Stray cat

I spent pretty much the whole day today trying to find a home for a stray cat. We found a beautiful Himalayan cat hiding out in our shed about a month ago. I assumed she belonged to someone because she looked well-fed, but when I picked her up, I was shocked at how skinny she was. She felt like a skeleton covered in long fur. I didn't bring her in my house, but I wrote a post on Facebook about her and asked if anyone wanted a cat.

See how beautiful she is?!

A mom from Eli's preschool (Melissa) said that she was looking for a cat, and decided to take her. I was so glad, because the cat was really sweet.

That was a month ago. Two nights ago, some kids knocked on my door holding the cat. They said "This is your cat, right? We found her down the road, and a dog was right by her, so we brought her here."  I said, "No, it's not my cat, but I know who she belongs to. Thanks for looking out for her." 

I put the cat in a cat carrier and called Melissa. She insisted that she didn't want the cat back, that the cat would rather be outside. I was kind of taken aback, like, "Okaaay, so what do I do?"  I was nervous about letting this cat loose in my house simply because I have 3 cats as it is, and I don't want them to get sick if the stray had some sort of disease. I felt awful, but I put the cat back outside, hoping it would run away and be gone in the morning.

Friday, I picked Eli up from school and the cat was waiting on our porch when we got home. We sat outside with her for a while, and I fed her. I was contemplating taking her to the animal shelter, but they closed at 4, and don't open again until Monday.

I let the cat in, against my better judgment, until bed time and then I put her back outside for the night. I put a blanket in the cat crate and put that outside for some shelter, and left food and water for her.  This morning, I opened the door and she darted out of the crate and into the house.

She's the SWEETEST cat. She's a total attention whore, and loves to be cuddled and petted. I think Melissa was making up the thing about the cat not wanting to stay in the house, because I cannot get the poor cat to go back outside now.

She doesn't look sick at all--her coat is beautiful, her eyes and ears look good, etc. But she's SO skinny. Anyway, today I was researching the cost of getting her spayed and her vaccines, and all that. I really wish we could keep her, but I feel like the 3 cats we have are too much sometimes--let alone having a fourth! 

I made another post on Facebook, and I'm hoping someone will want her. If not, I don't think I have the heart to take her to the shelter, so it looks like we'll be the owners of 4 cats.

Anyways, I promised a food journal today (and that I was going to count calories):

Breakfast-
oats with almond milk, 1/2 banana, chia seeds  (216)
2 cups of coffee with coconut creamer  (25)   <---I love the So Delicious coconut creamer! It's only 10 calories per Tbsp, and it is creamy... it doesn't turn your coffee that ugly gray color that skim milk does.

Lunch-
baked potato with cottage cheese  (235)

Dinner-
meatball stroganoff with whole wheat pasta  (441)
broiled asparagus  (46)

Snacks-
apple  (63)
almonds  (164)
string cheese  (60)
sugar free fudgsicle  (35)

Exercise-
none today

TOTAL:  1284 calories

I WILL post another food log tomorrow... hold me to it!!

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The Aftermath

I was finally going to write a blog yesterday, and then blogger was down... so I couldn't. But anyways, tomorrow morning it will have been one whole week since I ran my first half-marathon. I wasn't very sore--Sunday I felt fine, Monday my hips were a little sore, but after that I felt good. On Tuesday, I ran two miles to make sure my legs still worked, and they did :)

I've been feeling really shitty though as far as my sore throat and congestion. I kept feeling worse and worse all week long and today I woke up with a horrible ear ache.

I went to urgent care and I have a sinus infection and an ear infection. They gave me an injection of antibiotic, and script for antibiotic and decongestant. Hopefully I'll be back to normal by Monday.

Monday I'm starting a new running schedule. It's called "Spring Training", and you're supposed to start in March, but I'm not training for a particular race, so it'll be fine. I'll be running 6 days a week, which is way more than I'm used to, but they are shorter runs--3 miles here, a speed workout there, one long run of 6-8 miles per week... It actually looks pretty interesting.

My weight has been climbing and I sooo need to get it together NOW. I mentioned how I gained 8 pounds while on vacation the last week of April. Well, when I went to Indy, I ate and drank like crap--and when I got home, I got on the scale to see the damage... 159.5. ONE FIFTY FUCKING NINE POINT FIVE!

