Running 101

Starting out new. Wha???

Finally most of the snow is gone and the track is runnable all the way around. Since I haven't been running properly for almost two months due to snow and ice I'm back to where I was in November when it comes to my fitness. Which means a marathon on April 25th is out of the question. So I set out for a half marathon, where I will hopefully shave off a few minutes of my PR from my first half marathon in 2008, which was around 2:58 hrs. That means I'll lay out a new training plan for me today and will follow it through. (Well, a girl can dream! ;-)

Chris and I met up at the track at 10 this morning. Chris was as always a few minutes late. When I got to the track it was just starting to rain. All through the training it was raining. ;-) The training really showed how much fitness I had lost over the two passed months. But my knee behaved and except for the odd tweak here and there I felt alright though totally unfit. Funnily enough, I see blue sky now! *grumble*

Todays stats:
t: 1:09 hrs
iz: 46:22 min
HR: 138 bpm

I'm pretty pleased that I stayed for so long in my zone. And the track felt marvelous, Chris and I love to run there.

By the way I was wearing these:


When I prepared my shoe series for my tomboy to woman blog yesterday I took them out of their winter hiding place. Today I thought it would be a good thing to wear them for the track training. And it was such a good idea. In my opinion they are the best running shoes ever. I LOVE them.

Well that's it for today. Enjoy your Sunday, hopefully with sun. I'll write applications, yuk.

KEEP MOVING FORWARD!

PS: If you want to know how a double exposure looks like (pretty cool if I might say so) have a look at my the man-made project blog.

Happy 100th post!

Yours truly got tagged (for the very first time by the way) by Big Daddy Diesel from his well known blog http://tridiesel.blogspot.com/. He awarded me the "sunshine award" after he got it awarded from Aimee, congrats to you both. I am so honored, proud and happy about this, I nearly swooned. ;-) So thank you, thank you, thank you Big Daddy. I'll honor it with a place in my sidebar. *happy sigh*


And guess what: it worked! I had sunshine nearly the whole day here in Leipzig. *snicker*

Now, who do I want to give this award to, too?! Okay, here it goes (without an apparent order):

Molly Muppets on Parade

AZ AZ Running

Thomas Georgia Snail

Karen Working it out

Sherry A woman in motion

Marit Marit Chrislock-Lauterbach

Chloe Running with a bottle of wine

Jenna Will train for wine and chocolate

Keith Keith's Odyssey to Planet Fitness

Missy: I would have given it to you too, but since you've already got it... ;-)

Today I finally got around to take pictures of my Leipzig Marathon running shirt (I first had to unearth it, my room was pure chaos, under the week I don't really keep it neat). Big Daddy you'll love it, because it's from Brooks.

front

back

Tomorrow, Chris and I will meet for our track workout. Monday afternoon I'll see my practitioner to check on my left knee, since it's still acting up now and then, which is annoying and scaring me.

Except for that, I will stand back a little from blogging (I queued some posts for my other two blogs, but I'll still write posts for this one and yes, I'll still read your blogs and comment, if I feel so) and throw most of my energy into job applications (even for some boring jobs ;-), to finally get a new one. So I can get myself some new gear (gadgets, swim goggles) and finally sign up at a tri club, I need swim and bike partners! And get out of my class (Did you know that whole world is bad? No?! Well you just need to listen to the discussions in the breaks and you'll think so. Ugh.).

Now I'm off to read on in "What colour is your parachute?" the german version of THE bestseller on jobsearch. It's eyeopening. (honestly...)

Enjoy your weekend and hopefully spring is coming to your town too. Soon.

KEEP MOVING FORWARD!

Post 99: No, non, nyet, nein, neeeeee. (edit)

I did send out a job application just yesterday. And guess what, I've already got a 'No' back from them. Argh. After all the hassle for this application (I had to send the pdfs to a friend who put them together in one pdf), they could have at least waited another week to say no.

Oh well, it was a long shot anyway. And aviation isn't really my thing, so what the heck. As I've got 4 more jobs to apply for (from yesterday), it's not as if I run out of possibilities.

