Kaena Point

Nathan hiked with me today. It was a long hike but worth it for the monk seals. No doggies allowed on this one. Now he's passed out in the car. Bobby drove us along with his brother Brian.  Nathan flashed his knife around and had a great time.

Nathan was in charge of this hike, with his knife.

Albatross!

Adorable Monk Seals!

The monk seals are super lazy.  The one on the left was sleeping with it's head in the water.  I took a picture of it picking its nose out of the water to breath for a second. 

Another Paleo Challenge

Anna and I officially started our Whole 30 challenge yesterday.  The plan was to start on Friday, I was all set, and then got to my training at a Waikiki Beach Hotel in Waikiki.  All was going well, I ate my eggs and went to lunch with some coworkers.  Unfortunately, even though I ordered my burger with no bun, there was no getting away from all of the fried stuff.  I just texted Anna that we would start the next day instead.  To me it's a relief to be back on a "challenge."  I have poor impulse control, so when the brownies are sitting on the counter, I eat one.  Sometimes two.  And sometimes I have a difficult time stopping myself from eating way more than is socially acceptable.  With paleo I always start off wanting to snack a bunch, but I actually remember the healthy snacks that I have available.

View of Waimanalo from the Pillboxes

Yesterday started off fine, Anna made some bacon and eggs.  I went off to hike the Pillboxes with Keysa and Ananda and while I was gone she left for work.  She only took two bananas and two eggs, so I went to the store and got her some roast, some salad, cashews and coconut water.  It was nice to bring her her lunch at work.  We talked for a little bit at the bar, had some cashews,  and I headed home for my own lunch.  I'll definitely stop by there again one of these days when she's working there.  Bars are so different when they are empty during the day.  I had ahi tuna for lunch when I got home.
Dinner was steak, okinawan sweet potato and asparagus.  I am a damn good cook sometimes.  It was really tasty.  It was also a big dinner, so I didn't feel like I needed to snack on anything during the usual "dessert" time of the night.  We watched TV and made plans to run the beach and watch the sunrise.  Well, she's been working hard and hopefully she's finally having a good night's sleep.  It's 7am and she's not up yet.  Surprisingly, the sound of the dogs and I moving around out here didn't wake her up.  Hopefully she's still passed out pretty good.  There will be other mornings for sunrise beach walks.
I love this kind of morning.  I've got Gizmo on my lap, and Titus is on the couch all cozy, but keeping his eye on me.  I can hear the birds chirping outside, the usual air conditioner noise from the bedrooms and our neighbors, and the fishtank gurgling away.  Not too shabby.  I'm gonna make some coffee, then I haven't decided yet whether I will turn on the TV, read, or write in my journal.  I think I will just relax and take this day as it unfolds.

Anna's in Hawaii!

Pre-Thanksgiving on Hammock

This past Monday Anna and I were driven to the airport in a fancy schmancy car at 5am.  Her plane left at 7:30am and I slept in the airport until my plane left at 11:30am.  It wasn't so bad.  I also got a tuna melt and a coffee in the airport.  Yummy.  The flight wasn't horrible, I watched a few movies and napped a little.  When I landed I had to stay awake to go pick Anna up at 10:30pm Hawaii time.  I was so exhausted.  I got a little sick and just felt like sleeping for the next couple of days.

Jak and Ananda with Cake

We cruised around to Ben Franklin, hiked the Pillboxes, grocery shopped and prepared for Thanksgiving.

Anna's new Bike, Carmen

Thanksgiving was nice and relaxed.  I made some stuffing and spaghetti squash.  We went to Joanna and Jeff's and surprised Jak with a cake for her birthday.  We talked story with the ladies, then we headed over to Bobby and Corey's place for some more turkey.  Corey prepared a huge spread of food including a stuffed turkey and a huge ham, mashed potatoes, gravy and cranberry sauce.  Good thing we went since we were the only ones who showed up to eat all that food.  Anna and I stuffed ourselves, then Anna passed out on the couch.  We got mad leftovers to take home.
I tried to go into work on Friday, but the office was closed and I headed home to do a bit of paperwork.  When I did all I thought I needed to, Anna and I went out and she bought herself a bike.  It's really great, it's purple and she got a basket put on the front and fenders were ordered to be put on on Monday.  We grabbed some applications from a few bars on the way home.

Hamama Falls

Saturday morning we hiked Hamama Falls with Theresa, Joanna, Jak, Keysa and Ananda, and the doggies.  It was the perfect length of hike.  Tiring, but we still had energy for more activities later.  Anna and I headed to the beach in the afternoon.  It was super windy, so we hunkered down and watched the kite surfers.  Then we rode into town so Anna could grab a surf board she found on Craigs List.

