Shoe game

If you know me at all, you know I'm a Brooks girl. Brooks is the premier athletic shoe in the world. It is the best trainer you'll ever have.

I started wearing Brooks my senior year of high school when my beloved and incredibly patient algebra/cross country coach took us to a running store in Nashville. Ahh, math and running, the two things 17 year old Emily was the worst at. This teacher consistently made me feel like I didn't suck at either. Well, I'm still pretty shit at both, but I do them with a much better attitude. Haha just kidding, I do running with a positive attitude, you don't use algebra in the real world.

So, we're at this running store and for the first time I actually got fit for a shoe. They tested my foot fall, my arch, took my size, asked questions- it was all very professional. Then they set me up with the Adrenaline model. It changed my life.

I'm serious. I have fairly flat feet and my right foot has a severe pronation. Like...if I stand up straight forward, heels together; my right foot points sideways. No big deal. I mean, I can't roller skate- but I plié better than a prima ballerina. So other brand athletic shoes I've gone to war with have caused high casualties. Sometimes I won, sometimes the shoe won. Because of my crazy duck foot (did I mention it's barely noticeable?) a lot of tennis shoes bit the dust because I would wear down the left inside tread. Other shoes gave me horrible blisters. There was a time where each of my little piggies got a new bandaid every morning just so I could walk.

The Brooks changed all of that. They feel good. They come in awesome colors. They offer support. I'm not the only one. Brooks has a type of shoe for any type of runner. My husband has totally normal feet an a pretty standard gait, except he wears a size 15!

You know what they say about guys with big feet? They have to special order their shoes. Well, Brooks carries all the sizes no problem.

As a final testimony, I'd like to share one more Brooks experience before I get to the real point of this post. I met a lady at the super market with some sweet Brooks, the Aerials I believe. Because I'm Pshyco about these shoes and a habitual maker of small talk, I let her know I loved her kicks and then insisted she reciprocate some appreciation for the Brooks Pure Flows that I was wearing.

It turns out I had met a fellow Brooks enthusiast. This lady shared how a few years ago she was in an accident and broke all of the toes in her right foot. She couldn't walk. Even once her toes had healed and months of physical therapy, she was still struggling to get around. A year ago a Dr. Recommended she try walking in Brooks. Long story short she gets around just fine now and said with the support that the Brooks tennis shoe offers she is back in action.

Let me reiterate these are not medical shoes only for people with deformities or clown feet. They're more like the sisterhood of the traveling pants, Brooks will fit you whatever your situation (Disclaimer: not suited for people with elephantitis or no feet).

ANYWAY, when I moved to WA a few months ago, I found myself engaging in yet another Brooksversation with a stranger. This woman's shoes really impressed me because they were weather resistant (Brooks Glycerin) and yeah, I live in Washington state. I was tripping out because I'd never seen this shoe, and I always look at the new arrivals when I'm at the mall (weekly people, I'm there alot). The lady informed me she had gotten them at the Brooks outlet. wtf!?!? There is an outlet? omg omg omg. There is one, and only one outlet in all the world. It happens to be located in upstate WA, in a little town called Bothell, where the shoes originated.

Of course I wanted to hop in my car and make the trek immediately, but the woman also tipped me off that on the first weekend of April, the store has a huge blow out sale.
Brooks ain't exactly cheap. At retail price they run anywhere from 100 to 170 dollars.
So, I knew I had to bide my time. I marked my calendar. I put an alarm in my phone. I called the store twice to confirm the date the sale would begin, and I made sure I had that day off work.

Some of you have realized by now that today is the first day of the first weekend of April. Ohmahgawd.

Shoetopia. Runnirvana. I was at the freaking Brooks Mecca.

I got two pairs of the Pure Grit trail runners and two pairs of the Brooks Glycerin. I wanted more. Really. But the place is more of a boutique than an outlet. I had a huge stroller with me, and it was chaos. Probably about 60 people pushing to get in. I don't get social anxiety, on the contrary, I was pumped to be in this teeming cess pool of like minded people. No, the problem was I couldn't carry shoe boxes and push my giant stroller through the narrow aisles. I had stacked four boxes on my 2 year old and that was all he could carry. Damn your tiny arms, son! I also got 3 compression tops that were shoved in the basket with the diaper bag. So those and the shoes on sale and with our military discount totaled 160 dollars.