And since I've decided to experiment with these applications, there will be at least some fun in it for me. ;-)

(edit) Todays presentation went extremely well. I'm soooo good! And the test result from last week was also a lot better than I thought, so I'll get around 79 of 100 possible points. To celebrate I granted myself a piece of chocolate truffle cake from Starbucks. You know the dark chocolately decadence cake were you can never eat the whole piece in one time!?!

By the way, I changed the comment settings, if you don't have a blog or website you can still comment from now on. And you find my (blog)email adress in my profile from now on, if you want to talk to me and don't want to do it over the comments.

KEEP MOVING FORWARD!

Skipping speed training in favor of....

application time.

Sorry guys but I really NEED to get a new job. SOON. I need money and to move in my own flat.

So since I found such lovely job ads today (one of them APPLE related!!!) I just have to get some apps ready.

Especially since I got another "No" today. Though I have to say, that it was the nicest "No" so far. I actually have the feeling, that they read my application carefully and thought it over. A tailored 'No-letter', wow. How lovely. I'm bit sad still, since this would have been a really nice job. Oh well.

The jobs I found today are mostly in Munich

(http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/4e/Muenchen_Grosses_Stadtwappen.png)

and one in Switzerland.

(http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/f/f3/Flag_of_Switzerland.svg/500px-Flag_of_Switzerland.svg.png)

Sounding great, doesn't it?


On the other side, I was shooting today, because the sun was shining. And believe it or not but I shot 4 films. So I gave 6 films into development, I was 3 times at the drugstore today and probably walked something like 3 to 4 k at least.

And even better, the Man-Made Project is taking off like hell, 2 followers already. I just put this blog up yesterday. Wohoo. Now I have to rain myself in not to post pics like crazy only to run out of steam and good pics in a few weeks or just days.

Now, I have to get back to my applications.

KEEP MOVING FORWARD

PS: The comments "war" at the last post was hilarious. Like you guys.

There's nothing like best friends

I was at the cinema with Chris. And my mood changed dramatically. We were laughing and joking in no time. Best friends are the best therapy! We've watched "New York I love you", wonderful movie.

And as a huge THANK YOU for you all:

I took this picture last Wednesday at our photosafiri. It's at the Markkleeberger See. Through the fence you see the wild water rafting center.

Took me exactly one hour to scan the best pictures from four films. But it was worth it. You'll see.

KEEP MOVING FORWARD!

Fighting back (update)

First: Thank you for your kind comments. Just what I needed.

Second: My mood is a tad better than yesterday. A good nights sleep, mountains of chocolate and watching Harry Potter are doing their thing.

Third: I really have to fight with me, to not withdraw into my snails house, which I would love to do now. Rolling up in a warm sweater and scarf with a fantasy book and a hot chocolate and don't go out, don't get in contact with the world. It's what I usually did when someone was criticizing me. Living in my own safe world, where nobody can reach and hurt me. But I'm fighting it. I got up, I went to class with the streetcar, I didn't object to some girl who sat down next to me even though there were a lot of free seats in the streetcar, starting a new blog for my lomography. I'm fighting back this time.

Fourth: I got another film back yesterday. The pictures with people were awful. Not because of what happened on Monday, but because Leipzig isn't New York Fashion Week (surprising, no?). Shooting from the hip not knowing who stands there doesn't make good interesting pictures, the pics are boring and a waste of time and money. (No I won't post those two, they get canned.)

Fifth: As said before in point 3: I put up another blog. I was toying with this idea since the weekend. Only then I wanted to call it san analogue photography. Now I came up not only with a better name but also with a much more specific theme. It's called The Man-Made Project you find it here: http://the-man-made-project.blogspot.com/ It's much more simple than this and my style blog. It's about mundane man-made items. Shot mostly with my lomo fisheye. Since I want the pictures to have an artistic character. No people (guess why), just items (perfect, they don't get annoyed and hurt my feelings). I'm just starting out, but if it catches on and I hope so, I'll invite other lomographers and photographers to send me their pictures of mundane items to post them. I even got a new mail account at google for it. Yeah, well, I'm an engineer, we like to plan ahead. So it's also on another blogger account to make space for more pictures.

