's husband decided to partake with me so I didn't look like a total hog alone.  All I can say is YUM!  How could anyone resist!!!  

A fun day overall.  

Whining my way through personal training

Yes, I whined my way through my personal training session tonight.  "I can't do it."  "That is too hard."  "Are you serious?"  I am sure there are more but those are a few of the statements I made.   The personal trainer took it in stride although he did let me know I was being ridiculous.  Part of the problem  was that the PT was my son!  He had given me some sessions for Christmas and this was the first one.  I would not have given up so easily if the PT was someone I didn't know.  But by the end of the session I was doing a couple of things I had thought I wouldn't be able to.  Although I am a very motivated person I have not yet stuck with a strength training regimen.  I actually stayed with it last time for a year and a half and then abruptly stopped. Foolish I know.  This was the jump start I needed and now I will continue at my own gym. Unfortunately I won't be able to train with J again for awhile as his gym is a ways away.  It is an amazing facility which believe me mine is not!! So thank you J for putting up with me and getting me back on another important aspect to my fitness. We discovered J has waaay better balance than I do.  One of the things I whined I couldn't do was to balance on "whatever it is called" that I am balancing on in the picture above.  Whereas J can do it on one foot with major weights in his hand.

Before this I went to Dicks to buy a foam roller. I am hoping it will help my minor injuries before they become more major.  I heard a lot about them on various podcasts that I listene to and it all sounded good. Does anyone use a foam roller and have any advice or comments?

I'm also posting pics of the two items I bought in Maine last week. Well, one was at a running store in Portsmouth, NH.  I returned more items than I bought which believe me is good for me!

3/4 zip from Nike - very comfy

Love my new Mizuno 

Am I supposed to get in the snowbank/TTT

Three Things Thursday

OR

 Am I supposed to get in the snowbank? 

1. Today I was running on my usual route when a van waited until it was beside me and laid on the horn startling me, making me jump and giving me a heart attack.  I assume they thought I was in the way.  Well, I was on the side of the road, the "shoulder" was filled with snow and there was NO CAR COMING IN THE OTHER DIRECTION so there was plenty of room for this van and myself. The car directly in front of the van had no problem. The other 41 (yes, I counted) cars I met had no problem. If he truly wanted me to move he could have given a slight honk BEFORE he was beside me but no he wanted to go for the nasty approach!

2. I had a decent 5 mile run today except it was raining. Yesterday we had this beautiful snow and I stayed in because my body really needed a day off. Today I go thinking it will still be beautiful but the snow was already ugly and it was raining.  It wasn't cold though and the roads were clear.

3. Today I had lunch with two former colleagues.  I don't see these two wonderful friends as often as I would like but I am glad we haven't lost touch.  One woman left to pursue a new career which she has been very successful at. The other woman retired. She and her husband have done retirement the way I think it should be done. They have done a ton of traveling with lots of wonderful adventures.  Back in the day when I was 50 pounds heavier and pretty much a slug I admired C for her dedication to her running and fitness routine.  (But I only admired it with no attempt to follow it. )  She has stayed fit and is way more adventurous than I!  If I can do half as much when I retire I will be thrilled!  

Two Amazing Early Morning Runs in Maine

Generally following a half marathon or marathon I take some time off to allow my body time to recover.  But after Sunday's fun fun fun half marathon, I have not yet stopped running. I was in Maine on the ocean and could not resist running in one of  my favorite places.  Last week ESH at Sweat Once a Day asked what our favorite running routes were. I added running on the ocean as a distant fourth but that is only because I get to do it so seldom.  Running in York up to the Nubble Point Lighthouse is right at the top for me.  It totally rocked this year because I got to run it on a clear sunny day which was beautiful and then on a cloudy stormy day which is how I truly love the Maine ocean!  I ran slowly and smart so as to not strain my muscles and pretended it was recovery. Truly though I had a couple issues before my race (hip flexor and piriformis) and they both feel much better now!  Let's hope they stay that way!

Much of my running route in York follows the route of my last half marathon All Women and One Lucky Guy.  If you haven't run this race, think about it!  Crush Til It Hurts, you want to meet some running ladies, here is an opportunity for you!

Monday I left my hotel (off in the distance in the picture on the top left) and ran along Long Sands before heading up to Nubble Point Lighthouse.  I love going up toward the lighthouse looking past the houses on the cliffs to the ocean beyond.  My entire run was only about 4 1/2 miles so I don't think I did too much damage to my recovering muscles.  This picture to the left is headed back down on the other side to Short Sands.

Tuesday (today)  I was up bright and early again but I could see rain on the window.  It only rained for about 3 minutes but it certainly felt like it was going to storm later in the day.  The sky was much grayer as was the water.  When I got to Short Sands today I started playing
with my self timer. I am NOT headed into the water, just away
from the camera not always timing things the way I mean to.
I fooled around with it again at the lighthouse having trouble
finding a rock to balance the camera on and figuring out how to keep the ugly electrical wires out of the picture.  Lame lame photo but I was having fun! When I headed back to the hotel I went down onto the sand to run.  It was pretty wonderful. I guess I will take tomorrow off not that I am back home but it is snowing hard out and I do love to run in the snow when it is light and fresh!

Sunshine that is Gorgeous!

Thanks to Lisa and Katie A. for giving me the sunshine award!  I need to tag 12 people who bring sunshine to my day.  So many of you do this and I know I already tagged some of you once on this. In fact Katie and I were tagging each other at the same time! I also got the Gorgeous Blogger Award from Molly. Thanks Lisa, Katie and Molly!  I love getting awards!  For the Gorgeous Blogger Award I'm supposed to list 6 things about myself.  I'll give it a try.  I'm going to try to write about 6 things that I haven't already written about. No promises.

1.  I am very competitive even if it is just with myself.  That is one of the things I like most about racing.  You can always do better.  You can have lifetime goals, race goals, yearly goals.  I love setting goals and trying to meet them.  I am a huge list maker and love crossing things off my list as I complete them. This so feeds into my love of goals: lists......crossing off........new lists.

2. Skiing used to be my main sport of choice!  I loved it and spent most of my childhood winters skiing. I continued skiing a lot through college. In fact a large part of where to go was based on how close skiing was.  After college it got very expensive and I stopped skiing with any regularity. I was on my high school ski team but I was also a middle of the pack skiier  although I didn't call it that.

3. I like to eat popcorn for supper on Friday nights. Lots of it. Parmesan cheese on top with a good book in my hand.  I don't cook on Friday nights.

4. I love going to concerts.  My all time favorites are Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young.  I have seen them in different groupings many times.  Some of the best concerts I have seen are Paul McCartney, Dixie Chicks, James Taylor and Maroon Five.  If I could see someone new I would choose Coldplay or R.E.M. I am NOT a classical music fan.  AT ALL.

5. I have been a teacher for more than 30 years.  My mother was a teacher and it's all I wanted to be. Good thing I liked it and it worked out.  8+9 year olds are the best to teach!

6. I love coats/jackets. I own a ridiculous amount.  I don't seem to feel you can have too many.  Some people like shoes.  Nope, it's coats for me.

Now  I am going to tag some people to win the Gorgeous Blogger Award.  I am not going to promise you haven't already been tagged.  I will tag 6 people for my 6 things.

Alicia at Alicia Runs
Alisa at Ambitious Aspirations Make Great Accomplishments
Anne at Asthma and the Gift of Running
Tina at Gotta Run Now
Jocelyn at Running with High Heels On
Moni at Wife, Mom, Teacher, Jogger