Monday, March 29, 2010

Yay!!!

My favorite season has FINALLY arrived!!  Here's what I love about spring.

1. Blossoms!

2. Pedicures!
3. Morning dew

4. Rain, and the smell of it

5. Spring shoes!

6. Longer days
7. NBA Playoffs

8. My birthday!

Happy spring everyone!!!

Monday, March 22, 2010

Insanity - Day 50

Hello Friends!

I've decided to give you an in-depth update of my workout progress.

This month I decided to "get through" the workouts in a different way than I did last month.  Last month I turned on a DVD and just sloshed through as much as I could, which progressed as the weeks went by, but it was all based on how much I thought I could do.  I found myself only giving it half of what I really could, just so I could last the entire time.  This month I decided to put a little bit more structure into it.

The videos are all circuit training.  You have a circuit of anywhere from 5 to 10 different "moves" or exercises and you repeat the circuit of exercises three times each, with a 30 second rest between each circuit.  For example...

Today's warm up (each lasts for 45 seconds):
Jog
Jumping jacks
Heisman
Side to side jump rope
High knees (really, I mean really gets your abs if you do it correctly)
Hit the floor (similar to suicides....)
Side to side floor hops (reminds me of "bucking broncos" I used to do on the trampoline as a child... not as easy nor as much fun now though...)

Then you repeat that circuit two more times, increasing your speed and/or intensity each time.  So your third time through you don't start with a jog you start with a sprint.  Yeah, it hurts....especially if you had McDonald's and/or soda the day before.

The warm up doesn't give you a thirty second rest between each circuit.  So you're going for a good 10 minutes to get warmed up.  It took me four weeks to finally be able to get through a warm up without stopping!

Anyway, so you have your warm up circuit, then three other circuits in a workout.  Now... on to my point.

This month instead of sloshing through and being burnt out before my third repeat of my first circuit, I've paced myself.  The first week I went three times through the warm up, then only two times through the remaining three circuits.  The second week I went three times through the warm up, three times through the first circuit, and only two times through the remaining two circuits.  This week... Three times through everything except my last circuit.  So I'm only shaving off three minutes out of my total workout.  It's still really, really, really hard, but I have noticed myself improving and progressing a lot more than I did last month.  This may be due to my changed eating habits, also, but whatever it is it is totally working.  Next week I will go through the entire workout without stopping. (*crosses fingers*)

Here's what I have noticed this month:

1. My abs stay flexed practically all day without me even thinking about it!  I use the tips that Shaun gives in the videos (such as, "Lift with your abs!  Use your core!) everywhere I go.  When I go up the stairs, I jog and I lift with my abs.  I've really noticed a difference there.

2. Soda tastes disgusting to me.  I gave myself Saturdays to "cheat" on my "diet" but I've found myself not wanting to cheat.  Water tastes soooo much better!

3. I have so much more energy at work.  I'm able to focus and concentrate better on what I'm doing.  I don't get overwhelmed and stressed out as easily.

4. Overall I am just happier!

5. I am sore right now, but I love it!

After I'm finished with Insanity I'm not sure what I will do.  I feel like I am somewhat addicted to working out now.  Also I'm afraid of what my body will do if I just stop exercising.  I'm thinking about trying ChaLEAN Extreme... but I'll worry about that when I get there.

Breakfast today tasted like Jamba Juice!  Mmmm... I LOVE Jamba Juice!  Here's what I had:
1 cup of frozen mixed fruit (pineapple, mango, grapes, strawberries)
1/2 cup of greek yogurt
1 cup of orange juice
Blended together!

I accidently made too much, and I'm still drinking it.... 4 hours later.  Whoops!

Wednesday, March 17, 2010

Success!

I've been messing around with the HTML on a template I found... finally figured out how to put my own pictures in the slideshow.  I'm so happy!  ...I got bored with my old Jazz header and stuffs....

Lance got a job!  Hooray!  Right now it's in Midvale, but they're in the process of moving.  I'm not sure where they are moving to...  hopefully south!  He is now the manager of a shipping department.  So far he isn't managing anyone.  He's the only shipping person.  They are going to train him on everything then hire someone for him to manage.  I'm pretty excited for Lance.  I know he'll do well.  The owner of the company says that Lance doesn't have the personality to be a manager, but he has great work experience.  I agree... Lance isn't bossy, controlling or anything like that.  So we'll see how he does as a manager.  I think he could be a great manager!  He'd be more of a friend helping you complete your task rather than a dictator telling you what to do and how to do it.

My company is supposed to move next Friday!  I'm excited.  It will be an exciting change.

