Colors

My last name is Noah.  I love when people find out that fact, and I say to them, "Yeah, I'm a direct descendant of Noah!"

"REALLY???  That's SO COOL!"

I have gotten that response so many times, and it never gets old.  I crack up just as much every time.  People are so gullible!  Then I remind them that God wiped out the earth with the flood, except for Noah, his three sons, their wives and that boat load of animals: we are ALL direct descendants of Noah.  I just happen to have the coolest last name.  Someday when I get married and change my last name, I would love to name one of my kids Noah so I don't miss it so much.

Because of my name, I feel a sense of ownership of the rainbow.  Maybe that's a little bit ridiculous, but a large part of who I am is made up of ridiculousness, and the amount of laughter and joy that I bring to those in my life can attest for the value of ridiculousness.  I refuse to relinquish my right to ridiculousness.  And apparently I also appreciate a little alliteration.

In my journey to health and a lower and more appealing body weight, challenges are important to me.  I ran my first 5k on my birthday two months ago, and immediately signed up for the Color Run because how could I NOT????  It's full of the rainbow!  It's MY RACE!!!

This run took place yesterday in Irvine, and my friend Rocio and I drove down and participated in the madness.  It was crazy!!!  There were thousands and thousands of people there.  There was a race at 8 a.m. and another at 12:30.  When I signed up, the 8:00 race was already sold out, so we had to do the one in the horrible heat of the afternoon.

Traffic was nuts.  We allowed a lot of extra time to get there and stand in line for our t-shirts and wristbands, but we spent most of that time idling in a giant line of cars.  Here we are excited to get there and get going:

 This sign made us way too happy:

There were so many people there, so we parked about half a mile away from the start/finish lines and the registration tents.  We had to go pick up our stuff, then go back to the car to ditch the stuff, then back to the start line.  We had already walked a mile and a half by the time we started the race!  It was a good warm up.  But it was also hot and even with the sunscreen that I made sure to put on, before the race even started, I wasn't looking quite as Scandinavian as my roots would have you believe I am.

Check out the tan I got!

The run itself was harder than I anticipated, but the color part was incredible!  My goal originally was to beat my time from my birthday 5k.  I didn't.  The time was almost exactly the same, but I am actually quite happy with that fact, and this is why: my first 5k was two months ago, at 9 a.m., on a course with trees and shade.  In other words, it was probably twenty degrees cooler.  Heat saps energy and slows me down in a big way, so matching my time from last time while running in the extreme afternoon heat with no shade and on asphalt is perfectly okay with me.

Going through each color station and getting attacked with a cloud of colored cornstarch was so much fun!  There were people there to supply us with all the high-5s we could possibly want.  I like a good high-5.  Maybe not from my brother-in-law, who tries to smack your hand off and leaves it tingling for days afterward, but from pretty much anyone else in the world.

By the time we reached the finish line, my fingers felt like sausages.  I was pretty dehydrated.  But I felt great.  I was happy.  And full of color.

Here we are in all our colorful glory:

And the back.  Rocio was totally sassing that Police officer:

 

Back in the car after it was all over, we covered the seats with towels so I wouldn't get color all over me every time I get in my car for the next couple weeks.  And Rocio makes sure to look ever so beautiful for the camera.  Haha.  It's tough to get a picture of this girl really smiling.  She may be even more ridiculous than I am.

For Cookie Monster, "C" may be for cookie, but for me, "C" is for Color Run!

Haha.   I'm a dork.  And I can't wait for my next 5k!!!  One of these days I'll be able to run the whole way!

No time to eat... well

Whenever some skinny girl giggles and says, "I just forgot to eat!" I pretty much just want to punch her in the face.

However, a few times in my life, I have been so extraordinarily busy that I legitimately forgot to eat.  I went all day, rushing around from one thing to another, barely having time to breathe, and food just slipped right through the cracks.  My sister's wedding was one of those days.  I realized at about 5 p.m. that I hadn't eaten a single thing all day, and suddenly I was ravenously hungry. 

But other than extreme cases like that, I ALWAYS remember to eat.  And there is always time.  However, there is not always time to eat well.  Too often, especially during the school year when I am swamped with classes, homework, regular work, church stuff, and playing with the babies in my life, I don't take the time to prepare healthful meals and snacks.  This just leads to eating whatever is quick, which isn't always the best choice.  You know what's really quick?  Pizza from Little Ceasar's.  And it's only $5 for a whole pizza.  Yeah.  I've had way too much pizza in the last couple weeks.  I'm not proud of it.  I've also eaten lots of Subway sandwiches, which is an excellent choice, but I can't have that for lunch and dinner every single day.  I mean, I could, but I think that would get old pretty quickly.

Tonight I was feeling kind of gross, and I was craving salad, so I made one.  I immediately felt better after eating it, and as soon as I'm done writing this I'm gonna go to the gym, which I haven't done in a couple weeks.  My body literally craves healthful food and exercise.  It's the weirdest thing, but I love it!  I need to really take the time to make sure my body is getting what it needs.  I'm actually really shocked that I haven't gained five pounds back in the last couple weeks, but I haven't.  And I have 16 days to lose nine pounds for the diet bet I'm in right now.  I can do this.  I need to do this. 

For motivation, I tried on the size 16 jeans that I have sitting on my shelf waiting to wear, but instead of motivating me, it just made me feel like I'll never get there.  Why are my 18s getting loose, and there's still such a long way to go to get into those 16s??  Good thing I wear a lot of dresses.  I hate wearing baggy pants.  I'm no gangsta!

I have tight shorts on under the pants.  That is not my skin showing.  If it was, this picture would be way inappropriate.  But it's not.  Because that's not my skin.  Also, that face I'm making cracks me up.

I'm gonna try the pants on again when I weigh 215 and not before, because I don't want to get discouraged.

Time to go kick my butt at the gym!