Clean

I'm so tired.

Not just from hardly sleeping the past two nights due to a hacking cough that has sent both Andrew and the dog running to sleep on the couch (sorry guys) - but I'm so emotionally tired as well.

I'm tired of logging onto almost any form of social media and seeing hate being spewed everywhere. I'm tired of being bombarded with news stories and suggestions that we are all screwed, or one end of the 'spectrum' attacking the other. I'm tired of people choosing to consistently post negativity, instead of positivity.

I'm tired of being sick.  From a minor surgery earlier this month that majorly slowed me down, followed shortly by a cold that has now turned into a sinus, ear and eye infection, January has felt like a train plowed me over.  Health-wise, I'm not sure I've felt more defeated.

Lastly, I'm tired of being worried what other people think when they read my blog, see pictures I post, etc.  I shouldn't care, but I do.  I see all the mean comments out there on the world wide web, and I can't help but wonder.

So, here we are - February - my birthday month, the shortest month of the year.  And I'm wondering, maybe I can just start 2017 today? Because January sure didn't feel like a New Year.  It felt like being dragged through the mud behind a tractor.

A post caught my eye this morning, and it triggered a series of thoughts.  The blogger was explaining a Clean Slate Challenge she was participating in, and while most of her ideas are centered around health & fitness, it got me to thinking...

Clean Slate February has a nice ring to it.

So like Taylor Swift's song 'Clean' - that's my February theme.  My focus will be on all things positive - getting my health back into check, continuing to pursue passions and self-development, educating myself daily, healthy morning habits, pouring into healthy relationships  - all the while eliminating things that are dirtying my slate.

This includes a whole lot of negative thoughts, angry internal rants, poor self-talk, too much time on my phone, getting sucked into hyperbolized news articles, and worrying what others think about what I think. It's literally sucking the life out of me, and I'm over it.

So that's it.  This post may be complete crap because I don't write well when I'm tired - but man am I tired, and I just need to get this off my chest.  I would love if you chose to join me going into this short 28 day month - clean your slate, however you may need to.  I'll leave you with this, that was emailed to me earlier this week and is now my phone lock screen.  Whether you're a Bible reader or not, I think it's something we all need to strive towards.

Cheers - 

Kait

Anuli & Juma

Howdy ho, it’s Friday, we did it. Last day of the work week, last day of the shortest month of the year! 

First thing’s first, how did Fabruary go? If you followed along, let me know your thoughts below, I’m curious. I think I missed a day at some point, but overall was happy to have something to keep me on track.  I’m currently in the process of making up some March goals, hoping to have them pinned down by Sunday.

there i am, writing my goals!

Andrew’s awesome roommate & GF signed me up for a subscription to Baltimore Magazine for my birthday, and the first copy came yesterday. Don’t worry, I was immediately informed via page twenty-something that the Maryland Zoo has TWO NEW female giraffes – Anuli and Juma.

More amazing info. on them here. Must meet them.

I really like prunes. Is that weird? I feel like the word ‘prune’ normally makes people wrinkle up their nose and scream ‘gross!’ but I honestly like them. I keep this bag in my snack drawer and usually eat a couple per day. Pruney and Proud.

In case you are interested, the Crossfit Open started yesterday. I didn’t officially sign up through the website or anything like that, but each week for 5 weeks they will post the workout of the week, and you can try it out and compare your scores to others, if you’re interested and want a challenge. Andrew and I are going to use it as an opportunity to compete against each other. Neither of us are officially crossfit gym members, but will hopefully figure out ways to complete the workouts with the equipment at our normal gyms…. That’s the plan at least.

Crossfit is actually on the docket for 4:30 pm this evening, followed by a fun evening full of green. More details to come.

I leave you with another #backthatazzup jam – one of my favorite songs from the new Dierks Bentley album this week. Nothing screams Friday like ‘Drunk on a Plane’

 

Cheers –

Kait

Fabruary

WELCOME my friends, to my favorite non-warm month of the year! May the month start off with groundhog Phil not seeing his shadow tomorrow (early spring) and a Broncos win!!

Last night a few friends gathered at our house where our fabulous friend, Chef Ben, whipped up an amazing feast for the ages to usher out January. Crab legs, potroast, veggies, salad and cornbread were on the menu, followed by some mind-blowing apple cobbler.

Yum.

Now, as I mentioned in my last post, January was kind of a wash for me when it came to workouts. Type-A Kait ALWAYS does better when she has some kind of schedule/challenge to follow. And since it's still a little too early to slap a race in the books and make a training schedule for that, I put together a fairly well rounded FABruary challenge calendar.

I'll be adding this in with my normal cardio/running/spinning - I followed a similar type of challenge in October and felt pretty great about it when it was all said and done. Feel free to tailor it to your own needs, and join in with me!

Cheers FABruary, not FLABruary  :)

-K

competitor

This week flew by. It was glorious. I kind of feel like on Monday I blinked, and all of a sudden it was Superbowl Weekend. Ushered in by a beautiful sunrise.

