October Challenge

Today is the first day of my October challenge. The challenge consists of:

Paleo for 30 days - weekly cheat day, salt and daily coffee allowed

Each day, as part of my warmup or, if I do not get to CR, I do it anyway, the following:

• 20 burpees - working up to 30/day


• 30 pull ups working to do at least one unassisted (at the gym)


• run 400 m working up to 800m without stopping (this is hard for me).

CrossFit at least 3-4 times per week (have some travel this month)- push myself to exceed past performance.

Goal is to lose 20 lbs by Christmas/10 by end of month (starting weight is 160) and the reward is to go to SF Levi store with J in December to get custom fitted jeans.

Fran

In January 2009... time - 7:03 lifting 22 lbs and doing ring rows

In October 2009 ... time - 6:11 lifting 33 lbs and doing Green band assisted pullups

Sweet Progress.

J - they are expecting you to smash your time when you are here in Dec. A reminder, you did it in 7 min. even.

For those readers who are thinking that I am faster than my son at this - his Fran was what CrossFitters call prescribed (Rx) which is thrusters at 95lbs and regular pull ups...21-15-9 for time! VERY hard WOD.

More trip pix...one thing I found interesting about London was the variety of very modern buildings alongside the very old. In the states, we don't have stuff that is very old so the contrast between old and new is not as remarkable or distinct.

Number two

Back to work - bleech

many more emails than I thought possible

same drama, same issues, different day

all the more reason to have great vacations!

And, while on vacation, it is important that you eat what you want and most mornings, we ate at a place called Pret a Manger. We did this last year as well. Brekkie consisted of warm ham and cheese croissants and yogurt (of the creamiest variety) parfaits. For me, a latte, for R - oj and black coffee (not shown). Eaten outside on the sidewalk - all this helped start our days off right.

Yesterday at CrossFit, my warmup was: run 400 m (did it again); 2 rounds of regular CFV warmup; 50 box jumps (I jumped a smaller box). then the WOD was

7 rounds for time
25 SDHP @ 45 lbs m/22 lbs w
10 ring dips

I did band assisted ring dips and I did all of this in 9:20 which was the second fastest on the white board!!!!

running and a pix or two

This morning I rode my bike to the track determined to run... While I have not yet started my October challenge, it seemed like a good thing to do. I ran 4 - 400 m with 4 - 400m walks in between. The significant thing is that I actually ran the entire 400 m of the running ones - no walking, no stopping - just running (or my version of running anyway). I did time them and they were all below 2.5 min...used my phone as I did not bring my stopwatch. So that was good - the ride back was also good as it is all downhill...such a treat after a workout.

Thought I would start slipping in a pix or two from our trip....this first one is right after we got there. We are walking in J's neighborhood which is in the borough of Kensington. Weather was wonderful the whole trip - only one rainy day in London and one the day we were flying out of Italy.















This is at the Tate Modern Museum. Pictures were strictly forbidden but I could not resist. One of the guards followed me out of this room and gave me a verbal beat down for violating his orders. I told him I was sorry, but I wasn't - so, not only did I disobey, I lied as well.


I don't know who I am waving at here - maybe the guard... I wore this hoodie almost the entire time - got it from Target and, this trip, I did not see anyone else wearing it!!! We did much better packing this time than last, although still some room for improvement. Less is definitely more and v neck white t-shirts are essential.

Saturday n finally over jet lag

I figured since we were at home, we ought to be able to settle into a regular waking/sleeping routine fairly easily....WRONG. It took until this am for me to sleep until 5:30am - which may seem early to most but it is my usual wake up time. Can't tell you how happy that made me!! I did go CF last night - warmup was 5 min jumprope, 1 round of regular warmup and then 3-3-3-3-3 of snatch. Workout was 7 rounds of 10 each - wallballs, squats, push ups. I did it in 12 minutes which was not setting the world on fire, but it was ok and it was done!

This am - CF workout, after a significant amount of stretching, was 3 rounds of 12 each - burpees, pull ups, sit ups, box jumps. I did it in 10:54 and was not the last one. The first 12 burpees were ok and actually in pretty good form...after that, crap both in form and in the quality of fun doing them. My burpees focus in October will help.

Delivered a quilt to Jay this trip - one that I had been wanted to make for a while...

The back is fleece...I think he liked it!

Back Home

and really feeling the jet lag. For the last two days, I am awake at 2:30-3am!!! SUCKS! And this am, R was up as well. Good thing there is the weekend to get this right!! Might go to CrossFit this am to wear myself out a bit - who knows, might help, couldn't hurt.

Some pix from CF Central London:

It was so much fun to work out with Jay - he is one of the trainers at CrossFit Central London. He puts together the weekly schedule and trains the 6:30-7am class. He is terrific at it!!! He even got R to go - once, but hey, he went!

