Focus and Discipline - ah, how I hate those words...

Because I lacked both.

Starting from today, I will train myself in staying focused and being disciplined.

You wondering about this? Well, I just kind of figured out of who I want to be when I'm a grown up! (Took me awhile, but I think I finally have an inner picture of the new me!) And yes, I like to be both. Especially since both are the qualities which will make me the person that I want to be.

Ever tried to train for a marathon without focus and discipline? Well, in case you haven't, just read my posts over the last year and you know what this is like! Hahaha. The problem is you get nowhere without focus and discipline. So my September goal is to gain both.

Today, I was really disciplined. I didn't buy any sweets (yes, I ate some, but just to get rid of them, before the evening.) or stuff that doesn't go with the person I want to become. And I didn't do so in Basel on Saturday!!! Which was really hard, since they got some pretty nice stuff.

I still lacked focus though. I'm still starting things and don't finish them before I start with a new task. But I'm getting better with it little by little.

On the job front. Still searching. Interview went well, but ...

On the sports front. Still some little troubles with my knee but stopping the medication seems to have done the trick. Doc appointment is next week, I'll see how it goes and then I might start with some light running / shuffling. Wohoo. Until then it's having fun with my bike.


Have a great new week.

KEEP MOVING FORWARD!

The next round

considering my leg.

You know BDD might be on to something. Since my leg problems are getting worse and my physiotherapist is at the end of her knowledge and did send me back to my doc.

From what she said to me the problem is not located in my knee or my hip for that matter, but in the muscles and their sinews. Especially since the my deeper thigh muscles hurt in the night for no apparent reason, I hadn't done anything special that day. And she can only loosen them up, but they don't take well to it.


My next doc appointment is in 2 weeks, so I take the other two therapy appointments and wait for what he says. And I stop taking the new medicine, since it got worse since I took it.

Other than that it's still basic training, bike tours and core strength. Looking for a job and a flat, getting a haircut today (hooray) and visiting friends on the weekend (after another interview).

Have a great week.

KEEP MOVING FORWARD.

8 k and a howling leg

Hey there,

St. Peter seams to have a BAAAD week. Rain and "sunshine" switch positions every few hours, so I had to align my training schedule. I can't believe that it's already Thursday, time is racing.

Anyway yesterday I walked 8 k, not that much considering what my goals are. But my left leg was really unhappy about this walk. Around k 5 it started howling first the back thigh muscle than directly the inner knee than the knee cap, for good measure my front thigh muscle added a bit flavour to the crescendo and back to back thigh muscle. Wonderful.

The real thing that pisses me off, I've been to the physio about an hour before this crescendo. And she had loosened up my thigh and knee muscles, it hurt like hell and obviously my muscles thought: "Oh yes, this was fun, let's do it again while walking." Argh.

Anyway, I stick to my goals. Marathon, Triathlon, Ironman. Here I come. No matter what.


So today is Protein-and-Water-Day. Sounds bad? It isn't. Chocolate Milk(protein)shakes, Magnesium drinks and some yummy meat sticks on fresh salad. YUMMY.

KEEP MOVING FORWARD!

Sometimes I need a reminder

to get back on track.

Over the last few weeks or, let's be frank, months I got distracted from my big goal, Triathlon = Ironman!

Well, there is nothing like a running(biking) into a race to get me back on track and realign my priorities. Yes, you've read right, I biked into a race on my usual Sunday morning ride with Chris. They held a shortie right next to the wild water rafting station on Lake Markkleeberg. And me, Miss-I-want-to-race-Ironman-Distance-in-2013 didn't have a clue about it!!!!! Well, IRONMAN 2013 has gone down the drain anyway, after this year. (I can't even say season since I haven't done one race!%$%'§%$§&/$§$%)

AND YOU KNOW WHAT REALLY TICKS ME OFF??!?!?!?!? That I could have done this race without extra training, because the distances were ridiculous and I know this course in my sleep! Okay, so I would have been the last one in every part, but I would have had my first f*ing Tri. ARRGGGHHH.
And those competitors, ha, except for the leading group they were mostly not that prepared. I just say pot bellies and much worse creaking bikes! What good is it to have a 1500€ roadie and it creaks with every stroke? Seriously, take care of your gear if you do a tri!

