Two down one to go

Today was the last official day of classes and next week is finals week.  Two of my classes didn’t have official finals; one was just a paper and one was a regular exam so I am DONE with those two.  Next week I have a final group presentation on the sin of sloth (I am taking a class on the seven deadly sins and I love it) and then a giant moot court debate for my other final.

I quit my job about a month ago because I got a new job closer to school.  Unfortunately it didn’t end up working out because I wasn’t making enough money to justify driving 40 minutes each way for it.  Tomorrow I am going back to work at my old job and I picked up two shifts, one in the morning and a closing shift so I will be working a double.  Not really excited about that but I am excited about making some money finally.

I really wanted to get ten miles in this weekend but I had to make school a priority over running.  Sad I know.  I thought about doing the long run today but honestly I am just exhausted.  I haven’t slept much this weekend at all.  So instead I am going to take a nap, then go on a 4 or 5 mile run tonight and just do my regular runs throughout the week and next weekend will be the weekend of ten miles.  It sucks that it has to get put off but I think that it’s the smartest decision. It’s not like I am running out of training time for my half.

Okay, time for some beauty sleep.  Seriously I need it, looking in the mirror is a scary sight when I am sleep deprived.

No sleep for the student

If everything had gone according to plan I would be waking up within the next hour to go on my ten mile run.  But things don’t always go according to plan.  Instead I am just now going to sleep after staying up all night writing my final debate paper that is due on Monday.  Thankfully it’s a kickass paper… I think.  I will read it again to make sure when I am not crazy and insane and sleep deprived.

Ten mile run, I am coming for you… soon.

P.S. If you are bored, google “finals week memes.”  Maybe you will laugh a lot… or maybe not.

(both photos link to where I got them from on google.)

Happy December 1st, expensive bikes and running fuel

Happy December 1st!  I would love to say that I am spending this beautiful day watching Christmas movies and drinking hot chocolate with marshmallows but instead I am sitting at Book-A-Million looking like this:

So… much… homework.  Thankfully there is Christmas music playing and I have a delicious raspberry mocha from Panera sitting next to me.  I also watched my first Christmas move of the season, Love Actually, the day after Thanksgiving so I am held over for now but I am predicting a Christmas movie marathon coming up in my near future.

I went to a bike shop with my friend this morning to see what size bike I need, as if I could afford the $3000 bikes they sell.  They said I need a 52 inch so if anyone is selling for next to nothing/giving away a women’s road bike you know who to call.  But seriously, I am going to get one.  I will be looking on Craigslist for a used one to start off with because I think biking is going to be the next sport I fall in love with.  Even after just riding one around for about two minutes I was so excited.

I also picked up these while I was there:

I never use fuel during my runs and I get by fine but I thought since I am starting double digits soon- hopefully tomorrow- then it might improve my performance.  I got a Gu gel, Gu chomps, and two Hammer Gels.  I will just experiment with all of them during different runs to figure out which one I like the best, if any of them.  Honestly the thought of eating a gooey gel while running kind of grosses me out but I am willing to at least try it.  Plus having them makes me feel a little bit more like a real athlete.  I know, such high standards right?

Questions:

Do you have a bike?  If you do what kind?

What is your favorite Christmas movie?
It’s a Wonderful Life, and I also really enjoyed Love Actually.

What do you do for fuel during long runs?

A fake 5k

Tonight my friend wanted to run a 5k.  It was for a charity for arthritis and it wasn’t officially timed, so it was basically just a fun run.  I have an evil heart and didn’t want to run a race “just for fun” but in the end I decided to because I needed to get a run in anyways.  However the idea was that I was just going to pace him for his new PR and not actually register myself for the race.  Unfortunately I got there and realized they had really awesome long sleeved shirts, and I love long sleeves so I had to have one. Goodbye 25 dollars.  Actually he paid because I had left my cash in the car but I probably need to pay him back soon.  The shirt is really comfortable though (wearing it now).

We finished 3.1 miles in 25:02 according to Map My Run.  At one point in the race we took a wrong turn so we had to run a little extra at the end to make it up.  Like I said this was not very organized, hence why I called it a fake 5k in my title :) But here is the thing that is bothering me: I think I have hit a speed plateau.  This was 12 seconds off of my PR time and I was literally dying towards the end so obviously I do not have more speed in me at the moment.  I don’t do any speed work so maybe it’s time to start?

After the race we went to Jason’s Deli which I have recently rekindled my love for.  Don’t ask me why but I have never gotten the salad bar from there until tonight but I’m pretty sure I will never order anything else again.  Putting that salad together was one of the most fun things I have ever done.  There were so many choices and toppings!  This is what I ended up with:

No meat by the way, and I’m not ashamed to say that I went back for seconds on the chocolate mousse.

