GOOOOOOOAAAAAAAAAAAAALLLLLLLLL!

Well I met my goal today (weight loss). Now I have to change it. I couldn't figure out for the longest time why I set the goal there. I'm still not really sure. It isn't a century change. It isn't a round number lost and it isn't a 10%. But it is what it is. Now I have to figure out what to change it too. I think I have 60 more pounds to lose to get to the "proper weight." I don't know if I have ever been the "proper weight." Whatever, I will just set another goal and meet that. I definitely know, that I'm not setting it for 60 pounds. That would be defeatist.

It seems we have only had one new recipe so far this week, chicken in pan sauce. I was eh about it, because it was too salty. But I think it can be good.

I saw the doctor on Tuesday, and got more X-rays. (Why couldn't he have done this on the first set of X-rays?) My pelvis is definitely off, but he thinks lifts in my left shoe will do the trick. Although he couldn't explain why my left shoe wears out faster than my right one, since my right foot strikes first (left hip is the hurting one).

I haven't run or stretched (properly) since Sunday. I have studied more than I think I have ever studied for anything. And I still don't feel ready. Also all the studying is hurting my leg. Of course it is because I study, sitting Indian-Style on the bed and then bend over a book. The PT told me to stop. I don't know how to study any other way. I guess she wants me to use a table and chair. Eh. I have until Saturday and then this will be done and assuming I fail, I will get to retake this exam in March. Yeah, I have a positive attitude. I despise statistics, and I can't for the life of me figure out if you have N samples with a standard deviation of this, at a 10% Confidence level what is the range for the reliability to be 95%. Do you use a Z table or a 2-tailed tolerance table? I don't know. Every time I think I know, I'm wrong. Of course all the tests I've taken provide both answers in the multiple choice. (Oh, and I don't know what I'm talking about either).

So Sunday, I'm going to walk. And Tuesday I will walk. Wednesday I will assess. Wednesday seems very far from now...

I Jogged!

So D and I have been eating and drinking heavily giving no thought whatsoever.

Yeah, um no. I'm journaling, drinking water and eating healthy (if Kraft Mac and Cheese is healthy--sorry I love the stuff).

Yesterday was ribs and beer. I got a good buzz before the GT game (drunk before noon...hooray!). Anyway, yesterday was the walking and sit down, stand, sit , stand test. I felt decent (especially with beer). We got to 4th quarter and the sun hit me before anything else. They ran out of water, and after 96 oz of soda and sitting directly in the sun, I was just HOT. Plus Tech was sucking!!!

So we left. My leg felt fine, but lung power? OMG! I had none. I was breathing heavily. I was that fat chick walking and huffing and puffing and wheezing walking 10 feet. Anyway, I kept pushing and FINALLY got back to the car. D drove home and I studied for about 10 minutes before I fell asleep for 2 hours. Woke up and watched a lot of games and at 8, thought I was going pass out from exhaustion.

This morning, woke up and went with D for a bagel. Came home and made the grocery list...a few new recipes will be added this week to the other blog. Then I went to the gym for the jog.

I felt a little twingey, but decided to ignore it. Started 5 minutes of walking at 3mph. 5 minutes passed. Ramped up to 4.3 mph, and ran for 5 minutes. Hip felt fine. Back to 3mph, up to 4.3 mph, back to 3, up to 4.3 and back to 3. 2.01 miles total. I then did 30 minutes of stretching.

Felt fine. So walking out to the car 2 cops pulled a car over, 4 cops jumped out with guns drawn running to the car. No place for me to duck incase of a shootout (yes, I thought about that). I got in my car, and still couldn't go anywhere because the cops blocked me in. Whatever it was, a cop moved a car and off I went to the grocery.

I'm sore now, but I'm not sitting correctly. So off to study and sit correctly.

Jogging...Not Sure What That is

So this week, I hit 26 pounds. I'm not sure how since D, Guinness and I sat on the front lawn on Saturday and consumed lots of beer.
But 3 days in a row the scale was reading about the same so I'll take it.

PT Tuesday and she informed me that I could walk 15 minutes on Wednesday, 20 Th, 25 F, 30 from Sat-Tuesday. (treadmill flat surface). I also took a practice test for my exam. I did poorly. Studying took a priority over exercise. Although Thursday I took some time and went to the gym. D did 3 miles while I walked 1 mile and did a ton of stretches.

