Slacking, shoes, and childcare, oh my!

Oops. I knew this was going to happen. If I got a day job I'd have a hard time finding time to walk...and it has happened. I want a day job, don't get me wrong, but I really need to figure out a way to do some serious walking. I don't know how long this job is going to last but if they offer me something permanent I'm not going to turn it down. Paying the mortgage is kind of important, yanno?

Since kids under 16 aren't allowed on the walk or on officially sponsored training walks, I'll need to find something to do with him when I do those things. His dad is great about stepping up and helping, but he lives far enough away that I feel a bit funny about asking for his help. But childcare is going to be an issue, because I *am* going to do some official training walks.

On the other hand...a note about shoes. I had sneakers I was walking in, and they were comfortable. For about four miles. Then my feet would start to hurt and my legs would start to hurt and my back would start to hurt and my...well, you get the picture. I had planned all along to get some serious walking shoes. Actually, the 3-Day organizers recommend running shoes. They're a little lighter, and the "return" is better. The "return" is the "bounce" that you get from the sole...in other words, more "return" is more of the energy of your stride returned to your leg. It made sense when the shoe store employee explained it.

So anyway, I had been looking at shoes. OhmyGOSH are they expensive. I found a pretty great pair at The Walking Company...for two hundred fifty dollars. Since I'm going to buy two pairs for sure and maybe three, that was just out of the question. Talk about yikes. Well, AWSO and I were walking around Traverse City yesterday, when what do I see but a running store. No, the store wasn't going anywhere, silly. We went inside because I'd been wanting to buy some socks - there are actually special socks for distance walking and running. They're made of a material that pulls the moisture away from your feet, and they're cushioned, which help prevent blisters. Some of them even have arch support, which is something I need.

So, we went into this store so I could look for socks. They actually had socks with pink ribbons embroidered on them, which seemed kind of neat, so I looked for a pair or six in my size. No luck, so I picked up a pair of small ones and went to the counter to ask about a different size. Got to chatting with the person who worked there, and I asked about shoes. Long story short (TOO LATE!!) I walked out of there with a pair of the most comfortable walking shoes I have ever worn. And...get this....NINETY BUCKS. Not only that, but she gave me ten percent off because I am a 3-Day participant.

How cool is that?? Pretty cool, I think :)

Problem child...

I know everybody has bad days sometimes but this was just ridiculous. I cut the walk kind of short this morning because I hadn't had anything to eat beforehand and I started to get a bit dizzy. Eek. So I figured I'd stop by the bakery and get a scone and a coffee and figure out what to do with the day...when I get a call from the babysitter. The sprout is being a major PITA so I had to go get him. Argh. So then I had a day of him trying to argue me into letting him use the computer and his DS, when he knows perfectly well that if I have to pick him up from school or the sitter's because he's misbehaving, those are the first things to go. So...spent the day with a headache and not enough steps. Bleh. I try to be patient but it's just not easy sometimes.

I missed Monday's. Not going to post them; AWSO gets a freebie if I forget to post in here. Gotta say, he walked an amazing amount today. In keeping with his wishes not to make this a competition, I won't post how far he went but he definitely deserves a pat on the back :D <3

Steps: 7421

Slacking off

Kind of a lazy weekend, but it was nice. Didn't really concentrate much on walking at all. Back to the grindstone on Monday, for sure.

Took the kid to the zoo on Friday, which was a good walk. We went a few miles, going around the exhibits. I need to walk outside more, and I will once it's not arctic out there anymore. The 3-Day won't be inside, but it also won't be snowing (please, gods). Walking at the zoo will be a great way to train - there are a few hills and the terrain can be varied, at least when they haven't repaired the paths in a while. Besides, it's nice to see the animals. I could watch those prairie dogs for hours :)

Friday's step count: 10,214

Yay! Made it today!

Well, despite being scolded by a near-total stranger at the mall ("You need to go around once more! Your walking partner would have gone around again!"), I made five figures today, yippeee!!

It's surprising how much you can observe about people just from this kind of interaction. I'm sure he was well-intentioned, but it bugs me. There are a few other people that I am sort of getting to know, too - there's a pair of men that argue politics at the tops of their lungs the whole time they're walking. There's another pair of men that talk hockey the whole time. Wonder what they'll do for the two days between seasons. There's a woman who yaks nonstop about her grandchildren, and a couple who just walk way too fast to even talk. I get smiles and nods from most of these people now, and it's nice.