Questions:

Do you do speed work? Any suggestions for a beginner?

What are your favorite salad toppings?
My favorite would have to be onions, I always want extra.

Are “fun runs” worth it?
I had a lot of fun but I would prefer to have a timing system if I am paying for it.

I gave in and ate meat

I said I was going to start eating meat again but it was an easier thing to say than actually do when the moment came.  However I was lucky enough to have a friend who was willing to cook me a delicious dinner of chicken, broccoli and perogies (apparently not a word according to spell check) and I definitely couldn’t not eat it after he went out of his way to make it for me.  Here is the proof:

Not a fan that I look kind of like a 12 year old boy in that picture but the important part is the chicken on the fork that is making its way to my mouth.  This picture was taken towards the end of the meal so you can’t see the beauty and deliciousness that is was in the beginning.  So now I am eating meat again and no longer a “vegetarian” even though I never really considered myself one to being with, but I am still going to be eating a lot less meat than I was before the no meat experiment.

I woke up this morning and the best thing ever happened: I checked my account at school and my transcripts hold had FINALLY been lifted so I was able to register for classes.  I got into everything I need except one class that of course just filled up, but I am first on the waitlist so I think I will end up getting it since there is over a month before next semester starts and people add and drop classes all the time.  I better get it because if I don’t it will mess up the entire rest of my schedule.

Questions:

Do you eat meat and if you quit/started do you think it would severely affect your running/working out/lifestyle?

Do you like perogies?
I never ate them until a few years ago and I love them but I always forget they exist until someone else makes them and reminds me.

Do you get excited about school or work?
I am a nerd and I always do until about a week into it and I have no idea what I got myself into!

New blog theme

I have decided to update my blog since, you know, I post so often and everything.  The new theme is “A Piece of Reese” because my name is Reese, rhyming is fun and after all this blog is basically little pieces of my life.  Amazing, right?  Hopefully this name change does not confuse or turn off any of my eight followers (love you guys!!).

Disclaimer: I hope using Reese’s Pieces as inspiration for my blog is not grounds for getting sued.  If so, may the Reese’s company please realize that I am completely 100 percent broke and offer me a nice warning instead of attempting to ruin my life.  Thanks!

 

Thanksgiving, eating meat and 5k PR’s

Hello again from the world’s best blogger!

First I just want to say that I am one week and three finals out from completing my first semester at FGCU.  I’m so excited, happy, proud and ready for it to be over!  I might go clinically insane this week but hopefully it will all be worth it in the end.  I am having a hard time reconciling myself with the fact that I will have less than a month break before starting all over again.

The next thing I need to talk about right now are the two 5k races I ran since last time I blogged.  Two races, two unexpected PR’s.  First I ran the Run4aReason 5k that is hosted by my church every year.  I felt underprepared because my runs had been legitimately sucking for a few weeks leading up to it, but I ran a 24:48 (8:00 pace) which is nearly three minutes off of my former best time.  I was ecstatic and all of a sudden I got a whole new motivation for running.  I started refocussing and it’s still going well; I’ve now done 8 and 9 mile long runs and I am aiming for ten miles this weekend.

On Thanksgiving morning I ran a Turkey Trot 5k and I beat my time again by two seconds, which means I ran it in 24:46 (7:59 pace- my current standing best time).  This was an amazing feat in itself because it was the morning after going out for a friend’s birthday/the night before Thanksgiving… aka about three hours of sleep.  So as you can guess I took about a three hour nap after Thanksgiving lunch.

My friend Hannah and I after the Run4aReason 5k

Speaking of Thanksgiving dinner, I haven’t been eating meat for about three months now so I didn’t eat any turkey or ham or anything, which I did not complain about because it is my choice.  However, I have just decided that I am going to resume eating chicken and fish because I am too poor/lazy/busy to sufficiently provide myself with all the nutrients and proteins I need to be as healthy as possible on a plant based diet.  So while I am a little disappointed in this decision, I am also disappointed in the fact that I didn’t make it before Thanksgiving.  Live and learn…

This is the reason I want to be as healthy and in as good as shape as possible:

Yes, I registered for my first half marathon which is in 52 days from right now.  I am seriously so excited and I want to run to my full potential in this race so I am going to do everything I can to make that happen.  Not saying I’m going for an amazing time but I think if I work hard I have the ability to run it in under 2 hours so that is what I will be working towards.  That being said, if it turns out I can’t or do not do that, I will be happy just to finish.  It is my first one after all.

Internet memes make politics better

I just want to say that I really love the people who make internet memes so quickly.  I also love people who use Twitter during Presidential debates.  I have followed live tweets of each debate and they are both hilarious and sometimes informing.