Sixth: KEEP MOVING FORWARD is my mantra these days. I'm constantly trying to envision how I want to be like (Jumping from the joy of winning the Ironman Hawaii, not the age group but the whole thing! hahahaha), my style (sleek and dark and classic, with Manga-style hair in platinium blond), my significant other (kind and loving, humorous, smart, tall, alpha-male, non-smoker, triathlete, some nice tattoos), my flat (sunny, roomy, nice kitchen and bathroom with a huge tub, high ceilings, canopy bed, with a park near for the running), my car (white Audi A3 sportsback, 159 PS Diesel engine), my life in general (lots of fun, laughter, fantastic help, many good friends, relaxation, triathlon, angst-free, a job I love with a nice but nevertheless successdriven team, rockclimbing, saving the environment on tree at a time, making the world a better place). I do this to not think of the past, to concentrate on my goals and finding my way to these goals.

(update) Seven: Düsseldorf has written. No new interview. It's really interesting, the applications I give a lot of energy and money to, all turn to dust. Gladly, I'll go to the cinema with Chris later. We'll watch "New York I love you" That means, I've got someone to talk the Düsseldorf employer to trash and a shoulder to cry on.

Eight: Oh, yeah, the pictures I got back today are a lot better than the film from yesterday and I went shooting in my big break. There was one thing I realized. People are afraid of cameras, even when they point away from them. It's weird.

Nine: Another application will get send out today.

So,

KEEP MOVING FORWARD.

The grouch is back

It's raining (!) and I haven't slept well due to some unpleasant incident yesterday. So my mood is even underneath the subway level. Oh yeah, did I mention that I can barely walk because of open and closed blisters on my feet and I have a splitting headache.

I was on a high last week, I'm on a low this week. Even though it started out so good. Walking to and fro class (10k), having my first follower on my style blog, buying the second Harry Potter on DVD and watching "Sherlock Holmes".

But there is something about unpleasantries that everything good vanishes from my mind and I obsess about the one "bad" thing that happened. I found out that I can't take criticism on my behaviour through this incident. (On that note, who does take critic well?) But it took me nearly 24 hours to come to terms with it. Unfortunately I'm still cranky and soooo tired and totally beside me.

Okay, enough said. I have to prepare a presentation.

KEEP MOVING FORWARD!

Training with crows and nearly raw food

Good Morning.

I hope that you all have enjoyed your weekend. I certainly did. Well, what I did on Saturday, you could read in my previous post, except that I stepped on my scale in the morning. I wasn't exactly happy to see the number (66,5 kg), but it didn't down my mood anyway.

Yesterday I slept in, I got up exactly at noon and I wasn't really amused to see it was snowing (growl), but I didn't let it bother me and made my breakfast and put on my running gear. When I finally went out for my training session it was 1 o'clock and had stopped snowing. I walked fast to the track as warm up. Unfortunately the track wasn't completely free of snow, so I was shuffling/walking down the first straight around the curve and to the end of the second straight turned around and walked a bit to get my heartrate down. While doing this I also gave the crows a workout, since they always flew up when I ran in their direction. So we trained together. *grin*

I did some drills too and made an interesting experience. You know this drill where you run sideways switching your feet from front to back? Well, running to the right wasn't a problem. But when I did it to the left my legs and the mobility part of my brain were totally surprised and didn't know what to do. hahaha.

I really had the feeling that the electric impulses were frantically looking for ways to get where they should be, but oh no there were no paths... (Imagine the looks of pure horror on their faces, ahahahaha.) I nearly fell, because my body wasn't ready for these moves. Well after another normal shuffling "lap" I did this leftsided drill again but this time really slow, to get my body and brain to remember the movements and build the necessary neuro paths.

Yesterdays stats (beware: my watch didn't measure right in the first 15 min)
time: 54:36 min
in Zone: 21:36 min
heartrate: 143 bpm

This morning I walked to school, so I already got 5k for this week. Wohoo. And since this is Monday it's SCAL(R)E DAY:
weight: 64,6 kg (wohoo, much better than Saturday, though I probably only lost water)
fat: 29,4%
muscles: 34,1%
water: 51,3%

This is was

yesterdays raw meal.

Salad made of Pastileien salad (the green stuff, I don't know the english name), tomatoes, mushrooms, hemp seed, grinded flax seed, spices, olive oil, pumpkin seed oil, aceto balsamico cremoso and grilled salmon (yeah, I know grilled isn't raw, but have you ever tried deep frozen salmon? Not that good.). Yummy.