Run Happy? Yes. I think I will.

You Don't Eat Enough Vegetables

I hate when people say they don't like vegetables. How can you totally write off an entire food group? Not to mention it is the most nutritious and low calorie comestible on the pyramid. Here is your challenge this week: Eat more vegetables. Aim high. You should be getting 2 and a half cups or more a day. Google yourself a list of vegetables and pick some you've never had that you could try. Pick some you've tried and look up a new way to prepare them.

Vegetable preparation. Lord Jesus. I don't care if you get your greens from your heirloom plants you made out of your own organic human wastes or if you eat them straight out of the dented can you picked up at the dollar store. Raw, frozen, steamed, microwaved, canned, or boiled; it really doesn't matter. No one got fat from eating vegetables. Yeah, you might lose some nutrients, but I'd rather you find a satisfactory taste and texture than try force feeding yourself raw kale.

Season your veggies! Garlic is good. A tsp of oil or REAL butter never killed anyone. How about a smidgen of cheese? How about a tbsp of ranch? This is real life people.

I used to turn up my nose at most every veggie. What happened is, like developing any habit, I practice eating them, acquired a taste for them, and now I crave them.

What vegetables will you add to your menu this week?

My favorite is brussel sprouts. I had them for the first time 6 months ago when a friend insisted I try them. Up till that point I was repulsed by them. I would not let one pass my lips because they looked like premature cabbage patch babies to me. They're a staple in my home now.

Positive self-talk

Today's post is one I imagined up a few weeks ago. Perfectly fitting for the month of love/black history month. How am I going to combine romance, African Americans, and weight-loss all under the same header?

With Lucille Clifton's poem "Homage to My Hips":

these hips are big hips
they need space to
move around in.
they don't fit into little
petty places. these hips
are free hips.
they don't like to be held back.
these hips have never been enslaved,
they go where they want to go
they do what they want to do.
these hips are mighty hips.
these hips are magic hips.
i have known them
to put a spell on a man and
spin him like a top!

I love this poem. I love how self confident she is and how sexy she feels.

I have a lot of former fat girl body issues. But I think most people have some insecurities about their self image. I could not accept myself being significantly overweight, but there are things I have to learn to accept. I'm big boned. Ill never be a size 2. And yup, ill have stretch marks the rest of my life. Some people have genetically wide hips and some look anorexic even when if they eat 3000 calories a day.

The point is, whatever your goals are for yourself, you will be much more successful if you have a high degree of tolerance for your imperfections. The more you allow yourself to be discouraged, the more "fat days" you will have. No one wants to exercise on a fat day. You're setting yourself up for failure and a trip to McDonalds.

Also, guys hate when girls rag on their bodies. It is a huge turn off. Don't do that. Positive women are way more beautiful regardless of what they look like.

When I'm doing my bicycle crunches and it sucks and I'm starting to loose form, I like to tell myself, "Emily, your hips are mighty hips! You could spin a man like a top with these hips! You got this girl!"
See how that is way better than "Emily you sad sack. You still don't have the core strength to finish this set?!?!". Yuck. So, tip of the day: change the way you talk to yourself.

And if Clifton just wasn't doin it for ya, try listening to LMFAO "Sexy and I Know It". Same concept.

Giving up resolutions for Lent?

Man, February is hard. It's the easiest month to kiss your goals and resolutions good bye. First you're faced with the rule of six weeks. Most people can stick with a new diet or exercise regimen for 6 weeks before they hit a snag.

Guess what is 6 weeks from January 1st? Valentines day. F bomb. How can you stay on track when your honey lamb is coming home with candies every day? Or worse, you have no honey lamb; all you have are so many feelings to feed.

Then you've got Fat Tuesday. Are you kidding me?!?! The last thing we need is another reason to binge drink.

Finally, it's black history month. Mmm. I like to celebrate with hot wings and waffles.

The only redeeming thing about this freezing god forsaken disaster of a month is Lent. You get to have ashes painted on your forehead and make a promise to God you'll give up one of your vices until Easter. What could be more motivating than the guilt of breaking lent and the possibility of fire and brimstone?

Of course Methodists get a "cheat day" on Sunday. And maybe you're an atheist without proper fear of a Heavenly judgement (bless your apostate heart). So, Lent won't help everyone pull out of their February funk.

