I can be pretty long-winded when I want to be
I suppose it's been a while, which has a lot to do with how long this post will be. I also really REALLY don't want to do any work right now, so there's that.
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My triathlon is coming up in three weeks. I'm excited and nervous, but I'm also just a teensy bit over it. In the beginning I felt like I was progressing and getting stronger and leaner and faster, and I was for the most part. Depending on the day, I've lost anywhere from 7 to 12 lbs. I bought some shorts this weekend and it's the first time that I've been able to fit into a 36" waistline in I don't know HOW long. So I feel very good about that. I like being able to see a significant difference in my appearance.
But I think I've hit a plateau. My runs aren't getting any easier, I can't go longer distances when swimming, and biking just confuses my muscles. There are a number of things which I THINK are contributing to this...
1. My Diet
I eat pretty well, having traded in pizza and second helpings for turkey sandwiches and half portions of salads. I've gotten rid of most of the empty calories that come from a lot of carbs, and replaced it with protein-rich meals. (Speaking of which, Greek Yogurt is AWESOME, and the non-fat kind has ~24 grams of protein per 8 oz serving, without much of the sour flavor you get in unflavored nonfat yogurt) But I haven't found the right balance. Some days I feel like I actually eat too little, which is the wrong thing to do when one is working out as much as I am. Other days I overdo it, like eating a good 4-5 servings of tortilla chips with my meal. I don't have quite as much control over my eating habits as I feel like I should, and I think that's hurting me.
2. My Sleep Habits
Since pretty much forever, I've followed an 11-6:30 sleep cycle. 7.5 hours of sleep SHOULD be plenty, but you know how it is. You'll start getting READY for bed at 11, maybe get in bed at quarter after, and not fall asleep until quarter to 12. And once we got the cats, I've had difficulty getting a full night's sleep, what with the constant motion and the noises and me worrying that they're gonna hurt themselves in the middle of the night. I've had a few good night's sleep recently, but they've been when we kicked the cats out of the bedroom at night. Then there's also the issue of the weather. Sometimes it's too hot to sleep with the covers on, other times it's too cold not to. Right now it's too cold to sleep without covers, but I get WAY too hot under the goose-down comforter, so I spend most of the night trying to find a way to keep cool without freezing off a limb.
3. My Drinking
Michelle and I have very similar relationships with alcohol. We'll usually have a beer or a glass of wine with dinner, or a glass of liquor for an after-dinner treat. Since I started working out I'd toned down on alcohol, still indulging in beer every now and then. Last week I decided, after a rather painful run following a 3-4 pint night, to not drink at all until my triathlon. That's going to be quite the feat, considering that I've got a birthday party, a company party, a family bbq, and dinner out with Michelle's godparents between now and then. The other beverage which is my weakness is soda. Diet Coke in particular. I usually drink one with lunch, although it's never really just one. It's usually one with lunch and a refill for the road. And then two or three refills when I eat out. It's not the best beverage for me, but I can't just do water all the time. I do drink anywhere from 3 pints to a gallon of water a day, so I'm not too worried about that.
I just want to get over this hump. I should be feeling great, what with being in better shape than I used to, but more often than not I'm sore and tired.
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That may be in part due to work. I fell a bit behind in my tasks, and it's been a rough past couple of weeks. I was tasked by my boss to put together a schedule for the next 6-12 months in which we work to improve efficiency in engineering and development. I got about 12 pages in before I realized that I hadn't actually concretely SAID anything yet. It wound up being 18 pages long, but I think I outlined a pretty good set of things which NEED to be done. The frustration comes from the simple fact that none of this HAS been done yet. We've been working as a fly-by-night operation for so long, and it's starting to show in our performance. We don't have anything to make our work easier, and every time we hire someone, rather than task them to work on tools or something else like that, we put them to work on porting. One of our designers pretty accurately described it as a group of people pushing a broken down car hiring a mechanic, and then having him help to push the car rather than fix it.
