I wrote yesterday from a local coffee shop, Professor Java's, which is a really cute little coffee shop. It was one of the goals that I had for myself for Sunday, September 1st. You see, I realized on Saturday evening that I had the full day on Sunday with absolutely nothing to do and nobody to see. Most of my friends were out of town for various reasons, and I decided to just make the day a "me" day and in addition to getting done lots of errands (pay bills, return clothes, send some e-mails I needed to send, etc.) I had a few things on the list I always say I am going to try. One of those was to hang out for a bit with my laptop in a coffee shop, and another was to get a drink alone at a local bar.
Why get a drink alone at a bar when I live in a city with lots of friends and plenty of people to call? Well, one of the things that I want to do more of lately is push myself out of my comfort zone. Lately, I've been feeling very comfortable in my life. I don't see any major life changes coming up in the near future and rather than be "content" with things, I want to keep challenging myself. I continue to challenge myself physically -- running more miles and faster speeds. But I want to also stay sharp emotionally and mentally.
Getting a drink alone at a bar is something that I end up doing a lot while traveling and I always end up meeting interesting and different people. I have conversations on broad topics and interact with people I wouldn't normally on a day to day basis. If I do this while traveling, what's to say that I couldn't do that in my own home town? My friends and I often go to the same places over and over, which is fun to have a routine but there are plenty of great places in this town I've never actually been, so I'm going to make more of an effort to check them out and put myself out of my comfort zone to go to a bar by myself. Yesterday I spent a great day with myself, having both coffee, and later a drink at a bar solo. It wasn't too thrilling, but a liberating experience that I'll try to do again.
In between, I made myself a delicious meal with some of my CSA vegetables. I stir fried some onions and green pepper in sesame oil and combined it with udon noodles and topped it all with soy sauce and some chopped scallions. It turned out delicious and I was able to have make a few extra servings that I'll eat for lunch this week!
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Today I woke up early and headed out to Saratoga to meet my friends for a Monday morning run (despite having the day off!) It surprised me when I opened the door to pouring rain (yet again!) but headed out for the run anyways. I've experienced this enough times that I know what I'm doing :) Luckily, the rain died off by the time I got to Saratoga and we actually headed out on the run. Jess and I did 6 miles this morning throughout Saratoga park and by the race track. After we ran, we got bagels for breakfast and went back towards the race track to go inside and watch the horses warm up!
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It was fun to see the horses run on the last morning of the track season. I had never gone to breakfast at the track and it was definitely a fun experience and morning with the girls! After cleaning up at home I headed out to a BBQ with some friends. It was a fun day all around.
A few weird things that are on my mind though:
- GPS accuracy. Every day when I run with my friends, I use my Garmin Forerunner watch, which I LOVE. They all use their iPhones and the app RunKeeper. When we do 3-4 mile runs, my watch generally tracks the distance as being .1 or so miles short of their distance. It's become a little joke, because I'm always anal and keep running the extra distance to have my watch beep at the mile mark. Since my watch is the one odd ball, I've always assumed it's my watch that is wrong. However, when I wore it during a 5K recently, it marked the distance as exactly 3.1 miles. Today, when we ran, my GPS was .4 miles short of what my friend's iPhone app said. That was a lot for a 6 mile run! I have no idea if it is my watch or their app. Is there a way to test accuracy?
- Eating. Why do I feel like on the days that I run I can just eat whatever I want? I am doing Weight Watchers and counting my points, but I continue to just exceed them on the days I run. It isn't even because I am hungry, but it is because I just have this mental block saying that I can eat everything I want if I run. I really, really need to get that in track.
Hope you had a great Labor Day weekend!
I have the exact same issue with my Garmin watch/RunKeeper! I don't know. I like to think my watch is more accurate, but it's hard to tell. When the mile beep goes off and I still have a little while to go it's a little demoralizing, but I always feel a little bit like a badass for running those few extra tenths of a mile!
ReplyDeleteI have had the EXACT same issue with my Garmin. For about 8 months prior to getting the Garmin, I ran an iPhone App (Map my Run/Map My Hike). Then I got the watch in December and ran them both at the same time while I did my runs. Garmin was WAY short of the iPhone. I got really upset because I thought I had been running 12 minute miles, and Garmin was saying I was barely squeaking out 15 minute miles- 6 months of work felt worthless!
ReplyDeleteI checked my maps on Garmin connect, and the G was having issues picking up a signal in front of my house- my G runs were slightly inaccurate because of this. So I started walking down to the corner, and then starting the watch instead, which ensured it was getting the signal at my actual start point, but the mileage was still wildly different. I did a 5k, and my phone claimed I ran 6 miles. I don't know. I've written a few other bloggers about it, and almost returned the watch. But I finally ran a mile on a treadmill to compare my time- and I hit it around the 15 minute mark, which means my pace on the watch is probably correct, and therefore the distances are probably correct too. It was disappointing, but I'm trying to adjust. I guess I'm just not built for speed!!!
Just because your pace wasn't what you thought, doesn't mean you aren't meant for speed! It is bizarre that there are such differences, but don't give up. It took me 3 years to see a real different in my pace. Just keep with it and use something consistently hoping for change. I recently decided to ditch the scale because the "numbers" were making me upset and what really matters is the work that you're putting in!
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