Ze Beach is Zat Way!

Sunday we hiked the Koko Head stairs and then headed to the Verizon store to see if we could get Anna on her own phone plan.  She decided against it for the moment since it's pretty expensive with all the texting she does.  We got some yogurt from Yogurtland (delicious!!!) and headed back home.  We were going to head to the beach again since all the ladies and Jeff were headed that way, but we got caught in traffic.  When we got closer we realized it was due to some brush fires that were ignited all along the road side.  We had a whole bunch of ash blow straight at us in a quick windstorm.  Awesome!

Looking for Recyclables

Instead of the beach Anna decided to ride around town on her bike and check out the local stores.  I stayed home and did very little.  I think I had some wine and thought about taking a nap.  Then Joanna texted that they were at a coffee house in town and I met them over there.  It's one of my new favorite stores I've decided.  It had a whole bunch of locally handmade goods for sale and was comfortable, warm and the tea latte I had was delicious.

Waah!

I finally went back to work yesterday for a full day.  It was good, but I was a little bored.  Not that I didn't have plenty to do, I just didn't want to do it.  I had the same problem today.  I did a lot of work, but my heart wasn't really in it.  It was hard to get back to the same ol', same ol.  We'll see how tomorrow goes.

Smoke from Brushfire

Tonight is Tae Kwon Do, and hopefully it doesn't kick my ass too badly.  I am out of practice and out of shape.  I did go to the grocery store today to pick up healthier food so I am not picking on all of the chips and bread available to me in my refrigerator.  I have plenty of other options now.  No excuses!
It's going to be time to start my pre-New Year's Resolution!  I need to figure it out by Thursday.  Hope everyone else is ready with theirs, too.

Finally Crawled out of Bed

Wish I had one of these!

So Tuesday evening I flew out of warm Honolulu and headed to the East Coast.  My flight was so not comfortable.  Like an idiot, I forgot my pillow so my neck was all cramped up all night.  The guy next to me was very nice, but almost silent, and in his sleep he kept stretching out, getting all up in my space.  Then he'd wake up, look embarrassed and pull himself together until he fell asleep again.  I could not find a comfortable spot and had a painful stomach ache from the diet pepsi I drank that afternoon.  So, I guess it could have been better.  I did see Harry Potter the second part of the last one.  Good stuff.
I landed in Newark at about 10:30 Eastern time and began the journey up to NY state.  My Aunt Nancy picked me up, we met Mom for lunch and we had a picnic lunch complete with baked chicken and a banana cream pie to celebrate Mom's birthday.  Then Mom and I finished the trip north.  Not too much traffic, that was good, and the weather was really warm.  Got to keep the windows down for most of the trip.
When I got to my parents' house we did a hike through the woods of my childhood and surveyed the hurricane damage.  Pretty intense.  It's been enough time that it doesn't look as brutal as I'm sure it did, but there are trees down everywhere.  The really weird part is looking out and all the trees are leaning the same way.  Normally the trees just lean wherever the ground is taking them, but there is an crazy pattern to the leaning now.
It started to get cold around 4pm, and I wrapped up in a blanket on the couch and watched NCIS while Mom graded papers.  I love NCIS.  She left halfway through it the first time, cause her best friend from High School called her for her birthday.  So we watched it again.  I fell asleep for the second run through.  We had a fabulous baked chicken dinner with a veggie salad, asparagus and sweet potato.  Totally paleo and not on purpose.  My parents certainly aren't paleo, they just like real food.  Mom and I perused some of the stuff in one of the dressers in my old room.  I had really great fashion sense in high school, let me tell you.  There was quite a bit of belly laughing as each item came out of the dresser.
Dad came home late and I hung out with him for a while, we discussed Quantum Physics, the Web Theory and the String Theory as they relate to mental health.  Seriously.  Then I put an extra blanket on the bed upstairs so I could curl up.  Did I mention that I felt so cold I never actually changed out of my clothes?  I totally curled up in all my clothing and shivered until the bed warmed up.  I forget how totally quiet it is out here.  There was no sound last night.  I slept very well.
Woke up and hung out with Mom and Dad before they headed to work and made myself a leftovers omelette.  Salad, asparagus and baked chicken.  Yum!!

Just a picture of Opus 40.  Always reminds me of home.

