One More Recovery Week…

Sunday evening at home…

Week of November 4, 2013:

Monday: Off?

Tuesday: Bike commute to campus, I believe.

Wednesday: Off (just wanted to cook dinner for date night, but I did sneak in a few push-ups and crunches.  What, don’t you do your strength training right before date night?)

Thursday: Off (but I did walk to wine night!  Does that count?)

Friday: Bike commute to and from work!  Because it finally stopped raining.

Saturday: Bike ride to Target, Freebirds, and HEB

Sunday: Morning hike (~3 miles?) in Lick Creek Park with Paul and Lulu the dog + easy evening run.  45 minutes on my feet (14 min. running and 31 minutes power-walking)

Estimated mileage: 3.5 miles. Total minutes: 45.  (I’m only counting Sunday night’s more intense work-out here.)

Do you ever kick yourself later for not taking photos of something wonderful?  That is how I’m feeling tonight.  Paul and I had the best Sunday morning today.  He’s house-sitting this week, and this morning, we had access to the house waffle iron.  We made Ashley’s Peanut Butter + Banana Waffles and topped them with this warm apple sauté (doubled up for the two of us).  Best breakfast ever!  I wish we’d tripled the apple sauté because they were so delicious and I love them, but that is my only regret.  Full disclosure: we didn’t make the waffle recipe exactly as written.  I subbed an egg for the ground flax seed, and the batter was a bit too thin, so we added some more whole wheat flour to thicken it.  The waffles were a bit “floppy,” to use Paul’s description, and perhaps a bit more fragile than other waffles, but the flavor was great.  We will definitely be making them again…if Santa brings one of us a waffle iron for Christmas.  Or maybe a birthday elf will drop one off for me this month!

After our waffles, Paul and I took Lulu the dog out for a walk in Lick Creek Park.  It was cool this morning, and it felt really nice, even in my short sleeves.  Lulu enjoyed some leashless time in the park, though she was too shy to meet most of the other dogs and humans in the park that day.  Still, she seemed to have a great time exploring and sniffing.  Such a sweet dog she is!

You can see from my log above that I took it easy again this week.  It rained almost every day last week, and I took advantage of that time to cook and work on other projects, including going out to see my friends at wine night.  I have missed wine night!  It’s a Thursday tradition for us, and I’ve been more or less on hiatus this year, between all the traveling and training for the marathon.  It was so fun to see my female friends and catch up on their lives.  On top of that, I learned that Paul and I will be in Austin during my birthday weekend, so we’re going to take full advantage of that, with a Kerbey Lane breakfast and a hike in some lovely Austin location.  I’m excited.  It’s all I really want for my birthday: a tasty breakfast and a hike.  I thought we were going to be at home in College Station that day, but my friends are getting married in Austin on November 23rd, so in Austin we shall be on the 24th.

This week, I want to get back into a running groove.  I had some great bike rides last week, and now I feel ready to recombine my running and biking.  Last week Raquelita had asked everybody what their health-related goals for the month are, and I think mine is to log 40 miles of running/power-walking.  It’s a good goal to get me back in the running game after a nearly three-week hiatus!

Have a wonderful week, speedy friends!  Enjoy November!