Trying some new things

To mark the start of the holiday weekend,I met up with some girlfriends at The Redhead for dinner, and then moved on to The Belgian Room for craft beer. Yum! Knowing that we were going to be getting free frites at The Belgian Room, I tried to go light on my entree at The Redhead, opting for the appetizer-size portion of shrimp and grits while all my girlfriends had the fried chicken platter (their specialty, and supposedly the best fried chicken in NYC). After tasting a bit of the chicken, I was a little sad I hadn't gotten that as well, but the shrimp and grits were tasty and a much smaller portion.

At The Belgian Room, things started to get a bit out of control. I started with a basic Ommegang Witte, followed by a Delirium Tremens, since those were on draft and therefore part of the half-off happy hour selection until 8pm. But after two of those (and the two beers I had at The Redhead, Allagash White and a Double Dog Double Pale Ale), I was ready for the frites. They did not disappoint! Served with about six different dipping sauces, I loved the curried ketchup and found myself wondering why curry spices aren't added to all ketchups. Delicious!

Then came the bad decision to try my first sour beer. On recommendation from a new friend who knew a good amount about beers, I opted for the Cantillon Kriek as a starter (my other friend, Meg, went against the advice and tried the Cantillon Geuze).


But after the first sip - yuck. Call me uncultured, but sour beers just taste completely spoiled to me. It may be an acquired taste, but I would prefer to just drink good beer and avoid that. No Night of the Funk for me!

I called it quits after that, and woke up this morning mad at myself for eating so much. The scale doesn't show any difference even after my week of intense workouts, which is disappointing, but I know progress often comes in spurts so I just have to be patient. After procrastinating for a little while online, I hit the gym for a 40 minute elliptical session, and then headed off to Central Park to try out a new fitness phenomenon - hooping.

If you've never heard of hooping before, you can check out this video for a quick overview (though I don't know what's with the blindfolds - never seen that before). My friend Lorelei got into it a year ago and is pretty addicted these days, scheduling all her events around hooping classes. Meg had an extra Groupon for a class, so I took her up on the offer to join in. At first, I loved it - I was very good at the traditional "waist hooping." But when our instructor had us start getting into what I guess you'd call arm hooping (e.g. when you don't have the hoop around your body but instead pass it around in a circle around your body using your arms, and then hoop it over your head), I started sucking. I hit myself in the head quite a few times, let the hoop go flying a lot, and broke a few nails as well. Hooping is dangerous stuff! By the end of the class, I could transition from going around my body (with my body not in the hoop), to up in the air, to down back around my waist, but I hadn't yet mastered lifting it back up from my waist up in the air. My left hipbone was really sore from getting hit with the hoop (it's much heavier than a traditional hula hoop), and I decided that while I had fun, I didn't feel like doing it again.

But being outside on a gorgeous day like today was incredible, and I walked home in good spirits. I made plans to meet up with a friend to hang out in the park and read the rest of the afternoon, so just had to head home to shower, eat a quick lunch, and get ready. Inspired by the gorgeous outdoors, I decided to try out a recipe I had found on Vital Juice for a Glowing Green Smoothie.


The picture on the Vital Juice website came out a lot better than mine, probably in part due to the fact that I had skipped the fresh parsley and the celery (don't keep the former on hand, ran out of the latter). But the smoothie was delicious! I know I'm probably going to catch a lot of flak from those who think green smoothies are gross (I learned that the last time I posted a green smoothie recipe), but I thought this one was incredibly good and definitely worth a try. Romaine has less flavor than kale, so it's probably a better introduction to green smoothies, and the cilantro makes it very refreshing while the fruits make it sweet and tasty. No added sugar, too! I'd love to start making this my go-to breakfast, at least while I'm in town and have access to my blender.

Anyone else have any green smoothie recipes to share?

Men are from Mars, women don't waste time during workouts

This morning, I was meeting a friend for breakfast at 7am, which meant I had to get up at 5:30am to get a decent strength training workout in. My gym is pretty empty at that hour on the Friday of a holiday weekend, so I had the opportunity to really observe the two or three people that were there. Now, beyond the obvious observation that more women do cardio and more men do weights (I am a total sexist about this and have to suppress a giggle whenever I see guys under the age of 60 on the elliptical... man up and do some time on the treadmill!), I had a new revelation this morning while in the weight room.

I should first preface this by explaining that I tend to do all my strength training in circuits. I pick two machines for three sets of 15 reps on each, swapping machines between each set. NO idea if they work opposing muscle groups or not; I usually just pick two machines that are near each other but don't seem to do the same exact thing. Because I'm working different muscles, I don't need to rest in between sets, which means I just bounce from one machine to the next. I've seen this technique recommended a lot over the internet (usually by trainers who tell you to work opposing muscle groups and all that, but I ignore that part). It's great partially because it's a timesaver, and partially because it can turn an otherwise dull weight training session into a sweaty, cardio, calorie-blasting workout. Woo hoo!

