Still busy

I've gotten some cleaning done, and I'm up on my exercise, but I don't think I'll be packing anymore today. It means that a BUNCH of packing will have to get done tomorrow. But I seem to work better (read: more directly with less distractions) under pressure, so it should be okay. They're coming to do the final apartment check on Wednesday, so I still have 2 days.

I did my week 4 test for both push ups and crunches. I got 27 pushups, which is a vast improvement and means I went up one rank again. However, 27 puts me in column 3 for a week 4 and 5 progression, and that's a kinda scary jump for me, seeing how so far I've gone from w1&2c1 to w1&2c3. We'll just have to see how many I can do on Wednesday. I also did a marvelous 75 crunches. I'm really proud of my progress this last week, as I actually improved, as well as went up one rank, so I'm on w6c3. I'm taking that as a sign I'm back on track and moving up normally. I guess I need to start thinking about what I'm going to do when I can actually do 100 crunches in a row. I want to continue having them in my workout, but I don't know how many I want to push myself to do in one workout session. As it is now, I'm already doing about 200 crunches total every other day, maybe I should work up to being able to do 200 in a row? Sets are wonderful, but surely doing that much at one time without a break is more work on your muscles, ya?

Oh, by the way, with very little pomp and circumstance, I finished couch to 5k. I did my week 9 day 3 on Saturday. I did it down by the port, nice, flat, cushy. I kept a good pace the whole time, didn't feel extremely winded at the end of it. It went really nicely--more of a normal running day than a completion to a program (I started on May 23rd, so it took me 1 month and 4 weeks, I usually didn't take 2 days off a week, just ran every other day).

I still can't run for 5k yet, I did the program on time, not distance, so what I started today was My Plan. I've been walking 30 minutes after my run for the past 3 weeks or so (starting at 10 minute walks, and moving up 5 minutes each week, until I got to 30 minutes), and today, seeing how I'd finished week 9, I started week 1 day 1 after a 5 minute walk at the end of my 30 minute run. It went well. I felt awesome during the first few intervals, and didn't even really get uber tired at the end. I found and kept my running pace quickly, and was amazed at how fast that minute went by, remembering just 2 months ago how long that 60 seconds seemed, how it never seemed to end. I'm really positive that I can work it that I'll be able to run one hour in about 2-3 months (I'm moving back to the US from Japan about halfway to April, but in the meantime, I've got one more week here and then I'm traveling in Taiwan and mainland Japan for about 3 weeks. While I'd like to be optimistic that I'll be able to run regularly while traveling, I'd rather be realistic, and plan to run when I can, but not push myself when I've been sightseeing all day in the outdoor heat). On today's run, which I did on the Kurima Bridge, I saw 1 sea turtle, 3 really long thin fish (light gray, about 1.5-2 feet long), and a really long large brown thing that I thought may be another turtle or possibly a dolphin, but turned out to be most of a tree trunk. I then lounged about the beach, swimming occasionally (this is permitted as visiting the beach, while not specifically on my to do list, is one of the things that I'd really like to do as much as I can this week. As well as finishing my largest heaviest book, which also got a bit done on the beach. Oh, I can update my Shelfari!

Other than that, I had fun at Teresa's birthday on Saturday night, got a bunch done that day, I think. Mostly concerning the computer. Then yesterday was Sanitsuhama, which was the lowest tide of the year and the bay by Shimoji was all not a bay (it was kinda smelly, seeing how that dirt never sees the air) and they had tug of wars and races and horses and a volley ball tournament that Jeff, Jon, Jason, Greg, Hajime, and Nema had a team for (they one two and then lost to the team that eventually won), and Teresa, Ryu, Acchan, Nishi, and some guy I don't know had a team and they won right up until the final, when they lost to the team that obviously won. Then dinner at Sunnyside with Jeff and Nana, and then bowling practice with Justin and Ryuta (I didn't suck, but I didn't do as well as hoped, but I was really tired from being in the sun all day).

And now tonight Scott and Makiko are having a naming party for their newest son Alex who was born about a month ago. So yeah, I'm gonna chill and read and then go to that.

In other news, while I'm thinking about it, and have the windows open. The Guild is a really funny WoW Players' Real Life skit on youtube, but also with a dvd coming out in August. I think it's hilarious. And it stars Felicia Day from the recent Dr. Horrible's Sing-a-long Blog. She also writes and produces much of it (I think). Good times.

Oh, and I also went back and updated the necessary info on my travel itinerary. It's all fixed and up there now.