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Elephants Squared
Last Friday, I had dinner at Blue Elephant Royal Thai Cuisine and followed my meal with the movie, Water for Elephants. It wasn’t intentional – but I think I am drawn to elephants. I have a small collection of them at home. (Weird, but true.)
My friend and I were looking for redemption Thai – we had a subpar experience a couple of weeks ago. Having heard good things about Blue Elephant, we went there and sat down with zero minutes of wait. It’s exactly the right number of minutes.
I had a glass of Sauvignon Blanc to start and we had a couple of appetizers – spring rolls and crab rangoon.
Something I’ve noticed is that spring rolls are like snow flakes – always unique for each Thai restaurant. Blue Elephant’s were definitely unique, but not my style. The rice paper was a little thick and covered in tamarind sauce.
It was my entrée that sang: red curry chicken with bamboo shoots, green peppers, and basil.
The sauce was creamy and gently spicy, and I was satisfied with the portion of meat and the extra vegetables. It was so good that I could have finished it but the portion was generous and made for a great lunch a couple of days later.
We were having such a good time when we realized there was ten minutes until the movie started. Our sweet waitress was fast and understanding about the check and bagging up our leftovers. We made it to our seats right as the last preview ended.
I had read Water for Elephants a year ago, which is enough time for me to forget major plot details so that I’m not comparing and contrasting too much. I love Reese Witherspoon, but dislike Robert Pattinson – yet neither one of them impressed nor dismayed me. The villain circus ringleader (yes, the villain circus ringleader), played by Christoph Waltz, blew them both out of the water. Overall, I liked the movie, but the animal abuse is as hard to watch as an ASPCA commercial.
Did anyone else catch this movie? What did you think?
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Lincoln Half Marathon recap
This weekend I completed the Lincoln Half Marathon – it’s my 8th half marathon, and my 18th race. As you may remember, I was coming off an abysmal race at the Go! St. Louis Half three weeks ago.
I think at the Go! Race, everything that could have gone wrong did – whereas at the Lincoln Half, everything seemed to go smoothly.
Race congestion was one thing I didn’t mention in my last post – I think I take it for granted how packed the St. Louis half is. The St. Louis half had 6,000 more people in the half marathon alone, and not enough space on the race course to accommodate us. At the start, I was packed in so closely that I could not kneel to adjust my shoelaces.
The Lincoln Half was a breath of fresh air in that and many other respects, and I did not need to weave in and out of people. My Garmin reflected that too, since it told me I ran 13.17 miles – damn close to the measured course.
I’m getting ahead of myself!
Let me back up. My parents live in Lincoln Nebraska, and were planning to walk the Lincoln Half, so I decided to join them.
The morning’s weather was fantastic for an endurance event – it was going to be about 50 degrees. (I often remind people that they have actually done studies to determine the ideal distance running weather – and most of them say about 50 degrees.)
Anyway, a picture says a thousand words, so here are my splits:
Around the 6 or 7 mile mark, I was pacing with the marathon 3:55 group. I thought if I could keep up with them, I could PR. But they took off quickly and I wasn’t able to keep up. However, if I hadn’t stopped for a potty break at mile 4 or fussed with my shirt during mile 11, maybe I could have… Coulda, Woulda.
The end of the race was really fun – it was on the football field – the place is kind of a big deal in Nebraska.
While waiting for my parents to finish, I got a massage. A reporter from the local paper ended up taking a picture, and putting it in the paper. Here it is:
In conclusion, it was an awesome race and I had a great time. Congrats to Mom & Dad for doing so well in their races and finishing strong!! They really had a blast and I think they understand my race addiction a little bit better – in fact, I think they are getting the bug, too.
What’s next? Well, I don’t like that I have done 8 halfs (halves?)… if I do 2 more, I’ll have 10 in the bank by the end of the year. I just need to find a couple
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How to Obtain a Personal Worst
Hello! I can hardly believe how long it’s been since I’ve updated. I have been keeping myself busy by:
- Lurking on other people’s blogs
- Watching HGTV
- Staring at my cuticles and split ends
As you can see, hardly enough time to blog! Well, I am still very, very busy doing those above things, but I have too much advice to share to just let myself sit idly — I mean, busily.
