Cheryl Katz

It wasn’t a hundred bazillion degrees in my house today, so I also cooked a pretty awesome dinner.  I made a pan-fried salmon with chard and onions and seared polenta cake, all topped with an orange-mustard sauce.  I’m pretty modest about my cooking, but I sort of blew myself away on this one.

Most amazingly, it didn’t take all that long to make.  My one cheat was that I started with pre-cooked store bought polenta in a roll.  I spied it while I was at the market picking up fish, and since I hadn’t actually thought out my meal plan, it struck me as a simple element to finish up the salmon and chard.  Oh, but this was one of my favorite cooking experiments of late, and I was probably only actively cooking for about half an hour, plus a separate 15 minutes to decide on what to put in, and then to make, the sauce.  It wasn’t a Julia Child recipe, in that I didn’t use a recipe at all, but I’m pretty sure I did her proud.

The best thing was being able to use butter, since I was cooking fish.  I can’t use butter with meat and still be kosher.

Like I said, it was a thoroughly reasonable temperature outside today.  In fact, it was so downright comfortable that if the weather holds, I may go for a lengthy run tomorrow morning.

I am technically training for the Las Vegas Rock ‘n’ Roll Marathon on December 6th, but I have some challenges.  I’m a few weeks behind where I should be in training owing to 1) having taken the month of August almost completely off and 2) trying to avoid running when it is too hot and sunny out.  Now that the temperature is taking a nose dive, I may be able to get somewhat vaguely reasonably on track.  If I get up to a 19-mile training run at least 2 weeks before the marathon, I will consider myself prepared to run it.  I’ll be able to finish, even if I don’t finish fast.  If I don’t get to 19 miles, I will scale back to the half marathon, which I already know I’d be ready for.

Until recently, I had a never-say-die attitude about this marathon, but the cloud of potential injury is hanging over my head, so I am somewhat forced to accept reality.  I’m sticking to a reasonable training program and also getting all my practical responsibilities covered, and so what will be, will be in this case.

In other miraculous news, Sami napped yesterday.  Not for super long, maybe 45 minutes, but the new leaf in this story is that I told her:  you don’t have to sleep, but you do have to rest quietly.  Every time I come in here and you are not trying to rest, I am taking a toy away.

Toy #1 she thought was a joke.  Toy #2 she stood at her door crying, “My toys… my toys!” for about 15 minutes.  Toy #3, she threw a raging tantrum, and Toy #4 resulted in actual attempts at resting quietly.  I didn’t hold my breath, but when I checked on her about 20 minutes later, she was out cold.

Huzzah!  I found my method!  I know it worked because Mel, who watched her while Ben and I went to Yom Kippur concluding services last night, told me the following story.  She asked Sami to start picking up toys from her bed and the floor to put them away.  Sami flung toys one by one onto the floor, adding dramatically, “It doesn’t matter.  I’m bad, so mommy’s going to take them away anyway.”

I was guilt-ridden for about 30 seconds before I realized… that meant it worked.

Who says an old mom can’t learn a new trick or two?

I’ve registered for the full-length Rock ‘n’ Roll Marathon in Las Vegas, December 6.

My training is flagging a little bit due to the exhaustion of being with Sami all day, every day, but also for other reasons.  First, it’s hard to find the time to run, since any time she’s strapped into the stroller she is the opposite of burning off her daily energy stockpile.  Thus making napping dubious.  This is a problem for me.

The bigger problem is that running with 50+ lbs of stroller is just unpredictably hard.  It changes my posture to place more strain on my lower back.  Only one arm can be swinging at a time, which throws my balance slightly off.  It’s harder, and so I get less speed payoff for my perceived exertion.  I overheat faster.

As I’m learning with just about everything one does at home full time with a kid, it’s JUST HARDER.  I’m making strides at taking it easy, not worrying too much about mileage on my short-run days and just getting my 45 minutes in, but darn is it hard.  So hard that when I stopped for a few moments yesterday, I experienced firsthand why you’re not supposed to go from high exertion to no exertion.  I got lightheaded and a little nauseated, had to lie down and kick my legs to raise my heart rate a little, and once recovered I noted that I shall never do that again.

When Sami goes back to school, I’ll have 3 months in which I can actually focus on my training, and I plan to make excellent use of them.  Maybe all this stroller-pushing cardio will give me added strength which I can parlay into speed and stamina later.  Here’s hoping.

Tomorrow we’re going to a hilly place, where I very likely won’t be able to maintain a run even half the time because of the weight of the stroller.  The workout should be worth it, and it’ll be a 5-miler, so a worthy endeavor.  And we shall just not speak of my speed, until such time as I can get back to running solo.