However, while I've seen a lot of women employing this technique (or other forms of a "get in and get out" approach to the weight room), this morning made me see clearly a tendency of men that wasn't quite so obvious before. You know how sometimes you're waiting to use a machine and it's really annoying because some guy is sitting on it for several minutes but not using it? Or worse, putting his towel on it and standing somewhere idly nearby? That's because MEN DON'T WORK OUT MOST OF THE TIME THEY'RE IN THE WEIGHT ROOM.

I was watching the guy who happened to be in there with me this morning, and saw that I was getting through three or four sets in the time it would take him to do one and move on to the next. I didn't count his reps, but when we were both lifting at the same time, mine were slower than his... so it's not like I'm Speedy Gonzales busting them out. It's that in between sets, he'd sit there for a while, wander around the weight room, stare out the window, look at himself in the mirror, etc. As I noticed this and thought about it, I realized that it's what I've seen a lot of guys doing in the weight room.

Why is this applicable to me? Because in the firm fitness league (which ends today, which I am sadly not winning), we get points based on how many minutes we do of different exercises. I have long been wondering how so many people have workouts logged that are like, "90 minutes of intense strength training." Now I know, and I say, intense? BS.

My question is this: what do all you guys think about when you're just standing around in between sets, and how do I get in on this game? Do I need to just make to-do lists and write blog posts in my head, or am I allowed to bring a book to read during the downtime? The last fitness league was for our Enterprise industry practice, but in two weeks we start the Financial Services fitness league... I need to have my techniques down by then. Four hour strength training marathon, here I come!

Healthy Meal: Pan-Seared Scallops with Ginger-Orange Spinach

Last night, I skipped my late night workout in favor of trying to get a bit more sleep, since I had woken up tired. That meant I only got in 45 minutes on the elliptical as my total workout for the day. I love that these days I refer to a 45 minute workout as "only" :)

I got up again at 7am this morning, but this time didn't have much trouble getting off when my alarm went off. I considered going for a run sometime today, but what got me out the door was that if I didn't go now, it would only get hotter later in the day. There's one plus of summer running - it gets you out the door early!

I was aiming for a 3 mile loop going along the Hudson River / Riverside Park, but ended up enjoying it so much that I stayed out for four miles. I'm using the BuddyRunner app on my phone, which I like a lot... but just when I reached the end of my run, my update to the new Android system (FroYo) came through. I had read on various forums that if you opted to "install later," you might have to wait for two weeks, so I opted to "install now" and just hoped that the data from my run wouldn't be erased. Fortunately for me, it wasn't - score one for the day.

So to start off my morning, I did 4.03 miles in 38:10 - that's an average pace of 9:18/mile. Not bad for my second day back at running! I'm hoping I can get in at least a 10 mile run this weekend in between all the Labor Day festivities, because that would make me feel like I'm on track for Hartford in 5 weeks.

Speaking of Labor Day, any NYC-area bloggers interested in doing the Labor Day Five Mile Run on the boardwalk at Long Beach? I was thinking it might be nice way to close the summer by doing the race and then hanging out at the beach all day. Problem is, I'm not sure if any of my friends are into running enough to get up early and trek out there for the 8:30am start!

On the food front, today for lunch I made a recipe I had saved from Cooking Light: pan-seared scallops with ginger orange spinach. I mostly kept the recipe as-is, but took a few shortcuts in using pre-minced garlic and ginger, and frozen spinach (the fresh was too expensive at my grocery). My picture didn't come out quite as pretty as theirs, but it was still delicious!


I was proud of myself for getting the golden brown crust on the scallops - I had never cooked scallops before in anything other than a seafood soup. With visions of Gordon Ramsay in my head about getting them crusted but not rubbery and overdone, I actually set my kitchen timer to 90 seconds and flipped them exactly then. I think I actually undercooked them just a bit, but they were still pretty tasty. And yes, that is a ton of spinach. I opted to just use the whole box in lieu of making another dish to fill me up. Still, totally light and healthy:

Now it's time to buckle down to work for a while, and hopefully get enough done to be able to hit the gym a bit more later this afternoon. Pounds be gone!

My first run in three months

Last night, I headed out on my first run pretty much since my last marathon (Minneapolis, on June 6th). As I mentioned, of course I picked the hottest day of the summer to go for it! The mercury was still at 90 degrees when I headed out around 6:30pm to meet my running group.