You see, I am now the proud owner of a new personal worst in the half marathon. So many people have been asking me how to get their very own personal worst that I figured the best thing would be to write a blog post about it. That way I don’t have to repeat myself too many times.
Now, I don’t think you can pick and choose circumstances leading up to a personal worst. It really is a culmination of factors that leads to a breakthrough of this kind. However, if I don’t write out the factors in a numbered list,
- People will stop reading and go read other blogs with numbered lists.
- In fact, it’s a miracle if anyone has read anything before this numbered list.
Without further ado, here is how you too can achieve a personal worst.
- Pray to the weather gods for weather about 20 degrees warmer than what you’ve trained in, with extra humidity.
- Do not, under any circumstances, attempt to train in warmer, outdoor weather in an attempt to acclimate to increased temperatures. Stay inside and train in your comfortable basement on your treadmill.
- Blow off training runs in the month leading up to the race. You can do this. It’s your seventh half marathon after all. 13.1 miles is NBD.
- Screw around with your diet during your training period. Go on Paleo diet. Go off it. Go on it a week before the race. Go back off it the day before your race, in an attempt to carbo-load. Your GI system will be fine. If you wake up at 4 in the morning on race day and your stomach loudly revolts to this idea, don’t worry about it.
If you are lucky, these steps will lead to the following results:
- A very hot, humid day to have an endurance event
- Being graced with the presence of several thousand other people pushing fluids and needing to use ALL port-o-potties on the race due to their extra hydration and/or sympathy pains
- Needing to stop at almost every rest stop on the race yourself and wait in a long line for your spot in heaven
- Being unable to keep a good pace due to your stomach issues, and due to the periods of waiting in line, and the glorious heat
- If you are really lucky, you will get something called “cheek on cheek action“
- The crowning achievement of a personal worst 13 minutes slower than your last personal worst.
Thank me now or thank me later.
So, that concludes my race recap of the Go! St. Louis Half Marathon 2011. I am not sure I will ever run this event again, and instead, am considering only participating in endurance events in Canada. I am also not sure I will ever speak again without laying the sarcasm very heavily.
The good news here is that I have another opportunity for a personal worst at the Lincoln Half Marathon in a few weeks. A very optimistic person reminded me that my St. Louis half experience could serve as a good training run for that half. I really don’t know if I have it in me to do another personal worst but I will try my best.
But seriously - I think I know what I need to do. Nothing in the above lists.
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An update
Time is really getting away from me and I hadn’t realized it had been so long since I updated here!
The half marathon training is going ok. I had an awesome 10 mile run last time I wrote, and I should have knocked on wood because I struggled to maintain that pace for a 6 mile run this last weekend. Typical.
This Monday I had an assessment with a personal trainer. I did this for a couple of reasons: 1) To find out my body fat % and 2) To see if signing up with a trainer would help me reach my goals and reinforce accountability.
I found out a few things:
- personal trainers are really expensive, and I feel guilty for spending this much on myself
- that my body fat was lower than I expected, but I don’t think it’s accurate because they tested me on a body fat scale that looked like this. Here’s an article on why Consumer Reports doesn’t think these kinds of scales are accurate. The problem is, how does a regular person like me (who basically wants to spend next to nothing to get this info) get their body fat tested accurately?
- personal trainers are probably used to training people that know hardly anything about food/nutrition. She asked me if I had ever had a sweet potato.
- I can do 22 regular pushups before needing to stop. She actually said it was “excellent”. I’ll take it! :)
The next time I meet with her, I get an actual workout. The appointment I had on Monday was mostly talking. Once a week, I’m going to see her to check in on my progress and get a workout. Hopefully this will keep me motivated, however I haven’t really been doing that awesome yet.
As I texted my friend last night, “I’m really bad at dieting, but really good at eating Ben & Jerry’s.”