Insanity is kicking my butt.  By the end of last week I wasn't incredibly sore but all of my muscles were weak.  They are just burned out.  Unfortunately with the time change I couldn't drag myself out of bed yesterday morning to work out.  I couldn't do it this morning either.  But, today I worked out after work.  Which, again, I don't really like doing, but I HATE being behind in the workouts, and I hate missing more than one day in a row.  Gotta try again tomorrow!  Starting your day with sweat is a lot better than ending it with sweat in my opinion.

Well, I'm going to bed now.  I think my body naturally needs more than eight hours of sleep every night.  I read somewhere that to find out how many hours your body needs you should go to bed at your regular time and see what time your body naturally wakes up the next morning.  You know, without your alarm?  On Saturdays I do this and I sleep for 12 hours or more.  Unfortunately I don't have the time to sleep that long every night, so Saturday is the only day I'm fully rested, I guess!

Wednesday, March 10, 2010

REAL (Long) Update

Here's a real update about what's going on in our lives right now... brace yourselves!

The temp place that Lance was working said that it wasn't working out and they let him go last night.  They said he stood around with his hands in his pockets, sat at the computer for extended amounts of time, and never did his work.

BS!!!  Lance NEVER has his hands in his pockets, he always came home with sore, tired feet from standing all day, and he was always complaining about when he'd try to get something done, nobody would help him, nobody would let him do what he was supposed to do.  He'd try to get something done and someone else would tell him not to do that, and to do something else.  It's like they set him up to fail.  I honestly and truly believe he did everything in his power to do the best job he could there, and they are just so unorganized, unprepared, and unprofessional that they had to make up some excuse to let him go.

I mean, freak, a week after they got Lance they hired another guy on full time.  What's that saying?  "Oh, we can't hire you on right now, but we'll hire this other guy cuz he's my friend.  And we'll show him the breakroom, and help him learn stuff, but you are on your own suka!"

UGH!  I'm frustrated for Lance, but I'm happy about him not working there.  It wasn't right.  He wasn't happy.  When he's not happy, I'm not happy.



So the job search continues...

My professional life seems to be the opposite.  I posted earlier about my promotion, which was finalized today.  All I can do is smile about it.  I have nothing negative to say.  Seriously, best opportunity of my life, so far.  :)  I am so happy to work for this company.  Yes, sometimes I get overwhelmed and over worked, but they really do make up for it.

Dude, my boss, Donni, had me help her with some coding/re-coding on a big, ugly project yesterday.  It was a slow day so I took my time and made the coding real high quality.  Well today, out of the blue, she hands me a card and some DP to say thank you for what I did!!  I have the best bosses, ever!  The day before this, a mystery person put a card on my desk, with a drink that I've been enjoying lately called Sobe LifeWater... Yumberry Pomegranate flavor is the best!  The card just said that they were thinking about me and that I'm awesome.  How nice is that?  It really made me feel good.

My workouts are going great.  They're crazy hard, and I've been sore all week.  But, I managed to talk Lance into rubbing my back for me yesterday, and that helped out a lot.  I can REALLY feel my body start to tighten and get toned.  We'll see if the scale and/or tape measurements reflect the same.


I've started having a wonderful breakfast...  1 Nestle Carnation breakfast drink packet (chocolate flavor), 1 cup of 1% milk, and 1/2 cup of greek yogurt, honey flavor.  It's super delicious, and it keeps me full until lunch time!  I'm sure I'll get sick of this soon, so I might switch to making smoothies next week.

Saturday, March 6, 2010

Help, please?

My job isn't supposed to get busy until August, but it's crazy busy now.  I've barely had time (or had no time at all) for lunch, I've stayed late every single day for the past two weeks, and now I am burnt out.  I honestly feel like I can't go on any longer.  My job isn't physically exhausting, it's mentally exhausting.  Personally, I think mental exhaustion is harder to push through than physical exhaustion.  Physical exhaustion you can just take a bubble bath, go to bed, sleep like a rock and be good to go the next day.  Mental exhaustion gives me crazy dreams about work and anxiety about the next day.  There is no break for my brain! I hope it slows down... at least for a little bit so I can train some newbys.  Then it will be OK.

Due to this mental exhaustion (and our heater giving us fits) I have only worked out three days this week.  It's my recovery week, so I don't feel too bad, but I do feel like when this upcoming week of workouts start I'll be back where I was at the beginning of the program.

I'm supposed to start a new schedule at work...maybe go in an hour earlier, I'm not sure what it will be yet.   This worries me because I'm already getting up at 6 so going to work earlier means I'll have to get up at 5.... all this and daylight savings is in a week, so 5am will really be 4am.

That's all that's going on right now.  Just stress and anxiety, anxiety and stress.

Thursday, March 4, 2010

Lame

I didn't work out yesterday.  At lunch, my thought process was, "I didn't work out today, I might as well have soda."  So I had 2 DPs.

Really feeling it today.

Lame.