I'm baaaack!

Yeah, so I haven't blogged in forever - a slacker I KNOW!  It's been a nutty time around our house, selling Stephen's car, buying a truck with in a 1 week time frame - not so easy when you are paying cash and looking for something specific.  Kinda like shopping period - when you don't need anything you find everything but when you want something in particular its nowhere to be found!  Alas, all is well and we are settling in with his new (to him) truck.  :)

But things are good.  And I have good news.

Today, I ran my 4th 5k race.  It was a great experience.  One year ago my little girl and I did the race, but walked it (jogged just a little bit but not really, in fact I carried her part of the way).  We finished it in 58 minutes.

Today I ran it, the entire thing, in 40:04...which is 4 mins and 23 seconds quicker than my race on June 26th.  Pretty happy with that!  Not loving the race picture, as I was really tearing it up that last stretch and the picture reminded me that I've come a LONG way but still have a long way to go.  My butt fat is dragging behind the rest of me - I'm serious.  When I'm standing still my butt doesn't look like that - I promise you I am not making this up, I'll post the picture below so you can see what I mean.  If we got CSI to measure the picture based on the way the pic looks my butt be about 3 inches bigger due to gravity.  :) THAT is more reason to keep on going!

By the way the course was very hilly.  I knew this in advance...but I swear it was uphill most of the way! It killed me, but I kept looking at the ground ahead of me and reminding me that my quads are my biggest and strongest muscle and they could get me up those hills!  The race was really really rough.  My playlist was very strategically put together too - several of my favs are Boom Boom Pow by BEP...and when I was heading up one hill, Melissa Ethridge's song "I Run for Hope" came on and the emotional adrenaline kicked in as this was a run benefiting cancer research.  Maino's "All the Above" ran me in that final stretch.  Another saving grace was that the weather was gorgeous and around mile 2.4 I made a friend who conversed with me the rest of the running way.  She really kept me motivated and we raced at the finish which made it fun.  Wish I had gotten her name or email.  She was a guardian angel for me!  Maybe we'll meet again.

More good news.  I got on the scale when I got home and...drum roll please...I'm down 70 pounds today!  That feels great.  I've got 2 weeks to lose 5 more to meet my 75 down by 10/30 (when my haircut appointment is).  Will I lose 5 in two weeks?  Well, I could if I really worked hard....hmmm...I have a decision to make don't I?

Because its all about a series of decisions (yes, here I go again).  Every decision you make regarding food, your health, etc., is one that will affect you for the long term.  Every fried chicken sandwich I ever ate is why my butt literally dragged behind me in that picture today.  :)  I'm being serious here.  It is taking a long time to undo what did me in.

So do I push it to get that next 5 off?  I just might.  I've been losing pretty slowly these last 20 pounds...so maybe I'll jump start myself again.  And when I start feeling deprived or diety I'll go back to 80/20.  I'll need something to really jump start me if I'm going to be down 100 by December 31...

{insert movie announcer voice} Stay tuned to see what Clara decides to do over the next two weeks....

Peace out yo,
Clara