Eight weeks ago my childhood friend, BJ, and I decided that rather than sitting around moaning about the fact that we are fast approaching the size of small planets, we should actually do something about it. We spent an entire session (which included two margaritas each, two baskets of chips and a large cheese dip) planning our strategy and then we laced up our New Balance and started walking.
4.2 miles every morning. Five days a week. (The .2 is critically important because at the end of a week, that's an extra mile.) So after five days...21 miles. We were FAITHFUL, and after five days a week for four weeks, we had covered 84 miles. These aren't strolling miles...less than hour, all hills and since they're not rolling hills but pissy up-and-down hills, we are talking butt-muscle PAIN! Hip-locking staggering when you sit too long. Buying stock in Aleve MOTIVATION. (Wednesday I got out of the car at the liquor store and staggered...my muscles were screaming "Slow down, bitch!" and I know the other patrons thought I was having DT's. "Get that woman a drink before Elvis starts talking to her again!")
At the end of the 84 miles, I had not lost an ounce. NOT ONE SINGLE OUNCE. And BJ? Gained eight pounds. Now, I have most of a graduate degree in physical something and I KNOW all the right things to say. Muscle weighs more than fat. It takes a while to jump-start your metabolism. We aren't 21. NONE OF THOSE THINGS MATTER when you've hauled your flabby 52-year-old ass out in the Alabama summer for EIGHTY-FOUR MILES and.....nothing has happened.
So then I was at the beach for a week and in Lousiana for a week and then school started the next week so I didn't do anything for three weeks. And because that's what friends do, neither did BJ. This past Monday, I got up, shook the spiders out of the New Balance and got back on the road. (BJ isn't participating this week because she is having the paneling in her house ripped out and replaced with sheetrock and they tore up the thermostat and if YOU'RE GONNA HAUL YOUR FAT ASS around in the Alabama heat you better have air when you get home, so she's living somewhere else for five days.)
I am so damn self-righteous it is disgusting. I quit drinking in the daytime (not that I drank in the daytime before, but I think it uses to calories to sit around and talk about all the good things you are doing whether it's true or not.) I bought lettuce for salads, now that the garden lettuce has all DIED FROM THE HEAT, and it's sitting in the vegetable bin. I'm not eating it, but that goes back to that calorie thing and intentions. And then I got up this morning and instead of 4.2 miles, I did 6.3 miles because I MISSED MY TURN. And the one-millionth of my brain that is OCD and keeps the rest of my brain from functioning because I KNOW I CAN'T GET IT RIGHT made me do a third lap so that I could turn at the right place.
And THEN, because I walked/ran 6.3 miles I came home and drank a gallon of milk, ate one-fourth of a whole cow and put an entire bag of cookies in the blender and just mainlined it. I'm thinking that on the way to pick up the kids, I can just open a vein and pump in sugar water.
4.2 miles every morning. Five days a week. (The .2 is critically important because at the end of a week, that's an extra mile.) So after five days...21 miles. We were FAITHFUL, and after five days a week for four weeks, we had covered 84 miles. These aren't strolling miles...less than hour, all hills and since they're not rolling hills but pissy up-and-down hills, we are talking butt-muscle PAIN! Hip-locking staggering when you sit too long. Buying stock in Aleve MOTIVATION. (Wednesday I got out of the car at the liquor store and staggered...my muscles were screaming "Slow down, bitch!" and I know the other patrons thought I was having DT's. "Get that woman a drink before Elvis starts talking to her again!")
At the end of the 84 miles, I had not lost an ounce. NOT ONE SINGLE OUNCE. And BJ? Gained eight pounds. Now, I have most of a graduate degree in physical something and I KNOW all the right things to say. Muscle weighs more than fat. It takes a while to jump-start your metabolism. We aren't 21. NONE OF THOSE THINGS MATTER when you've hauled your flabby 52-year-old ass out in the Alabama summer for EIGHTY-FOUR MILES and.....nothing has happened.
So then I was at the beach for a week and in Lousiana for a week and then school started the next week so I didn't do anything for three weeks. And because that's what friends do, neither did BJ. This past Monday, I got up, shook the spiders out of the New Balance and got back on the road. (BJ isn't participating this week because she is having the paneling in her house ripped out and replaced with sheetrock and they tore up the thermostat and if YOU'RE GONNA HAUL YOUR FAT ASS around in the Alabama heat you better have air when you get home, so she's living somewhere else for five days.)
I am so damn self-righteous it is disgusting. I quit drinking in the daytime (not that I drank in the daytime before, but I think it uses to calories to sit around and talk about all the good things you are doing whether it's true or not.) I bought lettuce for salads, now that the garden lettuce has all DIED FROM THE HEAT, and it's sitting in the vegetable bin. I'm not eating it, but that goes back to that calorie thing and intentions. And then I got up this morning and instead of 4.2 miles, I did 6.3 miles because I MISSED MY TURN. And the one-millionth of my brain that is OCD and keeps the rest of my brain from functioning because I KNOW I CAN'T GET IT RIGHT made me do a third lap so that I could turn at the right place.
And THEN, because I walked/ran 6.3 miles I came home and drank a gallon of milk, ate one-fourth of a whole cow and put an entire bag of cookies in the blender and just mainlined it. I'm thinking that on the way to pick up the kids, I can just open a vein and pump in sugar water.
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