To the Runners

Dear Friends who are Runners,

At least once over the past 3 years you have probably heard me say, "Oh how I wish I could run a marathon [half marathon/10K/5K/3K] and each time you have said, "Oh, Kelster! You can definitely do it!" I always scoffed. I knew better. 

I heard you talk about your "runner's high". The euphoria! The sense of accomplishment! Oh how I wanted that! I suspected that you were lying to me and there was at least some cognitive dissonance at work. After all, that's the same song and dance I heard the P90Xer's with too. I did 90 days of that and there was no extra serotonin pumping through my brain. In fact, I was always just glad it was over so that I could move on to the next thing on my to-do list. 

Finally, two and a half weeks ago, I took the plunge. I found a Beginner 5K training plan on Runkeeper and set out running. It hurt. My throat hurt. I complained. But I tried again. It became less painful. I celebrated going faster each day. I learned to run while dancing to Flo-Rida and T-Pain's Low. I even did a booty smack! There was no runner's high but I wasn't calling any of you names.

Until....

UNTIL I WOKE UP THIS MORNING WITH BLISTERS!!!!! 

Why didn't you ever tell me about the blisters?!!!!

I thought we were friends. 

I feel betrayed. 

I don't know if this friendship can be repaired. 

I will have to rethink everything we ever had. 

I just.. I just don't even know what to say to you anymore. 

Just tell me, what do I do about the blisters?

Do you watch Scandal?

Do you watch Scandal? If not, I'm sure you have that one friend who insists on live tweeting the show every Thursday night at 10. Or maybe that friend does it on Facebook. If you're still clueless, Scandal is a drama series created by Shonda Rhimes that is in its second season on ABC. Shonda also writes the widely successful Grey's Anatomy. Scandal is about a DC crisis management firm headed by Olivia Pope. Pope is also having an affair with the president of the United States. Yup, scandalous.

The stories are good. The writing is great. But I think I'm getting tired of Scandal. There are little things that annoy me. Harrison Wright is always pushing the "We're gladiators" mantra. It was fine in the first episode. Now? I'm tired it. But what's really getting to me right now is Olivia's relationship with Ftiz, the president. The president is human. He cheats in his wife. OK. But the writers of Scandal seem to want me to cheer for this relationship and frankly, that makes me uncomfortable. I am far from prudish but since when did we give a thumbs up to extra-marital affairs?

Last Thursday, good ol' Fitz seemed to think that his Commander in Chief title also gives him control over Olivia's love life. "I command you to love me." Ugh. What's even worse is that Olivia seems to be falling for this. Say what? What happened to my strong Olivia Pope? I expect this kind of behaviour from Sharon in the Young & the Restless* - not from Olivia.

Sigh. I'll keep watching for now, because frankly, I'm addicted to television, but something has to change here. Fine, they're in love. Fine, he's only keeping up his charade of a marriage to avoid public scrutiny. I get all of that. But can we cut down on the commanding and demanding? Thanks.


* Yes, I follow the Young & the Restless. Judge away. :-)

Beginner's 5 K - Day 2 - 8 x 1

Well, I went out yesterday and did Day 2 of this 5K training. 8 x 1 is a misnomer, really. It's 8 intervals of 1 minute running and 1:30 walking.  That 1:30 is important. It went a little something like this: 

• Run 1 - Yaay. I can do this! I don't want to die like on Sunday! Woohoo let's go! Let's get this party started in here!
• 15 seconds later. Wow. One minute is a long time. 
• Walk 1 - Pssh. Walking. I can do this in my sleep. 
• Run 2 - C'mon baby. Let's go faster! Yeah. We can do this. Look! Your throat isn't burning like on Sunday. Progress baby! 
• 30 seconds later. No really. Is Runkeeper working? Because surely I've been running for five minutes. 
• Walk 2 - This isn't horrific. I'm being a crybaby. 
• Run 3 - You are the wiiiiiiiiiiiiind beneath my wiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiings. FLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLYYYYYYY
• Walk 3 - I may be losing my mind. Wait. How fast is this walk supposed to be? Brisk? Or slow enough to recover/reduce my heart rate? .
• Run 4 - Kill me. My knee hates this. They were not meant for this kind of work. Isn't this why we gave up on Insanity?
• Walk 4 - Why am I doing this again?  
• Run 5 - There's someone talking in my ear. Who is that? Is that the trainer on Runkeeper? God? How do I pause my music? I forgot. Crap. 
• Walk 5 - How did my music switch from Electronic to Dancehall. What the hell? 
• Run 6 - Screw it. Let's do this without music. 
• Walk 6 - I lost count. Are we close to 8 yet? 
• Run 7 - Is this the last run?: I want to go all out on the last run. Give it a Rocky! 
• Walk 7 - lalalalalalalala. 
• Run 8 -  Brain is off. 
• Walk 8 - Brain is off 
• Workout Complete - Yeah. I'm actually a bit dizzy. That's normal-ish though. I think.

