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Challenging

Today’s run was challenging. Heck all of the runs this week have been challenging. First of all, I can’t remember the last time I ran outside. I think it may have been in time immemorial. Running outside is harder than running on the treadmill, but I also found it way more rewarding. Secondly, I’ve been in an autoimmune flare for over a week. This means everything is angry including my stomach and lungs. To be fair, my lungs have been angry since we were hanging out in the smoke filled Minnesota air in May.

5 day streak! Hit my goal

I’ve got an appointment on Wednesday with my doctor to make sure I’m in the right meds for the allergies and asthma. I do hate taking prednisone though because it keeps me up all night. It should, however, help fuel my workouts. Now I’m sure you’re wondering why the hell I’m working out through a flare. The answer is simply because it helps alleviate it. I cannot express how much better feel mentally and physically after working out. The key is to not over do it. Running on a track this week was the perfect way to get my workout in without being too far from home or the bathroom. I should also mention my Endo and PCP are both on board with my workout routines.

Tomorrow and Sunday will be full rest days, less some restorative yoga and Pilates. Since I ran hard all week, I’m going to enjoy a full 48 hour break from the cardio. I’ll be staying Kayla Itsines HIIT program Monday. I finished her beginner program last week. I started back at he beginning since I had taken quite a bit of time off and I don’t need to hurt myself. Her workouts are great! They will definitely make my muscles quiver. The morning after leg day is usually the worst.

How would you design the city of the future?

If I could design the city of future it would be walkable and full of coffee shops (including my personal favorite Dunkin Donuts) and dogs.

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Greetings from Minny

Greetings from Minny. It’s good to back home with my family for the week. I was actually able to run outside this afternoon during my lunch hour. It wasn’t the best run of of my life, but it went well considering I haven’t run outside for over a year. The middle school by my folks’ house has a nice track, so I went up there for the run. I set timer of 30 minutes and ended up at nearly 2.5 miles. Clearly, they were the prettiest or my fastest miles, but I got them done.

Working from here has its perks. All of my clock are set at the same time zone. I can’t tell you how disorienting it is moving between time zones every day. Unfortunately, the different time zone also makes it entirely too easy to screw up appointment times. This is where my paper planner comes in handy. Far from obsolete, my planner ensure I get to the meeting at the right time in the right time zone. As for work itself, the queue was busy this morning, but it’s been a slow afternoon.

Yesterday, I got my see my Grandma T, my uncle Mark and my brother Justin’s family. Justin and Monisha hosted a bbq at their cabin, which is absolutely beautiful. The breeze off the lake was perfect and the scenery was sublime. It was nice to spend time with all of them while enjoying some amazing burgers and pickle roll ups.

Meanwhile in Ft Myers, the Mayor started his first day of training camp. I’m anxious to hear how it went for him and his roommates. He moved into his billet house yesterday. Thankfully, the billet family seems wonderful. His billet mom Tracey reminds him of his Grandma Dawn, which I’m sure helps smooth the transition. He’ll be living in Estero, which isn’t too far from the rink. It will also give him an opportunity to officiate at Hertz Arena. Lastly, the puppies seem to be behaving for the hubby, but they definitely miss their mama.

What do you enjoy most about writing?

I enjoy telling stories and sharing my thoughts. It’s a soothing exercise in self-expression that helps me manage my stress.

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Goodbyes

Goodbyes are never easy, but saying goodbye you r baby before he leaves the west coast is a fucking gut punch. Parents that have sent their kids off to to the military, college or junior hockey know the mixed bag of pride and sadness that comes with this particular goodbye. Perhaps it’s that these particular drop offs represent and end of a life stage it be it in their life or yours. Not to be overly esoteric or anything like that.

The Mayor heads west to Fort Myers tomorrow for orientation and Eels training camp. He’ll be moving into his billet house tomorrow as well. The Hubby is baking up some of his trademark chocolate chip cookies for the billet family. While the hubby bakes, the Mayor will finish packing up his stuff. He was pretty much ready to go before I left, but knowing him he’ll be thoroughly checking everything twice like Santa Claus.