A lot of that was water retention, because today I was 150.5. But still... that's like 10 pounds gained in less than 3 weeks?  Not to mention I'm "overweight" again. I could definitely see the weight gain in my Indy photos.  I'm going back to counting calories tomorrow. I'm afraid to even wash my jeans for fear of them not fitting!

My friend Sarah is getting married in October, and I'm her matron of honor. I desperately want to get my weight back down before trying on bridesmaid dresses. Isn't it amazing how long it takes to lose weight and then how fast it comes back on?

I got the professional pictures from the race last weekend...

Crossing the finish line!  Chip time: 2:10:40

The rain came down on me for the last mile or so... see how wet I am?

Okay, starting tomorrow I'm going to post my food journal EVERY day--so please bug me about it if I don't! Because that means I'm not counting calories, and I know I need to count if I want to get this weight back off.

Oh! And in my first post, I promised an entry explaining how I got started running (a frequently asked question). I created a running page if you are interested. I posted my old race reports too.

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500 Festival Mini-Marathon 2011

I just got home from my fourth annual trip to Indianapolis for the half-marathon. I've walked it the past three years, and this year was my first year RUNNING it. It was fantastic!!  Hopefully I can remember all the details (there was a lot of drinking, haha).

Friday-

Eli had a Mother's Day tea party at school, so I wanted to make sure I could go to that before we left for Indy. I went to the tea party and Eli was adorable. He was so excited and proud of the things he'd made for me.

My mom picked him up at 11:30, and I left with Jerry (my husband), Renee, and Jessica (my friends) for Indy. The drive was about 4 1/2 hours, and we stopped a couple of times along the way for snacks. At one gas station, they were selling Cadbury Creme Eggs for 6 cents each!! I was tempted to buy all of them, but I only bought two.

Top: Cathy, me, Renee, Jessica. Bottom: Jerry, Brian, Jen

We arrived at the hotel and my brother Brian, my sister Jeanie, and her two friends Cathy and Jen were already there. Everyone had a drink in our hotel room while we waited to head to dinner. We had reservations at Buca di Beppo to load up on pasta for the race. Reservations were at 5, and we were seated right away. We had cheese bread, lasagna, fettuccine alfredo, ravioli, stuffed shells, manicotti... OH, it was SO good. Then we headed over to the Expo to pick up our packets.

Dinner at Buca di Beppo

I was kind of bummed to see that I had requested a medium shirt, when I really need a small, but I registered for this race almost a year ago, and I was a medium at the time. We walked around the Expo, and I bought a sticker for my car that says "13.1 miles 'cause I'm only half crazy". I noticed someone walking around in a Biggest Loser t-shirt and I recognized it to be Allen from season 8! I said hello, and asked if he was doing the race, etc. I told him about my weight loss and asked if I could get a picture with him. He was SUPER friendly.

After the Expo, we went back to the hotel. I was kind of wired and wanted to play some games or something, but everyone else just wanted to lie around and go to bed early. I sat in my sister's room and talked to her and her friends for a little while, then went to bed at around 11.

Saturday-

The alarm went off at 5:00 AM.  I went down and ate breakfast (oatmeal with raisins, canteloupe, muffin). Then I got dressed and tried to calm my nerves. I get nervous every year, even though I already know what to expect.

We took some pictures, then everyone headed down to the start area, which was directly in front of our hotel. I was in the Q corral (by myself--no one else from our group was starting there, and I planned to run alone). Jerry wasn't running, so he had all our stuff in a bag and he was going to go wait at the finish line.

My "gear" for the race. Jerry bought me the visor for Mother's Day :)

Jessica, me, and Renee pre-race

The back of my shirt

Everyone ready to run!

My sister, my brother, and me (pre-race)

I made small talk with a couple of people, turned on my Garmin, and waited for the start. Once the race started (at 7:33), it took me about 20 minutes to get to the actual starting line. This is the largest half-marathon in the country, with 35,000 racers--and being in Q, I was pretty far back there. It's organized by estimated finish time, and when I registered, I had estimated my finish to be 2:30.