So, what is wackjob Kait gonna throw at you for some Friday entertainment? How about a quick story?

A week or two ago, Andrew and I decided that we were going to see Lone Survivor. I showed up at his apartment around 6:15 pm so that we could share split a Trader Joes pizza prior to walking down the street to the theater.

Around 6:45 we finished stuffing our faces eating, and realized we had well over 2 hours to kill before the 9:45 showing. Didn’t time that out too well.

Somehow, as we cleaned up and sat back down at his kitchen table over some wine, we got into a heated ‘What do we really want to do with our lives’ debate. One of those deep conversations that you can only have with a select few people in your life, which gets so intense that you lose track of time for a significant while.

I love Andrew for many reasons, but towards the top of that list is that he will always push me. Always. So he sat there and asked me what my fears were, what was holding me back from studying to get my PT certification, why I am not going after things that I'm so passionate about.

And with tears in my eyes like the emotional wimp that I can sometimes be, it basically came down to fear, and stagnancy.

I’m a big competitor in certain areas of life. I like to excel, I like to run fast, I like to beat people. I like to do things well, not half-assed. Recently I’ve been on a don’t be a (insert p-word here) rant, as anyone who has spent a significant amount of time with me recently could tell you. And so another good question that he threw at me was -

“What’s your plan for 2014? Are you racing? How are you going to compete in life this year, because we both know that you need that.”

I do. I just don’t know what my bodies going to let me do yet. And I sure as hell am not going to pay an absurd race fee to do it ‘for fun.’

A shamrock shuffle at this point would be just that – a shuffle. Some people shuffle, and there's absolutely nothing wrong with that. I prefer to see 6's in front of my 5k pace.

I’m getting antsy. I see race ads popping up everywhere, and I want to sign up. It’s one of the reasons that I sometimes avoid reading other blogs, because I get down on myself about not having some epic 2014 year of races planned.

I’m convinced that sitting on my ass all day is doing more harm than good for my freaking hamstring.

I’m convinced that crossfit would be a great solution for me. Yet I also know that that I still can’t afford it.

Basically, I realized that I was/am in a weird rut. I don’t have any races to train for, and I basically half-assed my way through life in January. Maybe I need to cut myself some slack, but I don’t think I do. Basically, what I need is for Jillian Michaels to walk into my house, scream at me, possibly backhand me, and then write me an epic workout plan for the entire year.

This post has no point but to be transparent and let you all know where I stand. I have a lot of awesome ideas in my head as to what I want this year to look like, and I think it’s time to hold myself accountable and start acting on them, don’t you agree? And as I sit here, on the eve of February, I’m feeling more motivated than ever.

Hold tight kids, 2014 is about to start FO’ REAL. I leave you with a jam for #Backthatazzup Friday that sums up this post perfectly.

Cheers –

K

Fabulous February

Happy February! I stole the above quote from Pinterest, and I love it. Number one because it's true and number two because it's Mumford and Sons. 

I've had quite the predicament this week. To start, I took off half the skin on the big toe of my right foot in a horrific shaving accident that I mentioned earlier this week. It rubs on just about every pair of shoes I wear so I've been obsessively treating it with Neosporin and speaking gentle words to it, asking it to heal up quickly.

Then there’s my left foot, that at some point I strained or something like that? I have no idea what I did to be honest. But when I woke up on Wednesday morning with 7 miles planned, I knew that wasn't what either of my stupid feet needed. With two crippled feet, I decided non-impact was the answer.

So last night at the gym involved a bunch of boring cross training and weight lifting, followed by an early morning spin class today. I REALLY want to be able to have a special Birthday run come Tuesday, so I may stick to low-impact stuff until then.  

Yes, that was a subtle date drop for anyone who wasn’t aware. Feel free to email me for my address to send gifts to. (I kid)

Word on the street is that the Super Bowl is this weekend? I searched high and low for Ravens gear in attempt to fit in with my purple-crazed coworkers, and here’s what I came up with:

do i look scared? because i was.
scared that someone in the locker room was going to catch me snapping pics of myself.

I realize anyone living in the ‘middle’ of the country probably doesn’t give a rat’s ass care too much about the game, but living in the Baltimore area it’s basically impossible not to get caught up in this Raven Nation madness. A fellow local blogger friend of mine came up with came up with an awesome idea of "Miles of Shame." Basically you pick your team, and if your team loses you have to run however many miles they lose by. Obviously you can put a cap on it to keep it reasonable.

source

The official rules are here if you're interested.

I also wrote an article about the Super Bowl for the Examiner if you're bored and want more to read.

That's all I've got for today folks. My weekend will entail some early birthday celebration, perhaps some pool workouts, and then Baltimore to watch the game on Sunday. Yes, we are very aware the city will be insane. Yes, we are also aware that we are possibly risking our lives by putting ourselves in the middle of the madness.

You only live once my friends. Experiences like this are rare.

Cheers to the freakin' weekend!