Standard Procedure

Good morning!

Now that Monday is over and the exhaustion from the weekend has subsided for us all, how’s it goin’?

Things are well in these parts. As standard procedure, the first few days following a long/busy weekend fall into a routine of sorts.

First off, sleep becomes an important focus. Not super hard to take care of. After staying up late, changing time zones, flight delays (two hours ON the plane ON the runway is quite horrendous), etc, slumber was quite easy. The last two nights have been deep and heavy sleep.

This doesn’t happen often, so please excuse me while I relish in it.

Ahhhhh….

Ok. We’re all good.

Secondly, groceries need to be acquired. As much as I didn’t want to, a stop by Trader Joe’s on the way home from the airport happened. Because a few cans of black beans and a pantry of cereal are never considered components of a balanced day all by their lonesome.

If you’re like me, you’ll be way too lazy to prep your own dinner after traveling all day, so you’ll walk (yay exercise!) to the nearby Whole Foods and zip through their salad/food bar. Sure, you still have to do it yourself. But they have considerably more options than what I would have been willing to prep in my own kitchen.

Don’t question my logic. Instead, look at all the coloooorrrrrsssss…. (or all the colors you would see- the purple cabbage, carrots, corn, and squash are still there, but hiding).

My aunt once told me, when I was a wee lil’ thing, there should always be a rainbow of colors on your plate for lunch and dinner. The rule has not been lost on me.

To me, this also should include peanut butter after dinner. Because brown is still a color to not be left out, yes?

I wonder if my aunt had a saying about having dessert every single day?

She probably did. Probably something like “don’t”. And it probably went in one ear and out the other. Sigh.

Lastly, it’s a matter of easing back into the fitness routine. We covered a lot of ground over the weekend as we walked through shops, ran through the rain, and danced our way out of the bars.

I also trekked through miles of airport terminals. Which is nothing to scoff at- not only was it tiring, but new flats were being broken in. By the time I reached my gate, said flats were filled with my blood.

Total rookie mistake. Running through O’Hare in heels may have been a better option.

Either way, I’m off on a tangent again, so let’s bring this back around, shall we?

 Monday was still too early to pull out a crazy “let’s go to the gym and GO GO GO GO“. Instead, I went with “let’s go to the gym and GO”.

One “GO” instead of four. It translates to 20 minutes on the stairmill at a lower level of intensity and 1.5 miles on the tread at an easy pace.

Baby steps.

Clearly not like this…