Once the race started, I started running at a pretty slow pace. There were so many people that I had to dodge people constantly for the first mile or so. Right after the starting line, there was a girl in front of me that I was going to pass, because I saw her trying to TEXT AND RUN at the same fucking time. She wasn't watching where she was going, and then she fell--RIGHT in front of me, which almost caused me to go flying to the pavement as well. I was so mad that I wanted to kick her, but I dodged her and kept going. At the first mile marker is the zoo, and I saw an elephant watching us run by :)

I kept focusing on maintaining a steady pace, and I didn't want to worry too much about how slow I was going. I wanted to stay comfortable, so I just found a happy pace and went with it. At mile 6, we went onto the Indy 500 race track. The track looks so small on TV, but it is actually 2 1/2 miles around. It's the most boring part of the race, in my opinion. I saw a man wearing a Martian Marathon t-shirt and I told him I did the Martian 10k in March. He is from Windsor, and went to Indy for the race like I did.

There were tons of pit stops along the race (probably about every mile) but I hadn't stopped for water or Gatorade at all. At around mile 8, I had some water--I didn't realize it would be so hard to run and drink at the same time, and I wound up getting water all over my shirt right before I saw the photographers. So I'm interested to see how I look in the pics!

After mile 9, the rest of the miles went by kind of fast. I had water at mile 10, and then Gatorade at mile 11. Most people eat some sort of fuel, but I always feel fine without food or water up until about 10 miles, and after that, I just need a little water and I'm good to go. My legs started hurting about halfway through mile 12, but I still felt pretty strong.

When I finally hit mile 13, I saw the finish line and there were TONS of people cheering us on. I heard Renee yell my name, so I smiled and waved at her. I didn't see Jerry at all, and I actually slowed down a little to try and see him, but no luck. I think I was half smiling, half crying when I crossed the finish line. I felt emotional for a minute and was about to go into the ugly cry, and then I was over it. My finish time was 2:10:40. I got pic taken with my medal, then went to find Renee (who finished in 1:46) and Jerry.

My finishers medal

Finish time

I'm not thrilled with my time, but it's decent. A 9:59/mile pace. I'm definitely going to have to do some speedwork. My splits were as follows:

Mile 1- 10:31
Mile 2- 10:10
Mile 3- 10:06
Mile 4- 9:56
Mile 5- 9:54
Mile 6- 10:00
Mile 7- 9:47
Mile 8- 9:47
Mile 9- 9:59
Mile 10- 9:47
Mile 11- 9:37
Mile 12- 9:41
Mile 13- 9:23
Mile 0.1- 8:55

For the most part, I had negative splits, so I'm happy with that. My best mile was actually the 13th mile, which surprised me.

Renee found me and she said she had no clue where Jerry was. We went back to the finish line to watch everyone else finish. I saw Brian and Jen cross, which surprised me, because I thought for sure they would have finished before me. Their time was 2:19. We watched for Jessica, but didn't see her. We saw Jeanie and Cathy cross. Then someone found Jerry, who admitted he completely missed my crossing the finish line!

We went back to the hotel and met up with Jessica. I took a shower and had lunch at the food court in the mall next door. Then I drank almost a whole bottle of Kendall-Jackson Merlot (my favorite wine!) and relaxed.

After that, we went down to the hotel bar and had some drinks and snacks. Renee and Jessica ended up going out to a club to dance, which I wasn't interested in doing, so I stayed with everyone else.

We went to Buffalo Wild Wings for dinner--that's where you end up if you don't make reservations on time--and then finally went back to the hotel. I went to bed at around 10:30.

We walked to BWW and it poured rain on us

I couldn't sleep at all, and at 3:30 AM, Jessica and Renee finally came back to the hotel. They were being pretty loud, so I went in the other room to sleep. I could tell I was getting sick because my throat felt like I was swallowing razor blades.

Sunday-

I woke up at 8 this morning and packed up our stuff. My throat hurt so badly. Surprisingly, I wasn't sore from the run at all. My hips felt a little stiff, but that's it. We left the hotel at 10:30, and I got home at about 3 pm. I looked up my results online. My kids asked if I won, and I explained that I came in 11,890th place... hahaha.

Overall, it was a great weekend. I'm so excited to be a part of the cool kids club now that I've RUN a half-marathon! I'm super psyched for next year--I'm going to run it sub-2:00! ;)

I'll post the official race pictures when I get them.  Here are the pics!!

