January in Review/February goals

I hate January. It is, by far, the worst month of the year. It is dark & cold & spring seems so far away. And now, it’s over.

January is a stupid month to begin the year in – I think March would be better – more hopeful. It would be easier for everyone to stick to their resolutions in March, I think.

So – first let’s review January’s goals.

  1. Go the whole month without using my ‘overdraft protection’ in my checking account. This didn’t go so well – but I swear it wasn’t my fault.
  2. Use my Mondays in the manner for which they were made work-free I did do okay with this, but then of course, had to work last Monday (the horror!)
  3. Run 50 miles I hit 51 miles, even with my less frequent working out schedule
  4. Get a minimum of 3 servings of fruit/veggies each day I was definitely more conscious of this, and most days I did just fine (ever since I found out that a banana counts as TWO WHOLE SERVINGS!) but there is definitely room for improvement here
  5. De-clutter house – get a Goodwill box together This was my most successful – I took a trunk full of stuff to Goodwill yesterday. It was fun getting rid of stuff we never use. We have a ways to go, but it was a good start.
  6. I usually only do 5, but I’m adding an honorary sixth today – Don’t burn down the house & kill the pets I totally did not even come close to burning down the house after that first day. So good for me!
I didn’t work out as much as I intended. I got 24 days in, which isn’t bad (I averaged 51 minutes of exercise a day overall); but the work stress is really doing a number on my working out. I’m pretty proud of how well I did do, though – I ran 51 miles – which is my highest mileage month maybe ever. I did a 10-miler and didn’t die.

Today I started February off right with a 6 mile run with Junk Miles.  She came to my neck of the woods and we ran in my beautiful park. I think later on this spring/summer, we may have to have an informal running group meet-up there for a nice run followed by a picnic!

Our splits:
Mile 1: 9:30 (again with the speediness)
Mile 2: 11:21 (there is a big, ass-kicking hill at the beginning of mile 2 – I think that’s the fastest I’ve done that mile in almost a year)
Mile 3: 11:06 (not bad considering we had to stop to cross the road)
Mile 4: 12:47 (we took a walk break here)
Mile 5: 15:50 (we took another break in here, but I had no idea it was that long/slow of a break!)
Mile 6: 11:07 (again, not bad considering all the road crossings & the fact that we were both about dead)
Overall: 11:57 – slower pace than last week, but way more hills than last week, too. All in all – a very good run.

Now – on to my February goals
  1. Maintain intuitive eating, which has mostly been going well (food) – I only lost 1.4 lbs in January, which is, of course, better than a gain, but I’d like to see a larger loss for February. I’m down 6 lbs since I started recording everything again at Thanksgiving, and it’s hard to complain about a 6 lb loss through the holidays & January, but I’m still 7 lbs away from goal #1, and 11 lbs away from my primary goal.
  2. Workout at least 5 days each week between 2/1 & 2/21; work out every day between 2/22 & 2/28 (fitness)
  3. Maintain a relatively clutter-free home (household)
  4. Decrease food spending by another $50 (finance)
  5. Get my next tattoo (personal)
My ongoing 2009 goal is to read 5 new books each month. Tune in tomorrow for a review of the January reads.

Happy February! This is when things start to get better!  The sun is coming back!

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