2012. Good-bye facebook, hello friends

Howdy howdy howdy (in the voice of Deanndra Reynolds)!!
Wow. It's been a while since I've written anything on here. The last post I had was from over the summer, I believe. A lot has happened since then! I became a Mrs., I officially started my 8th year of teaching 2nd grade, I have become more settled with the idea of being an actual home-owner, and more importantly, I've discovered quite a bit about myself... that sounds generic and cheesy, huh?

I did something that I was wanting to do for a long time- get off of facebook! I find it somewhat humerous how people have reacted to that. I get the "WHAT!? What are you thinking?" and the "I've really wanted to do that, but didn't think I could ever live without facebook" or the "I'm never on. I should get off of it, too." No matter what the opinion is, people always have the same,three lettered question that follow their initial response - "WHY?"

So here it is,for anyone who happens to care:
1. Work. Some teachers that I work with accept their student's parent's friend requests. That's totally cool, but not for me. I'm not doing anything that I'm ashamed of, but I'd rather keep my personal life seperate from what goes on in my classroom.
2. I don't need to know when you took a dump.
3. Connections. I realized that I stopped having one-on-one conversations with my closest friends. I would read status updates and see pictures that were posted and think to myself, "oh good, we're staying in touch" when in actuality, we hadn't talked in months. Since getting off the 'book', I have been able to catch up with people on a personal level. Not the generic, "have a great day! hope everything is going well!" It's been really nice and absolutely refreshing.


On a positive note, I'm signed up to run the Austin 10/20 in April. I REAALLLLY need to get my ass in training for that. More on that later,too.

Happy rainy Saturday. big hug,big smile from me. xo

Candy should be free!

It's been a couple of weeks since I've been able to write anything. We've been traveling all over the place like crazy monkeys! We started off hopping on a plane that took us to New Port Beach, California. We went to go watch Colin's cousin, Colleen, graduate from UC Irvine! What an accomplishment! She looked beautiful and the whole family was so proud. We were there for about 5 days so it was actually somewhat of a lengthy vacay!

We filled our time with eating yummy foods, checking out different cities in the area, drinking cold beers, experiencing new types of seafood, playing at the beach while drinking more beers, running into the ocean like a kid, making an appearance at a college keg party, and eating more....while

Colin J. in Cali

On the beach..Our wedding date in the sand

drinking! ;) hahahahaha, overall, there was a lot of consuming going on in the form of food, alcohol, and CANDY! We went to this kick-ass candy shop and I spent $15 on candy. I went on this trip with about $100 to my name, so the fact that I spent that fraction of my dough on sweets tells ya something- I'm totally ridiculous!

When we got back from Cali, we had just enough time to do laundry, unpack, repack, and take off again. Colin worked 2 or 3 days and took off early on Thursday so that we could head to South Padre Island! My cousin, Fred, was getting married! Now, I must fill in a tad bit of history here: I used to spend a LOT of time in the valley when I was a kiddo. My grandfather pretty much brought cinema over from Mexico and opened up the first drive-in movie theater down there. I used to work at the theater when I was younger, selling candy, popcorn, burgers, and all of that yummy movie food people like to eat...sometimes a piece of candy would happen to end up in my pocket at the end of the night, too! ;) ANYWAYS, I used to spend the summers down there, playing with my cousins, working at the drive-in, cooking with my grandma, eating valley lemons, and just soaking up everything about the valley that I could. It's a different world down there. This was my first time back since...jr. high? It had been WELL over a decade and I was SO excited to go. I was even MORE excited

Me and my cousins, Andrew & Chris

about taking Colin J. along for the ride. I warned him about the crowd. My family down there is LOUD, BIG, and .. como se dice?....  REALLY LOUD!! Everyone has the 'valley accent' and loves to know what everyone else if doing. It's a complete riot and I love it.

The ceremony was lovely and the reception was a freaking BLAST! It was very laid- back (valley style) and everything seemed to flow very naturally. We danced our asses off - typical- and were drenched by the end of the night. It was fantastic to see all of my cousins, aunts, uncles, grandparents, and close family friends that I hadn't seen in such a very long time. It really made me reassess my thoughts- We MUST get down there more often. No more of this 10+years of not seeing them. They are a part of why I am the Angie I am today and I don't ever want to forget about those roots that I have there. Ay ay yai yai!