At the halfway point. The famous bricks on the Indy 500 track.

Finished! Chip time: 2:10:40

It poured rain the last mile or so. See how wet I am?

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Nostalgia and pressure

I haven't talked about this with anyone because it sounds kind of crazy. Certain triggers are bringing on nostalgic feelings from when I had my surgery in November. Most people (I'm assuming!) would have bad memories of fainting, severely breaking their jaw, spending 6 days in the hospital, enduring 2 surgeries, and having their jaws wired shut for 6 weeks...right?  MOST people would hate that memory!

However, something about those 8ish weeks made me feel really happy. Sure, it was cool to have lots of attention from my family, and to have people show genuine care about me. But that's not really what the nostalgia is for. It's very hard to explain. I'm starting to think that it's because I actually cared about something OTHER THAN my weight and my size and food. With my broken jaw, I had no choice but to occupy my mind with something else! I couldn't binge when I wanted to--it wasn't an option (well, unless I wanted to binge on Ensure!)

Left to right: my younger brother, Nathan; me; my sister, Jeanie; older brother, Brian; husband, Jerry.
(And obviously my two kids lying across us). This was the day I came home from the hospital.

Now, even with all the pain and recovery I went through, I get warm, happy feelings when I think about certain things--such as Spicy Carrot Bisque (my daily lunch during recovery), Oxycodone (my pain med), my black pajamas (my mom bought them for me when I was in the hospital), pumpkin smoothies (my sister made it for me for my Thanksgiving dinner), the corner of my sectional couch (where I spent 90% of my first week home), Lipton black tea (part of my meals in the hospital), a red blanket with sleeves (Jerry got it for me for Christmas), Dr. M (my surgeon who seemed to truly care about me), a little blue dress (my friend Sarah gave it to me at my lowest weight in December; it's a size 4 and it was actually too big to wear at the time).

My Thanksgiving dinner (pumpkin smoothie)

My hospital meals were all the same. Broth, juice, tea, popsicle, jello
(I couldn't eat the jello--too solid)

The black pajamas that my mom bought me

Thinking about all those things almost make me wish I could go back and do it all again (ridiculous, I know). It was almost like my whole life stopped and I didn't have to worry about taking care of the house, the kids, driving Eli to school, cooking dinner, paying bills, etc.

I didn't intend for this to be a "deep" post, but now that I'm writing about it, it makes me wonder if maybe I feel nostalgic because people were taking care of ME instead of the other way around. I always feel SO MUCH PRESSURE and STRESS about numerous things in my life--and honestly the main stressor is my weight loss.

Ever since so many people found me on Sparkpeople, I get e-mails and messages daily from people saying what an inspiration I am, and how I motivate them, etc. I feel like such a fraud! I'm completely honest in my blog here, but some (probably most) don't read my blog. They just see my before and after pictures and think that I figured it all out and now I'm living my dream.

When I broke my jaw and my life was pretty much put on hold, it was such a relief from all the pressure! Now, every time I put on a single pound, I feel like I'm letting down all the people who say I am an inspiration. I even told my husband that some days, I wish I hadn't lost the weight. When I was fat, nobody expected anything of me. Now, the odds are completely against me keeping all this weight off, and that is at the front of my mind every single day.

Well, I didn't want this to be a "poor me" kind of post at all--and I certainly didn't want to whine! I hope it didn't come across that way.

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Worst run EVER

Yesterday I did my last long run before my half-marathon next weekend. I was scheduled to do 12 miles. I mapped out the route before I went--drove to a park and left the car for an out and back run. My husband and kids went with me, and they played at the park while I did my run.

It was, by far, the WORST run I've ever had.

Maybe because I was on vacation and eating and drinking like shit all week? I don't know. My legs felt like lead, and right off the bat I was running a very slow pace of about 10:00/mi. I wanted to keep my heart rate between 158-160, but to get that rate, I had to run a slower and slower pace.

I only drank 16 oz of water before I left, because I hate feeling like I have to pee on a run. Normally, I hydrate really well the day before I run, but since I was riding home from Tennessee, I didn't drink much water Friday.

