A New Frontier

June will be four years. Four years of my life that I've spent with the same company, doing the same thing, over and over and over. Sure, I've gained some marketable skills over those years. When I look back at my 22-year-old self, I'd say I'm much older and wiser now than I was back then. I've learned how to truly adapt to a business setting of 9-5. I've cultivated relationships with lots of people and definitely feel as though I've contributed a fair amount to the company. But the monotony has got to stop. I can only continue doing what I'm currently doing for so long before I do something stupid. I've decided it's time. Time to embark on a new adventure.

This is not to say that I don't thoroughly enjoy the people I work with on a day-to-day basis. My boss/mentor has taught me a ton and she truly is a great person to work for. And all the part-timers, I'm going to miss dearly. But I just don't think I can continue to work here for the rest of my life like so many people of our parents' generation have done. I need something new, exciting, scary and motivating. I want to work somewhere a little closer to the city. I want to put my skills to use in new and exciting ways that challenge me. I want to use some of those skills that I don't get to use very often. I want to write, I want to take an active role in my community and I want to love to go to work every day. Is that so much to ask?

At it again

So last week I decided that I was going to run another half marathon and I signed up for the Thanksgiving Day Half through the Atlanta Track Club. I probably should have touched on this last week but with the blog make-over and the dates I just had too many other things on my mind, but it didn't stop me from signing up for the low price of $48.48! So yeah, I've started running again (twice this week!). And you better believe I'm going at this with full force. Deep down, I really am a runner - and I love it! But dammit if my knee won't NOT cause me problems again. Seriously, it hurts to walk down stairs because when I step down with my right leg, my left knee bends kind of back and pain shoots up my left leg. It's not fun. Yesterday during my 3 mile run I could tell that it was giving me problems but I powered on because I really wanted to hit that 3 mile mark. I was wearing my jumpers knee strap but as soon as I slowed it down for my "cool down" my knee was in more pain than when I was running. Why oh why did I have to jack up my ankle last year and ultimately weaken my knee in the process!?

RIP Bella...

Out with the old and in with the new: Say goodbye to Bella/Bells/Bell and say hello to Blaire. I've run a half marathon, shed my caterpillar cocoon and turned into a new and improved version of my former self. Besides simply wanting a new name for myself, I have no other legitimate reason really to change it. But hey, I changed my hair up a little bit last week, I ran off a full average female's calorie intake in two hours on Sunday, so why not change my name too, right? Also - as Blaire, I plan to slightly re-invent myself and take a good hard look at those resolutions I made back in January and TRULY stick with them now. I've done an OK job with it thus far, but spring is in the air, which means summer is soon to follow, and I have yet to achieve the rock-hard body I yearn for, and yet to get out of any ONE of my 3 major debts I'm facing this year. I've chipped away, little by little, but really need to focus on knocking these out in the next few months. I will have ONE debt paid for sure by May (hooray!) and the other two are going to continue to take some time.

Nobody likes a Mr. Sniffles (or a Ms. Sniffles for that matter)

Well, i did it! I ran 13.1 miles on Sunday in the cold wet rain! And all in all, I'd say it was a pretty epic experience. I definitely surprised myself to find that I beat my own expectations by over 15 minutes. That's right, I ran the race in UNDER 2 hours! 1:57:11 to be exact. And I definitely patted myself on the back for that. It was invigorating and exciting, but i am so f-ing sore now. After the race, i could tell I was going to hate my muscles for a couple days but this is excruciating. On top of which, I woke up at 3:30am Monday morning unable to breathe except to cough up a lung. So that was sexy.

t minus 2 days...

and I'm running the half marathon. Holy Skittles I'm a little nervous. But I know I shouldn't be, I trained for almost 3 months - "I can do this if I set my mind to it! High school was a pain in the ass but I graduated" (name that movie...no? nothin? Billy Madison of course, then Billy's dad proceeds to tell him "you graduated because I paid your teachers to give you decent grades!) wamp wamp, I hope Mr. Madison didn't have anything to do with my training - like manipulating the treadmills to make me think I'm running 6 miles when in fact it's only 2. THAT would be a nightmare...AANNNYYWAY...

apparently i suffer from rage blackouts

I was a little bit hyped up last week. I'm sorry. All was not sunny in my world and I took it out on you guys through my blog and I shouldn't have reacted that way. I apologize if you didn't find any light-hearted banter in my dark and uncomfortable post last week. I was a little upset but I've since treated myself to alcohol on Friday, followed by a hangover remedy on Saturday and a 90 minute run outside on Sunday (in keeping up w/ my half marathon training).

I'm really doing it...

So over the last week I've come to find out via facebook (aka what I spend most of my time on) that I actually have a LOT of friends coming out of the woodworks who are running the ING half marathon (or the full marathon - kill me)! It's kind of exciting! And now that I've publicly stated it on my blog and on facebook, I can't not do it. I've just been struggling with the whole paying $80 thing. I know, I know, I could be using that $80 to help me get solvent by the end of this year but the way I look at it, this half marathon is a lifestyle change for me. Since I'm running on Saturdays and Sundays, I won't want to go out and get D-runk the night before because I know if I do then I won't be motivated to run the next day. And if I'm not going out as much then the money I would be spending out is actually not being spent and therefore, can go towards my $80 registration fee for the half-marathon! What's that you say? I'm a genius? Well, you said it :)

So I really want to run a half marathon but...

1) It's too damn cold to run outside, and
2) Every time I go to the gym the machines are taken.

FML.

So, I can't take full credit for writing about this topic today. I gotta give some love to my favorite blogger, 2 birds 1 blog. Meggles wrote about this a little bit yesterday (look for the part about ruffling her feathers and enjoy, she's hilarious).

He's just not that into you

Story of my life. And apparently every one of my single friends' lives as well. My roommie and I watched this gem of a movie on Sunday and at the end of it I was highly depressed. I alleviated my depression by watching parts of The Uninvited on HBO...holy shit. At least it took my mind off the terribly depressing feelings I was having before and replaced them with terror and a sudden urge to pee my pants. Don't worry, I controlled myself in case any of you were wondering. But for the last 2 days, I can't help but replay parts of that damn movie ("He's just not that into you") over again in my head. You see, I do this from time to time.