Hey! It’s been quiet around here due to a combo of things. 1. It’s summer break and my focus is not on this blog 2. My work has exploded. In a good way. It’s a great kind of busy. I’m in the throes of a project I’m so passionate about, it doesn’t seem like work at all. Who can ask for more than that? I am working out still. Here’s how this week went.
Monday: Rest
Tuesday: Track 3 miles + swim
Wednesday: Strength train
Thursday: 30 min. trail run with Ozzy, leg day
Friday: Run 6 miles
Saturday: Rest (planted my veggie garden finally)
Sunday: CrossFit
First track workout of the summer is in the books. I got out too late and it was already too hot but it was still good. Go figure.
I don’t often talk about the quality of my runs because honestly, getting out for even a shitty run is a victory in my book. I’m grateful I can run at all. I told you how I cope with getting slower here. That said, all of my runs this week felt amazing. My heart rate played nice, endorphins flowed, this runner was HIGH. Chalk it up to cool temperatures, the fragrance of peonies in the air, soft breezes, who knows? All of that might have helped, but at the end of the day, I think it had everything to do with whatever mysterious hormonal balance I’m in right now. Can I bottle this?
My Garmin agreed. I spent very little time in red zone 5 (usually most of my runs are there, I swear sometimes I have to walk to be any lower) my VO2max increased, and I’m in a “productive” training state. I’ll take it!
I made it to the pool for the third consecutive week. Is there an award for that?
I still need to tell you about this book. Anybody interested in doing an 8-day taste-bud detox?
I’m finally making progress toward conquering my sugar cravings too. There have been no after-dinner sweets this week. No chips or crap in the house either. And I’m back to my daily huge salad. All wins.
Thing 2 is getting ready for music camp…wait no..make that I’m getting Thing 2 ready for camp. Holy cow the stuff! While I already purchased every iteration of uniform top, I’m having a helluva time finding navy blue bottoms. Shorts and sweats are no problem but solid navy skirts and slacks for performances are elusive thus far. And pantyhose? Navy blue knee socks? What is this: 1975??
Not Loving
Can we all stop being so offended? The only thing I didn’t love in this unicorn week of running goodness was this Insta post from Lauren Fleshman. Note how women has an x in it. Apparently this word is taboo.
Let me preface this by saying it is not my intention to offend anyone. I’m so sick of so many people being offended by every little thing. It is paralyzing. Believe me I get the #metoo thing, have been a victim of the #metoo thing and am all for it. But personally I couldn’t care less if someone wants to call me a woman or a lady or a gal or a girl. Life is way too short to spend time grinding and worrying about who’s going to be offended. And guess what? I’m not in charge of how other people react to certain words. That’s on them. If you perceive the term woman or lady, girl or gal to be offensive, that’s your prerogative. By the looks of the comments on Lauren’s post, many people agreed with me. When someone speaks to me I consider their intention. Was it their intent to offend me? I don’t find any of these words intentionally offensive.
This reminds me of a time a billion years ago when I was a 20 yr. old college student interning at a network TV news station. I was tasked with interviewing a producer who’d recently won another of many career awards. As the interview wound down, I asked her if we’d covered everything she wanted covered and if there was anything else she wanted to add. She flipped out and literally screamed at me about how she’d just talked about her many accolades, and how dare I ask if there was anything else. Didn’t I think her accomplishments were enough?
For years after that episode, I replayed the encounter in my head, agonizing over how I could have asked the question differently/less offensively. It wasn’t until many years later that I realized her outburst was because of her own issues and insecurities. It certainly was not my intention to imply her accolades were insufficient.
Ok rant over.
How was your week? Did you race? Are you offended by any of the words above that offend Lauren Fleshman?
I’m linking up with Kim and Deborah for the Weekly Run Down. Join us!
I didn’t see that post from Lauren and yeah, what the what? Along the same lines, a mom of one of my patients posted a picture of her dressed up as “Doctor Wendy” for career day. One of the doctors I work with asked me why she calls me “doctor”. I responded that I guess they want to give me a title instead of just calling me Wendy. Apparently, she was offended that a patient called me “doctor.” Seriously, this is what she’s worried about.
Kind of tired of everyone getting offended all the time too. Thanks for posting.
Ugh on womxn. Really? I get the issues with unintentional bias and know the damage can be real — I just called out a colleague on his bad habit of telling women to smile— but I don’t know what to call females. “Women” seems too old, “ladies” seems too delicate, “gals” is too casual for work, and “girls” is too young. I think I usually fallback on ladies but it’s not the best.
On the uniforms, have you tried Lands End? I think they have a uniform section.
I know where your daughter is going, mine went there last summer. 🙂 Have her keep all the tags on those navy bottoms. I think mine only wore the navy skirt (maybe a skort) for performances and kept wearing the same one when needed. We found one at Justice. Most of the time the girls just wear jean shorts with their polos. The cabin host will do their laundry every few days. I bought two pairs of knee socks through the camp. (I attended this camp in 1986 or 87 and the uniforms haven’t changed one bit, except for the girls getting to wear jean shorts now!) Your daughter will have a great time! Mine wishes she was going back this summer. 🙂
I get called a girl by some people and I don’t care, however as you say, it’s the intention that counts; people who are generally kind and are maybe older and don’t realise that people get offended by it, fine, someone patronising me, not fine.
A good week but sorry about the uniform-finding woes. I have to wear navy trousers and a white polo shirt for officiating and even that was a bit hard to find at first!
