Caffeine

Oh my blessed coffee. I spent 3.5 years working in a  coffee shop. I live and breathed the stuff. Back in 2011 I did a massive cutback and it was successful... but then I slipped. I reacquainted myself with it. Dove in and have enjoyed every delicious drop. It felt like I was too busy to go at life without it.

Well life is always busy and as much as I love the taste, the sensations involved with curling up with multiple cups of warm coffee, "needing" 3+ for daily functioning is a sign that its time to cut back.

Things I'm hoping to gain from this cutback:

1. realignment of sleep cycle. Working 2nd shift I often consume coffee til late in the day because drinking coffee 3 hours into my shift is comparable to a 1st shift person drinking coffee until 11 or noon. I'm hoping that by cutting my consumption by 1 or 2 p.m. I can be ready for sleep at more reasonable times like 1 a.m. instead of 3 or 4 a.m. What was productive and exciting "me" time loses its luster when I can't manage to rouse myself before 11a.m. on a regular basis
2. save $! I brew at home but quality beans are expensive yo!
3. Drink more water instead 

This is also in preparation for the inevitable time I decide to embark on parenthood. Caffeine consumption is a restricted thing and I would rather not have to go cold turkey should the time arrive.

So here I go... off onto my caffeine cutback challenge. Note I am not giving it up completely. I did that in 2005 and it was a horrible disaster of an idea - think unfocused, groggy, foggy headed. 

If this is successful, I plan on a tandem challenge of decreasing my sugar consumption. 

VICTORY

File this one away for future interviews: I helped enact change.

Boom.

It feels great!

I feel accomplished. I feel hopeful. I feel hyper. I feel empowered. I feel optimistic and reinvigorated.

Spring is also beginning to creep its way slowly into the frigid MN air and I feel renewed energy as the daylight hours increase.

I am awakening too after a cold dark winter.

Life is good. It will keep getting better. The darkness is a lesson to appreciate the light.

feel free to tell me to "suck it Polly-Anna" anytime but you will not rain on my parade.

What's there to say about Wednesday?

Today was just one of those trying days that would have been better spent in bed. My subconscious agreed and I managed to turn off my alarm and wake up at 10:37 am.... 7 minutes AFTER I was supposed to be to work at job #1.... Thank goodness for a part time job where I set my hours and no one is depending on me for the most part. If they had been, I could have dragged myself from bed but instead, I arranged to work tomorrow. It'll mean a long day for a Thursday, but this time I'm ready. Clothes are set out for the two jobs. After this entry, I'm packing my lunch and going to bed because it's 2:30 a.m. and of course I'm still awake. So where was I going with this? Ahh yes, better day to have just stayed in bed. After getting the clearance to rearrange my work days, I did just that. Work out--- forget it!

So I walk in the door to my main job and I don't even make it from the locker room without hearing that it's a mess in there. Whee. In the past I may have gotten upset. Now it's just another day. I show up. In a sick way I'm happy its a mess because it means I have something to do. I set things up, some fail, but I don't get all upset and worked up. I like this new-ish zen but sometimes it just feels like I'm defeated. The passion has been deflated. I'm feeling used up.

I need a vacation.

2014 goals

Running:

1. 1 race per month. I need consistency in my life and having at least 1 race per month, official or unofficial will be really helpful
2. 500  miles in 1 year. I've barely cracked 300 the past 2 years. It's time to up my game.
3. Run Grandma's/Gary Bjorklund Half Marathon in June and finish in under 2:15
4. Run Lola's half Marathon again
5. 
   

Health:

1. Yoga & Meditation 2x a week - Yoga makes my running better. It makes me better overall. I miss it.
2. Strength train more than sparingly
3. Continue to make better food choices, incorporating more organic and cutting out more processed foods

Personal:

1. Read 1 book a month - this shouldn't be that hard, but I have the attention span of a hummingbird on cocaine. 
2. Finish "Anna Karenina" I'm 40% in and refusing to give up!
3. Rediscover the fun things of life - I feel like I work all the time and have little to show for it. Its time to find some balance, spend more fun time with husband
4. Schedule friend time - working 2nd shift this is getting to be really important. Its too easy for me to be disconnected!
5. Go on a vacation
6. Finish unfinished projects - ahem! penguin ornaments, crocheting, painting, house stuff..

So here we go 2014!

The November Blahs...

Mercury returned to normal. No more retrograde. I, unfortunately, have not returned to normal. I feel melancholy and sometimes borderline unstable. Stress at work and temporarily feeling the fact I work 49 hours/week, 6 days out of the week and really have no ability to take a day off if I need it without paying for it in other ways.

I know the strain is a temporary thing. I feel it now, but as quickly as I feel the burn out, it goes away and I'm magically fine with everything. I know why I hang onto the extra job. Until I'm certainly an employee somewhere, I won't let go. I need the comfort of it.

Last week was by far one of the worst weeks I had and I think I'm just a bit shell shocked still. The honeymoon is over with work for sure!

Mercury Retrograde

Something is off in my universe this week.

But I have a feeling I'm not alone. If you choose to believe in astrology Mercury is in Retrograde until the 10th.

"All machinery and things with moving parts--such as computers, VCRs, camera equipment,

 garbage disposals, and so forth, will reveal any weak links now. "

That above sentence encompasses most of my drama this week. All week I've been feeling like I've pissed off the computing gods as I've encountered increasingly random and weird errors at work. I was one step away from personal meltdown tonight. It's probably good I don't have direct contact with the public during times like that.

Then there's the human aspect. I feed very easily on the energy of those around me, one of the drawbacks being an extrovert. Right now changes are abounding and the mood is circling the drain to say the least which makes me extra sensitive to extreme moods. In simple terms I end up feeling like rapid cycling bi-polar barbie. Bouncing off the walls one moment, ready to burn down the building the next.

Also rare: I'm crabby at my husband. Its not often I feel short tempered/annoyed at him and this week, it's probably good we're on opposite schedules as I barely made it through grocery shopping without wanting to scream at him.

As much as I'm a scientist and skeptic of most touchy feel-y things like astrology I really can't help but wonder at times like this if there is a higher explanation... or I'm just having a bad week and REALLY REALLY REALLY need to burn off some anxiety with a long overdue run.

delusion?

Uh oh. I'm teetering past my 50/50 mark: where the yes's may be starting to outweigh the no's to do a marathon.....

1) aside from a couple healing blisters, I'm feeling pretty good. A little stiff but no more so than any other long run which tells me my body is stronger and recovering faster despite not training adequately for the half.

2) in the past during and even after I've said that I had no real desire to run further than the half. Not this time. Even during the hardest parts, I found myself thinking the marathon.

And now I find myself looking at potential ones for next year and not freaking out that I'm doing so and wanting to ask people if they've done it before, experience. I want to start planning training....

Oh dear. Falling down the rabbit hole....