I’m currently 35,000 feet above the ground watching Drop Dead Gorgeous. (Thank you Daddy Delta for the upgrade to Comfort+. Funny, I don’t remember the “Minnesota” accent being so thick when I watched the movie in 1999. Now that I’ve been living in Florida, I’m hoping it’s an exaggeration and not typical. I suppose it’s not so surprising that the accent would become more noticeable after moving away. Anyway, the movie is pretty amazing.

Thankfully, my travel day has gone smooth so far. Checkin and security were both a breathe. The Sky Club was packed to the gills. Can we just agree that people that take up an extra table for their stuff are worse than gate lice? When did folks become so freaking entitled? On the upside, the food was mighty tasty today. And now back to my in flight entertainment, which is now Curb!

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Ready!

I’m so ready to head up to Minny tomorrow. I’m not so ready, however, to have an empty nest. While I head north to see family, including extended family due to a 50th wedding anniversary, the Mayor will head west for hockey. We’ve pretty much have hjm ready to go less a few things we need to pick up tomorrow morning before I fly out. He’s super excited to get junior hockey started.

Meanwhile, I’ve checked into my flight and have been praying to the upgrade gods. So far it’s looks a little iffy for a first class upgrade. Comfort plus May happen, but we shall see. Worst case scenario, I came at a the Sky Club while waiting for an aviator to fly me away. And just think I’ll have nobody traveling with me, so there will be no complaints about the food tomorrow. Unless I decide to complain to myself, but I don’t think that we’ll happen. I prefer waiting in the Sky Club to minimize interaction with the gate lice, who like pirates are thieves of joy.

How do you plan your goals?

I plan my goals around how I’m feeling mentally and physically. I also use current performance as a basis. Over the past few years, I’ve had to learn to be flexible with my fitness goals. Injuries and Graves’ disease have knocked me from my goals a few times. In those cases, I’ve learned to pivot and create new goals that are physically possible. I thin one of the biggest things I’ve had to learn is being flexible with my goals in the face of chronic illness.

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Effort

I’m putting a little more effort into today’s post versus yesterday’s. I was in a bit of a mood and November Rain conveyed that mood better than anything I could write. Well, at least anything that would have been appropriate and inoffensive. Yesterday just wasn’t the most fantastic day of my life, nor was Tuesday for that matter. It was, however, another day above ground, so I’d still classify it as a victory.

In order to cleanse the mood, I decided to burn some of the Palo Santo I bought in April. Our yoga teacher in Mexico burnt it during our practice and it smelled wonderful. Palo Santo, like sage, is also supposed to cleanse and clear the bad energy out from your space. I’m not sure about all of that, but I definitely and accidentally sent off the smoke detectors. Perhaps I’m missing part of the diffuser or process, but whoops!

Insert Palo Santo for sage and yesterday for 2020 and this would be accurate

The last two days made it glaringly obviously that Athena is gone. She had a way of knowing when any of us were having a bad day. In fact, she made it her business to take care of us on those days. She was such a loving mother hen. I really miss her. Our house just isn’t the same without her.

Create an emergency preparedness plan.

We’ve had an emergency preparedness plan for years because we live in a hurricane prone area. This plan includes our hurricane kit, canned foods, and hurricane shutters. It also includes a plan to ride out the storm in our home. We choose to ride out the storm at home because we’re not in a mandatory evacuation zone. There are a lot of people that live in mandatory evacuation zones that need to be able to get to safety. Now if it was a catastrophic storm headed our way, then we would think about leaving. The one inquiry we would make before leaving is what shelters/hotels or airbnbs would allow us to bring onto dogs.

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Why?

Why must all Mondays be a clusterfuck? Is there an unwritten law in the universe that I’m unaware of? My Monday started when I woke up late for work. Now this is truly an astonishing feat as my desk is five paces from my bed. Yet here I was sleeping away like Sleeping Beauty until 8:06 am. Whoops! Fortunately, I was able to get up and on the computer without much effort. I just wasn’t mentally present for the first forty five minutes. I was so tired, I felt like a martian.