I am pretty tired of everyone being offended by everything all the time as well. Seriously people just do what you and want and stop complaining about every little thing all the time. Ok then! I am also on a refocus of my nutrition after all of my travel. It’s hard some days! Have not heard of that book what are you doing exactly? thanks for linkungup
Glad your runs felt so good this week! What an awesome feeling. And great job cutting out sweets and chips/crap. I’m doing a month-long challenge though the place I strength train and am trying to do the same, but I definitely have not been perfect…but even if just a few times I skip the bad stuff, I figure it helps in the long run.
Good luck to your child at music camp, and good luck with the uniform shopping!
I saw something (briefly) about how far more is spent on mother’s day than father’s day. And speaking of offending people — from my observations, most moms do put in way more work than the dads. Not always the case, to be sure, but it’s still definitely skewed to moms.
I didn’t see Lauren’s post either. Not really sure how think of it. At Trader Joes I’m often called miss, which I find extremely amusing, quite frankly. I am so obviously not a young girl . . .
It’s always wonderful when you’re getting paid to work on something you’d do for free.
Love to read about those magical runs! They don’t happen all the time, but when they do they are enough to keep you heading out the door. Good for you for cleaning up your diet. I (almost) eliminated all added sugar from my diet recently. I did recently cheat, though. I ran a race yesterday that gave free milkshakes out at the end of the race. I drank about 1/3 of it and felt guilty, so pitched the rest!
Glad you had a solid week of running! The picture about retraining our taste buds piqued my interest. I know that taste buds change, but I’m a bit skeptical it can happen in 8 days.
I remember having to shop for band uniforms too – it was a pain, and ours were standard black pants and white button shirt. Good luck with navy bottoms!
Oh, Marcia. I wish I could high-5 you through the screen. I’m in total agreement with everything you said about that comment above and the womXn thing. I, too, go over in my head, numerous times, when I get a snarky rebuttal from someone, especially when it was never my intent to say anything offensive in the first place. Like you said, I also have reached the conclusion it’s on THEM (and their life experiences) if something rubs them the wrong way. Honestly, can’t we all just get along LOL Good luck on your quest for those navy bottoms 😉 And pantyhose…do they still make them??? Thanks for joining us on the WRD
The post lost me at spelling women as womxn – really? In the workplace I just call everyone my colleague since it’s pretty hard to get offended at that, lol. Although I think it would be weird if someone referred to me as a girl (because I’m not a kid), no one has ever done that, lol. I think right now people are highly sensitive to a bunch of things and have “fake outrage” so much that they don’t get offended when there’s a real problem!
Glad your running are going well.
About the words, now in Italy every word becomes a problem, the politically correct rules … and I understand that I am getting really older because I think that “long time ago, when I was young, the things went better”.
So glad to hear you are “good” busy – that is the best! Getting ready for camp is hard enough without specific outfits so good luck with that. As for the Tweet from Lauren – I can see your point and can agree about the woman “x” thing because, really? And I DO think a lot of this is way over the top but she does have a point with trans or gender-binary people and the term “female” and I agree with asking someone how they want to be addressed. Since starting my graduate degree in counseling I have been opened up to this. As white, cisgender (meaning our sex at birth is the one we identify with) people is very easy for us to say “this is stupid” but for SO many others, it really does matter. #mytwocents
Where girls drives me nuts is (generic) you wouldn’t call a group of men “boys” so why do we do it to women? it’s kind of demeaning in my book. Ladies doesn’t bother me, and I know I’m in the minority in the north that I don ‘t mind being called ma’am. I’m all about following what people like and prefer. There was a similar conversation on my FB some months back about Ms. vs. Mrs. and the assumptions therein too
navy pants – try Kohls? I kept finding all the navy when I was looking for grey or black. I think they were Apt 9 Brynn’s if that cut fits your daughter.
Hey, maybe it’s going better because you aren’t running all the marathons anymore? I wonder if you’re body just needed a tiny break? nice that it’s going well – I hope I get that feeling soon. But believe me, I’m happy I can run and I *knocks wood* have no real pain in my foot.
To be honest, I just try to remember who I’m speaking to in general to try not to offend anyone, like for example I have two very good trans friends so I try not to use gender specific terms with them. But I get it. I’m not easily offended by terms but there are a few things that do actually rub me the wrong way and I do admit it’s on me. I don’t want to be called any term of endearment by a man who doesn’t know me. In Dutch, there’s this word “wijf” that I really hate, I can’t explain it. I don’t mind “woman”, what’s up with the x? I don’t want to be called “female” I find it odd. We don’t call men “male” usually, do we? Same with girls and boys when speaking about groups of adults; however, in Dutch we DO says girls and boys and it’s no big deal All that said, though, if you call me something I don’t like, I’ll just tell you. If you get mad at me for it, then it’s on you 🙂 I’m not going to be passive-agressive about these things that are on me, I’m going to tell you directly. So, back to the point, usually unless you are speaking directly to me then I’m generally not offended. Or am I? Maybe I need to check myself before I wreck myself haha!
I missed Lauren’s post and glad I did. I’m so over tip-toeing around people and couldn’t agree with you more. Really, who’s got time for this much outrage?!
So glad you’ve been enjoying some nice running!
Have you tried the Gap or Lands End for the navy skirts/pants?
Your comment about pantyhose is funny… I wear them everyday at work! I work at a “business” bank, and up until recently we couldn’t even wear pants unless it was part of a matching pant suit. I think the pant suit thing is lame, but I actually like wearing panty hose. In the past year my company did relax the dress code to include “non” matching pants and shirts or sweaters, and you can also wear skirts without pantyhose (wow!). My legs are not attractive at all, so I still stick with panty hose even in the summer. I don’t want to look at the spider veins and all of other stuff I don’t like on my legs, so I’m good with it. It’s also chilly in my office and I don’t find it comfortable to have my legs sticking together. How long is band camp? My son will be starting marching band in the fall, and there are quite a few rehearsals for that in early August, but no band camp.