Steps today: 10,165! Yay!

Actually looking forward to this....

I'm actually looking forward to walking tomorrow. Up till now, it's been mainly a chore, although I do enjoy it while I'm actually doing it, and it feels good all day afterward. I'm seeing actual results now. I don't get sore like I did the first few days. The joints are not protesting nearly as much. I have walking acquaintances at the mall that are noticing I'm walking better, too. I didn't expect this much in the way of results this soon, so it's great.

Took Wednesday off, as usual. Dumb computer went wonky as I was posting Tuesday night's blog, but the step count was 9585. I'm going to do 10K tomorrow if I have to keep walking all day.

Catching up from the weekend

Walked with AWSO at the mall on his side of town on Saturday. No need to post step count for him to match; when we walk together he matches distance instead. Besides, I forgot to look so I don't know what it is.

Sunday was kind of a slow day, at least in the morning. No walking, at least nothing official. I walked around Ann Arbor after meeting some friends, which was great. I was noticing that I walked for blocks and blocks and didn't get tired or footsore. That's a terrific change - it's nice to see improvements like that. I can't really see a difference yet, but I can sure feel one.

Three quick hard laps of my mall today. It's getting nicer outside, so soon it'll be walking outside. Which is a good thing; the 3-Day won't be indoors, so I need to be used to walking outside on different kinds of terrain and in different kinds of weather. This is Michigan, after all; I could experience anything from 30 degrees to 90 degrees when walking at the end of September...anything from rain to snow to brilliant sunshine. And all in one day, most likely.

Step count: 9886 (so close!)
Pounds lost: 6 (10 total!! Yay! Double digits!!)
Inches lost: nothing noticeable this week (.5 total)

Don't know why...

...there's no sun up in the...oh, sorry, got off on a tangent there.

Happy Pi day! (3.14)

No, what I don't know is why I can't seem to get back up to that magic 10,000 step mark. Today's was close, but no banana.

Step count: 9767

Getting there...

Love walking to Gershwin. That five bucks was probably the best I've spent on a CD in a while. "Rhapsody in Blue" and "An American in Paris" together total thirty-four minutes, which is enough for a full lap around the mall and about a quarter of the next.

I'm starting to see results, too. Not just on the scale and the measuring tape, but I *feel* different. I'm not getting as sore after the walks, and my knee is really starting to improve. Five miles is still a challenge. When five miles gets to be a walk in the park, that'll be a milestone. But the "activity-avoidance" mindset I was in for so long is slowly going away. I look forward to situations where I can add a few steps. I don't mind parking at the far end of the lot and walking. It's really rather nifty.

Step count: 9872. Five figures tomorrow, for sure.

MP3 player

Wow, what a great invention. And $5 CDs with my favorite music...bonus! Spent fifteen minutes ripping the music from the CDs and loading it on my player, and I have company for my walk. My erstwhile walking partner seems to have deserted me. *shrug* Oh well, he's not required to check in with me.

Step count: 9436 (got to get back up to five figures....)

Outta my Monday moanin' mind...

Wonky computer + sleepy me = late post. Monday's stats:

Step count: 9214

Ugh, birthday cake

It's been my downfall this weekend. Thank goodness "cake" birthdays only come around every few years. We have parties only for milestone birthdays - one, five (heaven only knows how this got to be a milestone but it's a tradition in my family), ten, thirteen, sixteen, and twenty-one. After twenty-one, he's on his own (the child for whom the birthday party was tossed this weekend).

I suppose that a couple of hours of chasing after five tweens at Dave & Busters counts as a workout. I sure hope so, because I took it easy today. Saturday was the party, and I was exhausted after we got home. Thanks again to AWSO for putting up with that - I know it's not your favorite thing, love, so I really appreciate it. I bet you're as thankful as I am that it's a rare thing.

Going to count Saturday's step count, since I wore the pedometer. Didn't even so much as put on a pair of socks today, let alone shoes, so this is my day off. Looks like that's going to be the schedule - Wednesdays and Sundays off. I think I'll try to resurrect my yoga DVDs on at least one of those days.

Step count for Saturday: 4,215

Just the stats, Ma'am

Too tired to write...

Steps taken: 11,981

Best day yet!

Nice long walk today! Four times around the mall - all the way around this time, none of this "nope, not going up those stairs again". Four full laps, for what I think might just be the first time.

