HL/WW Support Group - Week of October 8th

[Leslie Ferguson]

Greetings friends, neighbors, visitors, and lurkers and welcome to the next installment of the Healthful Living and Weekly Workout support group. A wild week on the east coast and I hope that others didn’t get whacked like we did in Southern Virginia. Fall is definitely in the air with all the colors and cooler weather. Thoughts turn to family events - some happening this week (Karen and her families) and those on the horizon with Thanksgiving and the other December holidays. But I won’t fast forward through October quite yet, time to keep myself in the present so I’ll try to recap what’s been said over the last week or so (besides the Les and Karen show):

Karen - Co-conspirator of last week’s Les and Karen show; dad’s been in and out of the hospital due to rehab center care and medicines and we hope he’s going to get back closer to himself soon; DD had a visitor - a mouse in the attic making noise and scaring her; kiddos had a good week even with forgotten class lessons; celebrated the festival of the tabernacles (Sukkoth) this past week; swimming, biking, and kickboxing tiding her over until their elliptical gets fixed.
Laura K, Terri, Jean, and Laura have been busy and missing a little leading to the Les and Karen show... hope you all drop by and give us a shout.
Me (Les) - Internship in full swing and really enjoying it; still trying to balance life right now with all the competing items but happier than I’ve been in a long time; running and riding once in a while - just enough to keep me happy and to see the sights; had a TON of rain yesterday but we’re high and dry.

Workout items: lift today (as always). I'll probably run long tomorrow since I didn't run yesterday and feel the need to do something long. Then again I might just ride long after I drop my car at the shop. After that my workouts may be wild again and Tuesday will be the worst day of the week with my standard midday meeting at my internship then a meeting at church later in the evening. I’m going to try and get workouts in most days this week. Some combination of running and riding (riding these days is a blast because of the cooler temps).

Healthful living - Loving almost everything about my internship and the reflection it is causing in me. But sleep - that’s something which is becoming dear to me and something that is falling by the wayside a little. I’ve gotten back in touch with my real self and have been having a great time doing things that feed my soul.

Well, that pretty much sums up as best I can remember. I hope we all have a good week and I look forward to the spirited discussions to come. If there happen to be any other lurkers out there - please drop in and chat, we love having new people come by for a visit.

Until later friends, have a great week -

Peace,
Les

[karen w]

It's only proper that I kick off a new week of the "Les and Karen Show" with a grand entrance......Ta Da!!! Was that grand enough??!! :D Well, onto the show....no rain to speak of for us all weekend, Les. It was a gorgeous day with a bright blue sky and temps. approaching 70. I ended up biking, making the kids brunch, grocery shopping, and gardening. This evening we all went out for pizza and ice cream. DH spent the day in "testosterone land" cutting down trees, chopping, and splitting wood for the winter(we like our fires on Sat. nights with our movie and popcorn). That and I think the brand new chain saw needed a test run. His old one broke last season. The kids played outside around our house most of the day. I guess the neighbors were not available today.

Tomorrow is a holiday so no school, but I still plan on swimming and then dragging the kids along with me to boxing. DS#1 has a cub scouting cookout in the evening and DD has jazz class, so it will still be a full day.

Hope everyone has a good week and we hear from some folks this week.

Karen

[Leslie Ferguson]

Thanks for starting the show this week - Ta-Da! LOL!!! I hope you have a good day tomorrow with the kids off. You probably will but it may be interesting having them home again tomorrow.

I lifted today and felt good. Tomorrow will probably be a run as I mentioned earlier. Other than that? Nothing big on the plate.

Peace to all,
Les

[karen w]

Les-Well, the good news is....the kids were home all day, and......nobody ended up in the ER for stitches or the like. As a matter of fact, I took DS#1's stitches out this morning. :) I hope you are able to get your run in today.

