For a few hours last night, I was wrestling around with some pretty horrible thoughts last night.

• I have been slacking off on my calorie watching and am still losing weight, so I’m going to eat whatever I want tonight and not worry about it.
• And even if I did gain weight, it happens to everyone, and I haven’t had a gain yet.  What’s it going to hurt?

Dinner last night was pretty bad (KFC, ’nuff said, right?)

Do I feel okay with this weigh in, since this is my first gain in 10 weeks.  F*ck no!  What’s it going to hurt?  About 3 weeks of progress.

I got cocky, and now, not only do I feel crappy and run down because I still a crap load of food flowing around in my system (ate pretty late too), but I feel like an idiot for trying to justify and rationalize it.  Thought’s like that are what let me got up to 265 pounds in the first place.

With that said, I am going into this week with a renewed vigor.  Despite this gain, I want to set my sets on getting down into the 230’s by year end.  I would LOVE to be at 235, but I will be okay with the 230s.

Have a good day, everyone, and stay away from KFC.

We did it.

We pushed ourselves to our limits and beyond.  We braved the cold, we ignored the pain, we cursed (or at least I did), and we did it.

The Marathon Week Challenge. Is. Over.

WooT

The results:

• Myself: 40.09 miles completed
• Kate: 26.9 miles completed
• Karyn: 26.44 miles completed
• Jessie: 26.21 miles completed
• Craig: 20 miles completed
• JetJaguar: 18.19 miles completed
• Ron: 14.23 miles completed
• 46and2: 2 miles completed

Everyone did a FANTASTIC job, but extra special kudos go out to the lovely Kate, Karyn, and Jessie, who completed the 26.2 miles with all sorts of awesome. I would also like to call out Craig, who whined said (jus’ kidding ) REPEATEDLY that he wasn’t ready for the challenge.  Yeah, 20 miles isn’t anything to scoff at my friend, you TORE IT UP!

So once again, congratulations everyone!  You’ve succeeded at a pretty lofty goal, and have given myself and countless others further motivation for our journeys.

Ya’ll ROCK!

There will be more challenges, that is pretty much a given.  This was an awesome experience and I beamed with pride every morning I logged in and saw the total miles increase. I just don’t know what those challenges are yet, hehe.

In the meantime, if you are starting a challenge (and if you aren’t, you should! It’s awesome) lemme know and I’ll sign right up!  Or if you have a challenge idea for me, feel free to hit me up.

Have an awesome day everyone.  Nurse your sore legs, sit back and relax, and savor your victory.

WooT

Yeah yeah, woohoo, or some sh*t like that…basically, that weight loss is from my hair cut (it was ALOT of hair).

SEE?!

I’m really conflicted this week about that reading.  I was worried that I wasn’t going to lose anything this week, because my scale has basically been hovering between 245 and 248 the entire time.

But then I lost, so thats cool and all…but…half a pound (.6 to exact)?  COME ON!  I am glad I lost, and I know that ANY loss is a good loss, but COME ON!  I’ve been working my ass off this week…WTF!

I can’t claim total ignorance for this though, as much as I’d like to try (or blame ninjas).  The diet’s been a little off, and I haven’t been tracking my food (like I haven’t been doing for a while, but say that I’m going to start, then don’t…ugh) like I want to be.  I don’t feel my diet has been as off as Thanksgiving week, but whatever…my body is a mystery.

Regardless, I still lost, so I guess it is WooTworthy.  Scale, you better be nicer to be next week, or I’m gonna be so mad at you!

In OTHER news…

Today is the F I N A L day for Marathon Week!  The technical difficulties (ie..me being a dumbass) are over and done with, so WooT to that, and everyone is posting AMAZING NUMBERS!  So far Jessie and I are finished (but I bumped my goal up to 40 miles, so I still have a bit to go), and most everyone else are coming into the home stretch.

WAY. TO. GO!!!11!!!1!

I know everyone is probably hurting right (at least, I know I am), but we are almost done, and everyone is SOOOOOOO close!

I like these challenges, and I know I will be doing more in the future, just not 100% sure what.  If anyone has any ideas, that’d be cool…OR…if anyone is starting up their own challenge, lemme know and I’ll be right there to join ya!

Have a WooT day, everyone!

I now return you to your regularly scheduled programming…

We are in Day 4 of the Marathon Week Challenge…

…and I am “finished”…

…WooT.

Yesterday I wanted to have 15 miles completed, which happened. WooT!  When I got up this morning wanting to walk or (attempt to) jog outside, and part of me wanted to see if I could FINISH the challenge today.  So I set a course in Google Maps, neglected to check the weather, updated my iPod library, and set out…

The original intention was to go from Point F (originally Point A) which is my apartment complex, to Point B, which is about where my office is located. I was going to take a indirect route that went through a few neighborhoods and went around the mall.  Once I got to Point B I would turn around retrace the exact same route.  It would have come to 9.4 miles total (4.7 miles each way).  Once I got to Point B though, I decided to keep going. I had a route in mind and thought I’d try that.  I would basically do a loop around a large chunk of town, and then retrace the first part of the path as the last part.