Today, I can't walk. I had PT. I told her I had thigh pain. WTH? So I changed and we figured out why (no, I don't look at myself in the morning, I guess). I have a bruise/cut on my thigh that is purple/blue/black/yellow/red. PT lady was laughing at me, because it got there between last night and today. So I know I was sober, but no clue where I hit my thigh. Anyway she had me do squat walks today. You put your legs in the green stretchy thing and get in the squat position and walk sideways down the hall, and back. In the squat position. Twice. I begged her to let me run a HM, because it had to be easier than this. OMG!
All the usual stretches.

And she wrote a letter to my doctor explaining her thoughts of why I need an orthotist for orthotics if I'm to keep running. (I called Doc to get a referral to the orthotist and got told to come in for an exam instead).

But... I'm all happy I got to walk on the treadmill. PT lady changed her mind. Walk 25 minutes today on the TM. Tomorrow take a break because I have to walk to the football stadium and stand up sit down stand up sit down. If my pain is less than a 1 on the 1-10 scale, on Sunday I get to jog for 5 minutes. I don't know what jogging is, but I think it is running with a less serious face.

So here's to GT winning tomorrow and for my leg to not hurt.

Because I want to be all clown face on Sunday!

More than 5.5 years, but...

So watching what I'm eating has been becoming very life-consuming since I can't run it off at the moment.

So I started the month tired of counting points, calories or anything. And Football meant beer consumption. I gained 2.5 pounds, and decided to just do Weight Watchers last week, and not Sparkpeople. I tracked all the beer. I tracked the dip. I tracked the 30 points I eat a day instead of fewer points. And I woke up this morning to a 3 pound loss.

And

Old and Grumpy but not Rude

I got my shot yesterday.

It was a mildly amusing visit. I am walking to the office building. This old man sees me and runs to the door (many doc's offices in the building). He doesn't hold the first set of doors. After he doesn't hold the second set I went, "Thank you for not holding the door. Your manners are apparent!"

With that, I went to the rest room and forgot about the man. Went to the doc's office. Guess who was there? Yep. He was filling out paperwork. I signed in and saw we had the same appointment time. No biggie. The doc seemed efficient last time I was there.

So I'm sitting there and the doctor (not the nurse) calls me back. Old man goes, "I was first. Why does SHE get to go back." I'm like, "Whatever, he can go before me. Seriously dude." The receptionist goes, "Sit down and shut up. You haven't even finished your paperwork." The doctor sees all of this. I'm now laughing; the doc is rolling his eyes. Anyway, I go back. It takes all of 20 seconds to get the shot. It didn't hurt at all (I can handle a shot, but not a papercut). Then the doc talks to me for 10 minutes about current events. I guess he didn't want to see the other guy either.

I was telling a friend about this, and she said she hopes she never gets old and grumpy. I said old and grumpy was fine, but being rude is entirely different.

Now as for the cortisone, silly me thought it was going to be like Novocaine, for some reason. I couldn't have been more wrong. Today I'm sore...more bruised feeling. It hurts to walk, but sitting is fine. So hopefully in a few days, I'll feel better.

Still in PT. I have lots of stretches to do.

Staying Positive

If you know me or read about me, you know I'm just a naturally optimistic person, 100% of the time, never waiting for the other shoe to drop.

OK, now that you stopped laughing...yeah, this week was very odd.

G-dog's health isn't great. She has lost a ton of weight in the past year (18 pounds), when she was supposed to gain (5). So I'm resigned to the fact the end is near, I just don't know when. D was on vacation this past week, and I think wasn't as "comfortable" as I was with this news. He took her to the vet on Tuesday when she lost yet another pound. I tried not to think about it, because this was about the same time last year that Porter started on her vet visits, and we all know how that ended up. Anyway, D called me and said G has a sore left hip and he got her appetite stimulants. We looked up the appetite stimulant and it is an anti-depressant. So...is your dog supposed to look like you, because I thought you were supposed to look like your dog? But G has sore hips and is now on "Doggie Prozac." She has eaten some, but today she wants to be left alone. So that's what she is up too. Although the other day, the dog was so high, I swear she would have eaten the shit out of a bag of Doritos.

On the hip front (mine, not hers), it still hurts. 2 more PT visits done. I was really confused as it is more my butt (piriformis) than my hip at this point. So should I get a cortisone shot? What would it do? What wouldn't it do? So I called my dad and asked him. He said at this point, doing nothing but PT was not working. Get the shot and the worst it would do is not work. So I called the doctor and I should get a shot Tuesday. I should mention that I saw the doctor before starting PT. Xrays were normal. And I didn't have arthritis. I think it is my hips are uneven, combined with the over-usage. But I don't have a medical degree, so what do I know?

