Post-It Wisdom Wednesdays

You rarely win, but sometimes, you do.

I like post-it notes. I'm old-school like that.

Freak Flag

Workout: 6 miles/1 hr

"Here's the thing, Meredith. You have a freak flag, you just don't fly it."

Here's the thing, I will watch Christmas movies whenever I want, and no one will stop me! The Family Stone is one of my favorites, despite having some painfully awkward moments; I gladly persevere due to my love of Luke Wilson, Dermott Mulroney, Diane Keaton and SJP.

Woke up hella early to go running this morning and consequently felt like crap by the afternoon. I'm hoping to get in a little weight training later tonight, but for the moment I'm perfectly happy watching this snowy, Christmas-y, feel-goodery movie to escape the heat and mosquitoes which are still unbearable here in Houston.

I swoon every time at this line: "You were shoveling snow. You were just a little girl in a flannel night gown. And you were shoveling snow from the walk in front of our house. And I was the snow, I was the snow. And everywhere it landed and everywhere it covered. You scoop me up with a big red shovel. You scoop me up."

Fluids

Workout: 6 miles/1 hour

For no apparent reason, I decided today would be a great day to discuss my main sources of hydration. First and foremost is water. I drink tap water. A lot of it. Throughout the day, I try to drink four Nalgenes of water, 34 ounces each. ...Ok, so really the Nalg only displays up to 32 oz, but I fill the thing to the top, top, top. It's probably 34 oz. Probably.

Fluids!

This is counterbalanced, however, by an inordinate amount of Coke Zero. I usually have a can for breakfast and another can at lunch. Sometimes there's an afternoon Zero as well if the day's really dragging.

Since my diet is low in barley, spirulina, alfalfa and other grassy, mossy, green goodness, I add a couple scoops of GreenSuperFood to my water every now and then.



Not evaluated by the FDA. Winning.



Basically, PURE, UNEVALUATED LIFE!

Other sources of fluids come from Crystal Light, Vitamin Water Zero, hot tea and Sprite Zero. Let's just say my colleagues refer to the bathroom as my second office because I'm in there so much. 

The following pictures are the highlights of my day. I absolutely adore coming home and finding these faces on the balcony. Roger (the doxie) has the loudest bark, and Benny has the cutest, most muffled little bark. Roger looks like a crow and Benny looks like a gargoyle. They just crack me up and make my day so much better!

Hope you had a great Monday! Remember, Tuesday is the most productive day of the week, so make it count! 

Live from Intention

This image comes from Pinterest, a website I - along with most others I know - have become totally obsessed with. This sentiment comes from an attitude about life I desperately want to adopt.

Usually Sundays are my glorious, schedule-free, fight-the-Monday-doldrums day of the week. That would be called a habit. I am the textbook habit-driven person; habits are my security blankets and safety nets.

Some of my habits include:
Peanut Butter and Jelly Ezekiel bread sandwiches for breakfast, washed down with a Coke Zero
Reading through a specific list of blogs before starting my day.
Leaving for lunch at 10:45 every day to come home to walk the boys.
Leaving work at 3:30/4. No matter what.
Eating dinner almost immediately after walking in the door.
Being in bed, usually asleep by 9:30

Notice none of these things are necessarily healthy or positive, they are just things I've latched onto as necessary in my life. But, really, none of these things are essential...they are just habits. (Am I getting redundant?)

Some things I want to incorporate into my life but that would require living with (dedicated) intention:
Eating more vegetables.
Sweating once a day. No matter what.
Not eating as many sweets. Maybe not even eating any.
Working harder and longer.
Taking pictures with my Canon.
Sleeping less to have more hours to create/read/enjoy life.
Investing more time in my glorious friends.

This whole post was concocted in my head 45 minutes into my Bikram yoga class tonight, when I was dripping - literally, drenched, dripping, soaked - and barely able to think clearly. Our instructor reminded up to keep our eyes open, to "stay" in the room, to not wipe or fidget, and to be intentional in our workout. These are instructions I plan to carry with me as this week begins. To not be afraid to lay my habits aside in order to make more room for new intentional living.

Honoring the Changing of the Season

Have you ever heard of this? I read once that it's important to do something to honor each season as it comes, beckoning it in, welcoming it into your life. My MO extends this even to new seasons of life - new years, birthdays, the beginnings/endings of periods of life. 

Today inadvertently became my "Welcome, Fall!" day. By this, I mean I've done almost everything that I love to do - exercised, cooked, ate, read, napped and hung out with my dogs. This afternoon, I extended the Fall Honorfest by going to my favorite little joint in Houston, Yogurtland, and piling vanilla, chocolate and strawberry froyo into my belly.

I came home intending to head back out for tennis with some friends but found out it was cancelled. Instead - and this is where the real honoring aspect comes in - I de-cluttered my room, study and bathroom. I dedicated 15 minutes to this endeavor so as not to become overwhelmed, but it turns out 15 minutes was all it took, and now I have an inviting, clean downstairs rather than stressful, aggravating areas I avoid. 

The new season deserves this, a fresh start. I deserve this. With the new season comes new perspectives, new weather, new opportunities and who knows what else. I deserve to be open, ready and willing to embrace all these things - free from the mess of seasons past. 

Anyways, again, today has been maybe exactly what I needed. I plan to open a bottle of sparkling white wine, rent a girlie movie from Amazon and read until I fall asleep (much like this little man has been doing all day). 

Easy Saturday

I'm at that point in marathon training where I'm excited I've gotten this far, but I'm really, really ready to get it over with. This morning I was supposed to run a 12-13 mile recovery run, but I'm pretty sure I sustained my first marathon-related injury last week on my 18 mile run, so instead I opted for a killer spinning class and 30 minutes of upper body strength training.

The rest of my day has consisted of making homemade chicken stock (can you IMAGINE how amazing my house smells?), which I turned into a "Throw it All in the Pot" chicken soup, which I followed with a bowl of Cinnamon Toast Crunch for dessert. Do you also love cereal as dessert?

The soup had shredded chicken, cannellini beans, tomato puree, chicken stock (obv), sweet potatoes, peppers and lots of different dried herbs. So delicious and fun to make!

I just started reading a new book, On the Divinity of Second Chances. I'm really excited about it, but when I tried to make another dent in the pages this afternoon, I ended up falling asleep with the boys. I finished Running on Empty a couple days ago, and it was such a great book. Definitely had a lump in my throat through some parts and felt myself cheering through the Kindle at other points.

All this to say, it's been a fantastic Saturday, and I suspect the majority of the rest of the day will probably involve a glass of sparkling wine and my new book. Obviously I'm not able to enjoy relaxing Saturdays like this very often, so I am soaking it all up today, every last ounce! 

On the Run

2011 has been a strange year. Hell, most of 2010 was a strange year.

2011 has also been exceptional, and I'm so excited to get back into blogging, getting y'all up to speed.

Tonight, I'm going to scaryoke. That's Scary (as in, Halloween) + Karoake (embarrasing, way-too-loud singing), and I've got quite the costume waiting for me.

It's hard for me to believe that Roger became my firstborn furbaby almost two years ago on Halloween. Time has truly flown...well, probably not for him because he spends the majority of his days sleeping, humping his brother, and picking out the round bits of kibble from his food bowl (which we call the nuggets), leaving Benny to eat the other, non-round bits (which we refer to as the vegetables).

I love my life. I really, really do. Praise God!