I didn't die but it was certainly a challenge. In two weeks I am supposed to be able to run for 2 miles. I am not entirely sure how that will be possible. 

Back in high school, I promised myself that I would run in the cross-country event one year. I have no idea how long that cross-country trek is. A few miles? Who knows? In any event, there I was the last year of high school, the cross-country run was the next day and I had not prepared. Sure, I took long walks into the town center every evening with my friends. I think those were two mile walks.But slowly walking and chatting with friends does not prepare one for any sporting event.  But I made a promise so I brought my clothes the next day and attempted the run. 

Ha. Not surprisingly, my friend and I were the last ones to cross that finish line. We weren't official competitors since we had signed up too late. However, one of my teachers knew which house * I was in and listed my placement for that house. So basically, I helped my house lose that year. I tried to protest - to indicate that I was not an official runner - but I was half dead and just wanted to suck on glucose. 

Remember that 2 mile walk that I mentioned above? That Friday afternoon would have been a great day NOT to do that walk. The only reason we did it was to hang out longer after school. I could have easily gotten onto a bus right outside my school's gate and head home. But smart, I am not. So I struggled along on that walk. It hurt so so so so much. 

Saturday afternoon I needed to go back to school for quiz club practice. I surely had a good reason to skip it - the inability to walk faster than a snail without saying "ouch" "ouch" would have surely gotten me out of practice. But I loved quiz practice so I went. And yup, I did that two mile walk after practice into the town center with my friends again. 

I am doing things better this time. I don't have an actual 5 K scheduled but I will be ready if one comes up in June or just after. Knowing me, I will fall off training and still sign up to do a 5K. That's what happens every year for the turkey trot. I walk for that but I am usually active before and a month or so before the trot, barely walking to my car. 

* All students were divided into one of four houses. These houses competed against each other in various events including an eisteddford and the big event - Sports Day. It was great that you did not need to be athletic to do something for your house. You'd be right if you guessed that my contribution came from - eisteddford. If I wasn't feeling particularly rebellious, I'd enter the poetry competition (reciting, not writing). 

All of this is taking me down memory lane. I'm off to reminisce. 

I'm alive

I've been meaning to write something in this space for weeks but I just have not been sure what to say. Do I talk about my off again and on again attempts at fitness? Do I talk about random kitchen adventures? Random life happenings? All of the above?

Well let's see. I started doing Brazil Butt Lift in February and that was not unpleasant and I think I could feel a difference but I fell off that wagon quickly. I started just doing random exercises from all the videos that I have. I did that for two weeks and then I lost interest. Well, I shouldn't say that I lost interest. I just found excuses not to do it. For example, if I was planning an 8 mile walk that day or the next morning, I didn't want to also do something too strenuous and be too sore for the workout. Things like that.

I have wanted to run a 5K for the longest time. Unfortunately, I hate running. I usually get about 20 seconds in before I want to die. My friend is an avid runner and after talking with him after each of his 5Ks this year, the bug has bitten harder and I have decided to try. I am following a Beginner 5K training plan on Runkeeper. Sunday was my first day. Ha!

It was supposed to be a 1.5 mile run/walk. I know that I can walk that easily so my focus was mainly on running. Hahaha. I wanted to die. I am sure that I walked more than I ran and it hurt so much. My throat hurt. I couldn't breathe. And no, I wasn't running that quickly. My pace for that 1.5 mile run/walk was 11:46 minutes per mile. Now let's compare that to an hour later when I decided to head home and walked a brisk 12:47 minutes per mile without breaking a sweat or feeling winded. Perhaps I should stick to walking?

I am heading out for Day 2 of training in a few minutes. It involves 8 intervals of running for 60 seconds and walking for 90 seconds for a total of 20 minutes. I hope to be able to breathe at the end. I'll post again about how that went maybe later tonight or tomorrow.

Kitchenwise, I have been bored. I didn't do anything for this past month's Sourdough Surprises. They made pasta. Meh. I'm not a huge pasta person so I will admit that I wasn't very intrigued. I also couldn't think of a dish that I would make with that pasta had I made it. Pasta sits in my house for years before getting used. It's usually a last resort thing for me. That being said, I saw a slow cooker alfredo lasagna on Pillsbury today and it looked good. I want to try it.