We finally made it back to Austin on Sunday. We were sunburned, tired, stuffed on booze from the weekend, dehydrated, and so thankful to have walked through our front door. The feeling of being home after a trip, is like no other. It just feels good.

Since then, we jumped right back on the wedding-planning train. We have the flowers, DJ, dress, suits, food, and of course, the venue, locked down. The invitations went out on Monday so it's OFFICIALLY OFFICIAL! WOO! This week we are meeting with Joe, since he is marrying us, and mapping out what we want the ceremony to look/feel like. I have my dress alterations appointment tomorrow, tasting at the venue on Saturday, and tie shopping for Colin this weekend. We just now booked ZAX for the rehearsal dinner so I'm pretty stoked about that. I've started working on gifts for my girls...there is no way that I could show them how wonderful they each are and how grateful I am that they are here, helping me every step of the way.

To shed a bit of the wedding stress, and the pounds I put on during our fabulous vacations, I went to visit an old friend of mine yesterday- Towne Lake!I refer to it as an old friend because it seems like I haven't been there in years! So I had a light and healthy breakfast yesterday, threw on my running gear, and was ready to head out the door. Of course, about 4 things had to come up as I'm leaving, so I took care of a couple emails regarding the wedding, grabbed my keys, and finally left. On the way to the trail, I got rear ended! I was already way behind on schedule and now to get hit IN THE BEHIND!? -ahhhh! Thank my favorite candies, that no one was hurt and both vehicles were totally fine. PHEW!
Finally! Made it to the parking lot... I quickly noticed something very bizarre- it was empty. I just assumed it was my lucky day and parked in the first stop I could. I did a quick stretch, noticed that the clock said about 12:55ish, and started my run. I'm bumpin' along to the beat of Micheal Jackson and all of the sudden I was sweating. a lot. I hadn't even made it to the half way point when these thoughts started unfolding in my mind... "Damn, it's hot. I wonder why no one is out here...I could really use some water already...shit, it's freaking hot. ... I'm not even close to the bridge yet and I need a walk break...where's the shade?...FUCK! It's fucking HOT!... ****light bulb goes off*** NO ONE IS OUT HERE BECAUSE IT'S 1 IN THE AFTERNOON AND TOO FUCKING HOT TO RUN!!!!" This may sound dramatic, but go with it- I thought I was going to pass out. When I got to the water coolers at the half way point, I didn't hesitate to stop like I normally do. I threw water all over my face, arms, neck, everywhere. I got some looks of pitty by people going by in the their cool hair-blown-by-the-A/C inside their cars. What was I going to do? I couldn't stop. I couldn't NOT finish and not get back to my car. I just ran.

I have never taken so many walk breaks during a run as I did yesterday. I never walk. I don't like to...it's like a rule that I have with myself- NEVER stop to walk, just slow down the pace. Yesterday was different. I felt like I was the only human that the sun was giving all of it's rays to. I would run and try to catch the shade under the trees in between the patches of desert sunlight. I was so hot, so tired, and completely miserable. I thought, "I have to turn this around. This is a GOOD thing, Angie. I'm doing what I love, it's just the conditions that suck, but I WILL make it back...." I turned on the Local Natives, specifically, Sun Hands, as I approached the last stretch with the downtown view of Austin. I nailed it. I ran and ran and sweat flew off of me like a sprinkler. When I made it to my car, I pretty much collapsed onto the back. I was exhausted and wiped out, but I did it. I made it back at 1:39, which would equal up to a pretty slow 3 mile run, but considering the heat, I felt no guilt.

So my advice, don't run in the heat of the afternoon. It's stupid. If you decide to...you might see me out there ;)

Cheers!

Here we go!

I started this blog months ago with the idea that it was going to be used just for keeping track of my running. I thought it would be a cool way to throw up all of the random thoughts that go through my head onto a page, and share it with anyone who wanted to take the 4 minutes to read it. You'll notice some older posts down below... that was from when this was going to solely be my running blog.