I'm contemplating what to do with my morning.  I think I'm going to don my workout gear and head into the woods.  It's been a while.  I'm usually in such a rush when I'm here, but I have absolutely nothing to do for a few hours.  I'm not going to waste it with TV (which was definitely my first thought).
Anna should be here around 11am and we'll try on some shoes and clothes and get ready to go, so when Dad gets home from his meeting we can take off right away.  Tonight and this weekend are going to be so much fun!  I can't wait!

Titus and Gizmo- best dogs in the world.

Did I mention I really, really, really miss my husband and my doggies?

Yoga

I'm going to round out this week with a yoga class at the Y.  It's been a while, hopefully I won't embarrass myself too bad.  I am the proud owner of some new t-shirt yoga pants I made last night, though, so it shouldn't be too bad.  I may stop at the Salvation Army afterwards and grab some more XL or XXL t-shirts.  These pants are super comfy and only took me a little while.  I've got to field test them today, then I'll make a few more if they're good for stretching.  I didn't even finish off my edges.  Last night when shopping I picked up a 90% cacao chocolate bar.  I had one square of it and that was perfect.  It's just bitter enough that you don't want to down a whole bar, but it satisfies that craving.  I'm starting to enjoy a lot of my food in much simpler form.  My coffee black, my chocolate more and more cacao and less sugar.  A good rare steak, a burger with a fried egg on top.  Veggies with salt and nothing else.  This year has been an awesome wake up call for me, to pay attention to my food and what exercise I'm doing and WHY.  I've learned to question conventional wisdom in all of it's forms, from what popular doctors say to do or take, to what religious leaders in different religions tell you to do, to what the government tells us to eat, to what exercises are good for you and why.  I've been questioning everything and trying to get to the root of it.  Why is it important?  Do I need all of this excess?  Is there a way I can simplify it and have it be just as awesome/tasty/effective?  Turns out most things in life can be way simpler and just as great.  Okay, on my way to yoga.  Have a great afternoon!

Update: Yoga was cancelled because the instructuor was having a tough day.  She was crying and I can only assume that something happened recently, she thought she could teach the class, but she was crying and couldn't do it.  So, I hiked the pillboxes.  I did the whole thing on my own for the first time, all the way around to the end of the Loop and back to the parking spaces.  The pants were fine except that if you are going to use t-shirt pants for hiking/jogging/running, you will want to add a tie to the waist.  As I got sweatier the pants got a little looser and they started to fall down a little.  Not too much, but enough for me to be hitching them up every once in a while.  The fold of material held my keys well when I rolled them up.  I ended up rolling down the waist band a whole bunch so I could pull them up easy every time they sagged a little.  Good pants, great I'm sure for yoga, some modifications necessary for running/jogging/hiking.

Here's where I got the initial pattern

Full Moon Hiking

First night time hike for me was last night.  It was a full moon so I planned a Lanikai Pillbox moonlight hike.  It was beautiful. There were a lot of cars parked at the entrance and two huge groups of people at the top, but even with all of those people it was still beautiful and serene.  There is something about being out in nature at night that I miss.  The moonrise was exceptional, it looked huge and I wish my camera could capture it.  I had to pirate some pictures from my friend Shane who joined us on our hike because his camera captured the moon better than mine.  All in all I'd say that moonlight hiking is something I'd like to try more often.

Quick Lunch Break Blog

So, today is my birthday. I did not lose the weight that I had been hoping. I know this is because I didn't really make the weight loss a priority. I allowed myself to eat junk and often. I continue to make myself lunch and have stayed consistent for breakfast. It's still that point of time between work and paddling- and then dinner and dessert. I eat a lot of calories at those times. I have consistently been tracking my calories. I got off track for a few days this week, but went back and filled in the calorie counts. I'm sure it's not as accurate as when you fill it out the same day, but this is the most consistent I have been with calorie tracking ever. I have been known to give up very quickly. I like my training log and how simple it is.
For my birthday I asked Nate for running shoes, and he got me a good pair. I also got a few pairs of really great fit-dry running shirts and shorts. I should have splurged for a bra. I will probably do that with some of my birthday money. I am going to put together a birthday hike instead of a birthday party. That way even if I eat a ton of cake, it won't matter quite as much. I'm not sure which hike I want to go on yet. I'll have to look a few up and see what looks best.
Goal for this week-
Drop back down to 138 (from 140)
Run two times in the morning.
Schedule- Tonight- paddling, Thursday- running (early morning or afternoon), Friday- paddling, Saturday- no workout, Sunday- OHCRA Championships!, Monday- paddling and running after practice, Tuesday- running (early morning or afternoon)