Challenge Update: Week 3

So far, each week of this challenge I have been plagued with some pain or another.  It's incredibly frustrating, but, dammit, I have prevailed!

My week opened with a repetitive stress injury underneath my left shoulder blade.  Shame on me for hand-pulling all the mint out from the front of my house.  Yeah, that one I have to own.  Silly me.  Fortunately, it didn't keep me from working out, but it did force me to take extra care on form to make sure I didn't aggravate it further.

I did make my yoga goal, but I never did get out running.  I'm only a little disappointed about this because Jeff is wanting to go running with me, too, so hopefully this week we will get out once or twice and hammer the pavement!  I'm thrilled about getting back into running with him. (By they way, Jeff went to his first parkour class last week and loved it!)

I did pretty well on the yoga.  Last week I wasn't sure if I should challenge myself with Boat Pose or Dolphin Pose.  Considering the shoulder injury, I decided to go with Dolphin since it's great for improving upper body strength, especially shoulders and upper back.  This was my uber win for the week.  I've had this sort of stress injury before and it took years to heal.  A deep tissue massage from a friend and liberal use of Dolphin Pose when the mood struck me, something that would have taken weeks before being full functional with some discomfort is now pretty much fixed.  There's still a bit of tightness but that's functional.  I'm pretty pleased with myself!

Speaking of yoga, class was again amazing.  Although I had everyone turned around the wrong way for the standing poses so they couldn't see me.  I need to learn to give directions more like a fitness instructor (when they tell you to lead with your right foot and they mirror with their left foot).   This is about learning from mistakes, and I'm sure to make a few more for...pretty much the rest of my life!  Everyone seemed to have a good time despite my awkwardness, which makes me happy.

After yoga, some of us went out to lunch at California Wok before running over to check out the Forestiere Gardens.  You can see the pics over at Cyn's blog.  It was pretty beautiful and everyone sounded resolved to get to work on their own underground houses!  After the Gardens, we retreated back to my house for dinner and Sucker Punch.

Unfortunately, I think the heat got to me while we were running about earlier and I couldn't shake the crankies.  The crank monster followed me into Sunday even and I spent the day freaking out about money, life goals, work, and a host of other things.  Thank goodness for Jeff and his patience, let me tell you.

Sunday night through Monday night, I traveled with my boss to San Mateo for one of our sales campaign kick offs.  In the nine years I've worked in advertising, I had never been to a kick off.  It was an experience.  Half the time I didn't know whether to be embarrassed for everyone or to sit back and enjoy the show.  I guess I did a little bit of both, but it was fun.

So this week, I have the running thing and I think I'll leave it at that.  Oh!  And the four-week yoga class I am starting at Fig Garden Yoga.  As the second week of the month, this is my crazy week.  My schedule is packed and running and a yoga class seem like quite enough to keep me motivated without being overwhelmed.

Oh, how's my weight loss progress?  Non-existent.  I'm remaining stable at 188 but I'm completely bloated thanks to my double X chromosomes.  My weigh in this Friday should be much, much better.  I feel better and I can see from the pics Cyn took on Saturday that my face is thinning up a bit.