Archive for the ‘running’ Category

Posted on October 4, 2011 - by Ashley Jackson

So I might have lied…

…when I said I’d be back with another post like two and a half weeks ago. I’m still trying to figure out this whole working-full-time-while-dating-and-training-for-a-half-marathon-and-cooking-healthy-food thing.

My half-marathon–the one I had to bow out of last year because my left foot went all pear-shaped–is on November 6, and I’m a little behind on my training, but still feeling confident that I’m going to be able to finish. I had a totally awesome walk/run last Wednesday, totaling about 4.6 miles; I ran for the majority of it and was fine afterward except for some muscle soreness.

This was largely thanks to all the athletic tape I put on my foot beforehand.

Here are some pictures that made their way onto my camera over the past couple of weeks…

Here’s one of the almond butter pumpkin brownies I made.

They were pretty tasteless, but in a non-offensive way, and the texture was fantastic. I plan to mess around with this recipe so that it involves chocolate.

The Tuesday after Contagion came out, the boyfriend and I went to the Cheesecake Factory and then to the IMAX. This was my first time at the Cheesecake Factory and I agree with everyone who said the menu was overwhelming. I finally went with some salmon and broccoli…

…and some fries. Because I couldn’t think of anything else to order.

I did only eat part of the fries. And they were delicious. As was the salmon. I’ve never had salmon with tartar sauce before and it seemed weird to me when they brought it out, but I figured I’d try it anyway. It turned out to be pretty good.

With the exception of some donut binges and the occasional meal out, I’ve been trying to eat pretty primal lately. It’s been fun to try out new dishes, such as buffalo chicken and veggies.

I’m still trying to get the sauce right for the chicken, but it’s pretty good. I’ve also been making blue cheese dip to go with it (out of cream cheese and blue cheese crumbles).

There was even a trip to Golden Corral where I pretty much stuffed myself on veggies, fajita steak, and shrimp.

I also got a piece of cheesecake for shiggles, but I didn’t eat the crust. Oh, and I had some chocolate soft serve. Because I could.

On Saturday, September 17, it was time for BugFest. I volunteered at the USDA-APHIS booth for the fourth time and sampled some of the buggy fare. My boyfriend tried some, too, which made me happy. We had the cricket and crayfish jambalaya…

…and some fried waxworms, and then some chocolate-covered mealworms. I had the orange-chocolate ones. Mmm.

I have recently discovered a love for Chargrill. (It hasn’t supplanted my love for Cook-Out; these two loves can co-exist peacefully.) I like to order their low-carb option–a 1/2 lb hamburger on a bed of lettuce–with cheese, mayo, and tomatoes. And more lettuce. And I split an order of fries with my boyfriend (which is to say, I take some of his fries).

I like Chargrill because you don’t have to talk to anyone to order.  You just check off what you want on a ticket and put it in a slot. It appeals to me in the same way that self-checkouts at the grocery and the library do.

At some point, I made more buffalo chicken, and my boyfriend made garlic Parmesan fries, and their wonder twin powers activated into a totally awesome dinner that I ate way too much of.

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I can’t remember if I’ve mentioned it here before, but I’ve spent the last couple of years growing out my hair with the intention of one day getting it all cut off and donating it. I finally did it this Friday!

I chose to donate my hair to Pantene Beautiful Lengths because their length requirement is only 8 inches, and because I’ve heard a lot of positive things about their program–the donated hair is actually used for wigs, not sold for profit (as with some other, better known charities), and the wigs are given to women who have lost their hair because of cancer treatments.  Everyone always tells me how beautiful my hair is, so I hope that my donation will help make a kick-ass wig.

I’ve cut my own hair, had friends cut my hair, and gone to some less expensive salons (i.e., Great Clips, JC Penney), but I’ve never gotten my hair cut at a nice salon. I figured that since I was doing a good deed by getting my hair cut, I could splurge a little. I bought a LivingSocial voucher back in May for a nearby salon and I finally used it on Friday. The stylist cut off my ponytail…

…and then gave me an extremely cute haircut that was exactly what I wanted.

And thanks to the LivingSocial voucher, it ended up being about as expensive as getting my hair cut at Great Clips would’ve been. LivingSocial FTW!

Posted on February 13, 2011 - by Ashley Jackson

Sunday, Sunday

Usually I refer to my Sundays as lazy Sundays, either because I ignore all the housework that’s piled up over the week in favor of being lazy, or because I do all the housework that I’d been avoiding all week because I was lazy. But so far I’ve gotten to spend my Sunday in a leisurely fashion, because I cleaned my entire apartment yesterday. So far I’ve played with the dog, gone for a short walk (for the first time in weeks–more on that in  a second), and watched A Sound of Thunder (good short story, awful movie) while riding my exercise bike for a while (also for the first time in weeks). I’m not sure what to do next…maybe catch up on all the food blogs I haven’t had time to read lately?

