Entries from May 2008 ↓

I’ve made the decision to finish my bachelor’s degree. I’ve taken the first step in signing up for a summer-session class at my local community college to begin establishing a stellar college record. And now, of course, my freelance business has exploded and local businesses are putting up job listings for a variety of designer positions. The universe works in mysterious ways.

Must. Resist. Compulsion. To. Apply. For. Amazing. Jobs.

I was planning on running 5 days last week but only did 4. I’m not going to beat myself up over it.

Since I listen to audiobooks while I run and since I don’t have a cool timer-watch thingy, I’m counting steps instead. Two steps = 1s. Probably not very accurate but the point is to run so I won’t worry about it. This week (week 3) I’m supposed to be running the following 2 times:

• Run 90s (180 steps)
• Walk 90s (180 steps)
• Run 180s (360 steps)
• Walk 180s (360 steps)

Walking for 360 steps feels like too long. And running for 180 steps is annoying when I know I can do 360 steps without becoming too tired or winded. So I changed it: I’m running 360 steps, walking 180 steps, and repeating that for as many miles as I can.

Today, I did 2.75 miles at that pace. It felt great! I’ll continue that pace this week (hopefully for 5 days) and then move on to running 540 steps, walking 180 steps for 3 miles next week. My goal is to get to the point where I can run 3 miles straight without stopping.

I read about the Couch-to-5k Running Plan over a year ago but wasn’t inspired to start it until I heard that a friend of mine, a busy working mom of two, had run the 5k Wine Run April 13th. I started week one April 14th but training was interrupted by my Chicago trip. So I re-started week one last week and have moved on to week two this week.

My previous experience with running consisted of jogging with Rick at 5 in the morning, running until I could run no more and hating every minute of it. This program starts off with running and walking and is much more tolerable. Listening to audiobooks while I run even makes it enjoyable. Getting the motivation to get out of bed is difficult but I’ve found that if I get out of bed with the intention of simply walking for 5 minutes to warm up and then stretching, the rest follows fairly painlessly.

I had been running in men’s New Balance 507s that I’d bought a couple years ago and had never really used. They were a little too long and made my feet sore. So today, I went Running Warehouse in SLO to get proper shoes. There, a saleswoman named Tara put me in some neutral shoes and got me on a treadmill to video my gait. I was over-pronating, which is a common problem. She put me in four or five different pairs of shoes, videotaping me in each one, until we found a pair that was comfy and supportive. It was a fun experience and I appreciated the time she took with me to find the right pair. I ended up buying a pair of Brooks Ariel shoes and will try them out tomorrow morning.

Gene and I are planning on running a marathon with Train To End Stroke, and organization local to California. I’m going to their information session on the 17th in Sherman Oaks. The Pasadena marathon is November 16th, which is about 6 months from then. Hopefully that’ll be enough time to train. In the meantime, I’ll continue the Couch-to-5k plan at a double pace.