By mile 4 or 5, I was DYING for water. I was seriously looking at the side of the road for a bottle with some water in it. I had brought 4 dates with me to eat for fuel, but I've never eaten on a run before, so I wasn't sure how it would do in my stomach.

I reached mile 6 and turned around, and just when I got to mile 7, I was passing a bar/saloon. I was so thirsty that I didn't care how ridiculous I looked going in there to ask for water. I had no money with me, and when I stepped in the five men sitting at the bar stopped and stared. It was dead silent.

I said to the (female) bartender, "I'm so sorry to bother you, but could I trouble you for a small cup of water?" She looked pitifully at me and said, "How about a cold bottle of water?"  I told her I didn't have any money, and she told me not to worry about it. One of the men said that he was tired and thirsty just LOOKING at me. I gulped down the entire bottle and thanked her. I told her I'd be back with some money, and she assured me it wasn't necessary.

After that, my stomach started cramping REALLY badly. Have you ever heard of "runner's trots"? I've had it once or twice, but not in a long time. It's awful. My stomach hurt so badly. I kept shuffling along, wanting the stupid run to be over with. I was really tempted to stop and call my husband to come pick me up, but since this was my last long run before the race next weekend, I needed to prove to myself that I could do it.

I got to the park where the car was parked, and I had to circle the park one time in order to reach 12 miles. At the other end of the park, I just wanted to quit. I was 11 miles in, and didn't give a shit if I reached 12 or not.

I saw my husband start to drive toward me from the other end of the park, and I almost cried with relief. Then I realized he was just turning the car around and backing into the parking space to be ready to leave. At 11.6 miles, I realized I could keep going on the trail to reach the car and finish the 12 miles, or I could cut across the grass. I cut across the grass and reached the car at 11.7.

I was doubled over from the cramps in my stomach. We stopped at a gas station for some Gatorade (I thought maybe replenishing my electrolytes would help with the cramping).

Then we stopped at the saloon so I could give them a couple of dollars.  They insisted that they didn't want the money, and then told me to help myself to a bunch of bread and Entenmann's baked goods sitting on a table. There were probably about 30 loaves of bread, 5-6 cakes, and about 8 boxes of donuts (none of them were expired--they said a friend who works for a bread company had excess).

They insisted, and not wanting to be rude, I took a loaf of bread and a box of donuts for my kids. Totally unexpected, but pretty cool!

I got home and spent the whole afternoon in the bathroom. I don't know if it was dehydration or the dates I ate or what... but good GRIEF, it was miserable.  I'm worried about the half-marathon on Saturday. I don't know if I should bring any fuel with me or not. I will make sure to hydrate really well though.

Yesterday, as we were going on the door, my husband dropped my Sigg water bottle and put a huge dent in the side of it. I was kind of bummed, until I realized that I could design my own Sigg bottle on Cafe Press!  I browsed through all the running designs, and then decided to create my own. It was SUPER expensive, though. I paid $20 for my last Sigg bottle (at Target) and designing my own cost me $35 after shipping. Yikes! But I think it's cute.

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The vacation damage

OHMYLORD... I just stepped on the scale after my week-long vacation in Tennessee. It was NOT a nice number. In fact, this is the heaviest I've been since JULY 2010!  I was so very tempted not to write the number here, because it's horribly embarrassing.

But... it was 147.5.

Now, I know that gaining 8 pounds in the week I was in Tennessee means that it will probably come off quickly too. It's mostly water weight, blah blah blah. But the point is, that number puts me back in the "overweight" category for my BMI.

How I spent 90% of my vacation ;)

Was I surprised to see the number? Hahaha, not at all!  Once I got to the cabin, all of my good intentions went out the window. My dad (who is a total junk food-aholic) brought tons of candy bars, cookies, chips, dips, donuts, etc. to snack on.

I always used to hate donuts (even as a fat person, donuts just disgusted me). However, I tried a Krispy Kreme donut on vacation and it was delicious!! So I had about 5 of those over the course of the week.

I can't count the number of mini candy bars I ate. I drank 4 bottles of red wine (by myself--I'm the only wine drinker in my family). I probably had about 6 beers.