The Debate Party Event at school last night was a lot of fun.  The college Republicans and college Democrats each had a “surrogate” Romney and Obama to represent them for an hour before the debate started and we all tweeted them questions which they attempted to answer.  Even though all the serious political talk was cool and everything, by far the best moment of the debate was when Obama made the comment to Romney that “we also have fewer horses and bayonets today.”  Commence the creating of internet memes.  Disclaimer: the following pictures ARE NOT a political statement by me, I just think they are funny.

Source: http://www.facebook.com/horsebayonets (yes there is already a facebook page set up for this)

While I’m on the subject of politics I finally had campaigners come to my door last week.  I am always super jealous of my friends who talk about hanging up the phone and not answering the door for pollsters (pollers?)  I have actually wanted to talk to them and I finally got the chance too.  First an Obama campaigner came to my house and then a couple days later while I was taking a nap at my aunt’s house a Romney campaigner knocked on the door.  I was still half asleep so I mostly just listened to my aunt and cousins talking to him, but I now feel like this campaign season is complete.

I actually can’t believe we are voting for the President of the United States in two weeks.  That’s a big deal.  On a serious note, it disturbs me that we are basically just given two choices and like it or not, one of them will be the President.  I feel like The United States really needs to move beyond the two party system.  I think the media is a big perpetrator of this, but I am hopeful that in coming years we will break out of the cycle.  I really believe that my generation sees the need to do this and  if we don’t give in we can see this change take place.

#politicaltalkover

My Day Monday

Happy Monday everyone! I saw this on Pintrest recently and thought I would share it with you :)

I actually really like Mondays.  I always feel like they are a chance to set new goals and make changes I want to make and get rid of any bad things or habits from the previous week.  They are especially good when I have a relaxing Sunday preceding them.

I do not want to turn this into a blog all about running, but I had the best and longest run ever yesterday morning.  I ran eight miles and my friend Stephanie let me wear her Garmin since I don’t have one.  It was 62 degrees when we started which is by far the coolest weather I have run in since probably March and it felt amazing.  My total elapsed time was 1:11:03 which means I ran at an 8:53 pace.  When I looked at my splits the first three miles were 9 minutes-something miles and the last five were in the 8s.  I had no idea I had it in me to run that fast for that long and I rode an adrenaline/runners high for hours afterwards.

The morning got even better because some of my good friends from Ecuador and Peru were at my church.  They are doing a quick tour through Florida, visiting some churches and doing concerts.  I got to hang out with them for a few hours and catch up and practice my Spanish a little bit.  It has definitely suffered since leaving South America.  I didn’t take any pictures of us so here is an old one.

This is their band Corban minus one member plus another friend (and me).  This picture was taken in Quito, Ecuador in December 2009.  You can learn more about them and what they do, if you want, at incalink.net or corbanweb.com (The second one is in Spanish.)

Today is about to be the longest day of my life.  I have school from 9-1:45 (and a test!), then I go to my new job for training until 7 (hopefully) and after that back to school to watch the last Presidential debate.  I am in a class called “Argumentation and Debate” so if I go to the debate party I get extra credit.  I am into following the election and watching the debates anyways so it’s a no-brainer for me to go as long as I get out of work on time.  Then once it is over around 10:30 or 11 PM I have to drive 45 minutes home and be up for work early tomorrow morning.

Ready, Set, Go!

Do you love Mondays or hate them?

Are you watching the debate tonight?

Did you run this weekend?

Building running endurance

When I started running last October and could barely even run .25 of a mile, I couldn’t imagine ever considering a two or three mile run short.  But now for the most part all of my runs during the week are in the 3-4 mile range and my weekend runs are getting longer and longer.  Both fortunately and unfortunately for me, Florida (at least South Florida) is completely flat and the only semblance we have of hills are bridges, so I’m pretty sure if I ever had to run somewhere up north all the endurance I’ve been building up wouldn’t even count, which sucks.

That’s why I have been attempting for the past couple months to run the one bridge in this area at least once a week, except that in those two months I’ve probably only run it twice total.  The problem is that if I don’t have someone going with me I lose all motivation to drive there and run by myself.  But this week I ran in TWICE (Tuesday and Thursday) with a friend from work and both times it wasn’t even very hard, despite the hill, and I felt like we were running at a pretty decent speed even though I don’t wear a watch to time my runs.

So I just wanted to say that I’m excited that I ran some “hills” this week and my legs still feel so good.  I texted one of my runner friends and told her that I even think I could go on another run today and still feel great, even though I’m not going to and instead I will be studying for my argument and debate class test that I have on Monday.  Friday night studying, yay!  I am also planning on stopping by the library to get a couple audio books since I spend so much time driving these days.

What are some running tips to build strength and endurance?

Do you have any thoughts/opinions on the Patriot Act? That is what my next debate for school is on.

Give me some good audio book suggestions!