Got a great waist pack. I've been walking with it the last few days. It's nice to have the water with me, and not feel like I'm slowing my walking partner(s) down by stopping at the drinking fountain.

Other progress too....I remembered to post here while I was in the shower, instead of waiting till 3:30 a.m.! Yay.

Steps taken: 12,811!

I think I need more than two days between days off...

Took today off. The snow was nearly hip-deep, and the kidlet had a snow day. Wasn't going anywhere today.

We had an orientation meeting last night. There were about fifteen or so women there - which is in no way indicative of the number of people who will be at the walk. They gave some statistics. Over the six years that the walk has been held, there has been something like $295,000,000 (yes, two hundred ninety-five MILLION dollars) raised for breast cancer research. There have been 92,000 people who have walked a total of 4.9 million miles for this.

There are two different kinds of volunteers - walkers and crew. The crew are the people who make the whole thing happen; picking up trash and handing out water and manning the sweep buses and helping pitch tents. It takes about four hundred crew members to put one of these things together. Crew members, unlike walkers (who commit to raising $2,200 each) do not have to raise anything. Well, the Michigan crew, last year, collectively raised $110,000. How cool is that?

The Better Business Bureau has a standard that they set for charities to meet in order to receive a nod of approval from the BBB. The charity must use no more than 35% of the money collected for administrative purposes - in other words, 65 cents out of every dollar must go directly to the beneficiaries of the charity. The Susan G. Komen for the Cure has its own internal standard of no more than 25% of the money going for administrative costs. This is just the standard - in practice, the Foundation does even better than that. Over the last few years, the organization has maintained a level of eighty-two cents out of every dollar going directly to the beneficiaries. Most of the money funds research, although there are some local organizations that benefit.

The meeting was terrific. They talked about how the walk would work - opening ceremonies, and the walk itself, and the pit stops, and cheering stations. There was a video that they showed of people on the walk and in camp and at the opening and closing ceremonies...there was not a dry eye in the place.

I'm really excited about all of this, and I can't wait to meet more of these people. Some of the walkers are men. About 1-2% of breast cancer cases also occur in men - it is not exclusive to women. One of the people at the meeting last night, in fact, lost her grandfather to the disease.

It hasn't always been easy, even so far. There have been a couple of times when I said to myself, "Ok, who am I kidding? There's no way I'll ever be able to do this." This is by far the biggest physical undertaking I've ever attempted. I'm not a runner, not a marathoner (in fact, I've met marathoners who say that people who do the 3-Day are nuts). But sitting there in that meeting last night, I knew I wasn't going to give up. I'm going to see this through, if I don't walk again afterward for a month.

But hey, if anyone knows a massage therapist in the Detroit area that would be willing to donate a couple hours' massage on the day after I finish this, I sure wouldn't turn it down

Step count today: Nothing. Not counting it.

Yesterday's was 7415

Took Sunday off

And felt pretty good walking today. Not sure what that means.

The official 3-Day training schedule - which starts 24 weeks before the event - lists walking on four days of the week: Tuesday, Thursday, and both weekend days. Crosstraining on Weds & Fri, and Mondays off. The only trouble with that is, I'm not sure that only walking four days a week will give me sufficient endurance. I'm not going really hard yet. Four miles today, and I still got the knee pain. I'm not going to give up on this; it hasn't been long enough yet to really make a difference. I think this is one of those days where I just feel like I'm fooling myself, and I'll never be able to do this. Can't let it get me down, though. I knew days like this would happen. It's ok, I'll get a good night's sleep and attack it again tomorrow.

Steps taken: 10,762
Pounds lost 2 (4)
Inches lost .5 (.5)

Numbers in parentheses are running totals.

Am I just a creature of habit?

Or was there something different about today? Walked a different mall and it seemed SO much longer. It wasn't the company - I'd rather walk with AWSO than anyone else. Maybe it was because it was all one level, and not broken up into different stages like my usual spot. In my usual spot, there are three different sections to go through to make up a mile. Maybe that's why something that's all one level seemed like so much more.

Didn't need any motrin today, yay!

Oh, and big thanks to the wonderful folks at Marr Haven sheep farm in Allegan, Michigan. She gave me a discount on supplies to make items to sell for my fundraising! If you spin, knit, felt, crochet, or locker-hook, check out her website (www.marrhaven.com) - she's got a great selection and she ships!

Steps today: 9505 (uhoh, slacking off!)