Yesterday was day two of working a full day and then taking files home to continue working until the wee hours for this big push to complete a job by tomorrow’s deadline. Needless to say exercise and decent eating habits have become a distant weekend memory…but i took back control of the ship last night (well maybe I took back control of the blow up raft…hey ya gotta start somewhere). The dog and i both needed some forward motion. I leashed him up and we started gingerly walking up the slicy (slushy and icy) road for about a half hour.

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I love when the snow gets to be the same consistency as coffee cake crumble….ya know…like butter and sugar mixed together?! MMMM who knew dirty snow could make my mouth water =)

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my walking buddy

Some areas were unplowed and the powdery cover gave better traction than the slicy spots letting us pick up the pace to a jog which was nice. I was wearing boots and a coat on so I don’t know that I would consider this a true workout but i warmed up enough to get sweaty and mentally i felt a whole lot better.
The dog was in his glory peeing on every telephone pole and digging in snow drifts. he also decided it was a perfect time for a snow facial. Exfoliation anyone?

Our destination was to my car that i had driven to the bus stop in the morning on my way to work. Once we arrived I let the dog jump in the car to warm up while I scraped the windshield (4 minute upper body workout!?)

take your time ma.

take your time ma.

I continued the upper body workout when I got home as I spent 20 minutes in the garage breaking up cardboard boxes and bundling it all up to be recycled. I know the technical term for functional fitness is activities that prepare you for your every day life, but i like to think of it as the reverse…doing everyday life tasks to fulfill a part of your fitness. And the run a million and a half miles to fulfill the remaining fitness quota =) Oh and there were a couple more packages at the door tonight.

First , Duncan’s birthday gift delivery from Petsmart. I opened the box and let him sniff around.

birthday loot

birthday loot

So one of the gifts is a laser light. I thought it’d give him a good indoor workout option for days when we really can’t get outside.

The other cool package was a surprise gift from my sister-in-law. She must read my blog because she got me a running ornament for my tree!!!!!

Running Chick

Running Chick

Tomorrow ill finally get a run in. I’ve been running basically twice a week-Thursdays and one weekend day. It’s quite a different world for me. But in about 3 weeks that will change and ill be back to 4 days a week when I start my NJ Marathon training. Speaking of….on the NJ Marathon Facebook page, they posted a photo and bio of Brian, the pacer for the 4:40 group. That’s my guy! He has quite the marathon resume with 100+ marathons under his belt. I can’t wait to meet him and hope I can hang on to finish in 4:40. (I tried to stay with the 4:45 pacer at the NYC marathon but at mile 16 couldn’t keep up. It was a harder course though, so I still feel confident I can do this.)

Question: Do you have certain everyday tasks that you consider exercise? When I go grocery shopping I don’t use a shopping cart. I take 2 handheld baskets and as they fill up I do bicep curls in the aisles. And then I carry all the bags to my car as well with no shopping cart. It’s one of my favorite ways of sneaking in some upper body strength training.