My Life As You Know It

So I am in the thick of things and running 4 times a week to help the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society.  It is hard and I am not going to lie I am struggling a bit, as I have a bad knee and it keeps acting up, but I will keep at it.  I NEED to keep at it for my sanity! Lots of people ask me what my training schedule it like, so I thought I would share a snapshot of what's up this week: Monday - off Tuesday - Tempo 6k (Meaning I run it a little faster than my race pace, so for me it is like turtle pace instead of snail pace ha ha ha) Wednesday - X-train (YOGA!) Thursday - Hills (run 800m up hill 7 times, plus a 2k warm up and 1k cool down.  I am not going to lie I hate Thursdays!) Friday - off (This is my only real off day as I ride and/or play softball all the other days) Saturday - Steady 6k Sunday - Long Slow 14k (I also hate Sundays) So that's what my running week looks like.  I have started to listen to audiobooks as I run instead of music in hopes that I...

So I haven't been around in a while.  Stuff has been happening, most of it out of my control and none of it I can talk about.  What I can talk about is that I have been stressed out and super depressed.  Until today I have not felt rested in about 2 months.  I have lost my appetite, but am not losing weight.  I cry randomly almost unprovoked, and I am not a crier.  The rest of the time I put on a happy face and go on with my life.  But it hasn't been working. You see this "thing" that is happening isn't happening to me exactly, and the person it is happening to hasn't exactly told many people, so until this person does (and I hope it is never because they won't tell anyone until they NEED to and I REALLY hope they never NEED to) I am not going to say who or what I am talking about.    Confusing right?  Yeah well I have a secret and it is killing me. The few people I have told have told me to "think positive" because it could never tu...

I recently started doing Bikram yoga and, I am not going to lie, it has turned into an obsession.  I really love it!  As many of you know I have been a little shall we say dissatisfied with my appearance as of late and I really wanted to shake things up and try to get out of this funk, so when a new Bikram's studio opened 15 mins from my house I decided to give it a try.  I was scared out of my mind the first time as I have heard so many conflicting things about Bikram's, but I swallowed my fear and gave it a try and I am so glad that I did. Bikram's is hot yoga (practiced in a 40 degree Celsius room with 40% humidity) so I was worried that I wouldn't be able to handle it, but I read up about it and heard that you should go15 mins early to get accustomed to the heat and that helped a lot.  Now when I go and I am walking up to the room and I feel the heat coming from under the door it instantly calms me.  I love warmth and nothing could be better to snap ...

I am going to warn you straight off the bat.  This post is going to offend some people.  I don't mean it to, but you can never have this discussion and NOT offend someone. With that said I will get on with my post. I have a large extended family.  My dad's side are catholic and all that that entails, so he had 7 brothers and sisters, and each of them has at least one kid, so I have 18 cousins on my Dad's side alone.  Anyway we are mostly a very close group.  There are 4 noteable exceptions, one due to family circumstances and the other three due to the death of one of my uncles when I was very young.  I have been reunited with all of them in my adult life and that was great.  Well it was sort of great.  A few years ago the kids of my late uncle (well calling them kids is a bit of a misnomer, seeing as the two older ones were in their 30's with 2 kids apiece) came to stay with us so that they could spend time with my gr...

Have you guys checked out the "stats" option?  I just did and I am not going to lie I freaked out a bit.  I have traffic coming from Eastern Europe, Asia and the Middle East (including Iran!)  Since this blog is mainly about my life I am not going to lie it freaked me out a bit.  It made me wonder if I should close this blog and start up a more anonymous one... What do you guys think?  (Not that anyone reads this anymore!) :P

That's right I have been keeping something from you.  I have been in the process of adding another member to my family.  I have been waiting until things were certain before I told people. That's right, I've bought a horse.  Her name is Kassandra, she'll be 4 this year.  She's a Selle Francais (French warmblood) and Thoughoubred cross.  I am actually still a bit stunned that this has actually happened.  I didn't think that I'd buy another horse after the death of my last mare two years ago.  But I felt ready and I was lucky enough to have this horse in the barn that I ride at and she was for sale!  So the stars aligned and I am once again the proud owner of another horse.   

I want to get my Masters.  I have always wanted to go to Grad school, but unfortunately I didn't apply myself enough in my undergrad.  I didn't do poorly in my undergrad, but I didn't quite do well enough for Grad school.  Now however I am older and know what I need to do, so hopefully I will be able to do it! It also helps that I am not working in the indusrty that I want to study.  I am working right now in health policy in dealing with climate change.  I want to study how the Canadian government is going to deal with the impending changes they will have to make in dealing with the probable public health challenges that are on the horizon from vector-borne disease and chronic disease. That's my dream for the future. I'm a geek. I did 30 days!  :)  Only two slip-ups! :D