On top of my late start, my allergy/exercise induced asthma has been wreaking havoc in my lungs today. If you listened to my last phone calls, you would think I had just ran ten miles after smoking 59 cigarettes. I’d love to say that my voice sounded raspy and sexy prompting my custom get to buy , but I think they felt sorry for me. Thank god for prednisone and rescue inhalers. Albeit, I had to go out and get both since the stuff I had on hand was used up or expired. Nevertheless, the meds should help clear up my lungs pretty quickly.

In between the wheezing and phone calls, I completed my annual compliance training. It was a wonderful reminder that I longer work at a place where work place bullying is venerated especially for the upper echelons. Honestly, I miss the workplace bullying about as much as I miss smelling the reheated five day old fish. Anywhere else, HR would have put a stop to both, but hey that’s not my problem anymore. And guess what I guarantee you, there will be no reheating of five day old fish in my new office.

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Whoops

Whoops!! I was so exhausted when I got up this morning, I couldn’t figure out why. I’m usually pretty tired by Fridays, but even with the additional workouts it didn’t make sense. And then I realized I forgot to take my thyroid meds that last two days. Whoops!! No wonder it took two cups of Dunkin’ this morning to make me semi human. Now that the thyroid meds, specifically the t3, are on board I’m awake. Before you tell me to set a reminder and an alarm, I’ll let you know that I’ve set both and still manage to forget.

This weekend our excessive heat warnings will a change into heat advisories. Nevertheless, it is still sizzling hot out there. Did you know the word sizzle is a onomatopoeia meaning it’s name is how it sounds. Another example of this would be the cuckoo. You can thank me the next time you play Scrabble and score a million points with that word. Anyways, I’m so glad the insane heat is finally breaking. It was borderline pleasant when I took out the dogs at lunchtime. The last few weeks it’s been an absolutely miserable enterprise to walk them at noon.

Tonight we’re having Sushi Yama for dinner to celebrate Goalielocks last night at home. Tomorrow he’ll head back to Orlando to start school. He’s got a beautiful apartment for the year and amazing roommates. He and his roommates have been best friends since middle school. They do a good job taking care of each other and keeping each other in line. Meanwhile, I’m looking forward to a decrease in my grocery, light and energy bill. Our FPL bill last month was over $700. Anyone want to guess what it will be next month when it’s just Luke and I at home. My guess is is will be around $200. We shall see!

What change, big or small, would you like your blog to make in the world?

The only change I’d like for my blog to make in this world is to make it a better place. Not because it’s profound, but because kindness and family are the major themes. I think it’s a nice change to read stuff that isn’t overly serious. While I’m am empath, the blog doesn’t usually get too deep or too serious.

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Halfway

We’re more than halfway to the weekend and what a glorious feeling it is. I’m ready for a nice chill weekend. Before we get there, I supposed I have to finish the work week. Work has been going well. Fortunately, the lead volume has picked up in the last few weeks. It’s only going to get busier, which is awesome. Tonight we’re heading to Boca to meet my brothers for dinner. My older brother and his family are in town for the week, so it will be nice to see them.

I started running again this week. Instead of just running a mile or two on the treadmill, I started doing treadmill workouts on Apple Fitness +. Initially, I was nervous that I wasn’t in good enough shape for it, but I was wrong. The workouts give you the flexibility to run, walk, or anything in between. Now that I have three of them under my belt, I can confidently say I really enjoy them. I don’t always enjoy them at the moment, but I feel great afterward. The treadmill workouts also take the banality out of a treadmill run. I love the coaching and the interactions between the Apple Fitness team.

One thing I really like about both Apple Fitness + cycling and treadmill workouts is that they’re a great way to interval train. Interval training can activate both the aerobic and anaerobic. This supposedly helps with improving insulin sensitivity, heart health, and caloric after-burn. That being said, I do think steady-state cardio is still an important part of training. Nonetheless, for me at the moment interval training is really helping me move the needle.

Tonight, before we head to dinner, I’ll do a Pilates workout. For these workouts, I also use Apple Fitness +. The Pilates workouts max out at thirty minutes and have really improved my strength. There are some crazy moves included like cat and cow while in beast. Imagine doing cat and cow with your shins off the ground maintaining balance as you move through the poses. It’s absolute insanity!