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It’s time for an update on both my inability to walk without hurting myself and my insomnia. Now with added Chuck Norris!

So a couple of days before the last time I posted (around January 24, I suppose…it’s been a while), my left foot, which hadn’t really hurt in the few weeks since I’d gotten my custom orthotics, started hurting again. But in a different place than before. So I started doing 800 mgs of ibuprofen and icing it and elevating it (using the recycling bin under my desk at work, because I am that classy), and when it still hurt at the end of the week (like, pretty bad) I decided to give it the weekend to stop hurting or else. I basically much did nothing all weekend, and it still hurt whenever I walked on it. Then I got to work on Monday morning and instead of having to walk around my 1100-sq-foot apartment, I had to walk halfway across a large building to do things like use the restroom and get to the fridge, so my foot started hurting more. I called my doctor’s office and was like, “Hey, have you guys gotten my sleep study results? And also, my foot hurts again. ”

Somewhere between that phone call and the 1:30PM appointment they made me I ended up in my office curled up in my ergonomic chair about to cry because my foot hurt so bad. Not bad enough that I actually did cry, but bad enough that I was seriously thinking about  it. This may have also had something to do with the three hours of sleep I’d gotten that night. On the drive to the doctor’s office I talked myself out of crying by reminding myself that I am supposed to be bad ass and that I don’t approve of people crying at work, and also, Chuck Norris would never cry (at work or anywhere else), therefore I shouldn’t either.

It turns out that I’m incapable of walking without injuring myself through unknown means, and now I have plantar fasciitis in my left foot.  So I got a prescription for some scary NSAID gel and exercises to do for three weeks, and I worked from home for the next two days and bought lots of athletic tape and now, two weeks later, my foot still hurts a tiny bit when I walk on it, but is much, much, much better.

And I did not find out the results of my sleep study that day because apparently the issue I’d had  before with getting my sleep study results from WakeSleep was not an isolated incident. Last time it took over a month for me to find out my results because they told the nurse that they’d talked to me about my sleep study being inconclusive and said I’d agreed to come back for a second study when I’d never had that conversation with them. This time, the nurse told me that she’d called WakeSleep after I’d left the message asking after my results and they faxed over my results from November. Then she tried to get them to fax over the correct results so the PA could talk to me about them that afternoon. As I was leaving she told me they hadn’t sent the results yet.

Three days later I called WakeSleep and asked if they’d sent my results and they were like, “Yeah, we did that late Wednesday afternoon.” That makes me think they hadn’t reviewed my results by the time they were supposed to. But I called my doctor’s office on Monday morning to ask about them again and the PA called me that afternoon, so they either sent them when they said they did or they sent them on Monday after someone called and yelled at them. Which is good, because I was going to call and yell at them myself if they hadn’t sent my results. Since I was once again running off three hours of sleep, I’m pretty sure I wouldn’t have been very intimidating. But my current opinion of WakeSleep after two sleep studies is that the actual sleep study experience is okay, but they are otherwise incompetent and you should avoid them. There are plenty of other sleep labs around Raleigh.

In any case, I slept during my second sleep study for a little while until the Ambien wore off and then was up the rest of the night, so now I’m going to go see a neurologist who specializes in sleep disorders on Tuesday afternoon. I am cautiously hopeful that something will come of this.

—

Puppy Interlude:

My Heathcliff is so photogenic. January 31 was the three-year anniversary of the day I brought Cliffy home from the shelter. He’s ugly, but he’s got heart, and he’s a good dog, so I’ll keep him around. <3

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Last week on a trip to Food Lion I stocked up on Progresso chicken noodle soup and Dole fruit cups, because when I’m too tired in the evening/morning to pack a lunch for work I tend to go for peanut M&Ms. I say they’re a fine mix of protein and carbs, but my friends say I need to eat better. Psh. So now the soup and fruit cups live in my desk at work, waiting for days that I need lunch. I also grabbed three boxes of Lean Pockets from Harris Teeter this week and plan to put them in the freezer at work for the same reason.

I also went to Whole Foods and bought 16 containers of Liberte Yogurt. I’d been taking a break from it for a while because it’s kind of expensive, but I don’t feel like it’s a good trade-off to eat a 25-cent container of pudding or a handful of peanut M&Ms for breakfast instead of a $1.25 container of yogurt.

—

This is a lunch from way back on January 27:

China Queen! I estimate I ate about 700 calories’ worth of food–I didn’t eat everything on my plate. I love American Chinese food.

During the next week, I had a small container of ground beef with taco seasoning in my freezer, so when I went to the store and bought a bag of tortillas and some fresh veggies to go with it.

I ended up making two meals out of the taco meat, plus it freed up some freezer space (which I’ve already filled back up).

