Let's start this entry with the bad news. My 30 day trendline is going up.

This isn't the first time this has happened (it also happened [before the 2010 holidays][1]), but it was a little bit frustrating this time, because I have gone a long time without a contraindication. Granted, it's pretty low, because the blue trend line is still down over the thirty day period, but for a week or so there, it was not fun to get on the scale. I can usually handle a set of three or four days with numbers that are higher than I expect, because it all corrects itself in the end, but I was starting to see a trend.

The yearly graph shows it as the largest chunk of red so far this year. Hopefully it will be the biggest chunk in the whole year. I'm getting kindof close to my yearly (modest) goal of hitting 212 in the year. I might be reporting in the next diet post about making it. It won't mean that I will be stopping, but I will at least have a nice mid-year accomplishment.

In last month's report I reported that I was signing up for Goldy's Run 5K, with a goal of completing it in less than half an hour. I am happy to report that I ran it without any problems. It being my first race, I was a bit nervous about going into it and making sure that I had everything in order, so I elected to pick up my race packet the night before. There wasn't really anything of note in the packet except for the bib, and some coupons that I don't think I'll be using anytime soon - also a bunch of ads for other races. I guess it makes sense, but I was hoping for some more information about the race in the packet. It would have been useful to have a course map to look at or something.

The day of the race, I parked the car in a spot and filled the meter. I had arrived before the 10-mile race that was being run in the same day had started, so I got to watch the 10 milers start, and a couple of stragglers too. The 10 mile was chip timed so I guess it didn't matter if they crossed the start line a little late. Then the mass of people who were running the 5K lined up. I found a spot near the back and snapped a picture.

There were certainly a lot of people there. The start line is up there somewhere. I made some really small talk with some of the people around me, and then they started the race. The crowd started to shuffle kindof slow. I made sure to start my personal timer (RunKeeper on my Android phone) as I crossed the start line to make sure that I had as close to an actual race time as I could get.

In the first stretch down University Ave, there were a lot of people. I mean, most of the people in front of me at the start were still in front of me. They were going slower than I wanted to, so I ended up bobbing and weaving through a bunch of people, and started to find some lines where other runners were also trying to forge a way through the people. I don't really blame anyone but myself for not lining up a bit closer to the front where the "faster" runners like myself were though. It wasn't so bad, and it started thinning out as we progressed along the first long straight part.

When I hit the first corner, it was not too much traffic at all, but more than I had ever run with before. Of course, that would be a given -- since I started running last year, I had never really run anywhere with another person before the race. My runs are a kind of alone time, even if I am usually listening to my podcasts while I am doing it. It was strange to have to worry about other people's feet, and working out how I was going to pass this person or that person, which side to run on, and whether I should just fall in line at the same pace or go a little bit faster.

The course winded through the campus, in between both of the labs that I have worked at for countless hours and taking a nice run around the mall. There were water stations, but I didn't really need any. I am sure that the 10-milers were happy to see them about 2 miles from the end of the course. It ended up curling around the new TCF stadium and crossing the 50 yard line was the finish. I had never been in the stadium at all before, to watch a game or for anything else.
When I stopped my timer right after I crossed the finish, it showed 26:49. I was pretty happy. Goal achieved, 5K under 30 minutes.

After the race, I was happy to go home and have breakfast with Diana. I think it was a good race to run, not really impacting anything and a lot of people around who were more casual runners like me. I was not completely tired at the end of it, which means that I could have probably run it a bit faster than I did. I should have run faster when I saw the 2 mile sign, or started with a faster pace once the pack started to thin. I really just wanted to make sure that I finished though, and didn't start too fast and end up being slow at the end. It would have been a real failure for me if I had to stop and walk part of it, because in my training I was running longer than this distance without stopping regularly. It was a great experience for a first race though!

Speaking of training, the training for running the Red, White and Boom has been going basically according to plan. Moving the rest days that I was previously doing to different days has worked out quite well, and while I wasn't happy with turning down the total mileage at the start, the addition of a long run to my week really gives me a great feeling of accomplishment every time. So far my farthest run has been just over 9 miles, but I have a scheduled double-digit coming up in a couple days which I see as a big milestone. I'm going to have to start carrying some water soon, I think.

Adding the race report to the middle of this has made this entry a bit long. I've got some more interesting running tidbits to share, so maybe I'll make some more posts in between the regular updates. Until then, wish me good training - and thanks to everyone who is motivating me. It's surprising how much a "Like" means.

Well, I've plonked out of the blogging for a little while now, but I hit another mark in my log book, so it's time for another diet and exercise update. Weight is still going down, although not as fast as I would want it to, in general. The exercise is going pretty great, and I have some exciting stuff coming up in the near future. Overall, I have been pretty happy about how I feel, look and weigh in the last month.

