Swim WOD

Yes... I finally bit the bullet. I did it. It wasn't as grand as I had hoped but next time will be better! I'm just glad I got through it without anyone asking questions or getting kicked out of the pool. :) The video is of the 4th set of thrusters. I did 5 RFT of 50 yard freestyle and 10 thrusters. It was a good one! Looking forward to hitting it again soon with friends!

Paleo Poolside

My family and I spent the entire afternoon at the pool on this sunny Seattle summer day. We wrapped up the evening with a paleo dinner by the pool. Best.day.ever. 

Burger, no bun, and side salad. 

Amazing Teen

My friend, Brandy, invited me for dinner one night this week. I absolutely love her and her family so much. Her hubby, Ed, has been deployed for a few weeks/month now and she's going to school full time and taking care of their two girls. Since Ed's deployment, their oldest daughter, Taylor, has voluntarily taken over dinner duty. Brandy comes home from work and enjoys a paleo/primal dinner every night compliments of Taylor. This young lady is amazing! Quite a good chef too! Thanks so much for having me over and for the amazing meal (planned and prepared by a 16 year old)!

Southwest fritatta! 

Chef Taylor (AKA: Tay-Love)!

Asparagus...

... cooking in bacon grease? Yes, please! My kids literally ate it all. I got very little... Making more next time.

Need brain food today

Meatballs

Some wrapped in bacon, some not. All good with veggies.

Good Morning!

Eat like a champion today.

Dinner

Created a party in my belly.

Thin sliced chicken, salt and pepper, slice of ham, rolled up and wrapped in a slice of bacon. I put it in the oven at 350 degrees and cooked it until the chicken was done (~30 min?). BAM! You're welcome!

I served it with a salad, sweet potato fries, heirloom tomatoes and basil. 'Twas GOOD!

Meeting a Friend

Support comes in various forms from various places. I finally got to meet someone who has been supporting me for a very long time. This is my twin, Jennifer. She's super goofy and strong as hell. We threw down a WOD at Rainier CrossFit last week. I'm hoping to get to see her again whenever she's in town. Till then, we'll just keep supporting each other via Facebook and texts.

Our WOD (we made it up):
1000m row
50 lunges
30 hang power cleans at 95#

Jennifer = 11:26
Me = 11:54

It was also great to be coached by Laurie Bowler... she doesn't let you get away with anything (EXACTLY what I expect!)!

Jennifer and me post-WOD.

Ummmm, yeah.... she's THAT strong.

Lunch

Mushroom & onion hamburger. Bam!

Shrimp

Nothing fancy about this lunch either... but it was so good. More importantly, EVERY time I eat shrimp, I think of my buddy, Mike. He pretty much rocks and can put down more shrimp than anyone I have ever met in my life. Together, we have completely wiped out all the shrimp on an all you can eat buffet. That's how we roll.

Lunch.

Mike, me, D-Lo.

OMG

Have I told you lately how much I love starting my day off right. Coaching, followed by "Camille", followed by good food. PERFECT.

"Camille":

8 min AMRAP of:

3 Snatch Complexes

3 Wall Walks

(1 Snatch Complex = 1 power snatch + 1 hang power snatch + 1 hang squat snatch)

2 eggs, bell pepper, onions, kale, raisins, pumpkin seeds, BACON.

Breakfast - The most important meal?

Maybe?  Maybe not? I do love it though. I tend to post a ton of pics of breakfast.... this has nothing to do with it being "the most important meal of the day". It has to do with the fact that I'm a morning person <insert sun rays streaming down from heaven, birds chirping, and smiling faces>! I LOVE MORNINGS! It is the only time of the day where things in my house are quiet. I can spend as much time cooking whatever it is that I want for breakfast. It always includes bacon and coffee... And... because it is so quiet, I'm not working yet, and my kids are asleep, I usually have extra time to snap a photo of my breakfast. My standard is some sort of eggs (omelet, scrambled, fried), veggies, bacon, and coffee. If I've had enough eggs (or if we're out of teggs <GASP!>), I've also been known to eat salmon, steak, or a pork chop for breakfast! Nothing screams "Seize the day!" like a pork chop and bacon for breakfast!

omelet, bacon, veggies (coffee too, not in photo)

Lunch Time!

Steak and cauliflower! Bam! This is the best perk of working from home.

Crack o' Dawn

Calm before the storm.

I get up early. Usually I'm up around 3:30am. I'm not sure why or if it is "good for me" but I wake up early. In my defense, I work east coast hours (I live on the west coast). During the week, I also coach the 5am class two days per week. Since cutting the junk from my diet (going Paleo), I wake up READY TO ROLL. I feel good, my brain is functioning, my body is rested, and it is go time.

