Happy Halloween!

This morning started out with a BIG bowl of punkin nanner oats.

My oats were topped with some almond butter and a handful of PB puffins, accompanied by coffee of course.  I needed to run 10 miles this morning so I needed a substantial breakfast.  When I have plenty of time on a long run day, I really like to eat a good breakfast then wait about two hours and then run.  On race days I typically eat less because I don’t have two hours to laze about.

My ten miles went great!…better than my 8 miles or my 9 miles.  The only real problem with any of my runs is that where our condo is situated in the city, it is virtually impossible to avoid a long run up a big hill on the stretch back.  I felt really good on mile 9 but the one mile run up a never-ending hill really tired me out.  Overall I feel pretty confident about my half marathon coming up, however I’m not being very astringent about my time.

After I got back Brad and I showered expecting to try the new sushi place on the same block as our building.  We were really sad to see it was closed.  So, we walked a few more blocks to try another new sushi place….also closed.  At this point I was ravenous and my legs were pretty tight despite stretching them well after my run.  Thankfully the sushi place in Brad’s office building (Room 112) was open and our sushi craving was satisfied.

Here is our sushi feast for two.  I ate all six pieces of the nigiri.  From left to right is tuna nigiri, salmon nigiri, and eel nigiri.  I also had two tastes of the rolls: one of the spider roll, which is on the right on the back row, and one of the spicy tuna, which is on the left on the back row.  To be honest, it was okay.  It cured our sushi craving but it wasn’t the best sushi I had ever had, although the eel was pretty good (my favorite).

After lunch we spent the rest of the afternoon at the Salvation Army looking for Brad’s Halloween costume.  I’m going as a flapper and he is going as Charlie Chaplin.  I think both of our costumes look pretty great.  I also went to TJ’s for some grocery shopping (and a bit of snacking) while Brad went by Target to complete his outfit.  Pictures soon to come!

After arriving home, I folded laundry and then made myself some dinner.  The sushi I had didn’t really hold me over very long, but I was afraid to eat too much as I often do when I’m ravenous, so I saved my appetite for later.

Dinner was humus and lite jarlsburg on TJ’s OWN SPROUTED WHEAT BREAD!!!  Is this new?  I’ve never seen it before.  Usually I go back and forth between Ezekiel and Nature’s Own Whole Wheat Bread, but I really loved TJ’s version of sprouted wheat.  It was much softer than Ezekiel’s.  I think it’s a keeper.

To go along with my sandwich, I had a salad of spinach, cherry tomatoes, cukes, and slivered almonds.  I also had some green goddess dressing on the side.  It was much too thick so I added a little apple cider vinegar.  I often find that all salad dressings besides vinaigrette are too thick but I wish I had a better way to dilute them without increasing the flavor of the vinegar so much.  If you have any ideas or methods for doing this, I would love to hear about them!

Now I’m off to get ready for Halloween.  There is a party in our building thrown for all the residents and then we’ll probably go out to a restaurant/tavern/bar afterwords.

Happy Halloween!

 

Rascal is a minimalist and a gentleman

Rascal would like to show you his Halloween costume.

He’s quite the exhibitionist.  The bow tie is actually part of the devil accessories package I bought to make my devilled egg costume.  He loves his collars so we thought we would try the bow tie.  It’s been about 12 hours and he’s still wearing it.  🙂

Hiatus

I’ve been on a bit of a hiatus here for the past two days.  Work is all-consuming and when I have plans with friends in the evening I have learned that this leaves me little or no time to blog about my eats.  This is probably going to be a pattern from Thursdays and most Fridays as well.

Thursday morning breakfast was pumpkin almond butter yogurt.

I made it with TJ’s organic french vanilla yogurt.  I love Greek the most, but pumpkin is completely un-sweet so it really needs something to counterbalance that.  Of course it was packaged in plastic for the ride to work.

Lunch and snacks were just so-so…nothing to be excited about, which might have the underlying root of the problem I had on Thursday, which involved finishing off my Halloween candy bowl.  Snacks were an apple and nut mix, 2 kiwis and a light string cheese, and for lunch a salad with shrimp, avocado, spinach, and cherry heirloom tomatoes.  For some reason, salads always are delicious at home, but just taste kind of bland at work.  I have no idea why – this should have been a great salad in theory, but for some reason just didn’t work for me that day.  In lieu of the 6-7 Mars minis I had, I forgoed the kiwi, but that was the only thing I skipped.

Thursday nights are always really fun.  That is the night I run with my running group.  It is a really large group of people (we usually average anywhere from 35  people on a slow night to 50 on a good night).  They are really into themed runs and this week was the Halloween run.  Costumes were anywhere from low-key (like mine) to completely outrageous (like the guy who had stuffed cats attached all over him to look like he was being attacked by them) as you can see below…

Our run always begins and ends at this little eclectic market called The Common Market.  After the four mile run, which includes some killer hills, we hang out there, grab a beer, and maybe a sandwich.

From this picture of Brad and I (who didn’t have time to come up with a costume), you might thing I went as a devil.  But you are wrong… (Please note that all but two of the bottles on the table were left there by previous patrons. 🙂 )

I was actually a devilled egg!

My yoke was looking a bit tattered by this point.  My friend Brittany pictured here with me, was a pilot.  She actually was Pilot Sully Sullenburger, which you can see is on her photo ID if you look closely. Josie, however, was indeed a devil.

As for my eats this evening…I had a huge snack when I got home consisting of a banana, lots of PB, half a pita, and a small ramekin of cereal.  I was out of control.  Then when I got home, the sweet tooth had not subsided and I had one more piece of gingerbread with a bit of frozen yogurt blend.  At running group I had two beers, the Blue Moon winter seasonal and some other domestic light beer (can’t remember now)…not a very balanced evening for food.

Thursdays are one of my favorite nights of the week because of the really fun people we run with and also because of the accountability of the running group.  I know people are expecting me to be there, just as I expect them to be there, so it is something I never back out of, unless I have a really good reason.  Sometimes I prefer to work out by myself, but there’s just something about working out with other people who makes fitness more fun.

What about you, do you enjoy exercising in a big group or with one other person?  Which do you do most of the time?