Looking at the last month or so graph is pretty interesting to me. There is a lot of strange patterns going on here. I don't know what the heck is going on, that there seems to be a pattern of me gaining weight and then followed by a precipitous drop down to a new low. The trend continued today when I reached my lowest weight, only one pound away from my (modest) goal for the year. Some of the points on the upper end of these sawtooth type patterns are above my weighted average line and pull it up, but most are still below, and the linear estimate still shows a caloric deficit. The year graph still looks good, even though it is more roller-coastery than I would like.

My running habit has been getting a little more serious, and I've been feeling pretty good about it. The training schedule I've been on in the last few months has been working pretty good, although I am thinking that it might be less of a training schedule and just more like a running schedule in the last couple weeks. I like the routes that I am on, though. I have been increasing the lengths of my long walks on Sunday for a little bit, and I really extended them this month. I've done about 10 miles or a little more on the walks in the last three weeks. The extended range of these walks feels pretty good, trouncing all around the city and reaching places that I haven't been able to get at before.

Running has been getting faster, and now I'm running consistently at around 9:30 per mile or faster. I lowered the amount of time that I am walking on my run / walk interval runs. I am thinking that I will be lowering the walking by a lot, and cutting it out completely possibly, in the next couple of weeks though. Lots of you I'm sure see my Dailymile profile posts to Twitter and Facebook though.

Last month I have been starting to get serious about doing at least a couple of races this year, just mostly for fun and to have something to aim towards. Well, my big news this month is that I have signed up and will run a 5K race next week. This is more of a race to get me used to races, or to do a smaller length race before I do something more serious later in the year. I've signed up for the Goldy's Run 5K and will be aiming towards a time under half an hour. I regularly run intervals which are much longer than that, so it shouldn't be a problem to finish and hopefully get a good time. I've never run with a lot of people before - not really with anyone before, so I am wondering how I will react when there are a lot of people around actually running a race. I initially considered signing up for the 10 mile race, but it was probably a little more ambitious to think about doing that only two weeks before the race when I was only walking that distance.

I also have decided that I want to run a half marathon before the year is out, and I don't really want to do it in the winter, so I've set myself a goal to run the Red, White and Boom! TC half marathon on the 4th of July. Luckily I've made this decision basically at the exact right time. I've found a 12 week novice training schedule online, and I am about exactly 12 weeks out from the race day. So I'm starting on the training schedule this Wednesday and following it closely. It starts with less running than I am used to, so I am modifying it a little to keep the total amount of miles that I cover about the same. I am a little worried because I usually am walking sections when I am running, and I will need to find some other routes that are slightly longer than I run now. I don't want to overdo it, but I have been pretty good at listening to my body about changes. Wish me luck.

From faces above ground last time, we switch to below ground faces this time. I'm not quite easy to know what to say though.

This is just a random cave face carving, which I can't really say much about. The source image isn't that much help, it just says carving of a face in the description.

So I was looking for some cave carvings, and I thought about the Mayans, who had some pretty elaborate cave carvings. They don't really look the same though. There have been a lot of people talking about the Mayans recently because of their calendar. There are quite a few carvings of the calendar that you can find around the web. People say that it predicts the end of the world in 2012, but I'm not convinced. At any rate, that looks like a dead end anyway.

So I was wondering about some of the other cave carvings, and I remembered that there were quite a lot of carvings and statues in the Indian mountains. These are mostly statues though. Lots of them are of the Hindu Gods and Goddesses, of which there are a lot. There are at least 33 different vedas described in the Rig Veda, but some people say that there could be 330 million gods. Even others would say that 330 million was just supposed to be a impossibly large number (like a hojillion), and it really meant infinity. Again though, those statues don't look a lot like the crude carving that you see above, in fact they are quite intricate, so I continued my search.

I hit up Google for just a random search of cave face paintings, and I found another path that I investigated in Hellfire caves in Britain. There are some strange rooms in these caves, and one of the rooms has quite a few faces carved in chalk. These look a little more like the picture above, but I think that they are probably a bit more recent, and they are in white, not the distinctive brownish rock that you see in the source picture. Some of them do look quite similar though.

I think this is the first solid picture that I just don't have a good handle on. I kept looking for a while, but I didn't find much else. There was one cave in Australia which had a very similar color and a face which was similar, but it looks like my search was fruitless. I may come back and try to search out the photographer of this later, to see if I can find something more.

Another month has gone by, and that means that it's time for another Diet and Exercise Update. I've been pretty happy with my progress in this month, which is really pleasing to me. That's somewhat strange to say this time, because the 30 days of progress graph doesn't show much in the way of progress.

Thirty days doesn't look good, does it? Except for that little dip down near the end, I don't really show a lot of progress on the scale. I can't say that I was unhappy to wake up this morning and see the lowest weight that I've achieved yet (and only about 3 pounds from my year goal), but I haven't really been focusing on it this month. Partly that is because of the scale starting to go up and down without much of a prompt from me. The other part of it is that I have been happy with other stuff that's been going on.

