Daily Walk – Page 2 – A Most Unreliable Narrator

daily walk: pause

Dear Internet,
Today is my last day at MPOW and this morning instead of doing my new usual morning mile, I lolled in bed slapping the snooze button until I had to get up.
It would be irony to be late on the my last day of work.
Truth be told, it was not overt laziness that prevented me from getting up but downright sleepiness and exhaustion. Starting with Sunday night, this week has been torture for sleep. I could not sleep until 6AM Monday morning and then ended up sleeping for four hours which threw Monday off like woah. Monday night we gutted like pigs in a trough over pizza and I took a Benadryl hoping it would knock me out early so I could actually get some sleep.
That failed as four hours later I took a Klonopin to finally knock me out.
Despite the drugs, Monday’s night’s rest was short which coupled with getting up early on Tuesday to walk, and the same pattern repeating itself on Tuesday meant I was averaging about 4-5 hours of sleep each night.
After dinner on Wednesday, I decided to put my feet up and do some web work with Orphan Black on in the background. TheHusband was off playing a video game, so he was relaxing on his own. I was feeling fairly peaceful as I worked until I got hit with rapid heart beat, which is my usual physical manifestation of anxiety.
A panic attack while watching Orphan Black? Really? Fuck this.
So obviously I took a Klonopin.
Hearts and guts are treacherous souls.
An absolute known, for me, on taking Klonopin on consecutive days is that I feel sluggish and even more tired the more I take it, even though the shelf-life is not long. Klonopin is great when I need to put a rampaging panic attack in its place, but it can never be more than that thought on occasion it has been.
So you will forgive me, I hope, that today’s walk was not done. After all, tomorrow is another day.
xoxo,
Lisa

This Day in Lisa-Universe:

daily walk: steam punk pig in a tree

Dear Internet,
6AM is far prettier in the spring (and summer), which makes it a lot easier to get motivated to get up and do stuff. I keep reminding myself how frustrated I was with the inability to do anything buried under 120″ of snow. Going outside was not an option. Exercising outside was a death wish.
Knowing how short spring was, and perhaps summer might be too, I’m trying to embrace this weather for all its worth, even if the 98% humidity means my hair looks like a bad ’80s perm, I’ll take it.
So here I am, up at 6AM and out the door around 6:20. My walk this morning was not routed and I figured that I would wing it as long as I got in at least a mile, which turned out to be in my favor because I stumbled across a steam punk pig in a tree.

Distance: 1.22 miles
Walk time: 20:38 minutes
Pace: 16:70/mile
After making and consuming my smoothie, I headed upstairs to get ready for work. TheHusband’s voice boomed from under his blanket and pillow fort the WHIR of the blender frightened him so much in his dead sleep, he woke thinking angry robots were attacking.
xoxo,
Lisa
P.S. I’m still not coordinated enough yet to pause the pedometer, take a few pictures, and then get going again, hence why some images may look a tad out of focus. Or I could just argue – ART!

This Day in Lisa-Universe: 2011, 1999

daily walk: welcome to my neighorhood

Dear Internet,
Last night we straight up went Bacchian on the forbidden deliciousness of pizza that we had delivered. As I was predictably feeling terrible this morning when I woke up at around 6AM, I decided there was no point to me laying wide awake in bed staring at the ceiling and I should get up and go do something.
That go do something turned into a brisk walk around my neighborhood.¹
As I start to sort my daily schedule, one thing I wanted to make sure to happen, regardless of weather, was that I got up and walked a mile each day around my neighborhood.² One, it would give me some exercise. Two, it would get me out of the house. Three, I could use this to loosely train for a competitive 5K walk. Four, it would help with the water retention happening in my ankle. Five, exercise helps with the crazy.
So really, there is no reason why I shouldn’t be doing this even if i it is the only thing I’m doing.
As I was walking this morning in the light drizzel, I thought it would be a great idea to get a picture of something that strikes my fancy that I see on my walk and post it as well as my distance and times. This will serve no purpose to really anyone but me, but what the fuck. Let’s see how much I can do this.

Distance: 1.32 miles
Walk time: 23:32 minutes
Pace: 16:56/mile
For a fat girl with sketchy ankles, I sure do walk fast. And this is my normal speed.
After I came home, I woke TheHusband up show me for the fourth time how to make a smoothie so I can do it on my own. Turned out much easier than I thought and despite the fact it looks like green slime, it is actually quite delicious.
Throbbing Manor Smoothie (base)

8oz orange juice
2 leaves + steams of a major green (I used chard this morning)
1 heaping tsp of hemp protein
1 heaping tsp of chia seeds
1 1/2 cups of frozen fruit (we are currently using mixed fruit)

Add ingredients into blender of your choice in the order above, making sure at the very least the juice is added first. Blend until thoroughly liquid and then pour into a glass and serve. Makes about 16oz of smoothie.
Variations: If OJ is not on hand, use about a cup or so of ice and swap out the frozen fruit for fresh. The recipe is flexible enough that you really just need liquid + green + fruit to get you going with protein powders added for extra nutrition.
xoxo,
Lisa
P.S. If I feel a bit — forced on excitement on this whole thing, I have found the more I fake being excited about something I dread, then discovering it is not akin to torture, I tend to be more open to continuing said thing. Rainbow sparkles unicorn poop for all.

1. It took me longer to find my earbuds, sort out music/podcast options, sync everything together, change, put shoes on then it did to do the actual walk. Next time should be a lot faster getting ready.
2. I use the web version of Gmaps Pedometer/Miler Meter to map routes and then sync it with the iOS version and then use Walkmeter to track time/distance/pace. While both are free, I upgraded both to get the extra features. Since it’s cumbersome to use both, and MilerMeter has a shitty interface on iOS, I hope to get intimate with Walkmeter to use it’s full potential.

This Day in Lisa-Universe: 2011, 1999