We had an absolutely gorgeous day here. I think it was pushing 80, but it is supposed to trend down from here. I think Friday is supposed to barely make it to 50! :eek: I had a fair swim this morning. Sleep was a bit disturbed last night(long story). I woke up to go potty at 3 am and heard the oven. I had set it to self clean early last evening, but it should have turned off hours earlier. Not sure what exactly happened, but I reset it and all was fine in the morning. But, of course, then I could not get back to sleep. :( Anyway, I also dragged the kids to boxing with me. They were more bored than usual this time since the boys did not have Game Boys(those were taken when DH's car was broken into this past summer). The kids don't know that we have already tucked away, the latest version they have been asking for to surprise them at Hannukah, but hey....I can make them work for it a little. Oh, am I evil or what!!! :p Anyway, they survived my class which was a good, but odd one because of the holiday. All the usual people with kids were at home, while the people that usually work were there in the morning. Overall, it was a very small class, too. This afternoon, I helped DS#1 edit his essay for school, made some soup, and a few other odds and ends around the house. Tonight DD had jazz and DS#1 is at a cub scout cookout.

Tomorrow the kids are back at school and I'm back to my usual routine.

Evening,
Karen

[Leslie Ferguson]

Karen - I guess that's one of the benefits of being a Dr., being able to remove stitches without having to go to the hospital. I guess if push came to shove I could get LW to remove stitches if I ever get more of them although I'm going to try to avoid stitches as much as possible from here on out. :rolleyes: I wouldn't call that evil, just holding presents until their time. Evil would be telling them they got the games but not letting them have them until later. 80 degrees - that's even warmer than it was here. :eek: We were close to that but still in the middle 70s - fall is coming. I bet you're ready to have the kids go back to school, if for only the respite from having them around all day. Have a great week!

I had a fantastic day! I slept in later than expected (after 7 am :eek: ). Ran today, not great but a good Monday run. I'm not sure how far I ran but I ran for 71 minutes. Started at about 8:30 pace and maybe picked up a little after that. I know that may be fast but I'm feeling a lull based on the lack of running training I've been doing. But I know that the things I've been doing are bigger than my running so I won't complain, just an observation. I did some personal things that I haven't been able to do while working the past couple weeks - haircut for tomorrow's inspection, around the house shopping including staples for the kitchen. Other than that - not much going on which is good for an R&R day. :cool:

I think that'll just about do it for me. I hope we hear from some of the others shortly but if not that's fine too.

Peace,
Les

[karen w]

Sorry Les, but this is going to be a drive by tonight. I did not want to leave you completely alone, however. I have to go to "cookie training" tonight. I am cookie mom for DD's brownie troup, and from what I've been told it is ALOT of work! :eek: Anyway, glad to hear you had a productive day yesterday, and I hope you looked dapper for inspection today.

I had a decent swim and boxed again today. I, too, finished a few things around the house in the afternoon. I had to go pick up DS#2 from school. He thought it was Monday. Mondays I pick him up after school for religion. By the time he realized it was not Monday, the busses had left! :p I just go him off to Cub scouts as well tonight. Meanwhile the other two are taking their baths. DH will pick up DS#2 on his way home from work, so I can go get my cookie training!(That sounds so ridiculous....cookie training!).

Anyway. . . .have a good night.

Karen

[Leslie Ferguson]

I guess this is drive by night. Long day for me and I wish it was cookie training. Sounds like you had a productive and busy day (as normal). Thanks for not leaving me to talk to myself again, although I'm getting good at talking to myself. Have a great day tomorrow.

Today wasn't as productive as I would have liked or expected. I did look just fine (very good I think was a direct quote). I did have a good meeting over lunch hour after being inspected this morning. However that precipitated my staying at work to catch up on the stiff I didn't do in ~3 hours away from the office and ~ 1 hour of unproductive work time. Then to top all that off, a 1.5 - 2 hour meeting morphed into 3+ hours and I didn't get home until 10:30. :eek:

I WILL do something tomorrow - just what is yet to be determined.

Time to wrap and hed in for the night. Anyone else out there???

Peace,
Les

[Leslie Ferguson]

Staking my claim early... I was finally successful and got out for a run at lunch. I trucked for 7 1/4 miles at lunch. Alas, I'm continuing to have a sour stomach when I run midday, almost like my mostly empty stomach rebels against my runs. Still a nice run so I'm in for the day!

And another freat thing... I've got no meetings tonight so I'm home and cooking dinner :cool: WOO HOO!!!!