KEEP MOVING FORWARD!

Back in training

Hello there.

I'm still on a high. My mood is fantastic and the weather too. Since the sidewalks are walkable again, I've decided to put my feet to them and walked extraordinary 10 k! Wohoo. First to the organic supermarket and back and than to city but not back. Hahaha. This makes wonderful 10k in warm sunshine.

And if that wasn't enough, I've decided to turn my eating into a much more healthy direction. From today on, one meal per day will be RAW. I've recognized this week that this is what my body craves: raw food. That's also a reason why I went to the organic supermarket. Luckily they had my favourite salad and I even bought myself a yogurt made from goats milk. Never ate one of them before, so it will be an interesting experience.
I also got more ginger and some chili to get my metabolism onto a faster pace. My mom only bought a small piece of ginger yesterday, since I didn't ate the last one. But now it's a new game and I need to lose my winter fat.

There was an interesting experience I made this morning. I looked at some old pictures of me and realized that I didn't look that bad on them. Not a big thing you might say, but it is certainly to me. I didn't like myself in the last 25 years and it didn't help that my mom told me I looked fat(even when I weighed 25 lbs less than now) and my dad telling me that I wouldn't get a boyfriend with my sense of order. HAH! Don't feel sorry for me now, because as I said I'm finally coming to terms with me and my looks. Wohoo.

I tell you one thing: This year is going to be great, marvelous and absolutely fantastic.

Tomorrow morning I will be at my track and doing some laps, with or without Chris. I have to prepare for a halfmarathon in two months, she doesn't. So lucky you, you'll get some stats from me tomorrow.

I wish all of you a wonderfull weekend.

KEEP MOVING FORWARD!!!

YOU'VE GOTTA SEE THESE!!!! (picture post)

My first lomographies! The best of two films! Enjoy!

Tuesday evening at Leipzigs trade fair!

What might this be?!

This is what the fisheye does. I thought that I was taking a picture of Leipzigs main station, but you only only see it on the upper end of the picture. Well, my shadow is more beautiful anyway, right? Right!

My class, I messed up todays test. Whoops.

The view from our class room.

This chain goes right around a monument in front of the main station. Strange, huh?

This shadow thing is really funny. See it?!

The column at the side of St. Nikolai in memory of the Monday Demonstrations of 1989 which led to the German Reunion. History folks. We lived right through it.

St. Nikolai from the side.

Leipzig has a lot of passages in the town, this is a column in one of them.

Leuschner Square, you see the tower of the new town hall center right. The keyhole building on the right was a bowling and billiard hall, built in the late 1980ies (yeah, we've got cool buildings in the GDR too). The bowling alleys are underground. Unfortunately nobody operates it anymore. Even though the location is perfect, smack down in the middle of the town. Well, obviously nobody has a vision for it (and the needed money). So sad.

A fountain at Leuschner Square.

My motor bike boots in the streetcar.

Broken window at the stairway in an office building. Only the outer pane is broken. (You have to love double pane windows for that. They also isolate pretty well, when both panes a intact.)

One of the open passages. The Ritter (knights) Passage looking to the main station.

In fact I'm totally crazy about lomography.
Chris said it's like I'm on drugs since Tuesday. I assure you I'm not, I just happen to have a tremendous amount of fun shootin' pics. I bought 6 films on Tuesday noon, the sixth film is in my Lomo yet. I'll get 2 other films back tomorrow and will give one into development. I bought another six films today, so to get through the weekend.

I always liked photography, it just seems that I never had the right kind of camera. Because I never got the pictures I wanted, I was frustrated to no end, so I stopped shooting. I got back a little to it through my digital ixus my blogs. And now I'm back full throttle through my Lomo fisheye2. So I'll definitely buy a second hand LOMO LC-A in March.

I just LOVE IT.

Tomorrow I'll walk into the city and on Sunday I'll go running. The snow is finally thawing.

KEEP MOVING FORWARD!!!

PS. I'll put up a new blog for my photography this weekend, so I won't pester you with this topic anymore. Just a few pics now and then.

Photosafiri or the right to eat some chocolate

Hi peeps.

I went on photosafari or photosafiri, as Chris and I call it from now on, with Chris to the Markkleeberger See on late afternoon yesterday.

