If I squint real hard I can pretend that this sugar-free hot chocolate that I’m drinking is the real deal. Sort of.

Last night we got about an inch of super fluffy fake-o Xmas-movie-style snow. It’s actually sticking around today thanks to the arctic winds blowing through. Supposedly it’s going to be 10 below tonight, which is rare around here. I’d better make sure that the heat is on in the basement. I’ll be exercising from home tonight if it’s that cold.

Speaking of exercising, I’m taking it up to a new level of science. Last week I tried spinning with Jeremie’s heart rate monitor and since I could monitor myself and stop before I got sick, it was a much more pleasant experience. I discovered, to my surprise, that it’s really easy to go way above my target heart rate while spinning. So, I ordered the Polar m32 monitor and it arrived today. It looks pretty cool and it came with a free bike mount for the monitor watch. I am very excited to try it.

Even more exciting .. my iPod Shuffle has left Ontario, CA and is now in Memphis. Scheduled delivery is Monday evening (after I’ve left for Madison) but I have hope that it will be here tomorrow. Puh-leez FedEx, I beg you.

Heat wave on the East coast! The high today in Stamford was a whopping 58 F, so Jeremie and I decided to go hiking at the Devil’s Den preserve in Weston, CT. When we got there the small parking lot was packed to the gills but the preserve is big enough that once you start hiking you only come across other people every once in awhile. There was quite a bit of mud but that was greatly overweighed by the no-bugs factor.

The temperature made it very hard to believe that it is January and not April. So far, not looking good for the snowshoeing.

Tonight is the last game of the season for my soccer team, the illustrious “Stamford Untied”. I just realized I forgot my camera and that’s a serious bummer. We may not have won any games but I learned how to play soccer. If you ask me, that’s more of an accomplishment. I am dumb at sports.

So I started this running program a couple of months ago. Basically, it gives you instruction for how to go from not running at all to running a 5K. It breaks out routines by week in distance or time and I’d been doing it by time. A couple of weeks ago I technically finished the program by being able to run for 30 minutes but I was somewhere between 1/3 – 1/2 mile off from the 5K. Today I decided that I was going to push myself beyond the 30 minutes and complete the whole 5K, which I did in 34 minutes and change. The last few minutes were a struggle, but I’m glad I made myself do it. Once I can more easily finish in 34ish minutes I’ll work on getting my time down. For now, I’ll continue to be pretty happy with myself.

Today at work one of the guys asked me if I’ve been starving myself. Hardly, but it’s funny/nice nonetheless.