Peace and happy hump day all,
Les

[karen w]

Les-Woo hoo! I'm glad you had time for a run to clear a few cobwebs. Is there anything very light that you could eat before a mid-day run to avoid getting the sour stomach? I'm sure you've probably tried everything at this point since you've been in the running game for quite some time now. And I'm guessing your stressful hectic schedule lately, does not help the sour tummy. Well, I hope this is just a temporary nuisance for you, and passes soon.

I had a great swim this morning. The rest of the day was not so shabby either, but not exactly as planned. DH had the day off and since he is going to be away at a meeting this weekend. . . .well. . . .we had a different form of exercise in mind after the kids got off to school. :D Enough said about that! Afterwards, I decided to bike while watching a show DH had taped for me on the VCR. Then I did some baking so DH can bring FIL some goodies this weekend. His conference is on Long Island so he will spend one night with FIL. I baked a batch of CC cookies and Almond Roca(my FIL is going to hate me...he loves that stuff!). Tonight DD had girl scouts. I gave the troup leader alot of the info. I got at last nights "cookie mtg." and we will distribute forms next mtg. The boys had religion and DH took them out for dinner afterwards.

Tomorrow I'm back to boxing and swimming! ;)

Karen

[Leslie Ferguson]

Karen - Ah the joys of a spouse with actual days off during the week... ;) I guess we can forgive you for not doing your regular workout. ;) Still, biking and baking on top of that (in addition to that) is a triple play in my book. CC AND Almond Roca cookies, you're going to spoil FIL and may even cause him to leave the Island. :D ;) And if he won't maybe... nah, it wouldn't be the same. :D Back to the rut tomorrow, somethings are constants in this world and those might be Karen boxing and swimming.

I might have to try something to eat closer to my run or running earlier (closer to my food). It's unnerving to have this happen and one other data point that I need to investigate is my water bottle, which I tosssed today mind you. It seems that I have the worst reaction when I drink water during the run but not during the whole thing mind you. Things seem to go haywire between 25 and 45 minutes but before and after those times I'm ok. Go figure. :rolleyes: Medical anomoly strikes again. But I'll try to get rid of any potential bug carriers - my bottles. Since I've got quite a few unused ones around (they give them out like candy before races) retiring a couple bottles shouldn't be an issue.

Sadly, I had dinner alone (LW called and had to work 10-8). Still nice to whip up a nice, well balanced dinner -- spicy grilled chicken breast, Moroccan couscous with saffron, green beans, and salad. It's been forever since I've actually been able to eat at home for dinner except on nights when I'm getting home at 6:30.

Tomorrow night will be meeting #3 for the week - starting at 7 pm and I hope this is shorter than 2 hours.

Anyone else to peep (or peek) in???

Peace,
Les

[karen w]

Les-When it rains, it pours...I am so sorry you had to dine alone last night, but I guess you have to look at that cup half full....at least you had a nice home cooked meal at a reasonable hour. I guess when life becomes insane, you have to grab on to the little things and take any of them that you can get! Go get one today!

I had a really good swim this morning, but I think I passed a bit of my mild crud from last week on to DH. He was droopy and full headed when I came home this morning. Chalk it up to family living. I also had a good boxing class, but just did not feel like staying for a double class today(BBC) so I headed home. I made a batch of "Fried" green tomatoes this afternoon. Anybody have any more good ideas for the green guys as I'm suspecting the first freeze is in the near future and there are still quite a few on the vines. Speaking of freezes, I have to get out to the garden and harvest the basil ASAP before we get that first killing frost. They are predicting the high 30's tomorrow night! :eek:

This afternoon i took DS#1 to the orthodontist for his monthly checkup. I asked him about DD as she is going to be a future vctim....uh, I mean patient. She lost her 8th tooth just last night and that is usually when they begin to evaluate them. He said "bring her on down." So the next time she is with me when we go, he'll take a peek, and then we can set something more definite up. DS#2 gets lucky and will be spared. he was blessed with straight teeth and a good bite.

