Rice Shortage 2009

Yes, it's true.  I'm out of rice.  I can't believe it.  I bought a 10 lb. bag in early September.  I had to scrape together 2 cups last night via all the little bits left in the bottom of my rice containers.  I use my old cytomax and endurox buckets to hold my rice.  I'm going to buy a 25 lb. bag this weekend when I hit Costco.  That should last me until the big May race.

Work starts today for a lot of people who have been slacking for 2 weeks.  That must be tough.  I just took a 4 day weekend and I was just getting used to not doing anything each day.  I've already accomplished a lot so far during the 2 extended weekend vacations.  I've watched all of season 2 of the X-files.  Although I was robbed as season 2 ends with a "to be continued".  I wish I had known so I would've just had the season 3 first disk in the mail.  Everytime I see one of those Fringe commercials on Fox I just think 2009 version of the X-files with more characters. I finished both season 3 and season 4 of the Office.  That show is just so hilarious.  I guess season 5 is this current year's so at least I'm caught up.  As you can see, I had an uneventful vacation.

Since 2009 is upon us, I've started getting my diet and workouts in line.  First, I will be cutting out the chips again until after the May Half Ironman.  This Costco trip I will be skipping the Doritos Super Size.  I also be cutting out the chicken nuggets and fries with ranch as well for dinners.  I just go back to my standard rice/sausage, rice/chicken, pasta, rice/pork chops, cheese filled tortelli, repeat.  That should help me lose some of the extra holiday weight.

Second, I've started to do a weekly hard swim interval workout and I plan to do a hard running workout per week.  I did 100s this morning.  I was planning on only doing 10 but lost track and did 12.  I tried something different since I only had 30 minutes between running to the gym and spin class.  I did 100s on 2 minute intervals.  I've never done this before but most swimmers do intervals on a fixed time although their fixed times are usually 1:30 or less.  I can't even swim an all-out race 100 in 1:30 so I just used my slow time of 2 minutes.  This gave me a nice 15 second or so rest between each one.  Joy!  They went okay but I was still tired from my swim on Saturday.  I crushed 2000 yards on Saturday.  It was great although I chafed the crap out of my shoulders from rubbing the slight unshaved morning whiskers of my chin.  Anyway, swimming is hanging in and I hope I can keep up with Orion this May.

My running is coming right along as well.  I was able to cruise a 7 minute average for a 9.2 mile run on Sunday.  I felt pretty good the entire way.  The legs didn't feel too heavy at the end but today they were tired.  I went pretty slow to the gym.  The spin class was extra tough today so I thought I was going to pass out on the pedals several times.  The hard swim plus the extra hard spin class really made it a tough run home.  I didn't bring any calories this morning so I was close to bonking.  That's okay it will let me shed a couple of extra pounds.  This Wednesday I start alternating weeks of hill repeats and fartleks.  I think I have a good hill to try but it might be too short.  I'll have to give it a go.  If all goes well, the plan is to really hammer the half marathon.