I'd actually like to move into that kind of work at least part time. Not necessarily writing tools, but coming up with processes to put into place to make our work easier. Streamlining everything. I remember one Sunday when I was waiting tables, we were short two cooks, so the manager had to go help out in the kitchen, whereas normally he would have been expediting food by gathering all the dishes for a table and putting them all on a tray, readying toast and sides, and sending out food with hosts or available servers. Without him, our already super-busy day would have SUCKED. I volunteered to expedite and take the hit in tips just to make everybody else's day go more smoothly. And it turned out to be one of the most relaxing days of work that I'd ever had. That's kind of how I see this opportunity. Rather than go through the stress of having to deal with carrier target dates and marketing butting in on design decisions and stupid-ass carrier requirements, I get to sit back and make sure everything is running smoothly.
I can get on board with that.
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I managed to take my paladin through his first full run of Karazhan. Granted I was only the off-tank, but still it was quite a change of pace. Normally I'd have to swap him out with my shadow priestess, who is moderately better geared and plays a less pivotal role in the raid group than meat shield. I got an embarrassing number of drops, including my Tier 4 gloves, a rare shield, and some honest to god tanking bracers. Right now I'm barely out of 10k health unbuffed, and I'm not quite uncrushable (both totally necessary when you're tanking some of the harder-hitting bosses), but once I get everything enchanted and gemmed up, and replace a few less-than-useful gear pieces, I should be gravy. I'm torn at this point, though. Part of me wants to run heroic dungeons so that I can get enough badges of justice to buy these awesome boots, or continue to run battlegrounds to get enough honor so that I can pick up this caster mace. The boots would give me a lot of stamina and avoidance (helping to push me up into the uncrushable range), but the mace gives me a buttload of spell damage, which is helpful when dealing with overzealous DPS classes trying to max out their damage.
And then of course there's my altoholism kicking in, and I kind of want to roll a MS-specced warrior just 'cause it'd be something totally different. Michelle rolled a mage, and we could totally steamroll anything in our path if we levelled together. But I gotta stay focused!
-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-
My triathlon is coming up in three weeks. I'm excited and nervous, but I'm also just a teensy bit over it. In the beginning I felt like I was progressing and getting stronger and leaner and faster, and I was for the most part. Depending on the day, I've lost anywhere from 7 to 12 lbs. I bought some shorts this weekend and it's the first time that I've been able to fit into a 36" waistline in I don't know HOW long. So I feel very good about that. I like being able to see a significant difference in my appearance.
But I think I've hit a plateau. My runs aren't getting any easier, I can't go longer distances when swimming, and biking just confuses my muscles. There are a number of things which I THINK are contributing to this...
1. My Diet
I eat pretty well, having traded in pizza and second helpings for turkey sandwiches and half portions of salads. I've gotten rid of most of the empty calories that come from a lot of carbs, and replaced it with protein-rich meals. (Speaking of which, Greek Yogurt is AWESOME, and the non-fat kind has ~24 grams of protein per 8 oz serving, without much of the sour flavor you get in unflavored nonfat yogurt) But I haven't found the right balance. Some days I feel like I actually eat too little, which is the wrong thing to do when one is working out as much as I am. Other days I overdo it, like eating a good 4-5 servings of tortilla chips with my meal. I don't have quite as much control over my eating habits as I feel like I should, and I think that's hurting me.
2. My Sleep Habits
Since pretty much forever, I've followed an 11-6:30 sleep cycle. 7.5 hours of sleep SHOULD be plenty, but you know how it is. You'll start getting READY for bed at 11, maybe get in bed at quarter after, and not fall asleep until quarter to 12. And once we got the cats, I've had difficulty getting a full night's sleep, what with the constant motion and the noises and me worrying that they're gonna hurt themselves in the middle of the night. I've had a few good night's sleep recently, but they've been when we kicked the cats out of the bedroom at night. Then there's also the issue of the weather. Sometimes it's too hot to sleep with the covers on, other times it's too cold not to. Right now it's too cold to sleep without covers, but I get WAY too hot under the goose-down comforter, so I spend most of the night trying to find a way to keep cool without freezing off a limb.