Remember the Markkleeberger See? Chris and I were running there in December.

You'll find the report back here. Yesterday the lake was frozen over.

So essentially this means I got to walk quite a distance yesterday (at least measuring for the last few weeks). Wohoo, seems like my new hobby is working out alright. And we were out enjoying a beautiful sundown, though it was quite cold. I took a lot of pictures, which I'll post as soon as I get the films developed. Yep, I shot 2 films. 70 pictures?! You might ask, but remember you shoot differently with films than with digitals.

On facebook one of the other lomographers complained that only half of his pictures were good. Hahaha. I remember times when I had films where only one picture was alright. 50% good pictures, wow, sounds like he definitely knows how to take pictures. (Or his expectations on the quality were really low.)

In any case I think that this is the thing for me and gets me out there even more. Good thing for my training.

Do you have any other hobbies except for Triathlon and Running? If so, what do you do?

KEEP MOVING FORWARD!

How to get rid of some pounds and

save some bucks, when you work or have class downtown!

I just found the most amazing "new" hobby.

Lomography!

Which is essentially cheap analogue photography, with the most amazing pictures. The focus is to make many fun pictures, not perfect pictures. And while it previously annoyed me to not know if my pics are sharp and interesting, the uncertainty is now part of the fun. In fact my pics will be a great deal different from what I'm used too, since I've got the Lomo Fisheye2, distortion is now part of the game. Here are some lomography pics for you, but without the fisheye.

(bricolage by Kevin Dooley, http://www.flickr.com/photos/pagedooley/3598131614/)

"Most photography aims at capturing the special moment or place. Lomography aims at the routine moment or place. The use of film and bad cameras ensures that the image maintains its mundane gestalt. Most of our lives we see scenes like the one above through our eyes--that's what lomography is about." (from Kevin Dooley on flickr)

(Gastown Nighttime Lomography by kk+ http://www.flickr.com/photos/kk/2576408024/)

But how is this going to save some bucks and get me to shed weight?

Well, instead of browsing the shops in my breaks, I will be out and about looking for interesting angles and pics. Which essentially will get my ass moving, without spending a lot of money. Okay, I have to invest some money in the 35mm films and in the development but that is a lot less money than when I buy a new pair of Jeans, design books (I've spend 50 € on them on Monday) or bags, hats, running clothes.... And what's also exciting about it, there is a big world wide community.

This afternoon Chris and me will go on photo safari. Can't wait. And since the sun shines, when we start out we'll have the most amazing light. Did I tell you that I can't WAIT?!!

Sports

Yesterday I went to the nutrition talk of my runners seminar. It was interesting, though I don't agree with everything that Dr. Feil told us. Well in any case I might know now a way to get my connective tissue on a good level and get rid of the cellulite.

And I've got my race shirt. It's in fact my second race shirt ever. It's black and, Tri Diesel will like to read this, from Brooks. Though it's a black mens shirt and that means wide and not very form fitting. Which I consider a good thing at this moment. ;-) And since this shirt is for the Leipzig Marathon, there is a lion on the back (lion is in our coat of arms). I'll take a picture and post it for you.

(Leipzig coat of arms http://www.glausius.de/images/leipzig.gif)

I took some pics yesterday evening, but since I took them with my lomo you'll have to wait a few days for them. At any rate I can't promise that they turned out well, because I experimented with the lighting time. And it's on my first and second film, so I still have to get used to this and they might be nothing but a big mess. (But that's part of the fun!!!)

Mampf Diary

Monday: chocolate protein shake, 1 ciabatta roll with goats cheese, 1 apple, 1 ciabatta roll with cheese, white fish filet and buttered green peas (yummy), tea and water all through the day

Tuesday: chocolate protein shake, 1 ciabatta roll with goats cheese, 1 piece of cake, 1 apple, 1 ciabatta roll with cheese, white fish filet and buttered green peas, 2 servings of chocolate pudding, tea and water all through the day

Today: chocolate protein shake, later: 1 roll with Teewurst, 1 roll with cheese, 1 radish ball, ?

So this is it for now. I'll keep you posted on the sports front.

Hey, Jenna aka reader No 10. Glad you're following me. Welcome.

