Iron Maiden - Run to the Hills

Since I've been a massive lazypants for the past fortnight or so (due to procrastination, as per usual!), I figured today is my day off so I would pick up my walking again and I aimed to do 4 miles.

So, I got up early (for me, for a day off) at 9.30, had a healthy breakfast and then, of course, sat around on my ass and watched crappy daytime TV and wrote succinct, 140 character rants on Twitter until 3pm. Obviously.

When I finally got my butt up and got dressed (yes, the whole time I was procrastinating, I was going so in my white dressing gown with the cute pink polka dots on), I pulled on my leggings, socks, rummaged around for my trainers, and ummed and ahhed trying to find a top that is thin and breathable for my sweaty ick factor to be as low as possible, but that still had pockets for my keys, phone (complete with workout tracker app, "Cardio Trainer", and headphones to listen to my music) and some change to buy milk when I'd finished.

I plugged in the headphones, selected Cherry Bomb by Ash as my first track, started my cardio tracker app, locked my front door, put my sunglasses on and trotted off into the distance.

Or not.

My plan was to walk along the sea wall, as has become customary for my walking/attempts at jogging.
(I like to think that when I "run", I look like this:


when really, I look more like this:

But that's okay. No really, it is.)

What I hadn't banked on is the wind. OH MY DAYS is it windy. I took a few steps to face the direction of the beach and the sea gale blew and jumped right into my mouth and I swallowed a huge gulp of fresh air. I almost walked into a neighbour's garden wall, the strength of the wind was that strong. I thought it was August, not fricking November!

I decided to persist, after all, the more resistance I was against with the elements, the harder my body would have to work and the better my workout would be.

Then my music stopped and I couldn't get it started again, my stupid phone had decided that it no longer wanted to "support this file type" even though I've played those songs almost a billion times before. Grumble grumble. Walking without music does not a happy Emmy make.

Then I noticed that the top I had chosen had been weighed down by the change, keys and phone in my pockets and due to my poor choice of bra, I was now displaying my jubbliest bits to my entire home town. Joy of joys. So I took my phone out of my pocket and my keys but of course with my quick power-walking, my top was still coming down, meaning I got some banter from some roofers who obviously got a damn good view (no Dad, and no The Boy, I won't tell you which house it was!).

(Ugh! Even as I am typing this, I can hear the wind whistling and howling through the trees!)

So, un-heroically, I gave up and just decided to power walk the half-mile to the shop to buy a bottle of milk and flounced off with a grumpy stomp back home. I'll try again tomorrow.

And there ends my middle-class problem.

Martha & the Vandellas - Nowhere to Run

Day 5 : Calf sprain

So, I have been a good little lazy-arse!

Here’s my exercise record from the past 5 days:

Tuesday - 2 miles in 30 minutes

Wednesday - 3 miles in 50 minutes

Thursday - *coughsplutterIwastoolazyandtotallychickenedout*

Friday - 4 miles in 67 minutes

Saturday - 2.6 miles in 37 minutes

Today I experienced my first calf strain. But! I haz teh mega proudz! 11.6 miles in 5 days. Previously, I reckon I would walk about 11 miles in a month, so I am quite impressed with myself!

My aim is to briskly walk for 2 weeks and then build up to jogging.

WOO!

I started my go-for-a-run playlist today for my phone (I’ve also added the Cardio Trainer app for Android which is awesommme!) because I was listening to music on my phone whilst I was out today and stumbled over some songs which are really *not* conducive to exercise such as:

Debussy - Clair de Lune
Beach Boys - Don’t Worry Baby
Evanescence - Bring Me to Life

A song that went surprisingly well with my POWERWALK! was Die in the Summertime by Manic Street Preachers. I felt totally badass marching along to that, for some reason, picking up my pace and trying to ignore the fact that my legs were about to fall off meaning I would have to surgically attach myself to a spacehopper to enable me to move about.

The only annoying thing about it is that my ponytail swishes from side to side like an annoying metronome. And I don’t own a sports bra. FML.

Survivor - Eye of the Tiger

I went running today. This is quite a mean feat for me, as I am possibly The Most Unhealthy Girl in the World. I don't say this lightly.