All in all, the new path came to 10.2 miles, which brings me up  to 27.23 miles total for the challenge so far.  I originally thought it was 10.8 (I’m on a roll today stupidity wise, I blame the cold) but there was section on the map that was a bit screwy. It would have been a bit longer, but I skipped going through some neighborhoods because the snow was starting to stick to the sidewalks and it was getting slick.

Speaking of the snow…

…when I left the house at 7:17 this morning it was lightly raining, with maybe a little itty bitty bit of sleet.  Manageable, in my opinion.  About 15 minutes past point B, it started coming down harder, and as actual snow.  By point D my hoodie was soaked, my shoes and socks were soaked, my hands were numb, overall not pretty.  About halfway between Point D and Point E the snow started sticking to the sidewalks, which were starting to become slick.  Thats when I decided to bypass part of the path and go home.

Another one of my original intentions was to do a decent amount of jogging during this trip.  I’ve had issues with this before, where I didn’t feel comfortable trying to run or jog outside because I didn’t want to be seen doing it.  I have images of my fat and sweat flying everywhere, and it’s not pretty.  I decided I was bundled up enough today to make that non issue (and to keep most things in place) so I thought I’d try it.  Unfortunately I only jogged about .6 miles of this whole thing, the rest was walking.  I’m just going to go ahead and throw my excuses for why I didn’t jog out there now: My legs were, my feet hurt, the weather sucked, and I didn’t feel like it.  Yeah, it was kind of lazy of me, but I still completed over 10 miles today, that isn’t exactly anything to scoff at, in my opinion.

In summary, here are some of the highlights and lowlights from my walk today:

• Highlight: Got to explore some of the (really nice) neighborhoods around me, that I didn’t really even know existed before.
• Highlight: Ran into a group of joggers when I was going around the mall, WooT to them.
• Highlight: Crossed the friendliest bridge ever.
• Highlight: Completed my goal with time to spare, and am going go try to push myself even farther.
• Highlight: Got a decent workout in and was able get out of the gym for a bit.
• Highlight: Once the snow started coming down I had some really pretty scenary to walk through.
• Lowlight: Slipped on a metal grate and almost fell on my ass.
• Lowlight: Walked past a dead deer
• Lowlight: Had to keep crossing a busy street because the sidewalk on the side I was on kept ending, and there wasn’t enough shoulder to walk on.
• Lowlight: My shoes, socks, clothes were soaked by the time I was done.
• Lowlight: Yeah, I got out of the gym for a bit, but I probably could have picked a nicer day to do it.

So my personal leg of the Marathon Week Challenge is over…kinda.  I’ve decided to bump my personal goal up to 40 miles for this week.  I was thinking of making it a True Double Jeopardy and doubling the goal (making it 52.4 miles), but I’m not sure thats attainable, which means I’ll probably end up making that a challenge for myself in the next few weeks..HA!  So the challenge is still on, and there are still plenty of great people who are working very hard this week.  I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, I am SO PROUD OF EVERYONE and we all still need your support.

Hope you have a great weekend.

We are in Day 3 of the Marathon Week Challenge, and everyone is doing awesome!!!  I’m starting Day 3 with 11.35 miles under my belt, and I’m hoping to have completed 15 miles by the end of today.  That means it would have taken me three days to accomplish what it took a week to do in Week 6. WooT.

And my legs?  They be sore, but its a good sore.  It the soreness of success (or something…)

The following people are also blogging a bit about the torture challenge.  You should go and cheer them on directly!

• Jessie - Who is doing MY challenge AND a 30Day Shred Challenge.  She be crazy, but in a good crazy way :-P
• Ron – Who is actually venturing out into the real world (and away from the comfort of a treadmill) for his challenge.  This is something I want to do too at some point.
• Karyn - Who is taking on goals like crazy thanks to Hot 100 and C25K, and SUCCEEDING!  I wish I had heard about Hot 100 when I started my journey, thankfully my bubble has expanded a bit since then.
• Craig – Who was doubting himself like crazy but really is kicking ass at this.  Another C25Ker as well…WooT.
• Kate – Who is in my challenge, runs like crazy and is training for a half marathon. WooT.
• John - One of my fellow Fatbloggers.  Hasn’t posted any miles yet or anything about the challenge, but maybe this will give him some motivation.  Best of luck, John!

I think I’ve gotten everyone who has been bloggin’ (or at least has a blog).  If I missed you, let me know and I will add you ASAP.  I also want to give a shout out to the other challenges who may not have a blog.  EVERYONE deserves Kudos for what has been accomplished so far.

That’s all for now (so much for relative quickie though, HA!).  BACK TO WORK (ugh)!  If I get time later I might post again, hopefully with 15+ miles under my belt.

TGIF!