While the leading group, sigh; the sound when they drove by... Well, most of you probably know the fantastic sound of perfectly working bike mechanic flying by you. Chris and I just looked at each other in fascination and jelousy. (My gearshift is still misbehaving most of the time, although it worked fine today. I'll have have word with the BDO mechanic this week for sure.)


On the other hand, I still don't have a helmet and my knee is misbehaving to an extent that's bothering me to even sit with bended knees! Good thing my next physio is tomorrow, so I'll howl my frustration in my therapists ear, hopefully she knows a way to get my knee back to function properly so I can get back to running. My hip and lower back are fantastic though, still I don't see why I have to trade in a working knee for a working hip and back.


Due to this run in with a tri I updated my priorities.

# 1 Getting an interesting job and an apartment.
# 2 Getting rid of the excess body fat and getting fit. (I'm on roll here.Thanks to L-Carnitin and the new harvest apples.)
# 3 Becoming a member in a tri club, depends on No 1.
# 4 Learning how to swim properly, depends on No 3.
# 5 Everything else, like getting a tripod and a scanner for my photography.

While we're on the subject of getting rid off things:
I finally got around to sort out some books. In these four bags are about 50 books. I'm reading quite a lot and I still had some school books on my shelves. So all of them go to a thrift store. The slightly frustrating thing? My shelfs look still the same because I had the books stacked in two rows on my shelfs.

Training schedule for the upcoming week. A bike ride every day. Core strength training every day. 1 hour of swimming, not every day. ;-)

Hope everyone had a nice weekend.

KEEP MOVING FORWARD!

Things are looking good around here

Hey there.

Currently life is quite positive around here, even though it rains cats and dogs all day.

The reasons? (For the positive stuff not the rain.;-P )

#1 L-Carnitin seems to do the trick. Love that stuff, so tasty. You should try it.

#2 Manual Therapy seems to be the way to go when it comes to my joints and muscles. A million times better than any massage could be. After just one session my hip joints mobility is much better. Unfortunately my knee isn't apreciating this new flexibility. It's back to that state it was back in March. Still no running! Dang it.

#3 I have an job interview scheduled for next week.

#4 It's fresh apple season!!! Get some old varieties from your local farmers market and enjoy them. I do so.

There are more things, but I have some stuff to do today, so I stop here.

(Botanical Garden Leipzig)

Greetings from Leipzig, enjoy your weekends.

KEEP MOVING FORWARD!!

Finally in "full job search mode"

I finally entered full "job search mode"and am back to my old pre-home-living self. (Feels damn good, if you ask me.)

Meaning, I'm doing nothing much else than looking for job opportunities and applying. No time for dilly dally and nothing interesting tri- or foodwise is happening currently in my life, so I barely have something to tell in this blog. (Or are you interested in the fact, that I threw away an old pyjama today?)

I'm sorry about this, I promise I'll post more again soon.

Tomorrow my physiotherapy is starting, so I'm hopefully back to running soon enough.
That means that I really need to get a job and move to a new town where I can get into a triathlon club and have new training partners.

The path to my new job?! I'm working on it everyday. Promise.

I wish you succesfull training and for the weekend that you rock your races.

KEEP MOVING FORWARD!

What a week!

The good things that happened this week, happened mostly today! (I don't want to think about the bad things!)

Good things:
1. I was called today by a headhunter to send in my application for a quite nice job. I did so, we'll see how it works out.

2. All in all I did send out 4 job applications today! I'm so proud on myself.

3. As a celebration to sending those 4 applications I granted myself some nice "new" songs by Wir sind Helden and Xavier Naidoo.

