Feelin' hot, hot, hot!

And not in a sexy way.

Today was a strength/toning day for me. My partner was out for the day working on our old house (fixing it up for sale), so no chance of getting to the gym. It's another hot day. So I did Michelle Bridges' prescribed outdoor workout, while the kids found joy in this, recently reclaimed from the old house's garage:



Sorry for the poor-quality photo, snapped it quickly with my phone.

Today was my first time doing burpees, oh my GOD they are horrible. Must've looked hilarious to passers-by too (we live on quite a busy street).

Verge find

My favourite season is coming up. I can hardly wait! Autumn, you ask? Of course not ... bulk rubbish collection in my neighbourhood! ;)

It's not for a few weeks, but some keen souls like to get in early. On my run yesterday morning I spied this:



I had to bring it home! It's missing one foot strap, but the pedals are both there. I have yet to get batteries for it and work out if the computer is working. If not, I'll probably still keep it in the backyard and use it without resistance for warm-ups or light cardio (no laps of the backyard here, what you can see in the photo is about all there is!) Well, it has to live in the backyard or on the front veranda anyway, no room inside. These retail at about $400, so if the computer does work, that's a real score.

I reckon I burned a few calories dragging the thing the four blocks home, too.

Red flags

I think I should just put a huge red flag over this entire WEEK.

1. It's stinking hot and will be all week.
2. My brother's birthday is on Tuesday.
3. I have to do a secret shop on Tuesday.
4. My son's birthday is on Wednesday. (He'll be five! When did he get so big?) I have to bake cupcakes for him to take to school, and he's requested fast food for his special dinner.
5. My work deadline is Thursday. I work from home compiling a family events calendar. Generally the night or two before deadline is spent frantically editing with one hand and stuffing food in my mouth with the other hand.
6. There's a school cake stall on Friday for which I also have to bake.
7. We're having my son's birthday party on Saturday, for which I have to bake and prepare food for 30 children.
8. Then it's a long weekend.

Also this week I need to liaise with a plumber, an arborist, make a doctor's appointment, try to make some decisions for the upcoming pre-start on my house renovation project ...

I am STRESSED. I hate weeks like this. I can do it; I have to. But it's going to hurt, and my usual fallback in these situations is FOOD. Wish me luck!

What's the plan? I HAVE to get my exercise in first thing, even if that means getting up at 5am when I went to bed at 2am. There's just not going to be time most days to do it later, and it's going to be too hot. The food, well, I can't promise I won't eat any cake, but I'll try my hardest.

But it's too hot!

I could so be rocking this excuse right now.

This is the 5-day weather forecast:

Forecast for Saturday
A mostly sunny and humid day. Light E'ly winds becoming light to moderate
W/SW'ly in the afternoon.

Precis: Very hot. Humid.
City: Max 38

Sunday Very hot. Partly cloudy. Min 25 Max 38
Monday Partly cloudy. Min 26 Max 35
Tuesday Sunny. Min 24 Max 37
Wednesday Very hot. Sunny. Min 24 Max 38
Thursday Sunny. Min 24 Max 37
Friday Partly cloudy. Min 25 Max 37

It's already been that way for the best part of a week.

And you know what? It IS a pain. I can't do outdoor workouts during the day, or even in the early evening. Luckily, I get my walking in because I have to. I run early in the morning, when it's still yucky - humidity this morning was 91% and it was already nearly 30 degrees - but not so bad that I'll die of heatstroke.

I can do indoor stuff after the kids go to bed or, again, early in the morning.

Besides, surely, SURELY, I am burning more calories than on cooler days, the amount of sweat that's coming off me!

Weigh-in Wednesday

Another 1.8kg gone! I'm so unbelievably stoked.

Rewriting my goals too, I think a half-marathon is completely attainable this year. I'm aiming for the City to Surf one at the end of August.

Day 1, 12WBT!

A good and a bad day.

Bad because I have my period (yes, I do say the word 'period' on the Internet, half the world's population experiences them so I don't think I really need to say 'my monthly friend' or something. I have also been known to say the word 'vagina', so watch out!), a cold, and started having horrible back pain after taking the kids to swimming lessons this evening.

Good because I stuck to my eating plan, and did some of my workout plan. Luckily today was core/stretch day for me, as I switched the days around, so doing stretches actually helped my back. Now I'm having a cup of green tea with peppermint, instead of eating, before I make the kids' lunches for tomorrow and go to bed. I have my fingers crossed my back will feel okay in the morning so that I can run!

My Michelle Bridges DVDs finally arrived in the post, so if I'm feeling good I might do one of those during the day as well as the run in the morning.

Two days until weigh-in, and I'm not expecting to lose much due to bloating and a couple of bad food choices over the weekend. But I am going to stick to the program, and I am going to lose more. I've hit 5kg lost already, so my next goal is 10kg, at which point I buy some new clothes!

I just f***ing did it

I ran 10 kilometres! I haven't done that since I was 16.

I didn't want to get up this morning. I have a training day for Phoenix today, so I'll have to be sitting around all day, and eating a buffet lunch - all the more reason to burn some calories. So I thought, I'll just go for half an hour. Then when I got out there, I couldn't get my legs to go very fast, so I thought, if I can't go fast, I'd better go FAR. I ran down to the river (which is a couple of kilometres), ran along the lovely flat dual-use path there, just kept running until I was 4.5 kilometres away from home, then turned around. I found the zone, where I can basically run forever at a steady pace, it's all in the head. I even managed to speed up a bit at the end! It took me about 70 minutes, which isn't too bad.

My previous best was about 6.5 kilometres, so this is a huge jump and I'm really proud. Plus almost 800 calories gone by 7.30am.