I had hamburgers, turkey dinner with a second helping, tons of chips and dip, a couple of bowls of ice cream, about 6 cookies, 2 pieces of pizza, loaded nachos... I can't remember what else. I didn't "binge", however--these things were all eaten throughout the week, sporadically throughout the day. My body is not used to eating that much junk, and of course it just packed on the 8 pounds in 7 days.  The exercise I got was a 3-mile and a 7-mile run. I also went for a few walks and there were TONS of stairs at our cabin.

On the 8-hour car ride home yesterday, I read Portia de Rossi's book called Unbearable Lightness. It was an AMAZING read for anyone that has disordered eating. I'm not bulimic or anorexic, but I AM a binge eater and I definitely have done my share of dieting (a form of disordered eating).

So much of her book really hit home for me. Reading that book really got me thinking about all the ups and downs--I'm either bingeing or dieting/restricting all the time. More than anything, I'd love to find balance in my life and my way of eating. To not binge and to not restrict. "Ordered" eating, instead of "disordered" eating.

And I'd like to live each day the way that I'd like to live forever. Each meal, even. I've been keeping that in mind now--when I want to eat, I ask myself, "Is this something that will help me maintain a healthy balance?" For some reason, that really resonated with me.

Anyway, that was my vacation damage. I'm going away again on Friday to Indianapolis for my first half-marathon. We'll be gone from Friday to Sunday. Thankfully, my dad isn't going, so I won't be loading up on junk! ;)  Last year, I actually lost weight when I was in Indy. Hopefully that will be the case again.

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Cade's Cove Run

My older brother, Brian, actually woke up at 6:00 this morning to go running with me at Cade's Cove! I was completely surprised, and I was actually hoping he'd sleep in so that I'd have an excuse not to go.

Cade's Cove is about one and a half hours from our cabin. I'd read some really great things about running there, and since I had to do a long run today, I figured it'd be a great place to go. But I'm on fucking VACATION, so I just wasn't "feeling" it. But since my brother woke up early to go with me, I didn't want to let him down.

My parents decided that they wanted to go too, just to sight-see. We arrived at Cade's Cove at around 8:45. Brian and I started running the 11-mile loop. The first mile was great.

Then I started running into hills... and I am NOT a hill-runner!  I avoid hills like the plague. But let's face it, I'm in Tennessee. So I was okay with the hills, and then came the WIND. It was about a 40 mph head wind and at times, I felt like I was running in place. My hat blew off my head a few times and I had to chase it down. It was a CRUEL wind!

I had read that the loop was closed to traffic on Wednesdays and Saturdays before 10:00 AM, so that runners and bikers could go without worry of getting hit by a car. When we got there, we discovered that it doesn't actually start until MAY, so we still had to worry about traffic. My parents ended up driving up a couple of miles ahead of us, and then when we reached them, we had a drink of water and kept running. Kind of like leap-frog.

A gorgeous view at 3.5 miles in... the pic doesn't do it justice

The hills were KILLER, and the wind was nearly impossible. And to top it off, it started raining at about mile 6.  I decided to keep going, because I'm stubborn, but then at mile 7 I could tell that Brian wasn't into it anymore. So I told him it's fine if we stop. We ran to my parents car at mile 7 and hopped in. I didn't get to do my long run like I'd hoped (12 miles) but with the hills + wind + rain, I think I paid my dues ;)

Running just before mile 7

We decided to call it quits during the pouring rain at mile 7

It was a GORGEOUS run at times, and I loved the view. I just wish the weather had been better, but I still enjoyed the run!

Turns out that later that day, Tennessee was hit with a lot of devastating tornadoes! We finished up just in time.

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Zip-lining!

I'm terrified of pretty much everything. Well, I guess that's an exaggeration, but I have bad anxiety about all kinds of things. Which is why it was surprising that it was MY suggestion we go zip-lining, but that was months ago when I was feeling a little brave. When it came down to it, I really wanted to back out, but we'd already paid $90 per person, and my husband and I don't exactly have a lot of money. So yesterday (Monday) was the big day.

We drove into Gatlinburg (OMG, downtown Gatlinburg was awful--SOOO touristy, and I'll never go again). The kids did one thing there (a ski lift-looking thing, up a mountain) and then we had lunch (Subway). I stopped at a little shop and bought a half-pound of peanut butter fudge (I know, I know! But it was worth it--DELICIOUS!)