3. My Drinking
Michelle and I have very similar relationships with alcohol. We'll usually have a beer or a glass of wine with dinner, or a glass of liquor for an after-dinner treat. Since I started working out I'd toned down on alcohol, still indulging in beer every now and then. Last week I decided, after a rather painful run following a 3-4 pint night, to not drink at all until my triathlon. That's going to be quite the feat, considering that I've got a birthday party, a company party, a family bbq, and dinner out with Michelle's godparents between now and then. The other beverage which is my weakness is soda. Diet Coke in particular. I usually drink one with lunch, although it's never really just one. It's usually one with lunch and a refill for the road. And then two or three refills when I eat out. It's not the best beverage for me, but I can't just do water all the time. I do drink anywhere from 3 pints to a gallon of water a day, so I'm not too worried about that.
I just want to get over this hump. I should be feeling great, what with being in better shape than I used to, but more often than not I'm sore and tired.
-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-
That may be in part due to work. I fell a bit behind in my tasks, and it's been a rough past couple of weeks. I was tasked by my boss to put together a schedule for the next 6-12 months in which we work to improve efficiency in engineering and development. I got about 12 pages in before I realized that I hadn't actually concretely SAID anything yet. It wound up being 18 pages long, but I think I outlined a pretty good set of things which NEED to be done. The frustration comes from the simple fact that none of this HAS been done yet. We've been working as a fly-by-night operation for so long, and it's starting to show in our performance. We don't have anything to make our work easier, and every time we hire someone, rather than task them to work on tools or something else like that, we put them to work on porting. One of our designers pretty accurately described it as a group of people pushing a broken down car hiring a mechanic, and then having him help to push the car rather than fix it.
I'd actually like to move into that kind of work at least part time. Not necessarily writing tools, but coming up with processes to put into place to make our work easier. Streamlining everything. I remember one Sunday when I was waiting tables, we were short two cooks, so the manager had to go help out in the kitchen, whereas normally he would have been expediting food by gathering all the dishes for a table and putting them all on a tray, readying toast and sides, and sending out food with hosts or available servers. Without him, our already super-busy day would have SUCKED. I volunteered to expedite and take the hit in tips just to make everybody else's day go more smoothly. And it turned out to be one of the most relaxing days of work that I'd ever had. That's kind of how I see this opportunity. Rather than go through the stress of having to deal with carrier target dates and marketing butting in on design decisions and stupid-ass carrier requirements, I get to sit back and make sure everything is running smoothly.
I can get on board with that.
-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-
I managed to take my paladin through his first full run of Karazhan. Granted I was only the off-tank, but still it was quite a change of pace. Normally I'd have to swap him out with my shadow priestess, who is moderately better geared and plays a less pivotal role in the raid group than meat shield. I got an embarrassing number of drops, including my Tier 4 gloves, a rare shield, and some honest to god tanking bracers. Right now I'm barely out of 10k health unbuffed, and I'm not quite uncrushable (both totally necessary when you're tanking some of the harder-hitting bosses), but once I get everything enchanted and gemmed up, and replace a few less-than-useful gear pieces, I should be gravy. I'm torn at this point, though. Part of me wants to run heroic dungeons so that I can get enough badges of justice to buy these awesome boots, or continue to run battlegrounds to get enough honor so that I can pick up this caster mace. The boots would give me a lot of stamina and avoidance (helping to push me up into the uncrushable range), but the mace gives me a buttload of spell damage, which is helpful when dealing with overzealous DPS classes trying to max out their damage.
And then of course there's my altoholism kicking in, and I kind of want to roll a MS-specced warrior just 'cause it'd be something totally different. Michelle rolled a mage, and we could totally steamroll anything in our path if we levelled together. But I gotta stay focused!