Well…skipped Day 3 due to soreness (dang spontaneous pull-ups), and struggled enough with Day 2 to think that maybe repeating the week would not be a bad thing.

Thus, I was back to Day 1 again, and lo, it continued to be challenging. Dang. I was hoping that it would be a breeze! I have to keep reminding myself that I am really starting from almost nothing, and that any improvement at all is worth celebrating. We shall see how the rest of the week goes. As long as I keep working, I will move forward eventually.

Today was an odd day. I woke up at 4:30 am and couldn’t get back to sleep. So I did what I normally do in these situations: I got up, rather than laying in bed fretting about not sleeping.

I had planned to take a nap later on in the day, but got into the middle of cleaning and never actually did it. Consequently I was pretty darn tired, a state which usually sets off the sweets cravings something fierce. There was a little bit of that, but not much, really. Again, yay!

Since my arms and shoulders were very tired from the pull-ups I did yesterday, I gave myself a pass on push-ups today. And since I spent a large part of the day climbing up and down from a tall stool, and squatting and standing (all in the process of cleaning my kitchen top to bottom), I also gave myself a pass on cardio.

I am going to go to bed early tonight and try to catch up on some sleep.

I have made something similar before (basically identical, but with hot chili added) but forgot all about it. Thanks for the reminder; cabbage is on sale this week!

that’s fantastic! I want to be more like you. :)

What?! It’s been almost a week?

Wow. It doesn’t seem like it. I think that’s a pretty darn good sign that this way of eating/being is working well for me so far. I had absolutely no cravings for sweets today. I even left the sugar out of my morning tea (although I had it with milk) – I didn’t really want it. This is unheard-of for me.

I also walked a ton today. I have been trying to walk to the grocery store instead of driving or biking when weather permits. There and back is between 3 and 3.5 miles round-trip. I also walked to and from the Co-op (total distance a bit over 1 mile), and took a stroll through the “other park” near my house (the bigger one that I never go to, even though it’s closer). So I walked almost 5 miles!

It wasn’t hard, although I will certainly sleep well tonight! I really need to try to walk all the time if at all possible, even when the weather gets bad. Maybe I need a raincoat/pants and rain boots.

Oh! Almost forgot. On a whim this morning, I did three ‘negative pull-ups’ on a bar at the park. This means jumping up to the top position and lowering myself to start. Three was plenty challenging; I’m not a bad-ass yet. Still, it was damn cool to realize that I don’t need access to the assisted pull-up machine to work on pull-ups in the future! I am a little bit stronger than I thought.

Today I’m grateful:

1. For a seriously good mood all day today. I don’t know if it’s being done with coursework or the exercise or the sunshine or the regular walks or the quality food, but…MAN, I’ve just felt amazingly good and calm all day long. Completely imperturbable. It’s been quite awhile since I could say that.

2. For my boss, who lets me buy freakin’ awesome vitamins from the office at cost.

3. For Thai green curry yum yum yum.

4. That I came up with decent (vegetable) substitutions for rice and pasta so I can have something to eat with my curry or spaghetti sauce and STILL stick to my eating plan.

5. That I somehow did not get sunburned today (even though I forgot to put on any sunscreen).

...my exercise plan is totally up for grabs again.

It’s really ok, as I was started to get very bored with the machines anyway. Also, I have been reading up on whether extended cardio is actually the most effective way to build fitness (again, Mark Sisson’s blog influence coming into play).

My new M.O. is to just try to do something physical every day. I’d like my new routine to develop organically, and to be as ‘un-routine’ as possible so that I don’t get bored. Eventually I would like to try something like CrossFit, but right now I don’t have the resources to take classes (and I do think that in order to push myself that much, I’d need outside motivation).

I’ve got the push-ups plan going, of course, so that’s something at least.