Let me set the scene for you. I am one of those heinous bitches who can pretty much eat whatever I damn well like and not get overweight. The only time I've teetered on the edge of the normal-overweight line on the BMI scale is December last year when I'd spent three months sat at my desk at work eating fish & chips, cake and biscuits before returning home to Mum & Dad's for Christmas and gorged on cheeseboards, turkey, mashed potatoes, gravy and yet more biscuits and chocolate. In the past 6 months I have lost a stone (14 pounds) just by putting less food on my plate. If I wasn't me, I'd slap me.

I never exercise. I don't enjoy it, I don't get into a routine of Just Doing It Anyway. I don't put effort into maintaining my physical health. I like the idea of exercising and want to be able to enjoy it, but it's easier to just say that I'll start tomorrow and for now I'll just sit here and watch another episode of How I Met Your Mother on BT Vision.

Pretty appalling since I studied muscle and cardiovascular physiology along with exercise, nutrition and health at the third largest university in the country.

At weekend, I spent time with The Mister's friends from work, who I met for the first time. And they all do workouts of some kind, be it running, mountain biking, swimming, etc. It's kind of hard to live in a rural area of the most beautiful part of the country and not be the outdoors-y type.

So, somehow, I got it into my head that one day, soon, I will be an outdoors-y type, too and I'll be fit and healthy and drink ice cold water and not get tired walking up the stairs(!) and actually look cool wearing trainers.

I asked The Mister to text me today and ask how my run went. You know, so I could feel incredibly guilty when I inevitably stayed indoors and played Scrabble on Facebook with my day off instead.

Well, imagine my surprise today when I actually went for a run. No, I know, I was amazed, too. It's mostly down to my friend Kate that I went, since she texted me saying she was all full of buzz and excitement after getting back from her long walk in the rain (she is an actual rockstar) and encouraged/persuaded me to JFDI - Just Fucking Do It. Because "the thought of it is far worse than the actual doing", she said. (I would later find out that this isn't the case, but more on that later.)

And, I scraped my already slightly greasy hair back into a ponytail, got changed into my black leggings and my floppy white DKNY t-shirt that I've had since I was sixteen, my argyle pumps (because, as I've said, I am not outdoors-y and this was the most athletic clothing I own). I so wish I could have worn a superhero jumpsuit and cape, just to spur me on a bit more, but alas.

Hilariously, I drove to the place I wanted to run from, which Google Maps tells me is only 0.3 miles.

I parked my car and walked up the hill to the sea wall where is and started to run. Since I was a pretty decent sprinter at high school, I started off running at what I thought was a reasonable pace but it turns out, was not. After about 500 metres, I started to feel the burn in the back of my throat. And after not very long, I began to feel actual fire in the space where my trachea splits into my bronchi. 

It was then I realised just how unfit I am. I was disgusted with myself and had to start walking. And that is just plain piss-poor. At one point I may even have sat down on a step. Deary me, eh?

I managed to pick myself up again and started plodding along. THUD THUD THUD went my feet on the concrete.

People say you feel better when, or immediately after, you exercise. Well. *During* my run I could feel my sinuses pulsating in my skull and thought my cheekbones would burst out of my face, I could feel myself drowning in my own sweat and well, we've already discussed the flammable lung issues. Immediately after my exercise, I felt sick.

Google Maps said I "ran" 2.0 miles in 30 minutes. That is pretty rubbish.

But you know, I think it's pretty good in some ways. Now, I have a really low benchmark to beat tomorrow, haha! And at least I DID IT instead of sitting inside drinking tea and eating biscuits. (Yes, when I got home from my run, I *did* sit down and eat biscuits, but that's allowed, right?) And I will get faster and be able to run further. Maybe not straight away, but one day. My friend Laura has asked me if I want to do Race for Life with her next year, so I've now got an entire year to learn how to do 5k.

This blog entry was brought to you by me procrastinating. I am supposed to be writing my last psychology entry for this module by 11th July but apparently I'd rather write something embarrassing about myself than write 400 more words on how society influences your personality. This entry was 965 words by the way, over 500 more than I actually need to write for the Open University. Wow, my procrastination knows no bounds.