PMS means let’s carbo-load.

What’s better than Coffee and Donuts? More Donuts please! The iced coffee literally makes me so happy!!!!!! No brand Iced Coffee rocks!

One cake donut and one sugar raised.

Had to bake with my sourdough culture! Added coconut oil, oh so fragrant!

Little mushroom shooting off after the rain. My cauliflower flame!

Homemade banana bread rocks! My way of chilling by the pool!

Pork ribs stew, oh I love me some good stew!!! Drink all of it!!!

Got a free drink from Starbucks. Next time I will order iced coffee not latte.

Look at our fancy gym room! Staff that I haven’t even seen before!

Me after a supposed-to-be-easy-but-felt-so-hard 5 mile run. PMS definitely kicking in.

Oh that shrimp! and red onion fried egg!

Got to bring this baby to potluck today.

From runningwithrosiek on Instagram:

Acknowledge how far you’ve come and the changes you’ve made inside and out, whether they seem small or not because they are all adding up to something much bigger.

OK so lot of hands spotted!

So this is how my banana bread turned out to be, my friends always trade food!  Aren’t those cookies so cute! My little girlfriend made this! It literally melts in your mouth!

So since I have decided that I want to do my long runs on Friday, Friday becomes more exciting. I decided to finally get my hands on making my own Frappucino, well, the consistency is a little to watery, I guess I will use less milk and more ice cubes. I also put a scoop of coffee icecream in there!! And Nutella! Ended up needing more sweetness so I added agave and shak’em up. Then with the oh-so-good banana bread, I am off to the game!

 

My friends at work went together to an Indian restaurant, which is approved by our beloved Indian lab mate, to celebrate my birthday. Look at the size of the menu!!! Well as you can probably tell the hand on the right isn’t mine, my friend got this amazing colored nails!

This is what I got, Veggie Kurma, I really want some veggies for my long run recovery, and this is what I’ve got. Totally saw Curry leaves for the first time! It was a great time, but I felt bad that even 3 of my fiends ordered mild, it seems like they are served with some spicy spicy food that one looks like he is dying, another didn’t really eat it, and my boyfriend took the gut to jug down the whole thing. Today in the morning after I woke up I still feel the Indian Spices in my stomach.

On my hands are some special snacks brought from India by an Indian friend. She swore by it to help with digestion, she asked for 4 packets and her mom sent her 30 of them! It is fried and coated with salt and it only has an Indian name that I can’t remember and we decided to call it “no idea”, “oh I have no idea, do you want some?” Totally cracks me.

So the 12 miler was great, 5.3mi/h, had 1 GU before run, 2 GUs during run. OJ after run, Broccoli for lunch, then coconut water for electrolytes. I was doing experiments the whole morning before a conference call, then went for the long run around 1 without lunch, not sure whether I still feel the coffee from morning. I definitely added too much instant coffee to my Frappe, I literally feel my hands shake a little bit and feeling high.

Now I didn’t mean to, but really everyone is asking me about the long run… I didn’t mean to! I just told Sunny about this because I was feeling more intimate and want to share my excitement about running, and Emily spotted me before my run and asked about it and then when we arrived at the restaurant, everyone knows. Now I am a little freak who tries to run the hell out of herself. Well I guess I will be that little freak happily.

Long runs are my favorite workouts, for now.

25 years living on the planet. I am feeling good about myself.

25 years old officially.

emotional marriage proposal. Not to me though.

Cold Stone icecream cake. Dark Chocolate. Scrumptious.

Have moved my Saturday 11 miler to Friday, because of the unforseeable nature of Florida weather. I’d rather run while I can rather than risking being caught in a rain and ruining my long run. Starbucks double shot skinny mocha, not a fan.

Currently reading this awesome book. Knowledge is power. Carboloaded on Thursday with porridge and cake, Learned my lesson to refuel with high GI juice immediately after my 11-mile long run. 5.4mi/h for the most part, last 3.5 mi using 5.5mi/h. And feeling good on Saturday 5 mile recovery run.

Refuel after lunch, super hungry after looking at the microscope for 2.5h. Ate the bagel like a tiger, and feeling no shame about it. Look at the blackberries in our yard! Another round of refuel with yogurt, protein powder, chia seed, hemp seed, cacao nibs and PB.

 

After Saturday 5 mile recovery run. Might have overdone it a little bit. Tiny bit of rain at the beginning.

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Chinese salad, broiled salmon steak. Oh Soooo Good!!

PS: JB is such sweetheart. wants me to wear dress for my birthday celebration.

#Friday Funday #killed that 10 miler # Did I really treat myself after my long run?# Do you like Quest bars? Starbucks?

Yep I decided on my daily dose of dark chocolate, so I could be buying them every grocery shopping. Yay for chocolate!

Since my decision to eat more veggies to fuel my runs, this is what a quick lunch would look like.

I was going to present my work in lab meeting today, didn’t finish up the powerpoint last night before my cross training. I decided I would come early in the morning to finish, I had planned to walk to school but as I was walking I saw the school bus! I never thought they have this early shift! Hopped on in. Feeling good.

