Double Up

Thursday’s Bike Ride and Short Run (1/13/11)

Relief, thy name is Friday.  It has been a very hard week around the Feels Like Flying headquarters, but with a fun weekend just a few hours away, I feel like I can make it through this final stretch of the week.  It’s been very cold (by Texas standards), and things have not gone well at work for me.  I need a weekend to recuperate from this work week!

On Thursday morning, I had a stroke of good luck when I missed the bus.  Good luck?  Oh yes!  I was too impatient to wait for the next bus, so I decided to ride my bike, even though I had a lot of stuff to take with me.  In the moment that I decided to ride the bike, I immediately thought that getting some morning exercise might make me feel better—all that huffing and puffing would help me to blow off some steam and relax before starting my work day.  I was totally right—the bike rides to and from work made me feel much, much better.  However, I did not feel good enough to not flip some rude driver the bird when he ran a red light and cut me off during my evening run.  In this town, the drivers are about 50/50 when it comes to pedestrians: about half are quite nice and appear to be paying attention to pedestrians, while the other half look like they’d rather run me over than slow down.  Most of the time I keep my fingers to myself, but sometimes I get a little pissy and feel the need to vent my frustration.

My run was short and sweet: a quick 20-minute out-and-back, just to keep those feel-good chemicals pumping a little longer.  Afterward, I had a terrific evening at home on the couch, reading my new cookbook, In the Kitchen with a Good Appetite by Melissa Clark, which is really wonderful and I highly recommend.  I haven’t even cooked anything out of it yet, but the stories behind the recipes are enough for me to give it two thumbs up.  (As opposed to two other fingers up…)

And for this lovely Friday, how about a few recommendations from around the interwebs?  I love a good link list; here’s a few that caught my attention this week.

* I’d love to do something like Jenna’s 40 days of yoga.  Yoga, meditation, journaling…it sounds like a really nice way to unplug from the outside world and tap into your inner world.

* I’ve been listening to Iron & Wine’s “Flightless Bird, American Mouth” on Grooveshark, and it is a beautiful song.  I’d like to slow-dance with someone to it…and while I was listening, I thought, I swear I’ve heard this song before!  Maybe at the end of Twilight?  And sure enough, it’s on the Twilight soundtrack!  I think Bella and Edward may have already slow-danced to this one.  Does that make me cliché?

* I’m cutting into my food blog territory here, but Jess’s Walnut Cake sounds like a great way to fire up the oven this weekend.  Everyone knows that walnuts are good for you and cake is a good way to recover from long runs.  (hee hee!)

* Finally, congratulations to S. of Simply Bike, who is pregnant!  Hurray for the little bun in the oven and the parents-to-be!  And hurray for staying fit during pregnancy!  I’m sure it’s not easy, but I applaud S.’s enthusiasm to stay active and healthy for two.

Happy weekend, everyone!  Stay warm out there, but don’t stay inside all weekend.  Lace up your sneakers and get some exercise.