Couch to 5K - W4D3 - I talk about stairs. A LOT.

Week 4 is finished! 54 degrees and sunny, no wind, rain or freak hailstorms in sight. About an hour before I ventured out I had some breakfast, and I was rewarded with no headache. Hopefully this means I don't have to give up my beloved homemade iced coffee. Fingers crossed!

Anyway, along with my usual musical recap, I thought I'd post some pictures of my run from beginning to end. Let's go.

Definitely tripped over these when I woke up. Grrrrreat start to my morning. 

The keys are what's really important here, but can we take a look at everything I have due this month? I can't tell you how excited I was that I could fit everything on this calendar. That's how close I am to being finished with my junior year!

 (And yes, I really should NOT be complaining. I'm absurdly lucky to not have to deal with finals. But these 50 pages of writing ARE a little intimidating!)

Moving on! I'm really here to grab my keys. Don't you just love the wristlet? 

I popped off my house-key and stuck it in the inside pocket of my shorts.

Let's talk about this for a second. I love my Tempos. Really, I do. However. I do not love the 'internal card/key' pocket. It just has a little flap, no velcro or snaps or anything. Knowing me, I would lose my key without realizing it halfway through my run. Super fun. 

So this morning, instead of switching back to my cute leggings with the zippered butt pocket (sexy, right?), I improvised.

I binder-clipped my key to the pocket.

That's right. I folded it over itself and clipped it in there with a mini binder clip.

How'd it work? PERFECTLY. Please try this.

Hey Lily-Mae! Isn't her ducky sticker the cutest? A friend decorated her on Cinco de Mayo, she's even got a dinosaur on the back. Yes, I name my Apple products. You should see the reactions I get from the Genius Bar. Priceless. (Don't let me forget to tell the story of the unfortunate passing of Celia!)

I have an iPod Nano (Costell), but I rarely run with him. For one, I don't have a Nano sized case (though I could use this one!). Also, I'm using the C25K app on my phone! I absolutely love the app, but I'm not the world's biggest fan of running with an armband. Oh well.

These headphones are great too, they don't fall out! They're not noise-blocking, but that's not a downside for me at all. Safety first!

Ready to go! 

Oh man, I must have missed 'how to take a myspace pic' day in middle school. 

I'm not that weirdly proportioned, I'm just bent over. Cute. You also can't tell in this picture, but about halfway through my run I realized my shirt was on inside out. Skills, I tell ya, skills!

It was (and still is right now) gorgeous outside.

And there was absolutely no one outside. 

I think I saw maybe 5 people the whole time I was out.

Oh yeah, we keep it classy. 

You would think this pro-graffiti area would discourage people from spray painting other places, right?

Yeah, it doesn't.

One of my many 'gradual uphill' slopes.

Aka a freakin' hill!

Um, it looked more intense in person?

These stairs are horrible.

I had to stop and walk down them.

Not because my legs hurt.

Oh no. It's worse than that.

They confuse me.

You read that right! These are the most confusing stairs in the world.

Instead of being shaped like this:

|---|

they were built like this:

\---/

Which means unless you start at the very middle of the top (which you can't because there's a supper pillar), you have to walk down them diagonally (sideways?)

It's bad enough when you're having a good day, but you should have seen my trying to get up and down these stairs last winter. I had given myself a concussion during yoga (I'm awesome), and this was just way too much for my brain at the time. I literally stopped and stared at them for quite some time until my roommate realized I was seriously struggling to comprehend how to use the stairs.

Like I said, I've got skills.

Once I got past the stairs, time flew by!

The only time I struggled (aside from you-know-what) was during my last 5-minute run. I had a bit of a side cramp and my legs just felt dead. I walked for about 20 seconds and then I just powered through!

Home again, home again! 

I'm glad to be done with week 4, but I can't say I'm too jazzed about what's coming next. I remember hating week 5 last time I did the C25K program. But if it's all about the mind-set, then I need to push that aside and think positively!

And today's music: As promised, it's Britney!

(You Drive Me) Crazy (The Stop! Remix)
Rock Me In
Blur
(I Got That) Boom Boom
3
Radar
Outrageous

Ehh. I love Britbrit, but these songs didn't do much as far as motivating me. Possibly because I've heard them all a million times by now?