Also during that week, I decided to get creative with a bag of apples I bought. I combined a cut-up apple with some Brummel and Brown, cinnamon, and Panko bread crumbs, then threw it in the oven for a while.

Fake apple pie! It was pretty good and I think it was below 150 calories? Definitely below 200.

I took advantage of one of the days I was working from home to throw some rice in the food steamer I got for Christmas. During my lunch break, I threw together a quick meal of red beans, rice, onions, and smoked turkey sausage.

The pan of this that I made fed me for like three days. In my attempts to waste less food, I’ve been trying to not cook any new meals until I’ve eaten all of the leftovers from the last meal I made. Unlike some people, I can eat the same thing for dinner a few nights in a row with no problem, so it’s just a matter of not giving into the temptation to make something new.

This next meal I made would have fed me for dinner for several days. Except it was so awful I threw it out.

I tried to make lamb curry. I have no idea what went wrong–if it was the lamb or if my recipe was off–but I only got through half this plate before I gave up, trashed the whole pot, and ate some butterscotch pudding for dinner. Ugh. It tasted like food poisoning.

I had a mean craving for brownies, so during a trip to Target I scoped out their selection. I discovered a new offering by Pillsbury–brownie minis! The package has two packs of mix and two trays; each package of mix makes six mini brownies, so the whole box makes six. If I make brownies, I eat the entire pan, so I immediately threw a box of these in the cart. And last Saturday and yesterday I made a tray of brownies and ate them all the same day.

And you know what? They were good. I love brownies.

Earlier this week I used up some old bananas by making banana pudding.

Homemade banana pudding. Not only can I not walk without hurting myself, but I also can’t cook milk on the stove without burning it.

Friday I left some chili cooking in the slowcooker while I was at work. I’ve been eating chili for lunch and dinner ever since. I finally finished it off this afternoon.

It wasn’t as good as my mom makes, even though it’s the same recipe. But it was still good.

—

The holiday calorie challenge we’ve been doing at work ended yesterday. I made back my $100 and will win part of the pot of money that other people lost. But I also lost 9.4 lbs in 10 weeks, which is pretty awesome. We’ve got a break for a week and then we’re starting another challenge with the same rules (earn back $10 every week that you make your calorie goal) and the added difficulty of exercising a certain number of times a week (cardio and strength) and eating 5 servings of fruits and veggies a day. That’s going to be difficult for me, but I am too big awesome to fail…

—

Also, I have signed back up for the half marathon I had to drop out of last year. My registration was completely free because I deferred before the deadline. It’s a long way off–November 6–but it’s been a long time since I’ve been able to run. I might have to go make friends with the treadmill in my apartment’s fitness room…

Posted on August 15, 2010 - by Ashley Jackson

Lake Ohmihall

Wednesday was an okay evening. No flooding. I made brown rice pasta and sauced it with pesto, and threw some smoked salmon on the side.

I filled out the paperwork to vacate my apartment and made a note to drop it off in the morning. Oh irony, how it taunts me. Not real irony, of course; I mean the Alanis Morissette kind. I mean, my apartment flooding the day that I signed the paperwork to vacate it–that is so like rain on your wedding day.

When my alarm clock went off at 5:30AM, I woke up and stepped into this:

You may ask why I stopped to take pictures when my apartment was flooding and dumping water into the apartment below mine. But this was me in crisis mode: since the guy who lives below me had already called maintenance, I searched for the shut-off valve for the water and, failing to find it, couldn’t really do much else. There used to be books stacked between the two bookcases on the right side of the picture; I moved those to safety, then grabbed my camera and snapped a few pictures of the damage in case I should need them later. Then I took all the books off the bookcases and moved them elsewhere; then I moved the bookcases into my bedroom; then, since the water seemed to be creeping toward my bedroom, I moved my TV stand, since it’s right next to me in the picture.

Later, I moved my other hallway bookcase, my dining room table, my exercise bike, my end table, and my sofa. The floor was wet everywhere thanks to our friend humidity.

Maintenance came and shut the water off, then replaced the water heater, and in the process mucked up my kitchen floor and tore holes in the linoleum.

You can see that at this point I’ve moved out of crisis mode and into “Um, my kitchen is a little messy, I should clean it” mode.

I also practiced making frazzled faces.

Shortly after the property manager came to talk to me, the carpet guys came to do bloody murder on my carpet. They vacuumed up the water, then set up a fan to blow under the carpet…

And a dehumidifier in the water heater closet.

At this point, I was staaarving–I’d managed to sneak in my normal breakfast in between bits of mayhem, but I’d been terribly clever on Wednesday and left my lunch leftovers at work so I wouldn’t have to repack them for Thursday (I’d just thrown the bag of carrots and cheese and the containers of hummus and tomatoes directly into my bag Wednesday morning). This meant my lunch was at work. And I had nothing to eat. So I dinked around for an hour or so trying to decide what I wanted and then ordered side items from Papa Johns. Chickenstrips and cheesesticks, which served me well for lunch and dinner.