However, I have decided to reshift this whole idea. Instead of focusing it so much on just one aspect of my life, running, why not add all of the embarrassing stuff too, right? It's taking me years to finally get to Austin; the place that I always wanted to end up. Now that I'm here, doing exactly what I want, why not write about it? It was a long and rather difficult journey for me to get to the place in my life that I'm in today, but every single step was worth it.

I enjoy writing. I'm not good at it, I don't do it well, but I enjoy it. I don't have this massive vocabulary to pull from, like some of my friends. I know that I use punctuation incorrectly at times and I'm ok with that. I wasn't going to let that stop me from starting a blog and sharing all of this with you. If you think I suck at writing, it's alright, I still love you.

Ok, moving on from that.... I just, this week, wrapped up everything at school and have now started my summer break!!!! I'm officially on day 2 and things are going pretty well. I spent yesterday on the phone all day with credit card people, which blew, but I had a really relaxed evening with my love, Colin. Here's Colin, as most of you already know. I get to marry him in 65 days and I couldn't be happier. He's my everything. The way he has changed my life has been a miracle. We crossed paths in college but never knew one another... I believe it was all about the timing. Timing is everything. I love him more than anything in this world.

Last night we watched Selena. I hadn't watched that one in a while. I was so connected to that movie when I was younger. I loved everything about it, the music, the wardrobe, the similarities between our families (minus me being a singer), but what I loved the most was watching a woman figuring out the kind of future she wanted and owning it. She had it all- a career that made her happy, a terrific family, a loving husband...and BAM. She was gone. I'll never forget that day. I cried and cried when I found out the tragic news of the murder. It was in 1995, my mom was out of town, and I had started my first period that day (sorry guys!ha!). I was having a horrible day and then my dad told me the news about Selena's death. It was awful...

Onto happier things.... now that school is OVER, it's time to get focused. Like I said before, we have a wedding in 65 days people! That's going to fly by. I woke up this morning and made a 'to do' list full of the small wedding details that need to get done. I don't know where to start! We need money for all of these things on the list and frankly, I'm BROKE right now. I attempted to get a summer job, but a few things got in the way so now I'm forced to sleep in, be at home, and relax all day- who can relax with a wedding in just a few months?! :O

Ok, plan for today, get ready and go for a run- a very easy run- I have not been on one in a long while! Then, it's time for a change. Highlights are growing out, I don't want to spend money on touching them up with everything else we have to pay for, so I'm going back to black! ;) Then it'll be time to start thinking about tonight.

I feel so fortunate to have so many fabulous people in my life here in Austin and back in Houston. I wish there were more hours in the day that I could spend seeing everyone and catching up. Just know that I'm forever grateful for you all.....
On that note, time for a quick run. Happy Friday y'all!
Cheers!

Can't rain on my parade!

January 13, 2011

Well here I am sitting on the floor of our apartment bedroom, exhausted, sweating, listening to the guys rehearse in the next room, and feeling pretty damn proud of myself. I did two runs this week; a long run on Monday and a tempo run tonight. I meant to write about my long run right afterwards because my mind was consumed with thoughts, but I didn't have the opportunity to. So tonight, I suppose I'll write about them both!