Got a small iced coffee at DD, just to try it, I am not really a coffee drinker except that I started eating dark chocolate espresso beans before my runs. I just heard some real good words for DD iced coffee, so I decided to try this before my long run today. 2.78 bucks! Say what?! I couldn’t get it. It is just a cup of coffee! How much do you need to spend on a whole bag of ground coffee. I started off easy with my coffee tasting journey from DD, not Starbucks thinking DD might be cheaper, well, they just wowed me. Plus the owner is kind of rude when he is talking to an employee on the phone. Well, I say, it is more like coffee flavored water? Just ignore me, I grew up with instant coffee OK?

But, there is a big but here. After jugging this whole thing down, I was like HIGH. SO energetic, I could even feel my hands shake tiny bit. Well there you go, perfect priming for my presentation.

Randomly picked up tubes and then it perfectly fit the 32 wells! Scored! I decided to put on round stickers instead of directly writing on the tube, coz then it is made with LOVE.

Got my weekly bagel from lab meeting, the oven at the bagel shop broke so this is left over from yesterday. Boo! HARD AS ROCK. I was thinking i need the carbs for my run, so whatever. Got me some jalepeno cream cheese on it.

When I finished every thing up it is already 1:40PM. I decided I will do the long run first and then have my “lunch”. Had 2 cans of peaches, a salted caramel GU 15min before the run then strawberry banana flavor GU 45min into the run when I really feel the hunger, then another vanilla bean one 45min after. I told myself not to go too fast, so I did 5.4 for speed the whole time. I was keeping great form, SO PROUD of myself. Totally thought of making it to a half marathon, but then I decided, let’s not overdo it. 10 miler it is.

Today, I feel so good. Ever since I discovered that I can run faster, I find every run challenging and fun. I ENJOY the run so much! Endorphin flying. I am determined to become a runner. And I am just starting the journey.

Now I list everything I have eaten after the run, broccoli and carrots and rice in lunch box, Banana, 2 cups or more chilled coconut water, berry smoothie(with all that bubbles going on, 2 cups maybe). Did Rest, Ice my joints, compression on my calf,elevate my legs. RICE.

And dinner has to be served, my fav fav: noodles.

This is Saturday morning, didn’t have any power green left, so I had to be simple and rude.

I feel like, I really need to do something special to treat myself after long runs, I guess except for the really yummy coconut water, I am just doing my thing, chilling and eating my usual staff. I got to think… think….

And what about birthday present for myself! What happened to you girl? It must be messed up if you don’t feel like buying anything. Hello?

So I have been watching a lot of youtube fit people’s channels, and blog posts. Then I learned that many of them are sponsored, which means they buy the brands’ products at lower price and they got to try all sorts of good staff. Who doesn’t want that! Then I was thinking, things like Starbucks coffee, Quest Bars, I always have mixed feelings. It just seems like Starbucks is just so fancy and anyone holding a Starbucks mug or cup is getting fancy too. I have bought their Frappe once or twice, it is the sugar that makes them so tasty. And since I am such a foodie who also enjoys cooking and baking and making my own food, the instinct is that I can make it myself. Why would I want to spend 5,6 bucks on something I can make from maybe less than 50 cents? But truth is, eating habbits have their social nature that you just want to eat whatever everyone else is eating. Especially the people that you look up to. You think Starbucks is going to make you fancy too. Honestly that’s the reason I bought DD coffee this morning. Coz one blogger that I like, she loves DD iced coffee.

Material world. I just found out the song Wing$ by Macklemore yesterday, such coincidence. Loved the song.

For Quest Bars, I never had one. Whenever I find myself in front of bars that have good packaging and tempting to buy, I ended up deciding not to. They are Bars, they are made by machines, why not eat real food. Go get some banana and nuts if you have the money. But then I was going on Amazon, checking on Vitaminshoppe and everywhere to see their prices, but then again decided not to buy because of the same reason. Does this make me a struggling minimalist?

It is just that the marketing people at the company is doing such great job that people are eating them all over the place, promoting their products. I see it so much that it becomes real tempting to buy.

Then I think, the vlogs that people do, that channels that I subscribe, I admire these people, for their figure,for their personality, for their life full of highend product and free staff. It made me want to copy them, what they are eating, what they are doing, what they are buying, thinking it will make me happy too. Truth is, I am a saving kind of person, I don’t have that much money to spend on things I even doubt I will like. (Quest bars).

Happiness comes from within. I am down for a coffee tasting, donut tasting, energy bars tasting and fun activities like that, it will be good bonding time when I think about it. But it will recreational, not a routine.

I think now that I have written a full blog about this materialism, I got my thougts straight, well not so much but a bit more. Bottom line: don’t get blinded by the society to “Just do it”. I am even thinking of the word: anti-Starbucks, anti-Quest bars. Have some moral standards at heart and be casual about buying myself treats from time to time.

I have zero idea how this happy long run blog turns so serious. Anyway feeling good, happy that I pushed myself to crosstraining on Thursday, I have perfect excuse that I can rest for my Friday long run. But I went and killed my upper body. Keep pushing, Dig deeper!