I hope everyone's having a beautiful Saturday. Get outside and do something! :)

Couch to 5K - W4D2 - YES, really!

via.

I diiiiid it! I diiiiiid it! It was 53 degrees and SUNNY and I ran outside and I loved it!

For some reason I also decided I would run up (and back down) 3 hills, which may not have been my brightest idea considering I'll be running again tomorrow, but hey! It was fun.

We're supposed to FINALLY hit the mid to upper 60s this weekend and into next week. Spring, is that you? Are you here to stay? I hope so! We've had enough crazy weather (hail storms!) in May already.

The tunes for today included:

• Mercy
• Gives You Hell
• 4 Minutes
• Express Yourself
• You Keep Me Hangin' On
• Hair/Crazy In Love (I've officially decided I hate this one.)
• Sweet Caroline
• No Air
• Don't Stand So Close To Me/Young Girl (My favorite song from the 1st half of the season!

Yes, ALL from Glee! 

Now, I have to be honest here. I loved the pilot episode. I loved the first few episodes. And then things went downhill. This article points out a few of the issues the show's facing right now, which I couldn't agree with more. My parents watch the show, and my dad told me last night that they fast-forward (or bloop-bloop, as my mom calls it) through everything but the songs. Sadface!

Hopefully it's just a case of the show and the writers needing to find their legs again, and things will pick back up to how they were before. 

Tomorrow I'll be doing day 3 of week four and then enjoying the beautiful weather!

Couch to 5K - W4D2 or not.

Hey y'all. This morning's run did not happen. Not because I was sick or injured, and it definitely wasn't snowing or hailing or anything like that. It just didn't happen.

Excuses: Lack of sleep, dehydration, too much Applebees, the creative writing revision that's due by 6pm tonight.

But hey, that's life! I'll be moving day 2 to Friday, and then I'll do day 3 on either Saturday or Sunday. So it's okay. :)

Instead of heading outside this morning (46 degrees, getting warmer!) I headed to Starbucks to pick up a little something special.

Ohhh yeah. See that cup? It's resuable. See that straw? That's reusable too. I'm in love! It's a travel cup, but it LOOKS like a Starbucks cup.

Um yeah, so I'm pretty easy to please. The first time I saw this cup was last spring when Danica mentioned it on her blog. (Sidebar - her blog was the first running blog I stumbled across, and it's also what got me started!) I knew I had to have it, but apparently I was the last person in Los Angeles to find out they existed. So naturally everywhere was sold out.

But this year...I got lucky! Thanks to J, who reminded me that these exist and that I needed to get my booty into the 'bucks to get one pronto. Yeah, I called it the 'bucks. I'm cool.

So instead of running, I will be doing this:

And then I will be doing a lot of frantic revising for my 20 pages that are due tonight, a lot of reading of the ELEVEN HUNDRED page book that I need to finish very soon, and a lot of Cinco de Mayo celebrating after class tonight!

Also, Diana left a comment asking for some more deets about my C25K journey, so watch out for a post on that soon!

PSA for the day:

Don't be like me.

Don't forget to do the most important thing in the world.

Don't revert back to 1998 when you barely knew how to use a computer.

Don't forget to save your work. Seriously.

Sometimes you will do stupid things, like closing documents without clicking save. And sometimes those documents will be 20+ pages of revisions to a draft of a story you're working on for your writing class.

You will lose your work. You will lose the 8 hours you spent on your work. You will cry. You will swear. You will frantically Google.

This is not fixable. This will mean you have to start all over again.

If you're lucky, it will go faster the second time. If you're lucky, it will be even better the second time. If you're lucky.

Save. Your. Work.

That's all.

(I have no idea a) why I did everything in a new word document or b) how I managed to close it without saving but for some reason I did both of those things this morning. Sweeeet.)

Couch to 5K - W4D1

Week 4, day 1, you're done!

I'm obviously not skilled with iPhone self portraits, because I cut out my thumbs up! 

I'll work on it, promise.