Monday's run was ALL mental. It was in the mid 30's, drizzling, and cold as hell. It made me think about running races in Colorado. I remember running the Winter Series there. It was a series of 3 races smack in the middle of the snowy Colorado winter. I remember running the 4 mile race of that series on Valentine's weekend. I woke up that morning for the race and it was snowing. Snowing. I thought for sure the race would be canceled, and actually HOPED it would be - how was this little Texas girl going to run in the SNOW? I threw on some warm clothes and prepared myself mentally while driving to the trail and approaching the starting line. I jumped around in place the entire time I was waiting just to make sure I kept my blood flowing. During that 4 miles, I looked around at the snow falling and covering the city. It was pouring down, but not like rain...it was silent. During the last mile, I realized that my eyelashes were frozen. They had ice covering them. I definitely warmed up during the run, but the temperature didn't. After I completed the run, all of my sweat made me feel like I was standing in a freezer- it was SO COLD. Running in Colorado taught me a VERY important skill about running. It taught me that running those long distances is all mental. The reason I refer to it as a 'skill' is because it is something that MUST be applied in order to have a successful long run. WHICH brings me back to my run on Monday....
I pulled up to the parking lot right across from the Taco Cabana and noticed that it was practically EMPTY. Usually this is the prime parking lot for my trail, but it's always full. I usually have to go down a bit further to the next lot to snag a spot, but not today. I got out, ran my ipod through my shirt, and tucked my car key away. I very quickly realized that there weren't as many runners on the trail as there normally would be on a Monday evening. However, there were MORE runners out there than you would imagine. I thought to myself, "Wow! These people are hard-core! They are out here running in this awful weather...most of them having REAL winter running clothes on, not just sweats...these people are serious!" Then I thought, "Hmm...but I'm out here....does that make me a serious runner? I'm doing exactly what these people are doing in the proper running attire based on the weather ....hmm...naw".
The trail was wet. A bit muddy actually. I was going over this one part of the trail during mile one and the smell of sand filled the air. It made me think about being at a beach. I haven't been to a beach in years it seems like. The last time I went was when Kristin and Nic got married. I went to San Francisco with them and was honor to witness their beautiful wedding on the beach. It was gorgeous, real, and absolutely lovely. I can't remember, though the last time I actually went to a beach and played in the sand, went into the ocean, had the full experience. I need to do that. Note to self: talk to Colin about hitting the beach this spring/summer! :)
The loop that I was running was a 3 mile loop so I was planning on running it twice to give myself a 6 mile long run. The second half of the first loop was the most difficult for me. I decided NOT to stop at the half was point at the water station; I wanted to keep going. When I was wrapping up the first loop, I could feel my energy really escaping me. I popped a hershey kiss in my mouth while I was crossing the huge bridge. That is just a little bolt of sugar that I needed. I threw on the Ting Ting's song, "Shut up and let me go", and started the second loop. I felt good.Really good. I knew that starting this second loop meant commitment. If I started, I HAD to run and finish it. Once I hit mile 4, I usually get into my autopilot zone. I just run, I don't have to THINK about moving my arms, legs, or how my posture is, it's just all working together like a machine while I'm focusing on my breathing.
When I got to that half way point again, I didn't want to stop for water. I was on the bridge and looked to my right. The Austin skyline was right THERE. There was fog covering up the top of the buildings- it was as though I was looking at a painting. How freaking cool.  I looked to the left and saw people rowing. It looked like they were just fading away into the fog. The scenery that I was viewing at this moment was surreal. It's one of those moments in life that makes me know that I'm exactly where I should be.
As I started the last chunk of this run, my ipod decided to treat me with SL's song, "Strange". Hell YES! Talk about getting pumped! I felt great! What I love about the end of this loop that I do is that I'm heading towards downtown during the last mile. The tall, lit-up buildings getting closer and closer is such a rush! I love it. I love Austin and I love running in it.
I couldn't believe it-I straight up ran 6 miles without stopping, in this cold shitty weather, and felt GREAT! I ran it in 1 hour and 1 minute.
OK, this was long enough...more about the tempo run later!

Last Week of Break

I went on 2 runs last week. Between everything going on, I didn't get to write about them, so here we go:

First of all, I had to exchange my shoes. I loved, loved, loved the Nike's. I wish I could have kept them but they were hurting my arches too much. I got a kick-ass pair of Asics though. They are pink (I've never had pink running shoes before) and they make me feel like I'm running on marshmellows. I've never owned a pair of Asics. I grew up watching my mom run marathon after marathon in them. I thought they were 'magic shoes'. Shoes that I could MAYBE get one day, when I grew up, that would allow me to run races too. Here I am, 28 years old, and I finally have my own pair of 'magic shoes' ;)

When I was running this past week, I thought about the race. There is no other feeling in the world like the one of running a race. I've never been in a race to actually RACE. It's a challenge. The only person I'm competing against is myself. I try to push myself harder or more than I have ever before. 

While I was running, I was thinking about all of the people that will be surrounding me. It's going to be like being a heard of animals. Everyone breathing, pacing, and focusing on different elements just to make it through the next 13 miles. Yikes! Gotta go. more on that later....

The First One.

