Weekly Money Check-Up: 9/30

1. The most I’ve spent this last week was on… PAYING OFF MY MOTHER F-ING STUDENT LOAN! Sorry, but I'm just so excited. I'm $1032.75 much closer to being debt-free. Whoop whoop!
2. Today I am thankful for the magic that is Autumn :) So excited for the weather and fun fall activities this weekend.
3. Money can’t buy happiness. One free thing I did last week that made me happy was spending Sunday on a walk with Adam and Bentley. (Notice how most of my free happiness comes from these two? Pretty sure that's a good sign!)
4. I will consider this week a success if I get a few runs in.
5. A talent I wish I had is anything related to creativity. If I could be an artist, a dancer, or a musician (or at least have some talent in one of those areas), I would be thrilled.

Thanks, My Pretty Pennies!

Braaaaaaaains

For real? As if I needed another reason to start running!

I'm not naming names...

...and I won't even reveal his face.

But SOMEBODY with green paws bounced around my white comforter this morning.

The NERVE!

Ah, it takes me about 20 seconds to forgive him for just about anything he does. And it's not his fault the lawnmowers came when it was time for his morning poop.

Anywho, I found this article yesterday on increasing your running speed. I thought the treadmill workout looked killer:

"I run at speed 10 at an incline of 1.5 or 2.0, sprint for 30 or 45 seconds, and then jump off," Natasha says. "So if you run for 30 seconds, you'll rest for 30 seconds. Do 10 straight of those, take a 2-minute break, and then jump on and do 10 more." Work your way up to three sets of 10. Once you notice a difference in your speed and feel the difficulty level waning, increase the speed and incline to make sure you're still pushing yourself.

So I attempted it this morning.

It.was.AWESOME. I couldn't even get up to 10mph on the treadmill...I had to hover around 8.5 or 9. And boy, let me tell you. When it was time to jump off after those 30 seconds, it was WELL DESERVED. I actually only got through one set of 10 of these, and with a warm-up walk and cool down, my whole workout lasted about 15-20 minutes and I blasted 200 calories.

Not a bad way to start the morning, eh? Even with green paws.

Make it Count

Y'all, running is HARD.

Really hard.

Remember how I was all gung-ho about lifting weights with New Rules of Lifting for Women? Or at least how I pretended that I was?

After taking my measurements when I completed the first stage, I found that I had lost an inch. In two months. Sure, that's better than nothing; I could have gained inches, blah Blah BLAH! Sorry, but an inch in two months isn't good enough for me. Hell, when I was training for my half marathon in the spring, I lost 5 inches in my hips ALONE.

This brings me to my next point. I've decided I have to run. Observe.

This handy-dandy chart is a representation of 2011 from the perspective of my weight. I've weighed myself (almost) every Friday since January 7. I think there is a clear pattern going on here.

Run=lose weight and inches.
Don't run=get fat.

It's not rocket science.

So, despite not having a goal to work towards or a big race to run in the next few months, I've got to get back to running.

Tonight, though I got off work at 7pm, though I am working a 12-hour day tomorrow, and though I feel like I have beat the proverbial crap out of my emotional self from my lack of devotion to my health and wellness in the past couple months, I ran. I told myself I had 30 minutes. Not long at all, but if I only allowed myself 30 minutes, then I had to make it count. I intended to do 25 minutes of intervals, but having been so lax with my running routine since May, I had to take a few more breaks than I wanted.

A 13-minute mile. Not too bad considering, but I have so much room for improvement. Last year, my goals were only to complete my races (5k, 10k, 10-miler, and half-marathon). I think in the next few months, my goal will need to be to get FASTER. That way, when this rolls around in the spring:

I can show those hills who's boss and leave last year's time in the dust.

Weekly Money Check-Up 9/23

Happy Friday, Y'all!

1. The most I’ve spent this last week was on my car payment! $191 a month. I am determined to pay this off 3-4 years early, so hopefully, post-2012 I won't have a car payment.
2. Today I am thankful for hot dates with my boyfriend. We don't frequent fancy restaurants, but we both decided to set aside some money to go on one nice date this month. That date is tonight and I've been looking forward to it all day!
3. Money can’t buy happiness. One free thing I did last week that made me happy was spend the morning at the dog park last Saturday. It's not exactly free...but I feel like we've gotten more than our money's worth as it only costs $30 for the yearly membership.
4. I will consider this week a success if I successfully plan and execute a menu for the next week.
5. If I could have coffee with one blogger, I would choose seriously, all of them! With that said, I would love to meet Molly at Smart, Pretty, & Awkward, Ninja at Punch Debt in the Face, and Andie at Can You Stay for Dinner?.


I would love to know, which bloggers would YOU love to have coffee with?

Perfection=Exhaustion

I noticed this week on the financial blog circuit the recent popularity of the book Switch. I haven't picked up the book yet, but one of the philosophies mentioned really resonated with me.

In one of JD's posts on Get Rich Slowly, he talks about the metaphor of the elephant (do not insert fat joke here):

The rider represents our rational or logical mind. The large, powerful elephant represents our emotional mind. And the path through the jungle represents our environment and surroundings.

The authors say that we most often approach habit change by leveraging only our logical mind, the “rider”. We outline the exact tips, tactics, and strategy we need to systematically execute our plan.

We see early success with this method because, in the beginning, the rider has enough control and strength to force the elephant to go wherever we desire. But the longer the rider tries to overpower the elephant, the more quickly she tires and burns out. Trying to change a habit with only your logical mind quickly leads to exhaustion. You cannot succeed with willpower alone.

He goes on to mention that you need to motivate the ELEPHANT, or the emotional part of your mind and you also need to work with the jungle, or your surroundings.

This is the very best thing about being a Dave Ramsey follower. The reason he sets up his debt snowball in the fashion that he does is so you DON'T lose momentum when trying to get out of debt; to do this, he appeals to the emotional side of your brain. When you're chipping away at debt, if you're paying off your smallest debts one by one, the emotional gratification that comes from your quick pay off will help keep you motivated throughout the process.

How very applicable this is to not only getting out of debt, but to losing weight as well. I LOVE that Weight Watchers sets small, achievable goals. They don't tell you to lose 50, 100, 150 pounds right out of the starting gate. You start with a 5% target, your 10% target, until your WEIGHT LOSS snowballs. (Look, I just connected money and weight loss. How clever--someone should make a blog about that).

For me, I feel like I set myself up for failure by constantly expecting perfection.

If I don't get in 4 (or 5 or whatever arbitrary number I designated for the week) workouts in, then I have failed at life and I just quit and veg out on the couch. You know what? 2 or 3 workouts would have probably been just as good.

If I haven't stuck to my daily calorie needs and I've gone over? Well, screw it all! Velveeta shells and cheese, I'm comin' to get you! (Right, that's a fabulous idea.)

In all honesty, I feel like I've been at this game my entire life and I still can't get it right. For this week, I will try to think as more than just the rider; I will consider the elephant in the jungle as well.

We interrupt your regularly scheduled programming...

I spent the last, oh...36 hours engrossed in this. 

Thanks, Suzanne Collins. Like I didn't have other things I wanted to do this weekend. 

Pages 243-301 were a good excuse to finally get my first pumpkin spiced latte of the season, though.

At least I got the entire thing out of the way, but then of course I had to start the third in the installment. I'll get back to y'all as soon as I get through this one.