Spring, now please.

I really don't know how much more of winter I can take, seriously. I'm tired of being cold. I'm tired of wearing dress pants to work (I miss skirts and dresses!). I'm tired of snow. I'm tired of gray skies. Sick of it all! And I really cannot wait to start biking and running outdoors again.

Thankfully, I have some fun trips ahead of me in the coming months and 2 are at warm places!

March 13-18: San Diego! I'm not sure how fun this will be because it's for work. But we do have all day Saturday and Sunday to enjoy ourselves, as the conference we are exhibiting at doesn't start till Monday afternoon. And hey, free trip = sweetness...

April 21-24: Ft. Myers, Florida! I'm going there with my Aunt Sandy. She is being super awesome and paying for my plane ticket. I just have to split the hotel room with her! We're just getting away for a few days and laying on the beach all day and going out all night.

May 21-23: CEDAR POINT! Robin planned this trip for her and Mike and Nels and I. I'm so excited! Nels and I have been dying to go to Cedar Point for awhile now and Robin booked us a really awesome deal for 4 people. We're staying at the on-site resort and going to the park Friday night with a "twilight pass" that only costs $15 since we're staying at the resort. Then more of the park all day Saturday! Woo hoo! Overall the whole weekend is going to cost little over $100 per person - awesome price!

The CA and FL trips are helping me stay focused on my workouts during this cold winter weather.

Today I finally decided to just bring my Foreman grill to work. You just cannot cook a turkey burger the night before and microwave it the next day. Gross. It seemed weird to bring the whole thing to work at first, but it was totally worth it! My lunch was delicious. See, I love cheeseburgers, and so this is a good way to distract me from hitting up some fast food place for lunch. Glad we have a nice sized kitchen space at the studio.

For my workout tonight, I focused on a treadmill interval workout since my muscles are pretty worn out from weightlifting in my class yesterday. I've posted this workout from Fitness magazine before, but here it is again (sorry for the formatting):

MINUTES SPEED INCLINE PLAN

2 4.0 mph 0-2 Warm-up

5 4.5-6.0 0-2 Increase speed by 0.5 mph each minute until you reach

6.0 mph; maintain for 2 minutes.

7 4.0-4.5 2-10.0 Increase incline by 2.0 each minute until you reach

10.0; stay there for 3 minutes.

1 6.0 mph 2.0 Descend

4 Varied 2.0 Sprint (your best effort) for 1 min., then jog (4.5 mph);

repeat combo, trying to sprint faster second time.

1 5.0-6.0 4.0 Climb

4 6.0-7.0 4.0

1 4.0-4.5 0 Recover

1 5.0-6.0 0 Jog

2 Sprint 0 Best effort

2 2.0-3.0 0 Cooldown

I actually felt pretty good after this. My legs were really aching between all the squats yesterday and this run; but cardio-wise, I felt great. I'm glad to know I've really built up my endurance in that area : )

I'm still toying with the idea of a half-marathon this summer...but I'm really scared...my last issue of Fitness magazine provided an 8 week training plan for a half-marathon that seems pretty doable. Hmmm...we shall see!