I also made a pina colada cake my third "brainiversary", Pineapple. Coconut. Rum. Cake. It was delicious!! I can't wait to remake it and possibly share it with others. Oh yes, I had half a cake all by myself. I wasn't in the mood to share cake with friends who would give me the "O woe is my diet" speech. My diet and figure will be just fine with half a cake. That reminds me, I should do an official weight check before I get deep into this 5K training. I should still be 117 lbs but who knows. I don't want to start burning more calories than I am consuming.

Life? Hmm. Let me get back to you on that one. The cop out for that is that I have no life to speak of. But maybe that isn't so true.

Time to go run and not die.

Leaked Steubenville Rape Video

A group of guys sitting around and making jokes about how "dead" the girl is and  about her rape. Sickening.

The Sourdough Cake that Wouldn't

As I mentioned in my last post, I gave up cake for Lent which was a bit inconvenient considering that this month's Sourdough Surprises challenge is cake. I decided to make mini bundts so as not to add to the growing collection of cakes that I can't eat in my freezer.

I really wanted to experiment but decided to keep it simple and make a chocolate beer cake. I used this chocolate cake recipe from King Arthur but since I only made a quarter of the recipe, I didn't use eggs but added a little vinegar and a extra liquid. I also swapped half of the milk for Red Stripe beer.

The recipe called for making somewhat of a poolish and this is where I made a huge mistake. As I mentioned, I was using half milk and half beer. The polish called for mixing the milk, starter and flour together. I wanted to add the beer later so I didn't add it. Apparently I forgot that I was making cake and not bread. With less liquid, this was perfect kneading consistency and I got a little mix-happy. And that meant GLUTEN!

There was really no way to "dissolve" all those gluten strands and there were specks of gluten strands in my cake. I could have tossed the batter and started over but really, that's a waste. I knew it wouldn't taste bad. It would just have a lump or two in it. Yeah.. that didn't sound appealing to me either but hey. I baked it anyway.

It smelled great. I could smell the beer. And since the batter tasted good, I assume the cake itself might be good too. Who knows? On March 31 I will be able to tell you. The recipe used a really yummy look frosting that I really wanted to make. But since this was only heading into my freezer and not to a friend as I had originally planned, I decided to just skip it. Yeah, the pics would have been really great with the frosting but I can't be too concerned about it.

After Lent, I will try this again. I'm sure there are great cakes elsewhere for you to drool over so hop on over to the other blogs and have a look.

On Lenten Sacrifices

We never gave up anything for Lent when I was growing up but I was always fascinated by others choosing a "vice" and trying to abstain for the 40 + days. I tried in the past, halfheartedly, and never succeeded. I think I'd make it a week before I was back to doing whatever it was.

It's always hard to find something to give up though. I could give up meat (and all animal byproducts) but I did that for 30 days one November (yes, that meant I did not have turkey on Thanksgiving) and while it wasn't extremely difficult, it was just a lot of work trying to plan my meals. Also, I know that I can do it so it's no longer that much of a challenge.

I don't drink coffee or sodas. I no longer eat ice cream by the pint per meal. I don't eat that much chocolate anymore either. Besides, I gave up chocolate when I had TN and I'd rather not give it up again. So what can I give up? Well, someone suggested that I give up cake. Yes, cake. I am pretty sure that person will no longer be my friend but I decided to try anyway. It didn't help that the day before Lent started, I made an Oreo stuffed chocolate bundt cake. What do I do? Eat as much as I can on Fat Tuesday or freeze it and forget it? I decided to freeze the remaining slices. Forgetting has not been that easy.

I have thought about cake every single day since February 13. I have craved cake every single day since February 13. The funny thing is that I know that I probably would not have had much cake anyway but the fact that I can't have it is driving me crazy. I NEED CAKE. Last weekend I made over 4 dozen cupcakes for a shower. Do you know how many I had? ZERO. I did have a lot of frosting though. A LOT.

The hardest part about baking these was not knowing if the cupcakes were moist enough and if the frosting paired well with them. I have one of each flavour combination in my freezer so on March 31, I can feast. 

Now you may have realised that while I talk a lot about cake, I also talk a lot about sourdough. I'm also doing the Sourdough Surprises baking challenges each month. Do you want to guess what this month's challenge is? I'll give you one guess. 

Yes. Cake. 

I'm still not sure what to do about this. Bake it, blog about it but not taste it until March 31? Skip the challenge? Decisions. Decisions. I'll figure it out this weekend, hopefully. And hopefully sourdough chocolate cake isn't what makes me break down.

Did you give up anything for Lent? How's that going?