Got an interesting letter from DS#1's school today. It had 3 parts. The first was his quarterly progress report. He is averaging three A's and a B so far. I am a proud mommy....this is a big change from last year. Plus the teacher's comments were all excellent. the second was about their Health class....uhm...they are going to begin sex ed. or as they coined it "Human growtrh and development." Of course, we've already talked a bit about this with him, so he asks why he has to take this portion of the Health class. IO told him cause I did not want him to think my belly button opened up and he popped out...he needs to know the real story! :cool: Finally there was a letter explaining about a assembly the 5th graders will be participating in next month. King Arthur Flour(a representative) will be coming to their school to teach them how to make bread(along with the science and all other pertinent learning behind bread making), They will each go home with 4 # flour(2 all purpose and 2 organic white whole wheat), a packet of yeast, and a KAF logo dough scraper along with the instructions to make 2 loaves of bread. They want the child with family to make the bread that weekend, keep one for the family and send the second loaf back to school in a bag they are providing so that they can be donated to a shelter or soup kitchen. What a neat project! I wish I was in 5th grade....well, some of the time! :D

Anyway, tomorrow swim, meet with DS#2's teacher to discuss "room mother" stuff :eek: , box, DD's gymnastics, and DH leaves for his meeting until Sunday.

Have a good night,

Karen

Les-Do we have virtual B.O.?? Bad breathe??? or what?? :confused: I think we scared 'em all away!

[Leslie Ferguson]

Les-When it rains, it pours...I am so sorry you had to dine alone last night, but I guess you have to look at that cup half full....at least you had a nice home cooked meal at a reasonable hour. I guess when life becomes insane, you have to grab on to the little things and take any of them that you can get! Go get one today!
That's a good summary - these days I just have to take the little victories when they come. The sane moments seem to be few and far between these days. :rolleyes:
... I also had a good boxing class, but just did not feel like staying for a double class today(BBC) so I headed home... Speaking of freezes, I have to get out to the garden and harvest the basil ASAP before we get that first killing frost. They are predicting the high 30's tomorrow night! :eek: ... This afternoon i took DS#1 to the orthodontist for his monthly checkup. I asked him about DD as she is going to be a future victim....uh, I mean patient... Got an interesting letter from DS#1's school today. It had 3 parts. The first was his quarterly progress report. He is averaging three A's and a B so far. I am a proud mommy....this is a big change from last year. Plus the teacher's comments were all excellent. the second was about their Health class....uhm...they are going to begin sex ed. or as they coined it "Human growtrh and development."... Finally there was a letter explaining about a assembly the 5th graders will be participating in next month. King Arthur Flour(a representative) will be coming to their school to teach them how to make bread(along with the science and all other pertinent learning behind bread making), They will each go home with 4 # flour(2 all purpose and 2 organic white whole wheat), a packet of yeast, and a KAF logo dough scraper along with the instructions to make 2 loaves of bread. They want the child with family to make the bread that weekend, keep one for the family and send the second loaf back to school in a bag they are providing so that they can be donated to a shelter or soup kitchen. What a neat project! I wish I was in 5th grade....well, some of the time! :D
Wow - what a busy day. I'll hope that DD doesn't become the next victim and that she's like DS#2. Ahhh - health class for "that" age. Wish I could say I remember it well but that would be a slight mistruth. ;) The baking project is way cool - I kind of wish I was in the 5th grade too. (more times than not actually).
Les-Do we have virtual B.O.?? Bad breathe??? or what?? :confused: I think we scared 'em all away!
I hope not on all accounts. I'm going to believe that it's because they're busy...

Now for my day and a weird evening. Someone must have been watching out for me because I was going to take a short run then drive over to Hampton but I decided that it would be better to just head over (it was about 5:20 - the meeting started at 7). As I started out I found out the traffic was backed up 7+ miles solid through the Hampton Roads Bridge Tunnel (HRBT) so I went the "other" way through town (it was backed up too but not as bad) then through the alternate tunnel to Hampton. But that is a lot longer drive. I probably ended up getting to church at the same time (give or take) and it was 6:40. :eek: So not running was a good call. The meeting wasn't too bad - only 90 minutes but it still takes ~30 minutes to get home when all is said and done and tonight wasn't an exception. 9:10 as I entered the door. :rolleyes: So no run, a moderately long meeting, and it's 11:15. :eek:

Here's looking at tomorrow and the end of the week!