Then my mom took the kids out for a while so the rest of us could zip-line. We used this company called CLIMB, and according to the reviews, it was fantastic.  We got there, met our guides who were very nice and fun, and we suited up (after stepping on a scale!! I didn't ask what I weighed, because I truly didn't want to know. I'm sure it was horrible).

Jerry and I suited up in our zip gear

We headed out and I was terrified. I had taken a couple of Xanax, but they weren't helping much. We climbed up to the first platform and I was third in line to go. My dad went first. Then Brian, my brother. Then it was my turn.

I had a hard time stepping off the platform, but finally I did it. And it was fun! It didn't go nearly as fast as I was picturing in my head, and it was very comfortable (kind of like a little seat). The guides give you signals if they want you to "ball up" (go faster) or "starfish" (go slower). Balling up is exactly what you think--you curl your legs to your chest and lean back a little. The starfish position is where you push your chest forward and stretch your legs out and open them a little.

We did 9 jumps total, and then from the last platform, we got to rappel down to the ground (fun!)  I had a BLAST and would definitely do it again. The guides we had were fantastic, and I'd recommend that company for anyone visiting near Gatlinburg.

Here are some pictures:

Just before my first go on the zip-line

The gorgeous scenery!

Jerry and me

My first landing... it was harder than it looks!

A "ball up"

The "starfish" position

I even attempted to go upside down :)

At the end, we had to rappel down... it was fun!

Jerry, Shawn, Jeanie, Brian, me, and my dad

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The hills of Tennessee

Well, we made it to Tennessee. We left on Friday morning at about 8:00, and drove straight through to Pigeon Forge (stopping for lunch at a Waffle House in Kentucky). The kids were pretty good in the car, surprisingly.

Our cabin is AMAZING. It's absolutely huge, and it sits right on top of a mountain. I'll overload you with pictures...

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My Hollywood 11-mile run

I realize that what I'm about to write about may make some (most?) of you roll your eyes. But drastic times call for drastic measures, and after a terrifying experience on the scale yesterday, I am officially in drastic times!  My weight has been on an upward trend the last couple of weeks, and that is NOT cool--I'm supposed to be LOSING weight.

I leave for vacation tomorrow, and I was just feeling really crappy about my weight, so I decided to do something a little drastic--I bought a bottle of the Hollywood 48-Hour Miracle Diet. Yes, laugh your ass off, I don't care.

It was on sale for $10, and I thought, "What can it hurt?" A juice fast for 2 days will drop a lot of this extra water weight I packed on the last few days. Now, I know that the H48-HMD is not magic... it is simply fruit juice. But if I'm paying $10 for a quart of this stuff, I'm much more likely to stick with it for the whole 2 days.

I normally don't do fad diets, but I know that I'll at least feel better about myself starting my vacation if I don't FEEL so fat.

Since I had this brilliant idea just yesterday, that meant today was going to be Day 1... and Thursdays are also my long run days. Which meant fueling an 11-mile run with just a cup of juice! However, I think all the crap I ate yesterday was still sitting in my digestive system, so I'm not too worried about it ;)  I actually felt pretty decent during my run (as decent as one can feel while running 11 miles). 

I parked at my friend Renee's house and ran out 5.5 miles, then turned around to head back. On the way back, I impulsively cut down a different street--aptly named "Hollywood". I actually hit a dead end(!!) which is NOT cool when you're on a long run. I didn't want to do a tenth of a mile more than I had to.

It ended up adding 0.13 miles to the run, so all-in-all, I ran 11.13. I got bad stomach cramps during mile 4, and I prayed they would go away quickly. They did. I kept my heart rate at around 156, and my pace was terrible. My pace just keeps getting slower week after week. Today my average ended up being 9:49/mi. I really need to start doing some speedwork every week.

I'm completely exhausted right now, but I still have to pack for vacation. I have a ton of laundry to do first, though. I just want to lie on the couch and recover! I'm actually starting to look forward to relaxing in Tennessee. I really don't feel like DOING much on vacation--just relaxing. I am going ziplining on Monday, and I'm kind of nervous about that. I'll see if I can get pictures to post.

I'm bringing my computer with me, because the cabin we are staying at has free wi-fi, so I'll and try and post there.

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