I was supposed to go to a 5K on Saturday to support D and a friend. On Friday, D and I were looking at the website. The start and finish were 2 miles apart (not following the course). The T-shirt and after-party were 1/2 mile away from the finish. I knew from the after party to the start (where you would park) was straight uphill. There was a bus option, but seriously? Would you like a non-participant on the bus? I wouldn't. So D and I decided I would stay home.

So these types of things usually set me off. And I was more happy. Why? Because I worked late every day. Seriously, this made me happy. I can't remember the last time I worked this hard, and didn't notice the clock. The only reason I know it is 6PM, is that the AC goes off at 6. So by 630 it is really hot. But my brain is being tested, I'm being tested, and I'm doing something that has some sort of benefit to the company. I feel useful. It kind of overshadows the crap in my life. (Remember this for a later time, when I bitch about work).

So on Saturday, D went to the 5K. Of course he got a PR. He never found my friend, so he just came home. While he was there though, I had 2 pups looking at me like, "Mom, puh-leeeze let us go out!" So I leashed them up. I think I made it 200 feet. I felt that I looked ridiculous. I was practically using Scuttlebutt as a cane. And Guinness was upset because her buddy Mooshu was out and I wouldn't let them play. My other neighbor who is a runner was out. He showed me a stretch that I am already doing, but it is good to know I'm not doing some whacked exercise. We talked a few minutes. G acted foolish still yearning for Mooshu, while Scuttlebutt sat on the sidewalk and behaved.

D came home and we went to our friends' house to watch Georgia Tech lose to Kansas. Yes, Kansas. I know, Kansas! Then we came home and D made dinner. (Really glad it wasn't James Madison they lost to, but Kansas?)

Then we went out to a concert. I used to hear this guy in his band Angie's Hope back in college. For whatever reason, he has been solo, for a really long time (Angie Aparo). I could go look it up why he is solo, but I don't really care. If you ever heard Faith Hill's "Cry," he wrote it (and performs it so much better).

So we left of course too early. So we swung by to say hi to Clay for about 30 minutes. He had spent 5 weeks in Asia. It sounded like a wonderful exciting trip. Then we left and went to Park Tavern. D and I had our wedding reception there 7+ years ago. We hadn't been back since. We had to park far away because parking was $10. Since the concert tickets were only $10, I wasn't going to pay for parking. So we walked further than I walked the dogs. I was pretty much done when we got there. D got us Pale Ales. They brew their own beer. Their beer is good. The Pale is not hoppy, but yet has a good hop flavor, if that makes any sense. I meant to try the IPA, but D was getting my beers, and I forgot to ask for a change.

The first band we heard (I think we missed one) was "Better than the Beatles." They were just a fun cover band of 70s music (but not disco, more Classic Rock). Angie Aparo was really good. He is a good story teller. I had fun (and a lot to drink). D had fun. The walk back to the car was fine, except we were adopted by a cat. Seriously, D had to walk past the car while I got in, so the cat wouldn't get in the car. He was cute, but we aren't cat people, and neither is Guinness. And I don't want to find out if Scuttlebutt likes cats or not.

So when I look back on the week, I had a really good week. I'm really positive about that.

I Don't Like This No Running Thing

The weather is seriously pissing me off. Saturday it was 65, yesterday 64 and today it was 58. Perfect running weather. Not perfect weather for me to be laying on the floor doing leg stretches.

Saturday, D went running. I was jealous. I did stretches on the floor and then we went to see GT play. True to form like everything else in my life lately, my mind wandered constantly while watching the game. I wasn't talking, so I'm not sure how I missed 2 TDs, but I did. During the 3rd quarter I realized I was in terrible pain, so we left. At home, I think we watched more football, and random tv and drank some beer and had some chili.

Yesterday we had our Sunday morning date and then did the grocery store. By the time we got back, guess what? I was in pain. So I took a nap. We ended up watching No Reservations and drinking beer.

Today, I was just in pain. I did my stretches. My hip is not getting better. I'm talking to the PT tomorrow (3rd visit). I think I need something else.

I'm tired of complaining about my hip. I'm tired of it hurting. I'm tired of taking meds that aren't working. But besides not running, I cannot walk the dogs, mow the lawn, go shopping, go grocery shopping, help cook, help do laundry, walk to the football stadium, stand through a game, etc. Not to mention I have no focus. I'm all caught up on your blogs, and I read, and can't remember what I just read. I'm trying to study for my certification, and get through 1 page and totally get lost. Ugh!

Yeah, I need to figure out plan B for this hip thing.