This morning was a little different... I woke up even earlier. It might be because I just got back from a trip to the east coast so my body just thinks it is on eastern standard time? Not sure? I love it though. My house is so quiet. I was able to  work for a few hours before going into the box. I rocked my work. I mean, I killed it this morning. So productive.

Then I drove to the box to coach my 5am class. I LOVE being the first one there. I unlock the door. I turn on the lights. I set the stage for what is about to go down there all day long. It is quiet. It is peaceful. It is perfect. It is full of possibilities. It just screams, "Come and get it."

Within 15 minutes, people start trickling in the door... some half asleep. It is funny because we all know that  half asleep feeling won't last for long. And shortly after, there is "3-2-1-GO!" and all the quiet is gone. The peace is filled with sounds of effort. Work is being done. People are pushing themselves, some are succeeding and some are pushing themselves to failure. When the storm is over, all are stronger, all are braver, all are better for waking up so early. Anything their day throws at them is nothing compared to what they've already done. So bring it "today". You got nothing on me. I own you. Today is MY day.

I'm pissed.

Hold on paleo peeps, this might get rough. You (average Americans eating your Standard American Diet [SAD]) might not like me. You may even hate me. I don't care. You need a wake up call.

Glen Pendlay isn't the only one who is pissed (pissed2, or pissed3).I'm pissed too. Yesterday I was on a cross country flight from Charlotte, NC to Seattle, WA and I was completely surrounded by a sea of unhealthy people. About two hours into our flight we had a medical emergency. One of the passengers passed out in the bathroom. From my seat towards the rear of the plane, I looked back to see half of a large elderly woman laying on the floor, half in the bathroom and half in the rear of the plane. Frightening doesn't even begin to explain the situation.

The flight attendants had been busy pushing their cart and offering the customers on the flight their choice of a variety of sugar infused beverages and alcohol when this happened (this pisses me off too and it was a 7:45am take off, sadly people were already drinking alcohol) . They quickly put away the cart and tried to help the woman. Seconds later, they were on the intercom asking for doctors or nurses who could assist.

What happened next astonished me. They got back on the intercom and asked if any passengers had a blood glucose monitor that they would be willing to let the lady borrow and if so, "please push your flight attendant button located above your seat". NUMEROUS BUZZERS AND LIGHTS began going off as passengers offered up their diabetes paraphernalia to help the woman in need. Wow. I was shocked to see so many people having ties to this disease. As the glucose kit was returned to the generous passenger who loaned it, it was mentioned that the lady's blood glucose was "a little too high". It took a while to get her off the floor, stable, and laying down in the last row of seats in the very back of the plane.


I had hoped that this experience would help to force a change in many of these passengers. If seeing a woman passed out on the floor of an airplane bathroom (ewwwww) doesn't knock some sense into you, I'm not sure what will. I believe that Type 2 Diabetes is a disease of choice. If you continue to over-consume sugar and processed crap, you are well on your way to becoming a train wreck on the bathroom floor of an airplane. For all of those who claim that diabetes runs in your family and that your destiny is to become diabetic too, pick up a copy of "It Starts With Food" (ISWF) by Dallas and Melissa Hartwig. My FAVORITE quote in this book is their no-nonsense way of explaining epigenetics (p. 83 of ISWF)...

"Genetics loads the gun, but environment pulls the trigger." - Dallas and Melissa Hartwig

Meaning that the genes for disease (even diabetes) may be present but YOU actively decide to "pull the trigger" when you make poor nutrition choices. You control your decisions; you control your environment. No excuses, no bullshit. You do this.

So I'm pissed because I'm on a plane surrounded by people who continue to make poor nutrition and health choices.  I'm pissed because numerous people on this plane are choosing to live with diabetes. I'm pissed because a lady would rather lay on the floor of an airplane bathroom than eat healthy food. And after all of this, once the plane had calmed, I got up and headed to the bathroom in the back of the plane... I stood there, waiting for a restroom to become available, and I'm beside this lady who now has an oxygen mask over her nose and mouth and is laying there trying to breathe and what do I see in the isle DIRECTLY beside her? An overweight couple chowing down on a gallon sized bag of M&M's. Obviously they missed the wake up call and that REALLY pisses me off.

PISSED ME OFF. Paleo-ninja skills used to discretely snap photo. 

And what was I doing before I got so pissed? I was reading ISWF on my five hour flight home. Now I'm pissed because I was the only person on the plane who was reading it.

Go get it, change your life.

Happy to be home

NC Breakfast