4. Writing my applications at the library was the best idea I've had in a long time. The atmosphere gets me to work and it's still okay to lay my head down when my eyes get to tired from looking at the screen. At home I always find ways to procrastinate and don't get the stuff done. I don't know how anyone can work from home, they definitely are different from me. I admire them for it, nothing for me though.

I did a bit of cycling this week and will do a bit more on the weekend. Except for that my main focus is still on getting a new job and moving out.

Oh yeah, I got new medicine and a therapy prescription for my knee from my doc. Guess what, the problem is not my knee but my hip! So from next week on I learn some drills to get my hip in the right position and then I'm hopefully back to running (shuffling) in a few weeks. Believe it or not, I miss running. Every time a runner passes me these day I really get annoyed for not being allowed to run.

Now I'm off to enjoy a nice food magazin I bought yesterday.

Lomopic I took back in April during my sunlight session.

Enjoy your weekend.

KEEP MOVING FORWARD!

perfect job?

Hi,

today was a really good day for me.

I looked for job offers and I found one that sounds perfect to me (cool project, lots of travel), I already asked for the contact and will write the application first thing tomorrow morning.

The next good thing, I finally got some songs from "Monkey Majik", which is a japanese music group. Their music is really fantastic, unfortunately japanese music is really hard to get in Germany. Don't know why, american music is everywhere, but japanese...it's really annoying. No wonder that the record companies have problems, they don't do their job, which is to provide the music I like, when and how I like it. They deserve it to suffer.

(Yeah, I took this pic.)

Todays food diary is really crazy.
Breakfast: chocolate protein shake, a handful of mangetouts, black tea
Snack/Lunch: 7 sugar apricots (small sweet apricots, not apricots coated in sugar!)
Dinner: chocolate protein shake

This happened by accident, I lost track of time and suddenly it was evening and I still wasn't hungry, so to give my body some good stuff I drank another protein shake.

Hope your Monday was equally nice.

KEEP MOVING FORWARD!

Ramen at the UMAII

Miso-Ramen with fresh Salmon (The best fish I ever ate! Because it's really soft and juicy, since the uncooked salmon slivers are just put into the hot broth and then refine while served and eating. *Very Happy Sigh*)

Tamago-Ramen (I like the Tamago = omelet, but the broth of this Ramen isn't exactly my cup of tea. ;-)

UMAII is a japanese Ramen Bar in Leipzig. They are fantastic. I love to eat there. Chris loves it too.
I went there with two other friends (K & A) on Friday and they didn't like it. The interior is too stylish (read cold) for them and the food too japanese (Algae is obviously a "no go" for them. Well, if I should move to Japan and they come to visit, this could be a problem for them, I on the other hand would be perfectly fine.), K ate Thyme-potatoes at another bar right afterwards and then felt stuffed, poor girl. No wonder if you ask me. After that we went dancing, it was real fun and felt fantastic, but I really need to improve the strength of my thighs. Ouch.

I like the Japanese (Okinawan) culture of Hara Hachi Bu = Eat only until you are 80% full, though I'm still struggling to get it ingrained, but I'm getting better day by day. At UMAII this isn't a problem however, since the portions are perfect for this 80% approach. Japan watch out here I come! ;-D (I've decided to learn Japanese. Now I just have to find a language course, for February 2011.)


I have a new favourite supplement: L-Carnitin.

It's not only delicious, but also very good for my muscles and body as a whole. So, we'll see how it works out. (I bought this myself and it's my own opinion, the producer didn't pay me or send me this. But I wouldn't say no, if I got a package for free. ;-)

Okay, now I'll clean my room and then go for my Sunday training ride. Chris isn't in town this weekend, so I have to ride alone. (Well, Elliott will keep me company. Wonder what his excuses will be this time.)

Tomorrow I will view some apartments, wish me luck that they are what I'm looking for and can move into my own flat soon. This also means I have to cut my triathlon budget to half since I need the money for flat stuff, like a bed, kitchen stuff and so on. Anyway, moving out is hugely important for my mental health, being a 32 year old teenager isn't fun anymore.

Have a great new week.

KEEP MOVING FORWARD!