I got to the meeting spot (72nd street entrance to the park) about 10 minutes early, so sat on the bench and played with my phone while I waited. However, it was soon 6:59pm and I didn't see anyone who looked like they might be for the running group. There were plenty of runners going by (I had forgotten how much fun it is to people watch at the park!), but no one with an Urban Feet shirt on like the Meetup organizer was supposed to be wearing. Just as I was about to look up his number on the website and give him a call, another member of the group showed up (identifiable by his Urban Feet shirt... apparently I am the only one who doesn't have one). There were only four of us running that night - two people had bailed to go swimming or stay home and eat ice cream instead. We are hard core!

We headed up to the reservoir, did two loops, and then back down to the entrance. When combined with my 1 mile run over to the park, that made 5 miles - not bad at all! I felt pretty good throughout, too, though my legs were pretty sore from the asskicking I had given them the day before doing strength training at the gym. But the fact that running wasn't particularly hard made me hopeful that I can actually do a decent job at the Hartford Marathon next month (eep).

And of course, the whole reason I got through it? The promise of Dive 75 and beer at the end! For my first drink of the night, I chose the Southhampton White - not my favorite white beer, but it was pretty good. However, after realizing how drunk just one beer got me, I passed on any more and opted to go meet my other friends at Amsterdam Ale House. There, I chose the Ommegang Rare Vos - a bit darker than I was expecting, but still tasty. But after having that, I excused myself to stumble home - made even more difficult by how sore my back was from the day before. I couldn't believe how drunk I was after just two beers! I've forgotten what running will do to you...

This morning, I set my alarm for 7am - pretty late, I thought, since I went to bed at 10pm. However, I ended up snoozing until 8am - my back was also really sore and I just wanted to sleep longer! However, that meant that I missed out on the chance to do a really long workout, and in true "go big or go home" style, I ended up not going to the gym at all before settling down to work for the day. Oops!

I ate pretty lightly all day though (breakfast: smoothie; lunch: homemade veggie soup; dinner: light peanut stir fry from Mario Lopez's Extra Lean), and at night, I hit the gym for 45 minutes of intense elliptical. 4.75 miles, baby! Okay, so it wasn't the best workout day in the world, but it still wasn't bad. I made dinner in between the elliptical and when I thought I would go back and do more elliptical during Top Chef, but ended up being way too tired. Bedtime for this girl! Hopefully I can do better on the workout front tomorrow.

Getting the week off to a good start

Yesterday I worked from home, and it went pretty well. I alternated work with chores around the apartment (VERY few bugs left alive, and those that are still here are just living on borrowed time because there is absolutely nothing starchy for them to munch on), and managed to get a lot done on both counts. Plus, I was able to sneak in quite a bit of gym time, and eat healthy to boot. For example, dinner last night was seafood sausage, lentils with veggies, and a side of steamed okra. Yum!


Today, I started the morning with an hour on the stationary bike and then ten minutes on the elliptical, finishing up a book that was due back to the library (Operation Mincemeat, which I thought was an interesting spy mission but a very long and drawn out book). I later squeezed in another 35 minutes on the elliptical to bring my total elliptical time for the day up to 45 minutes. I'm weirdly OCD about having my workouts be in 15 minute increments, at least when I'm not running. Then, I get fixated on having run a distance that is either an even mile or half mile (if I ran 3.9, I'll circle for another tenth to make it 4). Does anyone else do that kind of weird math in their head for their workouts?

Tonight I'm supposed to go join the Urban Feet running group for an evening run in Central Park, followed by drinks at Dive 75 (one of my favorite bars in NYC) on the Upper West Side after. Running and drinking - how can I resist? Besides, I realized today that the Hartford Marathon is only about 6 weeks away and I haven't gone for a run since June. Uh oh! Time to get cracking. I think instead of going for a BQ, I'm going to go for a "wow, Laura is an idiot who barely ran in 4 months... let's see if she can finish a marathon!" You know, true Absolut(ly) Fit style :)

As far as tonight goes, it's 90 degrees, but since I already registered on the Meetup.com website, I feel like a wuss for dropping out. Off I go! Hopefully the heat won't be as bad as I think.

Diet inspiration from a lazy Sunday morning

Despite my push to increase my workouts last week (successful, too - I logged 450 minutes of gym time in the last 7 days!), I have been gaining weight. I blame my all-inclusive trip to Punta Cana, my singledom that is encouraging me to go to bars and drink in order to meet guys in NYC, and my training last week that had catered food about which I had little to no choice in eating. Okay, so maybe those tequila shots with my team were another story...

Speaking of which, last night I was out with my friend Kristen until the wee hours of the morning - 3am! I don't think I've been out that late in months. I still got up at 8:30am, but I was just not motivated in the least to go work out. Instead, I spent the morning curled up in bed catching up on Top Chef - a real luxury for me! I've gotten in the habit of only watching my TV shows while at the gym or while doing something else, so it was really a treat to just get to curl up in bed, skip the gym, and have nowhere else that I needed to be. I decided I deserved it!