December 27th

I decided that I should start a blog. I've been playing with the idea for a while, going back and forth with the thought, and today on my run I decided, "Yes! Hell yes!". So here I am. Sitting on our living room floor, sweaty, smelling disgusting, and wanting to get this thing going!

The point of my blog will be to be able to document my training- to keep track of what's working and not. Most importantly, to keep myself accountable and motivated. I am running the Austin Half Marathon on Feb. 20th. As of today, I'm not ready..not even close. I have to change a few things about my lifestyle.

When we finish the pack of cigarettes that we are on, I'm done. I have got to quit! I HAVE TO QUIT SMOKING!!! Angie, you WILL quit smoking. I can feel it in my chest after a mile. It's a tightening feeling that burns. I'm already using an inhaler. I shouldn't have to be.

I've done a half marathon before. It was 2 years ago in Colorado. The difference between that experience and this one is that I want to do this one 'the right way'. I got way too intense and went a bit, 'over the line' with that training. The big secret that I've kept is that during that training, I deprived myself of ANY tasty foods on a day to day basis. I look back at that now and realize that I actually had what some might consider a ...bum bum bum, eating disorder. Today, over 2 years later, I'm able to admit it for the first time. I would starve myself...I wouldn't eat anything at home except maybe some egg whites for breakfast and a breast of chicken at night. At work, I had a cabinet where I had my 'treasures' stored. I would lock myself in my classroom during my break and down, literally, bags and bags of chips, multiple candy bars, and a shitload of popcorn, all in one sitting. Anything that I could get my hands on that actually had flavor.  I wouldn't make myself throw up, but I wouldn't tell a soul. I didn't want anyone to know about my horrendous eating habits. I would make myself go run all of it off. I would cheat by not writing down, in my food log,  ALL of the food that I would sneak into my classroom. So basically, I would binge eat a couple times a week, run and run and run every single day, and thought it was alright because I was losing weight. People would tell me how tiny I was getting. My friend Leah came into my classroom one day and asked me what the hell I was doing because all of my pants "were practically falling off of me". Bottom line is, I wasn't taking in the calories that I needed to, not for the distance that I was running- 9,10,11 miles at times. There wasn't any kind of balance to anything that I was doing-eat, running, dropping weight, nothing.

Here is what I want to do differently this time. This time:

• I will allow unhealthy foods throughout my week. My only 'food goal' is to try to work in a salad everyday or every other day.
• I'm not cutting out alcohol, just cutting back...a little bit. Maybe 3-4 glasses of wine when we go out on a Saturday night, rather than 6-7. 
• Smoking- I have to stop. It's going to suck. Bad. Really bad. I have to quit though.

• Not run to the point of injury. I have bad arches and bad knees. When I feel those areas feeling pain, I'll back off a bit. There probably won't be any getting around wearing my knee brace, but I won't push it as hard as I did then. That was just stupid.   

A HUGE difference this time will be having Colin. The support that I've gotten from him so far has been incredible. I could create a different blog on just us and our relationship, but I don't think I would ever be able to stop typing. He's literally my angel. I would be lying if I didn't say that he is a huge part of the reason that I've stepped up to the plate and have taken on this personal challenge. I have no doubt he will be everything I need during this training and more.

Ok, so today.... I went on my usual 3 mile loop at TL. It's SO gorgeous running down there. Every time I run over that bridge, I feel like in a movie. A movie about a 28 year-old woman, living in Austin, with a fucking fabulous life. That's me! It look me 28 years to get here, but that's me! Ok, back to the run... it was nice. Very windy. I ran in my new shoes. They are Nike's that I got for Christmas (what a kick-ass gift, huh?). My left arch was a bit achy towards the end of the run, but that could just be because I was 'breaking them in'. I'll try the same run tomorrow and see how they feel. If I need to, I'll go switch them out with other shoes. I felt a bit short-of-breath after the first mile-ugh! There were a lot of families out there. I wish Colin could have been with me. Maybe this weekend we'll go on a walk out there..if he wants to...

Overall, it was a decent run. My running playlist is growing, but I hate hate hate my stupid ipod. I doesn't shuffle so I have to listen to the same list of songs in the same order every single run. I much prefer Colin's ipod. I need to go find it and throw on my new music. I'll do that now.

Thanks for listening blog. Not bad for the first one. :)