Let me share what happened to me in February of 2009. This was my Junior year of college and I was at peak weight. I was eating an entire bag of chalky sweet heart "hug me" candies every day. Lord, I love those sugary little antacid treats. It was seriously about 2,000 calories a bag. I was single and partying a lot and eating the hell out of st. Valentine's cheapest and least favored candies. On Valentine's day I was miserable. I was single and hung over and belly sick on sweets. My roommates all had some form of significant other, and here I was, alone at the house and awfully pathetic. I just made the decision on a whim that I would go to the campus gym. I would stop being pathetic for one hour. Although I was obese, and hadn't seriously exercised in over a year, I got on the elliptical and stayed on it for an hour.

That was it. That Valentine's day was the catalyst. By October I had lost my first 60 pounds.

Well, the moral is February sucks. You'll probably have set backs, plateaus, candy, and alcohol. You'll likely be freezing as second winter strikes and depressed by your lackluster love life. You'll break resolutions (like blogging 3 x a week).

But this February, challenge yourself to commit. Say I will start over. I will keep going. I will not go to the back of the bus! Yeah! That's a Rosa Parks weight loss metaphor. Puzzle it out.

Breakfast of Champions

It just so happens I am an expert omelet maker. I learned to make them from my step-dad, who by the way is Mexican. If you have never had the good luck to have a Mexican cook for you, you are really missing out. The things they can do with steak and cornmeal is unreal. Anyway, I am really into omelets. Some tricks of the trade:

1. Buy a tiny skillet. 6 inches or so. If you are trying to make an omelet in anything larger you will either end up with crepes or scrambled eggs...all over your face. What is a boy to do? A boy should invest in a little skillet.

2. Use whole eggs, not just the whites. Unless you're medically restricted, then quit being a pussy and eat the whole egg.

3. Fry it in butter. Whoa! Don't freak out on me. All good things in moderation. In the book "French Women Don't Get Fat", Guiliano says butter is a decadent rich necessity. Use it sparingly and enjoy richer food. Truth is fat makes food taste better. If you eat better tasting food, you will be more satisfied. Don't DON'T fry it in margarine or any other synthetic crap. A good rule to live by is anything they ate before electricity was invented, is good to eat. Just use half a tablespoon or less and you'll be fine.

4. Dress up your omelet when you're done. If you went western style, put some guacamole and salsa on it. If you went Greek, sprinkle feta and pesto. Maybe you made a vegetarian omelet? Go ahead and crumble some bacon on it to make it suck less.

I like to have an omelet for breakfast because they are high in protein, under 300 calories, a good way to get veggies into your breakfast, and they are so yummy.

Unfortunately, I don't always have time to chop vegetables, beat eggs, and watch cheese melt. I am a busy girl. I normally wake up at 4:30 a.m. (this is a true story) and get in a work out. Then I have to get cleaned up and ready for work, get my toddler up and ready for child care, and then hit the road for a short commute.

Breakfast is extremely important to me, but I like to go into a morning workout fasting. I've heard that is a good plan for optimal calorie/fat burning, but more importantly, my workouts are typically high impact, and I would get sick on a full stomach. So, what types of foods do I eat when I am on the run?

I like Chobani Greek yogurt. It is a little high in sugar, but it is also high in protein, convenient, good tasting, and in vogue to eat. I like to keep my diet fashionable, ya know?

I may have a packet of instant sugar free oat meal in a coffee mug with half a cup of unsweetened almond milk.

Some days I will even eat a Luna fiber bar. I don't like to over indulge in meal replacements, but I like these with my coffee.

Good Gawd. How did I forget coffee? I drink 1 and a half cups a day with 3 tablespoons of sugar free creamer. My morning routine is exercise with a liter of water and breakfast with a thermos of coffee. If either gets interrupted, I can get pretty cranky.

OK. To recap, this blog is to remind you to eat breakfast everyday. I aim to keep mine around 300 calories, and because I eat after a workout, I try to keep it high protein. If I do have a more carby breakfast, I make sure it is fiber dense.

It is also to show you how freaking good an omelet made by yours truly looks. This one is pre garnishments so you could appreciate it in its natural form. 