My body has quit its most strenuous complaints against general motion, and today I got off my bum and ran an easy 3.1 miles.  Way better average time than in the half, OR in the first 3 miles of the half, go figure, on an equally hilly course.  Guess that’s what a good night’s sleep will do for you.

Clearly, it’s back to the grind.  Having picked up and gone back to running actually has helped to ease tension and relax me, and in the heat following my jog I stretched well.

And now that I’m not substantially increasing mileage for the forseeable future (there might be a marathon ahead, and DEFINITELY another half, but not for a little while) I am shifting priorities for a while back to overall fitness with an eye toward weight loss.  Who knows, maybe running a half marathon 5 pounds lighter will make that much difference in my time and energy level.  Never can tell until I try.

I’m coasting on the “Holy crap I did it!!!” sentiment.  I’m now further chuffed having dragged my sorry butt on a run I didn’t feel particularly inclined to do until it was already under way, and really proud of how good I feel RIGHT NOW.

Taking full advantage of the endorphin boost, I’m counting calories again, I am completely ditching my “chocolate for lunch” attitude of the last few weeks, and I’m gearing up to be cooking a lot – hot kitchen be damned!  I have a very interesting food project on the horizon which you will be hearing about in due time (sooner rather than later, I hope.)

Right now, I’m scanning my to-do list (yes, I have one!) and seeing that I need to get busy.  Daily grind, here I come.

It’s been a few days, but pushing myself through the dreaded 11-miler of doom has done wondersof ro my motivation and my personal investment in running.

So here’s an epiphany.  If I can take myself from the absolute lowest morass of ill-motivation and funk, and push out not just the longest run I’ve ever done in my life, but actually beat my intended mileage by .56 miles, then why do I doubt myself?  What was the worst end I could have come to on my intended run?  I run out of steam and walk home?  I call Ben or a friend and get a ride?  I lose nothing, gain however long I made the run, and can still try again next time.

Staring up from the foot of a mountain is no excuse for not doing my best to climb it, one step at a time.  I never thought I’d run more than 5 miles in my life, if you asked me a year ago, I’d have told you the very idea was ridiculous.  And yet here I am, 11.56 miles down, then another 3.8 miles down; I’m not as thin or as fast as I thought I’d be by now, but hey, I chose to prioritize athletic ability over my weight or appearance, and I’m still not doing so shabby.

Mountains come in all shapes and sizes, and today a new one cropped into view that I never saw coming.  Sami told me she thought it was her fault that Alex died, because of the time Sami jumped onto Alex out of a chair.

I didn’t laugh at her.  She didn’t seem to think it was funny, although she also didn’t seem to feel terrible about what she’d just said.

“It was scary when you landed on her belly, wasn’t it?”

“Yeah,” she said. “And then her bum was broken, and she went to the doctor.”

We’d been avoiding telling her that Alex was “sick” or that she’d gone “to the doctor” because we didn’t want to create any exaggerated impressions of what those things mean.  When Alex died, we told Sami that Alex’s body got broken and no one could make her better.  We didn’t even use euphemisms for the death part, we’d just said, “She died, and we can’t see her any more.”

“But you didn’t make Alex broken.  We were scared, but everyone was ok.”  Shit.  I don’t know why she would have linked the jumping incident with Alex’s death – those were months apart.  I really didn’t know what to say.  I settled for reiterating that her jumping on Alex had nothing to do with what made Alex die.

Sami seemed satisfied, if not convinced.  She’s remembering way more than I would have expected her to, and that alone is fine.  She doesn’t seem sad or concerned about the connections she’s making, so that, also, is fine for now.  I just didn’t expect her to make connections between memories that were unrelated, and I never, never expected her to somehow assume responsibility for Alex dying.

If I could run 11 miles and make this sinking feeling go away, I absolutely would.  Haha, 11 miles in the face of tangible desire NOT to run it proves that I can do pretty much anything if it’s up to me.  I can’t change the way my kid thinks and feels, though.  And that, to say the least, is a bummer.

I am staring down the opposite of motivation – three hours and counting until I plan to gear up and head out for the 11-mile run I was supposed to complete two weeks ago.

The physical challenge is nothing compared to overcoming the giant, nebulous mental hurdle I’ve conjured up right in my way.  Sure, it’s hot now.  It’ll probably still be hot at 6 pm, though not quite as much as now.  I’m not physically exhausted, my knees don’t hurt, and yet I am easily able to think myself into these conditions because the truth is that in my heart of hearts, I kind of don’t want to go.