After lunch, I intended to do some freelance writing so that the day wasn’t a total waste, but exhaustion hit me like a ton of really heavy objects, so I cleared off space on my couch (which was shoved up against all my piles of books) and slept. Later I took a walk around the lake. Or maybe that was Wednesday. I know I took a walk, though.

Friday morning I went to work and had my breakfast, and then finally had my leftover lunch.

I also had some awesome chocolate covered hazelnuts from Oregon. I love it when visiting scientists bring food!

I left work early to see what was going on at my apartment, since despite the property manager’s claim that she would be in touch, no one called to let me know what was going on. Apparently my leasing office is also good in a crisis, but not so much with the aftermath. I got home to find that nothing had happened in my absence–the fan and dehumidifier where still there–so I left to go to Whole Foods and Target for some grocery shopping.

I came back to discover that people had been in my apartment while I was gone, with no notice before or after (other than this missing equipment). I expected that they’d come pick up their stuff, but it still bugs me that I wasn’t told when this would be happening. It reminds me of that time they let the steam-cleaning people into my apartment on the wrong day and majorly freaked me out.

But my carpet was fixed…

And my water heater closet…was still gross.

I made swiss steak for dinner.

…there’s a steak under there, promise.

Then I took pictures of the shambles that were my apartment. Remember how I had the laundry room, the dining room, and the living room all cleaned and organized?

…okay, it’s not that bad. But you also can’t see the other side of the couch. I got a lot of my furniture put back in the correct spot Friday evening, and subsequently had one of the best nights of sleep I’ve ever had, curled up on my sofa.

Saturday morning I woke up and had some yogurt, then got back to work on moving things back into their antediluvian state. Naturally, I got hungry, so I threw together a big lunch.

Spinach artichoke dip (from the prepped section at Whole Foods), a few bits of broccoli, some salad tomatoes, two carrots, a banana, almond butter, and a piece of cotswold cheese. I made two cheese selections this week and picked this one because it had chives and onions in it and therefore had to be awesome. And it was. But very strong–as I move away from plain cheddar, I’m seeing how one ounce of a good, strong cheese can be plenty.

My eyes were bigger than my stomach here, though–I only ate half the banana and left one of the carrots for dinner.

I did have some of my new chocolate bar (Whole Foods brand of dark chocolate peppermint crisp). Not as good as the Lake Champlain kind, but it’ll do.

My bookcases made it back into the hallway, empty–no point in putting the books back on them when I already took them off and can pack them (when I have enough boxes).

Dinner was a repeat of last night, with less potatoes and onions and the addition of the leftover carrot from lunch.

Note the massive prep bowl of Brummel & Brown in the background. Yes, I ate it all. If there are potatoes on my plate, there is almost always a massive dish of butter or B&B just out of the picture. Don’t judge me, y’all.

Post-dinner snackage…a piece of the dark chocolate peppermint bar, and a piece of the dark chocolate hazelnut toffee bar (one of those ones with the endangered species on it). I wasn’t too impressed by the latter–apparently I like my dark chocolate at 54%-55%, not 70%+.

I totally still ate it, though.

Today I slept in again,  thought not so well as I had the night before, and woke up to more yogurt (I’ve stopped taking pictures of my yogurt most days–same old Liberte Mediteranee yogurt every day!). I then hit the lake trail in an attempt to get some running in, but my fitness has (obviously) decreased since I haven’t been able to run the past couple of months, and because it’s hot outside, so I didn’t get much running in before I had to walk. I’m supposed to start training for my half marathon this week and I’ve already accepted that I’m going to be a little bit behind, but that’s okay. I came home and immediately threw my ice pack on my foot, which has been hurting a little more than it had been recently since I started walking again, but not enough that I’m willing to go back and have it checked out again (yet).

Lunch was some broccoli, salad tomatoes, and carrot sticks with spinach artichoke dip, a dish of trail mix, and a piece of my other cheese selection, mahon.

Mahon is a hard Spanish cheese that taste delicious when eaten with tomatoes. I’m a huge fan of cheese + tomatoes.

I spent the afternoon going all Operation: Clean Sweep on my kitchen and have now checked it off my list–hurrah! That leaves the balcony (entirely gardening stuff), the bathroom (which I’ve worked on twice throughout the week–shouldn’t take long at all), the bedroom (half okay, half not so much), and the closet (um…yeah). I’m happy that I was able to make progress despite having what other, more dramatic people would call the week from hell. (Remember me griping about Wachovia shutting down my bank account on Monday? Oh, the fun week that lay ahead…!).

Well, now that I’ve snacked on a cranberry orange Pure bar and blogged for an hour, my dinner seems to be done. It’s time to eat again…!