I also have some interesting facts from a guest contributor -  formerly of LJ fame -  murphy. he’s unaware of his contribution to my blog, but these are real things he said.

interesting facts by murphy (please use the word “interesting” loosely here)

1. the Chinese red panda is not a panda.
2. the bear cat is neither bear nor cat.
3. the pangolin is a weird African mammal-thing that looks like an artichoke.

seriously, it does look like an artichoke. i know.

today i went to the park.

pictures to follow.

I’ve started running again and it’s been a blessing. On Monday I started training for a 10k that I plan to run in July – The AJC Peachtree Road Race. This will be my third year in a row running the Peachtree. In 2007 I started running seriously again after take a 4 year college hiatus. I got in pretty good shape and ran a lot of local road races, including the Peachtree. I decided that year to make it a tradition if I was living in Atlanta or if I’d be in Atlanta for the 4th of July. In January I became a member of the Atlanta Track Club, so I was able to register for the race early. Yay! Anyway, training has begun. I’m schedule to run in the ATC’s Women’s 5k in Candler Park in a few weeks. I’ve participated in that race before and really enjoyed it, so thought doing it again would be good to get my competitive juices flowing and have a mini-goal to be working towards. I also talked a friend of mine into running it as well, which is nice. I always like to have friends to run with! As it’s tax season with the March 15th tax returns for corporations deadline looming, I don’t have too much time to be doing updates, but will leave you with this quotation I read about running. So motivating!

“I run because I can. When I get tired, I remember those who can’t run, what they’d give to have this simple gift I take for granted, and I run harder for them. I know they would do the same for me.”

Official day two of the sugar fast and I feel great. I woke up at 5.30a to make it to a pilates class; made it to work a few minutes EARLY (a feat only repeated once and that being my first day of work) and have been eating super cleanly all day long. It feels good to be taking care.
Anyway, today I learned that Xylitol is added to sugar-free gum as a sweetener. From xylitol.com: “Xylitol is a sweetener that occurs naturally. It can be found, for instance, in berries, fruit, vegetables and mushrooms. The Finnish name for it, “koivusokeri”, or “birch sugar”, derives from the fact that the best way to make xylitol industrially is from birch, by chopping up and rendering down the structural fibre of the wood, xylan.”

But, that’s not the part I learned (although that is interesting): In tests, Xylitol has been shown to kill cavity-causing bacteria that grow in your mouth after you eat. I know that sounds gross, but obviously it happens…Anyway, By chewing gum with xylitol in it, you’re actually helping keep yourself cavity-free, and at the same time freshening your breath. I was excited to get my hands on some gum with xylitol in it and it was easy- my favorite gum- peppermint Orbit- has xylitol in it. Sweet!

Today after lunch I ran a work-related errand. I passed my boss leaving the office as I was driving back. When I got back to my desk, after about 20 minutes I noticed a note from her asking me to call her Doctor to let him know she’s running late. So, I do this and am told that she was already at the appointment. Duh. I waved to her.

In other news, today is Fat Tuesday and I am relishing in my fat. Well, sugar actually. But, sugar turns to fat so I suppose I was right on the first time.

So, as I am obviously eating sugar today my dear reader may wonder what happened to my sugar fast last week. Well, it was crushed. It all started with a piece of Juicy Fruit. Then a Jolly Rancher. Then I decided to participate in Fat Tuesday.

In honor of my now apparent Lenten observance, I have learned recently that our bodies are tuned to like sweet tasting foods. Sort of a bummer if you’re a sweets-lover like me, right? When I first heard that I wondered how I’d ever kick my sweet tooth. Enjoying sweet tasting food is a survival mechanism for our bodies because naturally sweet, non-processed foods (e.g. fruit, vegetables) pack a huge nutritional punch. Therefore, an obese person is actually malnourished as opposed to just being fat. By abstaining from sugar and getting your sweet fill from fruit, sweet vegetables (like sweet potatoes and beets) and sweet salad leaves, you retrain your body to crave sweetness from natural sources. Granted, that piece of chocolate will still taste good after you’re retrained your mind to process sweet food, but chances are by this time you will have seen and felt some drastic results from abstaining from processed sugar and will be able to motivate yourself to enjoy the chocolate in moderation. Exercising (quite literally) self-control is a big factor, too.