I also wanted to show off a new picture of me! I know I didn't update my weigh in Friday. I was down .2 lbs. So, yeah, I had a loss, but I didn't have much to say about it. Then I did my measurements on Tuesday since it had been 4 weeks since the new year started. I had one tiny half inch loss. Wanna guess where it came from? MY BRA! What a bummer. So, I was feeling a little butt hurt about my results and decided retail therapy would cheer me up. It sure did. I look so skinny! So, the scale and the measuring tape can stuff it. I'm still pretty confident I'll be in the 170's by February 1st.

Tell me, what do YOU eat for breakfast?

The Biggest Loser

Today I want to talk about mine and P. Diddy's favorite show: The Biggest Loser. Now I don't watch a lot of television. In fact, I don't even have basic cable, and I haven't had full cable since I lived with my parents back in 2006. I think watching television makes people stupid, fat, and boring.

My humble opinion is that if you are spending a few hours a day sitting in front of the boob tube, you are wasting your life and making your ass wider. Ugh! No wonder you "don't have time" to cook your own meals or fit in a work out. What about the 60+ dollars a month you are paying to watch this crap? That shit adds up quick. Don't even get me started on the declination of America's youth in relation to electronic babysitters --no, I digress.

This post is about a show I do watch. I like Biggest Loser because it inspires me. I really believe there is nothing better to work out to. That's right, I stream the episodes on my smart phone using the NBC app. It is free and super user friendly. Then I can watch it at the gym.

When I am on my treadmill watching these morbidly obese people on their treadmills, I can't stop. If this guy can keep going at 300 lbs, then what is my excuse? And I sure as hell am not gonna touch the arm rests because I don't want to incur the wrath of Jillian.

Please don't be ignorant and try to tell me that the show exploits fat people. How? Cause it is a game show where people can be voted off based on popularity even though they're slowly dying from out of control diabetes? Or cause they will show the same clip of a contestant falling down and rolling on the floor like a flipped turtle 1,000 times? Or because they regularly are forced to participate in "temptations" where they have to binge eat junk food for prizes? Ummmmm.... Yeah. There are some aspects of the show that suck.

Nevertheless, in the 14 seasons the show has been airing, hundreds of contestants have lost thousands of pounds. Millions of viewers have gotten motivated to take up the Biggest Loser challenge, myself included.

I love how the shows tries to get to the root of why people are fat. These people start talking about their pasts and their feelings. Lord. I LOVE feelings. I appreciate that this mainstream show is saying, "Look, fat people aren't all lazy idiots who can't quit shoveling burritos down their throats. They've got issues. There is a lot going on in their chubby little hearts that has to get sorted".

It isn't too late to start following this season. Go ahead and cancel your tv subscription, and stream it from NBC.

My tip for the day: limit how much tv you are watching. Did you know you don't have to watch it every day? Don't eat in front of the tv. Don't watch tv right before bed or when you're trying to sleep. Don't leave it on for background noise. If you are going to watch, watch it online, you shouldn't waste one more second than you have to on commercials.

Exceptions to my television policies:
I watch tv at the gym
Women who are nursing should watch loads of tv.
Having "a show" that you watch with a group of friends or your family can be fun. If you are under the influence of drugs, you may as well turn on the tv, melt into the couch, and stay the hell out of the kitchen.

Fridays weigh in #2

This morning I had a great weigh in. I am down to 181.2. I am so close to the 170s I can taste it.
I did lose a lot of weight this week, but so help me, I will find you and fight you if you say anything negative about losing 3.2 pounds in a week.
Truth is, 3 days this week I went marginally over my calorie goal. I ate out at a Mexican restaurant. I had some cookies and a slice of cheesecake. Last night I had 15 oz of wine right before bed.

BUT!

I also wrote down everything I was eating, and the days I went over, it was just by a little. I'm over my cold this week and brought renewed intensity to my workouts. I worked out 5 days, but hit about 8 hours. Plus we bought a ping pong table, and table tennis will make you sweat.

I didn't expect to have such a successful week, but looking back I know I earned it.

If you want to get fit- go exercise! I felt so healthy and awesome this morning after my weigh in, I went and did a 4 mile run.

After my run, I went into the locker room to collect my things. Then I saw myself in the mirror and, with total disregard to multiple posted signs prohibiting photography, took a quick pic of myself. Thought I'd show you what I mean by cute gym clothes.