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Stormy Afternoon

It’s been a stormy afternoon here. Fortunately, the storms took away some of the heat, which made the dogs’ lunchtime walks tolerable. The last few weeks the lunch walks have been tough due to the overwhelming heat. At least it’s August and we only have two more months of summer here. Usually, it starts to cool down in October, but nothing about this year has been usual.

I love a good thunderstorm, so long as it doesn’t impact power. Last time we lost power, not storm related, it set me back several hours at work. The power surge fried the peripherals and made it really difficult to work. After a day of working with IT, I finally got everything back up and running. There was definitely an art to resetting everything fully to make it work. Honestly, it’s a little frustrating given I was using a surge protector that the company provided.

While I’m busy selling insurance, the boys are getting ready to leave for the year. Goalielocks heads back to UCF on Saturday. Judging from the way the upstairs looks, he’s got a lot of stuff to pack. I also need to make sure he doesn’t leave with my foam rollers, massage gun, or cervical pillow. If he’s up to his usual monkeyshines antics, then I wouldn’t be surprised if they end up in his new apartment. By the way, his new apartment looks like an absolute palace. He’ll have his own bedroom and bathroom and will be living with his best friends. Student housing has come a long way since I was at the U.

P.S. Nordstroms Anniversary sale may have just ended, but Fabletics semi-annual sale just started today.

P.S.S. If you’re wondering what a cervical pillow is, here’s what I bought on Amazon. It’s really helped relieve my neck and shoulder pain.

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Great Weekend

I had a great, albeit busy weekend. In fact, I left the house three days in a row, which has got to be a record. Friday night I went to dinner with our PanCan Affiliate chair Joelle, PanCan regional manager Kathleen, Rita (one of our amazing survivors), and her daughter Marni. Unfortunately, Addie, who is our community relationship manager from PanCan got sick and was unable to make it. We definitely missed Addie, who is a big reason for our affiliate’s success and a big reason I jumped on board. Dinner was fantastic. The company was great and a good time was had by all.

Friday’s outfit
Saturday’s outfit
I searched for the perfect purple outfits. A lot of the results I got were more vermilion than purple.

Saturday morning we got ready for our affiliate social event at Barrel Of Monks Brewery in Boca Raton. The brewery generously donated the space for our event. I love that the brewery is back in the middle of an industrial/office park. South Florida has a lot of hidden gems like this brewery. Despite its non-traditional location, the brewery was super easy to find and free parking was abundant. After breaking the bank on parking in Boston, I have a real appreciation for free and ample parking.

The event itself was great. We spent about an hour decorating the space before folks arrived, so it looked really nice for folks. I built a candy bar because they look pretty and I like candy. Thankfully, we had a really good turnout for the event. It was nice to see so many new faces come out to support the affiliate and celebrate our successes with them. Moreover, our affiliate is full of wonderful people that love and support each other. I’m sure you can see from the pictures that this group is extraordinary. It’s nice to have an added layer of support as one navigates the grief pancreatic cancer has caused.

Unfortunately, Addie wasn’t able to make the social on Saturday either. We missed her dearly. Despite being terribly sick, she still sent her boss with a beautiful gift for me. Let me tell you, Addie is so thoughtful and kind. She gifted me a framed tribute to Athena. It’s so special. Joelle, our amazing affiliate chair, also gifted me a beautiful orchid in remembrance of Athena. Their kindness and thoughtfulness meant so much at the end of a very difficult week for me. Both items now grace my desk where they won’t gather any dust.

After the event, I chilled at home and we watched a movie. Sunday morning was relaxing as well. I baked bread and ran in the morning. At night, the Mayor had a Wolf Pack 4 vs. 4 tournament that we went to watch. We’ve done countless 4 v 4 tournaments over the years. Most of them are pure shit. One team, usually the tournament organizer’s favorites, blows out everyone else. It’s just not fun. In contrast, South Florida Wolfpack does a great job of creating teams with parity in mind. Literally, any team could win and every game could go either way. Consequently, I think it’s a better experience for both players and parents.