Peace
Les

[tmsl]

To interupt your regularly scheduled thread:

I'm still kicking, just not very engergetically. We've had a few rough weeks at work and life in general lately, and didn't want to go into all of it.

Hi to Les and Karen and all the rest who may be lurking.

Laura K.

[Leslie Ferguson]

(((Laura K)))
Sorry things haven't been going well for you lately. I understand and hope that things get resolved for you soon. Good thoughts and prayers for you.

Peace,
Les

[karen w]

Laura-Take care and thanks for reassuring Les and I that we don't stink....too much anyway!! :D :p

Les-Of course, you know I'm just teasing on the "stinky" thing. Sounds to me from your day yesterday that you need a nice relaxing weekend. I hope you get one...I'm pulling for you.

I had a super busy, super charged day today. My swim was right on this morning. Then I bustled about to get everyone set for school since I had to go meet with DS#2's teacher before school to talk about "room mom" duties. After that I stopped for milk, fruit, and veggies. Then it was off to boxing. It was a really great class. I think because I was full of energy today. ;) After lunch I hit the garden....literally. Everything is down now, except a few herbs that are perennial(parsley, oregano, and sage). I made two batches of pesto, chopped a boat load of scallions to freeze, another boat load of green peppers to freeze, also roasted some peppers(to freeze and eat on salad), froze some chopped rosemary, and tore down all of the tomato plants. I bundled a bunch of them up in newspaper and perhaps some of them will ripen in the next week or so. The rest I will just compost. We had a ton of green ones on the vine this year since we got started late.

This evening DD had gymnastics. DH picked her up and got his rental car(and sushi dinner ;) ). After he brought her home and took care of bringing in his plants, he headed off to L.I. for the weekend. He'll be back sometime Sunday
afternoon.

Since DH is gone, there are no special weekend plans. I'm still doing the biking thing since the elliptical is STILL out of commission. :( The kids will likely play with friends. Sunday is religious school and DS#1 has a b-day party.

Have a nice and relaxing weekend.

Karen

[Leslie Ferguson]

A quiet weekend??? Well... but first...

It sounds like you had a busy day (as normal). Any ideas about why there might have been more energy today or just "phases of the moon" or "first cold day of the year?" Cooking and freezing up a storm - sounds like that kept you busy for most of the afternoon. Room mom for DS#2 too - when is it enough? ;) I hope your weekend is quiet without DH being there to corral kids. I didn't take the stinky comment to heart either (my kids ;) keep me in line - that would be the striped and spotted ones ;) :p ).

I guess you can call the weekend quiet. I'm only running tomorrow morning (Saturday) for the first time in a couple weeks. Then going to a fund raiser for the Old Dominion University Canterbury Community (the Episcopal Campus Ministry). LW has a booth where she's going to sell some of her quilts - that should be fun. Then there's baking muffins for a fund raiser bake sale for church on Sunday and two service on Sunday. OOPS! Can't forget lifting weights on Sunday or getting ready for my Lay Committee meeting on Monday evening. Luckily, most of the stuff is relatively local/close by but still lots of running around. I can't wait for Christmas - then things will slow down.

'Bout it... peace to all and maybe a drive by from someone else in the crowd???

Peace,
Les

[Leslie Ferguson]

Back-to-backs I know... but I have a workout report to make since I did my long run this morning 16 miles which is my longest in a long time - a new thing and an old thing took place. The old (and tiring) thing - stubbed my toe and... you guessed it, took a spill. Now I'm going to have a nice bruise on my right hip and shoulder to go with the abrasion on the outside of my right knee and the two cuts on my left palm. Nothing too terrible, just a little ache in the morning I'm afraid from the tumble. The new thing, after running 1.5 miles without stopping I hooked up with the 3 other runners and slowed down (a lot) and did a 5 and 1 run/walk ratio (the first time I've actually done that without being forced into it). It felt really good, probably because we were running about 2 min/mile slower than my normal but there seemed to be less pounding regardless. I may have to start doing that more often but that does make for a really long day 2:51 to do 16 miles (not including stops). But on the up side, I did 16 miles!!!

Off to see LW's quilts that are on sale at a charity event.

Peace all,
Les