E is for Endurance; T is for Training

Last night, as I suspected, I did NOT get a very good night's sleep.  Between the laughter of my fiance and his cousins downstairs, his nine month old nephew and my "first day of school" nerves...I probably got about 4 hours of sleep.  Luckily, the first day back is pretty low key...I usually end up doing a lot of talking to my friends that I haven't seen in eight weeks.  I also like to put the furniture in my classroom back in place.  When I walked in this morning, everything was pushed into the middle of the room.  Boo!

Thankfully, as a whole, the day wasn't too bad.

As I was driving home from work, I felt surprisingly excited about doing my Couch to 10K workout.  It's crazy because I NEVER feel like exercising after work.  Matter a fact, I made a conscious effort to leave at a respectable hour so that I could work out at a decent time.

Today, Couch to 10K had me running 10 minutes with one minute walk breaks in between.  The total run was 53 min (which includes a 5 minute warm up and a 5 minute cool down at the beginning and end of the workout).  Though I should've been super tired...my pace was faster than I have ever done before on C210K.

Distance:  4.501
Time:  53:24
Pace:  11:51 (this is very good for me!...and includes the warm up and cool down walks)

As I was running, I realized that I was running faster than the day that I decided that I was going to quit C210K.  (I was running 5.6 mph)  I remember feeling like I was gonna die for most of the run...after, I was miserable.  I just knew that I would never be a runner.

Today, I felt good.  I was actually a little excited that I was running that fast.  I was amazed at how you can train your body to do different things.  It's so simple, but it still kinda baffled me.  The fact that something that at once was hard can now be done with ease through training.  The same endurance that had me winded the first time was now allowing me to run for 10 minutes straight.  It really is amazing!  I'm really glad that I did not quit the program when I wanted to originally.

Oh!  One other thing on the running front...I have pledged to do monthly 5K's starting in September with two of my co-workers.  (One of the co-workers is a woman that I did my first 2 5K's with years ago).  It's a pretty big challenge...especially since I don't run outside.  5K t-shirts are my motivation:)

I'm super exhausted and excited about getting in the bed tonight.  I had a quick dinner of Herb crusted cod (it comes already herb crusted)...and some roasted balsamic green beans that I found on Ohsheglows.com.

I was worried because I really only like green beans (wait for it)...when they come in a can. (I know!  Blasphemous!!)  But today, I tried to step out of my box and try some fresh ones!!

Here's the recipe...

INGREDIENTS

• 2-3 cups fresh green beans, ends trimmed
• 2 tsp olive oil
• 1-2 tbsp balsamic vinegar
• 1/4-1/2 tsp sea salt
• Freshly ground black pepper

Preheat the oven to 400 degrees. Wash and trim green beans.  Place on a baking sheet.  Drizzle oil on beans and mix with hands.  Next drizzle the vinegar, sea salt, and pepper and mix well with hands. Bake for about 25 minutes until slightly brown ends appear.

The fish looks kinda fish patty like...but it wasn't.  AND it was super good!  

These were good too!

Sidebar:  My fiance told me that there is a way for my food to look better in pictures.  Something about too much white and changing the setting.  I'm still not sure what I'm suppose to do, but it's comforting to know that it's not just me and it can be fixed.

Okay...sleepiness is setting in super fast.  Gotta go!!!