Juggling Act

As I mentioned, I've known that I'm going to have to do some sort of juggling act in order to get the marathon training in, while making all my after hours work events, having a social life and remaining relaxed.  I don't do too well with too much stress or too much on my plate.  Since yesterday was the official 29 week out marker, I've still got plenty of time to get ready for the race, but I know that I'll always have conflicts.  Tomorrow, for example, I have an event to attend for work after work.  After a full work day and an event, working out, even if it's just a short run and some weights, is just not going to happen.  Not yet at least.  Hopefully, my attitude on that will change, or I'll gain the necessary determination and endurance to make it happen.  But I'm not there yet.  Another advantage of starting so early is that I can ease into the "official training schedule."  That being said, one of the main objectives of following a schedule is to prevent injury.  This schedule requires you to take certain days off to keep you from overdoing it and straining muscles or doing something else damaging.  This leaves me at a crossroads.  Do I take today off, as the schedule says, in the hopes that I'll magically get my butt out of bed early enough to get tomorow's work out (short run) in in the morning, or do I do it today, knowing that most likely, even if I'm up in enough time, I won't be able to pull that off yet.

I've done good for the past two days.  Done pretty much what the schedule instructs, but working the wedding turned out to be a lot more actual work than I'd planned, so it almost counts as a workout in itself.  So, when I look at it like that, there is an additional workout.  Not cardio, but definitely strength and endurance (carrying around a heavy camera for hours, holding it in odd positions, kneeling, squatting... Really, it adds up, and you feel it the next day!).  Nonetheless, the wedding was fun, and we all had a really good tme! :) Congrats to David and Becca!  Hopefully we captured their day just as they wanted it captured.  The venue was very unique and pretty, but it wasn't set up all that well for lighting properly.  My dad should have his hands full in photoshop making corrections where our lighting let us down!  On a fun note: He sent me home with some fun new camera equipment to play around with!!  Hopefully I'll get around to creating some fun pics that I can post on here.  I found this 31 day photo challenge that I've been wanting to do...  But, of course, that takes time.  So many things I want to do, not quite enough time to get them all done in a timely manner!

So, I feel like I'm off to a good start with the working out with the 1/2 marathon in mind.  Now, on to some goals I've set for myself this week:

• Get the number of workouts in that I'm supposed to.  Hopefully as close to what the training schedule calls for as possible (i.e. running the right distance, sticking to the right days), but even if it isn't exaclty what the schedule calls for, I'd like to get them all in in some way, shape, form or fashion.
• Drink more water.
• Finish the book I'm reading!!!  I'm ready to start this book club!
• Work on photography, possibly starting with the 31 day challenge.  (I'll post more about that later.  It's nothing hard.  It mainly just gives you inspiration for pictures, but gives you complete freedom with all aspects of the photo for each day.)

So, that's all for now!  Let's see how this week goes! :)

UPDATE: Well, I managed to pull off tomorrow's run today since I'll most likely NOT get it done tomorrow.  I only did the 2 miles that the schedule said to do (and then came in and did some weights and abs- not many, but enough of an additional workout to count it! :), but it was HARD!!  I had almost convinced myself not to do it, as my car thermometer said it was 105 degrees!  My car is black, so that must have something to do with that because the temp dropped to 93 degrees before I got to the second light on my way home.  So I convinced myself to do it.  Like I said, it wasn't easy, but I did it.  My time wasn't great.  Maybe because it was so hot, maybe because today should have been my rest day...  I don't know, but it doesn't matter.  This will get easier.  This will get easier.  This will get easier.