So let's break it down:

• 45 degrees, sunny, raining, windy. Yes, sunny and windy. And raining. I like to call them sunshowers. They kind of suck. It was pretty though!
• Awful headache partway through. I kind of thought my head might explode right there in the middle of the road. Maybe from allergies? Caffeine? Probably the allergies, considering I haven't had any caffeine today. Have I told you how much I love iced coffees though? This is a new thing of mine, and if that's what's causing the problem I'll be one unhappy camper.

Listened to: With links!

• Up! - M83 (This is my go-to airplane song. Love listening to it during take-off. Yes, I know that's not really allowed. Shhhh.)
• Collapse - MuteMath
• Typical - MuteMath
• Chaos - MuteMath
• Backfire - MuteMath
• Spotlight - MuteMath
• Armistice - MuteMath
• Bulletproof - La Roux

Lots of variety today, right? I know I said I was going to do the whole Glee thing, but I just wasn't feeling it this morning. Instead I listened to a little M83, a little La Roux, and a LOT of MUTEMATH!

They're probably one of my top 5 bands and if you haven't heard them you should definitely give them a try! Typical is from their first album, and Backfire is from their most recent. 

So, Glee on Wednesday, Britney on Friday? Sounds like a plan!

I'll probably have to stop doing my music recaps once I start doing runs longer than 3 miles. Lucky for you, that won't be for a looooooong time!

Also, a sale!

My mommy sent me a text today to let me know that Champion is having a huge sports bra sale! They have a TON of them on sale, and a lot of them are only $19.99.

I'm not gifted in the chest area, so I don't know too much first-hand about the importance of 360 degree support and all that fancy stuff, but I do really like their bras. Also, I saw a few tops on sale too.

Cute color, right? I have this one in (boring) black, and I love it. There aren't any seams or tags and the straps don't stick out from under the collars of my t-shirts and I can wear it with tank-tops. 

Is this not adorable?

Not a super huge fan of the color pictured, but they have it in hot pink! Would it be weird to wear an empire waist work-out top? I have a love/hate relationship with these kinds of shirts because they can either look really cute, or look like maternity wear.

One thing I absolutely like about this top is that it's not super form fitting which means it (hopefully) won't ride up while I'm running. Doesn't that drive you crazy? As much as I love my Nike tops they ALL ride up!

Okay, thought I'd let you all know about the sale so I don't have to be the only one going on a work-out clothes shopping spree. The truth is out! Too bad shorts aren't on sale! Oh, I take it back, I just found their $15 and under section. Somebody stop me!

Coming up with a challenge!

(This isn't running related, just an FYI.)

I've been toying around with the idea to do a 30 day challenge for fun. I've got almost 30 days left before my junior year of college is over, and at this point I'll do whatever I can to make those days go by even just a little bit faster!

Here are the ideas I have so far...

• Manicures - I have a very large collection of nail polish. And when I say large, I'm talking 200+ bottles. That's more than enough to do a manicure a day for 30 days! I could showcase them here or maybe just on Flickr.
• TED Talks - Watch, reflect and share one a day.
• Waking up early - 7 or 8 am? This could get pretty miserable when we roll around to finals. Heck, Saturday and Sunday mornings will probably be pretty rough too.
• Writing - 30 minutes every morning. This would probably be most beneficial to me right now considering the classes I'm in this quarter. Doing homework and accomplishing a goal? Sweet!
• Exercise - I run 3 days a week already, but I miss lifting weights and taking classes. This could be a great way to get everything in at once.
• Letters/Cards/Email - One of the three every day. Do I even know 30 people to send a letter to? Okay, yeah I do. I'm not sure why, but I have some kind of block surrounding this challenge. Maybe because I don't write letters or long emails very often to begin with.
• Reading - 30 minutes or an hour every day. I read so much when I was little, I miss doing that!

I'm leaning towards writing for 30 minutes every morning or sending letters/cards/emails every day. Anyone have suggestions? Have you ever done a challenge like this? I plan to start the challenge this week, most likely on Wednesday (Cinco de Mayo!).

Tomorrow begins week 4 of C25K! It's supposed to rain all of tonight and through tomorrow afternoon, so we'll see how things go. I haven't settled on a music theme yet, but I'm thinking about running to songs from Glee! I'm absolutely in love with the show. Hopefully I can get out there early enough that I won't get caught singing and dancing as I run!