Speaking of health numbers, yesterday I got my cholesterol checked and was glad to hear it’s normal. About 6 years ago, when I was in law school, my cholesterol was 215, which is considered “borderline high.” Read here to learn more about cholesterol numbers. At the time, I was not overweight, but I exercised only sporadically, was usually stressed out to high heavens, didn’t eat that well, and a genetic predisposition to high cholesterol made my lifestyle a problem.
Now, I exercise 3-4 times a week and think that I eat better (but definitely far from perfect). The last time I had my cholesterol checked a few years ago, it was right around 180.
But, I was especially interested to see how my cholesterol fared because since the beginning of December, I have been playing around with Paleo and Primal eating. That means eating more meat (including red meat), lots of eggs, and other animal protein, and eating sources of saturated fat while avoiding wheat, soy, and any grains (which sounds like a recipe for high cholesterol). Oh yeah, and I’ve cooked and eaten more bacon in the last couple of months that I probably have in, well, EVER. Frankly, I was a little worried about how that would affect my cholesterol.
But – good news. My cholesterol as of yesterday is 185. My good cholesterol is 95 (which is excellent) and my bad is 80 (which isn’t awesome, but according to this calculator, it’s in the optimal range). I’ve been reading that saturated fat is not necessarily evil, and I’m starting to believe it. I definitely plan to continue to check on my cholesterol and make sure I’m doing okay. I wonder if there is a way to do this without going to my doctor? Anyone know?
So… Questions for you readers:
* Does it surprise you that all saturated fats may not be as bad as we think?
* Do you know your body fat %? Do you think it even matters?
Thanks for reading! Even if you disagree with me, I hope you got some food for thought here!
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Sage and Apple Pork Loin (and other things)
I don’t even like Justin Bieber.
But I thought it was funny at the time.
My friend Tabitha had her 30th birthday at Fast Eddie’s (HAPPY BIRTHDAY TAB!) and when I looked at my neck the next day, it was a lot less funny. Thankfully, the tattoo came off easily with makeup remover. FYI.
St. Louis weather has been awesome. Last night Mark and I grilled outdoors.
We kind of winged it and made Sage and apple pork loin with asparagus.
First, I marinated the pork for about an hour and a half (not very long, I know) in apple juice, spices (sage + garlic + salt and pepper), and cider vinegar.
Then Mark did his thing on the grill.
Meanwhile, I chopped up one braeburn apple and an onion. I chopped the onion very finely – nearly a mince – and added it to a pan with oil. Then I added sage and thyme. The spices filled the air.
After the onion had cooked for 3-5 minutes (and was just brown), I added the apple. I cooked it for another 5+ minutes. I didn’t want the apples too soft, but also not too crisp.
Voila.
Mark asked me if I used a recipe to come up with this, and I didn’t. I initially came up with the recipe when I saw a spice packet for “sage and apple pork chops” and I thought – I don’t need a spice packet, I have that stuff at home. Lots of times when I cook things, I check around to see if there is anything like it to get a sense of what flavors will work together or if I’m off my rocker. Or, I get some inspiration from something I saw in a cooking magazine, cooking show, or of course, a blog.
I found a lot of recipes that involved apple, sage, and thyme and just hoped for the best. A lot of them were stuffed pork loin or pork chops and I just didn’t feel like stuffing them.
Brag time
This weekend I had one of the best long runs in a long time. 10 miles on the treadmill in 88 minutes. This is a lot faster than I normally run – usually I do around 9:20-9:30 minute miles for my long runs. In fact, it felt easy and I kept bumping up my speed and incline at the end to make it more challenging. This is crazy but I must be doing something right! I think part of it is that I have really been pushing myself speed-wise. I will just bottle this feeling and try to remember it when I have a bad run.
Now I’m off to the Tivoli to watch Oscar nominated animated shorts. See ya!
About Me
My name is Michelle and I like to write about running, food, and fitness in general. Check out my About Michelle section for more!