I’m going to do it, because I paid to be in a half marathon and by George, I’m going to run that blasted 13.1 miles.  I need to run this 11 so that I can run 12.5 miles two weeks from now and finish the half on 7/26.

That doesn’t make facing down my lack of motivation easier.  In fact, its compulsory nature makes me feel more rebellious against it.

I’m going to now focus on trying to get to that euphoric state, the one that  comes up about a half hour in.  If I mentally ignore the part where I start the run and skip to the  athletic bliss and then the satisfaction of completion….  well, that almost worked.

I have three hours to play mind tricks on myself.  Here goes.

I ran the Capitol  yesterday.

Running from our digs on the Hill around the Capitol building itself and then all the way down and across the Mall and up to the White House fence… was at the same time exactly like running any other nine mile run and unlike any experience I’ve ever had.

I weaved in and out between small throngs of tourists.  I say that as if I were a native, and I sort of felt like one – at least the Capitol area seemed to make sense, I had a vaguely intuitive understanding of where I was going based on a rough running plan mapped out before I left, and the buildings were all so big and gravely important.

I imagined it was something like running in ancient Greece.  The horizon in all directions was large, classically styled and built of very large stones, and dwarfed completely the pedestrian schlepping we all were doing.  These buildings have been around for lifetimes, and will last for many more.  They’re styled to keep us mindful of principles thousands of years old.

The scenery didn’t successfully keep my mind off my physical condition, however.  I wound up slightly prematurely exhausted in the 86 degree afternoon, with a knee that felt on the verge of injury.  We’d gone out for breakfast and ended up walking about 3 miles that morning, which I never should have done before a long run.

It should have been an 11 mile run, but I had to lop off the last 2 miles lest I drop from exhaustion in a strange city.  Given the heat, the jet lag, the lack of proper rest and my knee, I’m giving myself a pass and repeating the 11 miler back in San Diego in two weeks.

And resting.  I’ll get back in the saddle soon enough.  9 miles is still pretty long, and I need to feel recovered.

I made these lemon bars this weekend and they were amazing.

I went to IKEA today, and I hope that someone will remind me next time that whenever I go I want to stab out my eyes with one of their stylishly designed carving forks.  I went in looking for kitchen shelves.  They were out of stock.  I also spied a new set of dishes, but decided to wait for Ben’s approval since he’s expressed that he’d like to be included in some domestic matters; and I observed a few options for kitchen island/cart ideas that might work for additional baking surface space that I have found myself desperately needing.

I left, however, having purchased nothing.  The process of navigating the store was so frustrating (normally I go with the flow of their floor plan, but today I had objectives, people, ‘kay?) on a day when  I just wanted to be in and out.  No such luck.

My schedule this week and weekend sort of necessitate that I move up my running schedule by a day, so I need to squeeze in 30 minutes of running that I otherwise would do tomorrow.  I’ll probably also move Thursday up to Wednesday and somehow squeeze in an extra run day this week.

In running news, I did a series of hill intervals on Thursday, rested Friday and Saturday, and when I did my Sunday run (3 miles, it’s a rest week) I was not just measurably but palpably faster.  On the order of a whole minute per mile.  It was much cooler than it had been on previous recent runs, and also a shorter run, so these are also factors, but it is nice to see some results – theories in action, I love it!

That’s about all the news that’s fit to print today, so far.

I think I’ve figured out what my body is doing here.

I’m building muscle mass, check.  I’m gaining a little weight, check.  I’m starting to look slimmer… not check.

I think what’s happening is that I’m building muscle, which is well and good, except that it’s pushing all my fat OUT.  I’m sure with time I’ll work it all down and lean muscle mass will rule the day (my long runs are around 8 miles now; when we’re talking 12 or 14 miles, we’ll talk again.)  I just need to hang in there.

Sadly, weight loss nutrition and sports nutrition are somewhat at odds with each other.  Fueling an intense run requires eating in quantities and composition things that from a weight loss perspective I am not inclined to consume.  I need to find a balance so that I can adequately fuel my run, develop longer and longer endurance, but also avoid overfueling and building fat stores rather than depleting them.

Damn, but I wish I were better at this nutrition thing.  In any case, I’m trying to relax.  I’m trying to look at these small gains not as setbacks but as the implementation of a new paradigm, new goals with new priorities.  Maybe I will never actually hit my weight loss goal, but if one day I can maintain an 8 minute mile, will it feel worth it?

I don’t know yet.  I’ll let you know when I get there.