The first thing is that I have been making progress on my running habit and it's been going pretty well. The training schedule that I outlined last month has been working out okay, and recently I've added some mileage to my interval workouts. I switched out my interval route run for the longer one that I was previously doing on my "As You Like" running days, because the original route was consistently less than 45 minutes.

That means that I'm running about a third of a mile longer than I was before. It also means that I'm also trying to find another route for my longer runs just to keep it interesting. I've tried a couple of different routes on my walking and Thursdays, but haven't settled into anything yet. I've been exploring around the neighborhood on my walking days lately, trying to find a course that is only 10% or so longer. All of the easy answers are kind of boring. I've found one last Thursday which I ran that was a good distance though, or at least felt like it. It was technically longer than I was looking for, but I like the route because it goes over a massive train yard, and apparently I am still 12 or something. At any rate, my running goal graph shows me 6 to 7 days ahead of my plan, which feels pretty good.

In the last month, it's been probably some of the coldest running days. This winter has been very mild, in major contrast to last year. I still had to don some of the gear that I would normally have to work out with when I went outside though. I wasn't really running last winter, so I didn't know what was really up. I did some research when it started getting cold and got what I needed though. Over the last three months, I've worked out what I need to stay comfortable in the harsh climate while I am running.

First off, I don't run when it is dangerous outside. That means that I won't run when there is a lot of ice, or the snow is high enough that I can't see obstacles or ice patches that I might need to avoid. I also don't run when it's raining or snowing significantly hard that I would worry about my phone breaking in the moisture. I got lucky enough this year to not have to switch to an inside workout or switch some of the days of the workout.

When it gets colder, I go through multiple stages of upgrades to the wardrobe as it gets colder. The first thing that I'll do is switch to a long sleeve shirt. I have two different long sleeve shirts now, one that is a little more breathable than the other, so I will use one first and another if it's windy or a bit colder. In the past I have felt strange wearing long sleeve shirts and shorts at the same time, but the rules of running are different. I will go around with just shorts and a long sleeve shirt until it is about 35 degrees or so.

Once it gets colder than 35, I'll consider switching out the shorts for running tights. I hadn't really experienced wearing tights before, but they work remarkably well for keeping the legs warm while they have a good compression feel on the legs for running. If it's colder than 30, I will almost guaranteed to have the tights on. Once it gets below 20, I will wear a compression top that I got as well, which layers under the long sleeve shirt.

If it's colder than freezing, I will wear some nice running gloves and a hat, which will protect my hands from getting frostbitten. When it was just starting to get cold, there were a couple incidents with my hands getting cold and not being able to move them earlier this year, which was bad, so I got these and they have been working good. They also have some mitten parts which come out, and block the wind while they also are hot yellow for visibility.

I have two different pairs of tights now, a lighter pair and a pair with a wool lining. The pair with wool lining is extremely warm, and I wear it when it gets below 15. If it gets colder than that, I will start layering even more on the top. I have a coat that I could wear, but I have never had to this year, and I also have a set of loose pants that I could put on top of the tights, but honestly with the wool lined ones, they were almost too warm even at the coldest day this year.

It's getting warmer again, which means that I haven't had to change from my default outfit of shorts and a running tech tee or long sleeve tee for a week or two. With any luck, spring has sprung and there will be a lot of good days from now on. I'll have to figure out some storage scheme for the winter stuff.

The great mysterious monuments continue on this next picture. I haven't been to this one yet. The source image was pretty easy to find.

These are the statues called Moai. They are human figured carved from the rock around Easter Island. Easter Island is interestingly, owned by Chile, even though it is over 2,000 miles from Santiago. It's a quite small island in total, with only 63.1 square miles, and only about 40 miles if you walked around the whole thing on the outside. Mostly because of the statues, it's a popular tourist destination.

Speaking of the statues, they are mostly carved out of volcanic ash which had been compressed after many years. There are lots of them on the island, 887 that have been found. They are carbon dated to around 1100 AD, which means they're not all that old. They were carved by hand out of that stuff, using stone chisels which are actually much harder than the ash. Thirteen of the statues were carved out of basalt, which is much harder.

Interestingly, almost all of the statues are faced inwards. They would normally be placed on a big stone platform called an Ahu. The only ones that are facing the ocean are quite far inland at Ahu Akivi. Most of the statues aren't on their platforms anymore, because there was a time in Easter Island's past when the islanders got into a intra-island war and they toppled all the Moai, breaking a lot of them.

These ones have head dressings which are of a different stone and are called Pukao. They're carved from a different volcanic stone, which is actually red which you can see in the color version of this photo. There's actually a dent in the bottom of them, so that they can stand atop the statues like that.

The statues themselves are still being excavated actively from the island, with regular reports from the people at the Easter Island Statue Project. Their aim is to locate them all, document them, and also understand the context of all the statues that exist on the island. They've done some interesting experimental archaeology on how the statues were moved from the original quarry that all the rock came from to the different places on the island that they are at now. They've also laser scanned one which has been in the gallery at the British Museum for a while now.