The mystery of the dead honeybee and other things

I've been living in this apartment since July 2011, and periodically I will find a single dead (or occasionally living) honeybee near the window. It continues to baffle me how they get in. I've been sitting on the couch reading and suddenly become aware of buzzing against the window...it's like they appear out of mid-air, one at a time. Is it possible that a bee would make the long, dark journey down my chimney only to become trapped and then ripped apart by the tornado-force winds of my Dyson? Tragic...

Half-marathon training is going well, although it's definitely cutting into my free time (mostly because I'm so slow). I ran with a woman from my gym last weekend, which was great because she's faster than  me and we talked as we ran. So I went ahead and considered that my speedwork for the week...because I still don't know what that means. 9 miles total last week, shooting for 10 this week.

Concurrently with race training, I'm participating in a Paleo leaning challenge at the gym, with the opportunity to win a significant amount of money. Everyone pays $30 to enter the challenge, then they take a 'before' picture (guys in shorts, gals in shorts + a sports bra) from the front, side, and back. We email in a food log each week for seven weeks and try to stick to the Paleo diet. Then at the end they take an 'after' picture and the trainers vote on who leaned out/lost the most fat. I'm very much appreciating how having to account for everything I eat helps me not to cheat or eat for the wrong reason, and how motivating $1000 winnings can be. The first week was hard but good, and I enjoyed the glowing skin and feeling like a rockstar at the gym that go along with cutting out sugar. The second week I was feeling pretty wiped out at work each day, with a perpetual mental fog, and one night kept waking up every 90 minutes. So (after talking to my mom who voiced some concern) I added up what I was eating each day, and realized I needed to take in about 500 more calories. Oops, thanks Mom.

I recently got my renewed passport in the mail, and I suddenly feel like the world is waiting for me :)  It's deliciously exciting.

Speaking of delicious, I ordered some of these Tanka bars from Amazon. Anyone looking for a tasty, meaty, low-carb, grass-fed buffalo treat, look no further. Seriously.

Modern miracles

I remember when I first got glasses, what feels like a million years ago. I had no idea how nearsighted I  was until I put those glasses on, and everything in the world came into focus. It was miraculous. Then came a decade and a half of contacts lenses and all the fun that comes with wearing them. Starting each day touching your eyeballs, not being able to go to bed until you take them out, the itchy discomfort during allergy season (which is perennial, in my case), and being incapacitated every time a stray eyelash makes its way into your eye. Let's not even talk about jalapeno peppers...

After several friends had great outcomes with Lasik surgery in recent years, I decided I was ready to join the eagle-eyed among us. I set aside some funds in a flexible spending account, scheduled the appropriate appointments, and thankfully found out I was a candidate. The weeks before my surgery, I tried to drink in the beauty around me, knowing there was a (very small) chance that something could go wrong and I might never see again. I spent some time looking at pictures of all my loved ones, not in a dramatic way, just acknowledging that there are always risks associated with surgery.

So, the procedure itself was very strange. They gave me a Valium in pre-op, after which I passed out for an hour. Then they woke me up, and I walked into the laser suite. I sat down in what looked like the chair you sit in at the dentist's office, fully reclined. They placed a big stuffed alligator on my abdomen, and told me to grab it if I felt the urge to move during the surgery. Then they wrapped a foil blanket around me. I asked if it was to stop me from catching on fire from the laser, and the nurse responded that it was an anti-lint blanket. I still think it was to stop me from catching on fire.

Then came the mildly uncomfortable parts of the procedure. If you're squeamish, just skip this paragraph. They put sticky drapes over my upper and lower eyelids, then put in a retractor to hold my eye open. Then numbing drops (thank you!). Next came a lot of pressure on my eyeball as they pressed some apparatus onto my eye, so hard that my vision blacked out. I could hear a buzzing noise, and I presume they were sawing into my cornea to make the flap. Then I could see again (sort of) and all I had to do was stare at the red and green lights while the laser made some clicking noises (did you know that lasers make a clicking noise? I did, because we use them in the O.R. but I bet not many people know that). The doctor put something onto my eye and brushed the flap back into place. Retractor out, drapes ripped off (which may have been the most painful part of the whole procedure), and then they did the other eye. The whole thing took about 20 minutes.

Then my eyes burned like the dickens. Think sand, srirracha, and glue rubbed into your eye. They led me into a dark room and tested my vision (20/10 baby!). I went home wearing some super cool plastic eye shields, ate some food, took the Vicodin they prescribed me, and slept for 12 hours. I woke up to a gloriously sunny day, with no eye pain and terrific vision. MIRACLE. My roommate took me to my post-op appointment where the doctor cleared me to go about normal activities (gym, running, etc) as long as put the prescribed drops in my eyes.

It was a truly beautiful weekend in Seattle. Springtime in full swing.

I took advantage of the beautiful weather and went for a long run (6+ miles) wearing a hydration belt for the first time ever. There was definitely an adjustment process. After a mile of the darn thing hiking up my back every 50 steps, I figured out that it worked much better for me with the water bottles in front (a tip for other pear-shaped runners who didn't already know this). My next step, besides just putting the miles in each week, is going to a nearby track and doing 'speedwork' or some such. I've got to be honest, I'm not really sure what that means, but that's why the internet exists right? I keep reading things about your race pace + 15 seconds, and realizing I don't have a race pace. So my plan is to go to the track, just pretend I'm in middle school gym class, and run around it faster than I normally run (with rest between laps). I'm not trying to break any records here.

To keep with the body-themed nature of this post, I had an alarming experience at the gym the other night. We were doing overhead squats, and the trainer was helping me because I said that it didn't feel like a very stable position in my shoulders. He told me to push my elbows forward to externally rotate the shoulder, which I did, and immediately realized that my left shoulder was stuck. Like, I cannot lower this (thankfully empty) barbell without damaging something in my shoulder. Trainer Mike took the barbell from me, and then I was able to lower my arm. He suggested I get my shoulder looked at because there's something going on. I'm pretty sure I have 'loose' shoulders because of that one time one of them partially popped out while I was sleeping. I'm also pretty sure that going to a sports medicine clinic is going to get me an expensive MRI and medical advice to stop going to Crossfit. So, I asked some of the ortho guys at work, who said I should look up rotator cuff strengthening exercises. Did anyone else in the family get these 'loose' shoulders besides me and Jeremy? Does anyone have any favorite rotator cuff strengthening exercises? How about hip flexor stretches? Please share. 

Thanks for stopping by!