Tomorrow: Day one (for the millionth time).

I am hungry for lunch and am having to go later than normal today. Today is the first day of my sugar fast that I’ve woken up with a headache. It wasn’t bad, and not anything eating breakfast won’t cure. But, now that I’m hungry for lunch I’m starting to fantasize about chocolate and anything that’s predominately sugar. I passed up even a bite of cookie cake brought for a friend’s upcoming birthday yesterday, which was hard. I’d like to be able to say I made it one week. The weekend is pretty much here and if I can get through tonight, I will be able to make it booze-free. I hope…

Enough of my sugar dilemma and onto my recently acquired knowledge:

Mother’s Day was originally created as a day of uniting women together to fight war. I think everyone eventually realized that this is what Mother’s do on a day-to-day basis anyway, so it was used to honor our Mothers.

OK, so I was totally reading an old magazine from (surprise, surprise) May of last year so that’s how I found that out. I know.

I’m into day 2 1/2  of my sugar fast and it’s going ok. I mabe be singing a different tune when the weekend rolls around. It’s going to be really hard to pass up drinking…That’s sad to admit. Anyway, onto my recently acquired knowledge.

The part of your brain that controls your internal clock is called the suprachiasmatic nucleus. This is important because it also controls our circadian rhythms (which we have over 100 different rhythms going on in our body that regulate different functions, e.g. hormone levels, heart rate, blood pressure, body temperature and even pain threshold).  Due to artifical light and people spending more time indoors than we ever used to (think pioneer days versus 2009) our internal clock gets off balance and our body functions become imbalanced. Cool, huh? Or actually, not cool if you’re imbalanced…

in other news, I have learned the following things:
1. if you are allergic to ragweed, do not drink chamomile tea as ragweed grows near chamomile & when it’s harvested sometimes ragweed gets in with the chamomile thus potentially causing an allergic rxn.
2. America is addicted to sugar. Sugar is everywhere and totally a drug. I am addicted as well, obviously, I am an American. But, I am on day one and a half of breaking the habit.

during my run i thought about the new year rapidly approaching and all of the things i wanted to change in my life. “January 1st!” i thought to myself, but then stopped. i realize that a lot of people will make resolutions to begin the first week of the new year, but why not start today? if those things are so important, why keep living in a different way until a day on the calendar arrives? i am mainly talking to myself here as I have issues with food and therefore am famous for starting to “eat better on monday.” really, eating better and exercising need to be a day to day thing – something that should be re-evaluated and planned for on a daily basis. yes, this is hard. yes, this will get results.

also during my warm weather run i thought about blogging. i decided that i want one of my resolutions to be blogging on a  daily basis. the goal for each blog post will be to document what i learned that day. i’m a lover of knowledge, so i have no doubt i’ll be able to find something to share. sure, i probably will miss days, but i want to at least log into my blog account an even if it’s just a “mel learned that drivers in atlanta are all assholes” kind of post, i want that to happen. i want to watch myself grow and learn. i thought about starting a new blog – starting fresh –  but realized that there’s really no point in doing that. what’s wrong with this blog? granted, it was created in accordance with a required assignment for a class I took spring 2007, but it’s still shiny and new.  sort of. anyway, that’s the plan.

today i learned that sometimes you have to take a few steps back if you want to make a giant leap forward.

pretty cliche, no?

My local Shell is also a service station, so I asked the attendant if they could fix it. He walked over to check out the tire and stated that I was the likely cause of air leaking from the inflation tube.

“They break pretty easily,” he said without making eye contact. Great. So now I had that to replace that AND still needed to find out where air was escaping from my tire.

When it was fixed, I left with only dropping $20. And, it turns out, that the tire was not all my fault. There was a nail in it.

Nice start to the week.