Also, he has really been stepping up his fitness routine... See his website: http://jaydwil.com/ . He is doing a 30 day Paleo challenge (for those who don't know, that is a way of eating that involves no carbs, no sugar, no salt - all protein, veg and fruits); a 100 day burpee challenge - which means day 1, do 1 burpee; day 2, do 2; etc. As you can see from his blog, he is up to day 50 and he is doing them in better times each time with his latest at 3:48 min!!!

So, he has inspired me (as he usually does - I do CF because of him). I am down for a challenge for the balance of the year - done in 30 day increments. The first 30 days starting 10/1 is this:

1. Paleo for 30 days - with a weekly cheat meal if necessary
2. Each day, as part of my warmup or, if I do not get to CR, I do it anyway, the following: 20 burpees - working up to 30/day; DU working up to 30 per day - can't do one now); when I am at the gym - 30 pull ups working to do at least one unassisted; run 400 m working up to 800m without stopping (this is hard for me).
3. CrossFit at least 4 times per week - push myself to exceed past performance.

A goal is to lose 20 lbs and the reward is to go to SF Levi store when J and T are here in December to get custom fitted jeans.

Here is what burpees look like (the muscle ups at the end are a bit over the top - not that I am jealous or anything):

Coming home today....

Great trip...when pix are sorted out, will post some.

Worked out with J...will try using this site to log what I do.
http://beyondthewhiteboard.com/

finding my roots

This was spotted on the way to the Globe Theater in SE London.

We were running late so we did not knock on any doors.

Jelly Belly

Upon request from the most amazing Loli, we visited the Jelly Belly Factory yesterday. Sweet fun.

In my lifetime....

We went from this....

and this....

to this....

and from this....

to this....

now, before any or all of you either out loud or in your head give scoff because this is THE least expensive (above the shuffle) and has THE least memory (8GB) IPOD there is...let me tell you that my first Nano, which I loved for a good long time, had 2GB so 8GB is HUGE to me and, so far, seems to hold everything I have piped into it.

I think it is very interesting that the thing that holds it all is so small compared to the thing that just transports the tunes.

Also - to my eldest and lovely (mind you, 2nd daughter, I did NOT say loveliest) daughter - notice I did get big earphones, ones that will not allow one's music to be heard and commented upon by one's seatmate. That experience spooked me away from using my nano anywhere close to another human being. Hence, the purchase of these noise retaining and most excellent noise cancelling jumbo earphones.

i be jammin

first day of school

Nothing like the first day of school - especially first grade and especially for grands!

blues

blues must be a universally human experience

an entire genre of music is dedicated to them

what's the purpose tho

they seem to come out of nowhere

and are difficult to shake

even if you look around and tell yourself

you have tons for which to be thankful

altho I have never been quite sure just who it is I am supposed to thank

and, if you can pull yourself up enough to look at yourself

you would say

buck up

cut the crap

quitchurwhining

life is not allaboutyou

you still get stuck in the swirl of them

the heaviness of them

the life looks like shit of them

with no end in sight...

a small part of me knows that eventually

the fuse that is blown or the breaker that has broken

will get the attention necessary to make things light again

put the workorderindammit

quote

With or without religion,

you would have good people doing good things

and evil people doing evil things.

But for good people to do evil things,

that takes religion.

- Steven Weinberg

A Day with my Brother

My brother is a good sport. I kept asking him to join me at a CrossFit class and he agreed to come yesterday morning. He also agreed to do all that the class asked him to do and he did it well and with grace.

Then we went to breakfast, joined for a quick bite by O.

We took a trip to Berkeley in search of something for a quilt I am working on - bounced around Berkeley Bowl for a bit. Located C to say hi.

Back at the ranch for more good convo with R, some baseball watching and some eats.

Bro - love you so, thanks for a perfect Saturday.

mo pigs

A striped bank I made while I was waiting to hear the results of a job interview.

A cute lady bug one

This is one of my favs!!!

always finish a WOD

no matter how awful you look!!!!

collection - and this isn't all

focus

This past weekend, Ny asked me if she could make a quilt. She has done a bit of hand sewing and she knew just what she wanted to do. She chose the colors - blue and grey - and the design - some half square triangles. I cut them out and put dots where she should sew. We started on this at around 3:30 or 4.

An incredible 4 1/2 hours later... 4 1/2 hours of continuous sewing... here is her quilt.

She wanted to put a red border on it so she continued sewing until she was so tired she had to quit to eat and go to sleep.

Oh, and by the way, did I say she was five years old?

why tweet if you can....

do anything else??? So the only way I can use twitter is if I am on my computer and if I am on my computer, I might as well update my blog or check facebook (which I sorta get) or check my email (which I have gotten for a good long time) or check my account balances or or or.

Anyway - I decided to post a blog entry and it goes like this....

just finished cfittin

did Cindy

9 rounds plus

I was sweatin like Whitney

I did start my warmup

with two 400 m runs

getting better at the running

not great

but better.

oh, a game for any and all..

see if you can guess what this puzzle is a picture of...

got me tweetin

blame it on the kids... i am on twitter only I had to use quiltenfool as some other fool took my real name!!!