KEEP MOVING FORWARD!!!

Just for you, Keith

my uncluttered desk. ;-D

Some motivation.

KEEP MOVING FORWARD.

SCAL(R)E Day & Weird knee & Mampf Diary

Good Morning.

Monday morning weird knee update: my left leg is okay again. After having been to the cinema with heels (2"), it was nearly gone. I still feel it, but I can move without looking like the Hunchback of Notre Dame. Major advantage!

Today is SCAL(R)E Day. Here are my weight stats:
Weight: 64,9 kg = 143,08 lbs
H2O: 51,3 %
Fat: 29,7 %
Muscles: 34,1 %
Bones: 7,7 kg

Mampf Diary
Friday: chocolate protein shake, assorted nuts, 1 honey melon, 2 bagels (chocolate, cinnamon-raisin), 1 ciabatta roll with goats cheese, 1 ciabatta roll with curd, 2 servings of chocolate pudding (75% of chocolate, yummy), 2 Lion bars, tea and water all through the day

Saturday: chocolate protein shake, 1 ciabatta roll with goats cheese, 1 ciabatta roll with curd, 2 servings of chocolate pudding (75% of chocolate, yummy), 2 Lion bars, tea and water all through the day

Sunday: chocolate protein shake, veal steak with string beans and carrots, 2 servings of chocolate pudding (75% of chocolate, yummy), 1 Lion bar, 1 apple, 1 Curly wurly, tea and water all through the day


I'm all set for a much better week than last week. (For those of you who might have wondered why I didn't go swimming, I've had my cycle during last week and still on Saturday and since Saturday is my swim day...) So this week I will walk much more, go swimming and watch out what I eat and when. I also made some changes in my clothing: more adult, less student. And I will envision my goals daily to get my Über-Ich working on my new and aspired life. Olympia 2012 beware Super-San is on her way to the Olympic Triathlon. Muahahahahah.

By the way: Chris and I watched "Percy Jackson" last night. This movie was sooooooooooooooo poorly written. Seriously, I can't imagine how bad this moviewriter must be to put out a movie this boring and bad, when the original series is extremely funny, hugely imaginative and perfectly paced. It makes me want to send him a book on how to write a good movie script. If you like books with a nice twist on reality get the real Percy Jackson books, they are worth every penny. Stay away from the movie!

Keep moving forward!

Chocolate weekend and an unwilling knee

Cheers,
I wasn't out and about this whole weekend. Yesterday I just cleaned my room, watched "Il mare" at youtube, pampered myself with a looooonng bath, pondered the question of what to do with my life in general and indulged in mountains of chocolate (pudding + lion bars).

Today we finally had, would you believe it, sunshine. Unfortunately I must have twisted my left knee this night, so I can barely walk. It's the weirdest thing. I can only make it straight without pain, when there is no weight on it and I don't bend my foot. The pain is in the hollow of the knee, so I think some of the bands are in the wrong place or contract the whole time. This is really unfortunate, since I had no chance to enjoy the beautiful weather outside. Argh. Has anyone of you had this problem and knows what to do about it?

Tuesday will be a talk about nutrition for our running seminar which I will attend. Should be interesting.

Keep Running!

Picture Post - lots of pics, small talk (yesterdays Mampf Diary at the end)

So I've been to the Museum of Arts yesterday. Funnily enough the architecture was a lot more interesting to me than the showed art.

The museum is a cube covered with glass panels.

Interior Design: Lightened hand rails

Okay, something about the art. I realized yesterday, that I don't like expressionism and cuts (wood or lino cuts, yuk). There were a lot of pictures that I didn't like.

These are considered master pieces? Are you sure? The whole Ernst Ludwig Kirchner show consisted of 100 pieces of this or worse quality (in my opinion at least), seriously even I can draw better.

The only drawing that I liked, but it's from a different artist than the upper two.

As you can see I love these staircases.

Modern Art

And this is what Leipzig looked like yesterday evening on my way home. Snow.

Yesterdays Mampf Diary:

chocolate protein shake, 1 1/2 apples, 1 piece of chocolate streusel cake, 1 punch orb, 4 pieces of buttered toast and 125g (4.4 oz) of smoked trout, another punch orb

Water and tea all the while

Keep running and feeding your mind.