One of the other (usually guilty pleasure at the gym) shows I caught up on was Bachelor Pad, and it provided a surprising epiphany. While watching one of the contestants sprint around a pool in her bikini, I was amazed how tiny and light she was. Something in it struck a chord with me - I remember how this past spring, when I was still marathoning, I was at a pretty low weight and I had that feeling of airiness and lightness when I walked. I've gained a bit of weight since then, but something about watching Natalie run around just made me really take a good hard look at my weight goals. I'm not saying that Natalie or any of the contestants on Bachelor Pad are healthy (frankly, I'd bet that a lot of them starve themselves), but I want to get down to my healthy-but-light-and-airy weight that I used to have. I miss that feeling, and I'm hopeful that this little epiphany will stick with me as inspiration.

It sounds silly to write about, but just that one little scene had a big impact on me. It also made me think of the old dieting cliche, "nothing tastes as good as thin feels." I never really gave much credence to that motto, but somehow it now really resonates with me. I want to feel like I look fabulous in whatever I wear, rather than picking out the tops that hide my little tummy pooch (admittedly not a serious problem, but it does annoy me when I'm getting ready to go out). While I've been working on my exercise a lot lately, I've learned from past experience that for me, my weight doesn't have a lot to do with how I work out; it's primarily affected by my diet.

With that in mind, I set about making a really delicious but light dinner: shiritaki vegetable noodle soup. Shiritaki noodles are made from tofu, so a huge bowl of them only has 20 calories. I made a really simple soup to go with them: chopped carrots, celery, onions, and parsley - so good. Plus, I had just come across a great blog post that gave me some new knife skills to try while preparing it: check out this wonderful video on forming your "claw grip." For me, the revelation wasn't so much the claw grip (I'm still working on that), but more the gliding motion she talks about as you chop. I always used to have a problem with celery where it would still be stuck together, connected by one thread! No more.

Perhaps this will get me on the path to becoming a real Top Chef?

Running through it

I've run through breakups. I've run through rainstorms. I've run through depression. And today, I ran through a buy out of my company.

Last night, I was out with my new team doing the normal consulting getting-to-know-you-routine. Unbeknownst to us, while we were throwing back coffee-flavored tequila shots at the bar (try it, it's AWESOME!), all the partners in our firm were meeting in a conference room to vote on an offer to buy the firm.

This morning I got up at 5am (!) to get in a good long workout and burn off the alcohol calories from the night before. While getting ready to head down to the gym, my phone buzzed at me. I couldn't imagine that anyone on my team was up and sending e-mails, what with all the Patron we had the night before, so I curiously opened it up. The e-mail was from senior leadership, letting us know that we had been bought. As a result, my small 600-person firm is now owned by a Big 4 firm with over 160,000 people. I called one of my best friends from my old firm (I knew he was up to work out as well), and tersely reported the new development. His response? Two words: "oh boy." And with that, I headed down to the gym to run and think.

I've done the Big 4 thing before (and thank goodness this isn't the same firm that laid me off in 2008!). I loved it at the time and was devastated to leave, but since then, I've found that I like the benefits of a small firm much more. Sure, I sometimes miss the name recognition I used to get when I told people where I worked, but there are so many benefits to my current small firm that I just don't think my new overlords will offer.

For example, my current firm is pushing for more women to become partners (yay, pick me!), so they have a program where you can work part-time from home but not necessarily lose your whole rank and career - the idea being that the flexibility will keep women who might otherwise choose to leave to take care of their families. Additionally, there's just the whole culture around senior leadership at my current firm - they're not people who gave up their families and personal lives just to make partner. They all have vibrant lives outside the company, and aren't looked down upon for having those other interests. Until I left my first job, I never knew you could rise to the top that way; I thought you had to just be a machine that worked into the wee hours of the morning with nothing like family or personal commitments to distract you or steal focus. That's not what I want in the long term for my career, so I'm thinking this will probably limit the chances of my ever making partner.

Leadership on both sides is talking a big game about how much the new firm wants to learn from our practice - for example, our revenue per consultant numbers are much higher than theirs, so the party line is that they bought us to "learn our secret sauce" and improve their own consulting practice. I don't know though... you're telling me that you're going to change the policies of a 165,000 person firm based on the success of a 600 person firm? That seems off. Besides, I learned from my first experience with the Big 4 not to trust anything their senior leadership says. My current firm has seemingly been very upfront and honest about things, but I'm definitely approaching this acquisition with a bit of skepticism.

The deal hasn't closed yet (SEC regulations, etc), but I don't think there's much shot of it not happening. Until then, we're proceeding business as usual... and I guess we'll see what the future brings.