Counting Down

It is finally, spectacularly beautiful outside! And guess what? I'm sitting indoors. I was listening to a commercial this morning on the radio and a guy was interviewing people on the street. He asked the question, "What do you want the most?" I thought about that and besides the obvious like world peace and the ability to eat unlimited amounts of ice cream and not gain weight, I thought, "I want to have summers off again."

Remember how great it was, when it was the last day of school and you knew that you had months of unlimited sleeping in time, laying out time, playing moonlit tag time? Ah, summer. My favorite time of year and I spend 50-60 hours a week of it indoors working and commuting. The old saying is definitely true, youth is wasted on the young. Do you know what I could do with a whole summer off? Oh, the possibilities. I remember the first summer I didn't have off and, boy, was that a slap in the face. I always worked before I had a career, from the time I was 12 years old I was slinging Dairy Queen or babysitting or working retail or in a restaurant, but there's a big difference between a part time job in the summer and working full time in the summer. Thankfully we have more daylight in the summer so we can at least enjoy part of the summer days once we are home from work. And I am lucky enough to work at a company that gives us summer hours on Fridays (we close at 2:00), which is incredible.

That being said, I am really enjoying running outside in the nicer weather and am so glad it's finally here. The problem is that I STILL haven't been on my bike. It is still Spring after all and it just so happens to rain on the days I have the time to bike. The only other day I had open to bike was last Sunday but seeing as I drank my weight in Skinnygirl Margaritas and Vodka and Club Sodas the night before at one of my closest friend's Bachelorette party, I wasn't running anywhere except to my couch to sleep the day away. Pathetic, isn't it? Someone who is a hardcore triathlete who would read this would scoff at my dedication to my training but I'm not a hardcore triathlete and I am a realist. I enjoy my life and am going to live it. Could I have skipped that last cocktail and purple frosted cupcake at midnight? Yes, I could have. But, I didn't. Am I going to beat myself up about it? No, I'm not. I mean, don't get me wrong, I was cursing myself when I woke up to the world's worst headache and a tongue that felt like people were walking across it with wool socks on, but once I recovered I didn't let it derail me.

As I said in my last blog, I started back to Weight Watchers last week and thankfully, it is a realistic program that lets you work in things like a night of partying and still lose weight. I lost 1.6 pounds in the first week, in fact. Even with the debauchery! Had I towed the line, not drank or ate too much, I probably would have lost 4 pounds, but I'm okay with that. I still lost because I was smart and healthy all week, knowing that I had this weekend of fun planned. After all, it's about the journey and doing this for the long haul, not trying something crazy and losing a ton of weight in a short time that I would just gain back after returning to normal eating again. Weight Watchers allows you to live your life, you just have to plan for extras like parties, dinners out and special occasions. Case in point for me this week. I'm right back on track and plan to stay on it. Until my friend's wedding of course!

One last thought for the day...it's about little victories that have big payoffs. I knocked 30 seconds off my 400 meter swim time last week. Now, don't get me wrong, I am not competing in the triathlon for time at all; I truly just want to finish but it was a good way to push myself to try and beat my last timed swim. And I did! 30 seconds may not seem like a lot, but it was a little victory for me that gave me a ton of motivation to keep training. It kicked my ass, but my ass needs kicking, so that's a good thing. Did you know you can sweat while swimming, by the way? It's such a strange feeling. The triathlon is 5 (gulp) weeks away. It's time to crack down and get some brick training in (see last blog for definition of brick training, it doesn't have anything to do with actual bricks, although that might be effective, too). That's my goal for this week. I'll let you know how it goes.